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| Thread: Bringing Heroes to the next Level | |
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DSTG
Hired Hero
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posted April 03, 2001 01:33 AM |
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Bringing Heroes to the next Level
The more and more i play heroes the more and more i realize how much lucks involved.
I started my strategy career at the age of 10 when i became a 1700 USCF playing chess. Over the next year i got up to 1900 and retired at 11. Why? I got addicted to Heroes.
I found that the two games were similar in manyways but chess remains the perfect game. Both sides are equal there is no artifacts no surprises no spells, no special abilities. It is heroes in the simplest form. The only advantage in chess is going first which is also apparent in heroes as red.
Heroes is completly difference in the sence that everything can go right or everything can go wrong. You could go with magic and get crapy spells. Or might and get the plague or the oposition finds the week spot. Bad artifacts and starting heroes is always a case. Even Maxym himself could get very unlucky against a very lucky cadet and still lose. Even a cadet with 1050 rating can leap on an advantage and even win. So i ask you. Toh is brings heroes to the level of chess, but with so much possible descrepency is this what game designers want. I am not trying to undermine ToH and what it stands for but ask yourself if this is how the game was ment to be played? Or have we turned a simple game and tried to make it complex with hundreds of made up rules and restrictions left and right and endless quarling on a fair map?
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Maxym
Known Hero
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posted April 03, 2001 02:00 AM |
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Edited By: Maxym on 21 Apr 2001 22:51
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Well....
well what can i say except maybe that HoMM3 is the best strategy game around, better then chess  And i am a very bad chess player so maybe i should not give opinions on that matter
DSTG asked me is HoMM built for tournament play? I think I know what he thinks but i will not be biased.
I think there is nothing in heroes which prevents it from being played in tournaments. It is the tournamanets and their rules that should be adapted to the way HoMM3 is, we cant change the game. And therefore the need some people have for all sorts of rules: no diplo, no 4th level, no log, no this and no that.
When i play a TOH map i usually ask for one rule myself: no hit and run. Why rule out this particular tactic? Not because it is a game winner, I know how to keep myself from being open to it, how to counter it and how to use it effectively myself. I do it because i feel that most times it brings nothing new or exciting to the game. I always play random towns and i would like to play my stronghold or tower in a straightforward way with a final battle at the end of preparation and not have to worry about AA from a camp and a hired Solmyr.
But I never insist on it since it is part of the game, and I have had many memorable games very close ones with multiple hit and runs, countermeasures and countercountermeasures  So maybe i should abandon even that rule.
I don't think TOH maps require any rules, they are almost perfectly clean and even with some of most dangerous spells and arties and even heroes taken out. And U know what? I am sick and tired of playing TOH maps.
In a last week or so i have decided not to play them anymore except for division and clan games. I want an excitement of a new map, a well fought loss against overwhelming odds or a close win. Not a map counted up to the last detail, played by players who know it to perfection. I will rather lose on a crappy random to a necro with Thant then win another game on a sterile TOH map.
And yes random maps require rules, and tons of them: No diplo, no cartographer, no free scrolls and no Armageddon Blade are some of the ones i like to see. I think in that setting they enhance the game rather then detract from it. We all want a fair game, but lets not push it to extreme, we dont want that either. Look, no one is playing on completely mirror maps, with same heroes, same arties, same towns and spells. A game like that would be ultimately boring.
So lets just have fun with the way the game is
Anyone up for a L random, no under, no water, no diplo?
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"What is life? Work followed by television."
"1985" Anthony Burgess
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DSTG
Hired Hero
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posted April 03, 2001 02:05 AM |
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Anytime maxym
I agree with most of it but is heroes built for the level of play that toh broght it too? Somthing i have thought alot about and would apreciate feedback.
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Mocara
Famous Hero
what?
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posted April 17, 2001 04:24 AM |
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I always enjoy reading both DSTG's and Maxym's post(although I wish Maxym would use the enter key more :-) and this post is no exception.
Sir Alkis is probably the best chess player we have ever had here in our community being 3 time champion in his home country and a professor of chess and he was very turned off by the extremes put into heroes3.
But those extremes do not need to be implemented into the maps.
A map like Battle for Honor is in the spirit of chess. The more random features we put into a map the more "luck" will rear it's head.
