H3SW: Creature Balance

Cool to see a response so fast! You might be right about most things, as I've only had limited experience and would definitely need MUCH-MUCH more time to play to figure things out as base growth/abilities go. As you see, I've missed quite a lot and wasn't sure what is intended and what is just a leftover/overlooked for now. Plus, I've not played nearly enough, these are more first feelings, just really wanted to give some feedback.

I'm definitely enjoying the mod a whole lot and the balance is already more than playable, at least in non-competitive environment. Only time and lots of players will help find the gold mean for every single unit, HotA team still makes adjustments to H3...

About dwellings - what do you mean by classic H2 being flaggable? I might not remember it properly, but as far as I remember they were just map objects in H2 with no way to really flag them.

I personally wouldn't mind them being non-flaggable in H3SW, as I feel like it was a bit too powerful in H3, especially for high tier dwellings, like dragons... One such dwelling could seriously screw balance in a competitive match, especially with power difference in tier 7 units. If it just gives units, not affecting growth - that's powerful, but not quite as much.

As for creatures:
Archers - you are right, though they would make a good scouting unit for low level heroes. It just feels thematically appropriate, more than anything. And seeing Rangers side by side with other units really makes you wonder why they are so slow, archers are slower than peasants now, I think... Plus, there were no crossbowmen in H2 to compare them to.

Ther are not underpowered though - that's true. They might be even a bit OP, as they often feel more powerful than crossbowmen. Could it be the range penalty, double-shot, large numbers calculations? Not sure, but it does feel like they deal massive damage when double-shooting, especially in sieges. Maybe I'm wrong.

Champions - not sure, will have to double-test. In most of my runs with Knight they were kinda bad... The jousting did help in a couple of instances, but overall feeling is still very flimsy. Maybe it's supposed to be like this, when compared to Liches/Trolls - these are much flimsier, but they are archers. I didn't consider the growth difference with Unicorn though - this is significant.

Elves - really not sure about this one. Yes, in original H2 they were different tiers with vampires, but this is a bad comparison as most units of the same tier have moved up (minotaurs, rocs, ogres), I don't think that vampires are that much stronger than elves in this case.

It might be just thematic, but elves are supposed to be great archers, yet human Rangers/Marksmen are just as good. It feels for them appropriate to be real high damage glass cannons (which there are none in tier 4), while satyrs can be more numerous and die more easily as tier 3. Neither of these changes is necessary, it just always surprises how much damage can satyrs take and how little damage my elves do. I'm more talking about sprites impressions, rather than actual technical balance.

Skeletons might really use some sort of a buff. Was playing necromancer today and it looks like skeletons are dropping like flies, everything is just killing them left-right and center... I mean, it was happening in H2/H3, but I don't remember it being that fast... After you carefully accumulate a couple of hundred, you lose them in a couple of fights with enemy herpes without them doing any actual damage...

Liches - I always felt that it was more appropriate with liches, when with magogs. It's up to you, guys, of course, it definitely is more relaxing and convenient, but I would probably take extra damage overall + friendly fire over less damage, but no friendly damage to undead. Throw in damage walls - and I'm sold

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Overall, the biggest issue seems to be the missile damage. It completely destroys peasants/goblins/skeletons and wreaks havoc to other units (though some tanks can take it pretty well), and flying units have very hard time reaching enemy lines.

I would probably suggest increasing speed for all flying units by 1-2. I've just had soooo many times where I'm one step short from reaching enemy archer and they just demolish me in one-two turns.

It would be close to H2 huge range flyers, and I don't think it would affect overall speed balance too much as all fastest units are already flyers, but something has to be done about this ranged fire. Right now, having as many archers as possible with 1-2 tank feels like the best strategy, and there should be some punishments for that.

P.S. Ohh, and about Cyclops - I think Behemoth's ability to ignore armor is more than appropriate. With this ability they should be good as is...

Hello, Nikita! It's been a good while since you last appeared on Forums of Enroth or our Russian DF2 forum branch.

I will comment on some of the suggestions you provided to clarify the current state of events a little more.

