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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 01:00 PM |
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Stevie said:
This is utter bullcrap. You have absolutely no clue what you're talking about.
Frankly, Stevie, I doubt your ability to judge that, since you don't even seem to have the ability to read properly.
When I point to HoMM IV I don't point to it, because it's such a great game - I point to it because it's so instructive, when you have a look at game design.
The point you should look at is the design process. It's from making a decision with regard to what the Heroes are supposed to do, be able to as opposed to the 3 games before.
Let's bring Heroes to the battlefield.
From then on, more or less EVERYTHING was regarded with a view on that - to make that possible and to make most of this.
In my opinion, there are a lot of areas in which HoMM IV excels. However, it paid a price for that, and people who consider that price too heavy may have a point.
However, HoMM IV is still played - a lot even - and that's BECAUSE it is different. The angle is different. TOO different perhaps.
STILL, the idea of having more than one hero in an army - OFF the battlefield - is an interesting one. That's because game play of HoMM IV, when it comes to hero development, was rather sound with a view on developing more than one hero.
Having more than one hero would give you more than one hero action, which in turn would make it feasible to develop more than one hero, which in turn might add something interesting.
However, it's not something I suggest to do - it's just an example for how things should be done in HoMM: if you want "more Emnpire Building", you can't just say, "let's add a couple of Civ features" - how boring and unoriginal is that? Instzead, you have to ask, "if we want more Empire Building", how can we make that part of hero development, and how can we make up for the fact that empire bjuilding heroes are no good battle heroes?"
If you want to "keep cities interesting even after six weeks of building them up", AGAIN you have to ask, with a view on the HEROES, what can we do to add city functionalities that will need managing even after 3 months.
So the point is, DOING THINGS HoMM-LIKE, and NOT adding stuff done in other games. You see that it doesn't work, too.
Example: Disciples 3. Did the game gain by copying the HoMM/AoW BF, instead of keeping THEIR way and just refining it some?
Example 2: AoW 3. Game is brilliant - except for the empire management part, because currently, even with "few cities" as option picked, the RMG produces too many cities. You just don't want to have 20 cities to manage in AoW, halfway through a medium map with underground.
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xerox
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 01:22 PM |
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Edited by xerox at 13:28, 27 Jul 2014.
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So basically JJ, your point is that any new features such as kingdom management must relate to Hero development, which in your opinion is the core mechanic of the franchise?
If I understood that right, I agree. Nearly everything in HoMM relates in one way or another to heroes. Through developing your heroes, you improve your spells, your armies, how fast you can travel across the map etc. This is indeed the defining feature of HoMM and I see no reason why kingdom management can't be part of it.
The most obvious thing would be a category of skills which do not improve your armies, magic or adventure map travels, but the management of your kingdom. Something like the Nobility skill from H4 could return, Diplomacy could improve your chances to score diplomatic victories with other factions instead of being about recruiting random creatures of the adventure map, and there could be a construction skill if we want heroes to be able to build forts and such on the battlefield.
The problem I can see here is the combat role of the hero becoming to diminished, when kingdom management becomes a large part of what he/she does. Most of all, HoMM players are interested in developing the combat capacity of their heroes, and they'd not want this to suffer at the expense of kingdom management. If this is a problem, a solution could either be to expand the amount of skills a hero can have (or even reserve some for non-combat skills), or move the kingdom management improvements from the hero to the towns. So instead of Diplomacy being a skill, there would be an Embassy building improving it.
____________
Over himself, over his own
body and
mind, the individual is
sovereign.
- John Stuart Mill
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 02:21 PM |
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Right, that's what I wrote about.
Sooner or later the problem must be tackled that it must be attractive to develop more than one hero.
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xerox
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 02:29 PM |
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Edited by xerox at 14:34, 27 Jul 2014.
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Is that a problem unique to a HoMM with kingdom management?
I dislike the whole "One superhero moving around with a massive army" thing too, and I think a major thing contributing to it, is how powerful mobility heroes have. Maybe the portal spells should be cut. There should be more emphasis on deciding between exploring the map quickly with multiple heroes, or focusing on one area at the time with one, powerful hero. With to much mobility, you get both and there's no choice.
