So right now the team is working on getting v1.09 of Elemental out this week. I’ve been working on the AI which continues to generate a considerable amount of pain for me but it’s getting better but as I’ve gotten better at the game I’ve found it very problematic at certain things.
What I’m working on tonight is a detailed user manual update that will be based on v1.1 of the game (global mana and population as a resource). Population as a resource was something discussed in the beta a lot and was one of the core design elements of the game got lost because, at the time, the engine didn’t support non-storable resources (i.e. resources that are calculated each turn).
Playing Civilization V
I’ve been playing a lot of Civilization 5 recently. I am enjoying it quite a bit and I really really wish the Civ and Elemental communities would cease sniping at each other. It may seem hard to understand this but Stardock and Firaxis are on the same side. We’re not competitors. We’re friends. I think I can safely say that we want Civilization V to succeed and Firaxis wants Elemental to succeed. What neither of us want is for everyone to just throw their hands up and decide that Elemental II/Civilization VI should be a first person action game.
Anyway, my point is, please don’t use our forums to criticize Civilization V. Given the state Elemental launched in, it makes us wince (glass houses, stones, etc.). But flaming Civilization V is about the same as flaming Elemental to us. They’re our friends. Please back off.
Elemental UI
Now, a lo of people have been talking about the original Elemental PAX Beta UI:
So why did we change from that to our current UI?
There were a lot of reasons but a big one was, at the time we had to do a UI, performance. These are development journals so one assumes some of you guys like technical details. But basically, at the time we had to finalize our UI, we couldn’t support having a context-sensitive detached UI like this (the highlighted object would bring up a context-sensitive mini UI where the current item was). It also required 1280x1024 which we weren’t prepared to require as our minimum resolution.
After Elemental: War of Magic, we’ll be able to reevaluate what the engine can support.
Other Ramblings
So v1.09 is still mostly about bug fixing, memory optimization, etc. A broken API got fixed that made the AI considerably better but it’s still way way too unaggressive. Having a non-cheating AI kind of stinks sometimes because the AI doesn’t usually know how weak your cities are. In GalCiv, the AI could come up near your planets and see how poorly defended. But the same technique fails in Elemental because they don’t get close enough to your cities to see how weak they are and then coordinate. So it’s something I’m still trying to deal with. But if anyone wondered why the AI wasn’t “aggressive” enough now you know. It’s something I’m painfully aware of.
Demo version
The demo version won’t come out until v1.1 and will be based on that.
Best Buy and Walmart content
v1.09 will also coincide with the special content for people who bought the game as Best Buy or Walmart. They get their own special quests. That said, we will be providing this content for free to all users 90 days after their availability to those users (they paid for them so don’t feel like you missed out).
Similarly, if you bought the book Elemental: Destiny’s Embers, the full map of Anthys, will be released this week for those who bought the book.
The book is at a bookstore near you. We’re pretty happy how it turned out and the book takes place 800 years AFTER the War of Magic so you can get some hints and allusions to things coming up in the game world over the next several years.
How about a unit that has a stealth or temporarily cloaking availability for a few turns?
Temporarily cloaking may be a good test of player spying skill, as well as good in unit balancing.
It may be expensive to produce and require players careful thought which turn to start cloaking and fastest escape from enemy territories
The closest thing I have found to Lords of Magic is King Arthur the Roleplaying Wargame, though it lack overland magic (and Lords of Magic's special edition did better with the story of Arthur). And it has no stealth or ships, but otherwise is somewhat similar.
Also Lords of Magic where you moved you steathy units mattered, they were easier to spot on high ground and when they got too close to the enemy units they were also visible.
I must say, that beta UI looks very elegant.
Also, those two pictures look so pretty and colorful. I don't recall my kingdom looking so beautiful. Am I playing the same game?
Although I am an unyielding advocate for non-cheating AI, I would condone allowing the AI to know my military strength. Forcing the AI to scout may even be a bad idea, considering how a player can "hide" his army by teleporting away when an enemy scout is sighted.
Yeah, that 2 pictures looks really good. The game is very ugly compared to that pictures.
Shouldn't cavalry require almost double the metal because the horse will get it's share of armor too? Definitely a thought provoker when making those evil munchkin army units.
Here's my shameless link for a gameplay change to improve the combat AI without actually altering the AI or cheating. Hopefully will help the comp retake those cities.
https://forums.elementalgame.com/397290/page/1/
As suggested multiple times in the forum:
- Use different damage and resistance types
- Ranged units should not be able to move and shoot in the same turn, but they should have many different weapons
- Mounted units should have higher damage if they move before the attack and lower damage if they dont move
The easiest way to make the three different is to start giving negatives on the appropriate item instead of just having all bonuses. Something like this:
Range Weapons: +ATK, -DEF, -MOV(ASPD)
Melee Weapons: +ATK, -MOV(ASPD)
Mounts: +MOV(ASPD), -ATK
Thus, archers are innately vulnerable, they do their damage at range, but if anything touches them (including other archers), it's over.
