Suggest how you want factions to behave and play as

[The Holy Pilgrim]

Hello everybody,

I'd like the people of Hyrule: Total War to post how they'd like certain factions to play like and how you'd like to seem them in-game.

I'm doing this so that as I balance the game, I will bend the factions to what you guys ask for while keeping the factions from being overpowered/underpowered. I ask you, the people, as you, the players, know what should be in-game the best. The more people that respond, the better results I can achieve.

So post away and post your suggestions

[Avatar of the Ice Wolf]

Alright, I guess I'll post suggestions on the "big 6" first before I go into all factions. Keep in mind, Nephalim's intents on their strengths and weaknesses will be taken into account while I write this. I agree with his assessment on what these racial traits should be.

Kingdom of Hyrule - In short, the Hylians are supposed to be well rounded. However, they come off to me as infantry heavy while lacking the ranged and cavalry power. Crossbows do not have fire arrows, which, in my opinion, decreases their versatility for a race that is supposed to be equipped to handle any situation. The Repeater Crossbow may answer my concerns about their ranged. However, then we come to the cavalry. If you take the quality of the high-tier infantry, such as the Ironcald Elites, and compare them to Mounted Knights, well, the Mounted Knights just don't stack up. It is more cost-effective to opt for Mounted Recruits. They have nearly the same effectiveness as the Mounted Knights, at reduced cost. So, I guess my overall suggestion will be to up the power on the Mounted Knights.

Gerudo - Volvalgians are overpowered, but Neph is aware of that. Overall, this faction doesn't need much of a redesign at all. Their strengths are in archery and cavalry archers with soldiers that are more agile than strong. Done. I don't see any problems here.

Gorons - We have all said this, numerous times, and I suppose some may be sick of hearing it by now, BUT THOSE RUBY GUARDIANS ARE RIDICULOUS! I get that Gorons are supposed to be slow, hulking powerhouses, but these guys go overboard. I don't care that they are strong, per se, but their very presence forces the game to take the fast-paced grand military action of Hyrule: Total War and turn it into a touch-and-go Skirmish for a half hour trying to kill the Ruby Guardians. Aside from that, Dodongos and Mounted Fire Warriors need a power UPGRADE. Powder Kegs just kill everyone, ally and enemy. I don't know what to say about that really.

Zora - We all know the Big Octo Battle Platforms need to have less charge damage. Period. Their charge instantly kills anything, even Darknut Deities and Goron Ruby Guardians. Sapphire Wardens need an effectiveness boost. Mages are simply a better alternative in most situations as they now stand. (They do far more damage at half the cost.) Overall, the Zora need a cost reduction. They simply cannot field a comparable army given the same Rupee count as other factions.

Kokiri - Again, Emerald Archers need a melee damage reduction. The feel of the Kokiri should place an emphasis on ranged fire and meat shield walls. If the Emerald Archer fulfills both great melee and great ranged, then why not just spam these guys? The unit that I believe best represents the Kokiri, is the Slingshot believe it or not. Slingshots with Minutemen on the front lines to me really captures the feeling of the Kokiri in general. I wish for this feel to be expanded to fit the faction on the whole.

Gohma - Gohma are a tough one. The way they are now, they accomplish a Zeg/Tyranid role. They can have swarms of spammable mini troops and a few large powerful troops. The feel is captured perfectly. If I have any suggestions, it would be make their cavalry (Pincergohma and Gohma Long Legs) not entirely useless. I know they are supposed to be a psych weapon, but they are a waste of space as it stands now.

[UndyingNephalim]

I suppose I'll add my intent with each of the factions.

When creating the factions I divided them into three categories: Aggressive, Defensive, and Allround. I do hope these terms are self explanatory, but I'll be sure to go into a little detail.

Aggressive Factions: These factions are designed to be on the offensive in order to succeed. Mobility is a must, and sitting still and holding ground is a no-no. This is usually because aggressive factions either have weak swarm units, lack longer range, or their units are just not durable enough to be defensive.

