Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

A resource increase, though a restriction for early-game expansion, is not a mid-game or late-game restriction. Personally I care more about the Hinnom chariots then I do about the elephants.

On the subject of balancing nations, lets stick to one nation at a time. It's been like five posts and we are already talking about elphants, ghost riders, and a host nations who have national summons. If your problem with the ghost rider is that deep then it should get it's own post dedicated to hating it.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Kristoffer O:

I think there are some issues with overall nation balance. Most of them are about early and mid game [before you can diversify and get big enough gem income to do almost what you want]. My biggest concerns are about:
- sacred nations [they just own, and you can always put cheap Shroud on whatever you summon later], getting a good bless is just too cheap [and some blesses are useless]
- recruitable SCs/thugs [other nations first need to get research to summon them and then pay at least 10-30 gems just to get a chassis], Niefel Jarls can even beat a big part of summonable SCs and cost well, only gold [Hinnom SCs are powerful too]
- tramplers [many nations have almost no ways of protecting against them and get nothing in exchange]

There are simply some nations that base their survival on luck or diplomacy. And they should have normal chances of getting through [even if they are weaker in that stage]. I don't like paying 150 points for awake SC only because I will be dead within 15 turns if I don't. If someone wants to pay 150 points for faster expansion it is his right, but that should be a choice. But I don't know if I can expect major changes like that before Dom4 [even QM's CBM does not try to work on that].

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Berserking Baal means no buffing. Without buff, are you going to survive against 4 hydras? I do not think so.

Arrow fend is a good counter to Sauromatia, but at Ench6, which is not something you research first, it is hardly an early game counter. Blade wind, you could very well hit the skeletons instead of poison archers.

Yes, with research scale up and in the late second year, Hinnom can start to counter effectively, but an early war will put Hinnom in disadvantage, even 1:1. Remember if you expand too fast, you also make a lot of enemies.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I'd prefer to see tramplers not get nerfed. They give some otherwise weak early game nations a nice boost. And they always have the risk of trampling their own troops and have some significant morale issues that can be exploited.

I disagree on nerfing Ghost Riders - I think it should be able to take out most PD - it is a very high level spell that requires most nations to bootstrap to be able to cast and helps accelerate the end game.

The point re: Hinnom's magical diversity is also valid - as Fomoria I turned the tide briefly until Hinnom started showing up with SR trinkets. That's something that Niefel would have a tough time with except through trading. So I wouldn't mind seeing Hinnom lose access to some magic schools.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I would really like to see more counter against SC on unit level. One solution would to incur fatigue on the target for every attack attempt. Even it is just 1, those infantries will do at least 15 fatigue damage on target every round.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Are you kidding? Slightly more than 1 in 3 niefel jarls will have A1. And they can all forge ring of shock resistance, giving 100% SR. If you mean it does not have capital A income, neither does Hinnom.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

No, I wasn't kidding, just mistaken. I hadn't played Niefel in a while and forgot they had A randoms. My bad.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

[quote=AreaOfEffect;642011]What has always balanced trampling units is the fact that when they rout, they kill your own men, instead of the enemy. Thats the key.

But the way things are right now, tramplers generally have too high hp and prot to be really risky to use in combat. Particularly if you balance thier morale by adding some slow, good morale troops to thier squad. If we just nerf thier prot and hp stats somewhat and make them vulnerable (not totally helpless, mind you!) to the relatively moderate attacks of a mundane army, then you will take tramplers back from being a no-brainer to a really interesting and risky decision.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Nah, I actually played this matchup as Hinnom vs Sauro - though granted it was late year 2 after my research had a chance to mature and I was already much larger than my opponent (scarcely a rare occurrence wit Hinnom), but I'm pretty confident I could have smashed him with much less resources. Flesheater axe gives you berzerk, but not "gone berzerk", so you can buff just fine and the first time you get hit you go berzerk (works great for SCs as the berzerk gives you more protection as well!). If you're having trouble getting this to work for some reason (cons-4 not researched? Arrows tending to hit you before you finish buffing?) you could also forego the teleportation and have one of your N2 mages (with a tower shield) stand around waiting for you do finish buffing before berzerking you and retreating. Have to say though that I had no trouble at all slaughtering groups of 8+ hydras using nothing but cons-4 gear and alt-3 buffs on a single Baal. Didn't really notice the Androphag archers because I already had SCs at that point, but if they had tried to rush me (how in the world you rush tramplers with mostly archers I've yet to see) it wouldn't have been much of a stretch to stall him with counter-raids. Following my strategy guide you're pumping out two expansion/raiding parties per turn from just your capital while leveraging your fast expansion and awesome scales to plop up cheap castles from which come more raiding parties/mages while at your suggestion Sauromatia has taken a bless and possibly an awake pretender so it's impossible for them to match Hinnom's troop output with cap only troops.

