Conceptual Balance Mod v1.92

[llamabeast]

After a few months of work, the Conceptual Balance Mod v1.9 is hereby released!

I have attached a full changelog below, but here's the short version to give you an overview of what's been done.

- Huge review of items, with the intention of making every item have at least a niche use. Quite a few items recosted (generally downwards in view of the hammer change), others given boosts or even new effects in a few cases. Two-handed weapons are much better. Item descriptions have been updated - there should be no non-obvious changes.
- A PDF Forging Reference is included with the mod - this was a bit of a monster to create, but hopefully will prove useful. This may be worth printing out - I have tried to choose colours so that it will be comprehensible even in black and white. The reference is based on a previous document by Cleveland - thanks Cleveland!
- Boosts to a number of weak nations. EA & MA Agartha, MA Ulm, MA Man, EA Vanheim and EA Helheim in particular benefitted. Other nations to receive some changes include Marverni, Tir na n'Og and Eriu. Great effort has been put in to make the changes interesting and thematic. For example with MA Agartha the challenge was to increase the power of the nation while maintaining an overall theme of sorrow and loss. Hopefully this has been successful. These nations should have gained not only raw power but also diversity of choices.
- Full incorporation of Burnsaber's Underwater Gameplay Improvement Mod. Hopefully interactions between land and water nations should be much more interesting. The water nations also receive some new content. Playing Oceania or MA Atlantis should no longer feel so frustrating.
- "Unfun" spells, e.g. Burden of Time and Arcane Nexus, made harder to cast or more expensive
- Small scales tweaks - Production a little better, Order a little less good
- A large number of miscellaneous changes - see the full changelog for details. For example Storm Demons can no longer throw lightning underwater, Tartarians can be Gift of Reasoned again (via a new spell, Restore Soul), Tarrasques and Treelords are better, and some of the most powerful EDM summons got slightly more expensive.
- A lot of bug hunting and miscellaneous fixes.
- Thanks to quantum_mechani for comments and of course having done the huge majority of this mod, Sombre and kianduatha for contributing some code, Larz for his dom3editor which helped with bug hunting, and above all lots of you for the huge number of helpful comments I went through in preparing this update.

I really hope people enjoy this, it's been a lot of fun to create.

Comments are as always extremely welcome.

[Curious Yellow]

Thanks a lot llamabeast!

One small thing I noticed: Curse of Blood still appears to be 66 slaves even though changelog says it should now be 99.

[Scaramuccia]

Army of statues agartha alt4 spell has no description.

[llamabeast]

Inevitably, a quick bugfixing release, motivated mainly by the Ulmish Tower Shield bug.

v1.91 fixes the following bugs:
- Ulmish Tower Shields were obscenely good (I had been using them for tests of spells which were stopped by shields)
- Army of Statues had no description
- Erroneous spells "Paralyze Statues" and "Heal Statues" were visible
- Curse of Blood still costs 66 slaves, was meant to be changed to 99
- Medallion of Vengeance used the bearer's strength to determine damage
- EA Agarthan netters had wrong stats

In addition a couple of design changes:
- Polypal Spawn no longer sacred. An earlier CBM had made them sacred but that no longer seems good with them being amphibious.
- Fay Boars have reduced rather than zero upkeep.
- Locus of the Seal has misc slots only.

[Dahis39]

How about a movable dome statue? Like a Juggernaut.

Im getting tired of four flames from the sky in one turn which just destroy any human army outside of their dome. :re:

[PriestyMan]

How about a movable dome statue? Like a Juggernaut.

Im getting tired of four flames from the sky in one turn which just destroy any human army outside of their dome. :re:

Well you would hope that spending 140F gems would do some damage.......

[Dahis39]

How about a movable dome statue? Like a Juggernaut.

Im getting tired of four flames from the sky in one turn which just destroy any human army outside of their dome. :re:

Well you would hope that spending 140F gems would do some damage.......

I don't think three SCs can do the same effect. A movable dome really open up and enrich the late game gameplay. I'm really tired of SCs vs SCs and those giant troops and mages, which are the only army type u can bring out of your domes safely late game. QQ

[Dahis39]

For ma Oceania, there are two mermages, one of them cost only 30 golds.

[llamabeast]

How about a movable dome statue? Like a Juggernaut.

Sounds interesting, but can't be done!

For ma Oceania, there are two mermages, one of them cost only 30 golds.

Thanks.

That reminds me, I like to take a perfectionist approach to this kind of thing. Bugs are inevitable, but before releasing any future versions I will make sure to go through this thread (and the one on dom3mods) and fix any bugs or typos people have spotted. So please do report them!

[rdonj]

How about a movable dome statue? Like a Juggernaut.

Im getting tired of four flames from the sky in one turn which just destroy any human army outside of their dome. :re:

Well you would hope that spending 140F gems would do some damage.......

I don't think three SCs can do the same effect. A movable dome really open up and enrich the late game gameplay. I'm really tired of SCs vs SCs and those giant troops and mages, which are the only army type u can bring out of your domes safely late game. QQ

I really don't think mobile domes would open up anything. Quite the contrary in fact. Let's assume we have mobile domes now. Well, any conceivable overland ritual you can cast is now effectively dead and useless. No need to spend gems on these. What else can we spend them on? Summons and SCs. People would still build lots of SCs, maybe even more now that a good deal more spells become more or less useless in the lategame and there's nothing else to spend gems on. Perhaps SCs would see more use in armies sitting under domes but... consider SC raiders hiding under mobile domes now. They're protected from rituals, so if you want to kill one you have to take a gamble and pray that your spells pierce the dome and then get lucky with whatever spell you were casting to kill it. Coincidentally this would make intercepting SCs even harder, as now you can't rely on teleporting anti-thugs to do the job.

Thus, in my opinion even if it were possible to make mobile domes (which, as previously stated, it is not), I can't see how it would do anything other than make matters worse.

Also if you're worried about flames from the sky, try using an army made of fire-immune troops. No you can't bring out a human army without it being potentially exposed to ruin, but if your opponent is spending huge amounts of gems killing your regular armies in that fashion, he's not doing something else with those gems, and is helping you win the gem war. But really in the late game gold is for buying mages, not armies.

[Makinus]

The new MA Man Woodsman are nice! You put then at the front with Fire Closest orders and they will fire their bows until the enemy closes and then use their axes... They are also useful as bodyguards for bards that will have a better survivability if discovered in enemy territory during their unrest missions...

Edit: they are also very useful as screens for longbows with the Fire Closest orders and put in front of your longbows... assign Fire Archer orders to the longbows and you will be nearly unbeatable in archer duels as the enemy archers will normally target the woodsmens instead of the longbows and the woodsmen shields give them a better surivability against archers than Man longbowmen.

[shatner]

I'm skimming through CB1.91.dm and noticed a tiny typo for the Lord of Agartha.

#newmonster 2917 -- Forge Lord from the Seal
#name "Lord of Agartha"
#spr1 "./CBM_Sprites/lord_of_agartha_1.tga"
#spr2 "./CBM_Sprites/lord_of_agartha_2.tga"
#descr "In the time of the Sunderer, the Lord of Agartha dwelled deep beneath the earth and was a being of great power. But the might of the Sunderer was reater still, and slowly his power crumbled.

Should be "was greater still,".

[Valerius]

Llama, I haven't had a chance to look over all the changes yet but want to say thank you for the forge bonuses for the glamour nations and for restoring blood as an option for Van. I think this release really helps keep some of the traditional strategies for these nations viable.

And the other changes for these nations are also fun. The price reduction on Vanherse is great - I will actually recruit these as research mages as they are now only 10 more gold than the indie mages I typically use to fuel Van's research. Price reductions on the troops are helpful and the low upkeep on the fay boars is interesting.

Also, making bean sidhe recruit everywhere is a big help to Eriu. And in my opinion makes them more fun to play. As much as I like the thugging aspect of the game, it's nice to have some other options. Really like this change.

I also like the changes to problematic blood spells like vampire lords. What do people think about the price/mechanics of onaqui? I'm not much of a fan of freespawn units (especially good units as opposed to chaff) and onaqui can generate huge numbers of beast bats. But, I've never actually fought a Mictlan player that was using them. Any experiences with this?

Regarding spell requirements (and my grudge against skratti ;)) what about making claws of koyktos, and maybe infernal prison as well, have a B4 F/W1 requirement? It just doesn't seem like these spells should be so easily castable by a recruit everywhere unit.

[llamabeast]

Thanks Valerius, interesting comments.

By the way I have just realised I omitted two new spells from the changelog : "Return from Valhalla" for EA Van, and "Return from Hel" for EA Helheim.

[Valerius]

By the way I have just realised I omitted two new spells from the changelog : "Return from Valhalla" for EA Van, and "Return from Hel" for EA Helheim.

Very nice; that definitely falls into the fun category! I'm already looking forward to bringing back a magma eruption or rain of stones casting dwarf as a vanadrott. :)

I like this idea of copying and modifying spells to make national versions of them. Return from Valhalla/Hel is certainly a nice example but even something like the more straightforward Quickening Song is useful as it lets those A1N1 Sidhe Champions cast a spell that would normally be beyond their abilities. National spells/summons help differentiate nations and make the game more interesting.

Speaking of fun things, making tarrasques commanders falls in that category. This seems to be a growing category: non-humanoid monsters that have some nice built-in abilities but limited slots. The most successful examples that come to mind are EDM's shishis and zmeys. It's an interesting change and hopefully tarrasques will find a place in that group.

The Treelord changes are also good and I think they're worth summoning (maybe one research level lower, though?). And the kithaironic lion change is interesting as well; mixing some of those into a formation could be useful.

About the changes to scales, I think it's good that Order/Sloth is no longer a default combination. Tough to say if the spread between order and production should be two or three points. I lean towards the current two point spread, though. I think with a three point spread I'd still go with Order/Sloth. Two point spread I'm not sure... It's also nice how Growth is differentiated - less income upfront but paying off a lot later on.

I've only started to look over the magic items but so far it looks good. One thing that I think is helpful is the increase in protection on some of the lighter armors. For instance, increasing the protection on shambler skin hauberk means that if the commander has mid-range armor built-in he's no longer ending up with lower protection by using this item than if he used one of his misc slots for a water breathing item and kept his built-in armor.

I also like the 15 gem pricing of more powerful items like wraith crowns, robes of invulnerability and bone armor.


So far I've looked over the glamour nations and Man. A couple of things that I think are worth keeping an eye on to see how they play out are:

* Man's Hex spell. Nature has gotten some (welcome) strength on the battlefield recently with improved MR resists spells but this one could be particularly nasty. It's instakill on a failed MR roll just like polymorph but it only has half the fatigue and if it's AI friendly and gets spammed even after the script runs out it could be brutal.

* Vanjarls at 240 gold. I'm certainly not complaining about the boosts to Van but it occurs to me that with dwarves having a forge bonus to help with thugging and half of Vanjarls having B2 a cost of 260 gold or even the original 280 gold might be reasonable. I never thought it was feasible to give two blood boosters to a B1 Vanjarl for a late game cloud trapezing life for a life caster. But one blood booster? That's feasible. I don't think the change to Vanjarls is OP (especially not in EA) but 240 gold may be too cheap a price, all things considered.

[Tarrax]

Excellent work. Thanks. The PDF is also great. One small suggestion I'd make for next version is to indicate unique items in some way such as using an underline font.

[llamabeast]

Thanks!

Unique items are the purple ones (all Const. 8 items are unique).

[Tarrax]

Haha thanks. I don't know what I was thinking. For some reason in my mind I thought as Const. 8 items and unique items as separate. Nevermind. :)

[PashaDawg]

Thanks, Llamabeast!!

[Peter Ebbesen]

I've tried out the new EA R'lyeh, only having given it a cursory look earlier, and two minor things struck me right away:

The Polypal Queen pretender appears to only spawn Polypal Spawn, unlike the recruitable Polypal Mothers, that also spawn the occasional sacred Gibodai at high levels of dominion (#domsummon20 1522 in CBM1.91).

The Polypal Queen, the reason and the fate of the Aboleth race, seems an exceptionally poor choice of those available to EA R'lyeh. Amongst the immobile pretenders she competes with the Monolith (dom4, S1N1, pathcost 40) and the Void Lurker (dom2, S3, pathcost 15) with her own (dom2, W1S1, pathcost 25). She's worse for blessings, worse for magic, and her sole unique benefit is a stream of Polypal Spawn that is equaled in magnitude by two recruitable Polypal Mothers at low dominion and in quality by one at high dominion.

She'd really benefit from spawning a few Gibodai (and perhaps even the occasional rare mind lord?) as well as the Polypal Spawns or from having better magic or something. Immobile pretenders tend to need something special that isn't easy to cover elsewhere to make them worthwhile using, and she's severely lacking in that respect, being easily replaced in her unique ability by a few cheap recruitable commanders.

----------------

A quick look at Vanheim and Helheim reveals that the Allfather pretender is *gone* in all ages. Surely, that can't be right? [this is 1.91]

[Valerius]

A quick look at Vanheim and Helheim reveals that the Allfather pretender is *gone* in all ages. Surely, that can't be right? [this is 1.91]

Any chance you have other mods active? I just started a test game with EA Van and was able to select the Allfather as a pretender.

[kianduatha]

A quick look at Vanheim and Helheim reveals that the Allfather pretender is *gone* in all ages. Surely, that can't be right? [this is 1.91]

Mine has the Allfather for all the Heims...must be something on your end.

[Peter Ebbesen]

A quick look at Vanheim and Helheim reveals that the Allfather pretender is *gone* in all ages. Surely, that can't be right? [this is 1.91]

Any chance you have other mods active? I just started a test game with EA Van and was able to select the Allfather as a pretender.
Thanks for the quick response.

I didn't have any other mods active, but upon checking I discovered I had been performing testing with a version 3.26 Dom3 install together with CBM1.91; In this combination, the Allfather is gone.

Using my 3.27 install with CBM1.91 the Allfather is back in business.

[llamabeast]

I was looking at R'lyeh pretenders yesterday and came to the same conclusion about the Polypal Mother. I'll give her a little boost. Maybe she needs a big boost, but I'll save that for a later version (I intend to do a proper pretender review at some point).

[tratorix]

Agartha's Earth Communion spell is giving seperate results for each type of gem it find. For instance if I find an earth site and nothing else, the message reads: 1 new magic site found in wherever, No new magic sites found in wherever, No new magic sites found in wherever, No new magic sites found in wherever.

[llamabeast]

Yeah, it's a shame Earth Communion reports back like that, but unfortunately it can't be changed. I decided the slight quirkiness of it was worth it to give Agartha a cool spell.

[llamabeast]

Right! Following a few days of feedback, here's another little update release.

CB1.92:

Errors fixed:
Fay Boar protection dropped after recruitment - fixed
Trident from Beyond was W1S1 - meant to be W3S1 (forging reference was correct)
Forging reference error - Jade Knife listed as const 2 rather than 8
Spider Bite and Heroic Blade shared a weapon id, which was bad
For modders: ID usage info at the start of the mod was wrong, fixed

Content stuff:
Polypal Queen given a buff - she now domsummons gibodai, but costs more points
Mind Lords have 3 misc slots (just for thematic reasons really)
Spells which kill the caster now also give the caster insanity. This means that if you use an immortal pretender to cast Possession or Foul Sacrifice he will quickly go mad (would you like to be eaten from the inside by spiders?)
Foul Sacrifice once again gives more spiders if you have more nature magic
Jomon tweaks from kianduatha - ninjas keep shurikens when given magic weapons, tatsu has more powerful magic (lvl 3), shark warrior has improved MR, mori-no-kami is a better archer, and sea units got Japanese weapons and armour


Of course one never knows what monstrous bugs may still be lurking, but at present I don't anticipate releasing any more updates in the immediate future. Fingers crossed, this should now be ready for people to go ahead with MP games. :)

[llamabeast]

Shatner: Forgot about your typo till just now, sorry. Will be fixed in the next version.

