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| Thread: Rough town rating |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 4 5 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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Zenofex
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Kreegan-atheist
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posted July 02, 2011 07:51 PM |
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With dominant cores, marksmen will overpower both cyclopes and centaurs in damage dealing, especially with flawless assault and guardian angel support. It doesn't take really much atm, maybe 1-2 external dwellings and maybe an extra converted castle, to make elites completely irrelevant compared to cores.
While maulers are definitively strong, you can't skip the fact that haven can simply abuse guardian angel and praetorians' bulk and protective talents to postpone blocking their main force until at least several turns have passed, during which it's extremely possible the combined assault of marksmen and vestals (which through magical attack score more damage then they in theory should). If the haven plays smart and gets blazing glory in both castles, you will also have to face a very annoying stack of "furies" of their own, with the ability to blind your stacks.
This might change if the pace of leveling is fixed; +10 attack is no joke (reminds me of ultimate artifacts from heroes II...) allowing stronghold for more successful damage dealing, but right now with "fast" setting it's not really possible to get to level 10 when playin a 1v1, even on XL map, unless you both specifically agree to delay combat until reaching that level.
We agreed, for test purposes, to delay combat until we both have more than five upgraded champion creatures, and it still happened when we had a puny herolevel 8.
Marksmen alone can't handle Goblins, Centaurs and Cyclopes alone and currently they aren't easy to guard either. In a proper late game there should be some strong remedy for turtles - like AoE spells but seeing how pathetic the basic durect-damage spells are in general, I guess this will require a major boost of their efficiency. Right now I see Guardian Angel as the greatest problem as the ability just screams "come to me noobs!" Making it reasonable should fix a few things (not all mind you). The damage output of Stronghold is very high though while Haven can't really advertise the same about its creatures so it should be mainly a matter of disrupting their formation as soon as possible and killing as many of their damage-dealers - the Glories and the Marksmen - as possible. I might actually check it against myself later (nobody available for hotseat unfortunately).
By the way I hope Broken Alliance is not indeed a XL map - it looks like L at best.
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xerox
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 02, 2011 08:14 PM |
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I think that UbiHole really shot themself in the head when including three healing and one ressurection abilities for creatures, three defensive racials where one functions like healing and ressurection and then two healing spells accessable at level 1 with mass version upgrades
but I do not think the healing spells are nearly as powerful as the Renewal of the Tides ability or whatever its called
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Over himself, over his own
body and
mind, the individual is
sovereign.
- John Stuart Mill
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Doomforge
Admirable
Undefeatable Hero
Retired Hero
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posted July 02, 2011 09:33 PM |
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]Marksmen alone can't handle Goblins, Centaurs and Cyclopes alone and currently they aren't easy to guard either.
Sure they can. Goblins are too weak and have range penalty, Centaurs are betrayed by the fact they belong to elite tier, and cyclopes are betrayed by the fact they belong to champion tier 
So most of the time you won't have any cyclopes at all (too expensive) and not enough centaurs to be a threat. Goblins can't do jack **** to marksmen considering their:
1. very high HP (30)
2. Prateorian stack near taking 50% damage dealt to them away
and the fact goblins have range penalty effectively means 25% damage to them while marksmen do 100% damage.
Aren't easy to guard? piercing shot doesn't hurt friendly stacks adjacent to them, even if they are in the line of fire. So - with tactics skill they are very easy to guard, just put them behind pratorian wall.
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In a proper late game there should be some strong remedy for turtles - like AoE spells but seeing how pathetic the basic durect-damage spells are in general, I guess this will require a major boost of their efficiency. Right now I see Guardian Angel as the greatest problem as the ability just screams "come to me noobs!" Making it reasonable should fix a few things (not all mind you). The damage output of Stronghold is very high though while Haven can't really advertise the same about its creatures so it should be mainly a matter of disrupting their formation as soon as possible and killing as many of their damage-dealers - the Glories and the Marksmen - as possible. I might actually check it against myself later (nobody available for hotseat unfortunately).