____________
Over himself, over his own
body and
mind, the individual is
sovereign.
- John Stuart Mill
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 04:25 PM |
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The problem is that the combination of
Hero strength (Level and skills)
Army size and
movement ability
wins the game.
If you can maximize all 3 chances are you win.
Movement has been SOMEWHAT limited in the last two HoMMs, but the problem is, if you want to act offensively you MUST have an excellent hero and a big army, because you come to opponent, and oppponent has the shorter supply lines - offense takes the risk. Limiting movement too much favors defensive play which iss bad, because effectively nothing happens.
HoMM 6 has already been a pretty good mix IN THAT REGARD. The fact that you can hire verry good heroes later in the game is supportive here, but of course it makes hero development even more focussed on ONE hero per map.
The only working solution so far was allowing more than one hero per army in HoMM 4. If you simply ignore the fact that heroes were actually on the battlefield, the fact that you would need always more XP for a hero to reach the next level and that there were a lot of map locations where heroes could gain XP and skills, worked FOR multiple heroes: Instead of having one powerful level 20 or so hero you'd have something like a level 15, a level 12 and level 8 or something like that (I have no access to the actual XP progression ladder in HoMM 4 at the moment, so the actual numbers may differ somewhat), and since you would have one hero for boodting your army and two to cast spells, as opposed to 1 doing the whole work, you were better off with having 3 than 1.
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 05:03 PM |
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I was exactly on point with the multiple heroes system from H4. Shows as much who exactly is the one that doesn't know how to read properly.
Quote:
In my opinion, there are a lot of areas in which HoMM IV excels. However, it paid a price for that, and people who consider that price too heavy may have a point.
However, HoMM IV is still played - a lot even - and that's BECAUSE it is different. The angle is different. TOO different perhaps.
MAY have a point?! So it's good in itself, but it's not good because it wasn't well received. Problem with this argument is, were it to actually be good, wouldn't it be well received?
Quote:
However, it's not something I suggest to do - it's just an example for how things should be done in HoMM: if you want "more Emnpire Building", you can't just say, "let's add a couple of Civ features" - how boring and unoriginal is that?
It was NEVER like this. We were discussing how can we LOOK at other games and learn mechanics and systems which could be well implemented into Heroes. It's not like splat, we port something from Civ and leave it like that. No, we look at how it works, how it could benefit Heroes, and implement it in a style that fits it.
If you're outright opposed to that.. well, can we say anything more?
Quote:
If you want to "keep cities interesting even after six weeks of building them up", AGAIN you have to ask, with a view on the HEROES, what can we do to add city functionalities that will need managing even after 3 months.
Simple. Governors. And there are plenty of ways to make a Governor relevant to the game, even tho he's useless in combat. Actually, being useless in combat is a must to compensate for his/her efficiency on the "kingdom" part of the game.
Your Governor has 2 main tasks:
1. To squeeze out your region's maximum economical potential.
2. To ensure building and recruitment development.
Because of this, you will want to keep your Governor within the safety of your castle's walls. But, that won't give him the experience necessary to improve his skills at governing. So what do you do? Well, you obviously give him the means to get some. And how is that? By assigning him kingdom chores or such.
For example, I've been thinking that Governors could get special assignments from your Capitol from time to time. In this way, you make your primary building even more important and relevant, so you hit two birds with one stone. Maybe you can do more things there, I dunno. But for now let's focus on missions for your Governor. It could be that the miners from a Gold Mine inside your region discovered more gold which could be extracted at twice the pace for your benefit. If you send your Governor there to approve the expansion and fund it. That means going outside from the safety of your walls to that mine and give 10.000 Gold. And completing this mission will award you experience. What do you think, could work? Or, maybe you get missions inside your town! Like catching a thief that's been stealing from the market. There are many possibilities here.
