testing - 2x/3x cost of the units

Sparth said:

Do you belive that Trireme unit its just one ship and for example Rifleman unit its 3 guys with guns?

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Yes I do.

Sparth said:

Do you belive that Trireme unit its just one ship and for example Rifleman unit its 3 guys with guns?

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Well... it's a squad so 7-20 of them

I really have never had a personal problem with faster generating troops. Given the length of time a turn represents it makes sense to me. As mentioned in another thread, I think the weight needs to be towards defenses and it should be horrendously difficult to capture territory. Having units build quickly is one way that you can ensure a defender can have a chance at turning the tide of a war they weren't quite ready for. That's happened many times throughout history...

It can also mean that a nation can fairly quickly militarize, which we've also seen at other junctures in history.

Furthermore, nothing is worse than finally getting your army rounded out and then having to upgrade that army thanks to tech improvements already.

and it should be horrendously difficult to capture territory.

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It already is for the 1st 3 Eras.

OT- Going to have chance at getting you alls turns down in the MP games tonight?

JosEPh

Depends on Whisperr.

Thunderbrd said:

Having units build quickly is one way that you can ensure a defender can have a chance at turning the tide of a war they weren't quite ready for.

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It depends on the speed settings. I like to play on Eternity and the initial assault force is crucial, in the early eras the enemy has hardly any chance to prepare counterstrike.

It seems AI sucks in Size Matters. Just merge units, attack with merged units and you will have a bad luck to lose any unit. If the opponent merges units too, attack with bigger groups (e.g. 9 instead of 3) or higher quality (Quality Up rocks). I mostly play on Monarch and Emperor but maybe I will try this tactics at higher difficulties.

About the initial subject: maybe 2x or 3x unit costs would be O.K. but 10x is way too much.

S.

The AI still does need vast refinement for Size Matters, which awaits vast refinements for the main game as well. The AI for SM is good enough to mess with players who aren't all that familiar with the mod but that's about it.

Thunderbrd said:

The AI still does need vast refinement for Size Matters

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I am wondering if something like Quantomas AI could be applied. Quantomas is a physicist and programmer and he is the creator of the "AI mod" for Heoes of Might and Magic V (HOMM V, H5). Some players (including me) think that H5 with this AI is the best game of HOMM series - AI may do things that only human players used to do (e.g. use a spell that hurts its own troops if it is more painful to enemy troops).

This AI is based on AI of some chess program (IIRC Fritz) and may learn. Quantomas is about to finish his work with H5 AI because he is involved in a similar (but commercial) project.

S.

Sparth said:

It will be modmod but I strongly recomend to use it.

For my play experience and testing different saves in bug thread there is problem with overproduction of units. AI build tons and tons of units and stack them (stacks with more then 100 or even 200 units are common). I know that final solution of this problem should be by fixing AI but for now its not possible to do (lack of knowledge and skills in our team).

Plus from player perspective tons of units its useless micromanagment. Also more units = longer turn times and chances for MAF.

Generaly I would like to see less units but more powerful then now. And maybe cities defense bonus should be trimmed down too.

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After my experience with the new promo line Self-Heal and the ensuing discussions/arguments I'm starting to lean towards your ideas here Sparth.

... like to see less units but more powerful then now. And maybe cities defense bonus should be trimmed down too.

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Actually city defenses Do Need trimming, quite a bit impo. I would support that even if it means my own cities would become more vulnerable to capture.

So have you done the 10x cost yet?

JosEPh

There is that up-scaled unit cost option right? Maybe make that higher by a lot.

Ok here is file with unit production cost multiplied by 10

https://docs.google.com/uc?authuser=0&id=0B6VuHphw5zHzdTJSTXBKVUphN0k&export=download

I really would leave the first units alone in costs. You need to spend quite a few game turns to build up a sizeable stack (10 or so) Spiked Clubman, and that's ok. It's when your production starts booming (Maybe around Classical) that stacks start to become annoyingly huge.

Faustmouse said:

I really would leave the first units alone in costs. You need to spend quite a few game turns to build up a sizeable stack (10 or so) Spiked Clubman, and that's ok. It's when your production starts booming (Maybe around Classical) that stacks start to become annoyingly huge.

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I agree; up to Classical, the amount of units in-game is ok. No need for fixing there.

Noriad2 said:

I agree; up to Classical, the amount of units in-game is ok. No need for fixing there.

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So that really makes it sound like the unit cost issue is not a matter of a generalized problem across the board and instead a matter of how the unit costs themselves ramp up.

A while back I did an evaluation of the building and unit costs through eras and found that the curve increasing those costs was heavily bent and not on a very smooth incremental upwards ride. What I mean is, unit costs would seem more expensive at the beginning and end of the game and would, towards the middle, seem cheaper because the rate of increase variation wasn't maintained as well there.

I recharted what I thought would be an improved cost scheme and the chart is one of the more recent posts on the modders documentation thread. Perhaps if someone were to go through and tweak unit costs to be closer to these base values, by the tech that actually unlocks a unit, we would see a much improved overall game balance in unit costs.

The chart is here. You should probably read some of the further commentary that follows as well.