Heroes in the mod
- Thread starter deadliver
- Start date
(I've got 2 heroes to do and I'll upload it all.)
because she also got mage and archmage promos 
Ahriman
Tyrant
Mounted isn't intended to give strength boost.
Otherwise, very cool.
Otherwise, very cool.
mimic
Magic Box
Oh really? I'll remove the strength boost from it then.
Ahriman
Tyrant
See post 101 for the intended design, ignore any of the earlier proposals before then.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=331795&page=6
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=331795&page=6
mimic
Magic Box
Slight problem with the magic promotions such as warlock/mage/archmage, It isn't possible to give free promotions via promotions.
Ahriman
Tyrant
Hmm, that is a problem.
The reason why I added the free promotion is because normal mages automatically get a spell promotion; when you upgrade a tier1 dark elven mage to a tier2 dark elven mage, the tier2 mage starts with dark magic 2 promotion.
We need to think of some way to get an extra promotion or the desired spell promotions when the heroes tier up (ie when they gain mage or archmage or warlock or sorceror etc. etc.)
Anyone have any ideas?
*edit*
Maybe it isn't as big a problem if we give all the mage heroes channeling 1. Then they will be constantly gaining xp from both hero and channeling, and so can just select the magic schools with normal levelups.
And if we have the FF tweak where after level 10 or so the xp requirements for gaining levels stop growing.
But it would still be easy for a tier1 hero caster to get to 100xp (where hero cuts off) without having gotten their mage or archmage promotions, and so spending all their easy levelups on non-magic promotions and so not managing to access the higher level magic even once they had the tech for it.
*edit2*
Is it possible to make some of the normal spell promotions (eg Lore of Fire Magic 2) be both a normal selectable promotion for mage units AND a freely applied with some tech to particular hero units?
*edit3*
Another possibility is that we could abandon the promotions-only hero concept just for the spellcaster heroes. And so have the spellcaster heroes upgrade into their higher level versions which are separate units with the magic promotions they need, but leave the rest of the heroes in the promotion-boost only system.
Most of the heroes aren't casters, and so we would still be saving a lot of time.
The reason why I added the free promotion is because normal mages automatically get a spell promotion; when you upgrade a tier1 dark elven mage to a tier2 dark elven mage, the tier2 mage starts with dark magic 2 promotion.
We need to think of some way to get an extra promotion or the desired spell promotions when the heroes tier up (ie when they gain mage or archmage or warlock or sorceror etc. etc.)
Anyone have any ideas?
*edit*
Maybe it isn't as big a problem if we give all the mage heroes channeling 1. Then they will be constantly gaining xp from both hero and channeling, and so can just select the magic schools with normal levelups.
And if we have the FF tweak where after level 10 or so the xp requirements for gaining levels stop growing.
But it would still be easy for a tier1 hero caster to get to 100xp (where hero cuts off) without having gotten their mage or archmage promotions, and so spending all their easy levelups on non-magic promotions and so not managing to access the higher level magic even once they had the tech for it.
*edit2*
Is it possible to make some of the normal spell promotions (eg Lore of Fire Magic 2) be both a normal selectable promotion for mage units AND a freely applied with some tech to particular hero units?
*edit3*
Another possibility is that we could abandon the promotions-only hero concept just for the spellcaster heroes. And so have the spellcaster heroes upgrade into their higher level versions which are separate units with the magic promotions they need, but leave the rest of the heroes in the promotion-boost only system.
Most of the heroes aren't casters, and so we would still be saving a lot of time.
orlanth
Storm God. Yarr!
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I agree with this - better to have something for heroes to spend all their excess XP on anyway. If you want caster heroes to buy spell promos, the added caster XP gain tag could simply be added to the "Warlock" etc promos.
If you're worried about heroes gaining too much free excess XP too early, I think that's a valid concern & they should be likely be discouraged from racking up tons of generic City Garrison / Medic / Drill type promos in the first place. Why not simply postpone the auto XP gain feature to the first tier "Champion" promos instead of getting it right at the beginning, which seems to be what you're trying to avoid. You could also make Heroes ineligible to buy most of those generic unit promotions, effectively forcing them to save upgrade slots for the Hero promos you want them to get. This would remove a lot of the headache of trying to create a complicated automatic system.