What I just did there is combine 3 systems from 3 different games into something relevant for a more Kingdom focused Heroes. The Governor from H4, the Mythril expansion from WoG (only without the mythril), and the events from Civ4. And I didn't cut-pasted them, but I ADAPTED them!
And again, something which I failed to reply at the last time. It's not all about heroes, it's about everything. Things are all intertwined between each other, not only with heroes.
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Steyn
Supreme Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 05:21 PM |
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Stevie said:
MAY have a point?! So it's good in itself, but it's not good because it wasn't well received. Problem with this argument is, were it to actually be good, wouldn't it be well received?
You forget that people are really conservative. If a game does not meet the expectations, it will not be well received even though it could be a good game.
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 05:40 PM |
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I will just answer to your one actual point.
Stevie said:
Quote:
If you want to "keep cities interesting even after six weeks of building them up", AGAIN you have to ask, with a view on the HEROES, what can we do to add city functionalities that will need managing even after 3 months.
Simple. Governors. And there are plenty of ways to make a Governor relevant to the game, even tho he's useless in combat. Actually, being useless in combat is a must to compensate for his/her efficiency on the "kingdom" part of the game.
Your Governor has 2 main tasks:
1. To squeeze out your region's maximum economical potential.
2. To ensure building and recruitment development.
Because of this, you will want to keep your Governor within the safety of your castle's walls. But, that won't give him the experience necessary to improve his skills at governing. So what do you do? Well, you obviously give him the means to get some. And how is that? By assigning him kingdom chores or such.
Except that will be the most boring thing ever, since in HoMM the only way to get XP in an interesting fashion is via combat, because only on the BF what you do not only matters, but makes a difference.
So Governor, yes, obviously, that has been done in HoMM IV, but designing a different game around that - no.
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Storm-Giant
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
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posted July 27, 2014 07:02 PM |
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Stevie said:
Quote:
In my opinion, there are a lot of areas in which HoMM IV excels. However, it paid a price for that, and people who consider that price too heavy may have a point.
However, HoMM IV is still played - a lot even - and that's BECAUSE it is different. The angle is different. TOO different perhaps.
MAY have a point?! So it's good in itself, but it's not good because it wasn't well received. Problem with this argument is, were it to actually be good, wouldn't it be well received?
Maybe because it was friggin different, STEVIE?
Dude, H4 has been always seen as a black/white game. You love it or you hate it. But it is so different that it's difficult for the mayority of the fanbase to accept it.
However, JJ doesn't discuss that, he is trying to theorize around ideas H4 has. And that proved to be beneficial in H5 already, so it's fair he do so.
You may agree or disagree with him, but calling his posts 'bullcrap' speaks of yourself, and not in a good way.
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 07:47 PM |
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Storm-Giant said:
Maybe because it was friggin different, STEVIE?
Storm-Giant said:
Civilization says hi.
Games can still rank 9+ on metacritic even if they're very different from previous installments. So your point is null.
And please excuse my french earlier, SG.
Quote:
Except that will be the most boring thing ever, since in HoMM the only way to get XP in an interesting fashion is via combat, because only on the BF what you do not only matters, but makes a difference.
So Governor, yes, obviously, that has been done in HoMM IV, but designing a different game around that - no.
The only boring thing is to be without such a system. And another boring thing is not to have diversity in the way experience is acquired. You have battles regardless, so there is no loss. Having battles for a Governor too, to acquire xp, is not just MORE boring but even counterproductive, since it forces you to split your troops and you lead into battle a hero that skills in the opposite way of battles. So the only LOGICAL thing to do is to make the Governor acquire xp from GOVERNING the region. That may even require battling say some ogres that occupied a lumber camp and stopped the production so you need to go drive them away - and even that can come diplomatically, maybe the ogres are upset about something so you try and resolve the situation, it's really endless possibilities. Battles are in no way excluded but should not be in any circumstance the main way of handling Governor experience. Simply for the fact that his role is to govern and not to battle.
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xerox
Promising
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 07:56 PM |
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Meh, I don't really like the idea of a managing a separate governor character while managing your hero at the same time. HoMM should stay focused on the heroes. It's what makes the franchise what it is. So either get rid of governrs or make the governor be a hero.
