Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

"Do you have any actual justification for this? A 500 gold cap only with only S2 is about the ideal target for magic duel, and the MA is the strongest age for astral."

Justification? It's a personal matter so I doubt I need to justify myself. I find teleporting/returning more reliable than having a commander stuck.

Nitpick, twist and turn...

"If Adonim can't be risked against humans before the human can field counters, why exactly are they OP?"

You serious? What counters? What are you talking about?
I'm saying why would anyone send an unfitted Adon against a human player? Or any other Giant for that matter.

"Everybody has to be careful against heavy cav and elephants. Adonim have to be careful against something like half the indy provinces you are likely to see in an initial expansion. And if you are recruiting Adonim for expansion, they aren't going to be notably nasty until well into year 2 thanks to your awful research. If you aren't, you are leaning on expensive regulars, expensive mercenaries, and expensive researchers while your scales are not exactly great (combining misfortune and death, how fun) thanks to a high bless that you aren't even using. Unless of course, you just decide not to take a high bless for a unit that you won't even field until year 2. How exactly are they OP again?"

So kill half the indies with Adons and the other half with something else.
Yes, if you recruit as many Adons as you can they aren't gonna be as nasty. But, again, why would you recruit them every turn? Make one or two for expansion (again, if you take that road) and build up your economy and nation.
Play them like you'd play C'tis. Make a war machine and start recruiting them after you establish an economy. I've never once recruited a mage with C'tis before turn 15. It's all a matter of opportunistic cost.
Once you have established yourself start recruiting them every turn.
Expensive regulars, which clear indies nicely.
Expensive mercs which clear indies nicely. (Othervice I doubt anyone would bid for them)
You scales are good enough. Better than average I'd say. BTW, ammmm, don't use death if you don't like it???
And yes, taking a bless you effectively start using around turn 15 when you start facing real opposition. Sort of like when you play Yomi, or don't you take a bless since you can't reliably expand with them from turn 1?

"Moreover, you seem to be forgetting your initial claim, that Ashdod can field fully geared and buffed SCs year 1, and nobody else can, and that's why Adon are OP. You've now admitted that's not actually true, that Ashdod can gear up SCs no earlier than anybody else. At which point, how exactly is an Adon superior to the geared, mistformed/mirror imaged Fom King, or fireshield/earth buffed Dai Oni that would also be fielded at the same time?"

How have I admitted this is not true? Oh, excuse me, it's not turn 13 but turn 14, mybe 15 in some cases? How silly of me...
Like I said, Dominions is a game of chance and opportunity. But yes, you can get them aroundish year 2. Maybe a bit sooner maybe a bit later.

Ashdod certainly can't gear up sooner than anyone else. I've never said as much. I've said once they gear up they're better than anything else. Please follow.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Wait what? That makes no more sense that your claim about year 1 geared and buffed Adons. Are you casting Ritual of Return on your Adons so they fly back home every time they take a hit? Or scripting returning round 5, so they only fight 3 rounds (or 2, or none depending on your buffs). What exactly is that supposed to achieve? How exactly would an astral Adon be able to both fight, and not be stuck whereever it teleported same as a cloud trapezer?

It's increasingly obvious that you are just making up nonsense because of some crazy vendetta against Adonim. I mean, really?

So..did you somehow forget an entire line of argument? You know, about how if you don't replace armor, shield, and weapon, Adonim are subject to very low research counters, and if you do, you can't exactly argue about how Ashdod can't be balanced with Adonim without also arguing the same about Gath and Kohen Gadols. You do remember your extremely strong claim about Adons right? Surely, you wouldn't be attempting to backpedal? Admittedly, to a more reasonable general argument about Ashdod being OP, but have the spine to say so outright.

So are you claiming Yomi cannot be balanced without removing Dai Oni? You aren't forgetting what you are arguing are you? Demonstrating that high bless Ashdod is playable is pointless and trite.

Yes, indeed, quite silly of you to make obviously false claims in hopes nobody calls you on them. Also silly to claim without backing that geared up Adons are better than geared up Kings, Oni, etc and continue doing so after being called on it, and yet have to temerity to suggest that hasn't already been responded to.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

OK,
Here's my impossible Adon. End of year 1, year 2 early spring. With no mercenaries used. With my terrible scales and expensive expansion units. Second fort under way also.

