Random Picks and Modding...

[Saber Cherry]

Graeme Dice said:Empoisoners are just about the only assasins that you'll ever be able to make use of besides taking out independents early on.

Hey, my modded assassins and slayers are pretty cool And I loved building slayers in the base game. Skull Talisman, Boots of the Messenger, Lifelong Protection, Copper Plate and Lucky Coin made them able to take over many remote provinces alone... and those are all low-level items.

Of course, the way I play is not necessarily an effective way to play...

[The_Tauren13]

OK, scratch that old and busted formula; that was just something basic to start off on. Here's the new hotness:
sqrt(((HP*(10.0+Prot)*Def*MR)/1000.0)*((Str*Att)/10.0))*((3.0+Move)/5.0)*((40.0+AP)/50.0)*(9.0/(6.0+Enc))*((Mor^log10(7))/7.0)

Comments:
HP, Prot, Def, MR, Str, and Att are all wieghted the same now.
The square root does not encompass Move, AP, Enc, or Mor.
log10(7) = 0.84509804001425683071221625859264 (about), meaning that about 22 Mor is worth twice as much as 10 Mor (instead of just 20 Mor being worth twice 10). I chose to use a logarithm with base 10 so that, for unit with 10 Mor, the equation (Mor^log10(7))/7 will equal 1, so a unit with 10 Mor will be 'average'.
The basic idea is: sqrt(defensiveness*offensiveness)*other. I decided upon this because in a simplistic system where the units only have 2 stats, HP and Damage, an ideal cost formula is sqrt(HP*Damage).
I counted MR as a defensive capability, but it could be brought out of the square root to be weighted more heavily.
I didn't really know what to do with Enc, so I just threw it in so that a unit with 0 Enc is worth 50% more than the same unit but with 3 ('normal') Enc, and the same unit but with 12 Enc is worth half as much.

[The_Tauren13]

I have a n00b modding question: How much is the 4th magic school worth? Ive been counting it the same as the 3rd school (10, 30, 50) so far... so that F2E2D1?1 costs 183.75.

Also, a few questions about your costs:
How much did poison resistance end up being worth? 10, same as elemental resistance? Less?
What about being an animal? I would think that does more harm than good, right?
50% increase for sacred troops, but not commanders, right?
Is the capital only reduction 10% or 20%?

One more question: What's with the 'Death Poison'? How much damage does it do?

[Saber Cherry]

Death Poison: 35 damage IIRC. Animal is a negative feature.

As for morale value... it's sort of an s-curve with the steepest part around 9, with asymptotes at maybe 5 and 16. I can't think of an s-curve equation offhand.

At any rate, morale 14 is perhaps twice as valuable as morale 10... and above that it doesn't matter much. From my observations.

[The_Tauren13]

Saber Cherry said:
As for morale value... it's sort of an s-curve with the steepest part around 9, with asymptotes at maybe 5 and 16. I can't think of an s-curve equation offhand.

At any rate, morale 14 is perhaps twice as valuable as morale 10... and above that it doesn't matter much. From my observations.

Hmm... so perhaps I took the wrong approach.
How about: (((x/10)-1)^(1/3))+1
Code:

---

Morale   Cost

   6     0.26

   7     0.33

   8     0.42

   9     0.54

  10     1.00

  11     1.46

  12     1.58

  13     1.67

  14     1.74

  15     1.79

  16     1.84

  17     1.89

  18     1.93

---

[Evil Dave]

Saber Cherry said:
As for morale value... it's sort of an s-curve with the steepest part around 9, with asymptotes at maybe 5 and 16. I can't think of an s-curve equation offhand.

You can generate s-curves (gamma curves) by integrating normal or polynomial distributions. In this case, integrating the distribution of 5 three-sided dice will get you almost the distribution you want: range of 5-15, with the steepest slope at 10.

[Saber Cherry]

Evil Dave said:

You can generate s-curves (gamma curves) by integrating normal or polynomial distributions. In this case, integrating the distribution of 5 three-sided dice will get you almost the distribution you want: range of 5-15, with the steepest slope at 10.

Thanks Actually, I play Dominions to get away from math (especially calculus) but for some reason it keeps popping up...

[Evil Dave]

Saber Cherry said:
Actually, I play Dominions to get away from math (especially calculus) but for some reason it keeps popping up...

Really? Wow. From reading this thread and the others on modding and balance, I'd concluded:

1) You and the other good/knowledgable players really liked math.

2) The reason I'm not very good at Dom2 is that I wasn't using enuf math, and was worrying too much about silly notions like reducing the other side's ability to fight.