Arga Dis, Blood and Bronze - NEW VERSION 1.4

[Sombre]

PREVIEW IMAGE

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=9899&stc=1&d=1271278135

-- version 1.4

-- FIX - Just shuffled around IDs to make this conflict free with Warhammer MA, CBM, Endgame Summons, FW Thugs


-- version 1.35

-- FIX - sorted out bug with urtyr shaman summon


-- version 1.3

-- CONTENT - Added "Bray of the Urtyr" spell

-- CONTENT - Added Urtyr shaman and troops as blood summons

-- TWEAK - Slightly upped companion protection - leather cuirass to hauberk

-- TWEAK - Recosted some commanders and troops slightly

-- TWEAK - Tweaked Myrmidon description.

-- TWEAK - Helgrot scout brought to stealth 10 in line with other scouts

-- TWEAK - Gilgan fear, berserk and cost reduced slightly.

-- TWEAK - Blackwing riders got scale mail hauberks to make them more useful and accentuate the foreign influence on them

-- TWEAK - Blood Wind pretender removed. I never liked it.


-- Version 1.2

-- FIX - Argan myrmidon captain's move to be the same as his troops

-- FIX - Apparently weapon 57 was sickle, not hoof. Hoof is 56. Fixed.

-- FIX - Hoof attacks on sworn companion and blackwing changed to non str based horse hoof attack id 56

-- TWEAK - No more misborn starting scout. Now they get a nice helgrot scout instead.

-- TWEAK - Misborn are now younger, with lower maxage.


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UPDATE TO 1.1

Very minor fix here. I messed up the mr on some units, so now I've sorted that out. I also added a bit of gold cost to the augurs, so you have to pay them upkeep. Not much though.


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UPDATE TO 1.0

Fixed price error for Harpy.
Reduced cost of Augurs.
Some other tweaks (primarily resource cost corrections. Now Arga is more of a sloth nation, befitting their lack of armour.)


UPDATE TO 0.9

Added a harpy blood summon
Added an Augur mage blood summon
Tweaked many a stat


UPDATE TO 0.8

This update addresses some balance issues, fixes a bug or two I recently spotted and gives the Argans a fine pretender selection, including a new national one, the Blood Wind.


UPDATE TO 0.7

This is a small update fixing numerous bugs in the previous version. Sorry about that, but it's worth downloading this, trust me.

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VERSION 0.6 ATTACHED

Includes a whole bunch of stuff. Couple of new recruitables, changed values, moved to the middle era rather than early, 3 national heroes.


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A society which venerates war and bloodshed. Their city nation watched over the imprisoned Gilgan blood giants. Following a terrible war it seemed Arga would be razed and forgotten, a terrible fate for a once glorious nation. In their darkest hour the Argans turned to the blood giants and swore an oath in exchange for power that would allow them to save their city and slay their foes. The Gilgan's were freed and not only fought the enemies of Arga but gave a 'gift' to those who swore loyalty to them. This gift was a glimpse of the afterlife, of Dis, a terrible place of brutal conflict where the strong reigned. The newly sworn Argans turned to their foes as changed men and fought like devils, finally defeating them and saving their city. Now Arga is a changed city, more brutal and violent than ever, more focused on slaughter and glory. It is effectively ruled by the Gilgans and with the coming of God they have turned their attentions to the surrounding lands.

Strengths:
1. Truly elite infantry
2. Frightening shock cavalry
3. Effective Haimgrot blood hunters
4. Thuggable Gilgans
5. Magical diversity via Augur summon

Weaknesses:
1. Spears are poor against high protection
2. Gilgans and Companions cap only and expensive
3. No preaching
4. Lack good missile weapons
5. True elite aren't sacred

Note: Sworn Brothers and Sworn companions fight on after death in a temporary 'mortally wounded state'.

[Foodstamp]

I have been waiting for this one. I will give it a go tomorrow http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Juzza]

Yaaay, been waiting for this, it'd better be good *shakes fist* :p

[Juzza]

Two quick things, one I think the shield bash does too much damage, if being stabbed by a spear does +3 then shouldn't being bashed back by a shield do a bit less then +0?

Just my opinion, think on it, oh and the Argan Hoplites have a white spot on their shield, lol, dunno why I noticed that looked out of place to me.

their kinda hard to manage with their most expensive troops not being sacred, goldwise I mean, it's challenging to play, I love it!

[Sombre]

I might well tone down the shieldbash - right now it lets them kill light infantry a bit too fast. Maybe give it another -1 to attack and drop the damage by a few points.

They're definitely supposed to be a nation where keeping a large army of your elites is impossible. Since they have powerful blood magic and an efficient bloodhunter they can go for an upkeep free blood summon army to go alongside their super-elites.

[Juzza]

oh, wait, I thought of this the other night, it really depends on what you mean by "shield Bash" do you mean like, they are fighting with their spears and as they are doing that, using their shield to bash them one handed, if so than I think you should keep it the way ti is, although perhpas take some parry off it, considering they'd be flining their shield around as a weapon rather than blocking.

However, if you meant it as the way say, 300 did it with the line of sparatans and sort of bashing them back in line, I think you should take a bit of damage off it at least.

Um, did you understand the way I explained it? sometimes I'm bad at explaining things, sometimes, heh, most times.

[Sombre]

They're smashing their shields into people's faces, slamming the edge into exposed throats, generally smacking people around with them. I set the damage to -2 because it was making them a bit too good at crushing light infantry.

[Juzza]

ah okay, I wasn't sure exactly what it meant, that being the case though, -2 should be okay, oh and I have to say this is the only mod I've seen the AI utilize effectively.

[Sombre]

I think the powerful infantry, lack of any need (or capability) to bless and direct ratio of gold to kickass armies would be the reason for AI effectiveness.

However the nation is a blood one and as far as I remember I didn't give the #bloodnation tag in the .dm, so the AI should be pretty abysmal magically speaking.

[Juzza]

if you wish them to be effective as an AI I'd suggest not to give them #bloodnation, it would most likely effect their gold income too much for considering they have no special blood spells.

But some new spells would define the nation even more and not nessisairly blood magic since their mages rely on blood mostly making something that needs 5 death skill or 5 astral skill to cast would put a bit of strain on pretenders, also with adding a death spell, you could make something along the lines of "Risen Brother" anyway, hum, you know I'm not modding much and don't really mod my own stuff right now, I could help make some summons if you'd like, if you need some help or are too lazy to script a spell, just send me a pm with some details.

Good mod never the less, oh, except the banner, http://cooltext.com/ I do most of my banners from here and modify them to my liking if I want something special in there.

Once again, this is just my opinion stick to your own originality, these are simply suggestions.

[Sombre]

Heheh, the banners for all my mods suck. I spend roughly 2-5 minutes doing each of them.

[BandarLover]

WE ARE SPAR- uh, I mean ARGA DIS!!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

I know this is still a rough beta version, so I won't be overly critical. Past experience has shown me that you will fix this up quite nicely, like all your other mods. That being said, this nation is still a blast to play.

Love the graphics! Super sweet they are! At first I thought the sworn brothers may have been broken, but the first slain brother I saw in battle put that to rest. I've not played deeply into the game I'm trying with them, so I've not tried all the units. I find myself sticking with hoplites and Sworn for my armies. The only nit-pick I can think of is perhaps different graphics for heroes. Like I said, I'm sure you will tidy this mod up given time, it's just that my Gilgan hero looked like any other Gilgan unit to me.

