(18-08-2011 06:54 PM)redgreen Wrote:  Ok, the males look like dwarves. But how come the lady Valkyr looks to have normal human dimensions with large breasts. If she was given pointed ears, she could pass for an elf. Oh I take it the Valkyr isn't a true dwarf. Wasn't she a spell and wasn't she on a mount in d2?

Autumn of 2012, hmm Well wake me up when its ready. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Valkyria:

http://www.strategyplanet.com/disciples2...lkyrie.gif

http://www.strategyplanet.com/disciples2...lkyrie.jpg

She was always human-like, although now she's more dwarvish in my option. She looks great ;]

(18-08-2011 06:54 PM)redgreen Wrote:  Autumn of 2012, hmm Well wake me up when its ready. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

They are VERY fast, aren't they?

And don't forget that's the release date for russia. More like Spring 2013 for English version

(18-08-2011 06:54 PM)redgreen Wrote:  Ok, the males look like dwarves. But how come the lady Valkyr looks to have normal human dimensions with large breasts. If she was given pointed ears, she could pass for an elf. Oh I take it the Valkyr isn't a true dwarf. Wasn't she a spell and wasn't she on a mount in d2?

Autumn of 2012, hmm Well wake me up when its ready. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Yep, the Valkrie was a summon and she was on a mount. Had a cool blue sphere like attack animation.

Btw, it isn't Autumn, it's Spring 2012. But knowing the way this series has been delayed - you're probably going to be correct

Units look great in general.
Wish the Valkyrie was more like in D2, more human-like, less dwarvish and would come with a mount but I guess I can live with her new appearance.

The Valkrie looks hot but the Clans are doomed and here is why.

Their uniqueness will be gone. Sure they can be balanced, but the mose unique aspect of the clans in D2 was that they had the only buff mages. If you don't count healing as a buff. The clan mages were the only units to buff damage or give an extra turn.

In D3 there are already numerous units that buff damage and even do it with 4 times the strength for a tier 1 mage. Example: The Demon Cultist has 1 use of eagle eye which gives 50 dex to any ally for 5 turns. 50 dex cast on a Demon Possessed adds 100 damage to the Possessed base attack of 90. So the bonus is over 100% damage for 5 turns. IN addition the 5 dex bonus totally eliminates the Possessed chance to miss and instead gives it a % chance to crit depending on its target.

Compare that the the level 1 buff mage for the Clans in D2. That mage buffed damage for only 1 turn by only 25%. Unlike the Cultist Clan mages had have no means to attack.

Even worse, is the fact that in D3 there are cases of melee units being able to buff attack as well. The Elves Griffin can buff any unit with Eagle eye. Other units can self buff there str, like rage for Centaurs. Elf Archers self buff also.

So the uniqueness of the Clan Mages is completely gone. The other thing that made them unique, is unlike damage mages for other factions, the Clans had no tier 1 damage mage, other than the leader. Every other faction has a tier 1 damage mage. The Clans eventually get a damage mage via the range tree and the melee tree. Its from an archer that levels into a fire mage, and a melee unit that levels into an air mage (or was it earth) but the earliest that happens is by tier 3.

I suspect that this will be brought forward in D3 Clans, but it isn't as unique as it was in D2 either. Due to the ability to cast damage runes in the arena from the beginning.

I've started implementing a version of the Clans in Renassaince and these are some of the issues I ran into. I intially thought the level 1 clan mage is easy. JUst give it a skill that would buff the str of the dwarfs by 25% as in was in D2. But that would be a handicap when as I said, the Demon cultist has the same ability now at level 1 but instead of buffing damage by 25% it does it by 100%. So wouldn't the clan buff mage need to be at least 100% also to balance the factions. Or probably 125%. It just doesn't feel right. Plus the Clan buff only lasted 1 turn, not 5. Would the Clan mage get unlimited uses of this buff, not at leavel 1, way OP.

To be honest I don't like it. Unless all buffs are removed for other races, the Mountain Clans get cheated cause now all the factions have thier buff mage abilities. It is blasphemy, might as well give the Clans the Undeads Paralyze skill then.

Yea it can be balanced out, but its fundamentally wrong. There I said my peace.

Wait--I'm still seething. See I don't think this would have happened if they had developed all 5 factions at the same time and released the complete game from the outset. As a result the clans got thier skills dolled out amongst the 3 races that came out in Renassiance. Now the Clans have no speciality. They will just be a conglomeration of the other 4 races. Its a disgrace really. They shall feel Wotan's rath for this slight.

