Mod: Warhammer Dwarfs, version 0.92 -- Quickfix

[kianduatha]

Originally Posted by alansmithee

I can understand reducing the PD, and also changing the troops. But I think the runesmith nerfs are a bit much. More gold (when gold's already tight), more encumbrance, and less paths don't nearly do enough to offset the small research boost. Also, with all castles being so expensive now, your research will lag quite a bit, and recruiting non-caster commanders puts you at an even greater disadvantage.

I'm inclined to agree; You will be behind on research, probably by a lot. Your Runesmiths are already at a disadvantage, between massive casting encumbrance and a total inability to thug them. You're more reliant on noncaster commanders than, well, anyone.

That castle-summoning spell is the most ludicrously difficult thing to cast I've ever seen. You have to lug a prophetized astral-random runelord over to a mountain province with a lab, and then he dies when he casts it? Or I suppose you could make an anvil of doom and then kill it.

By the way, at this point the whole nation almost works better by getting Magic-1, using cheap Engineers as your main researchers, Runelords for your forgers, and just not getting Runesmiths if you can help it. You don't get as many high-earth casters, but you really didn't need many of those anyways. And on the plus-side, you one-turn siege every castle you meet. And have actual battle-casters that don't fatigue out on turn 3. It's at least a fun strategy to consider--you do lose other things by doing so.

It's my perception that Runesmiths have so much not going for them that they didn't need a cost increase. Frankly you shouldn't be caught dead bringing more than a handful of them into a battle--and that's mostly because you can't get water/astral buffs any other way.

Again, a lot of these things I'd have to be in an actual multiplayer game to test out.

Oh, and no matter what, Dwarves can't be as low-tier as Machaka. Just think of what prospectors can do to Machaka province defense. (Actually it's Rangers that utterly destroy them--those throwing axes simply demolish militia)

[Burnsaber]

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Line 334 --> "Dwarf Lighting" should be "Dwarf Lightning". I think. LOL.

Er, yeah. I always spell "Lightning" wrong. Don't know why, it's alot like my issue with "Strategy".

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Why all the "Dwarf Weaponname/Armorname" bits? Are they *that* different? Weapon slots are limited too, you know :-) Couldn't you just bump the stats on the dwarfs?

Well, I admit that they're not *that* necessary gameplay wise, but it's a important thematic element. Basically every game always highlight the "Dwarf-made items are awesome" thematic aspect, but they don't get any in-game bonuses from it. Luckily dom3 has the mechanics to especially show this "dwarf items are awesome" fact and I intent to use it.

The custom armor actually has a gameplay intent behind it. To make dwarf units more vulnerable to Iron Bane, acid spells and desctruction effects. With the way how natural prot and armor prot combine, if I were to give dwarf units regular chain cuirass instead of dwarf-made one (which has +2 prot compared to normal), I'd have to give them +4 natural prot to keep the same prot value.

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Also, since you're not using "Dwarves", should you be using "Dwarven" or "Dwarfish" or just "Dwarf"? (in your weapon/armor names)

Dwarven Axe
Dwarfish Axe
Dwarf Axe
Dwarvish Axe

...personally, I like the 'v', but since you seem to be moving away from it.

Yeah, I admit that the use of possessive pronoun is a bit of a mess currently. I prefer "Dwarven" myself, but sometimes I just used "Dwarf" because I wanted to avoid bumping into the character limit. I'll make it more consistent in the next version.

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Along that vein, your mod directory is still "Dwarves". Need to be consistent :-)

No, just absolutely no. Changing the name of the graphic folder will break all the "image links" in the .dm and replacing them will just open so many possible bugs (like the engineer battle crash bug in the v0.6). It's just a case of opening a really big can of worms for 0% gain.

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

...and after all that, I like your name list, although the potential for humor exists with names ending in 'i'. (I met this dwarf engineer who was afflicted with a broken leg. His name is 'Hurri'. Apparently his brother accidentally hit him with a hammer. His brother's 'Thorri'. ) I'd leave them in, though. The dwarfs won't be laughing.

