Maniac
Apolyton Sage
IIRC it allows combat from water but not combat over rivers.
FfH2 0.20 Balance Feedback
- Thread starter Kael
- Start date
Has there been any thought given to giving the Vampire epromotion vulnerability to Holy damage? It makes sense from a flavour perspective and it would serve to slightly counter the Calabim's general uberness and perhaps force a choice between other religions and the Veil (with the Veil having the better synergies but bringing the wrath of Basium).
A+ombomb
Actuary
I am not quite sure why you guys made a civ start with 3 warriors, but it's really easy to kill someone's civ before they can get a second defender by attacking someone with them, using their settler as a scout for their enemy's city. I don't think any civ should get 3 warriors, it's just extreme and asking for abuses. Teamers are even worse, because you can stack all your warriors against one person, so not even some distance can save you.
I agree that the Stooges can help you a lot in the early game ... if you can get them. I have noticed AI civs rushing to get Pact of Nilhorn.
One correction: if you use one of your units to capture the city you will have to declare war first.
I like the strategy of clearing out the city of defenders until a barb wanders along (but you must move HN units away from the city or the barb will attack them instead of razing/capturing the city).
This is a great way to take out small AI civ cities without declaring war, or, more importantly, as the AI civs defensive pact-up like crazy, you can do this without risking several civs declaring war on you.
Great Mod Guys!!
I host a lot of online multiplayer games. I frequently invite Warlords lobby players to join me for a FFHII game. But I have noticed more than one of them independently mention a couple of things that bug them enough so that they are reluctant to play. I know you can't please everyone of course, and those who love fantasy themes will play regardless of balance, but I have identified 2 or 3 seriously game unbalancing issues:
1) Late Chopping
2) Agriculture Civic
3) Slavery Civic
4) Altar of Luonnater (thx for the patch)
5) Basium's Resurrected Angels
-----------------------------------
Ok... #1 and #2 above are the most frequently cited things players have independently mentioned about the mod, right off the bat.
1) If a player has forests on his river tiles and hills, he is at a serious early disadvantage. (This is even more so a problem on some great map generators where jungle may be in the capital radius.) Starting in the jungle belt can almost be a death sentance on some maps. Chopping should occur at least 1 tech tier sooner for both forest and jungle. An easy and aesthetically pleasing way to do this would be allow chopping forests with crafting (What did the natives do with all those stone axes when not at war??? They must have been for something!!) And then you could use bronzeworking for chopping jungle. Sanitation would still be an awesome and important tech with it's +1 farm bonus.
2) +2 food Bonus for Agriculture civic is really cool... However most players I talk with agree that it overpowers any specialist based economy, especially slavery and altar of Luonater. It also makes some of the other civics in its class rarely used, unless you're elf. Even just a +1 food bonus alone would still be awesome (In vanilla civ I allways try to sneak to sanitation and it's +1 food bonus if I'm not imminently threatened. It really fuels growth and specialization), and most players would still make it a priority. I know you may have all long cherished the coolness of early 5 food grassland tiles (As do I) but this fuels the fire of abuse of any specialist base economies. Even in vanilla civ, players using specialist economies without this +2 bonus can out-tech players who are 100% cottaged up. Changing to +1 bonus would bring a lot more balance to slavery, altar of Luonnater, and specialists in general. I think you could change to +1 without too many other tweaks (and still get your satisfying looking breadloaf with sanitation!) :-D Other civics in that class would then be even more appealing.
3) Slavery.
Lots of great players are crossing over to your mod right now, and the elite among them have quickly focused on what amounts to a major exploit... Slavery civic for Octopus Overlords and any race that can get it. In fact, these players make it an early priority to get Octupus Overlords even if they are playing a good race. Last night a good player with slavery on a balanced inland sea map beat all 5 or 6 of the rest of us (experienced players also) easily. He had size 3-4 cities the whole game, and was whipping our combined butts... Easily outproducing us by more than double or triple. This is becoming a serious problem, and I may not even play this mod online until this is fixed, and if so I will only do so if players agree not to use slavery. The shields produced by whipping needs to be cut at LEAST in half, and if Agri civic is changed to +1 food bonus instead of +2 bonus, then that MAY be sufficient. Everyone online I've met who has played more than a few games agrees with me on this. It's far worse than the Altar of Luonnater was.
