Mod: New nation: NATURE rising 0.30

[Cor2]

I like the ants but I see your point about micro. At least they don't rout, you would hang yourself trying to collect them all back up.

I am afraid the Bears need nerfing. In my test game that is all I recruited and nothing could stop them ( I had a nature 9 bless) Thier only drawback is the low MR.

I see the limited magic as a trade off for:
1 Free units
2 A badass sacred
3 the most powerful preists in the game
4 thuggable units
5 the most powerful single path recuitable mage in the game (I think 6 is it right)


I have been tweeking and I have already raised the magic leadership to 80 on the Witchplants

Might I add that I found the tanglers to be Awesome. They are worth the gold IMHO, but not when you could by 2/3 of a bear. They tangle when they are attack and have 3 sleep vines attacks (total of 9 attacks!) They are a real thug killer. By my calculations ( i could be wrong) if three of them attack a SC, the final attack gets +52 to hit. Ouch. They should die to archers and hordes of chaff.

For research I usually use boars, they are half as cheap for upkeep (sacred). But I guess it seems slow b/c there is no native research items.


I am alos going to bring start site in line with others of early era (ie 6) and have the bears capital only.

[Cor2]

I ran a test game were I set Nature to Impossible AI and played one on one. It did pretty well. The AI favored the Tanglers, and of course hordes of indy chaff.

Other tweeks i am going to introduce:
1 a random pick mage so you can get elemental magic(its going to be cool, and have a research bonus)
2 I have already raised the Vine queens magic leadership to max.
3 I will lower the cost of the lions as per your suggestion Jutetrea.
4. Add an amphib unit and commander, I am thinking Toads and turtles, we will see.
5. I am going to fix the guardian and the Keeper's slots, they should not have head or feet (B/C horns and hooves)

[jutetrea]

Been playing this mod a lot:

I'm still running the 9N4E(2F1W3S) bless against impossible and mighty ai.

I'd love to see vans in some of the battles the bears are in, I THINK they'd do just as well. 16 bears and a keeper can take out about 200 pans of a 400 pan army. How do you plan on nerfing them? Right now they may be a bit better than vans, but cost over twice as much. Plus they really need a nature bless to be truly fearsome (I think), which limits options a bit and is very redundant with the national path.

Kind of oddball, but did you think of giving them a "thick fur" type armor so the +4 prot of earth works?

If capital only, will the cost drop or will there be more changes?

Really sad about the loss of guardian feet slots, no more flying boots. 10 prot for the head is a bit low for an ideal thug, especially with such a low defense when berserked. Do you plan on adding a gore attack by default to simulate horns?

Im curious how theyd fare with a preset god of 9N and a no indy map.

[Cor2]

I was thinking of dropping their hp to 40 instaed of 60. Maybe dropping berserk some. You may be right.

If i gave them thick fur then rust and destruction and such would work on them. Seems silly.

I was going to give them a antler attack, better than gore, i think the moose might have it already.

thanks for playing and all the great feedback Jutetrea.

[jutetrea]

Couple more thoughts:

What's the reasoning behind the fort types? Pretty brutal starting with a 5 or 10 admin fort, I'm quite psyched when I capture an enemy capital.

oddball thought: Any interest in making the 3 armed Ettin available for summons? I've always wanted to play a nation where one could be used as a thug.

Lanka > Bears. Started up a new game (N10A2) vs an impossible Lanka, their high str guys did a number on the bears. Luckily I've started using the keepers to ferry bears instead of the boars and the 4H banishment helped.

So far sauro's wrath of ancestors (para), high str units, and fatigue casters have been their biggest problems. Similar to the giants in that at size 5 you're only getting 1(?) a square and they get mobbed. They're fantastic against indy's or < 80 troop armies but mobs do quite a number even with 20% regen. With the 60 hp and good regen they can usually shrug off the single big hit from a lance, or small heavy cav squads. Archers don't do much against them either. Finding them very similar to giants but without the cold aura but with berserk (which is a good and occasionally bad thing).

Very similar to giants, with a couple differences - cold aura which is huge, cold resistence - meh, and 15 MR which is huge. Bears get fear +0 which is huge, recup which is nice but an 8 MR which is a huge negative. I'm not so sure they need to be nerfed all that much.

Boars - would you think about giving them a boost? I just looked through the EA nations and it isn't uncommon to find similar plus an ability for similar cost.
Arco - + heal, 20g diff
Ermor - +1 100Random, 30g, +1H 30g
Mict (bit different though), +1 10Rand -40g
TC - similar, minus stealth -15g, +1 100Rand +10g
Tir - +1A +glam +80 leader, darkvision, 50g

Possibly a 50% random for 2N possibility, or 2H, or increase leadership. Healing would be sweet and it kind of fits. Or on the other hand, reducing their cost to say 75ish.

I could just be using them wrong, and I have started using them for researching to keep costs down. I still find I need a ton of vine mages to ferry magical troops.

Guardians - They actually die pretty easily, especially unblessed. With the limited item types available they aren't a huge killing force. I've been using hydra armor, horned helm (which will be going away), eye shield+kris (or whatever I can lay my hands on) or gladiator gloves, ring of regen and anything else I can get for another misc. With const 6 items and a bit of magical diversity by that point they do pretty well as thugs. I still like them a lot, just don't use them as much.

hounds, boars, apes
Have you been able to successfully use the hounds or boars? They seem to rout quicker then base infantry and have less impact on a battle even in large #'s. Still ok in large #'s, but I can't seem to use em right as they flee.

The apes seem too expensive as well, their ranged attack is minimally useful and in melee they are chaff. Any thought on dropping their HP/size a bit and reducing their cost? I like the idea thematically, and limiting the ranged to sticks/stones but 20/5 is pretty expensive for a cash strapped nation. I'd rather find indy's at 10/4 and get 30 range.

Pretenders:
Tree is good, although I personally hate immobile. What's teh reasoning for giving the orb thing an 80 path cost? Unsure about balance wise, but for utility he'd jump way up there with a 40 path cost. Lower would be better, but unsure if you'd rather have a higher base price and lower path cost. like 150 start, 20 path or something around there, whatever works out with Endo's pretender cost formula.

Still playing it, still liking it. I'm thinking the bears make it much more of a bless nation in my mind. Although my next game will be going for a moderate N4-N6 bless and good scales. Used the tree this time for an N10A2 and mostly good scales and its working out ok, except Lanka.