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Sligneris
Supreme Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 07:39 AM |
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"The truth always begins with a heresy" - Sandro
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Maurice
Hero of Order
Part of the furniture
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posted April 14, 2015 08:26 AM |
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Edited by Maurice at 08:26, 14 Apr 2015.
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Dave_Jame said:
Another point I noticed is that people call the skill system limiting. It i smaller then H5's but not that much 13 v 10 skills. With 2 Skills beeing not as developed, but looking at H5 again each class had a skill with very limited abilities.
No, you're wrong here. As far as we know by now, H7 will have 30 skills, of which 6 are Racial skills. That leaves 24 "standard" skills. Of those, each Hero is locked out of 15 right from the get-go, while locked into the remaining 9 (not counting the Racial skill here, which is the 10th).
In Heroes5, the only unavailable skill to any Hero was the Racial of the other factions. In Heroes7, there are 15 "standard" skills that are unavailable to any given Hero on top of that Racial skill exclusion.
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Steyn
Supreme Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 08:31 AM |
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Edited by Steyn at 08:38, 14 Apr 2015.
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What I missed the most in the H6 skill system and what I see is missing again in H7 are prerequisites from other skills. Examples are the ability cold steel from the attack tree, which only unlocks when you are master of ice and twilight, which required both light and dark magic (and the fallen knight ability). I liked the way these abilities made some combinations of skills more powerful.
Of course enough has been said on race specific abilities already, but I just would like to agree that they are really important for giving each faction its own flavour. In H6 they all felt the same, because apart from the forbidden magic schools and the might/magic distinction every hero could get exactly the same skills. Which is boring.
And what Maurice said. Being locked out of so many skills from the get-go feels really limiting and it is indeed very annoying not being able to get offence with your stronghold might hero or with your offensive academy magic hero.
Zombi_Wizzard said:
If in H5, Dark Magic would show to Haven hero one game out of 100, in H7 it will never show. This is all that fuss is about. And I don't care.
It is even worse. The chance for a knight to get dark magic is as large as the chance to get light (8%).
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Avirosb
Promising
Legendary Hero
No longer on vacation
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posted April 14, 2015 08:35 AM |
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God, the "Racials".
Such a dumb name for a decent enough mechanic.
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Zombi_Wizzard
Famous Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 08:38 AM |
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Maurice said:
No, you're wrong here. As far as we know by now, H7 will have 30 skills, of which 6 are Racial skills. That leaves 24 "standard" skills. Of those, each Hero is locked out of 15 right from the get-go, while locked into the remaining 9 (not counting the Racial skill here, which is the 10th).
In Heroes5, the only unavailable skill to any Hero was the Racial of the other factions. In Heroes7, there are 15 "standard" skills that are unavailable to any given Hero on top of that Racial skill exclusion.
Yes, but that was only on paper. In reality, I could count the number of times light magic, for example, has poped up on my Necropolis hero, on fingers of my one hand. And that was atleast several dozens of games I played with Necro hero. So certain skills were in effect locked out in H5 aswell. It was just soft lock instead of hard lock.
Sure you may argue, that this allows you to surprise oponent one game out of 100 ... and I agree it can be fun, but how realistic it is that someone might pick light magic, for instance when his/her hero is already high level, AND has active Dark magic + Summoning magic combo going on ? Some skills are worth only when/if you are low enough level, and have not yet comited to one strategy.
H3 was way better. No prerequisites, and you could have realistic chances to get any of the skills, regardless of your faction.
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Steyn
Supreme Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 08:49 AM |
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Imo such a 'soft lock' is still thousand times better than a real lock. The heroes 5 systems allows for wizards to get logistics, offence and defence, even though the chances are very slim. This even makes some heroes quite interesting starting heroes, as they already start with such a rare skill.
Besides, the chances are not that small. Because you always get to choose one advanced an one new skill the relative chance to obtain a rare skill is not so bad. Especially not once you have already leaned a few of the high chance skills.
