Work in Progress - Conquests of Might and Magic III

[vmxa]

Invisible to whom?. The reason the AI is given the knowledge is to make pathing a bit easier and less demanding on the CPU. It is at time a benifit to the AI, but it is a double edged sword. Thia due to the ability of humans to use lures like the bare naked lady tactic or empty towns, which you will fill as soon as they approach.

It may be an interesting addition to the game, but I doubt I would spend the shields and time to build it as it would not help me. It may help the AI some as it wil force the human to investigate the town, maybe.

In most cases I do not care what they have in the town, when I attack as I am bringing over whelming force.

The privateer is similar duck, it does not have much impact as the human tends to know who owns it and for me, I don't care as I will sink anyway. The AI attacks them the same way.

I always found the Cover Of Darkness to be a real distraction and not worth making.

 

[tom2050]

I don't want it to be annoying... as currently, the only advantage is for the AI, simply because it makes it a pain for the player. Soon realized was that it covers too much of the players own view (player needs to right click to constantly view own terrain, or click another city unit). These are all bad. I will shrink the graphic to make it a normal size unit so it will simply hide the city defenders and give a defensive boost to the city (Necropolis does not have stellar defense anyways). And perhaps the best thing may be to have it make where it's cities are immune to city investigations. Although AI still knows what strength defenders cities have, etc, something like this should provide overall good balance.

The last thing I want is some annoying thing like a huge black cloud blocking all view (Although it did look kinda cool when animated). A smaller Darkness Cover, the size of a normal unit, should be no prob to make.

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Castle Archer Tower


Mage Tower


Tom

 

[nick0515]

Is that cover of darkness one huge unit Tom? How many squares is it covering? Looks totally awesome anyway.

I was actually thinking of doing something a bit similar in another mod. Making units that look like terrain (eg forrests) to act as camoflage. Only fools human players of course, so good for multiplayer only. I wonder if the little circle at the top of the health bar can be made invisible by making it magenta, would be for all units though, not really necessary for your purposes.

 

[tom2050]

Yes, it's one big unit... it was suppose to cover all 8 squares around it's square, but it only partially covers the units behind it, but the thing is that I also just noticed is... units that are in front of it are hardcoded to show up on top. So any unit in front of the big unit will look as if they are standing on top of it (standing on top of the Cover Of Darkness). I don't know if King Units act in this same manner though, although I'm sure they do, since it's a depth of perception type thing.

The circle is really not a needed thing... I never even knew what it did until a year or so ago, and still don't pay attention to it ever; since it just shows movement left.

For multiplayer, something like this would be terrific...

Tom

 

[vmxa]

Tom the towers are super.

 

[DFBATTLER]

Nice towers :O

What about just trashing the CoD altogether?

 

[tom2050]

Scrap the CoD? Hmmm... That would leave the Necropolis one unique building short, while all others would have their full 3. I'll try to think of another way to put it into the game that works better.

I'm putting all my efforts today into trying to get the terrain done (a base version, which will probably need to be cleaned up a bit still). I'll try to post a screenshot tonight. I need to go back and clean up some of the coasts, and come up with a better way of blending the terrains together. But I am 50% done with the final terrain PCX, which was a little more work setting up since it involves the final 3 terrains; Plains, Desert, and Grassland all coming together.

Tom

 

[vmxa]

Why not change what is does? Maybe it could spawn a low level unit every once in great while. What do the other towns get in its place? Are their structures giving them much? They should be more or less equal.

It could have a slight edge over the others, if the Necro towns are a bit weaker. Maybe a few gold every 10 turns? Maybe it could have the reduces corruption flag, but only one could be build. Lots of ways to go.

 

[tom2050]

All the unique structures have different abilities, some are vastly different than others. I try to keep them similar to the way they acted in HoMM3 itself, but obviously that cannot be done completely.

The Necropolis I suppose is not exactly weak by any standard, in fact they can become rather powerful in eary-mid game with their Necromancy abilities. They have one of the best 6th level units available to anyone. In late game, their 7th Level unit (Bone Dragon) cannot stand up well on it's own to other powerful units, but does have some good abilities of it's own.

