Middle Earth: Battle For Arda - Official Thread
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I'm wondering if there's anything we could to do help expedite the next release, some xml work or some such. What remains to be done? We've been playing some games, and getting a strong feeling that good has a significant advantage, and are looking to the next version addressing that somewhat.
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An uncertainty about the intended rules, on which we'd like clarification, it may've been discussed before but worth bringing up anew.
When a flying unit attacks hostile territory, and then the 'retreat' action is taken, the flying unit can remain over the hostile territory. It then survives since air can now survive hovering land. This means there's a hostile unit contesting that territory, so units friendly to the controller of the territory can't move there in noncombat, though they can move there in combat and engage the flying units directly albeit without the help of other allied forces in that territory; and it also means that any units of the territory's controller (especially walls) will have to attack the flying units on their turn. This matters particularly in terms of dragons, who might attack, but not fully win the battle; then be left hanging over some hostile walls. The way the engine does things now, the walls then attack the dragons on their turn, and cannot retreat.
Is that the intended gameplay? If not, how should it be handled?
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Some issues related to lowluck: It might be worthwhile to have slightly different unit costs in lowluck than in dice, as the value of some units is somewhat different when one has certainty. In particular, while strafing is always a possibility, lowluck makes multihp unit strafing very safe. Even more particularly, the multihp air units can strafe very safely in a lowluck environment, whereas in dice it takes fewer archers to create a risk of direct killing the attacking air. Similarly with siege, in ll you can have just enough siege that you know you'll 100% kill all the enemy walls, whereas in dice you can't reach that level of surety.
Another issue is that the 'duel' mechanic is VERY dicey. People play lowluck because they want to reduce the impact of luck on the game; however even in lowluck duels make a HUGE difference. Units with duel are all quite powerful, and bring piles of fear or leadership, so that a single death can change the relative number of hits/round by 2-3 quite readily; even moreso since these deaths happen in the targeted attacks first strike phase, so any loss means a dead unit AND a lot of damaged missed that same round.
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I'm wondering if there's anything we could to do help expedite the next release, some xml work or some such. What remains to be done? We've been playing some games, and getting a strong feeling that good has a significant advantage, and are looking to the next version addressing that somewhat.
Which next release? For v3 there is a lot of work to be done still.
For v2 I'm planning an update that addresses the worst balance issues for those that want to keep playing it, but most of the big issues have no simple fix. That's why an overhaul is needed, and for now, I'm focusing my efforts on making that happen.If you're curious, all I know is that the v2 update will probably include something like (checks notes):
- Oathbreakers defense 2 -> 1
- Rangers cost 6 -> 7
- Pony riders cost 4 -> 5
- Uruk warriors attack 4 -> 5
- Eagles cost 24 -> 30
- Esgaroth production 6 -> 8
- Dale production 4 -> 6
- Fornost unit production 5 -> 3
- Lond Daer production 4 -> 6
- East & West Forochel Coast owner Neutral -> Angmar
But I haven't tested any of this, and most of the balancing will probably happen by adding / removing starting units. Figuring out how many of which units to place where to get better balance is mostly trial and error with a lot of testing, which is time consuming.
How is the "all units blitz" option supposed to work exactly?
Some terrain prevents Blitz.
I noticed recently that once a nation's capital is taken, any territories of its that are taken back by allied nations go to that allied nation rather than the original owner.
It's not intentional, I'm not familiar with the parts of the xml responsible for this.
When a flying unit attacks hostile territory, and then the 'retreat' action is taken, the flying unit can remain over the hostile territory.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the two available options are either this or requiring the units to land in a territory owned at the start of the turn. Neither is great for this map.
Some issues related to lowluck: It might be worthwhile to have slightly different unit costs in lowluck than in dice, as the value of some units is somewhat different when one has certainty.
True. I'm not going to try to balance two different games though, one is plenty of work already.
By the way, I'm sorry I'm not very active, and I appreciate that you and others (like @rsnorunt) are. Writing these comments takes a long time for me. This one took (checks time) almost an hour
, good thing I checked the time, this is ridiculous, this just can't go on like this, I'll have to do something about it. Perfectionism is as much a curse as it is a blessing. -
The next v2 release is the one I was wondering about, as tweaks that improve the game in its existing form are the ones most available to do.