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alcibiades
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
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posted April 14, 2015 09:22 AM |
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Zombi_Wizzard said:
fuChris said:
Problem is that despite having 3 different hero types they will all end up with the same build. Always.
No, because this is where random skills comes in. If you play with non-random skill option, yes, this is exactley what will happen. Thik about it this way. 60 skills are available, and only half of those will you be able to get. Which ones will it be ... dice will be thrown when you level. So there will be diferent combinations each time you play, altho I admit, because there is seperate wheels for each class, instead of comon one for all classes, the same combinations of skills will pop up more often.
Now with H5 Ultimates. If you go for Ultimate, you are avoiding randomness. Yes. If you wan't to get Ultimate skill, in H5, randomness is not an asset, since you are ACTIVELY WORKING to PLAN BUILD IN ADVANCE. In other words, you are not embracing a random skills, but are figuring out a way to pick what you want. Randomness only serves to screw you out of your victory. It serves to annoy you, when you want that ultimate.
Oh ... what is that? You get Ultimate with no planing to what you pick? By shere luck you pick right skills, and Ultimate pops up? Yea. I belive you. I also belive you won a lottery 100 times in a row. 
But forget Ultimate. H5 worked like this: There were Skills, which had 3 decent perks each. Then IN ADITION, they had 4'th, 5'th and sometimes 6'th HIDDEN perk that was awsome. You realy wanted that. So you went online on celestial haven, downloaded the skill-wheel app, and PLANED what you wanted. You never want 3 of the basic perks. Screw that. You want triple flaming balista, teleport assault, power of speed, warlock's luck etc.
Ofcourse you knew, that skills are random, which means you will not get what you want. This created several options for you to begin with. For instance: If war machine pops up, ima aim for tripple balista, if I get attack, I'm gonna try to gab power of speed ... etc. Also, you knew that playing one faction, you have high chance to get certain skills, so most likely, you never considered aiming for destruction magic with Haven for example. And if it showed up when you were already on your way and level 25 ... what's the point? So, what this did, was ending up with certain "cookie-cutter" builds EACH TIME you played with a given faction. Only thig was, there was never a perfect build, as because of randomness, you weren't offered one skill or the other. This ment that you for example, didn't get "Tripple flaming Balista" at the end, but had to settle only for "tripple balista" ... or "double flaming balista" ... effective, but not perfect. And next time you played, you tried EXACT SAME THING, because PLAYING HAVEN gives you EXACT SAME CHANCE to get those skills.
Here: IN all my games as Necro, I am willing to bet 10k bucks, Dark Magic will show at least once during my game. While I am not prepared to bet 5$ that I'll get Light Magic. That's 5$ lost. There was not random system AT ALL. If it was completley random, NO ONE WOULD GET ULTIMATE EVER, except realy rare and lucky people. There was a soft limit to what part of skill wheel is available to you. Much like in H7, only that this time it's hard limit. If in H5, Dark Magic would show to Haven hero one game out of 100, in H7 it will never show. This is all that fuss is about. And I don't care.
H5 system was not about random skills showing, and you picking what is best for you at that point, then adapting to situation .... It was about trying to get cockie-cutter build, but sometimes being screwed by the randomness ... and it required no real "adapting". It just made you a bit weaker in what you did.
You want a good random system. Try H3. And even THAT could be more random. Prerequisites suck and demand non-random skill tree. That's all there is to it.
I think you have many good points in your post here, even if I overall disagree with your conclusion (in the end, that does also come down to taste). What you write about the H5 skill system is in many ways true, but this is also what I liked about it, because: a) It was unpredictable, yet for that very reason gave you bigger satisfaction when you did get those tasty perks. b) You could actually influence your chances if you understood the system well: By picking skill with high chance first, and by maxing out all skills and holding on perks in those that mattered less, you could significantly increase chance for rarer skills to show up. c) Sometimes you did just get those fluke skills that you didn't plan for but completely changed your direction. Playing Inferno and being offered Light Magic really opened some interesting doors for instance. Or Necropolis with Leadership, Diplomacy and Herald Of Death just for the hell of it.
