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Heroes Community > Heroes 3.5 - WoG and Beyond > Thread: [Official Thread] HoMM 3: Horn of the Abyss - Announcements, Questions, Features
Thread: [Official Thread] HoMM 3: Horn of the Abyss - Announcements, Questions, Features This Super Thread is 548 pages long: 1 ... 70 71 72 73 74 ... 140 210 280 350 420 490 548 · «PREV / NEXT»
malax83
malax83


Famous Hero
Game ranger, HotA Player
posted July 18, 2014 06:06 PM
Edited by malax83 at 18:10, 18 Jul 2014.

Macron1 said:
malax83 said:
OMFG caravans in H4 is an evolution !


I think it's other side - it's an ugly croocked nail to save drastically slowed down map movement of heroes.


It s not about speed, everyone know some heroes skill are cheated (logistics). I m complaining cause while there s no supply to growth in castle AND an imbalanced army strenght which they are drastically (i use your own words) dependant from gold => SO there s no utility to merge castle while you can travel hired units by mass (worst again in H6). One purpose to explain it.

Now i know nobody wants H4 come back, so leadership and level heroes could ratio the amount of creatures u hire.

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ericoz
ericoz


Adventuring Hero
posted July 19, 2014 07:53 AM
Edited by ericoz at 08:00, 19 Jul 2014.

I must agree that hero chaining is kind of... dumb. Being able to trade a whole army between 5+ heroes always felt like a cheat to me. Even in multiplayer, when you have one or more hero with logistics specialty/expertise.
The same for being able to hire 8+ heroes in 2 or less weeks.

Mass spells being overpowered, I also agree... Also earth magic being better than all other schools of magic.

But these are minor issues in the game imo, the biggest problem I always face in HOMM3 are these, in order: eagle eye, learning, first aid, sorcery, ballistics and mysticism. 20%+ of the secondary skills in HOMM3 are utter useless. These are all must skip and the reason to avoid getting expert into a hero's secondary skill and risking yourself to learn one between two of these on the next level.

Also, the lack of fog of war after you leave a place. Being able to see the action on places without a dwelling/mine/town you own is just dumb, again.

If only HOMM4 wasn't a rushed, cheap and bad version of MOM, all the fixes they made into those things would shine in HOMM3...

Well, maybe it's just me...



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hippox89
hippox89


Famous Hero
posted July 19, 2014 09:46 AM
Edited by hippox89 at 12:08, 19 Jul 2014.

ericoz said:
I must agree that hero chaining is kind of... dumb. Being able to trade a whole army between 5+ heroes always felt like a cheat to me. Even in multiplayer, when you have one or more hero with logistics specialty/expertise.
The same for being able to hire 8+ heroes in 2 or less weeks.


Coordinating movement/creatures between multiple heroes is an art to master in HMM3. It adds depth and dynamic to the whole movement system.  Calling the concept 'cheating' is something I fail to understand, because setting up good chains is not 'free', it takes planning/coordinating. I don't have time to comment on logistics just right now.

ericoz said:

Also, the lack of fog of war after you leave a place. Being able to see the action on places without a dwelling/mine/town you own is just dumb, again.


HMM3 is not a RTS where you have control over a lot of individual units which you can use for keeping the fog at bay. I don't think fog of war has a place in HMM3. Disguise and Cover of Darkness are concepts that was meant to affects the shroud, or lack thereof, without having 3 layers of vision (FoW).

ericoz said:

If only HOMM4 wasn't a rushed, cheap and bad version of MOM, all the fixes they made into those things would shine in HOMM3...

Well, maybe it's just me...


It seems to me that HMM3 might just not be the right game for you. You seem to want to completely change core parts of the game.

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malax83
malax83


Famous Hero
Game ranger, HotA Player
posted July 19, 2014 12:35 PM
Edited by malax83 at 16:26, 19 Jul 2014.

hippox89 said:

Coordinating movement/creatures between multiple heroes is an art to master in HMM3. It adds depth and dynamic to the whole movement system.  Calling the concept 'cheating' is something I fail to understand, because setting up good chains is not 'free', it takes planning/coordinating. I don't have time to comment on logistics just right now.



