Faction design: Estalia, Tilea, Araby, Cathay, Nippon, UnderEmpire

[Ahriman]

Yeah, but having a powerful navy is not the same as having naval improvements like pirate coves.

I would think that Tilea would have a good brown-water navy at Navigation, but that other factions woudl have better Blue-water navies at astronomy. This is what I was aiming for with the War Galley (which should be a tilean UU; it can pwn Privateers or caravels in non-ocean tiles).

Like historically; Genoa and Venice were powerful Mediterranean naval powers, but were eventually outshined by Spain and Portugal, and eventually Britain.

 

[orangelex44]

I'd add a UU, just for the garrisons - and allow it to upgrade for free, to keep it current (I know, even MORE UU's - as if the mod didn't have enough already).

The uniqueness of the Tileans would be that city defence isn't a problem for them; they essentially get them for free. Since that isn't an issue, they can get by with a small, expensive, but capable field army to stop large invasions. Attacking may be a problem, but if I remember correctly, the Italian city states were always more of a threat to each other than anyone else. They were disproportionaly powerful at sea (exceptional trading), but as for land armies they were pretty hard-put to defend HRE/German and French assaults - Sicily was captured by the Normans, even. So, being weak on attack/military is pretty correct (assuming they are, in fact, based on the real Italy to that extent).

And again, I'd think they could build the stock Militia (current Militia, that is) for regular maintenence costs; by that time in the game, they've started to unite better and recruit a real national army instead of a mercenary ad-hoc. I'd possibly include Arquebusiers (easy to train) and naval units in that category (to influence stronger navies). That leaves the powerful cavalry units, siege units, midgame everything, last-stage infantry, regular mercs, and mages to incur extra costs.

Now, I have thought of an extra difficulty - what happens when the initial city garrisons die? I'd hate to force the defender to pay for a garrison from then on, and I'd equally hate for the attacker to have to defeat all the defenders in one turn in order to capture the city. Perhaps a system like FFH has for Skeletons (one Skellie per Death mana), only applied to cities or a unique resource given by each Lord's Palace? Meaning that a replacement could still be trained, but not instantaneously and, potentially, in a different city.

 

[orangelex44]

Like historically; Genoa and Venice were powerful Mediterranean naval powers, but were eventually outshined by Spain and Portugal, and eventually Britain.

Yeah, this ties into the quarrels between the Italians (and, I suppose, the constant invasions). If they could've united earlier, it's quite possible that they'd have been a stronger naval/economic power than anyone else even today; however, no single city could remain in power long enough or get enough land to become a true competitor with full countries.

 

[Masada]

Estalia doesn't have a fleet I don't think, courtesy of Araby.

Tilea would have the strongest Old World human fleet, Marienburg the second strongest.

Playing with the upkeep is probably the best means of simulating mercenaries.

 

[Ahriman]

You could create a Tilean garrison UU (maybe instead of archer warband) that provides +1 gold per turn, has very cheap hammer costs, has zero moves, and a national limit of 10.

This might simulate the effect you're after.

Yeah, this ties into the quarrels between the Italians (and, I suppose, the constant invasions). If they could've united earlier, it's quite possible that they'd have been a stronger naval/economic power than anyone else even today;

Well, the italian navies were always limited to the mediterranean - war galleys and galleasses. They never developed the blue-water navy, and so lost wealth and naval power as the rest of Europe colonised the new world. The center of trade moved from Venice/Genoa to Spain and Portugal and Amsterdam and London.
Plus, Turks.

Estalia doesn't have a fleet I don't think, courtesy of Araby.

Well, this mod isn't just a single snapshop in time. I'm sure they once did; wasn't Estalia the first old world human civ to cross the big ocean and discover south america (err, Lustria?)?

 

[orangelex44]

See, I wouldn't like a hard cap on the unit limit - if possible, I'd like a per city unit cap. Plus, making a hard cap on the unit wouldn't allow for the free ones to spawn.

And the Italians never did get an open sea navy, for a couple reasons. One is the aforementioned fighting city states, another is geography (not a lot of oceans near Italy), another is a "brain drain" as innovative thinking moved to the richer lands elsewhere.

 

[Ahriman]

if possible, I'd like a per city unit cap

Sounds pretty hard to implement.
And I wouldn't make them "free" or "spawning", I'd just make them cost like 5 hammers, so they will build instantly and the AI will always build them and replace them if/when they're killed.

