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Catapaults... Holy Crap!!!

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Catapaults... Holy Crap!!!

from Elemental Forums

So I am playing a large game on Rediculous level. I got to about turn 250 or so and attacked my nearest neighbor (I had previously wiped out one AI). I took the first three of his cities when he started showing up with catapaults. At first he had one with 500 health and did 50 points of damage twice each round. I quickly learned that they cannot fire if you are standing next to them. But needless to say my little units and summoned elementals would die with each hit of the catapault. This meant that I would lose 2 or 4 units each time I ran into one, even if htey were alone. THis caused a SERIOUS strain on my summoned stack and quickly caused all my magic users to be useless (one summon takes 16 turns to restore, means that one summons means that your hero is useless for the remainder of the game as you will be over run by the time they can do anything.

 

So I was dealing wtih that, he was showing up with like one or two small units and a catapault. THEN he started showing up with these Mega Catapualts. these things had just under 2k health and did 100 damage each shot. I mean OMG these things are WAY over powered. I would lose 2 or 4 units before I could get close to him, no matter how beefy the units were.

elemental
26,524 views 43 replies
Reply #26 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting cpl_rk, reply 25



Why would you take away the one good unit the AI has? unbelievable. The AI is a complete washout in this game, and you would take away the one good unit the AI does have. This is just unbelievable.

I think the AI needs to have much more powerful units. They need to have extreme spellcasters that actually cast that firebally & firestorm spell before the human player does. I would like to see their sovereign actually kill my sovereign. The AI needs much stronger archer unity & even horse or warg archers that can take down their equivalent human couterparts. I would like to see AI stacks "concealed" in this game which I cannot veiw, mated with strong AI units which, at size 8, have a reasonable chance of killing any of my "killer stacks." It would be so cool if I would actually lose a tactical battle that I initiate: 1 out of a 500 times simply doesn't cut it.

Having a "killer" unit is the only good thing the AI has in its arsenal in the game as-is. Not only is this too rare, it should be expanded upon in many ways. And yes, it should target whatever the most valuable opposing unit is, which would be 1) strong spellcasters 2) strong archers 3) other ..
End of cpl_rk's quote

They have a point, the catapult should not be one shotting things one at a time... it should thrown a bunch of rocks (like a stone giant) and take out most of the player's army! After all big rocks are not accurate and are overkill for non-monsters (dragons and demons), but about 100 fist sized rocks over an area would make the catapult a real anti-personel weapon.

Reply #27 from Elemental Forums Top

- double post -

Multiplicity - Control multiple PCs using one keyboard and mouse
Reply #28 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting joasoze, reply 20

Quoting Alstein, reply 19How about ballistas and maybe Cowtapults?

 
You wanna shoot cows at them? Thats just mean
End of joasoze's quote

 

I've never understood the desire to fling food into a city you're trying to starve out...

"On The Next, FANTASY FOOD FIGHT!"

Reply #29 from Elemental Forums Top

This post was originally created prior to the 1.09 patch, so at the time the catapualts could stack. The new patch has made these units at least manageable. With it's "not always do max damage" fix my firegiants can actually take a round of damage... maybe... if I get lucky.

Reply #30 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Gwenio1, reply 26



Quoting cpl_rk,
reply 25



Why would you take away the one good unit the AI has? unbelievable. The AI is a complete washout in this game, and you would take away the one good unit the AI does have. This is just unbelievable.

I think the AI needs to have much more powerful units. They need to have extreme spellcasters that actually cast that firebally & firestorm spell before the human player does. I would like to see their sovereign actually kill my sovereign. The AI needs much stronger archer unity & even horse or warg archers that can take down their equivalent human couterparts. I would like to see AI stacks "concealed" in this game which I cannot veiw, mated with strong AI units which, at size 8, have a reasonable chance of killing any of my "killer stacks." It would be so cool if I would actually lose a tactical battle that I initiate: 1 out of a 500 times simply doesn't cut it.