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What will happen now?
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Maurice
Hero of Order
Part of the furniture
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posted April 14, 2015 09:47 AM |
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Zombi_Wizzard said:
Yes, but that was only on paper. In reality, I could count the number of times light magic, for example, has poped up on my Necropolis hero, on fingers of my one hand. And that was atleast several dozens of games I played with Necro hero. So certain skills were in effect locked out in H5 aswell. It was just soft lock instead of hard lock.
You're forgetting one thing in this consideration: Witch Huts. They were mostly random and could offer such a rare skill, circumventing the rarity of it popping up on a level up.
In Heroes7, I don't think Witch Huts actually exist - at least not in the form that we've been used to from Heroes3 and Heroes5.
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Sligneris
Supreme Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 09:58 AM |
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Witch huts should open a window that would tell you the skill it can teach you and ask whether you want you learn it or not, rathen than forcing the skill through into the hero's mind...
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Steyn
Supreme Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 10:11 AM |
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Of course the option learn skill yes/no would be better, bun not having it is not a huge disaster. You can just first check out which skill is provided using a secondary hero...
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Sorts
Known Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 11:46 AM |
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Steyn said:
Of course the option learn skill yes/no would be better, bun not having it is not a huge disaster. You can just first check out which skill is provided using a secondary hero...
I remember times in H3 where i visited a witch hut with a secondary and got eagle eye (or navigation on maps without any sea movement), thought a moment and then clicked load game.
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kiryu133
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Highly illogical
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posted April 14, 2015 11:51 AM |
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man, you guys just make me want h4. that game had some great ideas about skill progression and teaching skills and stuff. those rubies man.
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It is with a heavy heart that I must announce that the cis are at it again.
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Zombi_Wizzard
Famous Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 12:58 PM |
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alcibiades said:
b) You could actually influence your chances if you understood the system well: By picking skill with high chance first, and by maxing out all skills and holding on perks in those that mattered less, you could significantly increase chance for rarer skills to show up.
Indeed, and this was the way it was played. But this is my point. If you play it like this, you effectively avoid randmoness as much as possible, rather than embrace it. To me, that sounds like if someone would say: "White shirt is the best, because I can colour it orange later." That makes no sense. Buy orange shirt. (not absolute best analogy, since there are miltiple colours, but there you go). If you want to avoid randomness as much as possible ... why not accept non-random system  . A good random system, to me, should be the one where randomness isn't avoided, but accepted. And with prerequisites, you always want to avoid random stuff.
Maurice said:
You're forgetting one thing in this consideration: Witch Huts.
Indeed. Those were great. And they worked like random skills should work. So...
Sligneris said:
Witch huts should open a window that would tell you the skill it can teach you and ask whether you want you learn it or not, rathen than forcing the skill through into the hero's mind...
No. The good thing about which huts was the randomness. This is why...
Imo hero shouldn't be given a choice of skills, when (s)he levels up. That's right. You heard me. You would only get to choose perks, but not skill itself, and untill you don't choose a perk for a skill, it can't level up, so new skill is automaticaly choosen, unless all skill slots are full. No prerequisites, no planning. You are limited, but have a full selection of which perks to choose inside of a given skill. This would mean, that player has to adapt to situation. You got light magic? Nice, now you should consider building mage's guild...
Furthermore, the army composition should be more flexible, with multiple alternative creatures in core and elite tier, not just champion tier. This way, you would pick apropriate creatures for apropriate hero. Ofc. a skill can still have high or low chance, depending on class, or it can be like it is now in H7, where there are classes.... actualy this way would be better, but we don't have this system now so...
Steyn said:
Imo such a 'soft lock' is still thousand times better than a real lock.
