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Heroes Community > Heroes 5 - Temple of Ashan > Thread: Abilities you least pick
Thread: Abilities you least pick This thread is 2 pages long: 1 2 · NEXT»
Elvin
Elvin


Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
posted March 30, 2007 10:07 AM

Abilities you least pick

With H5 came a brand new skill system with greater customization that we had ever seen in the series. H2 and 3 were only about the basic skills thus a no-brainer once you got the hang of it and H4 didn't really favour multiclassing! Now, some skills were incorporated in others in the guise of abilities, others were improved or added new content and to sum it up we ended up with a system that you can avoid hero clones and shape your hero according to your wishes. Or so we thought...

To this day there have been abilities I have never picked more than once either because they are rare or because they have extreme requirements. For instance counterspell with ranger. I mean fire warriors, arcane exaltation AND fire resistance? Why even make it available, there is no sense in that! No sane person would pursue that, in the process butchering his skill selection
Retribution for dwarves is no better though I feel is more effective in a game should you have the patience to wait for it. Others such as corrupted soil are easier to get though their effect isn't as good as other combinations. Now it's very easy to get with a necro yet I have never bothered to take it, instead preferring the basic abilities or not getting enlightenment at all.
Triple ballista for rangers seems very easy to get except you will rarely be offered warmachines.
Boneward is awesome but sorcery doesn't complement dark magic too well unless you plan to bling/frenzy at a fast rate in later game. Finally there are abilities like dark ritual that I always take yet rarely use.

These things make me wonder how much different the game would be if such abilities were within reach or maybe a little stronger with easier requirements. So many good skills seem a waste, a pitiful reminder of what could have been, taunting us from their distant perch...
I love the new system but I'm afraid it could easily be a lot better. Also I'm glad that the starting skill affects your gameplay so much but I wish it didn't have to come with a 'bad' ability...I hate getting a hero with defense and protection
Or leadership and recruitment for that matter.
Anyway I have ranted enough, what would your least used abilities be and why so?
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dschingi
dschingi


Famous Hero
the guy with the dragon golem
posted March 30, 2007 11:54 AM

As you said there are abilities you hardly ever pick just because of the requirements - not to mention the ultimate abilities, which waste a lot of potential just because of that.
I don't see a problem with Retribution or Empathy having high requirements for Dwarfs. It's quite possible to obtain Empathy and for Retribution, Dwarfs have some good abilities already, I just see Retribution as the cherry on the cake you will almost never get. It only bothers me when a special ability is unique for one or two classes and extremely hard to get. There are some special abilities I haven't used at all yet, like Elemental Balance, Fire Warriors. I at least want to try them once without messing up my skill choice I never saw Remote Control in action either, but I probably will sometime...

Of the racial abilities I rarely use Dark Ritual.. and I just noticed I haven't ever used Consume Artifact since it resurrects creatures. I think I just always forget that this skill even exists I should try it one day...
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emilsn
emilsn


Legendary Hero
posted March 30, 2007 03:33 PM

The sad skill called: Navigation, it's never really been choosen by anyone, expept in HoMM2 when you played elves, you were forced to it...

I would never choose summoning magic with dwarves, nothing good for dwarves. but there is a main skill like that for every race. But I think we shall see it as "You have the choice and some times choosing this will not be bad, but not good either" ... They made it to
vary the gameplay a bit.
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ZombieLord
ZombieLord


Promising
Famous Hero
that wants your brainz...
posted March 30, 2007 03:58 PM

As dschingi said, abilities like Elemental Balance or Fire Warriors are simply not useable (and I'm talking for all factions, not just Rangers with Counterspell, as Wizards can get it easily)

Quote:
and I just noticed I haven't ever used Consume Artifact since it resurrects creatures

I always use Consume Artifact on a stack that completely died at the end. I mean, it destroys the artifact, so what? With the stack dead you lose the artifact anyway
That's a pretty cool trick with this ability