Calvary has higher movement and thus can rush down archers, their lower attack is okay due to archer's innate vulnerability.
Melee are slower, thus are vulnerable to archers at range, but are the stronger than calvary, so will beat them when 1v1.
And lastly, calvary archers might have more movement than normal archers, and thus can kite, but they are weaker than normal archers.
You basically get a system where Archers > Melee > Calvary > Archers.
Then, you can build on top of this by having various weapons offering other bonuses. Like spears/maces might offer some bonus def, or short bow might not have as much or any negative modifier to make them somewhat of a choice, etc..
I think that is a great idea and it should be very easy to use your suggestion in the current version of the game.
I don't know, that feels like forcing the rock/paper/scissors model by changing the wrong stats. Having a bow or sword doesn't reduce your defence or movement and mounted units are not always light cavalry.
Since the game has detailed unit customisation, it shouldn't apply arbitrary modifiers to make the model work, it needs to use weapons and armour with specific modifiers that reflect what their real advantage is. So:
Spears should give bonus attack against cavalry and suffer a penalty in woods.
Heavy armour slows movement.
Mounts should suffer a penalty in woods.
Mounts with lances should get a charge bonus if they move and attack (would only work if mounted units can move at least 3 squares, and you get this bonus if they move at least 2 squares then attack, to simulate the distance required to get to charge speed)
Swordsmen get bonus against spearmen (swordsmen are generally the classic anti-spear unit, because once they get past the spear wall their swords are more useful than the enemy's spears)
Archers' defence isn't penalised just for being archers - that should just come from how much armour you're willing to give them. But they are way too powerful in the current combat model... they should be affected by LoS, elevation difference, enemy under forest cover and importantly, their chance to hit should start quite low and only increase as they level up. Large units like dragons should have some stat that makes them much more likely to be hit by arrows as they're so big.
There was a progenitor ship in Sins that let you do just this, and it wasn't really overpowered. You just make it non-permanent, like it was in that game. Make it last X number of turns then they lose their intel.
Mounts with troops in heavy armor should either require breeding grounds(improvement that requires a stable and lvl 3 city), or get a move penalty.
The breeding grounds improvement should unlock better mounts. There could also be a racing horse which is quicker.
Empire should lose wargs, which should become a food source instead, and gain the ability to use horses themselves. Horses are rare enough that it doesn't need to be split up.
The warg resource: maybe empires could gain a similar improvement that would unlock warg mounts instead of just being a food source. You could have similar things for other sorts of mounts (which would be modded in, I'm shocked we don't have a bear mount mod yet)
In general, I'd like to see more buildings in Elemental down the line require lvl x city + resource. The specialist stuff should be strong enough, and the bonuses for leveling cities enough, to discourage ICS, but you'll need something to equally discourage OCC (one-city challenge).
I think another way this can work is making some of the logistics/training techs require buildings like barracks or training posts and the high end versions to require higher level cities in addition to boot. (maybe equal to level of city)
I agree on the specific modifiers. If you're going to have a fairly mundane model (which I'm fine with, only so many pointy-eared pretty-boys I can stand), you need some wargamey-type stuff in there. I think the fanbase here would respond positively to that.
Another thing down the road I'd want is AOW-style levelling up, where you can gain an ability on level up. Doesn't have to be something dramatic, a modifier could work as well. For example, a ranger-class hero (heros, especially adventurers should have classes)- could gain charm animal to get a chance to convert animals defeated in battle, or marksmanship bonuses to increase archery to-hit and damage, or poultice skills to improve healing rates. Warriors might get a weapon mastery skill to improve stats with weapons, or something making them immune to counterattack, a toughness skill that lets them roll their defense multiple times to get the best result, etc. These probably should be in addition to start bonuses.
One idea is instead of just a flat move penalty, have armor give encumberance, which reduces dex and move speed for different races differently.
That may be too complicated for base Elemental (I could see a mod trying to do something along those lines though)
...
QFT. Having mounts to reduce attack is ridiculous. Mounts in fact increase it by giving you charge speed, increasing impact strength, plus mount itself was used to attack enemies (war horses can stumble and bite, and wargs should be even deadlier). Plus mounts let you wear much more armor since you don't have to move it all by yourself.
