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Heroes Community > Heroes 7+ Altar of Wishes > Thread: Atlantis town (with pics)
Thread: Atlantis town (with pics) This thread is 3 pages long: 1 2 3 · «PREV
Svarog
Svarog


Honorable
Supreme Hero
statue-loving necrophiliac
posted September 16, 2004 02:09 AM

Hey, gerdash and Djive. I was tired of one-liners and then finally – you two. What a relief! I suppose i should thank Consis for sending Djive here.

Gerdash,
Quote:
the idea of the creature [dragon turtle] does look very much like mythological creatures but i am not sure about it's folklore origin, maybe it was purely dungeons&dragons or some other modern invention.

That was the problem I had with the turtle too. To my knowledge, there aren’t any important turtle-based mythological creatures. In which case, a giant turtle would look very awkward, I think. I don’t like how the turtles look. It looks sluggish and cute to me, rather than the fearsome creature its supposed to be.

I share your opinion about the Kraken and leviathan, with the difference that i don’t mind them two traveling on land. All it takes is making them more apt for land, with less water-related characteristics.
However, those two can be guardians of a special type of building, where you fight the creature in a specially designed combat screen, where the creature would be put IN the water. Too bad you will only see it once in every 5 games that way.
(Having said that, Kraken – OK, but I don’t understand why the Leviathan is unsuitable for land. I mean, its just a huge whale-like lizard with scales and all kinds of ugly outgrowths.)

Quote:
if the amphibious sea creatures had a sufficiently severe penalty on land, wouldn't conquering land castles with sea creatures become hopeless anyway

“Severe” is relative. I don’t know how big those penalties should be, but disbalancing the towns shouldn’t be the case.

Quote:
i think that a sea town on land would also make me sick. thus conquering a sea town with land creatures should be equally serious problem, maybe even more of a problem because there don't seem to be enough land based creatures who would feel comfortable fighting underwater.

Hmm, are you referring to the proposal here. It sure doesn’t seem you do. Where exactly is the fighting underwater mentioned?
And with that first sentence you nullify the entire thread, since that was exactly the problem I was trying to solve. How to conceptualize that town without making people sick. And I think we should all understand that Atlantis is not functionally a sea town; it is really a land town, inspired from the sea, with some additions.



Djive,

Quote:
Land dwellers have boats to travel on the seas so perhaps the water dwellers should have transports for moving on land?

*shivers* Please no. Its even more unrealistic than anything else, and non-functional (you wont be able to mix armies).

Quote:
I think they should be permitted to stay in water between turns, because water is their native terrain and they would have good bonuses there.

Letting them stay between turns in water is a no-no. Mainly because that tactic will be used as sanctuary whenever there’s an enemy nearby. And the Atlantis player will have potential sanctuaries all over the place!
Of course, if you remove the embarking/disembarking penalty, this thing could function, but others wont. Its there for a reason, and the reason is not to allow an enemy to escape whenever they want, just because you lack a summon boat spell. In the same way, potential sanctuaries, will be again present, if the player lacks the spell. Now, if you propose the spell to be default for all heroes, then I think water loses its value as a natural boundary, since now every hero can whenever they want summon a boat and embark there without any penalty. Not good imo.
As I said, I feel that there should be a native terrain for Atlantis, but it should look imo something like the “Shadow of Death” Water Plane, passable for other towns also (with disadvantages).

Quote:
Land dwellers have access to fast boats on water and if most creatures in the Atlantis line-up have severly reduced speed on land then this is a very significant penalty (since the speed you can expand is a very important factor in the game). I think the penalty of slow land movement can hardly be overestimated!

The same I said to gerdash: Reduced speed – fine, but the exact specifics are not determined. I would consider a penalty for all non-native terrains (except the swamp) something similar to the Inferno creatures traveling on snow in homm3, or something along those lines.
And note that when open water is not native terrain for Atlanteans (as I suggested) then other towns too have penalties on Atlantean native Water Plane (unlike the fast boats), so the scores are even more or less.

*** Another idea: As you know, you cannot attack a boat with a Water Walk spell (the same ability of an all-Atlantis army). But maybe we can improve the Atlantis performance if we allow them this opportunity. Meaning, after the fight they will either die in the see (loss) or conquer and occupy the boat (win). Now the implications of this ability would be something like wearing that Admiral hat, which prevents boarding/unboarding penalty, but somewhat less significant (since, you can only do that when there’s an enemy boat or empty tile nearby).

Quote:
In order to make movement fair, I'd suggest that all creatures have a land movement and a water movement. A flyer would have the same movement on land and water, but for any other creature these two parameters can be different.

I don’t get your concept really. If you could explain it with more detail maybe.

