I agree, two wyvm hatchlings should not be able to kill a angel (life or death) except by very rare fluke of RNG. Its worth testing some more to see how often it might happen. Once doesn't tell us much, also you didn't say how much health.

As far as focus on balancing buildings verses focusing balancing units. Both are fair game. Buildings aren't much but names in cities, units aren't much but stack graphics on overland map till you get into regular combat with the enemy player. Anyways both have strategic effect on the game, neither should be mostly ignored. Anyways buildings are easier to balance since most of them are the same for everyone.

I'm curious but at the same time don't care how AoW1 played. Its not that so it doesn't really matter.

I notice we are now talking about balance that stranger asked us to email him about

[This message has been edited by TruePurple (edited 08-03-2006 @ 06:04 PM).]

Quoted from stranger:

So libraries with maintenance cost but more research? Wizard towers not giving research but mana instead? Initial cost being equal parts mana & gold? If so how expensive? 600 both mana/gold?

[This message has been edited by TruePurple (edited 08-03-2006 @ 06:01 PM).]

I haven't been able to access my account for a couple days, so I'll try and reply to some of your ideas here now.

True Purple, I assume you got buildings to cost gold maintenance by setting a negative value in the "gold" field in the editor? I hadn't thought of that...

I've upgraded Angels in Def and Attack, which will be refelected by a slight price increase. I had four stonings kill two Black Angels once (and kill them good), and still haven't recovered....so, I feel your pain, DM.

Regarding the Dwiggs is obsessed with buildings comments, I think that is too much of a casual observation made without really exploring the mod. If you were to count the number of posts here on buildings and those on units, I think the ration would be 1 to 20 or so. Dwiggs just makes buildings meaningful in terms of the paths a player wishes to take while playing--magic, research, rushing, big economy and late level three and fours--it is not a building based mod.

I was curious on units that some of you never see in online games. If some of you could email me lists of such units along with possible reasons for their not being used, I would appreciate it. The Frost Queen and Sorceress come to mind...

regards,

bj

So what do you think of those suggestions?

Winters queen (is what you mean by frost queen right?) should get some leadership, especially at medal. Makes total sense for a "queen". Also would make her more worth getting.

[This message has been edited by TruePurple (edited 08-07-2006 @ 03:40 AM).]

Just out of curiosity, why does the Courtesan have leadership? Isn't a Courtesan like a prostitute?

[This message has been edited by Kalindor (edited 08-08-2006 @ 00:41 AM).]

I fixed the Human hero...but am not sure what to do about the Shrine yet.

I think I've fixed the Syron thing (with the help of Merk) also.

"Just out of curiosity, why does the Courtesan have leadership? Isn't a Courtesan like a prostitute?"

Because of her ability to inspire the troops....?

I think that must be a mistake as well

I'll check it.

Cheers,

BJ

C'mon, guys. let's loosen up a little and enjoy some anomalous quirks.

Its surprising such a unit is in there.

Stranger please reply to my ideas/suggestions concerning wizard tower/library etc. I don't understand why you haven't.

True Purple,

If we were to set maintenance on the Library, then why not all buildings, since presumably all would require maintenance and workers. I don't see what this "feature" would add to the game other than penalizing magic strategies more: i.e. go for gold structures and you get more gold, go for magic and you not only don't get as much gold, you lose it! BUT, on the other hand, it would make the Library a choice type building one rather than one everyone builds. But other buildings, such as a siege workshop could be classified in the same way: i.e. we could make building them a strategic choice....I suppose that I'm apprehensive to make buildings anymore complicated than they already are, as some players already find them too intrusive.

Kalindor, I'm not sure that I understand your question; could you please rephrase it?

Regards,

bj

Quoted from stranger:

Using your logic, if we are to give halfings stone throwing because they can pick up stones and throw them, why not give all humanoids stone throwing since if you got arms & hands you can throw a stone.