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Elvin
Elvin


Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
posted March 30, 2007 04:16 PM

For 25% of initiative who wouldn't? But the bad part is that I depend more on motw and magic mirror so I may not have it for sure. It definitely has been improved though.
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ZombieLord
ZombieLord


Promising
Famous Hero
that wants your brainz...
posted March 30, 2007 04:24 PM

It uses only 25%
I thought it was 50%

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dschingi
dschingi


Famous Hero
the guy with the dragon golem
posted March 30, 2007 05:23 PM

True, I forgot that too. It's probably not a bad pick in late game. How much hp does it resurrect compared to the Resurrection spell?
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executor
executor


Famous Hero
Otherworldly Ambassador
posted March 30, 2007 10:01 PM
Edited by executor at 22:11, 30 Mar 2007.

Not an outstanding amount, but can be useful. According to manual:
10*(hero level)*(1+x), where x is the number of effects on the artie.
So on 20 lvl wizard it would revive 800 hp, with a 3-effect artie. Not that bad.

I would like to underline rage of the elements, which is not bad in itself, but it's requirements suck like no other. You must resign from both destructive+sorcery(magic way) and attack+leadership/defense(might way). What do you use it for then? Just makes warlock spoiled.
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PhoenixReborn
PhoenixReborn


Promising
Legendary Hero
Unicorn
posted March 31, 2007 12:34 AM

Great thread.

I would have to go with Scholar as my least picked skill.  I rarely develop secondary heroes.

Navigation would be fine if the maps were bigger (ran well) and had more water.  It might be worthwhile on the map great confrontation.

Fire Warriors would be better if summon elemental was better...does anyone use it in 2.1?
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alcibiades
alcibiades


Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
posted March 31, 2007 02:20 AM

Good discussion topic, I think both Elvin and dschingi sum up very nicely the pros and cons of the current skill system. I especially think that dschingi has an excellent point by emphasizing that it's not a problem that some abilities are hard to get for some factions (Retribution for Dwarves) as long as other factions have easy (or easier) access to them. This will ensure that all abilities get in play, and in the same time emphasize the difference between the factions.

The Ultimate Abilities, on the other hand, is kind of a wasted opportunity. The idea looks extremely nice on the paper, but in reality, it just doesn’t work, because a) it’s FAR to difficult to actually get these abilities, and b) once you manage to get them, the game will practically be over in normal situations. It would be interesting to find another option for how to implement the Ultimate Abilities, but that’s a topic of its own …

I may elaborate the topic a bit here, however, to include not only which abilities I don't take, but also how they could be changed to make them more attractive, or even how the general system could be changed to make up for the current shortcomings. A pretty ambitious discussion, I know.