OK.

To me, it s impoverishement regards to the awesome difference existing between races. In addition to focus army to one hero, the scouting direction is add linearly cause you can use the movement of previous hero; as Ericoz think too, i would like the movement / exploration system diffuse.

An art system is about feeling, it s not about carrying army in straight line.

In reality, HotA can t bring a thing cause the size map affect the game style.

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Sal
Sal


Famous Hero
posted July 19, 2014 02:42 PM

ericoz said:
Well, maybe it's just me...


hippox89 said:
It seems to me that HMM3 might just not be the right game for you. You seem to want to completely change core parts of the game.


This...


******
About eagle eye, learning, first aid, sorcery, ballistics and mysticism: it will be hard to add bonuses for each in order to give them enough priority, as for offense or armorer. Personally I would go instead for an "experience level" minimal requiring (sorta wog thing) where some ability is activated.  Example:

Starting with level 10, an hero with scouting expert will receive informations about all enemies heroes at starting of each turn. 2 hexes are magically revealed around all heroes and their position is known. Problem: will be a mess after a while as I see no way to restore fog of war over previous hexes.

Learning: the wog thing is great. In wog learning has a chance to give an extra primary skill on level up. This chance could be raised to 50%, so a level 20 hero with learning given very early will have 1/2 better stats. Then is worth investing in.

Or: A 10 level hero with expert learning can teach secondary skills to others. Example: you fail to get earth on your main but have it on a secondary hero with learning, get level 10 with then teach to the other.

First aid: Again, the wog thing seems to be a good idea. The tent can resurrect creatures each battle turn. Also in wog, the power of this action depends on how many tents you bought, is a matter of investment too.

Ballistic: considering that town battles are boring and people usually avoid them in MP, I think is enough good as it is. Vs AI is a great skill to have, being able to control the catapult thus block the castle gates allowed us epic battles on epic maps.

Mysticism: any mana refill below 100% is not worth. Mysticism should replenish your mana entirely, if you want it to be a selectable skill and count in your victory journey. To make it more attractive, could create might/magic patterns, for might heroes, it refills 50%, for magic heroes 100%.

Sorcery. In my opinion, this skill should give a great magic damage bonus to those going for, 200-300% more spell damage. The reason behind is that sorcery is rarely proposed to might heroes, so to get it you must go magic, thus suffer other important penalties on level ups. Still will be not attractive, damage spells proved to be a no go in H3, compared to physical damage.

*****
Completely aware that such changes look better and are probably easier to script in wog, but if you want those skills to ring a bell in players head when offered, you will really have to make them attractive and useful on a large scale.

Because there are already 8 skills which can ensure a victory.  Also one must pay attention to keep them compatible with the large collection of maps already designed, you may not want to have a special Heroes III for the <>10 or so HoTA maps designed.

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SkeleTony
SkeleTony


Hired Hero
posted July 19, 2014 02:58 PM
Edited by SkeleTony at 15:26, 19 Jul 2014.

ericoz said:
I must agree that hero chaining is kind of... dumb. Being able to trade a whole army between 5+ heroes always felt like a cheat to me. Even in multiplayer, when you have one or more hero with logistics specialty/expertise.
The same for being able to hire 8+ heroes in 2 or less weeks.

Mass spells being overpowered, I also agree... Also earth magic being better than all other schools of magic.

But these are minor issues in the game imo, the biggest problem I always face in HOMM3 are these, in order: eagle eye, learning, first aid, sorcery, ballistics and mysticism. 20%+ of the secondary skills in HOMM3 are utter useless. These are all must skip and the reason to avoid getting expert into a hero's secondary skill and risking yourself to learn one between two of these on the next level.

Also, the lack of fog of war after you leave a place. Being able to see the action on places without a dwelling/mine/town you own is just dumb, again.

