Apotheosis (Mp patches and SP modmods)

[Tasunke]

Okay so I have a lot of plans for Apotheosis but first thing is first.

Here is the 'base' of Apotheosis which is just one basic change, I added a few minor things but really it is just one (or two) basic changes.

Major Change: Raider is now Mobility1/Flanking1/Drill1 instead of Commando

Minor Change: Harbor gives +1F/+1C, while SeaHaven does not, giving food equality post-Harbor. Lanun food-palace bonus still allows for Lanun to grow faster pre-Harbor, and with Pirate Coves, Lanun coastal will ALWAYS do better.

The water change is mainly not to nerf Lanun, but rather to bring the rest of the civs up a little. Why? Well, it is no big secret that spamming along the coast is one of the weakest strategies in FFH2. Lanun's coastal superiority is two levels of magnitude removed from this dilemma. Therefore in Multiplayer maps, having too much coast can be seen as an imbalance, merely because most civs cannot make much use of the oceans. In my opinion this is a very anti-flavor thing. Lanun are of course MASTERS of the Seas, but if only Lanun want to be there then this is a very lonely place indeed. Also, on random maps, which I believe most of us play on, to be stuck on a tiny peninsula would be, in real life terms rather excellent, but in gameplay terms would be rather unfortunate. Eventually I would like to try to get boats moving through forts, as I believe they can in vanilla BTS, for even more interesting Naval Strategies. As AI can allow for more use of enemy Naval use in SP, game-play reasons to increase the importance of Naval Combat for all races seems fair. And the only way for naval combat to ever truly matter is to increase the importance of controlling the seas ... something that only presently matters to the Lanun. I think it is certainly worth experimenting with, at the least.

And as far as Raider, I am just starting from the assumption that anything that gives out free Commando to the majority of a player's army is simply too powerful. There are of course arguments against that assumption, but this is where I am starting with. This is the main reason for this patch, and this philosophy may not be the guilding force for future development, but it will be one of the many core tenets of this mod.


Sincerely,
Tasunke von Papen

 

[Bad Player]

I haven't played a lot of multiplayer but I think the too much water in a map would be unbalanced if someone was Lanun. Is there the reverse problem that Lanun aren't capable enough on land do you think (I haven't played Lanun much though)?

 

[sunbeam]

I never got why the Lanun got all this special sea stuff aside from the flavor. They can build the same units as most of the other civs.

I mean why are their land cities any worse than anyone else's? But they get sea havens and the pirate ports. It is a rare site that is much good for any other civ on the coast.

Maybe if fish and other such resources were more common, but that would just make the Lanun even better.

 

[Calavente]

well, initially they had less powerful farms(?), and their champions were 1str less...
this meant that their land cities were less powerful than other civ's cities

 

[sunbeam]

well, initially they had less powerful farms(?), and their champions were 1str less...
this meant that their land cities were less powerful than other civ's cities

I've gone back and forth on playing this game over the years.

No idea about farms and the history, but:

1) Isn't the ideal to club the world to death with your bronze warrior stack of death? Going Aristograrian the whole way?

2) Aren't warriors the most effective unit? I've seen this argued a number of ways. Though axemen sometimes have fans.

3) Most games don't make it this far. I actually play on the Erebus map so hopefully civs start far enough apart I can get to the end game. But it is kind of weird what civs tech and what they decide to build. Seems like they mostly have axemen and warriors in the end game, even with the more naval ai. I see them building warriors all game long, even if they don't have ingenuity as a trait.

But giving the Lanun all these perks doesn't seem like it was balanced in the beginning with the way things actually played, and definitely doesn't seem so now.

 

[sunbeam]

Minor Change: Harbor gives +1F/+1C, while SeaHaven does not, giving food equality post-Harbor. Lanun food-palace bonus still allows for Lanun to grow faster pre-Harbor, and with Pirate Coves, Lanun coastal will ALWAYS do better.

The water change is mainly not to nerf Lanun, but rather to bring the rest of the civs up a little. Why? Well, it is no big secret that spamming along the coast is one of the weakest strategies in FFH2. Lanun's coastal superiority is two levels of magnitude removed from this dilemma. Therefore in Multiplayer maps, having too much coast can be seen as an imbalance, merely because most civs cannot make much use of the oceans. In my opinion this is a very anti-flavor thing. Lanun are of course MASTERS of the Seas, but if only Lanun want to be there then this is a very lonely place indeed. Also, on random maps, which I believe most of us play on, to be stuck on a tiny peninsula would be, in real life terms rather excellent, but in gameplay terms would be rather unfortunate. Eventually I would like to try to get boats moving through forts, as I believe they can in vanilla BTS, for even more interesting Naval Strategies. As AI can allow for more use of enemy Naval use in SP, game-play reasons to increase the importance of Naval Combat for all races seems fair. And the only way for naval combat to ever truly matter is to increase the importance of controlling the seas ... something that only presently matters to the Lanun. I think it is certainly worth experimenting with, at the least.