4) Alter of Luonnater
Ok, thanks for the patch, much appreciated, but I want to add a comment about balancing. It's impossible to know how long games are going to drag out. If something is accessible late-game which players can use to more than double their production, at some point it will essentially become a victory achievement, for all practical purposes terminating the game once the other players stockpiles of forces are worn down. I dont' know if this is what you wanted, if so, I'm OK with that, but... maybe 2 shields maximum per priest would balance this better, still be a great option (like Angkor Wat) and still prevent late game over-dominance. Other players actually suggested this in our discussions. Maybe just tweaking the agri civic would help ammend this with patch "g".
5) In our last online game, both Hyboream and Mercurian gates were opened. A player hotjoined our game and took over Basium (his only unit pretty much at that point) It was allready late game, but soon he had 109 angels with mithril weapon. Yes, that's correct, 109. He was the only thing standing between the rest of us and certain destruction by the player who was making a premium use of the slavery civic. Did you intend getting free angels to be game ending? Does everyone in this mod go to heaven, regardless of how naughty they were? LOL... maybe only the good heroes should be able to return in another form...
I hope you read this.
Thanks for a great mod!!
Bigben34
I host a lot of online multiplayer games. I frequently invite Warlords lobby players to join me for a FFHII game. But I have noticed more than one of them independently mention a couple of things that bug them enough so that they are reluctant to play. I know you can't please everyone of course, and those who love fantasy themes will play regardless of balance, but I have identified 2 or 3 seriously game unbalancing issues:
1) Late Chopping
2) Agriculture Civic
3) Slavery Civic
4) Altar of Luonnater (thx for the patch)
5) Basium's Resurrected Angels
-----------------------------------
Ok... #1 and #2 above are the most frequently cited things players have independently mentioned about the mod, right off the bat.
1) If a player has forests on his river tiles and hills, he is at a serious early disadvantage. (This is even more so a problem on some great map generators where jungle may be in the capital radius.) Starting in the jungle belt can almost be a death sentance on some maps. Chopping should occur at least 1 tech tier sooner for both forest and jungle. An easy and aesthetically pleasing way to do this would be allow chopping forests with crafting (What did the natives do with all those stone axes when not at war??? They must have been for something!!) And then you could use bronzeworking for chopping jungle. Sanitation would still be an awesome and important tech with it's +1 farm bonus.
2) +2 food Bonus for Agriculture civic is really cool... However most players I talk with agree that it overpowers any specialist based economy, especially slavery and altar of Luonater. It also makes some of the other civics in its class rarely used, unless you're elf. Even just a +1 food bonus alone would still be awesome (In vanilla civ I allways try to sneak to sanitation and it's +1 food bonus if I'm not imminently threatened. It really fuels growth and specialization), and most players would still make it a priority. I know you may have all long cherished the coolness of early 5 food grassland tiles (As do I) but this fuels the fire of abuse of any specialist base economies. Even in vanilla civ, players using specialist economies without this +2 bonus can out-tech players who are 100% cottaged up. Changing to +1 bonus would bring a lot more balance to slavery, altar of Luonnater, and specialists in general. I think you could change to +1 without too many other tweaks (and still get your satisfying looking breadloaf with sanitation!) :-D Other civics in that class would then be even more appealing.
3) Slavery.
Lots of great players are crossing over to your mod right now, and the elite among them have quickly focused on what amounts to a major exploit... Slavery civic for Octopus Overlords and any race that can get it. In fact, these players make it an early priority to get Octupus Overlords even if they are playing a good race. Last night a good player with slavery on a balanced inland sea map beat all 5 or 6 of the rest of us (experienced players also) easily. He had size 3-4 cities the whole game, and was whipping our combined butts... Easily outproducing us by more than double or triple. This is becoming a serious problem, and I may not even play this mod online until this is fixed, and if so I will only do so if players agree not to use slavery. The shields produced by whipping needs to be cut at LEAST in half, and if Agri civic is changed to +1 food bonus instead of +2 bonus, then that MAY be sufficient. Everyone online I've met who has played more than a few games agrees with me on this. It's far worse than the Altar of Luonnater was.
