FfH2 0.20 Balance Feedback

[Blakmane]

The mass order/Veil conversions are really pissing me off ATM. In the games i've played there has been no good vs evil battles at all- whichever religion that gets founded first is pretty much universally adopted leading to almost everyone being good (or everyone being evil).

The issue, as I see it, is that once one of those religions is within a city, it is not possible to introduce the other. Thus after a short period of missionary spamming it is possible to literally bar an evil/good civ from adopting their preferred religion, forcing them to adopt yours.

Perhaps evil AI should be discouraged from converting to order as state religion and visa versa for good to ashen veil? Also, is it possible to lower the chances that The Order will spread in evil cities (and the AV in good cities)?

 

[GeeJo]

Ignore this

 

[Yoshi2942]

Yes, but that doesn't help the poor sap who can't do this. Plus - With the various bugfixes/patches/whatever that will be coming out - it seems that if the authors of this fine mod agreed with my statements, and decided to make the changes as well, then that would be a one time change as opposed to me making the change each time that the files are updated. And because of the change to river-crossing, there is a precedent for such a change.

Hmm, guess I'm not responding to anything, anymore..

As far as the Good vs Evil battles.. I'm in the middle of my 4th game.. and this time there isn't so much good vs evil as there is Good (2 civs + Basium -- who is dead ) at peace with each other, 2 neutrals who keep getting into war with everyone, and about 8 evil empires who are at war with every other empire out there.... it is crazy. I had to summon Basium and give him one of my better cities just to stay alive when Pentranach summoned Hyborem on my border... then Hyborem declared war against everyone - including Pentranach - except me, until Basium appeared. Basium charged into battle - was decimated - leaving me at war with everyone..

 

[GeeJo]

Renaissance starts are now a heck of a lot harder. Hyborem appears only a few turns in, when you still only have the starting few archers and spearmen. At this point he inevitably single-handedly wipes out the continent he appears on. Taking over him on an underpopulated small map, it took all of 30 turns after he appeared to clear the board. Shortest game ever!

Best way to counteract this would be to tie Hyborem's appearance to an Armageddon count, even a smallish one (Heck, it was at 0 in both Renaissance-start games I played.) Putting in a minimum 1 or 2 points above whatever the founding of AV adds would probably be enough for the civs to build up a passable defence against the guy.

 

[TheBoatman]

As far as the Good vs Evil battles.. I'm in the middle of my 4th game.. and this time there isn't so much good vs evil as there is Good (2 civs + Basium -- who is dead ) at peace with each other, 2 neutrals who keep getting into war with everyone, and about 8 evil empires who are at war with every other empire out there.... it is crazy. I had to summon Basium and give him one of my better cities just to stay alive when Pentranach summoned Hyborem on my border... then Hyborem declared war against everyone - including Pentranach - except me, until Basium appeared. Basium charged into battle - was decimated - leaving me at war with everyone..

Welcome to middle ages

 

[Black Attila]

Basium/Mercurians are WAY too strong. Once they come into the game Angels(STR 7 with the right resources ) start spawning like crazy. After perhaps 20 turns, Mercurians already had 70 of these units. Most of the world at this time were still using Archers/Hunters/Axemen which simply couldn't stand up against the horde of Angels that the Mercurians don't even have to work for.

Evil beware. You don't stand a chance against a unified Basium/Whoever.

This is so unbalancing that it is just plain silly.

 

[Yoshi2942]

On a serious note though -- In Light, I almost always went with Magic. Either Summoners, or Nature, or Fire... Pretty much always. With Fire, forget it. The magic tree might as well not exist. The first stage of the game is the same, research techs to match nearby resources. Then Found a religion and begin gathering units. But in Light, this is the point where I could turn my attention to the Magic tree and build a handfull of Adepts so that they could begin gaining exp while I turned my attention elsewhere. Not so in Fire. War starts to break out and by the time that I have stabalized to the point where I can build a handful of Adepts -- they'll never gain enough exp to be worthwhile... I've tried it. Had 6 Adepts on the board for 50-100 turns.. ended up using their exp for combat promotions and using them as meatshields, not only did they not have enough exp to be worthwhile mages -- I needed to research too many turns worth of techs to actually advance them anyways.

Out of the 4 games that I've played all the way through, the only spells I have cast are Haste, Enchant Blade, and.. um... Thats it I think.

 

[TheBoatman]

It is impossible for hyborem to win the conquest victory. They always get religious one sooner, because of the AV autospread.

 

[Bad Player]

Is it really a problem that Hyborem and the Infernals start off really powerful? Kael has mentioned that he wanted the early world to be dangerous - it's just luck of the draw that you end up with Hyborem next door and then he crushes your civilisation.


However if you do want to make the Infernals weaker depending what stage of play they come in you could tie it to the average (or median) number of beakers produced by civs or techs instead of beakers if that's easier.

 

[Bad Player]

Maybe Hyborem and Basium should be equal strength?

 

[Bad Player]

The mass order/Veil conversions are really pissing me off ATM. In the games i've played there has been no good vs evil battles at all- whichever religion that gets founded first is pretty much universally adopted leading to almost everyone being good (or everyone being evil).