[BrodieSWR]

Hello everybody!

I would like to spark a bit of debate in this thread about Yomi. I believe that there are two things that need to be changed badly.

1) The first would be their heat scale. Yomi consists of many fire resistant demons, and their homeland is a Volcano! I think it would be more than appropriate for them to have a preference for Heat Scale 1 and just for thematic purposes, if nothing else.

2) The second and most important thing that needs to be changed, in my point of view, is the base magic of the sorcerers.

Currently, they have 1 Earth and 1 Death with a +1 random in Air, Earth, Fire or Death.

What if the 1 Death were changed to 1 Air?

As it stands now, the Hannyas basically trump the sorcerers in almost all ways, with them seeing almost no play time. With this one small change, the sorcerers would become a viable alternative to the Hannyas because they would have a 25% chance of having 2 Air/1 Earth, which would open them up as fantastic, yet fragile support mages for the armies of Yomi, acting as casters for all kinds of nice spells such as Wind Guide, Lightning Bolt, Aim, and Contact Dai-tengu. They could also forge many items that would benefit Yomi greatly, and expand their options against certain nations whom they have many, many problems fighting against.

The way I see it, Yomi's theme is about reckless and violent elemental power being wielded by selfish, greedy, gluttonous demons, with lots of emphasis on offense, and very little on defense. This one small change would open them up for more of their thematic demonic violence, such as dai-tengu, and reduce some of their crippling redundancy.

But anyway, I can see how it could be a bit strong, but I just feel like Yomi gets jipped, seeing as how they have a whole slew of "national" spells that they can't even access reasonably well, such as Contact Nushi and Contact Dai-tengu. Air magic is SO vital to Yomi that the fact that Air 2 Dai-Oni are basically diamond-coated godsends makes Air a NECESSITY on your pretender, severely limiting your builds and options.

Maybe if they were made a little bit more expensive to compensate, although I don't think this is necessary, as they have old age, and Yomi needs growth to counter-act that, something for which they almost never have spare points available.

At least for me, it is more thematic. Yomi is about wild and crazed googly-eyed demons who aren't civilized or patient enough to hone and develop their raw magical power. Their schools represent this, too. To me, it is almost as if they are lazy because of all of the power that they naturally wield, taking it for granted and therefore not using it to it's maximum potential.

Fire, Earth, Death and Air and even a little Nature. These are all violent magics and elements weilded by wild demons that hail from the mountains and forests of the Volcanic Mountain of the Oni.

If anything, perhaps I could make a mod to change this one thing about Yomi for people to test and to see if they like it or think it is too overpowered. I think it would make Yomi extremely competitive and that they would finally start receiving some love and attention from the community!

Please tell me what you guys think, I'll be looking forward to your opinions and input!

[BrodieSWR]

I have made the mod, and you guys can download it to test it. I gave Yomi a preference for Heat Scale 1 and the sorcerers now receive 1 Air and 1 Earth with a +1 random for Air/Earth/Fire/Death.

Tell me what you think.

[sidhos]

I am at my g/f's house and d/l'ed the 1.92 and added the files to the mod folder. Previously, the game was strictly vanilla on this computer. I enable the mod. Go to game tools-create pretender-middle ages,,, game crashes, small message box pops up about bad #selectweapon command

[kianduatha]

The Yomi with Fire resistance have it because they have innate Fire magic, not because they're used to a hot climate...that's why only the Yomi that can Throw Flames have FR. And there are cold-aspected demons too, so I'm not sure that Heat-1 makes much sense. As they are now, because many of their units have Fire resist, you can probably get away with taking Heat-3 without so many repercussions, but it isn't their native heat preference.

Why should Sorcerers get Air magic baseline instead of Death, thematically? I mean, we are talking about "a dark magician who has chosen to serve an Oni King to gain power". Sounds pretty dark/death-y, not air-focused.

You have an excellent point though about Hannya overshadowing Sorcerers. Perhaps a small price decrease(they are very old, after all) or a research bonus of 1 would make them comparatively more attractive, because right now they simply aren't better researchers than Hannya.

As an aside, I made a practice game with Yomi and my first Dai Oni was A2, heh.

[Deathblob]

Well, the Hannya does have the demon and cold-blooded traits, which can be disadvantages (End of Culture and End of Weakness are not nice to Hannyas.

in M1:
Sorc = 115G/6R = 19, Hannya = 200G/8R = 25
in D2:
Sorc = 115G/4R = 28, Hannya = 200G/6R = 33

So sorcs are always cheaper researchers.

In addition, they have totally different paths. You're not going to cast many army buffs (or debuffs) with a Hannya. Hannya are really only better at battlefield evo (unless you are up to RoS, only a Dai Oni or a EA sorc with boots can do that), and maybe making undead archers. Yomi has great thugs, there's not much point in using Hannya as thug mages, any item you make is better off on a Shura or Dai Oni.

[llamabeast]

sidhos: Have you patched dom3 to the latest version?

[sidhos]

llama: Thanks, I'll give that a check. :)

[sidhos]

llama: That fixed it. Thank you. I THOUGHT I had the latest patch but obviously didn't. D'oh

[BrodieSWR]

Before I begin, getting an Air 2 Dai Oni on your first turn is like winning the lottery.

They have a 25% chance of coming with Air 1. Air 2 is another 10% x 25%. So that would be:

1/4 x 1/4 x 1/10 = 1/160

That means that 1 out of every 160 Dai Onis will have Air 2.

Yeah. Real dependable.

Getting back on topic, I think that maybe the Heat Scale 1 change wouldn't be a good thing on second thought. My main reason was the fact that they hail from a volcano and the netherworld. But, now that I think about it, they also consist of many humans and bakemono, who don't care for it either.

However, I still believe sorcerers need a change.

I have played Yomi a lot. And by a lot, I mean a lot. I test them all the time because I love their theme, and people tend to treat them as "weak" and I enjoy the challenge of trying to make them shine.

I have only joined the forums recently, but I have down many test games in private through e-mail with my brother, LongBrodie, and in singleplayer.

From my tests, I can tell you, without a doubt, that Yomi has some serious issues holding them back:

1) Sorcerers die from old age in DROVES. While they are better researchers monetarily, it doesn't really pay off later when they are dying before you get your money's worth out of them.

2) Yomi needs the Growth Scale to support the Sorcerers. Yet, Yomi has a very, very limited selection of Pretenders, and none that are thematic. Their ability to take Growth is only viable if they take a scale-monster as their Pretender, which isn't very useful as they need magical diversity to support their redundant mages.

3) Yomi needs Air magic. They need it. Without it, they are severly limited in their capacity to fight certain nations. They become a one trick pony that is very, very easily countered. Air alleviates this problem somewhat, opening them up to flying sacred Tengu and other wonderful spells.

My main argument is that giving them the ability to have Air 2 would free up the Pretender to get other magic or other scales, such as Growth, which would in turn allow them to support the sorcerers. There would be nothing stopping you from taking Air anyway, but it wouldn't be an absolute necessity.

I can sit here and argue this into the ground or until I am blue in the face with theorycrafting all I want, but I recommend you guys check out the mod and play a few games with it and tell me if you think it is "overpowered" or not by seeing for yourselves.

I just ask that you please, please consider them in comparison with other powerhouses such as Hinnom, Sauromatia, Mictlan and Niefelheim.

[Deathblob]

Try a sleeping Dom6 E6S4 Lord of Plenty, O3S1H1G1L3M1. Bakemono hordes are great for initial expansion. Actually, they are great after expansion too.

You will get more A than your initial income from events/A1 sites/cross-path sites, and if you want A2 to get into A through Dai Tengus, empower an A1 Dai Oni.

If you're really against empowering, forge a RoW with your god. It'll make it easier to advance in N & W too, if you don't find nice indies like Jade Amazons.

[kianduatha]

You'll want the RoW anyways eventually--slap one on a Dai Tengu and you suddenly have enough for air boosters.

But yeah--worst-case scenario, you have to spend 30 air gems getting an A2 Dai Oni.

[Morla]

Hi all, i try to play a bit with Niefelheim EA but when i try to recruit, black screen and---"myloasmalloc: can´t open./mods/./Worthy_heroes/niefel_Jarls_1.tga", btw i am new to mods...

[llamabeast]

Oh! That one is my fault! Many apologies, I'll get a patch out ASAP (it won't need a new version number as it's just a graphical change - the mod is pointing to some image files that many people will have but I didn't actually include in the mod).

[llamabeast]

Okay, I've updated the zip file so that all the image files are included in the CBM_Sprites folder.

Morla - please try the download again, hopefully it will work this time. :)

[Morla]

YaY, it works, but with the YARG3 version it doesn´t work, same error, i try copying the worthy heroes 1.91 and it works, but i am going to play my first mp game and we are going to uso yarg3 version, this solves the problem but i don´t know if i can play the game with that version of worthy heroes

[Samhain]

I am definitely of the opinion that Fomoria could use a little help. Their capital dependence is crippling. Not only is this a major vulnerability, it dramatically reduces their competitiveness in large maps.

See the thread: Well CBM1.9 is nice, but why no buff for Fomoria?? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=47743

Unmarked Champions are an excellent unit for the price. But, you can't really recruit them as you are so weak in research you can't afford to recruit anything outside your capital but the otherwise nearly useless Fomorian Druids.

Here are the changes I would propose. They are nothing dramatic. There would still be plenty of more powerful nation choices for EA in my opinion. But, it would go a long ways to broaden the options for playing styles.

* Give the Fomorian Druid a Leather Hauberk and Shield
* Give the Fomorian God King pretender chassis N1 in additional to his current base paths, W1 and D1.
* Make the Fomorian Giants, Fomorian Kings, and Fomorian God kings fully amphibious and give them at least 50% darkvision. They came from the depths of the sea for goodness sakes.
* Give the Fomorian Druid a 10% random AWDN pick.
* Make the Unmarked Champion capital only. I know this is a bit of a contradiction in my stated goals for these changes, but it really wouldn't hurt Fomoria much at all with a better armored Druid. Besides, its odd that Unmarked troops are cap only but their champion is not.

[Samhain]

Sorry, that should be W1 and D2 on the Fomorian God King.

[Deathblob]

Sauromatia too is absolutely crippled.

Hydra: cap only.
Androphag Archer: cap only.
Witch King: cap only.
Oiorpata: cap only.
Hydras: cap only.

Sauromatia will never win! Because of the CAP ONLY!1!!

At least give Witch Kings a chance for A4, so they can put up an Air Dome in their cap and compete with Fomoria.

Here's an excellent idea: take the Death off the Witch King, and replace it with Air.

[PriestyMan]

Deathblob my respect for your trolling skills goes up every post

[kianduatha]

I do admit that the Fomorian Giants themselves getting darkvision 50 or so would make a lot of sense(it's apparently pretty dark in Fomoria, what with all the black dogs and stuff running around with darkpower). But I think most of your other changes hinge on Fomoria being weak at research. And for that, the easiest change is simply to make Fomorian Druids cheaper by 10 or 15 gold.

[Samhain]

I was afraid of giving them a research boost would give them more help than they need. And, it would seem inconsistent with other giant nations which have much the same issue with research. I'd say that they need a nudge to keep up with some of the other CBM changes, but no more.

Giving the Druids a Shield and Hauberk, to me, gives Fomoria something a bit more interesting to recruit from their non-cap forts than an oversized researcher while staying in theme. They may not be much good at evocation, but with some basic gear and spell buffs, Fomorian Druids could put up a decent fight. If someone goes with a E9N6+ bless, they could even be formidable. For that option, I might actually see increasing the cost slightly.

And, a final clarification on the Fomorian God King. I'm proposing he would end up with W1D1N1 instead of his current W1D2. Perhaps he gets played more than I know about, but I have yet to see him in a game. And, considering how cool of a chassis he is, that's a shame. I think giving him a spot of nature, which Fomoria really should always have in its bless, would do that. Though, this is more a thematic than balance change. Fomoria has no need of an SC pretender.

[DeadlyShoe]

The Hierogallus and Black Emerald heroes for pythium dont have shields or helmets.

however, im not using a clean mod so YMMV.

[kianduatha]

If someone goes with a E9N6+ bless, they could even be formidable.

I'm not sure I approve of driving yet another nation(another giant nation, no less) to E9N6 blesses. Fomoria so far has been fairly good about liking weird blesses that still work(W9 especially has been a favorite), and that seems unique enough for a giant nation that getting rid of the cool Unmarked Champion minithug dynamic in exchange for yet more cloud trapezing E9N6 raiders... it completely changes the mechanics of the nation, and it changes the mechanics to something less unique.

[shatner]

I just noticed something peculiar: the Vanherse commanders have slightly different stats based on whether you are using EA Vanheim or EA Helheim.

The Vanheim Vanherse has a protection of 12 and defense of 19.
The Helheim Vanherse has a protection of 11 and a defense of 20.

Also, the Vanheim Vanjarl has a protection of 12.
The Helheim Vanjarl has a protection of 11 (all other stats are identical).

[Valerius]

It's because they have different armor and are actually different units. This isn't specific to CBM but is also the case in vanilla since Helheim's units don't have sailing (Helheim's Vanherse also has a 1 point higher defense than Van's version).

[kasnavada]

Fomorian Druids could put up a decent fight. If someone goes with a E9N6+ bless, they could even be formidable. For that option, I might actually see increasing the cost slightly.


I do not think it's a good idea. Fomoria needs research, and it has no other researchers out of capitol... Also Unmarked fill the fighter role anyway.

[Mightypeon]

I think Fomoria is very well balanced.
They arent Niefelheim, or Lanka, but between recruit anywhere minithugs, recruitable SCs, excellent Air and Death access they do have a number of things going for them.
Even the much maligned Fomorian militias can be suprisingly usefull in a Siege defense due to low cost and S.

And dont underestimate the Fir Bolg troops either, the Javelin guys are actually quite good.

To summarize it:
Formoria has a quite decent early game with Unmarked expansion backed up by quite good Fir Bolgs, can rely on early recruitable SCs in the Midgame (Construction 4 and alteration 2), and is well disposed for Tartarians/High End Air Summons in the late game.
Dance of the Morrigans (especially if backed up by other spells) is also strong.

[Soyweiser]

Isn't formoria a bit like LA Atlantis, most of the stuff is cap only(*)? The mages are better, a bit more expensive, but with more diverse magic. And with a good early game (which the cap only units provice) having 4 rp for 150 gold isn't that bad. You can always make the research boosters, both air and death ones are available easily.

And Air 1 with wadn random allows you to use some interesting thugs.

*: one little problem of course. Atlantis also as acces to the excellent underwater mages, giving them access to all paths but nature and blood.

[Scaramuccia]

with LA Atlantis you could build some ok troops in non-capital castles. Massed ice guards could be nice addition to your armies.

With formoria - druids and sometimes unmarked champions, you don't want anything else.

[Morla]

I found a little bug with a magic site "SHAMBLER CITY"--> enables recruitment of wild ettin(costs 0 gold 1 resorces)

[Soyweiser]

Yeah, found that one myself also. Posted it in the other forum.

[DeadlyShoe]

Burkhard Nachtzehrer, LA Ulm hero, is dual wielding greatswords. Without ambidexterity. Good thing he's immortal.

[DeadlyShoe]

Woops, last post is bogus. Loaded an old test game and forgot to change mods before starting a new game; CMB 1.7something was enabled instead.

[Mightypeon]

Imho, buffing the Formorian National units a bit could be quite usefull and fitting.
There is simply no (apart from militias if you want to drag out a Siege) incentive to ever hire non Cap Formorian National Units.