Yes. It generaly is better. I would not say a thousand times, but it's better. This means ofcourse you ditch hero classes, because you lose class identity, when you build full magic skill on might hero. It also means all heroes should level the same when it comes to passive improvements. That is, all atributes increase the same ammount. With classes, you can have certain classes improve attack and defence, while getting no wisdom fo instance.
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 01:18 PM |
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Edited by Stevie at 13:20, 14 Apr 2015.
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Zombi_Wizzard said:
alcibiades said:
b) You could actually influence your chances if you understood the system well: By picking skill with high chance first, and by maxing out all skills and holding on perks in those that mattered less, you could significantly increase chance for rarer skills to show up.
Indeed, and this was the way it was played. But this is my point. If you play it like this, you effectively avoid randmoness as much as possible, rather than embrace it. To me, that sounds like if someone would say: "White shirt is the best, because I can colour it orange later." That makes no sense. Buy orange shirt. (not absolute best analogy, since there are miltiple colours, but there you go). If you want to avoid randomness as much as possible ... why not accept non-random system . A good random system, to me, should be the one where randomness isn't avoided, but accepted. And with prerequisites, you always want to avoid random stuff.
You're avoiding a certain outcome, not randomness. Avoiding randomness isn't even possible, unless the system doesn't involve randomness to begin with.
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Guide to a Great Heroes Game
The Young Traveler
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fuChris
Promising
Supreme Hero
Master to the Speed of Light
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posted April 14, 2015 01:20 PM |
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Zombi_Wizzard said:
A good random system, to me, should be the one where randomness isn't avoided, but accepted.
I couldn't disagree more.
You do realize that Heroes is a strategy game? A strategy game where calculating risks on everything is the main point of the gameplay?
Can I rush that mine? Can I take that town? Can I beat that Dragon Utopia without crippling my army? Can I get that ultimate build without suffering through half the game with shoddy skills?
Heroes has always been about the management of these risks. But if you take away the management part of the game then you end up with a rail shooter disguised as a strategy game.
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"Now I am become Chris, the destroyer of worlds." - Robert Oppenheimer.
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Maurice
Hero of Order
Part of the furniture
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posted April 14, 2015 01:27 PM |
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Edited by Maurice at 13:28, 14 Apr 2015.
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Zombi_Wizzard said:
This means ofcourse you ditch hero classes, because you lose class identity, when you build full magic skill on might hero. It also means all heroes should level the same when it comes to passive improvements. That is, all atributes increase the same ammount. With classes, you can have certain classes improve attack and defence, while getting no wisdom fo instance.
No. Odds are still different, with each class having a certain affinity for certain skills. In a random system, Might Heroes have a much higher chance of getting offered Might skills than Magic skills and vice versa. Furthermore, primary attributes increase based on class; for Might Heroes, the Might attributes have a higher chance to increase whereas for Magic Heroes, this applies to the Magic attributes.
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Minion
Legendary Hero
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posted April 14, 2015 01:34 PM |
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That is certainly not true, a game can surely strategic without randomness. It can be argued to be more strategic without any randomness. But that is not the point, it is just that randomness of skills has previously given something to the overall experience of playing the game. Getting a skill is like opening a present - something you are excited about. I have yet to witness a system in Heroes were non-randomness works well, and based on Stevie and others remarks it doesn't work here either.
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"These friends probably started using condoms after having produced the most optimum amount of offsprings. Kudos to them for showing at least some restraint" - Tsar-ivor
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Dave_Jame
Promising
Legendary Hero
I'm Faceless, not Brainless.
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posted April 14, 2015 01:50 PM |
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I'm not going to justify my observations to anybody, I'll just let the numbers speak
H5 Vanilla/hof had an average of 100 points worth of skills and perks per class.
39 of these were skills, 61 were perks. There was a total of 7 classes = 7 variations of these wheels.
H7 Vanilla has an average of of 89 points worth of perks and Skills per class.
30 of with are skills, 59 are perks. There is a total of 36 classes in the game = 36 variations of these wheels.
