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| Thread: Shadow Town for Expansion? |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 · NEXT» |
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Grythandril
Famous Hero
who is a Chaotic Wizard
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posted July 18, 2002 11:33 PM |
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Shadow Town for Expansion?
I have started this thread because of Xenophanes suggestion about the expansion for Heroes IV. This is a copy but with the mistakes taken out
I am hoping for a new town with a new magic alignment. At the moment we have opposites ie
Life and Death
Chaos and Order.
But there is no opposite for Nature.
Since nature deals with life and all bright and happy creatures then there should be an opposite for this.
I would like to see its opposite in the form of Shadow Magic.
This would deal in dark shadow magic and dark shadow creatures. Its two counter parts would be Death and Chaos.
The Mage would be a shadowy person in dark robes like the Priest but with his/her face concealed.
The Warrior would look like a Dark knight with heavy dark gleaming armour and a purple glowing sword.
Spells could be like Fog spell or Dark Aura
Creatures could be Phantom Soldiers or Ethreal Wraiths etc
That would make the cycle of magic complete and leave the might as the single unit without magic..
Does anyone agree with this?
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Might is Power
Magic is Power
Honor is Power
Power Rules Above All
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Djive
Honorable
Supreme Hero
Zapper of Toads
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posted July 19, 2002 12:52 AM |
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Edited By: Djive on 18 Jul 2002
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Introducing a new alignment will be very awkward.
The basic H4 product assumes that Nature is opposed to both Order and Death and you get penalties of -5 Morale for mixing this. Adding another alignment that gives -5 if mixed with nature will handicap Nature.
The problem is that I don't see them taking away the existing penalties, and a new alignment will break the symmetry of the magic schools.
If you think about Nature vs. Order, you'll find the opposites. Nature is often chaotic. it follows it's own rules. Order also represents artifice in H4 (Golems) and this is also opposed to nature.
If you compare Nature vs. Death, you'll see that Nature represents vigour, and growth, while death represents death. These are also kind of opposite.
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"A brilliant light can either illuminate or blind. How will you know which until you open your eyes?"
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Largo_LeGrande
Promising
Known Hero
from the Carribean
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posted July 19, 2002 06:51 AM |
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Ok, let me indroduce my old idea that helps us to make more towns.
Now all the towns are based on magic so making a new town would be hard cause we have to make a new magic school (except for that all magic town). My idea is that the towns are based on aligments like chaotic good, lawful evil, neutral... Here's some examples:
Any Good: Haven
Any Evil: Inferno
Any Lawful: Mech?
Any Chaotic: Fortress?
Lawful Good: Academy
Lawful Evil: Necropolis
Lawful Neutral: Stronghold?
Chaotic Good: Preserve
Chaotic Evil: This Shadow Town
Chaotic Neutral: Fortress of Stronghold
Neutral Good: ?
Neutral Evil: Ch
Neutral: Water Town
Not sure have the magic would work but I don't have time to post here. Great idea, this shadow town, magic would do something with that uses other as your own good: voodoo image, steal enchantment... I'm going on a little vacation so don't except me to reply for a week or more. Bye!
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Grythandril
Famous Hero
who is a Chaotic Wizard
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posted July 20, 2002 03:26 PM |
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I disagree with you Djive on certain parts of your statements about Nature and Shadow.
You stated that Quote:
Nature represents vigour, and growth
. However so does Life.
Life deals with the living and so does Nature. It is nature that we see the growth and vigour of living creatures. Here these two alignments are practically on the same side.
Order is linked because life and growth is the order of these two because that is how we are meant to evolve in the species
Death deals with the darker side of Life.
Chaos is the outcome of a decision that is made.
The same can be said of Order.
Shadow deal with the darker side of nature. Yet link to Death becuase of the relation with the dark and unseen.
Chaos is also linked because of the chaotic side to it.
So this would balance up the alignments nicely and have the opposing forces to each other.
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Might is Power
Magic is Power
Honor is Power
Power Rules Above All
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Saruman
Famous Hero
On academic leave
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posted July 20, 2002 06:15 PM |
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Quote:
Introducing a new alignment will be very awkward.
The basic H4 product assumes that Nature is opposed to both Order and Death and you get penalties of -5 Morale for mixing this. Adding another alignment that gives -5 if mixed with nature will handicap Nature.
