Blood Red FIGHT ON!)

[Baalz]

For balance purposes I'd say Sauromatia is a decent yard stick - they've got a lot of the same flavors and are a powerful nation. All of Sauro's troops have scale mail, plate seems pretty unthematic to me - but that's just my opinion. If it is used, it makes sense to put the heavier armor at map move 1. Dragon scale is fine thematically, but it should have a very high resource cost and only be on one or two elite unit types - both for balance and just from common sense. Pegasus riders seem more like a 80-100 gold recruit to me : sacred, flying cavalry with a high defense and a poison bow. I'd also raise Jade Maiden's price a little bit, they're quite cheep compared to other sacred cavalry. I might peg them even a little more costly than the Sauro Oirorpata if they're not cap only and have poison resistance, if they were...maybe 60 gold (along with more expensive pegasi) then there probably wouldn't be a balance issue with having the sacreds recruit everywhere - though I can't think of any other nation with recruit anywhere sacred cavalry.

Oh man, I just noticed the amazon archers have a poison bow. That needs to be switched for a normal bow. Sauro's poison archers are very, very strong even being cap only. Those things are in the PD? Gah, that is insanely over the top....

[Gregstrom]

Originally Posted by Baalz

Oh man, I just noticed the amazon archers have a poison bow. That needs to be switched for a normal bow. Sauro's poison archers are very, very strong even being cap only. Those things are in the PD? Gah, that is insanely over the top....

Ah... You're looking at the original mod. Here's a more current version - dm file only.

[Gregstrom]

Originally Posted by Baalz

For balance purposes I'd say Sauromatia is a decent yard stick - they've got a lot of the same flavors and are a powerful nation. All of Sauro's troops have scale mail, plate seems pretty unthematic to me - but that's just my opinion. If it is used, it makes sense to put the heavier armor at map move 1.

Onyx amazons are down in their descriptions as making heavier armour than other amazons. If you're talking thematic, wearing a cuirass is more of a greek thing than middle eastern - but they're a greek myth so I think it could be gotten away with.
I was working on the principle that MA armour tends to improve a little over EA armour, and the step to a plate cuirass (NOT hauberk - the cuirass is what units like Ermor's Centurions wear and is generally mapmove 2) didn't look like a big one.

Originally Posted by Baalz

Dragon scale is fine thematically, but it should have a very high resource cost and only be on one or two elite unit types - both for balance and just from common sense.

Sounds reasonable enough to me. What resource cost are we talking - 20?

Originally Posted by Baalz

Pegasus riders seem more like a 80-100 gold recruit to me : sacred, flying cavalry with a high defense and a poison bow.

Well, the indy ones are 50. How much extra is a poison bow worth, given you can't mass them in the numbers Sauro can?

Originally Posted by Baalz

I'd also raise Jade Maiden's price a little bit, they're quite cheep compared to other sacred cavalry. I might peg them even a little more costly than the Sauro Oirorpata if they're not cap only and have poison resistance, if they were...maybe 60 gold (along with more expensive pegasi) then there probably wouldn't be a balance issue with having the sacreds recruit everywhere - though I can't think of any other nation with recruit anywhere sacred cavalry.

Jade Maidens are pretty much the nation's shock troops as things stand currently. They're very affordable, and have an attack that's better than str 9 + spear. Bumping their cost and cutting back on infantry armour will be interesting, and could well be beneficial by promoting the use of a greater range of units.