PRI#1: Orc tower spam - is it op? IMPLEMENTED

[Stratego (dev)]

i have received these reports

Just play orcs and spam towers

This is the 50th match where orc towers were unstoppable.
Before undead nerf on fel dragon and warden I still lost 99% of the time to tower spam.
Now that warden shoots once and dragons take 30 turns to make 1 Because embassy tech and 10 turns to train. By the time I get 1 dragon enemy has 25 towers

Towers need nerf and cap limit.
Because no cap all races with bad towers lose vs tower races
Elves have no tower. Makes them useless in competitive games.
Undead towers are useless and no range or damage and golem either dies or disappear before useful.
Undead have raise dead skill, but raise units come with their turn ended. They die before I ever get to use them. I raise 10 corpses, and towers kill them all and my necros and liches by the very next turn.

Honestly it takes the fun away. If there was a 10 tower limit than it wouldn't be so bad. But with no limit all orcs just make 100 towers and then train mages+giants almost unbeatable

my first answer was that i dont think you can win with only towers, if you lose all other factory and TC you are doomed.
but maybe i am wrong so please forumers tell me your thoughts.

so , please everyone:
Q1: is he right?
Q2: if so please suggest quick change that we can make against this.

remark: @makazuwr32 i know you will mention the building rework - but we need here some easier solution too (if he is right).

thanks!

daniel

[Anchar]

I haven’t played against Orcs for a long time, but before, Orc defenses (in the form of volcanoes for 9 range of fire damage over an area, magic fire shot and high durability) were indestructible, as they greatly complemented other super-strong units and mechanics of Orcs. If all the characteristics remain the same as when I wrote topics about this on the balancing forum (9 ranges, etc.), then in the late game on large maps this gives an impressive advantage. The question is whether the orc will have time to study and implement them before they crush him, if he has time, then this must be changed, since this is an atomic bomb.

I think they should lower the max ranges to 8-7 and also remove the magic fire shot ability if it hasn't already been done.

[Anchar]

It's also part of the weakness of the undead that they don't have something long-range and siege that could destroy towers without casualties, or at least be reasonably guaranteed effective, because the same picture will be in the battle of the undead with the human and dwarves.

[Bfkninja]

This is my complaint.
I try and attach photo but file to large.
Because there is no cap on tower, many players focus building tower and tower tech first. Early game it is very hard almost impossible to rush orc with only a couple towers. Because early game units weak without upgrades.
This problem only gets worse late game.
Yes orc tower has 9 range. With fire damage. And AOE trample. It also get bonus against many different units, including building.
If enemy orc makes tower tech building first. And then focuses building many towers while making troll or giant building and only doing tech.
Makes orc almost unbeatable on large map and very very hard even on small map because tower high range and high damage even early.
Because no cap on tower limit, when you send your forces at orc even early game they may have many tower to defend, while also spawn units.
Undead need bone building, skeletal monster tech 9turn, before can make 1 single skeletal warden (4 turn unit) by this time orc have many tower. And tower range better and damage higher and HP very high.
This is not only problem for undead but other races as well.

[Bfkninja]

My suggestion for easy fix is to create limit on tower cap.
Orc tower is strongest. But human have strong tower as well and the same strategy can be used by human to spam tower.
Lizard also I have seen use this strategy of make 20 towers at base.
Compared to undead or elf who have little to no tower it is very hard to attack and because no tower(undead tower no good), have no option of defense.
I think the tower of orc need nerf on range and damage, and all races should have cap for support building (including undead grave and fountain which are not very good)
Either that or all mele units need extra defense against tower damage.

[Stratego (dev)]

My suggestion for easy fix is to create limit on tower cap.

actually that is not an easy fix - nerfing them or making them harder to access is easier.

