FfH2 0.14 Balance Recommendations

[Sarisin]

I think the hunter is an important early game unit, especially in dealing with raging barbs such as Lizardmen and Worg Riders. With the right promotions they can even handle adequately orc archers, orc axemen, and chariots (although terrain advantages make it difficult with them).

I always try to get a Hunting Lodge as soon as possible not only to build hunters, but upgrade scouts which likely have some nice promotions.

I have wished for a promotion that gives a % over recon units like the one for melee, mounted, archery units, etc. This comes in handy when the Lizardmen come as well as the Lizard Rangers later.

 

[Frozen-Vomit]

I would suggest making the tower of mastery a world wonder (the first that is built ends the game anyways):

- The four minor towers are all national wonders and take up national wonders slots in your core cities. In my game i had to build the tower of mastery in a city where it took about 227 turns.

- When it's a world wonder you can no longer rush it with money (ok, it cost more than 25000 gold to finish it. But financial civs can manage this.)

- In my opinion it comes to early in the tech tree. I would move it to omniscence (a expensive but useless tech most of the times.)

 

[Chalid]

Kael,

Since 0.13 there is a building that i think nearly useless : palisade.
Explanation:
One of the first building i build is an obelisk to improve my cultural border. it also gives me +25% def bonus when i reach the first cultural growth level. Palisade also gives +25% def bonus. So, i think that palisade building is useless. It gives you a non permanent bonus equal to the cultural one (which is permanent). Furthemore, palissade are quickly obsolete and cost too many shields.
What is the solution ?
OMI:
- lower the cost. 20 shields for exemple.
- raise the bonus to +50% against barbs and let it to +25% in others cases(for exemple) as it becomes quickly obsolete.
- divide the cost by two for def trait leader. There are defensive, no?

What do you think of my feelings?

The Frog.

You know that it does give +50% together with the cultural expansion??? The building percentages are not listed below the city. That number only represents the cultural defense.

 

[Chalid]

I would suggest making the tower of mastery a world wonder (the first that is built ends the game anyways):

- The four minor towers are all national wonders and take up national wonders slots in your core cities. In my game i had to build the tower of mastery in a city where it took about 227 turns.

- When it's a world wonder you can no longer rush it with money (ok, it cost more than 25000 gold to finish it. But financial civs can manage this.)

- In my opinion it comes to early in the tech tree. I would move it to omniscence (a expensive but useless tech most of the times.)

We think about removing eitehr National building limit, or to make the towers not count as national wonders (like the place) for the count. You Are rright about the world wonderstatus for the final tower.

The timing ist on purpose so early. It is inteded to allow you to early end games when you are successfull. So you only have to get the nodes. that is all that should count for the victory.

 

[Hian the Frog]

You know that it does give +50% together with the cultural expansion??? The building percentages are not listed below the city. That number only represents the cultural defense.

Hi Chalid,

Are you sure that cultural def bonus and building def bonus are cumulative ? I'm not. If i well remember the best of the two bonuses is the one used in case of fight in vanilla. Maybie i'm wrong, maybie you change that in FfH2. If you are right, palisade are less useless even if it costs too many shields for a quickly obsolete building IMO.
I will look at that in my next game..

The Frog.

PS: For the first time i played a whole game as Kuriotates. Your dragon is awesome, beautiful,....

 

[BeefontheBone]

Unless it's been changed from Vanilla, the greater of the cultural and fortification bonuses is used for defending cities (global bonuses from Wonders etc. are on top of this).

Hadn't thought about that for the Towers, but I agree - they definitely shouldn't count towards the national wonder count. Going for the builder victory shouldn't limit your city specialisation options

 

[AndrewDJ]

Playing as the Ljosalfar, I'm in a bit of a war with the Balseraphs, and am finding the lack of siege weapons a trifle annoying--it takes a long time to knock down city defenses with Meteor Storm. So then I remembered the ending of The Two Towers: why not either a) give Treants a bonus to attacking cities, or b) give them a bombardment ability, somewhere between a Meteor storm and a catapult?

 

[Sureshot]

Ya, I liked the idea of Treants (and any giant type of unit) having collateral damage and bombardment.

About the +% vs. recon units, that would be nice. There's no need for it in vanilla games (likely why it doesn't seem to exist) since there's no strong recon units in vanilla, but recon units in FFH2 are the equals of all other units usually (I like a mad rush for rangers due to their strength, mobility, and access to mountains).

 

[Kael]

The reason we havent added either of these (bombard ability for the ljosalfar or an anti-recon promotion) is because one of the key concepts of FfH is dramatically different options with varying strengths and weaknesses.

The Ljosalfar are designed as a defensive civ. Their forests and tendancy toward recon units makes them incrediably strong but they pay for that with a general offensive weakness. I wouldn't want to mitigate that weakness by giving them a pseudo-siege unit.

The anti-recon promotion is the same. The fact that you can get a promotion against them is one of their strengths. I wouldn't want to steal that strength from them just to make things consistent. If they were overpowered I prefer to lower their strength (but I dont think they are).

