Under the Burning Suns

[scott]

The ending bonus is based off of villages, but your base income can also be set. On scenario 3 your income changes during the scenario. It's a little disorienting to all of a sudden see you're going negative.

[quartex]

I have played the first 3 scenaria. (On easy)

The campaign looks specialand very challeging.

But I think I have found something that's not completly logic, in both the first and the second scenario I had more income then I received gold for early finishing.

This campaign tries to break all the rules (well, most of them). Player income is one of them. I think the calculation for finishing early is baed on the assumption that the player's base income is 0. But on easy I often give the player an extra 2-5 gold a turn.

I believe the formula assumes the player's base income is zero, and it also counts the number of villages at the start of the scenario and uses that number to determine the maximum income. This does not take into account the fact that villages can be detsroyed (by being turned into other terrains) during scenario. I would much prefer a formula that counted the number of village hexes left when the player is victorious, and takes into account the base income for the player's side.

Until then, the bonus you get for ending early may be less than what you would get for hitting end turn 30 times. But gold is the achillies heal of my campaign, it is easy to get too much. I have trouble regulating the player's income.

[quartex]

1.0.1 has just been uploaded to the campaign server.

I have just spent the last two night working on the lava cavern in scenario 5. I hadn't realized it was quite so difficult. The combination of the lack of manuverability and the fact that the fire guardians just keep coming and the heat damage means that even though on paper the fire guardians aren't that bad, the combat is much tougher than I envisioned.

The good news is that I have taken drastic steps to make it easier. I redid the map to give you more maneuverability and make it much quicker for units to cross the cavern. I have also hit the fire guardians with the nerf stick a lot, trying to get them weak enough to be challenging, but not impossible. And I made the fire phoenix appear a lot less often. I also added a rest-stop half way across to help.

I still encourage people to use elves with high movement. And the dwarves are very useful. Being able to reshuffle your units really helps you protect the weaker units with the stronger ones. It's still a challenge, but I think the lava cavern is beatable. And for the record, in the end I think the dwarven ally may be better than the troll ally.

1.0.1 changelog

Scenario 5:
-a unit ending in lava now only suffers 25 damage per turn
-weakened "fire guardians":
-lowered defense, movement, hitpoints, ranged and melee attacks
-fire pheonix unit now only comes every 5 turns (4 on hard)
-fixed bug where units in lava reduced to less than 0 hit points would not be killed

Scenario 8:
-fixed dark sorcerer Hekuba dialog bug

-fixed Elyssa's Silver Mage, Arch Mage and Great Mage variants. Now they all display the correct portraits

[fmunoz]

You can use my fire wisp images from the Path of Summoners multiplayer pack if you want to add more fire guardians variations (smaller than the one you use, I use your current ones as 2nd level for them)

PS: Shameless advertisement... Everybody, go downaload it and send me your feedback.

[quartex]

Thanks fmunoz. I was thinking of making the phoenix guardians and the fire guardians different units, but I only have 1 set of artwork. It's great to see that you are creating new artwork.

[torangan]

I found that the lava cavern actually isn't that hard if you've got at least to Shydes/Stars which may fly over the lava healing each other as well as your units which follow the safe path. Additionally, a magical attack is very usefull in killing those spirits which really were rather much on the though side.

[quartex]

I found that the lava cavern actually isn't that hard if you've got at least to Shydes/Stars which may fly over the lava healing each other as well as your units which follow the safe path. Additionally, a magical attack is very usefull in killing those spirits which really were rather much on the though side.

Well Elyssa is about the only magical attack the player gets. And I figure it's better for a scenario to err on the side of being too easy, rather than being too hard.

[torangan]

Well Elyssa is about the only magical attack the player gets.

Not counting the magical thorns from Shyde/Star?

[scott]

I was spoiled with 3 Desert Stars. Very nice.

I think the ending was spectacular. The final scenario and epilogue reminded me of a SNES rpg. Did Jetryl make the enemies in the last scenario?

[quartex]

Point taken, torangan. Desert Stars would certainly make that scenario easier, but getting 3 of them by level 5 can take some work, especially for less skilled players. Thorn attacks are powerful, thought not as good as a mage's fireball attacks.

Yes, Jetryl did do the artwork for the final scenario. It reminds me of some nintendo RPGs I played as a kid too. Glad you liked it.

[torangan]

I got my second star in that scenario when I played it last time. Of course, I was using lots of Shamans so I got a couple of Shydes and used them rather offensively.

[quartex]

The Shydes have been called the most useful unit in the game. In UTBS I agree that the Desert Stars are especially powerful. Since I don't let you recruit mages, I figure you need the extra advantage.

[torangan]

This campaign mostly taught me how powerfull slow can be. A Shyde/Star can take in some blows, cures and does magical or slow damage ranged. Additionally, they have an acceptable defence in caves which makes them really usefull to have. I recruited lots of Shamans for the waste crossing but later I was very happy to have them.

[Tolesnikov]

May I ask if it was your intention to make Rangers SO powerful? Backstabbing Avenger deals 18-3 damage in the normal conditions while having good (10-4) ranged attack. And (I suppose it is a bug) sometimes he/she has also "ambush". I really think Rangers with backstab attack are overpowered.

[breversa]

I personnaly think that backstab does not suit the rangers very well, but Quartex had to find a compensation for ambush which only works in forest. And since there's no forest in the desert (and even in the whole campaign, IIRC !)...

Would skirmisher ability be better ?