As an alternative, you could probably create a script that created a Tilean city garrison unit when the city reached popualtion 5, another at population 10, another at population 15 and a fourth at population 20 (making sure that if the population starved or was whipped below the threshold and came back up that the unit wasn't recreated to avoid exploits). The garrison would have no maintenance upkeep (or would provide +1 gold per turn - arguably the citizens aren't full time soldiers so are still engaging in trade), and would have 0 moves. The garrison would otherwise have the same stats as an archer warband. The garrison would not be replaced if lost.

But this would take some python coding.

And the Italians never did get an open sea navy, for a couple reasons. One is the aforementioned fighting city states, another is geography (not a lot of oceans near Italy), another is a "brain drain" as innovative thinking moved to the richer lands elsewhere.

Plus, Turks. The Ottomans sank rather a lot of it....

Venetian power wasn't ended because of threats from other western powers (well, except at the very end, when Napoleon conquered them) or rival citystates. It was ended from centuries of gradual encroachment from the Ottomans gobbling up their island possessions, the New World and African trade routes surpassing the eastern ones, and the shifting of Alexandrian trade to Istanbul rather than Venice following Ottoman conquest of Egypt. Brain drain was an effect, not a cause, to the extent that it mattered. Renaissance Italy had lots of great minds (artists and engineers and such) because it was rich and so nobles could patronize such people, not the other way around.

This does get me thinking though... are there some interesting Da Vinci style UUs we could add to Tilea? Primitive helicoptor? Bridgecrossing unit (adds amphibious promotion to all units in stack until end of turn)? Superior catapult (better bombardment)?

 

[Squirrelloid]

Why not just let Tilea always draft? That gives them 'free' units but with a cost that can be balanced. (What they can draft is of course up to you).

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

Well, this mod isn't just a single snapshop in time. I'm sure they once did; wasn't Estalia the first old world human civ to cross the big ocean and discover south america (err, Lustria?)?

Estalia was a very explorative civ iirc and yeh they were the first old worlders to discover lustria (although i think there are hypotheses that the amazonians are desendents of the norscans when a ship got VERY BADLY blown off course and landed in lustria... so i guess the norse got there first inadvertently)

 

[Arexack_heretic]

@skavenstuff:
Haven't read through it all yet, but
I don't like the inacessability of elemental (and other) magics...skaven history clearly has skavendom building huge projects to harness light magic and such. Not entirely successful but that is not the point.
why no spearmen? they are my most common trooptype.

 

[Ahriman]

I don't like the inacessability of elemental (and other) magics...skaven history clearly has skavendom building huge projects to harness light magic and such. Not entirely successful but that is not the point.
why no spearmen? they are my most common trooptype.

Skaven get their own unique magic. "Elemental" magic is only used by Araby, Ind, Nippon and Cathay in this mod. Though there is also the Lore of Fire and such, which are somewhat elementalish in nature. Skaven are also getting a ton of warpstone/industry based stuff here, which I think adequately compensates for their industrial prowess.

Stormvermin are basically spearmen/halbardiers. My impression was that the mass of skaven armies were all swordsmen clanrats.
I'd have no problem with going back to clanrat swordsmen and clanrat spearmen though.

Some of this design might change a little once PL makes final decisions (ie implements my suggestions? on changing the combat system slightly to achieve more specialisation.

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

just for reference Ahriman, i know you joined the team recently, but Arexack heretic has been a team member for a while and i regard him as a skaven authority . just pointing it out, i dont mean anything by it

as for skaven access to elemental magic, id rather limit skaven to their magic and light and maybe shadow magic.

as for spearmen, yeh there are a lot of spears among the skaven, but we still havent fleshed them out much so when we get to them feel free to give us the low down on their units and such AH

 

[Arexack_heretic]

Ah, thanks for the vote of confidence PL.

Truthfully, I have been away for a long time,
so I don't know how magic has developed lately.

My suggestion is to allow small forays into alien magics, just for the sake of flexibility. Maybe it can be a leadertrait (experimentation) that allows access to one (random) magic.
Or the building of one of several magical worldwonders that may allow use of a magic or change its nature somehow.
Lots of fun events can be driven by huge (evil) machines.
Your warpstone industry sounds interesting. So horned rat magic will be of the priestly sort? Granted by THR itself.


Yeah, the masses of clanrats use singlehanded weapons and light armour.
Many carry shields too. Though they do have the possibility to carry spears in stead, one unit in an WH army can even carry doubly handed weapons such as halberds or flails.
Slaves use all sorts of clubs, knives and spears.
Spears are very cheap to equip skaven with.
The halberds used by stormvermin are not spears.
Halberds are not piercing weapons you can use to spit horses, they are axes on poles.