Place those items on the earth Adon and attack a province. That 24 protection becomes 36. Give me a nation that can match that.

Now go away little silly troll and bother someone else.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Thematically, you can always argue things different ways but I don't see a thematic reason for Ashdod to have stronger D magic than the rest of them.

As for the other aspects of nations, another thing Ashdod has (like other giant nations) is commanders that won't crumble under a casting of rain of stones or flames from the sky. I think we'll just have to disagree on this as I don't see those other nations "extras" as being superior to Ashdod's and I do think giving Ashdod common D3s is a mistake. Now I'm certainly not going to say that kianduatha's idea of maybe a 25% chance of an ED random is a disaster but giving a 50% chance of just D as you propose is IMO a mistake.

Btw, I don't think things are so well defined that each age has (or should have) a single strongest nation - I think there's a top tier. And as I mentioned recently I'm certainly not looking to nerf all those top nations. But if a single nation stands out as head and shoulders above the rest then, yes, nerf it.

I think we just look at it from different perspectives. You want Ashdod to resume their former position (with a proviso that they shouldn't be able to run over people early on) whereas I think they're a solid, playable nation that no longer changes the game just based on their presence and that's a good change.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

This one is easy, actually. Your astral adon enjoys having returning available in a couple of circumstances. For example, that makes it impossible to teleport anything in to kill it as it will just vanish in a puff of smoke when you try. Then next turn it can teleport into another province. It makes it a lot harder for your adon to get stranded and unavailable if you need it somewhere else as well.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

You did well playing against nobody. Lets see you play other people....

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

You're right, I'd probably do better in a competitive MP game, more incentive.
I'd use mercs and expand faster, wider. I'd blitz the weakest bastard who'd border me and double my nation in almost no time, with very little loses probably.
That is if everyone didn't decide to gang up on me from the start. But why should they since Ashdod is ruined now?

I have no doubt a gang would kill me instantly in the first 15-20ish turns of course, but, if I were left to kill my first neighbor which would have no chance in hell what so ever to fend off from this, even a 3-4 side gank would have trouble putting me down at that point.

Any nation that is unstoppable in a no diplo game should perhaps get some changes. I count Ashdod as such a nation personally. Not because of the mages, sacreds, summons, good national troops, but the absurdity that Adons can become very early on. And as such I don't think they can be balanced at all, nor Ashdod for that matter.
And this is why it will continue to be ganked upon always, whatever nerfs are implemented.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

no, a bless nation like Van with their 24 defense 0 enc troops would just slaughter all those junk troops and you would be dead by turn 20

and if you are too scared to actually play them in a real game, then please stop posting.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Perhaps you should calm down a bit. You're, for what ever reason, taking this personally and I have no interest in...wait something sounds familiar. I mean, some people like all in strategies with dom 5 and no strong priests and hoping they don't get hit by a plague in the cap, and go AI if it doesn't work out, and it does sometimes work out for them.

But aren't you forgetting what you are arguing...yet again? You've admitted that Ashdod can't gear up faster than the other SC nations, so why don't you get to actually arguing why that Adon is better than other geared up SCs.

A Fomorian King with same equipment and research will be mistformed and mirror imaged, which is a lot safer than raw protection. A Dai Oni will still have sky high protection protection and fire shield shortly. But we've been over this. Are you really arguing the one additional slot to fit a bracer makes Adonim unbalanceable?

Can you explain that a bit more? Are you saying cast ritual of return on an SC, launch a teleport attack, hope to not take any hits winning, at which point you are immune to counterattack and can indeed use the counterattack to return to a lab for further attack? I mean, I guess, but that's not exactly a huge thing that's likely to be exploitable...for anything really. Nor would it actually do anything against magic duel.

Perhaps Executor can just come out and say what he meant.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

LOL
You're right ghouly, I will stop posting, but for entirely different reasons. A man has only so much sanity and sleep he can spare.
Good night trolls, it's been... something else entirely.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Hopefully, you'll calm down after a good night's rest and stop taking things personally. That and actually responding to points made would be nice...