Great start Sombre! Looking forward to your efforts finishing this mod. It will be awesome I'm sure.

[Sombre]

That is a regular Gilgan. Since they're pretty expensive / powerful I thought it would make sense for the nation to get them as multiheroes, at least until I add uniques, maybe summons.

It would be helpful if you could give me some specific critical feedback if you agree the mod's a bit rough. I'll definitely change things, but the more feedback I get, the more the mod improves. See Avernum or Ulm Reborn as examples.

[Foodstamp]

My first game with Arga Dis was a disaster. I created my pretender without looking over the units and went with a fire/water bless. That being said, I really liked the Achillians on the map I played. I did not find the Gilgans with maces that overpowered at all. With fire/water bless, they had difficulty taking some provinces solo.

It is too early for me to form an opinion on this mod as far as balance goes because of my poor pretender design, but I found a few typos and made note of them:

are are in orphan description

taste in sworn companion (I believe this is supposed to be task). A few other units seemed to share this description, so they have taste instead of task as well.

[Juzza]

I'd like to suggest one more thing, the sworn brothers, their very cool and all, but when they die and become slain brothers they usaly end up with only 4 hp and not enraged, I'd suggest a slight hike in hp, or simply give the slain brothers the berserker attributes, because they usely will not even get a chance o become enraged in most cases I've seen.

[Sombre]

Taste and task - strange. I must have been hungry when I wrote that. A lot of the typo goodness comes from writing this late at night.

I think I might hike the hp of the sworn slain a bit. It's actually pretty hard to make them go berserk when they're 'killed', from a modding perspective. I wish there was some way to make units start off berserk. I don't want to berserk the asic sworn brother, because they aren't berserker units, they just sometimes (rarely) lose it.

Arga Dis is getting a sacred unit soon enough. It won't be that good though - just a sacred version of the regular hoplite basically. So a bless strat is never going to be a must have for them.

Interesting that fire/water is so good that people take it without even checking the national units ;]

[Foodstamp]

haha, I should have looked them over first. The prospect of sacred hoplites chainsawing through the enemies was just too good to pass up for my first game http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[llamabeast]

Wow Sombre, this is really exceptional. The graphics in this mod are by far the best I've seen, they really are brilliant. Really thematic too, there's a really strong feeling of 'blood and bronze'. Good stuff.

So, I haven't managed to play much with these so far (so much to look at, plus the llamaserver to work on). But I'll give you my thoughts so far.

You've definitely succeeded in giving really elite infantry, and they feel really pleasing to use. All the units have a unique role as well, so it feels interesting to play even though almost all the units are infantry.

I notice you've given the Hoplite Shield a Parry value of 8. This seems a bit high really - the shields the Arcoscephalian hoplites have are Parry 4, and even Ermor's huge tower shields only have parry 7. The effect is to make the Argan hoplites/Sworn etc almost completely immune to arrows. So although they actually have quite low protection, effectively it's really high. This actually feels really nice - no-one can kill my elite infantry! - but also seems a bit odd.

I think the orphans might be a little overpriced. They're vicious, but they die very easily. Feels like I'd be safer with a Sworn than two orphans. I might be wrong though, I haven't playtested enough. Maybe they're good to add some offensive shock to a force. I like the berserk +4.

The Red Achillans seem rock hard. My feeling is that they're the best troops you can get at the start of the game, and if you're playing against anyone without astral/death magic (so the MR doesn't count). Perhaps they should have some other curse/side effect as a result of their dunking? Maybe their near immortality results in cowardice in the face of true danger (lower morale), or a side effect of the blood magic is short lives and failing health (HP 8, and lower maxage while you're at it)? Or perhaps they're not so good and I'm off the mark. I just feel like it'd be good if the Sworn Brothers were the most solid choice most of the time, with other units being more specialised - as it is, I think I'd rather buy Achillans. Also, should it be 'Achilleans'? I don't know, just thinking aloud.

The Sworn Companions are nice. I like having a bit of elite cavalry. Could they really carry Parry 8 shields on a horse though? Tower shields aren't allowed on cavalry. Also, just out of interest on the flavour text - where do the Mares of Dis come from? Do the Gilgans summon them from Dis? (Am I right in thinking Dis is the afterlife?).

I think that's it for now - I have some thoughts on the commanders too, but don't want to bombard you!

[Sombre]

Good points.

When I decided on the hoplite shield parry value I factored in that it was being used by very, very well trained units who are experts at using their shields to survive arrow bombardment. I'll drop the parry to 7 I think, but I intended it to be that much better than the vanilla hoplites, who carry very, very small weedy shields (as far as I know, very unlike those of actual hoplites). The parry value reflects the guys carrying it as well as the actual size of the shield.

The orphans are supposed to be there to use if you don't have many resources, but right now I guess it might be a bit hard to justify using them. I could make them either tougher or cheaper.

Red Achilleans (you're right it reads better) are supposed to be very, very good,... but another drawback could specialise them even further. I might just give them high gluttony, since they are the guards of the Gilgans, making them a bad choice if you're going through low supply areas or want a huge army. I could also tone down the prot a touch.

As for the Companions - you're right about the shield. I left them with it because of the graphic. I'll reduce it to a normal shield, maybe redo the graphic. Dis is the afterlife, but the Mares of Dis aren't really from there. They're just wild horses tainted by proximity to the Gilgans over hundreds of years which have been collected into the stables.

The more thoughts the better, so go ahead. I want to next version to sort as many issues out as possible, since it might be introducing some more via a sacred hoplite unit.

[Sombre]

New version is up, provided attachments are actually working.

Enjoy.

[llamabeast]

Looks like attachments still aren't working.

[Sombre]

Updated to v.04.

Awaiting feedback / suggestions. I'd be happy to add a couple more units or spells if anyone has any ideas.

[Juzza]

I looove the Oathsworn, I just mass them! they are, the best!!!

[Huzurdaddi]

Awesome mod. The graphics are great.

From a gameplay perspective I *really* like your PD. I wish ever nataion had PD like that.

[llamabeast]

I wonder if you can guess what my main comment about the commanders is... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

They need a decent recruitable-anywhere mage!

Now, I know this is a combat-oriented nation, and blood magic is their main magical strength. But still, this is early age, and most nations have powerful recruitable-anywhere mages. The Misborn are very expensive for a very low probability of being useful. I would say they are a little less good than vaetti hags (I would rather have S1 than F1), and twice the price. And the vaetti are LA.

How about making them 100% (FEDB _+2_), with an additional 40 or 50% (FEDB +1). So because the change of the second pick being complimentary is small, they are basically normally just a level two wizard in one of those paths. Level two isn't bad, but they'd still be magically very weak. It's really hard to build a strategy around mages which are so random - what do you research?

I'm not sure if this is the best solution really, but I think definitely they need a really considerable buff. Obviously they should remain a relatively magic-weak nation, because they are exceptionally strong in combat, and because it fits their theme. But many other EA nations are also very strong in combat and have excellent magic - look at Niefelheim, for instance. And at the moment they are off-the-scale weak.

