6 replies to this topic

[Mathijs]

These changes apply universally to all factions including Gundabad and Eriador. The main idea of all these changes is to promote a longer early and mid-game with skirmishes and power pushes instead of a rush to end-game upgrades and powers that can wipe out entire armies.

 

BASIC STATS

• Melee and ranged damage vs. structures is reduced by 25%.
• Camps and outposts now cost 3000 and 1200 respectively. 

 

UPGRADES

• Fire Arrows is no longer an upgrade. It now becomes available to rank 2 archer battalions and functions like a toggle. Toggling to Fire Arrows gives archers +100% damage vs. structures and siege weapons and -50% attack speed (reload time). No bonuses vs. enemy infantry, no bonuses vs. siege rams/Isengard ladders. This immediately makes rams and ladders more useful.
• Heavy Armor now comes with certain downsides. It grants +40% extra armor, but also decreases movement speed and attack speed by 10%. It also removes the ability to stealth in forests for appropriate units. (flavor names: Gundabad: Scavenged Armor, Gondor: Plate Armor, Eriador: Mail Armor, Rohan: Scale Armor, Mordor: Scavenged Armor, Isengard: Thick Armor)
• Forged Blades: Increases unit damage by 25%, but not vs. structures. (flavor names: Gundabad: Fell Blades, Gondor: Numenorean Blades, Eriador: Barrow Blades, Rohan: Gondorian Smithwork, Mordor: Scavenged Blades, Isengard: Cruel Blades)
• New upgrade: Improved Arrowsmithing. Increases archer damage by 25%, but not vs. structures. (flavor names: Gundabad: Fell Arrows, Gondor: Steel-tipped Arrows, Eriador: Steel-core Bows, Rohan: Elven Fletching, Mordor: Barbed Arrows, Isengard: Steel Bolts)

SIEGE

• Decrease ALL siege (ent & troll rock throw, catapult, ballista, slinger) splash damage range by 80%.
• Add an accuracy factor; like archers, siege weapons should be able to miss. Perhaps 50% miss chance for Mordor and Gundabad catapults, 25% for Gondor Trebuchets, 25% for Eriador Catapult, 15% miss chance for Trolls/Ents.

[saruman_the_wise]

Miss chance for siege units is brilliant! will their missed shots hit other enemy's instead (if their there)

[Rider of Rohan]

Missed Projectiles can still do damage so anything it collides with will still take normal damage. 

[Ganon]

Another thing you could do to lengthen the early to mid-game play, is increase the amount of experience required to earn skill points. That way you're not seeing Elven Allies summons, 5-10 minutes into the game and such.

 

I had to increase that for my own mod, because I got tired of seeing the Balrog and Army of the Dead, in what I felt was midgame. Those were intended to be endgame powers in my opinion.

[Mathijs]

You won't see Balrogs or spooky ghosts in SaF anyway.  Well, except for Gundabad's Dúrin's Bane hero, but he's significantly nerfed compared to the vanilla Balrog summon.

 

Increasing the amount needed is certainly something worth trying. Is there an easy way to do this globally?

[Ganon]

Oh yes, it's very easy. The values that need changed are in "Data\ini\rank.ini". By default, each rank only needs 125 experience to earn in skirmish. Which is why they're earned quicker in mid-game because you're just simply killing more units. EA really should have made each level require just a little more experience than the previous one.

Although, for my purposes, I didn't feel like increasing the values exponentially for each level, as you would with most things that level up, and as would make sense. Instead, I just made each level require 4x the experience to gain. So in the same amount of time you would normally get your 4th point, you'll only be getting your 1st skill point. That may be too much required experience, but you can play with the values to suit your preference.

Edited by Ganon, 14 June 2016 - 01:55 PM.

[Kwen]

I think either 1.5x or 2x would be a good value to start with to see how much it affects gameplay, particularly with the AI. The goal is not to make the AI easier.