I don't get the joke. Is there something wrong with me?

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Some other things I saw: I like that Clan Kings get some research, but they're not drain immune so it ends up only being 1 research.

Yeah, I knew that. Unfortunately I can't make them drain-immune due to modding constraints. Basically they are copystatting a Gath commander for that "research although not mage"-tag and the only way to get the "Drain-immune" tag is to copystat a ulm smith. I can't copystat two units, so here we are. I decided that some research is better than no research and let it stay.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Did Distill Flame/Thunder get a higher price because of the lower research level? Because with the efficiency of Dwarven construction, I'm not sure I can justify getting at least the Flamers--that's 3 Lightless Lanterns a bit later in the game, or a few fire brands.

I upped their price because it was really needed. Compare Flamethrowers to Fire Drakes and Thunderers to Storm Demons (which are often spammed in MP basically just for their lighting throwing ability).

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Burnsaber's (mis)coinages are growing on me, though:

Stragedy - A strategy destined for tragedy. Suits dwarf history.
Disencouraged - Discouraged via the encouragement of other options.

...they always seem to make sense in a weird way
(Hope I'm not being too harsh Burnsaber; heaven knows what my posts would look like if I was trying to write in Finnish!)

Hooray for abusing the english language! I am the corruptor, the defiler, sneaking in new words spawned from the wicked aether of my chaotic mindscape! And wasn't shakespeare famous for basically making words up as he went along?

But seriously speaking, I really don't mind. The only way for my grammar to improve is to be pestered about it constantly. Lightning and Strategy, lightning and strategy. Thanks for that and please keep on rolling.

Originally Posted by alansmithee

I don't see either Itza or Pythium being anywhere near too strong, but again that's more personal philosophy. I just see a nation that is upper-mid in power level getting used a lot more than one that's lower in power level. We need more Pythium, C'tis (who I think is really strong MA), etc and less Ulm, Malacha, etc.

Yeah, when talking about power-level, it's pretty much impossible to come to a clear conclusion. I dislike Pythium because it gets the best human infantry, hydras, best human mages (in its era), communicants, uber national summons, and completely random extra gem income (why?) with no clear drawbacks. Old age is more like a nuisance than a real drawback.

But this mod is still in development stage. I know from experience that it's best to *really* aim for weakness for the first releases. It's always easier to boost than nerf in order to fix something. This is basically what my other nation mod, Alugra, is going through. It started out too strong, but I (and other people) got used to it's power level, which made it difficult for me to try to get things appropiately costed. I call this "I don't want to castrate my baby" -effect.

Originally Posted by alansmithee

But I think the runesmith nerfs are a bit much. More gold (when gold's already tight), more encumbrance, and less paths don't nearly do enough to offset the small research boost. Also, with all castles being so expensive now, your research will lag quite a bit, and recruiting non-caster commanders puts you at an even greater disadvantage.

I assume that when talking about "less paths", you mean Runelords, not smiths? I really don't want to go overboard with the Runelords, forgebonus 30 is really powerful (compare to Ashdod's Talmai Elder, which costs 500 gold for less path power and forgebonus 15).

And if I calculated correctly, Runesmiths now have the second best upkeep/research ratio (second to only journeyman runemsmiths) in the nation (in a drain 3 enviroment, of course). But if people feel that they're not worth going for, I might lower their prices back to normal.

It's also good to remember that dwarfs are really supposed to suck at magic, in fact, they shouldn't have magic at all. They could thematically have okay research but they shouldn't ever be "magic" comparable to anything other than MA Ulm.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

That castle-summoning spell is the most ludicrously difficult thing to cast I've ever seen. You have to lug a prophetized astral-random runelord over to a mountain province with a lab, and then he dies when he casts it? Or I suppose you could make an anvil of doom and then kill it.