For me, certain units under or over-performing are the biggest concern. Unit diversity is nice, so the more balanced units with more diverse armies are most fun to me.
Testing can be done by the community feedback fairly well.
It'd be good to have some notes about which terrains affect blitz in the game notes, in case anyone uses the option.
On the air units; those are indeed the only options IF you stick to engine supported options. Sometimes maps use rules not supported by the engine to handle corner cases better. That has its ups and downs.
On lowluck, it's not really balancing two different games; as the set of divergences would be quite consistent. I could probably code the xml myself for ya; though it would be unusual to have a map with unit stats differing for ll vs dice.
Do you generally aim the maps' balance based on dice play, ll play, or a mix?
It's fine not being very active; I know the curse of perfectionism quite well.
and ofc, great work on a fun map.
edit: another minor issue came up in game: the problem of angmar/dol guldur/mordor units having very similar palette. If you have say, orc marauders, it can be hard to tell which nation they belong to visually, and easy to mistakenly think an area is just the expected nation instead of what it actually is; given how powerful can openers are on this map, mis-seeing what nation a unit belongs to can be costly. All the other nation's colors in the game are quite distinctive and the units are highly differentiable.
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What would be on my wishlist is a description of terrain type rather than ONLY a picture. So, if you hover over a hill with mouse, it would have the existing picture but underneath would say "hill."
Other than that, maybe consider a limit on certain multi wound unit types?
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It'd be good to have some notes about which terrains affect blitz in the game notes, in case anyone uses the option.
Or just remove the restriction. I mean, if a player ticked a checkbox because they wanted to blitz, just let them blitz.
Do you generally aim the maps' balance based on dice play, ll play, or a mix?
Dice.
Other than that, maybe consider a limit on certain multi wound unit types?
So many of you are asking for this, I'll add something to this effect. But I still think this is the wrong solution. If any unit is overused, then that just means it's too cheap; if it isn't, build caps are unnecessary. Out of curiosity, which units do you have in mind?
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I agree fixing the price is better than a unit limit. I've only been using unit limits since it's easier to manage manually than a price adjustment. But there's also going to be that inherent difficulty that ll and dice have different balance points for some units.
I might also want to reduce eagle movement by 1; because even a weaker eagle stack projects power over a huge area, and it makes calcing a nightmare. Reducing their movement greatly reduces their ability to control a theater. There's also some places on the map where move 5 can go deceptively far, making it easier to miss.
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New video update on some of the biggest changes so far, including
- Changes to marshes and mountains
- Dwarves and Northmen map rework
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I was thinking eagles specifically. They are so good for 24 and movement 5 is huge. If they were 30 and movement 4 that would probably be better. Dragons could prob be pushed to something like 45, they are really good... But then again I just lost 4 to 5 rangers in 2 rounds of combat because dice. Was epic.
Winged Nazgul are a pain if spammed too.
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@alkexr said in Middle Earth: Battle For Arda - Official Thread:
New video update on some of the biggest changes so far, including
Interesting video.
What graphic software did you decide on in the end?
What videos did you watch to learn the 'art' ? -
@thedog Doubtless he used one of the rings of power to accomplish all of that...
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I forget whether we've covered this or not, and I can't get the search tools to find me the answer:
Currently, Flyers cannot go over FAlls of Rauros in 1 move. They have to use 2 moves. In order to fit the normal way flyers work on this map, they should be able to go from sz Lower anduin 4 to sz upper anduin 1 in just 1 move, much as they fly past all the other circle spots that mark crossings/towns/stuff along the river.
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Thanks for posting again Alkexr! It's totally fine that you're not that responsive on here! I think I speak for all of us when I say that we'd rather have you use your time to move towards a playable beta rather than responding to all our silly comments (this comment took way longer than an hour lol). Here are some thoughts I have on the final map. Feel free to take or leave any of them! You know best! And I'm looking forward to a beta soon. Let me know if there's anything I can do to help.
Love the final map, it's very pretty! Though I guess I'd prefer something to playtest over something pretty (though having a pretty map is definitely helpful in getting people to play). My only comments on the map appearance are to be careful about cave and pass appearance (if pass is still a terrain type).