[rdonj]

Most of the giant nations are like that. They're all very cap-centric. Fomoria is actually probably better off than most of them.

[Mightypeon]

Yeah, Fir Bolgs are quite cool, I think Formoria is the only Giant Nation were the small ones are "better" than the big ones though ;)

[Question]

I dont know if this is a bug, but i was using early Ermor, and had 5 arch bishops + the heroe Innocentius. All of them set to heal for 30+ turns, but they never healed any afflictions at all, and Innocentius's recuperation nevver worked either.

[llamabeast]

Perhaps the afflictions were caused by old age? Old age afflictions can't be healed, except by using the Chalice or Gift of Health.

[Question]

How do you tell if they were getting afflictions from old age and not something else?

My pretender, prince of death, got 3 afflictions but couldnt get rid of them either...

[llamabeast]

Oh - he's undead. You can't heal afflictions on undead either.

I'm not sure whether it's that you can't heal afflictions on old people, or the game actually knows where the afflictions came from. If the latter, there's no way of knowing where they came from other than memory.

[Question]

If you cant heal afflictions on undead, how can they get afflictions in the first place?

I dont understand why a "never healing chest wound" would affect an undead creature that heals through magic anyway...

[llamabeast]

Well just for clarity this is all base game behaviour, not related to CBM in any way.

[Question]

What about making undead afflictions curable by labs?

[llamabeast]

None of that kind of stuff is moddable.

[Question]

...Seriously? Wow...

What about making undead immune to afflictions then? Its kind of game breaking when you have undead commanders or your pretender rack up afflictions with no way to get rid of them.

Also i noticed that my mage was burning through air gems at a ridiculous rate, even though the only wind spell he casts that needs gem is wind guide...any idea whats going on? Did the gem requirement for wind guide get increased, but the help text was left unaltered?

Edit : After one battle, my mage lost 3 air gems...he was set to cast wind guide, flaming arrows, eagle eye and 2 thunderstrikes.

[thorfrog]

I'm getting an error in the CBM 1.92. myloadmallocLcan't open ./mods/./Worthy_Heroes/Valkyrieheroine.tga

Any idea how to fix this?

[kianduatha]

...Seriously? Wow...

What about making undead immune to afflictions then? Its kind of game breaking when you have undead commanders or your pretender rack up afflictions with no way to get rid of them.

Also i noticed that my mage was burning through air gems at a ridiculous rate, even though the only wind spell he casts that needs gem is wind guide...any idea whats going on? Did the gem requirement for wind guide get increased, but the help text was left unaltered?

Edit : After one battle, my mage lost 3 air gems...he was set to cast wind guide, flaming arrows, eagle eye and 2 thunderstrikes.

Making undead immune to afflictions is definitely not moddable. Undead units are amazing. It being difficult to cure afflictions is one of the drawbacks.

Casters in general use gems to reduce fatigue if you give them some, even on gemless spells. Usually players put gems they want to save for future battles on non casters, typically stealthed scouts who run alongside armies as gem mules.

[Question]

So what am i supposed to do with a undead pretender that has racked up so many afflictions to become useless? I still think the idea of undead being affected by afflictions is really silly.

And i suppose theres no way to actually stop your mages from eating gems en-masse?

[thorfrog]

I'm getting an error in the CBM 1.92. myloadmallocLcan't open ./mods/./Worthy_Heroes/Valkyrieheroine.tga

Any idea how to fix this?

My games seems to hang on this.

[Squirrelloid]

So what am i supposed to do with a undead pretender that has racked up so many afflictions to become useless? I still think the idea of undead being affected by afflictions is really silly.

And i suppose theres no way to actually stop your mages from eating gems en-masse?

The Chalice (artifact) and Gift of Health (global, in dominion effect) are the only ways to heal undead afflictions.

Well, you could also get him killed and then Call God him back, but that has all the usual drawbacks, and gives each affliction one chance to heal.

[Question]

Kind of means im forced to go nature for gift of health though.

Im looking at the forging reference PDF, its pretty detailed, but my question is...which of those items give path bonuses?

[llamabeast]

thorfrog - try redownloading CBM1.92, it briefly had an error where it pointed to sprites it didn't have, which I then sneakily fixed. If you still get the problem, try making a copy of the CBM_Sprites folder called Worthy_Heroes.

Nothing affliction-related is moddable.

my question is...which of those items give path bonuses?

The ones which are in bold italic font.

[Question]

Not sure if this is a bug, but i noticed that the Aesir pretender god that comes with a free chain of displacement doesn't actually get her image displaced like glamour/mirror image does.

[llamabeast]

Chainmail of Displacement doesn't actually have that effect. Although I thought that the Asynja (is that who you mean?) had glamour and hence mirror image anyway.

[Radio_Star]

Not sure if this is a bug, but i noticed that the Aesir pretender god that comes with a free chain of displacement doesn't actually get her image displaced like glamour/mirror image does.

http://assets.motherboard.tv/post_images/assets/000/008/377/successful-troll-is-successful_original.jpg

[Soyweiser]

Not sure if this is a bug, but i noticed that the Aesir pretender god that comes with a free chain of displacement doesn't actually get her image displaced like glamour/mirror image does.

http://assets.motherboard.tv/post_images/assets/000/008/377/successful-troll-is-successful_original.jpg

Really you think he is trolling? I was also pretty surprised when the chain of displacement didn't really do anything. Apparently the defense bonus is the displacement.

[shatner]

Yeah, I'll second Soyweiser on this one. Initially, I too was expecting the chainmail of displacement to hit the wearer with mirror image at the start of battle.

[shatner]

I've been meaning to ask, why do we have both "Mermaids' Blessing" and "Sirens' Blessing" when the two spells are completely identical in every way except their name?

Behold:
#newspell
#name "Mermaids' Blessing"
#descr "This spell is a larger version of a spell that Sirens and Mermaids use on attractive humans to make them able to do certain 'physical tasks' underwater. This blessing affects all friendly troops in the battlefield using some magical means to breathe underwater and gives them easier movement and increased agility underwater. This spell however does not prevent the extra fatigue granted by underwater combat. This spell can only be casted underwater and has no effect on those who can naturally enter the sea."
#school 4
#researchlevel 3
#path 0 1
#pathlevel 0 3
#effect 23
#aoe 666
#range 0
#fatiguecost 100
#nreff 1
#damage 33554464 -- (Unholy Power + Water Shield)
#flightspr -1
#explspr 10068
#spec 46202880 -- (not vs ambhibians, Friendlies only, castable UW, only UW)
#end

-----------

#newspell
#name "Sirens' Blessing"
#descr "This spell is a larger version of a spell that Sirens and Mermaids use on attractive humans to make them able to do certain 'physical tasks' underwater. This blessing affects all friendly troops in the battlefield using some magical means to breathe underwater and gives them easier movement and increased agility underwater. This spell however does not prevent the extra fatigue granted by underwater combat. This spell can only be casted underwater and has no effect on those who can naturally enter the sea."
#school 4
#researchlevel 3
#path 0 1
#pathlevel 0 3
#effect 23
#aoe 666
#range 0
#fatiguecost 100
#nreff 1
#damage 33554464 -- (Unholy Power + Water Shield)
#flightspr -1
#explspr 10068
#spec 46202880 -- (not vs ambhibians, Friendlies only, castable UW, only UW)
#end

[shatner]

This is a small thing but I'm wondering if Kivigtok, the tupilak riding LA Atlantis hero should have a bite and/or claw attack from the mount. That and the fact that he is the sole poor amphibian in an otherwise fully amphibious nation is a bit odd.

These aren't big balance issues at all but they do seem a bit incongruous.

[Numahr]

I still think the idea of undead being affected by afflictions is really silly.

They are undead but they are still physical beings. If they lose an arm or a whole part of their undead body, they should be bearing he consequences of that.

Note however that a very common and nasty result of wounds is a raise in encumbrance (especially, but not only, the dreaded chest wound); well all 0 encumbrance undead are unaffected by this, as long as they only melee (the rule is that if you have 0 encumbrance, any additional encumbrance from whatever source impacts only your spell casting encumbrance). This alone makes undead thugs much more affliction-resilient than most living thugs.

[Question]

They are undead, you can just reattach an arm or something. If you have the magic to raise the dead from the ground, you can surely do that.

Also noticed something weird with the erinyes...one of them attacked a researcher, who casted hellbind heart. The erinyes failed the save, so the battle ended in a victory for me. The erinyes didnt join my army though, and just kept attacking from next turn onwards. Not sure if intended.

[Soyweiser]

Erinyes are special, they cannot be banished or charmed.

[DeadlyShoe]

They are undead, you can just reattach an arm or something. If you have the magic to raise the dead from the ground, you can surely do that.
you can do this with magic beings that 'never heal'; they are considered repairable constructs. Unlife is different, healing just something the spells that grant unlife cannot do. Especially since healing ingame is kind of mystical medicine that wouldn't work on undead anyway.

I like to think of it as an aspect of the inability of death to create life, only to create a hollow mockery of it.

Note that undead are not created equal, undeath is not the same as lifelessness, never-heal or mindless.

[Question]

Erinyes are special, they cannot be banished or charmed.

But the battle ends in your favor if they get charmed (although it only works temporarily).

[earcaraxe]

Erinyes are special, they cannot be banished or charmed.

But the battle ends in your favor if they get charmed (although it only works temporarily).

so what?

[13lackGu4rd]

hey guys, I'm back from a long slumber from Dom3. anyway, I see that CBM has evolved quite a bit into this new version, haven't actually played much with CBM 1.71 or whatever it was, just 1.6, so there's a lot to take in. anyway, tried out EA Caelum in single player, just to test some things, and I noticed that the Eagle Kings have no magic paths at all and cost 10 gold 20 something resources. I tried it on 2 seperate maps to rule out some weird map issue. so I have no idea whether it's something weird with my game or whether it's a bug in the mod itself. also, if anyone else raised this issue already than I'm sorry, can't really be bothered reading through 10 full pages of comments here, too many other things to catch back up on.

[PriestyMan]

you have a mod conflict.

[13lackGu4rd]

how can I have a mod conflict when it's the only mod I have? I deleted all of my older mods(including all older CBM versions and nation mods I had).

[Soyweiser]

Did you install the latest patch? That changed a lot of mod commands

[Executor]

I'm sure this was already reported but just in case;
There's a site that enables recruitment of Wild Ettins, Metropolitus Nautilus.

[DeadlyShoe]

I feel jomon's units are a bit high powered for their cost right now, the HP thing helped bring their crazy weapons into line...

maybe im just bitty because im playing c'tis

[rdonj]

Jomon is reasonably good at killing infantry, yes. But anything with any sort of ranged weapon will slaughter them. Unfortunately that's not really c'tis forte, but standard c'tis skellyspam + poison tactics should work just fine against samurai, so they really shouldn't be a problem. Plus falchioneers should be able to put a decent level of hurt on the samurai, and the light infantry should be a relatively efficient buy for fighting samurai. If you're buying desert rangers and tomb guards then yes, your military is going to feel feeble against the samurai. Jomon's infantry are really quite vulnerable though, relying on their higher than standard defense and medium armor to keep them safe. You should have no trouble killing them.

[oldbone]

BUG?

Carrion Dragon in Carrion Lord form cannot reanimate (no command for it).

[kianduatha]

Reanimation comes from Holy, so a Carrion Dragon in Carrion Lord form shouldn't be able to reanimate.

[shatner]

Shouldn't the Zmey be cold-blooded? The Bogarus-only summon it is based on is (http://dom3.servegame.com/wiki/Zmey).

[llamabeast]

Excellent catch!

[Valerius]

It may be thematic but I'm not sure if making the Zmey cold-blooded is a good idea simply because the encumbrance hit you take in cold dominion is so severe (it's a sad thing seeing Agarthans fighting in cold 3). I haven't used them much but have had them used (effectively) against me and I really like this style of unit - a monster with relatively few slots but a good set of built-in abilities (shi shis also fit this description).

Also, a small thing, but thematically it would make sense for dwarven elder (monster # 2826) multiheros to also have a forge bonus.

But the real thing I want to say is how much I'm enjoying this release of CBM. This version of Eriu is by far the most fun one I've played (have a game going with the Tuatha with awe as well and of course I've played every previous version ;)). I'll have more detailed feedback later but I'll mention that I think Eriu is quite capable of defending itself against a rush and I don't think I'm being overly optimistic in my belief that they have a very strong midgame. Endgame the lack of native SDB access is an issue but I don't feel nations have to be equally strong in all stages of the game. The only problem is having too weak an early game such that the nation is an obvious target (Eriu used to fall in this category).

I also really like the changes to magic items and find myself considering items I would have never forged before (even with a hammer).

I think this is an excellent version of CBM. Thanks for all your work on this. :)

[Squirrelloid]

Really disagree Zmey should be cold-blooded. That 'feature' basically ruins units, especially since Cold-3 dominion is really common.

[GFSnl]

Depends on the price you‘ll have to pay for them.

I like the idea thematicly.

[Squirrelloid]

Depends on the price you‘ll have to pay for them.

I like the idea thematicly.

If its cold-blooded it will stop being used at almost any price. You'd have to make them like 5f to get people to bother, because its really easy to throw Wolven Winter on any province you're expecting to fight in.

A cold-blooded zmey in cold-3 dominion would lose to *PD*. Its like +10 encumbrance. Totally unplayable. Its worse than having a chest wound.

[Scaramuccia]

You get exactly +10 enc for cold-blooded in cold 3 province. Also you get some enc for cold climate. Just crushed C'tis with Wolven winter research rush. 18 enc sauromancers suck.

Cold blooded is really bad thing. Not sure if Zmey need such nerf.

[Valerius]

Actually, reading the zmey's description it doesn't say they are the same family of creature as the Bogarus zmey, only that "they have lent their names to the lesser drakes of Rus". So, let's consider them three headed red dragons, and red dragons aren't cold-blooded. :p

And keep in mind zmey make nice heavy duty raiders and can be expected to operate in hostile dominion so if your opponent has cold scales he may not even have to bother spamming wolven winter.

It's too bad the penalties for being cold-blooded aren't moddable. Even cut in half they would be serious but the 4/3/3 penalty for each tick in the cold scale is just crippling.

[GFSnl]

You haven't convinced me.

I still like the idea and I think you're exaggerating.

Against cold 3 it's a problem. But how many gems cost Wolven winter? Where is the Zmey gonna raid? Against pd the Zmey wins easily even with +10 enc. With it's AoE 3 fire attack most battle against pd take 2 or 3 turns.

So he's not a good raider in all circumstances, this is called strategic thinking. When your fighting cold, summon a Wendigo.

[Soyweiser]

So zmeys stop being usefull against any cold1 or higher nation. Or a neutral nation with good pd.

Also, now unkitted zmeys can killed by ghost rider spam and retreat route removal, about 1/3 of the time. With cold blood, you can ALWAYS kill them with one ghost rider and casting woven winter twice. No exception. cold blooded means + 12 encumberance each attack round. (10 for the cold blooded, +2 for extreme cold).

Sure, ghost riders is a end game spell. (and way to cheap at 5 dgems, CBM should up that a bit 7-8 perhaps), and you need a lot of gems to prepare for ghost rider spam (lich + 35dgems in death boosters). But it works great against most foes.

I think it would be better just to give them a cold resistance malus. Cold blooded seems a bit broken anyway.

And against PD with 13 enc the zmey does not win. Perhaps if you give the zmey equipment. But I doubt it.

[Executor]

Zmey is unusable in cold. I've had the privilage to fight Neif as Abysia and kitted Zmeys died to jotun PD, and that really says something.

GR's are the bane of zmey btw. 2 GR's will usually kill just about any Zmey, kitted of course.

