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| Thread: Creature experience instead of upgrades |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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lantranar
Adventuring Hero
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posted November 22, 2018 06:00 PM |
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Elvin said:
I dislike town backtracking in general so some form of remote spell learning or creature upgrading(as long as appropriate buildings are upgraded) would be welcome. Not instantly or without some drawback of course. For instance.. Upgrading units out of town should definitely have a movement cost. Learning spells could work like a scroll delivery where time delivery depends on distance. Or cost mana just like the summon creatures spell did in h5.
Thats something the logistic skill is supposed to do, not some boring terrain movement bonus bs. The Caravan system should not just limit to town-dwelling, but town-heroes as well.
AoW 3 has changed the gameplay a lot to implement the Play-by-email thing. I think Hmm should also go for that route and has some late game mechanics that improve the macro aspect.
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In that respect I liked H3. Infernal Troglodyte pattern colour and protruding bones made them look more dominant. Medusa queens had a different skin pattern and longer tail. Thunderbirds had that wonderful plummage. Greater basilisks had those.. thingies. Ancient behemoths looked greyed with age. There were some that felt superfluous like horned demon, dendroid soldier and scorpicore but overall you could tell apart basic from upgrade.
not lazy enough. Artists still have to redraw the whole creature for each version.
the best I can think of is some kinds of script that automatically transition one asset to another (sprite sheet for 2d, texture map for 3d). The transition might just be opacity change, or some filter/effect.
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verriker
Honorable
Legendary Hero
We don't need another 'eroes
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posted November 22, 2018 07:09 PM |
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lantranar said:
As for aesthetics, well, I agree somewhat about H4 art direction, but I think H4 models looking bigger and more detailed is a part of the reason. I assume they would look just as good or even better if you convert them into horizontal view like H3. Afterall, H3 3d models look worse.
to be honest not the case, go to look up some higher res models of H3 and H4 creatures on the Internet, H3 models are just plain better looking whereas H4 ones were quite fugly up close (because game rushed and art depatment gutted) cheers lol
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lantranar
Adventuring Hero
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posted November 22, 2018 08:30 PM |
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verriker said:
to be honest not the case, go to look up some higher res models of H3 and H4 creatures on the Internet, H3 models are just plain better looking whereas H4 ones were quite fugly up close (because game rushed and art depatment gutted) cheers lol
Unless you show me some images of those creature in HORIZONTAL view, i ll still leave a small window to defend H4's art (yes some units are beyond redemption, but there are some decent ones as well).
There are many things that can affect your impression on them. Silhouette is one of the most important elements for that. some simple tricks can be used to improve the models as well (posing, paint-over).
If a model need to look good from high camera angle, it need to be designed with that purpose from the beginning, but I guess H4 models were not. Horizontal angle, on the other hand, is quite easy to make some model looks good.
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PandaTar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Celestial Heavens Mascot
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posted November 22, 2018 10:19 PM |
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Although H4 is in my heart, I remember that it took me a while to get used to those creature designs, and the no-upgrade thing, because back then, I sort of liked having upgrades, until time convinced me the vanity of having for the purpose of having only, instead of making upgrades really something unique.
Medusa model was AWFUL. No matter if you placed them vertical, horizontal, upside-down, inside-out. ^_^ Phoenix was another that looked terrible! It looked like this. The only thing that looked good was the small photo, and only because it had no resemblance with the thing on the battlefield whatsoever.
Some units looked good, though. I liked the Angel, Champion, Earth and Water Elemental, to name a few.
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"Okay. Look. We both said a lot of things that you're going to regret. But I think we can put our differences behind us. For science. You monster."
GlaDOS – Portal 2
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Galaad
Hero of Order
Li mort as morz, li vif as vis
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posted November 22, 2018 11:32 PM |
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H4 has gorgeous adventure map. Creatures not so much.
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verriker
Honorable
Legendary Hero
We don't need another 'eroes
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posted November 23, 2018 12:12 AM |
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lantranar said:
Unless you show me some images of those creature in HORIZONTAL view, i ll still leave a small window to defend H4's art (yes some units are beyond redemption, but there are some decent ones as well).
