Default+Dunefolk era balance

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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

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ElderofZion wrote: March 17th, 2018, 5:42 amTaking this into consideration I guess you could argue that removing it from khalifate and changing the alignment of liminal units could be a good option, but really, what is the point? I believe you can not tweak liminal so it will look "nicer", and khalifate itself is sort of a gimmick, its gameplay is rather special in some ways, I am not sure if you could ever balance khalifate.
I agree khalifate is mostly a gimmick, which is not a problem if they go back to being the downloadable addon they should always have remained. The trouble is, they keep getting pushed by political forces further and further into the core multiplayer era that is supposed to put balance first.
Xalzar wrote: March 17th, 2018, 2:09 pmAnother option is to convert liminal units to chaotic,
In that case, they would become somewhat unique as the only mainline faction that has all three alignments.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Celtic_Minstrel »

So I've commented on the pull request, and don't really feel like repeating myself here. Basically, I like the concept in some ways but am not confident in the implementation. In particular, it confuses me.
Xalzar wrote: March 17th, 2018, 2:09 pm About this, maybe adding a poison attack to the Herbalist could add some utility to that unit and solve this problem. A healer/poisoner units could be quite unique in mainline, and we can even decide to branch its level-ups so that one specializes more on healing and the other on poisons. Just an idea! :)
From the flavour perspective, I actually think this sounds like a great idea! I have no idea what sort of effect it would have on balance, though. There'd also be the question of whether both L1 and L2 get it, or only L1.
Cold Steel wrote: March 17th, 2018, 11:39 pm In that case, they would become somewhat unique as the only mainline faction that has all three alignments.
Well, I don't really see a problem with this though. They only have one neutral unit anyway, if I recall correctly.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

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I did not wrote that xD
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Celtic_Minstrel »

You're right, I deleted the wrong bit when quoting Xalzar's post. Fixed.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

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Celtic_Minstrel wrote: March 18th, 2018, 6:56 amWell, I don't really see a problem with this though. They only have one neutral unit anyway, if I recall correctly.
It is not a problem at all but an improvement if they have all three standard alignments. It makes their alignment set unique without resorting to problematic gimmickry like liminal. Better still if they had three neutrals and two each of lawful and chaotic, as their play style would be further separated from drakes, which it otherwise resembles.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

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Im a bit disappointed after reading this thread. Seriously, where are the replays, the test games? No faction can be balanced only through discussion. If anybody wants a Khalifate/Dunefolk with Default quality, it's not enough to rename them. You have to go the server, play high leveled games (or close to that at least) with them on the popular maps and share and analyze the replays to see the issues clearly. Impressions by looking at the unit stats will not be enough.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Celtic_Minstrel »

The rename has nothing to do with balance and was never intended to have anything to do with balance, and it was my impression that holius's opening post was made from experience playing the faction. Of course you need to play more games now, to see if the balance tweaks work as intended.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Pentarctagon »

The balance changes discussed here so far were also (I think?) only merged into master, not what will eventually become 1.14, so that's a limiting factor at the moment as well.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

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Holius' post looks like a summary of How to play: Khalifate. I think this thread was not meant to be a real balance thread.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Celtic_Minstrel »

That's incorrect, the balancing changes were merged before 1.13.12 was tagged, so they'll be in 1.14 too. That means the suggestions from holius's first post only, and not any additional changes that might have been discussed here.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Pentarctagon »

Alright, my bad then.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by The_Gnat »

Hi, i was wondering. I remember at one time mattsc or someone mentioning that there was a way to run the game in some sort of console mode and thereby simulate many battles with AI vs AI.

Perhaps a first step might be running all the factions versus Dunefolk and seeing which are not very balanced with the AI and then play testing those.

Of course it would be ridiculous to make changes merely off AI performance but that would allow us to narrow down what actually needs testing and then allow us to get some good human players to test those match ups. The only reason I suggest this is because currently no testing has begun and, as Krogen has said, in order to really balance something we need testing. Khalifate have existed a while and I think everyone agrees that they are not entirely balanced which is why they were not fully included in the default era because of this it would be good to make some changes if it is possible to get some people play testing.

However, a main thing to consider is that testing takes time and of course that is a limited commodity. Because of that I would say that we may not see much change because of peoples limited time and that is why it would be good to run some tests with the AI (its not like it would hurt anything to have some data about how the AI does against the Dunefolk).
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Krogen »

Tests against the AI would not be enough of course, not even close. But it's still better than nothing (and right now, that's the case) and it would be a good start.
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by Pentarctagon »

The_Gnat wrote: April 1st, 2018, 7:59 pm Hi, i was wondering. I remember at one time mattsc or someone mentioning that there was a way to run the game in some sort of console mode and thereby simulate many battles with AI vs AI.
It is possible. From Wesnoth's command-line --help text:

Code: Select all

Multiplayer options:
  -m [ --multiplayer ]            Starts a multiplayer game. There are 
                                  additional options that can be used as 
                                  explained below:
  --ai-config arg                 selects a configuration file to load for this
                                  side. <arg> should have format side:value
  --algorithm arg                 selects a non-standard algorithm to be used 
                                  by the AI controller for this side. <arg> 
                                  should have format side:value
  --controller arg                selects the controller for this side. <arg> 
                                  should have format side:value
  --era arg                       selects the era to be played in by its id.
  --exit-at-end                   exit Wesnoth at the end of the scenario.
  --ignore-map-settings           do not use map settings.
  --label arg                     sets the label for AIs.
  --multiplayer-repeat arg        repeats a multiplayer game after it is 
                                  finished <arg> times.
  --nogui                         runs the game without the GUI.
  --parm arg                      sets additional parameters for this side. 
                                  <arg> should have format side:name:value.
  --scenario arg                  selects a multiplayer scenario. The default 
                                  scenario is "multiplayer_The_Freelands".
  --side arg                      selects a faction of the current era for this
                                  side by id. <arg> should have format 
                                  side:value.
  --turns arg                     sets the number of turns. The default is 
                                  "50".
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take one down, patch it around
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Re: Default+Dunefolk era balance

Post by MathBrush »

I’ll do this tonight if I can. Do the results get dumped somewhere? I’ll need to know how to recover the data.
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