The problem of low hit points on humans

[PvK]

Turin said:
I don´t think anyone wants humans to be giants. The problem is simply that most human thuggie heroes are practically basic commanders with a trivial stat increase.

Take marius lorca for example:
Unmodded he is an 80gp Emerald lod with +1 hp +1 str +1 att, +1 def, +2 morale, + 2 ap and one less encumbrance.
A recruitable emerald lord with 2 stars of experience is a better fighter than marius, who is supposed to be a living legend.

Shouldn´t a living legend excel the run of the mill recruitables a little bit?

Yes, you're basically right - The way it currently works, many of the randomly-arriving heroes are just above-average and slightly unique. They only live up to their descriptions if they survive to get experience and items and/or heroic abilities or are made prophets or whatever.

I don't really see that as a big problem, though I think they could be several levels better in abilities like fighting skills without breaking balance. On the other hand, if the mundane heroes were to be given boosts so that they arrived much better than average commanders, I'd miss having the kind of heroes we have now - the "hero material" guys. Though those could be added too as regenerating heroes for all nations. Especially now that we can mod two types of those in for every nation...

As for Marius Lorca, just to annoyingly quibble about your example, he may not be much better than an Emerald Lord, but Emerald Lords are some of the best human melee foot commanders in the game, so adding a bunch of +1's to one of them is actually quite good from a mortal human perspective. Vanheim's Vanlade is even less impressive compared to typical Vans (he's about the same), though again, mounted Vans are some of the best mounter human combat commanders (and they have magic too).

PvK

[Endoperez]

PvK said:
As for Marius Lorca, just to annoyingly quibble about your example, he may not be much better than an Emerald Lord, but Emerald Lords are some of the best human melee foot commanders in the game, so adding a bunch of +1's to one of them is actually quite good from a mortal human perspective.

Marius Lorca is one of the few units in Dominions who has base Attack rating over 15. He has 16. Bane Lords, Scorpion Men, the Devourer of Souls, Devata, Dai Oni, one Heliophagus - 14. Firbolgs, Tartarians, at least 3 of the elemental royalty, Arch Devil, Abomination, angelic Seraph - 15. In a quick browse through the manual, I found only Wraith Consuls, Wraith Lords and the Ashen Angels (from Manifestation), and Horrors (from Send Horror). Horrors had attack 18, the three others had attack 16.

Marius Lorca is impossibly skilled - unfortunately, that doesn't help him to survive in battles. Not much. He'd need expensive equipment, and could still easily die. He'd be easy to kill as well, if he did survive to become enough of a threat.

[DrPraetorious]

Well, Marius Lorca is a hero, but lets talk Emerald Lord (who is nearly as bad-***.)

The emerald lord costs *80 gold*.

That's roughly equivalent to a four or five gem summoned monster. The emerald lord, on average, smacks a wyvern like a red-headed stepchild. So, the emerald lord doesn't need more than 15 hit points - if he had 25, he'd beat the wyvern almost every time, which would be unfair.

Now, it's true, the niefel lord is a *way* better chassis than he is. This is why the niefel lord costs six times as much.

So, I'd agree that -
Mantle of Life (Constr 6, NNEE) - Body Prot 13, +20 hp.
Blood Vigor Charm (Constr 4, BB) - +10 hp. That's 1 hit point per blood slave.
Equinox (Constr 8, AAAANNN) - Sword, poisonous, does lightning damage, resist poison and lightning, +30 hit points.
etc. would be fair and reasonable.

[PvK]

That explanation makes it clearer what you were suggesting, Uh-Nu-Buh, and it sounds quite reasonable to me when explained that way.