Gerudo - Intended to have best archers
Gorons - Intended to have best melee units in terms of damage
Gohma - Intended to be the best at number spam and rushing
Ordona - Intended to have the best cavalry
Deku - Intended to be the best at harassment (attack, fall back, repeat)
Moblin - Intended to be the best at charges (high charging and trample damage)
Fairy - Intended to be a faction of the best glass cannons (Massive damage but horrible HP)
Sheikah - Intended to be a stealth faction: Can hide anywhere and outmaneuver armies. They are melee glass cannons.

Defensive Factions: These factions are best at holding their position, bunkering down, or otherwise wearing down an enemy with slow and calculated movements.

Zora - Intended to have the best morale and formations
Kokiri - Intended to be a defensive version of the Gohma: Swarms used to hold ground rather then move.
Darknut - Intended to have the highest armor ratings
Labrynna - Intended to be the best anti-cavalry faction with the best spears
Wizzrobe - Inverted of Fairies. Better defensive and lesser offense.

Allround Factions: These factions are intended to be able to pull off being aggressive or holding their ground depending on what units they have

Hylians - Intended to be the Jack of all trades. Zero on the scale from which all other factions should be measured
Lanayru - More speed then the Hylians but less HP
Lizalfos - More HP then the Hylians but less speed
Stalfos - They are basically the Hylians but much less durable and can't run in fear.
Ikana - More damage then Hylians but slower and more expensive.
Twili - Not sure how to describe my intent with them, I think they speak for themselves.

[Avatar of the Ice Wolf]

Notice that my two favorite factions, Kokiri and Zora, are Defensive. That's typically my playstyle in most RTS games. Nice to know that I fell right into that category once again.

[Mjolnr839]

Piggybacking on Avatars post, I'll agree that Hyrule needs actual archers to go with their crossbowmen. Zelda 2 has archers for a bodyguard for crying out loud, so the kingdom obviously has them. I actually think the mounted knights work pretty darn well, but they are way too expensive.

The Gerudo, I think need a infantry unit a little better than Marauders. but otherwise are perfectly fine as is.

Gorons = OP period. Sorry if thats not exactely specific, but almost everything needs to be toned down.

Zora; almost perfect. All I think they need is an infantry unit between standard infantry, and shock troops. Wardens could use a bit of tweaking, and maybe another infantry unit above shock troops. And then of course fixing Big Octoplatforms.

Kokiri: EMERALD ARCHERS. Please god tone them down. They have higher melee attack than ironclads if I remember correctly, have twice the numbers, and the best archer attack in the game. They are the single most overpowered unit in the game after Ruby Guards/Darunia. Other than that, I don't have much of problem with them, but if others are to be believed they should be toned down a bit overall. They are cheap, and numerous, but have stats that a bit too high.

Gohma; I really don't have a problem with anything other than Armogohma's. They should be limited so that the AI cannot spam them, even if they will be a temple unit.

[Xebenkeck]

In general I’d like to say that every faction should have at least one of the following type of units, Light Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Ranged, Spearmen, Light Calvary, and Siege Equipment. I say this because when every faction has these units they are NEVER limited in what they can do. I know Neph doesn’t want homogenesized factions, which I also don’t want but each faction at its base should have one of these units, to keep the general Total War balance. Which is, Ranged beats Light Infantry, Calvary beats Ranged, Spearmen beat Calvary, Heavy Infantry beat Spearmen, And heavy Infantry you have to wear down with a combination of all other units. Siege units are necessary for obvious reasons. With this fundamental balance in place, this is when you can start to differentiate the factions, like Gerudo have the best archers, ordona has the best calvary, etc.


Also just as a base I believe The Kokiri and Gorons are by far the best two factions in the game currently and Lizafos and Ikana are the two weakest.

Kokiri- Emerald archers are ridiculous and their sheer numbers do make the difference in a fight if you can hold the lines, as they wont run away then.
Gorons - Just overall are powerful, everywhere from Calvary, to the damage bomb throwers can do, to Ruby guards.