Nikita wrote:

First of all, if it was intended - a really good idea to remove flagging from creature dwellings, but at the same time to standardize them as H3 dwellings. This kinda combines systems of H2 and H3 in an interesting way, dwellings are useful, but not OP. I'm fine with only 1 week of creatures, no stacking of weeks. Still looks weird on minimap though, as dwellings are kinda flagged, hope this can fixed later on.

The situation is a little bit different. There are classic Heroes 2 dwellings, and there are classic Heroes 3 dwellings. They have different mechanics.

Heroes 3 dwellings work as they always had in vanilla Heroes 3. They are flaggable (and this is a feature we transfered to H3SW) and they are always 2-squared, having one of the squares as an entrance. This is an obligatory rule for all Heroes 3 dwellings which is due to some RMG restrictions. The game will treat other dwellings incorrectly if they are parsed by the RMG.

Heroes 2 dwellings have custom size, custom growth, custom starting amount of creatures, and sometimes even custom mechanics where you have to beat the guards and pay money for creatures otherwise accessible for free. We do not have such mechanics and we are nowhere close to implement those mechanics, because they are not used in RMG for the abovementioned reasons, and thus they are not prioritized. For flavor maps, however, I'd like to have these mechanics eventually, because the maps were designed for that kind of dwellings, and for example, "Dragon Rider" map conversion is easier because you can sit on an island collecting lots of creatures from a village in the center of the map, and at the same time players on maps will be forced to send heroes for creature collection since this would be a more beneficial strategy than actually playing the game further, exploring and fighting. In Heroes 3 HotA, the creature accumulation in dwellings was done for a reason.

Currently, the former Heroes 2 dwellings are technically "flaggable" because they utilize exact same mechanics as Heroes 3 dwellings. This will change when we find a way to implement Heroes 2 custom mechanics for those. Some of the dwellings, however, might never be changed, because they fit to Heroes 3 rules, like the Medusa's Ruins (2-squared). The Dragon City also has changed its mechanics to Dragon Utopia for all of the maps including flavor maps, because of obvious reasons.

Nikita wrote:

Necromancer
Really tooough start, even worse than it was in H2 due to Vampires having lower range in flight. If you are surrounded by shooters - good luck! Laughing Not sure if this can be fixed in any way. As you gain momentum, you do get pretty strong, it's just these first few days which can be very challenging.

The tough start of the Necromancer is caused by the necessity of magic system revamp. We see Necromancer as a faction oriented on constant losses and recovers, somewhat close to what it was for H2 Necromancer (that's why, only 1 shooter). Indeed the Skeletons are currently weaker than they should be, so this will be changed. However, one major aspect which is missing is the magic with which the Necromancer should start. This will be implemented via changing the accessibility of spells for the Necromancer. This class should use offensive magic and casts like Haste (especially Roxana with her enhanced Zombies and starting Tactics skill) to deal with nasty shooters. Our plans for factions were briefly expressed in a recent thread of similar topic.

Nikita wrote:

Liches should deal damage to undead though... Think it will be added later, for now it's functioning as H3, and I think that H2 liches are more akin to artillery, killing everyone. I think this works for them better than for Magogs. (I would also think about making them artillery to damage walls like Cyclops in H3, they probably have the damage for that)

The Liches, however, do not need any changes like that. They are already somewhat expendable, always suffering from the Arrow Towers and being the only shooter for the castle. Making them even less useful would not be a great idea. In Heroes 2, their upgrade also had a nice speed advantage which is important for a spellcaster. I would give them an ability to shoot at terrain, like it is done for Magogs in HotA. This will improve their potential and usefulness in combat.

Nikita wrote:

Harpies - their sprite is pretty, but it's a bit too pretty. They look more beautiful than pixies (aka Sprites), they don't really look like they fit the game as they are a bit too perfect in their wings and faces, and the animation is quite stiff. Their strategic use is also limited - they die rather quickly, they cannot block archers on hit as they return, but they still get retaliation.

Having Harpies attack with retaliation was a moment of principle, because Barbarian always attacks first and always loses some of the troops if the defendant is still alive to retaliate. This is also done to harden the Barbarian's life in sieges, or he would be simply able to clean all shooters behind the walls easy enough. It's just not his style of combat. Having an ability for Harpies to change their attack style so they can not return when they want is a nice feature though.