I think that 2-step mountains and marshes are pretty interesting (presumably they don't affect fliers), though I think this definitely harms evil more than good. But I think this can be mitigated by territory values and unit changes. My main question is if this change eliminates the mountaineer trait. I think a lot of units are going to have to be reworked. Snagas, marauders, balchoth, and wild men are already a lot worse than the units they face, and without mountaineering (or even with it and with decreased range) they're even worse. 3-4 move mountaineers are going to be very powerful.
It feels like many of the Evil sides (Mordor, Harad, Angmar, Dol Guldor, and even Isengard) are supposed to have really shitty fodder and less production, but be balanced by good monsters/leadership and advantageous positioning. But it feels like their fodder is getting shittier and their positioning worse (because of increased distance between their cities and early game targets), without changes in anything else.
Here are some comments on individual factions:
Isengard:
- I like the terrain in Dunland. It allows Isengard to mount a defense against rohan if they take the river.
- The mountaineering changes make Methedras very hard to defend. Seems like Isengard will need a standing army on West Methedras or Dunland to stop hunters from getting into Dunland
- A turn 2 Tharbad capture is much harder, since Arnor can reinforce (for example by building a 3rd wall). Also the Marsh at swanfleet makes Tharbad much harder to attack. In the past, the only way I've been able to hold off the Free folk as Isengard is to take Tharbad early and build a wall and a few pikemen before the Free Folk get there. Now it seems like Isengard will be fighting a losing battle in northern Dunland.
- Taking Ost in Edhil turn 1 seems much more necessary now
- I like the number of options Isengard has to choose from in the south. Freca's stronghold, Grimslade, the Hornburg, and the Fanghorn all seem like (potentially) reasonable choices
Angmar:
- Not sure that it matters that the forodwaith area is less accessible. Angmar can never get troops there again, so it'll belong to good. It'll just take a turn or two more.
- Cold drakes seem very interesting
- Overall I'm interested in seeing Angmar's new unitset
- It looks like Angmar has some potentially reasonable early game plays in the East
- Only one settlement is still a major disadvantage. Maybe Fornost is easier to take now? (I doubt it)
- Will Angmar be able to afford dragons anymore? A lot of their production went to Gundabad.
Mordor:
- Mordor seems significantly weaker. In the past they relied on flipping all the territory on the East bank of the Anduin to (somewhat) match Gondor in production. Now it will be significantly harder to take any of that land. In order to take Ithilien, Mordor will need to hold the Morgulduin and perhaps also crossroads and Emyn Arnen. But orcs are incredibly inefficient defending on plains, so it seems likely to take 4 turns or so hold Ithilien.
- The dead mashes seem good for protecting Amon Lhaw from Gondor, though it seems unlikely that 3 units a turn in Amon Lhaw will be able to do much to Rohan.
- The new mountain rules mean that rangers in Ithilien can threaten southern mordor as fast as troops from Barad Dur can defend it.
- Mordor/Dol Guldor/Rhun have fewer free IPCs in the brown lands, though I guess they already start with some of them.
- Is Mordor losing Shelob? She was pretty helpful in defending their otherwise weaksauce stacks.
Arnor:
- I feel like Arnor is meant to have 3 potential strategies: Attack Angmar, attack Mount Grum and help Rivendell, or attack Isengard in the south. It seems to me like attacking Isengard is the easiest of the three. Arnor's troops are much more efficient than Isengard's in the plains, and the territory there is pretty valuable. Ofc, maybe to pull that off Angmar will grow too strong in the North.
- Anuminas is farther from Angmar, so I guess it'll take another turn or two for Arnor's full force to attack
- Fornost is closer to Carn Dum (though that won't fall easy)
Gondor:
- We didn't see the new Gondor coastline, but Gondor is stronger in basically every way. I guess Caer andros is a bit harder to defend
Northmen:
- Framsburg is much less vulnerable to a surprise attack
- Resource allocation between Gundabad, Dol Guldor, Dale, Rhovanion, and the Celduin seems like an interesting decision. And investing too little in an area will actually have consequences
- Greylin seems like it'll be fought over, since it's a much better defensive position than North Eotheod. Though depending on how much the dwarves invest it might never happen
- The long marshes actually seem like a mild disadvantage rather than an advantage, since troops in Esgaroth will need to use boats to reach Dale or Rhovanion
Silvan Elves:
- The Silvan elves in the woodland realm seem pretty weak. Though I guess if they invest up there, ents will play very well against dol guldor's troops.