Again, I played this matchup, and not only did I attack Sauro in a crushing invasion late year 2/early year 3, I simultaneously declared war on all the remaining nations (Sauro plus Neifelheim, Lanka, and TC with none of them fighting each other) just to try and give them a fighting chance - FWIW nobody could even put up a convincing speedbump. That's in early year 3 - scarcely left alone to grow in power forever.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Lower PD - Excellent idea.
Fewer starting troops - Even better idea.
Dawn Guard +5g - Okay.

Chariot nerf - Just increase resources to decrease early numbers. They are easily dealt with later.

General trampler nerf - Please don't. It will effect alot of nations, all Caelum/Arco/Monkey nations and weaken them considerably. Elephants/Mammoths are very good as a alternative strategy to a bless and allow nice scales. After turn 20'ish elephants/mammoths are fairly useless, indeed they are expansive to maintain, so should be killed off, perhaps keep a small force to distract the enemy perhaps.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

The buffs suggested seem like it would do the trick, with them Hinnom would still be a good nation, but it will not be too good.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Im glad to see that KO is looking into this and Im very glad to see the players making suggestions. I wish that I could also but truthfully I just could never find them fun to play. There never seemed to be much thinking in deciding what they should do. There didnt seem to be much specialty-use units.

The most thinking was putting my archers to the left of the battlefield (to avoid hitting my own men) and setting them to fire at archers. Setting my tramplers to the right (bottomof the placement screen) of the battlefield to avoid trampling my own and setting them to hold and attack rearmost. Then setting my infantry in the middle behind the mercs and set to hold and attack closest.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Sorry, I know I said I'd write a guide but I haven't gotten Ashdod in a game yet and I can't "get inside the head" of a nation until I've played them against people.

On your ideas I think they're all good, though I agree with others that nerfing tramping in general would have very wide reaching side effects that are a bit hard to assess the scope of. Reducing the size seems best, given the size of the other giants and the fact human chariots only increase the size by one.

A couple other ideas -

Remove Hinnom's ability to produce their best research & combat mage without a lab. Either change the mechanic which allows this, or give them a set path. It's kinda cool that other nations can recruit a weak mage if they haven't gotten a lab up yet, it's pretty much an exploit that Hinnom can crank out battle/research mages with no need to ever put up a second lab until it's convenient. Or maybe make those guys cap only? *That* would be a pretty big nerf.

Perhaps add a minor unrest effect to complement the population eating? Thematic and a tiny amount would go a long way towards reducing their ability to bloodhunt. Even a tiny amount would make it so you could really only use two blood hunters per province, thus cutting down their blood income by 1/3rd.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

On the question of Tramplers, I always beleived the best way to "nerf" them would be force repel checks on sufficiently long weapons (say 12 length of weapons in the square). They'd still be fine for expansion, but would give players a non-magic option for countering them with out lots of mages.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

This is the idea I would support. Giant nations tends to be balanced by the fact that while individually they are more powerful, they are a greater investment to build.

By letting them pump out good research mages without a lab and/or temple, you are basically funding their troops (an advantage no other giant nation can claim).

I also think that the Shaman they get seems like an oversight from the design process. He adds Death to an already diverse nation and seems designed just to let people climb the death ladder and/or make Flaming Skulls.

Also, their starting army is awesome. Cut that back to something reasonable and their early rush is extremely blunted. As far as I can tell, Hinnom's starting army is the only one in the game that can take a province a turn for the first ten turns.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

You know, the Devs themselves have even stated that they assumed balancing problems would be taken care of by the modding community, so I wonder why more people don't try to create MP friendly versions of Nations? Where's the great shame and doubt in this? There's good, easy access to in-game graphics now, so Hinnom will look the same, and it's a lot faster and easier than waiting for the off-chance that one of the Devs *might* someday play a Nation you think is unbalanced, and *might* rebalance it in a way that satisfies you.

