Rebalance Mod game now running on a 24h timer.

[Huzurdaddi]

So I have a question for you guys? Is Man dominating? In my test games his AP longbowmen put him at the top of easy expanders. He was very difficult to stop. I was wondering if this trend would continue in this mod.

[quantum_mechani]

Huzurdaddi said:
So I have a question for you guys? Is Man dominating? In my test games his AP longbowmen put him at the top of easy expanders. He was very difficult to stop. I was wondering if this trend would continue in this mod.

Actually, Man is around the middle of the pack. Ulm, Jotunhiem and Pangaea seem to be leading in most areas.

[Huzurdaddi]

quantum_mechani said:

Actually, Man is around the middle of the pack. Ulm, Jotunhiem and Pangaea seem to be leading in most areas.

Interesting. Perhaps man is not using the 100% longbow armies or perhaps something horrible happened to him early on ( not a stretch there is a lot of random stuff in this game ).

Jotunhiem also worked very well in my test games I can easily see them doing very well.

Ulm ... well I never play Ulm but they were beefed up quite a bit.

As for Pangaea I've never played them and I don't understand them at *all*. It would be really cool if someone made an AAR of this game with saved turn files and explain how the heck to do well with Pan. What a bizzare nation ( again: IMO ).

[quantum_mechani]

Huzurdaddi said:

Interesting. Perhaps man is not using the 100% longbow armies or perhaps something horrible happened to him early on ( not a stretch there is a lot of random stuff in this game ).

Jotunhiem also worked very well in my test games I can easily see them doing very well.

Ulm ... well I never play Ulm but they were beefed up quite a bit.

As for Pangaea I've never played them and I don't understand them at *all*. It would be really cool if someone made an AAR of this game with saved turn files and explain how the heck to do well with Pan. What a bizzare nation ( again: IMO ).

I could write an AAR for this game, though I played Pan quite a bit different with white centaurs getting such a boost.

[Graeme Dice]

Huzurdaddi said:
As for Pangaea I've never played them and I don't understand them at *all*. It would be really cool if someone made an AAR of this game with saved turn files and explain how the heck to do well with Pan.

Pangaea's early game strategy is actually fairly straightforward. For Illwinter's scales, you might take something like:
Order 3, sloth 3, misfortune 2, magic 3. Pick a monster for a pretender in very hard research games, or a giant humanoid in standard research games. Recruit dryad's for researchers and centaur warriors for troops. Only recruit Panii when you need them to cast specific spells. Gold is your major limiting factor. Centaur warriors give Pangaea a huge amount of early game punch, and remain effective for a very long time. They are even capable of taking down full-fledged SCs. (An air queen with wraith sword, jade armour, and luck pendant.) Against normal troops, 20 centaur warrior's will kill kill 20 Hoplites with fewer than 5 losses.

Research alteration up to mother oak, then cast it right away. Then research conjuration to Lamia's. You now have you standard troops for most of the rest of the game ready. Pile these against SCs, and the lifedrain fatigue can take them down. Research construction for blood stones and other items. Trade for a starshine skullcap so you can boost your astral magic. Make sure to research up to charm, which gives you what is probably your most effective anti-SC weapon. Watch out for wrathful skies, as it will hurt you badly. If you can catch air mages without storms, use harpies.

[Saber Cherry]

Huzurdaddi said:
So I have a question for you guys? Is Man dominating? In my test games his AP longbowmen put him at the top of easy expanders. He was very difficult to stop. I was wondering if this trend would continue in this mod.

I really hope Dominions III allows variable armor-piercing ratings (0-100% in 5% increments at least). If 9ap is much too strong on a longbow, though, I can always increase the price, drop it to 8ap, or (worst case scenario) return the longbow to its original stats, where it can't hurt knights at all. I'll be experimenting with #flail today (the command that makes morningstars ignore shields), and maybe I'll be able to make Blow Pipes (woodsman) ignore shields, since they are short range and highly accurate weapons that you would not aim at a shield. If so, I'll make boulders and ballista bolts ignore shields as well, if they don't already (I'm not sure).


Edit: What do you know, #flail works on projectiles. Watching longbowmen with #flail and 90 ap damage versus indies with 12-defense round shields is pretty funny.

