Making Doviello (and maybe Clan of Embers) more fun to play

[ChaoticWanderer]

need a god thats more barbarian like that would make them more useful i think

 

[Unser Giftzwerg]

Becauase your chopping down an ancient forest...
Treants are the guardians of forests.

How more clearly could i put this?

The Ancient forest is a quasi-sentient thing and will protect itself. Most of the time, its associated with FOL, becuase the civ who adopts FOL is a mortal manifestation of the same "will". However, for Ancient forests in lands that have either "Lost" their civ-guardians, and/or have changed religions and/or have had boarders move, should still retain some measure of self-preservation.

Self-preservation is all im talking about here. And a Barbarian Treeant who's appearnce depends on the destruction of its ward makes perfect sense.




Gem mines arnt quasi-sentiant. And chopping down an ancient forest that is in your own lands, when youre not FOL, because of boarder movement - ISNT enough. Because there is no consequence. You wanna kill FOL forests? Culture-expand over them, chop em down, NOTHING will be pissed off by that. Thats rediculous.

Please. The forests are bestial and are at minimum aware of self-peservation. I'm not sure they take much in the way of "political ramifications of boarders" into account.

-Qes

I'm sorry QES, I have a hard time feeling AFs are "specal" when I see about 300 AF tiles at the end of a game. If the ancient forests was really a special feature, a patch of forest comprising say 1%-2% of the map, then yeah, I'd say tha't "special." But AFs as implemented right now are "common", not "special". Add a robot defender to every other tile in someone's empire and how the devil is that going to balance out? Don't even have to pay for those insta-defenders. There's already a chance for such a robot to emerge simply for entering an AF tile. Isn't that enough?

One can't have one's cake and eat it too. If AFs are as common as we see now, they deserve to be at risk for chopping. If AFs were actually rare, then it would be flavorful to have the also-supposedly-rare ents emerge to defend them. It is not flavorful to have ents as common as raging barbarian Orcs, nor will it lead to game balance.

Sometimes one must make a choice. Since the game right now spawns a lot of AF tiles, giving a couple realms the incentive to chop them down makes for a great source of diplomatic friction and open hostility. That means more fun. There are players who like playing Doviello and Clan ... they deserve to have a few cool mechanisms apply to their favorite realms too.

 

[QES]

I'm sorry QES, I have a hard time feeling AFs are "specal" when I see about 300 AF tiles at the end of a game. If the ancient forests was really a special feature, a patch of forest comprising say 1%-2% of the map, then yeah, I'd say tha't "special." But AFs as implemented right now are "common", not "special". Add a robot defender to every other tile in someone's empire and how the devil is that going to balance out? Don't even have to pay for those insta-defenders. There's already a chance for such a robot to emerge simply for entering an AF tile. Isn't that enough?

One can't have one's cake and eat it too. If AFs are as common as we see now, they deserve to be at risk for chopping. If AFs were actually rare, then it would be flavorful to have the also-supposedly-rare ents emerge to defend them. It is not flavorful to have ents as common as raging barbarian Orcs, nor will it lead to game balance.

Sometimes one must make a choice. Since the game right now spawns a lot of AF tiles, giving a couple realms the incentive to chop them down makes for a great source of diplomatic friction and open hostility. That means more fun. There are players who like playing Doviello and Clan ... they deserve to have a few cool mechanisms apply to their favorite realms too.

The crys for balance generally fall on my very deaf ears. The reason i Play FfH is flavor, then the "gameplay". Now while ive always agreed that gameplay is important and can never be ignored, when we speak on very small matters (like speicifc bonuses, or tile differentials) then were nit-picking.

I agree, that Ancient Forests tend to be over common near the end of the game. But instead of allowing willynilly chopping, personally I think that Ancient forests should be powerful and rare. I think the % chance under FOL should plumit drastically. And perhaps all forests everywhere get a VERY small chance of independantly turning into AF. (This would give non-FOL civs an opporunitiy to randomly and independantly gain AFs).

Ents:

Ents in my opinion are underpowered and overly common. I agree that they're an "oft spawn" situation. But in the late game, if we're honest with ourselves, they're of not much use. T4 units eat them alive, and T3's can gang up on them. Personally I think the ENTs should be a force to be reconed with individually, and en masse nigh unstoppable. But their apperances should be far more rare.

In this, My "barbarian ent" philosophy should be understood to be apart from FOL ent-ness. If there is FOL coverage over an AF, then it has 0% of chance of spawning a barbarian ent, all it can spawn is civ-specific ents.

If the AF is in non-FOL territory then potential spawns are only ever barbarian units. ALSO, I did not intend the Ent to spawn BEFORE the AF is chopped down, but instead, in responce TO it. So the AF STILL gets chopped down. And on the offence, IN territory belonging to the FOL, chopping forests would have 0 reprocussions except for the already standard issue of wandering around in unfriendly AFs.

