So... about the council....
Sat, 02/23/2013 - 14:20
#2
Give the Knight move 3.
Sat, 02/23/2013 - 14:22
#3
The ninja would only be able to spawn 1... I gave you 4 different options and of course you pick the op one. Which way i gave options. One option was that the unit that swappedwith ninja loses armor so its also kind of a bad deal. And you saying lots of words to me than critizing me sounds like you didnt read it very carefully and all you got out of it was change. Thats just what it sounds like to me it me not be truthful. Im just saying thats how i intreprated it.
Sat, 02/23/2013 - 14:31
#4
Give the Knight move 3.
Not to be rude but why? Just filling in spaces so teams get balanced is not where to go. And in real life knights are terribly slow given how much armor they put on. The archer, wizard, cleric would fit more logically. If it wasnt a knight but had everything the same than i would maybe vote yes for that. I hope you understand what i said, and get my point.
Sat, 02/23/2013 - 14:40
#5
The ninja would only be able to spawn 1... I gave you 4 different options and of course you pick the op one. Which way i gave options. One option was that the unit that swappedwith ninja loses armor so its also kind of a bad deal. And you saying lots of words to me than critizing me sounds like you didnt read it very carefully and all you got out of it was change. Thats just what it sounds like to me it me not be truthful. Im just saying thats how i intreprated it.
Here i didn't answer what you said. The ninja can't swap back off the game. Only in one of my options can the ninja swap out. And thats only if the ninja is at the spawn tile... And i even stated that it might have alot of flaws. So your example wouldnt work to well. Unless you swap with knight. Hit them 2 run all the way back to spawn a knight that lost it's armor (in one option) to spawn back. I don't think that very op. I think that nothing will come out those little raids as you waste 5 ap to do those things. And armor (in one option).
Sat, 02/23/2013 - 15:24
#6
Give the Knight move 3.
Real life logic does not apply to game design. Knights are Council's primary defensive utility. They are, in effect, their "Bubble" and like the DW Engi Council players depend on the Knight to raise the AP cost of stomping their units. Rather than applying a shield, they act as a positional blocker, forcing additional moves as opposed to attacks to set up a kill. Issue being, like the pre-buff Monl and VM they have a hard time doing their job at Move 2.
On top of that, it's one of the few changes I could see making to Council that wouldn't break them. Any buff to the Wizard or Cleric could leave them far too powerful and the Archer is obviously right out of the question. That leaves the Knight for tweaking and you can't raise his damage or tank without turning him into a monster (Council does not need DE style bruisers).
I could also see Potions rezzing to 400, but that would be a fairly minor change.
Sat, 02/23/2013 - 15:51
#7
Give the Knight move 3.
Real life logic does not apply to game design. Knights are Council's primary defensive utility. They are, in effect, their "Bubble" and like the DW Engi Council players depend on the Knight to raise the AP cost of stomping their units. Rather than applying a shield, they act as a positional blocker, forcing additional moves as opposed to attacks to set up a kill. Issue being, like the pre-buff Monl and VM they have a hard time doing their job at Move 2.
On top of that, it's one of the few changes I could see making to Council that wouldn't break them. Any buff to the Wizard or Cleric could leave them far too powerful and the Archer is obviously right out of the question. That leaves the Knight for tweaking and you can't raise his damage or tank without turning him into a monster (Council does not need DE style bruisers).
I could also see Potions rezzing to 400, but that would be a fairly minor change.
I agree with the potion. But i still don't like the knight thing. I think its a good idea but i just don't like it.
Sun, 02/24/2013 - 02:04
#8
I did read your entire thing, I did not, however, understand it all. I have a bit of trouble with your grammar (no offense) and I thought you meant all of the abilities at once, plus I thought you said you could swap the armor to the ninja and back again to another character. But seriously, the ninja doesn't need any confusing or 'special case' ability. Remember that his abilities need to be able to be accurately described in the tooltip. :)
Sun, 02/24/2013 - 13:08
#9
I did read your entire thing, I did not, however, understand it all. I have a bit of trouble with your grammar (no offense) and I thought you meant all of the abilities at once, plus I thought you said you could swap the armor to the ninja and back again to another character. But seriously, the ninja doesn't need any confusing or 'special case' ability. Remember that his abilities need to be able to be accurately described in the tooltip. :)
Ya i have messed up grammar... Lol the way i talk makes sense (sometimes), but on paper it doesn't. And all of those things are options, so not everything i said for the ninja works. I just wanted to give ideas. The one that i would really consider is the ninja spawning out onto units, like the wraith spawning on dead corpse. But the unit that swapped with the ninja works like the respawn token.