[Soyweiser]

Wraith crown and a berzerker amulet work pretty well. Eth means the lances don't hit, gives regen, and gives berserk. Sprinkle in MR and resistances as needed :D

[shatner]

Really, I don't think anyone is arguing that giving the Zmey cold-blooded would make it's defeat likely in a cold province. I think the larger question is whether the Zmey having that weakness is too much.

The point is the Zmey is an extraordinary raiding unit which skirts the line between heavy thug and SC. It flies, has three lives, very high protection, does AoE fire damage on top of 4 high strength attacks (so one is likely to connect even when the foe is ethereal AND fire immune). The Zmey being a poor choice to invade a cold nation is fine. After all, you know not to rely on body ethereal to protect your SC against Caelum when even their PD has magical ice weaponry. That's the tactics of the game. And having the correct response to a Zmey be Wolven Winter combined with a remote attack spell sounds like a gem and research-appropriate counter.

Finally, fire gems suffer from fewer viable outlets than other gem-types. The main uses for fire gems are forging fire-spam items, lightless lanterns or used as an ingredient for non-fire gear (firebrands, gold shields, rune breakers, etc.). That makes saving up for an awesome summon like the Zmey a very easy decision to make. If the Zmey cost death gems or earth gems instead, I'd be more hesitant to weaken it, but not fire gems.

I think the change is both thematically appropriate and mechanically balanced.

[earcaraxe]

i back up shatner's opinion to the fullest.

[Squirrelloid]

Really, I don't think anyone is arguing that giving the Zmey cold-blooded would make it's defeat likely in a cold province. I think the larger question is whether the Zmey having that weakness is too much.

The point is the Zmey is an extraordinary raiding unit which skirts the line between heavy thug and SC. It flies, has three lives, very high protection, does AoE fire damage on top of 4 high strength attacks (so one is likely to connect even when the foe is ethereal AND fire immune). The Zmey being a poor choice to invade a cold nation is fine. After all, you know not to rely on body ethereal to protect your SC against Caelum when even their PD has magical ice weaponry. That's the tactics of the game. And having the correct response to a Zmey be Wolven Winter combined with a remote attack spell sounds like a gem and research-appropriate counter.

Finally, fire gems suffer from fewer viable outlets than other gem-types. The main uses for fire gems are forging fire-spam items, lightless lanterns or used as an ingredient for non-fire gear (firebrands, gold shields, rune breakers, etc.). That makes saving up for an awesome summon like the Zmey a very easy decision to make. If the Zmey cost death gems or earth gems instead, I'd be more hesitant to weaken it, but not fire gems.

I think the change is both thematically appropriate and mechanically balanced.

Its not just raiding cold-based nations. Wolven Winter means that Cold-3 can be applied to any province during the magic phase, say preceeding assault by a thug/SC with teleport or ct. At that point Zmey become so many wasted gems. Heat scales cannot be applied so easily, and Cold-3 can be generated predictably and on-demand with Wolven Winter.

Cold-blooded is not mechanically balanced. Nations who have cold-blooded mages are amongst the weakest nations in the game, and cold-blooded troops rarely get used as anything more than arrow stoppers if it can be helped. The idea of a thug or SC which is cold-blooded is laughable, and it will not be used, since a single naked zmey more than justifies the cost of a Wolven Winter, and chances are its carrying 15-25 gems worth of gear too. At that point the entire map should be treated as Cold-3, because wherever the zmey goes it *will* be cold-3 for the relevant follow-up combat.

This is totally ignoring that Cold-3 is the single most common temperature extreme in dom3. (In addition to nations with a cold preference, lots of people use X3 temperatures for the points because its one of the easiest places to get them, and C3 is favored by default for anyone without cold-blooded unless they have specific reason to prefer H3, since there are more summons with a cold aura than a heat aura (offensive benefit), and more units with firepower than cold power (defensive benefit as most of these are nationals - if you expect to see lots of enemy coldpower units you might choose otherwise)). The only people who choose H3 are people with a specific heat preference, people with a cold-blooded unit they plan on using regardless of heat preference, or people who specifically are planning to use firepower or fire aura units (generally B/F nations because Devils have a heat aura). Cold also has an advantage over Heat because the game starts in spring, which means you'll suffer less economy hit early because summer will knock that C3 down to C1-2 in the early turns, reducing the effect of the negative scales.

tl;dr Zmeys costing more than ~5f are useless if they're cold-blooded, because that's the break-even point in gem expenditure on both sides. Cold-blooded means instant 2x chest-wound-equivalents whenever your opponents wants - and a single chest-wound is enough to end the career of most thugs.

[shatner]

tl;dr Zmeys costing more than ~5f are useless if they're cold-blooded, because that's the break-even point in gem expenditure on both sides. Cold-blooded means instant 2x chest-wound-equivalents whenever your opponents wants - and a single chest-wound is enough to end the career of most thugs.

You are absolutely right that cold scales are more common than heat scales. I myself favor them for precisely the reasons you laid out. Where we disagree is in whether Cold Blooded is really the nail in the Zmey's coffin.

First off, a Zmey doesn't need 15-25 gems worth of equipment. Sure, it's got three misc slots and three heads so you could decorate it like a christmas tree, but the main points of the Zmey are first rampant raiding and second for ruining commanders by attacking rear. And for that all you really need is a 5N Lyncathrope Amulet. Face it, the Zmey comes with fear (10D helm), flying (10A boots), flame AoE (5E5F fire brand...x3), 22 protection (10E fullplate), fire immunity (5F ring) and 50% poison resistance just for laughs. Those 30 fire gems summon a big scary monster that's the equivalent of more than 45 gems worth of equipment attached to a really good chassis (high hp, three lives, high moral, excellent MR, high attack, etc., etc.).

Second off, when your opponent does cast Wolven Winter on you (possibly twice if the province had heat scales) they still need to teleport, cloud trapeze or remote attack with something that can kill a Zmey. And sure, in a Cold-3 province, that really just means surviving 7+ rounds of combat after which the creature will be crit to death. But even then you are talking about employing a high moral, fire immune, ethereal/high hp monster with A2 or S3. That requires gems and mage-turns of preparation to ready. At that point, your opponent is reacting to you tearing up his backfield, teleporting his thugs into his own former provinces instead of doing something proactive like raiding you.

As in all wars, a worthy opponent will respond to your tactics. It's not a question of if your weapon will fail you, but when... and for how long/savagely you can beat them with it. Zmey are only conjuration 6 so they can pop out and raise hell early enough to make a huge difference in a mid-game war. And even once they are eclipsed by late game summons (angels, elemental royalty, etc.) and late game spells, they are still cheap enough to be used as a bolstering force in a late game army. And once that foe commits their three tricked out golems (or whatever) to some province that doesn't contain a lab, well that's when the Zmey can once again take wing and burninate the countryside.

And if worst comes to worst, you can always give them an amulet of reinvigoration and a heart of life. At that point you're likely not paying much more than your opponent who has to bring the stubborn thing down.

[earcaraxe]

Second off, when your opponent does cast Wolven Winter on you (possibly twice if the province had heat scales) they still need to teleport, cloud trapeze or remote attack with something that can kill a Zmey. And sure, in a Cold-3 province, that really just means surviving 7+ rounds of combat after which the creature will be crit to death. But even then you are talking about employing a high moral, fire immune, ethereal/high hp monster with A2 or S3. That requires gems and mage-turns of preparation to ready. At that point, your opponent is reacting to you tearing up his backfield, teleporting his thugs into his own former provinces instead of doing something proactive like raiding you.

i'd like to add, that the player with the zmey also can counter the counter: "my zmey is here, so next turn there will be wolven winter and his cloud trapezing something, so i teleport my anti SC there", etc etc. What i state is, that its not an automatic loss of a zmey to send him raiding, even the opponent has the aforementioned tools.

[Valerius]

Its not just raiding cold-based nations. Wolven Winter means that Cold-3 can be applied to any province during the magic phase, say preceeding assault by a thug/SC with teleport or ct. At that point Zmey become so many wasted gems. Heat scales cannot be applied so easily, and Cold-3 can be generated predictably and on-demand with Wolven Winter.

I don't think this is true. I ran some tests with two wolven winter casters at the top of the order and two at the bottom with a cloud trapezing angel in the middle and the battle that was fought in the magic phase did not reflect the shift in temperature.


The point is the Zmey is an extraordinary raiding unit which skirts the line between heavy thug and SC. It flies, has three lives, very high protection, does AoE fire damage on top of 4 high strength attacks (so one is likely to connect even when the foe is ethereal AND fire immune).

No question it has a nice set of abilities and is a good raiding unit. But in addition to the things it has, it is also missing some important things like full slots (in particular hand slots) and any kind of magic (aside from the 10% chance of F1). The lack of magic does have one benefit in that you don't have a buffing phase and can go right to the attack but overall having magic would be helpful as you might be able to use spells rather than magic items to cover some vulnerabilities. The lack of hand slots is very significant in that it means you don't have magic, armor piercing weapons (aside from the fire breath which is easy for an opposing thug to counter) and you don't have a shield and just in general can't swap out weapons depending on the opposition.


Finally, fire gems suffer from fewer viable outlets than other gem-types. The main uses for fire gems are forging fire-spam items, lightless lanterns or used as an ingredient for non-fire gear (firebrands, gold shields, rune breakers, etc.). That makes saving up for an awesome summon like the Zmey a very easy decision to make. If the Zmey cost death gems or earth gems instead, I'd be more hesitant to weaken it, but not fire gems.

I've never bought into this line of reasoning. It seems too much like saying if a path has powerful things it can have more powerful things but if a path has weak things you can't add something powerful because it might get used too much. Seems to me it would be better to add a bit more to the weak path to provide more options. And as regards fire, if you have a strong F income and reach late game you'll switch to ember lords anyway.


Second off, when your opponent does cast Wolven Winter on you (possibly twice if the province had heat scales) they still need to teleport, cloud trapeze or remote attack with something that can kill a Zmey. And sure, in a Cold-3 province, that really just means surviving 7+ rounds of combat after which the creature will be crit to death. But even then you are talking about employing a high moral, fire immune, ethereal/high hp monster with A2 or S3. That requires gems and mage-turns of preparation to ready. At that point, your opponent is reacting to you tearing up his backfield, teleporting his thugs into his own former provinces instead of doing something proactive like raiding you.

In cold-3 I'd say all you need is enough chaff to do the job. Skelly spam should work nicely. And you don't have to teleport someone in to deal with him. Use conventional movement: a force to retake the province and another couple randomly moving about to fight him - eventually he should run into them. And of course you can try the traditional mind hunts. You'll need three successful hunts to get a kill but if the zmey doesn't have an AoMR that's feasible. And even if you don't get three successes you can knock off one or more heads, weakening the zmey. Also, while they have good MR if they don't have an AoMR or luck pendant they are very vulnerable to spammed MR resist spells on the battlefield.


i'd like to add, that the player with the zmey also can counter the counter: "my zmey is here, so next turn there will be wolven winter and his cloud trapezing something, so i teleport my anti SC there", etc etc. What i state is, that its not an automatic loss of a zmey to send him raiding, even the opponent has the aforementioned tools.

Sure, you can always up the ante by sending in reinforcements to try to destroy the expected counterattack but this is no different than with any other raider/SC that doesn't have an escape route planned (stealth, returning).


I think the change is both thematically appropriate and mechanically balanced.

Really, if zmey are too powerful for the cost/research level (and I'd like to see more evidence of this first) it seems like this could be easily solved by bumping up their cost a bit (and it just went up 5 gems in any case). To me this is preferable to crippling them in cold dominion. I agree with Squirrelloid that the game's cold-blooded penalties are just too harsh and not in any way balanced.

[Fantomen]

What should really be changed is the Bogarus national Zmey, by taking away the cold blood from it. A cold blooded national summon for a cold preference nation is ridiculous and will never ever be used. Why make the EDM Zmey less viable when you can make the national Zmey summon viable instead?

Zmeys are basically three headed dragons, and no other dragons are cold blooded in Dominions. A creature that can breathe fire should be able to keep itself warm I gather, especially one with it's roots in siberian folklore.

Zmeys are balanced and not overpowered now. Cold blood is a huge nerf, so you'll just end up with a big need for more balancing for the benefit of a minor thematic quirk.

[Executor]

Nicely put...

[Starbelly Geek]

EA Oceania has the Oceanian Captain recruitable twice.
Is that intentional?

[oldbone]

Does the Argatha Spell "Fury of Loss" do anything except add a few battlefield movement points? The description says it adds strength, but it certainly does not.

Any help is appreciated!

[llamabeast]

It gives an extra 4 points to Attack. Makes a big difference to Agartha!

[oldbone]

oh crap - I was looking at strength :)

Thanks!!!!

[shatner]

The new UW spell Ride the Currents won't allow mages to travel to a friendly fort under siege in an UW province. Is that intentional? Conversely, you can use that spell to travel to an enemy fort that your forces are besieging.

I haven't checked if the larger version of that spell (Traverse the Sea) will or won't allow you into a friendly, besieged fort, but it certainly bears investigation.

[PriestyMan]

yeah thats a known bug. iirc its basically the best solution that is possible because of the whole uw only thing.

[Slobby]

I'm glad to see I'm not the only one saying what's up with Zmey.

Perhaps this may be off in terms of reasoning, but I'm trying to think of what to compare a Zmey to. I chose a Red Dragon.

Zmey Red Dragon
HP 80*3 125
Str 24 25
Prot 22 22
AS 18 15
Mor 18 30
DS 16 11
MR 18 18
Pre 10 12
Enc 1 2

Both have fear, FR100, but the Zmey has PR50. The Zmey has 3 bites, 2 claws, 1 tail and AOE3 range 0 fire breath. The RD has a bite, a claw, and a ranged AOE3 fire breath.

So what's the deal? Zmey can destroy crap better than the Red Dragon Chassis which is also a god chassis? People use the Dragon chassis so all is well, and it has fewer slots/stats, so it seems Zmey are a bit out of hand.

On another note, then I look at the Ettin. Big fan! BUT the amount of gems I have to pop into them ... ugh it leaves me disappointed when I compare it to the Zmey cost wise. Ettins NEED gear to be useful (full kit imo), Zmey need nada. At this point Kit Lions (why did they lose their commander status btw) seem to be a better deal than the Ettin.

Also Valerius I'm curious what thugs you're sending to fight Zmey. I tried Shishis, tested it first equipped with fire rings (or was it dragon helms and burning pearls? I forget :)) and pendants of luck. In the trial Zmey went down but so did 1 shishi. LOL I then decided fine, I'll lose a shishi and did it in game and due to map positioning lost them both. The only other thug type counter I could think of would be multiple sword of heroes (?) with perhaps an axe of hate wielder or 2. But still cost wise that's just nuts.

So then right now imo it's just mind hunt spam to take them down, or if you're lucky a full army backed with mages doing insta kill or fatigue spells.

[Slobby]

Just ran 2 simple tests Red Dragon with dom 10 in its own dominion owns zmey one on one. Red Dragon with dom6 in its own dominion gets its *** handed to it.

Just keeping with the Red Dragon and Zmey comparison. Red Dragons have less AS and DS, perhaps the Zmey could be nerfed in those stats.

Another possibility could be to reduce the Head hp to maybe 60 or something.

[Squirrelloid]

A pair of Rocs with at least some FR gear should hand a Zmey its ***, which is about equal gems on chassis. (That first strike is near 50 AP damage (with AoE 1), and the beak is enough AP damage on top of that to make the Zmey cry, and its got 2 claw attacks to go yet, both of which expect to put some damage through). If they have FR100, the Rocs can also mistform up to make the zmey work to do any real damage whatsoever.

[earcaraxe]

why did the kit lions lose commander status?

[Corinthian]

Because they were pointless as commanders and using them requires massing them. So having 10 of them would just clutter up the screen for you if they were commanders.

