Is it just me or are the new barbs a bigger PITA than the 4 horsemen?

[Krieger66]

Ok, their not literally that bad but I've 3 games now where I've been completely outclassed in unit strength by barbarians(all on marathon: game I turn ten centaur charger rampage, game II turn 100 highwaymen cc charge, and of course game 3 turn 300 the barbarian city more strongly defended than an ai capital). In my last game 2 ai's went down before I even had more than 2 warriors. At the moment I'm facing barb city 6 squares away from my city with 4 str horseman, a lizardman, and 3 archers. I'm in turn 300 on marathon and I'm lucky to have tier 2 morai. Now my chances of beating said horsemen with bronze weaps, raging blood active on my best std soldiers with combat I(from apprenticeship civic) and str 4 is 33%. Now if they were the only units in the city I would need at least 6-8 morai and some decent luck but there are also archers. This is ridiculous, I mean who is the idiot who decided to have str 8 units roaming around that early? Who decided to make barbs tougher to take down than a rival civ?

I understand some people like getting beaten down every other game and kudos to them but this is just ********, you find tier 2 units now before you even found your 2nd city and that annoying muris goblin event is now a PITA spawn in your borders of strength 4 and higher goblin units with massive poison dmg bonuses. Someone else has to see how much of a farce this is...right?

 

[Valkrionn]

Ok, their not literally that bad but I've 3 games now where I've been completely outclassed in unit strength by barbarians(all on marathon: game I turn ten centaur charger rampage, game II turn 100 highwaymen cc charge, and of course game 3 turn 300 the barbarian city more strongly defended than an ai capital). In my last game 2 ai's went down before I even had more than 2 warriors. At the moment I'm facing barb city 6 squares away from my city with 4 str horseman, a lizardman, and 3 archers. I'm in turn 300 on marathon and I'm lucky to have tier 2 morai. Now my chances of beating said horsemen with bronze weaps, raging blood active on my best std soldiers with combat I(from apprenticeship civic) and str 4 is 33%. Now if they were the only units in the city I would need at least 6-8 morai and some decent luck but there are also archers. This is ridiculous, I mean who is the idiot who decided to have str 8 units roaming around that early? Who decided to make barbs tougher to take down than a rival civ?

I understand some people like getting beaten down every other game and kudos to them but this is just ********, you find tier 2 units now before you even found your 2nd city and that annoying muris goblin event is now a PITA spawn in your borders of strength 4 and higher goblin units with massive poison dmg bonuses. Someone else has to see how much of a farce this is...right?

Technically, I would be that idiot.

That said: The vast majority of the issues you mention are due to a lack of decent scaling in the Lair upgrade mechanism. Which, honestly, I should have foreseen; There's no surefire way to take a set turn amount, and balance it to tech progress. Too many variables; Choice of techs, one person able to tech faster than another, etc.

It will be changed soon; My goal is to sit down tomorrow and hammer out the replacement mechanism. Here's a quote describing it from the new forums:

Possibly implement something similar to the way techs can allow lairs to spawn, but for upgrades? Say, a chance each turn for a lair to upgrade, if a player has the appropriate tech, and weighted by the number of players that have the tech. This way we can have it upgrade pretty much right when the new lairs spawn, as they should.

Should give you some idea of what I'll be doing. Allows us to absolutely ensure that lairs upgrade at the appropriate tech level; Barbs will remain challenging, but not overpoweringly so, and never very difficult to handle in your own territory. Their role is meant to be to impede expansion.

 

[Tholal]

Barb tech is already computed in deciding what units barb cities can produce. Can't you just piggy-back on top of that functionality for lairs?

 

[Valkrionn]

Barb tech is already computed in deciding what units barb cities can produce. Can't you just piggy-back on top of that functionality for lairs?

Probably. On the other hand, I already have a function doing exactly what I want, for lair spawning.

I prefer basing it on player tech as it is more reactionary. If another player beelines a tech that allows a new barb... You will see it, immediately. There is no lag while the tech slowly leaks to the barbs. At the same time, the way it is implemented means a single player with the tech does not have the same effect as if all players possess it; Lets us gradually phase in the new lair, while the older variant continues to spawn at a reduced rate.

So yes, we probably could. Certainly could. But it doesn't give me the type of effect I want with it.

 

[Jester Fool]

Just had to say that right now barbs are way overpowered (I got conquered by savages on turn 10). However, once the balancing is corrected, the new system should really shine. IMO, until all the new code is in (magic etc.) and the final debugging/balancing is performed, RiFE is really in a beta stage (due to the staggering amount of changes/new mechanics etc). RiFE is going to be bad ass when the team gets done. Just saying.

 

[Torugu]

IMO, until all the new code is in (magic etc.) and the final debugging/balancing is performed, RiFE is really in a beta stage

I always felt like the team is actually working on Rife 2 ver 0.4 rather than 1.4.

 

[Valkrionn]

Not a bad way to put it, actually... Especially seeing as we're about to begin wholesale revisions of all buildings, units, promotions, techs, all of it.

 

[Valkrionn]

As an update on this: We're going to use my idea, plus an idea of Torugu's.

Would it be possible to increase the likelihood of lairs spawning the further away you get from civilization?

