Heir to Throne in Easy mode

[ziberpunk]

Hi, I open this thread to discuss the Heir to Throne campaign in Easy mode. Please make your suggestions about changes to scenarios to make the campaign in this mode more balanced.

[KK_r]

In Isle of Aundin the enemyleader spends all his money and can't recruit after just some turn, this makes the level very easy to beat and it makes your army less experienced so I think there are two reasons of making this level a bit harder.

The gryphon mauntain can be tough if you havn't leveled enough units, maube needs to be a little easyer, maybe.

The scepter of fire level is very hard indeed, mainly because the passages is so narrow, you have to have some luck to get out and beat up the enemies at the other side of the passage.

Just my opinion I don't really know what you can do about the scepter level without changing the map but the Isle of Aundin could give the enemy a little more money.

[Dave]

In Isle of Aundin the enemyleader spends all his money and can't recruit after just some turn, this makes the level very easy to beat and it makes your army less experienced so I think there are two reasons of making this level a bit harder.

It might be best to give the enemy a small trickle of constant income, so he keeps hiring troops.

David

[KK_r]

Yes, that would probably solve it.

[methinks]

Well balancing may be tough.
Keep in mind that:

1. There should be difference in scenario difficulties (some really easy, some easy, some hard, of course not so hard that it won't be easy )
2. It should be playable, somewhow "normal" for new players.

Good luck with your task

[ziberpunk]

In Isle of Aundin the enemyleader spends all his money and can't recruit after just some turn, this makes the level very easy to beat and it makes your army less experienced so I think there are two reasons of making this level a bit harder.

It might be best to give the enemy a small trickle of constant income, so he keeps hiring troops.

David

I've been looking to my replay of this game and enemy recruited quite fluently. He only didn't recruit in turns 2 & 4. This scenario is quite easy, that's true, but some of them have to be!

[Kamahawk]

Things that need to be changed:

1. The Latest levels in the Heir to the Thron campign need to be reworked beacuse at the moment there are not dificult enoghf. Now before one of you guys jumps at my throat with all your stuff about the dificuly setting I'd just like to point out that "A Choice Must be Made" can be beaten in 7 out of 40 turns of aloted play without the recuitment or recall of a single unit (on easy setting). The result is over 800 gold pieces. I don't realy care what you guys think about the current dificulty levels, but "A Choice Must be Made" and the following level need some serious tweaking.

[ziberpunk]

Things that need to be changed:

1. The Latest levels in the Heir to the Thron campign need to be reworked beacuse at the moment there are not dificult enoghf. Now before one of you guys jumps at my throat with all your stuff about the dificuly setting I'd just like to point out that "A Choice Must be Made" can be beaten in 7 out of 40 turns of aloted play without the recuitment or recall of a single unit (on easy setting). The result is over 800 gold pieces. I don't realy care what you guys think about the current dificulty levels, but "A Choice Must be Made" and the following level need some serious tweaking.

I haven't seen your replay yet, but I agree with you that beating a level without recruiting is extremely easy, so I'll work to make it more balanced

[ziberpunk]

I've changed A Choice Must be Made scenario a bit to make it harder to beat south leader. Please Kamahawk play it again and tell me your opinion.

[Kamahawk]

I'm playing wesnoth on a Mac, so I ahev to wait for Sithrandels Binary and he rarley makes them for the CVS. So it might be a while before I can test that level. By the way have you seen the sugestions I made for changing "A Choice Must Be Made"? Its in the string: http://wesnoth.whitevine.net/forum/phpB ... sc&start=0
(wich Methinks locked down )

[k8to]

Some commentary on 'easy'. I think primarily the game doesn't really have a smooth introduction to new players, and this makes it seem hard.

Issues:

- It's pretty unclear initially whether it's acceptable to be losing your troops left and right. Maybe a hint as to what's acceptable losses?

- The interface doesn't make it very easy to figure out what's good positioning on terrain. The interface could support some kind of right clicking speculative information about what terrain is good for what troops etc. Clearly this is nontrivial, but I think it's a big barrier for new players.

- The opening scenario(s) is (are) too demanding. The tutorial is fine, but the opening attack of the orcs is rather overwhelming. The sheer number of units running around combined with a need to manage a coherent defensible unit when you don't yet know how is not inviting.

- Some players (including me) are actually pretty lousy at comprehending what's good play and what's foolish. If you're an old hand at hex games I'm sure it comes pretty naturally, but it's rough going if you haven't got much of an idea as to how to strongly deploy units.

- There's a frustration factor involved with the conflicting issues of your goals being to raise capital and troop levels while completeing missions, while the game makes it very easy for troops to get killed off in one turn and often makes it unclear as to whether rushing the adventure or drawing it out will provide more gold. I'm not suggesting this makes it a worse game, and it probably creates a fair bit of depth, but before you get your sea legs, both are kind of frustrating.

