Barbarians in Final Fixes

[The Flame8]

Hey, I seem to have run into some controversy with my barbarian changes. My personal feeling is that the barbarians are overpowered and need to be toned down (which I started in 0.3), but I'm putting up a poll to see what you guys think because I've gotten feedback for both sides.

 

[The Flame8]

Seriously, 25% for all. Come on guys I need a little more feedback than that!

 

[xalien]

I haven't tried 0.3 so I just voted decreased (compared to original RifE).

 

[Gangrin]

The only thing that seems to me a little off is 4 riders. They tend to keep all to themselves, somewhere around map's edge on some mountain. Maybe conquer a city or two in a vicinity of their spawn point. That's it. On a plus side, i REAAAAALLY like their tendency to stick together. I just imagine what they can to do as a team and shudder.

Apart from them, all seems fine to me. Regular goblin raiders, occasional stacks of doom from nearby barb cities and a 5-square-radius zone of inevitable doom from Acheron. But i tend to play with barbarian world (but not raging barbs), so my impression might be a little wrong

 

[The Flame8]

xalien: try 0.3 as I decreased the barbarians a bit and see how that works for you.

Gangrin: 1. is this on 0.3?
2. Raging barbarians and barbarian world still work in 0.3 if you want more barbarians
3. Acheron's city does tend to be the center of the barbarian world and will stay that way as a threat to all players.

 

[Gangrin]

Gangrin: 1. is this on 0.3?
2. Raging barbarians and barbarian world still work in 0.3 if you want more barbarians
3. Acheron's city does tend to be the center of the barbarian world and will stay that way as a threat to all players.

1. Yeah, it was a game i just finished playing, and i downloaded all the fixes. Well, maybe i am assuming too much, but it's just that for about 40 turns Stephanos and Buboes were summoned and there were no announcements about Agares destroyed any cities - and they were spawned near borders of Chislev (and they were WAAAAAAAAAAAAAY behind in technologies, so all of their civ would be a piece of cake for Steph alone). I sent Acheron (yep, fix with leash works just fine) to see what's up. I found them together in the middle of a mountain range. So i assumed it was their occupation all 40 turns. Maybe i am wrong, but the memory of other games in which Buboes alone were responsible for summoning Yersinia and Ars is still vivid
2. No thanks, i am content with the way they are
3. I am fine with that.

 

[The Flame8]

Interesting, technology researching has been one of my main concerns with the first few releases as the AI were failing to research at all. I'll have to check the Chislev research.
And please elaborate on your last sentence.

 

[Gangrin]

Interesting, technology researching has been one of my main concerns with the first few releases as the AI were failing to research at all. I'll have to check the Chislev research.
And please elaborate on your last sentence.

Don't get me wrong, Chislev were on par with everyone else (that is Archos, Elohim and Lanun), it's just me who got rather far with research. And, with me razing city after city Steph and Bub came rather early. Technology researching is quite good actually - i am now playing a game, in which Malakim get their hands on Iron working 30 turns or so before me (that was quite a shock)

About my last sentence: Buboes has weapon called War, which increases AC each time he kills a unit. Also, 4 riders don't bother themselves with city capturing - razing them without second thought (which increases AC too). The result was that in some games - where Buboes were ignored by me - he made AC skyrocket, which is resulted in summoning his brother and sister


and about 4 riders doing nothing - it was false alarm. In current game Steph causing mayhem just like old times

 

[The Flame8]

Glad to hear about the technology thing. I spent a lot of time playtesting and coding to rebalance the AI research. They should be a lot better now and it's good to hear the human can't get away so easily.

Yay, mayhem! So is that a good thing or do you want it changed? Because it sounds pretty dang sweet that the demons are raging.

And where the infernals called by anyone? I'm really interested to see if any AI call the Infernals or Mercurians into the game as their willingness seems rather low.

 

[Gangrin]

Glad to hear about the technology thing. I spent a lot of time playtesting and coding to rebalance the AI research. They should be a lot better now and it's good to hear the human can't get away so easily.

Yay, mayhem! So is that a good thing or do you want it changed? Because it sounds pretty dang sweet that the demons are raging.

And where the infernals called by anyone? I'm really interested to see if any AI call the Infernals or Mercurians into the game as their willingness seems rather low.

Is it a good thing? It's marvelous! For me, half of the fun playing FFH mods was watching these four guys wreaking havoc, burning cities, reveling in the utter bloodshed and setting Erebus on fire! If you make them even more vicious, it would be SOOOOOO awesome. But i know, not everybody want them to be THAT powerful

About Infernals and Mercurians:
By my experience, there is following pattern: if you have Sheaim in a game who are not in some kind of icy wastelands, you WILL see Hyborem. It's set in stone. If you do not, however, you can relax - he is on a vacation. With mercs the situation is rather strange: they tend to appear often, by the most part with Elohim assistance, but not always. Heck, i saw OO-following Alexis summon him. What i do find strange is AI total misunderstanding of what to do with them. He just sit in his city with a billion of angels and do nothing. If some miracle occurred, he would found one city. That's it. Infernals are more or less ok, with some strange tendency to never have a city with more than 20 population, but otherwise they do the job: building cities, building army, doing research, trying to wage war (almost always resulting in their own destruction, but hey - they ARE demons. Self-destruction is in their nature)

 

[The Flame8]

1. I simply agree. Watching the demons destroy everything is quite entertaining.

2. Thanks for the feedback, I'd been wondering how other people experienced things. The Sheiam do tend to be only ones for infernals, but I'll try to amp up the Mercurians.

 

[kazuma6666]

I didn't play the original rise from Erebus, but I really like the barbarians as they are in your fix. I lose some cities sometimes with their attacks, but I'm not always in fear for my civ .

The best would be to add an option of course, because some people will never be satisfed but I have no idea how you could do that. It would be like 3 difficulty level for the barbarians, raging would be the highest, then there would be normal, and then calm barbarians I guess or something like that would be your fix.

But I don't know if something like that is really necessary (certainly not from me) and I have no idea how easy/hard it would be to do.

 

[The Flame8]

Thanks for the feedback. Raging barbarians and barbarian cities are there for those who want more, and my goal is to ensure barbarians are a threat but not so annoying that the game is unenjoyable.

 

[Granix]

The only part I find annoying is that Acheron is capable of spawning ridiculously early. MY brother had his second city taken over by barbarians. Not that big a deal, he was getting ready to take it back, when BAM! Acheron! Orthus hadn't even spawned yet and now he has the Big Red right outside his capital. It completely hosed him over in the game.

 

[The Flame8]

Yeah, it was like that in the original game and gives the barbarians some strength, so I'd like to leave it that way as Acheron is fixed until someone kills it.