4) Alter of Luonnater
Ok, thanks for the patch, much appreciated, but I want to add a comment about balancing. It's impossible to know how long games are going to drag out. If something is accessible late-game which players can use to more than double their production, at some point it will essentially become a victory achievement, for all practical purposes terminating the game once the other players stockpiles of forces are worn down. I dont' know if this is what you wanted, if so, I'm OK with that, but... maybe 2 shields maximum per priest would balance this better, still be a great option (like Angkor Wat) and still prevent late game over-dominance. Other players actually suggested this in our discussions. Maybe just tweaking the agri civic would help ammend this with patch "g".
5) In our last online game, both Hyboream and Mercurian gates were opened. A player hotjoined our game and took over Basium (his only unit pretty much at that point) It was allready late game, but soon he had 109 angels with mithril weapon. Yes, that's correct, 109. He was the only thing standing between the rest of us and certain destruction by the player who was making a premium use of the slavery civic. Did you intend getting free angels to be game ending? Does everyone in this mod go to heaven, regardless of how naughty they were? LOL... maybe only the good heroes should be able to return in another form...
I hope you read this.
Thanks for a great mod!!
Bigben34
Lower damage from ring of flame and ring of flame type spells or make it so .1 strength is as low as it will take units
Lower agriculture by 1 food and remove production penalty, -or- make the other civics in the line worth considering
Add a way for elves to change jungles into forests to make it so they don't have to go down the ironworking and construction > sanitation techline right away to remove them
Give lanun amphipius promotion as a special race trait, or add pirate trait and later a enemy civ with ninja trait
Lower altar of luonnatar priest production to +2 instead of +3 at the final stages, becomes overpowered when mixed with agriculture farms and allowing the player to all mines short of special resources
Add unique building and unit listing in the civilopedia for things that aren't very clear which civilization gets (demagog flag holder ancestral cave tower of light tailor) to help new people understand
Tell us what units can learn the Sing ability
Lower metal requirements on high level archery units as was done with melee units
Add special clan of embers only religion at warfare/military strategy?
Decrease harshness of the penaltys with dwarven vaults and amount needed to go into the unhappy range
Thats all for now, hope am of any help with my ideas and suggestions.
Lower agriculture by 1 food and remove production penalty, -or- make the other civics in the line worth considering
Add a way for elves to change jungles into forests to make it so they don't have to go down the ironworking and construction > sanitation techline right away to remove them
Give lanun amphipius promotion as a special race trait, or add pirate trait and later a enemy civ with ninja trait
Lower altar of luonnatar priest production to +2 instead of +3 at the final stages, becomes overpowered when mixed with agriculture farms and allowing the player to all mines short of special resources
Add unique building and unit listing in the civilopedia for things that aren't very clear which civilization gets (demagog flag holder ancestral cave tower of light tailor) to help new people understand
Tell us what units can learn the Sing ability
Lower metal requirements on high level archery units as was done with melee units
Add special clan of embers only religion at warfare/military strategy?
Decrease harshness of the penaltys with dwarven vaults and amount needed to go into the unhappy range
Thats all for now, hope am of any help with my ideas and suggestions.
Sureshot
Goddess
- Joined
- Feb 2, 2006
- Messages
- 3,771
Ashen Veil gets the Sacrifice the Weak civic which also allows sacrificing population for production. But there are other ways of getting fast production that aren't so evil, and many ways of players doing things that might seem out of balance, until you compare them to each other.
Try having 109 angels compare with a city thats size 198 lol
also, what patch are you playing? because it seems as tho some of those issues have been resolved. and the more you play the more you'll learn, there's always tons of fun crazy stuff, its what makes it fun, don't get discouraged just cause someone found something that works better than your current strategy.
for a neat orc religion, hopefully the Bhaal fire religion gets added.
