Equalizing heroes

[Anthony]

Currently, heroes have a basic power level (which varies by the hero, and is on average higher for heroes that require higher fame), which then gets bumped by level. A sudden odd idea I had, though: how about making it so all heroes start out roughly balanced with one another (though some might still require minimum fame), and then the role of fame is to increase the starting level of randomly summoned heroes -- say, 4 xp per point of fame (so at 5 fame all heroes start at level 2, 15 level 3, 30 level 4, 50 level 5; that might be the cap). Summon Hero would summon heroes at base xp, Summon Champion would summon at a higher level.

Not sure how practical that would be, and whether it would be a good change even if it was practical. Thoughts?

[kyrub]

The idea is neat and I remember that we pondered something similar in either Catnip or ZiKy projects.
The main Pro- for me is the splendid increase of variety in starting heroes. Current MoM suffers from terrible repeating of "seeing the old faces" again.

The main Contra is the fact that once your starting hero becomes really good, he will exceed your new hired heroes (unless you get your fame quickly up to 40, which you won't). The mid- and endgame heroes will feel like unnecessary underwhelming minnows and the game will continually lose its energy. You could lower fame requirements, but this system is very hard to balance, in some games you gain fame easily with good targets nearby, in others you must wait.



(Now, before I forget, the theme of hero variety could be partly solved with some adding of new early-game heroes into the old system. This idea has crossed my mind already. Maybe it is not entirely impossible to find some code space. I am not a fan of new content, but heroes are a welcome exception. And you have created quite an interesting poll of new heroes. This could be used, if all the parties are interested. Off topic, sorry, but I wanted to say that.)

[Anthony]

I did do some flattening of hero power level in my mod, but there's a problem with summon hero: it doesn't care about fame. Thus, I can't make the base power level of high fame heroes too high without causing issues.

If Summon Hero respected fame, that would also eliminate the problem, though at that point I'd probably make the spell cheaper (both to learn and to cast).

[kyrub]

If Summon Hero respected fame, that would also eliminate the problem, though at that point I'd probably make the spell cheaper (both to learn and to cast).

What exactly do you mean by "respecting fame"? Summon Hero never summons a champion, does it? So you mean SH should never give you a better hero than your fame level? Or never a worse hero than your fame level?

[Anthony]

What exactly do you mean by "respecting fame"?

SH, or finding a hero in a lair, doesn't check whether your fame is high enough for that hero to show up as a mercenary.

[kyrub]

SH, or finding a hero in a lair, doesn't check whether your fame is high enough for that hero to show up as a mercenary.

I think I did it for Catnip (so I have it somewhere). Not a big fan, as it makes the spell predictable and boring. Maybe some middle way? You may get a hero up to +1 above your fame bracket, that sounds 50% better. Summon champion stays the same.

[Anthony]

I think I did it for Catnip (so I have it somewhere). Not a big fan, as it makes the spell predictable and boring. Maybe some middle way? You may get a hero up to +1 above your fame bracket, that sounds 50% better. Summon champion stays the same.

I'd sort of like it if which heroes are good was random, though that would require a major revamp. Say, it goes through the list of heroes and picks 10 who get baseline abilities and cost 100, 5 who get +1 random pick and cost 150, 5 who get +2 random picks and cost 200, 5 who get 5 who get +3 random picks and cost 300 (this obviously requires rebalancing existing heroes). That would require a change in magic.exe (which is what sets the random picks on each hero) and also something in wizards.exe that adjusts the cost of heroes based on where they wound up in the list. Based on SaveGame2.html, byte 11 of the hero structure is trash and could probably be used to store the adjustment.

[kyrub]

I'd sort of like it if which heroes are good was random, though that would require a major revamp. Say, it goes through the list of heroes and picks 10 who get baseline abilities and cost 100, 5 who get +1 random pick ...

By "it goes through" you mean at the start of the game, when the game pre-creates heroes, right? Interesting idea! It would require some balancing of random picks (which is bound to happen in zitro's patch anyway).

I see a problem in the section of "knowledge of spells", though. Getting even basic Morgana or Malleus seems really powerful. So you'd have to think out how to pre-change this as well, or you would have to "neutralize" or "balance" the knowledge. - What if we use 2 spell places for "basic hero" and the other 2 for "advanced one"? Or better: the 100g hero gets 1 spell (common), 150g gets 2 (common + uncommon), 200g (common + 2 uncommons), 300g (... + rare). That could work, no?

Then there are the unit abilities. Could they be overpowered, flying Fang or invisible Ninja? Jaer the Windwalker seems a tough case.


(Another quick idea combining your previous suggestion with balancing Summon Hero: if SH summons 100g hero, it gives him more experience, say +150 experience, +70 exp for 150g, 0 for 200g. Not a solution, but better.)

[Anthony]

Then there are the unit abilities. Could they be overpowered, flying Fang or invisible Ninja? Jaer the Windwalker seems a tough case.

Jaer the Windwalker was such a tough case that I changed his ability from wind walk to flight in my mod. In general, though, you'd solve that with changes to other stats to balance out -- subtract a few points of attack, defense, or life, or maybe make a difference in whether the unit has a fixed skill in addition to randoms. Which you do depends on whether the ability is flat, or one that improves with level (for example, in my mod a melee hero with a thrown weapon doesn't get another attack advantage, while a hero without may get might, agility, or blademaster).

As far as knowledge of spells go, baseline casters probably won't have an awful lot of magic points, so it will take levels and bonuses before they can even cast the spells they know.

[kyrub]

As far as knowledge of spells go, baseline casters probably won't have an awful lot of magic points, so it will take levels and bonuses before they can even cast the spells they know.

But the wizard can, that is the problem. He gets Flame strike, Mind storm or Doom bolt for free in his spellbook.