Here's what some of the other towns unique buildings have and do:
Rampart
Mystic Pond - in HoMM3 this provided resources, here it provides additional wealth
Fountains of Fortune - Increases the Luck of the town, making enemy attacks on it more difficult
Treasury - A good wealth producing building

Stronghold
Ballista Yard -Just as the name implies, extra Ballistas mean extra Might!
Escape Tunnel - Gives the Stronghold great tactical ability to move their units around very quickly
Hall of Valhalla - Provides additional attack capabilities against any enemy that ventures near this town

Dungeon
Academy of Battle Scholars - increases research as well as allowing strengthened troops early in the game
Mana Vortex - increases research and provides additional spells
Portal of Summoning - another early powerful structure allowing additional creatures to be recruited

Tower
Lookout Tower - allows early and increased ability of Visions
Library - increases research and provides additional spells
Wall of Knowledge - greatly increases research to help get down the powerful tree of Magic

Inferno also has one of the most expensive, but most powerful structures available, the dreaded Castle Gate. If Inferno can build this, they have a greatly increased ability to maneuver units around like no other.

So the Necropolis' other 2 unique buildings are based around Necromancy (Necromancy Amplifier and the Skeleton Transformer), so the Cover of Darkness I will have to think about... but I guess it will have to be changed to something different... the question is, what?

So as you can see, a player needs to play along with the town's strengths. The Stronghold, which is almost pure Might, has units with high Attack values yet low Defense, and cannot research spells above Level 3. It's buildings assist in it's Might abilities (some of the Might abilities are rather powerful, and Might towns can crush a Town's defenses quickly). The Tower on the other hand, which is mostly Magic based, is better off using it's structures to research down the expensive Magic path than going for Might (which it cannot use as well as others). But high level Magic Spells will be devastating to opponents who are unprepared for them.

Tom

 

[vmxa]

I was only asking about it weakness or lack in your mod. As I have no info on what is in it. In Homm3 I consider Necro as weak compared to Castle or Dungeon. You just cannot beat Arch Angles.

At least as far as the towns units. The ability to raise the dead and its speed are very strong.

 

[tom2050]

I was only asking about it weakness or lack in your mod. As I have no info on what is in it. In Homm3 I consider Necro as weak compared to Castle or Dungeon. You just cannot beat Arch Angles.

At least as far as the towns units. The ability to raise the dead and its speed are very strong.

That is definitely true... the Ghost Dragons are not near as powerful as Arch Angels (not many other units are, Titans could be considered to be one of the most powerful also with their ranged attack abilities). And you are right, necro will have to rely on it's Necromancy abilities to stay competitive against other towns.

One of the more interesting towns in the Conflux Elemental Town. It's units are quite different in terms of strengths than all other towns. Just like in HoMM3, it takes a bit more planning and skill to do well with this town than others. Expansion is easier with this town, but early defense is tougher. Mid-game attack and defense capabilities are excellent compared to other towns, but you will not have as many units to work with as you do with other civ's. By researching high level magic, you can increase your supply of Elementals (as other civ's can do this also) by summoning them. The Level 7 Phoenix is terrific, in that it can raise it's own from ashes, is incredibly fast, although has only decent stats compared to other Level 7 creatures. But it is produced more often; carefully planning can supplement your forces with many Phoenix.

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Just as info on download size, right now the compressed mod in rar format is 385 MB. It is actually a bit smaller since there are some files in there which will not be needed (used by me for graphics creation, etc). But the leaderheads, and a few other things have still yet to be included, as well as some of the missing units I still need. I will try to keep the final size under 450MB, but a complete overhaul is difficult to make very small.

Tom

 

[vmxa]

I always felt the Conflux was just an after thought and did not fit in III. It would have been fine in IV.

I like Titans fine, but they come after Arch Angles and Black Dragons for me. The immune to magic is what makes the Black dragons work. The Birds can only raise themselves, the Angles can raise any unit not immune to magic (cannot raise Black Dragons).

In IV I like the Titans better, mainly due to the Angles being no so great and Black Dragons being so hard to produce.

I am ignoring the super monster like Azure Dragon in III. I just played a campaign off the web with lots of super creatures. Nothing like having a good stack of Azure's to use.

Looking forward to seeing this one finished.

 

[DFBATTLER]

I loved the conflux , If you build a Grail Structure there, you get all spells So if you have a powerful Magic hero, it's ownage time.

Also, Imo Arch > Bl-D > Titans because:
1. Arch Angels have a very high base damage (and resurrect!)
2. Bl-D are immune to all spells (which can save you from a loss from the Armageddon spell)
3. Titans can do ranged and melee with the same damage. The problem is when the enemy is too far away and the damage dealt is halved or worse.

 

[tom2050]

I always felt the Conflux was just an after thought and did not fit in III. It would have been fine in IV.

I like Titans fine, but they come after Arch Angles and Black Dragons for me. The immune to magic is what makes the Black dragons work. The Birds can only raise themselves, the Angles can raise any unit not immune to magic (cannot raise Black Dragons).

