Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

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zookeeper
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Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by zookeeper »

Wesnoth 1.13.6 now includes a redesign of all the desert elf units, and general feedback regarding them should be collected in this thread. Please post your experiences about how fun you found them to play, whether you encountered any particular tactical problems or challenges, if you found some units to be under- or overpowered, or anything else. And of course please mention any actual bugs you may find.

The units are still subject to change if gameplay demands it, so feedback about how fun and interesting the new units are to play (especially compared to the old ones) is very appreciated.


Known bugs or other issues: (fixed items in green)
  • Choosing the old units in the difficulty menu fails. This can be fixed by replacing the file data/campaigns/Under_the_Burning_Suns/utils/character-definitions.cfg with this fixed version.
  • Most lvl3 units lack AMLA.
  • Nym's sprite shows up as Kaleh's during movement in some cutscenes.
  • Sun Shyde has no illumination halo.
  • Shydes take damage from lava.
  • Most of the sprites are still placeholders.
  • Several units lack descriptions.
  • Movement in caves too slow for various units.
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Inky
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Inky »

I've played a few scenarios with the new desert elf units, and they are a lot of fun! I found them much more interesting and fun to play than the old faction, where desert prowlers and stars were the only units worth using. I can't wait for the portraits etc. to be added!

Bugs/Issues:

-The support ability makes it so your units will not cost upkeep for the entire rest of the scenario after spending only one turn next to the unit with support.
-Contrary to its description, the daze status also gives magical attacks a +10% chance to hit (at least, according to the attack dialog box).
-The moon shyde's moonwalk ability doesn't do anything.
-In S3 (Stirring in the night), Garak's damage type is not changed to fire when his weapon is blessed.
-In S4 (Descending Into Darkness), Kaleh mentions the old desert elf units when you enter the cave. Another dialogue advises giving the ring of speed to Kaleh which is no longer necessary since he gets +1 MP from his hunter AMLA - currently, Zhul is the one who needs it.
-After the units become more expensive to recruit, trying to check their unit description page from the recruit window will tell you the unit is unknown and you need to discover it.
-(Not sure if intentional) It is strange that the mounted units (scout line, tauroch line) have 50% defense on flat land, and only 40% on villages/castles etc.
-Tauroch riders have 50 HP at both level 1 and level 2. The level 2 Quenoth sun and moon singer also have 50 HP at level 2, seems they should have much less.
-The level 2 sun and moon singer have the flying movetype, when it seems they should use the walking movetype like the shaman.

A couple things unrelated to desert elves:
-In S2 (Across the Harsh Sands) the last ogre was surrounded and killed by bandits, which resulted in Nym running right into the middle of the bandit horde to release the dust devil. Maybe it could be changed so she runs and grabs the bottle, then runs back to her original location to release the dust devil.
-I think the dehydration mechanic would be more intuitive if units became dehydrated at the end of daylight turns, instead of the beginning. Otherwise the player needs to place their units around healers during the last turn of night, which involves constantly checking the schedule to see which turn of The Long Dark it is.
Thoughts on individual units
Kaleh/Nym: The support AMLA seems overpowered and potentially unbalancing; it can save a huge amount of gold in long scenarios giving players a large gold advantage over players who chose an alternate AMLA path. Maybe instead of making all surrounding units cost 0 upkeep, it could reduce their upkeep by 1.

Quenoth scout line:
I think their 17 gold recruit cost is probably too cheap for a fast slowing unit.
  • Scout/horseman/outrider: These units seem a little overpowered. Very high movement, pretty high damage (and effective against undead), reliable slowing, and they can even slow an enemy and then run away! Maybe remove the disengage ability (and give it to the archer line?).
  • Archer/marksman: Seems very underpowered. At level 3 they only do 9x4 pierce marksman damage, which is very low especially considering how fragile these units are, in addition to being useless against undead. Their melee attack is also weaker than the horseman line, and they don't even have disengage anymore.
Quenoth Mystic line:
  • Shaman/druid: It's inconvenient that they only have 5 movement at level 3, in addition to not being able to fly, so only the ones with the quick trait are usable. Your hero Zhul doesn't have the quick trait, so you really need to give her the speed ring in S4.
  • Sun singer/sun shyde: This unit is quite overpowered - it has high HP, massive arcane damage, illuminates, heals +4 and flies! It is basically as good as an elvish sylph, at level 3. This unit alone makes many scenarios much easier; I think it could use much less HP and also less damage.
  • Moon singer/moon shyde: This unit would have to be really, really good for me to pass up +8 healing or illuminates to get it, but I don't feel that it is worth it. Being chaotic is an advantage, but their cold damage is worthless against undead, and they don't actually need the +1 move from their moonwalk ability since they already have 6 base movement. As with the sun shyde, their 59 HP seems much too high for a magical unit.
Quenoth Fighter line:
  • Warrior/champion: Their HP (60 at level 3) feels much too low, considering they have no resistances. The formation ability is not so helpful because it is not practical to set up (the other unit with formation needs to be adjacent to both it and the enemy unit - it would be more convenient if only the two units with formation had to be adjacent), and they're probably going to get hit anyway on cave hexes (30% defense vs. 40% with formation). Finally, their 5 base movement and pierce damage make them generally a bad choice in this campaign.
  • Flanker/ranger: Just plain better than the warrior/champion in every way: 6 movement instead of 5, more HP, ranged poison, and skirmisher. 62 HP seems a bit too high, given everything this unit can do.
Tauroch rider line:
Not really usable in the cave scenarios due to their max move of 5, but really great in the outdoor scenarios at the beginning.
  • Vanguard/flagbearer: These are possibly a bit overpowered, being very tanky with leadership, high damage and the shock weapon special. I think even without shock they'd be a good unit.
  • Stalwart/protector: I don't feel these are worth it because the vanguard/flanker are already tanky enough, in addition to having leadership and doing more damage. Their steadfast ability is also not so great because they have no resistances to arcane, fire and pierce (very common damage type) to double.
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The_Gnat
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by The_Gnat »

