Bobchillingworth Wrote:Fall From Heaven is only balanced in the sense that several factions are able to break the game with equal contemptous ease- but that's half the fun!
+1
.Darrell
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Fall From Heaven II PBEM?
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Selrahc Wrote:I'd definitely be interested. I call Auric Ulvin/Illian. EDIT: Or if people don't want to sit through stasis I could always go for Beeri Bawl/Luchuirp Umm, yeah, you can play as the Illians as long as you don't stasis us in the first 100 turns when we're dealing with the barbs...  .
It's probably better I just lurk this one for now. As much as I want to I don't think I'll have enough time. I would prefer to stay dedicated to one player though so does anybody want a dedicated lurker?
Athlete
Played in:
RBPB2 - Willem of Ottoman - 6th/10 RBPB3 - Joao of Inca 13th/17 or so??? PBEM6 - Shaka of the Vikings 2nd/5 (thanks Lewwyn) Dedicated Lurker For: Scooter/Pindicator/Noble PB8
Okay, FFH II has a lot more customizable options than regular civ, so there's much to discuss- I figure we should start with the basic map type.
Great plains is out from the very start- mana nodes don't spawn on it for some reason. Ring probably has to be out as well- the game crashes for me whenever Varn is playing, and I suspect that other leaders / civs cause the same problem. I personally would like to see navy, Octopus Overlords, and the Lanun potentially play a role in the game, so I'm not in favor of any maps that lack or marginalize seas / ocean. Highlands with seas tends to make for some very interesting maps, but PBEM 3 is already using that sort of setup. Tilted Axis with small continents also makes for some really interesting maps. I don't mind if the starts are less than fully equal, as long as they're balanced so that no player has a crushing advantage from the very beginning; Darrell has graciously agreed to look over the map, so we don't have to worry about completely random starts (thanks!  ) I also don't mind if some players start on islands, while other share a large continent, but I suspect that my opinion is in the minority there. Regarding Unique Features, I'd like to see all of them enabled- they add spice to the game and none of them are really overpowering in the long-run. If we do play with them, the map should be edited so that nobody gets a capital with the Remnants of Patria or Yggdrasil, though. I also vote to allow the smaller monster lairs as well (barrows, graves, etc). For map conditions, I have no preferences, although too much desert is going to make the burning sands a real nightmare to deal with (Hyborem summoning on an oasis map ruins the game in some of the most hilarious ways possible  ) That's all my ideas/comments regarding the map itself for now, thoughts?
I tend to play Pangaea maps for FfH so that everyone is involved and "stuck-in" as it were, and I find that AI handles it better [not at issue here]. TBH Lanun, even on the Pangaea can be leveraged pretty hard (+1 Food in the water, a +1 Happy that only they can see [pearls], Financial if you're playing Hannah).
A "Flat Map" would be an interesting change, do you know if the inner-sea map script is working correctly for FfH?
Go for full unique features. I agree that removing Ygdrassil, Dragon Bones and Remnants from immediate vicinity is a good idea.
I'd suggest we turn off Acheron and maybe Orthus. Acheron is a huge screwover to whatever civ he spawns near to. Especially now that he comes with back up in the form of dozens of Fire III archmages. A badly placed city can cripple one players expansion for basically the entire game. Quote:I don't mind if the starts are less than fully equal, as long as they're balanced so that no player has a crushing advantage from the very beginning; Darrell has graciously agreed to look over the map, so we don't have to worry about completely random starts (thanks! ) I also don't mind if some players start on islands, while other share a large continent, but I suspect that my opinion is in the minority there. I'd prefer if we all start on one landmass myself. Erebus Continents is the maptype I normally play FFH on. It needs to be downloaded though. http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=308590
I like All Unique Features and a living world (double events) in my SP games, but I am flexible on both.
So for the map, general consensus seems to be for a Pangaea or similar map, with all players on the same continent. Large seas and/or oceans should be present to allow for naval tactics and water-based improvements / wonders, and perhaps some islands should be present as well. Does that sound about right? We could play on a Highlands with high seas or inner sea map (which does seem to work without issues from previous experience), but both of those are being used in PBEM games already, and we might want to try something new.