As for the Zmeys, yea iv'e always considered them very powerful. Even back when they costed 35f. But an easy counter should be Shishis as I dont think it got any magic attacks to pierce mistform. I might be wrong about the fire being non-magical and if I am you have to put a Fire ring on them though.

[earcaraxe]

kit lions were usable as commanders with one lycanthropos amulet, according to my tests.

[Corinthian]

But for the cost of a lycantrope amulet you can have a second lion!

Unless you had forge bonus there was nothing that you could give to the lion that did not cost more than the lion itself!

[earcaraxe]

it would worth testing if two lions r better than one with amulet.

i tested it only with forge bonus, and from the same amount of gems a lycantroph version was "better".

[Rookierookie]

Seems like Sanguine Heritage is still 44 slaves?

[Excist]

I am growing to dislike Agartha's Fury of the Doomed spell. I think I have seen too many fights where the enemy is routed, but rooted, or fleeing slowly out of range of Agartha's H3's and then the Oracles start 'Battle Frighting' my commanders and mages with 10-20 castings of Fury of the Doomed for no reason.

Is it possible to make it an H4 spell so only the prophet or somebody with a +1H item can cast it, or lower its bonuses and get rid of the affliction it causes or do something to it that would make the spell AI not choose to cast it when enemies are not in range, but friendlies are available for afflicting?

Gaining a bunch of morale-reducing afflictions every time you win a battle is both non-thematic and non-fun.

I mean, I have trouble imagining a bunch of priests seeing the enemy turn tail and head for the woods and then start shouting out 'We're DOOMED!!!!' and all within earshot suddenly become scarred for life.

[shatner]

After playing a game as MA Atlantis I've notice a few more cases where you can't cast certain spells underwater when you seemingly should be able to.

1) Lichcraft. It summons a poor amphibian undead, same as summoning a bane. Seems like this should be permitted.

2) Volcanic Eruption. You can't cast this spell at an under water province. Fine. But you also can't cast this spell at a land province from underwater. For most UW nations this isn't an issue but EA and MA Atlantis have EF casters all over the place.

3) The Magic Lamp. You can forge the item underwater, hand it to one of your commanders but you can't have them use the item spell to summon the genie. The genie is fully amphibious so this seems like it shouldn't be a problem.

4) Cleansing Water/Solar Rays. On land, a water-heavy nation can hose down a battlefield with holy water, tearing up undead and demons. On land, an astral-heavy nation can send searing beams down from on high to scorch the undead. Underwater, they can do neither, leaving them with no dedicated anti-undead spells save for the death ones... death being an extremely rare path for native UW recruits. Furthermore, you can cast "Light of the Northern Star" underwater so shooting star light at stuff underwater is already something people do in Dominions.

[rdonj]

Something along the lines of cleansing waters would be especially welcome, since most UW nations have powerful water magic and don't really have astral.

[dojango]

Say, is there anywhere I can find some stats on the summons added in CBM 1.92? Just wondering what I'm getting (or will be getting).

[PriestyMan]

look in the mod file?

[shatner]

Oh yeah, one more "can't cast underwater" weirdness is that you can't cast darkness. What's that about?

[Shangrila00]

Is there any reason the LA ULm Guardian hero is map move 1? He was mapmove 2 in vanilla, and it would only make sense seeing as how he's the first and leader of the Ghoul Guardians who are all mapmove 2 themselves. As it is now, it's not very thematic leading Guardians with Banes, Mound Kings, or God forbid, Fortune Tellers when you have their commander who's too slow to keep up.

[Slobby]

Oh yeah, one more "can't cast underwater" weirdness is that you can't cast darkness. What's that about?

Same reason that you can't cast solar brilliance. :) You're too deep! That said the UW dark citadel should have auto darkness much like the cave city.

[shatner]

The argument for not being able to cast star/brightness spells underwater has been that there is too much intervening water for the light to reach that far down. That's a reasonable argument aside from the fact that you can still cast Light of the Northern Star underwater. However, it is not consistent with the game overall.

If fighting underwater is so deep that light from the surface can't reach you... then you are already fighting in darkness and the effect should be auto-cast. If light from the surface can reach you underwater, then casting a spell (darkness) which blocks that light should have the effect of plunging the battlefield into darkness. Either way, darkness should work underwater.

[Admiral_Aorta]

Ideally deep sea provinces would have auto darkness like caves and normal sea provinces should be like land.

[Slobby]

Hey, EA Oceania, I like most of the changes, but the addition of the Triton Queen has me stumped. On first glance thug or baby SC chassis, BUT, she seems to have low astral? I summoned a couple and they ranged from S1 to S2. Now she's 55 water gems and with that astral she's just asking to be magic dueled to death, so realistically why would one summon her?

She either needs 0 astral or needs a price change imo - perhaps both? Water gems for EA O are pretty tight, and Grendels/Wendigo's are cheaper and with the right pretender set up easy to get, so once again why would one summon her?

[Bwaha]

Hi, do you all know that Helheims dwarves have a crafting bonus!

That means skull mentors are cheap...

While I like it, it seems to me a bit overpowered...

;)

[kianduatha]

Hey, EA Oceania, I like most of the changes, but the addition of the Triton Queen has me stumped. On first glance thug or baby SC chassis, BUT, she seems to have low astral? I summoned a couple and they ranged from S1 to S2. Now she's 55 water gems and with that astral she's just asking to be magic dueled to death, so realistically why would one summon her?

She either needs 0 astral or needs a price change imo - perhaps both? Water gems for EA O are pretty tight, and Grendels/Wendigo's are cheaper and with the right pretender set up easy to get, so once again why would one summon her?

Honestly, the Triton Queen is a throwback to Burnsaber's Underwater Gameplay Improvement Mod and was created in the context of CBM 1.6 or so. Other things have changed to make her...less needed, let's say. That being said, the low astral was there to give astral access if you didn't happen to have any on your pretender.

[Shangrila00]

Is it possible to increase the output of the gemgens? I definitely agree with making them artifacts, but comparing with the Ruby Eye, the original artifact gemgen, they are really subpar, and I think most people agree they aren't worth forging. And that kills some thematic strategy, like the conversion of water/nature into astral for nations with lots of astral summons, or getting use out of the now completely worthless fire/nature crosspath and only slightly more useful earth/blood crosspath.

Say quadruple the output and triple the price of the clam and fetish to turn them into poor man's gem globals. The bloodstone is still worth forging regardless since it's a booster, but double its output to match the similarly priced Ruby Eye.

[rdonj]

I would hardly call earth/blood a useless crosspath. Can you say demon knight apocalypse?

[Shangrila00]

I would hardly call earth/blood a useless crosspath. Can you say demon knight apocalypse?

Depends. The mass summoning for demon knights is at blood 9, while tying up mages summoning one demon knight at a time is pretty bad, unless you have a cheap recruit anywhere that can do it without boosters. Is LA Marignon the only one that can pull that off? Otherwise, you'd get demon knights with ritual of 5 gates which doesn't need E/B.

But yeah, it's F/N that really is worthless with a worthless fever fetish. W/N can...summon Naiads if your only water access is your pretender, I guess, though its main strength did die with the clam. E/B is definitely the most useful of the lot now.

[legowarrior]

I just got back from a year hiatus from Dominions, and I'm curious why Jomon Samurai Archers have a precision of 10, but all the others have a precision of 11.

[Excist]

Have you ever tried firing a bow when aiming through one of those samarai masks?

[legowarrior]

Of course I have!
Just kidding, but seriously, why should Samurai without bows have a greater precision then samurai without bows?
Also it is important to keep in mind that Samurai were first and foremost uses of the Bow and Spear, the use of swords became more prominent after the invasion of the Mongols in the 1200's.

[Excist]

OK. theory 2.

Based on my extensive research watching samarai movies its because they always give the bows to the noobs and the more experienced ones are the ones that go out and actually fight the good fight.

[legowarrior]

I guess that could work, but I find that explanation lacking.

[Slobby]

Honestly, the Triton Queen is a throwback to Burnsaber's Underwater Gameplay Improvement Mod and was created in the context of CBM 1.6 or so.

Quite right, but now it's a later version of CBM and if no one says anything then llama may not catch it. :) Squeaky wheel gets the grease right? ;)

[Nightfall]

Just some feedback, I have to say that the last CBM game I played completely turned me off the mod.

While I like the idea of EDM, at the moment the easy availability of these summons, massively overpowers any nations with a good early game.

They really need to be balanced better against the vanilla summon spells available, because at the moment they are simply overpowering them in every way.

My views on the ones I have seen in action:

Summon Zmey - The unit is overpowered, available too early and too easily summoned. Im less concerned about the power than the fact that it should be a level 9 spell requiring at least 6F.

Summon Shishis - Pretty decent core design, a little bit too much better than the other options at that level, maybe just a bump to level 7.

Great Kraken - Again a decent core idea, but like the Shishi is better than the other options at that level, bump to level 7 5W.

Call Grendelkin - Needs to be level 9 and require 5W, it's a better summon than water queens.

Overall I think my biggest problem is less that they are overpowered as individual units, as most can be countered, but that they are all way too easy to research and summon. The end result of this being that they effectively eliminate the mid game entirely and make most of the vanilla summons in the game redundant.

[PriestyMan]

Great Kraken - Again a decent core idea, but like the Shishi is better than the other options at that level, bump to level 7 5W.


This pretty much makes it impossible to take anything else you say seriously...

Just because you got stomped by a player better than you, dont blame the mod, blame yourself.

[Mightypeon]

I kinda agree on Zmeys being a bit too tough, too cheap (since they can be totally decent with 15 gems of gear, just about anything in their weight class would need more) and available too early.
I actually like giving them cold blooded as a glaring weakness.
They are very hard to kill, even compared with actuall high end summons costing twice the gems.
Grendels are blobs of hitpoints with full slots, that niche is actually suprisingly empty (Iron Angel?) apart from them. Elemental royalty is indeed a bit underpowered in general, but comparing them with Grendels is imho not a good way to establish this.
I have no hard opinion about Shishis and Krakens.
I find Wendigos interesting, while they are available quite early, it will take between 5-10 turns for them to be battle capable, and thats actually quite interesting.

[Squirrelloid]

I haven't had any problems killing zmey... What are you guys trying to kill them with? Srsly.

EDM summons are balanced to the stuff people actually use. Yes, they're better than the random junk at their level - because no one uses the random junk.

[Executor]

No one uses the junk cause EDM pushed it out of the way. People used to rush conj 8 to get ERoys. I think it's been quite a while since I've actually seen one in a game.

[Nightfall]

Great Kraken - Again a decent core idea, but like the Shishi is better than the other options at that level, bump to level 7 5W.


This pretty much makes it impossible to take anything else you say seriously...

Just because you got stomped by a player better than you, dont blame the mod, blame yourself.

And that has nothing to do with it... but is a good go to when you don't have anything worthwhile to say.

If you are trying to claim that a Sea King's Court (an equivalent level spell) is better or equal summon to 2.75 Great Krakens, I'm not sure that it's my credibility that's a problem.

End game diversity mod is a great idea, mid game diversity mod, which is what it is right now, is, in my opinion, terrible.

[Nightfall]

No one uses the junk cause EDM pushed it out of the way. People used to rush conj 8 to get ERoys. I think it's been quite a while since I've actually seen one in a game.

And this is my point, when the royalty are now considered junk, there is a serious problem.

Sure, there was some stuff that was always junk, but there is a lot that was usefull midgame that isn't any more if your using EDM.

[Squirrelloid]

The royalty have always been junk. They were the poor-man's nation SC (poor insofar as they had no other options except tarts if they could get the factory going or wishing for Seraphs). They were and are extremely overcosted.

FWIW, i stopped seeing elemental royalty when gemgens went unique, even before EDM was released. They were never cost effective, and when gem supply got tight, people stopped using them. And i still see QoAs and QoWs, who were the only ones even plausibly worthwhile before. (And anyone who thinks a Grendelkin is better than a QoW doesn't know what he's talking about).

So anyone claiming that its EDM which has marginalized elemental royalty has it wrong. Its not. They were marginalized because they were not efficient summons, and making gemgens unique forced people to be more efficient. No one wishes for Seraphs any more for the same reason - 100s is simply too expensive when gem supplies are tight. They'll never pay off in the long run.

I think there was also a metagame shift at some point. SCs tend to be *very vulnerable* to certain tactics, and people figured out what these tactics are. The value of SCs fell through the floor. I rarely see lone SCs tearing it up these days. They accompany armies or act as glorified thugs raiding PD. No one takes just an SC or a handful of SCs into an army and expects to win these days. (I've seen it attempted just once, and it resulted in the deaths of 2 out of 3 of the SCs involved).

So yes, elemental royalty became less desirable. They don't see as much use these days. But the cause was most certainly not EDM. The change happened before EDM was even released.

--------------------------------

But using Sea King's Court as an example of a good spell is hilarious, btw. Really? It wasn't really worthwhile even when gemgens were non-unique and you could blow gems on useless crap. Its a bad spell, its always been a bad spell, and its lack of use has absolutely nothing to do with EDM.

Streams from Hades, which has more right to feel trod upon by EDM than anything else, still sees play.

[Nightfall]

The royalty have always been junk. They were the poor-man's nation SC (poor insofar as they had no other options except tarts if they could get the factory going or wishing for Seraphs). They were and are extremely overcosted.


Junk compared to what, Tarts and Chayots/Seraphs, which both require a much more massive amount of investment in research and boosters. Gems used directly in the summon are only one part of the cost of a strategy shift.

So anyone claiming that its EDM which has marginalized elemental royalty has it wrong.

I didn't say this, but nice strawman, and my comparison was between vanila and CBM(with EDM). I think you'll have a hard time making the case that a QoW is stronger than a grendelkin in any situation other than where you need a high attack, but then that isn't an equivalent comparison anyway, you need to compare 1.5 grendelkin to a QoW. Sure the underwater regen on QoW can be great, but they don't really have enough hp to leverage it.

But using Sea King's Court as an example of a good spell is hilarious, btw. Really?

Once again your setting up a straw man. I used that comparison only to refute the inference that it was ridiculous that great kraken were better than other summon spells with similiar requirements.

All that is required to prove I'm wrong is to pick a spell and put forward the case that it better, I'm open to being convinced, but insults aren't going to do it.

[Squirrelloid]

The royalty have always been junk. They were the poor-man's nation SC (poor insofar as they had no other options except tarts if they could get the factory going or wishing for Seraphs). They were and are extremely overcosted.


Junk compared to what, Tarts and Chayots/Seraphs, which both require a much more massive amount of investment in research and boosters. Gems used directly in the summon are only one part of the cost of a strategy shift.

So anyone claiming that its EDM which has marginalized elemental royalty has it wrong.

I didn't say this, but nice strawman, and my comparison was between vanila and CBM(with EDM). I think you'll have a hard time making the case that a QoW is stronger than a grendelkin in any situation other than where you need a high attack, but then that isn't an equivalent comparison anyway, you need to compare 1.5 grendelkin to a QoW. Sure the underwater regen on QoW can be great, but they don't really have enough hp to leverage it.

I was responding to Executor about the elemental royalty, not you. And you don't seem to know what a Strawman actually is. He did specifically advance the claim that elemental royalty don't see play/get rushed because of EDM. That is absolutely false. Elemental royalty faded from play shortly after gemgens were made unique, which was *almost a year* before EDM was created. So the facts do not support Executor's claim that Elemental Royalty suffered due to EDM - they were already virtually unplayed before EDM was ever created.


But using Sea King's Court as an example of a good spell is hilarious, btw. Really?

Once again your setting up a straw man. I used that comparison only to refute the inference that it was ridiculous that great kraken were better than other summon spells with similiar requirements.

All that is required to prove I'm wrong is to pick a spell and put forward the case that it better, I'm open to being convinced, but insults aren't going to do it.