Sure, you'll get the same arguments and hassles about how it's still not balanced, but once the work of actually recreating the vanilla nation is done, making adjustments becomes a fairly simple process that anyone can do.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Im of the same opinion.
Except that Im hoping for the AI complainers to mod more AI friendly nations. :)

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Well, yeah, you and I both share a love of the SP game. I keep hoping the Devs will gift us with a magical bundle of tools that we can, at the very least, unpack and put into play. It's a faint hope, though.

There is some work being done on making the AI more challenging in the Mod forums, by Edratman. From what I've read, he seems to have the right idea about what needs doing to make it better-atleast as far as preventing the AI from suiciding itself.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

While this is a great theory, there are a couple of problems with it. First being that we've only even been able to properly use mod nations in MP games for a couple of weeks, so it's not as if everyone's mindset is geared towards that. But I think the major hurdle is that most people are going to be a bit leary about mod nations that they haven't experienced before. I mean, consider the body of effort that has gone into at least making a case for balancing Hinnom - to expect that sort of undertaking for a mod nation may be a bit fanciful. So it's likely that a lot of people (other than the most experienced, who are either 100% confident in themselves, or who can assess the mod nation at a glance) will continue to have a generally fearful perspective on the unknown. Obviously, you could release a mod version of Hinnom that was declared "toned down" or "weakened", but even if people acknowledged it were true, I bet you more often than not if someone said they were implementing that mod, no one would want to use the player nerfed nation.

I'm not saying no one will ever include player modified vanilla nations, or that no one would ever select that particular mod nation, only that there is a bit of a gap between where we are now, and that being commonplace on either end.

But also, it seems to me that everyone is pretty comfortable with there being "some" discrepancy in power. I mean everyone acknowledges that Lanka and Niefel are powerhouses, and they usually get picked fast, but they're within a certain variance that is acceptable, because they CAN be taken down with a joint effort, and often are as a result. Because of that, it does seem reasonable to ask for them to be brought within that range of variance so that perhaps they might be considered very strong, but not entirely unfairly so. And not necessarily to expect it to be this grand sweeping fine-tuning. A few increases in resource/gold cost, maybe a certain unit made capital only, a tiny change to starting army, and voila, you have surely brought the nation more in line with their expected performance.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

There are two mods available for AI friendly nations, EA Improved Computer Opponents and MA Improved Computer Opponents. Each mod improves the six nations with the lowest number of MP victories.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

JimMorrison:

I wouldn't be so sure about Niefel. They are more powerful than Lanka and should be toned down. The only reason they are not banned is that they are not as extremely overpowered as LA Ermor. But not far from that [powerful recruitable SCs, what else do you want?]. They could try to beat LA Ermor 1:1.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I acknowledge all of that, JimMorrison, but every single nation ever is a "player nerfed nation"-that player being Kristoffer or Johan, and-coming back to my original argument-they're the ones asking that we take up the burden of balancing the nations out.

They're busy fellows, and expecting them to do all that they're doing, *plus* something like this (and they already do, quite often, as it is), is putting a lot of burden on them.

And the easiest way to get people thinking about a new idea is to present it in a public place, so that's what I'm doing here-in the hopes that it'll start people changing their gears a bit.

As far as people using the "nerfed" nations, once you get some of those very experienced players playing them, and acknowledgeing that they are indeed more balanced, and better for MP, then I'm betting the general public will accept them. And it's better that they be nerfed than banned from MP. Besides, "nerfed" isn't the same as "neutered". If Himmon could be adjusted from an 11 to a 9 or an 8 on the power/versatility scale, I think that would be enough.

I haven't noticed many MP games that have stayed empty for very long, for lack of players, even the mod-nation ones, so I'm pretty confident that test games for rebalancing nations will get filled too.

It's a lot of work to do, but such a project would make the game more fun for everyone, and I'm sure that thanks and appreciation would follow.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I think in a Elite Vetern Player game Hinnom may be taken cautiously because the Vets all know to take Hinnom out early and HOW to do it.

In lesser skilled games I would support Hinnom being banned as in all the games I've played (and thats really not very many) Hinnom jumps out of the gate and never looks back.

By the time everyone decides to quit squabbling and do something about it...its too late.

Game over and people start going AI.

Its our own fault for the most part but most of us really DON'T know how to stop them.

Just an opionion...