I for myself liked that ghost could do damage, and am looking forward to druidess. I do not think that was the thing that made them unique, as it's only one thing and not really the major one, imho.

Plus, we don't know how will mechanics work, even more since they said "some old things from D2 will return", maybe such will as no attack, only buff.

(22-08-2011 09:19 PM)redgreen Wrote:  Even worse, is the fact that in D3 there are cases of melee units being able to buff attack as well. The Elves Griffin can buff any unit with Eagle eye. Other units can self buff there str, like rage for Centaurs. Elf Archers self buff also.

I don't think Elven Archers can buff themselves...Bandit, Brigand and Night Dancer have Extra Attack but that isn't a buff. They have no other active skills besides that. Only the demon mages, the archon, griffin/skylord and the Prophetess give buffs to other units. Some units do indeed buff themselves but that is very different from the Dwarven mages. Dwarven mage's existence revolves solely around buffing other units. As such it should do it very well and be able to do it all the time (unlike Eagle Eye which has limited uses). On the other hand the other races have to sacrifice a valuable turn to increase another unit's damage. Very rarely would it happen that anybody would skip a move for Archon, Modeus, Pandemonius or Demonologist to cast Eagle Eye. Prophetess is generally more useful healing than buffing, only in the first turn can she potentially be better off buffing because not much damage has been dealt. Griffins are probably the only unit which sacrifices little because they don't do amazing damage while archers and other units might use the benefit of the Eagle Eye more. As for Rage, that is both a buff and a debuff and more importantly, the unit that actually gets the benefit has to sacrifice its own turn. The dwarven mages on the other hand sacrifice their own otherwise useless turn to buff a unit...which thanks to the initiative system (dwarven mages go first, only then comes the other unit's turn) means that the benefit for the unit can be put to use immediately. Self buffing does not provide that advantage and the majority of the buffing units like Modeus have low enough initiative to go after the fighters which might use the buff the most. Thus dwarves would get an entire extra turn to deal extra damage.

(22-08-2011 09:19 PM)redgreen Wrote:  The other thing that made them unique, is unlike damage mages for other factions, the Clans had no tier 1 damage mage, other than the leader. Every other faction has a tier 1 damage mage. The Clans eventually get a damage mage via the range tree and the melee tree. Its from an archer that levels into a fire mage, and a melee unit that levels into an air mage (or was it earth) but the earliest that happens is by tier 3.

I'm sure this will be preserved. BTW the mage was actually water based

There are ways to make the dwarves unique in their own way, I wouldn't underestimate the development team. So far with Rebirth they are showing a lot of potential for greatness so I wouldn't put it past them to make Dwarves awesome in their own way. Just look what has been done with the other races (though by a different studio). In D2, the fighter lines were very comparable to each other. The only deviations in the tier 1 units was that Dwarves had more health and damage and lower initiative and empire had less life. Now look at LotD. Their aggressive nature is reflected by giving them extremely high damage but very low health. To balance this out, they were given demons with a lot of health and not so dominating damage dealing capabilities. In D2 Legions fighters were pretty much the same as those of the undead. To compare, the undead have now become extremely resilient and damaging, but also very immobile and easy to kite. I'm sure a lot can be done with the Clans...it may not be the same as in D2 but let's face it, this is not meant to be D2. This is meant to be progress, a new addition to the series. The combat system has already changed massively with D3 and a lot of things had to be accustomed to that. I'm sure the developers will invest a lot of time into this since the Dwarves have an expansion all for themselves.

(22-08-2011 09:19 PM)redgreen Wrote:  I intially thought the level 1 clan mage is easy. Just give it a skill that would buff the str of the dwarfs by 25% as in was in D2. But that would be a handicap when as I said, the Demon cultist has the same ability now at level 1 but instead of buffing damage by 25% it does it by 100%. So wouldn't the clan buff mage need to be at least 100% also to balance the factions. Or probably 125%. It just doesn't feel right. Plus the Clan buff only lasted 1 turn, not 5. Would the Clan mage get unlimited uses of this buff, not at leavel 1, way OP.