The issue, as I see it, is that once one of those religions is within a city, it is not possible to introduce the other. Thus after a short period of missionary spamming it is possible to literally bar an evil/good civ from adopting their preferred religion, forcing them to adopt yours.

Perhaps evil AI should be discouraged from converting to order as state religion and visa versa for good to ashen veil? Also, is it possible to lower the chances that The Order will spread in evil cities (and the AV in good cities)?

I just played a game where Perpentach was the weakest civ and he founded the AV. Hyborem and Perpentach were killed and noone else had converted to the AV.

 

[QES]

And PLEASE, could we do one of the following:

A: Get rid of the desert defense PENALTY. Desert should not give a defense bonus but it should not make you defend worse in combat realistically.

If not that then AT LEAST, make it so DESERT HILLS get 25% defense bonus. It is absurd that an archer on a desert hill does not get a hill defense bonus.

Oh and cities built in the desert should not get a 25% defense penalty either. After all the terrain isnt even desert then. Its urban.

While I agree that cities in desert should have the penalty mitigated, I LOVE the fact that there's a penalty in deserts. This could be because I came up with the idea - it could also be because it generally serves a purpose.

The idea being that the penalty makes it even more undesirable land. It makes the lands hostile - and therefore a soft barrier to invasions and movement.

I agree that hills should still provide "some" benefit - but they could also be functionally considered "Dunes" and dunes are not defensiable positions, becuase of the nature of the consisitancy in the ground - (yeah they're hard to climb, but they're also hard to stand on and hold.)

The "worse" the desert is, the better all other terrain is. Also the Malakim dont suffer this penalty, making deserts less threatening to them. They can fight in their native terrain and use it to their advantage against others.
-Qes

 

[Sureshot]

Maybe Hyborem and Basium should be equal strength?

basium can get the demon slaying promotions, so he doesnt need to be as strong, and theres no angel slaying promotion.


deserts are great the way they are, and hill deserts do have a benefit, archers still gain their +25% natural hill bonus, and units that get guerilla get a bonus of +40%
desert hills are easier to defend than a normal flatland, especially for archers

 

[Chip56]

Also hill deserts to give the +25 from hills.
-> -25 from from deserts +25 from hills =0

 

[Ringtailed]

Basium/Mercurians are WAY too strong. Once they come into the game Angels(STR 7 with the right resources ) start spawning like crazy. After perhaps 20 turns, Mercurians already had 70 of these units. Most of the world at this time were still using Archers/Hunters/Axemen which simply couldn't stand up against the horde of Angels that the Mercurians don't even have to work for.

un-promoted angels probably shouldn't get weapon promotions, since manes don't...

 

[Bitwise]

I really think there needs to be a way to scale Basium and Hyborem's starting force better depending on when they enter play. They should be weaker if brought out very early and stronger if brought out very late.

Just need a workable mechanism to define "early" and "late".

 

[Sureshot]

if someone gets macemen or rangers really "early" they can dominate just as easily, so its the way it is with everything, if you rush it, its more useful

 

[Black Attila]

I feel the Good are far more dangerous than evil is, because of the cooperation. Hyborim needs to enter into an alliance with its summoner to bring balance to the game.

Also, Angels are much stronger than manes as my buddy was pumping out STR 7's with them. He had 9 civs go to war with them and he beat them back and had them begging for mercy after 20 game turns and 70 more angels later.

It is in my opinion that they come in too easily. He would kill Runes of Kilmorph guys and they would pop in his capital with their full experience total as Angels. Thia really should only be limited to the Order troops, while only the Veil should be coming back as Manes. Hyborim's Manes start intrisically weaker and they don't recieve experience points for them. In that game Valin Phanuel was killed, and my buddy ended up with a str 7 ANGEL with 126 experience points. So Basium at str 12 and this almost heroic type guy are wrecking havoc on the world while he beats up on Hunters/Archers/Horsemen/Axemen just don't stand a chance against so many high powered units at this stage in the game. Think of an army of 70 macemen crossing your borders led by 2 huge leaders and all you have is 2-4 level 3 units guarding most of your cities.

For starts,Angels need to be lowered to the level of Manes and not gain experience points. Basium and Hyborim both need to be weakened a bit. Perhaps 8 STR instead of 12. Hyborim needs to have a permanent alliance with its summoner.

I also fear these changes have rendered the now lesser religeons as unusable. Its almost suicidal choosing these now as they cannot hope to stand up against Hyborem and Basium. I happened to be Cassiel in the game we were playing and I felt so impotent that the game became instantly a big bummer to play, and I was doing okay too, as I was in 3rd points wise. Nowadays, Cassiel is doomed.

 

[Sureshot]

build rangers, you can get them faster than the order or veil are founded, and they're 7 strength and move 2.

if someone rushes for units a tier above yours, you're going to be in trouble unless you do similarly.

 

[Black Attila]

un-promoted angels probably shouldn't get weapon promotions, since manes don't...

The whole weapon promotion should be done away with IMO.

Copper gives you axemen
Iron gives you macemen.

It shouldn't mean just because you have Iron, that Warriors weilding wooden clubs should get stronger. Nothing is free in life.
make them pay for their upgrades.

If need be, make Mithril a pre requisite to show its special quality in the teir 4 melee units