Yeah, I might have gone a bit overboard with it, I'll probably remove the random mountain requirement. But the spell had to fill a lot of reguirements, like:

1) Reguire astral gems (if it costed earth, it'd compete with Anvil of Doom, and fire/air just don't make sense)
2) Be cheap & low research enough to be able to be casted in mid-game, where forts actually matter (to avoid "Wizard's Tower"- pitfall, it just comes too late to have effect on anything)
3) Not to be spammable, which is hard when taking into account reguirement #2 (because then we'd be right back to the "invicible forts" issue, hence the requirement of killing a prohetized mage, this gives at least 6-month long period between castings).

Originally Posted by kianduatha

By the way, at this point the whole nation almost works better by getting Magic-1, using cheap Engineers as your main researchers, Runelords for your forgers, and just not getting Runesmiths if you can help it. You don't get as many high-earth casters, but you really didn't need many of those anyways. And on the plus-side, you one-turn siege every castle you meet. And have actual battle-casters that don't fatigue out on turn 3. It's at least a fun strategy to consider--you do lose other things by doing so.

Yeah, it's sort of quasi-intentional. Of course the magic scale shouldn't be the best strategy you take all the time, but should be considerable, perhaps even plausible with certain game settings and maps. It's not even unthematic, considering how the Golden Empire dwarfs are basically embodiments of "magic 3" scale (where everyone and their dog had a runeaxe and people were using anvils of doom as lunch tables). Going drain-3 all the time in a "no-brainer" mode is a bit boring.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Again, a lot of these things I'd have to be in an actual multiplayer game to test out.

Yeah, this is the biggest issue when doing MP-balanced mod nations, it's all talk until the first game. At the moment, I could see the v0.7 go for MP-testing. Basing on the comments, it's certainly not overpowered, but (IMHO) shouldn't be that weak. And there really isn't any revisions and major additions waiting impletion, the content is there. Unfortunately, I really don't have time to start admining (or participating) in a yet another MP game.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Oh, and no matter what, Dwarves can't be as low-tier as Machaka. Just think of what prospectors can do to Machaka province defense. (Actually it's Rangers that utterly destroy them--those throwing axes simply demolish militia)

If you want to compare to vanilla nations, Ulm is the way to go and dwarfs really trump them in all aspects (except for battlemagic). MA Ulm isn't even really considered *that* weak anymore.

[Swan]

Originally Posted by Stavis_L
...and after all that, I like your name list, although the potential for humor exists with names ending in 'i'. (I met this dwarf engineer who was afflicted with a broken leg. His name is 'Hurri'. Apparently his brother accidentally hit him with a hammer. His brother's 'Thorri'. ) I'd leave them in, though. The dwarfs won't be laughing.

i didn't get it

[kianduatha]

Originally Posted by Burnsaber

I upped their price because it was really needed. Compare Flamethrowers to Fire Drakes and Thunderers to Storm Demons (which are often spammed in MP basically just for their lighting throwing ability).

Well, I am comparing them. Fire Drakes with Dragon Master are way cheaper, have longer range, more ammo, don't cost upkeep, and are significantly tougher. They're capable of forming a frontline, while Flamethrowers are...not. Well, they can in a pinch, but you have better options once you get into melee.

Storm Demons are an entire league above Thunderers, between the flying(in storms, too!), storm power, no upkeep, and a nicer ranged attack(theirs scales with strength). Oh, and they're ethereal and take blood slaves, which are renewable.

[Graeme Dice]

I'm wondering if, now that there are seven playable Warhammer nations, that somebody might want to go and make a total conversion mod. There are a lot of spells in the base game that probably aren't appropriate to the feel of the Warhammer world, and it might be neat to strip the game down and rebuild it a bit.

[Burnsaber]

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Well, I am comparing them. Fire Drakes with Dragon Master are way cheaper, have longer range, more ammo, don't cost upkeep, and are significantly tougher. They're capable of forming a frontline, while Flamethrowers are...not. Well, they can in a pinch, but you have better options once you get into melee.