I think it's possible to modify those threshholds to whatever is desired if that's what you're trying to achieve. IMHO, it's probably a lot better to simply adjust the XP gain and levelgain thresholds as desired with playtesting and to make heroes not eligible to waste their upgrades on crappy/generic unit promotions, than to spend a lot of effort on devising complex systems to grant promos according to a schedule, I think those are likely to be poorly understood by the player.
Ahriman
Tyrant
Thats a good idea. We would remove +1 xp per turn from hero, but add it to champion, mage, champion of venom, champion of chaos, high priest, shaman and elementalist. Every hero gets one of those promotions.
My main worry then is that the combat heroes would be pretty weak early game.
Maybe we could improve this by adding one passive effect to each non-spellcaster hero, like training, happiness aura, hammer production aura, etc.
I'm not sure whether this would be good or bad for the AI. Will it make the AI more or less likely to get them killed early? More likely since they will be weaker, basically the same stats as horsemen or axemen, and will die more easily. But less likely because they'll no longer have the highest attack change.
My main worry then is that the combat heroes would be pretty weak early game.
Maybe we could improve this by adding one passive effect to each non-spellcaster hero, like training, happiness aura, hammer production aura, etc.
I'm not sure whether this would be good or bad for the AI. Will it make the AI more or less likely to get them killed early? More likely since they will be weaker, basically the same stats as horsemen or axemen, and will die more easily. But less likely because they'll no longer have the highest attack change.
orlanth
Storm God. Yarr!
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What do you think about making Heroes ineligible to spend their upgrade slots on some of the low-level generic unit promos (Medic etc), and as above simply tweaking the XP gain and levelgain thresholds as needed. We can eventually develop a brief menu of selectable Hero-only promotions (including those already designed, plus some others like the training, happiness aura, hammer production aura etc you mention) and make specific Heroes eligible to buy various subsets of these as appropriate. With appropriate adjustments to the XP gain and levelgain thresholds, players could be able to select Hero promos as they advance that are customizable yet unique/appropriate to their Hero; this would enable them to be more personally involved (& more easily aware of tech requirements etc) than a complex auto-granting system, while avoiding problems with getting locked out by loading up on too many low-level promos.
Ahriman
Tyrant
More good ideas.
I like the idea of making various passive aura effects be promotions selectable only by heroes. I could see a "tactician" promotion line that boosted combat strength/first strikes/withdraw chance for units in the stack, a "trainer" promotion line that trained units in the stack, a "siegecraft" line that boosted the bombardment rate/city attack/bomabard strength of units in the stack, and maybe some others. A magic resistance line? A defensive line? An improved spellcasting line (that reduces miscasts, boosts summons and gives extra damage?) An adiministration line (that gives happiness/production aura)?
I think though that I would combine this with the current design, rather than replacing it.
Leave the free Champion/Lord/mount promotions as they currently are designed, I think these work well.
Make heroes ONLY able to learn Combat 1-5, city attack 1-3 (for some heroes), magic promotions and then some subset of these special hero promotions.
Exclude them from city attack, shock/cover/formation, drill and medic promotions.
With the mage heroes, we could just exclude them from getting most of these secondary hero lines.
Rather than programming the available lines for each hero, we could also just tie them to the particular Champion/Lord promotions. So for example, Tactics 1 requires the Footman promotion OR the champion promotion OR the champion of venom promotion OR chaos champion promotion. Tactics 2 promotion requires Tactics 1 AND [the champion promotion OR the champion of venom promotion OR chaos champion promotion]. Tactics 3 requires the Tactics 2 promotion and the Lord promotion.
[Alternatively we could just tie them to combat promotions.]
Then we could leave the +1 xp per turn at the hero promotion, knowing that mage heroes will only have a handful of eligible promotions until they get enough tech to learn the magic promotions. So the caster heroes can learn combat 1-5, but then won't have any more promotions to select until they learn the mage promotion or elementalist promotion or whatever, which allows them to start choosing more magic promotions.
So for example, Ariel could be built in the early game, and select combat promotions 1-5 as she rises up to level 6. Then even though she gains enough xp to reach level 8, she doesn't gain the levels because there are no more valid promotions to purchase. Then you research the Education tech and she gains the Mage promotion, which suddenly allows her to spend her level-up promotions by purchasing the Lore of Athel Loren 2 promotion and the Lore of Beasts 2 promotion (if she has the tech pre-reqs for these).