There are quite a few special options to discuss which are independent of any particular map type; I've listed all the ones I could think of below, with my personal preferences in yellow. Lairs- on or off? I would like for monster lairs to be present, however Goblin forts should probably be edited to be removed from player starting locations, as the longbow-equivalent goblin archers they start with are very difficult to dislodge early on, and could eliminate players only a few turns into the game if someone gets lucky with a "for the horde" worldspell Unique Features- on or off? I think there's a consensus to enable all features, but to remove the Dragon Bones, Remnants of Patria, and Yggdrasil from the starting locations. Acheron- enabled or disabled? I'm torn on this one, personally. On one hand, the dragon spawns early & unpredictably, and forms a massive roadblock for anyone unlucky enough to have him next door. On the other hand, the fire elementals from the Sons of the Inferno never seem to actually attack much of anything in range, so players only have to watch out for the 4 enchanted blade drill / combat II warriors that Acheron periodically sends out. Removing him also makes the Grigori Dragonslayer UU even more useless than before, and gimps one of the main appeals of beastmasters. Most importantly, it makes the Horde a much less appealing civ choice, as they won't be able to use their worldspell to convert half the Sons of the Inferno to their side. Which might be for the best, actually. Orcus- enabled or disabled? I say "enabled". Orcus can usually be defeated by only a few warriors, if you know what you're doing, and he tends to spawn after you should have had more than enough time to get together a reasonable defense. The reward for killing him isn't overpowering, either. Barbarian activity level? Probably standard; barbs are a fundamental part of the game and so shouldn't be removed under any circumstance, probably want to avoid raging though since barbarians are pretty intense already, especially on maps with a lot of open land, which it sounds like we're going to have. Tech trading- on, off? I would rather that tech trading be off; I'm already investing more than enough time in PB3, where tech blocs and the associated diplomacy dominates all aspects of the game- I'd prefer that not happen here. The many unique units and equipment found in the game open up plenty of non-tech trading opportunities anyway. Always War? I would rather not have AW; it bars some interesting cooperative and role-playing opportunities, makes the Seven Pines location useless, neuters Corlindale's special ability, makes Council of Esus much less useful, and renders the Salvatar worldspell pointless. Permanent Alliances? Should probably be off with only 6 players; makes earning a cultural victory too easy, among other balance issues. Altar of the Lunotar Victory enabled or disabled? For some reason I'm under the impression that only Good and maybe neutral civs can win this one... probably should disable it if that's the case, since evil civs don't have a corresponding victory option of their own. Last days- on or off? I say "on"; the Armageddon counter otherwise seems to move very slowly, and with only 6 civs (and no AI players, at least starting out) there won't be many ways to raise it for those who wish to do so (and I'm sure someone will  ). Living World- on or off? On, for sure- events bring a lot of fun to the game, and they seem to happen surprisingly rarely, even with this option selected. Huts? Yes, if we're going to have lairs and events. Which we should. Blessing of Amathon (or whatever it's called that gives double resources)? [COLOR="Yellow"] I like this option for single player, but I think it's too unbalancing for MP, so I vote for keeping the option off for this game. [/COLOR] I'm sure there's a few that I missed, feel free to bring up anything else that should be discussed
Quote:Last days- on or off? I say "on"; the Armageddon counter otherwise seems to move very slowly, and with only 6 civs (and no AI players, at least starting out) there won't be many ways to raise it for those who wish to do so (and I'm sure someone will ). If you turn last days on then a good Hyborem rush can bring armageddon with startling ease. Even worse is the Clan of Embers, whose game strategy could be as simple as: Tech to Way of the Wicked. Build Prophecy of Ragnarok. Build Warrens. Build 20 goblins. Watch as everyone else in the world is ripped to shreds by the Horsemen. Early horsemen is really powerful, especially on a pangaea and bringing Armageddon is a viable road to victory for the Barbarian civs. I say we don't make it easy for them. If nobody is trying to actively raise the counter, it probably will stay low. But if someone is trying to raise it turning on last days makes it ripe for abuse. Quote:Altar of the Lunotar Victory enabled or disabled? For some reason I'm under the impression that only Good and maybe neutral civs can win this one... probably should disable it if that's the case, since evil civs don't have a corresponding victory option of their own. The only person it really affects is Auric, since anyone else can swap religions to change alignments, or starts with the right alignment in the case of Cassiel. I'd say leave it. It isn't really that open to abuse since it requires teching all the way up to righteousness then all the way up to omniscience then building a big wonder. It isn't like they'll steal the game early. Anyone attempting that victory type will have to do a lot of work, and their opponents will have ample opportunity to foil them. Everything else sounds fine. With the exception that I am still in favour of either removing Acheron, the dragon slayer thing doesn't really matter, the horde thing is really unbalancing and the beastmaster thing takes so much effort you might as well be out conquering the world. A compromise position could be to place him on an offshore island so that any questers could still defeat the dragon and take his horde, but he wouldn't overpower anyone. It would just require the mapmaker to place a barb city on an island and they should build the Dragon there. |
