Why do Undead have submerge when Merfolk don't?

[Darker_Dreams]

I have to reply still? Relax.

you don't have to reply. And I am relaxed. Really, 90% of this conversation is just to entertain myself. The only thing that stresses me out is getting an answer that seems to lack the full round of thought. "because it is" and "because it shouldn't change" just don't strike me as good policy.

First up, hunters are available for rebels.

AI's post explains why drakes' defense is lower over water.

Yes, ok.

OTOH, if you weaken their land movement, you make water a thing to be respected without giving them unfettered access. You also make it easier to lay traps in shallows (which requires only some sacraficial knalgans) or just *near* water.
Acknowledging I haven't played that map- I don't see nautical *combat* being considerable, even there. I see avoiding it being a much larger challenge... the only solidly "nautical" units seem to be mermen and nagas. Even without submerge, are you going to try to take on 2 mermen in the deeps even with a full-strength griffon rider alone?
I see the river being a tactical consideration and barrier to what is otherwise a land war. If there were, say, 4 towns on that central island, or some other goofyness that drew people towards the water I could imagine a nautical battle. Undead aren't going to be in a nautical battle, even with submerge, they aren't that good. Knalgans will take their ariel battels over the water, drakes will pass over water on their way to better terrian...

And, as a note, a merman fighter has equal movement and defense in deep water to a griffon, and less damage. In shallow water the merman fighter gets 10% better defense.
I'm not surprised, but I would be interested in seeing some of those discussions. Honestly, a search for discussions (especially on drakes) seems to indicate a heavy inclination of the devs towards reflexive "don't touch that!" (I may be searching the wrong forums/terms though)
so pull back to the water's edge and attack with units from land, or measure your jaunts across water so you're on better terrain (in the crossing, jumping a griff over to the island, and setting him on the mts is perfectly doable, and gives the griff a better defence than the merman in the deeps.)

I suppose. I don't entirely agree with your logic, but it is what it is. Good example with the seals, I find that an excellent compairison in units (there is an argument about whether a seal could be spotted at it's 2/turn surfacing... but, what was the acronym? WINR.



perhaps I'll scale back the suggestion to this;
Give the Siren submerge (can we agree that's generally MP neutral and completely reasonable?).
I'll frankenstine the WML and some sprites for a "diver" unit that gains submerge and post it hoping to get some better art/critique on the unit and leave it be.

[anakayub]

Combats don't rely on the fights itself, but also maneuvering. Your idea will make the maneuvering part difficult due to the difficulty in calculating risk. I was never talking about the battle aspect on its own. Maneuvering can help you achieve superiority in numbers.

The fact that you haven't even played that map really discredits your idea, regardless of its merits, unfortunately. I suggest that you play on the MP server first. You'll get a better feel for the game by going against good players.

Unless there's a valid reason to do so, there's almost no reason at all to put a merman on land, except if you're a noob. 2 MP, 30% def. Without severing those stats, no average player would put a merman on land, period [Unless there's a very good reason].

The only thing that stresses me out is getting an answer that seems to lack the full round of thought.

I hope you're not referring to me, coz I would find that extremely insulting. I think I should stop here as we're both going nowhere.

[Darker_Dreams]

Combats don't rely on the fights itself, but also maneuvering. Your idea will make the maneuvering part difficult due to the difficulty in calculating risk. I was never talking about the battle aspect on its own. Maneuvering can help you achieve superiority in numbers.

The importance of maneuvering is true in any war/strategy game.
However, it is the risk of a particular battle that makes it a concern- will this movement get my unit attacked, will the unit survive the attack.
As a note, the griff can move/see further than any mer unit in water, and has equal deep-water defense, 10% weaker shallow water defense, and stronger damge than any lvl 1 merfolk.

All of which is appropriate given it's cost.

However, the concern that suddenly it will be incalculably more at risk rings false. the risk is perfectly determinable; at maximum it is the amount of resources the opposing player is willing to invest in holding the area around that central lake. Which is exactly the amount you can ignore if you get ambushed there by a significant force (enough to take out the griff you hop directly to the middle island, giving you stronger defense than the merfolk have anywhere) by going around.

The fact that you haven't even played that map really discredits your idea. I suggest that you play on the MP server first. You'll get a better feel for the game by going against good players.

Actually, if you retrace, it was never *my* idea. it was an idea proposed by someone else that I liked. I merely pointed out that it was wierd the one truely aquatic "race" in the game didn't have the one truely aquatic ability in the game *at*all*under*any*circomstances.*

OTOH, I do have a background in strategy games, and statistics, and as amazing as wesnoth is it's not spectacularly groundbreaking enough to invalidate that. I will bow to greater experience in the environment/map/code- but it doesn't mean I'm ignorant of what a set of statistics come together to make.

It does rather bother me how much time and energy seems to be put into discrediting ideas around here though.

Unless there's a valid reason to do so, there's almost no reason at all to put a merman on land, except if you're a noob. 2 MP, 30% def. Without severing those stats, no average player would put a merman on land, period [Unless there's a very good reason].

yes.

(what do you mean "without severing those stats?")

The only thing that stresses me out is getting an answer that seems to lack the full round of thought.

I hope you're not referring to me, coz I would find that extremely insulting.

Not that I recall.