Hi SW Team,

Sorry for my English. I would like to discuss such insidious creature as Vampire Lord and respectively corresponding balance problem.

In original game (H2, H3) VL have adequate AI value which corresponds its real power. However as all probably know there is "exploit" - VL fly to one of two right corners and there VL grind all enemies. Exploit based on the fact of VL regeneration.

Possible solutions ("exploit fix"), which I see:
1) reduce by half regeneration HP of VL attack
2) change division into units of wandering monsters which are attacked by Hero with VL (reduce number of units - only for this special case) as I have made in my mod for H3

It seems building upgrade cost realised in SW (15 gems, 15 crystal) is very enormous. IMHO, it should not be comparable with building upgrade of 7th level creature.

Hi Ben80 and welcome to the forum

Currently Vampire Lords spawning on the adv. should be balanced both in terms of stack size and AI value. Thus, neutral VL should be balanced at the moment. Special abilities like the Life Drain is of course taken into account for the VL as for all other creatures with abilities.

Though, in town VL gives about +25% more power compared to other lvl 4 units, which is unwanted. This will be changed in the next version. I personally agree that 15 gems and crystals is too much for the upgraded dwelling, hopefully we will agree on a new building cost for the next version.

To be more illustrative and concrete:

Some time ago I have experimented in H3 with VL against wandering creatures.
It was so (if I remember numbers properly):


Hero (1 lvl) with 16 VL attacks 18 Cavaliers. Cavaliers are divided to 7 stacks
by 2-3 Cavalier. 16 VL wins ))

After that I have applied my patch, Cavaliers were divided to 5 stacks (by 3-4)
- and Cavaliers wins (thank to God ))

Of course I have played for Hero with VL, and AI have played for Cavaliers.

I have read Orzie's interview where he have mention that VL regeneration was reduced by half.

After that I have realised that it is already done in SW
(I have tested SW a bit but did not see all game aspects)

Thanks for exellent mod !

I will write my idea again, because I would like the devs to consider it and let me know what about this idea is wrong.
The idea is to give citadel and castle make growth +1 and +2 instead of doubling respectively
pluses:
+ reminds of heroes 2 "well"
+ makes base growths of lesser units less strong
+ makes creature buildings more important and their price worth itself
minuses:
+ makes the differences between 7th level units more imbalanced, so there would be
3 minimum or 4 in full built castles, but i think it's kinda cool, because everything has its price. and the building last dwelling would be more exciting.

Also I think the balance order should be like heroes 2 probably was
1/ creature price
2/ stats
3/ building price
4/ building tree

also it would be nice if genies had the ability of hota' enchanters or genies from heroes 3 and cool if you had discord

Alright, I think this might be the third time (1, 2) you bring up this idea, so I hope I can answer it sufficiently this time around

It can actually be shown quite easily, why this will disrupt the balance of the game, please take a look at the box below:


Here we have the base growth of both the Knight and the Warlock. The base growth is calculated as the power of each unit (level 1-7) multiplied with its base growth. Power translates into gold cost, so the paladin has a power of 1099 (which makes him cost 1100 gold). If a creature has an upgrade, then the average cost of the non-upgraded and upgraded creature is used.

As you can see the Warlock is capable of recruit worth 12,5% more “power” than the knight in this situation. If we apply your idea, it is clear to see what effect it would have on the balance of between the two. The Warlock benefits much more from this system than the Knight, which makes great sense as the Warlocks units individually are much stronger than those of the Knight (Black Dragon vs. Crusader to give an example). If using the H3 standard system of percentage-based growth, the difference between the Knight and Warlock are kept as it doesn’t favor strong individual units like the Warlock’s.