I dont see a reason to nerf mounts at all. With 0.3/turnnode, we are quite limited in their production already. And historically, cost (in both monies and time to train rider and horse itself) was only disadvantage of heavy cavalry.
The whole point is to put a negative so you have to decide when to use it and when not to. Otherwise there's just no reason to ever not use it. Everyone will be on mounts whenever they can. There's really no decision in unit design if everything is just a big bonus.
Cavalry counter units would be the best solution. Spearmen/Pikemen with XP should get a cavalry foe modifier.
Also warhorses should be very pricey in both cost and infrastructure.
So? Its being offset by unavailability of horses/wargs. You cannot gather large mounted army in no time, it takes over 20 turns to get enough wargs for ONE squad even with multiple dens. So there IS decision. Have few, but powerful units, or have many less powerful.
As a long time owner of GalCiv II and all it's expansions and a member of the formerly awesome (and now defunct) Galactic Core forums, I want to say how much I appreciate Stardocks work on Elemental and it's commitment to making Elemental a true heir to MOM.
The original DOS versions of MOO and MOM were incredible, something I think anyone who posts on these forums can agree with. I felt that GalCiv II was the real heir to MOO, not MOO II. While I tried several different games that tried to be the nextgen MOM, none got it quite right or in some cases, even a little right. I purchased Elemental on the second day of it's release, confident that I would have a fun game that would be playable for years. While I was disappointed initially, the resultant patches and dev journals outlining the future direction of Elemental have really reaffirmed my faith in Stardock as a premier developer of strategy games for the PC.
As an example of "What not to do to your customers", I offer another game that I looked forward to with great anticipation, a PC adaptation of Games Workshops "Blood Bowl", developed by Cyanide in France and released by Focus as the publisher. BB was an incredibly popular game in Europe as a table top miniatures game and playable on line via an internet client from the FUMBBL website. I learned of the game from several Euro and Australian friends ( I'm an American ) and really got into the team building RPG elements combined with in game tactical strategy. Cyanide released a commercial PC version of this game that I waited for for over 18 months and bought on the second day as well. While there were tons of problems, I was patient because I knew that a 20+ year old board game would eventually be able to be faithfully translated to the PC after some patches.
Long story short; The developer never bothered to fully implement the printed rules of the game ( LRB 5.0 or "Living Rule Book 5.0 is available on-line for free, so there is no excuse for not knowing or implementing the rules), so there were many situations that were exploitable and atypical for players. The games AI opponent was horrid, because the developer said the game was aimed at MP ( something that was understandable to me for a primarily Table Top game) but the on-line MP system was completely ridiculous. Cheating and exploits were rampant, and the most common occurrence, a player quitting the game when he or she fell behind, was totally unplanned for, and then exploited by cheaters who actually profited from quitting before an opponents victory. Even Private leagues had problems, where all the players knew each other and played fairly, due to inconsistent awards due to dropping out internet connections during games. I was very patient with Cyanide, until no new patches came out for three months, despite lengthy bug lists posted by players. Then the other shoe dropped, a "Legendary" edition of the game was to be released, encompassing moist of the other teams from the board game that were left out of the original release, and NO FURTHER PATCHES OR FIXES WERE TO BE MADE TO THE ORIGINAL GAME ( only months old at this point ). To add insult to injury, the Legendary edition was not going to be offered at a discount, and there were no guarantees that the original edition would be compatible to play on-line with owners of the Legendary edition. All AI fixes were going to be from a player Mod that would be incorporated into the main DB and BTW NO MORE MODDING IS AUTHORIZED OR ALLOWED.
So, thanks Brad for being a responsible business owner. I appreciate the the fact that you lost sight of your goals while you were in "the weeds", and I appreciate your integrity for being committed to giving your customers the great game experience they were expecting. I have been playing 1.08 and all the intermediary versions, and everything keeps getting better and better. I look forward to the 1.1 version which will more closely approximate ( in my opinion ) the design genius of the original MOM.
Have a great day!
How do we make all 3 distinct and meaningful? Unit design tends to encourage users to create single glombed mega units that are expensive and largely unsupportable leaving the player to complain about "balance".
I would;
A. Add a primary training focus choice to the unit design screen. This would allow the system to track whether the unit was trained as a melee unit, ranged unit or calvary unit. You can't select weapons or armor until you select a training focus.
B. Give each type of unit access to unit actions specific to that type of unit.
Example: A melee unit equipped with a shield might have access to Shield Wall action (+2 armor, -1 movement). A Ranged Unit and Cavalry unit cannot use the Shield Wall action.
Example: A ranged unit has access to protective fire action (automatically attacks first unit that attacks a specified defending unit). Melee and Calvary units don't.