- No more ridiculous turn 1 against dol guldor
- Moria can't hurt wardens in the woods anymore, and can't counter supported ents in the mountains
Gundabad:
- The new mountain rules mean that Eagles Eyrie will last at least a turn. This is pretty terrifying
- Goblins in Langwell and Rhimdath can actually hold against the northmen (unless they underinvest against Rhun)
- Archers are still strictly worse than spearmen everywhere except the east or west trollshaws, the front porch, or the goblin gate
- Holding the weather hills seems important
- On the one hand, more hills makes the area around mount grum much more defensible by angmar. On the other hand, goblins do as well in the plains.
Moria:
- Fighting elves without goblins seems difficult, especially with Eagles' Eyrie alive on turn 1
- Moria can't actually protect Fanuidhol or Hithaeglir
- Eregion is closer to Rivendell than Moria now, which seems tough, and without goblins, holding it or Hollin seems very difficult
- Moria either needs to start with a lot more or get some better defensive units if it ever hopes to beat Lorien.
- Snagas can't attack cities and are blocked by wardens, marauders and warg cavalry can't defend, bats get shot, and trolls are very expensive. Warg scouts seem to be their only reasonable bet at this point
Rivendell:
- Rivendell itself seems incredibly defensible, and can't fall on turn 2 anymore
- The Trollshaws seem very easy to hold, if they can be taken
- Eregion, Hithaeglir, and Hollin are easier for them to hold than Moria
- They have lots of neutral land to take in the West.
- Gundabad is a much bigger threat than Moria
Harad:
- We didn't see them
Rhun:
- Seems mostly the same
- The Iron Hills seem harder to take, but Rhun can now attack Dale without them
- Ships seem even more important (though against a good player Rhun will never win there)
Dol Guldor:
- Assuming they go before the Northmen, they should be able to put the Northmen on the defensive by taking Rhosgobel, Lands of the Woodmen, Eryn Galen, and North Wilderland. This will allow them to protect west wilderand, which seems quite important for them.
- If the Northmen go first, they might still have a chance. They probably can't take ???-Fuin even with a Silvan can-open, which means that Dol guldor can at least consolidate. Though they could probably make taking Rhosgobel very difficult.
- I'm interested to see what the new spiders do.
- A turn 1 attack on the Fields of Celebrant seems like a somewhat reasonable play, though its likely that the Silvan elves will take the upper undeeps first.
Free Folk:
- They seem similar. A little more vulnerable to attack by Gundabad and Angmar, but they need to commit far fewer troops to the south
- They still have tons of free ipcs
Dwarves:
- Seems like they can just attack Gundabad through Eotheod rather than Forodwaith.
- Seems like putting the Halls of Gror on the river makes it more vulnerable to attack. I still think it's a worthwhile change
- Thorin's stronghold is actually relevant now
- They can choose between Angmar, Rhun, Dale, and Gundabad, which is nice
Rohan:
- Looks like Isengard will have a tough time killing all Rohan's units on turn 1.
- Helming warriors will probably be a little less OP now, which is good
- I think the Amon Hen vs Amon Lhaw conflict looks great, though I'm dubious that Mordor can actually pose a threat with only 3 production, given that cavalry from Edoras can range to the lower Undeeps in 2 turns.
- The marshes in southern Rohan make Aldberg and Edoras significantly better at defending those areas. This makes the heartland of Rohan much harder to take
- Rohan probably won't be reinforcing Gondor much (though they rarely did in games I've played)
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I'm wondering alkexr do you play in the lobby at all? I'm not sure I've ever seen you there, unless you use a different name there.
I watched the videos; and it sounds like the way play goes in your games is somewhat different from what I typically see. So I thought it'd be interesting to see what games you play end up like. Are there instances of your saves somewhere online? Play by post games for instance? Or of the games that you've watched others play a lot?
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What graphic software did you decide on in the end?
GIMP, mainly, sprinkled with some paint-dot-net for some of the steps as I'm more familiar with that one.
What videos did you watch to learn the 'art' ?
Odd choice of a word, is that what you're implying? (I welcome constructive criticism on my English.)
