Era of Races

[illcwaticando]

thanks for letting me no i was changing that sprite anyway as i do not feel it sits right in the race, one thing though i would prefer you pm me anything about sprites that need to be changed if that is ok

[Thrawn]

sure, no problem >_>

[ElvenKing]

Good to see you back illcwaticando. Unfortunately I've taken a break from playing Wesnoth so I won't be able to help play-test the era this time(at least not for a while anyway). I can still give suggestions on how it could be improved if you like; but I will probably be considerably hampered by not actually playing.

Anyway here are suggestions from what I remember from the last version.

The units were to powerful: I think that there needs to be a general drop in stats, or at least raise the hit points to offset the more powerful attacks(The Vampire Old One being able to kill almost every thing in a single hit was far to much).

Faction diversity: While each faction had diverse units, each faction virtually had one unit of every type, this meant all the factions played much the same way, and so it was quite dull. To avoid this you need to make factions that have different resistances(so one is mainly vulnerable to cold, another to fire, another has units with many, varied resistances), and you need to make sure that each faction does not contain every type of attack(as most factions did in the last version).

[illcwaticando]

im considering raising the hp for the units,as well as lowering the movement for some units. only the shadow race exsists from the old era, the others are being remade, the summoners are almost exactly the same aswell.

as with the units, i like having a unit to counter every unit, because then you have to use the races special abilities to win, for example with the shadows you have to play them stealh like and set up traps to win.
if you get the chance i would like you help on how to make that idea more viable.

[ElvenKing]

The trouble with giving every unit have a direct counter is that it means that every faction will have most abilities, which makes them no longer unique. Making a race have a special ability that it must use to win is an excellent idea; it's just important to make sure that those abilities stay unique. If those abilities get diluted across all factions, so that every one has a direct counter to very thing, it is no longer unique, and instead of being faction vs faction it is effectively unit vs unit.

Making each faction have a direct counter to every other unit does precisely the opposite of what you are trying to achieve. Take shadows for example: why would I need to use my stealth to beat my opponent's units, when I could simply buy a unit that does an extra 30% damage to the unit I want to kill, and has a 30% resistance to the attacks of the unit I'm trying to kill. Having one faction that is made up of direct counters is okay because it is then different to all the other factions that are not made up of direct counters, but having more than one makes it pretty boring, as the factions will be roughly the same. Of course this is much harder to balance, but it is much more interesting.

What I would do is make a list of the factions you are going to make, and work out what you want their unique advantages/disadvantages to be.

*edit*
I thought about it some more and you could probably get the faction stealth idea to work with lots of direct counters(though I still think it's a bad idea), but the counters would have to be aggressive ones, rather than defensive ones. If too many units have high resistance to damage, then the idea will not be very well work, as you would have to get lots of different units to counter your opponents army, which would mean all your units would have to be stealthy: something which would be a thorny problem when balancing the factions(of course having even a few units which are stealthy is going to be a considerable problem), but if most units can do reasonable damage you don't need to make every single unit stealthy.

*edit2*
Please ignore most of the above post: everything except the first,and third paragraph is utter nonsense. I think I also misunderstood your reasoning for having lots of direct counters; I took what you said to mean that you wanted each faction would have a unique strategy; but I thought about it, and I think I understand what you mean: you want them to be as similar as possible, so that the thing that decides the battles is the a faction's special advantages, such as the shadow's stealth, rather than the base stats of the units making special advantages in particular match-ups.

[illcwaticando]

your last edit nailed my idea completely, though i did find the bit about it being unit vs unit instead of faction vs faction exactly what i dont want.
i want it race vs race where who eva better uses the races special skills win.

[ElvenKing]

They are kind of contradictory ideas, because if every faction has every type of attack, and every unit has a direct counter, then every faction will be the same on a basic level, and instead of it feeling like you are playing a faction with different advantages/disadvantages; it will sort of feel as though you are playing units with different advantages/disadvantages.

Actually that is probably an incorrect description. A more accurate one would be it feels like you are always in a mirror match-up, even though one faction will have have night-stalk, another flying etc.etc., each faction still plays roughly the same because they share similar basic stats.

Your idea of making similar(though they would have to become somewhat different for balance reasons) different factions, with every type of unit, differentiated by a special ability that decides the battle could probably work; it would just be a bit boring.

[illcwaticando]

thats where i disagree, i think it will make it more interesting as you wont just be able to play the faction the same way every game, some games a salamander rush may work , some times it wont, you can come up with alot more strats and ways to play each faction. but to use them to there full pontential you have to uterlise there unique ability into those stratergies.

[ElvenKing]

It certainly would accomplish the goal of every almost strategy being available to all factions. Unfortunately(at least in my opinion) it leads boring games because every faction feels basically the same. There isn't a different overarching theme(even with the special ability: the basic units are just to similar.) to each faction: I think this a mistake because the factions don't feel unique, which is(at least in my opinion) a large part of what makes up a good era.

Anyway I don't think we'll agree on this, so I think it would probably just good to drop it for now: both of us have established our opinions, and anymore discussion of the point would be rather pointless, as we would be just be repeating what has already been said. I will say one last thing related to this issue: it is inevitable that some factions will require different stats for balance reasons, some special abilities are simply more useful than others: the Sprites for instance will require something significant to offset their manoeuvrability advantage, especially if you drop movement points across the era.

[illcwaticando]

this is the summons race

they will be up soon.

[wesfreak]

i find it strange that even though it's called era of races, no era is yet all one race (Like loyalists)

faction suggestion: the ogres. you can have the normal ogre, an ogrer rocklobber/bowman/slinger, a heavy ogre (an ogre that plundered a human village and got itself a load of armour and weapons), crows and dire crows for scouting. i have no idea for a mage though. ogre mage or shamen, or an ogre with a stolen magical amulet.

[RenoOfTurks]

shadows and summoner races sprites are very cool!! nice work..

[doofus-01]

This topic had been dormant for many months... (Maybe wesfreak saw "Jan" as "Jun"?)

[wesfreak]

no, i just didn't look in the corner. and i post this now partly to be a thread necro because this seems like a good era idea which i quite frankly look forward to playing and maybe even contributing to, but that won't happen without this thread reviving.

[StDrake]

Thread necromancer! but seriously, there's little point in reviving a body if its soul is long gone. All it can do is turn against you and try to eat your brain.