“- Giant snakes (The Naga is nice so Svarog already has this covered.)”
Yeah, and not only the Naga, but the Sea Serpent fits your suggestion perfectly.

”- Varans and Crocodiles (These would have a similar look and walk as the Basilisk has in Heroes 3.)”
If there’s a basilisk in the game, I think they will be overabundant.

”- Giant Turtles or Giant Frogs. (Amphibic)”
See my reply to gerdash here. Both Turtles and frogs look funny to me and I wouldn’t want them in the game.

Quote:
... And there is also the option to add more flyers to the line-up.

You’re absolutely right. I forgot that. Currently the Siren is the only flyer.
I think the Nereids (sea nymphs) can fly somehow magically, and then we can add wings to the Leviathan, which will make him much more appropriate for land movement too. A huge scaly monster, with wings, levitating on the battlefield, with fins and spikes on the back and claws. Not bad, huh?



Oh and igoraki, I had considered selkies for admitance. And well, i concluded they look too funny-mutant for my liking. But I guess they can fit this town nicely aside from my subjective view.

Thanks both of you for the feedback.

____________
The meek shall inherit the earth, but NOT its mineral rights.

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B0rsuk
B0rsuk


Promising
Famous Hero
DooM prophet
posted September 16, 2004 03:34 PM

Hi Svarog, I know you are delighted to see my post again. Not much time here, until recently. Fortunatelly now I have serious health/spine problems and have to stay at home.


(about the slaves)

me
You said that, so blame yourself.

you
Well, show me where I initionally made that brilliant proposal.

Here you are:
me
====================================!!!!

So... they use slaves ! Apart from specific, national armies (which need various castles to be built), there are Indies (Independents). They can be recruited anywhere. While they don't kick ass, they have better heavy cavalry/infantry than some nations, reasonable archers (not all nations have archers !), and research.


you
Slaves pulling the water creatures?! lol. And you call
yourself someone who promotes realism? Bah!

=========================================!!!!

As you can see, one of my sentences taken out of context can make impression that I mean pulling. If you cared to read later parts, and now I doubt you did, you'd see the sentence beginning with "while". It says that the slaves themselves actually fight , not pull,  infantry and cavalry mentioned in same sentence. And previous sentence is about recruiting independents, so it is logical the "while sentence is about idependents the moment.

End of story. I didn't even use the word "pull". You did it. Misunderstanding, fuzzy english grammar, whatever - check twice before you put something into my mouth.
$#^%$#&$@%&%$#!&^%#(&^$)&!&$@%&%$@^*&54

(sea monster, shamelessly taken out of context)
Quote:
And since it�s able to walk on solid ground (ship�s deck), it might as well be able to walk on other solid grounds.


Why exactly ? Ship deck isn't that big, the battle doesn't last long. And the air is quite humid.
Eels can travel on land, but ultimately they have to return to water. Anyway, sea monster from H4 wasn't my idea, it looks exceptionally silly with that headlight. It makes it look like a kind of creature living so deep it explodes when taken to "our" pressure.

Quote:

That�s the part about ability, not realism. As for that second part, it can easily be solved by not including sea creatures with fins and seal-like awkward movement, although even that wouldn�t be a disaster.


That would cause mental breakdown for me. Why bother with daily sword training, rigorous exercices, lighting reflexes and fast feet, longbow training which takes literally years; years of tactical studies.... then one day you realize you are effortlessly beaten by awkwardly moving, arping (sound), ball-on-a-nose fat creature.

Quote:

Quote:
Water creatures are similar to snails in the way they need lots of water - but more. Fishes certainly need water.

That�s a strawman�s argument. Well, laundry services need a lot of water too. Why not make that comparisson with laundry services as creatures then?


I hoped you'd realise you use this kind of argumentation. I tried to mimic you. You take it for granted sea dwellers can travel land with no big trouble,(and even fly) but somehow opposite can't be true. You decide one thing is stupid, another is not because it's your idea.

Quote:

It�s soft and squishy, and tiny and slow. Kraken is hard, huge, medium fast and rough skinned. You should read more about Krakens if you think he�s just an ordinary squid.


You mean it's bigger, so it should use even more water than ordinary squids ? Sorry, I can't help being nasty.
Quote:

Further on about Krakens, I explained the way he moves (octopus like). Are you against the beholder�s movement too?

No, because it's refreshing to see a flying shooter monster finally in Homm series ! Seriously - in homm4 it doesn't touch the ground. It flies.



Quote:
Name a single reason why normal, land Homm units should be unable to go underwater.

Another strawman. If the realism we have was about going underwater, then it would be worth considering.


Suddenly, you become a great fan of realism when it's convenient. Our realism isn't about fishes traveling the land, too !

Quote:

You cannot adjust an entire environment in an unnatural way, so that some other unnatural things in it may happen, just to prove a point. And also, would gameplay gain something by implementing underwater level, and creatures going there? Cathegorical NO! End of argument.