Or you can just call everybody who disagrees with you a troll and run, that works too.

They are not talking about ritual of returning, they are talking about the spell returning. You give your commander 2 astral gems, kill the PD with a normal script(bless body ethereal bla bla attack) and then the next turn you set your commander to cast returning instead. And yea it gives you better strategic value than cloud trapeze. (at a higher price but I feel that loosing the thug + the gear costs much more so better 2 astral gems than that)

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Hmm, that can be useful. Seems the SC is likely to burn some of those pearls if you script him to buff though. Guess I owe Executor an apology. Not that his "Adons are impossible to balance" nonsense isn't still silly.

As if elephants won't still squish a 36 prot Adon, or any earth nation with piercers, or any nation that can cast lightning bolt, which is like half the nations in the MA.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Yea I found the thread about the bracers. thx for the info:)

About burning perls I think there was a thread somewhere explaining when a mage will use more perls(something like if the spell requires less than 50 fatigue or makes the overall fatigue less than 50 then the mage won't use gems to increase casting lvl) but I can't be bothered to find it. Point is with body ethereal you can take on most PD without worries.Same goes for unexpecting thugs/SCs.So they make their kill and the enemy canno't even mind hunt them, so its a pain having to deal with them.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Heh...I learned just now that Spine Devils are actually pretty good counters to fully tricked out Adons, amusingly enough. Them poison spines are killer when half your attacks are length 0. It might take a dozen or so of them to take him down, but it's totally worth it. Also it should be noted that the sample Adon you gave had super-nice prot on his body but only 17 on his head, which is rather a lot worse than 36 prot in general. That is admittedly because bracers of prot give body armor these days; I forget if that is going to get reverted.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Lol. I had forgotten about bracers stacking. Nice use of those three misc slots, Executor. Though I might sacrifice one of those bracers for a pendant of luck.

Another nice piece of Constr. 2 gear forgeable by Ashdod is lantern shields. While the opponent chases around the corpse candles you can buff in peace. Added bonus: fear.

And, if facing Aby or an F9 bless you can use fire plate instead of black plate for 100 FR.

Also, if you build a temple/lab and can scrape together 5 N gems you can forge a raw hide shield so that you will be fatigue neutral with just the E5 bless.

I've never faced off with Ashdod. Tuatha vs. Adon would be an interesting matchup.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Lol, managing astral SC's is one of the easiest areas in which it's obvious to spot whether someone is a decent player or a complete scrub.

I wouldn't worry about it Executor, it's obvious to most readers who knows what they are talking about.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

LOL. The fun thing is that IMHO both Hinnom and Gath are much more scarier in their era than Ashdod in the first 30 turns or so. Hinnom has size-5 MR-12 tramplers to clean up all indies (well, with two exceptions). And by the time they are obsolete, you are recruiting Melqarts.
And Gath had already rushed their nearest/weakest neighbor, and switched to turtle mode for the next, say, 30 turns.

Compared to them, Ashdod struggles with both expansion and research. The giant they have are neither tramplers, nor affordable, nor (en)durable. Asdod has two cap-only giant sacreds that are expensive. The Hinnom ones are both cheaper and just better (Fear). The Gath Gibborim, while not spectacular individually, are affordable to mass in critical quantities.
The nonsacred regular Ashod giants are worse than what Hinnom and Gath could do. They just... can't kill stuff fast enough?

Research: Hinnom recruits Ammi - kinda overpriced for researcher, but they are awesome fortune teller (10), and provide A2 access. The Horite Shaman is adequate to start up the Death ladder (with a native RoW). Gath has not that expensive (120g)options that provide diversity (ED, FD, ES, SD, D2, E2) - if a 80gp S1 caster would not also be available. What does Ashod have?
1/ Overpriced Emite that can't be used as thug - at that point just spend the gems on a Zamzummite. Wait, 1/4 of them can forge flaming skulls, too bad you don't really need more than one of those. Another 1/4 of them are actually useful as communion slaves, and could cast Nether Darts at Evo7. Unfortunately, researching that would take an eternity.
2/ Sages. They are just too expensive for research. The magic they provide (E2/S2/F2) is overpriced at 200gp. Nor are they providing any spectacular magic on a reliable basis. This leaves you, out of capital, the
3/ Zamzummite. Yes, he can be thugged (for gems). Yes, half of them can skellispam giant skellies (1/2 chance for doing that effectively). But no E3 access (boosts/casts/forge). F randoms give you nothing besides forge access. Token ES access that you should already have on the Sphynx, and 310GP is to expensive for communion slave. Gath can do it all except the skellispam.
But as it is in CBM 1.92, I'd make three or four changes:
2/ Change Sage random to 3 F/E/S. Those guys are supposed to know more than what could be learned in a human lifetime.
3/ Reduce the cost of Talmai Elders 400GP. That's about what they worth, without H3 or cross-paths.
4/ maybe, give them a semi-decent size 2 unit.