Lizafos - in my experience they are weak compare to all other races, and they run away quicker then the Kokiri and Deku.
Ikana - There units don't pack the supposed punch they are suppose to, plus the current lack of calvary hurts(though this will be rectifyed by those beautiful chariot units)

[Agent 51]

In general I’d like to say that every faction should have at least one of the following type of units, Light Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Ranged, Spearmen, Light Calvary, and Siege Equipment. I say this because when every faction has these units they are NEVER limited in what they can do. I know Neph doesn’t want homogenesized factions, which I also don’t want but each faction at its base should have one of these units, to keep the general Total War balance. Which is, Ranged beats Light Infantry, Calvary beats Ranged, Spearmen beat Calvary, Heavy Infantry beat Spearmen, And heavy Infantry you have to wear down with a combination of all other units. Siege units are necessary for obvious reasons. With this fundamental balance in place, this is when you can start to differentiate the factions, like Gerudo have the best archers, ordona has the best calvary, etc.

Unless of course it's stated the faction lacks such a thing. At which point it's fair game.

But then there's the Labryannan's who don't have "No Cav" marked in their faction list yet lack it anyway.

At the same time I'd hope for a better sense of progression among units. So far we have a lot of instances of units being scaled from cannon fodder to elite units in a without much inbetween (Goron Guardians to Fire Warriors for instance). I'd also like to see some units get a better version of themselves without going into another unit type or species, like Bulbin Veterans or Heavy Ordonian Calvary.

[mnviking]

I second this.

Unless of course it's stated the faction lacks such a thing. At which point it's fair game.

But then there's the Labryannan's who don't have "No Cav" marked in their faction list yet lack it anyway.

At the same time I'd hope for a better sense of progression among units. So far we have a lot of instances of units being scaled from cannon fodder to elite units in a without much inbetween (Goron Guardians to Fire Warriors for instance). I'd also like to see some units get a better version of themselves without going into another unit type or species, like Bulbin Veterans or Heavy Ordonian Calvary.

[PaulH]

In general I’d like to say that every faction should have at least one of the following type of units, Light Infantry, Heavy Infantry, Ranged, Spearmen, Light Calvary, and Siege Equipment. I say this because when every faction has these units they are NEVER limited in what they can do. I know Neph doesn’t want homogenesized factions, which I also don’t want but each faction at its base should have one of these units, to keep the general Total War balance. Which is, Ranged beats Light Infantry, Calvary beats Ranged, Spearmen beat Calvary, Heavy Infantry beat Spearmen, And heavy Infantry you have to wear down with a combination of all other units. Siege units are necessary for obvious reasons. With this fundamental balance in place, this is when you can start to differentiate the factions, like Gerudo have the best archers, ordona has the best calvary, etc.

This is what I was aiming for with my old Tech Tree remakes, although some were added many were not, which I found to be a shame but I understood that Neph wanted to stick to his vision for how this would mod would play. I believe that to get the standard Total War balance fundamentals, and the many more units that go with it, it will need to be done via Submod

[UndyingNephalim]

To help push my idea and why I think it will work, every faction does not need to have the same class of units to be balanced (melee, spearmen, archer, cavalry, etc). Rather, every faction needs a means to counter every type of unit. For instance, a faction without cavalry does not need cavalry to stack up against another, however they need to have a fair substitute for it. Examples would include infantry that can run as fast as cavalry, a unit that has a trample bonus like cavalry, etc. I highly, highly recommend playing the RTS called Universe at War, it the best example of an RTS where the three factions have absolutely no common unit types (even the construction and harvesting units are widely different!), and yet there's almost perfect balance between all three races. One of the races is composed of units the size of skyscrapers for crying out loud, while the other two factions are tiny and human sized:



It's done though the counter-substitute method rather then common-skeleton method.

[Avatar of the Ice Wolf]

To help push my idea and why I think it will work, every faction does not need to have the same class of units to be balanced (melee, spearmen, archer, cavalry, etc). Rather, every faction needs a means to counter every type of unit. For instance, a faction without cavalry does not need cavalry to stack up against another, however they need to have a fair substitute for it. Examples would include infantry that can run as fast as cavalry, a unit that has a trample bonus like cavalry, etc. I highly, highly recommend playing the RTS called Universe at War, it the best example of an RTS where the three faction have absolutely no common unit types (even the construction and harvesting units are widely different!), and yet there's almost perfect balance between all three races. One of the races is composed of units the size of skyscrapers for crying out loud, while the other two factions are tiny and human sized:

It's done though the counter-substitute method rather then common-skeleton method.