However, the buff of 100% only relates to the Possessed if I understand this correctly. If the spell is cast on the Berserker/Dark Paladin/Infernal Knight, it's damage will no longer be increased by 100% but by less...combined with Rage, the Eagle Eye actually decreases the unit's damage...it is not as all powerful as a direct % buff to damage would be. Besides, you are forgetting one important change that came with D3. Units now have stats. The buff mage's purpose is to buff a unit's damage but a unit's damage is related to it's intelligence, strength or dexterity, usually two of these at the same time. If a mage is to buff a unit's damage regardless of which unit it is, it should buff the base stats. As a result, while Eagle Eye gives +50 Dexterity (which could be nerfed with the expansion or a patch) the Dwarven buff mage could for example give +20 str, +20 dex and +20 intelligence at the same time. It could add endurance or agility too for good measure. Suddenly the effect extends from simple crit/damage buff to an overall improvement so extensive that it equals the unit going up an entire tier. So your Dwarf could suddenly be equal/stronger than a Warrior...or your Dwarf King could suddenly surpass all other Tier 5 units in all areas, effectively becoming something of a Tier 6 unit. In comparison to this, the Eagle Eye would feel like a minor improvement, while Dwarves would buff like crazy. Heck all it would take is an area/all buff and voila, Dwarves are already several times better at buffing units than any other race in the entire game. And that is just a suggestion I came up with in under a minute. The devs will do much more than that. There are so many ways to make Dwarves unique and viable that I haven't even thought of yet. The buff could carry with it so many other effects, removing debuffs, increasing initiative/armor/resistances etc.

(22-08-2011 09:19 PM)redgreen Wrote:  See I don't think this would have happened if they had developed all 5 factions at the same time and released the complete game from the outset. As a result the clans got thier skills dolled out amongst the 3 races that came out in Renassiance. Now the Clans have no speciality. They will just be a conglomeration of the other 4 races. Its a disgrace really. They shall feel Wotan's rath for this slight.

Unfortunately this is just the reality of game development business. Renaissance was done by a small developer in Russia. Look at how long it takes them to produce an expansion/translation to the game. They could spend three or four additional years before they would be able to ship the game with the complete number of races. Most likely, some of the features that are present in the game now like the new combat system, cover, runes, visual hero equipment or power nodes would not be present in the released game due to lack of time. But most importantly, the company would go bankrupt before releasing the game. Development process is incredibly expensive and a small development company like .dat or hex studios just can't afford to spend 6 years producing a game. They need to pay their people, they need resources. They are not Blizzard, which gets millions of dollars every month from subscription fees on their other products, this is a small company with smaller budget and smaller fanbase. Look at how buggy the game is now, while it's segmented into smaller portions. The development team had only 2 programmers just about 6 months ago I believe. Imagine how buggy and imbalanced the game would be if they were aiming to release the whole thing at once. This way they can release the initial game, boost their resources (in case of .dat sadly go belly up in the process) see what fans like and what they don't like and polish things up with the next expansion. The nice stuff we see in Rebirth and Resurrection so far is all a result of feedback from the initial release of the game. People wanted water, more distinct spells, open maps, passive skills, longer level up periods (I'm so glad this is changing!!!!) and they are getting it. Though for us potentially more expensive, this segmented process results for a more polished product when the entire thing is said and done.

(22-08-2011 10:26 PM)lMarcusl Wrote:  Besides, you are forgetting one important change that came with D3. Units now have stats. The buff mage's purpose is to buff a unit's damage but a unit's damage is related to it's intelligence, strength or dexterity, usually two of these at the same time. If a mage is to buff a unit's damage regardless of which unit it is, it should buff the base stats. As a result, while Eagle Eye gives +50 Dexterity (which could be nerfed with the expansion or a patch) the Dwarven buff mage could for example give +20 str, +20 dex and +20 intelligence at the same time. It could add endurance or agility too for good measure. Suddenly the effect extends from simple crit/damage buff to an overall improvement so extensive that it equals the unit going up an entire tier. So your Dwarf could suddenly be equal/stronger than a Warrior...or your Dwarf King could suddenly surpass all other Tier 5 units in all areas, effectively becoming something of a Tier 6 unit. In comparison to this, the Eagle Eye would feel like a minor improvement, while Dwarves would buff like crazy. Heck all it would take is an area/all buff and voila, Dwarves are already several times better at buffing units than any other race in the entire game. And that is just a suggestion I came up with in under a minute. The devs will do much more than that. There are so many ways to make Dwarves unique and viable that I haven't even thought of yet. The buff could carry with it so many other effects, removing debuffs, increasing initiative/armor/resistances etc.