How ironical - you do it yourself, and despise it at the same time !
About "no gains from implementing underwater" - where does your sureness come from ? Isn't it like water covers above 70% of our planet, and at the same time remains the least known environment ? There are dozens of new water species discovered each year - coelacanths and more (haha ! learned that english name from XCOM2 game !). No humans dwell underwater, despite the fact there is SO MUCH place there, and gravity is much less of a problem so you could possibly build taller bigger buildings.
Oceans always inspired and frightened human fantasy, out of same reasons as darkness. The unknown. That's there are (were) many, many, many sea stories and legends among the sailors.

Quote:

Quote:
And what gives you right to decide what is good, and what bad fantasy ?

Well, if directly answering to the question, there is no good and bad fantasy (unrealism more accurately; since fantasy/mythology in the case of heroes is realism). There�s just justified and unjustified unrealism.


It seems like you are contradicting yourself.
And, considering what I just wrote about the water, sailors etc... unjustified ?

Quote:

(...)
justified and unjustified realism. The first when there�s no harm to gameplay, and the second when there is harm (just as in your case of not implementing atlantis).



It's funny, because I oppose this way of implementing Atlantis... to protect the concept from stupidity. I want it implemented right, or not implemented at all. I don't want to play a game where many players wonder why is the town called Atlantis, when all it takes to recreate the effect is to place Boots of levitation near starting position.
One day someone will make this kind of map, a duel map... Atlantis on one side, Stronghold + boots of levitation on the other. And then you'd have to search HARD to spot differences. And perhaps Equestrian Gloves for atlantis player, to compensate for land movement penalty.
Can it be ? A town from another, alien world (water) made identical gameplay-wise by just 2 artifacts ?

Quote:

ith you solutions, just for the record.
And about the questions:


The pleasure is all mine :-)
Quote:

towers
-Yes, they are useful in the beginning.


But really worth it ? I, myself, think about beginning as a time where every bit of resources counts - a lot ! You could as well buy extra elves and end up with similar effect.

Quote:

-Yes, if you have like 20 power, implosion does mean a lot against 25 behemoths.

There are spells whose effects are dependant (percentage increase) on army size, and I think are much more worth it. I mean stuff like berserker, mirror image, blind, forgetfulness frenzy (on ranged units), etc. These are the spells that kill legions, not direct damage spells.

(healing)
Quote:

-Yes. In fact in first two weeks its not really useful. Its most useful middlegame.

I prefer Luck, Offense, Armorer - this kind of stuff. Very useful, and with future.

Quote:

-Yes, it can be more, if just as in Tower, the damage land mines take depends on the Power of the defending hero.

Still, it doesn't deal much damage and unlike moat - a mine works only once.

Quote:

(land raids)
Any other option when they are available for recruitement, but land travel is not allowed, is not a viable one at all imo.



Doable, I think. Two tricks would be needed:
a) allowing only a short time on land, in which you could conquer some castles
b) substantially increase weekly growth rate(ONLY), so you could hire large army quickly with lots of money... becaust you wouldn't normally have money to buy all the creatures. The game would remain playable, even if sea creatures would be used mostly for defense.

Quote:

If its not devils (because of their power) who are barefooted,  then its gogs. They are not isolated examples.


About as much trouble as Fortress creatures have on desert. Doable. At least they breath air, not water (I know I know it's still air technically blah blah)

Quote:

And the �its not used� argument is invalid. They were made to be used and people have no problems with them.


Power hungry players generally don't use them, because they are
a) not that strong
b) their ability promotes taking beating and doesn't help agaist arrows
c) casting Terror at right moment can be much more devastating.

Quote:

And btw, there is desert in homm3. maybe you should play that game often, instead of dom2.

The terrain is called sand, it's the same as shore (and looks like it). Desert was last seen in Homm2

Quote:

Look pal, I never make up creatures. Those creatures are all real, and as authentic to mythology as they can be. If that�s surgery then I�m not the doctor, but our ancestors and their lore, which I absolutely adore. And yes, all mythological creatures are surgery.


All right, but would you be happy if you had centaurs, hippogriphs, pegasi, cavalry, unicorns, nomads, kelpie and nightmares in same town ? They are all homm creatures, and mostly mythological.



Quote:

When I say capable, I mean the way they move (that I described on each) looks prefectly natural. Of course it is fantasy! Hallelujah! They are fantastical creatures, but not from mine, not from your fantasy, but from the global fantasy embodied in folklore and mythology.


Did Herakles kill a Kraken, Bellerofont ride a Leviathan (hey ! you say it should fly), have you heard tales of mermaids from ... miners, or perhaps do nereids fly on broomsticks ? Nope. They were all associated with water.

