If Giants existed in BC times...

[vfb]

Originally Posted by MaxWilson

The description strongly implies that the shininess is what gives it its high parry. You'll see the same thing for other high-parry shields like the Shield of the Accursed (?). High parry also gives good missile protection.

-Max

But that's not at all how they should affect missile defense, if the mechanism is through interfering with the archer's vision. The shield should reduce the precision of any archer targeting the square the Gold/Accursed-Shielded unit is in. The shield should not be more effective against arrows coincidentally falling into the space where the unit is standing.

[JimMorrison]

Originally Posted by vfb

But that's not at all how they should affect missile defense, if the mechanism is through interfering with the archer's vision. The shield should reduce the precision of any archer targeting the square the Gold/Accursed-Shielded unit is in. The shield should not be more effective against arrows coincidentally falling into the space where the unit is standing.

Shield of Gleaming Gold is not a specifically anti-missile shield, it's is just fast, and heavily enchanted. The "shiny" part of this description is for the Awe effect, causing melee attackers to "avert their eyes" and miss the opportunity to strike.

Silver Hauberk "distracts the eyes of the enemy", such that missiles rarely hit - this is a bit odd to me, for reasons you describe.

Shield of Valor says "Symbols of power are inscribed on the surface of this shield to protect the bearer from missiles". So, totally unshiny reason for deflection there.

Interestingly, Valor is 8 Parry + 80% Air Shield, while Gleaming Gold is simply 9 Parry. You are virtually immune to missile fire with Shield of Valor..... simply well protected by Gleaming Gold, because it's a good shield.

[MaxWilson]

Originally Posted by MaxWilson

The description strongly implies that the shininess is what gives it its high parry.

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

Shield of Gleaming Gold is not a specifically anti-missile shield, it's is just fast, and heavily enchanted. The "shiny" part of this description is for the Awe effect, causing melee attackers to "avert their eyes" and miss the opportunity to strike.

Other high-parry shields like Aegis and the Shield of the Accursed have similar notation about how they're hard to look at, in addition to their other effects. It appears to me that they're trying to explain why they get such an insanely good Parry.

But okay, maybe I'm wrong. I'm not KO or JO or anything.

-Max

[Sombre]

Does the item description say the air shield effect is because the item is shiny? It seems more like they just, you know, give an air shield.

[KissBlade]

Bah, regardless, the whole point of this post was to say that that theme should not overtake balance.

[Redeyes]

How fun is a discussion when everyone agrees ?
Que someone who disagrees:

[MaxWilson]

Originally Posted by MaxWilson

I know, but for our purposes it doesn't matter. The fact that the shield of gleaming gold is better at deflecting *arrows* because it's shiny is actually even weirder than if it boosted defense directly.

-Max

Originally Posted by vfb

But that's not at all how they should affect missile defense, if the mechanism is through interfering with the archer's vision. The shield should reduce the precision of any archer targeting the square the Gold/Accursed-Shielded unit is in. The shield should not be more effective against arrows coincidentally falling into the space where the unit is standing.

Precisely, vfb.

-Max

[MaxWilson]

I'm AFC so I can't check/quote the Aegis description. Oh well, such is life.

We agree, though, that the fact that the Shield of the Accursed gives good protection against missiles is an unintended side-effect of its thematically good "defense" (in the form of melee parry). Ergo, stat bonuses don't always correlate perfectly with thematic intent and that's okay; so a defense bonus to Jomon armor doesn't strictly-speaking have to denote better mobility. It could denote spikes or something that the enemy would try to avoid impaling itself on, etc., and even if that gave you more ability to avoid an Earthquake it would be okay--even canonical items have problems.

And KissBlade is right that this is *still* massively OT from his original post. Fine. I propose that all cap-only mages should become recruitable-anywhere. Hmmm. I should mod that into my game. It would certainly make me more willing to play 80% of the nations out there.

-Max

[Sombre]

How is that supposed to be moving things back on topic?

And wouldn't that just reduce the variety in the game and the distinction between nations?

[JimMorrison]

I wouldn't mind if a bit of extra attention were given to those nations who had strong cap only mages. Basically to either reduce the cost of those slightly, or to somehow slightly (I mean -slightly-) improve the non-cap mages. Of course, only for those who can use such a change in the name of balance/realism. For example, T'ien Ch'i already has adequate non-cap mages for their price, to offset their amazing cap only mages, whereas EA Agartha and the 'Heims (aside from Niefel) have very poor cost/effect choices outside of their capital.

I'm having trouble finding ways to balance out the giants in general terms, without completely gutting their thematic essence..... The only thing I can think of, other than the types of nerfs we mostly see (mostly increased costs?), is to just reduce them in size a bit. I mean, in realistic terms, we consider anyone above 7' to be a giant in the real world, so I'm not sure if in game terms, a Niefel Giant absolutely must be size 6. If most giants dropped a size category (with a small reduction in hp/str to coincide), it might go a fair way towards the balance between thematic power, and overall game viability.