Seriously, you don't know what a Straw Man is... I don't have to create weak positions to argue against - you created the position yourself. Its not a strawman if you actually argued it!

You specifically advanced the position that Sea King's Court doesn't see play because of EDM, or more appropriately, that SKC was weak compared to GKraken. Sea King's Court has *always* been a bad spell. Why would you ever use it over almost 2 Streams from Hades (you wouldn't). So its *not a useful comparison* at all. Your own argument fails because you chose a craptastic spell.

I don't have to disprove anything. That's not how argument works. You are making a positive claim and thus you have to prove it.

But if you really want counter-examples to your general position:

I did specifically note that Streams from Hades still sees play. (It has useful path requirements for bootstrapping into D, for example).

I might also note that Hidden in Snow is better than the same number of gems spent on Krakens. In fact, the only EDM summon I don't routinely prefer HiS against is Wendigos, who may be a little too good for their price. But I use both of them, so maybe Wendigo are about right. I also prefer both to Grendelkin (who, being without magic, I don't find very useful).

I might note that the same number of gems in Manifest Vitriol are better than Krakens, and probably better than Grendelkin.

I might note the same number of gems in Wolven Winter, given the right circumstances (circumstances you can arrange by using chill aura units or thugs), is superior to Krakens.

I would rather forge Bottles of Living Water than summon Krakens. Or boots of quickness. Or frost brands. Or several other magic items.

I might note that Krakens are considered unplayably weak right now by the people who are actually good at the game. They get too few paths, and those paths tend to be really short, so they aren't any good as mages. And they aren't that good as thugs either (insufficiently many slots, too many weaknesses). And they aren't cheap enough or mobile enough to qualify as a budget thug. The only thing EDM krakens have *ever* been useful for was breaking into blood magic during the incarnations they had guaranteed blood picks.

In short, Krakens are junk compared to all the uses water gems have historically been *actually used for* by experienced players. That SKC compares badly to Krakens is mostly evidence of just how bad SKC is.

Edit: I suppose now you're going to shift goalposts on me and require me to demonstrate old spells for another path of magic that are still viable... Well, go ahead, which path or EDM summon would you like me to handle next?

[Dimaz]

Squirreloid, I think you're wrong regarding Sea Kings. And I hope I can consider myself an experienced player.

[Squirrelloid]

Squirreloid, I think you're wrong regarding Sea Kings. And I hope I can consider myself an experienced player.

If you'd like to defend SKC you're welcome to.

I'll admit, I've screwed around with SKC in games. I'm not going to pretend I think its actually good though. I certainly don't think the King himself is worth the 55w cost, or that he's anything special as a thug or mage. And the gold upkeep from a single casting of SKC alone is substantial and punitive.

But if you have a case to make that SKC is a worthwhile spell, please make it. My curiosity is perked.

[llamabeast]

piqued. Curiosity is piqued. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eggcorn

Sorry, I am reading the discussion properly as well, I just couldn't resist since I've been reading about eggcorns this morning.

Can't reply properly to the discussion since I'm at work. But Nightfall - the EDM creatures are the result of a great deal of testing and community feedback. Many of them have been strengthened as a result of this feedback. This certainly doesn't mean that they are perfectly balanced yet, and more feedback is always welcome.

Personally I feel that there is a chance that the Zmey is a little too powerful. Previous iterations were extremely weak. I think the Zmey is interesting in that it's an almost unique example of a "monster" in dom3 - it's powerful in combat, but certainly isn't an SC and doesn't really benefit very much from magic items. It is easily killed by heroes kitted out to kill it or by elite troops, but it is powerful against standard troops.

As for the Kraken, I am pretty sure that it is underpowered. I've had real problems getting it to be at all interesting without either giving it excessive magic or making it more powerful than the pretender Kraken. I think that for the next iteration I may add some fluff to say that it's a different kind fo the pretender kind - less intelligent but more physically powerful. Then I can give it better stats and it can be a proper sea monster to be feared, a little like a watergoing zmey.

[Executor]

Anything people used to rush probably isn't junk. You either got Tarts or you rushed to get Eroys.

EDM in fact has marginalized elemental royalty. As Eroys are not cost efficient compared to EDM summons now. And I've seen them used in the brief time between no clams and EDM.
As for Seraphs, I'd for one still use them, but it's not the 100 gems cost that'a s problem, it's the some 300-400? gems you have to invest without hammers and clams to get a mage to summon one. That's why I suggested lowering Wish to S8.

As for the Sea King, I've seen him used a load of times before EDM, and he was in fact, great. Someone who didn't catch a Water Queen could still get a Sea King. I've seen Dimaz use them regularly, WingedDog, Psycho, me, etc.
Corwin used them to smack my tartarians in a game not long ago.

But as for Krakens, I agree they are junk. And Ettins too, if they were free they'd still be useless.

But as far Eroys go, I said it before and I'll say it again, either their cost needs to be lowered or the cost of all EDM increased.

[Dimaz]

Sea kings have regen, quickness, cold and poison res and some prot without items. With helmet and fb you have fr also. With vine shield and rainbow armor, ama and resilience it's a killing machine with more chances to survive battle involving lots of mages than Grendelkin, unless you equip Grendelkin with resistance items only, but SK also deals lots of damage with quickness. I managed to kill equipped tarts with such sea kings. And before EDM they were *the* water summon, unless you needed water queens for underwater conquest. With CBM1.6 (I never played later versions) + EDM it's a hard choice for me between Grendels and Sea kings. Also, the free units are really nice under Army of *+ FW + AM + MR. They can absorb lots of damage and act as a very good shield due to high HP.

[Nightfall]

Can't reply properly to the discussion since I'm at work. But Nightfall - the EDM creatures are the result of a great deal of testing and community feedback.


There is a _massive_ difference between balancing something at turn 60 and turn 20, which is when a lot of these chassis can _easily_ hit a game.

To me it just seems obvious all the emphasis has been put on the former and not enough on the latter. Maybe I'm wrong, or maybe the fact that I played a few vanilla games in between playing CBM 1.6 and CBM 1.92 gives me a different perspective.

[llamabeast]

Turn 20? Which chassis are you thinking of? That's pretty early.

[Nightfall]

Turn 20? Which chassis are you thinking of? That's pretty early.

An awake sage plus capital mages can open level six in a school of magic by about turn 16 (Depending on nation).

If your capital income then matches what you want to summon your golden.

[Squirrelloid]

Sea kings have regen, quickness, cold and poison res and some prot without items. With helmet and fb you have fr also. With vine shield and rainbow armor, ama and resilience it's a killing machine with more chances to survive battle involving lots of mages than Grendelkin, unless you equip Grendelkin with resistance items only, but SK also deals lots of damage with quickness. I managed to kill equipped tarts with such sea kings. And before EDM they were *the* water summon, unless you needed water queens for underwater conquest. With CBM1.6 (I never played later versions) + EDM it's a hard choice for me between Grendels and Sea kings. Also, the free units are really nice under Army of *+ FW + AM + MR. They can absorb lots of damage and act as a very good shield due to high HP.

Sure, but for the almost the same cost of that sea king with brand and dragon helm you could have 2 bane lords with boots of quickness, brands and dragon helms. Bane lords start with decent armor and no enc, so we can grab 2 vine shields for the same number of gems as your shield/armor combo. The only thing we're missing at that point is regen, but we gained chill aura and 0 enc, and we have 2 thugs instead of one for basically the same cost.

Now, you can argue that isn't w gems, so we could compare to Hidden in Snow which gives us a thuggable commander, a bunch of good troops (better than trolls), and 1-3 decent to exceptional mages.

And neither of those options cost us gold in upkeep.

I mean, yeah, its not that the Sea King is that bad, its that he costs far too much.

-----

Executor:
Yeah, i saw *some* ERoys after gemgens went unique, but no one was rushing them anymore. And I still see some. I'd say I see them with about the same frequency. In both cases its mostly the queens. Fire Kings and Earth Kings have always been pretty lame.

I will agree they are overcosted, but I would argue they have *always* been overcosted.

[Squirrelloid]

Turn 20? Which chassis are you thinking of? That's pretty early.

An awake sage plus capital mages can open level six in a school of magic by about turn 16 (Depending on nation).

If your capital income then matches what you want to summon your golden.

So.. if you're Abysia with a very focused research strategy you could have early Zmeys? With no gear? I'm... not really that impressed.

You do realize Zmeys lose to skellie spam without a RoR and some sort of reinvigoration, right?

Being able to pull something awesome out early is the whole point of an early research strategy. I don't think a turn 20 naked zmey is really all that more awesome than kitted Eriu thugs by turn 10...

[GFSnl]

I agree. The Troll could use a little discount.

[Dimaz]

The thing is, while Bane Lords and HiS commanders are pretty good thugs, Sea King is a proper SC.

[Squirrelloid]

The thing is, while Bane Lords and HiS commanders are pretty good thugs, Sea King is a proper SC.

That I don't believe. In large part because i don't believe in 'proper SCs' at all anymore.

Any army fielded these days that a SK could take down, 2 banelords could do so as well.

There's no such thing as a proper SC anymore. Competent players don't lose armies to SCs. The primacy of mage-backed armies is a huge meta change, and it really changes how certain units need to be valued.

Edit: I'd say the unwarranted nerf to Rain of Stones was a cause, but really it just helped a trend that was already in motion in late 1.6.

[Dimaz]

I don't know about post-1.6 changes, but IMO SCs weren't supposed to kill heavily mage-supported armies alone from the beginning, by proper SC I mean the guy who can easily kill ordinary thugs like mentioned banelords, deal with medium armies (low magic support) alone and survive in big battles.

[Nightfall]

So.. if you're Abysia with a very focused research strategy you could have early Zmeys? With no gear? I'm... not really that impressed.


Doesn't have to be that heavily focused, and why would you deploy them naked unless it's appropriate to do so. It takes a whole extra 1-2 turns to research construction 2 for some basic gear.


You do realize Zmeys lose to skellie spam without a RoR and some sort of reinvigoration, right?


Fire shield works pretty well to, but I'm pretty sure you already knew that.


Being able to pull something awesome out early is the whole point of an early research strategy. I don't think a turn 20 naked zmey is really all that more awesome than kitted Eriu thugs by turn 10...


I agree that the awe on Sidhe Lords (Was that Eriu as well or just TNN?) was also a ridiculously bad call, but that's not relevant to the discussion at hand.

Also while Zmeys are certainly the most blatant issue at Conjuration 6, I intentionally didn't limit it to them.

I'm starting to think that a big part of llamabeast's problem is the fact that some people are more invested in finding and using the exploits to notch up a win or two than giving him good feedback.

[Nightfall]

I don't know about post-1.6 changes, but IMO SCs weren't supposed to kill heavily mage-supported armies alone from the beginning, by proper SC I mean the guy who can easily kill ordinary thugs like mentioned banelords, deal with medium armies (low magic support) alone and survive in big battles.

I agree that in general they don't and never have.

I guess they can, in some situations, if they are specifically equipped to nail a force with known tactics and scripting.

[llamabeast]

How would you go about giving Zmeys fire shield?

Squirrel wasn't referring to the awe on Ris (Tir na n'Og), which was indeed OP. Eriu didn't have that, but Eriu's thugs are indeed available early and very powerful.

I think the problem is that dom3 is basically a game made up of "OP" things. If you have just been hit by a rush of E9N9 Niefel Giants, or well blessed Jaguar Warriors, or anyone using Fog Warriors, or a massive Eriu stealth / cloud trapeze attack, you could say quite legitimately that these strategies seem "overpowered". Luckily there are many opportunities to create overpowered strategies so a good player can generally create their own with any nation.

So, turn 20 zmeys would be really powerful, I agree. I don't really agree that it's more powerful than many other strategies. It does succeed in increasing the diversity of options available to Abysia, which I consider a success. I would be concerned if the Zmey strategy was difficult to counter, even by a skilled player.

Balancing for EDM can be difficult, because the whole point was to correct the lack of viable powerful summons for many of the paths. So if the Zmey, for example, stands out as an exceptional Fire summon, that's because there weren't any before, and that was the problem that EDM was trying to solve.

[Squirrelloid]

So.. if you're Abysia with a very focused research strategy you could have early Zmeys? With no gear? I'm... not really that impressed.


Doesn't have to be that heavily focused, and why would you deploy them naked unless it's appropriate to do so. It takes a whole extra 1-2 turns to research construction 2 for some basic gear.

Const 2 does not get you RoR, iirc. Nor does a research blitz get you the necessary gems to build the gear you need. How many nations can you name that can have 30+f by turn 20 and also enough n and probably e,s to forge the necessary gear to make it really good *while* doing a research rush. And the mages to forge that gear.



You do realize Zmeys lose to skellie spam without a RoR and some sort of reinvigoration, right?


Fire shield works pretty well to, but I'm pretty sure you already knew that.

We were talking about Zmeys, right? Fireshield? (honestly confused, my 1.92 Zmeys don't have that).

Zmey are also weak to archers, especially xbows.



Being able to pull something awesome out early is the whole point of an early research strategy. I don't think a turn 20 naked zmey is really all that more awesome than kitted Eriu thugs by turn 10...


I agree that the awe on Sidhe Lords (Was that Eriu as well or just TNN?) was also a ridiculously bad call, but that's not relevant to the discussion at hand.

Also while Zmeys are certainly the most blatant issue at Conjuration 6, I intentionally didn't limit it to them.

I'm starting to think that a big part of llamabeast's problem is the fact that some people are more invested in finding and using the exploits to notch up a win or two than giving him good feedback.

I wasn't referring to Ri with awe. Vanilla sidhe lords with brand and vine shield.

What else at research level 6 would you like to talk about?

Wendigo? Needs at least 14? turns to mature, 7 if its in battles every turn (although its going to have to piggy back your army for much of those).

Roc? Not a very effective solo thug. I mean, sure, it can raid light PD... but what can't?

Shishi? Honestly not that good and very easy to counter. People had a big hardon for them when they were first released, and now you don't see that many of them - they just don't actually perform against any real opposition. They have one real use - anti-thug/SC against people using demon/undead thugs and SCs.

Krakens? lolz. If you wasted your time beelining enchantment over conjuration underwater, be prepared to lose. (And I don't mean to conjuration UW EDM summons - since i don't think there are any - I mean to Shark Attack, a vanilla spell.)

[Valerius]

Squirrel wasn't referring to the awe on Ris (Tir na n'Og), which was indeed OP. Eriu didn't have that...

Yes, we did! It was just more expensive to do the one thug = expansion party strategy than it was for TNN since Tuatha cost more than Ri. The funny thing is in my one game with them I ended up with a horrible start position surrounded by undead, lizardmen and (as an "easy" province) knights. And got attacked early by apostacizing, smiting Ermor. So sometimes even OP things don't work out as planned. :p

I've heard good things about Sea Kings as thugs but since I usually play thug nations this isn't something I'm looking for. I do like using sea trolls as durable units that can draw enemy fire but it's cheaper to just summon some individual trolls for that purpose. So I think part of the problem is you're paying a high price and may only have need of either the troops or the commander. You could of course have a spell to just summon a Sea King and price it competitively but that might detract from the theme of the original spell. Something that I think would cause this spell to see a lot more use is increasing the Sea King's gem gen from one to two gems per turn. Even if you use him as a thug and he gets killed in a half a dozen turns you've still defrayed the cost of the spell significantly. The main drawback would be creating a gem gen mentality but I don't think 2 gems/turn is enough to cause that.

