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| Thread: HotA Secondary Skills Balance |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 4 5 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted January 08, 2014 06:44 PM |
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artu said:
Exactly! A new section replacing Heroes 3.5 that sub-categorizes Wog, Era, VCMI, HoTA as separate titles would really help clean things up and find things easier. Wog is outdated to be a main section.
I agree that WoG is outdated as a section title, and should be replaced with something like H3 Modding, but separating WoG, HotA, etc. would be too much fragmentation. And only Val can do it, as far as I know.
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Eccentric Opinion
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blueskirt
Adventuring Hero
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posted January 08, 2014 10:23 PM |
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I think I once proposed the same thing in a previous thread, namely that all secondary skills that I found useless get buffed, but then some of you helped me realize a couple thing, for one, that I had no idea how powerful some of the skills I didn't like were already (notably Artillery), secondly, many skills are situational, like Navigation or Pathfinding, and lastly, not all heroes are meant to be uber heroes. Some are meant to be scouts, some are meant to be mules, some are meant to be garrison leader... and no matter how buffed Scouting or Scholar are, you will never waste a slot on your uber hero to teach them those skills. Same goes for Logistics and Pathfinding for a garrison leader.
That being said, Learning needs a buff. Even in the ideal situation where you max it out on your third level, at no point during the course of the game, whether it is a small map or an extra large map, whether it is on a uber hero or a scout or a mule or a garrison leader or anything, will you get a bonus of any kind or an edge over your opponent that'll justify wasting one secondary skill slot and two skill advancement for it. It's been close to fifteen years and I am still amazed how New World Computing allowed this skill to make it into the game considering thirty minutes spend doing the math on a napkin are enough to show how useless it is.
As for Mysticism, I don't pick it up by choice, but the few times I had to play with Mysticism, it still managed to save my butt when I Dimension Doored on an island, or behind a dragon, to flag a mine or collect resources but discovered afterward I didn't have enough spell point to get out of there. That's about the only use I had for it. That said, it could use a buff to make it more useful and less situational.
As for Eagle Eye, the last time I used it it was in 1997 or 1998, during my first games of Heroes of Might and Magic II. I am afraid if it has any use, situational or not, I never encountered it. But just for the sake of driving the conversation forward, here's another idea for it. What if, if an opponent cast Haste or Bless at expert level, you had a chance of learning how to cast Haste or Bless at expert level, and this even if you do not have Expert Air or Water magic? OP? Useless for Magic heroes? Useless when the most important spells are cast on the world map? Yet another skill that favor Might heroes, as if they weren't powerful enough?
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Maurice
Hero of Order
Part of the furniture
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posted January 09, 2014 01:39 PM |
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Edited by Maurice at 13:41, 09 Jan 2014.
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I'm guessing one huge disadvantage to Eagle Eye is the fact that spells can be obtained through other means as well. Given the number of level 1 and 2 spells in a Mage Guild, it's easy to get most of them that way, especially after visiting a few towns. Magic Shrines are another source. Furthermore, once a spell is learned, it's one spell less that can still be obtained through it. In short, it nullifies itself through its own success and becomes less useful the more spells a Hero already knows.
The only way I could possible think of to make it useful in its current form would be through defining spells along spell schools and such, as is the case in HoMM V. But for HoMM III, such a school system isn't going to work.
The form as I proposed it is more useful to Might Heroes than Magic Heroes, while it's supposed to be a Magic skill. Another form that might be useful is to make it work like Scholar, only then with enemy Heroes: a Hero with Eagly Eye would be able to copy spells from the enemy, based on Eagle Eye skill level, akin to Scholar (only it's uni-directional, not bi-directional as Scholar is). This, however, doesn't provide a means for Heroes to make use of their Eagle Eye specialty. A small modification that would make the specialty useful in that respect would be to give it a chance for each spell to be learned at the start of combat and have specialty increase that chance - but that immediately reduces the value of the skill itself at the cost of that specialty. Or how about having those Heroes get +1 to their effective Eagle Eye skill level? That means they would be able to copy up to level 5 spells from the enemy.
