Mod: Warhammer Dwarfs, version 0.92 -- Quickfix

[Burnsaber]

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Line 334 --> "Dwarf Lighting" should be "Dwarf Lightning". I think. LOL.

Er, yeah. I always spell "Lightning" wrong. Don't know why, it's alot like my issue with "Strategy".

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Why all the "Dwarf Weaponname/Armorname" bits? Are they *that* different? Weapon slots are limited too, you know :-) Couldn't you just bump the stats on the dwarfs?

Well, I admit that they're not *that* necessary gameplay wise, but it's a important thematic element. Basically every game always highlight the "Dwarf-made items are awesome" thematic aspect, but they don't get any in-game bonuses from it. Luckily dom3 has the mechanics to especially show this "dwarf items are awesome" fact and I intent to use it.

The custom armor actually has a gameplay intent behind it. To make dwarf units more vulnerable to Iron Bane, acid spells and desctruction effects. With the way how natural prot and armor prot combine, if I were to give dwarf units regular chain cuirass instead of dwarf-made one (which has +2 prot compared to normal), I'd have to give them +4 natural prot to keep the same prot value.

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Also, since you're not using "Dwarves", should you be using "Dwarven" or "Dwarfish" or just "Dwarf"? (in your weapon/armor names)

Dwarven Axe
Dwarfish Axe
Dwarf Axe
Dwarvish Axe

...personally, I like the 'v', but since you seem to be moving away from it.

Yeah, I admit that the use of possessive pronoun is a bit of a mess currently. I prefer "Dwarven" myself, but sometimes I just used "Dwarf" because I wanted to avoid bumping into the character limit. I'll make it more consistent in the next version.

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Along that vein, your mod directory is still "Dwarves". Need to be consistent :-)

No, just absolutely no. Changing the name of the graphic folder will break all the "image links" in the .dm and replacing them will just open so many possible bugs (like the engineer battle crash bug in the v0.6). It's just a case of opening a really big can of worms for 0% gain.

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

...and after all that, I like your name list, although the potential for humor exists with names ending in 'i'. (I met this dwarf engineer who was afflicted with a broken leg. His name is 'Hurri'. Apparently his brother accidentally hit him with a hammer. His brother's 'Thorri'. ) I'd leave them in, though. The dwarfs won't be laughing.

I don't get the joke. Is there something wrong with me?

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Some other things I saw: I like that Clan Kings get some research, but they're not drain immune so it ends up only being 1 research.

Yeah, I knew that. Unfortunately I can't make them drain-immune due to modding constraints. Basically they are copystatting a Gath commander for that "research although not mage"-tag and the only way to get the "Drain-immune" tag is to copystat a ulm smith. I can't copystat two units, so here we are. I decided that some research is better than no research and let it stay.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Did Distill Flame/Thunder get a higher price because of the lower research level? Because with the efficiency of Dwarven construction, I'm not sure I can justify getting at least the Flamers--that's 3 Lightless Lanterns a bit later in the game, or a few fire brands.

I upped their price because it was really needed. Compare Flamethrowers to Fire Drakes and Thunderers to Storm Demons (which are often spammed in MP basically just for their lighting throwing ability).

Originally Posted by Stavis_L

Burnsaber's (mis)coinages are growing on me, though:

Stragedy - A strategy destined for tragedy. Suits dwarf history.
Disencouraged - Discouraged via the encouragement of other options.

...they always seem to make sense in a weird way
(Hope I'm not being too harsh Burnsaber; heaven knows what my posts would look like if I was trying to write in Finnish!)

Hooray for abusing the english language! I am the corruptor, the defiler, sneaking in new words spawned from the wicked aether of my chaotic mindscape! And wasn't shakespeare famous for basically making words up as he went along?

But seriously speaking, I really don't mind. The only way for my grammar to improve is to be pestered about it constantly. Lightning and Strategy, lightning and strategy. Thanks for that and please keep on rolling.

Originally Posted by alansmithee

I don't see either Itza or Pythium being anywhere near too strong, but again that's more personal philosophy. I just see a nation that is upper-mid in power level getting used a lot more than one that's lower in power level. We need more Pythium, C'tis (who I think is really strong MA), etc and less Ulm, Malacha, etc.