Quote:

Well, I�m sorry about that. I�m from the southern most and you�re from the northern most Slavic country (Russia aside; it�s all over the world ), so I guess that adds up to the difference. We don�t have Bursuk in our language.


Macedonia a slavian country ? Um... let it be. All I know about them is they don't like being called greeks ;-)
============================================
My point, in general, is that Homm games are not suitable for water-based town. It's because of structural limitations. At the same time these limitations make game relatively fast-paced (comparing to some other strategies) and some things nice, but it all comes at a cost.
Now I'm playing Master of Magic, really great game that (aside from balance problems and bugs) has some very nice concepts in it, and can be easily called "homm ancestor". So many things impossible in homm works fine there, like healing, transforming creatures into werewolves, dozens of global spells, REAL variety in spells... This reminds my I've got to finish my death magic myrran gnolls campaign :-).

In case you get interested:

http://www.the-underdogs.org/game.php?id=687

and emulator which runs it well on winxp
http://dosbox.sourceforge.net

If you never played it before, you should... if you can handle the graphics which I considered ugly 10 years ago. It's quite similar to Homm, (tactical combat, spells, towns, fighting neutral creatures...), and in some ways years ahead.

I promise never ever write such a long post again until a next one.

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Djive
Djive


Honorable
Supreme Hero
Zapper of Toads
posted September 16, 2004 11:51 PM
Edited By: Djive on 16 Sep 2004

"*shivers* Please no. Its even more unrealistic than anything else, and non-functional (you wont be able to mix armies)."

Actually, the picture that come to mind was a huge machine usually used to carry ore and resources but could carry nearly anything.

Anyway, if you can accept shipping a Kraken using a land-based Caravan, then an improved version of this machine is feasible since I see no other way of getting the Kraken from city 1 to city 2 in caravan speed.

(Of course, there might not be a carvan in the game, but otherwise the consequence would be that you can't ship Atlantis creatures using caravans.)

If you can make the wall to a city in one turn, then you can also make such a big machine in one turn.

The bad thing is that it does require a bit of technology to be in the game, but as long as this technology is not mechanized monsters, arms and ammunitions then I think it might be worth it.

The back-up solution would be to have spells in the Atlantis, which allowed for these creatures to travel on land. (And they would need to be cast each turn you moved.)

"Letting them stay between turns in water is a no-no. Mainly because that tactic will be used as sanctuary whenever there’s an enemy nearby. And the Atlantis player will have potential sanctuaries all over the place!"

I don't think the town will be able to make up for reduced speed on land with anything less than a bonus of this magnitude. It's not only the sanctuary effect, it's also having to fight on enemy terrain (=land) in each and every combat against other players.

It might be an alternative to make a corridor 2-4 squares/hexes wide, at every place on the map where lands meets deep water. (And this would use your new Atalantis Terrain, or I'd prefer to call it "Shallow Waters.)

"Of course, if you remove the embarking/disembarking penalty, this thing could function, but others wont."

Yes, this is necessary. This restriction has to go. I can't say I ever liked it.

"Its there for a reason, and the reason is not to allow an enemy to escape whenever they want, just because you lack a summon boat spell. In the same way, potential sanctuaries, will be again present, if the player lacks the spell."

Not really. Remember that an army of flying creatures could attack you on the shore, and also remember that movement at sea tends to be a lot further than on land. In other words, you will often not see your enemies in time.

This can also be counteracted with shipyards where you can buy boats and cities where you can build shipyards. Place enough of these on the map and you will find that you are not as safe as you had hoped.

I agree that if the map maker (or a random map generator) doesn't handle this at all then it will often become an issue with unfair maps as a result. But if you go to the length of actually making a water town, then I think it's reasonably that they take this into account when making maps.

"Now, if you propose the spell to be default for all heroes, then I think water loses its value as a natural boundary, since now every hero can whenever they want summon a boat and embark there without any penalty. Not good imo."

No, I want maps to have appropriate structures to enable buildings of boats. Also note: I want the boats to allow you to travel further than the water creatures would be able to do wihtout a boat.

"And note that when open water is not native terrain for Atlanteans (as I suggested) then other towns too have penalties on Atlantean native Water Plane (unlike the fast boats), so the scores are even more or less."

I don't think so. The % of terrain where the Atlantis town have bonuses is likely to be 10-20% and the terrains where they have huge penalties is the rest (because to the Atlantis dwellers every land-based surface should impart huge penalties.)

Most of the other towns likely have the same amount of terrain with bonuses, but only perhaps 30-50% terrain with severe penalties. Thus they will be able to expand quicker.