I do not believe Universe at War would be the best example. The game is very unbalanced and there are a lot of things that just don't make sense. For example, the race that gets the most powerful base defense turrets is the Heirarchy, and their base MOVES for crying out loud. To me, this game came off us rushed and unpolished. This, plus a lackluster single player campaign (I am highly critical of the single player), make this one of those games that just collect dust. They had a great idea going with the unique playstyle; however, the gameplay is far from balanced and there is absolutely no excuse for the single player.

Now, what you are trying to do is create unique playstyles not for three, but for over twenty playable factions. You have done very well so far. I do not believe, however, that you should stride to make this game too much like UAW. The game had its faults. To be fair, I will include reviews of the game from multiple sources. I allow for it to be shown apart from my personal bias against it. But please, to whoever buys it, get it on the PC and not the Xbox 360. It is fact that the PC version is superior. While the PC gets scores between 7 and 8.5 / 10, the Xbox version gets 5.5 / 10.

http://www.gamespot.com/universe-at-war-earth-assault/
http://www.ign.com/articles/2007/12/...sault-review-2
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/un...-earth-assault

You can find all the critic reviews here:

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/un...critic-reviews

[UndyingNephalim]

I do not believe Universe at War would be the best example. The game is very unbalanced and there are a lot of things that just don't make sense. For example, the race that gets the most powerful base defense turrets is the Heirarchy, and their base MOVES for crying out loud. To me, this game came off us rushed and unpolished. This, plus a lackluster single player campaign (I am highly critical of the single player), make this one of those games that just collect dust. They had a great idea going with the unique playstyle; however, the gameplay is far from balanced and there is absolutely no excuse for the single player.

Now, what you are trying to do is create unique playstyles not for three, but for over twenty playable factions. You have done very well so far. I do not believe, however, that you should stride to make this game too much like UAW. The game had its faults. To be fair, I will include reviews of the game from multiple sources. I allow for it to be shown apart from my personal bias against it. But please, to whoever buys it, get it on the PC and not the Xbox 360. It is fact that the PC version is superior. While the PC gets scores between 7 and 8.5 / 10, the Xbox version gets 5.5 / 10.

http://www.gamespot.com/universe-at-war-earth-assault/
http://www.ign.com/articles/2007/12/...sault-review-2
http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/un...-earth-assault

You can find all the critic reviews here:

http://www.metacritic.com/game/pc/un...critic-reviews

I guess we have very opposite opinions of the game then. Other then some wonky pathfinding for wide vehicles, I found little flaws with the game. It's probably my favorite RTS ever made next to Armada.

[Torvus]

I'd like to see the Darknut Legion get a bit of a buff. The unit sizes are too small. I consistently lose to Ordona because I just don't have enough men. I'm not saying their units should be the same size as a normal infantry unit, but instead of in the 15-25 men per unit range (on huge unit settings), something more like 25-50 men per unit. Also, the Zuna crossbowmen should be a native unit, they are invaluable to the Legion. Or maybe some Fokka archers.

[Shika_mech]

I love how I play the Dekus. Highly underestimated. The best way to play them I think would be really great if the Ai could mimic this. How I use them is like this. I treat them as a 16th century linemen with flintlocks. Sense almost all scrubs are ranged and not melee focused except two. The pine scrubs and the royal scrubs (spearmen)

My first line almost always are the pine scrubs. They are fantastic at stopping all melee charges. While they are holding them off in the front the second line and third line(when available) fires. I use forest scrubs for these two lines. Depending on the enemy strength you should have two lines of Pine scrubs

My last line is always the Yucca Scrubs, for they have the greatest range and can fire at enemies and either widdle them down or inflict moral. Softens them up for the pine Scrubs in line one.

