FfH2 0.30 Balance Issues

[kenken244]

That wouldn't change anything, the horse would still always survive because it is unliving, and it hits 60% of all living units so even if nothing had hero status they still would die.

 

[Nimbus]

why is it an act of war if i hit a neutral unit with a ring of flames spell or chain lightning but if i use raging seas or world break, etc nobody in the world cares??? sounds out of whack to me.

just go into the ffh editor and go to the spell tab, you can change the bCausesWar from 0(does not cause war) to 1 (causes war) for the offending spell. So this way either your ring of flames will not cause war when hitting a neutral unit by accident or when Basium(or Lanun/Sheaim,etc) casts Divine Retribution 17 civs will come knocking on his door saying "Hey!!! I saw that, Now Die!" Hmmmmm that could be interesting, wonder if the computer would ever cast it, would be lots of fun if it would.

 

[Sarisin]

That wouldn't change anything, the horse would still always survive because it is unliving, and it hits 60% of all living units so even if nothing had hero status they still would die.

I guess you are right. Are there any other non-living heroes that would be unaffected by Armageddon?

I thought this would include Basium, who I believe has the Angel promotion, but I have lost him when the counter hits 100 - also, I seem to recall losing some of the higher level Mercurian units, which I think had the Angel (non-living) promotion.

Hyborem?

Anyway, I thought there was some sort of special calculation for Armageddon where you didn't lose all your heroes, for example, and kept other living units in that 40% left...

 

[mindlar]

The Khazad smith event really screws up the early game by allowing early forges to pretty much every civ, and by extension giving Great Engineers to all civs much earlier than expected.

To bring this back into balance, the event should have a requirement of the smelting tech.

 

[xienwolf]

It'll be better once they get in a bunch of smaller events from the Community Request thread. Then it won't be so likely that every civ winds up with a forge because they will be busy with other things, like a Spider Mine!

 

[xienwolf]

Been doing some event playtesting, and I highly reccomend that the Global Defines gains:

<Define>
<DefineName>EVENT_PROBABILITY_ROLL_SIDES</DefineName>
<iDefineIntVal>10</iDefineIntVal>
</Define>


Either that or bring the iEventChance up to 20 instead of 2 in each era. At this level the events weren't too frequent to be annoying, but they were often enough to keep things entertaining

Mainly though, I bumped up the chance of events to test out Circle of Gaelan. If events 2 & 3 are set to Weight -1, they will trigger properly. But with values of 10 each not even the first event will trigger, while with values of 90,000 each, the first triggers within 3 events of getting a Mage Guild constructed, but neither of the following events trigger at all.

 

[bc1]

I hadn't looked into precisely what that modifier meant yet by testing. You are right it just adds another 20 (yipee!) to the 500 already. And you cannot use Engineers for anything BUT buildings, so I can't see where the bonus would not apply... (Same with the Lightbulbing, I thought it meant you got double or triple value if you were going to be the first to get the Tech, but it just adds a flat +2 or +3, meaningless).

Based on experience large cities will get more bang from their great engineer. I would assume the x20 is a multiplier of city population added to the base 500, sounds about right IMHO.

With regards to slaves: slaves should remain cheap (30$ apiece sounds about right). However slaves effectiveness should be low: I would recommend their shield value to be nerfed from 15 to a single shield.

 

[xienwolf]

30 gold per shield might be a little overly steep. Slaves already are horrible workers (50% of base for their racial type), so if the code can limit you from hiring unlimited quantities in a turn they ought to still give a better conversion rate of gold to hammers than standard rushing would get you.

I'll inflate the population of my city and check your idea on the rush multipliers. I think you are probably correct on that one.

 

[bc1]

@xienwolf:

1) the multiplier and base values are probably affected by difficulty level AFAIK.

2) slaves are way too powerful with 15 shields @ 30$. This 1:2 ratio for $ to shield conversion is *way* higher than any other method, and if this was not enough it is unhindered by any city happiness penalty (and slaves are currently in unlimited supply)! Completely broken IMHO.

slave usefulness as workers: just make them cost no upkeep. Then you can have tons of slaves doing all the busywork of your empire, even if each is a slowpoke!

There should be a balancing drawback to slaves in the form of some random slave revolt event (more slaves = more likely), i.e. some chance that all your slaves in a given area convert to some random types of semi-weak barbarian military units, with scripted orders to attack your closest city in the area.

 

[xienwolf]

I believe there is an intention to limit how many you can buy per turn eventually. But even if you just cut them down to 1/4 ratio, they should be decent without being completely exploit worth. I just think that 1/30 is a bit extreme.

No way to make something No Upkeep currently. You can just make it so that they are No MILITARY Upkeep, which workers/slaves already have. Actually it could be kinda cool if Slaves DID require military upkeep to reflect having to have caretakers ensure they do not run away...

 

[Kentarion]

So, I have a suggestion. The Lanun are already very, very powerful on Islands or archipelago maps and are weaker on a Pangaea map. Maybe their 'world' spell should have a balancing impact, instead of reinforcement impact. That is, for game reasons (although I recognize this may not be as good from a flavor standpoint) their world spell should kick ass on Pangaea and be weak on Archipelago. Giving them even MORE power on archipelago means we are practically playing at a higher difficulty level on this map.

good idea.

 

[bc1]

...even if you just cut them down to 1/4 ratio, they should be decent without being completely exploit worth. I just think that 1/30 is a bit extreme.

That's assuming you even have to buy them. With the slavery civic, not only do you get to farm XP, you also get to farm slaves from combat! At 15 shields apiece, warmongers can quickly build up infrastructure no peacenik could ever hope to match.

Edit: and slaves can be used as shields for (arch)mages. Never fear pesky marksmen any longer, drag your bunch of pet slaves captured during combat along with your (arch)mage stack.

Slaves to win!

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I think that the fact that Adepts have an AI weight of 300 while their upgrades have a weight of 8 (or 16 for the top level) means that the AI won't upgrade them when it is able to; this is probably a huge part of why the AI is so bad with magic.

 

[Mesix]

Now that you mention it, I think that I have seen adepts and no upgraded units from the AI. That goes for any unit category though. Even with "AI no build reguirements" option checked, the AI seems to spam low tier I units like diciples way too much and ignore higher tier units that can be built.

 

[Darkheart]

The AI never seems to upgrade ANY units, is this lack of funds or low weighting?

 

[xienwolf]

I would lobby for it being mainly due to lack of funds, since they do still build the upper tier units if able to do so.

 

[Mesix]

I've always thought that having both a level requirement and a gold gost seemed a bit off. I understand that upgrading a unit of stone age warriors with clubs to bronze age spearmen costs money. I have a disconnect in seening the gold cost when upgrading an adept to a mage or a priest to a high priest. The upgrade seems like it should be free to a unit that meets the qualifications. Many of the high tier units that have level requirements already limit production to 3 (as national units), so making the upgrade free should not lead to abuse or an unbalanced game. Making this change might also get the AI players to update a lot of their outdated units and make the AI more competative.

 

[xienwolf]

Would be nic efor the AI. But will have to re-balance Industrious trait (the 50% off upgrade prices one). I think it is well worth doing though.

 

[Mesix]

I don't know...getting 50% off upgrading all your early warriors to axemen/champions is a pretty good benefit not to mention promoting your early scouts that survive to hunters/rangers.

We're talking about adepts and tier 3 units that are upgrading to national units (only units that have a level requirement). I don't really think this nerfs an Industrius leader enough to merit a retooling of the trait.

 

[xienwolf]

Probably valid. I don't often notice the trait happening anyway. Money comes, Money goes...