Luck is something that is a fun part of heroes but it need not be so extreme.
A dragon utopia on each end of a map is just asking for something bad to happen. Random relics are not bad but when they are placed in a way like they are in East vs West where each player will get 2 a piece then not only is this a chance to get the game out of whack but also a chance for the host to do some creative editing.
If there is going to be something as extreme as a relic on a map put it central where both players have equal chance.
I think most players would prefer a map with many random factors because it gives a player with less skill a chance to win a game he could not win on a more straight forward map and also because if they lose they can say "He got Angelic Alliance from Dragon Utopia and I got Statue of Legion.".
If someone plays HG and complains about their bad luck from the utopia and the island artifacts then this is truly not luck as they knew their chances of this happening going in.
Everyone agrees that the grail is too powerful yet I may be allowed to pick up the book of earth close to my town while my opponent is stuck with book of water on this random draw.
Many relics and most combination artifacts are way more powerful than the grail yet it is not uncommon to have 3 or 4 of them on one hero.
Map design is something everyone can do so consider eliminating some of these random elements if you want the game to be more chess-like. And for those who like maps with random elements to the extreme like on Hourglass please know that I am not downing this style of play. Merely offering a suggestion for an alternative for chesslike play that would be fun to some of us.
-Mocara
"The wind and the waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators." --Edward Gibbon, 1737-1794, British Historian
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Greiger
Tavern Dweller
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posted April 17, 2001 05:39 PM |
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Was heroes built for the level of play that toh brought it too?
Of course it wasn't. The level of play that is in toh has taken over two years to come to its currentl level. For 3do to build a game for that level of play is infeasable. It means that they would have to have spent two years testing (probably more since they wouldn't have as many people testing as toh has playing) aside from the staggering cost of doing such testing it implies that the game would be written for the limitations of computers that are two years old when the game is released. So what can 3do do but do some testing making sure that nothing is too obviously unbalancing in the games they play and hope that it remains so once people have spent months and years developing strategies.
Overall, I would have to say that 3do has done an excellent job at balancing the game. After a couple years the fact that no town, hero, or creature has come to be viewed as dominating the others (at least by a majority of the players) is a testimony to the effort that was put into making the game balanced and has held up in the long term. Some of the artifacts I think are a little too unbalancing, but even those depend on the map being played.
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Gobs0 in Zone
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Maxym
Known Hero
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posted April 17, 2001 06:10 PM |
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Yes they are all balanced and good, except....
Conflux, those who play AB know that already. There is a good reason it is banned in KoR. This town (build for one purpose - to combat the Armageddon's Blade artifact in AB campaign) is so unbalanced it boggles the mind.
But other then that, yeah i think 3do has done a good job designing and changing the game with patches. And I was apprehensive about H4 coming out and making my vast HoMM 3 knowledge useless (j/k LOL i am quite ingnorant. some of you might have seen my questions on the zone), but now I think it will be fun getting a brand new game and being on a forefront of new strategies.
And sorry guys that was my 1st post here i think, i am getting hold of that "Enter" thing. BTW Moc, great quote
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Defreni
Promising
Famous Hero
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posted April 17, 2001 09:12 PM |
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Hehee Maxym.
What about this one
Yesterday I finally learned u could enter a teleporter and then press space, and eventually u would get to where u wanted. I better post this myself, as Greystole promised me I would be on Weeflea, under stupid players
But concerning wether HoMM3 is designed for tournament play, I guess it is. Much more so than some other games, offcourse theres the odd thing about air and earth magic being much better than water and fire. And the snowty thing about getting eagle eye, when other guy is getting logistic.
But all in all its pretty balanced, and always exciting
Defreni
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Zud
Promising
Famous Hero
box worshipper
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posted April 17, 2001 09:57 PM |
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Dont be dissin water magic :)
I used to be an earth/air magic only guy, but i have slowly gotten a lot of respect for water magic (fire only if U get the right spells) now it is i gotta have earth magic, and i want air and water, mass bless, mass dispell, mass cure. all very sweet (expecially with no fly or dim door on most toh maps)
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Defreni
Promising
Famous Hero
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posted April 17, 2001 11:28 PM |
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Well ur as ussual right Zud
But u forgot to mention mass prayer, thats a real killer
But fire has its charm too, mass curse is a nasty spell on a pure might guy, suddenly ur attack isnt that good anymore, but if I gotta choose i prolly would take air over water anyday. But again as u said, it all depends on the spells.