"*** Another idea: As you know, you cannot attack a boat with a Water Walk spell (the same ability of an all-Atlantis army). But maybe we can improve the Atlantis performance if we allow them this opportunity. Meaning, after the fight they will either die in the see (loss) or conquer and occupy the boat (win). Now the implications of this ability would be something like wearing that Admiral hat, which prevents boarding/unboarding penalty, but somewhat less significant (since, you can only do that when there’s an enemy boat or empty tile nearby)."

I'd like to see Flyers and Swimmers to travel at sea without a Boat (only cost is a reduced speed.)

Quote:
In order to make movement fair, I'd suggest that all creatures have a land movement and a water movement. A flyer would have the same movement on land and water, but for any other creature these two parameters can be different.

"I don’t get your concept really. If you could explain it with more detail maybe."

All right here is an example for how some creatures could look:

Merman: Water movement 20, Land movement 10.
Griffin: Water movement 25, Land movement 25.
Hydra: Water movement 15, Land movement 12.
Naga: Water movement 20, Land movement 18.
Leviathan: Water movement 25, Land movement 2.
Halberdier: Water movement 0, Land movemnet 12.

Boat (Water Transport): Gives Water Base movement of 30 for army.
Carrier (Land Transport): Gives Land Base movement of 8 for army.

(It might be better to have this as a speed since then you can easily say how much time it takes to move over each hex, but then again it's possible to do this as in heroes 4 by converting movements when entering and leaving water.)

Borsuk:
I think the reason for there not being societies in deep waters, is that sun light is reduced very quickly so that in fact very little can grow on the bottom of the sea when you reach some 30 metres depth.

This more or less makes it necessary for deep water cultures to have access to some other power source than the light generated by the sun... and this I think would be very rare

About Svarog and Borsuk debate.

Please play nice. I like a good debate... but keep things friendly. (Some mistakes made by the other party is perhaps best overseen, especially when they have little relevance to the discussion.)

____________
"A brilliant light can either illuminate or blind. How will you know which until you open your eyes?"

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Svarog
Svarog


Honorable
Supreme Hero
statue-loving necrophiliac
posted September 17, 2004 04:32 AM

Hallo Bursuk. Sorry about your back problems. I hope writing the long posts in this thread is not the reason.

Quote:
I hoped you'd realise you use this kind of argumentation. I tried to mimic you. You take it for granted sea dwellers can travel land with no big trouble,(and even fly) but somehow opposite can't be true.

This was about the snails right? I never said snails cant travel on land, but the problem with them is they’d look incredibly silly as a creature, if you didn’t get my point. I know you were not serious about implementing them, but the comparison you made between snails and Atlantis creatures based on their hydrophilia, was without a point. E.i. if snails look silly on land, that doesn’t mean Atlantis crits would also look silly.
Quote:
No, because it's refreshing to see a flying shooter monster finally in Homm series ! Seriously - in homm4 it doesn't touch the ground. It flies.

Surprise! I wonder how that doesn’t break your realistic world. Cause the beholder doesn’t fly; it levitates; no wings. Even I thought it looked stupid.
Quote:
About "no gains from implementing underwater" - where does your sureness come from ? Isn't it like water covers above 70% of our planet, and at the same time remains the least known environment ? There are dozens of new water species discovered each year - coelacanths and more (haha ! learned that english name from XCOM2 game !). No humans dwell underwater, despite the fact there is SO MUCH place there, and gravity is much less of a problem so you could possibly build taller bigger buildings.

*confused* Are you trying to claim that going underwater should be implemented, because 70% of Earth’s surface are underwater, and because of the spacious ocean floor?
Quote:
Can it be ? A town from another, alien world (water) made identical gameplay-wise by just 2 artifacts ?

OK. You’re right – there wouldn’t be much gameplay differences with those two arties. But people feel towns in homm were different and there werent any gameplay differences between them. This is the case because heroes is a game where the gameplay structure is built on the general level and not on individual race/town level. As I said in the first paragraph the reason we add Atlantis is not gameplay, it’s diversity, which has been proven many times is liked by people.
I think that a major gameplay drift for Atlantis, which would make it dramatically different from other towns, is impossible to implement, or would make the game much disbalanced.
Quote:
a) allowing only a short time on land, in which you could conquer some castles
b) substantially increase weekly growth rate(ONLY), so you could hire large army quickly with lots of money... becaust you wouldn't normally have money to buy all the creatures. The game would remain playable, even if sea creatures would be used mostly for defense.

And here’s an example to what I just said.
If you think that scrambling two a,b tricks is what it takes to make a serious proposal for such an essential change in the game, then you’re on the wrong track, friend. I wont even try to count all the errors and problematic situation arising from your “solution”.
Quote:
Macedonia a slavian country ? Um... let it be. All I know about them is they don't like being called greeks ;-)

Ignorance is not a sin, when you’re willing to learn.
Macedonians; Who are they




Hi Djive.
First to your remark about caravans. I never viewed them as wagons that carry troops. Isnt a caravan supposed to be a group of people/creatures that travel long distances on established routes?