I usually go for the extra though.
As skaven don't have cavalry, these form a serious threat. They can easilly flank you and rip your large units to pieces. Spears are your best answer to those equine bastards. plus they give a range bonus for the second rank.

kay. nice rant.

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

Truthfully, I have been away for a long time,
so I don't know how magic has developed lately.

i noticed good to see you back again though. any idea for how long youll be around?

My suggestion is to allow small forays into alien magics, just for the sake of flexibility. Maybe it can be a leadertrait (experimentation) that allows access to one (random) magic.
Or the building of one of several magical worldwonders that may allow use of a magic or change its nature somehow.
Lots of fun events can be driven by huge (evil) machines.
Your warpstone industry sounds interesting. So horned rat magic will be of the priestly sort? Granted by THR itself.

ooo that trait is a cool idea... im intregued... i wonder what mechanics we could use for such a thing...

(although the easyest would just be to limit to skaven ligth and shadow magic )

you should DL the next version which ill upload after the 22nd or so AH, test out the magic and other stuff weve added

 

[Ahriman]

just for reference Ahriman, i know you joined the team recently, but Arexack heretic has been a team member for a while and i regard him as a skaven authority

Good to know. I know little about Skaven, so it will be great to get some feedback and ideas about the real armies.

My suggestion is to allow small forays into alien magics, just for the sake of flexibility. Maybe it can be a leadertrait (experimentation) that allows access to one (random) magic.

That would be very hard to implement, given how magic access is a tech restriction. I think it would be easier to just give access to a say Lore of Shadow.

So horned rat magic will be of the priestly sort? Granted by THR itself.

I thought the intention was for the spells to be arcane magic of the same kind that other races practice; they get an adept unit that can learn level 1 Magic of the Horned Rat, a Mage unit that can get level 2 MotHR, and an Archmage unit that can learn level 3 MotHR.
What should these be called? Seer/Grey Seer/Grey Seer Lord?

Yeah, the masses of clanrats use singlehanded weapons and light armour.
Many carry shields too. Though they do have the possibility to carry spears in stead, one unit in an WH army can even carry doubly handed weapons such as halberds or flails.
Slaves use all sorts of clubs, knives and spears.
Spears are very cheap to equip skaven with.
The halberds used by stormvermin are not spears.
Halberds are not piercing weapons you can use to spit horses, they are axes on poles.

Ok, so maybe we can have a clanrat swordsman, and a clanrat spearman as tier1 units. Historically, halbards are semi-effective vs cavalry - they can't stop a charge, but they have the reach to be much better than normal melee weapons. In this mod we're representing that as a hybrid of melee/mounted bonuses.
Make the swordsman strength 4/3 +50% vs melee units (as opposed to 4/4 +50% vs meleefor most factions swordsmen) and the spearmen 3/4 +50% vs mounted units, +25% vs chariots (as opposed to to 4/4 +50% vs mounted units, +25% vs chariotsfor most faction spearmen).
And make Stormvermin strength 5/5 +25% vs melee, +25% vs mounted, +10% vs chariot (as opposed to 5/5 +50% vs melee for most faction swordsmen, and 5/5 +50% vs mounted +25% vs chariots for most factions spearmen).

As skaven don't have cavalry, these form a serious threat.

My design intention is to deliberately make skaven relatively vulnerable to cavalry, I think this is a civ feature.

 

[Arexack_heretic]

true.
Skaven are vulnerable to cavalry, but not only because they don't have any.
The real threat comes from their shock-value, that sends the rodents scurrying in a total rout.

Perhaps 'spears' can be implemented as an option that can be bought for x units (or x% of total units) (in effect upgrading them to a new unittype).
Basic speartroops are a must for any skaven army.

Seers, grey seers, seer lords are born prophets of the Horned rat and this magic is chaotic in nature (laced with strife and corruption) Ingestion of warpstone gives them access to raw power.
Other skaven (skryre) warplocks (mechanics, engineers etc) gain their power through arcane mechanics. Most commonly they employ warpstone as source.
Warpstone is raw magic and contains all magical winds within it unrefracted.
So in theory (and historically!) by refraction seperate winds of magic could be acquired.

Is it not possible to gift a TECH by script when it is forbidden to a civ?
I thought forbidding the first tier magictech effectively prevents unassisted aquisition of latter techs in that direction. Un-forbidding (some of) these latter techs for skaven should enable them to acquire these techs by any other means than research.
...I doubt this could be molded into a leadertrait though.



I like your ideas in general.
Don't be offended by my slews of suggestions:
My methodus operandi is to suggest a lot of ideas and possible mechanisms for all kinds of stuff, and usually several conflicting ideas at once.