C. Let armor and your mount affect your ability to use various weapons. Example: A person wearing a plate helmet can't use a bow.
D. Add bonuses for flanking attacks. This would increase the need for a unit to be supported.
Perhaps higher maintenance for mounted units?
Problem: The AI doesn't know the size of other Players cities.
Solution: (Since this is a game about magic) New Spell: Scry City - this spell allows the caster to gain information about any city
Counterspell 1: Cloak City. This makes Scry City more difficult - if you add extra mana you can completely block the spell. Of course, a cloaked city is probably rather important, so the AI might decide to attack it with a large amount of troops.
Counterspell 2: City Illusion - this spell allows the caster to cast the illusion of a city anywhere in his territory (or maybe anywhere on his map). In combination with Cloak City the caster could put the illusion of a larger city when there is a small one, or the illusion of a small village when actually it is a metropolis.
I'm still more partial to a Spy unit / Spy pack. It feels wrong that magic should be the only possible way to gather intel.
The spy pack would add a "Sneak" ability to the unit. That makes it invisible unless a hostile unit steps on an adjacent square.While the Sneak buff/mode is active, the unit can only move at a speed of 1 square / turn and is immune to speed buffs such as Endurance.If the unit disables Sneak in enemy territory or is "detected", the AI should see this spying as a hostile action. (which it is...)
Detection of spies might only be possible for some units, such as those with scout packs.A scout weaving his way deep into the enemy's territory, avoiding "detectors" would be a mini game all by itself.
Watchtowers should also be able to detect hidden units within x squares of the actual spot where the WT is built.Cities should be able to build multiple watchtowers if desired.That would give the watchtower a tangible reason to exist beyond increasing the city's sight range by a measly 0.5 - 1. (that's all it does atm)
At design, Spy packs need to limit the unit size and the armor a unit can use. A company of spies clanking around in full plate is not stealthy.Without restrictions there will be companies of heavy cavalry bowman spies.Why not? It would be an obvious advantage to be able to enter the "neutral" ZOC of the enemy, bringing your army in position for a simultaneous first strike on 5 lightly defended cities.
If magic does end up being the only / main means of spying, Scy City should have a decent chance to be detected by the enemy so there is some risk of the enemy declaring war over it.Otherwise it's just another freebie without consequences. One of those no-choices Elemental has to offer...
How about a modular UI. A UI that allows you to select
- Which part you want to appear on the screen
- Where do you want each part to appear
- and various ways to display the same information. (Short, Detailed, lots of graphics, etc)
This way I would be able to play elemental on my netbook which has a smaller resolution by customising exactly how I want My UI.
By the way, is it possible to make the game support 16 bit color depth. What do you lose if you use 16 bit instead of 32 bit? Do you lose translucency? It's not so bad? There are not that many situations where translucency is very useful.
<tongue slightly in cheek>
How could anyone miss the pure awesomeness a first person mode option for these games would be? You run around and can't see the landscape beyond normal first person. Have messengers asking what you want to do next. It's like, playing chess with blindfolds! AWESOME!! Every once in a while you could hire a scribe to draw a really crappy map that's supposed to be the field, but missing stuff here and there due to sketchy intelligence!
</tongue in cheek>
Well.. maybe?
Have specilized cavalry that can do melee or ranged, but not both. That's how. You can change your weapon set before/after battle, like now and fight with what you have armed.
Maybe a bell-curve in accuracy would also be good. Thus at high(est) and low ranges the archer is less accurate or does less damage (since damage depends on the arc in which a arrow hits). Also more ranged weapons would be nice say a Crossbow with middle-range good damage but very slow and a sling or javelins for lowrange ranged (like 2 to 3 fields) attacks.
The only mounted unit in rl. I know were mongols which used Riderbows on short and middlerange but never on high distances - i guess the accuracy wasnt good enough and the horse had to be stay still for a good longrange shot - and i guess Longbows on horseback are hard to handle.
Shields might also work against overpowered archers by increasing the dodge value against ranged weapons.
As for mounted units: giving them a "charge"-Attack would be need for horses. For wargs on the other hand some kind of flanking might be an idea - i mean if Unit A has unit B in front and Unit C on the site B and C could do more damge or could be more accurate.
Multiple melee units could use "formations"that give them advantages.
what bothers me btw. (since i am a bit to lazy to find a good thread) is that you have all those nice descriptions with all those little "trophys" on Monsters why didnt you expand on that in some kind of crafting mechanic?
Is it me or the graphics on the screen shot above looks better than the current game graphics?
Besides the different UI, Everything on the map looks more beautiful.
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