Sun, 02/24/2013 - 19:43
#10
That would make him a bit too much like the wraith IMO. Plus there is still that tooltip issue. :-/
Tue, 02/26/2013 - 00:30
#11
Sorry for the radio silence, school stuff all piled up. I haven't forgotten about this thread, and I'll be responding eventually.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 11:09
#12
Council doesn't need any help vs SL, DE or council
Dwarves, TF2 need nerfs to be brought to Council level
if any buff is needed by council it would be one to help against this teams the thing I see in common is their slay unit abilities
Jarate + Drill
you could also argue about them having the best AoE (dwarves) and TF2 having decent AoE
going by all of this and going by council strengths I would say increase the amount of healing on rezzed units by the cleric as a possible buff.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 13:07
#13
On January 7, 2013, you said that your primary Council tactics involved "Knight + shield + helm with archer/wizard + sword behind to pop out and attack." I consider that to be fairly recent, and it suggests that you've been playing with better Council equipment distributions for less than 6 weeks.
I didn't say that those were my "primary" tactics, but my "early" tactics. I.e. when I started playing, I tried to leverage the knight's toughness and the archer's range that way. I learned a long time ago that such tactics didn't work, and haven't played that way for several months.
That said, the 1000 HP of a 2 AP cleric heal is not *that* much better than the 3 AP heal from every other healer (900HP vs 1000). In most circumstances, things that will kill the 900 HP unit will kill the 1000HP unit (how many units have more than 900HP without also having resistances that make the difference between a 3 hit KO from a 300 power unit and the 4 it would take to KO the 1000 anyway?), so I'm going to estimate something like a 1.5 average AP advantage to the cleric due to raw throughput. Significant, but when taken into account the AP that has to be spent getting 50% closer than a priestess must, or healing the first cleric with a second cleric while the paladin heals herself, etc. it's not really that big a deal in the long run, in my opinion.
This is where we differ, then -- I consider a 1 or 2 AP gain per healing or rezzing a HUGE deal, regardless of range.
When you say "regardless of range" I can only interpret that as you ignoring the very real difference between the cleric's 1) move 2) revive 3) heal for 1000 and the priestess's 1) revive 2) heal 3) heal for 900 when both start 3 squares away from their intended healing target. This is my entire point regarding the cleric- her increased throughput as compared to other healers doesn't actually make her better than them, because they ALL have other advantages that the cleric lacks in actual healing ability. Priestesses have range, paladins have self-heal, shamans have chain heal, medics have self-heal, Taoists suck but that's it's own problem.
Net effect? That 1 or 2 possible gain in AP because of direct throughput works out, long-term, to a 0 or 1 AP gain because the clerics have to have other clerics to heal them, have to move into range, etc. They're not actually better than the other healers in most circumstances because of these perks, and they lack all of the other perks that the other healers have, like the priestess's debuff, medic link, paladin aura, etc.
Heavies on the TF2 team are hard to heal, sure. The engineer upgrade (if present) still goes a long way to make up the difference in throughput, and the medic has lots of other fringe benefits as noted before. The TF2 are weird, and have lots of offensive gimmicks to help make up for having only 2 medics.With respect to Dark Elves: A) See my above commentary on DE's reduced reliance on clumped units due to individual resilience and the priestess's long range. B & C) Void monks leech life through AOE, AKA easy to pressure/harass while healing themselves; Impalers do 300 base damage, so they heal themselves decently even without a sword; Necros attack from long range so they can do chip damage and heal themselves somewhat without having to be too close to the enemy, although supplemental healing from a Priestess will probably be necessary to top off. It's not very hard to make up the AP loss from the Priestess's heals by offensive pressure + life leech, but particularly if the unit in question has any equipment at all.
Agreed -- these are all great tricks. And they are necessary to keep those respective teams from being horribly underpowered.
"Horribly underpowered"? Yes, if you removed life leech (and didn't institute some other mechanic in its place) the dark elves would be terrible. Sure, if you took out engineers the TF2 team would be in a bad spot. That said, I think it's disingenuous to say that the teams would be "horribly underpowered" without these tricks, because you imply that their presence creates the balance that I don't believe currently exists. Even the league stats indicate that the TF2 is in significantly better shape than the council (if memory serves), so it's not hard to believe that some kind of modest bump to the council would be a step in the RIGHT direction for balance.