I said I would comment on the commanders - but apart from the Misborn I think everything is just how it should be. There's an interesting range of nice commanders, they all have a place and all their graphics are great. An excellent line-up, I'd say.

[llamabeast]

Oh yeah, I meant to comment on the revised infantry.

I think you've done an amazing job of having lots of different kinds of infantry, which end up being really distinct and with very different purposes, and strengths and weaknesses. I wouldn't really have thought it was possible to make so many distinct kinds and keep them all interesting.

I think the orphans are much improved, by the way. They are vicious now, but sufficiently killable that they don't feel overpowered.

I think this is definitely now up there with UR and Vaettiheim as one of my favourite nation mods (I think probably this and UR have a little more polish, but I love goblins for some reason!). How is the new Vaetti stuff coming by the way? Really looking forward to seeing it.

[Sombre]

Interesting. I'll look at this more later - but I think the misborn are pretty useful as is - they are sacred so they are well suited to research and they are your only stealth units too. Maybe I need to change them though.

There are probably still another one or two units I could add to the nation, so a combt mage of some sort is not out of the question.

What's different about the PD? Is it too good?

The Vaetti stuff will probably be finished off next weekend. I can't do that much work on it during the week due to my job.

[llamabeast]

Well, if you use them as scouts, they are extremely expensive. And as researchers they are still pretty expensive for what you get. Unless you take a magic scale, I'd say they're barely worth it. As it is, I would say a magic-3 scale is a necessity for Arga Dis, which is a bit strange.

You could perhaps leave them as they are, make them much cheaper and have them as interesting general purpose scout-mages. They could become assassins with a black heart, an occasional one might be useful in battle, some could be sent scouting, and the rest could be put on research. You could maybe give them spy abilities so they could incite unrest (skulking in the sewers setting up blood cults by spreading visions of Dis). Hmm, they could be really interesting multi-purpose units in that case. But you would definitely then need a separate combat mage/better researcher I think.

Incidentally I think the graphics for the misborn are awesome.

[Huzurdaddi]

What's different about the PD? Is it too good?




The PD is probably the best in the game. But that is a good thing. Every nation should have PD which is at least of this quality, IMO.

[Sombre]

If it's the best PD in the game, I'm going to tone it down, since incredible PD isn't supposed to be a feature of Arga Dis.

In the next version I'll add some nice new national heroes (A black Gilgan, a Gilgan Warrior, the sworn king of Arga,.. maybe a seer with some astral magic). I'll also make sure the mod is linux friendly, add a bit more magic to the misborn and add a helgrot scout unit.

Possibly this coming sunday.

At that point I'll consider making a CBM version of the mod too.

[llamabeast]

I must say I didn't notice that the PD was particularly good. Probably needs some tests I guess.

[Sombre]

Just attaching a preview pic.

A new version will be up by tomorrow, so wait until then before downloading anything.

[lch]

Något gick fel:
Argan Captain.tga
Argan Hoplite.tga

[Sombre]

Sombre said:
Just attaching a preview pic.

A new version will be up by tomorrow, so wait until then before downloading anything.



Only change 'tomorrow' to read 'whenever'.

[Sombre]

Still working on these guys.

They'll get a cheap scout, a boost to the Misborn magic and four new heroes.

Most importantly, Arga Dis are being moved to MA. They just don't quite fit in as an EA nation.

[Juzza]

huh, that is gonna make things very very different, but, I mostly wanna see how mid age ulm fairs against them.

[Sombre]

Ok I'm working on these guys today.

They get a new flying unit called the Blackwing Rider very similar to the Wind Rider, but there are no Blackwing Captain commanders, so it can only support the troops usually.

They get 3 heroes - a big gilgan, a blind hoplite guy and an immortal king.

They move to MA and get some balance changes.

[Sombre]

A new preview pic is attached here and the new version of the mod will be up momentarily, so check the front page in twenty minutes or so.

[Sombre]

I just noticed a few bugs with the 0.6 so I updated it quick like so go DOWNLOAD 0.7

[Amhazair]

I've been lurking around here for a while, but had never yet actually downloaded a mod nation (even though several sounded quite intresting from reading about them) since, well, basically I lost intrest in SP quite some time ago. With this latest post however I decided to have a look at the new version and give it a quick whirl so I could give some feedback.

First of all: the flavor, the unit types, the graphics, everything fits. I just really dig the nation. Just looking at things makes me want to play them. (In MP mind you http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif ) Also all the sprites are really nice. (From reading stuff here it seems people have come to expect this from you, but it's still worth mentioning. )

The regular untits are all very nice, and they all seem to have their uses. In a (very) quick test game - basically just early expansion and an early attack on the AI without mage support to gauge the power of the military - Only 15 turns or a little more - I recruited and used most of them and was happy with their performance. I didn't use windriders nor orphans yet, but I can definitely see me recruiting them for their own purposes. It's also a really fun idea to make the sacred unit a low-morale version of the regular troops. A few remarks:

* The hoplite line of infantry seems a little slow. If regular Ulmish infantry with its heavy armor and a tower shield moves 7 it would seem that the hoplites with their relatively light armor should move at least 8 or 9, even carrying around that beast of a shield they've got. I don't know if you're conciously trying to give them a 'slowly but inexorably marching towards the enemy' feel, or if they just happened to turn out that way?

* While in the long run the sworn companions aren't quite as survivable as elite knights (they have only half the armor and the same defence) they are also relatively easily massable thanks to their low resource cost. I'm curious what effect a big unit of fear causing heavy-damage cavalry will accomplish on the battlefield. I have a hunch they'll be fine, but it bears watching by someone who actually makes it into mid game.

* Despite what someone said earlier in this thread, the PD doesn't seem all that strong to me. (I don't know if you changed it?) In fact, I would rate it at slightly below average, with the helgrots rushing ahead and getting killed before the hoplites can join the action.


* At 80 gold the Haimgrots make decent bloodhunters, say Marignon level. Not nearly Mictlan level obviously, but then they shouldn't be that good either. They do have one problem though. Roughly half of the Misborns you will be recruiting anyway also have 1B, and while they're a bit more expensive at 110g, they're also sacred, so they cost less upkeep than Haimgrots, which is really the deciding factor to set up a stable long-term blood economy. As things stand now I see no reason to recruit Haimgrots. I'm not sure what would solve this problem. Making the Haimgrots holy would obviously work, but this doesn't seem quite thematic to me. It would also make them slightly better bloodhunters than Lanka, only behind Mictlan in efficiëncy. While I don't think this would overpower Arga Dis as a nation I don't know if this is the flavor you want to give them. You might also give them 2B for the same price (Marignons hunters are 1F1B for 80g), but I didn't delve deeply enough into Blood hunting Mechanics to figure out if that would make them better bloodhunters than the Misborns. Maybe ask Baalz, he should know. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif (And they have to be better for people to recruit them, at equal bloodhunting value the Misborns will be recruited due to their flexibility. ) Third option would be to tweak the Misborns somehow to make them a worse choise as bloodhunters. (but then that would make the misborns a far less useful unit)