Having a "killer" unit is the only good thing the AI has in its arsenal in the game as-is. Not only is this too rare, it should be expanded upon in many ways. And yes, it should target whatever the most valuable opposing unit is, which would be 1) strong spellcasters 2) strong archers 3) other ..



They have a point, the catapult should not be one shotting things one at a time... it should thrown a bunch of rocks (like a stone giant) and take out most of the player's army! After all big rocks are not accurate and are overkill for non-monsters (dragons and demons), but about 100 fist sized rocks over an area would make the catapult a real anti-personel weapon.
End of Gwenio1's quote

I agree, but that's part of a the larger problem of making things more realistic (more "logic" less "abstraction"). Catapults are used to batter walls, but we have no walls to batter in this game. I don't know why the dev thought of adding catapult tech considering this is the case, but I'm not a mind-reader. I can see an anti-personel type round being added to catapults, greek fire would be most appropriate against personel units (perhaps with the same/similar effect as a firestorm spell). But, in the absence of improving the AI, the one good AI unit that provides a good challenge should be left as-is. A boulder-bash does sound good to me though, I'd actually love to see half my archers go down to a catapult "boulder bash."

Who knows what version 1.1 will have in store. I'm hoping-beyond-hope that I'll be pleasantly surprised.

Reply #31 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting vashtyphoon, reply 28



Quoting joasoze,
reply 20

Quoting Alstein, reply 19How about ballistas and maybe Cowtapults?

 
You wanna shoot cows at them? Thats just mean


 

I've never understood the desire to fling food into a city you're trying to starve out...

End of vashtyphoon's quote

Generally the cows (or other animals/humans) were dead and decaying when they flung them over the battlements. It was to spread sickness and disease inside, not to give them food, haha.

Reply #32 from Elemental Forums Top

I want a "Release the prisoners." Option for the Catapaults. }:)

Reply #33 from Elemental Forums Top

i personally don't think that "it makes the ai competetive" is a good reason for allowing a unit that i also believe to be overpowered to remain so. players could just as easily abuse this themselves.

Reply #34 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Sethai, reply 33
i personally don't think that "it makes the ai competetive" is a good reason for allowing a unit that i also believe to be overpowered to remain so. players could just as easily abuse this themselves.
End of Sethai's quote

It is less overpowered in the hands of players because the AI gets an HP multiplier.

Reply #35 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Chalkbot, reply 31



Quoting vashtyphoon,
reply 28


Quoting joasoze,
reply 20

Quoting Alstein, reply 19How about ballistas and maybe Cowtapults?

 
You wanna shoot cows at them? Thats just mean 
 

I've never understood the desire to fling food into a city you're trying to starve out...


Generally the cows (or other animals/humans) were dead and decaying when they flung them over the battlements. It was to spread sickness and disease inside, not to give them food, haha.
End of Chalkbot's quote

 

I believe Ghengkis Khan actually catapulted heads, but I'm sure he wasn't the only one. I read a book some years ago (can't remember the name now right off-hand), after he took Beijing in 1215 he killed every living thing therein, reducing the population of 1million to zero plus a pile of bones over 100 feet high. The body fat (from the burnt corpses) made the streets slippery for weeks for those that visited the gruesome scene afterwards.

Ghengkis Khan was one guy in history you'd do better not to piss off.

Reply #36 from Elemental Forums Top

The first crusade also shot heads when besieging Antioch.

Reply #37 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Sethai, reply 33
i personally don't think that "it makes the ai competetive" is a good reason for allowing a unit that i also believe to be overpowered to remain so. players could just as easily abuse this themselves.
End of Sethai's quote

 

I feel, whatever it takes within reason to create a challenging AI is justified. This is a significanlty better unit than the horde of pushover units that gets slaughtered by my archers one at a time (which sucks), and makes the game more fun. It enriches the game. It's like, "wow now at least I have something to fear," even if it's just one small unit at end-game. 

Challenging=fun & enjoyable,

un-challenging=boring & sucks. 