It's entirely possible that I have missed some critical aspect of council play that makes the difference between the mediocrity that has been my experience, and the competitiveness that you assert that they posess. I just have a hard time believing that, due to my experience. I have NEVER been handed a ridiculous rush zerg loss by any other team, nor have I had any other team hit my early units so hard that I *cannot* recover (not counting the rare, ridiculously useless "3 engineers, 2 beer and a shield" kind of opening hands). Likewise, I have never felt so completely outgunned when playing any other team (haven't bought Shaolin, for the record) in the late game, after having been forced to blow consumables early to stay in the game at all.
Yes, I cannot explain that easily either, without seeing your games. I've experienced brutal rushes from TF2, Tribe and Dwarves that were on par with the best I've seen from the Council, and I never feel that CL is "forced to blow consumables early", other than in the case of exceptionally bad draws. Question: do you and most of your opponents play with 3 AP first turns?
I play predominantly random games, and 95% of them do not use first turn 3AP. This may skew my experiences somewhat. If it's such a good thing for balance, RE needs to make it mandatory, and pretending that HA is a "casual game" does not excuse inaction on the topic of game balance, but that's an entirely different discussion.
Whether you would say that this is because the Council are numerically "weaker" or just harder to play effectively (assuming the existance of some playing-field-leveling tactic of which I'm not aware), I think it's a reasonable concern, particularly for the team that introduces new players to the game. I know that if my first several games had been against the dwarves, I would have quit in disgust, and the original incarnation of the Tribe (with the field-leveling meat+rage+witch doc bomb) made the Council look pathetic. The Dark Elves are a more nuanced team, I will grant that, but with significant "quality of life" advantages that make them a lot more playable in practice than their numbers on paper would suggest, which means at the very least that there was a lot of learning that had to happen before I felt comfortable facing them as Council.
Essentially, the council lacks the relative gimmicks of the other teams and instead has only marginal throughput gains (and most of those in healing) in their place. Unless I'm missing some huge synergy that is so obvious to everyone else that nobody ever talks about it, I can only come to the conclusion that the council is, unit-for-unit, mildly disadvantaged, but that high archer damage + range gives them some early oomph. I'd really love to hear what, if anything, I'm actually missing here.
Council is a classic "easy to learn, difficult to master" team, which is what makes them so ideal for beginners. The natural roles of the units are intuitive (except for the "swords should be carried by the Knight!" assumption...), and it is the ABSENCE of gimmicks that makes this possible. Gimmicks don't necessarily make a team better -- they just make it more gimmicky.
Agreed, the obvious roles of the units is intuitive and useful for the new player to learn. I agree that some complicated gimmickry is neither desirable nor necessary to bring the council up to the level of the other teams... but I continue to be of the opinion that some kind of defensive buff, particularly against AOE, would go a long way to keep the council from running out of steam just as the other teams are hitting their stride. One idea that I have heard is to give council units some small amount of innate HP regen (50 HP a turn?) such that they can more easily shrug off a medium AOE attack. Less reliance on the frail, range-limited council would increase their survivability over the long term, but not drastically over the short term.
Just a thought.
Again, you are consistently falling back on simple listings of other teams strengths -- none of which I will argue -- which says NOTHING about that team's net effectiveness compared to the poor, gimmick-free Council, who seem to do pretty much as well as everybody else despite not having fancy hats or flashy combo orbs.
The stats I have heard (having not looked into your excel upload yet, sorry!) place the CL above only the SL, who are a complete separate problem in multiple ways. They are supposedly competitive with (though very slightly below) the DE, competitive with the Tribe (who have a widely agreed-upon lack of consistent AOE, which needs to be fixed) and modestly disadvantaged against the TF2 and Dwarves.
In short, they are ahead of a broken team, tied with 2 teams, one of which is distinctly lacking in one category of tool, and markedly behind the 2 front-runners. Doesn't sound like a balanced status-quo to me.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 13:46
#14
I didn't say that those were my "primary" tactics, but my "early" tactics. I.e. when I started playing, I tried to leverage the knight's toughness and the archer's range that way. I learned a long time ago that such tactics didn't work, and haven't played that way for several months.
