Ulm beefed up ...

[Arralen]

The troops acutally wear Black Steel, they are strong(er) humans, the smithes get a random pick.


-- Smith is F1E2R1 now
--
-- The troops wear either "Full Chain of Ulm",
-- helmet and have strat move 2,
-- or "Full Plate of Ulm", Black Steel Helmet
-- and have strat move 1.
-- All standard Inf is STR+1 (fits it's HP 12)
--
-- "Full Plate of Ulm": prot 17, def -2, enc 4
-- "Full Chain of Ulm": prot 15, def -3, enc 3


I'm not shure about the smith part, so maybe someone want to test or simply voice his opinion?

PS: This mod uses "#newarmor 399". I kept the number of new armors low to avoid conflicts with existing mods, but watch out nevertheless ...

edit: TYPO !! .. sorry ..

[Thilock_Dominus]

Well... Vanheims smiths also get a random pick (E3 R1) and have some cool units vs. ulm

[Boron]

F E3 R1 is imo a bit too much .
F E2 R1 will do .

Because in battle all smith can easily cast summon earthpower and cast magma eruption/blade wind then even in unmodded ulm .
Since you build a lot of Smiths you soon will get as random earth . Then you have an E4 smith and with only boots of earth he can summon earth kings or cast the forge of ancients .

This elminates the need to put earth 4 on your pretender if you intend to cast forge .

So imo from a balance point F E2 R1 is enough .

[Vicious Love]

Would it totally throw things outta whack if, instead of keeping Ulm low-magic and magic-susceptible, we made them low-magic and magic-proof?
Were we to raise black steel troops' base MR(Maybe to meteorite guard level), that might give 'em a certain longevity. They'd still be inferior to many other nations' national troops, but they'd be much more viable in the lategame, what with their resistance to Disintegrate, Master Enslave and whatnot.

Update: Oh, agreed with Boron about the random, by the way.

[Arralen]

E3 was a typo ... sorry.

Thought about the MR, too. I'm not quite shure, though - if it works out gameplay-wise, or mod-wise.

Will check if you can change the MR without re-doing all stats.

Concerning gameplay, any further opinions?

[Taqwus]

Five levels of magic including a random would seem a bit high for an ostensbily low-magic empire. Good thing it was a typo.

If more games were on maps with few magical sites, slow research and high resources... might be regular Ulm's niche. For something more magical, well, there's Iron Faith or Black Forest, although IF research is a serious problem, and BF requires some ugly scales, IIRC.

Having Black Steel and strength does seem quite thematic, however. If that's not enough, one might wonder whether the focus on the mundane should offer, say, an Administration bonus or Supply, as nerds that might otherwise study magic get channeled into other vocations such as being efficient civil servants or logistics gurus.

[Sly Frog]

Vicious Love said:
Would it totally throw things outta whack if, instead of keeping Ulm low-magic and magic-susceptible, we made them low-magic and magic-proof?
Were we to raise black steel troops' base MR(Maybe to meteorite guard level), that might give 'em a certain longevity. They'd still be inferior to many other nations' national troops, but they'd be much more viable in the lategame, what with their resistance to Disintegrate, Master Enslave and whatnot.

Having a better resistance to all things magical to me fits in far better with the Ulmish theme. Rather than giving them more magic to fit with other Groups balancewise (which is a reasonable change for balance purposes, but does not fit with the "drain land of no magic" theme), it would be better if the devs actually made their drain scale or the nation itself have a greater impact on the ability to kill Ulmish units with magic.

When I first played Ulm, I assumed that their troops would fight off the effects of magic better (which would then make their high protection more useful than it is now, which is to say useful for about the first 5-10 turns of the game). Instead, if anything, Ulm seems more suceptible to magic than other nations.

[Boron]

Arralen said:
Thought about the MR, too. I'm not quite shure, though - if it works out gameplay-wise, or mod-wise.
Will check if you can change the MR without re-doing all stats.

I like the idea of your mod so far .

I also like Vicious Love's suggestion with better Mr .
You just need to add this line afaik :#mr <magic resistance>

So just upping Mr from 9 to 11 or 12 for all ulm units and copy/paste into the mod.dm . Should not need longer then 2 minutes .

9 MR is really low imo . The base penetration roll is 11 + diceroll iirc . So all mr-negate spells should have about 70% success rate at least vs. ulm .
This is especially nasty with charm/enslave mind .

So half of your opponents could just stop your battleline midgame by charming away your troops and you can't do much against .

I have some suggestions for the ulm master smith :
Make him cost 180-200 because he has now very good skills + a forgeboni .
Give him though a lower encumberance . He is a smith so he should not get exhausted quickly . A base encumberance of 2 or 3 is ok imo .

All in all in the current stage your mod imo is already very good and makes ulm just what it should be : Playable in mp . Now it is at least a midclass nation and not together with tien chi among the 2 worst nations .

[CUnknown]

Ulm is supposed to be more susceptible to magic than other nations, taking Drain-3 makes them about even to everyone else.

Raising their magic resistance sounds like a good idea, although I disagree that Ulm needs much if any beefing. They're a perfectly legit nation, it's just that their strengths are in the early game, not the late game. In 1v1's or on very small maps, they're one of the best nations out there.

[Boron]

CUnknown said:
Ulm is supposed to be more susceptible to magic than other nations, taking Drain-3 makes them about even to everyone else.

Raising their magic resistance sounds like a good idea, although I disagree that Ulm needs much if any beefing. They're a perfectly legit nation, it's just that their strengths are in the early game, not the late game. In 1v1's or on very small maps, they're one of the best nations out there.

Hm i think vanheim , marignon , caelum , man or abysia are all suited better even for a 1on1 on small maps than ulm