SCs other than the vq

[Cainehill]

Originally posted by johan osterman:
The lack of item slots is not that big a drawback on immortal combat pretenders, if you put a heap of items on an immortal you are 'compromising' its expendability, especially the flying ones which can quickly get back to the front if slain.

Depends. A VQ benefits greatly from Black Steel Plate, as well as other items which are pretty cheap to replace. It almost doesn't matter if you lose your 3rd battle in such a case, as long as you won your first two. And the VQ can be equipped well enough to have a shot against almost anything.

Whereas a Phoenix can _never_ be equipped well enough to deal with certain SCs. Especially if the Phoenix only invested in Fire, its chances against something like an ice devil and slim and none. Almost any other flying SC can kill it in the first turn of combat. Even garden variety knights can.

Phoenix winds up capable of roast and toasting many (but not all) armies. But it's barbecue chicken against many if not most SCs with mediocre equipment. (IE - fire & lightning immunity - easy to get.)

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Cainehill:
Whereas a Phoenix can _never_ be equipped well enough to deal with certain SCs. Especially if the Phoenix only invested in Fire, its chances against something like an ice devil and slim and none. Almost any other flying SC can kill it in the first turn of combat. Even garden variety knights can.

That's because a Phoenix is not an SC and is not designed to be used that way: It's very effective in the roles of kamikaze attacks on provinces with either fire or air magic, and is an excellent support caster....but neither its price tag, slottage, nor physical attributes promote its use as an SC.

[ May 05, 2004, 05:20: Message edited by: Norfleet ]

[rabelais]

This is my Last post on the VQ thread, I am simply too frustrated with it.

No one has responded to my Posts in other threads, I though the objections to the SC VQ were well documented by now... if I missed the rebuttal, please direct me to it.

As I have said in other Posts, naked immortal SC's that can destroy entire armies (particularly before turn 30 or 20 or 10!!!)are obviously broken.

The castling/temple-ing strat just makes it a more efficient munchkinism, the fundamental problem is that getting a new flying army every turn for free, with no risk of losing it, in whole or in part (the latter being the fate of most normal armies...) while getting it's full tactical benefit.

The resources which must be devoted to stopping an immortal SC far outweigh the costs on a per use basis for producing one, (especially for ermor, whose recruitment does not suffer from scale poverty)... and are highly fraught with the risk of failure, attrition, and are much less flexible weapons than the flying immortal SC.

If there is a counter for it, other than attacking with overwhelming superiority in three places at once, and losing two of those *nonimmortal* armies while taking down one of the castles... you see my point.

The strat is so effective under the current rule set, it is broken.

Your saying someone, an expert, "almost" beat it, having encountered it several times before, isn't much of a defense.

If I know what my opponent is going to do and I *still* can't stop it in a cost effective way, knowing it's coming ... it is BROKEN.

This is a strategy game, ...optimization is supposed to be difficult and non commutative.

In this case it is neither.

Rabe the Retiring


references for those wanting more detail...


http://www.shrapnelgames.com/cgi-bin...583;p=2#000036

http://www.shrapnelgames.com/cgi-bin...583;p=1#000050

[Zapmeister]

This is my Last post on the VQ thread, I am simply too frustrated with it.

Ditto, and for the same reason.

[archaeolept]

what rabe said

[archaeolept]

dp

[ May 05, 2004, 08:34: Message edited by: archaeolept ]

[Tris]

I'm still new enough not to assume I can tell one way or another whether any particular issue is unbalanced by myself.

But having heard the arguements I have found the ones from the "VQs need to be nerfed" camp more convincing, so far.

A lot of the arguements supporting the VQ are logically flawed, and while I accept that the people making the arguements no doubt understand this game WAY more deeply that I do I would still like to see a concrete counter-strategy proposed.

For example the recent arguement that it is killable, and having it killed costs the owner resources (gems etc) only holds water if the expense of killing the VQ is much less than the expense the owner incurs from it's death, and I haven't seen this demonstrated.

Comparisons with the "Metagame" of many CCGs have been made:

In a CCG, if one flavour of deck is very popular, very quickly people produce decks which counter it. The popular deck has very little or no chance against a deck that knows it is coming.

I think any veteran Magic player could, if shown a deck, come up with several decks that would beat it easily, and still be competative against other tournament decks (except those designed to counter this deck...but that's what makes the Metagame). If a deck can do its own thing regardless of how you try to counter it then it is unbalanced.

So. Can the veteran Dominions players come up with a strategy, for all nations, that would beat a VQ SC strategy everytime?

The most popular example of the VQs supposed unbalance seems to be the Ermor-VQ-temple-fortress combination that Norfleet seems to have such success with. I've read that this success is largely due to the map settings which favour Ermor, and that it's down to Norfleets expertise, but pro-nerf people seem to quote this example a lot. So could we also have a concrete strategy that utterly destroys this strategy please?

Two strategies - one for the player who spots the VQ SC early in the game and wants to counter it, one for the player who spots the Temple/Fortress/VQ-SC early.

Remember - if a strategy is anticipated early enough it should be countered easily. If you can continue using a strategy despite it being anticipated perfectly by your opponent, and still hope to win against even a mediocre foe, then the strategy is unbalanced.

Two convincing strategies. If the strategy is balanced there should be a lot more than that. Worked examples, no unfair assumptions. The prize - my humble support for the VQ to remain as it is. The bigger prize - the Metagame will adjust to make VQs undesirable, until the Metagame evolves to the point where VQs are the best counter to...whatever strategy happens to be kicking *** this time next year :-)

The price of failiure? You wouldn't want to know. It's FAR too terrible