As I said, I really dislike the idea about the machine transport, not only from esthetical reasons, but also because it would restrict mixing armies.

And I feel magical movement for Atlantis is not really necessary, since not a single one of the creatures I mentioned is a traditional swimmer. I don’t think people would be more happy to see a levitating Kraken on land, than a crawling one. I’m really surprised by people’s logic. They are not OK when a Kraken crawls on land, but as soon as you drop some magic dust, they are fine even if it dances hula-hula.
Quote:
It might be an alternative to make a corridor 2-4 squares/hexes wide, at every place on the map where lands meets deep water. (And this would use your new Atalantis Terrain, or I'd prefer to call it "Shallow Waters.)

This is a nice idea, but can only be imlemented if that Shallow Water is passable by normal land creatures. Otherwise, it’ll still function like normal water with the before mentioned disadvantages.
Quote:
Yes, this is necessary. This restriction has to go. I can't say I ever liked it.

But if you prevent this restriction and add lots of shipyards here and there, then again the role of water as a natural barrier is completely diminished. Now it’s even more passable (due to the longer movement rate) than ordinary terrain!
And still, we’re not talking only about consequences on Atlantis, but all towns would be affected with such a small, but significant change. A summon boat can save you your life, if there’s no shipyard nearby. Still running away is much too easy.
Quote:
Remember that an army of flying creatures could attack you on the shore, and also remember that movement at sea tends to be a lot further than on land. In other words, you will often not see your enemies in time.

Army of flying creatures?! We’re talking about 1-3 creatures per town. Now who in their right mind would send fodder cannon for a full Atlantean army? Also, how would this kind of battle look like? (You have amphibians and flyers. Common ground?) And in addition, flyers on water, would make the Atlantis bonus not as significant as before, since now everybody will be able to explore across bodies of water with their flyers.
Btw, I think that flyers as a concept is nice, but not in relation to the Atlantis and as part of its solutions.
And the fact you mention about not seeing your enemies in time is also correct. It will happen very often an enemy to unboard near you castle and take it, with your main hero just a turn away from it, and unable to react in time, precisely because this naval raids will be hard to predict.
Quote:
I don't think so. The % of terrain where the Atlantis town have bonuses is likely to be 10-20% and the terrains where they have huge penalties is the rest (because to the Atlantis dwellers every land-based surface should impart huge penalties.)

You’re absolutely right. But don’t forget the other water-related bonuses Atlanteans will have.
Quote:
Also note: I want the boats to allow you to travel further than the water creatures would be able to do without a boat.

So, the water creatures would need a boat to travel faster? So much of their advantages.

Basically, I think implementing all this flyers, end turn on water etc, leads to many problems, and is only an addition to the land movement of Atlantis creatures, which we agree is a must.

About your movement idea, I think it’s great, but what I don’t like about it as I said, is all the problems that arise from the removal of embark/disembark penalty. However, if we keep that penalty for everyone (including Atlantis creatures) and make them travel on water without the necessity of a ship, then I think it can be implemented excellently, even with an Atlantis town in the water itself.
So, either no penalty/no end turn on water goes, or yours - with penalty/end on water allowed, but I don’t think both are viable.
I feel that after you crystallize your position even more, I will have this idea of yours much more developed in relation to Atlantis.

Regards.

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gerdash
gerdash


Responsible
Famous Hero
from the Animated Peace
posted September 17, 2004 03:30 PM

Svarog:
Quote:
That was the problem I had with the turtle too. To my knowledge, there aren’t any important turtle-based mythological creatures. In which case, a giant turtle would look very awkward, I think. I don’t like how the turtles look. It looks sluggish and cute to me, rather than the fearsome creature its supposed to be.
i remember that in our english textbook in the school there was a japanese fairy tale with a magical turtle (somewhat similar to goldfish but quite different in some ways).

i don't see anything sluggish and cute about a creature who's body is a huge roundshield (not real turtle shell as i imagine it), who has fins of a fish and head of a dragon and has steam breath. it would be sluggish only on land, but that's the same with hippocampus. take a horse and cut off the hind legs and see if it's sluggish or not. i havn't even heard about the fins, maybe it could also have dragon-like feet, but fins would look better imho.

Quote:
I share your opinion about the Kraken and leviathan, with the difference that i don’t mind them two traveling on land. All it takes is making them more apt for land, with less water-related characteristics.
kraken doesn't have a skeleton, it's more or less like a jelly thing. i would expect it not to be able to hold it's form out of water. kraken on land should be a sad site to look at.