Actually I hadn't forgot how the stats work. Yes its not % across the board. But one could figure out a % based on the str mod. If a unit had a str mod of 4 and had 25 str it would do 100 damage. If you wanted a 25% damage buff, you would give the mage a skill that buffs str by 6. Increasing the damage by 24 to 124 in this case. But say those str stats were for the dwarf, then because the warrior does more damage, the same buff of str would be a smaller %. The % could never be exact, but it could be made close by having the mage and dwarf level simaltaneously, then the leveled mage would do 50% str buff if modeled after D2, so the tier 2 mage has a new buff skill. Say the warrior does 200 damage with also a 4 str mod. To raise 50%, the str mod would be 25 to increase damage of the warrior to 300. In D2 the level 3 tier mage gave a 100% damage buff. Again base that % off a level 3 tier melee unit and give the req buff to the level 3 mage. So each higher tiered mage gains a new buff at each level. But the skill wouldn't have to be just str, it could be str/int/dex/agi Then all damage is covered. However even a non melee unit such as the hermit, it could be made to do damage off of str and not int. Believe me I've modded quite a bit so understand the modifiers. Its not straight %, but % could be approximated based on the damage modifiers and amout of str/dex/ini units have at each tier. I was using % as a ball park figure to estimate what the buffs might need to be if they are ported over from D2 to keep the balance the same as from D2.

Also one can see that the % model 25% -50%-100% of the 3 tiered buff mages in D2 may be OP by tier 3. As in the example that Warrior, a level 2 unit is doing 300 damage already with a 50% buff. So the level 3 melee unit with a 100% buff would be astronomical. If the highest buff is 100%, then the highest melee damage would probably be 275, giving 550 possible with a buff. In this example I based the str of the dwarf and warrior from the damage of the Demon Possessed and Beserker. In D2 clan melee units did about 1.2x more damage than equal level demon units. While the str buff of approx 25%-50%-100% might be good for melee, they might also be OP form the Hermit if it works the same as it did in D2. So the INT buff could be a lesser % for units that do damage to all like the Hermit. Then the hermits damage would be based off of int.

My main point was really that no other races had damage buffs of any kind in D2, weather from str, dex or int.

If they did add more buffs like resistance,armor etc... then IMO they are losing some integrity of Disciples. The Clan buff mages did cure, the D3 equivalent to that would be to give 100% death resistance on_attack. I'd rather they kept the skills in line with D2 with just str/dex/int buffs, along with 100% death resistance and the other path would have an extra attack skill it could give to any ally. Remember also that in D2, the buffs from the 1st 2 tiers only lasted one turn, while after tier 3 they would stay on for the entire battle, or as long as the unit that was buffer survived. This could be duplicated as well in D3. I do believe it was this ability to buff 1 unit per round, so that the longer the battle lasted, the stronger the Dwarfs became... that was what was most unique about the Clans within the arena.

Battles in D3 last longer than they did in D2, so a buff that lasted indefinately would be OP if 10 turn battles perhaps. I'd like some of the buffs to be 1 turn though for low level buff mages, then last 3 to 5 turns for the highest tier ones.

(22-08-2011 10:26 PM)lMarcusl Wrote:  I don't think Elven Archers can buff themselves...Bandit, Brigand and Night Dancer have Extra Attack but that isn't a buff. They have no other active skills besides that. Only the demon mages, the archon, griffin/skylord and the Prophetess give buffs to other units.

They do in Ressurection but not in Renassiance.

(22-08-2011 10:52 PM)redgreen Wrote:  Actually I hadn't forgot how the stats work. Yes its not % across the board. But one could figure out a % based on the str mod. If a unit had a str mod of 4 and had 25 str it would do 100 damage. If you wanted a 25% damage buff, you would give the mage a skill that buffs str by 6. Increasing the damage by 24 to 124 in this case. But say those str stats were for the dwarf, then because the warrior does more damage, the same buff of str would be a smaller %. The % could never be exact, but it could be made close by having the mage and dwarf level simaltaneously, then the leveled mage would do 50% str buff if modeled after D2, so the tier 2 mage has a new buff skill. Say the warrior does 200 damage with also a 4 str mod. To raise 50%, the str mod would be 12. The level 2 tier mage could give an str bonus of 12. In D2 the level 3 tier mage gave a 100% damage buff. Again base that % off a level 3 tier melee unit and give the req buff to the level 3 mage. So each higher tiered mage gains a new buff at each level. But the skill wouldn't have to be just str, it could be str/int/dex/agi Then all damage is covered. However even a non melee unit such as the hermit, it could be made to do damage off of str and not int. Believe me I've modded quite a bit so understand the modifiers. Its not straight %, but % could be approximated based on the damage modifiers and amout of str/dex/ini units have at each tier. I was using % as a ball park figure to estimate what the buffs might need to be if they are ported over from D2 to keep the balance the same as from D2.