Now, if NO implementation is made, and all things are kept as they are now, I've no real problem with it. But the nature of the AF (while it should be more rare, i agree) is that it IS going to try to defend itself if it has a burst of insight. AFs dont LIKE being chopped down, and so what other options have they? Hence the barbarian Ent.

Also, if AFs are "all over" as you said, that means Multiple civs are under the religion of FOL. If you have ONE or two FOL civs, then the AFs are generally going to be quarentined in those areas. The barbarian ent issue is therefore mitigated immediately to "rare" occurances, since the only possibility of their apperance is in Non FOL territory and after a AF is chopped down. Frankly, this doesnt happen ALL that often unless your dealing with a FOL v Culture Whore situation. Any of the "barbarian civs" dont strike me as particularly cultueresque, and when they go on the attack IN FOL territory, nothing would change. The only ents to spawn would be normal FOL spawnage.

So, while your trying to defend the "gameplay" and balance issues, while i can respect that, this "occurance" would be rare, and equally hostile to the FOL players in the game. "Mad, enraged ents" dont have allies.

Summery:

AFs grow only in FOL territory. And Barb ents shouldnt spawn in FOL territory.
Barb Ents %chance spawn only AFTER a good chopping down of a AF.
Barb ents are not friends of FOL civs - Or any civ for that matter.
Keeps things consistant for AFs
Keeps Balance becuase its not particuarly Pro or con anyone. Its the game defending itself.
I like cheese.

-Qes

 

[Unser Giftzwerg]

I think chopping down an ancient forest, NO MATTER WHERE IT IS, should have a LARGE % chance of spawning a permanent barbarian tree ent.

One should not be able to chop down ancient forests (Regardless of where they are) without some serious consequences.
-Qes

Well, I'm fairly good at reading between the lines, but I didn't see this coming.

The crys for balance generally fall on my very deaf ears. The reason i Play FfH is flavor, then the "gameplay". Now while ive always agreed that gameplay is important and can never be ignored, when we speak on very small matters (like speicifc bonuses, or tile differentials) then were nit-picking.

I agree, that Ancient Forests tend to be over common near the end of the game. But instead of allowing willynilly chopping, personally I think that Ancient forests should be powerful and rare. I think the % chance under FOL should plumit drastically. And perhaps all forests everywhere get a VERY small chance of independantly turning into AF. (This would give non-FOL civs an opporunitiy to randomly and independantly gain AFs).

Ents:

Ents in my opinion are underpowered and overly common. I agree that they're an "oft spawn" situation.

...

"Mad, enraged ents" dont have allies.

Summery:

AFs grow only in FOL territory. And Barb ents shouldnt spawn in FOL territory.
Barb Ents %chance spawn only AFTER a good chopping down of a AF.
Barb ents are not friends of FOL civs - Or any civ for that matter.
Keeps things consistant for AFs
Keeps Balance becuase its not particuarly Pro or con anyone. Its the game defending itself.
I like cheese.

-Qes

It's cool that your thinking has evolved. But clearly I was responding to something entirely different from your latest post.

I agree that it is entirely possible to create a different Ancient Forests system in which it would make sense for Treebeards to come out of the woods and start tipping over towers. But that's not the way it is in FfH at this moment. Ents do not have a starring role in this saga, else there would be an Ent civilization. All that's happened is the Axemen of a couple civs have gained tha ability to chop down forests. We don't even know if they can do this in enemy territory yet. This is a small change so far, and it makes sense WRT to the existing AF situation. Small changes are good. Kael and Ko. kan realitkally be expekted to kode only so much.

 

[Sisonpyh]

The Orc units are not 'Orcy' enough. They seem bland and nothing special about them. Lizardmen and Ogres are somewhat nice, but I play Clan of Embers for the Orcs.

Why don't Orcs get a racial bonus like Elven and Dwarven units recieve?

 

[Jono]

The crys for balance generally fall on my very deaf ears.

Does this mean you're okay with rangers being the strongest T3 unit (IIRC)? that doesn't sound too flavourful to me.

 

[Grey Fox]

The Orc units are not 'Orcy' enough. They seem bland and nothing special about them. Lizardmen and Ogres are somewhat nice, but I play Clan of Embers for the Orcs.

Why don't Orcs get a racial bonus like Elven and Dwarven units recieve?

As I've said before in another thread. I dont think they are done with the orcs yet. I think being Orcish will have a bonus soon (as well as the current drawback of having a promotion against you+the fact that barbarians are orcs mean that many others will take the orc slayer promo, atleast in MP).

