Content
Added lots of new early game common items so there is a greater variety of stuff to find, Trog Blood, Quendar Wine, Bottled Fire, Recall Scroll, Wellspring Scroll, Despair scroll, Dark Candle, Enchanted Collar, Fireball Scroll, Pariden Wine, Ironeer Ale, Prismatic Potion, Curse Scroll, Rusty Helmet, Rusty Curiass, Rusty Greaves, Rusty Vambraces and Rusty Boots
Fixes
Fixed an issue where henchmen couldn’t wear cloaks or use ranged items
Updated the threat level on the diseased livestock and the Alchemists offer quests
Fixed Craul’s schizophrenia
Switched Rihanna the Scorpion’s dagger to one she can use
Fixed the Market and Merchantcross Bazzar (so they are now buildable in towns)
All blunt weapons (except staves) Bash now
Fixed a font issue on Vista
Fixed a wrapping issue with the tooltip for the Refuge of the Dark Sorcerer
You no longer get population added to your cities when you disband units
Fixed bug with the AI treaty offer
Fixed bug that could cause outposts to be built too close to one another
Fixed a bug with the Receive and Demand tribute treaties
Fixed slow frame rate/stuttering in cloth map mode
Fixed an issue with the Paragon spell (wouldn't take hp from the caster if he was in an army)
Fixed an issue keeping newly designed Henchmen from being trainable
You can now see the full description on trait abilities on the custom faction screen
Guardian Idols won't show up in the caster list for strategic spells anymore
Fixed a mouseover issue in the ui when viewing resources (could cause the lines to get messed up or strange coloration, possibly cooties)
Fixed an issue where wildlands dont get converted if the AI conquers them
Ejecting a unit correctly moves it out of the stack now
Fixed the Revelry event (finishes research and completes the first unit in the queue)
Fixed an issue where some players dont see the sovereign on the choose sovereign screen (unless they run with the /nomultisample parameter)
Fixed an issue with the Order of the Asok tile design not showing up
Fixed an issue where modifiers that were per Essence weren't being calculated correctly
Fixed crashes
Fixed an issue where city tile designs dont show up when you discover AI cities
Fixed an issue where quest locations aren't linked in the empire tree after a reload
Fixed the Varda quest
Fixed an issue that allowed Summoner's Boon to be cast multiple times
Balance
Cities provide production (so your city increases in production as the city level increases)
All sovereigns can cast Paragon and Steal Spirit
Summoners Boon cant stack
Reduced tech costs
Increased Mount costs
Magic staves crystal costs are reduced, they do slightly more damage
Changed hit points from 4 (base) + 4 (per level) to 6 (base) + 2 (per level) so a few levels don't make such a dramatic difference
Monsters were given many traits (Frail, Endurance I, Endurance II, Tough, Large, Monsterous) that impact their hit points per level
Changed Battle Axes, Maces, Broad Swords and Short Swords to be Uncommon items (so they won't be dropped by the early goody huts)
Black Widows get the Beguile ability (spell that causes the victim to have a 50% chance to strike a random target instead of the intended target)
Darkling Shamans can cast Shrink instead of Blindness
Darling Warriors can cast Blindness
Third Book of the Magic now has an appearance chance of 100%
The tax rate is applied to the entire cities gold production, running with low taxes is much harder now
Added the ability to modify min distance between cities by map size. Cities now have to be slightly farther apart on Large, and can be slightly closer together on Tiny
Master Scoutting ability will not keep monsters from attacking cities
When monsters conquer a city, they destroy it but they no longer raze it
Normalized the cost of armor (basically it used to multiply prod costs, now it increases at higher tiers, but at moderate amounts, if you have access to better armor, you should use it)
Normalized the cost of weapons
Normalized the cost of traits
Regeneration doesn't heal in tactical combat
AI
Fixed bug that caused AI not to "see" good tiles for cities
AI values materials as much as food
Put additional logical in tactical AI for determining whether to retreat
AI surrender threshold now hooked up
AI will now tend to go to war with your enemies if you have good relations
AI will typically go to war with your enemies if you have an alliance
Monsters more aggressive about attacking cities on higher levels
UI
New city details screen (http://screencast.com/t/cRWI4yOfUso)
New city ledger screen, shows production, max and used essence, etc
Updated the abilities that unlock techs
Added provides tags to the water adept skills
Fixed a string not found error on the custom difficulty level
Added an icon for the Coal Stones spell
Shortened the desc on the Dark Spire so ol' man Wardell doesn't have to get out his reading spectacles