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted January 09, 2014 01:46 PM |
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It looks to me like people are mostly complaining about having same skills path to follow, each game. Personally I see nothing wrong in that, having exactly same skills from a game to another does not at all means the game will be same or less complex.
Is how you use these skills effects which will make the difference.
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Era II mods and utilities
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Macron1
Supreme Hero
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posted January 09, 2014 02:08 PM |
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Edited by Macron1 at 14:10, 09 Jan 2014.
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Salamandre said:
It looks to me like people are mostly complaining about having same skills path to follow, each game. Personally I see nothing wrong in that, having exactly same skills from a game to another does not at all means the game will be same or less complex.
Is how you use these skills effects which will make the difference.
In VCMI, for example, some skills can be disabled for class of heroes.
So new heroes can be created, that don't have access to some skills. So nonpopular and snow skills can be rehabilitated, if their values/bonuses would be corrected/upped.
In WOG/ERA, i think, it can be made same.
So with help of new factions skills can be balanced and can be made popular on same level.
It will eliminate strategy to constantly pick up same types of skills and game will be more unpredictable.
This is good theme to gather ideas for mods.
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krs
Famous Hero
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posted January 09, 2014 07:31 PM |
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Maurice said:
The form as I proposed it is more useful to Might Heroes than Magic Heroes, while it's supposed to be a Magic skill./quote]
Here I think you are wrong. Might heroes use 2-3 crucial spells (Haste/Slow, Shield/Stoneskin) and usually have earth magic at expert. so blocking one of those spells is of huge importance!
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krs
Famous Hero
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posted January 09, 2014 07:43 PM |
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Salamandre said:
It looks to me like people are mostly complaining about having same skills path to follow, each game. Personally I see nothing wrong in that, having exactly same skills from a game to another does not at all means the game will be same or less complex.
Is how you use these skills effects which will make the difference.
People play the same 15/16 heroes over and over again. Usually barbarians that will learn the same skills every single game. I see a huge problem with that! So why not implement some of the buffs proposed here or elsewhere?
A lot of people were saying there was nothing wrong with necro, oblivious to the fact that nobody was allowing them in multiplayer. To address that, HotA not only implemented minor changes, but they HALVED! the whole thing, to balance it. Same with some of the other secondary skills... There will always be people that say even Eagle Eye or learning are good and that a +1 mana buff to mysticism would bring the game to its knees.
On the other side are people who want scholar to be on par with offence...
The scope of this thread is to make some skills somewhat more usefull, while not deviating too much from their original form.
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted January 09, 2014 08:02 PM |
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They don't play barbarians because they learn same skills, but because game is broken: might will always win over magic. And the best in might level up is barbarian.
Now for skills, I agree that changes could be done for single player, and those changes are already done in wog and parameterizable and so on. But for multiplayer, you won't find two people who will agree on same things, so this is beating a dead horse.
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Era II mods and utilities
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artu
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
My BS sensor is tingling again
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posted January 09, 2014 08:31 PM |
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Edited by artu at 20:33, 09 Jan 2014.
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Quote:
They don't play barbarians because they learn same skills, but because game is broken: might will always win over magic.
I think that's mostly because might heroes can be pretty decent spell casters, too. They can learn 5th level spells just like them, they can get expert magic schools just like them (some can't spawn water magic or fire magic but they can still learn it from witch huts, universities, conflux which aren't rare at all), so they can cast mass spells, they can use spell artifacts. Magic heroes, on the other hand can not engage in melee combat as good as magic heroes. It's unbalanced.
So what if your starting town has no mage guild L4 and L5, all you have to do is invade other player's town for a day, not even that, for a second.
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krs
Famous Hero
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posted January 09, 2014 08:47 PM |
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Edited by krs at 20:48, 09 Jan 2014.
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Salamandre said:
They don't play barbarians because they learn same skills, but because game is broken: might will always win over magic. And the best in might level up is barbarian.
Now for skills, I agree that changes could be done for single player, and those changes are already done in wog and parameterizable and so on. But for multiplayer, you won't find two people who will agree on same things, so this is beating a dead horse.
Nope. They might! like/get barbarians for their attack gain, but they are so good because of other reasons!