General Abilities that should be changed
Recruitment and Estates: Bonuses are way too small, and requirement of Hero to stay in town for recruitment is horrible. See discussion here of how to improve these skills.
Arcane Intuition: Good ol' Eagle Eye simply never seems to become an attractive choice. Well, they almost made it this time, until they changed it so you cannot learn from own casters. Too bad! Suggested change: Learn from own units, and probably the WOG approach: Learn a new spell every 2nd (or 3rd or 4th) level?
Scholar: Well, this is not a bad ability, but how often will you spend a skill point to learn this? Never. The ability needs to offer something extra. Suggested change: Add Magic Insight effect to this skill as well, and change Magic Insight as below.
Resistance: 15 % chance to resist is not enough to make this skill worth it for me - it's too unreliable. I would say at least 20 %, preferably 25 %, and maybe even 30 % chance (that would probably be too much!). One should notice, however, that an ability like Sap Magic reduces damage from spells by 20 % fixed, and even though Resistance applies to more all spells, not only damaging ones, I think it should have higher average chance to trigger because it's less reliable - or at least the same (same discussion as Luck and Attack skill).
Resourcefulness: The idea with this skill is pretty good, but the bonus is way too small. Or, the +500 Gold from chests is actually pretty good, especially if you get it in early game. The other bonuses are really bad, however. Maybe one could change this skill to offer extra resources as: Gold: Luck * 100. Wood + Ore: Luck. Precious resources: (Luck + 1)/2. This would mean that a Hero with Luck = +3 would find 300 extra gold in chests, piles, windmills etc. He would find 3 extra Wood / Ore in all stacks, campfires, etc., and he would find 2 extra precious resources.
Magic Insight: This skill is completely useless because the only reason to learn it is to get Phantom Forces (see this discussion). Therefore I suggest to move the current effect to Scholar to improve that ability. Suggested new effect: Increases the mastery of all known spells by one level. Thus, if Hero has no mastery in a school, he will cast the spells at basic level, whereas a School with advanced level will work as expert. Expert level spells are not affected.
Master of Conjuration, Earthblood and Life: I’m a bit biased about these abilities. +4 Spellpower is nice enough, but compared to the masteries of the other schools – especially Light and Dark – these abilities are clearly inferior. Some extra effects would have been fair, perhaps something like: Master of Conjuration: Adds an ATB bonus to summoned creatures (starts with ATB = 0.5 similar to Swift Gate). Master of Earthblood: Adds tremor effect to Earthquake (why you need War Machines to get this!? – you will not need Earthquake if you have War Machines!) and Armour Damaging effect to Fire Traps (or Ignite ). Master of Life: Reduces the HP-lowering effect of Raise Dead to 10 %, and adds stunning or displacing effect to Fist of Rage.

Special abilities that should be changed
Corrupted Soil: Damage applied should be per tile moved. This would add a great tactical effect of this spell (will motivate not to move units far). Current damage is ridiculously small.
Power of Speed / Endurance: Spell should be granted with mass effect (think it is so in latest version of game).
Resistance: Could be spiced up a bit (+2 Defence is pretty boring).
Arcane Exaltation, Graduate and Wizard’s Reward: Very boring abilities, would be nicer to have something that adds more interesting abilities to the hero. And the +1000 Gold / +1000 XP bonus is pretty laughable. Suggestions: Maybe add something like Lore of Might / Lore of Magic, which will grant the ability to learn either one Might or one Magic skill at basic level beside the normal 6 skills granted.
Dark Revelation: Probably the most broken ability in the game? This ability is so unfair, a clever player will wait to take this ability till the Hero is high level, where it will correspond to possibly a XP bonus of hundreds of thousand.
Battle Commander: Ok, at least with this skill they tried to spice it up besides the plain stat bonus – but War Dancers!?
Spoils of War: Even worse than Resourcefulness. Percentages are way too low! Let’s take an example: Hero battles 10 Arch Angels, cost 42.000 Gold. He will gain: 0 – 630 Gold, 0 – 4 Wood/Ore, 0 – 2 Precious. Or another, Hero battles 500 Conscripts, and will get: 0 – 225 Gold, 0 – 2 Wood/Ore, 0 – 1 Precious. The only time this will be useful will be in  the final battle, where Hero will kill large amounts of creatures, but at this point, the player will have no use of the resources. This skill should be a help in early game, and therefore, amounts need to be changed. Suggestion: Gold = [number / weekly growth] * level * 10. Wood/Ore (level 3+ only): [number / weekly growth] * level / 10. Precious (level 5+ only): [number / weekly growth] * level / 20. Here, “level” is the level of the creature – upgraded creatures counting as half a level higher. Examples: 110 Peasants = 50 Gold, 500 Conscripts = 340 Gold, 20 Imperial Griffins = 240 Gold + 2 Wood/Ore, 10 Arch Angels = 1050 Gold + 10 Wood / Ore + 5 Precious. Numbers could be tweaked.
Arcane Brilliance and Arcane Excellence: Another set of skills with rather boring stat-increasing effects.
Banish: This is another severely overpowered skill. At level 25, you can effectively negate the Demon Lords racial ability. Woot?