 

[Chandrasekhar]

The anti-recon promotion is the same. The fact that you can get a promotion against them is one of their strengths. I wouldn't want to steal that strength from them just to make things consistent. If they were overpowered I prefer to lower their strength (but I dont think they are).

Alright, so what's their weakness? I'd prefer them to be as strong as the melee unit one tier below them, not bad when you consider their higher movement points and different promotion selections.

 

[Nikis-Knight]

Recon units can't get city raider or city guard promotion, those help alot.

 

[Kael]

Recon units can't get city raider or city guard promotion, those help alot.

Yeah in general they arent good at city attacking or defending.

 

[Chandrasekhar]

The AI always seems to use them to dealy effect against my cities. Even when they don't attack, they seem to be really good at pillaging. This is alright, but the problem is that the power units of the same era can't dislodge them from my workable radius! Of course, my militaries have always been a bit small, but the technological advantage should count for something. The AI also seems to like to use hunters to defend cities, which doesn't seem right, and isn't very good for the gameplay either. They should get -30% city defense and attack, in my opinion, if their strength isn't reduced.

 

[z00t]

Govannon and his trainer promotion is very strong combined with the way raised skeletons are counted.

I have a factory deep within my borders where Govannon stands training units each turn, meanwhile on the front line Bambur has a stack of 30+ skeletons with combat V and raises a new one each turn. Very fun, but seems a bit overpowered =)

Also I was thinking, I could stack tons of thane of kilmorphs this way, train them all with Govannon and raise the skeletons with Bamburs combat V, then boom! Culture bomb the thanes.. and the skeleton army remains!

 

[Sureshot]

The AI always seems to use them to deadly effect against my cities. Even when they don't attack, they seem to be really good at pillaging.

Recon units can't pillage (believe me I've tried many times ). Ranger's feel pretty tough, but that's only because I tend to go straight for them (honestly though, they can't hope to succeed in taking a city from a unit of the same tier). The main reason for wanting a +% vs recon is because of the lizardmen... maybe a +% vs lizardmen promotion?

Bombard for treants definately wouldn't make sense, but what about collateral damage with a -city attack? Unless collateral necessitates bombard.

 

[chocmushroom]

I love the fact that the dwarves are good at wonders (if they are kept happy with their gold). But I agree that the amount of "goodness" may be to much. Lets get some balance feedback back from others and we can adjust it if its to powerful.

I'm playing them now, and yes you can get a high production value in some cities. This does mean you can build Wonders quick, and building and units.

It does come at a cost.
To be able to build a lot of units, cost money, I don't mean money to make them, but for their upkeep. This also goes with buildings. I'm finding it hard to keep the increase production in all cities, as the more I build the more money it takes.

There is also the problem of rushing items with money. I was thinking of rushing a pirate galley in a city on a small sea, so I could kill the boat and get some crabs and fish. It would cost over 300 gold, which is a city, I was up to my total munber of cities for the production bonus, so had to wait until I made another 300 gold before I could rush the ship. If i'd rushed it right away, i would have lost production in my whole empire. This is a big benifit but also a big draw-back in the game.
You need money to improve, but you find it hard to use this money or you loose your improvements. One more thing, to maintain my money, i have to limit my research. Normaly i'd have max reseach to get a tech I wanted then build up money after, this is not possable with the stunties as if they loose money, they will loose production, which means they loose even more money than you expected.

In summery, Yes, they are hard and a big production bonus is very very good, but maintaing this bonus does limit your play. In money you can spend and cities you can have.

 

[QES]

Recon units can't pillage (believe me I've tried many times ). Ranger's feel pretty tough, but that's only because I tend to go straight for them (honestly though, they can't hope to succeed in taking a city from a unit of the same tier). The main reason for wanting a +% vs recon is because of the lizardmen... maybe a +% vs lizardmen promotion?

My Orc Slaying Got Bonus' against them. They're not orcs, but i got the bonuses.

 

[QES]

Everyones talking about how uber these little munchkins are, but I for the life of me cant expand with them, without either A) pissing them all off. or B) falling behind in territory - which then leads to C) and eventual technologal lag, and conquest by superior units and numbers. I wanna add the promotion to my dwarven units "Get drunk and accept doomed fate"

 

[Sureshot]

My Orc Slaying Got Bonus' against them. They're not orcs, but i got the bonuses.

Ah, that's good to know, thanks

 

[Hian the Frog]

Kael,

It seems that aggressive trait does not give anymore half cost for training yards built. Right ?
If yes, why ?
When you play aggressive leader such as Sheelba of the Clans, it's a very important bonus. Because you can't earn xp by destroying barb, every single xp is very important at the built of your troop. Sometimes, you can improve your ratio by around 7-12 % just by a single promo upgrade......
Furthemore, it only gives you +1 xp whereas it was +2 xp before. Again, why?
Even if magic if very important, some players (like me) and some played civ are strongly militaristic....

Last thing: Rantine is fun to play. Difficult but fun.

The Frog.