Mercenaries won't show up twice in the Hiergamenon
Full tooltips on objects in your production queue (rather than just the name)
Gildar and Mana are always displayed in the resource bar, even if they are 0
Added tooltips to the victory screen
The full "Quests" tag now shows up in the empire tree
The empire tree scrolls if oyu have to many entires to fit
Last setup screen button says "Play" now
New dragon textures and updated model
Lots of new sfx
Strategic regen keeps the downtime on an injured hero. If you fight a battle and get pounded with say 4 hp left. You're probably not going to do the next fight until the hero is somewhere around 20 hp for a little cushion. It takes a long time to heal naturally, so regen is saving you time for a healing hero
but you dont need to heal naturally
if you have regen you surely have heal too
and if you save the mana cost and upkeep of regen you have spare mana to heal
yeah i agree
i just dont see this job, also there are traits doing it, cities doing it
but well lets see how next build play
Oh no
Sincerely~ Kongdej
I don't think having turn limits is an elegant solution to over-kiting, simply because it doesn't really solve the abuse but it just makes some battles a more drawn out and boring affair, maybe over several turns.
Another poster has rightly raised some valid points concerning turn limits that I think should also be properly considered:
https://forums.elementalgame.com/432506/page/1/#3236373
I dont think the solution is perfect, or ungameable, but it reduces the bar on the exploit considerably. Streaching it between turns means that you as a player are losing turns when you could have been doing other things. Finghting other monsters you could beat, gathering form other goodie huts. The monster will heal, defending cities will get production (and the ability to rush). Units will move, enemies will attack.
On the negative side you are right, it isn't perfect. Im not to worried about defenders bouncing attacks by running around enemies. If an obsidian golem attacks you fast unit on a horse and you want to run around him until combat times out, more power to you. Better than spending 500 turns running around the golem and pinging it with minor arrow attacks (in my opinion). And there is no real defensive reward for the bounce (unlike the pinging).
On the positive side I like that it may turn some big city battles into multi-turn affairs. City heals, rushes production, sneaks in reinforcements between attack waves. Could be cool.
But there is a reason we havent cut it in yet, we have to play with it, it is being considered.
Turn limits is just a band-aid for the deeper issue: the rock/paper/scissors relationship between initiative, movement, and range (known as kiting). Crowd control needs to be addressed now that time and space have been introduced through initiative and tactical movement. All units need strengths in at least one of the above areas, through stats, or abilities to hinder those of opponents. A unit on one side of the battlefield should not be proficient in multiple methods of crowd control, while the opposition is weak in all of them. Balancing this mechanic will solve quite a few higher level issues.
Any chance we'll get a UI visual added that would show the ZoC for a pioneer's Outposts or Settlements?
Improving the tactical AI so that it recognizes kiting (or specifically, the dangers of it) would go a long way to improving tactical combat without limiting the player to prevent kiting in the first place.
Yes. Turn limit is not enough to stop kiting. We need some additional fixes: adding combat spells (or buff existing spells) and counterattack to powerful monsters, Freeze spell should not affect movement in tactical combat, etc.
Ensure that every unit (& monster) in the game is proficient in at least one of the following: initiative, movement, or range; either statistically, or via abilities that weaken an opponent's stats.
I love this part of time limits.
Is .981 going to be released today? I can play a few Demigod matches 'till then...
I don't really like the sound of limits on tactical battles - it sounds terribly arbitrary. I can strike the enemy - which I am in melee range of - exactly 7 times but NOT 8.
I want a REAL siege mechanic instead of that... thing... you are describing.
But I guess it could actually turn out to be fun to play with such a rule. Techs could improve the limit. Defensive improvements could reduce it. Special army leader champions could increase it. Mighty spells could extend it.
You absolutely need to come up with a reasonable lore-excuse for it though. The obvious being supply lines for your army. Which means you should have more time when attacking in your own ZoC, and less when in the enemy's. Outposts could help you as well.
