https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEiqQTJcLzo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nQGB_N1tMM
As we can see in this video, a single unit of werewolf is still powerful enough to beat stacks of 4-5 enemy units. Those without weapon immunity I'm ok with, but these stacks included bears, nagas, occasionally spiders, and two summoned centaurs. In many of these battles the werewolf barely wins (even goes down to 1 hp left) but still they win consistently.
I believe it is more reasonable to require at least 2 wolves to fight that many enemy units. If 1 can do this much, they can expand way faster than any other strategy in the game.
(Note, I'm still watching the second video and there will be more parts coming so it might change my thoughts, but currently this doesn't feel right.)
So we likely still need to do something about it.
I see 5 different possible actions (and we can also combine more than one) :
Regeneration 0
This has very small impact on the short term effectiveness of the unit, and will also have minimal impact to larger stacks, while it still has large impact on solo or small unit count werewolf stacks. It also has no effect on the strategic strength of the unit.
Less HP (4/figure)
This has massively less impact on the long term effectiveness, but will impact short term ability to survive, making it the opposite of the above. The breaking point is around turn 6, after that, the Regeneration nerf will be more effective. This reduces strategic strength by 20%.
Armor 2
This makes the unit take more damage, so it'll much more likely die when fighting multiple ranged enemies alone. This makes the unit weaker against everything, and also reduces their strategic strength by about 20%. It also brings down mithril and adamantium wolves to more managable levels but the difference between them and normal will likely even grow.
No Poison Immunity
This makes them fight fairly against Nagas, Ghouls and Spiders. They'd still beat those creatures, but not in the current "1 wolf beats 4-5 of those" manner. It also makes the realm less effective at countering those realms and is one we are already considering and likely will add for other early Death units. However, this has no effect on any battle where poison units are not involved, so those early battles of 1 wolf vs 2 centaurs, 2 bears and other things, would still be a win. Since we wanted Death to counter Nature, this might be acceptable but I'm worried letting 1 wolf win instead of 2 results in too fast expansion. This also has no effect on strategic rating (which I think is about right as is, equals spiders or unicorns, nearly twice as much as a ghoul.).
However as Cloak of Fear is fairly effective against Nagas, this might have less impact than expected.
No Death Immunity
This makes the vulnerable to Black Sleep so you will require using more than one unit against Death wizards. It also means they pretty much auto-lose to Night Stalkers. Additionally, they'll be raised as undead when killed by Ghouls or zombies, and will be unable to regenerate if killed by those, even if winning the battle.
No Illusion Immunity
This makes them vulnerable to confusion. Similar to Black sleep except against Sorcery and you don't get your wolf back after battle, even if you win. Not really a fan, as that really defeats the purpose of using regeneration units. Illusion units doing more damage has minimal impact, as the wolf has low armor to being with.
Disallow Magic/Mithril/Adamantium weapons/armor
This doesn't address the base problem directly but prevents those ores from escalating it. Adding +1 to hit to compensate for the loss of magic weapons might be necessary. Alternately keeping the magic weapons, only disabling mithril and adamantium would still require the alchemist guild (or alchemy retort) but would still get rid of the extra armor. The upside is being more AI friendly, as they missing out on adamantium/mithil will no longer matter.
(and now back to watching part 2, which might change my opinion. Right now he has 13 cities and seems to be mostly successful at holding them all, in 1403.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nQGB_N1tMM
As we can see in this video, a single unit of werewolf is still powerful enough to beat stacks of 4-5 enemy units. Those without weapon immunity I'm ok with, but these stacks included bears, nagas, occasionally spiders, and two summoned centaurs. In many of these battles the werewolf barely wins (even goes down to 1 hp left) but still they win consistently.
I believe it is more reasonable to require at least 2 wolves to fight that many enemy units. If 1 can do this much, they can expand way faster than any other strategy in the game.
(Note, I'm still watching the second video and there will be more parts coming so it might change my thoughts, but currently this doesn't feel right.)
So we likely still need to do something about it.
I see 5 different possible actions (and we can also combine more than one) :
Regeneration 0
This has very small impact on the short term effectiveness of the unit, and will also have minimal impact to larger stacks, while it still has large impact on solo or small unit count werewolf stacks. It also has no effect on the strategic strength of the unit.
Less HP (4/figure)
This has massively less impact on the long term effectiveness, but will impact short term ability to survive, making it the opposite of the above. The breaking point is around turn 6, after that, the Regeneration nerf will be more effective. This reduces strategic strength by 20%.
Armor 2
This makes the unit take more damage, so it'll much more likely die when fighting multiple ranged enemies alone. This makes the unit weaker against everything, and also reduces their strategic strength by about 20%. It also brings down mithril and adamantium wolves to more managable levels but the difference between them and normal will likely even grow.
No Poison Immunity
This makes them fight fairly against Nagas, Ghouls and Spiders. They'd still beat those creatures, but not in the current "1 wolf beats 4-5 of those" manner. It also makes the realm less effective at countering those realms and is one we are already considering and likely will add for other early Death units. However, this has no effect on any battle where poison units are not involved, so those early battles of 1 wolf vs 2 centaurs, 2 bears and other things, would still be a win. Since we wanted Death to counter Nature, this might be acceptable but I'm worried letting 1 wolf win instead of 2 results in too fast expansion. This also has no effect on strategic rating (which I think is about right as is, equals spiders or unicorns, nearly twice as much as a ghoul.).
However as Cloak of Fear is fairly effective against Nagas, this might have less impact than expected.
No Death Immunity
This makes the vulnerable to Black Sleep so you will require using more than one unit against Death wizards. It also means they pretty much auto-lose to Night Stalkers. Additionally, they'll be raised as undead when killed by Ghouls or zombies, and will be unable to regenerate if killed by those, even if winning the battle.
No Illusion Immunity
This makes them vulnerable to confusion. Similar to Black sleep except against Sorcery and you don't get your wolf back after battle, even if you win. Not really a fan, as that really defeats the purpose of using regeneration units. Illusion units doing more damage has minimal impact, as the wolf has low armor to being with.
Disallow Magic/Mithril/Adamantium weapons/armor
This doesn't address the base problem directly but prevents those ores from escalating it. Adding +1 to hit to compensate for the loss of magic weapons might be necessary. Alternately keeping the magic weapons, only disabling mithril and adamantium would still require the alchemist guild (or alchemy retort) but would still get rid of the extra armor. The upside is being more AI friendly, as they missing out on adamantium/mithil will no longer matter.
(and now back to watching part 2, which might change my opinion. Right now he has 13 cities and seems to be mostly successful at holding them all, in 1403.)