____________
Over himself, over his own
body and
mind, the individual is
sovereign.
- John Stuart Mill
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 08:02 PM |
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You could just as well add an adventure game - it makes no sense to invent a different "game" just for the sake of having a governor, "governing". Why have that in the first place?
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Storm-Giant
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
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posted July 27, 2014 08:03 PM |
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Stevie said:
Games can still rank 9+ on metacritic even if they're very different from previous installments. So your point is null.
On the contrary, it's logical that H4 gets a 'low' (7.7) user score on metacritic because a majority of HoMM fanbase dislike the game. A lot of people disliked the huge changes, but that doesn't make H4 a bad game, just different. If you can't understand something as simple as that...
Stevie said:
Storm-Giant said:
Civilization says hi.
Taking a quote out of context....I'm tired of your bullsnow, Stevie. Go to Hell
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 08:15 PM |
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Edited by Stevie at 20:16, 27 Jul 2014.
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xerox said:
So either get rid of governrs or make the governor be a hero.
It IS a hero!
Quote:
You could just as well add an adventure game - it makes no sense to invent a different "game" just for the sake of having a governor, "governing". Why have that in the first place?
Quote:
Because frankly, building your 35~ buildings then let your town rot is the epitome of boredom. I don't want a game where moving the hero on the map becomes the sole thing that I do.
Please appreciate how I didn't stomp on you're "reading ability" just now... Oups!
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 27, 2014 09:44 PM |
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Play a different game then.
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Sleeping_Sun
Promising
Famous Hero
Townscreen Architect
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posted July 28, 2014 11:55 AM |
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Well, there are ways to increase the power of secondary (governor) hero, while the main hero is exploring and conquering the land.
1) One building could be added to all cities. Let's name it Battle Academy or something like that. This building could provide the secondary hero (or any visiting hero in town) some small number of experience points for each day spent in the city. (Passive earning of experience) Of course, it will be smaller than the amount of experience points the main hero gets. Let's keep it around 30% of the main hero experience.
2) Another building could be Training Camp where the hero in town can fight some of his own troops in order to get experience. Again, the experience gained will be capped or limited in some way. The troops defeated in the Camp will not parish, but the hero will spend all his movement points. Similarly, in H3 'dig' ability also used all movement points. Training Camp would be usable only once per day.
3) Another building could be Arena or Colosseum (like in Heroes 4, which is one of adventure map object focused on increasing the power of the heroes) where Hero would fight some exotic or boss-like creatures. Could be accessed weekly or something like that.
4) However, these building could also be an adventure map objects, not necessarily buildable buildings in towns. They could be placed near towns or between the players. If they are buildable in towns they would have some requirements in order to be built.
All in all, the combat is more or less included into the earning of the experience. The Hero in a town will have relatively good amount of creatures so some combat could be done at the town as well (Training Camp), and kingdom management stuff has been avoided...
____________
"The age can be wicked to those who walk alone. When I look into the Mirror, I see myself as I might become..." -Freya
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 28, 2014 12:37 PM |
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Great ideas. 
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JollyJoker
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 28, 2014 02:17 PM |
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It's opposed to the idea of letting heroes select their skills - every skill taken is also skills NOT taken. If you create a special secondary hero career, it's also some kind of no-brainer, unless you offer a whole selection of careers where every career picked is also some careers not picked, which will amount to a sub-game plus the question, whether it wouldn't suffice to have some extra alternative buildings.
All this is no solution for the perceived problems.
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Storm-Giant
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
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posted July 28, 2014 02:20 PM |
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Not to mention once you clear your area, you would probably use your main hero to get even more experience with those buildings instead of the secondary...
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Stevie
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted July 28, 2014 03:18 PM |
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Yea, cuz it's really efficient to get 1000 xp a day on a hero with 2 digit level. Great thinking SG.
JJ: A no brainer would be not having secondary careers, but just 1. Hack and slash, great Heroes. /applause/
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