[Bfkninja]

Ok maybe not easy fix for programming but best fix for balance.
If nerf damage and range and hp players will have to use more strategy. But will still when possible build many many towers without limit.
Remove range and nerf HP may help but even at 6 range the towers would still be very strong strategy to focus.
Because towers slow advance of attack it buys time to spawn large units. So assaults fail often.
Hard for races with little defense options. Elf defend ok because of quick archer spam. But in late game elf and undead have very low defense against powerful units like ettin and sabercore/blimp. Or imperial and full upgrade human

[Jerryqian39]

The biggest problem I found enttin nside the tower that stop any mellee unit from approaching it or kill the ettin.Player are forced to deal with the tower with ranged unit which have a range of +9.But those seige unit can be easily destroyed with a wagon combo.This will result the work defence to be very tough and can only be chipped away The only race can win against ork in late game is dwarf so for rest of he race that could just wait till work get super strong.To fix this i think giant should not be grassion in frontified building.

[makazuwr32]

Nerfing orcish defences is in plans for buildings update.

What nerfs volcano and stone shelter will get:
Current range techs:
2 of them will increase range of attack and 2 attack and spell power. Costs will be updated.
Also will be added aoe tech.
Volcano:
1. Range 5-7 for attack and 6-8 for bullet
2. Removed default aoe from volcano.
3. Nerfed a bit aoe (less percentage of attack will be done to secondary targets, part of overall aoe nerfs for orcs).
4. MUCH HIGHER construction cost (but thta is universal for all current 2x3 megas nerf).
Stone shelter:
1. Range 4-6 for attack and 5-7 for ability.
2. Removed default aoe from stone shelter; nerfed a bit aoe that is obtained from tech.
3. Much higher construction cost.

In return these 2 buildings will also get buffs as well.
Stone shelter will be only tower where you can hide giants (stone piles will not be able to). It also will get much higher health, another melee range aoe ability (researchable), another passive aura (researchable, unified for all defensive buildings, will have several tiers), and total attack sliiightly better than current one.

Will not spoil volcano buffs here.

Another planned change is to rebalance anti-building non-siege units, anti-building siege melee units and anti-building ranged units vs all buildings and vs non-building targets.
Siege will get some usage aside from demolition of enemy base.
Also all races will have some ranged siege who can outrange most towers or megas of all races (but not all though — great tree will be hard to outrange with undeads or scalefolks).
This part if in short "if you see enemy is towering — use actual siege units".

[Stratego (dev)]

ok, please suggest for now ("before buildings rewamp")

eg this is doable if u think:
1. Range 5-7 for attack and 6-8 for bullet
2. Removing default aoe from volcano.
3. Added volcano aoe tech - volcano AOE Nerfed a bit (half percentage of attack to secondary targets)
4. consrtuction cost: increasing to about 1.5 time
5. Stone shelter to be only tower where you can hide giants (stone piles will not be able to)

is it ok to set? or needs more?

[makazuwr32]

About buildings update in general:
We need to finish working on salamanders for scalefolks since these guys will have one of 2 basic ranged siege units of scalefolks and prepare naval fleet for dwarves.

After that we will work on buildings update.

[Stratego (dev)]

i wrote a change suggestion for now in my prev. post.
(we can never expext to wait for the buildings overhaul when we have balance issue - as buildings rework can take 1 year to be there )

[TwiztidOne]

100% orc tower spam is out of control...
The best solution is to have a tower cap at half the building cap. That's the best solution because it solves it also being an issue with humans and lizards and dwarfs. But short of that because that takes a long time and understandable that a short term remedy might be needed in the interim I'd suggest a slight nerf may be good but in all honesty really jacking up the build turns required would solve the issue. Want a tower well it's not 6 turns its 20... this will make them less desirable to spam because it won't be a worthwhile strategy any more for early game impenetrableness... but still a viable solution later in the game when you may have time to do so but by that point your enemy should also have a viable means of still fighting back by the time you could start making a mass amount of tower spam if you so chose to do so. Other option would be severely nerfing them and giving them a few diff options of crappy towers like the three turn human tower. And the Dwarven 3 towers. Make the current towers like elven outposts. No shots just safe havens for troops. Or by god... at least take away the aoe and the burn...

