Alsark
Noble
Hm... not even sure what an integrity check is. I'll begin the download, but won't have time to play/test for awhile.
[UXP] Legends of Revolutions
- Thread starter phungus420
- Start date
Just try to run the file after you download it - if the install process starts, you've gotten farther than we have.
Alsark
Noble
Oh, yep. Happened to me, too.
Roland Johansen
Deity
I have the same problems with installing the newest version of the mod.
I also wanted to discuss a balance issue (at least in previous version of this mod) with two promotion lines: guerilla and woodsman.
On the one hand, I think it's great that these promotions now are finally useful when you're on the attack. That makes them far more useful throughout the game. However, maybe a bit too useful.
I'll give two examples to show this. The second example is the best one.
-The woodsman III promotion gives a 90% bonus when attacking forested tiles (and 2 first strikes and +15% healing). This means that when units approach a city through wooded terrain, thinking that will help them then this will not be the case. They'll be extra vulnerable. The 90% bonus on attack will more than nullify the 50% defence bonus from forested tiles leaving a 40% bonus for the woodsman III attacker. This bonus is so big that it will likely undo the rock-paper-scissors advantage that the defender usually has. This means that the defender moving through wooded terrain needs to have woodsman promoted units too to be safe in the forests. But because of the rock-paper-scissors effect, it needs to have woodsman promoted units in every type of unit as otherwise it will be vulnerable to attack by the woodsman promoted counter unit of that unit type. All of that makes it unattractive to approach a city through wooded terrain.
This problem is larger with hills and the guerilla promotion line as hills only offer a 25% defence bonus which is even more easily overpowered by the guerilla III 90% attack bonus.
-Hill based cities are extremely vulnerable to guerilla III promoted units. The 90% attack bonus + 50% retreat odds of guerilla III units are far better than the 75% attack bonus of city raider III units. This is especially true for the period after gunpowder when city raider promotions are almost gone for normal units and the mod encourages you to focus more on siege units to overpower city defences. The guerilla III units however massacre city defenders of hill based cities.
By the way, I personally disliked the way Firaxis offered huge and weird bonuses to the guerilla III and woodsman III promotions. The healing bonus for woodsman III which is larger than the ones you can get through the medic promotion line is very weird and the huge retreat odds for woodsman III units makes them better at retreating than many mounted and helicopter units. Now that this mod changed the usefulness of the earlier woodsman I and II and guerilla I and II promotions, I don't see the need for such huge bonuses for the third promotion.
Suggestion: Reduce the attack bonuses from what they are now (+ 15%, +20% +25% for a total of +45% for the third tier of the promotions. Make the defence bonus of forests and hills the same (25%). Spread the extra bonuses that were given to woodsman III and guerilla III a bit over the different levels and lessen them a bit to make it less overpowered.
In total:
woodsman I: +10% attack in forest, +20% defence in forests
woodsman II: +15% attack in forest, +30% defence in forests+ 1 first strike
woodsman III: +20% attack in forest, +40% defence in forests+ 5% healing, + 1 first strike
guerilla I: +10% attack in hills, +20% defence in hills
guerilla II: +15% attack in hills, +30% defence in hills, + 10% retreat odds
guerilla III: +20% attack in hills, +40% defence in hills, + 15% retreat odds
and a standard forest defence bonus of 25% instead of 50%.
Even with these values +45% attack on hills and +25% retreat odds (guerilla III) is a good investment of 3 promotions when you're facing hill based cities and don't have access to city raider promotions for your normal post gunpowder units.
I also wanted to discuss a balance issue (at least in previous version of this mod) with two promotion lines: guerilla and woodsman.
On the one hand, I think it's great that these promotions now are finally useful when you're on the attack. That makes them far more useful throughout the game. However, maybe a bit too useful.
I'll give two examples to show this. The second example is the best one.
-The woodsman III promotion gives a 90% bonus when attacking forested tiles (and 2 first strikes and +15% healing). This means that when units approach a city through wooded terrain, thinking that will help them then this will not be the case. They'll be extra vulnerable. The 90% bonus on attack will more than nullify the 50% defence bonus from forested tiles leaving a 40% bonus for the woodsman III attacker. This bonus is so big that it will likely undo the rock-paper-scissors advantage that the defender usually has. This means that the defender moving through wooded terrain needs to have woodsman promoted units too to be safe in the forests. But because of the rock-paper-scissors effect, it needs to have woodsman promoted units in every type of unit as otherwise it will be vulnerable to attack by the woodsman promoted counter unit of that unit type. All of that makes it unattractive to approach a city through wooded terrain.
This problem is larger with hills and the guerilla promotion line as hills only offer a 25% defence bonus which is even more easily overpowered by the guerilla III 90% attack bonus.
-Hill based cities are extremely vulnerable to guerilla III promoted units. The 90% attack bonus + 50% retreat odds of guerilla III units are far better than the 75% attack bonus of city raider III units. This is especially true for the period after gunpowder when city raider promotions are almost gone for normal units and the mod encourages you to focus more on siege units to overpower city defences. The guerilla III units however massacre city defenders of hill based cities.