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I don't agree that Niefelheim is uber-powerful. Very powerful, yes, but they lack any PD, they're not an early rush Nation, and they have no real national Summons. They can become quite powerful, if you know what you're doing with them, and aren't opposed effectively, but they're not that easy to learn, and they're almost always used in exactly the same way. They're a middle game nation that's relatively weak in both the Early game and the Late game.

They should probably get some Gluttony (Starvation really isn't a threat for them in their current state, if you plan for it), and their Gygjas and Skratti might eat a little Population, but they could also stand to have some more heroes and a few decent National Summons.

There's a *ton* of mythological elements that could be directly added from Norse literature to Niefelheim to make them more interesting. The biggest problems with Niefelheim are that it's generally a 1 trick pony with a very powerful trick, and that they haven't been updated in quite a long time. I could stand some minor nerfing, to keep them more in line with newer nations, but I want more diversity and interest out of them, too, especially since they're the defacto "flagship" nation of Dominions.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Yes they are.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Maybe, sometimes, but only as a side effect of being giants in the first place. If you try to rush Abyssia or Hinnom for instance, it's not likely to work out in your favor. If there's weak nations that you can stomp on, sure, you can rush them with Niefelheim, but you can also overextend yourself, and get your Nation cut out from under you, for lack of PD and the expense of your troops.

Rushing with Niefelheim is very risky, as opposed to say Helheim, where you can quickly and consistently attack your nearest neighbors, and hold on to the territory. And Niefelheim's just as vulnerable to a rush as any other nation, too, and moreso than several.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I like the trample discussion, so I created a new thread for it. I think it warrants more discussion, and this thread is about Hinnom, not elephants.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I'll happily move the Niefelheim discussion over to the Niefelheim thread, too, if anybody will follow me.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I would have thought that Niefelheim was an extreme example of a rush nation. Stopping E9N9 giants early on is all but impossible.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

say what???

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I agree with Sombre here. But I also agree with Honey in that they are not that strong at the end game, and hence I don't think they really require a major over-haul.

I hate "nerfing" anything as a general philosophy unless it is ridiculously out of whack--though I understand sometimes that that is the only practicable and convenient solution.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I'm sorry but I really don't like the way the pole is presented. As was mentioned earlier in this thread the pole doesn't give any choice. I for one would have like to vote, "no, don't ban Hinnom".

Yes, its strong, very strong, but so long as MPers are aware of that you can bet Hinnom will usually get its neighbors to ally against it.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

People don't like being forced to double team a nation, to ally, or indeed to have to face double teams against them every single game.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

"Pole"? Which "way" would you prefer a "pole" to be "presented"?

Freudian? :)

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Indeed. I respect the work Gandalf has put into this game--as well as this community--but his understanding of "balance" is really baffling.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

my understanding of what the dev team looks for in balance is simply that a single nation does not force most other nations into a particular course of action simply to counter that nation.

thus, why LA R'yleh and Ermor are considered unbalanced by most, because they must be dealt with very deliberately and specifically, forcing other players to take _special_ action against them, thus reducing the possibilities from the player's perspectives in the game.

I think Hinnom falls into this category too. I see some players saying "they're not unbalanced, all you have to do is have EVERYBODY gang up on them, so therefore they are automatically rebalanced." That is NOT balance. I will NOT join an MP game where the first twenty to thirty turns of my game are dictated to me by the simple presence of another nation, before the game has even randomized placement and the game world. That is not balance, and it is not good MP gaming in Dominions.

Now, I don't expect all nations to be absolutely equal either, it is simply impossible, and this is where that diplomatic balance comes into play. But no nation should crystalize the diplomatic landscape of a game into a particular form before the game even starts.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

That doesn't invalidate the point about unfair poll. Besides, ever since the early day of dom-ppp there were nations you just knew you had to team against or expect to be teamed against if you were to play them. In dom-ppp it was Ermor, now there are quite a few of them. It makes for a more interesting MP, at least for me.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

It all goes back to Early game power, and Late game power. If a Nation is very powerful in the Early phase of the game, then it's justifiable that a couple other Nations might have to team them up to bring them down. But there should be a trade-off. Nations who start small should finish large, they should eventually "come into their own".

From what I'm reading, the problem with Hinnom is that it's always large, it always has a new trick to pull, which means that other Nations *have* to ally to bring it down-even the more powerful ones, like Lanka and Niefelheim. And I don't understand why they have such good PD. For a giant Nation to have the "best PD in the game" seems like a bit of a stretch...

