Conceptual Balance Mod 1.5

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by Dragar

I don't find it's that bad.. not worse than bad plague events that's for sure

One turn's buying mages is no big deal - you are normally cash limited early anyway so you make it up the next couple of turns in useful purchases. One turn's lost research hurts but again isn't excessive, and further into the game you can choose to spread out your mages or take the risk.

The rebuild cost is possibly the worst of it early on, but again it isn't a game killer, and if you took misfortune scales, well, that's the cost.

...

Have you been hit with the event:
-On turn 2 with a sleeping/dormant pretender and didn't buy a mage turn 1? No research or mages till your pretender wakes up!
-In year 1 with a heavy investment in mages and/or a research pretender? Losing the useful actions of 5+ commanders and 70+ rps in the first year is not ok.
-When 500 gold is most of your income for a turn?
-When you've been rushed and you need mages/research/access to gems to survive?
-When playing a nation that has no useful commanders aside from those requiring a lab?

The event is far more common than the plague event as far as I can tell, and you can minimize the chance of the plague event by taking growth scales (in addition to taking order to reduce event frequency). And I'd argue that for many nations, the plague event can actually be less damaging than losing their lab.

And if it was the only cost of misfortune scales it might almost be ok. Except you'll also get incessantly plagued by indie attacks on your provinces, get units cursed, and generally have bad stuff happen to you. Misfortune scales shouldn't be 'you lose the game' - well, maybe misfortune 3 could be that. And as i've already noted, i've seen this event year 1 with Lk3 scales! That's just stupid.

[chrispedersen]

I'm playing a game right now, and with +2 luck, in the first 5 turns, I've had earthquake(killed pop and temple), fire (burned lab), and plague.

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

I'm playing a game right now, and with +2 luck, in the first 5 turns, I've had earthquake(killed pop and temple), fire (burned lab), and plague.

I had a SP game i was trying to turn-bash expansion in. Lk+3. By the end of turn 8 the game was unplayable due to 3 overwhelming indie attacks (including one that put my capitol under siege), burned lab, and a capitol plague. Also numerous unrest and curse events. Number of positive events? 1 (woo, +15 province defense!). Combined with a really unlucky combat that lost most of my largest expansion army due to routing early (and my capitol getting sieged, so no retreat route), and there really wasn't much I could do.

Maybe more bad events need to become impossible with good luck scales as well? But I still maintain the lab burns event is really reamful.