Wizards in New Horizons on Overlord difficulty

Добавлено: Вт Авг 25, 2015 0:50     Заголовок сообщения: Wizards in New Horizons on Overlord difficulty

I'm not sure if this should be here because of the discussion of strategy within a mod, or if it should be in the war academy because it is, nonetheless, a discussion of strategy. Certainly balance of NH is part of the topic here though, and honestly the english military academy area seems a bit dead.

So, just wondering if other people have tried playing a wizard hero with the New Horizons mod, and how they've fared? Usually I play on overlord with a wizard and manage to take out the first ring and some of the second ring only using the fatigue spell, with one healer and 2-3 swordsmen. With the mod, I can take out the first ring like this, but no chance in hell of taking out any second ring. Most fights have been made more difficult with NH, but to make up for that, I'd say other classes get a lot more gold income through buildings and so on. Not much of a gem buff for wizards though, and also some spells have been made more expensive and weaker (in the case of astral energy). Maybe this is a bit unbalanced? I don't know for certain since I haven't tried other heroes just yet.

Anyway, I don't want to just whine about balance; this is also discussion of strategy. So far I've taken to fully exploring the home province before I start fighting, so that I'll have enough locations to allow me to level sufficiently for the second ring. At first I thought the new swordsmen were kind of lame because I thought counterattack works much better with their defensive design, but actually, it seems like the attack works for them; you try to only get hit by one unit like normal (because of parry), but instead of backing up so they can use more stamina, you then attack that unit with everything. Sometimes it still doesn't die, but you at least have it on low health so that its next attack doesn't hit very hard.

I'm currently having a bit of a look into how well I can work with undead; actually, this is something that I'm learning to do with vanilla as well. I've tried starting with barbarians but no healer, you just let them die and replace them until you have the levels of necromancy necessary to run a full time undead army. However, I think starting with swordsmen as usual is better, and you simply dismiss them at some point when you have sufficient levels to host your undead army, and in the meantime you use your undead as extra summons. This might kind of work better with NH, since the swordsmen are more able to kill specific units with high attack, but I'm a bit concerned about gems with the more expensive spells, and sometimes I even wonder if gem income has been reduced for the mod.

So I'm curious as to whether anyone has come up with something a bit more effective than that, and also I guess, if my idea about the game balance is correct; have other heroes been having less difficulty than this?

Oh, and morale... has this been changed with the mod? Because it seems like there's a bit more emphasis with this mod on morale, with the hero's cross even giving... was it 6 morale? My first thought was "LAME!" but, has morale maybe been made more effective? I wonder if anyone knows exactly how effective it is now?

Добавлено: Ср Авг 26, 2015 5:33     Заголовок сообщения:

In my opinion, wizard is not suited for the first hero. Because you dont have access to powerful spells in the beginning. Some spells have been balanced but they add a bunch of new spells that can make wizard powerful even before lvl 10, if you lucky yo find them early. summon earth or fire elementals for example. I usually use commander as first hero in big map or warrior in smaller maps.

For me, NH fights is more fun. I find it late battle become easier since your units can promote. especially rangers. I use commander and can kill most enemy with 6 upgraded rangers as main attack units, and some spellcaster and melee as support/tanker.

Most people struggle with gold at the beginning of the game, so its fine with the increase of gold income here and there. As for gems, NH add crystal mines upgrade in midgame. that should sufficient for spellcasting, but an army full of high tier undead or demons may still find it... troublesome. unless there's lot of swamp in the map.

Добавлено: Ср Авг 26, 2015 11:06     Заголовок сообщения:

Okay first, I want to make sure we're on the same page: overlord difficulty, right?

In vanilla wizard works fine as first hero. You just have to know how to play them. The trick is realizing that your spell selection is different since many of the spells that work well with wizard skills are kinda crap without them. As I said, 2 swordsmen + healer to start, get an extra swordsman when it's available, and fatigue alone will be enough for the entire first ring, both in vanilla and NH. From here the paths diverge. In vanilla I can go straight to the second province at this point, whereas in NH it seems like I need to do a bit more leveling, usually by exploring for locations, before I can do anything much in the second ring. So if you're not playing wizard then I'm curious about how soon do you hit second ring provinces? I guess I should check this myself, and I will, but I'm just being a bit lazy for the moment.