At level 18:
Knight 8/8
Overlord 8/7
Barbarian 11/6
The +3 attack and -2 defense (as to knights) does not make the barbarian OP. The 10% Navigation, 10% Leadership, 6%Estates, 8%Ballistics, 4%Water + other subtle differences, make Knights a hazard to level up. (and when I say % I mean aprox.)
As for multiplayer, the top elite will need more time to adjust to this, but at lower levels people are already playing it. What is not to love? You can play now a completely new faction (15 more creatures), + Necro + Conflux, you got 2 factions somewhat fixed Inferno + Tower. Besides you get, tons of banks and one conservatory, and loads of new artifacts... and lets not forgetting Bad Luck  .
My prediction is that in 1/2 a year the majority of tournament matches will be HotA.
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Warmonger
Promising
Legendary Hero
fallen artist
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posted January 09, 2014 09:52 PM |
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Quote:
They don't play barbarians because they learn same skills, but because game is broken: might will always win over magic.
I see that and propose boosting magic (heroes) here and there. Most of their specialties sucks balls. Most of arifacts and abilities in game give protection from magic rather than boost it. Finally, spell points are very limited (unlike H4 or H5, for example).
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The future of Heroes 3 is here!
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Salamandre
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Wog refugee
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posted January 09, 2014 10:26 PM |
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A simple borderline would have been to prohibit magic schools from might heroes. But now is too late, there are 10-20 players at max in WT and you don't revamp a whole game for a couple of dinosaurs.
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Hippox89
Famous Hero
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posted January 10, 2014 12:26 AM |
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Edited by Hippox89 at 02:30, 10 Jan 2014.
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Salamandre said:
Now for skills, I agree that changes could be done for single player, and those changes are already done in wog and parameterizable and so on. But for multiplayer, you won't find two people who will agree on same things, so this is beating a dead horse.
That's why we're so lucky to have a dedicated team that considers balance changes soberly and with neutrality. In the end, they decide what is balanced and what needs change, but they also listen to the community, of course.
Personally, I'm glad that HotA is making these tough choices for us. It's not a easy job to make balance changes. Nothing is truly balanced, however, or should be, but HotA makes a mark in the stone and then we'll have to adapt to the changes they make.
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krs
Famous Hero
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posted January 10, 2014 06:33 PM |
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Quote:
I see that and propose boosting magic (heroes) here and there. Most of their specialties sucks balls. Most of arifacts and abilities in game give protection from magic rather than boost it. Finally, spell points are very limited (unlike H4 or H5, for example).
First steps are in the skill proposals already: Reducing Expert offense 5%, Improving Sorcery 5%, improving mysticism and making eagle eye useful (These are Magic Heroes skills) also from learning magic heroes will benefit more than magic ones (because they have it and because they could have the skill slots for that).
They would also benefit from some some spell changes (hypnotize could use some buffs).
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Hobbit
Supreme Hero
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posted January 10, 2014 07:21 PM |
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Warmonger said:
Finally, spell points are very limited (unlike H4 or H5, for example).
How about giving all of magic heroes (except for Conflux and maybe Dungeon ones) +1 to Knowledge (Warlocks would get bonus in Spell Power to make them more different from Elementalists)? That would be some kind of boost and it won't change the game that much.
Also, some kind of major artifact which prevents all magic-blocking stuff (like Orb of Inhibition, Dispel and Anti-Magic spells, magic resistance etc.) would be nice too. But that's more of a wish than a real solution.
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Horn of the
Abyss on AcidCave
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krs
Famous Hero
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posted January 11, 2014 09:37 AM |
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+1 knowledge will just benefit secondary heroes. You will just equip them with 7 1 stacks and shoot away 30 dmg Magic arrows.
For main heroes will mean just 2 more spells... That is nothing, when you do 3-4 battles a day. (That is why I proposed mysticism to kick in after each battle). Keep in mind that in MP it is too expensive to spend a full day in a town. That +1 knowledge will not help much.
The idea of some artifact negating Orb of inhibition of Cloak is good since those 2 alone are 100% GG for a magic hero. Include this part maybe in eagle eye?
