I play a lot of boardgames, and i am sorry to say but i find the tactical battle in Elemental mostly boring. What is the point of designing units if you don't have a way to play with them fully ?
Go look at a tactical boardgames like Battle of Westeros, and you will see a lots of basic things that are missing from Elemental.
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_minisite.asp?eidm=105&enmi=Battles of Westeros
But i like the game and i want to be succesful, so here are my suggestions:
Initiative:
Instead of having all units from a side moving at the same time, units should move in descending order of Battle speed:
Initiative = Battle Speed*10 + random(10)
Leadership:
This new abilitie would increase the Initiative value of all adjacent friendly units, at the start of a turn.
Units Class:
Units should be one of the following: Infantry, Mounted, Flying.
Weapons Class:
Weapons should be of Ranged or Melee class, dealing Physical or Magical damage.
We should have also Physical and Magical Defense.
Zone of Control:
Unit moving from a square adjacent to an enemy, directly to a square also adjacent to an enemy should pay a penalty in AP:
Infantry: +1 AP
Mounted: + 0.5 AP
Flying: No penalty
Mounted charge:
A Mounted unit moving before attacking should get a +25% to it's attack.
Engaged:
A unit attacking in melee should became engaged. When an engaged unit attack or is attacked by another melee unit, it should get -25% to it's defense.
When an engaged unit move away, it's current target could get a free counter attack.
Note: Engaged unit don't exert a Zone of Control.
I like your ideas for initiative.
I would consider replacing battle speed with experience in the initiative rating of a unit; thus a more experienced infantry unit would have a greater chance to move before a lesser experienced unit.
Likewise not all units should be able to move each turn; due to the fickleness of combat, some units might fail a movement check and remain in place as they did not receive or comprehend their leader's orders whereas other foolishly brave units might disregrd orders and charge towards the nearest enemy unit.
So;
1. Initiative Check - Order in which units are activated, affected by presence of adjacent hero or lord.2. Command Control Check- If this check fails the unit disobeys orders and automatically moves to attack nearest enemy unit.3. Movement Orders Check - If this check fails the unit does not move this turn not having received its orders.4. Morale Check - A morale check is made when an army has lost 50% or 75% of its strength. Units that fail this check panic and flee the battlefield unless rallied by a champion or a lord. So the question is - does the lord use his movement action to rally paniced troops or does he attack.
Can I propose an alternative or related idea which requires slightly less changes to the basic flow, but may be a way of implimenting some of the changes above.
Issue
Currently speed is a major issue - picking up a short sword allows you to move quicker.
There are significant speed levels that are far more advantageous (2.1 much better than 2.0)
Proposal
Use a single action point resource (AP's) with a fixed amount per turn (e.g. 60 - you could think of these as seconds)
This replaces the current combat move bar.
Let the weapon determine how many AP's are taken up by an attack
Let the model determine hom much a move costs in AP's (based on combat speed - possibly modified by local terrain)
Let the spell or othe special action determine how many AP's it takes (stats could modify it)
- this should address issue 1
You can take action provided you have action points left, but when you go negative this gets carried over to next round
e.g. you have 10 AP's left and do a move that takes 30 AP's - you are now at -20AP's you you can't do anything else. At the start of the next turn you get 60AP added to your total so you start the turn with 40AP's.
second example - you have 10 AP's left but decide not to move. The 10 AP's don't get carried over so you start with 60AP's
This allows for a more continuous feel (7 moves over 3 turns rather than 6 or 9) and therefore addresses issue 2
It also allows for other features
Counterattacks could use AP's (if a unit is under attack by many units it could get pinned down) also makes engaged units more difficult to move which feels right.
The possibility of actions which span multiple turns (e.g. epic spells)
Defending against missile fire could use AP's (same reason as above)
Wounds could affect AP's (less recovered by wounded units - so moves slower & attacks less)
Leaving the square adjacent to an enemy could cost AP (simulating Zone of control)
An initiative system is much needed, yes.