Crystal mines, hey? Any upgrade to gem income will be huge for wizards; you can probably maintain a full undead army with that. I haven't fully tested it, but I'm fairly certain that it's already possible in vanilla; you just have to be sure to cast your dark ritual as often as possible (and drop expensive guards on them with all your extra gold, in order to handle rebellions). You can also get a lot of extra gems from some locations like monoliths or enchanted pools locations, which undead armies tend to excel at, due to the immunity to poison and no need for stamina.

So yeah, I don't want to hear no "wizard is not suited for the first hero". I already know that it works on vanilla; if I took that attitude, I definitely wouldn't know that. I'm going to suppose for the moment that it works in NH but I just don't know how, Supposing other heroes are actually able to play faster than the way I've been playing my wizard. Maybe all classes are slowed down to the same degree?

Добавлено: Ср Авг 26, 2015 13:41     Заголовок сообщения:

I think you just want too much. You can't have overlord difficulty, first hero wizard and NH.
NH designers are obsessed with the idea that swordsmen + healer is too much cool tactic and now swordsmen are offensive units, low level healer is less useful and medals are replaced with some expensive or/and useless junk. And they seem to believe wizard is overpowered class.
However so called wall-of-light (defensive units + healer) should still work with pike-men.
Morale starts working above 20. Maybe additional morale can help against some units that damage morale, but morale bonuses itself is IMHO the midgame stuff.
_________________
20.11.2009 - 24.02.2015

Добавлено: Чт Авг 27, 2015 1:00     Заголовок сообщения:

Okay, good to know. I thought that they were just balancing the game around whatever their favourite hero is and just happened to nerf wizards incidentally. It's different if they were actually aiming to nerf wizards and healers. I did consider pikemen, I'll have to check it out. First aid on a defensive unit seems pretty strong. Though I think maybe swordsmen still work, just differently. After all, they only lost 1 counterattack, but gained 3 attack, and they haven't lost any defense, unless they get less defense from leveling now? The medals... well, I can still work with that, I think.

So, how about my question? On other hero types, when do you hit second ring?

Добавлено: Чт Авг 27, 2015 3:59     Заголовок сообщения:


Sorry I don't have much experience playing on extreme hard mode. I used to play normal with +2 difficulty to AI.
I think the game is balanced around normal difficulty and there it is pretty balanced. You can't use some tricks you get used to, but it is just different experience, the exact reason people making mods.
They don't tend to nerf exactly one class but rather tactic. You have around 16 classes in the game with good/evil/neutral/combined units, but you are pretty much happy with 4 or 5 tactics. Another options are basically worse. They try to improve balance that you should choose more different options in different situation. This is the brilliant idea itself, but the game is quite complex to do all right.
However I'm with this game since 2009 and what I can tell some people do amazing things with this game. Maybe you will discover new killer-tactic that will be nerfed in later patches. It was time nobody talking about light-wall, and now barbarian-wall is passing by. Something new definitely should come. They added a lot of low-tier units.
_________________
20.11.2009 - 24.02.2015

Добавлено: Чт Авг 27, 2015 9:56     Заголовок сообщения:

I never play on overlord difficulty though. I play on expert. I usually hit second ring around turn 30. could be faster if I there's lots of easy dungeon in home/first ring. Warrior usually the fastest to reach second ring, then commander, scout is a little bit slower unless you find decent bow . wizard as first usually my slowest hero to expand (or its just because I'm not very good using wizard). Its better if you experiment with other class as first hero and compare them yourself.