The extra maintenance would be accompanied by more research like I suggested. & if Wizard towers don't give research but mana (see previous suggestions you still haven't replied too but I'm sick of repeating myself so much hoping you will notice & reply...) Libraries becomes key to getting a good amount of research, but that trade off of precious early game gold becomes very interesting. Do you invest for the future or use early gold to rush an attack?

That does not apply to other buildings like workshops/master guilds etc. We need not micrologic this, yes other structures require staff but then again they pay for themselves by producing income. Quality librarians that mages can really use to help with studies & make sure delicate books are not damaged are rare. As well as the material & man hours needed to find & protect these delicate books & other such.. But none of this matters because its only a game & what most matters is the strategic aspects of it.

[This message has been edited by TruePurple (edited 08-18-2006 @ 06:16 AM).]

Quoted from TP:

Its not so simple as that!
Early gold is not only to rush attack but also to defend against attacks. Taking away gold for a research building is,IMO, making Magic a secondary aspect of the game - taking away the Magic Management part of the mod, which is as important.

If, as you suggested, research is taken away from Wizard's Towers and the gold penalty+increased research is given to Library, this would cripple the non-research races heavily. Not only do some of the non-research races get penalties on gold and housing, now they have to incur even more penalties to do proper research!!

Quote:

The above is a misquote since comparing racial differences with buildings is not valid. As Stranger pointed out, many people already feel that too much importance is given to buildings...complicating things like these just because it is possible will just intensify that feeling.

I feel that the mod has attained a status where it is reasonably balanced, except for a few minor balance issues - which will be addressed in the patch. Stranger should close the Suggestions Book and make the mod final.

Stranger, you should also think about some spells like Tremors. Devastating for 20cp, I would say. I experienced it...thrice in one battle, so maybe I am a little biased but 20cp is a mite on the lower side, I feel - considering its area effect of the whole battlefield, damage, attack value, avg. low def in Dwiggs and the possibility to cast it multiple times in a battle. Agreed, it harms one's own units too but still...

Only archons have a gold penalty & are not research.

Yet you speak broadly of nonresearch races being the most penalized. I see no foundation for this presumption.

Yet you may have a point about shifting balance, like it could hurt archons. This could be balanced by making archons have a research bonus perhaps.

Also tigrans have a mana & research bonus, (Cats doing research? Strange) Perhaps they could get a gold penalty?(lazy cats love wasting money?)

Quote:

Wizard towers 2 & 3 could retain research bonus & only base tower giving mana instead of research perhaps.

for quite a while now, starting with a post on the high upkeep of enchantments, you seem to be suggesting that mana is too scarce in Dwiggs. This seems to be reflected in the suggestion that Towers give mana instead of research. I am not ignoring your posts on this subject but, as you are the only one who has consistently voiced this opinion, I wish to reiterate that Magic Managment is a crucial part of the mod and I have never had any difficulties enchanting large numbers of units or summoning them if I chose to take that strategic path. If research was taken off the Tower and its upgrades, and if a player chose not build a Library because of its penalty under your model, they would have virtually no research and thus access to no magic. As I perhaps built to much research into the orginal version of the 1.4 Dwiggs, I don't want to got the opposite route and remove too much of it either. This would involve other consequences, such as reducing the research bonuses for other races, which seems to me an inordinate amount of changes for something that would offer a dubious strategic value.

So, in regards to the Library, I am not interested in what seems to me inovation for inovation's sake. I am not willfully trying to misunderstand your post, but if, as you suggest, the gold bonus races are the ones that can afford to build a library, one is simply negating their bonus in order to even up or supersede the research numbers with other races. This would, in effect, be giving the gold bonus races a research bonus instead of a gold one, since they could afford the Library and still have as much gold as other races. Races without a gold or research bonus would now essentially be given a gold penalty in order to have as much research as everyone else. I suppose I prefer the more simplistic approach that players should choose building based on their benefits, rather than having to evaluate their detrimental effects as well.

bj

Quoted from my last post:

Otherwise half of it could be mana & half research. (base wiz tower)

Quoted from stranger:

As far as enchantments go, yours cost up to 4 times more in upkeep then any other mod & one has to careful not enchanting too many units in other mods. So nothing in that is a commentary on how much mana is in dwiggs.

