Improvements for .81->.82

[Mammoet]

Here we can discuss things that are in need of a change in order to improve the overal gameplay balance.

The things I think are the most in need of a change are:

Haeftmace
Currently it is quite useless. To me it looks like a relativly light weapon with a specialized function, namely shredding apart armor. I seriously do not understand why two handed axes are faster (the smaller ones a lot) then this thing. On top of that it also does less damage, even to armored foes in my experience. Ofcourse it doesn't have to be as good as any two-haned axe, but currently you can almost just as well use a throwing spear in melee.

Two-handed axes
The problem with the two-handed axes is partly because of the engine not really understanding if you hit someone with the head or the shaft of a weapon. But apart from that they often appear to be even faster then one handed weapons, or at least just as fast. I beleive they suffer from sort of the same problem the spears did prior to .80. So I suggest giving them a speed reduction. I see them as hard hitting heavy weapons anyway, and the longer ones already have their advantage in the range.

Knyaz archery
I beleive it is not just the horse archery that is a bit unbalanced, but the fact that there is an additional archer on the other team. From the start I was convinced he has too many arrows. As an archer I hardly ever fire all my 20 arrows. Usually I have a few left. Now I know the knyaz has 'only' 13 (or 12) arrows. But this means he can fire throughout the largest part of the round. Even if he is not on a horse this is significant advantage as long as there are only <15 people on each side. Him being on a horse makes everything worse as he can easily ride around and shoot people/archers in the back. Maybe him being on a horse is less of a problem with the new slowing horses, but I haven't had enough time to play to come to a conclusion on this. I suggest either taking away his bow or giving him maybe something like 7 arrows.

 

[Æthelwulf]

My two cents.

Kynaz

The Kynaz again was trouble last night because there were about 8 to a side, we were Saxon and up against the Rus with Cora, Rasul and some Einherjar types which meant we had to contend with some nasty infantry. Usually with small numbers against Cavalry you face the harrassment tactic, they wait till the Infantry engage and sweep in and attack and rightly so but they face getting stuck, having a few throwing weapons lobbed in them or facing the sharp end of a spear. Yet the Kynaz does not, he sits on the sidelines and is a right bloody pain in the arse, double that up with the small map and infantry and cavalry on us from the get go and it was just horrible. Yes the Kynaz only had 3 kills but his presence gained much more as our archers had to focus on him and our throwing weapons just weren't up to the job (Also the rather weak Saxon bow/arrows meant that poor Shoep was sticking a good 4/5 arrows in the buggers horse). As for the horse wounding, as awesome as it is, truly great for taking out normal cavalry it sadly just powers up the Kynaz, the slower he moves the more accurate he is, staying a nice distance away again meant he was even more of a thorn in our side. Once again I argue that he is only a pain when against small numbers, I can't see anyway of balancing that but I must agree with reducing his amount of arrows once more, thus forcing him to engage with his spear and sword a tad more and perhaps dying from his lack of shield. Or you know you could just give the Saxons some Gungnir? No? Too powerful? At least give us something lol, Normans have counter Cavalry, Self Bows and Crossbows, Vikings have the Large Bow, Zerks and monstrous speedy dane axe which loves cripping horses and man alike. I know I'm in the Fyrd and it may sometimes seem like were constantly asking for Saxon stuff but it's because they bloody need it.

Haeftmace

I agree wholeheartedly here, I see some people will roll with one but more as a fun option. It's piercing damage should be deadly against armour and it is, but so are all other weapons at this stage as armour doesn't really offer any serious protection and thus the Haeftmace is underused why take this when you can roll with a dane axe which is often faster, deadlier and has a bonus against shields or a longer spear that is effective against horses and great in a group.