The problem is that I don't see them taking away the existing penalties, and a new alignment will break the symmetry of the magic schools.
If you think about Nature vs. Order, you'll find the opposites. Nature is often chaotic. it follows it's own rules. Order also represents artifice in H4 (Golems) and this is also opposed to nature.
If you compare Nature vs. Death, you'll see that Nature represents vigour, and growth, while death represents death. These are also kind of opposite.
Well that's logical and all, but there still is no one direct opposite to nature.
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Thank god I'm an atheist.
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Xenophanes
Promising
Famous Hero
Chief Consul to Queen Mutare
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posted July 21, 2002 06:39 AM |
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You cant' post things from your computer directly to HC.
I don't see what people mean by upsetting the pentagram Magic circle thing. It fits to put in another alignment to have all the magic types have a direct opposite. You can't say that Nature has an opposite already with Order or Death--there are already opposites for those that make much for sense:
Order vs. Chaos
and
Live vs. Death
These are the hard-core, head-to-head opposites. Nothing can oppose Death like Life can, and the same goes for Order and Chaos.
I agree what was said on the Heroes IV Expansion thread about Technology working better as an opposite for Nature, but I'll restate here what I said there:
"I know that the opposite of Nature should be something mechanical, however, this would just be a redundant shadow of the Academy. Also, if you recall, when they wanted to add the Forge Town, some creeps went far enough to send death threats to workers at NWC. New World probably wouldn't use the futuristic town idea even if you paid them now. Plus, it really doesn't fit. Also, if you try and make it fit...it just becomes an insubstantial shadow of the Academy, with units that overlap all too often, with everything being manned by Red Dwarves..."
Face it. Heroes is and always will be fantasy.
I'm going to work on a revised star-alignment chart now, to illustrate what the Shadow will make it look like.
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Okay. I've just realized that I've been rather stupid. Observe the chart:
You can see here that if we put Shadow magic in between Chaos and Death, it messes things up so that Death has to be the opposite of Nature, and Shadow the opposite of Life. The only way to fix this is to put the new alignment in between Order and Death. One would naturally think a Forge Town, and it would work, but remember: Heroes of Might and Magic, not Miniguns(I love quoting whoever first said that )
So, I guess the real question here is: How do we make the Shadow Alignment work for Order?
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<Dragons rule, Titans drool!>
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Grythandril
Famous Hero
who is a Chaotic Wizard
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posted July 21, 2002 12:22 PM |
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Very impressive Xenophanes.
Here is a suggestion How about all the magic alignments link to the might in the middle. I mean that in heroes IV eg the Academy has a Magic hero and a Might hero.
That way the Might side has access to the might heros in the alignment and vice versa.
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Might is Power
Magic is Power
Honor is Power
Power Rules Above All
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Djive
Honorable
Supreme Hero
Zapper of Toads
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posted July 21, 2002 12:55 PM |
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If you upset the Magical Pentgram, you will get huge problems with re-balancing every scenario and campaign where you counted on mixing troops from certain towns gave certain penalties.
If you look at MtG and how they did Shadow in Tempest, you see that they made new creatures for the Shadow ability in White, Blue, and Black. It was not a new alignment in itself. (Shadow creaturs cannot be blocked by creatures without Shadow and vice versa.) So it should also be if you do something similar in Heroes.
There's no need to add a new alignment. The reshuffling will make the expansion a new game and not an expansion.
IMO Haven doesn't represent Growth and Vigour. It represents Life and Civilzation. Civilization because of the humans in it and the machines they have like the Ballista.
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"A brilliant light can either illuminate or blind. How will you know which until you open your eyes?"
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Xenophanes
Promising
Famous Hero
Chief Consul to Queen Mutare
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posted July 21, 2002 06:49 PM |
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Um, actually, civilization is much more Academy, with order and civilization, etc. Haven is simply life, and Preserve is simply nature. Both of those may overlap at some points, but hey, that's why they're allied with eachother.
I'm still not sure what you mean by a new alignment affecting mixing troops...clarification?
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<Dragons rule, Titans drool!>
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Grythandril
Famous Hero
who is a Chaotic Wizard
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posted July 21, 2002 09:16 PM |
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Anyway isn't the expansion meant to feature a new town. I read somewhere that it might be called a Magic Town full of spell casting creatures.
If that is to happen then the pentagram will be altered to fit the new magic ie for example it might be called a
sorcery alignment which will change the outlook if that is what there intended to do.