[HoneyBadger]

Rather than argue for or against humans with more/less hp, I thought I'd put forth an alternative system for dealing with hp. because I enjoy designing role-playing and game elements better than I do arguing about them (which I end up doing a lot anyway ) I'm not sure what the copyright laws have to say about things posted to this forum, but to the extent the forum rules and the law allows, I'd like to retain the rights to the following:

Size: expanded, 1-12
hp: based on levels of size, each unit recieves 1-12 hp per size level. This means that a Hoburg unit (for instance, not taking into account any rebalancing necessary with size increase) can have between 1 and 12 hp. Very weak Hoburg children have 1 hp, while mighty Hoburg warriors with mutant genes and adamantium bones have 12. The same thing applies to size 12 titans, except that with every increase in size level, the unit gains a minimum hp base of their size PLUS the minimum hp they could otherwise have, thus size 12 titans have between 24 and 144 hp, while size 2 humans would have between 4 and 24 hp. and size 1 hoburgs actually have between 2 and 12 hp, despite what I just said in the above example. In addition:
Commanders, not because of their own personal, physical body, whether they're Alexander the Great, Ajax, Hercules, or Napoleon, but because of A: their status on the battlefield, B: the unseen but present national network of support they gain by being commanders-better equipment, better food, better triage, all that stuff, and C: because they are better able to both understand and to determine their place on the battlefield, have double hp. Example: a human commander could have between 6 and 48 hp.
This system allows for a wide range of variation between the very weak and the very strong up to heroic levels, allowing an extremely mighty buff human to go "toe-to-toe" with an extremely weak, scrawny, out of shape, but still size 12 titan, atleast in terms of HP. The greater size variation is there for personal preference, and to add a greater range of sizes for purposes of demonstrating that there's a big difference between what is very small and what is very large aka scale. Also, it helps this system cope, in terms of sheer numbers of hp and gradiants of size, with both a wide range of hps in the game and a wide range of units, and the effect they would have on a battlefield. Lastly, it enables the general advice that most races in the game have members which will vary in size by 1 level. Thus you can have humans from size 1 (Verne Troyer) to size 3 (Andre the Giant) and heroic abilities/disabilities could raise or lower size by a step without being unrealistic.

As far as legality goes, if Illwinter wants to use this system in Dominions, they are more than welcome to, and I'd probably be open to others using it as well. I just would appreciate it not blatantly being stolen, since it is something I came up with a long time ago, for my own gaming purposes, and am rather proud of. If you want to use it, feel free to let me know, (and I really have no problem with anyone using it as long as they don't plan to publish it, or plan to publish it without my name on it, and once again Illwinter/Dominions is free to use it regardless) and we'll talk about it. Thanks!

Edited because the first time through I didn't really understand the rule I was espousing, but now I think I do.

[Agrajag]

HoneyBadger, while your idea is generaly speaking a good one (thuogh very reminicent of D&D rules), I'd have to say that (again, sorry ) it doesn't really fit into Dominions.
Such a huge variation as you are suggesting would simply make the game much too random, as you can't even estimate what unit you will get when you purchase it.
Furthermore, this will shift the balance of power much in the favour of mages, since a mage's HP isn't very important (sure, its nice to have more HP to survive a battle that has gone bad, but more often than not, your mages are sitting safely at the back of your army).
My idea as to how something similar could be made to fit into Dominions is to:
1) Keep all the stats exactly as they are right now.
2) Make it so each unit/commander recruited will have a random amount of HP between (HP + Size) and (HP - Size), when recruited.

Though either way, I'd rather see Dominions stay as it is right now, because I like knowing exactly the stats of the unit I'm about to get when I'm purchasing it :X

Also, as far as the idea goes thematically, while it seems to make sense to have such a wide range of HP because people can be really puny or really big and strong, practically, you'd expect anyone that has been recruited into the military and is being payed to fight will atleast go through some screening process and training, which should weed out "very weak hoburg children". Atleast in all grades of unit besides militia (which already has -1 hp IIRC) and PD (which traditionally is made up of the local population of fat unemployed people )

[HoneyBadger]

Agrajag, have you made it your mission in life to make my life more difficult?

You're right, I guess I'd better explain it more thoroughly.