[quantum_mechani]

One balance note: Independent lizard troops are quite inferior compared to barbarians and other fodder at the moment.

[Ironhawk]

Saber Cherry said:
Speaking of which, I think making Mauls 5ap damage was too much... Barbarians and Maul-using Ulmians became immensely powerful in this mod. I'm considering a change to 4ap or even 3ap, which still allows Barbarians and Ulmians to damage protection 30+ targets regularly (at the price of -1 defense and no shield) and possibly increasing the rcost and attack or defense penalty.

On the other hand, it did finally make mauls useful

Yeah now that mauls are AP, they can probably drop a point or two in damage. But I wouldn't go further than that. They are two handed after all, so if the maulers ever come under missle fire, they are pretty much done for.

I agree, it *is* really nice to have the maul be useful!! It went from being a joke weapon to filling a really useful niche. Was there never any AP infantry melee weapon prior to this?? I'm thinking back now and I cant recall one... well, lances I guess? But thats not really infantry per se. On the topic tho, does anyone feel that mauls might be moving in on the territory of heavy cav? 13-14 dam ap attacks every round instead of once per battle?

[Saber Cherry]

Ironhawk said:

Yeah now that mauls are AP, they can probably drop a point or two in damage. But I wouldn't go further than that. They are two handed after all, so if the maulers ever come under missle fire, they are pretty much done for.

I agree, it *is* really nice to have the maul be useful!! It went from being a joke weapon to filling a really useful niche. Was there never any AP infantry melee weapon prior to this?? I'm thinking back now and I cant recall one... well, lances I guess? But thats not really infantry per se. On the topic tho, does anyone feel that mauls might be moving in on the territory of heavy cav? 13-14 dam ap attacks every round instead of once per battle?

No other mundane melee weapons are AP, and AP is pretty rare even for magical weapons. Lances are not AP, despite the description. Unfortunately, Action Points and Armor Piercing have the same abbreviation... lances get a damage bonus based on the unit's speed, and kill things easily because they do massive damage, not because they pierce armor.

That's a very good point, though - I certainly would not want to render an entire unit category obsolete to make a single weapon useful. One *possible* solution is to give mauls a negative attack modifier, and lances a positive attack modifier. When you think about it, it would be WAY easier to hit a moving target with a sword than with a maul, yet they have the same (0) attack modifier. OTOH, a knight charging into a battle is probably going to hit SOMETHING with his lance before his momentum dies. If lances can hit and damage most things, while mauls tend to miss agile units and are best used on heavy / slow things like Living Statues and super-heavy infantry, then both would still have a niche. Not to mention that lances - being a cavalry weapon - are still ideal for many things that mauls can't do, like racing across the field to kill pretenders while they are still buffing.

Anyway, my preliminary thought is to change mauls from (5ap, 0, -1, 0) to (3ap, -1, -1, 3), and I still think they will be highly useful. Considering how seldom Cavalry is deployed (though that may change with the pricing in the mod), lances might be due for an upgrade, like ignoring shields. Part of the point of lances (war lances, not joust lances) is that they can go right through wooden shields and kill an armored unit. They should damage / stun / dehorse / knock down someone even if it is blocked by a metal shield, though I'm not sure that shields with thick enough metal to stop a lance were ever commonly deployed. Either way, it makes sense to me for lances to ignore defense. As a little footsoldier watching a giant, armored, lance-wielding, mounted knight bearing down on me, I wouldn't lift up my leather-bound wooden shield - designed to block swords and rocks - and assume I'll somehow live, if only I keep the shield between me and the lance.

So, I think giving #flail (shield ignoring) to lances - heavy lances, at least - would be a good change. I don't think light lances should get that, though I'm not really sure what they are. If they're just spears aided by charge momentum, I doubt they could pierce shields AND still do damage, since true lances have a very long, sharp, steel head specifically designed for very deep piercing attacks. In fact, it makes sense for heavy lances to get both #flail and #armorpiercing, but that might make them too powerful.

[Ighalli]

Yeah, my armies arnt 100% longbowmen... Maybe I'm expanding too slow, but at least I'm taking no casualties from indies, so it's a tradeoff. I don't play Man all that often, so I'm just experimenting really.