I didn't learn it from videos. I used google to navigate the features of GIMP, but mainly it was... well, it's difficult to explain in just a couple of sentences. To someone looking, it would look like trial and error, except it's a very particular way of doing the trial and error, with a theory of creativity behind it. It's a very powerful tool, unfortunately there isn't really a good summary I can link to, maybe I'll take the time to explain it in depth at some point.Here are some thoughts I have on the final map. Feel free to take or leave any of them!
I just want to point out that this is the sort of feedback that usually ends up being the most useful. Sharing your observations and your intuitions, the faint "it feels like", even though you yourself aren't sure about it. You, the player, are the expert on what it feels like to be the player. If the game makes you feel something then that's valid and carries important information about the game. Ultimately, that's why we play games in the first place. I just wanted to mention this because providing useful feedback is a very useful skill nowadays, here and elsewhere, and this is a good example of it. Thanks!
Only one settlement is still a major disadvantage. Maybe Fornost is easier to take now?
At the moment Angmar can take Fornost turn 2 and there is nothing Arnor can do about it. But the balance right now is the result of literally me just placing a bunch of starting units on the map without thinking about it, so it's not reflective of much if anything. There is more work to be done before I'll invest more effort in balance.
Cold drakes seem very interesting
They do? Did I leak something I didn't mean to? Oh well.
Is Mordor losing Shelob?
Not in the game atm, will come back later.
We didn't see the new Gondor coastline, but Gondor is stronger in basically every way.
It's the topic of the first video. Gondor is strong, but the naval invasions are a huge pain to defend against.
Harad:
We didn't see themWhoops! It's still just a desert divided randomly into a dozen or so territories though, so not much to see.
???-Fuin
Taur-nu-Fuin
I'm wondering alkexr do you play in the lobby at all?
No.
I watched the videos; and it sounds like the way play goes in your games is somewhat different from what I typically see. So I thought it'd be interesting to see what games you play end up like. Are there instances of your saves somewhere online? Play by post games for instance? Or of the games that you've watched others play a lot?
I haven't played for quite a while. There are two of my games linked somewhere in this thread. Other people have posted some of their savegames here as well. But I'm not sure what you mean, could you give an example?
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I'm not entirely sure I remember exactly what you said in the videos; but for the examples:
The loss of cair andros is quite expected in my games, and always happens in the early rounds. It's not particularly fatal for good or anything, just somewhat harmful.
In my games Rhun is usually coming around the west side of the rivers with the bulk of its forces rather than coming around the east way where Gror is.
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It's the topic of the first video. Gondor is strong, but the naval invasions are a huge pain to defend against.
I wasn't sure if things had been changed after the first video, but based on the first video I don't think naval invasions have been made any easier. While you've added new coastal settlements and made it a bit harder to move troops between them, you haven't made it any harder for Gondor to mount a naval defense.
The crux of the problem is that black ships are a 7/4/2, and dromunds are a 5/5/2. This means that while black ships have an advantage when attacking dromunds, they're at a disadvantage when attacked (while still costing 15% more). This means that Gondor can build a fleet in the sea zone just south of Dol Amroth / Western Belfalas. Any sea zone within 2 spaces of any Gondor territory is within 2 spaces of the Belfalas SZ. This means that Gondor can preemptively attack the Harad fleet no matter where they are before they have a chance to land. This is the same strategy I used in the current version. Gondor need only spend 24 IPCs a turn the first turn and any subsequent turn that Harad builds ships to completely neuter them.
Ideally the sea zones would be designed so that Gondor would have to split their fleet to properly defend against a Harad invasion, thus forcing them to spend more on defense than Harad spends on attack. One way to do this would be to give black ships an extra movement (but still make it require 4+ move to get from the City of Corsairs to the Gondor coast). Though this might make black ships too powerful. Another way would be giving black ships more defense, so they maintain their advantage over dromunds even when attacked.
Gondor still would have the money to outspend Harad on navy, but if Harad is more efficient than Gondor, it at least might make sense for them to try, And then Gondor will have to decide how much it can afford to divert from Mordor to protect its coast.
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Since people are asking questions. The project is not abandoned, I'm still working on version 3. I can't say it's going quickly, but every few months I tinker a bit. That said, probably more than half the work is still ahead of me, a nasty case of scope creep I'm afraid. So yeah.
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any possibility of just releasing a version 2 balance patch with the most important/useful fixes, I forget if there's any bug fixes in one as well.