Ah, and make their national evocation castable by their mages.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

P3D, yes Hinnom is better. I agree, it can do anything Ashdod can better, though I've never played against Gath so far so I won't make any claims for them. Personally, Ashdod seems better to me than Gath at a glance.
Generally, the unrest and pop eating is a large deterrent when taking Hinnom. I know it's not a big MM problem but people still dislike dealing with it. Well, me first anyway.

Kianduatha, you can even use ghouls to kill such SCs. Cast a few Arouse Hungers. A few successful attacks will ramp up his fatigue due to that paralyzing claw.

Valerius, you could use faithful for luck. A level 2 construct as well.

Anyway, do sole Adons make Ashdod unbalanced? No. They have an array of other nice stuff too. A lot of small things combined does. Like the recent boosts to MA Ulm.
Are Fomo Kings better for example? They can be. Certainly. But their sacred giants suck compared to Ashdod. And their mage force is near nonexistent. Anyone who's played them knows what I'm talking about.

Do I think Adons are OP? Yes. Do I think Adons are unbalanced? That too. I've seen what these things can do and I don't like what is Ashdod early on.
Do I think everything can and should be balanced? I don't for that matter as that would take out much of the flavor out of Dominions. But I still do stand by my earlier, mock comment, that without removing Adons, Ashdod couldn't be balanced. But like I said, I don't actually expect or advocate any changes to them. Some things just can't be balanced as they're built like that. Like Amos nations.
Are there better SCs than Adons? Yes, their EA bothers are much better. Does having one better OP thing make another OP thing less good? It does not.
Is Ashdod unplayable now since they got an increase of another point of enc? It isn't. Is it weak? It certainly isn't. Is it OP still? It is. Can the nation be adequately balanced? I don't think so.

All of this is my personal point of view. A lot of you probably disagree with me, which is a good thing, as if everyone advocated the same thing we'd have a much sorrier version of CBM now.

And one last thing. I get that people will, and should, have different points of views. I respect other peoples opinion. But I don't think if I state certain things ( even something radical like when I said why Agartha PD is hopelessly OP, or make a mock comment about Adons and state why they are still a killer unit ) that my comments should be argued in such a way or ridiculed. There's a fine line between debating and what's been going on in this thread.
So, I apologize for all my comments from last night. And if anyone else wants to have a normal debate of why Ashdod is far from ruined I'd be happy to.

BTW, I agree Zamzummite are fine like Valerius said. 1/4 will have D3 and 1/4 will have astral which can be as good or even better than D3. Though I find them slightly overpriced.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Busted!!! :lol:

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Enc-3 is a huge shift--even with an E5 bless it is impossible to get net-0 on your F2 and S2 Adons until either Const-4 for Girdles or scraping up an indy shaman with some nature income(or alchemizing and it just costing 10S) to make birch boots. And that's a pain--especially if you were going Conj-3 for your Earth guys. I'm tempted to say that Ashdod should only go E9 instead of E10 nowadays because you're not going to get quite there either way.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

I don't understand why is everybody so obsessed with getting fatigue down to 0. Gaining 1 enc a turn is not that much of a big deal until turn 25-30 of the battle. The problem with enc 1 is undead spam and thats where fatigue 0 is important but since you are talkin about expanding I don't see where is the problem.

