Mod: Conceptual Balance Mod 1.6

[Sombre]

MoV can't even be picked up can it?

[rdonj]

Only if you have -6% luck.

[Quitti]

Yeah, and that requires 4 hands to accomplish.

Still, I would like to raise the issue of MA Ulm again, as there was discussion about it in the "nations under CBM 1.6" thread on the main part of the forum - mainly that MA Ulm mages lack diversity, iron angels are (pretty much) impossible to get and cast, especially now without blood stones. Also the troops are very high enc - full chain mails are still usable, but their flavor text says that they "are large and can endure much physical punishment before collapsing", which would in my books mean more than just +hp. Full plate units are enc7 and def6(axe) or def4(flail), chainmail units enc6 with +1def for the aforementioned weapons. The low def score pretty much plainly states that the troops are not made to evade the hits, ever, but to endure them, and chain mail doesn't really do the job properly. Slashing some enc or implementing national earth-based slight reinvigoration spell (such as earth version of relief) would do lots for the troops, and slightly boost the mages. Reducing the requirements, level of research and cost of iron angels would do a lot of good for MA Ulm lategame also.

[Sombre]

I would definitely be pro a research level reduction for iron angels. Not sure about cost currently.

[Jarkko]

I've only ever found one use for Medals of Vengeance. I was playing Pangaea (suprise!) and IIRC the opponent at the time was Marverni (or perhaps it was Tien Chi; some fragile human mage-wielding nation anyway). I had found (or rather, taken a province with the site) a site with mages capable of crafting MoV's, crafted five of them.

Enter the Harpy commander. I recruited five of them for this test. Gave them each a red bandana, a Medal of Vengeance, and script Hold, Hold, (if I had been defending, I would have added one more Hold to that), Attack Rear.

KABOOM. Scratch a few evil hostile mages and their equally evil guards. I tried it again (with just three harpies then IIRC), but the opponent had put some archers/slingers/something at front with Fire Fliers, and the harpies did sadly died before attacking, and killing a couple dozen maenads this time


Would work wonders against communions too, I think. Except of course if the opponent is expecting you to do it...

[Sombre]

I find it hard to get fliers on attack rear to actually land near casters, personally. Maybe it works differently for flying commanders with that order though.

[Festin]

As I noticed in "Nations under CBM 1.6" thread, several nations widely considered weak (Tir, Eriu and Man in particular) are, so to say, "nature themed". Nature is a useful path to have, but it lacks real power, especially in endgame. Path considered game-deciding (Death, Astral, Blood, to a lesser extent Earth) are generally unavailable to these nations for thematic reasons.

So, maybe it is possible to give Nature a bit more endgame power? I do not really know how can it be done - maybe by seriously boosting some obscure high-level summon like that dragon (forgot the name). Anyway, in my opinion boosting Nature can solve many balance problems at once.

[Jarkko]

Originally Posted by Sombre

I find it hard to get fliers on attack rear to actually land near casters, personally. Maybe it works differently for flying commanders with that order though.

Pangaea has a thing which forces fliers to actually attack rear, if they just wait a couple rounds. That thing is called "maenads" (and "manikin", except in CBM 1.6, but that is a good change IMO ). The maenads swamp the front line and flanks, so fliers with Hold&Attack Rear actually *have to* attack rear (and commanders with Hold, Hold, Attack rear actually attack rear (on the defense it's best to scrpit Hold x3 Attack rear, so that the maenads can swamp the forward positions)). Otherwise the fliers just end up attacking the front or flank, and the fun goes wasted

[Jarkko]

I would rise up a tabu on the table.

Flaming Arrows.

Been looking at the different percieved weak nations, and they all seem to have one commong thing: They would benefit a lot from a more easier to cast Flaming Arrows.

There must however be something I am missing, ie some of the super strong nations would reap the benefits even more. But as I am the simpleton that I am, I just can't figure out which nations that would be.

So, if I may ask, why was Flaming Arrows originally made so hard to cast in CBM? Is that reason still valid now, with the changes CBM has gone through in the different versions?

[Sombre]

Flaming arrows was simply too dominant a spell early on. It may not be the case any more, but people were rushing to cast it to the exclusion of pretty much everything else. And it is absolutely devastating in the early game, increasing the kill rate of archers by like 300%, if not more.

Historically nation balance has been less the target of CBM than unit and spell balance - where there have been nerfs it's because the spell or unit, as an option, eclipsed everything else to such an extent that it was simpler to tone down that option than boost everthing else.

So while easier flaming arrows would help weaker nations, its biggest change would be making everyone go after it again - provided they have archers they'd want to be casting it.