By the way, I personally disliked the way Firaxis offered huge and weird bonuses to the guerilla III and woodsman III promotions. The healing bonus for woodsman III which is larger than the ones you can get through the medic promotion line is very weird and the huge retreat odds for woodsman III units makes them better at retreating than many mounted and helicopter units. Now that this mod changed the usefulness of the earlier woodsman I and II and guerilla I and II promotions, I don't see the need for such huge bonuses for the third promotion.
Suggestion: Reduce the attack bonuses from what they are now (+ 15%, +20% +25% for a total of +45% for the third tier of the promotions. Make the defence bonus of forests and hills the same (25%). Spread the extra bonuses that were given to woodsman III and guerilla III a bit over the different levels and lessen them a bit to make it less overpowered.
In total:
woodsman I: +10% attack in forest, +20% defence in forests
woodsman II: +15% attack in forest, +30% defence in forests+ 1 first strike
woodsman III: +20% attack in forest, +40% defence in forests+ 5% healing, + 1 first strike
guerilla I: +10% attack in hills, +20% defence in hills
guerilla II: +15% attack in hills, +30% defence in hills, + 10% retreat odds
guerilla III: +20% attack in hills, +40% defence in hills, + 15% retreat odds
and a standard forest defence bonus of 25% instead of 50%.
Even with these values +45% attack on hills and +25% retreat odds (guerilla III) is a good investment of 3 promotions when you're facing hill based cities and don't have access to city raider promotions for your normal post gunpowder units.
achilleszero
Emperor
Roland: I agree with most of your findings on promos. Promotions is one of the few things that I would like to see reworked. The guerilla and woodsman lines do seem kinda wacky. But as you say the guerilla line does seem a tad more powerful. The AI loves hills.
However the woodsman line is extremely specialized. As you state woodsman3 units is going to overpower a unit approaching in forest, but thats just the thing. Your unit needs to waste 3 promos to do it. While the AI will get the +50% naturally and furthermore the whole stack gets it for free. You also cant have cities in forests so that cuts like 75% of its usefulness. Maybe if the AI could learn how to better promote its units that would be a bigger help.
Edit: got the same error as everyone else when trying to install, except mine got all the way to 99% and then stoped! Just tried it twice more and it verifies it up to 100% and still dies on me.
However the woodsman line is extremely specialized. As you state woodsman3 units is going to overpower a unit approaching in forest, but thats just the thing. Your unit needs to waste 3 promos to do it. While the AI will get the +50% naturally and furthermore the whole stack gets it for free. You also cant have cities in forests so that cuts like 75% of its usefulness. Maybe if the AI could learn how to better promote its units that would be a bigger help.
Edit: got the same error as everyone else when trying to install, except mine got all the way to 99% and then stoped! Just tried it twice more and it verifies it up to 100% and still dies on me.
Roland Johansen
Deity
You're right that the issues with the guerilla promotion line are quite a lot larger than with the woodsman promotion line. I made some remarks in that direction but didn't emphasize it. As the promotions are at the moment in LoR, the main problem would be the guerilla promotions strength against hill based cities.
Maybe the first promotion in the woodsman/guerilla line should be enough to negate the defence bonus of the terrain, but followup promotions in that line shouldn't make the attack bonus a lot larger. If the followup promotions allow overpowering of the defender in forests/hills than the normal rock/paper/scissors combat between various units can be almost ignored in forests/hills. I wouldn't like that.
I think this is a non-issue in practical play terms. Getting a unit up to wood / guerilla III means missing other valuable promos, and it is an extremely situational case. Sure, you can get one or two units that can totally smoke the enemy on hill or woods... and that are completely weak and helpless elsewhere.
Roland Johansen
Deity
The AI really likes to build cities on hills and these are normally hard to capture. But with the guerilla line of promotions you'll get a bonus of:
guerilla I: +20% bonus to attack
guerilla II: +50% bonus to attack
guerilla III: +90% bonus to attack, 50% chance to retreat.
Not every AI city is on a hill, but many will have hills on the approach path to the city and then the defence bonus will be 20%/50%/90% on top of the hill defence bonus (25%) and you'll have the ability to slaughter enemy units which happen to be on hills and move back into the stack thanks to double movement on hill terrain once you have guerilla II.
All in all, I don't see why this is situational.
Note that these promotions have been changed from the normal BTS promotions.
From a multiplayer point of view, I do think this is a problem. It might be situational, but the situtations where it matters aren't all that rare. +90% bonus for any promotion (or series) seems extreme, and easily turns what would otherwise be a well-defended site into a deathtrap. It's OK if the terrain-specific promotions beat out City Raider, since you are giving up relative versatility to attack at most a single city or two, but 90% creates a problem, I think. If a human player has a capital or other important city on a hill, and is facing a human opponent at the same tech level who (unlike the AI) knows how to promote effectively, there's really no defense. Border cities on hills will just ping-pong back and forth, and rarely would be worth defending.