The above abilities are more or less the ones I think are problematic currently, and save Dark Revelation and Banish, are the ones I try to avoid if possible.

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PhoenixReborn
PhoenixReborn


Promising
Legendary Hero
Unicorn
posted March 31, 2007 03:36 AM
Edited by PhoenixReborn at 03:37, 31 Mar 2007.

Quote:
Banish: This is another severely overpowered skill. At level 25, you can effectively negate the Demon Lords racial ability.



You give up the wizards turn to banish one stack.  What's overpowered?
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TemjinGold
TemjinGold


Known Hero
posted March 31, 2007 04:36 AM

Quote:
Dark Revelation: Probably the most broken ability in the game? This ability is so unfair, a clever player will wait to take this ability till the Hero is high level, where it will correspond to possibly a XP bonus of hundreds of thousand.



This isn't broken at all. In fact, it's a crappy ability. When you are low level, you're better off just picking another ability. When you are high enough level to get hundreds of thousands of XP from it, that one level won't make any difference to your power as all you get for leveling up at that point is one measly stat point. Dark Revelation is essentially 1 random stat point as you give up your new level for the next one. It is a hindrance to take because you effectively make all future levels require MORE xp in exchange for that stat point.

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alcibiades
alcibiades


Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
posted March 31, 2007 10:24 AM
Edited by alcibiades at 10:27, 31 Mar 2007.

Quote:
Quote:
Banish: This is another severely overpowered skill. At level 25, you can effectively negate the Demon Lords racial ability.



You give up the wizards turn to banish one stack.  What's overpowered?


Oh ... I thought it was a passive ability! I simply thought it negated the effect, like Counterspell. I've not tried to use the ability yet, because I generally don't like Summoning Magic. Sorry for the misunderstanding then.

Quote:
Quote:
Dark Revelation: Probably the most broken ability in the game? This ability is so unfair, a clever player will wait to take this ability till the Hero is high level, where it will correspond to possibly a XP bonus of hundreds of thousand.



This isn't broken at all. In fact, it's a crappy ability. When you are low level, you're better off just picking another ability. When you are high enough level to get hundreds of thousands of XP from it, that one level won't make any difference to your power as all you get for leveling up at that point is one measly stat point. Dark Revelation is essentially 1 random stat point as you give up your new level for the next one. It is a hindrance to take because you effectively make all future levels require MORE xp in exchange for that stat point.


That's actually a good point ... had not really considered it in that way. I still think it's pretty powerful, however, at least it's very nice when you're Necro and want to aim for Howl Of Terror, but yes, the number of properties in the game that depend on your Hero level are not that many, so yes, maybe it's not as great as I considered it right away.
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feluniozbunio
feluniozbunio


Promising
Supreme Hero
posted March 31, 2007 11:16 AM
Edited by feluniozbunio at 11:22, 31 Mar 2007.

I think Dark Revelation is alright. Works well with enlightenment when you have high lvl hero. Its just a pains that it comes after useless eagle eye.
To be honest i like those +2 stat skills but, as it is in main post, there should be significant additional bonus to it. (i haven't used battle commander yet but i think this is significant bonus). Also, the fact that some of them give just stat bonus and other give something else in addition is weird.
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dschingi
dschingi


Famous Hero
the guy with the dragon golem
posted March 31, 2007 12:35 PM

Adventure abilities

Most abilities which affect the adventure map don't improve your hero's army and are better used by secondary heroes. That doesn't necessarily mean they are weak. Estates provides a decent amount of gold, Resourcefulness too. However, I like your suggestion about Scholar & Magic Insight. Maybe Recruitment should be improved a little, too. It's already good for Dungeon with its low growth, but for most factions the bonus is rather weak.

Oh and I completely agree with TemjinGold about Dark Revelation. It just gives you one stat point but makes further leveling more difficult. I would never aim for this except if I knew that I wouldn't get another level up without it.
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Elvin
Elvin


Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
posted March 31, 2007 12:55 PM
Edited by Elvin at 12:58, 31 Mar 2007.

