FfH2 0.20 Balance Feedback

[Saien]

Likely important for balance to remove or limit the techs received from tribal villages, in vanillia getting a free 50 research or 80 research tech is all good and well, but a free 120-200 research agriculture or mining can be pretty huge for a bonus based solely on luck.

No doubt, I just picked up Way of the Wise from a goodie hut.

 

[marioflag]

I agree about tech huts, they are a bit overpowered, instead of having a free tech they should give free research, on Marathon getting 80-100 turns of research for free is a bit too much.
Anyway if there is a change toward tech huts also getting gold should be balanced because if tech huts are nerfed, getting gold from huts become more powerful

 

[Frozen-Vomit]

With the new damage type and restistance stuff it would be cool for pieces of barnaxus to give some resistance bonus that normally golems have (not sure which they have...).

I think now you don't get a bonus, but as the promotion is already in it would be cool and flavourful (and easy to change I suppose) to get one.

"Magic pieces of golem junk radiate an aura of restistance"...

 

[A+ombomb]

If you have your cities well defended Orthus shouldn't be a problem.Actually in my recent games he dies really easily, i play on Emperor so probably also other AIs are better defended against him

Oh really? Considering he has about 90% odds on a warrior in a city, and promotes himself the next turn to 1 or 2 stars...I would say you are incorrect. And if you are playing in a teamer it's often extremely difficult to have enormous amounts of warriors in a back city when you are perhaps being choked in the front by 3-4 warriors yourself and you need every last unit there to help out. I've had cities with 3 warriors and a fourth popping out still die to ortheus on a number of occassions. I also play mostly raging barbs, so there are usually piles of other barbs attacking simultaniously on other cities. However, I don't feel that raging barbs should mean impossible barbs or lucker barbs. I don't think ortheus popping outside of cultural boundaries is an unreasonable request at all.

 

[marioflag]

I play only on Marathon and he appears on turn 226, before this turn i have already at least 7-8 units and 2 cities and i usually build at least one building like Elder Council in both cities, i also play always with Raging Barbs.
Frankly i never got any problem with Orthus, just place your troops very well and wait he stays at 1 tile from your troops.Attack first with unexperienced troops and lastly with more experienced and you will be usually fine.If you don't manage to defend with a lot of troops your cities it can be really hard, but Orthus is not meant to be cannon fodder.
Playing with Raging Barbs you should have also easier life because Barbs are just cannon fodder, usually i already have a unit over 40 xp and other 2 with 20-30 xp, so it's not so hard to destroy barbs or Orthus.On Emperor difficulty Orthus is nearly ludicruous he just lives 10 turns just to be killed by some AI or myself.

 

[A+ombomb]

to be killed by some AI or myself.

You didn't really read my post I suppose. I play with real people - AIs won't attack you deliberately while ortheus is on you, but a real player will, and GOOD LUCK.

 

[Jean Elcard]

I didn't read the whole thread, sorry, but unless I missed something essential, than the mounted and melee tech tree are highly imbalanced!
Realised this while playing a multiplayer game with a friend, when he was running around with his Hippus War Chariots of strength 15 at a time, when my best unit had a strength of 7.

I compared the War Chariot (14/11/3) to the Spartiatoi (11/11/1) by counting together the you need to get them. Both are national units which cost 240 each, need a special building for 300 and have a comparable strength, I would say. The result at normal speed:

War Chariot: 11.168
Spartiatoi: 28.588

That's a difference of 17420! I think a bit of balncing is highly recommendable here, don't you think so?

 

[Blakmane]

i've actually found the complete lack of defence power makes the mounted line quite weak -_-

 

[A+ombomb]

The funniest part about the mounted line is that horsearchers are a downgrade IMO from the regular chariots 1 tech before it. Go figure! There should also be a high tech mounted unit that is infinite rather than 100% national units. Also, sparts get weapon upgrades from bronze/iron/mithril don't they? That would put them at 14 power.

 

[DarthCycle]

I like the new system of weapon promotion, but in its current format:

1) it adds a lot of micromanagement. You have to manually cycle your unit from one city to another that has the proper building in order to benefit from the upgrade.

2) AI does not understand this feature. Some of its axemen have a strength of 3, some have 4 for the same civ. This makes for a bigger difference with warrior (from 2 to 3), which can break the game (or perhaps gives an unfair advantage to human players) in the early game.

How about upgrading the weapon of a unit when it is inside the cultural border of its civ and connected to a forge via the trade network?

This way, units waging war at the front do not magically upgrade with the new weapons but should resolve the 2 issues I mentionned.

 

[onedreamer]

I compared the War Chariot (14/11/3) to the Spartiatoi (11/11/1) by counting together the you need to get them. Both are national units which cost 240 each, need a special building for 300 and have a comparable strength, I would say. The result at normal speed:

War Chariot: 11.168
Spartiatoi: 28.588

That's a difference of 17420! I think a bit of balncing is highly recommendable here, don't you think so?

War Chariots don't get defensive bonuses and can't get many cool promotions that Spartiatoi can get. Although I do agree with you. Maybe the tech for war chariots should need another prereq.

Oh really? Considering he has about 90% odds on a warrior in a city, and promotes himself the next turn to 1 or 2 stars...I would say you are incorrect.