Try having 109 angels compare with a city thats size 198 lol
also, what patch are you playing? because it seems as tho some of those issues have been resolved. and the more you play the more you'll learn, there's always tons of fun crazy stuff, its what makes it fun, don't get discouraged just cause someone found something that works better than your current strategy.
for a neat orc religion, hopefully the Bhaal fire religion gets added.
Nikis-Knight
Deity
Would it be possible to give units hit by ring of flame, pillar or fire, and similar high damage spells a point of experience? Small consolation I guess, but it might cause someone to think twice about rof'ing a city.
Edit: Or it might lead to someone powering up all their own tropps. Hmm, nevermind!
Edit: Or it might lead to someone powering up all their own tropps. Hmm, nevermind!
Sureshot
Goddess
- Joined
- Feb 2, 2006
- Messages
- 3,771
could just make it not give xp to your own units, and also for good measure, make it cause unhappiness in your own cities "-1 happiness : You sadist!"
Here are my views on mercurians after playing as them last night online.
While angels are strong and are basicly free macemen +angel promotion and holy, think of all the requirements for them to work and the negatives
Infernals need to be in the world
You need to build the wonder in a city that is not your capital and lose that city to the mercurians once summoned (and if its a weak city the mercurians will also be somewhat weak early on)
They come in late and need to play a slight catchup to get there footing and cities
If Basium dies they lose there aggressive/raider/ingenuity traits and the angels and other units become below average, and Basium is mortal
You need to move every angel that comes out of every random city to the city(s) that have forges or weaponsmiths which can take alot of turns, and you need to move them out and back in to get the upgrade if they spawned in the city, and if they spawn at the city ruins you just razed, you got a raw recruit with 5 strength, when all your other angels are likely 7 or 9 fighting equally strong or stronger enemies
If there is no war, there are no angels, if there is war in the world, they will get there smiting mojo on, so if all is right in the world they will be pretty weak, and if people don't start razing cities they will have to wait for basium to level up they can be beaten before any angels come out of the war
Angels are all they have that are unique basicly, and units such as berserkers and shadows need to be upgraded from higher level units (even the assassin, who is not a angel but needs to gain experience to upgrade to one while other civs can train theres)
All in all I would say there are so many requirements and negatives and late expansion that even tho I beat off the calabim building nothing but farms and had stacks of 80 angels when he was half done razing the bannor lands and at the very end I had 190+ angels when 75% of the world was ruins and being pillaged to fund my gold (Nothing says *the good guys* like pillaging towns)
The only reason I had so many angels was because the whole world at the time was in chaos, everyone was at war with there neighbors, civs and cities were being razed left and right, and if you don't raze the city they won't be reborn as angels, thats my view on the matter and don't see how you would make them weaker without making the city sacrifce to summon them pointless.
While angels are strong and are basicly free macemen +angel promotion and holy, think of all the requirements for them to work and the negatives
Infernals need to be in the world
You need to build the wonder in a city that is not your capital and lose that city to the mercurians once summoned (and if its a weak city the mercurians will also be somewhat weak early on)
They come in late and need to play a slight catchup to get there footing and cities
If Basium dies they lose there aggressive/raider/ingenuity traits and the angels and other units become below average, and Basium is mortal
You need to move every angel that comes out of every random city to the city(s) that have forges or weaponsmiths which can take alot of turns, and you need to move them out and back in to get the upgrade if they spawned in the city, and if they spawn at the city ruins you just razed, you got a raw recruit with 5 strength, when all your other angels are likely 7 or 9 fighting equally strong or stronger enemies
If there is no war, there are no angels, if there is war in the world, they will get there smiting mojo on, so if all is right in the world they will be pretty weak, and if people don't start razing cities they will have to wait for basium to level up they can be beaten before any angels come out of the war
Angels are all they have that are unique basicly, and units such as berserkers and shadows need to be upgraded from higher level units (even the assassin, who is not a angel but needs to gain experience to upgrade to one while other civs can train theres)
All in all I would say there are so many requirements and negatives and late expansion that even tho I beat off the calabim building nothing but farms and had stacks of 80 angels when he was half done razing the bannor lands and at the very end I had 190+ angels when 75% of the world was ruins and being pillaged to fund my gold (Nothing says *the good guys* like pillaging towns)
The only reason I had so many angels was because the whole world at the time was in chaos, everyone was at war with there neighbors, civs and cities were being razed left and right, and if you don't raze the city they won't be reborn as angels, thats my view on the matter and don't see how you would make them weaker without making the city sacrifce to summon them pointless.