These guys are summons, you can't just compare the units onene, you have to take into account how easy they are to summon. First of all, Dragon Master + Fire Drake reguires more research (not much, I admit), mage-time from N3F2 mage (unless you need boosters, which makes it reguire even more research). Where as you can just research alt 3 and just start summoning them, no need for extra research or boosters or mage-time from a 5-pick mage. Fire Drakes also have pretty poor accuracy, often causing pretty heavy friendly fire casualties (a problem flamethrowers don't have, you can use them with non-fr troops with no problem). As for frontline abilities, drakes can tank, but that's the extend of their ability. In prolononged melee, they will just fatigue out and die, because they have serious issues dealing damage in melee. (being size 4 and having to solo everything doesn't help). Flamethrowers have higher mr, prot and are smaller size, making them much more difficult to counter with spells (even basic stuff like Sleep Cloud is painful for drakes).

But in conclusion, yeah, you can't form a frontline with them, but that's not really their point (remember that dwarfs are all about working in community & teamwork). They are slightly behind your frontline, throwing flames until they run out and then wading into melee to support your melee frontline with their 14 ap fire damage with 14 attack value + dam 3 bonus attack staffs. I'd say that they're pretty comparable, but flamethrowers are easier to mass. You have a point about there being other uses for your fire gems, so I might go down to 5 gems if more people feel that they're not worth going for.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Storm Demons are an entire league above Thunderers, between the flying(in storms, too!), storm power, no upkeep, and a nicer ranged attack(theirs scales with strength). Oh, and they're ethereal and take blood slaves, which are renewable.

[/quote]

Once again, compare the summon spells. Storm Demons are pretty god damned hard to mass (whereas Thunderers are not), and require *much* more mage time. Thunderers also have slightly higher prec on their weapons and ignore shields (although, to be fair, I think that Storm Demons might too, but I'd have to test to be 100% sure). Besides, one more thing going for Thunderers is your lack of other uses for air gems (air level 1-2 items pretty much suck) and air gems are pretty easy to get, even with just a engineer manually site searching, since over 50% of air sites just reguire Air 1 to find. [8 common sites and 12 uncommon ones, to be exact]. And god help if you luck out into a A2 engineer. He can find over 90% of air sites, just by manual searchs.

But in conlusion, I'd consider Thunderers overall performance. Just try them out. You can easily get, say 9-12 of them by turn 18 if you sent out Engineer to site search early. They were just absolutely wicked in my test. Of course, the AI didn't try to counter them, but Thunderers don't really have that many counters. Get lighting resistance or die.

Originally Posted by Graeme Dice

I'm wondering if, now that there are seven playable Warhammer nations, that somebody might want to go and make a total conversion mod. There are a lot of spells in the base game that probably aren't appropriate to the feel of the Warhammer world, and it might be neat to strip the game down and rebuild it a bit.

Wrong thread, try the "Warhammer Nations" thread. That thread is for discussion WH stuff & nations in general, this thread is about the dwarf mod. (not that I'm against the project, but I'd like to keep this thread in the point)

[kianduatha]

Yeah, Thunderers are still wicked; all I would want to do is change Thunderers to have the same ranged weapon as Storm Demons(so that strength buffs affect it, and to save a weapon slot), and maybe 5 ammo for the Flamethrowers.

I disagree about the air gems once you hit Const-4, though. Boots of Flight are prettymuch the most important item you can forge, right after Slave Matrices. Giving your Runelords mapmove 3 and flying just can't be beat. Dancing Tridents about double the life expectancy of a Slayer in melee, what with the repel and some ridiculously high attack stat.

It would really be nice to get better randoms on at least the Runelords. It feels kinda weird that Runesmiths have more reliable Astral, and you just don't have the stability to be able to count on basically ever getting a water random before year 3 or something. You also might go for owl quills if you had any chance of getting an Air1 Runelord before they were obsolete.

[alansmithee]

Originally Posted by Burnsaber

Yeah, when talking about power-level, it's pretty much impossible to come to a clear conclusion. I dislike Pythium because it gets the best human infantry, hydras, best human mages (in its era), communicants, uber national summons, and completely random extra gem income (why?) with no clear drawbacks. Old age is more like a nuisance than a real drawback.