I agree that spells are pathetic, however, breaking a formation of praetorians that protect one another takes AGES. And vestals ressurect them, too. If marksmen can score a hit against two stacks of yours (which isn't even that hard with battlefield being rather small assuming you have 7 stacks, some of which are big...), they are (currently, assuming external dwellings captured but since we have 1 map which has external dwellings, we may say it's a given for beta) the strongest damage dealer in the game, so I don't know where have you came with the "can't really advertise the same" line  Think of it as extra attack(s) for marksmen that have piercing/no range penalty too, and benefit greatly from flawless assault skill.
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By the way I hope Broken Alliance is not indeed a XL map - it looks like L at best.
It looks small, but try to cross it from one end to another... expect two-three weeks of travel ;D
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We reached to the stars and everything is now ours
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Zenofex
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Kreegan-atheist
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posted July 02, 2011 10:18 PM |
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Edited by Zenofex at 22:53, 02 Jul 2011.
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OK, I'll make one game against myself and see how it goes.
Edit: That is if I figure out how to add a second human player... It won't be today anyway.
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alcibiades
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
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posted July 02, 2011 11:17 PM |
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We haven't picked any exp from chests at all because if we did, there would be no gold for creatures and their ridiculously expensive dwellings. It took us roughly 1/3 of the map cleaned per player (along with gold mine and endless pack of gold) to be able to buy full populations (including champions) at sixth week. Well, excluding my stronghold game in which I had insufficient funds to buy cyclopes and their dwelling wasn't upgraded.
Possibly because the two times I played Broken Alliance I had week of plague in week 2 and week of gold in week 3, I always had plenty of Gold, so maybe that was why I could pick XP from chests.
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What will happen now?
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Nelgirith
Promising
Supreme Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 12:07 AM |
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OK, I'll make one game against myself and see how it goes.
Edit: That is if I figure out how to add a second human player... It won't be today anyway.
Click on the swords to remove either of player 1/2/3 then click on the + and click that weird stuff that probably means "add human player"
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Doomforge
Admirable
Undefeatable Hero
Retired Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 11:09 AM |
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We started a game yesterday and I must admit Elvin was right.
Regeneration does work and it changes everything...
My town ratings may change because this time, playing stronghold, I took the external dwelling (protected by 15 sissy breeder mothers) in 1st week thanks to regeneration (without loses) and hence I'm at 45 upgraded furies at 2nd week... lol. This is completely different from my clumsy barbarian start. Also, playing a magic hero now. My mate plays necro (we watch eachself as we testplay) and wth, necro's good. So much healing, even your damn racial is in fact a resurrection spell, lol. This might be the easiest faction to rush others and break through protected places.
We also asked another guy to play as inferno, but he's a bit newby, so we're telling him what to do. So far I am not impressed, though, inferno just doesn't feel as "carefree" as regeneration-stronghold or necropolis. Lilims are good because of their ridiculously good special ability and regeneration helps a lot to prevent loses but once you encounter mind-immune or undead creeps, it's no longer that easy. The guy couldn't get the external dwelling for instance because it's protected by undead which cannot be put to sleep.
Once we have 6+ champions, well make a save and I will upload the save with all three heroes next to each other, by the way, so you can play a big hotseat battle yourself to see what's good and what sucks.
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We reached to the stars and everything is now ours
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 11:31 AM |
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Then he plays foolishly. Believe me, playing Inferno isn't worse than the rest whether with undead or not, and you do not even have to upgrade your Succubi in week 1. If you play highest levelling, which you should do, if you want to see level-ups in these skirmishes, it's the same procedure than with the others, except that the three healer factions most of the time don't need the Hero to cast a spell.
By the way, you shouldn't have been able to beat the Breeders without losses, because in theory Breeders and Glories are the bad guys whose inflicted losses are permanent or can be made permanent. The only way to avoid this is slapping Reinforcements onto the attecked stack.
Anyway. The game COULD be fun, if...
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Zenofex
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Kreegan-atheist
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posted July 03, 2011 11:41 AM |
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Edited by Zenofex at 11:45, 03 Jul 2011.
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Splitting the Lilim into a few stacks so you can manipulate the neutrals solves part of the problem but is not a remedy for the overall impotence of the faction. The Lilim have low Initiative which puts you in disadvantage against high-init shooters and as you mentioned, the immune creatures just can't be treated this way. What I don't get is why the other two Cores are so weak? The Maniac has a single "ability", which is passive and - guess what - is also given to every Necropolis creature by default in addition to the real abilities that it has. The Hell Hound just dies - that's what it does best. Every neutral attacks it, having little problems targeting something of this size and kills it pretty quickly, given the lowly HP and defense. In return you have another set of passive abilities which require the damn thing to be alive and in large numbers to be of any use.