That's not a very satisfying alternative in my opinion. You shouldn't have to rely on discovering one of several 'uber' strategies in order to have a chance in this game. Basic economies, with all cottages, and maybe one specialist city should be viable options. At the present this is not the case. The player who slaved in our game was miles ahead of the rest of us, in every category. I was very careful with my economy, and by the end i was first in GNP and first in production, and still falling woefully behind in production of units compared to the slaver economy!!!
A size 198 city also relies on the extreme food bonus in this game... These strategies are overpowered compared to the basic cottaging strategy. If this does not change I will not be playing this mod for long, even though I love fantasy genres... And while I was reluctant to say so earlier, I have met several people in Warlords lobby who simply don't play the mod more than a couple of times because of the uber unbalance of the farm/agri issue.
As far as Basium's Angels, is his economy reliant on getting free Angels? As far as Uberness's comments that he gets them weak and has to move them to forge cities... any player who makes units in cities without forges has to do the same. All I'm saying is that Basium entered late game with only 1 city, and in a while has 190 angels??? If you want this event to be game-ending, then it works just fine. If I see the basium enter any more games I will instantly declare war on the bastard and do my best to nip him in the bud, (which could still be almost impossible if I have to raze anyones towns on my way to him, lol...) That can add an interesting twist, to be sure... but I would still recommend finding a way to limit his angel recruitment... maybe max of 1 per turn? Even that could be an extreme advantage during global war.
To have to rely on one of these specific strategies to have a chance reduces the dimensionality of this game, rather than enhancing it. It's extremely difficult to balance an overpowered strategy in a game by trying to vamp up all the other strategies...rather than just toning down the existing overpowering elements.
Anyway, Great Mod, I hope some of these issues will be addressed.
Bigben34
Sureshot
Goddess
- Joined
- Feb 2, 2006
- Messages
- 3,771
the size 198 city has nothing to do with agriculture or farms heh, and does not benefit from or use either.
why don't you know this? because there's plenty of depth and breadth to this mod, one person utilizing a useful strategy while you mill away not knowing the nuances are hardly a reason to give up and claim many silent others will do the same unless changed, and is a kinda funny position tbh
very different mod, yes, but each civ/religion/alignment has many strategies and synergies, makes it a lot of fun.
personally i find the slavery methods weak compared to other strategies. if you don't want to be evil, yet want to sacrifice innocents to achieve greater production speeds, then you're stuck in a contradiction that should not be solved via this mod heh
why don't you know this? because there's plenty of depth and breadth to this mod, one person utilizing a useful strategy while you mill away not knowing the nuances are hardly a reason to give up and claim many silent others will do the same unless changed, and is a kinda funny position tbh
very different mod, yes, but each civ/religion/alignment has many strategies and synergies, makes it a lot of fun.
personally i find the slavery methods weak compared to other strategies. if you don't want to be evil, yet want to sacrifice innocents to achieve greater production speeds, then you're stuck in a contradiction that should not be solved via this mod heh
Sureshot
Goddess
- Joined
- Feb 2, 2006
- Messages
- 3,771
making Aggressive trait give Combat 1 to mounted units is definitely a good balance, but the Commando promotion from Raiders is a bit excessive, without it mounted units are nearly impossible to protect improvements against, but with Commando they are the biggest nuisance in the world (you have to worry about what might come from 18 tiles away all the time).
Maniac
Apolyton Sage
Yeah those changes were taken over from Rise of Mania, but the Commando stuff probably doesn't fit in regular FfH without some other changes. Eg in RoM roads never multiply movement by three, and there is of course the Zones of Control around forts and cities as a potential method to slow down mounted units.
Chandrasekhar
Determined
I'm thinking that Agriculture may be a balanced enough civic, but not at its current upkeep and tech placement. If it's to be kept where it is, I think I'd prefer to see it just give +1 food to farms. After all, it's a low upkeep civic on a first tier tech.