Gold bonus races would be the races most able to afford the gold penalty of library soonest. But that hardly means that even gold penalty race-archon couldn't build libraries early game if they built structures that give gold/conquer gold structures.

Quoted from stranger:

Makes sense, but its not a complicated decision. You either go for a early victory, ignoring building libraries for the build time & gold penalty. (even gold bonus races can always use more gold for recruiting from structures & stuff) Or play more defensive, only building higher level troops to save upkeep & building up cap including library.

A simple decision that allows players to go down two more clearly different strategic paths then otherwise.

--------------------------

I posted the suggestions following this sentence (or pointed requests for feedback of such) a few times so it peeves me that I apparently have to post it again for it to be actually seen. (would it kill you to look back in post history? no matter)

My tentative suggestions for costs.
600 gold & 600 mana for a tower. (or even more mana/less gold?)
(base tower)Towers could give 30 gold & mana (instead of research.)
Wizard tower 2 could cost say about 100 gold & mana.
Wizard tower 3 could cost about 160 gold & mana but not give any addition resources then wizard tower 2. (remember, base wizard towers would be more expensive, and the additional domain radius is ever so much bigger then that before it)

Those values are a bit high, & I'm not attached to any particular numbers. (maybe 450 mana & gold for base wizard tower?) What I would most appreciate a reply on is the suggestions that all towers cost at least as much mana as they do gold & that wizard tower 3 cost more then wizard tower 2.

Also, what do you think of frost queen with leadership stranger like I suggested earlier?

[This message has been edited by TruePurple (edited 08-18-2006 @ 08:29 PM).]

*Edit: And TP, I personally have no preference on the cost of the towers because the players will be on a level playing field regardless. The only thing that annoys me about towers is the length of time required to construct them. That said, I would really like it if the computer players would build them and they would probably be discouraged by 600 gold towers.

[This message has been edited by Kalindor (edited 08-18-2006 @ 09:45 PM).]

If your editing heroes within the map editor, then unfortunately there is just one base animation for each hero type that can be placed on the map. However, I am creating "default" hero bodies that will occur for each hero type that will probably be better than the current ones. For example, the default Elf Warrior is now an Ent graphic, which is very limiting for maps. With the update, that hero will be a swordsman.

Did this answer your question? Or are you referring to hero bodies within the mod editor?

TP, I think you are right that your numbers are a bit on the high side. I am inclined to keep tower upgrade mana lower than the gold cost, just because mana can often be quite hard to come by in the early game and I don't want to make tower upgrades too expensive if players want start off with a strong magic base. Now, in regards to the full tower, a higher mana cost might be a good option, as it should only occur in the later game by which time a player could have stockpiled plenty of mana if they had made that a priority. I'd like some other people's thought on this here or by email.

On the Frost Queen, I've gotten several emails about how to make her more effective. As she is a ranged unit, I am inclined to give her more power in this area. Leadership might be a good option, but I'm wary of making it too common. Again, if anyone would like to post or email me suggestions, I would like a bit more imput on this unit.

Thanks guys,

BJ

[This message has been edited by Kalindor (edited 08-19-2006 @ 01:01 AM).]

Unfortunately, you can only use the default or latest hero body when creating a class for a map. The map will only take the hero that was created most recently in the editor as it's body choice. If you want the specific hero bodies, you must place the default heroes from the mod.

Now, there is something you could do, which would involve a little modding of Dwiggs. You could create a new resource set for your map, it would only be 1 mb or so to download, so it wouldn't prevent people from downloading the map, I think. Then, in the editor, you could create your own heroes for the map and assign them whatever bodies you like. I'm happy for you to do this if you want.

