Conceptual Balance Series (Mod)

[Cainehill]

No preview of the mods so people can prepare (and thus possibly get a blitz started a little more quickly)?

[Truper]

I think Zen is still putting the finishing touches on things, but we are planning a blitz using the mods at 3pm today at the usual place - irc.gamesurge.net #dominions

[alexti]

Truper said:
I think Zen is still putting the finishing touches on things, but we are planning a blitz using the mods at 3pm today at the usual place - irc.gamesurge.net #dominions

It sounds interesting... But 3pm in what timezone?

[archaeolept]

well, IRC isn't the most precise place anyways

but trupe's in the same time zone as you are...

[Truper]

Whoops. Yes, 3pm EST (GMT-5). Sorry not to have posted that in the 1st place...

[PDF]

Another balance topic : I've experienced in several PBEMs the power of flying armies - usually Caelum and Demon armies totally dominate strategically any landlubber nation.
The only "counter" to fliers is magic transportation, which is way more expensive.

I think that reducing the strat move of fliers - let's say to 2 at most, and 1 for "heavy" troops, be they SG/IG or Gargoyles - will balance things a little.

After all this can even be rationalized by considering that fliers can't fly all day, they aren't usually birds (except hawks, but these ones are not too powerful lol).

[Chazar]

PDF said:
I think that reducing the strat move of fliers - let's say to 2 at most, and 1 for "heavy" troops, be they SG/IG or Gargoyles - will balance things a little.

What is the difference of an ordinary move of 1 and a flight-move of 1? Maybe PerpetualStorm should just be made a little bit more accessible if strategical flight is to be nerfed at all (which is a thing that I do not want to judge here).

[Cainehill]

Reducing the strategic movement of flyers would have the very bad effect of allowing troops that move on foot to move as far or farther than flyers in some conditions (such as when the terrain is plains). I don't think that light infantry is supposed to "run like the wind", or that cavalry should be running faster than creatures can fly.

That strategic mobility is very nice, yes. But it's one of the main benefits of Caelum (who doesn't necessarily even bring armies along), and I'd disagree that the "only" counter was magic transportation (which is, barring artifacts, more expensive, but also goes further). There's also remote summons, remove evocations (murdering winter for devils, fires from the sky against Caelum), stealth units being used to surprise them, and otherwise strategically deducing where they're going next (ie, blind guessing) and attempting to move an army there.

And arguably PD ought to be more effective in warding off such things, but as I believe the devs want an offense oriented game, it seems unlikely that PD is going to be boosted much.

[Huzurdaddi]

murdering winter for devils

Have you tried this? It does not work. I have casted 2 in one turn in a cold province. Nada. They have too many HP. Further there is no remote summon which is cost effective against them ( unless you are using Zen's mod ).

but as I believe the devs want an offense oriented game

I don't know if they wanted one however it sure is played that way.

very bad effect of allowing troops that move on foot to move as far or farther than flyers

Hey it's hard to fly long distances when you weigh as much as a human. Perhaps you spend all of that time eating since your metabolism is so high? No idea. Anyway it's only bad thematically it is not bad wrt. game balance.

[PDF]

To previous replies :
Flying has a *big* advantage over overland strat move, it allows to pass any terrain without having to have "xxx survival" ability.
So any Caelum/Devil player can use 1 army to as much effect as 3 or 5 landlubber armies, attacking the weakest one in turn without possible retaliation. And if the landlubbers regroup you can wreak havoc everywhere else and use mass damage spells against them !
And no, M Winter hasn't any noticeable effect on devils, nor against Caelum? Only FftS is effective and only against Caelians.

As 1 turn is 3 months long, I don't suppose strat move represent any unit running/flying for the whole season, but is rather an estimate of an army ability to move in an organized fashion, with supply train and so on. So "Flying" shouldn't be that much of an advantage .

Powerlessness of PDs is another balance issue indeed