You can argue that the Knight then just needs a buff in the base growth (no well/castle) to make up for him falling behind when the +2 bonus is reached, but that creates even more extreme factions where they either completely dominates the early game (Knight) or takes over the late game (Warlock). Having a fully built town being about 4 times stronger compared the other factions than now (49,83%/12,54% = 3,97) is not beneficial at all. The percentage-based system allows for more variation between faction as the Knight isn't punished by this system as he was in H2. It is actually a very fitting system that allows for factions with high growth, but weak creatures as well as factions with low growth, but strong creatures. I hope this makes sense to you

I know this statistic, but this applies to lategame. Knight will never be as strong as warlock for sure. I checked base growth of dervish castle units' hp and it came out nomads have 150 total health (and bandits have 40) which is more than medusas/anubites or manticores (by a little) and genies have 180 for their base. if you just double it with castle, it comes out weaker units are stronger and buying buldings is not that rewarding as it was in heroes 2. In h3 it worked as the higher level units were much more different than in h2 (hp for example, 300 for 7th level or 100 for 6th, high att and def)

castle could give +2 and let balance units another way especially with cost and buildings

or another way, if general strenght of lategame castles is more important, try to balance weekly growth of neutral monsters (adventure map creatures) as much as you can cause weekly growth of current doubling castle is too high in comparison to neutrals.

YhyJasne wrote:

I know this statistic, but this applies to lategame. Knight will never be as strong as warlock for sure.

But the well clearly makes it an unavoidable problem. How can you defend the well giving the Warlock +50% power than the Knight?

YhyJasne wrote:

I checked base growth of dervish castle units' hp and it came out nomads have 150 total health (and bandits have 40) which is more than medusas/anubites or manticores (by a little) and genies have 180 for their base. if you just double it with castle, it comes out weaker units are stronger and buying buldings is not that rewarding as it was in heroes 2. In h3 it worked as the higher level units were much more different than in h2 (hp for example, 300 for 7th level or 100 for 6th, high att and def)

First of all, let's look on all the factions and not just dervish. Dervish will naturally fit into your argument as it has some really offensive creatures (Rogue/Bandit, Acolyte and Genie) which have high damage, but low health. I find it more appropriate to look on all classes and compare it to how it looks in H3:

Health of base growth fore each unit in H3:


Health of base growth fore each unit in H3SW:


As you see the health increases from 1st to 3rd level of units in H3, but then it is rather similar for levels 3-5. 6th and 7th level have then high health again. This health distribution is (naturally) not evenly distributed between all factions as some creatures are meant as "tanks" or highly defensive units and others are more aggressive oriented, just look on monks/zealots vs. griffins/royal griffins.

The health increase between creature levels in H3SW looks rather similar to that of H3, but with some differences. Clearly 1st level units contribute less to the overall health pool and level 7 bring even a larger health contribution than in H3. Levels 2-6 seem to be pretty close to each other and no large increase can be seen. You might think this is a problem, but I think it is because many of the level 6 creatures in H3SW are attack oriented (cavalry, mage, lich, troll) compared to a lot of tanky units in level 5 (swordsman, death knight, ogres). This bring me to my second point.

It doesn't make sense only to compare units by their health stat. Ranged units relay much on attack, and other units have incredible speed that allows them to receive the first turn and move across the battlefield, not to mention special abilities. If only health was important, then according to the table about H3SW above, no one would ever bother to go for bone dragons as zombies give the same weekly health amount.

I wouldn't go for bone dragons. it's just speed. Teleport zombies into ranged and you are good to go. Something is wrong clearly with this hp I just don't see what

Well, you can always make green tower cost 20k and cathedral or altar of wishes 5000 or whatever is adequate

YhyJasne wrote:

Well, you can always make green tower cost 20k and cathedral or altar of wishes 5000 or whatever is adequate

Yes, of course. It is very natural that, the stronger the unit is, the more expensive it is to build its dwelling. Just look as the Vampire Lord dwelling at the moment (it might even be too expensive). But Cathedral and Altar of Wishes are already a lot cheaper than Green Tower.

Btw. if you would want to read someone else's thought on our creature balance then check out what Ctesiphon had to say. His views are almost the straight opposite of yours, but maybe you could find some of his thoughts interesting.

I actually became aware of a potential issue because of you. The power gap from 2-6 level creatures seems to be a bit too small at the moment, and I would like to bring especially 6th level creatures up a notch.

