Fall Further 050 Balance Issues

[heisenberg]

Another issue about the Carnivals though, the Sheaim get their chaos marauders from Carnival+Gate. By the time the Sheaim actually get down to creating the corporation and slowly spreading and building carnivals, the marauders are obsolete.
Perhaps there could be some tweaking either to the building prereqs for the marauders, or some minor boosts in str to them, so perhaps they are still useful by the time you get them?

 

[Sarisin]

A couple of issues with the new, improved Animals:

1. I have had two Hunters and an Assassin killed by Animals - two Wolves (strength 7) and a Gorilla (strength 9). Those are powerful animals, but in each instance my guy had nearly 99% defending odds, so I think something might be amiss here. All were Combat V, with Subdue Animal, and 2 had extra first strikes.

2. I saw an Elephant that was strength 14. Holy Powerful Pachyderm! With over 500 turns left in my epic speed game, I wonder what is the limit on strength for animals? Could they end up stronger than the Avatar of Wrath?

3. I wanted to capture an Elephant, but my Hunters, even with Subdue Animal, were hopeless against them. I am just now getting Rangers, but at strength 14 I am not so confident. Anyway, I want to see what happened when you captured a strength 14 Elephant and turned it into a War Elephant. Has anyone done this yet?

4. I managed to build the Grand Menagerie early - a good thing, too, as these animals, if they are allowed to hang around get very strong and also pick up a host of promotions as apparently the AI sends low-level units against them.

5. As animal units, why don't my Stooges gain strength over time like Bears, Lions, etc.?

6. Maybe this was a change I missed in FF, but why do captured Animals NOT have HN status? Now it appears only the Stooges and that Nightwatch you get from Deception are HN. I guess if you build units in cities with CoE, you have a chance of getting them too, but I used to like to have HN Giant Spiders and Griffons for some early game fun.

 

[Thunder_Gr]

3. I wanted to capture an Elephant, but my Hunters, even with Subdue Animal, were hopeless against them. I am just now getting Rangers, but at strength 14 I am not so confident. Anyway, I want to see what happened when you captured a strength 14 Elephant and turned it into a War Elephant. Has anyone done this yet?

Just build a few archery units and use their ranged attack to soften the animal. If you have fireball mages or Storm mages, you can use them to soften it.

 

[Randomness]

I know it has already been said, but, the barbarians are drasticly nutered. I was playing a game with a masive barb city right next to me, at least 4 units in city and 6 patroling cultural borders, and I got attack around 5 times...

 

[jwin]

Are the people who aren't being attacked by barbarians playing with barbarian world setting? In all three games I have played so far, I haven't had any shortage of barbarian unts.

I have noticed, however, that even at turn 250, I am still fighting only hordes of warriors and scouts unless I have the no AI building requirements option on.

edit: I forgot to mention, I do not have barbarian world on.

 

[Breez]

I am NOT playing Barbarian world, but AM playing Raging Barbarians, and they are all over the place.

I have a scout running from a stack of 6 that he has picked up one at a time as he has made attempt after attempt to get around them to head back to our culture.

 

[xienwolf]

A couple of issues with the new, improved Animals:

1. I have had two Hunters and an Assassin killed by Animals - two Wolves (strength 7) and a Gorilla (strength 9). Those are powerful animals, but in each instance my guy had nearly 99% defending odds, so I think something might be amiss here. All were Combat V, with Subdue Animal, and 2 had extra first strikes.

2. I saw an Elephant that was strength 14. Holy Powerful Pachyderm! With over 500 turns left in my epic speed game, I wonder what is the limit on strength for animals? Could they end up stronger than the Avatar of Wrath?

3. I wanted to capture an Elephant, but my Hunters, even with Subdue Animal, were hopeless against them. I am just now getting Rangers, but at strength 14 I am not so confident. Anyway, I want to see what happened when you captured a strength 14 Elephant and turned it into a War Elephant. Has anyone done this yet?

4. I managed to build the Grand Menagerie early - a good thing, too, as these animals, if they are allowed to hang around get very strong and also pick up a host of promotions as apparently the AI sends low-level units against them.

5. As animal units, why don't my Stooges gain strength over time like Bears, Lions, etc.?

6. Maybe this was a change I missed in FF, but why do captured Animals NOT have HN status? Now it appears only the Stooges and that Nightwatch you get from Deception are HN. I guess if you build units in cities with CoE, you have a chance of getting them too, but I used to like to have HN Giant Spiders and Griffons for some early game fun.

Animals can gain 9 total strength over the course of the game, the speed at which they gain it is based on your gamespeed and handicap settings.

Bonus strength on the animals will carry over for any unit conversion, like making an elephant into a war elephant.

Hill Giants are not animals.

Animals don't have HN because Fall from Heaven needed that to keep animals hostile toward Civilizations with Barbarian Trait. With the Animals being their own Civilizaiton, Fall Further does not need such a work around.

 

[Sarisin]

Just build a few archery units and use their ranged attack to soften the animal. If you have fireball mages or Storm mages, you can use them to soften it.

Great idea on the Archers (I even have Horse Archers now), but it is a little early in the game for me to have any Mages. Come to think of it, I do have a Lich I got from a Lair and can use him to summon things to soften those Elephants.

Thanks.

 

[Sarisin]

Are the people who aren't being attacked by barbarians playing with barbarian world setting? In all three games I have played so far, I haven't had any shortage of barbarian unts.

I have noticed, however, that even at turn 250, I am still fighting only hordes of warriors and scouts unless I have the no AI building requirements option on.

edit: I forgot to mention, I do not have barbarian world on.