Anyway, assuming that you can handle the neutrals around your starting position, the question "what next?" follows. With an utterly useless shooter and two melee creatures which deal equally good damage to the enemy and to your own forces - or are left with simple point-and-click functions - you have some of the worst Elites in general. The Champion has some use but it's not even worth upgrading as it receives + 10 HP, a little extra defense and one useless ability and - as every champion except maybe the Cyclops - can't do much on its own.
By the way I don't understand how Gating works. Once I gate 2 Lilim out of 40, some other time 20 Demented out of 110 with the same level of the ability.
Quote:
Click on the swords to remove either of player 1/2/3 then click on the + and click that weird stuff that probably means "add human player"
I think I tried that but it added another AI. Maybe it's some mini puzzle-game, you need to click the right combo of buttons to add a human player. Those naughty devs...
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DIEGIS
Supreme Hero
power of Zamolxis
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posted July 03, 2011 11:46 AM |
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Edited by DIEGIS at 11:54, 03 Jul 2011.
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Inferno earlygame is actually pretty decent. Lilim surrounded by maniac single unit stacks(tactics) and firebolt work nicely?!?!, master of fire is another sweet perk and pressed attack as soon as you hit lvl 5  You may lose the occasional maniac but that's about it, hellhounds I avoid using for fear of casualties  The new enthrall helps a lot.
quote]
About Inferno, my impression was:
a) fire specials are very weak for them!
b) regen for inferno? ... seems odd, even if it was nice to use it in H5; is nice and the only way to keep ur troops alive even now
c) late gating works good
d) lilim ability is quite good
e) non upg Pit Fiend sux ....and so on...
I think its one of weakest faction!
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dacian falx behind you
-knowledge itself is power-
www.cabinet-dentaire-malaunay.fr
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 12:58 PM |
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I think, that you are not playing the Inferno correctly. This factiin plays different from the rest, und you have to take the right abilities to support the faction. All upgraded Inferno troops deal massive damage, and the BA map is played and won with Cores. It's no map to get a real picture about Elites and Champions - they simply do not count.
There is a noteworthy exception here (I'm ot sure whether they are comparable cases, but I will check that). When you create Heroes, for Necro you can take the specialty "+3 Liches". I tried that on Hard and built not only the three Cores but Liches as well in week 1, so I had NINE Liches on day 8, which would have been amazing, except that I had a ton of Cores also, so while the 9 Liches as such were quite good (and with upgrade and Wall I would get another 10 Liches on day 15), that was just ONE Elite - THREE would be needed in that quantities to compete with the Cores here.
On Broken Alliance it makes no sense to build Elites. Haven has so nice ones - but who needs them on that map with all those cores?
The same is true for Inferno. The Cores deal so much damage, once upgraded and supported with the right abilities.
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Doomforge
Admirable
Undefeatable Hero
Retired Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 01:04 PM |
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Also, bloodlust is currently giving more like +100% damage for three turns. Try it on your biggest core damage dealer and watch the damage skyrocket... It made my furies, doing 200-300 damage per turn, move to 400-700 damage. Lol. A must have spell, definitively.
I agree that there's 0 sense in getting elites, not mentioning champions, atm. Just convert all the externals you can get and try to get a second castle. Your cores will quickly jump to hundreds (actually it's doable in third week to have a hundred of each core, assuming their base growth permits it) whereas elites will be maybe 5-10.
External dwellings are the first thing that needs fixing, they should offer 50% of what they offer now (plus elite/champion buffs.)
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We reached to the stars and everything is now ours
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Zenofex
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Kreegan-atheist
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posted July 03, 2011 01:12 PM |
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Edited by Zenofex at 13:16, 03 Jul 2011.
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Quote:
I think, that you are not playing the Inferno correctly. This factiin plays different from the rest, und you have to take the right abilities to support the faction. All upgraded Inferno troops deal massive damage, and the BA map is played and won with Cores. It's no map to get a real picture about Elites and Champions - they simply do not count.