Even when ambitious ideas are cool, does not mean they should be incorporated into the mod immediately. (that would only hold up progress in general)
Mini-mods worked before to test out rival or unconventional concepts.

 

[Ahriman]

Perhaps 'spears' can be implemented as an option that can be bought for x units (or x% of total units) (in effect upgrading them to a new unittype).

Purchasing upgrades is just a bad idea given the civ engine. Lots of warhammer players have suggested it because they want to mimic the tabletop mechanics, but it just won't work with the engine; the AI knows how to build units and upgrade them, but it will never understand how to intelligently purchase upgrades for gold.
We can just create a tier1 clanrate spearman unit, but not give them them a tier2 spearman unit (stormvermin are a tier2 halbardier, which is less effective than spearmen against cav, though more effective against melee)
Skaven's defenses against cavalry are sheer numbers and withdrawal chance.

Seers, grey seers, seer lords are born prophets of the Horned rat and this magic is chaotic in nature (laced with strife and corruption) Ingestion of warpstone gives them access to raw power.

So, lets just make Seer a hedgewizard replacement, grey seer a mage replacement, and seer lords an archmage replacement.
Make Magic of the Horned Rate a researchable tech (not one they start with for free) that requires Raw magic, but is fairly expensive.
Seer requires Raw Magic tech, starts with channeling 1 and skaven magic 1 promotions.
Grey Seer requires Magic of the Horned Rat, starts with channeling 2 and skaven magic 2 promotions.
Seer Lord requires Magic of the Horned Rat and Arcane Lore, starts with channeling 3 and skaven magic 3 promotions. Possibly give it lower base strength and warpstone affinity?

Allow Skaven to research Winds of Magic, and Lore of Shadows magic. Add an OR requirement to Shadow Magic 1 promotion as works with elven magic and winds magic.

Don't be offended by my slews of suggestions:
My methodus operandi is to suggest a lot of ideas and possible mechanisms for all kinds of stuff, and usually several conflicting ideas at once.

I am absolutely fine with this; criticisms and more suggestions are the only way a mod gets better. But don't be offended if/when I recommend against many/most of them as not particularly workable. I think controlling feature creep is one of my prime functions on the team.

Mini-mods worked before to test out rival or unconventional concepts.

I don't think we really have enough coders/time to create a bunch of unusual "whatif" features. It is much better IMO to focus on core mod features - like actually getting Skaven implemented as a playable faction.
I think that we would be able to do this once we pin down the combat system changes (ie greater unit specialisation) and tech tree changes.
The design of Skaven seems fairly complete.

What are your thoughts on the implementation in the design of the various Skaven units?
How do you feel about:
a) the sprawling trait (limiting Skaven to a few megacities)
b) The skaven warrens, unique civic, improved cottages, and extra industry buildings to compensate for this (without these, Kuriotates fail in FFH)
c) the Clan HQ national wonders

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

i wonder then if grey seers etc should be chaos religion UUs (seeing as the GHR is a chaos spirit/god?) and the mechanics and engineers the regular mages (make them require warpstone but the grey seers not require warpstone). prevent the mechanics etc from skaven magic, and give them access to shadow metal and light? perhaps give the skaven some twisted variety of light magic seeing as it is so important to skaven history? though i dont really want to have to make another whole set of spells for them though :/ perhaps a series of wonders or events based on the corrupting of light magic could be better.

but following on from the experimentation trait idea:
we could simply make the mechanics and engineers act like the sheim Mobius Witch where they get random magic promotions upon creation and can learn no more after that, this would however require no colleges, so an expensive Skyre Wonder would be necessary to make it more balanced me thinks.

 

[Psychic_Llamas]

Purchasing upgrades is just a bad idea given the civ engine. Lots of warhammer players have suggested it because they want to mimic the tabletop mechanics, but it just won't work with the engine; the AI knows how to build units and upgrade them, but it will never understand how to intelligently purchase upgrades for gold. We can just create a tier1 clanrate spearman unit, but not give them them a tier2 spearman unit (stormvermin are a tier2 halbardier, which is less effective than spearmen against cav, though more effective against melee)

agreed

What are your thoughts on the implementation in the design of the various Skaven units?
How do you feel about:
a) the sprawling trait (limiting Skaven to a few megacities)
b) The skaven warrens, unique civic, improved cottages, and extra industry buildings to compensate for this (without these, Kuriotates fail in FFH)
c) the Clan HQ national wonders

yeh what do you think about these?

 

[orlanth]

Seer pic?