Fall Further 0.51 Balance Discussion Thread

[tokala]

On seeing
2. Chislev Mounted units can now gain Orc Slaying

in the relaese notes for the next patch, is this a compensation for the fact that Orc Slaying got pretty much useless with patch B?
If yes, it is a pretty weak compensation:

Since the creation of the goblinoid racial promotion, much of the Clans units and most of the early bhall units are not affected by Orc Slaying anymore.
Gameplay wise, Orc Slaying was a big help for early defence and exploration, but now its just not cost effective in the early game. Its now only useful if you have the Clan in your game AND you are planning to wage war against them.
Flavourwise Goblinoids are a part of the Clan, and should in my opinion be affected by an an anti-"orc" promotion that has its foundation in the violent displacement of the Chislev by the Clan of Embers.

 

[Wodan]

Maybe Orc Slaying should be renamed Goblinoid Slaying and changed to work how it used to?

 

[tokala]

I would rather suggest to keep the name and just include again all the units that were affected pre-patch_B.

 

[WarKirby]

It's being allowed for mounted units simply as orrection of an oddity, since there's no reason why it shouldn't be allowed.

I don't see why orc slaying is useless. It's a pretty hard counter to an entire civ.. And what do you mean "not cost effective". It doesn't cost anything beyond making a simple building, then you get it for free on every unit. It's not something you have to expend a level on, it's more or less an inbuilt part of the chicslev civ.

Also, as the goblin pedia entry points out, goblins are not a subspecies of orc, but are in fact an entirely seperate race.


But ultimately, the real reason it doesn't work on goblins, is because PromotionCombatMod is a single item field. And it's literally impossible to put multiple anti promotion bonuses in a single promotion, Hopefully xienwolf will get around to adding a better function for us at some point.

 

[Valkrionn]

Well, you could always call Orc Slaying, Greenskin Slaying instead...

And it's not completely impossible. Simply have an autoacquire promo, requiring the original promo, that adds an equal combat mod vs the Goblin racial.

That said, not something I personally would do at the moment.

 

[tokala]

It's being allowed for mounted units simply as orrection of an oddity, since there's no reason why it shouldn't be allowed.

I don't see why orc slaying is useless. It's a pretty hard counter to an entire civ.. And what do you mean "not cost effective". It doesn't cost anything beyond making a simple building, then you get it for free on every unit. It's not something you have to expend a level on, it's more or less an inbuilt part of the chicslev civ.

By pretty much useless I wanted to indicate that there are few games where Orc Slaying is useful, namely those where the Clan is in and it makes sense to fight against them. (With flavour start Chislev(plains) and Clan(jungle) tend to start rather far away). Of couse, a cheap promotion (for the middle/late game) versus melee/archery is quite useful, when applicable.
But in the early game, when every counts, its not just a "cheap" building to unlock a free promotion. You also need a tribal shrine as a prerequisite. Thats 110 , which could get you some additional warriors. And on higher levels the barbs start to swarm you just about this time. If the barbs are mainly orcish warriors, then getting Orc Slaying may pay off, but usually they are not. I get mainly vanilla goblins, scorpion clan goblins, skellies and lizardmen, with only a few orcs in the mix.

IAlso, as the goblin pedia entry points out, goblins are not a subspecies of orc, but are in fact an entirely seperate race.

A did not question this, but I supposed the Chislev hatred went against all races under the banner of the Clan of Embers civ rather than the orcish race.

But ultimately, the real reason it doesn't work on goblins, is because PromotionCombatMod is a single item field. And it's literally impossible to put multiple anti promotion bonuses in a single promotion, Hopefully xienwolf will get around to adding a better function for us at some point.

If there is no easy way to change it, then of course this discussion is rather moot.

