Mirror image (and glamour) does not protect units

[MaxWilson]

I think it makse sense for both missiles and magic, and therefore I'm happy with it. Verisimilitude is at least as important as game balance, because game balance can be tweaked by adjusting costs. A good change.

It's certainly not crippling to Helheim. Helhirdlings have shields and good protection, and have access to spells like Legions of Steel that boost that protection further. This change will roughly double the amount of glamour that a given archer volley dispels, but Legions of Steel should roughly halve it again. (It's not as effective against longbows, but those are pretty rare EA.)

The change to Svartalfs is much more important IMO, because it limits Helheim's access to army buffs (Legions of Steel and Strength of Giants, Weapons of Sharpness) AND it slows down their research. Best recruitable-anywhere researcher is now the Vanjarl/Helkarl at 3/turn for an initial 160 gold, instead of the Svartalf at 7/turn for an initial 180 gold. The difference is fairly dramatic, and encourages taking positive Magic scales. (IIRC after ten turns of researching they'll gain 1 star and go up to 4/turn and 8/turn respectively, but it's still dramatic. Because the Varjarl is sacred, maintenance costs don't really suffer, but purchases cost more and you also need twice as many forts for maximum research.) This is offset by Helheim's death magic (helped along by the new site searching spell fix) which lets them get skull mentors, but in a long game Helheim now has real incentive to spend points on something besides a huge bless.

I haven't yet installed the patch, but I would expect the change to Sloth + increased resource cost for lightweight scale mail make Sloth-3 less attractive to Helheim, likewise giving Helheim less free points to throw into a bless.

In my SP games I think I'll mod Helheim back to Svartalfheim (220 gcost recruitable-anywhere Svartalfs) but leave the other changes intact.

-Max

[lch]

Yes, limiting the Svartalfs to the capital only was harsh. Although others argued that it was necessary, too.

[Micah]

It's good that glam got nerfed, although I'm not sure if doing it by using archery was the best plan, since archers are already one of the dominant strategies. I think making the images dissapear when they're hit might have been a more interesting solution.

Also, while Helheim certainly needed some nerfing I'm not sure if glamour weakening + the double resource hit from sloth/scale mail + (the big one) cap-only svartalfs all at the same time might not be going a bit too far. The Svartalf change especially pretty much cements them as a face-hugger nation, since their research potential just got cut in half. I know EA Vanheim has the same problem, but indy-based research does not a good nation make. 160 gold for a 3RP researcher is pretty suck-tastic. Maybe the intent was to force a triple magic scale to weaken the bless? I don't know, maybe having Hel/Van run around with a legion of tribal shaman for research is a good idea from a balance standpoint (I'm doing it as Abysia), but it seems a bit off to me.

[MaxWilson]

Yeah, it probably was necessary. Thematically, it's supposed to be a nation of Vanir, not a nation of little black dwarves with Vanir slave-warriors to do the dirty work.

-Max

P.S. Also keep in mind that those 160 gp researchers can each forge an owl quill for 3 air gems (once the Svartalfs start passing around the Dwarven hammers) as well having access as skull mentors and lightless lanterns forged by Svartalfs. The actual effect might be that Helheim becomes reliant on gem income for research, which is not necessarily all that bad a thing, but it does take some time to kick-start (time which the face-hugging can purchase).

[Micah]

Nice Max, as I said, it's going to change from a nation of dwarves to one of totemic shaman now. They're 50 gold cheaper as researchers than the Helkarls and you can pump em out without the 800 gold investment for a fort.

I guess it remains to be seen if the change will encourage people to play Helheim differently or if it will just shove them further down the double-bless path, hurting their income scales even more. I haven't seen how severe the resource hit is yet, so it's hard to say...forcing both magic and production scales on them might do away with double blessings, but just magic 3 is possible with tolerable scales. Anyone have the new Helhirding resource costs handy?

[Edi]

Gold cost for the Helheim units hasn't changed, as far as I could see.

It's funny how earlier people were complaining about Helheim being too strong and now that it got knocked down to size, there are doubts. The way I see it, now you actually have to make CHOICES as to what you're going to do and have a long term impact from it instead of having it all.

It used to be that you just took screwed up scales, hit a double bless and TRRRRRRRRAAAAMMPLLLEEEEEEE! Not anymore. You need more of the very good units to get the same impact and if you go the maximum bless route, you will suffer in other areas where you did not before. The thing is that you can still recruit a Svartalf every turn that you do not recruit a Hangadrott and you can use the Helkarls and Vanjarls as commanders of the armies.

[HoneyBadger]

It might be a little bit extreme, once you consider all three changes that were made. Not sure yet, ofcourse.

I've got a solution, though, to the svartalfr-the typical one for the badger-how about creating a few more svartalfr units? Certainly they should be working for Vanir, but why not some more support units? maybe a unit that throws armor-piercing francescas (axes ala the Francs) and maybe a low-level researcher-like 1 death, 1 earth, that aren't capital only.

Maybe another combat type that can transform into a giant badger

I've got some more ideas along these lines that I'll post later. Right now, I've got an appointment to catch.

Before I go, though, Vanir were famous for being shape-shifters, so they should have access to *something* along these lines.

[Endoperez]

HoneyBadger said:Before I go, though, Vanir were famous for being shape-shifters, so they should have access to *something* along these lines.

Like, an ability to make themselves look like anything from a peasant to a peacock and walk unnoticed into enemy castles? Yeah, that'd be awesome!

[MaxWilson]

Micah said:
Nice Max, as I said, it's going to change from a nation of dwarves to one of totemic shaman now. They're 50 gold cheaper as researchers than the Helkarls and you can pump em out without the 800 gold investment for a fort.

Yes, but they're not the awesome recruitable-anywhere battlemages that Svartalfs are. It's easier to view shaman as vassal researchers, since they're 1.) native to conquered provinces, 2.) sitting at home researching instead of leading armies into battle, 3.) relatively scarce. (Though not if you were counting ALL indy mages when you said "shamans.") Plus, they'll be wearing Owl Quills and Skull Mentors that they received from their gods (who were actually Hangadrotts under a glamour illusion), and that will do most of the real research.

Also, because indys aren't usually good battlemages, Vanjarls will be recruited instead of the superior Svartalfs, which helps keep the Vanir flavor.

-Max

[PvK]

I think overlapping scale mail is not necessarily what is meant by Dominions' Scale Mail (or - ick! - D&D). Maybe they just mean cloth or leather with some scales on it, not overlapping, which would (depending on how much space was between the scales, and how thick they were) likely be less protective than good chain mail against some kinds of attacks. Note that Dominions (like - yetch! - D&D) also has an armor type unhistorically called "Plate Mail" which is not the same as Plate, and maybe that is more like overlapping scale mail?

However, if Scale Mail does mean overlapping metal scales, in general I'd agree that it would tend to offer more protection than typical chainmail.

And, back on topic, I think the Light Weight Scale Mail referred to here is actually the same type you can forge as a magic item using Air gems... not mundane metal armor. And (as a semi-relevant aside) for cavalry like Vans, encumbrance isn't even counted...