I have been playing the mod for several hours these weeks, and I would like to write a couple of observations & suggestings mainly related to WotR, I would like to start with the general dynamics of the game, some ideas could be very good to apply in the mod.
1) Bonuses related to the conquest and preservation of territories specifically related to the faction you are playing with:
This section seems to me the most interesting to comment on, now that there are many factions, and these factions include certain territories on the map, my suggestion is to give extra bonuses if you have all the conquered territories that are related to the faction you are playing at that moment, for example; If you decide to play with Gondor, and all the territories that comprise this faction you have already conquered, you will have bonus attack / defense / resources / extra units for free, etc ... You could even make a dynamic of "unlocking units", i mean, you can only use some units in real time as in Living World, if you only have a particular territory in your domain. This would create a greater challenge in the way of playing, and in particular it seems like a possible idea to program it (because you guys have already enabled and disabled units that require something in particular).
This idea would further the desire to conquer as well as protect what you already have, as well as broaden the culture in the canon about which territories were allies or close to a particular faction and ultimately give a perspective on "what if..." Haradwaith attacked the capital of rivedendell, the risks that it can have if it neglects any territory of his.
Applying this game mode would undoubtedly make the game much more "real" in the strategic sense, applying extra important bonuses for owning all the territories corresponding to the faction you currently are playing, is a very interesting idea, and of course, there will be factions that will have more and other less territories, it will be necessary to establish a balance in this. You could make the territories related to the faction, have as a special flashing color, or logos, to distinguish them with the main color of the player.
I propose extra bonuses in general (Real Time / Living World) as well as other additional bonuses, if the enemy attacks any territory related to your faction as well as if they directly attack your capital, for example; if mordor attacks gondor, it will be harder to attack Minas Tirith than Osgilliant (regardless of whether it is a fortress), because it is the capital itself and has "triple the bonus" for example when they attacking you this territory that belongs to you, gondor. The bonuses for having the capital would only apply if they attacking you in real time or in living world, but the bonuses for owning all the territories of the faction you play would apply in any game mode.
Even you could apply another way to create the hero leader of the faction, i mean, would be once you conquer all the territories of the faction, and this hero would appear in the capital then.
2) Bonuses related to territories as they are normally already established in the game:
These bonuses would apply equally as currently they are in the game, territories like Rovanion, Eriador, Rhun, etc, territories that include other territories themselves.
* Now that i am done with the bonuses, other dynamics of interest...
1) The preservation of structures and improvements that you make when playing in real time:
Here I admit that I do not know how possible this would be, because it would be that all the games you do on each map that you play, will be "saved" in real time, but without a doubt it is something that we would all love, not to start from 0 after making many things.
2) The conservation of the single ring only 1 time and permanently:
I think this idea was once suggested by me and others, it would be very cool if the ring appears when playing on any map in real time, but ... once you get it, the units that have the ring or the hero of the ring, can be permanently conserved from that moment, until it is stolen by the enemy. It would be much more interesting like that, so that you could take sauron / frodo / bilbo / etc to each battle (even replace some faction leader in the case of Sauron).
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1) I take the opportunity as well to comment on, other extra details related to AI. A rework for the AI is very necessary for this modality, the AI is often stupid and their movements sometimes make no sense at all, AI tend to destroy their fortresses and structures without any purpose and many times instead of attacking and defending, they just retreat. The AI usually leaves its territories unprotected in the same way, without any unit in most of cases, basically the AI prefers to continue conquering, ignoring whether it is protected against any attacks. In fact, I remember that the original AI at least attacked some territory as a group in more of cases than does in this mod.
2) This one that follows, corresponds to a failure/bug report, but I still attach it here; Heroes of Isengard and Dol Guldur, as well as in other factions such as Gondor (Forlong for example) cannot be revived in real time, their icons simply do not appear, this is a serious error.
3) It would also be quite good to add more territories with ports (more if you have planned to add new naval units in the latest updates) and can only move from to one port to another, if the territory has ships, and this move shouldn't be instantaneous if the distance is a lot (as it is currently).
Extra bonus for factions that have more experience in the naval (Haradwaith, Gondor, Rivendell), I don't know, ideas like these.
4) Something that WotR also fails in the mod, is its constant repetition of a single track of music, only one song is heard when playing, and it is repeated and repeated, it becomes annoying. (Bug Report)
5) Another idea would be to add more visual elements to the living world (eagles, fell beast, bats, etc.), add mumakils, moving ents, grimbeorn in the shape of a bear, etc., visually enlarge the map more.
6) Some powers of the power book of some factions, are somewhat or very irrelevant, for example "The Sons of Elrond", it is a totally useless power because heroes are created in Living World, not in real time, others like maybe they are something irrelevant in real time. A new power for Rivendell instead this, would be better.
7) The Woodland Realm faction is the most affected in this mode, they do not have access to heavy armor, and this complicates too many many matches where you do not have Thranduil for it. I suggest that for WotR, heavy armor can be bought in the traditional way.
8) The units creation requirements that require the presence of a particular hero also greatly limit the strategies as in the case of Gondor and the Ithilien Rangers and Faramir, in almost all games you will not be able to have access to these units because Faramir would not be in many games in real time. Same case for Gothmog on Mordor.
9) This again is about a Bug, but I will add it because it is important; Normally I avoid playing against the AI when the map is about invading a fortress (Minas tirith, helms deep, dol guldur), the match can be incredibly long, but for the reason, the AI takes too long to give up (even if the AI It no longer has anything built) and to make matters worse, units that you create in many of those maps (Helms Deep and Gundabad, which are the ones I remember the most), are never preserved/saved, therefore it is a waste of time and effort.
10) As I mentioned in section 6, this point will be similar, I consider it a better idea to keep Aragorn (Elessar) as Hero leader and change the dead Oathbreakers power (as it is originally in the game) instead of the summon of Elessar, for WotR only, I think it would make the use of the faction more varied for this modality.
11) You guys have removed the ability to mount fell beast for the witch king (I suppose because of the bug), but would it be possible to add any other power to it? or ride a horse at least?.
12) It seems to me that you have already commented on this before, and you mentioned that it could not be corrected, it is about the initial positions with which the game places you, sometimes it places you close to the enemy. Here I add when the AI places a resource structure in the place where its fortress goes, or also when there are 2 or more AI players, both remain in the same place instead of expanding.
I appreciate your time in reading me and the consideration of these ideas to implement in the latest updates, I know it would greatly improve the dynamics of this modality.
Regards!
Edited by Thranduil_King, 16 September 2021 - 05:28 AM.
