Conceptual Balance Mod 0.9

[quantum_mechani]

I know a lot of people feel they want to explore the base game longer before considering balance mods, however I have been thinking many of the veteran Dom2 players are probably ready to start experimenting with some changes.

So I thought I would release the changes I have been working on so far for CB, a beta of sorts. It's not documented by a readme, and many of the changes are likely not their final versions, but those interested are welcome to try it and give feedback.

A rough outline of the changes:

*Order scale income lessened, luck scale luck effect increased.

*Growth from growth scale increased.

*Pretenders ideal for blessing increased in cost. This was a hard change to commit to, since it makes such pretenders even less suited for roles other than blessing. However, that seems a necessary side effect to making blesses more expensive.

*Bows (shortbows, composite bows, longbows and crossbows) all slightly reduced range, and some increased in resource cost. This is not really enough to counteract their prevalence, but every bit counts.

*All cavalry given hoof attack, cavalry that already had it given warhorse hoof attack. This is bound to be a controversial change, due to it admittedly somewhat stretching realism. However, I see it as the lesser of several evils (such as useless light cavalry, or ridiculously cheap light cavalry) which strike me as even less realistic. More ideas on the issue are welcome, keeping in mind the limits of modding.

*Barding cost drastically reduced on all cavalry. Barding cost is another sticky balance vs realism issue, due to the fact it amounts to, in game terms, paying something for nothing. There doesn't seem a good way to mod in the benefit of barding, so instead I simply reduced the cost's impact.

*Some new factors in unit gold cost. Units wielding spears get a training cost discount. Units wielding a single one handed weapon and no shield get a training cost discount. Units with only leather armour given a discount (the idea being cheaper upkeep, but the way the game is set up that also means lower recruit cost). These are not necessarily universally applied, but then the old unit pricing wasn't exactly 100% consistent either.

*Independent commanders made poor leaders to encourage using national leaders. Independent scouts increased in price for the same reason.

*Some prominent sacred troops increased in price.

*Some primitive archers given a new crude shortbow weapon.

*Some site search spells and booster items more difficult to forge/cast, in order to improve magic diversity between nations. As it stands base game, it is not too hard by the time you have level 9 research in a school, to have dom2-like access to almost all paths.

*Many mediocre summon spells made cheaper.

*Falling frost/fires and similar spells got their range back in exchange for fatigue, and research cost.

*Other evocation spells moved in research and/or changed to allow more niches.

*Many rarely used globals made cheaper.

*No gem battlefield summons made more difficult to cast.

*Several blood battlefield spells improved.

*Treelords given increased magic.

*Many weak items made cheaper/easier to forge.

[Endoperez]

Testing testing...

[Shovah32]

Thanks alot for this. Too bad it couldnt have been released earlier (having a hoof attack on my samurai cavalry would be helpful) but thanks all the same.

[Potatoman]

Excellent work, thank you.

[Graeme Dice]

I'm not sure that you really needed to utterly destroy Ulm by making it impossible for master smith's to cast bladewind without earth boots. I also very much dislike the changes to site searching spells. I'm not going to voluntarily play mods that add to micromanagement, and magic already has far too little effect in Dom3.

[Nerfix]

Graeme Dice said:
I'm not sure that you really needed to utterly destroy Ulm by making it impossible for master smith's to cast bladewind without earth boots. I also very much dislike the changes to site searching spells. I'm not going to voluntarily play mods that add to micromanagement, and magic already has far too little effect in Dom3.

Earth Boots and a gem.

It's not only Ulm. Agartha and Marverni also.

[Graeme Dice]

Nerfix said:
Earth Boots and a gem.

It's not only Ulm. Agartha and Marverni also.

It's not like blade wind is even that good of a spell. A master smith casting it is likely to kill maybe a dozen troops per cast, which means that he doesn't even come close to paying for himself.

I also can't believe that celestial chastement, which is a superpowered version of enslave mind, is a level 1 spell.

[Nerfix]

The cons, on a quick glanse

- Red Dragon is rather redutant now
- The research bonus on Titaness is just crazy
- Moving Phoenix Power and Earthpower to pathlevel 3....wthex, this completely nullifies the purpose of those spells which bootstrapping Fire 2 and Earth 2 commanders to actually useful magic levels. Now they are there just to bring some slight boost to Falling Fires and Bladewind. But wait, with Dominions 3 research times and changes in the mod it's unlikely we'll see either spell in use ever anyway. Whee.
- Moving Lightning Bolt to Evocation 3 makes early game with Caelum feel like trying to piss blood up the wall.
- Bladewind costing a gem..........WTF. I'm sorry, but WTF. Umor, just make the spell have less effects or damage if it is too powerful but you just made earth utterly useless for combat. What are Agarthans and Ulm going to do in combat now? Or Marverni? Magma Bolts? Star Fires and Farstrike!? You have no idea how many nations you essentially invalidated with this move! Half the amount of the blades, make it do less damage or 99 fatigue instead of the 80 it was.
- Thunder Strike at research level 5? Uhhhh...no. Just make it less powerful if you feel it is too strong. It already has a fatigue cost of 80 so it's not terribly spammable.
- I don't like upping pathcosts for site search spells either
- Seven Year Fever, are you sure an AOE Disease spell that scales with power is a good idea?
- No Raise Skeletons at all?
- Abysians are still old
- ME Marignon has Lion TRibe Warrior instead of Friar in recruitable commanders

Pros

- I like most of the stuff you did to magic items
- Raven Guard Captain! I aprove
- Completely selfish, but I aprove cheaper sky titan pretenders, improved Slime and gemless ward spells

To put this all shortly, you were way, way too eager with the nerf stick but the mod does have interesting ideas. I know this sounds very harsh, but it's the way I feel as of now. I'll be following the development in future since CB for Dom 2 was good, but this one is way too radical as of now.