Or
They might go by the Conflux way and put the five magic alignments in one castle.
But that could happen as well.
____________
Might is Power
Magic is Power
Honor is Power
Power Rules Above All
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Djive
Honorable
Supreme Hero
Zapper of Toads
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posted July 21, 2002 11:26 PM |
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Quote:
I'm still not sure what you mean by a new alignment affecting mixing troops...clarification?
Mixing Preserve troops with Order troops or Death troops now give a -5 Morale penalty, and is cumulative so if you mix all three then the Preserve troops gets -10.
You really want to avoid this -5 Penalty as a player.
Let's say a map maker places a preserve town on a map, and then places an academy town close to it. Fully knowing that it will not be a good idea to mix troops from these.
The you introduce this shadow town. Suddenly, the order town will no longer be an enemy to the nature town. So the player can now mix the creature with a much more modest penalty than before... And this will probably make the map a lot easier than was the intention of the map maker.
I've written out towns in the example. Your addition of shadow alignment might not effect the penalty between these two towns, but it will affect morale penalties between some of the towns. In my case you get a lesser penalty, but some town combinations will instead get a higher penalty.
If you simply choose to introduce this town as an enemy to only Preserve, then the Preserve town gets one more enemy town and is weakened when compared to the other towns.
It's not only alignments that are affected. just consider the mage guilds in towns. Since the closest allies are changed the order guild would have to contain shadow spells instead of death spells, and the death guild will have to contain shadow spells instead of order spells.
That will also affect game balance.
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"A brilliant light can either illuminate or blind. How will you know which until you open your eyes?"
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Xenophanes
Promising
Famous Hero
Chief Consul to Queen Mutare
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posted July 22, 2002 12:52 AM |
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Shadow wouldn't be only against Preserve--it would be against Chaos, Nature, and Life.
Your scenario could easily be fixed if you have original maps and expansion maps, sort of like they had in H3. In the original maps, the old pentagram system would be used.
I think that fixes it right there.
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<Dragons rule, Titans drool!>
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Largo_LeGrande
Promising
Known Hero
from the Carribean
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posted July 22, 2002 10:55 AM |
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We don't need to make new aligments for new towns...
...we can add town to the old ones. Inferno to death, this shadow town (should have drows and duergars) to chaos, underwater town to order and fortress to might. They have the same spells and skills and heroes like the "main" town so we don't need to make up more skills/spells. The only problem with this is necromancy and inferno... Any ideas? Well what do you think?
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Grythandril
Famous Hero
who is a Chaotic Wizard
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posted August 01, 2002 04:15 PM |
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Well i hope they put in a town that has an oppossite to NATURE[/b}
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Might is Power
Magic is Power
Honor is Power
Power Rules Above All
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Djive
Honorable
Supreme Hero
Zapper of Toads
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posted August 01, 2002 04:58 PM |
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Edited By: Djive on 1 Aug 2002
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Quote:
Shadow wouldn't be only against Preserve--it would be against Chaos, Nature, and Life.
Your scenario could easily be fixed if you have original maps and expansion maps, sort of like they had in H3. In the original maps, the old pentagram system would be used.
I think that fixes it right there.
It does?
So if you play a H4 standard game, the Academy will have a Death Magic Guild Annex if you play an Expansion Map it will have Shadow Guild Annex.
If you introduce Shadow as you suggest then Chaos, Nature, and Life will get one additional enemy, thus weakening these towns. Death and Order will get another ally, thus strengthening these towns.
If you really want to solve this, then introduce 3 new towns instead of 1.
Then base the towns allies on Chaos-Order, and Life-Death. So you get...
Chaos town.
Chaos-death town.
Death town.
Death-order town.
Order town.
Order-life town.
Life town.
Life-Chaos town.
This system only have four types of magic. In my opinion, Preserve fits as a life-chaos town. Nature is chaotic.
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"A brilliant light can either illuminate or blind. How will you know which until you open your eyes?"
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Darkspirit
Famous Hero
aka Zutus
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posted August 01, 2002 06:17 PM |
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Quote:
If you introduce Shadow as you suggest then Chaos, Nature, and Life will get one additional enemy, thus weakening these towns. Death and Order will get another ally, thus strengthening these towns.