Yeah, when talking about power-level, it's pretty much impossible to come to a clear conclusion. I dislike Pythium because it gets the best human infantry, hydras, best human mages (in its era), communicants, uber national summons, and completely random extra gem income (why?) with no clear drawbacks. Old age is more like a nuisance than a real drawback.

But this mod is still in development stage. I know from experience that it's best to *really* aim for weakness for the first releases. It's always easier to boost than nerf in order to fix something. This is basically what my other nation mod, Alugra, is going through. It started out too strong, but I (and other people) got used to it's power level, which made it difficult for me to try to get things appropiately costed. I call this "I don't want to castrate my baby" -effect.

Originally Posted by alansmithee

But I think the runesmith nerfs are a bit much. More gold (when gold's already tight), more encumbrance, and less paths don't nearly do enough to offset the small research boost. Also, with all castles being so expensive now, your research will lag quite a bit, and recruiting non-caster commanders puts you at an even greater disadvantage.

I assume that when talking about "less paths", you mean Runelords, not smiths? I really don't want to go overboard with the Runelords, forgebonus 30 is really powerful (compare to Ashdod's Talmai Elder, which costs 500 gold for less path power and forgebonus 15).

And if I calculated correctly, Runesmiths now have the second best upkeep/research ratio (second to only journeyman runemsmiths) in the nation (in a drain 3 enviroment, of course). But if people feel that they're not worth going for, I might lower their prices back to normal.

It's also good to remember that dwarfs are really supposed to suck at magic, in fact, they shouldn't have magic at all. They could thematically have okay research but they shouldn't ever be "magic" comparable to anything other than MA Ulm.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

That castle-summoning spell is the most ludicrously difficult thing to cast I've ever seen. You have to lug a prophetized astral-random runelord over to a mountain province with a lab, and then he dies when he casts it? Or I suppose you could make an anvil of doom and then kill it.

Yeah, I might have gone a bit overboard with it, I'll probably remove the random mountain requirement. But the spell had to fill a lot of reguirements, like:

1) Reguire astral gems (if it costed earth, it'd compete with Anvil of Doom, and fire/air just don't make sense)
2) Be cheap & low research enough to be able to be casted in mid-game, where forts actually matter (to avoid "Wizard's Tower"- pitfall, it just comes too late to have effect on anything)
3) Not to be spammable, which is hard when taking into account reguirement #2 (because then we'd be right back to the "invicible forts" issue, hence the requirement of killing a prohetized mage, this gives at least 6-month long period between castings).

Originally Posted by kianduatha

By the way, at this point the whole nation almost works better by getting Magic-1, using cheap Engineers as your main researchers, Runelords for your forgers, and just not getting Runesmiths if you can help it. You don't get as many high-earth casters, but you really didn't need many of those anyways. And on the plus-side, you one-turn siege every castle you meet. And have actual battle-casters that don't fatigue out on turn 3. It's at least a fun strategy to consider--you do lose other things by doing so.

Yeah, it's sort of quasi-intentional. Of course the magic scale shouldn't be the best strategy you take all the time, but should be considerable, perhaps even plausible with certain game settings and maps. It's not even unthematic, considering how the Golden Empire dwarfs are basically embodiments of "magic 3" scale (where everyone and their dog had a runeaxe and people were using anvils of doom as lunch tables). Going drain-3 all the time in a "no-brainer" mode is a bit boring.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Again, a lot of these things I'd have to be in an actual multiplayer game to test out.

Yeah, this is the biggest issue when doing MP-balanced mod nations, it's all talk until the first game. At the moment, I could see the v0.7 go for MP-testing. Basing on the comments, it's certainly not overpowered, but (IMHO) shouldn't be that weak. And there really isn't any revisions and major additions waiting impletion, the content is there. Unfortunately, I really don't have time to start admining (or participating) in a yet another MP game.

Originally Posted by kianduatha

Oh, and no matter what, Dwarves can't be as low-tier as Machaka. Just think of what prospectors can do to Machaka province defense. (Actually it's Rangers that utterly destroy them--those throwing axes simply demolish militia)

If you want to compare to vanilla nations, Ulm is the way to go and dwarfs really trump them in all aspects (except for battlemagic). MA Ulm isn't even really considered *that* weak anymore.