 

[Unser Giftzwerg]

The Orc units are not 'Orcy' enough. They seem bland and nothing special about them. Lizardmen and Ogres are somewhat nice, but I play Clan of Embers for the Orcs.

Why don't Orcs get a racial bonus like Elven and Dwarven units recieve?

Chand suggested they be given some limited ability to develop in Jungle terrain. Enough so a city could get a head start in Jungle before Sanitation, but not so much that they could build jungled super-cities. (If that makes sesne.) How does that grab you for Orciness? Emerging from the "inhospitable" areas of the world seems like a pretty good match, IMO. What about IYO?

 

[QES]

Does this mean you're okay with rangers being the strongest T3 unit (IIRC)? that doesn't sound too flavourful to me.

Rangers as the most badass unit in the field strikes me as odd flavor wise, so no. But my complaints are not out of its comparison to other units, but instead its flavor in the FfH world.

Though, i've never posted on the Ranger issue. (Until Now)
-Qes

 

[QES]

Well, I'm fairly good at reading between the lines, but I didn't see this coming.



It's cool that your thinking has evolved. But clearly I was responding to something entirely different from your latest post.

I agree that it is entirely possible to create a different Ancient Forests system in which it would make sense for Treebeards to come out of the woods and start tipping over towers. But that's not the way it is in FfH at this moment. Ents do not have a starring role in this saga, else there would be an Ent civilization. All that's happened is the Axemen of a couple civs have gained tha ability to chop down forests. We don't even know if they can do this in enemy territory yet. This is a small change so far, and it makes sense WRT to the existing AF situation. Small changes are good. Kael and Ko. kan realitkally be expekted to kode only so much.

I am personally a big fan of the idea that the barbarian civs can chop down forests. I fully support it. I love that their axeman units do exactly this. My problem is not with that function, but with the (now addmittedly vague) role of AFs. If they're mysterious and slightly uberized, and Ents are supposed to be a force of nature (I dont want an Ent Civ), then people chopping down AF should bring consequences, or at least a risk of consequences.

These consequences on enemy soil is that your pissing off the enemy. The consequences on NON-enemy soil should still be a factor to consider before proceeding.

And im sorry my thinking hath "evolved" ill do my best to return to slime status. mmm, primordial goo.
-Qes

 

[Grey Fox]

If they're mysterious and slightly uberized, and Ents are supposed to be a force of nature (I dont want an Ent Civ), then people chopping down AF should bring consequences, or at least a risk of consequences.

Yeah I agree, they should not be a civ. They should be a slow and long lived race that dont care about petty small things happening during a short time as some centuries (short for them, they could be sleeping or meerely discussing what time of day is the best). But when they ARE angered, they will be surely pissed off.

 

[QES]

Yeah I agree, they should not be a civ. They should be a slow and long lived race that dont care about petty small things happening during a short time as some centuries (short for them, they could be sleeping or meerely discussing what time of day is the best). But when they ARE angered, they will be surely pissed off.

VERY well said. I agree. This is exactly what ive been feeling.
-Qes

 

[dreiche2]

I agree, too. Also, I'd rather say AF are rather too common than too strong (mostly flavorwise I mean). Or, actually maybe leaves is too common, again also because it is the alignment neutral religion.

Flavorwise I wished another religion would take the place of the common, aligment indifferent religion. Ok that's another topic, sorry.

 

[Unser Giftzwerg]

I am personally a big fan of the idea that the barbarian civs can chop down forests. I fully support it. I love that their axeman units do exactly this. My problem is not with that function, but with the (now addmittedly vague) role of AFs. If they're mysterious and slightly uberized, and Ents are supposed to be a force of nature (I dont want an Ent Civ), then people chopping down AF should bring consequences, or at least a risk of consequences.

These consequences on enemy soil is that your pissing off the enemy. The consequences on NON-enemy soil should still be a factor to consider before proceeding.

And im sorry my thinking hath "evolved" ill do my best to return to slime status. mmm, primordial goo.
-Qes

I agree that the classic concept of the sentinent 'ancient forest' involves pissed off ents emerging should someone be so rash as to attempt a lumberjacking. But right now I don't think the 'classic' concept is the 'FfH' concept. FfH AFs appear at random. Entire continents can be peppered with AF tiles all over. That doesn't fit the classic concept of some very special patch of forest. I'm no Tolkein expert, but I'm pretty sure he didn't have Ents scattered all over Middle Earth. They were found only in that one forest IIRC. So FfH AFs are different from Tokeinesque AFs. No biggie. That's fine. I personally have no problem with different fantasy imagined differently. It is for that reason that 99.9% of my feedback is concerned with gameplay balance. Contruct the fantasy setting any way you like, just so the game is interesting to play.

