Death & Blood a little borked?

Originally posted by Huzurdaddi:
I think the arrow points in the other direction. If there are a number of Posts about something being "effective" then there is a chance that something is out of wack.

That's a common misconception. Sort of like how unsung heroes are still heroes, even if people don't know or not.

I'm sure that you have played a number of on line games. Usually it starts with one or two Posts about something being "darn good." Then perhaps a discussion about it being "overpowered." This claim is almost always followed by counter claims supported by the assertion "with more experience you will understand." Sometimes the clamour dies down for a while. Then after some more time there are further Posts about how it is "imbalanced" this time more vocal. This is followed by even more people ( perhaps the very people that are exploiting the imbalance ) posting that "you simply do not see the counters" and perhaps illustrating a few ( difficult to implement or fraught with their own perils ) counters. The clamour dies down then. Then finally a good percentage of the gaming population starts doing this "abusive" strategy, and people come to the Boards en mass to say it is broken at which point the developers start to take a look.

Sheep are vocal, does that mean they are right?

It's a pretty classic cycle. Now to be sure there are plenty of people who yell "nerf" without proper justification. However I would say that, in most games ( perhaps dominions2 is the execption, time will tell ), the claims are justified more often than not.

Yes, it is classic that the most vocal try to initiate change, but is more often unjustified than justified.

Perhaps too effecive given it low research and casting requirements given that it is a battlefield effect spell that Lasts the duration of the battle. But I don't know if I want to get into specifics.

Evocation 6 is Hardly "Low". If you don't want to get into specifics, then don't say things are unbalanced. Especially when it was my Example of an obviously superior path of magic that wasn't as you claim 'borked'.

Again some may argue that it is too effective.

These people would be uninformed and aruging without basis. If Orb Lightning is too effective Fire Darts should be looked at prior to Orb Lightning.

Note this is exactly what I said about air. I see only a few problematic spells in air.

I doubt you see is what can be termed as 'problematic'.

Certianly only SOME spells seem to be out of wack. However the number of spells which seem out of wack seems great to me. I could be mistaken.

Indeed you could, especially if you can't point out any one spell. At least NTJedi pointed at the one really abusable, low cost spell in the Death Path that may be an issue if it needs to be changed. Previous to the Last patches, you could also have said Tartarians, but as it stands now, there is nothing in Death that gives it any sort of advantage over 5-6 other Paths. You seem to not be able to see or choose not to see the very real limitations of Death.

Are astral's combat spells really that superior to death? Is Slay Living/Enslave Mind for example superior to life drain? I don't know. In some cases yes, in some cases no. I would call it a push to be honest. The astral magic seems superior against normal troops, while life drain seems superior against SC's. Some would argue that normal troops are useless hence anti-normal troops spells are useless. To those people life drain is far superior.

Let me give you a list of what half are called TIDE TURNERS for Battlefield spells and the other half are the near creme of the crop individual buffs (Only a few others take priority).

Mind Duel (Limited but incredibly effective)
Stellar Cascades
Astral Fire (Includes Fire)
Nether Darts (Includes Death)
Astral Tempest (Army Killer Use Returning)
Body Ethereal
Luck
Battle Fortune (Realistic in most Games)
Doom (Army Killer)
Will of the Fates (In line with "Best Buffs of the Game")
Resist Magic
Astral Weapon (Like to kill SC's?)
Astral Shield (Like to be a SC?)
Astral Healing (The Unsung Hero for Living Armies)
Antimagic (Never leave home without it)
Communion (This is totally useless, don't do this, right?)
Paralyze (Neutered, but still extremely effective)
Soul Slay (Kill's dead, remember your Penetration Items)
Vortex of Returning (Game Winner)

Also the only Battlefield wide "Life Drain" spell is Soul Drain, all others are single target, no area effect spells. I'll leave you to guess what paths Soul Drain is.

Gimmie a wrath sword or Blood thorn any day of the week and twice on sundays!

And watch those Lifeless units eat you up. You need to get out more.

To sum up: Seems you've been playing with too many people who only use Lifedraining SC's. This is absolutely no surprise to me as it is the easiest way to make a SC and make them effective. But they have very real weaknesses, not the least of which is an entire class of units that cannot be life drained. And for every Wraith Sword or Blood Thorn on a SC, you're going to see a Antimagic Amulet and a Luck Pendant/Luck Coin with it. If not; then that is a disregard for their gems and they're planning on having a very real loss of gems by doing so.

[ June 03, 2004, 04:57: Message edited by: Zen ]