Have you tried this in the games you are playing? It still seems very underwhelming to be honest.

 

[omegaflames]

The reason you see the warrior spam is because there is an issue with the AI not making wise choices with it's aggressiveness. 1 priest (warrior with general attached works as well) with a few drill promotions or a mage with air 2 can pretty easily defend against a fairly large stack of warrior spam.

 

[Calavente]

warriors were OP when they had access to iron.
otherwise, +2str or +3 str can overcome them anytime.
nb: 1archer with drill2-3 can easily resist an attacking mob of warriors, (even bronze warriors)
however the same spent in iron axemen (+2 str versus a bronze warrior) can kill the archer.

 

[sunbeam]

warriors were OP when they had access to iron.
otherwise, +2str or +3 str can overcome them anytime.
nb: 1archer with drill2-3 can easily resist an attacking mob of warriors, (even bronze warriors)
however the same spent in iron axemen (+2 str versus a bronze warrior) can kill the archer.

How big are the stacks you are talking about? I play Magister's mod a lot (Erebus map again), and I see all kinds of crazy things. I fired up worldbuilder once, and Rhoanna had 95 Soldiers of Kilomorph on round 185 in one occurrence. Lately I have taken to killing the Khazad in any game I play with that mod. It is pretty typical for Kandros Fir to hit you with a stack of 20 or so SoK a few rounds after he gets Runes. I just got good and sick of dealing with his SoK spam, so I decided he just was not going to be in any game I played. Plus I got tired of him eating every other civ and building a gigantic sprawl empire.

It doesn't help that they can cross mountains and have the heavy promotion. The war mongerer will declare war on you at the drop of a hat, and you pretty much have to defend every city heavily since he has almost unlimited SoK's, and they can reach anything that isn't past an ocean.

 

[omegaflames]

@sunbeam I would imagine early game facing a stack of SoK could be a bit risky but SoK are not warriors either which is what calavente is talking about. And what are you talking about unlimited SoK? They are limited by the number of hammers it takes to build them, the same limit you have to build defenses. Where exactly is the inbalance???

I once faced a stack of 20-30 warriors in a city that was twarted by 1 axeman with a general attached and drill 4 (i think he had a couple levels in combat as well). I'm fairly certain I did not have bronze weapons at the time but that might have been present as well. I had actually written that city off and moved everyone but 2 troops from the city in a bid to at least kill off some of the stack and retake it later on. Boy was I surprised when I still had my city and the entire stack had died. My point is that with a few ranks in drill and an ok unit you can fairly easily defend against a warrior spam stack. Now for a SoK stack try getting an archer with a general attached, drill 3-4, and city garrison 1 and I'll bet those SoK will have 1 hard time taking that city.

 

[sunbeam]

You'd just have to see Magister's Mod with the Erebus map. His Khazad worldspell puts mines and quarries on all mountains (and roads) withing Khazad cultural borders.

So usually the Khazad have two or three cities by the time they get mining. The flavor usually puts them somewhere surrounded by lots of mountains. It is kind of extreme, but you can see them suddenly have anywhere from 10 to 15 quarries and mines, with gold, copper, iron, gems, etc by the time they get mining, say round 85 just for the heck of it. Couple that with the Runes of Kilomorph bonuses, and the Khazad palace bonuses for mines and it gets way out of hand.

In that mod all Khazad leaders have financial (does Arturus have that in base?). So they already have a ton of warriors, they promote them to SoK. Money isn't really an issue for them, and by that point they can build a warrior every 1 to 2 rounds in each city.

There is probably a break even point somewhere, so it isn't really unlimited. But he has no trouble coming up with two or three a round it seems to me.

How in the world am I going to have all those promotions by round 85 or 90? I can think of one game I played, I had two archers in a hill city. Kandros sent about 10 or so SoK across a river and had no trouble taking them out. He lost about that many, but it didn't seem to make a dent in his SoK reserves. I guess part of it is the attack bonus they get on hills, and the heavy promotion.

I also guess this is the wrong forum for his mod, but is is the one I play the most.

 

[sunbeam]

Edit: I made a mistake I just caught. All the Khazad leaders have Ingenuity in that mod, not Financial. Only Kandros has that.

 

[Tasunke]

Have you tried this in the games you are playing? It still seems very underwhelming to be honest.

Heh, yes I have tried the +1 food before and it really helps. Believe it or not, Pirate Coves are not as unbalanced as the permanent food advantage. Meanwhile Lanun can operate perfectly well on land. I have a lot of non-basic plans, but at the onset these two changes are the ones most needed, and it can be used as the base for all else.

 

[sunbeam]

Hmmm how does your raiders promotion work? You get drill, mobility, or flanking depending on the kind of unit?