If only HOMM4 wasn't a rushed, cheap and bad version of MOM, all the fixes they made into those things would shine in HOMM3...

Well, maybe it's just me...





I always get Ballistics for my attacking heroes. A must have skill for me. Probably something to do with my particular play style though. I imagine if a player is just routinely using armies of only flyers and sharpshooters or something then they may feel ballistics is useless but I like being able to get my melee guys through the gate of a town I am attacking immediately. I would not complain about the skill being tweaked to improve it's usefulness though.

EDIT: Forgot to add that, I do not play multi-player these days so I cannot comment on that aspect at all. But in single player games I think Necromancy has been cut way too much. It just seems like  after even massive battles where I lose a lot of troops the number of skeletons I get from necromancy is way too small and makes battles something to avoid until I can get a massive force of vampire lords, power liches, bone dragons etc.

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ericoz
ericoz


Adventuring Hero
posted July 20, 2014 12:25 AM
Edited by ericoz at 00:48, 20 Jul 2014.

hippox89 said:

Coordinating movement/creatures between multiple heroes is an art to master in HMM3. It adds depth and dynamic to the whole movement system.  Calling the concept 'cheating' is something I fail to understand, because setting up good chains is not 'free', it takes planning/coordinating. I don't have time to comment on logistics just right now.


Uhhh, it was already easy to chain heroes before and now with the new movement arrows system with the last HOTA update is even more automatic to do so. Just see where your hero movement ends and place another hero on the end of it. Doesn't seem like art to me, it's just a standard exploitation trick done by EVERY player (at least in MP) once you get how rewarding it is. Then you make your chain starting from your town(s) to get an army transported in one day to a hero that would take weeks to get back and return to where he was. Tweaking the chain according to towns and heroes is pure math, and gets boring as it grows.

The fog of war thing is about logic. What's up with you being an omnipresence in all places you've been? Kills the mistery knowing where your opp is all the time, how big is his movement range, what he's doing and even being able to see his army parcially. Makes scouting skill useless once you explored the place. A lot of turn-based games have fog of war, so your argument on RTS just doesn't make sense.

And I still come back for HOMM2, HOMM3, Jagged Alliance, Master of Magic/Orion, Dune, X-COM, ect. for the nostalgia and the strong points they had and still have. I'm pointing out personal experience I had with the game over the years. It has a lot of outdated concepts and unbalance. I barely play with friends online anymore. Still a great game. Also great to see a team working on it and improving it in such a great way (thanks HOTA crew ). Got me back into the game. But then I started seeing the same problems that at one point drifted me away from it. So you're probably right about it not being my game anymore.

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Storm-Giant
Storm-Giant


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
posted July 20, 2014 01:26 AM

From a theoretical point of view, you bring some fair points. BUT, maybe you should read the Openning Post before saying anything more. I'll quote for you the important part:

nik312 said:
Horn of the Abyss

Introduction
So, what is Horn of the Abyss?
HotA is a global add-on for Heroes of might and magic III that extends (and fixes if needed) classical gameplay elements and adds some of its own. On a more conceptual level – HotA is an attempt to continue legendary series RoE-AB-SoD as close to the original as it could have been done by NWC team, if only they had more desire, resources or even understanding of their own game. We try to keep classical h3 spirit in every tiny detail from code nuances to overall gameplay. Be welcome to check if we’ve succeeded


Heroes chaining and Fog of War are core parts of the game. Like them or hate them, HotA team won't change them.
____________

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ericoz
ericoz


Adventuring Hero
posted July 20, 2014 01:41 AM

I don't mind at all if they stay, as I mentioned before these are minor issues compared to the others I keep posting about (spells,secondary skills)

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hippox89
hippox89


Famous Hero
posted July 20, 2014 01:54 AM
Edited by hippox89 at 14:22, 20 Jul 2014.

ericoz said:
Uhhh, it was already easy to chain heroes before and now with the new movement arrows system with the last HOTA update is even more automatic to do so. Just see where your hero movement ends and place another hero on the end of it.