Had Gurnisson the other day, expert air, but no haste in 3 guilds and 3 shrines  needless to say, I was whopped.
Defreni
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Shae_Trielle
Honorable
Famous Hero
of Heroes
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posted April 23, 2001 02:33 AM |
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Balance has nothing to do with it
I've noted that in many Heroes discussions, players seem to have a problem with LUCK. People want their maps nutted out to the very last detail and want them perfectly balanced so that they have an even chance of destroying their opponent.
Geographical features are the ONLY things that should be fairly balanced as these are the only things which are truly fair. As for creatures and arts, hell, I say keep them random. If someone gets lucky, then he gets lucky, it doesn't mean that he's going to win the game, it merely means that he has an advantage.
And talking about luck, it is the ONLY thing that IS balanced in Heroes games as it is always a 50/50 chance that you are going to be the lucky one. Don't knock the luck factor as it just may get you out of a tight situation one day!
By the way, you can't TAKE heroes to the next level, it will progress to wherever it's supposed to be without anyone trying to yank it around and make it more like chess. Hell, if you guys want a perfectly balanced game, go play chess. Maybe that's why chess players dislike heroes so much is because their little brains are too small to get around the complexity of true strategy, where you can't predict the opening moves of the other player and you can't always see his pieces on the board. And for that matter, battles always take place on hex fields, not fields with 64 black and white squares...
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Mad_Unicorn
Famous Hero
I am a mean person shame on me
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posted April 23, 2001 04:02 AM |
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lmao
I enjoy both games but really how much strategy is there in a game where u have a huge advantage like HH,tome of earth and ur opponent has nothing to counter it? or is too new to counter it.. Luck is fun but too much is ridiculous 
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I guess with my way thinking I would be going to hell. Good thing I dont believe in it.
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Shae_Trielle
Honorable
Famous Hero
of Heroes
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posted April 23, 2001 07:13 AM |
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Too much luck is no fun, I agree. But remember, the knife cuts both ways. Still you can limit the amount of luck in a game so that it will bestow a small advantage upon either player. I played a random map where I had 5 towns by day three and they were all the same race.
At the end of the game, I ended up with 13 towns and thought I was on a roll (ridiculous random map!), but as it turned out, my opponent had a similar amount and his gold was somewhere in the region of half a million! I had plenty of luck, but so did he, so in the end it balanced out and it came down to one very simple battle.
How many times does lady luck touch you in one game without touching your opponent?
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dstg
Hired Hero
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posted May 03, 2001 12:57 PM |
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Not sure this was where i was going
Anyway if we are talking about pure luck now...
I like Wiz's map WvsE
It has 2 relics and alot of servivors so u can get real lucky. However it is very simple to breakthrough that map before getting relics on islands. The island factor gives everyone a chance to win the game.
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Maxym
Known Hero
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posted May 03, 2001 10:17 PM |
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yeah everyone who gets lucky
But I actually like this map too, i don't play it much but its fun to see it compressed into 8 day map from 5 weeks from what it was when it came out
I have no clue why i like it then, i dont like race maps and this one is not just a race its a mad race for most relics and better luck LOL
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Mocara
Famous Hero
what?
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posted May 04, 2001 10:44 AM |
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WvE
I find as red there are 2 things I can do to blue that if I am blue I do not know how to stop.
1) By having a chain set up and hero on a boat by the level6 creature and whirlpool I can steal blues north relic on day8.
Sure he can counter this by going through the whirlpool on his day 8 and trying to fight me on the island but if his relic is a good one I will have the edge with it and win the battle.
2) I can attack him at main town on day 15 w/ a full weeks supply of troops he has no access to.
I know people will say "Red can do that on any map" but it isn't true.
It is easy on this map because the lev7's offer cover for red's hero on days 1-14. Sure blue can fight them on day14 and attack red but will lose so many troops he will fall easy prey to red who has lost nothing.
Maybe I am missing something.