I don't agree at all. Every town will have two allies, and three enemies. So Death and Order won't get stronger. You seem to forget that Death would no longer be an ally to Order and vice versa.
Order: allied to shadow and life, opposed to chaos, nature and death.
Death: allied to shadow and chaos, opposed to life, nature and order.
I don't think this will have such a great impact on existing maps and campaigns. Afteral, I've never really mixed troops during a campaign. I just stick to what I get in my main castle, because of those creatures you have the biggest amount.
Now, on to the shadow aligned castle.
Heroes: I know thieves belong in asylum, but I'd like to replace them with the 'adventurer' class. Scouting skill would change. As stated in the thread 'Special ability for heroes according to heroes race' the 'stealth'-skill would be replaced by a riding skill, which allows you to take a horse into battle and have jousting bonus, faster speed, etc... Scouting-skill list would have scouting, pathfinding, navigation and riding. All adventure skills. 'thievery'-skill list would consist of thievery, gambling, bargain and stealth. I suggest you read the other thread for explanation on these skills. The thief class would then be a part of the shadow-town. I don't know a good name for the magic-hero class. But obivously they would have the new set of skills 'shadow'-magic, consisting of the shadowmagic-skill, some skills to boost spell points, damage, and then a special skill. It's not that easy to come up with something original, but I've come up with something: "When the hero has mastered this skill, he will be able to automatically raise a stack of shades out of a dead friendly stack. So as soon as a friendly stack dies, a group of shades (a new unit) would appear. These shades would vanish after the battle. But I think it's a nice skill, 'cause you could still win a battle you'd normally lose. Of course this has to be balanced so it's not too weak nor too strong."
creatures: Creatures living in shadows, avoiding contact with the light, although they have a sense for civilisation and order. This automatically brings me to Drow elves, giant spiders, etc... A dark nature version, which is okay, since they're opposed to nature.
I know changing the scouting skill is very drastic and that advanced hero classes, heroes bios, etc... would give a really huge problem. But if 3Do or NWC or whatsoever would think of developing a Homm5. I'd like seeing this, instead of what we have now.
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Young moles appear to be in full dispersal which means there are more moles per acre than at any other time of the year
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Grythandril
Famous Hero
who is a Chaotic Wizard
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posted August 01, 2002 11:35 PM |
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No no no
Shadow allies with Death and chaos and that is it. all the other alignments will be as they are
Order will have life and death and so forth
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Might is Power
Magic is Power
Honor is Power
Power Rules Above All
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Darkspirit
Famous Hero
aka Zutus
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posted August 02, 2002 12:22 AM |
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But if you do it the way you say, nature can't be the opposite of shadow, and you don't want to break the life-death relationship do you?
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Young moles appear to be in full dispersal which means there are more moles per acre than at any other time of the year
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Djive
Honorable
Supreme Hero
Zapper of Toads
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posted August 02, 2002 12:51 AM |
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Quote:
I don't agree at all. Every town will have two allies, and three enemies. So Death and Order won't get stronger. You seem to forget that Death would no longer be an ally to Order and vice versa.
But if you do this then you get the problem of changing the Mage Guilds in these towns. Also problem because in H4 standard product Death and Order mixes with a very slight penalty, but in Expansion with a major penalty.
Changes are big so this is an HoMM 5 wish. The thing about this symmetric pentagram they made is that is's a cornerstone which you're not supposed to touch. Because touching it affects balance and gives too much problems.
Quote:
I don't think this will have such a great impact on existing maps and campaigns. Afteral, I've never really mixed troops during a campaign. I just stick to what I get in my main castle, because of those creatures you have the biggest amount.
When I played through the Campaigns I noticed that they almost always placed Strongholds in them, or you just had one type of castle. There was a few which contained other castles, but often you took them so late in the game that you never could get much creatures from them.
However, don't forget that there's a growing number of player made maps and scenarios which may very well count on the existing alliances and enemies being maintained as they are.
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"A brilliant light can either illuminate or blind. How will you know which until you open your eyes?"
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Grythandril
Famous Hero
who is a Chaotic Wizard
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posted August 02, 2002 01:06 PM |
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The mage guild in the order wont have that problem because it would still be aligned to death.
This is how i see the alignments
Order
Death
Shadow
Chaos
Nature
Life
and
Might being the single non-magic town
The is would balance out the structure complelety
____________
Might is Power
Magic is Power
Honor is Power
Power Rules Above All
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