There are many things that can affect your impression on them. Silhouette is one of the most important elements for that. some simple tricks can be used to improve the models as well (posing, paint-over).
If a model need to look good from high camera angle, it need to be designed with that purpose from the beginning, but I guess H4 models were not. Horizontal angle, on the other hand, is quite easy to make some model looks good.
you can get good galleries of most of the creatures starting here and here (H4) at various angles,
one may come to their own conclusions but for sure I think the H3 creatures hold up best in terms of fidelity and detail and all of that, if they planted those into a modern 3D game I would be more than happy cheers lol
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NimoStar
Responsible
Legendary Hero
Modding the Unmoddable
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posted November 24, 2018 03:21 AM |
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Edited by NimoStar at 03:39, 24 Nov 2018.
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The conservative H3 carbon copy squad attacks again...
Really? H3 modeling being better? Have you even LOOKED at the psychic elemental? H3 3D models are trash, HotA even had to remade the default teleport portals on the map because they looked like ass. And Conflux buildings look blurry because of not being drawn on top. Plus look at the new alternate terrains like "darkness" terrain. It sticks out like a sore thumb and is completely flat (much like the bottom of the psychic/energy elementals, which arent even textured).
The only reason H3 "looks" better is because of art being redrawn 2D manually on top and low res images.
here you can compare an H4 3D town building with an H3 development one and their surroundings, it is clear which is more "detailed". H4 town screen development suffered from a design perspective (not have a correct layout), not from a 3D modelling one.
(I use Forge because it is the only one with the assets leaked)
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People, this experience can work more or less exactly like upgrades. There is nothing to complain about, you can still get different form of creatures in the way of getting more abilities and visual upgrades. So what are you pre-emptively mourning for? Please do tell.
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And yes being a fan of Diplomacy I can tell you, this IS your average endgame scenario.
Multiplayer games with an unnatural and artificial ban on using diplomacy is what isn't "representative of the game".
Be realistic, this not only is the most viable single player campaign speedrun strategy, but would also mostly dominate every single multiplayer game if allowed.
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Anyways, I don't see why would experience be "imba", H3 isn't even balanced to start with, H3 WoG creature experience wasn't very "imba".
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Really, in H3 most upgrades didn't even do anything worthy, things like +1 attack and +1 movement and +5 hp were the most common. In some cases not even that. H4 "no upgrades" creatures still on average had more unique abilities than even H3 "upgraded" creatures. Everyone remembers things like Gold Dragons but half of H3 creatures were more like Orc and Orc Chieftain...
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Never changing = never improving
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verriker
Honorable
Legendary Hero
We don't need another 'eroes
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posted November 24, 2018 07:09 AM |
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NimoStar said:
The conservative H3 carbon copy squad attacks again...
Really? H3 modeling being better? Have you even LOOKED at the psychic elemental? H3 3D models are trash, HotA even had to remade the default teleport portals on the map because they looked like ass. And Conflux buildings look blurry because of not being drawn on top. Plus look at the new alternate terrains like "darkness" terrain. It sticks out like a sore thumb and is completely flat (much like the bottom of the psychic/energy elementals, which arent even textured).
The only reason H3 "looks" better is because of art being redrawn 2D manually on top and low res images.
here you can compare an H4 3D town building with an H3 development one and their surroundings, it is clear which is more "detailed". H4 town screen development suffered from a design perspective (not have a correct layout), not from a 3D modelling one.
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 24, 2018 08:20 AM |
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Guys, we are not talking CREATURES of Might and Magic here. It's still HEROES of M&M, and creature experience is an idea, that, as with Heroes on the battlefield (which more or less is the same as "Heroes as creatures") will make a complete re-design necessary, because a lot of things wouldn't make sense anymore the way they are.
We are talking a different game here.
What is ridiculous, however, is to suggest a feature like this, because of a silly secondary hero skill. Diplomacy, the way it is implemented in H3, is a game-breaking skill, and therefore a crappy skill, designed around the utterly crappy meachanic of stacks having a chance to offer to join (depending on the setting in the editor).
