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Cortes
Adventuring Hero
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posted December 25, 2016 11:30 AM |
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Race-based.
Because of:
zazu1 said:
race-based I mean One with more than two of the same creature in the castle. Two is fine, if they are much different creatures.
Pretty much this.
May maybe not count for undead and demons and probably humans, who where always their own faction, who kind of fulfill both versions IMO.
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Macron1
Supreme Hero
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posted December 26, 2016 12:27 AM |
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I prefer race based towns, where it makes sense.
Like we know, that M&M world was inspired by AD&D.
So some races are self-sufficient and closed, so their own towns are expected instead of gathering them all in one soup.
Like humans, elves, dwarves, lizardmen, dark elves must have their racial common lineup with some differences like other levels for same type of troops. For example, humans have knights on horses and should have knights on gryphons, lizards will have lizards on velociraptors, dark elves will have driders, dwarves will ride on bears.
But there is little sence to make separate towns for cyclops, minotaurs, medusas, halflings. Minotaurs and medusas couldn't have complicated society or civilization. And halflings are not war race, it's hard to imagine mounted halflings (like riding on pigs).
So there are towns for races with civilization, culture and society, and mix for non-socialized creatures.
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Mediczero
Famous Hero
Warlord of the sea
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posted December 27, 2016 11:08 AM |
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I still stands on the ideal would be to combine both races and themes. And allow me to illustrate it, using the stronghold faction as an exsample:
We have seven units:
Goblin
Harpy
Orc warrior
Goblin cockatrice rider
Orc Shaman
Cyclop
Behenoth
See, that would be little to no doubts about this faction being based in the concept of might, as well as brutal savage barbarians native to harsh badlands. However, some races is present in multiple units, such as the orc warrior and the orc shaman. As they are very different units, there is no problems of having them being the same race, and the choice of having them both being orcs makes more sense in terms of the theme than having fx the shaman being a human just because there is already another orc.
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zydar
Adventuring Hero
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posted July 22, 2021 07:28 PM |
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Themes is winning formula of HOMM games
You can add pirate theme, scifi theme, steam punk or whatever
race based heroes is boring
Orc knight, Barbarian genie, minotaur warlock is cool
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted July 23, 2021 10:29 AM |
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History has vindicated theme-based castles such as the ones of H3, whereas race-based look childish and wrong. World of warcraft dark elves? Town in which 6 of 7 units is dwarves? come on...
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MattII
Legendary Hero
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posted July 23, 2021 11:41 PM |
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Edited by MattII at 00:35, 24 Jul 2021.
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Sylvan of HoMM5 is both a racial and a thematic town, and it wasn't too bad. I mean, on the whole, Theme is definitely more important than Race, but for a skilled creator, they aren't mutually exclusive.
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Alon
Known Hero
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posted July 24, 2021 10:05 AM |
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Question: when you say thematic, what do you exactly mean?
I'm asking because the following two lineups could be called thematic:
Castle
Pikeman
Archer
Outrider
Griffin
Monk
Siege tower (mobile but slow)
Paladin (mounted)
Angel
Preserve
Dwarf
Elf
Centaur
Pegasus
Druid
Weretree
Unicorn
Phoenix
And yet these units are pairwise equivalent and you can even give them exactly the same stats as in Wargroove or Warcraft - druids and unicorns both have mythological healing powers so it wouldn't even thematically be alien to give them healing spells just like monks and paladins.
So my real question is whether the theme of the town is seen in gameplay and not just in the names of the units and the graphics. (Would you call the castles thematic? They have distinct graphics, but in H3 they all play exactly the same, except for very minor differences in the moat and the thematically out-of-place Stronghold escape tunnel.)
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted July 24, 2021 11:11 AM |
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Thematic vs racial refers to unit lineup. In other contexts thematic may mean other things, but there is no such thing as a "racial" castle...
Also, H3 castles are definitely moderately thematic. Example Fortress having double4 moat because it's a defensive swamp town (originally it was the only one with moat), or Tower having mines insterad of moat because it's a frozen artificer/alchemist town (and water would freeze there anyways). Also every town defends on its native terrain.
Compare H4 which is definitely not thematic: All castles are identical, and you don't even get a native terrain bonus.
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Alon
Known Hero
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posted July 24, 2021 01:22 PM |
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Sure, but you can have a lineup that's purely racial and yet express themes with it: the castle is a militarily complex society, the dungeon is a strong-rule-the-weak society, the academy heavily relies on magic, etc. So in the town contest I had a fairly racial horde, in that 5/9 units are orcs (skirmisher, warg, warg archer, shaman, ogre), but the unit roles and abilities are rooted in steppe nomad armies, with hit-and-run tactics, a mounted archer unit, etc.
I didn't think before about how to make castles thematic but here are some possibilities:
* Tower archers - a historically realistic European defense would have stacks of archer units in the towers who could then be deployed in the field as well
* Thicker walls - Chinese city walls were thicker than European ones and could withstand cannon
* Layout, e.g. doubled walls
* Castles using natural terrain, so that the attacker can then choose one of several ways in, each with its own challenges (some have bad terrain, some have thicker walls...)