I'll accept your explanation, but it does raise the question of why you would bring it up at all in the context at the time. In the post in question you were explaining how you DID in fact understand how to play Council effectively -- why mention equipping Knights as evidence, if you considered it an obsolete practice that you hadn't been using for months? Anyway, moot point; I was merely using that as an example of how small changes in play can have big impacts on a team's perceived effectiveness.When you say "regardless of range" I can only interpret that as you ignoring the very real difference between the cleric's 1) move 2) revive 3) heal for 1000 and the priestess's 1) revive 2) heal 3) heal for 900 when both start 3 squares away from their intended healing target.
I don't understand why we should assume that the Cleric is out of range. Perhaps your problem with CL is Cleric positioning? Regardless, EVEN IF we assume your scenario above, 1000 HP is generally a FULL AP of damage better than 900 HP!
Net effect? That 1 or 2 possible gain in AP because of direct throughput works out, long-term, to a 0 or 1 AP gain because the clerics have to have other clerics to heal them, have to move into range, etc. They're not actually better than the other healers in most circumstances because of these perks, and they lack all of the other perks that the other healers have, like the priestess's debuff, medic link, paladin aura, etc.
I can give you dozens of situations where the Cleric's throughput is more valuable than the Priestess' range. It's a useless exercise, though: they both have their uses. I never claimed that the Cleric was ALWAYS BETTER than the other healers -- only that she holds her own in the context of the CL team. YOU are the one claiming massive imbalance, not me."Horribly underpowered"? Yes, if you removed life leech (and didn't institute some other mechanic in its place) the dark elves would be terrible. Sure, if you took out engineers the TF2 team would be in a bad spot. That said, I think it's disingenuous to say that the teams would be "horribly underpowered" without these tricks, because you imply that their presence creates the balance that I don't believe currently exists.
I really don't know what you are arguing here. You agreed that DE without Life Leach would be terrible -- far worse than CL, I'd say. That's my point. The "team traits" are meant to even out otherwise underpowered individual units. The fact that CL has none doesn't necessarily IMPLY imbalance.
I play predominantly random games, and 95% of them do not use first turn 3AP. This may skew my experiences somewhat.
Yes, this explains a great deal. 5 AP first turns are intrinsically imbalanced, and if you don't like them, you should stop playing random matches. I would LOVE to see a "ranked" mode with mandatory 3 AP first turns and intelligent matchmaking, but until that happens we have to deal with what we've got. Quite frankly, any team balance discussion based on games using 5 FTAP is nearly worthless, especially if a main issue is the problem of quick crystal rushes!The stats I have heard (having not looked into your excel upload yet, sorry!) place the CL above only the SL, who are a complete separate problem in multiple ways. They are supposedly competitive with (though very slightly below) the DE, competitive with the Tribe (who have a widely agreed-upon lack of consistent AOE, which needs to be fixed) and modestly disadvantaged against the TF2 and Dwarves.
In short, they are ahead of a broken team, tied with 2 teams, one of which is distinctly lacking in one category of tool, and markedly behind the 2 front-runners. Doesn't sound like a balanced status-quo to me.
Nope, not balanced. But CL is clearly not the main problem. As you said, we seem to have two top-tier teams (DW and TF2), 3 mid-tier teams (CL, DE, TR), and 1 bottom-tier team (SL). Why in the world would we want to mess around much with the 3 middle teams? Dwarves and TF2 likely need further nerfs, and Shaolin probably needs major, fundamental changes (we're in full agreement there). The three in the middle might all need some slight tweaks, but anything major (like adding an entire team trait!) would be a big mistake.
In short, they are ahead of a broken team, tied with 2 teams, one of which is distinctly lacking in one category of tool, and markedly behind the 2 front-runners. Doesn't sound like a balanced status-quo to me.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 14:01
#15
Just to keep things on topic, here's some graphs I put together from the full dataset last night, including everything since version 1.3:
Average length of wins by matchup
Average length of wins by matchup, broken down by win condition
(1 = CK, 2 = TKO, 3 = Resignation)
Total wins for faction divided by expected wins by player ELO
I'm calling this statistic the Faction Achievement Rating (FAR), and I think it does a better job than W/L for quick analyses of performance. Numbers over 100% indicate "overachievement" -- that faction got more wins than would be expected simply by comparing the rankings of the players involved. Under 100% shows the opposite.
