Enchantment 1/enchantment 2. Why enchanted blade before flaming arrows?

[Cuteunit]

Hello. I think these two spells are in the wrong positions, and that Flaming Arrows should be in the enchantment 1 position while Blade is in enchant 2.

As it is, +20% to melee from an adept is rather huge and because it's percentile, it's good no matter what tier of unit you case it on. Free combat promotion anytime and cheap yay.

However +1 fire to archers isnt even a 10% upgrade when you're using it on your crossbowmen or the like, and by the time you have enchantment 2 mages you're at least using longbows, assuming you've gone up the archery line at all ( archery line sucks if you're not elves btw, but thats separate)

Flaming Arrows would have it's place in the early game though, upgrading 3/5 archers to 6 str defensive strength, which might actually make them not the inferior choice to using Warriors with bronze for defense anymore ( or axemen if you have the hammers, which lets you save your improvements too..)

 

[Goodgimp]

Increasing a point of base STR enhances the effectiveness of all promotions, though.

Say you have an archer with 100% city defense, which is beyond easy to achieve. If his base STR is 5, he's fighting effectively at STR10 when defending the city. With enchanted arrows, however, he's actually fighting at STR12.

Factor in terrain bonuses, fortification bonuses, etc and it just scales up higher after that.

 

[Deon]

You are both right, Goodgimp, but the author of topic states that +20% melee is usually better in ALL means for units >4str (and AI usually uses melee units), and almost all good units are 7+, also remember that there're orcs with their fire resistance... So +20% looks a bit better , but after some research you can tell they are equal only if you use it for defence only (usually you can't get those +X instead of +1 str, if you attack, only for desert -25%).
Anyway spells which are based on the unit's strength are usually better because you can cast 1 spell per turn per caster, and it's better to be casted on stronger units.

 

[Ekolite]

Cuteunit, instead of making hundreds of new threads, why don't you just ask all of your questions in one big one? Also, check out the FAQ, that should probably have some helpful info.

 

[Cuteunit]

Forum doesnt move so fast that keeping separate points in separate topics is harmful ^^

 

[felwar]

Forum doesnt move so fast that keeping separate points in separate topics is harmful ^^

I don't think that's the point. What he's politely pointing out is that the shear volume of complaints you have flooded the board with may be drowning out other discussion.

 

[Cuteunit]

It isnt

 

[Nor'easter]

It isnt

Actually, it is. I just counted, and nearly a third of the threads (13 out of 40) on the first page of this forum are threads you started. (I'm not counting the threads that were stickied.)

 

[Cuteunit]

Good thing they're not being wasted then, and staying on the first page!

 

[skallben]

I think the point is that if you get Flaming arrows as a level 1 spell then you will have no units to cast it on in the start. Starting with Enchanted Blade allows you to cast it on those Warriors and Axemen.


I think it's good that different voices add to discussion, sure Cuteunit could have merged some of these threads but it's not like it is of any major significance.

 

[Cuteunit]

Archers come just as early as axemen if you go up that tech tree, and cost the same number of hammers to produce.\

If it was me, I'd merge both spells into a general "+1 Defense strength" buff for any living unit ( and repair for luichirp of course) and make Enchantment 2 be +1 to both Attack and Defend.

 

[skallben]

Bronze Working is a more natural choice in most cases as you need it to chop forests. Also, starting out by going defensive makes little sense in the start because there are not many major threats that justify it. Axemen are just better units overall, you don't really need archers for city defense until Catapults are appearing IMO. Axemen with cultural defense bonus are just fine in the start.

 

[Roghar]

Its true, enchantment 1 is better than 2, and that's simply because melee units are overall better and more often teched to than archer units. Only exception is for the elves. The problem there is with the archery line rather than the spells though I think, I favour leaving the spells and at some point making the balance changes necessary for archers.

Cuteunit's suggestion for +1 defence at lvl 1 scaling to +1/+1 at lvl 2 makes sense from a balance perspective, but I think it lacks the flavour of the current spells. Also if you don't make it weapon type specific it opens it up to other units, like catapults, golems, mages etc who don't currently receive it (although i guess it can't be too hard to limit it by type)

All in all enchantment 1 and 2 are both good spells though, its an excellent sphere

 

[eerr]

Spoiler :

Its true, enchantment 1 is better than 2, and that's simply because melee units are overall better and more often teched to than archer units. Only exception is for the elves. The problem there is with the archery line rather than the spells though I think, I favour leaving the spells and at some point making the balance changes necessary for archers.

Cuteunit's suggestion for +1 defence at lvl 1 scaling to +1/+1 at lvl 2 makes sense from a balance perspective, but I think it lacks the flavour of the current spells. Also if you don't make it weapon type specific it opens it up to other units, like catapults, golems, mages etc who don't currently receive it (although i guess it can't be too hard to limit it by type)

All in all enchantment 1 and 2 are both good spells though, its an excellent sphere

what if enchantment 1 .. gave +5% per node,
enchantment 2............. gave +1 str and enchant 1?

 

[Nikis-Knight]

I think that 20% and +1 str is basically equivalent, though maybe the melee should be changed to +1 str for consistency.
At zero promotions, 20% = +1 at 5 str. As you add promotions, the +1 becomes better. with combat V, 20% = +1 at 10 str.
So one is better than the other in certain situations, but overall I think they become equivalent.

As for whether archers or melee should get the first bonus, that's an interesting question. Archers come later, but by the time you get enchant, you probably already have archery (if you're going to get it). So I guess it comes down to: should defense or offense get the first bonus? I think we favor offense overall, so there is a good case for switching.

 

[loki1232]

I agree with Nikis-Knight on this.

Unless we wanted to make the enchanted arrows spell better by giving it +1 fire damage and +20% strength.

 

[Blakmane]

why don't you put these threads in the balance thread discussion? Spamming the board with useless topics isn't a nice thing to do.

 

[ophite]

Also, CU, you might want to stop being incredibly inflammatory. HTH.

-- ACS

 

[Roghar]

I honestly don't think forum activity is such that Cuteunit's thread's cause a problem. And I think inflammatory is a bit excessive - a bit confrontational maybe, but he is polite and each issue is at least worth discussing - I haven't agreed with all of his views but they are all at least worth considering. You need a devil's advocate every now and again.

Fall from Heaven is a great mod and the flavour and variety is awesome, but ultimately good balance is a big part of what makes a game. Apart from AI improvements its what it currently needs most, and its going to be very difficult to programme smart AI until the game is well balanced. Otherwise players will always go down the optimal path, such as fireballing and melee units, while the AI will waste its time on subotpimal spells/units of the same level. There is a reason that not many games have the level of complexity this game is introducing - you have to balance it all and teach the computer how to use it. I don't think it would hurt to keep our focus as a forum on these tweaks rather than worrying mostly about new content

 

[Ekolite]

The AI isn't going to be improved untill after the Ice phase anyway, its really not worth complaining about it atm because they're not about to spend hours teaching the AI to use stuff which will then just become obsolete a few patches later when they change things for extra balance, add new stuff, take old stuff out etc.