Two-handed Axes

The bane that they are, I understand most of the problems with these puppies is due to the engine, again not taking the haft into account. I have to agree with a speed decrease, swinging a long weapon is a pain in the arse, in reality they come around much slower because we have to compensate for the weight and balance, yet M&B doesn't take that into account so with a nice flick of your mouse the beast of a thing flies around faster than a 1h sword or axe, eats your shield for breakfast and in the hands of a zerk who is good on his feet can be a real problem for a chap weighed down with a 1h axe. I usually loot a better sword as Saxons to fight a good zerk, I used to take a spear but since the tweaks they ain't as great, the stun from a block takes a darn age and they are also unbalanced and only have two attack angles vs the long dane axes four (Also I know the overhead doesn't have the block stun but then you reduced to one attack direction). So I chime in and agree with a speed decrease, this shouldn't ruin the fun of a zerk too much the weapon proficency and speed of the buggers mean they should still be able to handle it well and it may mean for once they have to take a sidearm.

I have mentioned some of these things on the Einherjar/Shieldings forum along with some comments on armour. Which in my eyes is the thing that needs seeing to most. Perhaps later on I shall type up some of my problems with armour in here, but for now I'm going to have a nice cup of tea.

Also I love you all and the mod. Gays.

 

[Mammoet]

Just wanted to say that I know the knyaz is a much bigger problem with few people, but 99% of the time that's how many people are online (hardly see more then 30).

 

[Phalanx300]

A nice addition seeing the new horse nerf would be to make players actually slower when damaged to some extent just like the horses are currently.

Possibly add availability of duel wield for the Berserker. This could be done by having a sword or axe model (obviously just one handed weapons) used as a shield.
What this would mean: Berserkers would be able to block in melee like a shield. This adds for more option for the berserker rather then just going two-handed axe. Also to not make it overpowered it could possibly have low HP. And also making its protection field as small as possible, this to make sure ranged still works on a berserker, even one with a "shield".

Make the spear of Wodan not being able to pick up after its been trown. Just small sugestion since people often abuse it if one is trown. (Don't know if its possible?)

Make the Giants stronger. I was screwing around yesterday with some other people and we had no trouble bringing down the Giants. Possible make their club longer and two handed. Was epic fighting them though, driving them back with long spears and attacking one or a couple of them with a whole group was a lot of fun. 

Possibly some other fun bots, like a Odin bot. Would be fun, and hard to pull off.  (Though this should be for a way later version I gues)


Just my thoughts on what could be for next patch, hopefully crouch walk will be as well.

Some other things which would hugely increase the awesomeness of this mod would be moving ice and the ability to break certain pieces of ice . And weapons being slower once you succesfully hit and enemy, after all a weapon gets stuck. And possibly a small chance of weapon getting stuck in your opponent if you hit them with enough damage. (Don't know if this is possible)

 

[Æthelwulf]

They are taking the mod back into a realistic direction so the ice flow maps have been removed from rotation, as for the offhand weapon for zerks I don't really see the point, they can use 1h weapons as it is, adding a fake shield into the offhand would make the 1h attacks slower, may make blocking easier but they would still be best off rolling with the long dane axe if nothing changes with it.

The Giants etc and admin weapons are just for fun and have made a few appearences lately perhaps when they shouldn't have, I'm guilty as charged after somebody spawned Loki's Sword I proceeded to kill the enemy owner, steal it and rampage for a few rounds as a sort of lesson. The Giants and so on as stated in the change log are just testing items at the moment for the implemenatation of an invasion style game mode vs mythological beings. But I'm guessing and hope they get the core mod all fine and dandy first.

 

[Phalanx300]

Wasn't a ice map added in again in map rotation lately? And breakable ice and moving ice just fits in perfect with more realism. 

While the admin stuff isn't part of the core mod its still a lot of fun sometimes. Even more so if their improved upon.

Maybe we shouldn't change anything? Also the guy you stole the sword from was me, I stole it back in the end though.

 

[Æthelwulf]

Haha yeah I lost the sword in the worst way possible, horse bumped, arrowed, then back slashed. No defence for that.

As for an ice map being added back in to rotation, that I do not know, but again the amount of scripting and work involved in making moveable ice would be vastly time consuming, time that could be spent elsewhere. Thinking about it perhaps it may have only been the jumpy ice map that was removed as it was just silly, the large ice sheets are as you say are more realistic and I quite like those maps.

 

[Phalanx300]

Another thing which would be fun to have would a new raid map. Seeing that we have a giant that made me thinking. 