All this would be somewhat countered if the promotions also gave a nice defensive bonus on the relevant terrain, since the defender could then choose the Guerilla line instead of City Defender - but if this defense bonus is too high, the imbalance might swing the other way. Defenders don't need to be versatile, since they rarely move, and can freely pick what for an attacker would be an esoteric, single-purpose promotion. As it stands, though, I think the attack bonus is too high.
In general, I like the idea of pumping up the less-used promotions, and I don't want to say anything to discourage that, but I agree with Roland that we might have a problem here. I think Roland's suggestions for the promotion values are good, but what is really needed is some playtesting.
achilleszero
Emperor
Actually, the more this gets talked about the less of a problem I see. I do agree that may be there could be some fixes to some of these promotions but Im starting to think that the way firaxis has them is atleast somewhat balanced.
Even at 90% attack on hills with guerilla3, the defender can just as easily have city defense 3 and then since were talking about hills, +25% for that and then +25%for fortified. So the defender can just as easily out defend by 35%. On top of that the defender will naturally heal faster, atleast providing a small counter to any enemies that succesfully withdrew.
I see less of a problem with multiplayer. Since the human player promotes much better than an AI opponent. However I would like to see some of the less used promotions pumped up (provided enough testing were put into them).
Even at 90% attack on hills with guerilla3, the defender can just as easily have city defense 3 and then since were talking about hills, +25% for that and then +25%for fortified. So the defender can just as easily out defend by 35%. On top of that the defender will naturally heal faster, atleast providing a small counter to any enemies that succesfully withdrew.
I see less of a problem with multiplayer. Since the human player promotes much better than an AI opponent. However I would like to see some of the less used promotions pumped up (provided enough testing were put into them).
phungus420
Deity
- Joined
- Mar 1, 2003
- Messages
- 6,296
Hmmm, I guess filefront is wigging out. I'll try a different upload site. I'll tweak the guerilla and woodsman lines thus as well. +20%, +25% and +30%, instead of 20%, 30%, and 40% respectively.
achilleszero
Emperor
I cant ever recall overpowering anybody with either promotion. I use them quite frequently but they always take a back seat to city raider for me. The 15% extra attack that guerilla3 has over CR3 is there because it is more situatoinal than CR. And that 15% is almost nothing considering the defender has fortify bonus and faster heal and quicker reinforcements.
Roland Johansen
Deity
I'm not sure, but it seems as if some posters here think the way these promotions are in LoR is the same as Firaxis had them. This is not the case. The promotions were a lot weaker in regular BTS. But I also agree that the less used promotions could use a boost so I like the fact that LoR has boosted these promotions. I just think it's a bit too much.
I would agree if the only use for the guerilla promotion would be an attack bonus when attacking hilled cities, but that's not the case. Guerilla units also are excellent stack defenders as long as you move over hilly terrain. Next to that from guerilla II onward, these units can attack other units on hilly terrain (with a big attack bonus) and move back into the protection stack the same turn. Also don't forget that the guerilla III promotion gives a whopping 50% retreat bonus. Compare that with the 30% retreat bonus of the combined bonus of flanking I + flanking II and you'll see that that part alone is nothing to be forgotten in any discussion about this promotion.
By the way, I don't want to discuss to the end of days. It's just my opinion and I thought I'd give it in the hope of improving and balancing this already great mod. But if many disagree with me, then that's ok. These smaller xml-changes are not difficult for myself to do. I just wanted to share my view.
I would like to discuss other balance issues in this thread if and when it is appreciated. For the most part, this mod is very well balanced, but there's always something to discuss. There are also many balance discussions in regular BTS. This doesn't mean that I want to enforce my opinion on others. Just an attempt to achieve the best balance that we can agree upon.
phungus420
Deity
- Joined
- Mar 1, 2003
- Messages
- 6,296
achilleszero
Emperor
Anything that you come up with that would better balance the mod is most likely welcome. You have made very good points, and bothe the Brave and now promotions have been tweaked down by phungus. I just like all discussions to have views from both sides of the fence. (too bad politics never solves anything by haveing two opposing side)
Roland Johansen
Deity
Sure, we need to hear all arguments before a discussion is concluded. I just wanted to make sure that my last few posts were not misunderstood as argumentative.
Onionsoilder
Reaver
- Joined
- Mar 19, 2007
- Messages
- 3,173
I've been playing Fall from Heaven 2 for a while, but I've been getting pretty annoyed with some of the mechanics so I figured I'll return to vanilla BTS for a while. Except regular old BTS is too vanilla, so I loaded up this mod. Anyway, I can't seem to get Blue Marble to work with Legends of Revolution, I'm not sure why. I've become addicted to Blue Marble graphics(Use them for everything), so it's kind og put me off from playing until I can get it working. Anyone have any ideas?
phungus420
Deity
- Joined
- Mar 1, 2003
- Messages
- 6,296
There is a Blue Marble optional add on in the test build. Once 0.9.3 goes into the official release, it'll be included in that too. Just going to give the test build a day or two to make sure that there aren't any serious hidden bugs in it, and also to give Alsark and achilleszero time to finalize the bits they've been working on. But for now, you can upgrade to 3.19 and play the test build, and check the box marked blue marble when installing.
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