* I don't know how the misborns used to be in previous versions, but I really like how they are now. They're quite efficiënt little researchers. 7 out of 16(discounting the two 10% randoms) make efficiënt blood hunters, and 5/16 (DD, FF, EE, and EF) make useful battlemages. With stealth as a little bonus feature. (it will probably also mean you'll miss half your battlemages at a crucial battle because you forgot to shift+click to move them but anyways. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif ) I love them. Maybe you could hike the price up to 120 though? They're more versatile than, say, C'tis shamans, and have 2 extra randoms, but they do lack the communion ability. They do have two issues though, in the context of their nation. First, as I mentioned above, their blood-hunting ability makes your poor Haimgrots superfluous. Second, these guys will be your main battlemages (since the Gilgans are mainly there for blood rituals and thuggery) We're talking Ulmish levels of magic here, a bit more versatile (they have death) but not more powerful. (no magma eruptions without earth boots or lucky randoms for example)

* The Gilgans have truly Abysmal MR. Similar level big badasses such as basalt kings or Agarthan oracles (let alone Niefel Jarls) have 18 or at least 17 MR, even if you drop a level lower in big-badassedness Jotun Skrattis still have 17. Given their price I don't see how you can justify kitting them out for combat and sending them out into the fray with a base MR of only 14. This pritty much eliminates their use as a SC. On the other hand, given their ability to cast some of the top-end blood rituals (with appropiate boosters), and their ability as a SC (If the MR gets boosted) - with access to blood vengeance, and ,depending on randoms, ironskin and/or fire shields - they might use a sligh price hike, into the early 400's. (Gut feeling here, no advanced math was harmed in the making of this product ermm, asessment. If you want I could look at this more thoroughly when I'm more awake)

* General powerlevelwise - keep in mind this is very, very theoretical, from just looking at their units and 15+ turns of play, as I mentioned - they seem somewhat below average, with a strong military, but no powerful sacreds (and no tramplers either) so no early rushers. (And they do seem particularly vulnerable to trampler rushes.) A good blood capability, and a recruitable SC chassis (if the MR gets boosted, else they don't really have this either) but poor battlemagic. I have the impression (correct me if I'm wrong) that you prefer your nations to be slightly below average rather than slightly above average, so all in all this seems quite fine.

* I've been thinking a bit on ways to solve the Misbred/Haimgrot problem, and came up with 3 possible solutions to make both units desirable. Two out of those will make your nation a bit more powerful, but - I believe - not too powerful. Combining parts of the different solutions would also work.

First option, quick and dirty: strip the misbreds from blood magic. This would obviously install the Haimgrots as your bloodhunters, and leave your misbreds as researchers and battlemages. (5/9 misbreds will have one of the abovementioned 'battlemagic' path combinations) Main problem with this solution: thematically it seems to me the misbreds should have access to blood.

Second option: make the Haimgrots cheaper/more efficiënt. The Vaetti Hag for example costs only 55g for 1? so there is room for improvement, depending on how efficiënt a blood nationd you want them to be. Perhaps make them holy as mentioned above if you think it fits thematically, or give them 2B.

Third option: Hike up the misbreds price and power a little bit. Maybe into the 150 range? This would indeed make them potentially a bit better battlemages, but I do feel there is a bit of room for it. After all these guys are your main battlemages. You could also combine the second and third option, making the Haimgrot a bit cheaper, the misbreds a bit more expensive. Depending on where you want to see the strength of the nation in the different areas. Personally I dig the idea of keeping the battlemagic (and thus the misbreds) as it is now, and making the Haimgrot a really efficiënt bloodhunter, rivalling Lanka, but that's pure personal taste.

I hope the last part was coherent enough to be of use, I'm getting really tired and should have been in bed some time ago. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Anyways, that's it for now. This turned out to be a very long post, for what is basically a very nice nation mod. (it's the first I see, so I can only compare it to vanilla dominions, but that doesn't change the fact it's very nice. ) Since there's been some posts around here and there asking people to give feedback I thought I'd be as extensive as possible this one time I actually get around to checking one out. You should obviously use what you think useful and disregard everything else.

[Sombre]

I'll reply to this in a little more depth later, but one thing I think you've missed is that the Haimgrot has a base dousing bonus of 1, so he bloodhunts like a B2 mage. I tried to imply this in the description.

[Humakty]

Amhazair, I played with this nation big SP games, and, for the moment, they don't seem balanced for MP. It's true the AI almost never uses battle magic in a systematic way, and it is almost impossible to stop them without (tramplers are quite efficient, like always against small elite troops).

[Sombre]

Humakt: What about the nation isn't balanced? Can you go into a bit more detail? People have been telling me the nation is underpowered for the most part, so if you think they are overpowered then I'd like to hear your reasoning.

Their infantry are very good, but expensive. Their sacreds are ok, but not exactly great. Their fear causing cavalry is powerful, but is expensive and isn't heavily armoured.



Amhazair: Thankyou for your detailed feedback, it's much appreciated and exactly the sort of thing I'm after.

The speed of the hoplites is set to 7 across the board pretty much because despite having only light armour (that's why they have mapmove 2 not 1) when they're in battle they advance carefully and protect each other. It's supposed to represent that they're fighting in a phalanx-esque formation.

The PD seems pretty poor to me to. It hasn't changed a huge amount, but I did weaken it. It isn't supposed to be very good, just a way to get more bodies onto the field really.

About the Haimgrot, as I said in my earlier post, they have a douse bonus of one, so hunt at a level of B2. You still might be able to build solely misborn and use random B1 and B2 ones for hunting though, so maybe they need to be a touch cheaper.

I agree with making the Misborn 120 gold or so. Not a huge change but maybe they're a touch too good right now. Arga Dis is supposed to have relatively weak magic, but obviously be strong in blood and have a superior military.

Gilgans can have higher MR - I'll make it the same as an quivalent MA big mage/thug. It's not supposed to be a weakness. Being cap only I don't want to make them more expensive though and they are a major feature of the race. I might change my mind later.

And yes, I prefer to have a below average power mod than an above average one. People have the general impression that mod nations are hugely overpowered and they're happier when you boost rather than nerf stuff, so I prefer to try and shoot just under the bar and then slowly raise it according to feedback.

Glad you enjoyed them - as others will probably tell you, I keep updating and supporting my mods whenever feedback is available. I'm striving for good quality across the board here.

[Humakty]

I tested Arga on Glory of the Gods, so I had to fight really big battles against the AI.

The experience told me that an elite army is almost never too expensive, as they tend to survive and fight many battles, whereas less elite troops tend to die quickly.

The AI finds it almost impossible to vainquish elite armies because she almost never makes a systematical use of her good mages.

i.e.:abysia armies almost never have a suficent number of mages to compensate for their poor OB (only heavy infantry)

This behaviour makes Arga really powerfull, because the AI tries to crush you with hordes of chaff archers (inefficient because of Arga big shields)and light infantry.

Even if the AI adapts a little ( I spotted that on a big map, when you often have time to build another army if the first gets crushed, the AI tries to change the composition of its army, though I don't know if it is a random process or an intended reaction) Arga OB is sufficently varied to adapt.

On a MP game, human players take in account the weakness and strength of their civs, and I suppose they often decide to systematically put one or more battle mages in their armies, a technique which can ruin the day of an elite army like Arga.

None the less, I think that some of Arga troops could be tuned down (I'm at work, so I can't check the names).