Well, I think you simplify it by the way you look at it. Sure setting up a straight chain can be easy enough, but it's also about planning ahead and thus maximizing your effective movement points spent each day, so that you'll advance your process at the game faster. For me, this isn't a piece of cake. It's a competing race and each move matters in the whole of things.I'm not a pro player by any means, and I honestly don't know what the average pro player thinks of the matter, but that's how I feel about it at this time.

Edit: I meant that I cannot speak as a pro player, but I phased it wrong, I think.

About what else you said, it's fair that you have your opinions, but I don't really have anything more to add to it.

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malax83
malax83


Famous Hero
Game ranger, HotA Player
posted July 20, 2014 08:27 AM

hippox89 said:

Well, I think you simplify it by the way you look at it. Sure setting up a straight chain can be easy enough, but it's also about planning ahead and thus maximizing your effective movement points spent each day, so that you'll advance your process at the game faster. For me, this isn't a piece of cake. It's a competing race and each move matters in the whole of things. I'm not a pro player by any means, and I honestly don't know what the average pro player thinks of the matter, but that's how I feel about it at this time.



Pro players think in terms of cost-effectiveness, not in penny-wise and pound foolish. While u re ahead by a few movement, they already have dragons to burn you, but i admit you take up HotA's cause.

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hippox89
hippox89


Famous Hero
posted July 20, 2014 10:21 AM
Edited by hippox89 at 14:27, 20 Jul 2014.

It's hardly the only factor that matters in setting two players apart in skills, of course, but it does matter. We can argue/have opinions about the extent thereof, and it depends on other factors, too. If you and your opponent have mastered coordinating with multiple heroes about equally then you'd be more worried about other factors which might give you an advantage or at least keep you from being at a disadvantage.

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blueskirt
blueskirt


Adventuring Hero
posted July 20, 2014 11:54 AM

Quote:
Uhhh, it was already easy to chain heroes before and now with the new movement arrows system with the last HOTA update is even more automatic to do so. Just see where your hero movement ends and place another hero on the end of it. Doesn't seem like art to me, it's just a standard exploitation trick done by EVERY player (at least in MP) once you get how rewarding it is. Then you make your chain starting from your town(s) to get an army transported in one day to a hero that would take weeks to get back and return to where he was. Tweaking the chain according to towns and heroes is pure math, and gets boring as it grows.


You may be only using hero chaining as a way to bring the units from your castle to the front line, but most pro players view hero chaining as a technique to efficiently defeat neutral monsters in a zone and flag/collect resources as quickly as possible. They bring the units from one front line to another and another and another and another...

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nik312
nik312


Promising
Famous Hero
posted July 20, 2014 04:28 PM
Edited by nik312 at 16:36, 20 Jul 2014.

Quote:
[Uhhh, it was already easy to chain heroes before and now with the new movement arrows system with the last HOTA update is even more automatic to do so. Just see where your hero movement ends and place another hero on the end of it. Doesn't seem like art to me, it's just a standard exploitation trick done by EVERY player (at least in MP) once you get how rewarding it is. Then you make your chain starting from your town(s) to get an army transported in one day to a hero that would take weeks to get back and return to where he was. Tweaking the chain according to towns and heroes is pure math, and gets boring as it grows.


Some people have already answered, but I will react anyway.

You probably just don't know how hard it is and how much thinking it needs to build a correct hero-chain. You seem to know only one type of chains - most simple ones, that require a day to build it and a whole day to realise its purpose from one side to another. But that is only a summit of the iceberg. To be effective enough you need to build chains:

a)Double-sided, that can go in and out in one day. Mostly needed, when taking something valuable behind a strong guard far-far away from your main hero (you can't afford wasting the whole day with main).