Reply #38 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting cpl_rk, reply 37



Quoting Sethai,
reply 33
i personally don't think that "it makes the ai competetive" is a good reason for allowing a unit that i also believe to be overpowered to remain so. players could just as easily abuse this themselves.



 

I feel whatever it takes within reason to create a challenging AI is justified. This is a significanlty better unit than the horde of pushover units that gets slaughtered by my archers one at a time (which sucks), and makes the game more fun. It enriches the game. It's like, "wow now at least I have something to fear," even if it's just one small unit at end-game. 

Challenging=fun & enjoyable,

un-challenging=boring & sucks. 
End of cpl_rk's quote

I agree the AI needs to be more challenging but its not fun  fighting a golden gun with mega health its just annoying. I'm using the custom weopons mod by 3dGrunge so the AI are using really strong bows in big numbers (I got shock when i first met them). Late game the A.I do use the more powerful spells but i don't think they upgrade their INT so they will never be a strong as a focused magic user player. They seem to suck at research in general and use the same paths all the time.

On higher difficulty and with large numbers of factions you will be suprised how strong some of the AI can get, not enough to wipe you out but atleast stalemate the match or make it borning enough to quit. In anycase i don't think cheaping out the AI is the key to the problems. Brad said he has a major AI update for 1.1 so i guess we should see how the new magic system and AI up the challenge of the game. I imagine a difficulty mod to make cheap hard will probably be the last resort if the ingame AI fails to deliever.

I also agree that i don't see the point of catapults, they are not anti-personal weopens they are seige craft and at the moment there is nothing to seige so their presence is just annoying.

Reply #39 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting vashtyphoon, reply 28

Quoting joasoze, reply 20
Quoting Alstein, reply 19How about ballistas and maybe Cowtapults?

 
You wanna shoot cows at them? Thats just mean
 

I've never understood the desire to fling food into a city you're trying to starve out...

"On The Next, FANTASY FOOD FIGHT!"
End of vashtyphoon's quote

 

Cows were used as bio weapon, no seriously, in sieges to decimate enemy morale and stamina by spreading disease.  Diseased cow copses to be fair.

Reply #40 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Thizzbaby, reply 38

They seem to suck at research in general and use the same paths all the time.
End of Thizzbaby's quote

That is because all techs have the same priority for the AI to research them, and they all have the same multiplier to alter the priorety when the AI is at war.

Reply #41 from Elemental Forums Top

So I am playing a large game on Rediculous level. I got to about turn 250 or so and attacked my nearest neighbor (I had previously wiped out one AI). I took the first three of his cities when he started showing up with catapaults. At first he had one with 500 health and did 50 points of damage twice each round. I quickly learned that they cannot fire if you are standing next to them. But needless to say my little units and summoned elementals would die with each hit of the catapault. This meant that I would lose 2 or 4 units each time I ran into one, even if htey were alone. THis caused a SERIOUS strain on my summoned stack and quickly caused all my magic users to be useless (one summon takes 16 turns to restore, means that one summons means that your hero is useless for the remainder of the game as you will be over run by the time they can do anything.

 

So I was dealing wtih that, he was showing up with like one or two small units and a catapault. THEN he started showing up with these Mega Catapualts. these things had just under 2k health and did 100 damage each shot. I mean OMG these things are WAY over powered. I would lose 2 or 4 units before I could get close to him, no matter how beefy the units were.
End of quote

Actully this is a good thing. I have yet to encounter catapults in the game but this gives me hope that some time in the late game there might actully be some sort of challange. SD please don't nerf these.

Reply #42 from Elemental Forums Top

I do think it is rather silly when the AI shows up with 10 stacks of units with 500+ hp each... I mean really.... Oh well, guess that is what i get for not city spamming and rushing the ai on turn 3.

Reply #43 from Elemental Forums Top

Random thought: Ammo types? For both archers and siege?

Flaming rocks, smaller stones, big stones, maybe special weapons that are useful against elemental giants? (Barrels of water for fire giants? Things like that?)

And if we have ballista, then different ammo types for things like fighting demons (Silver or magically runed heads on the shafts?)

 

Just another thought.