Karl Franz at the start of the game could select from the combat promotions and maybe administration 1 and tactics 1. Then later he gains the Champion promotion for free with Feudalism, and so gains the ability to get the Tactics 2 and administration 2 promotions. Even later he learns the Lord promotion which allows him to learn the Tactics 3 and Administration 3 promotions.
I like the idea of making various passive aura effects be promotions selectable only by heroes. I could see a "tactician" promotion line that boosted combat strength/first strikes/withdraw chance for units in the stack, a "trainer" promotion line that trained units in the stack, a "siegecraft" line that boosted the bombardment rate/city attack/bomabard strength of units in the stack, and maybe some others. A magic resistance line? A defensive line? An improved spellcasting line (that reduces miscasts, boosts summons and gives extra damage?) An adiministration line (that gives happiness/production aura)?
I think though that I would combine this with the current design, rather than replacing it.
Leave the free Champion/Lord/mount promotions as they currently are designed, I think these work well.
Make heroes ONLY able to learn Combat 1-5, city attack 1-3 (for some heroes), magic promotions and then some subset of these special hero promotions.
Exclude them from city attack, shock/cover/formation, drill and medic promotions.
With the mage heroes, we could just exclude them from getting most of these secondary hero lines.
Rather than programming the available lines for each hero, we could also just tie them to the particular Champion/Lord promotions. So for example, Tactics 1 requires the Footman promotion OR the champion promotion OR the champion of venom promotion OR chaos champion promotion. Tactics 2 promotion requires Tactics 1 AND [the champion promotion OR the champion of venom promotion OR chaos champion promotion]. Tactics 3 requires the Tactics 2 promotion and the Lord promotion.
[Alternatively we could just tie them to combat promotions.]
Then we could leave the +1 xp per turn at the hero promotion, knowing that mage heroes will only have a handful of eligible promotions until they get enough tech to learn the magic promotions. So the caster heroes can learn combat 1-5, but then won't have any more promotions to select until they learn the mage promotion or elementalist promotion or whatever, which allows them to start choosing more magic promotions.
So for example, Ariel could be built in the early game, and select combat promotions 1-5 as she rises up to level 6. Then even though she gains enough xp to reach level 8, she doesn't gain the levels because there are no more valid promotions to purchase. Then you research the Education tech and she gains the Mage promotion, which suddenly allows her to spend her level-up promotions by purchasing the Lore of Athel Loren 2 promotion and the Lore of Beasts 2 promotion (if she has the tech pre-reqs for these).
Karl Franz at the start of the game could select from the combat promotions and maybe administration 1 and tactics 1. Then later he gains the Champion promotion for free with Feudalism, and so gains the ability to get the Tactics 2 and administration 2 promotions. Even later he learns the Lord promotion which allows him to learn the Tactics 3 and Administration 3 promotions.
orlanth
Storm God. Yarr!
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Sounds good - can't go wrong with some excellent Heroes of Might & Magic-type RPGlike features! 
Mimic is already doing a lot of work & I don't want to change stuff on him; so for now we can keep moving ahead with the implementing designed Heroes as planned, with the one change that they're ineligible to earn most of the generic unit promos as you described below. Some additional earnable Hero promos (e.g. Tactics, Administration, etc) can easily be added on later; I can try to bang out some of these later this week. We can also leave the standard +1 XP from the FfH Hero promotion as you suggest, and not need to modify the current Champion/Lord promos Mimic has implemented.
Mimic is already doing a lot of work & I don't want to change stuff on him; so for now we can keep moving ahead with the implementing designed Heroes as planned, with the one change that they're ineligible to earn most of the generic unit promos as you described below. Some additional earnable Hero promos (e.g. Tactics, Administration, etc) can easily be added on later; I can try to bang out some of these later this week. We can also leave the standard +1 XP from the FfH Hero promotion as you suggest, and not need to modify the current Champion/Lord promos Mimic has implemented.
Ahriman
Tyrant
Agreed. The 1 mod to the hero promotion we might want to change is to implement it to give immunity to psychology/fear effects.
Also; huge HOMM fan, I loved those games. And that is very much the inspiration for the kind of promotion chains I am thinking of.
Quick draft of a few possible chains:
Tactician 1. Requires [Footman OR mounted]. All units in the stack gain +5% strength and 1 first strike chance.
