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phoenix4ever
Legendary Hero
Heroes is love, Heroes is life
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posted August 12, 2026 09:26 AM |
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Phoenix4ever said:
Another thing is what happens if you pick up a ballista for example, if you already have one?
Okay, I found the answer to this question myself.
If you already have the war machine you pick up, it simply disappears from existence, but you will keep the one you already had. 
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BigPig2
Adventuring Hero
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posted August 12, 2026 12:09 PM |
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Edited by BigPig2 at 12:17, 12 Aug 2026.
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@syth1984 The changes you describe (new artifacts, shot effects, etc) would be extremely tedious, and only possible if you find enough game code to axe for space, to implement using hex editing, which is my main tool currently. You're really looking at plugins when it comes to adding new functionality or content. Alternatively you could present your ideas to the teams behind one of the currently active mods and see if they, or their communities, like and wish to incorporate them (especially if you're already playing for example HotA, which is plugin-resistant to some degree).
Myself I think I will balance the war machines by improving their stats, reducing their costs/level and/or potentially making them come back after the battle if destroyed like the catapult does (BTB's guide has a section with instructions on how to implement that last part).
I do like the current situation with each machine being offered in 3 of the 9 towns, even though I might swap a few of them around. I also think that ammo cart could be more useful if the numbers of shots ranged units have were to be reduced a little bit and it could even only provide less-than-infinity shots to be useful, I think this limitation could be healthy for the game's tactics.
Another major problem for the ballista if you play HotA is the cannon, which seems to outdo it on both damage and utility even for the ballista specialists. And then there is the Artillery skill itself, which is only situationally useful and I am considering, as many have before I believe, to merge it with Ballistics (which itself also may need some work).
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Phoenix4ever
Legendary Hero
Heroes is love, Heroes is life
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posted August 12, 2026 12:38 PM |
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BigPig2 said:
Another major problem for the ballista if you play HotA is the cannon, which seems to outdo it on both damage and utility even for the ballista specialists. And then there is the Artillery skill itself, which is only situationally useful and I am considering, as many have before I believe, to merge it with Ballistics (which itself also may need some work).
Yeah, it's kinda stupid cannon ruins ballista and even ballista specialists. For this reason I have considered banning cannon entirely. But it would be better if you could just equip both, that would also buff Artillery a bit.
That or Artillery and Ballistics could be turned into one skill, they are both some of the worst skills currently.
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Syth1984
Known Hero
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posted August 12, 2026 07:09 PM |
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Phoenix4ever said:
BigPig2 said:
Another major problem for the ballista if you play HotA is the cannon, which seems to outdo it on both damage and utility even for the ballista specialists. And then there is the Artillery skill itself, which is only situationally useful and I am considering, as many have before I believe, to merge it with Ballistics (which itself also may need some work).
Yeah, it's kinda stupid cannon ruins ballista and even ballista specialists. For this reason I have considered banning cannon entirely. But it would be better if you could just equip both, that would also buff Artillery a bit.
That or Artillery and Ballistics could be turned into one skill, they are both some of the worst skills currently.
Or ballista could deal +50% more damage to fliers which would differentiate it from the cannon.Also fliers would be at disadvantage a bit then.
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BigPig2
Adventuring Hero
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posted August 14, 2026 05:09 PM |
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+50% damage to fliers is borderline plugin work as, while a simple flag check in theory, no such functionality is present in the original game (and again, u need code space to implement it this way).
The bigger issue is that I dont think even that makes ballista relevant.. Some kind of niche bonus like that could be interesting but I think an easier way to go is a more general boost to stats and/or lower price and better availability. I can definitely see some artifacts that augment ballista similar to the artifact in H2 that gave the catapult an extra shot. You could have treasure class "magic" bolts with piercing, poison, all sorts of effects. But yeah, in a plugin most likely.
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Phoenix4ever
Legendary Hero
Heroes is love, Heroes is life
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posted August 15, 2026 07:15 AM |
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Is the Artillery skill needed at all?
I mean if you give ballista x 4 damage and cannon x 3 damage (if cannon is allowed) you would have the same effect as Expert Artillery.
There is also a hack that allows you to control ballista, cannon and arrow towers without having Artillery.
So we could have the same effects and actually have the ability to control ballista or cannon even if we have Blind, but not Artillery. That would also make blacksmiths in towns with ballista or cannon actually useful and it would free up a skill slot on all heroes who have Artillery. 
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BigPig2
Adventuring Hero
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posted August 15, 2026 01:31 PM |
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Edited by BigPig2 at 13:42, 15 Aug 2026.
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Phoenix4ever said:
Is the Artillery skill needed at all?
That is entirely dependent on your design philosophy and goals.. More skills equals more variety and replayability so my general aim is to keep as many of them as possible while making each at least not terrible. And I feel Artillery could be made just that but its a balancing act between ballista itself and the skill. Ideally I want ballista to be an accessory, useful to most heroes, solid with Artillery and potentially very strong on high level specialists.
The skill's main problem is its one of the most situational in the game, double/triple/quadruple damage for a single unit in the game available to 1 in 3 towns. Funnily enough the only thing giving it any semblance of balance is the control of castle towers. I feel ironically, the way to balance it is nerfing the skill and buffing the machine itself. On the other hand.. merging it with Ballistics is tempting, but I think then I'd maybe give the towers to Tactics?
Edit: Oor.. you could give the Artillery bonuses to the towers as well.. you could probably even display ballistas there if you want. A bit out there maybe but it solves the relevance issue immediately..
Quote:
I mean if you give ballista x 4 damage
I feel you will make ballista pretty powerful this way (which isnt necessarily bad as long as thats what ure aiming for). What I am now thinking about is scaling the min damage with level (more consistency) and max damage with attack skill (more potential) but probably a bit harder than it does now, it does double dip in attack tho so it may not need to be so much more than it already is. Or maybe both min and max with the sum of lvl and attack?
Specialists are the easiest to fix (if you consider them in need of fixing) - you can just lower or raise the ballista's unit tier to adjust the strength of their bonus.
Another thing I wonder is if it would be possible to allow the machines (or maybe only some of them, or only to spots on the edge of the map) to move in the Tactics phase but that feels like a major change and it opens up for a lot of abuse.
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Phoenix4ever
Legendary Hero
Heroes is love, Heroes is life
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posted August 16, 2026 07:17 AM |
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It would be interesting if ballista/cannon could also show up on the defenders side of a siege. It would also make ballista/cannon specialists useful in this case.
Allowing to place war machines where you want with Tactics is a neat idea, but I don't think it's possible, since they lack a movement animation and "making them move" across the battlefield causes the game to crash. 
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