For example, I think the armored guys (the ones who bath in blood)are a bit too well protected,lowering greatly the problems their army could have had because of being all unarmored. In facts, if you put them at the front of your battle line, ennemy archers will continuously fire on them, making your army almost impervious to missile fire.

All in all, I don't say I do not like this mod, in fact I love it, I think Arga OB is a little bit too complete for an early age nation,can you really imagine marverni winning against these guys ? But this problem will be solved if you put them in MA (crossbows will be a big problem).

PS : when I say a nation mod is overpowered, it is compared to an average civ, not compared to the heims

[Sombre]

They are in MA. Are you playing with the latest version?

I think the elites beating AI problem is something which comes up with virtually every nation - try massing ermor/pythium elite infantry or even just lots of indy heavy cavalry and see how the AI does against that. I believe you'll find it falls apart in much the same way, because it just throws chaff at them piecemeal and they all end up with lots of experience and virtually no casualties. Other nations are actually far better at this because they have more powerful sacreds, generally speaking. The AI has no answer for basically any sacred with say F9W9 on it.

Marverni are pretty much the absolute worst nation (in EA), so while I can imagine them winning against any other given nation (with difficulty, especially in early game), they aren't especially useful as a balance measuring stick.

The real issue for me is that a lot (if not all) of these problems vanish in mp.

Btw I'm 99% sure the AI doesn't adapt and basically builds at random.

[Kristoffer O]

I like it. It has a nice flavor. But I think they are quite powerful. I have not analyzed them, but I came across some things I remember.

Recruitable fear-causing troops. Say 5 of these guys can rout 1000 militias. Size doesn't matter when faced with fear. Rout checs are not dependent on losses, so the squad will be subject to rout checks regardless of losses (with a bonus due to squad size, but in the case of militia it might not help). Thus only highly magical units has fear. The nightmares of the onyx amazons are the only recruitable ones i know of, and they have 20 enc to compensate.

Hoplite shields. Parry 8 is high (I was about to write insane, but that sounded a bit offensive http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif ). A towertshield is pary 6, and is supposed to be the largest shield in use. I doubt few magical shields has parry 8. With parry 8 no missiles will ever hit the unit.

The Hoplite shield bash is also quite powerful. Second bonus attacks are good. I think the bash might come from another mod, but it is still powerful.

Gilgans can get 5 in blood magic (6 if 10% lucky). This is higher than all MA nations, with the exception of R'lyeh IIRC. This might not be a problem, but you should consider if you want them to be: 'A race of bloodmages of unequalled powers. No other nation have so immersed themselves in bloodmagic as the Gilgans. Their skills in bloodmagic is legendary and can almost rival the powers of the gods.' Something like that http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

As I said it is not a problem in it self (especially since blood magic don't benefit as much from increased skill levels as other paths), but you should be aware that you are making the most powerful blood nation there is.

I didn't play the nation, just checked around, so I cannot say if they are unbalanced on a grander scale. Low MR etc might well compensate for other strengths. THe two things I would be concerned about is the fear and the hoplite shields. The Gilgans go nice with the flavour of the nation, even though they are more powerful than other MA mages.

[Sombre]

The shields don't have parry 8 in the new version, they have 6.

Them having 8 was a sort of bug - the code was #enc 2 #def 6, which I thought would give them parry 6, but it actually gave them parry 8.

The high blood magic level of the gilgans doesn't IMHO make them the most powerful blood nation, because I believe they currently don't have blood hunters to the standard of Lanka or Mictlan. The blood hunter is the cornerstone of a powerful blood nation, not so much the high levels of blood magic (to a point). I might need to tone down the Gilgan's magic levels somewhat, this is true, though when I looked around they didn't seem much more powerful than other high priced cap only MA mages. I could have that wrong, I admit.

The chance of getting 6 blood with a gilgan is very very remote. They start with blood 3 so they'd need to pass a 25% chance, a 25% chance and a 2.5% chance in a row. Less than one in ten will have blood 5. They are expensive cap only units, so it's safe to say you won't have /that/ many of them.

[Sombre]

I just looked over some expensive 'archmages' from the MA period such as the Arch Theurg, Grand Thaumaturg, Grand Master one from Marignon etc - they seem more or as powerful as Gilgans, though obviously less beefy.

Is the chance of high levels of the blood with the gilgans even as powerful as the high levels they can have with some conventional stuff like astral or the elements? Blood can be empowered far more easily and isn't really very hard to boost 2 levels or so.

[Shovah32]

So if im correct here 1 in 16 capitol only, 390 gold mages will have blood 5 and 1 in 640(dosn't sound right but...) will have blood 6 and of course, those with higher blood have fewer other paths and as already mentioned high blood is not as powerful as certain other paths.
Their blood hunters arent bad but they either have higher upkeep than other nations due to the lack of sacred status or, in the case of the misborn, are not too reliable to get blood and those that dont often have few jobs to preform due to their odd/low paths.

[Sombre]

We were just talking about it over the IRC channel. Various numbers are flying around, but yes, the chance of B5 is less than 1/10 (roughly 1/15) and the chance of B6 is 0.15625% or 1/640.

[Sombre]

Chance of B4 or above (pretty damn good) is 52.5%

Abysians Warlocks have a 25% chance of B4 I hear.

[Sombre]

Anywha, I've made some balance changes based on suggestions I've been hearing and will release 0.8 quite soon.

I'll also throw in a bit of new content. A pretender or a blood summon or something. Suggestions are welcome.

[Amhazair]

Sombre said:
Amhazair: Thankyou for your detailed feedback, it's much appreciated and exactly the sort of thing I'm after.

You're welcome. I actually love soing this kind of thing, diving into the mechanics of a game I'm playing, trying to figure out the best options. Unfortunately, for some weird reason I have far less energy to do this since I'm working. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif


The speed of the hoplites is set to 7 across the board pretty much because despite having only light armour (that's why they have mapmove 2 not 1) when they're in battle they advance carefully and protect each other. It's supposed to represent that they're fighting in a phalanx-esque formation.

Yeah, I thought this might be it. Fair enough.


About the Haimgrot, as I said in my earlier post, they have a douse bonus of one, so hunt at a level of B2. You still might be able to build solely misborn and use random B1 and B2 ones for hunting though, so maybe they need to be a touch cheaper.

I did indeed miss this. (and the description) It (the description) actually fits right in with the dozens of other little hints that are spread around the game which you're likely to miss unless you pay close attention. Well done. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif I suppose you can still give them a dousing rod to up their bloodhunting level one more?

I dived into the manual for the exact mechanics of blood hunting, and - unless I made a mistake somewhere along the line - as things stand now the Misborn is still a more efficiënt bloodhunter. With a sanguine dousing rod Haimgrots generate 1,22 slaves/gold of upkeep, (1B)Misborns 1,37, so while the difference is not as big as I thought it still favors the Misborns. If you were to change goldcosts to 120g for a Misborn and 70g for a Haimgrot, things get turned around, giving 1,39 slave/gold for Haimgrots, and 1,24 for Misborns. You'll loose a little bit of that edge since 3 (effectively) 3B hunters will generate just a bit more unrest on average than you can recuperate with 0% taxation, so you'll miss the occasional hunt due to unrest. I'm not sure how to start calculating how much you'd loose, but I suppose the relative values would be allright here. (and your bloodhunting efficiëncy will still be behind Lanka and Mictlan, but better than most other nations. ) The occasional 2B Misborn would still be the best bloodhunter, by the way, but I don't think that's a huge problem.