Zmeys are an interesting unit. I like the idea of monsters without full slots being feasible combatants. They are challenging because with flight and without any need to buff they can attack immediately. And of course they can dish out a lot of attacks. But the lack of slots really is a significant drawback. Actually, the main thing that frustrates me about them is that they often have lychantropos' amulets. Please change the cost of those things to 25 gems - not because they are that great but because it's maddening to keep losing mages to them. :mad:

As regards the elemental royalty, rather than make them cheaper I would prefer to keep the price as-is and make them significantly better. Generally speaking, I think unique summons that are available to all nations should be better than the non-unique options as a reward for getting them. As to how they are better, well it could be through combat abilities for some of them (ex. earth king have a large AOE attack like the zmey), useful #onebattlespells for others (ex. AQ autocasts fog warriors), and improving the summoning abilities for others (instead of summoning one unit per turn, summon five, etc.).

Speaking of the cost of summons, what do people think of the cost of angelic summons? Perhaps I'm underestimating them since I never play these nations but it seems like these are kind of pricy in comparison to other options.

[Executor]

I kinda like your idea for ERoys Valerius. I'll second this.

As for angelic summons, I remember Harbingers were the only ones I found cost effective in the end. Angels of Vengeance, I think?, were nice but too expensive for me.

[Squirrelloid]

Squirrel wasn't referring to the awe on Ris (Tir na n'Og), which was indeed OP. Eriu didn't have that...

Yes, we did! It was just more expensive to do the one thug = expansion party strategy than it was for TNN since Tuatha cost more than Ri. The funny thing is in my one game with them I ended up with a horrible start position surrounded by undead, lizardmen and (as an "easy" province) knights. And got attacked early by apostacizing, smiting Ermor. So sometimes even OP things don't work out as planned. :p

I've heard good things about Sea Kings as thugs but since I usually play thug nations this isn't something I'm looking for. I do like using sea trolls as durable units that can draw enemy fire but it's cheaper to just summon some individual trolls for that purpose. So I think part of the problem is you're paying a high price and may only have need of either the troops or the commander. You could of course have a spell to just summon a Sea King and price it competitively but that might detract from the theme of the original spell. Something that I think would cause this spell to see a lot more use is increasing the Sea King's gem gen from one to two gems per turn. Even if you use him as a thug and he gets killed in a half a dozen turns you've still defrayed the cost of the spell significantly. The main drawback would be creating a gem gen mentality but I don't think 2 gems/turn is enough to cause that.

Zmeys are an interesting unit. I like the idea of monsters without full slots being feasible combatants. They are challenging because with flight and without any need to buff they can attack immediately. And of course they can dish out a lot of attacks. But the lack of slots really is a significant drawback. Actually, the main thing that frustrates me about them is that they often have lychantropos' amulets. Please change the cost of those things to 25 gems - not because they are that great but because it's maddening to keep losing mages to them. :mad:

As regards the elemental royalty, rather than make them cheaper I would prefer to keep the price as-is and make them significantly better. Generally speaking, I think unique summons that are available to all nations should be better than the non-unique options as a reward for getting them. As to how they are better, well it could be through combat abilities for some of them (ex. earth king have a large AOE attack like the zmey), useful #onebattlespells for others (ex. AQ autocasts fog warriors), and improving the summoning abilities for others (instead of summoning one unit per turn, summon five, etc.).

Speaking of the cost of summons, what do people think of the cost of angelic summons? Perhaps I'm underestimating them since I never play these nations but it seems like these are kind of pricy in comparison to other options.

Tend to be grossly overpriced, but I'd have to go through each of them individually =P

One battle at a time...

[Shangrila00]

Without clams, pearls are too valuable to use on summons. If by some freak accident, you end up with more pearls than you need for forging, they are pretty nice with a good bless though. Though Pythium/Marignon don't tend to have good blesses.

[Mightypeon]

Squirrel wasn't referring to the awe on Ris (Tir na n'Og), which was indeed OP. Eriu didn't have that...

Yes, we did! It was just more expensive to do the one thug = expansion party strategy than it was for TNN since Tuatha cost more than Ri. The funny thing is in my one game with them I ended up with a horrible start position surrounded by undead, lizardmen and (as an "easy" province) knights. And got attacked early by apostacizing, smiting Ermor. So sometimes even OP things don't work out as planned. :p

I've heard good things about Sea Kings as thugs but since I usually play thug nations this isn't something I'm looking for. I do like using sea trolls as durable units that can draw enemy fire but it's cheaper to just summon some individual trolls for that purpose. So I think part of the problem is you're paying a high price and may only have need of either the troops or the commander. You could of course have a spell to just summon a Sea King and price it competitively but that might detract from the theme of the original spell. Something that I think would cause this spell to see a lot more use is increasing the Sea King's gem gen from one to two gems per turn. Even if you use him as a thug and he gets killed in a half a dozen turns you've still defrayed the cost of the spell significantly. The main drawback would be creating a gem gen mentality but I don't think 2 gems/turn is enough to cause that.

Zmeys are an interesting unit. I like the idea of monsters without full slots being feasible combatants. They are challenging because with flight and without any need to buff they can attack immediately. And of course they can dish out a lot of attacks. But the lack of slots really is a significant drawback. Actually, the main thing that frustrates me about them is that they often have lychantropos' amulets. Please change the cost of those things to 25 gems - not because they are that great but because it's maddening to keep losing mages to them. :mad:

As regards the elemental royalty, rather than make them cheaper I would prefer to keep the price as-is and make them significantly better. Generally speaking, I think unique summons that are available to all nations should be better than the non-unique options as a reward for getting them. As to how they are better, well it could be through combat abilities for some of them (ex. earth king have a large AOE attack like the zmey), useful #onebattlespells for others (ex. AQ autocasts fog warriors), and improving the summoning abilities for others (instead of summoning one unit per turn, summon five, etc.).

Speaking of the cost of summons, what do people think of the cost of angelic summons? Perhaps I'm underestimating them since I never play these nations but it seems like these are kind of pricy in comparison to other options.

Tend to be grossly overpriced, but I'd have to go through each of them individually =P

One battle at a time...

The Angel from Blood for Mari is quite usefull, it opens paths and needs B and not S.

[Nightfall]

How would you go about giving Zmeys fire shield?

Umm, I have one in a test CBM 1.92 game right now with F1, although, I admit, I'm not sure what the chance is.

[Nightfall]

Nor does a research blitz get you the necessary gems to build the gear you need.

I usually prefer to play luck, because I find it more fun, having gems for minor kit isn't usually an issue.

[Nightfall]

Generally speaking, I think unique summons that are available to all nations should be better than the non-unique options as a reward for getting them.

I absolutely agree 100%; the Eroyals and Archdevils should not compare badly to stuff added by a mod that is across the board easier to summon.

The unique stuff should be the baseline, not tarts, if tarts are still too strong address them, not everything else...

[Nightfall]

Krakens? lolz. If you wasted your time beelining enchantment over conjuration underwater, be prepared to lose. (And I don't mean to conjuration UW EDM summons - since i don't think there are any - I mean to Shark Attack, a vanilla spell.)


While rushing Krakens would admittedly be very situational, the potential problem isn't with underwater nations, it's with nations that already have a large benefit from going skelly spam and/or gift of health early. Both of which just happen to combine really well with an early kraken or two.

[Nightfall]

I think the problem is that dom3 is basically a game made up of "OP" things. If you have just been hit by a rush of E9N9 Niefel Giants, or well blessed Jaguar Warriors, or anyone using Fog Warriors, or a massive Eriu stealth / cloud trapeze attack, you could say quite legitimately that these strategies seem "overpowered".


While I agree to an extant, the difference, as I see it, is that most of those things have a huge up front cost. And in some cases, it's an all in strategy.

Currently you can get some early EDM chassis at a relatively insignificant cost.

Sorry for the multiple posts, I just caught up on the thread.

[Valerius]

How would you go about giving Zmeys fire shield?

Umm, I have one in a test CBM 1.92 game right now with F1, although, I admit, I'm not sure what the chance is.

That's quite lucky as they only have a 10% chance of getting fire magic. I've tangled with them a fair amount and I don't think I've come across one with F1.

Generally speaking, I think unique summons that are available to all nations should be better than the non-unique options as a reward for getting them.

I absolutely agree 100%; the Eroyals and Archdevils should not compare badly to stuff added by a mod that is across the board easier to summon.

The unique stuff should be the baseline, not tarts, if tarts are still too strong address them, not everything else...

Well, I think you have to balance the EDM summons against tarts because they fill the same category: non-unique summons available to all nations. If they aren't competitive with tarts then you'll end up with the same old "must get Chalice/GoH in order to spam tarts" mentality. So, I'd say balance those summons against each other (and make non-unique national summons competitive as well) and then look at making the unique summons special. I think you have a bit more leeway with unique summons because even if they become a bit over the top their numbers are limited so it's unlikely to throw balance off.


On a different topic, I've been thinking about some of the magic items that have been made unique. Some are very good as unique items (dwarven hammer is the one that comes to mind), others not really. In a current game I finally got around to forging the unique SDR, more out of pity than anything else. I guess maybe if you reached Constr. 8 and your only blood access was from something like a lamia queen it could be useful at that point but other than that... So what about giving it boosts along the lines of what was done with owl quills? The drawback is that thematically you'd really be forging them for the secondary ability rather than the primary but I think it's worthwhile in order to make them useful as a unique item.

[Nightfall]

On a completely unrelated note, I don't think I've seen anyone ever use a vampire queen...

Has anyone suggested upping her base dominion to 3. It's a small change that might make her a little more viable?

[Executor]

Another item that should get a discount would be the Sunslayer. 40D gems for this is quite a lot. It was rarely forged even with hammers.
Something which might make it interesting is changing it to a one handed sword and keeping the price. Or at least lowering it to 15-20 gems.

[Bullock]

I noticed wendigo can't command undead troops despite their death knowledge, dunno if it's a bug or not.

Is there a release date for the CBM ? :)

[curtadams]

Well, I think you have to balance the EDM summons against tarts because they fill the same category: non-unique summons available to all nations.

That makes sense, and they should come at the same point as Tarts, research level 9. Balancing against Tarts is good but balancing them against Tarts and putting them at research 8 is bad. Balancing against Tarts and putting them at research 6 is insane.

[RonD]

But "balanced against tarts" does not have to mean "identical to tarts". It could (does, actually) mean "not as good as tarts, but available at earlier research level." That is, obviously, a harder balancing act, but I don't think anyone has advocated just adding a bunch more Conj 9, cheap, super-multi-path, 200hp, 0 encumbrance summons.

[curtadams]

But "balanced against tarts" does not have to mean "identical to tarts". It could (does, actually) mean "not as good as tarts, but available at earlier research level." That is, obviously, a harder balancing act, but I don't think anyone has advocated just adding a bunch more Conj 9, cheap, super-multi-path, 200hp, 0 encumbrance summons.

That's a definition of "balanced", but not for an *endgame* diversity mod. By that balance, Tarts are still the trump of the endgame; you've just added *midgame* options which may pre-empt Tarts. That's a lot of the complaint in the post that started this subthread. There certainly isn't much need for diversity at research level 6 - IMO that's the period of the game which already had the most diversity, with a lot of different magic options and still some possibilities for mildly boosted regular armies.

[Squirrelloid]

On a completely unrelated note, I don't think I've seen anyone ever use a vampire queen...

Has anyone suggested upping her base dominion to 3. It's a small change that might make her a little more viable?

Many proposals have been made to make the VQ playable. Including that exact proposal. None of them have been implemented.

I think a viable VQ is just too unpalatable for the Dom2 vets who remember when she was (too) good, so now she's doomed to suck forever.

[llamabeast]

Luckily I never played dom 2, so when I come to review pretenders I will definitely make her stronger.

[Mightypeon]

Awesome God changes her to Dom 3 and beeing a semi rainbow with 30pts path cost. This makes her a decent choice for a more expensive higher dom rainbow that can be used in battle, although, for some nations that need B/D the most, you could see her as a bit strong.
Some other Awesome God changes I like:
-Master Alchemist got immortal
-Frost Mage (the rainbow, not the SC) got Summon Allies for Winter Wolfs
-Master Druid domsummons Vine critters
-Freak Lord domsummons crossbreeding stuff
-I think the mounter archmage gets more paths
Basically, most rainbows get some kind of non too powerfull extra gimmick.

What I also liked was liberal use of Magic boosts on Pretenders, for example, the Virtue go Magic boost 3, so she can be a capable battlemage but is crappy at blessings. The Forge Lord got Magic boost 4, so if you empower him he gets straight up to level 4, but is sphinx class immnobile.
Other things are great bless grants by starting out with high paths, but not great casters because they have negative magic boosts.

[Bwaha]

What happened to rain of stones?


Do I have change my evil plans???


Noooo...

[Torgon]

Did rain of stones really need the nerf. Sure it was powerful but so are a lot of other spells. And its not like the nations that can cast it natively are exactly powerhouses.

EA Arco
EA Ulm
EA Tien
EA Caleum
EA Tir
EA Van
EA Helhiem
EA Yomi
EA Oceaniana

MA Man
MA Ulm
MA Tien
MA Van
MA Eriu

LA Man
LA Midgard

Am I missing any? And most of those needed at least a pair of earth boots to pull it off on any significant portion of their mages. It was also fairly hard to make it effective as you generally had to lure someone into attacking so you could get it off before any first round protection spells are cast. Where big mage communions under powered?

[Squirrelloid]

Did rain of stones really need the nerf. Sure it was powerful but so are a lot of other spells. And its not like the nations that can cast it natively are exactly powerhouses.

EA Arco
EA Ulm
EA Tien
EA Caleum
EA Tir
EA Van
EA Helhiem
EA Yomi
EA Oceaniana

MA Man
MA Ulm
MA Tien
MA Van
MA Eriu

LA Man
LA Midgard

Am I missing any? And most of those needed at least a pair of earth boots to pull it off on any significant portion of their mages. It was also fairly hard to make it effective as you generally had to lure someone into attacking so you could get it off before any first round protection spells are cast. Where big mage communions under powered?

The nerf to RoS is my least favorite change in CBM. It was totally unnecessary. (It also totally lobotomizes LA Man, who depends on the spell).

[Mightypeon]

+1 to rain of stone nerf criticism.

[Corinthian]

I am neutral to the RoS change. But only because I was personally abusing it quite a lot in earlier versions of CBM and it made my opponents miserable. I like that it requires more research though. People almost never research evo 8&9 previously unless they had nothing else to research.

LA Jomon
LA Ulm
LA Caelum

Can also cast RoS.

[Immaculate]

Some thoughts on patala:

The golden naga should be amphibious like all other naga.
The casting monkeys (gurus?) should have stealth. As is they have near zero mobility and a morale of seven. To make them somewhat better and still remain thematic, a stealth +0 option would be nice so they could accompany the stealthy monkey armies and provide a slightly stronger raiding vector.

[samoht]

Excuse the ignorance, but is there a list somewhere that documents all the changes between Vanilla and the current CBM?

[kianduatha]

Excuse the ignorance, but is there a list somewhere that documents all the changes between Vanilla and the current CBM?

No :(

I'm supposedly making one, but I don't have time at the moment to actually work on it. There's a start to it down in this thread. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=46904

[Corinthian]

When I want to know what CBM does I have found it most useful to just open the mod file in wordpad and have a look. Even if you are not a coder or a moder you can still often determine approximately what something does. And even if you cant, there are plenty of comments in the code explaining most of the complicated stuff.

[Shangrila00]

Possession, I just found out about this CBM spell playing LA Ulm. It seems pretty interesting, a cheap zero research GoR that eats a mage. Really nice for nations with cheap recruit anywhere S1s like LA Ulm. So question:

1) How many nations have this spell?

2) Obviously all the normal things you might GoR, you can now do more cheaply like Gargoyles and Crushers and what not, but there must be things that you'd normally not consider GoRing but might be worthwhile possessing. I was considering Demon Knights as cheapo thugs with built in fear and very low encumbrance, but LA Ulm has no easy way of getting Demon Knights. What other options are there that people have found?

