Mod: LA Oceania - seas of blood

[thejeff]

Besides, while blood hunting may be about "human virgins", blood hunting in surface provinces with non-human poptypes seems to work just fine. Lizard virgins, even icthyid virgins as long as they live on the coast not in the ocean.

[Squirrelloid]

I don't like Pearl Guardian/Pearl Lord - sounds too pure. Maybe Abyssal would be a better adjective?

[Squirrelloid]

Note: I'm running this with CBM 1.83. If this is causing problems then you should look into mod compatibility with CBM at a minimum.

Ok, some balance feedback:
Capital Sites:
50gpt isn't a good idea. I don't care if its based on the pearl sites elsewhere, it just isn't a good idea. Too abuseable with order + other cash related scales.
Similarly, 4s isn't a good idea when there are no astral mages in the nation. Similar problems already plague LA Man. Getting gem income your national mages cannot use is bad balance.

Commanders:
Demonic General: W1D1 for 45g? Woh. Ignore everything else, that's too much magic for its price.
Pearl Lord: E2 sacred thug commander for 65g? OMGWTFBBQ. No, seriously, its an even better researcher than the demonic general (less upkeep for being sacred) *and* its a thug. For a bargain basement price of 65g? Woh.
--Also, turns into a golden Naga on land. This can't be right. .dm has #landshape 2812. Should probably be 2612.

Units:
Starting army is too powerful. Took on a greater number of amber-clan tritons by itself and won. (No additional recruits at all).

zOMG Pearl Guardians. Ok, the encumbrance is obscene, but an E9N4 bless on these guys just eats stuff. I've been expanding with 5 of them + priest - meaning you can pump out an expansion party *every turn*. And you'll have 2 expansion parties on turn 2 (initial army + recruit 5-6 and a leader to send with your scout prophet).

So, you take P3, because you do. And O3.

Play:
I'm running a W4E9N4 imprisoned Wave Lord (i think - the W1E1 base one) with Dom 6, O3P3C3Mf2. I've got 5 castles in the middle of year 2 (~turn 18) with labs and temples. I'm just pumping out pearl lords as researchers at the moment while continuing to make Pearl Guardians asap to invade the land.

Now, obviously the AI can't deal, but its clear the early game is too good.

I can't even be bothered to do anything with blood magic. The mages are too expensive for too little payout, and they're capital only so its a pain to actually do any bloodhunting.

I also can't be bothered to really look at most of the units because Pearl Guardians are just so good. There's no reason to use anything else. And the aquatic only units are inherently useless, because they're aquatic only.

[PriestyMan]

ok, talked with squirrell, he had mod problems, and the stuff about the E2 pearl lords and demonic general stuff was obviously a conflict. so you can disregard that part.

stuff about the troops though is kinda true. i dont think LA ryleh stands a chance against their regular recruits. IMO buff their mages, especailly the blood aspect, and nerf the troops a little

[Squirrelloid]

so, the landshape on the Pearl Lord is definitely a mod error. Managed to edit my above post.

I'm still getting magic on the commanders even when i disable CBM. I don't know what's going on. No mod is active but this mod. I think your chosen monster #s may be conflicting with existing monsters, fwiw. You might want to check.

Edit: Restarted Dom3, that seems to have cleared the problem. Ug.

[Treant Hugger]

Check the .dm file, I found the same problem when I ran it with CBM, and switched all the monster numbers to 26xx from 28xx. I may have forgotten to copy this change to the uploaded version.

[PriestyMan]

treant- if your serious about this mod and balancing it, you really should take the time to go through the comments here and talk about each one. squirrell for example, may be a little rude, but he has good thoughts.

[Squirrelloid]

New Version:

The good:
*Diverse nationally useful gem income, yay!
*recruit anywhere blood hunter, yay!
*cap-site resource boost - UW nations frequently get screwed on resources, so this is a good idea.
*Gold increase on pearl guardians

The not so good
*enc increase on pearl guardians
*still retains vestiges of unfallen past: mermages, bishop fish, capricorns
*Demonic tritons in starting army probably too strong, at least in those numbers
*CBM mod conflict: weapons on pearl gatherer, pearl guardian
*Black Capricorn, acolyte of the shoals overcosted

The weird:
*pearl guardian has a hoof attack in sea form? Seems kind of weird.

Suggestions:
*Black Capricorn needs more magic or to come down in price. A 25% random is insufficient.
*Acolyte of the shoals is an 80g commander at the highest.
*Pearl Guardians encumbrance is really out of line, especially with current CBM. I'd suggest you give them base enc. 5 but make them #mounted (note that you'll want to decrease defense to compensate for the +3 for mounted), which will make them more in line with other sacred cavalry. Alternately, decrease the enc. on the armor they're wearing and go back to base enc. 3.
*Having Black Capricorns cap only but regular capricorns recruit everywhere really takes away from the uniqueness of the nation. Similarly, mermages being unchanged from MA and the continuance of bishop fish add up to a nation that doesn't actually seem that impacted relative to MA, all fluff to the contrary. I'd suggest the following:
**Make your mermages be W2B1 and their random include blood.
**Make black capricorn recruit anywhere and capricorns cap only, if not eliminated entirely.
**Do something to bishop fish. Eliminate, corrupt, or something.

[Wrana]

Idea seems quite good. Not tested yet, but some thoughts occurred right now:
Using Abyssal in unit(s) name as somebody here suggested. Much more thematic than "pearl".
Generally, I think undersea Blood magic/sacrifice quite thematic. After all, it was present in real world. But - probably the game designers had some reasons for not using it in the basegame, so bugs are quite possible here.
I do not think 4-armed demon is thematic here. However, there are a score of quite demonic-looking or called deepwater animals. E.g., there is a squid called "sea devil" - actually, it's quite small, but... Some extinct animals may also be handy. I'd also look into, say, Polynesian mythology.
Maybe, too, blood vortex should look more like vortex in a sea and less like a tornado?
Maybe more later.

[PriestyMan]

any chance of getting the homecoming spell to work soon? also, you should maybe make the great devilfish sprite bigger to differentiate it from the normal ones.