I find this to be a huge problem with the game. Glassteel has a bit too much damage, health and armor and makes you feel like your not giving up on anything that much. Especially when you get tier 3 Glassteel and Titanium tech which can sometimes be ridiculously early. Palladium and Adamantian tier 1 armors feel weak in comparison.



In my opinion the following suggestions previously mentioned would greatly improve the game:

1) Implement ZOC so that defensive melee units actually have a purpose and can better defend supports/archers.

2) Make initiative roll each round instead of being a constant all or nothing stat. This way it's worth to have some even when enemy has more.

3) Items need more balancing to make Glasssteel weaker and give some others a slight buff.

MomoOG wrote:
I don't think glassteel is the problem. I think initiative is the problem. Some unit composition just become basically invincible if they have the initiate advantage. A good example of this is an army made of pure Dust Bishops who can go first everytime. I feel all units should be balanced around their initiative and this initiative should not be a modifiable variable. Its way to hard to balance things otherwise.

I think this is a problem with the "RPG" system of unit design in EL. Since you can pick and choose from hundreds of combinations of equipment, it's extra important that the choices are balanced. Consider:

• Unit Type
• Experience Level
• Up to 8 different equip points
• Multiple choices of Weapons
• 8 different Materials with 3 "tiers" each
• Abilities
• Hero buffs (+1 range from Ranged hero)
• Tech buffs (ex. Brigade System)
• Faction buffs (ex. Technolover)
  
  

Simply reducing stats on a Ranged unit is not going to solve the issue because it is easy to stack items and other passive buffs (Hero skills and items) on top of a unit to compensate for a low amount of Damage.



On top of all of this there's the economy to consider - how much should a unit cost? Is it OK to have really good units as long as they are expensive?



On one hand we have a lot of options, which is good but on the other the system is so complex that balancing is a nightmare. I know a lot of players will think I'm crazy for saying it but there are WAY too many choices in the unit design system and very few of them are interesting.

MomoOG wrote:
I don't think glassteel is the problem. I think initiative is the problem. Some unit composition just become basically invincible if they have the initiate advantage. A good example of this is an army made of pure Dust Bishops who can go first everytime. I feel all units should be balanced around their initiative and this initiative should not be a modifiable variable. Its way to hard to balance things otherwise.

This sounds reasonable.

I might not have played this game that much, but enough games in general to know that alpha strikes are a bad mechanic. No one likes to be the victim of an alpha strike with no chance of reaction to it. Initiative should be there to spice the battle up and make sure that no player gets to move all his units before the other. Making it a constant value makes sense for balance which is of utmost importance.

Esran wrote:
I think the problem of ranged units being strong is separate from initiative being totally binary. The initiative system affect matchups between melee units just as much as between ranged units.



Maybe Amplitude should take a page out of the HoMM playbook, and give ranged units a separate (weaker) melee attack. That way, getting a unit next to enemy archers actually feels meaningful in terms of countering them.

I don't see it as being a big problem for melee. For one, 95% of the time, you wont be able to get all your melee units into range to attack one unit. But even if you have an all cav or all flying army that can over the ground in one turn, changes are your opponents units going to be grouped, so you're only going to have 2-3 free hexes free to attack a given single unit anyways. Out of those lets say 3 unit that focus, 1 is going to get counter attacked, and the rest are now in range of the opponents melee.



I think the problem of initiative lies primarily with ranged units, because if there is enough distance, your archers can get 2 volleys each without being in danger. That more then likely means 3 archers are taking out a unit of equal strength with each volley, so in 2 volleys (before your opponent has had a chance to move a second time) 4 units are dead, and that is simply too harsh.



I like the direction the devs are going with the nerfing of the ranged units, and unfortunately I haven't had too much time to play to test it out, but I think its a step in the right direction. By simply ensuring ranged units aren't able to deal so much damage without being in harms way, should fix a lot of battle balancing issues.

I think it would be nice to give units unlimited counterattacks, but maybe make all counterattacks after the first one weaker (maybe 50% damage or something), or start at a highish percentage (ie 75%) and it gets lower for each consecutive counterattack. The limits for counterattacks are there because I like the initiative system in the respect that you can focus multiple units on one unit, and I think it's balanced out somewhat by the fact that the first melee one that hits will be the one that is counterattacked, yet usually if you have more initiative then you have less combat stats than usual. This means that the fastest unit to hit the enemy is most likely to be hit the hardest because of it when you look at the other gear they could have had.