But this mod is still in development stage. I know from experience that it's best to *really* aim for weakness for the first releases. It's always easier to boost than nerf in order to fix something. This is basically what my other nation mod, Alugra, is going through. It started out too strong, but I (and other people) got used to it's power level, which made it difficult for me to try to get things appropiately costed. I call this "I don't want to castrate my baby" -effect.

I think you're really underrating the effect of old age. And I'd say Ermor is close for infantry, not to mention Agartha or even much-maligned Ulm. Mages are the best humans, but I'd put near-human Marshmasters and Bakemono sorcerers as being very similar in power level. And hydras are a nice bonus, but not overpowering. Really, I see Pythium as about where most nations should be, and the other "men" nations to be somewhat lacking (although Ermor is pretty close in MA). But again, this is all personal philosophy, and I would just hate to see a great mod not get used because it's no fun to play due to it's weakness.

I assume that when talking about "less paths", you mean Runelords, not smiths? I really don't want to go overboard with the Runelords, forgebonus 30 is really powerful (compare to Ashdod's Talmai Elder, which costs 500 gold for less path power and forgebonus 15).

Yeah, I meant the lords. And this isn't a fair comparison (which I think you know), as the 500 gold also comes attached to a thug/borderline SC chassis. Now, if you want to add in a body slot so you can get rid of the armor that makes them virtually useless in combat...

And if I calculated correctly, Runesmiths now have the second best upkeep/research ratio (second to only journeyman runemsmiths) in the nation (in a drain 3 enviroment, of course). But if people feel that they're not worth going for, I might lower their prices back to normal.

They're still probably worth going for IMO (since you don't really want to give up the 120 pts for drain3), but you're still gonna lag far behind. Again, it's not just the boosted cost of the smiths, it's also the boosted cost of the castles you have to get to recruit more smiths. And even considering that, they're still only second-best to the journeymen. That, coupled with their uselessness as thugs now makes them seem quite useless.

It's also good to remember that dwarfs are really supposed to suck at magic, in fact, they shouldn't have magic at all. They could thematically have okay research but they shouldn't ever be "magic" comparable to anything other than MA Ulm.

Well, to paraphrase something I heard about this game before I was playing it, Ulm (and this was pre-buff when they were considered the worst nation) is a nation full of people who are strong in will, and rely on the strength of iron to overcome magic. Unfortunately there's a spell that can block out the sun. Point being, any nation that thematically sucks at magic, is gonna be at a natural disadvantage since magic is so strong.

And it might not be what you want to go for, but when I think of the tabletop game I always imagine rows of sturdy infantry (which is quite present) backed up by ridiculous amounts of war machines (which don't seem present at all). Now if you don't want to add war machines (I was actually thinking if possible you could have cannons with gift of the heavens or some similar effect if it's moddable since nobody seems to want to just code "gunpowder" effects) I think it's reasonable to see runecasters as being essentially war machine replacements (through judicious use of earth spells, etc) if you did get rid of the crazy armor.

[llamabeast]

Interesting point about the war machines. I guess you decided to ditch war machines altogether Burn? That is basically in keeping with dom3 I guess. On the other hand Sombre included a Gnoblar scrap launcher in the ogres mod, which I thought worked quite nicely.

[Sombre]

Scrap launchers I think work ok because they are essentially the same as a bunch of archers or slingers. Other war machines like cannons, bolt throwers etc I don't think work properly in dom3 for a number of reasons which become evident when you try to make them. They never really work as they're supposed to, look the way they're supposed to or fill the same sort of role they do in warhammer. Dom3 as a system largely abstracts war machines as being part of sieges that you don't get to see.

Then again I have represented most of the war machines for the nations that I've done. When I finish Empire I'm sure people will complain about the lack of them (as well as the lack of gunpowder), but to me it just doesn't work in dom3. I've tried handgunners and pistoliers and I coded up a hellblaster volleygun even, but it all kinda sucked.