b)Improvised. Many times you won't be able to predict the need in a specific chain, so you will have to build and maybe even utilize it in one day from scratch. It can go horribly wrong if you miscalculate even one move, so you must have a lot of experience and intuition for this. Also, good players always try to position their heroes and plan their moves each day as if they would need some sort of chain on the next day. Maybe they won't, but it is always good to have that option. Of course it is quite hard to do it as you can't allow such precausions to ruin your ordinary map collection, but that is a part of an art.

c) Complex. Meaning that you don't have just two sides of the chain - the very start and the destination. Middle-lategame-chains are planned/improvised like this:
1st hero takes army from your Main hero, defeats the guard of some art and takes it on the last move. 2nd hero, that was just near that place takes the art&army to carry it to 3rd hero, which carries it to 4th hero, which takes off-road prison to free 5th hero, which will use his full move to take the army, take the highly guarded Earth Book and return it all to 4th hero. 4th one will continue its move to carry everything to 6th hero, leave army there (but not the Earth Book) and retreat from closest neutral guard. Then he is re-recruited in the tavern of your home town to deliver Earth Book (it is still with him, remember?) to one of your secondary mages with 100 mana and Expert Earth. That mage will TP to the closest town to your 6th hero (which still has all the army), hide to the garrison, hire one more hero, take the army back with the help of that hero, and then TP to another town closest to your Main hero (the one we left in the beggining of the day, remember?). Suddenly, you realise, that you already have 8 heroes on the map, so you dismiss the poor 3rd hero and recruit a new one in that town to carry everything to your main hero. Finally, your main hero advances with full army, Earth Book, one more art and full amount of movepoints. Was that simple or boring enough?

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Sal
Sal


Famous Hero
posted July 20, 2014 05:10 PM

Not to mention that any changes to your scouts army at the end of the turn will screw your tomorrow well planned chain if any speed penalty is created. Effective chaining is an art to learn.

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malax83
malax83


Famous Hero
Game ranger, HotA Player
posted July 20, 2014 06:20 PM

I think Tetris is more aritistic than chain in heroes 3...

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Sal
Sal


Famous Hero
posted July 20, 2014 06:30 PM

malax83 said:
I think Tetris is more aritistic than chain in heroes 3...


Have to give you credit on that, as I dunno what aritistic means.

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wond
wond

Tavern Dweller
posted July 20, 2014 06:47 PM

Simple curiosities:
1) Forge faction? distant future?
2) Better R-map generation on sea?
3) Monster turn icon Indicators?

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Storm-Giant
Storm-Giant


Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
posted July 20, 2014 06:52 PM

wond said:
Simple curiosities:
1) Forge faction? distant future?

Considering that Nik said earlier this week:

nik312 said:
Ehh.... WTF?? No, we are not. There was no major work on Forge recently. We've just collected our previous thoughts into one thread and sealed it with a note: "'till better days".

It's safe to asume is going to take a lot of time.
____________

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ericoz
ericoz


Adventuring Hero
posted July 21, 2014 12:46 AM

I tried to make it simple by giving a common example. All those kinds of chaining you mentioned were the same, connecting 2 heroes for a trade to pass army/artifacts. Leaving a hero in the middle of 2 objective points with his full movement between a bigger chain is just chaining too, but based on priorities. Also glad you mentioned earth spells, the only magic school  worth to be maxed in the game (unless you find a dimension door scroll early). Always keeping heroes with the stack of the fastest creature is also basics. And another exploitation you mentioned, hit and run to recruit again and pass artifacts on a chain, that's again just abuse of being able to recruit the same hero on the same day he ran away from a combat, a thing that makes no sense at all... How many times I had a minor army than my opp but would split my black dragons to hit and run armageddon him until I could crush his weakened army. You guys even had to fix it to not refresh the movement because it ruins the game. But it still works if they are close to your town.

Getting advantage on those game flaws can be clever, just like tricking stupid AI into getting a big stack of creatures killed  using a single pixie and fire wall spell.

And the bad thing is when you realize those things, they became the only optimal way to get advantage on the game, thus turning the game very linear. It's no strategy or art, it becomes a standard move for any player.

You have no options, if you don't make chains, you will lose the game.

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