This is the end....

Bobba although I don't think gear should be the main decider of the battle I also think it needs to be more effective than just bringing a mass of lower level ungeared units.

Scaren wrote:

Bobba although I don't think gear should be the main decider of the battle I also think it needs to be more effective than just bringing a mass of lower level ungeared units.

Well, as far as I can tell this was only really an issue with undead. If other races try that strategy they almost always lose.

This strategy of bringing more units and less gear does only work well for elves and ud players and it loses effectiveness as you progress through the tiers. In tier one this can be almost overpowering at least with the low gs-limits on olympus. But in tier 2 it doesnt work that well. And in t3 this strategy is just ridculous.

Plonck, I have to agree with the rest of the people commenting on your post.

Bobba wrote:

Issues with unit volume:

In theory I like the idea of adding unit volume. However, some changes will probably have to be made to make it work. Since flanking units will be harder, some side effects of this addition of unit volume is that gear will become more important, bringing lots of weak units will be much less effective, and HI will even more critical to surviving the match. Fighting against GL dwarf HI in tier 2 is really hard now, but I think it will be pretty much impossible for me if there is too much unit volume, since my best gear is epic. I feel like the game already favors gear plenty, so something may have to be done with the mechanics or equipment to balance the increased challenge of flanking when unit volume is added. Also, I think ranged units may become more effective, but not in any kind of way that would reflect negative balance.

The volume of a unit is not defined by a perfect rectangle, but it is rather a circle. That means that the edges of the unit, in all its sides, are not "impassable". Therefore, you will not have extremely rigid squared units and consequently the flanks and charges are not going to be that difficult to occur. I hope I was able to explain it in a clear way.

Bobba wrote:

Issues with fog of war:

Fog of war is an interesting and potentially great idea but an extremely risky one. Much care will have to be taken. One big concern I have is that it will be very easy for a player with an archer to hide or run after an encounter even though without any melee units that archer is no longer useful at all. Same thing with cav since chasing down a cav when you don't have one yourself is impossible. Technically this can already be done but it's so much easier when the opponent can't see you to try to corner you. A troll player could potentially run out the whole timer having their enemy chasing down 1 cav. Some kind of solution to this issue needs to be found before fog of war is implemented in my opinion. There are other potential issues of course, such as ranged units being less effective since they require a spotter, meaning that as Rune mentioned artillery (and possibly archers) may need some love with the addition of FoW. On the plus side though, kiting will be extremely hard if not impossible and many people have shown their disdain for kiting.

True, this is possible, but we could reduce the battle time a bit in order to prevent this. In your example, the player with the Troll would win, as he would have more AP than the player with the injured cavalry unit. I guess a "Surrender/Concede" function will also help, giving the option to the player who has sustained tremendous casualties to end the battle when there is no hope, as in your example. (Though it depends on whether it is a cavalry unit with impact damage... )

Some tweaking will be needed...and we are ready for that...but that is how it is with all new systems...What we find extremely exciting, is the fact that the battle will change dramatically adding more suspense, tactics and an ability of making decisions...fast and efficiently (especially in PvP).

RuneSlayer wrote:

True, this is possible, but we could reduce the battle time a bit in order to prevent this. In your example, the player with the Troll would win, as he would have more AP than the player with the injured cavalry unit. I guess a "Surrender/Concede" function will also help, giving the option to the player who has sustained tremendous casualties to end the battle when there is no hope, as in your example. (Though it depends on whether it is a cavalry unit with impact damage... )

You bring a similar good example too, but actually by troll player I meant a troll player.


And the troll player is the one with the cav just running around wasting the other player's time either because he doesn't like him, is angry, or just has nothing better to do.

I have actually got close to running the timer out on legitimate matches though so maybe decreasing match length is not the best solution. If you do, any lower than 8 minutes is too low. And 2v2 matches or higher will need slightly higher timers because they tend to last longer.

RuneSlayer wrote:

Some tweaking will be needed...and we are ready for that...but that is how it is with all new systems...What we find extremely exciting, is the fact that the battle will change dramatically adding more suspense, tactics and an ability of making decisions...fast and efficiently (especially in PvP).

Agreed  

Bobba wrote:

You bring a similar good example too, but actually by troll player I meant a troll player.

In a way...you can have a troll/bad player in COOP too tbh.

We will give some thought to it but we are always open to suggestions.

RuneSlayer wrote:

The volume of a unit is not defined by a perfect rectangle, but it is rather a circle. That means that the edges of the unit, in all its sides, are not "impassable". Therefore, you will not have extremely rigid squared units and consequently the flanks and charges are not going to be that difficult to occur. I hope I was able to explain it in a clear way.