:| So to be able to play these new elf units should i download the newest release of wesnoth 1.13? Or (hopefully) is there a addon/individual download for just the new UTBS that i can get?

Thanks!
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zookeeper
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by zookeeper »

Inky wrote:I've played a few scenarios with the new desert elf units, and they are a lot of fun! I found them much more interesting and fun to play than the old faction, where desert prowlers and stars were the only units worth using. I can't wait for the portraits etc. to be added!

Bugs/Issues:
Great, thanks for the detailed feedback!

Sadly, it's true that there's a large amount of problems with it and they're a bit more WIP than would be customary even in a development release. However, I think that we'll be able to have pretty much all the technical and balance issues sorted out by the next release.
The_Gnat wrote::| So to be able to play these new elf units should i download the newest release of wesnoth 1.13? Or (hopefully) is there a addon/individual download for just the new UTBS that i can get?

Thanks!
They're in 1.13.6 and later only. In theory they could be wrapped in a 1.12 add-on (with a few omissions such as the support ability), but that hasn't really felt warranted to me.
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The_Gnat
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by The_Gnat »

zookeeper wrote:They're in 1.13.6 and later only. In theory they could be wrapped in a 1.12 add-on (with a few omissions such as the support ability), but that hasn't really felt warranted to me.
Thanks zookeeper, it sounds awesome and i will definitely download 1.13 when this is complete! :D
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by ForestDragon »

hi, so, i love the new units, but the horse archers seem a bit out-of-place because they are just elvish scout line units with the ranged anim frame as a baseframe :| anyways, they seem more stylistically unique, because i hate the fact that they used to be recolors of mainline elves :)
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Wussel »

I am not sure about the moon shyde. Compared to the sun shyde she looks weaker. Maybe a slow attack would help?

It is exotic, that the bull riders do not get more hp when advancing to level 2. The defender line appears weak compared to the leader line. Solutions could be: better resistance, better attack, more hp, more movement. Or the opposite for the leader line.

The horse archer appears weaker to. Maybe give marksman on level 2 and match the XP for next level with the bola fellow. But melee is bad too. Maybe a fix should be there too. Yep, keep disengage.

Fighter line seems to prefer skirmisher. Basically you could drop the weaker alternatives for all lines or you could make them usefull at least for some roles. Pierce and cold is useless against undead anyway.

Very interesting. Lots of nice ideas.
Last edited by Wussel on December 12th, 2016, 8:24 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Wussel »

I finished playing. Good job!

Regular units:
The moon singer line seems to be fine. I had 3 moons and 3 suns at the end. You can not mix them at the front due to the iluminates. That is fine for me. Moonwalk seems to work? Not flying over deep water seems to be psychological? It is necessary for the campaign design anyway. So not much to do here. Maybe strong? They level kind of easy. Maybe make them level 4? So the cost would limit the use. Level 4 could get a movepoint and a few hitpoints. Or design a level 2.5 between old 2 and 3.

Basically advancing according to traits: quick->druid, strong->moon, dextrous ->sun

The skirmisher/warrior line had the bola before. Anyway I did not test the warrior line. The poison had some use, but not much. Maybe give a weak bola to the warrior? Or call it shield bash. It should slow. I used the skirmishers due to the benefits of skirmishing.

The horse rider lines: Basically the new bola wielder. Extremly popular, but the typical rider shortcomings. Disengage very powerfull, but nice. The sharpshooter needs fixing for sure, but I did not have one.

The bull rider: Need more contrast for the bull sprites. Movement in caves is a pain. I am not sure if the stalwart is tanky enough. I had only one. Both are nice tanks anyway.