Initiative is great!!!
And i don't like the "always advancing" enemy.
If i am the attacker the enemy (except non inteligent creatures) could occupy tiles with defense bonus.
Ok, if i have more archer or more mana they must advance, but if i haven't got mana or archer i have to advance. It would be real.
SO . . . :
INITIATIVE
NO ADVANCE, WHEN DEFEND
i don't know the files, but i think thise aren't hard things to solw, but would add a lot to tactical battles
(and yes, my english is bad)
Yes the tactical combat definatly needs to be more tactical.
Initative check, and Morale check are good ideas. Command Control Check, and Movement Orders Check.... could get a bit annoying I think. Its possible to tie that into the Unit level system, and instead of having a check, change it to response speed. So a veteran unit will respond to orders quicker, than a non-verteran unit (instead of not at all).
Some of my suggestions for improving tactical combat....
Right now the game is pretty much "My stick is bigger than yours, I win." Which is fine, but why have tactical combat if you are very limited tacticaly?
The main reason for this is the weapon and unit design system. The tactical benefits of equipment is either too low, or non existent. Take the spear for example.... a weapon that was used for almost 400,000 years of human history because of its tactical advantage, is uselless after the early game.
The most important factors to choosing weapons now is damage, range, and cost.
My suggestion is to change the weapons system. Instead of just getting better weapons, you get a better class of weapon. The classes would be something like: spears, ranged weapons, swords, axes, and blunt weapons.
Secondly give each class of weapon a tactical bonus.
Spear: first strike, bonus versus calvary
Blunt weapons: bonus vs. armor and/or each attack reduces targets armor value by a certain amount in addition to doing damage
Swords: good blance between damage, and speed
Axes: High damage, low speed, and maybe have some bonus against shields
Ranged weapons: range (obiously)
Lastly, for very weak weapons like dagger that are USELESS!!! If you make a secondary weapon attribute for weak weapons, and then you can equip it to say.... your archers (ie units can have 1 primary weapon 1 secondary). These weapons are no longer useless, which makes designing units more important, and increases the tactical depth of the game.
2 handed vs 1 handed - right now the attack bonuse from 2 handed weapons far outweights the shield bonus form one handed weapons + shield (in my opinion) since if you are smart.... in most cases you can always hit the AI first.
Give additional bonus to the shield. Maybe something like % depending on shield size to avoid ranged attacks. I know that right now shields give a dodge bonus, but the benefits are marginal in my opinion. Also maybe give a special ability to shield carrying units, like shield wall. For a certain amount of action points you can increase the defense of a unit for 1 turn.
I mentioned earlier about having a secondary weapon. This can be used to make dual weapon units which would make both weak weapons, and one handed weapons more tactically important. Plus it might give some sort of bonus or special attack to units.
2) Horse/wargs.... no real tactical advantage. Only movement bonus, but movement per cost wise you can make infantry as fast as horsemen by adding extra equipment for almost the same cost.... tactically the difference is marginal (in my opinion)...
Add some bonuses/abilities to horses/wargs
Charge: mounted units do more damage to unmounted units
Harass: a special attack that allows mounted units to use all thier action points to do a non-counterable attack (counterd only by units with first strike ability) and retreat
Also you can make horse archers with long bows... first of all that`s ridiculous. If mounted units were only allowed use the short bows ----> short bow doesn`t become obsolete ---> unit design becomes more important ---> tactical depth increases
3) Some other tactical features
Gaurd - Shield carrying Units can protect adjacent units
Flank - Attacking a unit that is engaged with one of your units from the side or rear will increase damage
Just saw this topic and it falls in line with a lot of the ideas I posted in the "Tactical combat is fun!" topic. I just wanted to say I agree. When all the performance issues are finally dead, I'll be ready to seriously play Elemental if the tactical battles can be made more interesting.
bump for supporting tactical battle love. As of right now tactical battles consist of my mouse clicking the auto-resolve button.