Release today, Kael/Derek?
I agree with Heavenfall, if turn limit is to be introduced, an idea which I don't like, at least make it an organic mechanic, not an arbitrary number. You can improve it with technology, you can make a buff like Endurance, which increases turn limit by 50% for a given army, but this is a lot of work, and it has to be done if this mechanic is to be integrated into the game, and not be an annoying arbitrary limit to gameplay.
I would rather a 'number of turns of inactivity (other than movement)' instead of 'limited number of turns'. Still can be abusable, but with the regen nurf, to stay in battle you need to take the occasional hit.
I love the idea of turn limits in tactical battles. Romance of the Three Kingdoms did it, and when you hit the end of the limits and had to fight the battle next turn with what you had ( + any reinforcements), you knew things just got real.
turn limit just mess so many more things that the problems it solve
lets follow guide for game designer:
1. Does it match the games focus?
not at all game focus was never supposed to be on hit and run
2. Does it solve a problem?
well arguably yes even if there are 320 better ways to solve it
3. Does it solve multiple problems?
surely not, also it CREATES multiple problems
4. Does it have drool factor?
no, it totally sux and made ppl agry already
5. How difficult is it to implement?
its easy but then youll have to balance it again and also add content to interact with it so its not a deus ex machina setup
so basically while i think its easy it will take a lot of time to fix all accessory settings it will create
Since a turn is one season, does this mean that all militia stacks would regenerate in city battles?
And would each side get experience in tied battles? I think this would be good too.
I love this idea. Not only does it solve some of the lamer exploits involving kiting but regardless of that it will add so much to the game. Multi turn battles would be awesome and add so much real strategy, instead of tactical blobbing. Just think a real intelligent retreat mechanic, instead of every battle being a grind to the death.
First i thought that a time limit is a bad idea, but multi-turn battles are really interesting, because strategic spells could be cast between the turns to summon new units or kill enemy units.
Three things should be considered:
- The strategic combat spells will be much more important and should be scaled down.
- To encourage multi-turn battles it should be easier to flee. Escape scrolls should be sold from the beginning in the store.
- City defenders could have a higher turn limit and the turn limit could be increased with fortress improvements.
Another option, though this would most likely be a 'feature', would be to decrease the size of the tatical map every X turns. This way, ranged units are welcome to kite...but eventually they're going to run out of room to kite.
do you guys understand that this system totally DESTROY the balance that is already on the edge
with turn limit all melees will be even more useless
the point of melees is that it take N turns to start doing things, but when they do they are strong
making a limit means every melee is so much less effective
also its basically a kiting exploit even empowered
basically every battle restart with melee far aways FORCED to take n hits each restart from mages/archers etc etc
this is totally uncool
But wouldn't it be to the advantage of the defending cities for battles to have fewer turns, rather than more?
What about AoW's system where attacking units can flee any unit via any exit square (except for quests like the Arenas or Tombs or Underground Quests in FE)? So any attacker that reaches an exit square can exit the battle and survive, in return for forgoing battle experience. As in AoW, defenders (including city defenders) would not be able to escape the battle this way.
However, in this case, you could still have rare escape scrolls that could be used by attackers or defenders, that would always return you to your capital, like it said originally in the Escape scroll text. If it was an attack on your capital that you are escaping from, the escape would take you to the city that would be your capital next, or if you were escaping from your last city, a selected place (which you would set before battle) up to 10 viewed squares away from your capital that you would escape to?
Having attacker escape squares and the ability for (rare) escape scrolls to actually take you to your capital would be an asset to the game, I think. What do others think?
I agree with this with some additional caveats. For example I don't care if players kite weak monsters. If a banished ogre doesnt have a good defense against a fast ranged unit, that's fine with me.
But it is a bigger deal for higher level monsters, and I will go through and review them all with an eye to figuring out which ones are vulnerable to kiting and what can be done to address that, especially if it makes the monster more interesting. For example, drakes movement may need to be increased. Powerful ogres may gain the Hurl Boulder ranged attack ability. Obsidian Golems may gain an Imprison spell that removes a units movement for a few turns and does damage each turn. All worth looking at regardless of the larger issue 9and it will feed into that larger issue as you note).
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