Heavy Infantry, Light Infantry, and Mundane AP Weapons

[Saber Cherry]

Mods are irrelevant. First, the thread is about improving Dominions II and addressing gameplay problems. Second, almost none of the suggestions could be added through mods. Third, there needs to be a thread to discuss the suggestions and decide which ones, in what degree, will balance the game. This is true regardless of whether Illwinter or a fan does the actual work.

But I think point number 2, that most of these changes require code-level change rather than data-level change, negates any relevance modding has to this thread.

-Cherry

[DominionsFan]

Originally posted by Saber Cherry:
Mods are irrelevant. First, the thread is about improving Dominions II and addressing gameplay problems. Second, almost none of the suggestions could be added through mods. Third, there needs to be a thread to discuss the suggestions and decide which ones, in what degree, will balance the game. This is true regardless of whether Illwinter or a fan does the actual work.

But I think point number 2, that most of these changes require code-level change rather than data-level change, negates any relevance modding has to this thread.

-Cherry

Ummmmmm, if you will be able to change the stats & abilities & equipment of the units, you can balance them. IMHO.

[Alneyan]

Originally posted by DominionsFAN:
Ummmmmm, if you will be able to change the stats & abilities & equipment of the units, you can balance them. IMHO.

Not quite. You will only be able to either reduce the price of LI to make it cost-effective, or you could make LI almost HI by increasing its hitpoints, protection and so on. Most of the other suggestions aims at giving LI different abilities than HL, and that needs to change the code I believe.

I second (or I third rather, as Apoger already exprimed his support for this) the suggestion about "strategic moves that end in enemy territory". It would give LI and Light Cavalry abilities other than what can do their heavier counterparts, and make them a worthwhile unit if you are planning to use such strategies. (Or if you are facing an opponent who refuses to engage your heavy-elite-impossible-to-defeat army. )

[Nerfix]

Originally posted by Saber Cherry:

19) Allow LI/LC to attack non-adjacent enemy territories (move across a friendly province and attack);
20) Add strategic "Raid" orders for LI/LC (skirmish and retreat);
21) Add "Move-Pillage" orders for LI/LC (e.g. Mongols, Vikings, German barbarians);
22) Increase armor encumbrance in deserts (dehydration), swamps (footing), and mountains (elevation)

-Cherry

I would like to see these. Fixing the ordered retreat-issue (units scatter even when ordered to retreat) could also be good solution, but Raid/Skirmish/whatever would be good also. Move-Pillage would make enemy province pillaging much easier(since you could just move out of the province when you have conquered & pillaged it instead of figthing with the enemy quick response forces).

And didn't LI(Spearmen) have some kind of a tactic(other than poking them with the spears) to slow down/hurt/kill cavalry with their spears? I don't remember the specifics, but i remember that in CoE Cavalry units attacking Spearmen take damage.

[ November 01, 2003, 09:25: Message edited by: Nerfix ]

[DominionsFan]

Originally posted by Alneyan:

quote:

---

Originally posted by DominionsFAN:
Ummmmmm, if you will be able to change the stats & abilities & equipment of the units, you can balance them. IMHO.

Not quite. You will only be able to either reduce the price of LI to make it cost-effective, or you could make LI almost HI by increasing its hitpoints, protection and so on. Most of the other suggestions aims at giving LI different abilities than HL, and that needs to change the code I believe.

I second (or I third rather, as Apoger already exprimed his support for this) the suggestion about "strategic moves that end in enemy territory". It would give LI and Light Cavalry abilities other than what can do their heavier counterparts, and make them a worthwhile unit if you are planning to use such strategies. (Or if you are facing an opponent who refuses to engage your heavy-elite-impossible-to-defeat army. )

---

Well, don't tell me that we won't be able to add special abilities for the units with the mod tools. IE. wasteland survival, fire resistant etc. etc.

I think that adjusting stats/equipment/abilities will be enough, however these additions, what Saber had mentioned would be very good of course.
BUT don't forget, the devs are already flooded with work, and this is not that important IMHO.

[Keir Maxwell]

One of the things which struck me as odd in my first game was how the strategic movement worked - HI and LI move 1 in the rough and HI move one in the open while LI move two. So this means HI move the same speed as LI in the rough but LI move faster in the open - seems a bit odd really.

I would suggest returning to all infantry moving 2 stategically but HI pay 2 for a rough province while LI pay 1 so that LI move faster than HI in the rough and the same in the open. This would encourage you to use lighter armed troops in mountainous area's whereas at present LI are more suited to open terrain.

Cheers

Keir

[Patrik]

Originally posted by apoger:
>allow strategic moves that end in enemy territory

This would be a good way to model light troops.

Light troops do poorly in straight up battle with heavily armored troops. The reason they are great is their strategic mobility.

Outstanding suggestion Mr. Byler.

I made this suggestion in beta about half a year ago - for the very same reasons. IIRC, JK and KO had already tried it out but found that it was to hard to block an attacking army - with the result that major battles almost never took place. I would really like for them to take another look at it though.