Vengeance of the dead, what the hell

thejeff · #1 August 13th, 2007, 08:26 AM

About the rules:
1) yes
2) yes, normally
3) I believe you can retreat in assassination attempts, you just don't survive?
4) yes.

Point 2 is actually where the problem comes in, I think. There is no commander with VotD, so some special rules are in play. Obviously, despite the lack of a commander, the dead don't dissolve immediately during a VotD. It may be as simple as the check to start dissolving/routing happens when a commander routs or dies. Since there aren't any the check is never made. Adding a check to the 50 turn auto-rout mechanism to start mindless dissolving would be a better fix.

Wyatt Hebert · #2 August 13th, 2007, 08:34 AM

Problem being is that due to my understanding of the way the code is implemented, NO units rout during an assassination. I think that's just a rule implementation. The simplest (meaning, most likely) way to fix it is to remove that, but then you have the problem of any unit routing in an assassination, including assassins themselves.

I guess my point is that #3 implies #2 is never checked, yielding the situation given. Is the issue severe enough that we get a codefix for it (which may be quite complex)? Is it severe enough if the only way we can fix it (or that it will be fixed) is if all units can rout during an assassination?

Resource limitations begin to dominate the thinking at this point. I agree that having them start dissolving would be nice, but the non-rout override in Assassination seems to prevent it. otoh, they have no commander in the first place, so I'm not sure if it applies (or they all may be a commander chassis). I'm assuming they have no commander, otherwise, a few particular kills would start them all dissolving.

Wyatt Hebert

Jazzepi · #3 August 13th, 2007, 08:37 AM

>Problem being is that due to my understanding of the way the >code is implemented, NO units rout during an assassination.

I'm fairly certain this is untrue. Retreating from an assassination attempt just means you die.

Jazzepi

llamabeast · #4 August 13th, 2007, 08:38 AM

Units definitely do rout during assassinations, including the assassin - I've seen it quite often.

And yep, I think your maths is right Wyatt - sorry, I just misunderstood what you'd done the first time.

Wyatt Hebert · #5 August 13th, 2007, 10:01 AM

Hmm, I thought they had fixed that issue completely; hence, I mentioned the removal of the capability. I'll look into verifying that, too, if and when I have spare time.

It's fine. You're right, in general, on the binomial expansion, but afair, the first term would still be 1x^3y^0, or x^3.

I had to do the addition anyways just to be sure I was doing it right. It was the long way around.

Wyatt Hebert

Fate · #6 August 17th, 2007, 11:08 PM

This thread is descending into a question of VotD, which doesn't seem like the point.

The Turn Limit kills the defender of an assassination. I consider this obviously bugged, and it should be fixed. Either the defender lives, or the attacker gets to face the entire army (I mean, how long can you fight a guy in the middle of an army before someone notices?).

If this makes VotD unbalanced, balance it without a bug.

HoneyBadger · #7 August 18th, 2007, 09:54 AM

Make it so that if the undead army fails to kill their target in 75 rounds, then they all dogpile on the one who cast the spell in the first place

That would make quite a few people a little more wary of casting it on an SC god, I'd say...But, that seems overly complicated, so I just vote 3. I hate to see a unit, even a very tough unit, fight the good fight, only to be betrayed by the game engine, of all things.

Another possible solution, though, would be to strengthen the *quality* of the undead, based on the unit they're attacking's kills, instead of the numbers. So that at 100 kills or so, you get 100 longdead, 250 you get 100 shadows, 500 you get 100 ghosts, 1000 you get 100 banes, all the way up to Tartarians or whatever-keeping in mind that I really didn't research the exact quality of one undead over another, except in the most general of ways, but I think the point's clear enough for comfort.

Aethyr · #8 August 18th, 2007, 10:30 AM

I would be in favor of changing it from a "nightmare" to a "real time" event (SP's bodyguards would then be able to help out).

Then, and I agree with Fate and with a previous post from GP, if the furn limit is reached the conflict is thrown into a "traditional" battle with the rest of the troops (including, but not limited to PD) coming to help out the assaulted party. Not a panacea, but I think this solves a lot of concerns wihtout over correcting.

#9 October 13th, 2007, 08:54 AM

Quote:

HoneyBadger said:
Make it so that if the undead army fails to kill their target in 75 rounds, then they all dogpile on the one who cast the spell in the first place

That would make quite a few people a little more wary of casting it on an SC god, I'd say...

Sorry to say it, but that's a pretty stupid idea. You can just as well remove the spell completely. Or you need to go and completely change the mechanic including the undead that turn up. Face it, nothing worth killing with VOTD will ever die to the undead the spell sends. You don't rack up a few hundred kills and get to be the target of an assassination spell when you can't deal with a bunch of freakind soulless. Even if they're etheral.
I'd vote for just changing the description of the spell to something that states outright that the commander gets killed if he can't win in the nightmare.
If you want a supercombatant that's immune against this spell just get a lifeless one, an undead one, or a demon.

Though i agree that the doubling of the kill count is a problem, i'd think an easy solution is to just remove the kill count increase from undead units. Ok, you'll getpractically no XP for fighting ermor, but hey, bashind skeletons is not really killing, is it?