Don't misunderstand me here - there is nothing wrong with an editor feature that would allow to set a stack to join (for campaign mode). But in a regular game? Stupid.
I mean, don't go further than looking at H4. There are actually TWO skills in H4 you could call Diplomacy; for one thing, Diplomacy itself, which works differently than in H3:
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Hero can convince a percentage of greatly outnumbered hostile creatures to join him/her for a price. Cost of surrendering is reduced. Diplomacy doesn't work on creatures of opposite alignment.
Basic: 30% of creatures, but no more than 120 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 80%.
Advanced: 40% of creatures, but no more than 240 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 70%.
Expert: 50% of creatures, but no more than 360 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 60%.
Master: 60% of creatures, but no more than 480 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 55%. Requires Advanced Nobility.
Grandmaster: 70% of creatures, but no more than 600 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 50%. Requires Expert Nobility.
See that? You have to pay for them AND there is a cap on it AND the stack must be "greatly outnumbered" (which can mean anything, from 2:1 to 10:1).
There is basically a second "Diplomacy" skill in the game, and that's the Order Magic secondary skill of "Charm":
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Hero can convert a percentage of greatly outnumbered hostile creatures to his side. Surrendering cost is reduced.
Basic: 15% of creatures, but no more than 60 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 90%.
Advanced: 20% of creatures, but no more than 120 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 80%.
Expert: 25% of creatures, but no more than 180 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 75%. Requires Advanced Order Magic.
Master: 30% of creatures, but no more than 240 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 70%.
Grandmaster: 35% of creatures, but no more than 300 experience points +10% per hero level. Surrendering cost = 65%. Requires Expert Order Magic.
Same thing here. Caps, checks and balances.
So why the hell would you want to completely redesign the game in order to fit it to a misdesigned skill?
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Elvin
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
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posted November 24, 2018 11:11 AM |
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Edited by Elvin at 11:15, 24 Nov 2018.
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Nimostar, more detailed doesn't make them any less ugly. Creature xp is hardly imba, just bad for the series.
And yes, h4 diplomacy was good. A bit surprising it was never implemented since.
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 07:51 AM |
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Diplomacy is a fine skill for normal maps, it just has to be balanced, and H4 had the right idea but made it too weak (600 EXP is less than one Hydra!).
Also, the existence of Charm is another example of H4's other primary flaw (besides ugly art) - too many identical and repetitive skills. To make matters worse, Charm and Diplomacy were both Academy-aligned, so if you had one in your army, you'd be likely to get the other too.
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Eccentric Opinion
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 09:08 AM |
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Mvass, is something wrong with you?
1) it's 600 XP +10% per hero level.
2) You still have to pay for it, and in H4 you cannot have too much gold.
3) It's an ability that works on every stack (except opposite ones).
4) They are not "the same" abilities - nor is it a bad thing that they are alike: they are not mandatory to take
5) What has all that to do with the fact that a misdesigned Diplomacy skill is no reason to introduce "creature experience"?
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 05:12 PM |
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I played the H4 campaigns recently, so I know what having Grandmaster Diplomacy on a high-level hero feels like - it's weak. Whatever the formula is, the joining stacks are tiny.Quote:
They are not "the same" abilities - nor is it a bad thing that they are alike: they are not mandatory to take
All else equal, a hero should get stronger/more useful by getting an extra skill. The only disadvantage should be the lower versatility by not having that skill slot anymore. But it's actually completely useless for your hero with Grandmaster Diplomacy to learn Charm. If they stacked, that'd be okay, but they're alternatives - "Would you like to have 3 dwarves for 100 gold, or 1 dwarf for free?".
And I just strongly disagree that Diplomacy is misdesigned. It'd be a good skill if it worked like it does in H4 but with higher values (and without its clone Charm). But it doesn't play nicely with creature upgrades, which is why we should have creature experience instead.
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Eccentric Opinion
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 06:13 PM |
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mvassilev said:
But it doesn't play nicely with creature upgrades, which is why we should have creature experience instead.