* Some kind of air defense - perhaps the Academy has figured out some shield that keeps fliers away?
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MattII
Legendary Hero
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posted July 25, 2021 03:46 AM |
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One thing I think would be interesting would be faction-specific siege weapons. f.e. In HoMM3, Cyclopses can demolish siege walls by throwing stones at them.
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted July 25, 2021 03:53 AM |
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Quote:
Sure, but you can have a lineup that's purely racial and yet express themes with it: the castle is a militarily complex society, the dungeon is a strong-rule-the-weak society, the academy heavily relies on magic, etc. So in the town contest I had a fairly racial horde, in that 5/9 units are orcs (skirmisher, warg, warg archer, shaman, ogre), but the unit roles and abilities are rooted in steppe nomad armies, with hit-and-run tactics, a mounted archer unit, etc.
Actually that is just giving races a racial stereotype, orcs are barbarians, dark elves are uh, BDSM "dungeon masters", if you catch the drift. It's just less dungeons and dragons and more of the 50 shades of grey kind... (they even have dominatrix, lol)
So, that's pretty shallow.
Also h5 academy is hardly race-based, it's more of a h3 type castle in that they have golems, djinn, beasts, gremlins, and so forth.
Indeed not a single unit on their lineup shares "race". Which is why they are cool in comparison 
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Alon
Known Hero
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posted July 25, 2021 07:06 AM |
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I wasn't even thinking in terms of dark elves, which I'm only familiar with through a handful of times in which I saw people cosplay them at LARPs. I was thinking about dragons and how they treat non-dragons as cannon fodder.
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MattII
Legendary Hero
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posted July 25, 2021 11:44 AM |
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Edited by MattII at 11:51, 25 Jul 2021.
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There's no draconic heroes though (aside Mutare in HoMM3), so their intelligence is debatable. Or maybe it's more that the mechanics can't actually support non-humanoid heroes. Either way, how much sway dragons have on affairs in those towns with them is up for debate.
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted July 25, 2021 03:04 PM |
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I think Ashan primordial dragons are more like "Gods". We seldom see them interfer directly. The dragons we do see are just creatures used by the humanoid heroes as "cannon fodder". So the tables seem turned...
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MattII
Legendary Hero
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posted July 25, 2021 06:31 PM |
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Urgh, can we please not discuss that aspect of Ashan? HoMM5 was a fair game to play, but the campaign wasn't great, and the worldbuilding was abysmal.
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted July 25, 2021 10:46 PM |
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Edited by NimoStar at 22:47, 25 Jul 2021.
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Well, I was just answering to the argument that the dragon lore is the "theme". I believe theme goes beyond background lore and is something tied to aesthetics and gameplay. I mean, story is (in most Heroes games) a part of it other than for campaigns, not play design. Nobody that playes H3 is normally going to know angels are ancient robots 
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MattII
Legendary Hero
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posted July 26, 2021 03:06 AM |
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One other issue I had was that Knight/Castle/Haven is that it's a boring faction, being just medieval knights in a fantasy setting.
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted July 26, 2021 03:14 AM |
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MattII said:
One other issue I had was that Knight/Castle/Haven is that it's a boring faction, being just medieval knights in a fantasy setting.
Yes, though I have this problem generally with all "vanilla" factions of games. In H3 Castle is the only faction where most if not nearly all creatures are just variations in the same species.
But the same I believe in things like WH40K space marines, or CNC Generals "USA". They are factions practically designed to be as bland as possible... yet people love them anyways. I guess most of the public actually likes "Generic bland protagonist".
I'd rather have factions with some character, but that's just me...
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MattII
Legendary Hero
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posted July 26, 2021 09:12 AM |
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NimoStar said:
But the same I believe in things like WH40K space marines, or CNC Generals "USA". They are factions practically designed to be as bland as possible... yet people love them anyways. I guess most of the public actually likes "Generic bland protagonist".
Well in WH40K all the factions are race-based anyway, and in CnC Generals, all the factions are based on one stereotyped culture.
Quote:
I'd rather have factions with some character, but that's just me...
I agree, 'variety is the spice of life' and all. A 'human' faction not based on Western Europe, or a Necropolis that is not distinctly evil would be quite interesting to see.
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted July 26, 2021 11:20 AM |
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Yes, most are race based, but fdor exmple the Tyranids have mnany different strains, the Tau have many auxiliary species and so on.
But people not only choose humanity more than all others, but from Humanity they don't pick something like the Mechanicus, but rather the most cookie cutter Space Marines available (and even within Space Marines, Ultramarines), showing they like the less flavorful option they can get (only thing blander is the Imperial Guard, and that's pretty popular too; I reckonpeople don't pick them as much because their lore is having low morale and dying a lot... and even then).
It would be interesting to give a cultural shakeup to the human faction in the Heroes series, for sure, to make them more interesting for once. Even something like an slavic feel would improve it. Honor russian and polish fans
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