CHAOS Realm

[Nelphine]

Experience levels throw a huge wrench in this too. Since most city units are multifigure, every level is a big boost (elite and champion are massive boosts). The cost comparisons should probably be level 0 for spearmen, level 1 for smithy, level 2 for armorer's guild and magicians, and.. I would say level 2 for fighters guild, but I could see an argument for level 1, especially due to AI. Level 1 it is.

So a great drake with warp reality should be equal to 9 veteran armorer's guild troops.

Edit: plus alchemy, and minerals. Top 3 city troop tiers should all assume alchemists lab. Mithril and adamantium and orihilcron just make things worse.

[GermanJoey]

I think city troops being more cost efficient in terms of raw strength than VR summons is how it should be, because the VR summon gives more strength for the amount of slots it uses in its stack. For instance, you can theoretically put 9 Great Drakes in a single stack, but you can't do that with 81 Berserkers. Most high-end summons also have special abilities that city troops don't have. More realistically, you can put 2-3 Heroes, a VR summon, an R summon, and some Armorer's Guild troops (or magicians) together to form a doomstack that's a lot stronger than it would be if the summons were more city troops instead.

That said, I agree that I don't find most VR summons worth the effort. For example, I agree that a Great Drake does enormous damage and is truly extremely hard to kill under Warp Reality. However... you can say the same thing about most Armorer's Guild units under Doom Mastery and Blazing March. Without WR, a Great Drake gets worn down pretty quickly by Ranged and Halberdiers. Furthermore, Great Drakes get relatively little benefit from Blazing March or Chaos Surge, which are two of the better high-end Chaos spells that you'll definitely want to be using all the time when you have access to them. Or Doom Mastery for that matter, but that's an issue for all Chaos Summons. So why spend so much research and casting skill on a Great Drake? Even if I got the spell from a node or tower or whatever, I'd rather be summoning Doom Bats (if I've got Magic Vortex or Armageddon or CtV) or Efreets (if I need nukes) or Manticores (if I've got Chaos Surge).

As for how to improve the GD, I'm not sure. It's already the strongest unit, but is vulnerable to more strategic threats like kiting w/ ranged, attacks from strong melee (especially berserkers, FWIW) and disables like web. I don't think simply increasing its stats a little bit will really make a difference in how its used - by which I mean, it would still win in situations where it won before, and still lose in situations where it lost before. In fact, I guess this is pretty much the problem with the GD. It's basically a flying unit with very high damage and high defense, but Chaos has no shortage of units exactly like this.

Instead, I feel like I'd rather see it... and in fact, many other higher-end summons in general, now that I think about it, be maybe a little weaker but significantly cheaper. It would make them more cost-effective as compared to city troops and encourage players to use more mixed strategies. Maybe they wouldn't even need to be weaker, since you've already spent 6000 mana on its research cost. and a wizard getting a Very Rare summon should be a pretty scary thing. This would be a buff to the AI too, since they already spam summons like crazy.

[Seravy]

How does the breath not kill things? 35 strength at +3 to hit is 21 points of damage. That kills almost anything...
Also, 10 shields is about the third highest value on a summoned creature, how it that weak?

My off the cuff gut feeling is to increase every very rare armor by 4 or 5.

Then all of them would be impossible to damage for multi-figure units in general, especially normal ones.

Problems...let's see.

1. Very rares rely on armor to be strong. At 10+ armor, they barely take any damage from multifigure normal units, which makes them worth as much as 9 of those or more. But this is only true if those units are not buffed. Put flame blade on each, add prayer, and they are now 2-3 times as good as the drake because as soon as their damage exceeds the 10 shields, each buff adds like another 5-10 damage per attack. If you play realms that can buff, this is a more reliable strategy - and chaos can buff.
2. The cost of the unit is high. Yes, the very rare creature kills two rares, but costs twice as much too. The only real advantage is you have twice as much power in one slot. An advantage the AI can't use and the human player often can't afford to use because they simply don't have twice as much casting skill to do so (and 9 rares are usually enough against anything except capitals anyway).
3. While there is low availability (you can summon one of these every 2-5 turns), combat direct damage spells can kill them without costing the other person overland casting skill. Killing a 1000 cost unit for 5*25 mana (Lightning Bolts) is 10x more cost effective than killing...2 berserkers that each have a Flame Blade (100 cost).

Problem is if we lower the cost (on rare+ summons in general), it's a huge advantage to the human player - they can build stacks of 9 of these units, the AI can't - at least they are bad at it and need like 6 times the amount of creatures to have it happen - or not if there is a target fewer can attack. (I might be able to change this but quite unlikely)
Also, the only thing that (sometimes) keeps an AI capital safe is that they have these creatures and the human player can't summon a stack of 9 of them to match it.
Ultimately, cheaper very rares is bad for the AI because they suck at using strong overland units.

Doing it would fix "2." and "3." though and to some extent even "1." So it's a good idea but I'm worried about the AI implications.

[GermanJoey]

The breath won't kill things if the Great Drake is attacked, rather than to be the one attacking. Which is the way to kill Great Drakes - either hit them with powerful ranged spam/nukes, and/or hit them with cheap high-attack melee, such as Berserkers, Draconian Halbers, etc. You might take some losses, but considering how enormously expensive a GD is, you come out way ahead.

It's not that a question of whether a Great Drake is weak (it is definitely not, which is why I say I don't think buffing it will help), it is a question of whether its cost of 8000 RP plus 1000 mana + 1000 skill per drake will help you win the game more rather than doing other things with that huge amount of resources. That's what Nelphine and I are saying - the Great Drake doesn't really give you anything different (in a strategic sense) than other stuff that Chaos already gives you for cheaper, so it is generally not worthwhile to get Great Drakes.