IMO, I personally think wizard class overall improved in NH. they add lots of new spellls. some is very useful for wizard. But of course, because they nerf some low tier spells, it can be more challenging for first hero, but I find my second (or third) hero wizard grow faster in NH.

mostly the balance is about to nerfing some overpowered class and improving some useless class in vanilla.
some major balancing from other class in NH compare to vanilla:
- warriors lost their round attack when learning combat lvl 5. its now only available to chieftain lvl 20. that makes pure warriors become less deadly before lvl 20.
- double attack will have less armor penetration and lose armor piercing. archery skill damage is also reduced. that makes dragon hunting with lvl 14-15 archer become harder.
- nerfing astral energy mainly affect commander class. since they usually use astral energy to make their strongest units act twice at early games. Now I depend on heroism and that make less choice of tier 2 spells.
- Most lvl 10 wizard class is improved. Necromancers have stronger and more troops. battlemages shoot harder and druids entangle. archmage is nerfed though.

Добавлено: Чт Авг 27, 2015 10:53     Заголовок сообщения:

Overlord?! <shiver>

Name: Overlord;
Start gold: 500
Start gem: 20
Gold income add: 0
Gem income add: 0
Population: 10
Exp mod: 130
Loot mod: 50
Neutral HP: 145
Corruption start: 8
Corruption max: 90
Hero advice: 0
Score: 175

If you feel wizards got too much of a nerf, perhaps you can set "Gem income add" to 1 or 2? or boost "Start gem" to 30?

I played mostly wizards in MotBW (on lower difficulties, mind you) but when I played NH (on Expert) I felt like the first-ring provinces were REALLY gem poor, like 0 gems out of the 6 provinces most of the time.

Regards

Добавлено: Чт Авг 27, 2015 13:13     Заголовок сообщения:


I play on Expert (where neutrals have 100% HP, so this looks like the "normal" level).
I typically play Scouts (with 1 healer + 2/3 swordsmen).
First I go for easy or high income provinces (Free Settlements and Bandit Woods)
Then a few sites in the capital, saving enough gold to buy a rare bow from a Ranged weapon Store that I hope to find somewhere within the first ring
As soon as I can, I add a few ballistas to my army.
At that point, I can take on the second ring.

BTW, what version of the translation are you using?
If you see anything weird, please report here

Regards

Добавлено: Чт Авг 27, 2015 13:27     Заголовок сообщения:


The problem is he can't. It should be something that can raise on 50% exp from battles and break through second tier province.
I'm pretty sure if double ammont of sites available it is doable to play on overlord.
_________________
20.11.2009 - 24.02.2015

Добавлено: Сб Авг 29, 2015 9:51     Заголовок сообщения:

Thanks for the info everyone, though I'm sorry to say that information from expert isn't that much help to me. Mind you, it's interesting nonetheless, and I might be able to glean something from it here and there. I was kinda wondering if other heroes had the same difficulties as I've been having with a wizard on overlord. It's possible that I'm just getting through the same kind of learning phase that I went through with the original game; wizards seemed impossible back then as well. There's a lot of cool stuff to look at in NH and I've only barely started.

So I can't say for certain at this point if things are unbalanced; it's just that at first glance, when I'm thinking about how this compares with vanilla, some things stand out to me in a way that might not stand out if you were playing on lower difficulties. In vanilla the "wall of light" works for wizards but is too expensive for other heroes, and the "barbarian-wall" is good enough for other heroes but too fragile to work for wizards. So the extra income should favour other heroes by making more expensive options possible for them; this should particularly favour commander heroes, since they've always had the most difficulty with gold; in point of fact, I notice that there's another thread talking about how commanders seem to level a bit more quickly when the ai controls them; I suspect that this is related. I would guess that this is still an issue on lower difficulties, but the difference is probably a bit more subtle.

However, as I said, I'm still trying things out, so really that's just the first thing that pops out for me; it might be that once I investigate further I'll find other things that even everything out. I was playing for a good long time on vanilla before I had things figured out. I've got quite a few things to investigate. Mercenaries for starters; maybe as a wizard just need the new, even more expensive option. Of course, the possible problem is that it'll be subject to rng, but that will also provide some interesting variety. Anyone know how often mercs change? It seems like maybe every 5 moves or something? Medals might help also; I can probably apply them sooner.