Quote:
(Having said that, Kraken – OK, but I don’t understand why the Leviathan is unsuitable for land. I mean, its just a huge whale-like lizard with scales and all kinds of ugly outgrowths.)
Leviathan is a fish. all the other creatures looked more like amphibians.

Quote:
Quote:
i think that a sea town on land would also make me sick. thus conquering a sea town with land creatures should be equally serious problem, maybe even more of a problem because there don't seem to be enough land based creatures who would feel comfortable fighting underwater.

Hmm, are you referring to the proposal here. It sure doesn’t seem you do. Where exactly is the fighting underwater mentioned?
And with that first sentence you nullify the entire thread, since that was exactly the problem I was trying to solve. How to conceptualize that town without making people sick. And I think we should all understand that Atlantis is not functionally a sea town; it is really a land town, inspired from the sea, with some additions.

Quote:
yes, i think a true atlantis town should be built into the bottom of the sea.

if we go with the old divine creature idea, we could have sea-only leviathan as the divine creature of the amphibians. that way kraken would be an exceptional creature, maybe it can be allowed.

i think we could have two towns, one would be amphibians and the other would be sea only. the amphibians would be the sea horse etc and the sea only could be the kraken etc. but even so the amphibians would build their dwellings underwater. in every meremaid fairy tale i have read the mermaid could live on land but the true home of the mermaid was the sea. it's not land creatures that can also live underwater, it's underwater creatures that can also live on land. so their home town should not be on land. those towns could be the means how water creatures could attack land towns, but not how land creatures attack underwater.

as suggested, i did try out dominions2 demo and found it extremely satisfying. those people seem to have used their own brains to a considerable extent. and there were some undead, e.g. ghosts, who were amphibians. so, ghosts were land creatures that could attack underwater towns.

i think we would not only need water creatures that can travel on land but we would need land creatures who could attack underwater. and we wouldn't really want to use ghosts if we are playing with town that has angels or paladins as the top creature (but also see reply to djive later).

Quote:
“- Giant snakes (The Naga is nice so Svarog already has this covered.)”
Yeah, and not only the Naga, but the Sea Serpent fits your suggestion perfectly.


btw didn't the nagas dwell on dry land? they were guardians of some holy places, as far as i vaguely remember, or maybe temples. my first guess would be mountains or even desert. their association with water might be more like rain rather than bodies of water. are we sure they are even amphibians? their tail is snake, not fish, and if we look at some nagas that have the neck of a cobra (sometimes many heads and necks) then i guess it would be surprising to see such dry land creature in atlantis (surely a cobra can swim a bit, but so can humans).

Quote:
”- Giant Turtles or Giant Frogs. (Amphibic)”
See my reply to gerdash here. Both Turtles and frogs look funny to me and I wouldn’t want them in the game.
hmm.. there was a giant 'northern frog' in some folklore. and frogs, more precisely toads, are extremely mythological/magical creatures.
========

Djive:

now, i am also against all kinds of chariots filled with water to transport sea creatures on land. i have heard of a folk tale where a lake levitated to another place as a cloud-shaped thing or something like that, except it was not vapour but water.

in most of the mermaid folk tales i know, a mermaid can e.g. marry a human, but she e.g. must not tell that she is a mermaid. i.e. the mermaid takes a form that is indistinguishable from humans. so this seems to be like some werewolf sort of spell. maybe the sea horse could also get hind legs on land. unfortunately sea horse and kelpie are (probably) different things, but a kelpie getting tail of a fish in the sea and the other way round on land is what i want to say.

in folk tales, sometimes the mermaid takes a human with her into the bottom of the sea with some magic. there was some possibly irish folk tale where, once the fisherman was in mermaid's home in the bottom of the sea, he could breathe as if he was on land (the problem was getting there and back). so, maybe somehow the land troops could attack underwater with some similar magic.
========

i don't think that we should discuss oxygen etc here. i guess that if you asked a medieval person why he cannot live underwater, he would say that he cannot breathe there, and nothing about oxygen. and i doubt that the medieval people thought that fish breathe at all. if anyone knows what thoughts the medieval people about fish dieing out of water, please let us know. maybe the fish just died because they were out of water and that's that.

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TitaniumAlloy
TitaniumAlloy


Honorable
Legendary Hero
Professional
posted September 18, 2004 04:09 AM

this is a great town, and despite the difficulties it has with movement, i think it will still be fine. Some of the things, like sea serpent should be dropped, but others, like the leviathan, will be AWESOME. they will work perfectly if you think about it like this one;


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gerdash
gerdash


Responsible
Famous Hero
from the Animated Peace
posted September 20, 2004 02:24 PM

Quote:
this is a great town, and despite the difficulties it has with movement, i think it will still be fine. Some of the things, like sea serpent should be dropped, but others, like the leviathan, will be AWESOME. they will work perfectly if you think about it like this one;
as far as i know, the word 'leviathan' has nothing to do with levitation.

