Ok, for now I have put Towers back into "ownership" mode.

You can ONLY enter Towers you OWN. No matter where.
Until I can find a way to fix the castle issue it will have to stay this way to protect the castles.


Secondly, I understand Catapults are now too strong.
Their range is too large i believe. Is this correct?

Yes, I belive it would be better to have them at the same range as ballista

Don't know if I'd agree that they are TOO strong, we've just experienced a measurable increase in their use since the changes (wasn't this the goal?...to make them more useful and active in the game?).
Certainly, players that haven't used them would react and take the position that they're too strong after losing to a player that acquired them.
The upgrade cost and training rate requires a major investment of resources as well as time to acquire a 'useable' size presenting a period of vunerability that other players may take advantage of due to decreased deployment of other melee or ranged units.

The range, as LOD suggested, should match that of ballistas in my opinion.

The damage range seems to keep the user guessing as well. In my experience, I've found that the expected damage seems to routinely be nearer the low number versus the higher.

If the bug, that prevents cats from attacking towers is fixed, perhaps a small adjustment to the damage inflicted may be in order, but again, in my opinion, a major overhaul is not needed.

gosh....the ownership is changed back?
doh!...i was just in front of my enemies castle...
should it be made so that new games only are changed
arghhh

IMO I have to say,
"yes and no" to Req's question.
The 10 player game is very interesting and if the tower ownership means towers can ALSO be destroyed, the game will even be more interesting and balanced;

but however, I don't think the same can be said for the 12 player map where ESPECIALLY if a player manages to gain a second castle very early, he can reach deep into adjacent territories from behind mountains and trees with catapults with opponents having little hope to even find the "cats" much less destroy them.

Along with other problems like not being able to take-over resources due to barbarians in adjacent territories and not enough gemponds, the additional *somewhat invulnerability* of catapults due to the *maze nature* of the 12 player map, I think is causing several players including myself to avoid 12 player games.

PS:
Then again if towers can now be destroyed because ownership has been restored, it may be enough to offset the advantage of them in the 12 player map. In any event though I think giving "cats" the same range as the ballista is a GOOD idea because IMO having used "cats" successfully before they were made to be quite super, I think they will still be quite super because they are able to endure quite well a ballista attack;
and reducing their range may cause ME at least to reconsider playing in a 12 player game.

TR

Last Edited : Tuesday, 26 April 2005 - 14:05

the tower thing was a little to late...didnt know about it to begin with and got taken over in my camp but good thing the towers are back

yes, I think i will lower the Cats range very soon.

any other imbalance with troops?

Req
please just reduce the range but there are bonuses using towers so I would still like catapults to be able to use them, although there may be a targeting problem when attacking towers with "cats" that are occupied by "cats" I guess.

TR

well this is kinnda out of the blue but i think millita should have there attack raised by one
this would not realy effect the outcome against hc but would alow them to hold there own aginst speer alitle more equily as speer generate so fast, hc have somany hp and mp it would seem fair to give millita an advangage to

You may wish to lower the attack/defense or damage of macemen by 1. Their multiple retaliation bonus makes them a better unit at their level than many others. Similarly you may want to increase the damage or attack/defense of archers and arbelisters by 1. Until you reach ballista level archery troops I feel are much less fair than others at their level.

Folks ... Req,
I have had second thoughts on catapult range (i.e. do we want catapult range to equal ballista range WITH or WITHOUT towers)?
It may be too much restriction on *catapult strategy* to have to build towers for them to get full range to equal the range of the ballista So I'm thinking now that catapults should have a maximum range of 11 but get no tower bonus.

Could we have some opinion on this?
I will really be happy either way on this I think.

TR

Of course we meant range equal to balista without towers, and range equal to balista in towers as well. Anything else would be silly and we'd definitely specify.

I'm not so sure it's silly but like I said,
"either way is okay with me."
Catapults didn't used to be able to be used in towers originally and I'm just concerned with being able to destroy the towers.
If for some reason we won't be able to destroy the towers so that the towers can be used by catapults, I would really prefer that the catapults have full range without the need of the tower.

PS:
I did request it the other way at first (i.e. equal range with and without towers) and that's why I said I had a second thought and requested it differently.

TR

Last Edited : Thursday, 28 April 2005 - 20:17

how can a Cat have the same range as Balistas with AND without the towers? In a Tower, Balista have one range, out of a Tower they have a smaller range.
How can a Cat equal 2 different ranges?

The Catapult needs to be the same as the Balista IN the Tower or OUT of the Tower. Not both.

Bah, I suck at talking.

Am I correct in believing that catapults get the tower ranged bonus?

What I was trying to say was that catapults would have the same BASE range as balista...so a catapult and balista would have the same range, but a balista in a tower would shoot farther than a catapult, but if they were both in towers they'd both shoot the same distance.

lolz...why use definition when u guys can use hexes range instead?
ballista has +8 range while cats has a +11 range
thats it

req,i think TR meant to say that cats range wont be affected by towers...that actually sounds logical as how can a cat get above a tower

p/s-what i meant by cat here is catapults ...not cats you...!@$!@#!..

Now that I've thought more about Req's concern about cats, got a suggestion for a possible adjustment or tweak.

Here's a situation to think about, currently a cat can retain mp even though in attacking all bp were used.

IMO, here's a suggestion, (reducing mp to 0 IF the cat uses all bp during an attack), this would level the field alittle back towards the defender, giving him the opportunity to launch a volley at the cat, versus the ability (as currently), for a cat to move in, attack and then move back out of sight/range without danger of suffering a retal attack.

Don't forget the bug concerning cats not being able to attack towers...that needs fixed first.

Last Edited : Thursday, 28 April 2005 - 22:00

Yes ... Disturbed has interpreted me correctly,
but now I'm going to say something else yet;
I personally would be happy to see CATS at a full range of 10 (i.e. still with no tower bonus).

With the present movement status of the CATS and a range of 10, a large stack of CATS can STILL get inside the range of a ballista stack that is inside of a tower and destroy the tower;
and so STILL leave the ballista stack out of the range of the CATS, plus as I have said a really big stack of ballista is necessary to do serious harm to the CATS.

PS:
If I'm not mistaken, I had recommended a range of 10 for CATS when a change was first suggested and I think it would be ideal and a nice even number too.

TR

Shouldnt Cats have a range of 9??

This makes all ranged troops ranges sequential... 5,6,7,8,9.

Cats still out-range Bali on the ground, but Bali outrange Cats in Towers.

Cant Cats target Towers now?

Well 9 is acceptable to me also although then many players may not want to produce catapults again as before.
As far as I know we were not able to destroy the towers before the last *ownership change* was made to towers and I still don't know if the recent change has corrected that problem.

TR