Interesting numbers. My takeaway:
When accounting for player skill (as represented by player ELO) the SL is way way behind (as would be expected); CL and DE are modestly behind (as my experience bears out), TR are somewhere in the middle, and TF2/Dwarves are modestly ahead, with TF2 edging out DW. Sounds pretty much in line with what I've been saying all along. I've been focusing on the council in this thread, but DE have their own issues (Void Monk AOE being dependent on enemy formation => certain turtles are extremely hard for them to crack, Necros are largely pretty meh ;P)
The average wins by matchup and win condition is very interesting too. People give up in this order: Tribe, DW, DE, CL, and THEN TF2. I would have expected people to be irritated against the TF2 and quit earlier, but the explosive power of the Tribe and the imposing Dwarf Fortress have caused players to give up against them more quickly than against the council or elves.
Some other observations:
In nearly every matchup (including CL on CL) the CL are the opponent most quickly defeated. The major exception to this rule is the Dwarves, who both BEAT everybody quickly and LOSE the quickest. This could be explained by their exceptional dependance on early draws. When given a decent mix of Paladins, Engineers, offensive units and equipment, the dwarves get set up and wreck house; when lacking offensive units or paladins, they get smashed.
The one additional thing I'd really like to see is the following:
Average Length of wins, by matchup, by win condition, weighted by win/loss likelihood. I think such a comparison would show that these fast CL wins against DW are comparatively rare vs. a more consistent CL mid to late game loss.
Thanks for the stats, though. I think your "Faction Achievement Rating" paints a pretty clear picture of what's actually going on, weighted to take into account player skill. Do you have any comments on your stats, Trip?
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 14:53
#16
I'll accept your explanation, but it does raise the question of why you would bring it up at all in the context at the time. In the post in question you were explaining how you DID in fact understand how to play Council effectively -- why mention equipping Knights as evidence, if you considered it an obsolete practice that you hadn't been using for months? Anyway, moot point; I was merely using that as an example of how small changes in play can have big impacts on a team's perceived effectiveness.
I was responding to the assertion that I didn't understand the council's defensive options... I was asserting that, aside from knights being tough, the council largely lacks defensive options, and my early attempts to leverage the knight's toughness (by using equipment to make him an even BETTER tank) were failures from which I have learned.
I don't understand why we should assume that the Cleric is out of range. Perhaps your problem with CL is Cleric positioning? Regardless, EVEN IF we assume your scenario above, 1000 HP is generally a FULL AP of damage better than 900 HP!
My point is that if your cleric is in range to heal the target without movement, she is either 1) blocked off by units, therefore forming a clump, therefore inviting an AOE attack that the council is ill-equipped to handle or 2) exposed to a direct attack, requiring backup from other clerics to maintain effectiveness. The extended range of the priestess mitigates both of these risks, mitigating the loss in throughput; the life-leech mechanic provides another avenue to make up lost AP, by healing the attacking unit WHILE putting pressure on the opponent. Point being, the AP gain of cleric throughput is easily negated by AP gains due to range, life leech, self-heals (in the case of paladin and medic), etc.
1000 HP vs 900 HP is only one additional AP of damage if you assume a 300 damage unit, with or without a sword, or a 200 attack unit with a sword. The only council unit that has baseline HP above 800 is the knight, so any unit capable of receiving upward of 900 healing will be a +2 non-knight unit, in which case they are unlikely to die to 900 pre-resistance damage anyway.
I can give you dozens of situations where the Cleric's throughput is more valuable than the Priestess' range. It's a useless exercise, though: they both have their uses. I never claimed that the Cleric was ALWAYS BETTER than the other healers -- only that she holds her own in the context of the CL team. YOU are the one claiming massive imbalance, not me.
1) You can't give me "dozens" of situations; there's really only one situation in which the throughput is better, and that's when both AOE is not a concern (therefore the cleric can "afford" to be in range and stay in range) and a single target is KO'd (or near KO) but not stomped. The Priestess's range gives the elves lots of flexibility that the council just can't match.
2) My comparison of healers is just one part of my comparison between the teams. I think that SOME kind of team perk (instead of the totally meaningless "strong alchemy", that doesn't have any effect on the team as a whole) might be enough to put the CL on equal footing with the other teams in long games, which is where I feel they suffer the most. Buffing crystal toughness to reduce the gib factor of an early crystal rush would be the other half of my proposed plan for achieving closer balance, but that's another conversation, perhaps.
I really don't know what you are arguing here. You agreed that DE without Life Leach would be terrible -- far worse than CL, I'd say. That's my point. The "team traits" are meant to even out otherwise underpowered individual units. The fact that CL has none doesn't necessarily IMPLY imbalance.