@burningdebris

Yeah, you're probably right that I need to compare for myself. Honestly this is just me being a bit lazy; I was kinda hoping that someone would respond to this thread with "Nope, you can still play any class on overlord, you're just doing it wrong". These responses are great because I love talking about this game (I guess that might be obvious?), but this discussion is definitely inconclusive. You're probably right about wizards being improved overall, but in order to make use of those changes I need to be able to play it. I'm hoping that the class won't be relegated to only being used as a secondary or later hero.

@arkitekt

How do you think they got the impression that Wizards are OP? Through multiplayer maybe? I swear, on steam forums everyone's convinced that wizards are the weakest hero, but yeah, I've never believed that, and I can see how they might be able to rule multiplayer.

I'd like to think that if I find something that works it won't just be nerfed to oblivion; I don't think that any method that works for wizards in overlord should be considered OP.

I agree that it's awesome that they're trying to allow for more choices of units; on overlord you basically have a situation where a lot of the weaker units have to be babysat if you want to see them get useful. Though that being said, they really do become quite useful if you make the effort. A high level slinger for instance actually hits really hard, and they have infinite ammo, so... yeah. Most people don't even know that it's an option, because as starting units they're kinda useless. But yeah; I really like the whole .5 tier idea; it's fairly brilliant. I think it'll allow a lot of interesting options if I can figure out how to get going. Also, even though I'm finding them difficult at the moment, I really like all the new fights I'm seeing. I've been playing The Witcher 3, so it was awesome coming across the monster hunter fights. So yeah, don't get me wrong, I admire the work on NH (maybe I should have mentioned this earlier, sorry).

@Boon947

I'm using 2.47, which is based on v15.0427 f01.

Huh... that corruption start is actually a little bit later than what it is on MotBW, and the corruption max is 6% less :p

Yeah, I usually tend to go for the highest difficulty in games; I just find it more fun, and I guess I feel like since it makes them last longer, it's better value for your money. I have played on easier difficulties in MotBW, but I definitely prefer overlord. I don't want to change things just yet; there's a lot of stuff I can still investigate before giving up

Although I prefer wizards, I've played the other heroes, and seen/read about other people playing them, and I think that on vanilla the game is actually fairly equal, however, people who don't have much experience with a particular hero have trouble because often the methods you'd use on one hero don't work so well with others. As I said above; barbarians work with other heroes but not wizard; swordsmen work with wizards but not others... I think there's a few other possible options that I've been meaning to explore; I suspect that spearmen would work fairly well with scout for instance, because of the heavy ammo affect of their ranged attack. Have you tried that out?

Добавлено: Сб Авг 29, 2015 10:42     Заголовок сообщения:

Wizards were OP always. I can't remember in which patch-note they were improved.
They are difficult to start, but then... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuZ1d8wDo1Q
Commander is #2 mainly because you can't replace lost units.
_________________
20.11.2009 - 24.02.2015

Добавлено: Сб Авг 29, 2015 12:15     Заголовок сообщения:

Well, to actually demonstrate that the wizard is OP, you'd have to prove that other heroes can't do the same thing, which... I gotta say I think they could. Instead of a bunch of powerful spells, you just need gear for the scout or warrior, or units for the commander (you could probably go with no spells instead of with no units if you want a semi-equivalent challenge). Maybe scout would have some trouble with it, though given the right gear, I doubt it, and in any case, the scout can kill dragons in two turns, which kind of makes up for that I think.

Mind you, the real issue with what you're saying is that if wizards are OP in the late game, then it's their late game that needs to be nerfed. Making the early game hard just means that even if you have to make them a secondary hero, they still have an endgame where they can do stuff like that... probably more now, with whatever extra spells are available.

Добавлено: Сб Авг 29, 2015 12:30     Заголовок сообщения:


It was time when you could take 5 levels at once using one single spell against site with solo hydra. That spell was significantly nerfed.

When I say about OP that is about human wizard will definitely kill human warrior, scout and probably commander (it depends). Every human class can beat almost everything against AI. There should be some anti-class sites in NH, but in vanilla wizard and commander beat everything.
_________________
20.11.2009 - 24.02.2015

Добавлено: Сб Авг 29, 2015 16:07     Заголовок сообщения:

Wow, I had no idea about this. Which spell?