Edit: they do get 2 enc with earth 10 my bad. But still that is not too bad until turn 15ish of battle.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Just found it - in the same province than a plaguewater stream where I built a fort a few turns ago, once again. :D

Certainly unbalanced for mp games because the Wild Ettins can be bought for 0 gold.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Don't worry, the ettin bug is probably the most reported bug ever. I've already fixed it in the early draft of CBM 1.93.

While I'm mentioning 1.93, a sneak preview: LA Pythium will be gaining a nice line of serpent-themed spells. Mainly for reasons of fun and theme rather than balance. I was working on them over Easter and have completed the sprites and the hard bits of the code (the spells include a few new mechanics such as a "Serpent Form" spell the priests can use to turn into giant snakes). I also went through all this thread and the dom3mods thread and compiled all the bugs and suggestions. There are lots and lots!

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Amazing. Gotta try LA Pyth again when 1.93 is out. :)

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Is there any way to add a lower research level Transformation spell (maybe as a national spell) without breaking balance? I find it a very fun spell that is used only for reducing upkeep of nature mages in late-game (when upkeep is nearly irrelevant)...

It would be fun to have a version that shows up early in the research tree and could be used to field some combat mages with the better animal forms...

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Would this one be too unbalanced?

#newspell
#copyspell "Transformation"
#name "Astral Transformation"
#descr "The jungle shamans discovered a spell where mages could change their physical forms to an animal form that mirrors their inner soul. The spell has its risks, including the possible death of the mage and, even if sucessfull, not even the mage casting the spell can really know if their soul is powerfull as a Lion or as weak as a Ant."
#path 0 4
#pathlevel 0 2
#path 1 6
#pathlevel 1 1
#school 1
#researchlevel 3
#fatiguecost 400
#end

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Wow. 1.93 draft sounds most promising. I too am looking fwd to playing LA Pyth.

Did you make up your mind what to do w/ MA Ulm?

Do you think giving MA Pyth some more Byzantium flavor is advisable?

Re. the Adonim discussion. It was my impression that IW specifically wanted the Nephilim nations to be ubber. It makes sense thematically and theme is pivotal to dominions (and makes it fun too). So I personally am ok w/ some small nerfs but I would find it not thematic to make them mediocre.
(For the record I never played any of them in MP and not much interested neither so I'm not emotionally biased. )

If I were to make a balance suggestion I'd say that better target availability rather than quality.
I mean that (for example) instead of making Adonim weaker make them harder to recruit. This can be done in various ways: like up their gcost, up their resource cost, do both or apply some more creative mechanism (like make them units and force GoR to make use of them).
The end result should be player can field small amount of OP Adonim.
In dominions lots of counters exist to small number of OP units.
IMO The balance breakage problem happens when OP things hit critical mass.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Consider your test game. Put the gear you forged on a Kohen Gadol, which as mentioned already, is basically an unequipped Adon with better magic. If you think your test game demonstrates an imbalance in Ashdod, why do you not think it demonstrates an even greater imbalance in Gath?

Odd, you say your ridiculousness on Adons was mock, but then you still stand by it. That you want a serious debate on why Ashdod is still playable or even that it's still powerful...which nobody has disputed except Ghoul, and is a far cry from that mock claim you stand by. You even say it's not Adon's per se that make Ashdod OP still, but lots of little things that add up...and still stand by your claim that it's impossible to balance Ashdod by looking at the little things, but instead Adons must be removed for that to happen.

Whether or not anyone wants a normal debate would have to depend on whether you only want to claim something not much disputed, or still everything you claimed last night, even if you take back the personal attacks.

Hey Nightfall, surely you agree that Ashdod is only middle of the pack. After all, Man is the strongest bless nation in the MA right? But even you didn't claim that Man was massively OP.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

my opinion is that the statement "asdod is unplayable" is obviously false.

I wanted to clear that up if we are arguing about "unplayable" or "not strong enough".

Someone already expressed something like some peoples panchant for confusing "unplayable" with "unplayable by the previously working methods". In ashdods case (one of) the previously working method was stomping the opponent by nearly irresistable brute force (something like niefel jarls can do even now against some nations/builds).