The thing is the balance of the game has changed drastically between the two games. My point was, simply put, I don't think the buff mages have to be damage buff only, in fact I doubt they will be. I would see them more as an overall performance enhancers (no pun intended) which would immediately make them distinct and more powerful than the other buff mages. Suddenly they would not have to compete with +100% damage boost on tier one since their buffs would extend further than that. +100% damage is good but not when coming up against a unit with superior health,armor,agility and dexterity which is what the dwarven buff mages could provide. Though I agree that buffs of various kinds are now more common and therefore are not solely the domain of the dwarves, this also means that units can complement each other (e.g. Defender of the Faith has low Dexterity but combined with Prophetess he can outperform the Holy Avenger in combat) and overall units can have more dimensions which makes for more interesting and varied gameplay which is definitely a good thing. This however does not have to result in dwarves losing their dominance in the buff division. They lose their monopoly but they don't have to lose their superiority.

(22-08-2011 10:52 PM)redgreen Wrote:  They do in Ressurection but not in Renassiance.

Wow, nice. I'm curious what else has changed in the expansion Don't tell me, I'll find out for myself in October

I edited my last reply since you quoted it as I had some figures wrong. I think faster than I type so always have to edit. But yea, we will just have to trust the devs. The Clans were my favorite faction in D2 so I'm a bit defensive about them. They dam sure better have powerful buff mages. Than again I can always mod them in afterwards.

I plan on adding them into my game as I can't wait until 2012, then I will be interested to see how my interpretation compares to the devs when they come out.

(22-08-2011 09:19 PM)redgreen Wrote:  The clan mages were the only units to buff damage or give an extra turn.

I see what you mean. The Clans did have a certain charm about their playstyle. The tenderfoot and the alchemist were cool units for the strategies they delivered. It was magnified by the fact that there weren't other units in the game that provided positive buffs. Made them unique.

D2 has high replayability not only within each faction, as it forced unit development to be down one path OR another, but also across factions as they had different playstyles. It gave a different experience each time you played, assuming you picked a different path or race.

D3 has tampered with this. In some ways improving it but in other ways detracting from it. It will be interesting to see how they make the Clans. The alchemist and tenderfoot won't stand out the way they did in D2, but perhaps they can still be unique in other ways. The devs did mention some interesting skills that seemed to trigger differently under certain effects. Perhaps this may form part of the Clans new playstyle..

Giving factions their own distinct playstyle has been a key guiding vision during my modding. It is easy to get caught up in making new skills and having this washed away. I've been consciously going back and eliminating certain types of skills from factions. For example, Empire has zero means to effect the initiative or movement of other units, Elves have no means to increase armor, etc.. Likewise, each faction has bonuses and penalties. Empire has increased gold production out of their capital. Legions have no healing spells. Elves have reduced vitality across the board, but increased dexterity and agility modifiers. The list goes on. I try to make it a big list, because it really differentiates the 'feel' of each faction when you play, requiring the player to adjust their strategies. It also adds to the faction's flavour and ambience, as it gives them a sense of character that defines them. Plus, not to mention, borking around with all these stats and skills has become a balancing act I'm sure I'll never get right, but sure is fun playtesting along the way.

(23-08-2011 05:40 AM)wabbit Wrote:  The devs did mention some interesting skills that seemed to trigger differently under certain effects. Perhaps this may form part of the Clans new playstyle..

I'm a bit apprehensive about new triggers based off of events. Because I like Renassaince as is for the most part. D2 was simpler yet in combat and I liked it even more. So adding layers of complexity is a opening a can of worms again. Could end up like the new ini system.

I like analogies so here is one. Take the game of chess which a lot of people like. Then try to make it better, how would you do that? BY adding new triggers? So instead of say , a pawn moving diagonally to take out the oponents knight, instead it opts not to take it out, but move 1 space forward or adjacent to the knight, which causes a trigger that gives the player that just moved the pawn two extra turns, but he can only move his bishop. But moving his bishop consectively allows him to take the opponents queen. But doing that triggers a rule where the player have to change sides, so if you had black and were ahead, now you have white and are behind. But wait. its after 3pm. so you get to place two pieces that were off the board back on the board in any of the last two rows if any spaces are available. Then the opposing player gets to remove one of the two that you placed back.............