Yeah, I can see that a wizard will beat every other hero in vanilla multiplayer. Does that mean that they won't in NH?

Добавлено: Сб Авг 29, 2015 16:19     Заголовок сообщения:

This one:
Sorry I don't know how it was localized. "Fear"?
The spell was nerfed itself, now resistance is twice efficient against it. And second nerf was about reducing experience for enemies, which you did't damage to 0 HP.
That spell is never so popular anymore, but is still useful. Beating trolls and hydras at turn 10 was really OP. But all that was mainly feature of wizard class. Other heroes don't have enough spell slots and spell power / resistance penetration.
_________________
20.11.2009 - 24.02.2015

Добавлено: Пн Авг 31, 2015 7:38     Заголовок сообщения:

Ah. Yes, it is called "Fear" in the English version. I think I vaguely remember hearing about that, though I never experienced it myself. When you think about it, the xp mechanic was the only thing needed to fix that. The resistance mechanic... it seems to me that it mostly makes fear less useful to other heroes, though there's also going to be some units that have high enough resistance to mostly negate fear even with thaumaturgy.

I gotta say that at this point I think everything is fine, I just had to learn how to handle a bunch of fights that had significantly changed. So, no special tactic that needs to be nerfed, I just got to know the game better. Swordsmen are actually pretty good as offensive units once you get used to it. I just had to get into the habit of attacking with them a lot more often. There are a lot of situations where it's better than it used to be, like if you face barbarians, I used to end up taking a lot more hits from enraged barbarians, whereas now I can mostly control when barbs enrage and make sure that they die as soon as it happens. I also had to learn a lot of the new fights; those ratmen fights seemed really nasty at first, but once you realize how low their stamina is, it gets pretty easy. The lack of gems on plains and hills is a little bit tricky, but actually it seems like swamp and forest provinces maybe even have more gems than they used to, so I think it evens out. Also the casino makes a difference; aside from the gem income, the exchange can be handy. I mean, the exchange rates seriously favour gem to gold conversion, but since you have a lot more gold income, it works out okay. Did they actually change the gold and gem income from provinces in NH? Maybe what I thought was a change due to the mod was actually just random chance?

Добавлено: Пн Авг 31, 2015 15:21     Заголовок сообщения:

They did. Province and building income was increased, site treasure decreased, unit upkeep increases with level.
_________________
Phenomenal self as such is not an epistemically justified form of mental content.

Добавлено: Вт Сен 01, 2015 0:21     Заголовок сообщения:

Thanks for the info. Didn't notice the unit upkeep part.

But I was also wondering, did they do anything to gem income? I'm seeing home provinces with 3 gem income fairly often, which I'm pretty sure the minimum (in MotBW anyway) was 4. Also, generally I seem to have fewer gems.

Oh and btw, I didn't actually get better at the fights; I just restarted and forgot for a moment, while I was writing that last comment, about the fights being easier in the first shard. I thought I was getting better, but no... this second shard is nasty once again. I can kinda handle it though; just have to push through with a lot of backtracking... hopefully as I play more I can learn the fights well enough to know what I can't go after... there does have to be a bit of exploring before I can go to second ring, but I've learned to do that once I have an army so I can look at every fight. This really feels like I'm not doing it right though; I might even be lagging behind the enemy ai.

Добавлено: Вт Сен 01, 2015 1:22     Заголовок сообщения:

About campaign.
First tutorial shard is pretty easy. And it has hardcoded lowest difficulty settings.
Next about six could be played on difficulty you want, but site and province guards are mainly tier one. Next couple are 1+2 tier and so on.
After shard 15 or so you start to get normal composition of sites and province guard. And later after 30 or so they just start to be huge.
In vanilla campaign I just rush through first 8 and then play some exploring and stuff.
Gem income is pretty ok unless you have complete plains and hills. And there're some event giving you decent amount of gems. In later game you just have gem mine province building.
_________________
20.11.2009 - 24.02.2015