I was the witness of what i consider the event that inspired ghouls original post about the topic. This is how i saw it: in the early game he was conquering indies with adons using a super-bless E10W6F6N4, then when the indies got eaten up, he got in war with shinuyama, using his expansion army of 6 or 7 adons. After the intial defeat, shinuyama assembled a huge army, with lots of O-bakemonos (among lots of other things, goblins, dai bakemonos) and managed to beat the adon platoon, suffering great casualties in the process. the O-bakemonos were key in that as they did hit hard enough.

i dont see any problem making an expectable strategy defeatable, in fact i much prefer it. (so i wont ban these kind of nations from my games)

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Actually only Ghoul was arguing either unplayable, or not strong enough, and he really didn't say much beyond that. Executor was (and still is?) arguing that Ashdod is impossible to balance with Adonim because it was and still is massively OP, and I was arguing against that. There was also a side argument on whether or not some of the nerfs against Ashdod were justified, with the understanding that no, the nerfs don't make Ashdod weak, but neither would the lack of them make Ashdod OP, and so CBM didn't really have any business making those changes for thematic reasons.

Edit: somewhat lost in the shuffle was how Seren can be made useable. Which is related as Anakite armor being the worst heavy armor in the game is one reason nobody would recruit them, as cheap as they are.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Dude, shangrila, for as much as you claim executor was making personal attacks it is hard not to read a large amount of hostility from you in what you're directing at him. You are making this excessively personal. Can we back this up a couple of steps?

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

I'll agree with the first part, that the nerfs don't make them weak - but not with the second. Ashdod was originally nerfed because it was viewed as OP. I understand you may not view it that way but the fact is it was commonly banned from games. And it's most certainly CBM's business to address that since I view CBM as being MP focused (at least with regards to balance decisions). Really, the question is do you want the nation to be playable or banned half the time?

As for the nerfs, they mostly had to do with gold cost. I'd agree some of those are now too high, in particular the Talmai Elder at 600 gold. I'd also agree with Executor's comment that it wouldn't be out of line to reduce the cost of zamzummite's.

But none of the changes were unthematic, unless you consider the theme to be "IW created an OP nation deliberately." But in that case I'd say balance trumps "theme" - at least in a MP setting.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Ashdod is the only nation that can't get 0 enc sacreds. So nations with 0 enc sacreds can just slaughter them in the early game

I am the only one here who has actually played ashdod in 1.92, so I'm the only one that can comment on it.


Why don't some of you actually play them before you keep spouting nonsense?

but of course none of you will, and will just keep spouting nonsense with no real experience to back you up.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

That's the most ridiculously expensive and stupid bless I've ever seen. W6 for an extra 3 def on an SC chassis?!? So that’s 170 points to negate 1.5 attacks. Awesome value!! And then another 170 points to get an extra 3 attack on a unit that doesn't struggle to hit.

I really love it when players take an absolutely atrocious build for a game, get trashed in 20 turns, and then complain about how rubbish a nation and/or mod is based on the game they just played. And never once looking at their own failings in both design and play style, or even think about blaming themselves in any way for a single moment. The other great thing about Ghoul's performance in that game is that Ghoul is well known for always having the worst Dominion and Research in every game he plays, but even so...

(these were the llamascores the turn Ghoul went AI as Ashdod)

LlamaServer Scores, Game_of_Dorian turn 21

Research
Nation Research
Independents 0
Ermor 655
Pythium 305
Mictlan 757
Abysia 1472
Shinuyama 1191
Ashdod 36
Eriu 1524

How is it possible to have done just 36 points of research by turn 21? I mean seriously, how the hell is that even possible. You hire a mage turn 1, set it to research, and that single mage alone will have generated 100rp by turn 21. So WTF?!? To have done just 36rp you would literally have to be sending out every mage you ever recruit every turn. Christ any and every nation in the game is unplayable if you trash your scales to take a pointless bless, on top of intentionally doing no research at all ever. If anyone plays like this then they seriously need to go back to SP games and learn the very basics of how to play.