[makazuwr32]

ok, please suggest for now ("before buildings rewamp")

eg this is doable if u think:
1. Range 5-7 for attack and 6-8 for bullet
2. Removing default aoe from volcano.
3. Added volcano aoe tech - volcano AOE Nerfed a bit (half percentage of attack to secondary targets)
4. consrtuction cost: increasing to about 1.5 time
5. Stone shelter to be only tower where you can hide giants (stone piles will not be able to)

is it ok to set? or needs more?

Ugh. I hate changing stats when we already are bound to change them again later.

1. This one requires revamp of techs so just changing range of towers might only make things worse when you siege overtowered orcs. Alas we can change basic range for tower down to 4.
2. This one i actually agree to be done now for both volcano and stone shelter tower.
3. Not right now because of point 1.
4. ×1.5 cost will not make them less op. Especially because we anyway will nees to drastically increase its cost later (about ×3-7 times in total i think).
5. Yes this is fine to change now.

[makazuwr32]

i wrote a change suggestion for now in my prev. post.
(we can never expext to wait for the buildings overhaul when we have balance issue - as buildings rework can take 1 year to be there )

Not anymore. I am pretty sure we will start it up until end of summer.

[makazuwr32]

100% orc tower spam is out of control...
The best solution is to have a tower cap at half the building cap. That's the best solution because it solves it also being an issue with humans and lizards and dwarfs. But short of that because that takes a long time and understandable that a short term remedy might be needed in the interim I'd suggest a slight nerf may be good but in all honesty really jacking up the build turns required would solve the issue. Want a tower well it's not 6 turns its 20... this will make them less desirable to spam because it won't be a worthwhile strategy any more for early game impenetrableness... but still a viable solution later in the game when you may have time to do so but by that point your enemy should also have a viable means of still fighting back by the time you could start making a mass amount of tower spam if you so chose to do so. Other option would be severely nerfing them and giving them a few diff options of crappy towers like the three turn human tower. And the Dwarven 3 towers. Make the current towers like elven outposts. No shots just safe havens for troops. Or by god... at least take away the aoe and the burn...

No tower cap is planned to be added in aof. And even if it will be added it will not be used for 99.99% of towers anyway.
Tower spam will still be a thing but it will cost ya since costly towers will require lots and lots and lots of recourses, time and manpower to construct while cheap towers will be destroyable by normal infantries and some anti-building cavalry (unique to few races).
It will ruin balance for other races who rely onto towers much more — elves and wolf dens, undeads with their towers, humans.

[Stratego (dev)]

Ugh. I hate changing stats when we already are bound to change them again later.

this is alwways a MUST to change, we talked it many times - we need to have balance ALWAYS so if there is any known problem than we need a quick fix in 1-2 days.

Not anymore. I am pretty sure we will start it up until end of summer.

as i wrote we need to fix these in 1-2 days - not in many months so again: we never should wait for ANY overhaul/rework, those are more time costy things always.

also dont forget: WE MUST NOT start buildings rework until we have ALL races out of UC (scaleds and dwarves) - so i think for 2022 it is not possible to start any buildings change.

[Stratego (dev)]

ok so based on your your reply: here is the promposed change:

1. Range 4 for attack and 6 for bullet
2. Removing default aoe from volcano and stone shelter
3. -
4. consrtuction cost: increasing to about x3
5. Stone shelter to be only tower where you can hide giants (stone piles will not be able to)

is it sok to set?
or anything else?

[makazuwr32]

Actually both races will get out of uc pretty soon.
Dwarves need casters (already worked on) and naval fleet (may be postponed after buildings update).

Scalefolks need salamanders (worked on), naval fleet and some final balance which we will find some time later in process.

They both are close to be ready to get out of uc.

[Stratego (dev)]

naval fleet (may be postponed after buildings update).

actualyl we need naval BEFORE buildings rework, UC can only be removed if they in all fields(ground, water, air) are balanced to other races.

They both are close to be ready to get out of uc.

good, but until they are not we can not thing about any revork of buildings.

[Stratego (dev)]

i wrote a modified proposal for the topic in my prev post - please check - thanks!

[makazuwr32]

ok so based on your your reply: here is the promposed change:

1. Range 4 for attack and 6 for bullet
2. Removing default aoe from volcano and stone shelter
3. -
4. consrtuction cost: increasing to about x3
5. Stone shelter to be only tower where you can hide giants (stone piles will not be able to)

is it sok to set?
or anything else?