Right now FfH AFs are just to common to allow robot defenders to emerge to defend them. The fact they are so common is what makes the Axeman chopdown such a good idea. One realm wants 'em to spread ... other realms want to reverse the process. War breaks out and everyone is happy. But if FfH did have a small very special patch of AF, then we probably would not want to allow mere grubby Axemen to chop it down in the first place.

I don't care what flavor Kael and kronies decide upon, but I do expect they respect play balance. I have played countless games full of flavor but empty of balance. I just haven't played any of them twice. Such games have no reply value; all the bells and whistles are just so much chrome. But that's just me.

BTW I meant nothing by the word 'evolve' other than the concept of change occuring over time.

 

[seZereth]

what about giving Orcs the Possibility to capture defeated Units (not as slaves, but as captives or pows) to bring em back to an altar and sacrifice them to Bhal for favour.
By that getting "a yet to define" bonus depending on the amount of captives being sacrificed at once??

 

[Grey Fox]

what about giving Orcs the Possibility to capture defeated Units (not as slaves, but as captives or pows) to bring em back to an altar and sacrifice them to Bhal for favour.
By that getting "a yet to define" bonus depending on the amount of captives being sacrificed at once??

How about copying the great people reward system? For the first reward you need a few sacrifices, for the next reward you will need more, and more and more, etc...

 

[Chandrasekhar]

Sacrifice captives to gain raw GP points, maybe? Meh, I like the Orcs-build-in-jungles idea better, but we might be able to use them both!

 

[dreiche2]

I don't know, are Orcs associated with jungle anyway? Wouldn't they just burn it down like forests?

 

[Grey Fox]

I don't know, are Orcs associated with jungle anyway? Wouldn't they just burn it down like forests?

I would say they are more associated with hills/mountains/plains, but if think about the shamanism about orcs in many RPGs/stories/games shamanism is often related to jungle in my book.

 

[QES]

I agree that the classic concept of the sentinent 'ancient forest' involves pissed off ents emerging should someone be so rash as to attempt a lumberjacking. But right now I don't think the 'classic' concept is the 'FfH' concept. FfH AFs appear at random. Entire continents can be peppered with AF tiles all over. That doesn't fit the classic concept of some very special patch of forest. I'm no Tolkein expert, but I'm pretty sure he didn't have Ents scattered all over Middle Earth. They were found only in that one forest IIRC. So FfH AFs are different from Tokeinesque AFs. No biggie. That's fine. I personally have no problem with different fantasy imagined differently. It is for that reason that 99.9% of my feedback is concerned with gameplay balance. Contruct the fantasy setting any way you like, just so the game is interesting to play.

Right now FfH AFs are just to common to allow robot defenders to emerge to defend them. The fact they are so common is what makes the Axeman chopdown such a good idea. One realm wants 'em to spread ... other realms want to reverse the process. War breaks out and everyone is happy. But if FfH did have a small very special patch of AF, then we probably would not want to allow mere grubby Axemen to chop it down in the first place.

I don't care what flavor Kael and kronies decide upon, but I do expect they respect play balance. I have played countless games full of flavor but empty of balance. I just haven't played any of them twice. Such games have no reply value; all the bells and whistles are just so much chrome. But that's just me.

BTW I meant nothing by the word 'evolve' other than the concept of change occuring over time.

These are all very good points. And the commonality of AF abundance is an issue I respect. Now, I have a thought - just me.

Why not change New Forests - Forests - Ancient forests into a system like cottages villages? Or is that too lame? It might be too lame.

But if FOL peopels worked a tile (blessed by religion) the forest transforms into an AF. The rarities of AFs would be restricted to being primarily around FOL (blessed) cities. Then these AF's could be given more power and ents, also subsequently more power.

Perhaps New Forests could still turn into regular forests on their own (but please, a lot lot slower).

It MIGHT be cool to make AFs impassible except by people with woodsman promotions. INCLUDING the elves. (Only the Penitant man shall pass).

Cool?

-Qes

Ps. I dont easily take offense...but seriously...dont diss primordial goo or I'll go Precambrian on your ass.

EDIT: Id like to see more variety in types of Forests and Mountains, personally.

Id love to add to teh New forest, Forest, and Ancient forest - the Haunted forest, and the Maiden Forest. The haunted forest would be a hotbed of barbarian producing activity (but not a city) and potentially a location for future questing, this would randomly appear on the map and not be connected to anything else. The Maiden forest is an EVEN OLDER Ancient forest. These would have REDUCED work benefits, but would be exceedingly rare. THe benefits however, would be the increadible defensive qualities of it (200%) and some other boon, like access to ent making, or fey creatures. Perhaps a restriction on the civ - unable to normally produce other units in that city. Still very cool.