[Seravy]

...I think we have found a fundamental flaw in the game.

As long as a wizard can be banished, aside from a long war of attrition where no one banishes the other, there are only two ways to win the game :

1. Your best stack is stronger. This means you can banish the enemy wizard, which allows you to kill all their other troops while they are out.
2. Your best 2 (or 3 or 5 or 9) stacks are stronger than the best enemy stack (in their capital). You still banish the wizard and win.

For 1, the human player can do it, the AI can't unless the human player has no access to the same tier of units at all (or can't afford 9 of them)
For 2, this one is worse. Yes, the human player can do it and the AI can't again, but there is more. Your best 18-27-36-81 units are better than the enemy 9 units, you win. The attacker gets a chance to attack many times a turn. The defender can't refill their garrison. So even in theory, capitals are impossible to defend - even against lower tier units - unless the defender can't lose units. (Heck, even if your 81 units are worse, you still win - you get to cast 9 combat worth of direct damage spells which is enough to kill almost anything. The defender can't cast anything to gain units for the next battle aside from healing, regeneration and raise dead.)

...I don't think this can be fixed and is probably why no other 4x game has a capital mechanic like this. It doesn't work and isn't AI friendly.

...and until this is fixed, giving the player easier access to units that have a better strength/slot by lowering costs is a mistake. (even though I agree it would be the best solution.)

[GermanJoey]

That is very true. Right now the dominant strategy is to beeline for Wizard's towers, banish them at whatever cost, and then efficiently take as many cities as possible while you can cast and they can't. That's one of the biggest reasons why high-mp units and various "rush" strategies work so well - you may take huge losses when taking the capital, but then you can take additional cities (and clear away wandering units) at only a fraction of the cost. A city that may have otherwise easily repelled a 9-unit halber or magician stack can now be taken with just 1 or 2 units now that possession/confusion/flame strike/etc/etc is no longer being spammed against you.

I don't think it would be so hard to fix this, however.

1.) Allow banished wizards to continue casting in-battle.
2.) Banished wizards still gain income from nodes/cities/etc.
3.) Continue to prevent overland casting until the spell of return is cast, but make that spell significantly cheaper. (maybe just 100 mana)

You could still give a banished wizard some sort of penalty for losing their tower - such as any spell they were in-process of casting is now canceled, and whatever spell they were researching is now reset back to nothing.

[GermanJoey]

Back to Chaos VRs, Hydras have the same problem as Great Drakes in that they're another unit that already does what Chaos already gives you. They're pretty much just a souped up Halberdier. They're good in whatever situation Halbers are good, and bad in whatever situation Halbers are bad. However, they're a hell of a lot more expensive than a Halber and share its critical weakness of being very slow. It's also not very thematic for Chaos, as the only time you'd want Hydras are when you need a very reliable unit for campaigns that you otherwise expect to cause you a lot of losses.

An idea I had to fix this unit is to change it into an in-battle summon, like so:

Summon Hydra
cost: 80mp
Attack/Defense/Resistance/Breath: same as now
Regenerates
HP: down from 10hp per figure to 5hp (4hp) per figure
Movement: 1
Has a ranged attack (9 ammo) equal in strength to its breath attack.

Is summoned onto a random square of the battlefield.
Is uncontrollable; will randomly attack one unit per turn. (or move randomly if it is out of ammo with no adjacent enemy units nearby)

What do you think? It would be pretty strong, but there'd still be a lot of ways to counter it. The random location and random attack also suits Chaos pretty well.

[Seravy]

"1." This is most definitely needed - I'm not happy about it but there is no way around that.
"2." I think this is unnecessary - The AI doesn't run out of mana while banished thanks to alchemy. Not getting income would be the main remaining penalty for losing a capital. (though if they spend on combat spells it might become a problem)
"3." You are actually casting an overland spell : The Spell of Return. Which is the perfect explanation why you can't cast another one. I don't think there is a need to reduce the cost - if you can keep casting combat spells, even extending the duration makes sense. This also means whatever you were casting does get cancelled - you have to cast the Spell of Return.

I think I'd like to combine 1 with 2 into "all spells cast in combat have a range penalty of 4x instead of the normal amount", replacing the loss of mana income. (or maybe 5)
Possibly add "the wizard cannot gain SP and RP while banished". (and forcing player to produce 100% mana crystals.
Makes a bit of sense - if you aren't there, you can't raise your skill or research spells.

...but these are drastic changes that fundamentally alter the game. I don't know what players would think about it (probably would hate the idea). Probably it would be better to make it optional (and default to "On").

[Seravy]

Back to Chaos VRs, Hydras have the same problem as Great Drakes in that they're another unit that already does what Chaos already gives you. They're pretty much just a souped up Halberdier. They're good in whatever situation Halbers are good, and bad in whatever situation Halbers are bad. However, they're a hell of a lot more expensive than a Halber and share its critical weakness of being very slow. It's also not very thematic for Chaos, as the only time you'd want Hydras are when you need a very reliable unit for campaigns that you otherwise expect to cause you a lot of losses.

I think Hydras offer two unique features Chaos otherwise does not have and both work well for the realm.

1. It has regeneartion
2. It has 90 HP - twice as much as the second most durable unit in the game.

What this means is you have an ultimate tank that can stay alive while you burn all enemy units with combat spells, and then it comes back to full health (even if it died) to do it again. Enemy city full of ranged enemies? A halberder won't do you any good, even 9 won't. But send 2 Hydras, spam Flame Strike or Apocalypse and you win without losses.

..and there is the new uncommon spell that is definitely very powerful on them because it raises speed and armor - the two weak points the unit has - plus it regenerates so it's not affected by the drawbacks.

[Seravy]

Made a thread for discussing how Banishment should change : http://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/showt...p?tid=8801