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

That wasnt mine. That was the developers.
I just understand it enough not to pitch trying for a 1-to-1 balance.

As far as me personally, it doesnt bother me much because Im not into MP championship-ladder style gaming. Im fine with solo play, ai games, multiplayer alliances games, etc. I dont really have a problem if the diehard MPer strategy players try to get this fixed. I just like to remind some of them that isnt the only way that the game is enjoyed.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I think that Hinnom might be nerved by lowering PD indeed and maybe lowering the chariot a size and give it some more resources.

I think Niefelheim is pretty strong early game, my latest game I rushed Lanka after year 1 when I knew others where not after me and I didn't have that much opposition and hardly any losses. The giants are strong... I must say I don't see much new options for me for the late game though... just more giants and kitted jarls and just bash and hope the best of it.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I just find early rushes with Niefelheim awfully risky, when you can just wait a little bit, and have an army that's twice as hard to take down. Against Lanka, it might be worth the payoff, since Lanka can be a real threat, at the same time Niefelheim is. And Lanka probably can't *take* an early rush quite as well as Niefelheim can-their PD's only a little better, and their troops are still expensive, and not as good in small numbers.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Hopefully there's plans for creating a nation which is extremely powerful. Currently any veterans playing SP games on large maps need to severely boost one or more advantages for the AI opponents if looking for a challenge. It'd save time and be fun to play a random map without using tools, modding or map edit commands to receive a strong AI opponent for middle and late game.

It would be nice to have one very powerful nation designed to provide a challenging AI opponent during middle and late game. The current strongest AI opponent during middle game is LA Ermor and the current strongest AI opponent during late game is EA Niefielheim.

I see no problems having one nation banned out of the other 20 which are available.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Of course the AI is crap with Hinnom. Just can't use them.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Actually I think it can, of course not like a player but it doesn't suck though. In all my solo games it is just after me in the graphs. If I started slowly, it can even be above. Anyway, around double the scores of every other EA nations in all the games I put them in - in everything except research (I think it can't use the advantage of having recruitable mages in every fort even without a lab).

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Really? In the couple of SP games I played they got a few provinces and then got stuck on that amount for 20+ turns. Definitely lower on the graphs than other races, especially fomoria.

That might have just been their scales or something though I guess.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Scales play a huge role on how powerful an AI nation becomes during a game. With a good starting position and good scales an average AI opponent can win and feed on neighboring impossible AIs.
Give an AI opponent 3 order, 1 productivity, 3 growth, 3 luck, and 3 magic and then it really thrives.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I always designed my AI Nations from the ground up, before I played against them in SP. And if it was going to be a lengthy 1500 Province game, I'd actually play them myself, through the first year or so. It makes for a vast difference in their ability to offer a challenge, and my memory of where they actually *are* on a 1500 Province map is vague enough (and dissipates quickly enough) that it really doesn't offer me that much of an advantage.

Usually, the biggest problem was just giving them up to the AI after I've put so much work into them, especially if they were doing well...It's a great way to learn all the different Nations, though, and really does offer the best AI experience possible.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

I only play SP, but I must say that with Hinnom I literaly don't know with what to wack the AI. The fact Hinnom has powerfull endgame summons is a joke, as you will have walked all other the AI with your base troops and recruitable everywhere mages. Really, even their sacreds and capitol only mages are unecessary.
Ashdod is less uber, mainly because they have supply problems.

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Heartily agree. I'd add even the Mid-game power into he sum (which doesn't also always translate in late game power), which some nations already make their strong point.

-

Maybe another thing that could help balancing Hinnom and be thematic at the same time, would be if the civilians of the lands where Hinnom armies go, aren't exactly happy of being eaten alive just for fun by the invaders (in game mechanics = if Hinnom soldiers/commanders with the pop-eating feature have the unrest-increasing one as well).
The amount of micromanaging required to keep the loss of gold and further population at bay, could make playing Hinnom a bit more of a challenge and somewhat "justify" its high power...
The AI, on the other side, would never be able to manage this and would be probably screwed ^_^

Re: No more MP for Hinnom?
 

Hinnom has sucked every time they were AI in my SP games. I suppose that's why I fail to comprehend the "Hinnom is over-powered" mantra.