My point is, making things complicated doesn't make things better. Just hope that they do mega play testing before release. Cause this feels like a smoke screen to me. I think they call this improving the AI, but it isn't. Improving the AI is making the AI act more human. Like if 2 units with cover are side by side, the player knows they can avoid triggering cover by attacking from a side hex, while the AI just goes straight in and triggers cover. I want a smarter AI, more triggers could just create more situations where the AI gets to make dumb decisions and set off all the triggers that make the AI easier to defeat.

btw Wabbit, like the sound of your mod. Let me know if you need a play tester.

(23-08-2011 06:05 AM)redgreen Wrote:  

(23-08-2011 05:40 AM)wabbit Wrote:  The devs did mention some interesting skills that seemed to trigger differently under certain effects. Perhaps this may form part of the Clans new playstyle..

I'm a bit apprehensive about new triggers based off of events. Because I like Renassaince as is for the most part. D2 was simpler yet in combat and I liked it even more. So adding layers of complexity is a opening a can of worms again. Could end up like the new ini system.

I like analogies so here is one. Take the game of chess which a lot of people like. Then try to make it better, how would you do that? BY adding new triggers? So instead of say , a pawn moving diagonally to take out the oponents knight, instead it opts not to take it out, but move 1 space forward or adjacent to the knight, which causes a trigger that gives the player that just moved the pawn two extra turns, but he can only move his bishop. But moving his bishop consectively allows him to take the opponents queen. But doing that triggers a rule where the player have to change sides, so if you had black and were ahead, now you have white and are behind. But wait. its after 3pm. so you get to place two pieces that were off the board back on the board in any of the last two rows if any spaces are available. Then the opposing player gets to remove one of the two that you placed back.............

My point is, making things complicated doesn't make things better. Just hope that they do mega play testing before release. Cause this feels like a smoke screen to me. I think they call this improving the AI, but it isn't. Improving the AI is making the AI act more human. Like if 2 units with cover are side by side, the player knows they can avoid triggering cover by attacking from a side hex, while the AI just goes straight in and triggers cover. I want a smarter AI, more triggers could just create more situations where the AI gets to make dumb decisions and set off all the triggers that make the AI easier to defeat.

btw Wabbit, like the sound of your mod. Let me know if you need a play tester.

Actually, triggered abilities make things easier. You don't abuse that power, plus devs don't need to spend time working on AI who would need to cast these spells, triggers will do it for them ;-) The triggers will make AI more dangeroes, I don't see how you worked that logic above.

They're changing the mechanics constantly cuz they know it's lacking and boring after some time.

(23-08-2011 08:32 AM)Qumi Wrote:  Actually, triggered abilities make things easier. You don't abuse that power, plus devs don't need to spend time working on AI who would need to cast these spells, triggers will do it for them ;-) The triggers will make AI more dangeroes, I don't see how you worked that logic above.

They're changing the mechanics constantly cuz they know it's lacking and boring after some time.

Its only boring if it isn't challenging enough. Regarding my logic. Well cover is a triggered skill that when its the AI's turn to attack, it simply walks directly into the players cover and triggers it, when it could be programmed to take a less direct route if enough move points are available and attack the unit from the side, thus not triggering the players cover and giving the players unit an extra attack.

Now the players job is generally to use strategy, so if the player sees a way to attack without triggering the AI's cover, that isn't abusing power, it is using strategy. A player shouldn't have to dumb down the game to compensate for the AI's inability to think 2 moves ahead. This could be programmed, the part where the AI takes a route that won't trigger cover, but it would take lines of code.

So yea the devs are taking the easy route by employing more triggers which might make the game feel fresh for a time. But I can gaurantee that a player will make better use of triggers than the AI would. Once a player knows how the new triggers work, they will use strategy to move to engage triggers that benefit them in battle, while the AI, if no lines of code are added like in the cover trigger example, it will simply move in a straight line to attack either the nearest tank or a summoned unit, with complete disregard for what trigger it might trip and what effect those triggers will have on the battle.

After some time, the new system won't feel knew and then the lack of code to instruct the AI on a more effective approach will start to stand out again. Trying to make the AI look tougher by just make things more convolluted won't make the game more of a challenge. This is exactly why the AI in campaigns builds units so fast, so your outleveled by the AI by almost a tier at the start of many acts. Its to make up for the Weak combat AI.