I agree with making the Misborn 120 gold or so. Not a huge change but maybe they're a touch too good right now. Arga Dis is supposed to have relatively weak magic, but obviously be strong in blood and have a superior military.

There's different ways of making a nation magically weak though. Say the Niefelheim way: powerful but expensive mages with awefull research efficiëncy, or the Ulmish way: Limited paths and low maximums.

Standing on itself the Misborn is a nice mage, even at 120g. He's a good researcher, depending on paths either a good bloodhunter or a good low level battlemage, has access to quite a few useful items for forging, and is sacred to boot. Add him to an existing nation - say Abysia - and they'll get a huge powerboost. But in the context of Arga Dis he's fine. Unless you envisage Arga Dis as really slow researchers too, because that they won't be with the Misborn in his current state.


Gilgans can have higher MR - I'll make it the same as an quivalent MA big mage/thug. It's not supposed to be a weakness. Being cap only I don't want to make them more expensive though and they are a major feature of the race. I might change my mind later.

About the price: I looked around a bit at other big guys. In MA the only recruitable in that category are the Agarthan Oracles, but while you could compare them magically the Oracles are just so much poorer as a SC chassis there's hardly any comparison. In EA on the other hand you can find some real yardsticks to measure the Gilgans by. Basically both the Basalt King and the Dai Oni are phisically similar to the Gilgans, with similar stats. Both these guys have a serious edge in the magic department though. With F/W/E and F/E/D with possible air random they have amazing self-buff capability. (the Basalt kings can't self-bless though), and they're both also very powerful battlemages if you choose to use them that way. So in view of all this they should definitely fall quite some way short of these guy's 500g cost, but keeping them cheaper than 400g Oracles is just criminal. Someone needs to give those poor Agarthans a break, don't you realise they're a tragic and dying race? They move me to tears... Then again using a dying race as a yardstick might not be the best idea in the world. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Seriously though, I'd peg the Gilgans at roughly 430g, though obviously you can make some allowances for the nation as a hole. (And I also haven't played Arga Dis for nearly long enough to actually be able to use the Gilgans, and judge them in action. ) Alternatively you could weaken them a little bit, knocking off a few hp, lowering strength a little, reducing the berserk to maybe 4, generally make them into really powerful thughs (with equipment obviously) rather than real SC's.


Glad you enjoyed them - as others will probably tell you, I keep updating and supporting my mods whenever feedback is available. I'm striving for good quality across the board here.

I've peeked in on the mod forums enough to be aware of that. Judging from what I see and read, and from this one nation I looked at you're definitely succeeding at this.

[Sombre]

I'll get 0.8 of this released on the weekend. I think I'll give them a new pretender. A blood and air tornado I think, like a huge air elemental only red ;]

[llamabeast]

Ridiculously minor comment: In the Blackwing description (they are very cool by the way), 'reigned' should be 'reined'.

[llamabeast]

Also, the Sworn Companions should in my opinion have a price increase - the Fear effect is extremely powerful, and almost no unit can stand up to them for any length of time (apart from units that can't rout of course). They are not bad fighters either. Maybe 100 gold? I think this is what Nightmares cost, and I suspect the Companions are definitely better than them.

[Sombre]

Yeah they cost more in 0.8

90 or 100, I forget. Standards and morale buffs like sermon of courage seem to pretty much stop them, btw, and they are of course quite vulnerable to getting shot or blasted with magic. Even a knot of crossbows can mess them up.

[Sombre]

I've updated the mod to 0.8 - get it from the first post.

Attached to this post is the updated national preview. It will also appear in the first post.

[llamabeast]

Just thought I would note that I'm just setting up an MP game with mod nations, and Arga Dis is still free. Someone sign up, they're awesome! (The game's called Marmoset).

[Sombre]

New version is up.

Adds a couple new summons, tweaks some stuff. Arga Dis is very near completion now, as the 0.9 status suggests.

Please give it a go and let me know what you think!

(Attached is just a preview pic that is displayed in the first post, where you can find the mod)

[TheMenacer]

Two comments about the new version. The first being that the harpies don't cost anything, which is obviously a bug and all that. When they do cost something I wouldn't make them more than a 1:1 ratio in terms of cost to amount of units recieved, they're a cool unit and that curse ability is nice, but they're too fragile for anything other than focused strikes against an enemy's main army. I'd also consider lowering their path costs to BD rather than BBD because devoting the resources to forging a booster for the occasional BD misborn or a gilgan to summoning 7 fragile harpies seems like a bit of an over-investment. Second, the augurs are pretty much useless as far as I've seen. They are too expensive for a mage who's picks are way too random to be useful. I've actually gotten one with one magic before, and a unit that starts old, comes with an affliction, and costs 33 blood slaves is way, way too much of an investment to even have a chance of coming with one pick on it. If the cost was lowered, or their paths altered to have a better chance of offering something really different from what you get from the misborn I'd consider ever using them, but as it stands they don't really bring anything new to the table.

[Sombre]

The Harpy problem is just a silly error.

I entered #fatiguecost 7 for the spell instead of #fatiguecost 700. Easy to fix for you guys. I'll fix the upload later, bit busy now.

They're ok at killing random archers etc, but the real ability there is the curse. It can't be resisted by MR (so long as they actually hit with the attack). Can be useful against elite units, thugs etc. I might change them a bit though. I'm ok with putting their cost to 1B1D.

As for Augurs, I'm not very confident about their balance, but I don't believe they are useless. Firstly it's 33 blood slaves, not gems, so in terms of gem costs it would be something like 15 or so,.. it isn't like blood isn't going to be something you're doing with Arga Dis either; it's their main magic. It's true that you can get one with only a single point of magic, or even one with no magic, but it's quite rare. The average amount is 3-4. True these are in some pretty random paths and some of them are covered by the Misborn, but you get access to astral and nature, as well as a chance (thoug not a very good one) of getting better fire and death magic than offered by the misborn.

Compare them with "Summon Spectre" for a spectral mage, a spell which is still used by plenty of people. In terms of magical diversity the Augurs are better and they are slightly cheaper in terms of cost. The area where they fall down is that the Spectral Mage is almost thuggy in terms of stats, while the Augurs are physically very weak.

I'd love to hear more input on them before I go reducing their cost. I'll also test them more myself and see if I come to similar conclusions as you TheMenacer.

[Sombre]

UPDATE TO 1.0

Fixed price error for Harpy.
Reduced cost of Augurs.
Some other tweaks (primarily resource cost corrections. Now Arga is more of a sloth nation, befitting their lack of armour.)


I think Arga Dis is largely finished now, joining Ulm Reborn and Vaettiheim in that regard.

[Sombre]

Very quick update to 1.1

I messed up the mr on some units, so now I've sorted that out. I also added a bit of gold cost to the augurs, so you have to pay them upkeep. Not much though.

Go to first page to download. This isn't anything that will break ongoing games using Arga Dis.

[ryo_akashi]

The myrmidon Argan Captain has Move 2/6 as compared to the normal Argan Myrmidon's Move 2/7.