What are you talking about - this is supposedly a XL map, the largest you can get! If you don't need Elites and Champions on it, where would you need them? On a S-sized map?  The external dwellings and their influence have nothing to do with the balance of the factions in general.
Moreover nobody is playing the map to "win" it. As you can see people are concerting a game where they fight after a specific time - at least X level hero with Y of each creature and so on. This is with the sole purpose to test the balance. Even against the AI you can do the same, it's not too bright anyway and it will leave you develop a strong hero with a large army + a large number of Champions.
"The right abilities to support the faction" just proves how bad the balance is. You have a choice between a few dozens of abilities with each level-up and... what - you have to choose certain ones because otherwise you can't do sh*t? You need Regeneration to do what Haven, Necropolis and Sanctuary do much more efficiently with their healers. You need some Haste to be able to deal with archers, otherwise large numbers of them will decimate you. And so on.
As for the high damage - come on! The only creatures which deal high damage are the Cerberus - which just can't wait to die, the Lacerator - which is equally prone to heavy losses and to some extent the Juggernaut - which just hits and does nothing else, without being especially tough itself. Stronghold has better damage-dealers and the means to increase their damage output even more, not to mention that these better damage-dealers are also tougher.
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 01:35 PM |
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What are YOU talking about? XL-Map? Are you kidding? Medium Skirmish-map, a copy of an old map.
It's made for early encounters and ahould be won in 2 months. Due to the high amount of available Cores, Elites play no role - you CANNOT test them against the AI.
Even if you disable all AI players, and play only the 3 human positions, alone or real Hot Seat, and even if you do NOT take the outside Core dwellings in leave them alone, the map is still too small - you can have easily contact before the end of week 2.
So for a conclusive test there isn't either room or time - the map isn't that useful for those kinds of tests.
Quote:
The right abilities to support the faction" just proves how bad the balance is. You have a choice between a few dozens of abilities with each level-up and... what - you have to choose certain ones because otherwise you can't do sh*t? You need Regeneration to do what Haven, Necropolis and Sanctuary do much more efficiently with their healers. You need some Haste to be able to deal with archers, otherwise large numbers of them will decimate you. And so on.
The game isnt called strategy game because can close your eyes, pick any ability and win. So your point is absurd. OF COURSE you should have pick some before others depending on your faction, the map, the opponent, the situation...
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DIEGIS
Supreme Hero
power of Zamolxis
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posted July 03, 2011 01:40 PM |
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Edited by DIEGIS at 13:55, 03 Jul 2011.
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Quote:
I think, that you are not playing the Inferno correctly. This factiin plays different from the rest, und you have to take the right abilities to support the faction. All upgraded Inferno troops deal massive damage, and the BA map is played and won with Cores. It's no map to get a real picture about Elites and Champions - they simply do not count.
Quote:
You missunderstand me. I finished the map with lvl 20+ hero
It just happened to see that the overall fire dmg made it with spells and so on isnt that great regarding the fact that inferno couldnt boost their troops (for creeping purposes) as well as necro or heaven for instance, is doing. In big battles, they will loose creatures, not a chance for resurect them, except for reputation abilities (which is very late) and ofc regen (Tear ability...what happ if Ill choose for Blood...!)
EDIT...forgot about reinforcement II whch is not working
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dacian falx behind you
-knowledge itself is power-
www.cabinet-dentaire-malaunay.fr
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 01:59 PM |
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You see that the wrong way round.
The game is completely dominated by the fact that "Heal" and "Regeneration", including the Sisters ability, the Priestesses ability and the Ghosts's ability, do what they with RESURRECTION effectg which isn't a matter of course.
Imagine Sisters/Priestesses, at least the unupgrade ones only healing/regenerating the wounds of the top creatures, as well as the tier 1 spell-abilities, and imagine a complete turnaround of the Ghosts Wail (deal damage to the targeted enemy stack and have an animation effect on adjacent friendly units), and things start to look DECIDEDLY different
As it is, with the healer factions being effortlessly able to go through without losses, the other two factions have to do it as well, which forces them into a certain development direction. You basically HAVE TO play magic heroes OR create a hero with the +40 Mana special to be able to cast those spells, and THAT is pretty obviously the root of all "evil" here.