"SPECIAL TRAINING"
I think the ability could work as the armours, weapons and equipments work.
They could be named as "special training" or some similar
the special training could have its cost in money, time and salary and you can give it if you want
every ability (not definitely every, but most) needs a weapon (or/and) armour (or/and) shield prerequisite on the unit
- (for example falanx needs large shild and one handed spearlike weapon)
the unit with special training could have some ability point (like the mana), and it could use its special ability from that pool
but the prerequisite of this is the initiative check, other way it kill the balance (more)
(or don't need mana, but that case the ability must be less effective / the problem with mana using, that the AI spares its mana on easy targets and you can take an advantage on it, but its more fun and more tactical / solution can be: every unit can use its special ability once per battle)
- so an example: you make 4 rchers, give them bow, cost (only for the exampla, not real): 160 gold, 40 materials, 12 turn, 2 gold/turn
because the bow you can give them the marksmann ability (double damage): 220 golt, 40 mate, 15 turn, 3 gold/turn
so i don't want to make all the abilities, just want to show the system
i think it could work well
(and leadership could set the maximum number of units per stack, it could work like strenght, essence . . . )
I would also like to see more results beyond "hit" or "miss". What about "stunned", "knock unconscious for X turns", "parry a blow", "blood loss" etc. We need all sorts of different possible reactions beyond either a miss or -X HP. The animations and sounds need to be completely revamped, too. I want to hear swords hitting shields, or the clang of blade on blade. Battle cries, trumpeting horns (perhaps for a morale boost?), etc.
As far as I am concerned, tactical battles haven't been developed at all. What we have now really seems like a placeholder.
And we are a lot to say it since the idea came out on the boards You can attack faster with a weapon than with bare hands -___-
Bare hands should be the fastest you can go without any magical help.
I don't know if Brad will but these in, We talk a lot about those in beta but as you can see none was in.......
Wounds are the way to go. But single unit and party unit can't have the same mechanics (if a 10 people unit is stunned, are they all stunned ? Or just some of them ?)
Morale could be a per/unit basis and be a way to simulate loss of spirit, stunned units, etc... It would still lacking things like bleed but that would still be a major improvement.
Well it's true that actual tactical battles have no interest.Just wait 2 tiles away from the enemy unit to give the first blow,that's all... and sometimes shoot at range enemy,that's all... no fun.
The job of the developpement team must be insteresting at the present time with all suggestions going on.I hope they preordered a full truck of coffee
That's a good point. Perhaps we need two systems? So if it is man vs man, results such as wound, stunned, etc. would be the result. But if it is a unit of men, a different set of results kick in, such as "disorganized", "shaken", etc.
I would like to see larger maps, so that a player can attempt to outflank his opponent and gain a bonus to his attack. This would also allow both sides more room to manuever. Now all you see is a straight attack down the middle of the map.
I agree that a mounted unit should get a bonus to his attack.
I would also like to see more tactical options for a unit. Example - a company of infantry units could be ordered for form a shield wall and gain protection from archery attacks. A company of men armed with polearms could be ordered to plant spears and thus gain a defense bonus vs. calvary attacks. Perhaps, only experienced units can execute certain commands.
Example of tactical command available for units: Shield Wall, Opportunity Fire
No Experience - No shield wall, even if armed with shield.
Experienced - Shield Wall (Movement reduced to zero, +2 defense to frontal attack)
Highly Experienced - Mobile Shield Wall (movement reduction -1, +2 defense to frontal attack)
No Experience Archer - No opportunity fire possible
Experienced Archer - Opportunity Fire (Archers fire automatically at first unit that moves within range, movement reduced to zero, no normal attack if opportunity fire)
Highly Experienced - Designated Opportunity Fire (Archers fire at first unit that moves to attack designated unit, no movement, normal attack allowed (i.e. 2 attacks: 1 opportunity fire + 1 standard attack)
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