And I just tried a quick and messy test game as Ashdod. By turn 12 I had 19 provinces, 3 forts and however many expansion armies I wanted. I took a Dormant Master Druid with A1W1E9N4 (you don't need more bless than that) and Dom5 O3P1H4G0Mis2M1, with 54 points remaining (so points left for more scales or Dom or Magic Div). I don't see why I wouldn't get that in a MP game if I wanted (note that's a big if!). I expanded no problem with almost no losses (Indy 5) using a mix of small armies of Gileadites backed with Indy archers when needed.

Ashdod is in no way weak at all, and in most cases have all the options available now that they did before. If you can't get a decent game with Ashdod then there's something wrong with your play. Sure they can and likely will be in danger of ganging, due to players knowing about Ashdod's mid-late game potential. But I can't see why they are more or less likely to be ganged than the other top nations in the game. As that is the danger (or should be the danger in a sensible game) of playing top tier nations.

-------------------------
Please don't tell me you have any important responsibilities in life, because that is one of the stupidest bits of logic I have even seen. "We've gone a long way to solving the problem, but people are unaware of what we've done, and how we've tried addressing the problem. Therefore we should undo all the fixes we made, just accept the problem, and never try to fix it ever again."

--------------------------
I agree completely. Removing SDR's has made Mictlan UNPLAYABLE! and they have been completely overnerfed as a result of the CBM changes. Mictlan were one of the weakest nations in the game to begin with, and I can not see them ever winning a game again, or even getting to turn 20, unless their priests get B3 minimum. As using cap mages to bloodhunt is an exploit, and it's impossible for Mictlan to summon any hunters who are efficient or cheap. Therefore the nation is now worthless IMO (which is the correct opinion). Plus removing hammers has not helped them in any way. Indeed it has made them far worse compared to other nations.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Shangrila00,
You refuse to even really hear anything I have to say and make any attempt to have a civil debate about it. For whatever reason, which I won't get into, you have taken this far too personally and continue to be excessively hostile towards me, and not only me (I have no peoblem with that btw). But yet in the end, it's me that's making the personal attacks...

I think I'll refrain from making any comments regarding anything on this forum from now on as dealing with the likes of you makes that rather unpleasant.
In the future, please don't address me and do not attempt to join my games.

Calahan, I finally get why you stopped posting anything or trying to be of help.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Chill. I didnt say roll it back, i said it was overnerfed and i suggestion to UNDO the overnerf.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Ghoul you've never played any nation in the game, simply because you have no idea how to play the game at all. Therefore any opinion you have on anything is meaningless. And as evidence of your inability to play, I present your above bless for Ashdod, and your complete failure to compete in any game you've ever played past the mid game (when 0enc super giants can no longer survive against magic).

This happens in every game you play (and you know it does) because you have no concept of the power curve, you never do research, you never build several strong mage bases, you always over-commit to every war you fight (top tip, vet players often use less than 50% of their forces to win their first war, and also try to win their first war without using any mages). With most of these points being the reason you keep getting ganged. ie. it has othing to do with players beign "****ing cowards" as you keep claiming. As the reason is they scout your lands, notice you have no troops or mages anywhere in sight. As you've committed everything you have, and ever have had, into just one war. Then they check the graphs and note you are bottom on research, so have no way of defending yourself with mages. they then add 1+1 together, and get the answer that they can take over your entire empire very quickly and very easily. So why the hell shouldn't they do it? (top tip, if your first war lasts more than 20 turns, you've already lost the game. And if you win your first, and your second lasts longer than 10 turns, then again you've lost the game. Quick wars are essential to staying on the power curve)

If you think how you play the game right now is how the game should be played, then I can assure you that you will not only never win a game ever, but you will not even get close to winning a game ever. As you are trying to play in a way that makes failure a 100% certainty. In chess terms (since it's the worlds most widely played strategy game) you are moving your queen out on move two of every game you play, trying to capture as many pawns as you can with her, and then crying like a girl when you lose your queen or you get checkmated (due to your opponents superior piece development), and then blaming either the game or your opponent for your loss. Rather than facing the truth which is that you have no idea at all how chess is really played. And until you accept you have no idea, accept you have to change how you play, and start learning the basics of playing properly, then you will never improve regardless of how many games you play, as it is impossible to improve with that play style. You could play 24/7 for 10 years and be no better than when you started.