Why couldn't the devs spend time on fixing archers that move to ranged hexes and never attack, or the Necro neutral summoner who revives a dead unit with only 1 life within its own hex.

Maybe they will address some bugs, but Ressurection proofed otherwise, and now a myriad of new changes again with no assurance of addressing the week AI, or still existing bugs. Yea there team is small, but then set the release dates further out so that we get quality for a change instead of just new bugs and week AI that just has more decisions that it doesn't know how to make intelligently.

D3 already has more triggers now than D2 ever did, yet I keep going back to play D2. While with D3 I mostly just mod and retexture. In fact, I'm outta here for a time, going to reinstall Port Royal 2. Don't think that game has any triggers.

D3:MC new artworks http://disciples3.ru/forum/showpost.php?...stcount=52

Please tell me the Mountaineer isn't wearing spandex tights with pink stripes!

at least his braids cover up his nipples. Hopefully that is just a prelim test work.

Son of Ymir looks cool, but what where they thinking when the Hermit was made?

I hope they go with the cool looking axe for the Son of Ymir. Though as a nitpick...if those shoulder guards are meant to be breathing icy air, the air should be going down, not up Also we have yet to see a single dwarf wielding a hammer. So far it's been all axes. I hope the Dwarf King gets a bigass hammer like he had in D2. And I SO hope this game gets released in English damn soon after the Russian version...pink stripes and all

Perhaps those pink stripes are part of the elaborate ruse of the Clans to stun their opponent's with a "WTF?".. then they come in for the kill.

This is what happens after one too many kegs of ale.

I guess the dwarves decided to go on a trip somewhere
Any news?

Disciples III:Mountain Clans - New sketches from Egor Dafidov http://disciples3.org/d3mclans/30-d3mcla...-viii.html

I have been a way over 6 months and read a news post on alldisciples.ru that hex is disbanded and there will be no dwarves add on. Here is the post from that site

.......................One news. And bad.
05/23/2012
A few days earlier, on the official forum, the lead designer of the project three disciples (now former), Dmitry Akimov told that Hex studio will close disciples.
Eighteen months ago, we got together to make a game for you will not be ashamed. We have gathered here to become Disciples 3 that game the way it was supposed to be the first. And we hope that the task we managed. It was a difficult year and a half. People worked for wear, they were and are huge problems with financing. But in the end, we released the game. Even with the new year it was known that the publisher is not able to finance the development of the Dwarves and that at the end of Rebirth - we all "go home."
May 18th studio ceased to exist.
May 21 we met for the last time and prepared for you the latest patch.
Thank you very much for your support and faith in us. We very much hope that the game will not disappoint you and will live on and on, this time without us.

Sincerely, ex hex studio.......................

Was hoping the date was April 1st so it was a joke or something. Ironic that my favorite race never makes it in game. All things end....

I know it's a bit of thread necrophilia but here's a link to the gathered artwork that was produced for the MC add-on (some few screenshots not posted here so far I think):

http://disciples3.org/gallery/category/1...clans.html

No less that a real small tragedy that these excellent works will probably never come alive on screen...

Yeah. I would have loved to see the dwarves too. I'm a bit surprised D3 made it as far as it did though. The project was huge when you think about it. The art resources of all the units, the attention to detail - no wonder a small dev team had troubles mustering the financial resources.

Akella also wasn't the most savvy on the international market either. Massive delays in releasing to worldwide. Complete lack of support to the non-Russian community. Also, management issues with respect to changes in dev teams as well as a swap in publishers/localization efforts. Akella had opportunities to earn money on this sooner, and this installment could have been more profitable. I think their egos of the Russian market supporting the franchise got them into trouble. I still don't see the game for purchase on Steam. Yet, I buy a hardcopy of the disc in Russia and then it somehow links up to Steam when I install? WTF? Bad management.

I wonder if I'll get to play Disciples IV before I become worm food. I do hope this franchise continues and we'll see the Clans hit the field once more.

Good points there, wabbit.

I think it was an unfortunate combination of both bad luck and suboptimal design and management decisions that led to the unfortunate state that we see D3 in now.

The financial resources that were to be mustered were probably really big but I am under the impression that D3 struggled and tripped in other critical departments that shouldn't have been that expensive in terms of manpower and financial efforts, i.e. quality assurance and game design.
And these shortcomings may have led to its overall performance and success way below its potential.