[quantum_mechani]

- Red Dragon is rather redutant now

Why?

- The research bonus on Titaness is just crazy

It's not, it has to be very high to make you consider leaving such an expensive pretender to research.

- Moving Phoenix Power and Earthpower to pathlevel 3....wthex, this completely nullifies the purpose of those spells which bootstrapping Fire 2 and Earth 2 commanders to actually useful magic levels. Now they are there just to bring some slight boost to Falling Fires and Bladewind. But wait, with Dominions 3 research times and changes in the mod it's unlikely we'll see either spell in use ever anyway. Whee.

I am positive I will still use both spells whenever I have e3 or f3 mages and conj 3, which is usually a high research priority anyway. Graeme does make a good point about Ulm ME, I may have to consider nerfing a bit differntly.

- Moving Lightning Bolt to Evocation 3 makes early game with Caelum feel like trying to piss blood up the wall.

Expanding using mages was not really necessary to start with, try mammoth and wingless.

- Bladewind costing a gem..........WTF. I'm sorry, but WTF. Umor, just make the spell have less effects or damage if it is too powerful but you just made earth utterly useless for combat. What are Agarthans and Ulm going to do in combat now? Or Marverni? Magma Bolts? Star Fires and Farstrike!? You have no idea how many nations you essentially invalidated with this move! Half the amount of the blades, make it do less damage or 99 fatigue instead of the 80 it was.

You may be right that cutting the number of effects would be less annoying to people, but I don't think this change is actually less extreme power wise than half the effects.

- Thunder Strike at research level 5? Uhhhh...no. Just make it less powerful if you feel it is too strong. It already has a fatigue cost of 80 so it's not terribly spammable.

I don't see why the research nerf is worse.

- I don't like upping pathcosts for site search spells either

This is a change I knew would not go down easily. I'm not absolutly committed too it, but I would like people to give it a try before deciding it sucks. I think the benefits from better magic diversity can outweigh the seemingly minor annoyance.

- Seven Year Fever, are you sure an AOE Disease spell that scales with power is a good idea?

Yes, I do, it is still rather hard to use effectivly.

- No Raise Skeletons at all?

Check slightly higher in research.

- Abysians are still old

I consider such matters of thematicness IW's call. However, I am still looking at boosting them in other ways.

- ME Marignon has Lion TRibe Warrior instead of Friar in recruitable commanders

Thanks for the catch.

I hope everyone keeps in mind, as I said in the first post, these are not final changes, they are things to try. Some changes you may find imbalancing, so try them out, and then convince me. Even better, suggest other ways to acomplish the same goal.

[Graeme Dice]

quantum_mechani said:
Graeme does make a good point about Ulm ME, I may have to consider nerfing a bit differntly.

I'd suggest not nerfing it at all. Battlefield magic needs to be able to ensure that a mage can kill, at an absolute minimum, his gold cost in troops, or else you might as well not bother researching it. To be truly balanced with respect to research costs, it should enable a mage to kill many times his gold cost in troops.

You may be right that cutting the number of effects would be less annoying to people, but I don't think this change is actually less extreme power wise than half the effects.

Of course it's a more extreme nerf. For one thing, it means that I would never cast the spell in any battle, ever. It's not like the spell needed it. I would have suggested halfing the fatigue cost on it and most battlefield spells to make them actually worthwhile.

I don't see why the research nerf is worse.

I don't see why any nerf is necessary at all. It can kill a maximum of three troops per turn, for a spell that requires a capital only mage or massive horde of communicants for every nation that can cast it. That means that you need to cast it multiple times a battle for it to pay for itself.

This is a change I knew would not go down easily. I'm not absolutly committed too it, but I would like people to give it a try before deciding it sucks. I think the benefits from better magic diversity can outweigh the seemingly minor annoyance.

It's not a seemingly minor annoyance, it's a game killer. Nor does it promote diversity. What it actually does is restrict the site searching spells to those few nations that have native level 3 path mages. Everyone else gets the joy of manually moving mages around the map.

I hope everyone keeps in mind, as I said in the first post, these are not final changes, they are things to try.

Thing is, most of the changes really aren't worth trying. I can tell just by looking at the spells that I won't be casting blade wind ever, nor will I be casting the site searching spells.

Some changes you may find imbalancing, so try them out, and then convince me. Even better, suggest other ways to acomplish the same goal.

I'd suggest starting from the Dom2 mod, rather than trying to further nerf magic down to useless levels.