Nah he normally won't have such a high %, but surely he's supposed to kill at least a coupla warriors of yours. Too bad that the third or even fourth one will kill him and grab about 30 XP along with the axe, which is now more powerful than in Light. Not to mention that Orthus is weaker because he now spawns much closer to civ borders (in some cases even inside civ borders) therefore he doesn't have all the promotions he used to have in Light. Not sure why of this change...

 

[z00t]

playing around with the sheiam, a few things i noticed during the game that im not sure are bugs or intended behaviour so this thread seems a good place to mention them

1. Basium got summoned by the Lanun, who were forced to declare Hyborem instantly, captured an infernal city and then converted to Ashen veil. So atm Basiums closest ally is the strongest ashen veil player on the map.. Perhaps he should break his alliance in these circumstances?

2. I built Prophecy of Ragnarok, founded Ashen Veil and then used the city with the prophecy mark promotion to spam savants everywhere. As far as i can tell (quite a bit of warring also going on) each adept built raises the armageddon meter once, and then using them to convert other cities raises it once more, so I am taking the world to the brink of armageddon extremely fast. I think sacrificing units with prophecy mark should probably lower the counter much the same way killing them does

3. Temple of the veil seems to give me +1 happiness although its not the state religion and I have no reagents (I just have the holy building + city)

 

[Chandrasekhar]

Have you adopted the "Religion" cultural values civic?

 

[Blakmane]

I like the new system of weapon promotion, but in its current format:

1) it adds a lot of micromanagement. You have to manually cycle your unit from one city to another that has the proper building in order to benefit from the upgrade.

2) AI does not understand this feature. Some of its axemen have a strength of 3, some have 4 for the same civ. This makes for a bigger difference with warrior (from 2 to 3), which can break the game (or perhaps gives an unfair advantage to human players) in the early game.

How about upgrading the weapon of a unit when it is inside the cultural border of its civ and connected to a forge via the trade network?

This way, units waging war at the front do not magically upgrade with the new weapons but should resolve the 2 issues I mentionned.

I think this a really awesome idea. Personally i'm tired of having to send my new units to forged-up cities every few turns and then trotting them back. AFAIK Civ is supposed to be more about macromanagement with optional micromanagement- not the other way round.

 

[z00t]

ahh yeh i guess that would explain 3, thx Chandrasekhar

 

[Maniac]

I like the new system of weapon promotion, but in its current format:

1) it adds a lot of micromanagement. You have to manually cycle your unit from one city to another that has the proper building in order to benefit from the upgrade.

2) AI does not understand this feature. Some of its axemen have a strength of 3, some have 4 for the same civ. This makes for a bigger difference with warrior (from 2 to 3), which can break the game (or perhaps gives an unfair advantage to human players) in the early game.

How about upgrading the weapon of a unit when it is inside the cultural border of its civ and connected to a forge via the trade network?

Just play RoM

 

[Chandrasekhar]

Just play RoM

Doesn't RoM just remove this feature for everyone but the Doviello?

"Doctor, my hand itches."

"Chop it off."

 

[Maniac]

In RoM the axeman melee line and the melee mounted units (horsemen, knights...) can get weapon promotions. You just need to be in a city for weapons upgrades. No need for a forge or weaponsmith, so no micromanagement and no problems with the AI. And you need Bronze/Iron/Mithril Working for Bronze/Iron/Mithril weapons, so the balance problem you reported in the bug thread (iron weapons with smelting) has also already been addressed a looooooooong time ago.

 

[Mesix]

playing around with the sheiam, a few things i noticed during the game that im not sure are bugs or intended behaviour so this thread seems a good place to mention them

1. Basium got summoned by the Lanun, who were forced to declare Hyborem instantly, captured an infernal city and then converted to Ashen veil. So atm Basiums closest ally is the strongest ashen veil player on the map.. Perhaps he should break his alliance in these circumstances?

2. I built Prophecy of Ragnarok, founded Ashen Veil and then used the city with the prophecy mark promotion to spam savants everywhere. As far as i can tell (quite a bit of warring also going on) each adept built raises the armageddon meter once, and then using them to convert other cities raises it once more, so I am taking the world to the brink of armageddon extremely fast. I think sacrificing units with prophecy mark should probably lower the counter much the same way killing them does

3. Temple of the veil seems to give me +1 happiness although its not the state religion and I have no reagents (I just have the holy building + city)

Nah...they are all sacrificed and become martyrs for the cause. Bring on the end of the world!!!

 

[Chandrasekhar]

In RoM the axeman melee line and the melee mounted units (horsemen, knights...) can get weapon promotions. You just need to be in a city for weapons upgrades. No need for a forge or weaponsmith, so no micromanagement and no problems with the AI. And you need Bronze/Iron/Mithril Working for Bronze/Iron/Mithril weapons, so the balance problem you reported in the bug thread (iron weapons with smelting) has also already been addressed a looooooooong time ago.

Ah! I misinterpreted. Hum... it fixes micromanagement and makes things easier for the AI, but I do sort of like the system as it is now. Maybe we should let the AI cheat in the way it does with adepts and mana nodes. So long as they have one forge (weaponsmith) and access to copper and/or iron (mithril), they automatically upgrade in cities; however, keep it the way it is for humans.