Rhymes
Drive 4 25 is back
I would personally have it give + 1 food and keep the -1 production. With the health bonus it would still be about the best civic in the category!
That, or give a larger production penalty. Something like -15% in each city, regardless if there are farms or not.
That, or give a larger production penalty. Something like -15% in each city, regardless if there are farms or not.
katika
Warlord
I think Basium almost definitely needs some rebalancing. Getting multiple free T3 units every turn, plus extra for razing cities is too much. It doesn't even make sense: if Basium burned your home to the ground, killing your family, would you join him in the afterlife? Didn't think so. I also think that he should get some more flavor, he's too one dimensional IMO. Oh, and the Mercurian Gate should probably be a ritual so that you can't instantly build it with a Great Engineer. That really throws off the balance of timing.
Agriculture probably is too strong. Probably meaning I can't remember the last time I've used anything else once I could switch. I agree with Rhymes about reducing the food bonus to +1 and/or replacing the -1 hammer with -15% hammer (general hammer production). As it is, the -1 hammer usually doesn't do anything, at most taking away 3 hammers per city. I might even go with -20% if the +2 food stayed.
Did anyone play the Khazad with RoK and take advantage of the insane production bonuses they can get (+40% from vault, IIRC, up to +40$ from Dwarven Forge, +50% in capital (God King), bonus production on unpillagable mines that have a higher chance to find metals, etc.)? Did anyone build several Confessors/Ritualists and spam Ring of Flames? Did anyone build tons of Ritualists as the Sheiam and summon new armies of Nightmares/Chaos Marauders every turn?
Agriculture probably is too strong. Probably meaning I can't remember the last time I've used anything else once I could switch. I agree with Rhymes about reducing the food bonus to +1 and/or replacing the -1 hammer with -15% hammer (general hammer production). As it is, the -1 hammer usually doesn't do anything, at most taking away 3 hammers per city. I might even go with -20% if the +2 food stayed.
Why should a basic strategy that doesn't focus on synergies between religion/civics/civs do as well as a strategy that does utilize religion and civics? I haven't played with OO in a while, so I'm not saying that slavery is balanced. There are, however, lots of "unbalanced" strategies.
Did anyone play the Khazad with RoK and take advantage of the insane production bonuses they can get (+40% from vault, IIRC, up to +40$ from Dwarven Forge, +50% in capital (God King), bonus production on unpillagable mines that have a higher chance to find metals, etc.)? Did anyone build several Confessors/Ritualists and spam Ring of Flames? Did anyone build tons of Ritualists as the Sheiam and summon new armies of Nightmares/Chaos Marauders every turn?
Lord Yanaek
Emperor
- Joined
- Aug 15, 2003
- Messages
- 1,664
I played the Khazaks once and was able to produce tier4 every other turn in my capital, it wasn't even a specialized city!
I think forest fires need to be rebalanced. I'm currently playing a hot-seat game on a map generated with smart-map. I selected random1-6 for number of continents, and we happened to end up on a huge pangea. When acheron appeared he started a forest fire south of my sister's postition. The fire quickly spread to nearby forests CROSSING RIVERS and nothing seemed able to stop it. If she wasn't Elohim (water mana with palace) and hadn't decided to stop any other building in her god-king powered capital to build a mage guild and some adepts the whole map would have been burned down!
It was too early for elementalism so we couldn't build a water node, and too early for bronze working so we couldn't chop down trees to stop the fire!
At the very least, fire shouldn't cross water!
I think forest fires need to be rebalanced. I'm currently playing a hot-seat game on a map generated with smart-map. I selected random1-6 for number of continents, and we happened to end up on a huge pangea. When acheron appeared he started a forest fire south of my sister's postition. The fire quickly spread to nearby forests CROSSING RIVERS and nothing seemed able to stop it. If she wasn't Elohim (water mana with palace) and hadn't decided to stop any other building in her god-king powered capital to build a mage guild and some adepts the whole map would have been burned down!
It was too early for elementalism so we couldn't build a water node, and too early for bronze working so we couldn't chop down trees to stop the fire!
At the very least, fire shouldn't cross water!