I disagree with the assertion that CL doesn't have otherwise underpowered individual units. Archers are great, sure, even considering their weak melee attack. That said, Wizards are mediocre AOE units, Knights are only useful as speedbumps or to hold assault squares, Clerics are about even with the other healers when considering ONLY their healing effectiveness, and not their full range of uses (due to the fact that the cleric has none and the others all have SOME buff to their personal survivability and/or their team's offenses), and Ninjas are easily the worst super unit.
I don't think one can assert that archers being "good" pulls the average council unit above "mediocre", and therefore that the council's units aren't underpowered on average.
Yes, this explains a great deal. 5 AP first turns are intrinsically imbalanced, and if you don't like them, you should stop playing random matches. I would LOVE to see a "ranked" mode with mandatory 3 AP first turns and intelligent matchmaking, but until that happens we have to deal with what we've got. Quite frankly, any team balance discussion based on games using 5 FTAP is nearly worthless, especially if a main issue is the problem of quick crystal rushes!
Fair point. That said, excluding the potential for an early council crystal rush makes the council outlook even bleaker due to their increased vulnerability to AOE attrition as compared to other teams. Your own statistics seem to bear out that the council underperforms its players' ELO ratings, and I assume those statistics are from a 3AP first turn basis.
Nope, not balanced. But CL is clearly not the main problem. As you said, we seem to have two top-tier teams (DW and TF2), 3 mid-tier teams (CL, DE, TR), and 1 bottom-tier team (SL). Why in the world would we want to mess around much with the 3 middle teams? Dwarves and TF2 likely need further nerfs, and Shaolin probably needs major, fundamental changes (we're in full agreement there). The three in the middle might all need some slight tweaks, but anything major (like adding an entire team trait!) would be a big mistake.
I think you oversimplify the stratification of the teams. Your FAR numbers seem to indicate 4 rough tiers:
Tier 1: TF2, followed closely by dwarves
Tier 2: Tribe
Tier 3: CL and DE
<crickets>
<tumbleweeds>
Tier 4: SL
Obviously, the SL need a lot of work, but what to do about the other 3 tiers is a more interesting question. Certainly, the TF2 and DW could be nerfed somewhat to bring them down, but how can we tweak the TF2 without basically reworking the entire team? Even minor numeric changes mean the difference between overpowered and irrelevant (See: Sniper).
Even if we assume that the fix is to nerf TF2 and DW, we have to decide whether to nerf them down to the Tribe (and then buff CL and DE anyway) or nerf them down to the CL and DE, and then nerf TR as well.
Given the choice between nerfing the Dwarves, who at least play like a coherent team, and buffing the council, who have always felt kludgy and awkward to actually play (in spite of their individual units' simplicity), I would choose to buff the council (and then the dark elves, but that's another topic entirely). You're entitled to your own opinion, of course.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 14:59
#17
Thanks for the stats, though. I think your "Faction Achievement Rating" paints a pretty clear picture of what's actually going on, weighted to take into account player skill. Do you have any comments on your stats, Trip?
In general, I agree with your analysis here! Bear in mind, though, that I originally put these together to investigate your claim that CL was somehow doubly broken: unstoppable with the right starting hand, unplayable without it. THAT is the point that I believe lacks evidence in the stats. They generally finish games faster than other teams, but the difference is not profound and there is not a major gap between wins and losses.
Could Council use a boost? Yes, though further nerfs to DW and TF2 would go a long way towards fixing overall CL balance. The CL/TR matchup is a problematic one, and especially interesting in light of your argument that AOE is a primary CL achilles heel. TR has awful AOE -- they win vs. CL thanks to their ability to assassinate individual targets, not their ability to deal damage to many targets at once. Fixing this matchup will require careful tweaking, probably on both sides, and underscores the need to balance a possible corpse-explosion boost with nerf(s) elsewhere.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 15:21
#18
The Tribe is another tough nut to crack. Their AOE having been nerfed so heavily, the TR is now very dependent on the Warrior to execute high-value targets that have been weakened by the overbuffed Axe-thrower. This means that the council can't rely on loading up individual units with equipment, because everything on the team except a knight dies in 3AP to axe + axe + execute.
The way that Warrior execute ignores the numbers (doing essentially "infinite" damage) is one of the most outlandish things in the game right now. Even with the Axe-thrower doing 400 baseline damage above 50%, the Tribe's lack of defensive gear makes their individual units easy pickings, so the warrior execute is "necessary" to make up a lot of their shortfall... but I still don't like it. I'd rather see a multiplier of 2 or 3x damage on units below 50% to preserve SOME of the purpose to high HP/heavily equipped units while still being the haymaker of the team.