I got blitzed as blue then blitzed a few times as red then wrote this map off as a pattern map.
Please enlighten me on how to stop these 2 seeming weaknesses in map design so that I may enjoy this map again.
-Mocara
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dstg
Hired Hero
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posted May 08, 2001 03:00 PM |
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First of all are you playing the old version or the new version. The new updated one has swamp land on it making it very hard to get through on day 1. Unless if you have gunnar and boots or gloves as well as pathfinding.
While breaking through day 1 is a brilliant tactic for red i have payed dearly for falling a space short. you can also make a wall of heroes in the swamp that slows them down alot as well as leaving key monsters living to make them go through them. A briliant counter for blue although difficult to do is to breakthrough day 7 and kill the hero that awaits with only his fast guys in it.
To counter the water tactic that i have had thecastrated use on me. It is good to keep a boat to the north so u can surprise him when he goes for the relic. The extra 3 days u take to build mageguilds level up and increase stats they are wasted traveling on water getting on and off the boat. Between that and fighting the 3 groups of creatures with the first week of dwellings evens it out.
Now you may want to know what if the artifact is the tomb of earth or helm of enlightenment. If it is a game winner you have the advantage and should chain your heroes as well and get there a turn earlier. It is also a game looser if you come through and find the sandles or some crapy artifact on the island.
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Ichon
Responsible
Famous Hero
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posted May 14, 2001 05:49 AM |
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Tournament play
I've been impressed with how well H3 has held up for tournament play. There are very few games I enjoy playing this many years after they come out. Especially multiplayer games. I can think of only 3 games- H3, PG2, and Starcraft. Age2 might join that list for me soon.
As for the way H3 is exploited by veterans- that is totally predictable, all games played this much succumb to that. In the case of heroes3, it's a very strong argument for that game that even with that explotation, so many people are still willing to play it. I look forward to H4 being more balanced, but it's inevietable there will be some inequities, hopefully not as many. Also- heroes3 is a very complex game- so many different things can swing the final outcome of a game. A certain spell, having a dragon in refugee camp week 1, getting a really good artifact from a shipwreck survivor. Those are random elements. In ToH, knowledge of the map is as integral to victory as the skill of the players. I'm not sure how to ever seperate that from any turn based game that uses scenarios for multiplay. Heroes4 really needs a reliable random map generator. I think we'll get one that's better than h3 for sure. But there will be many random variables that make it potentially unfair no matter what. The best time to play a game like Heroes3 is when it first comes out. Almost all my favorite games were from the first season.
That is not saying it isn't still fun to play, and can be used in a tournament system. It just means there are certain limitations everyone participating in the tournament should accept. For me, that means occasionally I will lose for no fault of my own, but simply because my opponent got lucky. That factor of luck has been there from the beginning of the game however. Few people reognized hwo to capitalize on it initially however. Now, everyone has been playing for years, and even a mediocre player can run away with the game given one lucky break. That makes eveyone more aware of how much luck is a factor.
The game is not dominated by luck, luck swing victories often, but the skill of the player in factoring in that luck determines victory more often. It does make it more difficult to win through strategy when all the same maps are played repeatedly. Both sides know the strategy, and then it's either a race map or a luck map like many people complain HG is.
I think almost everymap in ToH is largely luck based. Even barebones maps like BfH have a large degree of luck. The dwarvern treasuries and the shipwrecks gold and artifact output can vary between 5,000 gold and a no artifact, to 16,000 gold and a major artifact. Also, how many neutral creatures fight week 1 vs how many join. If you have a few joins week 1 you can use that to dominate the map for the rest of the game.
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dstg
Hired Hero
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posted June 12, 2002 02:21 AM |
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Heroes 4
Although nobody has probly read this thread in like a year i thought i should make a coment on it since i started. Heroes 4 has a much greater potential to be a tournement game. I think much of the luck that was there for heroes 3 has been eliminated and the possibilities for strategy increased 10 fold. Hope to c u all in the heroes 4 season when it finaly gets there.
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KittenAngel
Supreme Hero
Lee's wifey
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posted June 14, 2002 12:32 AM |
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hehe once H4 is complete and all in one I will be happy to join the new H4 session hope to see you there dstg!!
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Never wear anything that panics
the cat.
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