Questionable design decisions like addition of usable runes and IMO unnecessary addition of "role-playing elements" like stats and levelling grid created massive balancing problems (like, e.g. practically invincible leaders in later campaign stages, unlimited summonings in early versions)
and lack of sufficient QA and gameplay testing only added to these problems, e.g. extremely buggy release at start (Renaissance), poor campaign balancing (I remember the very first campaign mission of the supposedly easiest faction Empire to be the most difficult of the whole campaign, talk about gentle introduction of new players and rookies to the game...), transfer of items between the missions, etc. so that one could complete whole maps by auto-battling later.

All this led to a bad start of this iteration of the Disciples franchise, the reviews, in times like these where nearly every average crappy game receives scores of about 75-80, scored rather low in the mid 60s range I think I remember so that even people generally interested in fantasy TBS games held back and did not buy and the game was bashed in general forums. D3 probably never really recovered from that bad start in terms of sales numbers and financial revenues.

The situation is actually pretty comparable to HoMM6.
Greedy publishers keeping devs under immense financial and time pressure, leading to initial super buggy release with only a fraction of the staple factions of the franchise, suboptimal game is not received well by reviewers, gamers and community, lower sales than expected, dev studio goes bankrupt, new studio contracted which struggles with the messy foreign code, release of patchwork patches and one add-on.

The end result is, final game version that is still buggy and not complete in terms of content and factions (D3 lacks MC, H6 lacks staple factions Elves, Academy), players are not happy because the game is suboptimal, not what it could and should have been, devs are obviously not happy because they went bankrupt, publisher is not happy because sales were not what could be expected or was projected and fans are raging at them, and maybe even the whole franchise is destroyed or burnt.
Granted, I am unable to really see the whole picture here due to lack of relevant information but it surely looks somewhat like a textbook example of a Lose-Lose-Situation. And the reason for all this is what? Some most of the times insignificant cost-cutting during initial production stages?

Argh, really makes me mad when I think about what D3 (and H6) could have become with proper decisions and without inappropriate(?) business and financial constraints.

/Rant Off

(10-01-2013 04:34 PM)StupendousMan Wrote:  Questionable design decisions like addition of usable runes and IMO unnecessary addition of "role-playing elements" like stats and levelling grid created massive balancing problems (like, e.g. practically invincible leaders in later campaign stages, unlimited summonings in early versions)
and lack of sufficient QA and gameplay testing only added to these problems, e.g. extremely buggy release at start (Renaissance), poor campaign balancing (I remember the very first campaign mission of the supposedly easiest faction Empire to be the most difficult of the whole campaign, talk about gentle introduction of new players and rookies to the game...), transfer of items between the missions, etc. so that one could complete whole maps by auto-battling later.

All this led to a bad start of this iteration of the Disciples franchise, the reviews, in times like these where nearly every average crappy game receives scores of about 75-80, scored rather low in the mid 60s range I think I remember so that even people generally interested in fantasy TBS games held back and did not buy and the game was bashed in general forums. D3 probably never really recovered from that bad start in terms of sales numbers and financial revenues.

Good observations. I think that if they had just 4 good "balance testers" from this forum, play the game for 4 weeks they could have gotten 65 to 70 scores instead of 55 to 60. Even with some of the design issues.

I hadn't played for awhile and added a new faction, balancing as I go starting from a stock game. I come to a potentially awesome battle. I faced 2 theurogists, a griffin and a thieve leader before I was too strong. It should have been a fairly even battle that would have used up quite a bit of my resources. Instead, the 1st theurogist grabs a magic node, I'm thinking possible 440 damage all with crits. Of course it simply casts rust for no effect. Next turn, casts rust again. I crush this stack without using a single heal potion.rune or breaking a sweat. So removed rust and upped the theurogist damage instead. I had done that before, but as I said am doing a new mod from scratch, and had forgotten some of these design mishaps.

This is one of many of the simple things that ruined the initial release. It is also a simple fix. I would think that just 3 play throughs of each campaign would have exposed these gaping imbalances. They excelled with the artwork, must have tones of man hours invested, just a few weeks of play balancing would have made a big difference in the 1st impression.

Generally, players that play this type of game, don't like ultra easy battles, nor the impossible ones that used to happen sometimes by turn 15.

I do hope that someone eventually picks up the franchise and takes it back to its roots. If it is revived, the Mountain Clans need to come out 1st!!!!!