The mounted Sworn Captain cost 140 Gold as compared to the mounted Sworn Companion costing 120. I know that the Sworn Companion cost is inflated to compensate for the fear ability. Also, that Sworn Captain fights with the Gilgan for the capital commander slot. Something does not seem right that the cost difference is 20 gold though... The Sworn Companion's main weakness of low survival rate does not really apply to the Sworn Captain since the captain can use forge items. Also, the Sworn Captains does serve a unique role with map move 3.

[Amhazair]

So, I've been keeping tabs on this mod since I reviewed it for the first time, way back then. (Did I aleady mention that I really dig this nation? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif) I'm currently playing them in multiplayer, and I do agree with with your comment Sombre, they do feel like a finished nation. The issues raised in this thread all seem to have been adressed, and Arga Dis now feels and plays like a streamlined, balanced and unique nation.

Ages ago (it might very well be a full year by now - I must be getting old...) I saw a couple of modders (I can't remember if you were one of them, but I think it's not unlikely) discussing the possibility of writing guides on the different mod nations, to help spark interest in them. Since I felt motivated to write down my thoughts on Arga Dis, and would love to share my love for it, I decided to give it ago. I'll post the results of this exercise in the general forums in a minute. Though it's meant as a strategy guide, and not a mod review, I suppose you can get a lot of my opinions there. Keep in mind though that if I discuss balance or strength of units in that thread, I'm doing so from the point of view of developping your strategy, and not as suggesting something should be changed about the mod. (To illustrate my point: In that other thread I mention Gilgans having quite low MR for units of their calibre, in order to conclude that you should make sure that you equip them with enough MR items, before sending them out to face an astral nation. I do however feel that in the context of Arga Dis, and given their price, Gilgans are balanced, and the slightly low MR is just an intresting part of that balance, and thus, if I were to review the Arga Dis nation, I would not make an issue out of that MR. Does that make sense? )

So, having made that point clear (I hope) I have two minor points where I think some balancing adjustments could still be made, if you feel up to it.

I believe the Augurs to be very useful units, as you can also see in my strategy post. I see you added an upkeep cost to them to tweak them a bit. I feel this was a very good idea for this kind of units, who could otherwise start rivaling the misbreds as your general-purpose mages, which is something I suppose you want to avoid. At the revised cost of 25 slaves I do believe them to be slightly underpriced, given their various potential uses, though not by very much. I would price them closer to thirty (perhaps 29 to avoid the nice round number in accordance to general blood ritual pricing. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif) With their old age, deformities, general ill health, and (I assume) reluctance to leave their chambers with the cosy scrying fires, I would also think they would be prime candidates to be given mapmove 1. This would, imo, be thematic, another minor drawback to add ontop those they allready have to help out the balancing, and encourage (a little bit at least) their 'historical' use on the homefront as opposed to on the battlefield. Three birds with one stone.

The second issue is a bit more tricky. It's about the sworn companion and the blackwing rider, who both suffer from the same problem. Both these units fill a potentially very powerful niche, so to avoid their over-use you put a high price on their heads(and rightly so)while at the same time keeping them somewhat fragile. However, being a blood nation, you'll generally have somewhat less money available and thus will try to avoid spending lots on money on... let's call it non-core units. And, to put the final nail into their coffin, blood has strong units already filling the niche these two units try to occupy. (demon knights and devils respectively) As things stand now I see no real reason to recruit either of these units. Which is a shame as they're such cool units. I'm not quite sure on how to solve this.

For the sworn companion, I do believe they are slightly overpriced, but even if you lower their price to a level that would make them an intresting buy for most nations, (100g maybe?) they'll still be competing with the demon knights, and demon knights are absolutely awesome. Maybe at a lower price you'd recruit some sworn companions and form a mixed unit if you can't mass the demon knights fast enough? Massing these does take a while, at least before reaching blood 9. I haven't even convinced myself that this is a good solution though, so feel free to disregard me.

On the other hand, I can't justify lowering the cost of the blackwing riders. They are after all a truly elite flying unit. At the same time I can't imagine spending even far lower amounts of money on them as long as they remain as fragile as they are now. I mean, they literally get killed by dagger-wielding archers now. The only solution I can think of (which doesn't mean it's the only one possible of course) is by increasing their armour and thus their survivability. As you state in their description they 'became influenced by foreign cultures' so they did have the opportunity to come into contact with heavier armour. I don't know however if you're willing to abandon the high-defence-low-armour concept of the unit. Unfortunately defence alone just doesn't cut it for size 4 units. The multitude of attacks aimed at your square will lower your defence stat too far too fast.

Those are the last issues I have found with the nation, so all in all big congratulations are in order. This is a fabulous nation, and I humbly bow my head before the master. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Sombre]

First of all, thanks. This is great feedback and it's genuinely a thrill to hear from people who enjoy using my nations (I'm sad that way).

I'll comment more on your strat guide when it goes up. Perhaps you could include a few images for people unfamiliar with Arga Dis. I know strat guides encourage people to try nations out, so this is all good news to me.

As for the tweaking suggestions,...

Augurs can happily be moved to mapmove 1. You're right that it makes perfect sense. Their cost is low, it's true, and you can get an amazing bargain if you're lucky. On the other hand you can also get a virtually worthless, old, crippled high upkeep [censored]. I may have priced them low because I have rubbish luck.


to be continued when I get home .....

[Sombre]

-deleted double post-

[Amhazair]

Yep, I'm totally aware of the f@#*ng worthless, old, crippled, high upkeep [censored] feeling. I still stand by my point, though it's not such a big deal either.

Posting the guide I suddenly remembered that I forgot to mention that their scout units stealth hasn't been improved yet, as most other scouts have been. I suppose you'll also want to give them the 'normal' scout stealth?

[Sombre]

Yeah I'll bost their stealth. Scouts have 10 now do they? Or 5?

I think I might boost the Augur upkeep even more, though not by much. I like the fact that getting a crummy one is even more painful.

Regarding the blackwing and companions, I do see what you mean. The blackwing are very fragile indeed and tend to get shredded by almost anything they fight, despite good stats. I think it's reasonable for me to improve their armour in some way. They also have the disadvantage of not having a recruitable flying commander, though that isn't particularly hard for Arga to rectify with summons or items. They're a niche unit for sure.

Sworn Companions are a different story. The reason their cost is so high is that they've been price-hiked several times. At their old price I'm pretty sure they were overpowered. The problem is they can do a huge amount of damage in very short order on the charge and more importantly, they have fear. This means if you get enough of them they can simply ride through huge armies, routing them after a turn or two of melee and killing a huge number as they try to run away. Now it's hard to mass Companions, that's for sure, but if you get around 10 of them they really can be nuts.

[Foodstamp]

I think most scouts are at +10 stealth now. I think a few may be higher at +15 but I am not 100% sure.

[Amhazair]

Yeah, average scouts have 10.

I noticed the price hikes to sworn companions too. When I first saw them they were about 75g if I remember correctly. Which indeed was way to cheap for what they're capable of. If you're convinced they can't be made cheaper through previous testing that's fair enough. I still can't see myself using them, but then no one ever said everyone had to think the same about every unit in the game. Anyway, their biggest problem isn't their price, but the fact that if you want hard-hitting fear-causing cavalry demon knights are so easy to get.