They need some amla options. Even standard amla would do. It looks weird if the exp just keep counting and counting. Putting the halo for iluminates should be easy, too?

Dialog:
Somewhere in the dialog the elves were called "blond". Maybe that gets fixed later?

Nym/Kaleh Advances:

Nym and Kaleh having the same amla option? I did choose bola skirmisher and than sword warrior. After this 4 each the game was over. I am not sure if the leadership advances are usefull.

Was it here, that there is a gold advancement involved? Just reading between the lines of Inky's post. Basically a loyal aura? Saving up to 18 gold a turn? Sounds interesting. Problem is that after the hunter advances (necessary for movement and slow attack) leadership is already boring useless. Maybe make the starting bow a starting bola with slow?

Maybe give inspire as first advancement option and 4th level leadership as 2nd or gold aura as 2nd (choose only one). Maybe give a movement point for 1st leader advancement too?

Maybe force player to take warrior/leader/hunter first advancement first before offering the rest? But maybe not much fun this way.

Additional:

How about special advances for Zhul? I like the new Garak!


Edit:
I just had the idea to make the advancements for riders, scouts and fighters depending on gender. It is after all a tribal society. This would reduce art requirements and still give us some female units. It is the whole population going and the women are only singing for sun and moon? This is serious backward. Anita Sarkeesian will hammer us.

However the bow scout needs fixing. Better sword, marksman at lvl2 and disangage would do. Maybe lower the exp for lvl2. The rider stalwart line could have better resistance on the weak values. Moonies are fine. Fighter might be ok too.

Maybe the mystics could get a "sorting hat". Options should be according to traits.

quick-> healer
strong-> moon
dextrous-> sun
non of the above (only the combination of intelligent AND resilent) -> all 3 options
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Gyra_Solune »

Honestly the primary reason you shouldn't have promotion based on gender (or traits, for that matter) is that it isn't a factor the player can control - units just pop out being male or female or quick or resilient at random. Furthermore, individual unit gender isn't even a factor I pay much attention to during play. I just think 'this elf is nearly level 2 - i think what I want it to promote into is a ranger instead of a sharpshooter', so it'd be frustrating to set up for that only to find out because of something I had no control over, the unit has promoted into something I didn't want. And it's difficult to even tell which is which on the elves in the first place - the sprites look broadly the same for each gender, so if a unit is on its own, I'd have to really thoroughly examine it to tell.

Also, extremely minor note: despite the units database now being updated (i presume regularly timed, as it ought to be), the new UTBS units aren't being listed on the 1.13 part. Is it checking the right version of the game?
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Lordlewis »

I played the Under the Burning Suns campaign with the new units, but for some reason it wouldn't let me play the original unit version of the campaign. Also why is the defense on flat places 50% with the mounded unit? I thought it would be like before with the old Desert Elven mounds where it was 40% on flat. Also the Tauroch mound has a very odd defense thing, where they only get 40% defense on the castle, and it was also low on the village tile as well. Also for some reason (I don't know if it is because it's in the hardest mode, but) I didn't get the holy water for my melee attack from defeating the outlaw leader. PS it's my birthday.
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by MathBrush »

I like the new units quite a bit more than the old units.

In particular, I like how the fighters benefit from standing side by side. It definitely changes the gameplay, especially if you pick leadership for the two Quenoth youths, because you can form these big lines.

I also appreciate changing the ranged attacks of the shaman lines away from pierce, which I really didn't like in the original version.
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Prof_Hari_Seldon »

Where are the Quesnoth elves in the unit database? I cannot find them in the Elves faction like they used to be. Do I have to pick an Era?

https://units.wesnoth.org/trunk/mainlin ... nline.html
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Kwandulin »

You have to look in the unit database of the campaign: https://units.wesnoth.org/trunk/mainlin ... _Suns.html
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Prof_Hari_Seldon »

Thanks!
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Re: Under the Burning Suns, new desert elves feedback thread

Post by Wussel »

Ok lets discuss!

The Q Archer sucks in comparison with the Q Pathfinder! (Goatrider level 2)

The disengage is extremely powerful. There is no slow at level 1 anymore. (Old Q elves had it)

Possible solution would be:

to limit disengage to the Q Archer line and give the Q Scout slow too.

Or

to give the Q Archer marksman ability and lower xp to 80.

Or

to give the Q Archer Move 10 (instead of 8 )

The Q Scout could be a bowman with pierce damage, if he is not getting slow. That way he could keep disengage.

Does anybody likes to explain anyway? Right now the Q Archer is so bad, nobody would want him. The Q marksman has his uses, but again that will be filled by mystics too. So basically they will suffer the fate of the elvish sharpshooter? Cool but useless? Is that really intended?
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