Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I'd prefer that bless and elephants/mammoth strategies be weaker or slower to build up, rather than making magic better in the early game.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Agreed, PvK.

Sometimes the resource system is, I think, not quite what's needed.

For example elephants presumably can't in reality be massed very quickly. You have to go find them or something. But they don't necessarily need much equipment, so they don't have very high resource costs.

In my forthcoming Tomb Kings mod, the idea is that the ancient armies in the pyramids/tombs can only be woken up slowly by the priests. The resource cost should really be pretty much zero (they were buried with their armour and weapons). I've had to give them a fairly high resource cost to stop over-fast recruiting though (perhaps the rituals of awakening need lots of, er, iron).

It would be good if you could only recruit say 2 elephants a turn. But this would be a whole extra game mechanic which might be unpleasantly messy. Just thinking aloud really...

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Yes. There are several types of units whose equipment doesn't involve much, but they shouldn't be fast to mass-recruit for other reasons (training, etc.).

In the case of your revived tomb guys, perhaps the autosummon mod mechanics could be used - a special reviver priest type unit would have a command that would only recruit so many per turn. The reviver could either be recruited, summoned, or be a national starting unit or hero.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Perhaps you could use a summon system instead? Though that scales inaccurately with gold/resources/supplies game options.

Hm... that would be good. But it really changes the whole game dynamic. Perhaps a game option request? (Though that might be more trouble than it's worth to the devs.) (Also, I realize I'm a little request-happy, and I'm certainly not trying to be pushy or subtly complaining about what is so far available, which is considerable).

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

For limiting general recruitment, lower the starting game option gold/resource availability. To reduce specific unit availability modding or a summons approach would work.

For example order 3, prod 3 but with starting gold/resource availability of 50% only gives about 250g and 60res in your capital (depending on start loc). LA Arco elephants are already at 100g/62res. Of course then everyone just starts with 50% and its just a relative problem anyway.

Blesses on the other hand are a bit more tricky. I'm not generally a fan of the whole CB mod, but I like the scales part which makes blesses even more expensive. A bit more negative for bad scales and a bit more positive for good scales, so it widens the gap a bit overall.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

50% gold/50% resources/easy magic research/9 indies and 25 to 30 provinces per player is a good way to address magic balance/early rush tactics. This alters the ratio of resources allocated to mages/troops, slows down initial expansion/rushes by powerful troops and/or blesses and provides enough space so that the playing fields are pretty much level when you encounter neighbors.

You also have to rethink your scales because bad scales are even more of a penalty and selling everything out for a 9 F/W bless is a major buden now.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Resources doesn't *just* mean blacksmiths. It can also mean things like the time it takes a Basalt King to enchant a glaive; anything which takes a certain amount of time. If you wanted to prevent elephants from being easily massed, it would certainly be justifiable to raise the resource cost on elephants to represent the time it takes to train one, the limited number such trainers available, etc. On the other hand, if you're thinking more about the breeding rates of elephants and how unlikely it is that a single province could produce 300 of them over the course of three years, well, population is already decoupled from army recruitment in Dominions 3.

-Max

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I think I sort of agree Max - and it would be much more convenient if resources represented time as well as metals. But in fact all the resource costs in the game are pretty much based only on equipment, and resources come from things like iron mines.

Still, I don't think anyone would object if the general rules were bent a bit in certain cases - for instance elephants.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

(uselessinfo:)
I know one - summon lesser air elemental!

it was cheaper 4-5 years ago and isn't used now.. I think.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I met one the other day, but it might have come from a bag of winds.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Also False Horror, and the Vampire summons (Blood Rite etc). In earlier Dominions games, Caelum used to be the nation casting Illwinter because they preferred Cold 3 and Jotunheim (Iron Woods, or MA nowadays) preferred Cold 2. Reascendance (Marignon national Blood spell) is now restricted to Marignon only, while it used to widen up all Blood/Astral nations' magic by giving access to a Fire mage. Same with Angel summons and Pythium/Marignon. Carrion Reanimation used to rock in Dom:PPP (the first game), because it didn't need corpses and Jotunheim could have thousands of Soulless Giants in two turns after researching it.

The flying, gem-free summons that are very hard to kill (etherealness) and very good at routing enemies (trample or fear) were good enough to let groups of sole mages destroy whole armies themselves. Seraphs used to be Caelum's infantry: 1 Seraph == 3-5 Lesser Air Elementals, or later ~8 or so False Horrors.
Vampires aren't ethereal any more, but their cost hasn't been rebalanced.
Illwinter is still good, and very useful for EA Niefelheim, but now only three nations will ever consider it. Same with Reascendance - it isn't any worse, but it's going to be used only rarely. Same with Angel summons (Harbinger, Heavenly Choir, etc).
Carrion Reanimation is a bit weak now, because it needs corpses to work at all. If it would always create at least a certain minimum amount of undead (say, 10) and then existing corpses would be added to that, OR if it could be cast at a remote province, it would be useful again. Especially for Jotunheim and other nations with tough undead.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Regarding Tartarians...

Assume that you can't heal them (someone else has the Chalice, and the global slots are full, making Gift of Health iffy, at best). However, you can GoR them, using your modest nature income.

Are they still worthwhile?

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

They should be worthwhile jus by being 10 death gem monsters without any other effects.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Like KO said, even non-commander tartarians are close combat monsters, that shouldnt be forgotten.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Damn some of you people play like accountants. You put the game into a spreadsheet and figure out the best down to the last gem or gold piece. I guess we all want those experts around but I do not think that makes the other stuff broken or "never used". If balance is going to mean making everything match at the top of the spreadsheet then I do not want it.

Do not sweat balance kris. Just keep putting in more and more variety. Let the experts here sweat out balance (and let you know about the very FEW things that end up as a game-breaker). If you super-weak this game for the PvP people then it will trash it for the RPG people and lose half of your market. As long as you keep adding then they will have to keep playing it to test balance and the game will be fine. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image.../firedevil.gif

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I think Air Elementals are still very much worth it. They can tip the scales in battles (especially if you do several at once), and still only require an Air-1 mage with one gem.

False Horrors are still worth it too, IMO.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Air elementals are fine. Lesser air elementals are underwhelming.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I agree, I use elementals of all types and levels, though of course only in niche situations. I don't think false horror is usless either, though far, far less good than it it used to be. There is a pretty good case for vampires, especially the high research summons, being nerfed to oblivion though.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

False Horrors got nerfed? They're gem-free, ethereal, have decent defense, cost 10 fatigue, and have two attacks. That seems pretty decent to me, though not overwhelming. What did they used to be like?

In my SP house rules I've modded the Summon Lesser Elemental spells to cast 95 fatigue but require 2 path levels. I still don't use them but this cost seems more fair relative to Raise Skeletons.

-Max

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

True, although they do take a bit of care. They have low protection, so somebody has to buff them up with Iron Warriors or Body Ethereal or Luck or Quickening.

-Max

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Used to only need 1a.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

And worked very well with caelian seraphs when quickness meant 2 spells per round.