Hi Rune,

Some questions about volume mechanics:

1. Do "thicker" races (Dwarves) have a larger volume than the "thinner" races (Elves).

2. Is the starting volume of units of different classes different? (e.g. LI vs. Artillery)

3. Is the starting volume of units of the same class the same or does it vary by unit count (e.g. DL HI & UD HI; DL Cav & Dwarven Cav)

4a. As troop count decreases, does volume decrease.
4b. If so, is there a volume floor that occurs, say at 30% troops remaining?

Thanks.

The volume idea and its consequences have been going around in my head for while. Here is a concern of mine.
Until now a huge part of pvp was to catch as many units as possible head on on your strongest unit. Only this way you could ensure not getting flanked/reared by a player who is bringing more units than you are yourself. With the introduction of volume as you described it, it seems very hard or even impossible to catch more than one unit with full health up front on your strong unit.
Getting flanked without being able to do anything about it, cause you are simply outnumbered unitwise seems silly to me.
Another thought on this matter, what when a supremely geared HI unit of any kind hides in a tight spot, leaving you just the choice to take it head on with only one unit at a time cause of volume. That way a single HI could win an entire match just because you yourself have no unit that can even come close to compete with that one hi near caps. You might say bring ranged units in order to force such units out of there cover, but in my experience archers and dark arti do little to no damage to Heavies near caps. (One archer and one arti of mine could probably shoot the hole ten minutes at a capped HI without bringing it near to 50% HP)

I absolutely abhor games with FoW. Unless there is the option of disabling it, ofcourse. I don't even view it ''necessary'' or ''logical'' from a historical point of view. I guess I'll wait and see how exactly it will be implemented in BC and then decide whether to quit or not.

Johntheright wrote:

I absolutely abhor games with FoW. Unless there is the option of disabling it, ofcourse. I don't even view it ''necessary'' or ''logical'' from a historical point of view. I guess I'll wait and see how exactly it will be implemented in BC and then decide whether to quit or not.

Still afraid of the dark or what is your reasoning behind that.

Claudandus wrote:

Johntheright wrote:

I absolutely abhor games with FoW. Unless there is the option of disabling it, ofcourse. I don't even view it ''necessary'' or ''logical'' from a historical point of view. I guess I'll wait and see how exactly it will be implemented in BC and then decide whether to quit or not.

Still afraid of the dark or what is your reasoning behind that.

  No reasoning, just dislike. I just hoped the devs would consider an option to disable it, if only for solo missions, it would be great. If not, well, too bad for me...

Claud wrote:

One archer and one arti of mine could probably shoot the hole ten minutes at a capped HI without bringing it near to 50% HP

In terms of killing per volley all archer units with bonus strengh like plague and poison do more damage to a HI unit than elves and humans. Doesnt mean they kill faster, i dont know. But we did a test once with 4 elven archers shooting on capped DL HI and they were killing slow but steadily. Dragon longbows have the lowest missile strengh of all archer units at 50+modifier while all darks have due to their skill either 60+modifier + armor pen or 70+modifier (20 bonus from plague/poison).

I'm not gonna lie, I hate the FoW and Unit volume. I hate FoW a little more but volume is going to make it harder for those on lower end comps because of all the required maneuvers. If volume were to be made only for when your and the enemies units engaged, that would be much better. FoW is going to result in more dead units, so as Johntheright suggested, reward XP for dead units.

I was talking with ysosad last night, and we both agreed that thee new updates could make us cut down on our time here.

I really like FOG and volume. Every battle will be different. It will be hard to adopt at the beginning but those options will give more tactical movement and more fun from battle.

Well, most of the replies here seem to be "eww changes, but then I'll have to change my playstyle!" Johntheright won't even discuss the issue, he just needs us to know his precious feeeeelings on it ;P.

As such I'm only going to bother discussing the HI in the gap situation. Right now, with the new flee% and the fact that 2, maybe 3, units are gonna be able to attack 1 side of an enemy.... hmmm... HI in the Gap should stay there the whole fight until it dies, you won't be breaking it without flanking or overwhelming numbers.

Frankly against AI this shouldn't be a problem as you can just withdraw and the HI will pursue. Pick the spot of engagement to win the battle, nothing wrong with that. I can see this being a real annoyance in PVP though, especially against a dwarf. What incentive is there to not just plug both ends of a gap with an HI and start making Morpheus-style "come-at-me" hand gestures?