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Macron1
Supreme Hero
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posted January 11, 2014 11:05 AM |
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Another idea to balance mages and might heroes through commander:
might heroes will receive non-shooting commanders, mage heroes wil receive shooting commanders. so on early stages it will be more preferable to take mage heroes (shooters are vital on first weeks), so there will be more possibility to level up them.
Secondary skills can also give special bonuses to commanders.
For example, Archery will make commander shoot twiste, Mysticism will give commander ability to reduce spell costs for hero.
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RerryR
Promising
Supreme Hero
Researching Magic
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posted January 11, 2014 11:58 AM |
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Maurice said:
The form as I proposed it is more useful to Might Heroes than Magic Heroes, while it's supposed to be a Magic skill./quote]
Here I think you are wrong. Might heroes use 2-3 crucial spells (Haste/Slow, Shield/Stoneskin) and usually have earth magic at expert. so blocking one of those spells is of huge importance!
Ofc everybody has his own playstyle, but somewhere here is the truth!
Casting mass slow+shield is so important and easy obtainable, even by might heroes, making them so strong in the end.
Since WOG and Stack Experience every creature has additional HP making direkt dmg spells much more useless than before. +some magic resist artefacts and you are safe
My suggestions based on WOG and my playstyle:
might heroes have no access to expert magic (or cant cast mass spells) (hughe gamebreaker i know, but consider a fight between 50att/50def might hero vs 20att/20def magic hero)
or:
dramatically buff spell dmg to an amount that its worth casting that spell instead of mass stoneskine or mass bless
there are already some buffed artefacts since WOG(which i realy like by the way) which give +% spell dmg increase these even further
or:
allow magic heroes to cast twice per round! (hughe gamebreaker again i know) to balance it a bit out make some rules: pure magic heroes a able to cast twice when lvl 20 and thrice when lvl 50
subclases like druid or whatever can cast twice when lvl 30
also (dont know if even possible) not every spell can be cast twice in combat, e.g. only one defense spell+one attack spell per round allowed. blind, berserk, hypnosis(lol) and similar, can only be cast once!
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krs
Famous Hero
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posted January 11, 2014 02:00 PM |
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Macron1 said:
Another idea to balance mages and might heroes through commander:
might heroes will receive non-shooting commanders, mage heroes wil receive shooting commanders. so on early stages it will be more preferable to take mage heroes (shooters are vital on first weeks), so there will be more possibility to level up them.
Secondary skills can also give special bonuses to commanders.
For example, Archery will make commander shoot twiste, Mysticism will give commander ability to reduce spell costs for hero.
Yeah but that is commanders, which is another kind of heroes 3. these suggestions are for minor changes that still keep the original heroes 3 feeling. With few exceptions we try to leave the skills like they were (+/- some stats). And even on those exceptions we try to stay in the same area (Even the new proposed Eagle Eye should remain a skill spell oriented, that gives (or takes) spells).
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krs
Famous Hero
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posted January 11, 2014 02:19 PM |
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@RerryR.
It crossed my mind to let magic heroes cast 2 times, but then you will never stop balancing. It will just be too much damage. And from my feeling magic heroes are not 2X worse than might ones ATM. If your barbarians stack of 15 Ancient Behemoths get in their face a 4k Implosion... you will end up with exactly 2. Suddenly your barbarian does not look so tough anymore, with all the shields and slows.
Here some of the problems magic heroes have:
- Not enough spell points. You have many battles and you just do not have the spell point without some objects on the map
- Orb of inhibition / recanters cloack / GG the moment the oponent has them. And on a large map with some utopias it is very/VERY likely you will get at least one of them.
- Magic heroes have a hard time against magic immune guards, or Utopias. And they are a must! If your damage is mainly Magical how will you kill those dragon guards?
Only when these are addressed will magic heroes stand a chance.
So:
- give magic heroes a more reliable source of spell points (mysticism chnage).
- Nerf or add some artifacts that negate somehow the effects of orb/cloak
- Add some spells that negate dragons immunity (or some similar mechanism)
Also I had once a proposition to limit might heroes to their max town mageguild. this means that magic heroes will go around with DD, Fly, TP and stuff like that and will catch up in endgame on those "stupid" uber might heroes.
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