1: it doesn't have to be a totally random process, if you're going for big buff warriors, naturally they're going to be larger, the same generalizations can be made for smaller units, and ofcourse, most units are going to be "average" sized, and estimates of size can lead to exact numbers quite easily. Size levels don't translate into centimeters and kilograms, they're categories as in general, but defined, ranges. Sizes outside the "average"
for a race would be used only in special circumstances, like specific heroes for instance. This is what is meant by "general advice".
2: if it's got hp, it's reminiscent of D&D, it's pretty unavoidable, and I've played D&D for long enough to know that it's not really very reminiscent, you're thinking levels, not size categories, and I've put a cap on hp.
3: mages are already quite powerful, and a simple ruling that mage commanders don't get double hp because with all the magical periphenalia they carry around, and with the stress caused by, and the concentration necessary for, combat magic, it negates the double hp commanders normally get, and solves that problem
4: you're right, recruitment/training probably would in many to most circumstances weed out the weak, depending on the specific type of unit (obviously more in ultra-elite units than in province defense militia), which is why you'd want a variety of units in the game to take advantages of different levels of training/quality. This process could be used to explain and increase the usefulness of some otherwise pretty redundant units currently present in the game.
5: I'm ok with hp as they are now, and already said so, this is just a little fun project for me, but some controlled randomness (knowing that a specific soldier is going to have between 7 and 9 hp or a dragon within 135-150) can be a good thing because then there's less complaining by people about how weak humans are in the game, because some humans would now be stronger than others, which is more realistic, and would make battles more realistic.

[HoneyBadger]

Also, Agrajag, I think PD is something along the lines of National Guard/Standing Militia. I doubt too many midieval burgs successfully employed the fat and lazy, primarily because the fat were almost 100% necessarily wealthy and would at best have served as commanders. Not many of those would have been lazy if they were successful, laziness would have been a trait of some of the landed nobility and the clergy, if anyone. Real PD would be English Longbowmen with arms literally deformed by the musculature necessary to use their bows, or tough freemen (of which their were few, and the ones serving as town guards would have been specialized to the task, alert and energetic (because the alternative is being impaled by sneaky Mongols while they sell your children) and in good physical shape). The ones with the wide, low range of hp. would have been levees. Others with wide ranges would be dynastic warriors where soldiers serve as a duty for generations in the same family, as landed knights etc. Hp. ranges would depend a lot more on honor, rights, duties, and that kind of thing, in a feudal society than they would one's "place" in society, because either you're poor and weak and diseased, and probably won't survive without being rich or atleast gifted with noble/religious rank and/or an education, or you're tough enough to overcome the conditions of midieval society, which weren't very good for anyone. Now, it's true that the levees would be used for PD, but after you buy the first 20, you're dealing with a healthier class of people, because you're dishing out major loot, and only a complete idiot is going to spend that kind of gold on feeding fat lazy peasants who could be working their fat off in the fields. Don't forget, you're talking societies of fanatical people who are willing to kill, die, and sacrifice by way of flaying 10 year old virgin girls, in the name of their god. They're not gonna let potential fieldhands just stand around holding a spear, especially when the national welfare program is a visit by your local necromancer.

[DrPraetorious]

Well, Marius Lorca is a hero, but lets talk Emerald Lord (who is nearly as bad-***.)

The emerald lord costs *80 gold*.

That's roughly equivalent to a four or five gem summoned monster. The emerald lord, on average, smacks a wyvern like a red-headed stepchild. So, the emerald lord doesn't need more than 15 hit points - if he had 25, he'd beat the wyvern almost every time, which would be unfair.

Now, it's true, the niefel jarl is a *way* better chassis than he is - but, without items, six emerald lords chop him at the knees until he dies, and the niefel jarl costs six times as much.

But, if you're really set on letting people use human heroes into the late game, I think it would be reasonable for blood/fire/earth/nature (in various combinations) to add hit points - I notice no-one has requested a "bonus hit points" power for magic items in the modders wishlist.

[curtadams]

Endoperez said:Marius Lorca is one of the few units in Dominions who has base Attack rating over 15. He has 16. Bane Lords, Scorpion Men, the Devourer of Souls, Devata, Dai Oni, one Heliophagus - 14. Firbolgs, Tartarians, at least 3 of the elemental royalty, Arch Devil, Abomination, angelic Seraph - 15. In a quick browse through the manual, I found only Wraith Consuls, Wraith Lords and the Ashen Angels (from Manifestation), and Horrors (from Send Horror). Horrors had attack 18, the three others had attack 16.

That indicates not that Marius Lorca has a fabulous attack skill but that attack skill doesn't vary much in Dominions. He hits about 3-4 times as often as a smuck human. If he had "heroic" skill, akin to fiction, you'd be looking at a 50-100-fold ratio. Absolutely nothing in Dominions fights anything like Bruce Lee or Fafhrd.