Hi in the gap, no bid deal. Such little gaps are 99% of the time between small objects that can you walk around in no time. Now it will simply require a ballanced army that is prepared for all kinds of nasty enemy composition
And it may be the end of mindless grind. Good, right?

Since the volume is a "circle", that means you can flank from 4 sides + 4 corners. The only real issue i can see here is evolution of the flanktrap. I think AI will attempt to engage a unit head on, resulting in front side and two corners being attacked by AI and opening their own flanks on "flat field" without managing to flank themselves. Funny, cant wait to see   .

Rune,

You suggested that Fog of War will make cav more important, unfortunately Dwarven cav is by FAR the slowest cav in the game. I recently talked to some advanced dwarven players and they agreed that Dwarven cav is only really useful of they have +4 movement banners. with FoW this will get drastically worse. A dwarf can have a unit that moves at a rate of 21, when all other races have a cav unit that STARTS with a movement of 30 means the opponent is 50% faster than me and that's with a high end GL banner, which don't exactly grow on trees. My cap is only 25, my opponent's cap is 40, that's a 60% advantage if we're both capped. with FoW that's HUGE. If my opponent has cav and arty, the cav can spot for artillery and play matador to my units. I have NO chance other than charging down his Artillery. and now i won't even be able to find it. I think this disadvantage will just be too huge for dwarves to overcome against a smart opponent. Dwarves will need a unit that is as fast as the opponents cav or at least closer. 23-26 starting would be workable. it doesn't have to be Cav, you can up the barbarians speed, if they have no armor, they should be significantly faster than their heavily armored brethren, they could get the 23-26 speed as they lvl up, maybe so they'd get it about when another race gets cav?

I just think a smart opponent will be able to exploit such a huge disadvantage to the point where even a savvy Dwarf player can't over come it. And that would be very bad for the game and those of us that enjoy playing as Dwarves.

Also i really dislike this idea, one of the things i love about this game is its simplicity. all of the stuff you guys are doing to complicate it is starting to lessen my enjoyment.

Sincerely,

Ferarith

The topic of this discussion is more true then you realize!

Fog of war is the prequel to flying units. And dwarves will get one for sure

Tibr wrote:

Fog of war is the prequel to flying units. And dwarves will get one for sure

Again adding complications...

I for one like the idea of Fog of War. If done correctly I think it could end the boring grinding of solos. The only thing I've seen so far is dislike because of previous experience with it in games. It seems like a fun idea and good addition to the game. If it doesn't pan out well then i'm sure the devs will take it out. Besides that I don't see the problem. This game is about tactics and strategy, Fog of War will only increase the strategies you can use in the game._{Cav won't be useless in pvp}

ferarith wrote:

Rune,

You suggested that Fog of War will make cav more important, unfortunately Dwarven cav is by FAR the slowest cav in the game.

Dwarfs are unreasonably fast with any other unit, especially their HI is beyond ridiculous. As DL, It can't catch it with LIA most of the time. So you have one unit that is not faster than comparative units of other races. Bfd.

Plonck wrote:

ferarith wrote:

Rune,

You suggested that Fog of War will make cav more important, unfortunately Dwarven cav is by FAR the slowest cav in the game.

Dwarfs are unreasonably fast with any other unit, especially their HI is beyond ridiculous. As DL, It can't catch it with LIA most of the time. So you have one unit that is not faster than comparative units of other races. Bfd.

I don't believe you when you say your LIA can't catch a dwarf HI. Even if the dwarf HI had a +4 movement banner it still would be only equal to your LIA's movement. Unless DL LIA movement is 18 which I think it is. So your LIA would be even faster. Our HI are the fastest HI in the game by +3 movement. All our other units are the slowest.

Plonck wrote:

Dwarfs are unreasonably fast with any other unit, especially their HI is beyond ridiculous. As DL, It can't catch it with LIA most of the time. So you have one unit that is not faster than comparative units of other races. Bfd.

O.o I kite dwarf HI with my LIA all the time. Movement 18 vs 13, according to wiki...

MEANWHILE.... Dwarf LI has the SAME movement as their heavies. Dwarf LIA has movement 16. If the dwarf HI can run down all other HI (the real situation ) it's easily made up for by the fact that all their other units, ESPECIALLY LI, are slow as turd.

RuneSlayer wrote:

2. Changes in crafting/repairing

i) All items shall receive an increase to their durability values. That increase will be 1.5.

 
That was nice, but could you please lower the loss in durability from repairs?
It was 1-2 durability per cycle before update, right?
 
This now doesn't help much, especially because crafted items after the update have again the range in durability like in the past.