The Battle for Meridia: Startng balancing: alpha 0.1.7

[Drakefriend]

But what are the new Kalofa stats? The facelift gives (as far as I know) only information about the names, frames and lengths of lines, but there is nothing about á unit's role in the faction, which is the most interesting part for those units newly created.

However, I think this era seems interesting.

[Velensk]

I don't think their roles changed at all because of the facelift.

TSI: When I went back to do the Untamed monsters I could not find the art for the water units.

[thespaceinvader]

But what are the new Kalofa stats? The facelift gives (as far as I know) only information about the names, frames and lengths of lines, but there is nothing about á unit's role in the faction, which is the most interesting part for those units newly created.

However, I think this era seems interesting.

So far there are none publicly available. I'm goign to contact Noy about them.

Velensk: sorry about that. The Water Serpent is the one from Core. The Serpent is attached.

[Velensk]

Debugging is taking longer than I thought it would however at least one of the factions works mostly fine. Just based on some preliminary testing the tracker/shaman are still too similar except that the shamans specials will be almost always superior. I would like to suggest making the tracker neutral, and giving him an extra movement point to help differentiate them. It makes a certain amount of sense that tracking would be easier at day.

EDIT: Nevermind, I figured out why the price seemed too high it was because I put it in too high. Making it neutral still seems like a good idea though even if the +1 move isn't (or maybe a price increase and +1 move). Two factions working now.

[Velensk]

Alright, finished for now. There are a number of things that can be polished and the abilities still need to be made but this should serve adequately for now.

I won't be able to work on this tomorrow and probably the day after as well which should give you enough time to make the edits you'll undoubtably want to make.

[thespaceinvader]

o_O I thought I did make the tracker neutral. I definitely intended to. Apologies. Increasing the price and adding a move are also sensible i think. I'll make those changes and upload to umc-svn.

Thank you.

EDIT: There seems to quite a lot in there left over from EFM - should this be removed?

[Velensk]

All the the #textdomain wesnoth-Era_of_Four_Moons should be replaced.

As for the rest we don't need any of it but I'd prefer to keep it around for reference at the moment.

It occurs to me thinking this over, that there is an advantage to posting for partially completed eras. You say I've got this era but it's not done yet and I need help. People look at that and wonder how they can help and if their mark will be seen in the final product. Whereas when I post an era that is essentially done except for animations, polishing, and a non-essential unit or two people look at it and say oh, it's another era. Kind of funny how it works.

[thespaceinvader]

Yeah. I've fixed those things in my local copy, and am now going to get on with tweaking and fiddling. Thanks =)

EDIT: NB: abilities aside, I'm quite happy to do any further tweaking myself, and have been already. Thanks for your help.

EDIT: I published this to the add-ons server.

[Velensk]

List of proposals for unit changes:

Orcs:
Shaman cost->17 ranged damage 8-2
Tracker cost->15: hp->35 neutral movement->6

Elves
Swarmcaller attack 3-7 or 4-6

Dwarves
Miner damage boost of some kind and/or an extra mp
Scout line melee damage down (but with traits)
Swimmer hp+2
some sort of 8 mp scout I still like the medicine wagon idea best.

[Aura]

I think the tusker cannon should be raised to a 30% defence on grass and the like. 20% seems exceedingly low. The Soldier's should probably also be raised to 40% (he has a large shield and good armour). The Miner's teleport should probably be renamed tunnel or something too.

For an 8 MP scout a chariot would be a nice idea and fitting with the roman theme. Possibly a ram rider instead though. Plainswalker is spelt Plainwakler in-game. I'm not sure if the Novice Shaman should have Plague, compare to Dark Adept. Also think about renaming this ability too. The R in Twisted Remnant is not a capital in game.

[thespaceinvader]

See, now why didn't I think of a chariot? That's a great idea. Not sure what to use to pull it though. And sigh, it probably makes the Scout obsolete >.<

I'll add the rest of those to my to do list. Thank you.

[Aura]

A ram, a tusker, a goat, a pony, a deer, a small rhino, a dog ? Maybe one of those ? Stick an axe-thrower or a javelineer in the back and you are good to go.

Oh, and the Dracoatl feels like it should have poison. Dunno how this balances/unbalances the faction though. The Infernus line also has a sword attack but no visible sword to use.

[thespaceinvader]

I like tuskers, but I don't know if I can justify them going that fast. It would probably have to be dull, dull horses. Or I could invent something new...

[Aura]

Some ram/goat variation is my prefered choice. It could have cool Roman armour on it's head at higher levels. Something new would be fine though.

[thespaceinvader]

MM, maybe.

I've realised I made a HUGE mess-up when writing the Untamed listings down yesterday - I left out the Tamer/Beastmaster line. What i think I might do is move the blowpipe attack from the Brute to the Tamer, drop the Brute's price accordingly, and level the Tamer and Brute into the Warden, thereby making the Tamer a support unit and the Brute pure melee.

EDIT: Update, version 0.1.2 released with some fairly major changes:
* Fix race for Incendius line, Phalanx, Scout
* Fix Plainwalker names to consistency (Plainwalker is correct)
* Rename Swarmcaller line to match original naming conventions
* Fixed Twisted Remnant typo and file name
* Animated base frame and nozoc ellipse for Dracoatl
* Added missing Tamer unit to the Untamed.
* Remove Brute's ranged attack, gave it to Tamer instead
* Nerfed Neophyte line, renamed their weapons
* Drop Serpent XP to level, fixed its attack animation offsets
* Raise Dronecaller XP, along with several other max level units
* Tracker line made neutral, +1 MP, changed some weapon names
* Add portraits for Shaman line from SotBE

Obviously there's still a LOT to do, but it will get done as we go.