 

[Frogeater]

played with clan of ember, and rush his unique building (warren)
-this building is to powerfull, make settler worker and all military unit except catapult so early in the game in couple for the same amount of time.... where is the difficulti to win? none , just to rush all the IA and win ....

i think: -place this building in other research more later in the game to avoid the two settler and two worker production, to much powerfull early in a game, and make this building like national building

-if keep it in this research greatly nerf this building

 

[WarKirby]

The Clan of embers are THE rush civ. If you rush everything and win, you're doing it right.

Try fighting an intercontinental war, or raising the difficulty a bit.

I'm thinking maybe we could follow planetfall's example, and add a strength penalty to mass produced clan units, though.

 

[Valkrionn]

The Clan of embers are THE rush civ. If you rush everything and win, you're doing it right.

For now.

 

[Breez]

I agree with Tokala, Orc slaying is a 10% bonus that simply doesn't make any real difference and takes too long to get. It can either be left as is and stay simple irrelevant or something could be done to it to make it neat and/or useful.

Some options are
- Add other races (increases times it comes into play)
- Increase the Bonus it provides (10% isn't a big deal)
- Make it easier to get (move the effect to a building that will get build anyway like the tribal council.
- Cut the cost of the building in half and add a 2nd identical building that adds Goblin slaying. End Result is same cost as always has been and same utility but tad more flexibility.
- go Crazy and make it all yet none of the above. Make it a 0% promotion that is a civ effect that gains as you get techs.

• Poison = +5% vs Orc
• Preisthood = +5% vs Undead
• Bronzeworking = +5% vs Goblin
• KotE = 5% vs Lizardmen

5% is not a real useful promo, but in this case it is free (no real effort to get) so small bonus is fine.

The real issue here is it always has been a utility non-game breaking feature of the Chislev that lost 1/2 its "neat" factor when goblins became immune to it which they never had been in the past. Semantics about what is and what isn't an orc is less important than reversing a "nerf" to a race that hardly needed it.

 

[WarKirby]

10% ? I thought it was 30%

Shall look into that.

 

[Breez]

If it is 30% then I retract all my points... as that is actually enough to make a difference

 

[tokala]

I agree with Tokala, Orc slaying is a 10% bonus that simply doesn't make any real difference and takes too long to get. It can either be left as is and stay simple irrelevant or something could be done to it to make it neat and/or useful.
...
The real issue here is it always has been a utility non-game breaking feature of the Chislev that lost 1/2 its "neat" factor when goblins became immune to it which they never had been in the past.

Well said, apart from the fact thats it's 20%. Some good ideas, I like the "split it" suggestion. Maybe get a (smallish) bonus vs goblinoids from either tribal council or shrine (early survival), and/or a (larger) bonus vs orcs from council of the warchief ("now we are ready to take the fight to them").

 

[Frogeater]

I'm thinking maybe we could follow planetfall's example, and add a strength penalty to mass produced clan units, though.

yep or this solution, because this building make rapidly an exponentiel devellopement (take a city, build or buy the building, make another war, take city ...... rapidly it's to easy to win (in prince difficulty) because city states are in the first research and gold problem doesn't exist)

 

[WarKirby]

Ok, Orc slaying will be increased to a 30% bonus. it was 20% before. Just watch out for the chislev next time you do a warrens rush.

As to the warrens, I'm thinking then, they should give the Undisiplined promotion to units built in the city. Feedback welcome:

Undisciplined
-------------
-20% strength
recieves 75% more collateral damage
3% chance to wear off per turn
2% chance to turn barbarian per turn.
Automatically removed if the unit reaches lv4
Only applies to living units (so no undisciplined ships or catapults, and won't apply to heroes or national units either)

As a side note, The cost of warrens will probably be reduced a bit. Not entirely sure on a value yet, but at 300 they're too expensive to build in every city, which kind of spoils the flavour of the clan.
Notably the collateral damage penalty above makes them very vulnerable to catapults

 

[readercolin]

That is WAY to high a chance to turn barbarian as opposed to wear off each turn. Essentially, it is saying that 40% of your units are going to turn barbarian over time (especially as you're building up a force to attack with, less so when you're in the middle of a fight. Remember, you don't get barbarians to train on to get them to that level 4). Either increase the chance to wear off to like 5% or so, or reduce the chance to turn barbarian to 1%.