I dunno, I guess I feel that if I set a game on easy, I shouldn't feel like a failure over and over as my best troops get picked off and I can't figure out if I shouldn't care or how to prevent it. But maybe I'm just terrible at this kind of game.

[Kamahawk]

Issues:

- It's pretty unclear initially whether it's acceptable to be losing your troops left and right. Maybe a hint as to what's acceptable losses?

- The interface doesn't make it very easy to figure out what's good positioning on terrain. The interface could support some kind of right clicking speculative information about what terrain is good for what troops etc. Clearly this is nontrivial, but I think it's a big barrier for new players.

- The opening scenario(s) is (are) too demanding. The tutorial is fine, but the opening attack of the orcs is rather overwhelming. The sheer number of units running around combined with a need to manage a coherent defensible unit when you don't yet know how is not inviting.

- Some players (including me) are actually pretty lousy at comprehending what's good play and what's foolish. If you're an old hand at hex games I'm sure it comes pretty naturally, but it's rough going if you haven't got much of an idea as to how to strongly deploy units.

- There's a frustration factor involved with the conflicting issues of your goals being to raise capital and troop levels while completeing missions, while the game makes it very easy for troops to get killed off in one turn and often makes it unclear as to whether rushing the adventure or drawing it out will provide more gold. I'm not suggesting this makes it a worse game, and it probably creates a fair bit of depth, but before you get your sea legs, both are kind of frustrating.

I dunno, I guess I feel that if I set a game on easy, I shouldn't feel like a failure over and over as my best troops get picked off and I can't figure out if I shouldn't care or how to prevent it. But maybe I'm just terrible at this kind of game.

-This toatal depends on your playing style

-When you select a unit for movement when you put the cursor over a hex a #% will apear in the display window on the sidebar. The #% is now defended the selected will be in the hex. Remeber though that Magic attacks always have a 70% to hit no matter where the defending unit is.

-Your not supposed to defend any thing just cross the river and head west and keep your troops behind your allies defencive line and then make a run for the singpost when you hit the grass land.

-I don't have a clue what your talking about here.

-Don't lets your guys get swarmed under by your opponents troops. A large part of the game is learning to balace leveling your troops and finishing early for gold.

[k8to]

-When you select a unit for movement when you put the cursor over a hex a #% will apear in the display window on the sidebar. The #% is now defended the selected will be in the hex. Remeber though that Magic attacks always have a 70% to hit no matter where the defending unit is.

-Your not supposed to defend any thing just cross the river and head west and keep your troops behind your allies defencive line and then make a run for the singpost when you hit the grass land.

-I don't have a clue what your talking about here.

-Don't lets your guys get swarmed under by your opponents troops. A large part of the game is learning to balace leveling your troops and finishing early for gold.

part 1: thanks -- although I'm interested in questions like: if that troll comes into the mountains, what will its defense be?

part 2: you are supposed to defend Konrad and Delfedor.

part 3: move some units out, watch them get killed. Lose. Try again. Lose. Easy?

part 4: sure, the balance is the intersting part, but most games seeking to accomodate new players provide training wheels scenarios where the balance is unnecessary or unimportant. In Wesnoth, playing optimally matters right from the start, and it's not clear how to balance. Or at least, that's how it feels.

[miyo]

Feel free to read and contribute [1] GettingStarted in Wiki - http://wesnoth.slack.it/?GettingStarted

- Miyo

[1] edit button is on bottom of the page.

[Kamahawk]

part 1: thanks -- although I'm interested in questions like: if that troll comes into the mountains, what will its defense be?

Ok, then leftclick on a troll and look at its unit description, then select terain modifiers. For a full table look at a unit at this table http://wesnoth.slack.it/?UnitTables and then find its movement type and look it up at this table http://wesnoth.slack.it/?MoveTypeTables .

part 2: you are supposed to defend Konrad and Delfedor.

Well, I gusse your right keep to the villages and forest. Delfador can blast most units units to bits in 1 or 2 rounds. recruit 3 archer (or 2 and 1 druid) and 2 fighters basicly just keep them bettween the orcs and your heros.

part 3: move some units out, watch them get killed. Lose. Try again. Lose. Easy?

Hmm, keep your elevs in the forest where they are well defended and surround enemy units and try to kill it with takeing little damgage, use range agein the units witch have no ranged attack to counter with.

part 4: sure, the balance is the intersting part, but most games seeking to accomodate new players provide training wheels scenarios where the balance is unnecessary or unimportant. In Wesnoth, playing optimally matters right from the start, and it's not clear how to balance. Or at least, that's how it feels.

Ok, learn how the game works first and then start over from the begining, almost all of us, started over after we first beat the first few levels.