But I digress. :p
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 15:24
#19
1000 HP vs 900 HP is only one additional AP of damage if you assume a 300 damage unit, with or without a sword, or a 200 attack unit with a sword. The only council unit that has baseline HP above 800 is the knight, so any unit capable of receiving upward of 900 healing will be a +2 non-knight unit, in which case they are unlikely to die to 900 pre-resistance damage anyway.
Good grief. You are making this hypothetical scenario waaaaaay too awkward. On the DE team, it takes the Priestess 3 AP to get a +2 unit to 900, am I correct? And EVEN THEN it would still be 3-shot by a 300-damage physical attacker, or 2-shot by a 450-damage physical attacker, correct? At 900, they are now 1 AP closer to death vs. upgraded magical TF2 attackers, correct? (390 x 3 x 0.8 = 936) If you don't consider either of these meaningful problems for DE, then I don't know what to tell you.The Cleric's ability to rez for 400 and heal for 600 are beneficial for the CL team. Period. If you don't think they are beneficial enough, that's fine, but again -- they can't be THAT terrible, based on the stats between CL and DE!
You can't give me "dozens" of situations; there's really only one situation in which the throughput is better, and that's when both AOE is not a concern (therefore the cleric can "afford" to be in range and stay in range) and a single target is KO'd (or near KO) but not stomped. The Priestess's range gives the elves lots of flexibility that the council just can't match.
Nonsense. They, in fact, DO match it. Almost perfectly. Your continued implication that DE enjoy a major advantage over CL thanks to their Life Leach and healing range is pretty much COMPLETELY undermined by the actual numbers. And by "dozens" I meant actual, common in-game positions. There are plenty of ways to arrange CL units such that AOE can be healed as fast or faster than it can be dealt, even with the 2-space range of the Cleric.Fair point. That said, excluding the potential for an early council crystal rush makes the council outlook even bleaker due to their increased vulnerability to AOE attrition as compared to other teams. Your own statistics seem to bear out that the council underperforms its players' ELO ratings, and I assume those statistics are from a 3AP first turn basis.
All stats I've shown you are for 3 AP first turns only.Again, I'm not arguing that CL couldn't use a boost. I don't know how many times I need to repeat this. I'm arguing that:
A) the imbalance is nowhere near as drastic as you imply, and
B) they are not "doubly broken" through either unstoppable crystal rushes or inevitable long-term losses
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 15:27
#20
The way that Warrior execute ignores the numbers (doing essentially "infinite" damage) is one of the most outlandish things in the game right now. Even with the Axe-thrower doing 400 baseline damage above 50%, the Tribe's lack of defensive gear makes their individual units easy pickings, so the warrior execute is "necessary" to make up a lot of their shortfall...
This sounds familiar, and I think I understand now.
REDO ALL THE TEAMS!!!!!111
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 15:28
#21
Don't have time to respond to the new post, will do so when I can.
However: I wanted to comment that your FAR graph's inclusion of the Shaolin, who are widely agreed to be in terrible shape, serves to skew the results of all other teams upward. It might be beneficial to create another graph that excludes the SL to get a better idea of overall balance.
Just something that jumped out to me as I was closing tabs in my browser (getting ready to leave the office).
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 15:31
#22
Don't have time to respond to the new post, will do so when I can.
However: I wanted to comment that your FAR graph's inclusion of the Shaolin, who are widely agreed to be in terrible shape, serves to skew the results of all other teams upward. It might be beneficial to create another graph that excludes the SL to get a better idea of overall balance.
Just something that jumped out to me as I was closing tabs in my browser (getting ready to leave the office).
I commented on this above. Removing them drops everyone else's total numbers down by a point or two, but doesn't introduce any major skew. The total number of SL games is much fewer than the others, so they have a smaller weight in the final averges.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 16:44
#23
Why anyone would argue this long with the league all time #1 player is beyond me.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 17:53
#24
Why anyone would argue this long with the league all time #1 player is beyond me.
I appreciate it the sentiment, Vic, but I really don't want to bring "credentials" into these things... Not only is it off-putting to non-League members, but everyone who's been around here long knows that I've been wrong before.
Back when Tribe was first introduced, and after the first set of crystal-buffs, I declared DE the new top team, since the beefier crystals and 3 FTAP rule would make it harder for Council to get their precious crystal kills. When League stats continued to show the Elves playing second fiddle to Council, I argued that the algorithm was failing to take player ratings into account, since all the top League players played CL back then. After much debate with ArtNJ and calculations of my own, I had to concede that the faction ratings were indeed accurate. It remains my most humbling HA loss...
