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The Kingmaker

AlexanderPrimus
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Feb 23, 2008
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We know there are special affinities that grant you spider, nightmare, or unicorn mounts.

What other mounts would you like to see?

Some ideas:
*Pegasi (winged horses)
*Drakes or Wyverns (small flying dragons)
*Gryphons
*Giant Scorpions
*War Elephants
 
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As I understand naval combat, land units can engage in combat but with a significant penalty.

That being the case, I think it would be great to see a semi-aquatic mount option that provided no (or significantly lesser) bonuses or abilities on land, but removed the combat penalty at sea for the mounted units.

Off the top of my head, some creatures that might be good options for this: hydras, saltwater crocodiles, giant salamanders, giant frogs, or hippos.
 
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We know there are special affinities that grant you spider, nightmare, or unicorn mounts.

What other mounts would you like to see?

Some ideas:
*Pegasi (winged horses)
*Drakes or Wyverns (small flying dragons)
*Gryphons
*Giant Scorpions
*War Elephants
It's not special affinities that grant you mounts at the start. Certain form traits grant you stronger starting mounts.

I just hope the mounts granted by the form traits come in more than one color. I'd like my giant spider mount to be black or brown please. Lol
 
I really think mounts should be spun out into their own category. It feels so weird having them taking up a mental trait. Especially since it seems some cultures don't even have conventional cavalry.
 
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It's not special affinities that grant you mounts at the start. Certain form traits grant you stronger starting mounts.

I just hope the mounts granted by the form traits come in more than one color. I'd like my giant spider mount to be black or brown please. Lol
Yes, that’s what I meant. Couldn’t think of the term they used.
 
I really think mounts should be spun out into their own category. It feels so weird having them taking up a mental trait. Especially since it seems some cultures don't even have conventional cavalry.

I think they should be in a separate category, but I would like it to be more of a cultural flavor category and have things other than mounts.

I think it would be diminish their impact if every empire had some kind of super powerful/special mount.

But I would like it if you could instead pick from a number of different cultural specialties (each with several options), e.g. powerful mounts, expert armorers, expert smiths, expert soldiers (fewer troops in one kind of unit formation), expert mages (additional spell option for support units), etc.
 
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I'd like an elephant, mammoth or rhinoceros as an epic hero mount - with maybe some magic variations like a giant stag beetle or giant scarab - all with some sturdy bonuses to armour and health.

Giant moth and giant butterfly for the fey lord Godir.

A giant slug with a blanket over his hump for my toad king to slither around on.
 
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I think they should be in a separate category, but I would like it to be more of a cultural flavor category and have things other than mounts.

I think it would be diminish their impact if every empire had some kind of super powerful/special mount.

But I would like it if you could instead pick from a number of different cultural specialties (each with several options), e.g. powerful mounts, expert armorers, expert smiths, expert soldiers (fewer troops in one kind of unit formation), expert mages (additional spell option for support units), etc.

I said it elsewhere but I personally have thought that their should have been a third category for forms named Environment that contained the environmental adaptions and mounts and affected your starting location. So you are well suited for a particular environment because that is where your form lives or you are well suited to using particular mounts because such creatures are common in your environment. So if you picked Unicorn mounts you would have a start that has stacks with Unicorns in your vicinity which would explain why your people are good at domesticating such creatures. Or if you picked desert preference your start would be in a desert like environment but there is no guarantee that there would be unicorns around. Basically your starting environment.
 
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I said it elsewhere but I personally have thought that their should have been a third category for forms named Environment that contained the environmental adaptions and mounts and affected your starting location. So you are well suited for a particular environment because that is where your form lives or you are well suited to using particular mounts because such creatures are common in your environment. So if you picked Unicorn mounts you would have a start that has stacks with Unicorns in your vicinity which would explain why your people are good at domesticating such creatures. Or if you picked desert preference your start would be in a desert like environment but there is no guarantee that there would be unicorns around. Basically your starting environment.
I am on the fence with this suggestion.

I think it introduces another problem. If we take mounts out of body traits and environmental adaptations out of mind traits and consolidate them in a third category - I'm with you that far - but in this case we could never have - for example - spider mounts and an underground start, or unicorns and an arctic start.

I think that this option also has more balance problems. For example - if we have the Body trait that offers +10hp to all our units and we stack it with a mount that offers +10hp - then we have +20hp on all mounted units. That is a very large bonus. How do we balance that? We might make them mutually exclusive, but that calls into question whether having +2 damage resistance is equivalent to +10hp and therefore should also be excluded if you choose a mount.

Then if we think we should remove the +10hp from the special mounts - do they then lose value compared to an environmental adaptation? Yes.

I'm just not sure that it offers a better balance - but I do think that both special mounts and environmental adaptations simply do not fit with the idea of 'body' and 'mind' traits. I don't want them removed from our list of options, but they are screaming for other categories by definition.

I like what you're saying, I do, but I've some questions in my mind about the best solution for these traits. They aren't like the others in their lists and I do want to be able to pick both at the same time. I do like the idea that it costs you something if you want the economic advantage of an economic and strategic advantage in a particular biome. I do like the idea that it costs something to have specialist mounts.

I'm not convinced a third category really helps us except that we get another way of making our form selection more nuanced and interesting - and on that point alone I want a third category - but I'm just not sure mounts and environmental adaptations are a balanced set of categories to lump together anymore than body traits and mounts, or mind traits and environmental adaptations.
 
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@Sollis

Lots of good points there. Yeah not being able to select 'both' aspects of what I dubbed Environment would be quite sad for those who want both. In my 'Ideal' system there would be no categories and just a simple point pool. Like you get 4 points and all our current traits cost 2 or something like that. It could also be 2 points and current costing 1, but I like that 4 and 2 would give room for introducing more powerful and less powerful traits. So no categories you just pick and match as you want. But I can also admit balance isn't my biggest focus. I am mostly a single player person and in general I am perfectly fine with games having weaker and stronger combos, Fun being more important than balance for me.

So the Third Category was just me trying to work with the system shown while making it make more sense to me(Plus like you I would like Form to have more options available in general). As you put it they feel kinda weird in their current categories, not unexplainable, but they are kind of the odd ducklings. I recall someone else suggesting that both should be in their own categories basically giving us four trait categories. Which would be an even bigger power boost and balancing challenge than the 'Environment' Category idea. Though they could go Planetfall route and give X number of points with the options of choosing nothing in a given category, thus you don't get 1 from each category keeping power inflation down. So in that case you would have mind, body, environmental adaptation, and special mount as categories. You could choose 'No Environmental Adaptation' and 'No Mind' and pick Spider mounts and +2 defense or something. Still would have the issue of potential balance problems due to powerful combos that the current trait settings weren't designed to take into account, but that system would let you choose both Underground and Spider Mounts and wouldn't inflate power by just up and giving an extra trait. Unlike my 3rd trait suggestion.
 
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@Sollis

In my 'Ideal' system there would be no categories and just a simple point pool. Like you get 4 points and all our current traits cost 2 or something like that. It could also be 2 points and current costing 1, but I like that 4 and 2 would give room for introducing more powerful and less powerful traits. So no categories you just pick and match as you want. But I can also admit balance isn't my biggest focus. I am mostly a single player person and in general I am perfectly fine with games having weaker and stronger combos, Fun being more important than balance for me.
Stellaris is a similar system and the problem I have with that is it removes some of the interesting choices. Something similar to planetfall would be better, as you can’t choose certain combinations.

I think I’d need to play a few games before deciding however. Having only two categories might make the choices and combos more interesting.

like, should my dark elves have spider mounts or overwhelm tactics? Or whatever fells right.
 
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