[Soyweiser]

Eating a mage is a very big thing. Mages win games(*). So it isn't that useful.

iirc only la ulm has it. But there might be one other nation that has it.

(*)Actually mage turns win games. A mage can only do one thing each turn, search, forge, move research etc. By using possession you use up the mage turns for the rest of the game. Usually, this isn't worth it. Even with cheap mages. (As recruiting a mage also costs a fort turn).

[Shangrila00]

If you have sages, every year a bunch of them will get diseased at which point they might as well be used to possess something. Occasionally, you'll get a diseased astral Black Priest. And sure, recruiting an Illuminated One solely for possession costs a fort turn, but so does recruiting a thug for nations that have them. It'll be worth it if the result is good enough. Not sure a Demon Knight would be worth it, but there should be something useful.

[llamabeast]

LA Man also has the spell. And maybe LA Arco? Can't remember.

[Soyweiser]

If you have sages, every year a bunch of them will get diseased at which point they might as well be used to possess something. Occasionally, you'll get a diseased astral Black Priest. And sure, recruiting an Illuminated One solely for possession costs a fort turn, but so does recruiting a thug for nations that have them. It'll be worth it if the result is good enough. Not sure a Demon Knight would be worth it, but there should be something useful.

Recycling diseased mages is marginal. (And you never get them at the moment you want them). And recruiting thugs from forts instead of mages is suboptimal anyway. See the assassin discussions :D.

Demon knights are meh, get the devils. Able to command other demons, and flies. Flying rocks.

(Most recruitable thugs are mages, so they have dual role).

[Torgon]

If you have sages, every year a bunch of them will get diseased at which point they might as well be used to possess something. Occasionally, you'll get a diseased astral Black Priest. And sure, recruiting an Illuminated One solely for possession costs a fort turn, but so does recruiting a thug for nations that have them. It'll be worth it if the result is good enough. Not sure a Demon Knight would be worth it, but there should be something useful.

Recycling diseased mages is marginal. (And you never get them at the moment you want them). And recruiting thugs from forts instead of mages is suboptimal anyway. See the assassin discussions :D.

Demon knights are meh, get the devils. Able to command other demons, and flies. Flying rocks.

(Most recruitable thugs are mages, so they have dual role).

Where is the assassin discussion?

[Shangrila00]

Question, are all heroes in CBM supposed to have 3 miscellaneous slots? Ie, is a hero with only 2 slots an oversight or intended?

[Torgon]

Edit: never mind original post not accurate

[Ragnarok-X]

Machaka needs some loaf.

[kianduatha]

Machaka needs some loaf.

Still? What weaknesses do you see in the modern Machaka?

[Ragnarok-X]

needs more variance, its not about a specific weakness.
That, and a fix for the bad spider sprite.

[kianduatha]

Bad spider sprite? What's all that?

More variance as in it's too one-trick-pony-ish? I suppose they only get high nature/fire/earth/death, but that's a decent amount of stuff. You have to prioritize getting a wasteland to get Hidden in Sand astral(or spend a bunch of death gems for specters), but you can get that up too. It's pretty frustrating that they get max N3 and D2(realistically), but you can still deal with that.

Speaking of which, is the Treelord's Staff going to go down to N4? 40 gems is...a lot.

[kianduatha]

Witch Doctors should totally get heal-20 or something. In their description they heal the sick!

[Soyweiser]

Where is the assassin discussion?

Can't find a link, but assassins as recruits when you could have recruited mages has been discussed to death.

I think recruitable assassins are not worth it.

[Valerius]

One of the good things CBM has done is provide counters to rush attempts, whether they be general changes or boosts to specific nations. It's not much fun to get steamrolled by a heavy bless early and not have much you can do about it. But one side effect of this and other changes is that I think the scales + magic diversity and/or light bless build is better than ever.

What about reducing the gold bonus/penalty of each tick of the scales by 1? So order would be +/-5, production +/-3, and growth +/-1. This isn't a huge change and I expect scales builds would still be optimal but if someone wanted to try a heavy bless it would be a bit easier to justify since the discrepancy between poor scales and good scales wouldn't be quite so large.

On another note, I really like the change to the growth/death scale. Changing the percentages there really differentiates it from the other scales and I've been quite happy with the long term benefits of growth 3.

[Knai]

There's what appears to be a minor error I noticed. Late age C'tis starts with a Tomb Priest, which they can't actually recruit. That seems off.

[elmokki]

There's what appears to be a minor error I noticed. Late age C'tis starts with a Tomb Priest, which they can't actually recruit. That seems off.

Happens in vanilla game too, so it isn't really a CBM specific thing. Also I don't see it as a so weird thing since it fits the nation theme too and you can summon those rather easily with stock mages anyway too.

[llamabeast]

What about reducing the gold bonus/penalty of each tick of the scales by 1? So order would be +/-5, production +/-3, and growth +/-1. This isn't a huge change and I expect scales builds would still be optimal but if someone wanted to try a heavy bless it would be a bit easier to justify since the discrepancy between poor scales and good scales wouldn't be quite so large.

I think that's a good idea. It's not a small change though - likely to be a bit controversial I think.

[Shangrila00]

I disagree. It's a needlessly complicated and circular means of achieving balance that will inevitably never do so. The original goal was making high bless builds less dominant. If that has succeeded to an excessive extent such that low bless/pure scales are now too good in comparison, the way to balance that is to step back the original changes, not make completely separate changes to nerf scales. The former can achieve balance with just a few tries, the latter never will as the unrelated changes will have knock on effects on everything else, leading to further imbalances that if corrected with the same philosophy will only end in an endless spiral of imbalance.

[Deathjester]

I disagree. It's a needlessly complicated and circular means of achieving balance that will inevitably never do so. The original goal was making high bless builds less dominant. If that has succeeded to an excessive extent such that low bless/pure scales are now too good in comparison, the way to balance that is to step back the original changes, not make completely separate changes to nerf scales. The former can achieve balance with just a few tries, the latter never will as the unrelated changes will have knock on effects on everything else, leading to further imbalances that if corrected with the same philosophy will only end in an endless spiral of imbalance.

So.. you're saying balance can never be improved?

Close the thread!

[Shangrila00]

I disagree. It's a needlessly complicated and circular means of achieving balance that will inevitably never do so. The original goal was making high bless builds less dominant. If that has succeeded to an excessive extent such that low bless/pure scales are now too good in comparison, the way to balance that is to step back the original changes, not make completely separate changes to nerf scales. The former can achieve balance with just a few tries, the latter never will as the unrelated changes will have knock on effects on everything else, leading to further imbalances that if corrected with the same philosophy will only end in an endless spiral of imbalance.

So.. you're saying balance can never be improved?

Close the thread!

Learn to read.

[Valerius]

This raises the question of why the changes to scales were made. If they were made only to impede bless builds then I can certainly see the logic of going back to the 7/3/3 increments for order/production/growth. With anti-rush counters available I don't think that would be a problem from a balance perspective. But I thought it was also intended to make each scale (especially production) be of value and break the typical pattern of order/sloth builds (even in cases where a heavy bless wasn't involved). And I think the changes were successful in doing this. So regardless of which approach you take (of toning down scales or reverting to the previous setup or a similar one) is the idea of making each scale valuable an idea worth keeping?

[Shangrila00]

Honestly, I don't see how the scale changes from vanilla affect bless builds at all. I assumed you were talking about buffs to particularly weak nations that used to be prime targets for a bless rush, a few spells given lower research requirements, and some regular troops buffed so they were useable giving an alternative to sacreds for more nations.

I think the idea of making each scale valuable is worth keeping, and further has nothing to do with the viability of high bless builds. For that matter, I can't think of any high bless nations that no longer find a high bless attractive, except maybe Ashdod and that's due solely to specific nerfs to that nation's sacreds.

[Valerius]

No, you're right, I was talking about those kinds of changes - but also about how they interact with scales. You pay a price for a strong bless. And that cost has gone up, in particular with the changes to order/production. At the same time there are more counters to rush attempts. Taken together, this decreases the appeal of a strong bless. Long term I think the approach we're talking about (scales + magic diversity and possibly a light bless) is optimal for most nations. If it's also clearly optimal short term then I think you'll start to see a lot of the same builds. Note that I don't think this is a balance issue. I'm thinking only in terms of keeping a variety of approaches viable since it makes things more interesting.

As I mentioned, I think it's good that nation's have a chance against a rush attempt so I wouldn't want those changes undone. But in order to reduce the opportunity cost of taking a heavy bless I thought it might make sense to tone down scales a bit. It's worth noting that I tend to be in favor of making small changes and seeing how they play out and I thought that's what this suggestion was but based on llama's comment perhaps that's not the case. :p

[Shangrila00]

No, you're right, I was talking about those kinds of changes - but also about how they interact with scales. You pay a price for a strong bless. And that cost has gone up, in particular with the changes to order/production.

See that's the problem. How has the cost of a strong bless gone up scale wise? The cost of tanking order and the short-run (and thus most relevant for very heavy blesses intended to win quickly) cost of tanking growth have gone down. The cost of tanking production has gone up. That hurts Mictlan, but is anyone going to argue that high bless is no longer attractive for Mictlan? Lots of Bless nations have sacreds sufficiently resource intensive that they never could tank production: for them the cost of a strong bless has actually gone down.

[kianduatha]

Okay, there are two problems; One is that growth is too powerful at the moment. Granted. There are two ways to make that disappear: revert the changes and make it 3% income/0.2% growth, or make it 1% income/0.3% growth. The second is that scales in general are too powerful it seems, particularly Turmoil/Prod/Growth/Luck. How much of that is due to Growth being too awesome? If Growth is taken down a notch, will that still be overpowering Order/Misfortune?

In addition, pretender changes are on the horizon, which may affect the scales/bless/awake SC balance a bit. I have to say, awake SCs are looking mighty fine with some of the level 0 item buffs.

[Shardphoenix]

On a completely unrelated note, I don't think I've seen anyone ever use a vampire queen...

Has anyone suggested upping her base dominion to 3. It's a small change that might make her a little more viable?

Wouldn`t this make her a "default" pretender for LA Ulm?
Immortal, thuggable, with vamp freespawn and both needed paths... Maybe, a domscore of 2 would be enough?

[Valerius]

See that's the problem. How has the cost of a strong bless gone up scale wise? The cost of tanking order and the short-run (and thus most relevant for very heavy blesses intended to win quickly) cost of tanking growth have gone down. The cost of tanking production has gone up. That hurts Mictlan, but is anyone going to argue that high bless is no longer attractive for Mictlan? Lots of Bless nations have sacreds sufficiently resource intensive that they never could tank production: for them the cost of a strong bless has actually gone down.

The point about growth is very good - short term it costs less to take death but you'll pay for it long term. A good trade-off.

As regards order/production, if turmoil was taken as frequently as sloth in order to get points then I'd be inclined to agree but that hasn't been my impression. If you're not offsetting turmoil's hit to income by taking luck that's a very high price to pay. Previously the easiest way to get points (not just for a bless but for an awake pretender) was sloth. The same hit to income as death but without the long term effects. The price is a slower start until you grab a province or two to boost your resources. While sloth 3 can be pushing it, I think a lot of nations can get away with sloth 2 (a few examples from MA would be Van, Pan and Jotun). Now, none of the nations I mentioned have first class sacreds and I'm not claiming a heavy bless was ever an optimal strategy for any of them - but it was a viable one. And for those nations (all of whom happen to be blood nations and don't really want death) paying for a bless has become more expensive. It's worth keeping mind that if you are taking the bless primarily for commanders (as is certainly the case with Van) then as long as you can get through initial expansion you won't be too worried about dealing with sloth. A different example is playing MA Aby with an awake PoD and using sloth to help pay for it (the idea being to basically ignore my high resource troops and jump directly to blood magic).

But again, I like the changes to scales. My idea was just to reduce the gap between good and bad scales.


Okay, there are two problems; One is that growth is too powerful at the moment. Granted. There are two ways to make that disappear: revert the changes and make it 3% income/0.2% growth, or make it 1% income/0.3% growth.

I definitely prefer the latter. Makes growth different from order/prod as a scale you take for long term benefit.

The second is that scales in general are too powerful it seems, particularly Turmoil/Prod/Growth/Luck. How much of that is due to Growth being too awesome? If Growth is taken down a notch, will that still be overpowering Order/Misfortune?

My guess is that it will, because it strikes me that the key thing is that prod offsets most of the income hit from turmoil while luck keeps generating the same boosts as always (I think someone ran some tests at one point comparing the long term results of order vs luck - and that may have been vanilla where luck isn't as good as CBM).

In addition, pretender changes are on the horizon, which may affect the scales/bless/awake SC balance a bit. I have to say, awake SCs are looking mighty fine with some of the level 0 item buffs.

Good point; might be best to leave scales as-is and see how they interact with the pretender changes. After all, it's not like the current scales are causing huge problems. My main concern was that it will get a bit dull if we start seeing mainly scales builds.

[Shardphoenix]

Looks like I`ve found a bug in Worthy Heroes.
Member of the Third Tier, LA Ulm`s multihero has only one chance at showing up in his WH form (2F 3S 3B not old), and sometimes even this doesn`t happen, so even the first one comes as non-WH (2F 2S 2B old), and any subsequent Members of the Third Tier will be non-WH too.

[Legendary League]

Looks like I`ve found a bug in Worthy Heroes.
Member of the Third Tier, LA Ulm`s multihero has only one chance at showing up in his WH form (2F 3S 3B not old), and sometimes even this doesn`t happen, so even the first one comes as non-WH (2F 2S 2B old), and any subsequent Members of the Third Tier will be non-WH too.
I've had this happen to me in a game. Is this intended?

[Valerius]

Not sure if I've mentioned this before but I'd like to lobby for EA C'tis to get a scout. Indie scouts can be difficult to come by in EA and it's kind of tough having to rely on black servants for scouting or ferrying gems...

[earcaraxe]

i find the call selkie spell for ma oceania a fantastic idea, a balanced and thematic buff, but i wonder if its intentional that she can only be summoned above water. I would change that.

[Shangrila00]

Okay, this is not really a CBM issue, but I figure CBM might as well fix it. Why does Mictlan's starting army have map move 1 but otherwise identical versions of its armored warriors that it can't even recruit? Is it supposed to be that way for some obscure reason of balance? I didn't see it on the bug list, but surely someone must have noticed before.

[Shangrila00]

Okay, there are two problems; One is that growth is too powerful at the moment. Granted. There are two ways to make that disappear: revert the changes and make it 3% income/0.2% growth, or make it 1% income/0.3% growth. The second is that scales in general are too powerful it seems, particularly Turmoil/Prod/Growth/Luck. How much of that is due to Growth being too awesome? If Growth is taken down a notch, will that still be overpowering Order/Misfortune?


Okay, this is coming a little late since I didn't watch this thread, but...

I disagree strongly. The shift of growth from direct income boost to later income boost is only a positive thing in the absense of popkilling effects, which is only reasonably certain in single player. As it is, CBM growth only breaks even with vanilla growth on turn 20. Income early is better than income later, not only for reasons of expansion and the increasing obsolescence of recruitable troops, but because the later the income comes, the more likely it ends up never coming due to war, poploss events, or various means of attacking population. CBM has made Volcanic Eruption only cost 5 gems, btw. Certainly, your suggested turmoil/production/growth build is not conducive to actually benefiting from the new growth thanks to all the popkill events opened up by turmoil, which will hit even with luck 3.

Taking growth is a gamble, that you'll be able to keep your population long enough to benefit, as it should be. But it shouldn't be a terrible gamble. With your suggested nerf of growth to only 1% income per tick, it won't break even with vanilla growth until turn 38. I suggest that makes growth a terrible gamble. And it nerfs those nations with no choice but to take growth thanks to old mages.