[This message has been edited by Kalindor (edited 08-19-2006 @ 06:49 PM).]

another point i want to make is, that while venomious spit is short ranged it has too high attack and many poison immune untis where removed, hellhound and black angels comes to mind and succubi lost poison protection. its a bit odd when 1 lurker can kill witout any enchants or spell support/unit support 1 succubi without much problems compared to original succubi flying, life steal and poison protection was removed....why poison protection?

do we want to make it too easy to kill with poison all things?

btw on the pro side, i think sorceress is really cool, nice description! artwork and stats when is the next big dwigg game? i ask cause i switched mods

and there is still some stuff invisible at least for me:

units:

- green wyvern
- werewolf

and 1 hero but cannot remember look into it later

nature shrine reward:

i think i got with an easy quest(not sure though) dire penguin summon, but it turned out to be a red dragon when i finished summoning.

[This message has been edited by DarkMystery (edited 08-23-2006 @ 10:48 PM).]

thanks for the feedback

I've fixed most of what you noted here: the penguin summons as an easy reward and the missing graphics.

We had a nice 6 player game with Swolte, Joep, Time, TP, and others Lord Dracos (even though Swolte killed me ) last weekend. Maybe we could get another one this coming weekend?

In regards to the spit, the solution may be to add poison protection to some logical units rather than reduce its damage, as many players had complained about its short range.

regards,

bj

I do so a logic problem as you wouldn't figure spit to be very accurate. But gameplay should take priority over RL logic.

Ive attacked with lurkers for example almost as much as I've spit with them. Not found lurkers to be all that powerful.

Purgers on the other hand are pretty useful, healing @ silver plus float(makes them ok scouts) makes them especially effective. We might consider taking pass wall from them. Consider how they make it require so little life sphere selection to be a terror to any undead/deamon race selection.

Holy bolt with its 3 attack & better distance is a better range attack then venom with its 1. Even if venom has 50% more attack & damage in that one shot/compared to one shot of holy.

Maybe we could continue that game?

[This message has been edited by TruePurple (edited 08-24-2006 @ 00:43 AM).]

neither succubi or hellhound have much of a chance fighting it, as they both lack poison protection or immunity now. you have to outnumber them to stand a bit of a chance. even sorceress with 16 res is still vulnerable as venomious spit has att14 and quite some units tend to have low hp too. the short range is not as bad when defending walled cities.

i have to meantion this, cause its now the second time where that lurker showed extreme good performance! in open combat with fast units he is of course not that good, due to his low range. anyways, it might be to harsh to completely remove poison immunity from some of the shadow demon units like hellhould. hellhound and succubi could still have poison protection. hardly overpowered units i might add, seduce just working on male humanoids, lurker is creature the original succubi with life steal and poison protection would have dealt pretty fast with the situation.

and of course as usual i have to comment on the undead:

afaik there is not a single unit with wasteland concealment for them also considering silver and gold medals, but 2 units with path of decay. in my expierence terrain concealments are rather fun and i would like to see wasteland concealment on some of their units. spectre and vampire seem to be good canditates as i consider them stealthy too. i also though about swampconcealment but could not find the ability in the editor. maybe it does not exist but bog mummy idea would have been great fun, like it is in the old mummy movies where the ppl had to spot the mummy that was hiding in the bog.

btw,i hired chimera....aren't they supposed to fly? they just have walking!

new game as stranger said he was killed, and besides i would like to join

[This message has been edited by DarkMystery (edited 08-24-2006 @ 10:38 AM).]

We can have a game (lots, in fact) this weekend...I will be available starting 8 PM GMT+1. IIRC, in the game Stranger was talking about, TP was also killed.

DM, I will be online tonight after 8 PM GMT+1 and we can have a game. Usually, enough players are there to have a 4- or 6- player game, so you'd be welcome to join