Jolly Joker wrote:
The main thing is the hero, the town and racial, not the creatures. You would maybe like to base something around certain strategies, but it's the other way round: you have the main theme of the towns and the heroes and you try to combine it with the creatures.
Then why was one of yours(and many others)main argument been about dracogedon?It clearly is a strategy(no matter how sleasy,it still is a strategy).If it is unimportant,why argue about it?And Im not saying this because I support this strategy,but because you cannot say "Its about this and this,other things are irrelevant".Its a strategy game,so strategies are very relevant.
Jolly Joker wrote:
You can construct something for the other racials as well. Some of the following points are more valid than others, but the main thing to see is, that all those more or less valid points are completely inconsequential:
Academy: the racial special is forcing you (in the same sense as Dungeon is forced to cast area spells on Dragons) to block veluable resources you'd need for building dwellings: a clear disadvantage.
Sylvan: The racial is forcing you to always go back into town when you make new use of it. A clear disadvantage. Moreover you have no control over it
Haven: The racial is forcing you to let your own troops get hit to enjoy the racial.
Necro: the racial is forcing you to fight everything for maximum effect which is in itself boring and repetitive.
Inferno: that special is forcing you to a lot of micro-management in battle. Moreover the good speed of level 3 and 5 often doesn't allow making use of the racial because those creatures have to speed immediately to the front to attack and block creatures, another big disadvantage.
What?Wrong.Those skills dont force you to do anything.You have a choice.You can choose not to gate,you can choose not to train,not to construct artifacts,not to have a favourite enemy.And necromancy and counterstrike are just bonuses,that I dont see anyone would choose not to have.IM,on the other hand,you cannot choose not to use.And it forces you to use less effective spells in certain situations.
Read this example:you have your stack surrounded by some rather weak creatures,but lots of them,and tehyll kill you unless you meteor shower them.So you can either cast meteor shower and kill most of them,leaving just a small stack to die from your creatures strike in the next round,or you can cast an empowered meteor strike killing all of them,but killing more of your creatures.Thats called a choice.Now,imagine you have your dragons surrounded,and you have to strike them with a spell too.But now you dont have an option not to kill your dragons and just damage your opponents because your IM cannot be turned off.Thats forcing you and not a choice.
I dont see how to explain my point any simpler then this,so if you still dont get it,I give up.
Jolly Joker wrote:
Now what will happen if I make the poll:
Should the Rangers be forced to go back to any home town when they want to change the favored enemy of their hero?
And you could discuss this, yes, would be better, but would be more powerful as well, so this had to be nerfed somehow...
How about changing one of the Avenger abilities into "Change Favored Enemy" which would allow a hero to change the favored enemy on the way (you'd still need the building) and because that would be so much more convenient favored enemy damage might drop a bit in percentage.
Why not?Personally,Id love to have all racial not connected to cities.
Jolly Joker wrote:
You could all do that, but it is not possible to prove that it should be so, there is no law against a racial being harmful in certain situations (completely under the owners control. mind you).
The fact that nival controls it doesnt mean I haver to like it.
Jolly Joker wrote:
Lastly, here's another of your analogies. How about this one: Let's say Haven's Racial would be called Irresistable Retaliation. This would give all units the ability to retaliate with a certain percentage in a no-retaliation situation, especially when attacked by no-retal units like Cerberi, but also to counter skills like defense and so on, giving the Counterstrike racial in addition (with the basic efect that a unit could retaliate against no retal with 20/40/50% and that all hero-based skills and abilities guarding against retaliation damage would be negated or weakened). However, since this would affect the units that had the no-retaliation attack, the Imperial Griffins' Battle Dive would be affected and they would suffer up to 50% retaliation depending on the skill.
So what?
So what?Actually that is an excelent analogy.You dont see that existing of such a skill would be imensly dumb?
Jolly Joker wrote:It can harm you, but the harm is completely under the owners control! A seemingly small, but a decisive difference. If the opponent could do anything against it, use it against you, force you to hurt yourself, I would agree. But as it is, it is completely up to you how you handle it. You still have complete immunity in terms of your opponents. You will never see your Dragons Blinded, Berserked or Puppet-mastered, nor Wizard-marked or targeted by a nasty spells. The unit is armageddon-proof, if cast by another Hero type, for example a Wizard or - later in the addon, a Rune Lord.
However, you cannot blindly cast destructive area spells anymore - even though potential losses would be less than suffered by the opposition.
That isn't exactly harmful.
I find the Haven special a lot more harmful because it will come into use only if you are attacked in a way that leaves enough of the attacked stack to make it count - but if that's the case you probably don't need the special.
The difference is that the heaven special gives you just a bonus while IM gives you a penalty as well.And while counterstrike works against everyone,IM works only against a handfull of creatures,and a few skills.And you have one of those handfull creatures.To use counterstrike analogy,it would be like if counterstrike worked only against top tier units,and in a way that it decreased your defense when attacked by them,but increase your attack on retaliation.
Jolly Joker wrote:
In practise the "harmfulness" only shows when the best use of a Destructive spell would be a) an area spell and b) Dragons would be "in the way". This is most pronounced with the Armageddon spell. However, with Armageddon doing double damage in the 4 middle squares of the battlefield and Dragons only suffering half the normal damage, the casting of the Armageddon may be highly advantageous, even though it would inflict losses on the Dragons as well.
Did you ever see armagedon cast advantageously in HV?Neither have I.Besides,its more harmfull when your opponent gangs up on your dragons and you have no option to kill them but do minimal damage to the dragons.If your small creature is ganged on you can use circle of winter.If your gargoyels get ganged on,you can use your fireball(asuming your not a warlock).If your necro units are ganged upon,you can blast them away without worry(assuming your a necro).If your emeralds get ganged on,you can use meteor shower without worry(assuming your not a warlock).If your champions get ganged on,you can blast them away,knowing your angels will resurect.
Jolly Joker wrote:
For normal area spells there are different shapes and effects, you can cast them empowered or not and it's not all about getting the most damage with the most brutal spell and just banging around with the spells, it's a bit more thinking involved, about what spell to use in what situation with the vulnerability of the Dragons against one's own Destructive spells being a factor to consider as well.
Read the above.Giving an immune creature to a race focused on destruction magic clearly indicates the use of dragons in melee surrounded by massive damaging spells.
Jolly Joker wrote:
I repeat: it's completely under the control of the owning hero, so it's harmful only if you want it. You could say, the hearth is so hot you can burn yourself, if you are not careful. But you can burn yourself, for example with the fire breath of the Dragons as well, if you are not careful. By the way, this point still stands: if you are not being careful with your units and Dragons, the opponent may move and attack a small stack so that the retaliation of your Dragons will hurt your own troops. This is potentially harmful as well, and you can reread on page 20 again, how GC tried to explain that this could be used against you, if you were not careful, sure, but that it was so stupid that you could not fly your Dragons into the thick of battle and follow up with a Meteor Shower - which is basically the only point that is there: we cannot fly our Dragons into the thick of the enemy and follow up with a Meteor shower (unharmed).
But the same is exactly true for two-square attack as well: you cannot just fly somewehere and attack with the Dragons and move and attack with the rest of your units as you would like to because you have to take into account that an opposing unit might move and attack your Dragons with the retaliation then being harmful. So have to take consideration and this might lead to an inability to move and attack the way it would be best - but for the Dragons's Breath attack.
The same is true for the racial.
So?
Dragons breath affects everyone,not just MR creature.Thats a significant difference.