That's why I asked what's wrong with you - you seem to have lost the ability of rational thinking. Because we could just drop Diplomacy instead. Or change the way it works. Or allow creatures to move without hero. Or allow heroes to transport more stacks than they can put on the battlefield (and introduce a skill likes "Reserves"). Or make Diplomacy an AoC town/governor skill, redirecting stacks into town. Or... well, if I think a minute about it, I'm sure I find another handful of options - so no, we should NOT use creature experience instead.
Not to mention the fact that dropping upgrades and introducing creature experience instead is basically the same thing than saying we should put heroes on the battlefield again because if heroes were on the battlefield instead of to the sides you could have a bigger battlefield.
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 06:59 PM |
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There are other benefits to eliminating upgrades, and creature experience would be a much smaller change than heroes in combat or letting creatures move around on their own. Sending joiners back to the town is almost as bad as dismissing them immediately, and reserves are comparably bad - why not let them fight in your army immediately?
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Eccentric Opinion
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 08:17 PM |
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Look, I'm not discussing DIPLOMACY here. I'm discussing CREATURE EXPERIENCE (whether as in WoG or instead of upgrades) - and creature experience is an idea that obviously isn't bad per se, since there are tons of games where creatures indeed get XP and level up and so on.
However, it will change the whole game into something else. And you should be able to see that easily. That game would not be Heroes of Might & Magic anymore, because Heroes just wouldn't be important anymore, just ANOTHER source of even more power.
Then there is the PRODUCTION factor. Adding creatures to a stack will dilute the XP advantage - it will increase numbers but decrease strength/abilities, lowering XP levels. Would have to be changed completely. Then - snowballing, you can see that in WoG. The problems are ENDLESS, and in the end require a completely new game design that won't leave any stones unturned.
Play AoW 3 when you want a game like that.
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 08:32 PM |
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Why not let creatures join in their upgraded form for currency instead of thinking about removing upgrades altogether and then adding stack experience? You're seeing a problem (where I frankly don't, not to the extent you're insinuating at the very leasy) and then try to address it with game-changing features instead of an easy fix. That's the way it appears to me and I imagine to others too.
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Guide to a Great Heroes Game
The Young Traveler
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 09:05 PM |
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Creature experience doesn't have to be a massive change to gameplay - it's up to the developer to decide how impactful it'd be, just like it's up to them to decide how powerful upgrades should be. Heroes would still be a major factor - casting spells, moving around on the adventure map with logistics, and increasing creatures' stats.
Also, there are advantages beyond the diplomacy thing. You also get creature joiners from external dwellings (yeah, they could be caravaned or the dwellings could be upgraded, but not having upgrades would make for smoother gameplay). Fewer creature design variants is good, because it's easier to make one good minotaur than two or three. And I find that upgrading creature dwellings in town feels tedious rather than rewarding.
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Eccentric Opinion
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted November 26, 2018 09:58 PM |
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That's just because H3 made upgrades "standard mandatory" and then 5 and 6 and 7 continued this uninspired nonsense.
The key is to make "upgrades" a MEANINGFUL feature, not a mechanical one.
I mean, an upgrade that indeed does only give some minor stat updates - well, is that really necessary?
On the other hand, if you DO have a meaningful upgrade, say Gremlins to Master Gremlins, the upgrade is mandatory, and you might say redundant as well.
So the key of the game feature "creature upgrades" is doing them the right way, which shouldn't be surprising.
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Maurice
Hero of Order
Part of the furniture
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posted November 27, 2018 10:33 AM |
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Stevie said:
Why not let creatures join in their upgraded form ...
Actually, this is what happens already in Heroes 3, with respect to Necromancy. If a Hero with Necromancy raises Skeletons after a battle, while he has a stack of Skeleton Warriors and no free creature slot, the raised Skeletons will be raised as Skeleton Warriors instead. There'll be less Skeleton Warriors than normal Skeletons raised this way, if I am not mistaken, because the "cost" of Skeleton Warriors in Necromancy power is greater.
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The last Reasonable Steward of Good Game Design and a Responsible Hero of HC. - Verriker
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