[MattCaspermeyer]

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

Congratulations for the new creature!

Thanks - if you have any suggestions on abilities be sure to post them. Ideas are great for brainstorming what will mesh well with Drahha's mythos.

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

To be honest, and generally speaking, I'm not very fond of "bloating" enemies in videogames because sure, it's a way to make toughter opponents, but, I think, a bit raw and unfair. Moreover, from my experience, sometimes just leads to lengthy -longer- battles, and not necessary more really difficult or stimulating ones. I prefer clever level and AI design along with randomness. The first doesn't goes against the notion of fighting under the same rules/conditions and on the other hand, improves realism, and the second keeps unpredictibility alive.

I hear you - that's why I have the stat increases instead of just the leadership increases. Applying the bonuses to the talents I've wanted to do for a while, but I had overlooked them / didn't quite know how to implement them at the time. Now it just makes them more potent and I think that will translate to more fun.

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

On King's Bunty: TL, however, I'm not totally against raising enemy stats due to its chess-like game mechanics and I concurr some measures were and are necessary to increase challenge but, according to my vision and preferences, I'd use a slightly different formula: something like a tiny fixed increment (let's say 3% Hard, 6% Impossible) plus a partially random amount:

+3/+6 % + map difficulty modifier + *, where * is a quantity between -4% and +20%:

-4 (2%), -3 (3%), -2 (5%), -1 (5%), 0 (10%), +1% (10%), +2 (10%), +3% (10%), +4% (10%), +5% (10%), +12 (5%), +14 (5%), +16 (5%), +18 (5%), +20 (5%)

, this means most creatures (60%) would have equal or simmilar stats compared with default, but some of them be notably more powerful. Concretely up to +26 on Impossible, which is roughly the same maximum as you planned, and Hard would be even Harder.

I like the random adder - that is something that sounds interesting. You know, I've been spending a lot of time with the spell AI for enemy heroes and I think that this subtle change is going to make it a lot harder.

I may visit the actual unit AI in the future because there are some things that I scratch my head about, like for example, when a shooter runs away from a troop and still shoots it even though it can only do a small amount of damage when it could do more damage to another troop further away.

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

Yes, I agree. Very potent indeed. I'd weaken them by nerfing Sleep to one charge, two turns. I think more than that is very exploitable. If it proves to be too much, the three turns duration could come back, although I suspect it wouldn't be necessary. In all my KB runs I have used crowd control abilities the most, even when playing offensively and rushing to the enemy. In some sense, after all, a paralized unit is an almost non-existant unit.

You're certainly right there! One thing to do may be to remove their possibility in the early part of the game. Or add charges...

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

Yes, summoning is also very powerful. In fact, it doesn't matter so much what it's actually summoned, that's why walls of any kind, even fragile ones, can be useful as well.

Originally Posted by Sir Whiskers

I'd suggest leaving these as rechargeable. If they are in the enemy army, my choices have trade offs. Do I go for these troops right away, to limit their summoning? Or do I go for other enemy stacks, knowing I'll have to deal with the extra summoned stacks? And if they're in my army, multiple summons don't generally matter much - the battle is usually in hand within a few rounds. And if it isn't, having the extra summons can be the difference between defeat and victory.

My opinion is influenced by a battle I had in my last game. I stumbled into a really nasty fight. My army consisted of some dragons and several ancient ents. The dragons went down almost immediately, but the ents (barely) held out using summons, swarms and rooting, along with my mage's spells. I think I finished the battle with a single ent, which made for a memorable fight. It was one the most enjoyable fights of the game, precisely because I had to work so hard over multiple rounds to pull out the victory. If the ent summons had been single charge, I'd have lost the fight within the first 7-8 rounds and simply reloaded.

Just my two cents...

Good point and counter point here. By the way, Ancient Ents would keep their reloadable summon (level 5 troops, for the most part, have reloadable attacks since they can't be recharged via spell). The question falls to Level 4 Ents, and other Level 4's (or lower) and certain reloadable attacks. Certainly a good case can be made for the Dryad's Sleep (a level 2 unit) having just 1 or 2 charges since they are a level 2 unit. It wouldn't cost much mana to recharge them with Gift.

I certainly want to maintain the level of play that Sir Whiskers is talking about as that is what makes the game truly fun!

I also think that I've actually made plants useful now, whereas before they were pretty useless. With the increase to talent abilities, enemy Ancient Ents now really pack a wallop with their Wasps ability.

Anyway, I certainly don't want to undo the utility of plants and so that's why I may keep Ents (normal Level 4 ones) with reloadable summons (plus if the combat goes long enough abilities don't recharge any more any way).

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

Not sure about Alchemists, though.

6 attacks (or 4 technically if there are no Undead) might be enough. But their potions are pretty much reloadable now in the other KB games...

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

I feel the same. It's a mini game on its own and an addicting one, very funny. Problem is, like any other game, it needs the challenge and randomness factors to really be great. Otherwise, after you have cleared the initial areas it eventually becomes a little silly.

Yah, this has both good and bad things associated with it. There is a satisfaction gained from clearing an area. And it allows you a chance to relax when going through these areas. But this is not a static world so things do change.

I'll at least do a little probing to see if I can get a feel for how implementable something like this is...

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

Hmm, maybe there's another instance where something simmilar happens, and the funny thing, it's also located within Verlon F; do you remember the old castle there filled with undead? I think is named Old Kingdom Castle or simmilar... anyway, as you sure recall, when clicking on the pictures inside sometimes (or some of the pictures), an encounter is triggered/trigger an encounter.

Obviously to set random encounters the object used as a trigger should be invisible and the "click" involuntary.

The Old Kingdom Castle is exactly what I was referring to. Random clicks could be you clicking on the landscape to move, although I guess some people just click, hold the mouse button, and direct their hero with the mouse...

Originally Posted by Sirlancelot

Yes, exactly. What I find interesting would be a chance of failure of Scouting. At least a 15%, maybe even 20%. A fail stimation would lead to a wrong information, how wrong, being partially random; the higher the mistake, the less likely to happen (otherwise we could go mad xD )

This is interesting. Of course we'd have to be careful, since some consider Scouting to be a fairly useless skill. I'll at least see if I can find out if it is possible to make this happen. Scouting does increase the hero's search radius for digging treasures!

Well, thanks for the comments! Some interesting things to think about!

/C\/C\