Unit cost..

[Abdullah]

An Elvish Marksman costs 60 gold... fight with an Elvish Marksman in forest vs. three Orcish Warriors in water. Who wins?

?... I fail to see what you want to proof with this because it isn't a valid comparison.

Although I totally agree that some unit cost is unbalanced compared to others. Some of my observations of a few unbalanced/unreasonable unit cost are IMO:

White Mage - 80 gold -> too high, never seen any human play buy those because of that cost

Elvish Marksman - 60 gold -> as metioned by others, too high

Revenant - 19 gold -> 19 gold for a high resistant, 40 hp, 8-4 melee unit seems too low :/

Outlaw - 40 gold -> too high


I base these evaluation from MP games with Age of Heroes era so I don't know if any changes in unit cost will have any affacts on the AI in single player campaign games.

/Abdullah

[Circon]

Revenant is 19 because it was balanced as an enemy appearing in the constant undead enemies, it wasn't thought of recruiting. It should be more expensive, yes, and undead enemies in general will need more gold then.

[autolycus]

What I would like to see is a 'handicap factor' that map designers could build in. For example, in a 'lots of water' map, the cost of merfolk units could be multiplied by 'm' or incremented by '+c'.

So a map designer could insert a block like this:

Code: Select all

 [costs]
  merman_cost_m="2"
  merman_cost_c="1"
 [/costs]

which would make all type=merman units have inflated costs of 2x+1, where x is the original cost.

This allows designers an easy way to balance their scenarios, maps etc without having to hack units each time. It is also easy to tweak - you can just adjust m and c until it plays well.

Maybe I should transfer this to a new thread in 'ideas'.

[Fortify]

I would be interested in exploring an incremental cost system. This would discourage people from creating armies of one or two types of units. The simplest example would be units cost x+1 per unit of that type recruited.

Do you think there is value in this or is this excess complexity for little gain?

Cheers.

[Darth Fool]

I would be interested in exploring an incremental cost system. This would discourage people from creating armies of one or two types of units. The simplest example would be units cost x+1 per unit of that type recruited.

Do you think there is value in this or is this excess complexity for little gain?

Cheers.

best anti-zerg rush proposal yet. It would need to be per unit of that type recruited on your side. It might unbalance single-player, but it would make a good option for multiplayer...

[turin]

On shroud/fog maps, doesn't the cost changing tell you a lot about the map, thus making shroud less effective?

OT:

It might unbalance single-player, but it would make a good option for multiplayer...

its hilarious how people accept this and decide to put it in anyway, but when i propose changes to elves, nooo.....

[telly]

I would be interested in exploring an incremental cost system. This would discourage people from creating armies of one or two types of units. The simplest example would be units cost x+1 per unit of that type recruited.

Do you think there is value in this or is this excess complexity for little gain?

Cheers.

best anti-zerg rush proposal yet. It would need to be per unit of that type recruited on your side. It might unbalance single-player, but it would make a good option for multiplayer...

This is a really really terrible terrible idea. If you're losing to the sort of tactics you describe you probably need to think more about the way you play rather than try to limit what other players can do by setting annoying artificial limits to what they can recruit.

[Darth Fool]

best anti-zerg rush proposal yet. It would need to be per unit of that type recruited on your side. It might unbalance single-player, but it would make a good option for multiplayer...

This is a really really terrible terrible idea. If you're losing to the sort of tactics you describe you probably need to think more about the way you play rather than try to limit what other players can do by setting annoying artificial limits to what they can recruit.

Its not about losing to such tactics. Its about such tactics being really, really boring, even if you are the one using them to win.

[Popito]

I would be interested in exploring an incremental cost system. This would discourage people from creating armies of one or two types of units. The simplest example would be units cost x+1 per unit of that type recruited.

Do you think there is value in this or is this excess complexity for little gain?

Cheers.

best anti-zerg rush proposal yet. It would need to be per unit of that type recruited on your side. It might unbalance single-player, but it would make a good option for multiplayer...

I dont like it (but if its the only solution so far i'll hook to it!!). I like to have recruiting freedom and let anyone having this freedom, this helps a faction in special maps to get special balances in the unit recruiting and i see this penalty as a burden. (Imagine a forest full map and a knalgan...dont ask him to recruit as many dwarves because they are like drakes in forests).
Trouble is cost balancing, if lvl0 units rule is because their cost its not well balanced.
If they had a cost equivalent to the work they do in the map then lvl0 flooding wont be more lethal than lvl1 flooding.
Trouble is devs like some factions to have some "favored" units with its gold costs under their real market value. That would be fine as long as all factions have the same economic unbalance.
And trouble is nobody knows whats the real value of any unit! . So its impossible to point some unit/faction and say you are 20% underpriced!.

And while balance seems to be achieved trough playtesting... well, i will like to have some polls (in fact... lots of polls!, almost for every starting MP unit and faction) where ppl drops a little feedback of his experience with the game.
And let devs do whatever they want with the info.

[Elvish_Pillager]

How about level 0 units cost 1/2 or 1 upkeep?

[Circon]

No. I don't like that idea. 1/2 breaks KISS, and 1 sort of eliminates the point of them being lvl 0.

[Elvish_Pillager]

No. I don't like that idea. 1/2 breaks KISS

L0 units give 4 XP already, why not make them L1/2 units in other ways too?

[Popito]

No. I don't like that idea. 1/2 breaks KISS

L0 units give 4 XP already, why not make them L1/2 units in other ways too?

One thing that happened to me a game i played yesterday. It was a lvl0 goblin assault against mostly dwarves & thieves. One of the thieves killed 2 opponents and stood his ground to 12-13 assaults in 3 rounds before death comes to him. (Lucky guy!).
What's the point of not getting xp when attacked from a lvl0 unit???, as far as they can kill you and there is a fight xp should be involved somehow.
Just a silly idea: giving 1 xp for each attack/defense to a lvl0 unit would be a serious drawback to flooders because of his low attack values needs lots of guys smashing the same opponent, and if that means leveling them if they get not killed... could be a way to downgrade lvl0 units without actually changing them.

[scott]

Level 0 units should be very weak. Goblin spearmen are extremely overpowered for L0 units. It may not look like much, but I think at that level even changes of 1-2 points can make a difference. Their HP and attack power are comparable to some L1 units whose main specialty is not melee combat. It should NOT be a rule that all Lx units are weaker than all Lx+1 units but you have to be really careful with it.

I think the current method of maunal balancing should be continued until v1.0 - let's not change midstream. Adding a parameter system doesn't add enough ease to be worth the complexity, and you may have to start balancing all over. That said, L0 goblins were added and now need balancing. You can probably tell I don't like them very much! (I personally think the L0 goblins should be taken out)

[telly]

Maybe bats and goblins should just be made level 1 and have zombies as the only level 0 units. I don't see any easy way level 0 units can be properly balanced the way upkeep works atm.