For the flanks when available use Royal scrubs for anti Calvary and lily pad scrubs. The lily pad scrubs are special for they are the fastest and can run great distances. While they are tied up with the pine scrubs in the front and getting hammered by each preceding line have the lily scrubs run past and out to the flanks of the enemy or behind and then begin firing. set them to skirmish so if charged they can get away. When you get here also move third rank of forest scrubs to the flanks and slowly surround the enemy. Lily pad scrubs to the rear then forest at the flanks. When in a bridge battle or crossing a choke point in a river use Lily pad scrubs to cross said river and attack them at the flanks.

Magnolia scrubs make great artillery. For Field and siege artillery.

Once they are getting hammered from all directions they usually begin to flee. With everyone except pine and royal scrubs set to skirmish this style can be long and drawn out however effective.

For the moments when you are out numbered and need to resort to more guerilla tactics. When scrubs have the terrain advantage what you need are forest scrubs to hide in a semi circle at the edge of a forest with a line of mushroom scrubs in front in the open hidden ( they can hide anywhere) have a unit draw them into the forest once they cross the line of Mushrooms have them jump out and begin attacking. At the same time have all the forest scrubs jump out as well. Use Pine Scrubs to draw them in and engage in melee while the enemy is surrounded. The enemy will be surrounded and get hit from so many directions to fast they should flee. exchange royal scrubs when Calvary is present. I call this Death Blossom when all the Dekus are in place it looks like a flower.

When you know you will be engaging in a field battle. Try to use almost all Mushroom scrubs. They can hide anywhere. Try to set up a death blossom or multiple "mines" of mushroom scrubs set. Say when an army be begins pursuing one army that attacked the moment the cross another group of Scrubs spring those! once there attention is diverted make the mushroom scrubs hidden again. Repeat this en-till either flees or is destroyed.

Best way is to have the enemy attack them on the map. So the Deku scrubs have to defend. Best strategy to last at least. Hardest to beat when put on a time constraint.

[Agent 51]

I see this as a fair way to think of things. Though I do think that if a faction completely lacks a certain kind of unit, (Labryannans and Stalfos with Cav for example) it should be stated in their faction description.

Although Gunner Cav with the Labryannans would be glorious to see.

[Duke Serkol]

Single player is the most important to me. I like playing through "stories".

My favorite Street Fighter game is Street Fighter Alpha 2 because each character fights a different mid and final boss.
Alpha 3 has many more chracters but with a couple exceptions they all have Bison as the final boss (even ones that storyline wise really have no business fighting him).

Which is why, as I already told Neph, I'm certainly looking forward to people making submods with alternative campaigns (hope to make some myself!).

[UndyingNephalim]

Regardless of story and campaign or not, I cited Universe at War for how it took the approach of making every faction as different as possible, not its storyline. The campaign in UaW has nothing to do with my approach to unit rosters and how they function relative to each other.

[Avatar of the Ice Wolf]

Regardless of story and campaign or not, I cited Universe at War for how it took the approach of making every faction as different as possible, not its storyline. The campaign in UaW has nothing to do with my approach to unit rosters and how they function relative to each other.

Good.

I guess some of the imbalances of UaW would have no way of making it into this mod either. For example, the hero imbalance (Vertigo, for example, has little use aside from scouting and can get himself killed instantly by crossing the path of 1 gravity turret, while guys like Kamal-Rex can instantly abduct some of the Marari's best tanks) would have no comparable units to give these imbalances to. In the end, I guess it is a good approach overall.

[Duke Serkol]

Oh, I was just responding to the "singleplayer makes half my opinion" comment. To me, it would be much more than half.
I never played UaW and know nothing of its story... so no criticism from me on that one

[lax15]

I think that Ordona's cavalry need an upgrade. They remind me of Rohan in TATW which is why I love playing as cavalry, in my humble opinion, is the most exciting unit on the battlefield. Right now there are only three types of cavlary, the Ordona Horsemen, the Goat Lords, and the the Mounted Farmer Archers. I know that Ordona is made up of almost exclusively farmers but would it be possible to throw some mounted skirmishers or other types of cavalry into the mix?