Number of abilities
We now have 24 known. 6 of which are race related
The H5 V/H had 19. 7 of which were race related
If we would take into account the magic schools, and magic related abilities, we have 11+6+7 vs 7+7+5
So in the end
We have almost the same number of perks per wheel
We have 5+ times the number of unique template
we have 50% more standard skills and with fewer factions and a rather similar number of magic related skills.
This is why I can't understan what is so different, why do you hate this so much.
The system is thighter, better focused nad the only things that are different are:
1 - You have to know what you want from the start.
2 - Randomness can't scruw you, if you don't want it to.
3 - lack of cross-skill prequests.
2-, 1+, that is a total of one point against, one single point.
Only few of us had the chance to try it, nobody with the randomness implemented. Looking at the H5 V/H SW I actually see it being inferior to the H7 vanilla.
Shure H5 TotE is a different story. But not even as different as you would think. In average you got 3 new perks per skill. Something that is not unrealistic to create later on. But even without this, the system looks solid. And I would rather have a tighter design now, that is easier to balance, than a 1/3 bigger which would be much harder to balance.
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Maurice
Hero of Order
Part of the furniture
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posted April 14, 2015 02:08 PM |
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Edited by Maurice at 14:14, 14 Apr 2015.
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Dave_Jame said:
This is why I can't understan what is so different, why do you hate this so much.
The system is thighter, better focused nad the only things that are different are:
1 - You have to know what you want from the start.
2 - Randomness can't scruw you, if you don't want it to.
3 - lack of cross-skill prequests.
I assume you mean prerequisites instead of prequests.
Fact remains that each Hero class has 15 or so skills explicitely excluded. No way to acquire those, in whatsoever way. If we ignore Racial skills, Heroes7 has the dubious honor of being the first title in the series to exclude basic skills from Heroes.
And as Minion already indicated, the randomness is akin to opening a present. Each time you level up, you get a present and have one of several options to choose. Is there anything useful for your Hero build? Do you have to make a (difficult) choice between two (or more) skills/perks that you want? Do you have to choose between different evils because there's no good skill in the mix? It's the unpredictable nature of the random offer that provides a form of excitement, which is completely missing with a properly laid out leveling plan like the one from Heroes 6.
Cross-skill prerequisites can actually provide coherence between the perks and allow them to reinforce one another. I still believe that a system with prerequisites could work if they were of varying nature when multiple prerequisites are present, in the form of "and" or "or". In Heroes7, there will be 3 "Ultimates", though not as game-breaking as the one from Heroes5 - and this is a good change! They should make multiple Ultimates, with much lower prerequisites than the ones from Heroes5, while also having lower impact.
Furthermore, there should be perks that "work well together" and provide a synergy bonus.
And yes, I fully well realise that such a system must be a nightmare to balance properly, but on the other hand, that's what they're getting paid for (at least partially).
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fuChris
Promising
Supreme Hero
Master to the Speed of Light
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posted April 14, 2015 02:17 PM |
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I don't know who and why people are arguing about the number of skills. That is not the issue. Limiting each hero to only expert mastery in some skills and retricting some completely can actually add flavour to the game.
The issue is that due to no pre-requisites perks are going to be roughly equal by design and thus will feel like just another step on the ladder to hit lvl 30. There will be no feeling of accomplishmnet by achieving a desired build. Going by the warcries presented most skills will be boring compared even to the H5 vanilla ones.
And no randomness is going to save a skillsystem that is designed to be used in a non-random way. In the end even if it will get implemented I doubt that anybody will actually use it in the long run..
So unless we get both random skills and prerequisites I don't see how this will be different compared to the H6 skilltree.
But that's not gonna happen 'cos the game has got to be more "streamlined" to attract the new customer base. A generation raised on rail shooters where no decisions of consequence have to be made.
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"Now I am become Chris, the destroyer of worlds." - Robert Oppenheimer.
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