I like the sweep strike back ability for units with low initiative, but I think there should be more abilities/items that can counter high initiative or make low initiative units stronger. Maybe put in units/items that can lower the initiative of the enemy (not completely sure but i think slow was just for movement not initiative), which leaves them at low initiative with weaker relative combat stats than you. Or certain defensive/counter abilities such as ones that increase defense per attack for the turn or raise some other stat if attacked consecutively.

I agree that they are separate issues, but the symptom is the same, and when taken together (initiative and ranged) the problem is exacerbated.



As I have written elsewhere:

Tigregalis wrote:
Based on all of the reviews and comments I've seen, the combat system is widely-disliked (where it is not disliked, it is tolerated). I feel that those in support of it are more vocal than others, and tend to overlook its failings. More than any part of the game (i.e. the empire stuff), which most people love, it's the one part that brings it down (along with late-game tedium - but that's an issue all 4X or even strategy games deal with). Many people deal with the combat system by auto-resolving.



1) Ranged units are king because of this system. Ranged units don't spend their action by counter-attacking, ensuring that your orders are followed.

2) Initiative is king because of this system. Moving before your opponent ensures that your orders are followed.



You could fix 1) above by making it so that either A) counter-attacking does not spend an action or B) no units counter-attack

You could fix 2) above by implementing "overwatch" mechanics that allow reactions that override initiative.

You would also need to ensure that secondary orders (replacement orders for failed orders) aren't simply terrible - better yet, allow players to set secondary or even tertiary orders themselves.



However, even if you did fix 1) and 2), turn-based combat (where every unit takes its own turn) is superior to round-based combat (existing system) for these reasons, among others, because you can always ensure that your orders are followed.

I think the problem of ranged units being strong is separate from initiative being totally binary. The initiative system affect matchups between melee units just as much as between ranged units.



Maybe Amplitude should take a page out of the HoMM playbook, and give ranged units a separate (weaker) melee attack. That way, getting a unit next to enemy archers actually feels meaningful in terms of countering them.

AgentTBC wrote:
Isn't the OP nature of initiative boosts pretty easy to mod? I'll look into it.

The problem is that nerfing initiative buffs isn't really going to solve the core problem. It SHOULD be possible to specialize into high initiative, albeit at the cost of other stats, if that's what you want, but it shouldn't mean that only your tactical decisions have any purpose, and that it sets your opponent to do nothing but watch while you play out the battle.

I agree with initiative needing randomization. Units with special attacks and low initiative are currently useless. An example is the Urces minor faction unit, which by default has beam attack and 2 initiative. Since it never gets to attack first, it never really benefits from having beam and the unit isn't very impressive without it.

IMO make initiative less predictable. If unit A has twice as much initiative as unit B, then A should get to go first twice as often as B does (so 2 times out of 3) - not 100% of the time.



In other words units draw lots to see who goes next and your initiative is how many lots you get to draw. EZ fix.

PurpleXVI wrote:
Mechanics-wise, it makes sense, because level 10 units of equal equipment to level 1 units will stomp them mercilessly, and it's not exactly hard to keep a few units alive from start to end of game, so without this mechanic, one guy being careful with a single army could steamroll the entire endgame effortlessly. Fluff-wise, the argument could be that as the empire learns more about battle, it has more to instill in its recruits before turning them loose on the battlefield for the first time.

I'd kinda like to see a lesser version of it, tho. Tied to the Barracks technologies that are supposed to start your units with XP. Something like "Any units garrisoned here that are below the age's level gain much more XP per turn."

Adventurer_Blitz wrote:
The thing is though, that you could just equip a unit with a titanium weapon and glassteel armour to get both the initiative bonus (at the cost of life and defense) and the damage bonus. So even if you took away damage points from the weapon, it could easily be replaced and made up for by a titanium weapon and glassteel armour.And if the units equipped with these concentrated fire, they could defeat an opposing force with minimal casualties as the only negative bonus they would have is to health and defense.