[anakayub]

By severing those stats I mean by your suggestion of weakening the merman already poor land movement.

[irrevenant]

The only thing that stresses me out is getting an answer that seems to lack the full round of thought. "because it is" and "because it shouldn't change" just don't strike me as good policy.

You have to understand something: While there's always room for further improvement, Wesnoth is a complete, polished game. Most things in Wesnoth are as they are for a reason, especially unit stats. These have been finely balanced over goodness-knows-how-many versions.

Since any change to the status quo has a cascade effect the onus on people proposing changes is pretty high. A proposal doesn't just have to be "a good idea" - it also has to be a good idea that justifies the effort of implementing it and doesn't break the existing structure. ie. Pareto optimality applies

So it's not that "it shouldn't change", it's that the onus is on the suggester to provide significant justification. And the bigger the impact on the game, the bigger the justification required.

Oh, and since you're relying on volunteer Devs to do the implementation, if the Devs don't want to do it, it won't happen, no matter how good the justification is.

[Darker_Dreams]

[quote="irrevenant"][/quote]

A) I didn't come into this making the suggestion. I asked a question, to which the suggestion of stat-change was made as a possible answer. I don't know how much work that answer will take compared to any of the others, but it is what it is.

B) I have attempted to demonstrate impact : justification. I don't necessarilly feel that I've done as good a job as may be necessarry- but it is what I've been trying to do. Arguing ideas in a meaningful manner is interesting. Debating with statments with content that could have been equally expressed by just saying "no" is of no use to either the devs (you) or the random people (me).

Which is to say, I like the stat change better. while you, as a dev, get to choose what, if anything, is done- I'm going to express my opinion with as much information as I can get my hands on. I feel it's fair to expect that those who choose to participate in the discussion (as opposed to simply ignoring it) do so, and don't resort to prima-facia statments which may or may not be true and lack the substantiality they claim.


As for pareto effeciency, that is essentially what I've been looking to prove- that it moves to a different point on the same indifference curve (or near it) or makes an optimization unreachable on the current level. I suspect that the best argument against is a comment on current tactics used, not available tactics- though I lack the experience to actively make that claim.

Given the relative fragility with which the quality of balance is treated, and the fairly narrow band of players some commentary seems willing to consider, I suspect that efficiency has been reached given certain constraints- not on an inclusive scale.



But, all I really wanted to know was if there was a justification (preferrably one I could deal with) why the only seriously aquatic race doesn't have the only really aquatic ability.
The answer seems to be "hadn't really thought about it, we should do *something* so it makes sense."

[Soliton]

But, all I really wanted to know was if there was a justification (preferrably one I could deal with) why the only seriously aquatic race doesn't have the only really aquatic ability.
The answer seems to be "hadn't really thought about it, we should do *something* so it makes sense."

We've thought about it and didn't like its effect on balance. As mentioned before (note I haven't really read this whole thread) the justification is that merman have to breath once in a while thus can't stay submerged.

Some new (branch of a) merman unit could probably get it since it could be nice for a campaign for example, but I don't currently see any mainline merman unit that is somehow set apart from the others in a way that would explain the submerge ability.

[Neoskel]

I have a question only somewhat related to the discussion at hand. It has to do with the fact that skellys get submerge.

How does a skelly warrior at the bottom of the ocean attack a drake at the suface?

[AI]

with difficulty

[irrevenant]

[Lots of stuff]

Cool.

But, all I really wanted to know was if there was a justification (preferrably one I could deal with) why the only seriously aquatic race doesn't have the only really aquatic ability.
The answer seems to be "hadn't really thought about it, we should do *something* so it makes sense."

My understanding is that it had been thought about and it had been decided at the Developer level that mermen did not have the lung capacity necessary to submerge for hours. This information clearly has not been conveyed in the help texts.

I have a question only somewhat related to the discussion at hand. It has to do with the fact that skellys get submerge.
How does a skelly warrior at the bottom of the ocean attack a drake at the suface?

Well, given that the skeleton ceases to be submerged when discovered presumably he surfaces to attack.

[Ken_Oh]

http://www.wesnoth.org/forum/viewtopic. ... 808#249808

And to put my two cents in further, Submerge is already a horrible ability. Sure, skeletons could hide from land units, but how would they be able to hide from water units?

Just imagine what things would look like if Mermen (and maybe even Nagas) were submerged on the Bay of Pearls map. You'd have a ton of units that can't see each other over a huge area. It would be like playing football with everyone blindfolded.

Sure, as has been said before, maybe give one unit the submerge ability, but a whole race doesn't need it.

[vicza]

Strange, but the same question (why mermen don't have submerge?) has occured to me just a few days ago...

Just imagine what things would look like if Mermen (and maybe even Nagas) were submerged on the Bay of Pearls map. You'd have a ton of units that can't see each other over a huge area.

Why imagine? You can try it. I've tried just now with BofP, previously giving mermen and nagas this ability. Well, I would not say the game has significantly changed. Some aspects, maybe... For example, my wounded merman could escape a horde of bats due to his submerge. But then he ran onto ambushed naga. But in most cases, they fought each other, so were quite visible. Anyway, I'd not say the game became worse. More interesting, rather.

[irrevenant]

Sure, skeletons could hide from land units, but how would they be able to hide from water units?

Remember, HAPMA. Most people can't see for miles underwater.