This would not only make barbarians less of a threat inside your cultural borders but also would help the development of cohesive barbarian hinterland while at the same time make it less likely for different civs to be separated by barbarian territory (which takes a lot of action out of the game since isolated AIs don't feel the need to declare war on other isolated AIs).

 

[Krieger66]

Technically, I would be that idiot.

That said: The vast majority of the issues you mention are due to a lack of decent scaling in the Lair upgrade mechanism. Which, honestly, I should have foreseen; There's no surefire way to take a set turn amount, and balance it to tech progress. Too many variables; Choice of techs, one person able to tech faster than another, etc.

It will be changed soon; My goal is to sit down tomorrow and hammer out the replacement mechanism. Here's a quote describing it from the new forums:



Should give you some idea of what I'll be doing. Allows us to absolutely ensure that lairs upgrade at the appropriate tech level; Barbs will remain challenging, but not overpoweringly so, and never very difficult to handle in your own territory. Their role is meant to be to impede expansion.

Thats a relief to here.

Anyway sorry for jumping on you guys like that I got a little carried away after I got my army to the city and saw the barbs huge stack... Maybe the higwaymen, bandit marksman-like archers should be held back untill all civs have at least tier 2 archer and melee?(or at least tier 1 archer and tier 2 melee?) Maybe, even tier 3 because my calabim champion had maybe a 30% of beating a highwayman unpromoted and lost against one defending in forest...

 

[Valkrionn]

The highwaymen spawn out of tier3 dungeons; Iron Working is required to spawn them, IIRC, the issue is that it upgrades after a set number of turns, rather than at a tech. The Vigil (archer) is a guardian, so there's only ever one per dungeon and it's leashed.

 

[Krieger66]

The highwaymen spawn out of tier3 dungeons; Iron Working is required to spawn them, IIRC, the issue is that it upgrades after a set number of turns, rather than at a tech. The Vigil (archer) is a guardian, so there's only ever one per dungeon and it's leashed.

It didn't say leashed and it marched over to my capital and pillaged my plantation..the highwayman however....I just watched a stack of 8 come out of a peninsula. My vampire and morai(with combat I-III and formation) were able to take out the 4 that attacked, with a hefty fortify and defense bonus, and then I met the other 4 when I captured that barb city(with a little help from rosier and some uber luck and not-so-uber luck when the svartalfar declared war on me). None of them were spawned via dungeon I never exlored any lairs near my cities and I'm sure there wasn't a civ hiding on the peninsula that could have...

Maybe, the highwaymen could at least get a penalty on city attack?(-15% seems fair)

 

[Valkrionn]

It didn't say leashed and it marched over to my capital and pillaged my plantation..the highwayman however....I just watched a stack of 8 come out of a peninsula. My vampire and morai(with combat I-III and formation) were able to take out the 4 that attacked, with a hefty fortify and defense bonus, and then I met the other 4 when I captured that barb city(with a little help from rosier and some uber luck and not-so-uber luck when the svartalfar declared war on me). None of them were spawned via dungeon I never exlored any lairs near my cities and I'm sure there wasn't a civ hiding on the peninsula that could have...

Maybe, the highwaymen could at least get a penalty on city attack?(-15% seems fair)

The Vigil is a guardian of t2 and t3 Dungeons (only guardian I know of that's used that way), and guardians are "set free" once a lair upgrades. The one you saw would have come from a t2 dungeon that upgraded.

How do you know they weren't spawned via dungeon? It doesn't need to be explored for that to happen, they are spawned automatically until it is pillaged.

 

[Krieger66]

The Vigil is a guardian of t2 and t3 Dungeons (only guardian I know of that's used that way), and guardians are "set free" once a lair upgrades. The one you saw would have come from a t2 dungeon that upgraded.

How do you know they weren't spawned via dungeon? It doesn't need to be explored for that to happen, they are spawned automatically until it is pillaged.

I thought you meant spawned by exploration...then that probably is what happened.
No offense but I'm convinced the 1.31 patch is evil now....I was pressing on to the bandit lair and next turn Stephanos spawns adjacent to me on a mountain, kills my strongest unit and pushes my entire stack back. Does the AV holy city put a target on your back or something?

edit: and the game crashed after I miraculously beat Stephanos...somewhere a bandit vigil is shooting a voodoo doll of myself at 50 paces with a longbow and doing things I won't mention.

 

[Valkrionn]

Nah, he picks a random plot to spawn on and attacks anyone he finds.

And lairs have two types of spawn (three including exploration); The first, guardians, are only spawned when the improvement is placed (when it spawns, upgrades, or currently, pillages) and are leashed, and the second is spawned periodically and free roaming.

 

[Krieger66]

Nah, he picks a random plot to spawn on and attacks anyone he finds.

And lairs have two types of spawn (three including exploration); The first, guardians, are only spawned when the improvement is placed (when it spawns, upgrades, or currently, pillages) and are leashed, and the second is spawned periodically and free roaming.

Oh yeah I think I came across a dungeon earlier, that would explain it.
I also noticed a stack of: bandit lord, bandit, and centaur marauder keeps spawning frequently near the area of the suspected bandit hideout...

 

[Valkrionn]

The new lair upgrade mechanic is available via the Development SVN branch now.

Should be better.