But I couldn't care less if your Dom play improves at all, and you'll just ignore all this advice like you have done every single time anyone has tried helping you play better. And several players have tried helping you in the past, but you refuse to accept any criticism of your play because you always convice yourself that something else is the sole reason for you losing (****ing cowards!!!). As at the end of the day all I care about is that people realise how clueless you are as a player, and as such automatically ignore any assessment you make about a nation/mod/whatever.

----------------------------
Glad to see you've finally seen the light. Maybe you should set up a sig. to commemorate it, like the one I have over on Dom3mods.

"Don't ever try to help pig-headed douche bags, as it's never worth the trouble. Since some people are just too stupid and arrogant to listen"

----------------------------
I'll chill when people stop posting rubbish. Which by recent evidence suggests never.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

I hope you won't actually stop posting Executor, as your comments and discussion are much appreciated and I read them carefully. I may be fairly quiet on here but I read the forums constantly (I don't post so much since I'm generally either at work or on my phone).

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

And actually I generally appreciate your comments too Shangrila. I have no idea what happened on here in the last couple of days!!

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

I also hope you don't stop posting, Executor.

Obviously people will have differences when it comes to subjective things like balance but a little civility can go a long way. And sometimes you just agree to disagree and hope llama takes your side when reviewing the matter. And be glad you don't have to deal with all this like he does. ;)

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

I think the takeaway from all this is that Ashdod can expand quite handily with its non-sacred giant troops--which is really awesome.

I don't understand why people would want Zamzummites to be cheaper rather than better mages. Especially if expansion is starting to be from actual troops instead of Adon power-hour, the next step seems to be adjusting balance to be roughly equal between Zamzummite mage-power and Adon thuggery.

Frankly, though, I have no idea how powerful Ashdod is at the moment. Nobody plays them in legit games.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

This is definitely worth pointing out since CBM made those non-sacreds cheaper than vanilla. And this combines nicely with the current scales making prod more appealing than ever.

Because discounting their price a bit lets you afford more of them; making them better mages increases their power considerably more because you don't have to use those all important gems to open up things like banefire and drain life and even summon earthpower (combined with an E bless) for a mage that has incredible staying power. And as I mentioned, these aren't fragile mages that can't survive a late game battlefield.

Now I realize your proposal of a 25-50% chance of an extra DE pick is very different from the 100% chance they have in vanilla but those are the concerns I have about going that route.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Oh no, I'll be around Sombres forum as always, any real modding discussions and projects are done there anyway. The fact you go though these threads regularly and have the unpleasant job of sorting out all comments, suggestions and rants for further projects is well known to me. That is much appreciated as always. We all do out part to contribute something to this game which borders addiction.
I just don't know why I even bother here. I know I can be an ars or overstate myself sometimes but damn, at least I come around...

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Playing a game with Marverni and just noticed something.

With the new buffs to animals marverni's boars now have berserk. However, the boars they get with the spell iron pigs do not (yep, cool little thing about iron pigs with marverni, you get sacred iron boar versions instead of just normal iron pigs).

For consistency it seems like they should also get berserk if the normal boars now have it. Iron pigs explicitly says that it doesn't effect the minds of the animals.

However, obvious problem is that berserk (with the buff to prot and most importantly the unroutability) might actually be a little overpowered on the iron boars. Marv would now be getting 10 unroutable, super high protection, sacred tramplers for 4 E gems apiece.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

It was not an oversight; that is exactly why the Iron boars do not have berserk.

I was wondering what people use the great eagle for (Conj. 7, 4 A gems). It's not expensive, but the research level seems high for what it does - especially because the Roc is available at Conj. 6 (though of course it costs more and requires A4 to summon). Do they have a niche that I'm not seeing? The main thing that stands out is that they have map move 4.

Edit: I guess maybe to ferry gems and misc items around since they are actually cheaper than flying boots?

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Okay. Good to know. Still not a huge fan of the consistency problem. To bad you can't fix it with a price change since it would effect the spell for every other nation as well.

Maybe just add some flavor text to the iron boars explaining why they no longer berserk. Perhaps they're smart enough to realize that their skin is now made of steel.

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

Maybe they can't feel pain anymore because their skin is made of steel?

Re: Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92
 

haha. Good point.