You could tack on more damage or health bonuses to items that don't have +initiative, or significantly reduce the other bonuses currently given by +initiative items, or reduce the +initiative bonus from non-weapons. Health is a big counter to initiative, since if you don't kill fast, you die fast.

The thing is though, that you could just equip a unit with a titanium weapon and glassteel armour to get both the initiative bonus (at the cost of life and defense) and the damage bonus. So even if you took away damage points from the weapon, it could easily be replaced and made up for by a titanium weapon and glassteel armour.And if the units equipped with these concentrated fire, they could defeat an opposing force with minimal casualties as the only negative bonus they would have is to health and defense.

The items will be balanced if the attack/damage values of +initiative items were just significantly reduced, so you'd have a real choice between moving first and hitting hard. It's just a question of balance, not totally changing game mechanics like some people are suggesting.

What would people think about changing the initiative bonuses gained from equipment to a roll modifier instead of a flat value then giving each unit an initiative roll at the start of each round? (eg- unit's base value + equipment bonuses + 1 D20 roll = unit's initiative this round.) This would tone down the advantage of having higher initiative bonuses from equipment and also add a bit more spice to battles. I chose 1 D20 arbitrarily, but the weight the roll has in determining which units actually act first could easily be adjusted either or down after testing the idea. Thoughts?

It is the only way to customize units in any shape or fashion - The tech requirements are too high to to warrant a noticeable difference. Balance? To an extent - But you HAVE to feel a noticeable difference or else nobody is going to waste tech points on them. Outside of the factions who fully focus on warfare with only a small difference.

DotBeta wrote:
Get an army of demons, stack them in titanium armor and watch that crit bonus to go town.

Slight correction to this. It should read:



"Get an army of demons, stack them in titanium armor and watch them die before they get to attack..."



Also, the Glassteel weapons are the biggest issue, not the armor. As I mentioned previously, armor choice is more of a personal preference because they are actually balanced pretty decently against each other.

The combat system doesn't suck, initiative is not king and if you think glassteel is OP then you haven't been playing since the EA when it was god tier and made titanium obsolete. Much has been done to titanium to make it a viable choice for armors etc.. Also these are the starting strategic resources we're talking about, you should be upgrading your units to the better resources once they become available to you.



Get an army of demons, stack them in titanium armor and watch that crit bonus to go town.

While the combat system certainly doesn't suck, there are some inherent problems with it (as there are in any game). In this case, the OP and others here are correct that initiative is simply too important to ever give up. Can you win battles without having initiative? Of course you can, that's not the right question. Better question is, can you loose battles once you're whole squad is going first? So far, I've yet to figure out how...



Case in point, a very simple example that takes zero effort or intelligence. Wild Walkers, full squad of ranged units with a ranged hero. With Glassteel, it is extremely easy to insure they are all shooting first. You'll kill off half of whatever it is you're fighting from 5 hexes away before they even get to act, without taking damage. And it's not just ranged being OP either. As has already been mentioned, going first and forcing counter attacks (instead of the enemy moving and attacking as they planned) is a massive advantage as well. The game got really boring, really fast, because I literally never took damage. The best combat (read: the most fun combat) I had in that play through was with a privateer army of mercs that had crap initiative(I couldn't mod their gear to give them Glassteel...), and forced me to actually pay a little attention to what I was doing. You know, actually experience some of the tactics involved in the combat!

And for anyone that says glassteel is balanced because it does less damage...



Titanium Tier 2 Bow:

+43 attack

+30 damage



Glassteel Tier 2 Bow:

+21 attack

+32 damage

+24 initiative



The same holds true for pretty much all weapons. Check for yourself, Glassteel actually has slightly higher damage stat then Titanium. And considering the OP's main topic is Glassteel being overpowered, I've gotta say that's spot on when it comes to weapons. Armor is a bit different because there are different stats (health, defense, attack, init, etc) being modified depending on the slot/material. But when it comes to weapons, there's simply no comparison when one lets you kill things before getting hit and the other...doesn't.

I don't think glassteel is the problem. I think initiative is the problem. Some unit composition just become basically invincible if they have the initiate advantage. A good example of this is an army made of pure Dust Bishops who can go first everytime. I feel all units should be balanced around their initiative and this initiative should not be a modifiable variable. Its way to hard to balance things otherwise.