Yes, I mentioned I DO play with Barbarian World turned on and that this was part of the problem. The barb cities keep defenders, sometimes quite a few, in their cities and this takes away from number that can 'rage.' Also, often the cities are guarded by a Scorpion Clan Archer and that is one damn hard unit to kill in the early going.

I hate to switch off Barbarian World as I like that feature, however, I think I will do that my next game and see how it works and if there are any more barbs raging.

Yes, I also mentioned I had gone past turn 400 (epic speed) in my game and not seen a single barb Lizardman - only Goblins and Warriors. Around Turn 450 I started getting a few Lizardmen and Wolf Riders.

It's funny because I remember it was an issue with the previous version of FF that the AI barbscseemed to get more advanced units very early as well as upgrading their units en masse. Now it is quite the opposite.

 

[Sarisin]

Animals can gain 9 total strength over the course of the game, the speed at which they gain it is based on your gamespeed and handicap settings.

Bonus strength on the animals will carry over for any unit conversion, like making an elephant into a war elephant.

Hill Giants are not animals.

Animals don't have HN because Fall from Heaven needed that to keep animals hostile toward Civilizations with Barbarian Trait. With the Animals being their own Civilizaiton, Fall Further does not need such a work around.

Thanks for your responses. So, I can expect the Elephants to reach a max of strength 17 then? Wow. Also, it sounds like a must-move to capture them and turn them into very powerful War Elephants if they keep that bonus strength!

There is a discussion on the Hill Giants on the FFH forum too. It seems Hill Giants ARE considered animals in some ways. For example, Hunters, Lizardmen, Rangers, etc. all get the same bonus against them as they would against animals. But, I see what you are saying - for the purpose of FF, they do not get the bonus strength other animals get. It would be nice if they lost that 'animal' handicap against other units too, then.

No problem with the animals not having HN when you capture them. It is just something I miss as it was a lot of fun playing with the HN Spiders and Griffons.

 

[Valkrionn]

Actually, the whole Hill Giant thing was changed with this release of FF. In the past, Hill Giants were considered animals in order to prevent them from entering your borders. However, in the new version of FF they became part of the Orcish Barbarian civ, and are no longer animals and do not gain extra strength.

 

[xienwolf]

They did lose the animal handicap. Animal bonus on Handicap settings applies against the Animal Civilization (which Hill Giants aren't part of), and Animal Bonus on Promotions and units (Subdue Animals and Recon units) are applied against UNITCOMBAT_ANIMAL, which again, the Hill Giants are not.

But yes, they are VERY different in base FfH

 

[PotatoOverdose]

The following occurred in my first game with fall further, so maybe it's considered normal, but I'll post it here anyway. On turn 51 the Austrin had a Lich on my borders. I know that they are supposed to get better results from lairs but turn 51...lich? If I was playing the Austrin it would be game over for everyone else. Fortunately, they didn't have a clue what to do with him (probably) and he went on his merry way. I can post a screenshot/savegame if necessary.

 

[Anathema]

I've played several games with similar settings, and finally had one where "raging" barbarians were actually raging, constantly flooding in to attack cities and pillaging left and right as you'd expect them to. Comparing it to my previous games where "raging" barbarians rarely entered my territory, I think the key difference is the Clan of Embers. When they're present, they pop their world spell early and for reasons I don't fully understand, the savages are crippled from that point forward - but with no Clan, raging barbarians are just as powerful as they were before the patch. I did notice that the Clan-controlled savages left many cities and lairs undefended - actually, even if a Clan unit is in a barbarian city/lair, the unit won't stop me from destroying it if I'm at peace with the Clan will it? Anyway I saw several barbarian cities fall to AIs shortly after the world spell, perhaps that has something to do with it.

 

[Randomness]

I am not playing Barb world, but the AI didn't expand much, nor did I as I am playing as the Scions and I find them better suted to a some what small civ, I may be wrong but... anyways, due to large spaces, there are plenty of barb cities. Orthus has even been summoned, but is neither pawning nor dead... I have yet to find him on world builder. One more thing... Moka spawned in my boarders, next to a weak city, only two Scion warriors, and he ran away... They weren't even highly upgraded...

 

[Sarisin]

I've captured three strength 14 Elephants. For some reason, when I paid an incredible 5 Gold (used to be 273 Gold, I think) to make each a War Elephant it became strength 13 . Still, you would have to be crazy to not try to load up on Elephants in the game now.

 

[Methuselah]

Glory is overpowered isn't it? Combo it with Republic for:

+25% GP birth rate
+120% culture
+4 happiness in 5 largest cities
-25% War Weariness
No non-state religion spread.
Unhappiness penalty for civs not using republic.
Unlimited bards and engineers.


Even by itself, it is amazingly overpowered.

 

[Tarquelne]

I think it's best compared to civics in its own category. I looked at Liberty - I think Liberty is about as good, but maybe I'm over-valuing the free Specialist or under-valuing the WW mod (for both civics).

 

[lordrune]

Animals can gain 9 total strength over the course of the game, the speed at which they gain it is based on your gamespeed and handicap settings.

Because polar bears with combat x5 weren't dangerous enough?

 

[MaxAstro]

I have to say, now that animals heal while moving and can effectively gather combat promotions by eating scouts, they seem plenty dangerous enough. Strength 12 lions are just ridiculous, and unrealistic compared to the game's power scale.

So I am not sure yet if I am for or against this new mechanic... I do like the passive growth of animals, but I feel it needs to be toned down to maybe 2-3 points of strength max.