At this point it's pretty easy, actually: either they keep those resurrection effects, then the game will be boring because everyone will be buys resurrecting their troops and cry fool as soon as a unit is lost. This means automatically that creature stacks that do unresurrectable damage will be the Druids of H 6: woe to the player who gets them as neutrals, because he may actually lose a creature. Or they will debuff them to non-ressurrective, at least for basic creatures and tier 1 abilities, in which case this may easily become an interesting game.
Until then strengtzh comparisons are pretty pointless, because they amount to the simple question how much resurrection power a faction can amass.
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Zenofex
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Kreegan-atheist
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posted July 03, 2011 02:04 PM |
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What are YOU talking about? XL-Map? Are you kidding? Medium Skirmish-map, a copy of an old map.
Is that why it says "Extra-Large" in the menu screen?
Quote:
It's made for early encounters and ahould be won in 2 months. Due to the high amount of available Cores, Elites play no role - you CANNOT test them against the AI.
Look, I already told you that the AI leaves you be. That's it, it does nothing against you, except if its army is vastly superior to yours. Of course you can test the Elites and the Champions.
Quote:
Even if you disable all AI players, and play only the 3 human positions, alone or real Hot Seat, and even if you do NOT take the outside Core dwellings in leave them alone, the map is still too small - you can have easily contact before the end of week 2.
Which part of "you can agree to fight after X weeks just to test the creatures and the abilities" you didn't understand? Of course that's not how a real game will develop but that's the only map we have for the beta. Where else are we supposed to test the balance? In the tutorials?
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The game isnt called strategy game because can close your eyes, pick any ability and win. So your point is absurd. OF COURSE you should have pick some before others depending on your faction, the map, the opponent, the situation...
Yeah, yeah, all other factions can choose whatever they want because they are not handicapped by default but THIS ONE is forced to be "strategical" and follow a certain perfect template which only helps you be weaker than the others and not hopelessly doomed (but leaning toward the latter). What kind of balance is this? And what's the point in having a gazillion available abilities which you'll never use? They might as well disable the choice altogether and provide the faction with those abilities that it will pick anyway. Pure fun, that's how the sixth edition of the best TBS should look like!
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DIEGIS
Supreme Hero
power of Zamolxis
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posted July 03, 2011 02:06 PM |
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Edited by DIEGIS at 14:06, 03 Jul 2011.
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for Jolly...theres nothing new ure telling me....anyway we.ll see what happ if im playing necro, and you inferno 
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dacian falx behind you
-knowledge itself is power-
www.cabinet-dentaire-malaunay.fr
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 03, 2011 03:01 PM |
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Zenofex, do you believe it, when a tooltip says to you that an ability does 32 damage for 32 turns? If not, why do you believe XL, when your general feeling says that if that is XL, how would S look? 10x10 squares?
Anyway, it doesn't make sense to demand strengthening of a faction that is fun to play, when it's the others that need to be weakened. Or are you keen on playing a game that will never cost you a creature except in some arranged end fight?
When you play Stronghold and Inferno how they are supposed to be played - after all we are talking about demons and half demons that should concentrate on attacking and slaughtering and not on Healing and Resurrecting - and leave the crappy resurrection nonsense out, you may not be competetive compared with the other 3, since you will lose units, but as long as it lasts and as long as you can play that way, it's fun.
Conversely, especially Haven is NOT fun, because combat is long, boring and repetitive - if the opposition isn't fleeing, that is.
Sanctuary and Necro are a bit different due to their slightly different mechanics, but both are boring as well after some time.
So why are you so keen on having 5 boring factions, instead of 5 interesting ones? If you ask me, Inferno is the best-balanced faction, and if it was me, I would for them change only what I would change generally: there shouldn't be any Elites with a base production of 2 (minimum 3), Cores need a slight HP reduction of something that will see the best HP value of them at 30, while Champs need a 50% damage boost and a slight HP boost as well.
Add to that non-resurrectiveness of initial spells and basic cores, and you'll have a generally not so badly balanced game. If that is done, you can start balancing, but currently the fact that some Cores dominate in numbers AND abilities makes any balancing illusional.
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Elvin
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
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posted July 03, 2011 03:43 PM |
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Pretty much. I am all for blood to stand on its own without requiring healing, that said I would like a few blood abilities that can help avoiding losses in creeping. Better yet improve certain offensive blood spells/abilities to the point that you do not risk losing army without having to depend on healing.
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