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Strainer
Strainer

Tavern Dweller
posted September 25, 2004 02:08 AM

Lol ! You are ahead of me on fresh ideas. Keep it that way until game release ! Write me from time to time

damianjjbg@yahoo.com
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Consis
Consis


Honorable
Legendary Hero
Of Ruby
posted November 15, 2004 06:23 AM

The Real Atlantis

It seems the lost city was in the Mediterranean sea the whole time. This is an amazing discovery. I hope it sparks more public/private interest in Svarog's thread. Ubisoft could really make a profit from an added 'Atlantis Town" to its arsenal of brilliant city-related ideas.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/europe/11/14/cyprus.atlantis.ap/index.html
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Wolfman
Wolfman


Responsible
Supreme Hero
Insomniac
posted November 15, 2004 06:25 AM

I just saw that not more than 3 minutes ago.  But is it the real Atlantis...maybe Ubisoft will make a fake one for us.
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DARKMASTER
DARKMASTER


Hired Hero
posted November 21, 2004 06:14 PM

Quote:
maybe to add this kind of creatures also...

selkie                

Living off the coasts of the Orkney and Sheltland islands, these seal-people live under the water. Also called Silkie and Selchie, their normal appearance is human, however, they have seal skins with which they swim through the sea. When Selkies come ashore, they hide this seal skin. If a man finds a selkie maiden's seal-skin and can successfully hide it from her, he can force her to marry him. If however, at any point, the selkie finds her skin, she will return to the sea. They say that male selkies can take human lovers. It is also said that people born with webbed hands or feet are selkie-born.



ROFL!!
Seal-people!omg lamest idea EVER ROFLMAO!! shouldn't you be locked up in some phsyciatric institution?

'The guinnea-pig-people'

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Daddy
Daddy


Responsible
Supreme Hero
and why not.
posted November 21, 2004 06:22 PM

Quote:
ROFL!!
Seal-people!omg lamest idea EVER ROFLMAO!! shouldn't you be locked up in some phsyciatric institution?

'The guinnea-pig-people'
I don't see what's wrong with this idea. It is a nice idea to bring some of this cultural mythologys ointo the game. And besides it is a nice story.

reg
Daddy
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DARKMASTER
DARKMASTER


Hired Hero
posted November 21, 2004 11:12 PM

No its not. You guys are so lame. Wanting all these lameass species like cow-men and tuna-armies.Go watch animal planet!

The units must look cool! Im not saying every creature needs to be 40 mtrs tall and blowing fire from its nose, but diversity and style are needed! We dont need to use these lame creatures just because there's mythology involved ,you know.

Alot of the mythological creatures arent so diverse from real-life creatures, and therefore shouldnt be in a fantasy game!I dont want monsters who look's like humans dressed up!

We have WAY too many creatures based on `animals´ already! It's not going to be AOW with 14 species you know...We'll have at maximum 8 castles in heroes 5,wich doesnt make for hundreds of creatures.


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Daddy
Daddy


Responsible
Supreme Hero
and why not.
posted November 21, 2004 11:21 PM

Okay, I get get your point. And I think that you might be right at some things, I allso never said that only human-like creatures from mythologys should be used. I just like it to have here and there .
(But you needn't be so rude all the time, if you just said what you said in you post above mine in the first one, I think it would lighten up the discussion-athmosphere )

reg
Daddy
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Agraynel
Agraynel

Tavern Dweller
posted December 03, 2004 09:01 PM

That Naga...

I think h3 visage is better than Might and Magic. But that city is better than my Waterfall (on topic My town to h5 by Kallen).

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regnus_khan
regnus_khan


Responsible
Supreme Hero
[ Peacekeeper of Equilibris ]
posted December 04, 2004 09:56 PM
Edited by alcibiades at 20:07, 06 Jul 2009.

MASTER whoever... ain't you something *known* in HC?

anyway, atlantis town, IMO is not a must, but I'd be pleased to have such a town, because it would add something new to the gameplay.

I like new differences (especially after a stop of homm-playing) you're offering, Svarog...

I skimmed through the topic, but I think my participation is not useful these days, so I am leaving the topic with a phrase:

"To see towns we really want, we must examine the whole series of homm. Only then we would understand whether such town is agreed. Until then we should think of the primary rather than new, not vital towns"

P.S. Oh, well that's only my philosophy (i use it )...

cheers ")



Moderator's note:This topic has been closed, as it refers to an older version of the game. To discuss Heroes 3, please go to Library Of Enlightenment, to discuss Heroes 4, please go to War Room Of Axeoth, to discuss Heroes 5, go to Temple Of Ashan.
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