1. Range 6 for Magmatic bullet will result in whooping range 10 for it when maxed which will make things only worse. Range 4 for both.
4. DO NOT TOUCH CONSTRUCTION COST NOW.

Points 1,2,5 will be enough for now.
Additionally you can remove from tier 1 and 3 techs which affect volcano and stone shelter attack and spell range increase.

[makazuwr32]

naval fleet (may be postponed after buildings update).

actualyl we need naval BEFORE buildings rework, UC can only be removed if they in all fields(ground, water, air) are balanced to other races.

They both are close to be ready to get out of uc.

good, but until they are not we can not thing about any revork of buildings.

Problem here is with work on scalefolks since we do not have proper idea for their naval fleet.
Dwarves also have problems with images for their fleet.
Also naval itself actually is not balanced properly right now.

I am planning to work on rebalancing naval battles some time after magic update.

We will add several units for naval fights here and there and also scalefolks will get quite unique concept exclusive to them alone which might partially solve naval problems. But if we will wait up until naval is properly balanced... Well than you can expect magic update only in 2040 year, not earlier.

[Stratego (dev)]

1. Range 4 for attack and 4 or bullet
2. Removing default aoe from volcano and stone shelter
3. -
4. -
5. Stone shelter to be only tower where you can hide giants (stone piles will not be able to)

remove from tier 1 and 3 techs which affect

idk, which are these,
- tell me exact tech names please
- and what u mean "to remove": so they will not "target" the volcano and stone shelter?

------------------
also please dont talk here about rework schedule, that is off topic, but yes i would put reworks behind in prioprity, so total balance is more important - and we HAVE to keep balanceonce we reach it.

[makazuwr32]

I dunno their names, sorry.
But i know that there are 4 tiers of tech which all add +6 attack, +1 range and +1 spell range to volcano and stone shelter.
What do i ask is to remove this "+1 attack and +1 spell range" from tier 1 and 3, not remove volcanoes and stone shelters so techs do mot target them (it is meaningless since these techs affect ONLY these 2 buildings).

As for rework shedule:
They are actually planned to bring up this so wanted balance. And even more we can't properly balance things without these 2 planned reworks — buildings update and magic update.
The longer we will delay those the more we will have work to do during them and the harder it will be for us to balance things during these 2 reworks properly.

Furthermore i must admit that some things i can't allow right now to put in since those will be waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too op. More op than maxed ettin under all possible buffs against wolf spam from elves.
For example planned magic units for undeads, dwarves, scalefolks, orcs, humans, elves. Dwarves specifically. Not until magic update.

[Stratego (dev)]

1. Range 4 for attack and 4 or bullet
2. Removing default aoe from volcano and stone shelter
3. -
4. -
5. Stone shelter to be only tower where you can hide giants (stone piles will not be able to)
6. "+1 attack and +1 spell range" remove from 2 techs (tier 1 and 3) somewhere - i will look which.

is that all?

(here i intentinally not answering about overhauls - off topic)

[makazuwr32]

Specifically for orcs yes.

Side note: it must affect both volcano and stone shelter tower.

[makazuwr32]

Sliiightly off topic but still related to current discussion.

Remembered my discussion with one particular player who wanted to give for poison tower of scalefolks:
1. 100 hp
2. Carry capacity 1 to hide all possible units
3. Keep currect spammability
4. Increase range up to 7-10 tiles (7 base +3 extra via techs "because tower must be able to outrange elven best shooters").

That variant would make those towers even worse than current stone shelters so it was declined.

[Stratego (dev)]

ok! i go make these changes now (unless @Savra wants more )

[TwiztidOne]

I disagree wholeheartedly with the removal of the x3 construction cost change. That needs to be done. That is SOLE best option to reduce the spam. I think it's important and needs to be done. Maybe take it down a bit if it's contested x2 or x2.5 but I think they need to be harder to construct because with the 2 turn worker spam they go up fast and they NEED to be harder to make. At least to slow the early game spam.