Right now, warrens are exorbitantly expensive because they essentially halve the cost of each unit. And no, they are not too expensive to build in every city with the bonus that they give. However, building them does put a hold on clan rush during that time. Remember, its 300 now, but it drops each axman from 60 to 30 - it pays for itself with 10 axmen.

-Colin

 

[Wodan]

That is WAY to high a chance to turn barbarian as opposed to wear off each turn. Essentially, it is saying that 40% of your units are going to turn barbarian over time (especially as you're building up a force to attack with, less so when you're in the middle of a fight. Remember, you don't get barbarians to train on to get them to that level 4). Either increase the chance to wear off to like 5% or so, or reduce the chance to turn barbarian to 1%.

I tend to agree with all that.

Right now, warrens are exorbitantly expensive because they essentially halve the cost of each unit. And no, they are not too expensive to build in every city with the bonus that they give. However, building them does put a hold on clan rush during that time. Remember, its 300 now, but it drops each axman from 60 to 30 - it pays for itself with 10 axmen.

IMO that's way too expensive. 10 axemen is a LOT. You're going to build 10 axemen in multiple cities?

 

[WarKirby]

That is WAY to high a chance to turn barbarian as opposed to wear off each turn. Essentially, it is saying that 40% of your units are going to turn barbarian over time

But 50% of your units are free
And that 40% figure is assuming that you're going to stand around for hundreds of turns. It's most likely that an orc will die a glorious death in battle before either of those percentages triggers. Or kill enough stuff to cease being undisciplined.

Notice also, it would wear off at lv4, Lv4 is only 10xp. That's 2-3 wins at 50-70% odds. Less if you have a general with leadership. And it's also the training limit of a Training Yard/Archery Range. so if a unit does well and becomes powerful, you're not going to lose him. you'll just lose worthless runts who probably didn't matter anyway. And as the clan, barbarians are your friend, so it's not all bad. You don't really lose them, They just get bored of taking orders and go off to fight stuff on their own.

but the numbers are certainly up for discussion.

Right now, warrens are exorbitantly expensive because they essentially halve the cost of each unit. And no, they are not too expensive to build in every city with the bonus that they give. However, building them does put a hold on clan rush during that time. Remember, its 300 now, but it drops each axman from 60 to 30 - it pays for itself with 10 axmen.

-Colin

But why is putting a hold on clan rush a good thing? They're orcs, they're supposed to swarm all over in massive numbers screaming WAAAAAAAAAAGH. I'd lean towards making it less useful (by weakening units such as above) over making it harder to obtain.

Honestly, I've never seen the clan of embers do incredibly well. Sometimes they manage to hold the middle of the scoreboard. Sometimes they die horribly. I've yet to see a clan empire dominating the world. Or for that matter, any militarily oriented civ. It usually only happens to economically oriented people in my games. Flauros, any elven leader, etc

And I think facing a green tide would be amusing. Gives a nice counterpoint to all the uberherosingleunitarmies

As a side note, do orcs start with Chaos mana? If not they should probably be given it. Dance of blades is an awesome spell to combine with horde rushing

 

[WarKirby]

We were also planning an overhaul of the clan lategame. Specifically partially emulating FFH with regards to ogres, but not removing the orc champion. Instead, keeping both the ogre and the champion, as two alternate melee units at the same tech. With the ogre being more focused as anti-archery, and the champion being anti-melee like normal. Doubling up the clan melee line seems fitting, as conversely their mounted line would terminate at wolf riders, never going beyond the horseman level. Ogre Warchief and stoneskin ogre would become immortal and phalanx UUs respectively.

 

[Valkrionn]

Personally, I'd like to see the lizards dropped from the Clan. They have two civs of their own, and don't fit too well in the Clan IMO.