[Sombre]

I'm hard at work (well, sort of) at the next version of arga dis. Loads of tweaks and a couple of new blood summons.

Here's a look at the Urtyr, a corrupted fleshcloak wearing satyr with a limb lopping bronze sickle.

http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/uploads/616630-Urtyr%20preview.png

[HoneyBadger]

Looks great, as always, although the bronze sickle looks a little bit more like a shepherd's crook than perhaps you intend?

[Sombre]

Urtyr and Shaman.

http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/uploads/616766-Urtyr%20Preview2.png

I don't mind that it looks like a crook :]

[Sombre]

Note that we skipped over v1.2 because I never released it. Anyway I will attach 1.3 to the main post within the next 5 minutes, so wait for that if you please. I have attached the preview pic to this post - it will be visible on the first post as usual.


- version 1.3

-- CONTENT - Added "Bray of the Urtyr" spell

-- CONTENT - Added Urtyr shaman and troops as blood summons

-- TWEAK - Slightly upped companion protection - leather cuirass to hauberk

-- TWEAK - Recosted some commanders and troops slightly

-- TWEAK - Tweaked Myrmidon description.

-- TWEAK - Helgrot scout brought to stealth 10 in line with other scouts

-- TWEAK - Gilgan fear, berserk and cost reduced slightly.

-- TWEAK - Blackwing riders got scale mail hauberks to make them more useful and accentuate the foreign influence on them

-- TWEAK - Blood Wind pretender removed. I never liked it.


-- Version 1.2

-- FIX - Argan myrmidon captain's move to be the same as his troops

-- FIX - Apparently weapon 57 was sickle, not hoof. Hoof is 56. Fixed.

-- FIX - Hoof attacks on sworn companion and blackwing changed to non str based horse hoof attack id 56

-- TWEAK - No more misborn starting scout. Now they get a nice helgrot scout instead.

-- TWEAK - Misborn are now younger, with lower maxage.

[DaveCG]

Yay, love this mod, really do, nothing quite like being a magical sparta with giants http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Thanks for all the great work sombre, trying out new version now.

[Zentar]

Sombre, we are truly blessed to have your inventive creative brilliance visited upon us again and again. This was a strong bless nation with a little bit of everything (Arcoscephale meets Jotunheim). Now there is even more to enjoy with nice graphics as always.

You also have a new icon. What is that critter smoking?

You seem to have more map and mod ideas than I have accolades to show my appreciation. Please continue to do the things you do.

[Sombre]

Thank you both. The critter I have as my icon is Lazarus Chalmers, Gentleman Experimentor. He's smoking a blend of hashish from the near east, opium from the far east and tobacco from the East End. He walks with a cane following a catastrophic velocipede accident in which he lost his first love, gravity.

[TheMenacer]

(Edited)
Quick bug, the spell to summon an Urtyr Shaman just summons a commander Urtyr. Otherwise the urtyr make a fantastic addition to an already fantastic mod nation. They very much help along the image of the nation as a blood soaked ancient Greece. Maybe that's why I was never really thrilled with the blood wind pretender, there was nothing about it that was particularly Spartan, so it wound up feeling a bit arbitrary. I suppose if I were going to suggest a new one, I'd go with some kind of "restored gilgan" rather than the blood wind. The blood wind didn't make a whole lot of sense, but the gilgans are supposed to be reduced in power since the days before their inprisonment, it'd be pretty awesome to see a goddamn gigantic gilgan that hasn't been diminished taking the lead over his lesser brethren.

[HoneyBadger]

Awwww...I really liked the Blood Wind-it wasn't perfect, but it was unique as a Pretender type, and the only Pretender I used with Arga Dis (which I absolutely love), because of that reason.

Any chance you might consider just redoing it, rather than removing Blood Wind?

Arga Dis would be a fun nation to have several different "strange and terrible" Pretender choices, like Blood Wind, because I see it somewhat as a glimpse into a very bloody, barbaric pre-(or atleast formulative)-Olympic Greece that is rarely represented-and the vast Greek Pantheon had some of the godliest monsters and most monstrous gods.

As far as your sickle looking like a crook-well, it is a Greek goat-man, so it doesn't get much more shepherdy than that I suppose http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Sombre]

Ah, there's always a little bug or two creeps in.

I'll upload a fixed version at the main post momentarily.

I've basically discovered I don't like doing new pretenders. They never seem to work out well for me. I might come back and do a bigass Gilgan in the future, but for now they'll have to make do with the current pretender selection.

[Amhazair]

Is there an easy way to switch between two versions of a mod on the same PC? I'd like to check this out, but am currently playing a MP game with Arga Dis, and since it's close to finished I don't want to force my opponents through the hassle of having to update their mods just to suit me.

Edit: The satyr sprites look absolutely frigging awesome by the way.

[Sombre]

You can just rename the .dm from Arga Dis.dm to Arga Dis New.dm or something.

Then when you enable the mod make sure you enable the new one. Though it might be a little tricky to tell the new and old versions apart to be honest.

[HoneyBadger]

I can understand not enjoying a certain aspect of the game, Sombre, and if creating new Pretenders is yours, that's perfectly reasonable. I will say though that you've always done a great job with anything you've lent your hand to, modwise, Pretenders included.

[Carioz]

My first post to say I love this nation. A few ideas:
- Sparta had two kings, one warring, one staying home: another (immobile) hero -the sovereign king- would be nice.
- Hesiod in theogony writes about three Hekatoncheires being appointed by Zeus as guardians for Tartarus. Having a multi handed, horrid blood titan could be cool

[TheMenacer]

If we're saying ideas now, I've got one that I thought would be sort of cool, cerberuses (or however you pluralize that). Since Cerberus doesn't show up in any other capacity, it'd be pretty sweet and in my opinion super thematic to have three headed war dogs for this nation. They can work as either a low level blood summon if you just want straight up dogs, higher level if you want them to kick tons of *** or breathe fire or some crazy crap, or recruitables because hey, there's nothing magic about them, they're just some jacked up dogs that hung out near the gilgans for too long just like the mares.

War dogs are awesome even before they're terrifying and mutated, and Arga Dis feels like the sort of nation that'd use something like that, in my opinion. Also definately +1 to Hekatoncheires.

This has been my session of yelling "Ooh ooh do this" at someone else's project.

[Morkilus]

Dang, I missed this update. I've always been meaning to check this nation out again after my sorry attempt long ago. It really has a unique feel to it, and the graphics are superb.

[Sombre]

If only the author would get around to updating this!

[HoneyBadger]

Yeah, dammit!

Oh and it's not Sparta, it's really, really not.

[Sombre]

Version 1.4 up, no new content, just ID reshuffles. Enjoy.

[Attle]

I'm playing a game with the latest edition atm, and some things seem quite strange. I got wights, smoulderghosts, umbrals, sepulchrals, flame and iron corpses, and cavern wights as additional recruits.
Current mods are; CBM, CPCS, magic site mod and Holy war mod.

Edit: Just noticed that they are all for free, 0 gold cost to recruit. :D
Tried playing with only the Arga dis mod, and the extras was still there.

[Sombre]

Just test values I left in by accident.

Fixed in the OP now. Not worth a renumber of version.