Tactician 2. Requires Tactician 1 AND [Champion OR champion of chaos OR venom champion]. All units in the stack gain +5% strength and +5% withdraw chance.
Tactician 3. Requires Tactician 2 AND Lord. All units in the stack gain +5% strength and 1 first strike chance and +5% withdraw chance.
Administration 1. Requires: [Champion OR High priest OR champion of venom]. Gives +1 happiness, +15% hammers, +1 health to cities in range 1.
Administration 2. Requires: [Champion] AND Administration 1. Gives +1 happiness, +15% hammers, +1 health to cities in range 5.
Administration 3. Requires Lord AND Administration 2. Gives +1 happiness, +15% hammers, +1 health to cities in your empire.
Siegecraft 1. Requires: [Footman OR Champion OR Champion of chaos OR venom champion] Gives +5% city attack, +5% city defense to all units in the stack, increase bombardment of all units in the stack that already have bombardment +5%.
Siegecraft 2. Requires Siegecraft 1 AND [Lord OR Dwarf or Chaos dwarf]. +5% city attack, +5% city defense to all units in the stack, increase bombardment of all units in the stack that already have bombardment +5%.
Siegecraft 3. Requires Siegecraft 2 AND [Dwarf or Chaos Dwarf]. All units in the stack ignore city walls.
Weaponmaster 1. +15% strength. Requires [Footman OR Champion OR Champion of chaos OR venom champion OR high priest]
Weaponmaster 2 +15% strength. Requires [Champion OR Champion of chaos OR venom champion] AND Weaponmaster 1
Weaponmaster 3 +1 strength. Requires [Lord OR Favored of Chaos OR venom lord] AND Weaponmaster 2
Healer. Requires [High Priest OR Archpriest]. Gives +25% heal rate to units in the stack.
Swoop attack. Requires Aerial mount. Gives 1-2 first strikes.
Heroic charge Requires Mounted AND [Champion OR Champion of chaos OR venom champion]. Gives +10% attack strength, +10% withdraw chance.
Summoner. Requires [Archmage OR Warlock OR Sorceror]. And some heroes start with this. Summoned creatures start with Strong promotion.
Another idea: we can have some of the various Mutation promotions we were thinking of (scaly skin, extra arm, fiery breath, etc.) come not just from mutation effects but as purchasable promotions that require the Demon racial promotion.
That way, ordinary demons can pick them, and demonic heroes can get them too.
Or we could have them require [Demon OR Favored of Chaos]
There is so much we can do by messing with promotion requirements.
Psychic_Llamas
Wizard in the Making
yeh thats perfectly fine
Yeah I agree the mutation promotions should be purchasable by demons as the great daemons typically in the old lore had 6 to 12 or so mutations or something like that. Most chaos aligned models had d3-1 free mutations or something like that. I think that was in 3rd edition though I cannot remember exactly.
Psychic_Llamas
Wizard in the Making
i didnt have enough time this morning to go over all the posts before
but now that i do i really like the ideas going on here
one thing id like to suggest is that we could allow the Champion/Lord promotions to give very slow XP gain above 100 (say one every 10 turns) which can accumulate. or even just another selectable hero promotion line which does this.
but now that i do i really like the ideas going on here
one thing id like to suggest is that we could allow the Champion/Lord promotions to give very slow XP gain above 100 (say one every 10 turns) which can accumulate. or even just another selectable hero promotion line which does this.I bet you could do this with a UnitSpell requiring the tech to be cast which would then grant the promotion.
Psychic_Llamas
Wizard in the Making
the ai would never use it
I do not know if <iAIWeight> would fix AI issues regarding this. Frankly, many XMl tags do not understand me
Ahriman
Tyrant
So we'd still have create 2 new unit spells for each caster, one for their mage spells and one for their archmage spells.
I think its better to just have the mages purchase the spell promotions as normal.
This seems plausible. And of course, FF allows us to use fractional XP gain. So we could just have the [Champion, Lord, High Priest, Archpriest, Champion of venom, Venom lord, Champion of chaos, Favored of chaos, Mage, Archmage, Warlock, Sorceror, Elementalist, Elemental master, Shaman, Ice princess, Ice Queen.] promotions all gives +0.1 xp per turn.
We can tweak these xp gains with playtest anyway.
mimic
Magic Box
I'm a bit busy in RL so the heroes will be delayed for a few days, but I've got 7 of them done so far.
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