In IV I like the Titans better, mainly due to the Angles being no so great and Black Dragons being so hard to produce.

I am ignoring the super monster like Azure Dragon in III. I just played a campaign off the web with lots of super creatures. Nothing like having a good stack of Azure's to use.

Looking forward to seeing this one finished.

Conflux was an interesting add on, definitely a different play style needed. Do you remember what 3DO was planning on adding on originally in one of the expansions (can't remember which one)? It was like a cyborg advanced sci-fi town at first, but the community went into such an outrage over it, they scrapped it all.

Titans are almost necessary, since Giants are so weak for the top Tower creature. Black Dragons are probably one of the best all around.

Speaking of neutral creature stacks that are guards, that is what I think I may do tonight, add all of those in, since in Civ III they will need to have slightly different set up than the regular units.

I loved the conflux , If you build a Grail Structure there, you get all spells So if you have a powerful Magic hero, it's ownage time.

Also, Imo Arch > Bl-D > Titans because:
1. Arch Angels have a very high base damage (and resurrect!)
2. Bl-D are immune to all spells (which can save you from a loss from the Armageddon spell)
3. Titans can do ranged and melee with the same damage. The problem is when the enemy is too far away and the damage dealt is halved or worse.

I'm still trying to figure out the best way to put this Grail Structure into the game for Conflux, although I have a good idea. Should it be made to do the same thing? Supply all Spells? Or perhaps should it be made to just supply all spells that are different?

If all spells are given, the unit list of buildable units would be huge. So I think only the spells that are more powerful should be included to keep the unit list managable for players (since there would not be a great desire to build spells that are way weaker).

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Also, the base terrain is about 99% complete. I still need to do some fixes to the Rivers (I did most fixes already, but a few rivers still don't meet properly together), but that can wait until a bit later. Once terrain is done, I will put the Mountain graphics together. I should have a bit more time this week and next, so I can get alot of this done that seems to be dragging out longer than I had hoped!

Tom

 

[vmxa]

Yes I remember vaguely. It seems they were saying that Might and Magic already had droids and other sci fi units, so why not Homm?

I would be fine, if you make it easier on yourself. Have the grail do a few spells for Conflux. I do not know what the effects are going to be in the mod , but I am happy in Homm3 with Haste/Slow and Lighting. If I can get Town Portal that is great.

The others that are useful to me are, Mass Dispel and Clone. The rest I can do with out. Lighting is not all that useful after mid game as the monsters are too hard to take out with it. I would say all third level spells can go away.

 

[tom2050]

For the Epic Game, do you think the Grail should be a possible victory condition? (Space Race Victory?), or do you think I should leave that out?

In the scenario Seeds of Discontent, this was the way to win in the final scenario of the campaign, so it will be that way when this campaign is made.

If it is made as a possible victory condition for a Space Race type victory, I'm not sure what I could add as buildings that would need to be built (Grail 1, Grail 2, Grail 3, etc.. ); plus they would have to be added in new techs or pre-existing HoMM3 techs.

Or they could all be added in the Grail Tech, but require a wide variety of resources, forcing players to have to go to war in order to obtain them all to build all the structures.

It would be nice to make a new Space Race Victory screen for this, since it can be customized to a large extent.

Tom

 

[vmxa]

Yes. I have played a number of maps where the Grail was a victory condition. Of course they tried to make you cover most of the map to learn its location. The Space win splash causes many players game to crash, mine for sure. So I have to not play the last turn where the last part is completed.

So a new splash may work or it may suffer the same problem. I leave it to others to come with ideas, I have limited imagination.

 

[tom2050]

I wasn't aware that the Space Victory caused that many problems with so many... I usually never go the Space Race route, so I can't say if mine does or not. I wonder if it is known why it happens?

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In the meantime, before I end for tonight; here is one of the Heroes' (for Dungeon Might most likely). The unit is Civ Colored, and will be made in an Army version also (just the palette).



1 Down, 17 to go

Tom

 

[vmxa]

They have a thread on the issue in the bug forum. The work around helps some, but not all. I do not mind as I only play for conquest or domination now anyway.

 

[tom2050]

Thanks, I will look for it and see what it says... if it causes crashes for many, then I will avoid it.


THE HERO LIST:
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Dungeon Might Hero (Overlord):

Dungeon Magic Hero (Warlock):

If this unit has it's hair recoloured black, she could almost come off as Trinity from the Matrix with that jump kick she has

Tower Magic Hero (Wizard):

It may be possible to have Female and Male Heroes of each type since the number of units might possibly be available to convert.

Tom