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 18:18
#25
Why anyone would argue this long with the league all time #1 player is beyond me.
even if your the strongest player it doesnt have to mean your always right. And to more proper define "the strongest" should be used by a proper tournament with enough games to eliminate luck of the draw and such things instead of relying on the league (altho it gives a good grasp of things ^^). There are also strong players that havent even joined the league. :)
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 18:19
#26
Back when Tribe was first introduced, and after the first set of crystal-buffs, I declared DE the new top team, since the beefier crystals and 3 FTAP rule would make it harder for Council to get their precious crystal kills. When League stats continued to show the Elves playing second fiddle to Council, I argued that the algorithm was failing to take player ratings into account, since all the top League players played CL back then. After much debate with ArtNJ and calculations of my own, I had to concede that the faction ratings were indeed accurate. It remains my most humbling HA loss...
:O
where
did
i
miss
such
valuable
information
or did i just forget it? ;)
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 18:54
#27
Why anyone would argue this long with the league all time #1 player is beyond me.
even if your the strongest player it doesnt have to mean your always right. And to more proper define "the strongest" should be used by a proper tournament with enough games to eliminate luck of the draw and such things instead of relying on the league (altho it gives a good grasp of things ^^). There are also strong players that havent even joined the league. :)
I don't believe Vic ever used the term "strongest," Hiruma, and I already pointed out that it has nothing to do with anyone being right or wrong... ;D
For what it's worth, though, the League ratings are far less luck-dependant than any single tournament could possibly be (unless that tournament involved thousands of total games).
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 19:51
#28
I dunno, I argued with Trip about DE and TF for a while, too. =p I changed the way I think about the match because of that discussion, and now I believe that DE v TF is not a bad match at all! One of the more interesting matches, I feel.
Wed, 02/27/2013 - 20:51
#29
Well, notice I said "argue this long", I didn't mean to imply Trip is always right.
But to persistently argue the point that a team is imbalanced with a person who clearly has more experience and knowledge about the game, is silly to me.
I'd start to think that perhaps I'm just not using the team properly and my opinion is flawed. But that's just me, no offense to Jwallyr.
Thu, 02/28/2013 - 11:49
#30
ahem
well sort of back to the topic (after the battle of who can type the most!)
despite everything that has been pointed out for either side, i (personally) do believe that the council does indeed NOT have a racial trait. the "alchemy" that they supposedly have is in no way a defensible trait in comparison to the very clearly designed feats that every member of each individual team can perform.
the argument that something needs to be immediately taken away from them is unfounded in my opinion. you should have uniformity in the skeleton of the design with unique qualities being the flesh of that skeleton, otherwise you end up with imbalances, like the inappropriately large number of pieces for TF2. its like starting chess with one side having a 2nd row of pawns, yes a good player may be able to out maneuver the other, but why the need to start in a hole every game?
the priestess heals and revives extra, nothing wrong with that. that is no different than the unique abilities of every other support/healer character in the game. the potion can revive a fallen piece, that is no different than the unique abilities of every other healing item in the game.
in other words these are not "racial features" that EVERY OTHER TEAM HAS IN THE GAME.
if i lived in a beautiful fantasy world where my whims and thoughts were properly enforced on the entire population, i would argue for something along the lines of every time a council member stomps an opposing unit, all council members on the board get a 20% buff to both defense and magical defense for the next attack on an individual council member, then it fades for all members on the board. sort of a reverse tribe mechanic.
the focus should be on improving the holes. people want something that adequately stands up to dwarves and to a lesser extent TF2. all the other teams need little tweaks (or large tweaks in the case of SL). a little tweak to council is needed, and the first step is giving them the same tools to compete with every other team.
m
That would be crazy overpowered. Some guy walks a +3 knight into an under-developed enemy base, they can't kill him. Next turn ninja swaps in, deals a ton of damage, swaps out, knight is back at full health, repeat. (as it is right now, any unit that leaves the deploy zone is at full health, so this would require massive programming overhaul. Plus this allows you to not even think about who gets what armor because you can just swap it around. Oh, and as a reply to an earlier remark you made about us not liking change, change is almost all we talk about here, we just don't like bad/game-breaking change, so I wouldn't bring that up again if I were you)
Successfully scaled back my game count, resuming normal play. :)
I'll be back to helping train new players when school gets out. :)