Scenario:

A small rural village near to mountains is being raided. In the mountains lies the lair of a Giant. (The entrance of the lair is closed with rock like materials) The raiding has awakened the Giant from his winter sleep (so snowy map I gues). Once a certain number of houses are burnt the lair opens and the attackers have to get past the giant and into the lair to get the loot. Ofcourse the giant will kill anyone near to it, whether defender or attacker.

Just thought it up and figured it would be a lot of fun with the giant .

 

[Mammoet]

Let's try to keep it to 'improvements' as in changes to things currently in the mod and suggest new stuff in the suggestions thread

 

[Phalanx300]

Well technically all of this tread belongs there. Figured I just post here since it would probably be seen earlier.

 

[Partizan_Rusi]

Knyaz = Konung from a certain point of view. Where did you see Konung with bow ehh ?
I hope you will remove archery once and for all from Knyaz.

 

[Moeckerkalfie]

The Rus are in general superior to the other factions. They have good equipment for every class, and in comparison to every other faction they are at least on par in any field.

A special problem with them is the expensive lamellar armor that after a few won rounds becomes a real factor in favor of the Rus, as more and more of them can take a lot of damage, and a lot of blows are completely absorbed so that they are not even hindered in their attacks while receiving blows.
Just a few minutes ago I poked Lord Arga at least six times with stabs and overhead swings while he was fighting an allied archer and later an axeman of my side. Whereas my long spear killed one of his less unfortunate mates who wore no helmet with one forceful stab to the face, Lord Arga kept fighting after having at least three of my, admittedly ill-ranged, stabs glance off him and three more overhead swings doing only little damage. And us three fighting him (and only me surviving) left his mates the opportunity to overwhelm the rest of our norman team by numbers and after that turning against grim Moecker in a pair of four, so that they won. Lord Arga himself survived the battle safely inside his can.

 

[Partizan_Rusi]

There is always not enough money for Lamellar armor. Maybe people that bought it after starting with 860 silver  deserve it ? Get yourself big axe and forget about Terminators.

Horse slowing down after wound.....such Idiotism in this arcade action is amazing. Why don't you just make horses 1 hit kill as intended and give them 10-20 hp ?? Why human with arrow or spear in his leg running full speed and horse after almost any hit starting to walk ?

 

[Rath0s]

Why human with arrow or spear in his leg running full speed and horse after almost any hit starting to walk ?

Because this game doesnt really makes sense.

 

[Phalanx300]

Lol. Perhaps make it the same for players when their damaged? 

 

[Rath0s]

Just saying, this games doesnt really make sense.

 

[Mammoet]

I guess the problem with giving horses less hitpoints is that they would also die from one arrow which doesn't make sense

 

[reignlief]

There is always not enough money for Lamellar armor. Maybe people that bought it after starting with 860 silver  deserve it ? Get yourself big axe and forget about Terminators.

Horse slowing down after wound.....such Idiotism in this arcade action is amazing. Why don't you just make horses 1 hit kill as intended and give them 10-20 hp ?? Why human with arrow or spear in his leg running full speed and horse after almost any hit starting to walk ?

Because that makes cavalry entirly useless because even a poke would kill the horse and leave the man flat on his face ready to be killed, though the slowing on horses but not peopel does annoy me. Also why should a horse die from a single arrow but not a person?  I have seen people with two or sometiems if they have armour three arrows stickign out of them yet i have seen a horse die from a single arrow to the leg.

 

[Mammoet]

I blame the somewhat wonky speed->damage system. It would be better if the bonus was a bit more limited.

 

[rapier17]

That is a very good point - because of the speed bonus of a horse rushing towards you it's very easy to 1-hit kill the horse or the rider, yet you can loose 2+ arrows into someone on foot in armour on foot & they'll still be fine. Mind you I do like the speed bonus thing solely because I get to shoot people off of their horses as they charge me. "Hahaha little archer, prepare to meet your-" *ZZZZZZIIP!* "ARRRRGGGGHHHHHHHH...blurgle, gurgle, splutter, unk.". And then the horseman rides off with blood dripping from his lance as I lay crumpled on the grass...

...wait a minute!