Hard no to agree with Alci on the suggestions Maybe a bit toned down, 25% for resistance is too much. However about this:

Quote:
Quote:
Dark Revelation: Probably the most broken ability in the game? This ability is so unfair, a clever player will wait to take this ability till the Hero is high level, where it will correspond to possibly a XP bonus of hundreds of thousand.



This isn't broken at all. In fact, it's a crappy ability. When you are low level, you're better off just picking another ability. When you are high enough level to get hundreds of thousands of XP from it, that one level won't make any difference to your power as all you get for leveling up at that point is one measly stat point. Dark Revelation is essentially 1 random stat point as you give up your new level for the next one. It is a hindrance to take because you effectively make all future levels require MORE xp in exchange for that stat point.


Let's forget about the ultimate for a while. The skill you would take with the revelation's lvl up you could take it instead of revelation. In a high lvl you only care about specific abilities, not a single level up. The only good I can think about it is to pick exp enlightenment on the free lvl to gain a ton of stats out of nowhere But even this is situational, I will usually have taken it long before.
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Doomforge
Doomforge


Admirable
Undefeatable Hero
Retired Hero
posted March 31, 2007 01:11 PM

Elemental balance, fire warriors etc ---> crap.

Nival plz do something with these, they horribly suck.

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alcibiades
alcibiades


Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
posted March 31, 2007 02:11 PM
Edited by alcibiades at 14:26, 31 Mar 2007.

Quote:
To be honest i like those +2 stat skills but, as it is in main post, there should be significant additional bonus to it. (i haven't used battle commander yet but i think this is significant bonus). Also, the fact that some of them give just stat bonus and other give something else in addition is weird.


Again, I should add a note to my analysis: In many situations, I still analyse very much from a Heroes 3 point of view, and there's no doubt that in Heroes 5, and +2 stat bonus is much more significant than in Heroes 3: In Heroes 3, your Hero would develop to higher levels, and maps were much larger than in Heroes 5 (at least those I played),  making a +2 bonus pretty worthless. In Heroes 5, that's not quite the fact.

I like the places where they have coupled the skill boost to some other minor effect. I suppose Battle Commander is not that bad, but you get so few War Dancers (10 in week 1 and 2, 20 in week 3 and 4, 30 in week 5 and 6, etc.), and it's a creature most players find pretty worthless. If the added creatures had been Hunters, or even better, a selection of all the Elven troops (like 10 War Dancers, 5 Hunters and 2 Druids per week), it would have been useless.

Also, some of the other bonuses should have been either scaled with week number or done relative. Here are some examples:

Wizards Reward: +2 Knowledge and gain W * 1000 Gold, where W is the week number.
Graduate: +2 Knowledge and gain 10 % of experience needed for next level.
Arcane Exaltation: +2 Spellpower and increases spell mastery for all units in Heroes army by one level.
Arcane Excellence: +2 Spellpower and +100 temporary mana which you could decide yourself when to add to your mana pool (so that you could save them for later) *or* which were added to your mana pool the first time you passed 0 Mana.
Resistance: +2 Defence and Vulnerability spells targeted on Heroes units have their effective mastery lowered by one step.
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Elvin
Elvin


Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
posted March 31, 2007 02:31 PM

I rather like battle commander as it is. You gain a good fast blocking stack for free and that's what matters to me. With leadership and defense they are worth it.
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TemjinGold
TemjinGold


Known Hero
posted March 31, 2007 03:05 PM

I think some of the skills like Battle Commander, that thing that gives you +100 mana and the things that give you gold should be reworked in the campaigns. It sucks when you take that skill and only get the "bonus" on the map you take it. Maybe if you take it in the campaign, you should get the War Dancers, gold, and temp mana once on every future map of that campaign as well as the one where you picked the skill.

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