Proposal for creature balance in next version of H3SW


The work on balancing creatures in H3SW continues. I have looked carefully at the stats and feedback received to make adjustments. Currently, the creatures are relatively well balanced. Only a few major points are deemed out of balance and a lot of minor tweaks is made to giving weak classes a helping hand. Though some of creature balance comes down to math and stats, some design is also needed from time to time and this relies on opinion. Thus, I have made the following discussion point which I would like to hear feed back on.

Discussion points:

• Iron and Steel Golem speed, should it be 3/4 or 4/5?
I am in doubt about the speed of Iron and Steel Golem. They have been moved up to being 4th level creatures which may point to them having increased speed of 4/5, which would also make them more viable to bring along the hero. On the other hand, I believe they are closer to their roots in H2 with the minimum speed of 3/4.
• Death Knight speed and design
Currently Death Knight is way too strong. I believe he would receive the title as “most OP” unit in the game. I have formed my proposal in the changelog, but generally I would like him to be a strong tanky unit with speed 5 (lower speed to put stats in damage and health). He would fit nicely between flying (faster) vampire and liches and flying (fast) bone dragons. I know that the other necro creatures from level 1-3 are also considered slow melee walkers, but the Death Knight would be the “superior” walking force of the Necromancer, which I think would suit him nicely.
• Wasp speed
I currently put the Wasp speed at 8 (from 9), but I am unsure which speed would be suitable. What do you think?
• Larger gap between level 4, 5 and 6
I have tried to make the difference between later creature levels larger, as they were quite close to each other, especially level 4 and 5. What is your impression and opinion on this?

Changelog and comments:

Knight: The Knight really needed to receive a buff since he lacked behind badly in the early game. This has been fixed by buffing Peasants, Archer/Rangers and Pikemen/V. Pikemen. Peasants hopefully become a more valid creature with increased health, to make them stay in the fight longer. Archers and Rangers will benefit from improved damage to help the Knight out in the early game against neutral stacks. They also received a growth increase along with the Pikemen which makes them produce the same power as other creatures on their level. Crossbowmen and Marksmen got a slight buff and got their price corrected as it was too low before. Swordsmen and Master Swordsmen received a decrease in speed. Paladin and Crusader received a buff to their damage to further compete with other level 7 units. They should very well be among the top damage dealers with their strike twice ability and a base growth of 2.

Knight changes:

Sorceress: Mostly nerfed on certain low-mid level creatures to stay along the levels of other towns. Sprites have been changed to be more aggressive and less numbered. Now they have the same growth as other classic H2 level 1 units aside from the goblin and peasant. Also, now the Sorceress’ bless spell is useful for sprites. Elves were too strong and had their stats decreased a bit while also lowering their growth. Satyr got changed a bit receiving mostly nerfs, but a small damage boost. I decided to change Druids back to a state closer to H2 with them having a growth of 3 instead of the previous 4. To compensate for this the Druid and Greater Druid got buffed in health and damage to be about as strong as before.

Sorceress changes:

Wizard: Halflings and Gnomes brought too much power their level considered and thus received a decrease in growth and a slight buff for the Gnome. I decided to decrease the Golems speed to have it closer to its H2 variant, but I am open for discussing this as stated in the discussion point above. The Roc was also too strong and received several nerfs. I heard some people found Mages too weak and it seemed to be true, and thus I buffed them slightly.

Wizard changes:

Necromancer: Skeletons received a damage boost, which will help the Necromancer out in the early game. There is currently no sign of Necromancy being too strong, so this change shouldn’t be changing that. Zombies will be receiving nerfs as they were a bit too tanky before, which was unwanted. They are still very strong and serves excellently as guarding force. Vampires will be receiving nerfs as they were too strong before, but now they should be in a more balanced position. The same can be said for the Death Knight which was way too strong on all parameters. I am open to discuss this creature and especially the speed stat. He has received a major decrease to all stats making him as strong as other level 5 units. I would personally like this creature to be a strong, but a bit slow creature, serving as high level melee fighter which I believe would fit the Necromancer well. As with the Mages, the Liches also received a buff in stats, which was needed compared to other level 6 units.

Necromancer changes:

Warlock: The Warlock has got some nerfs to his early game to compensate for the strong late game Dragons. Gargoyles and Griffins were nerfed, and some other units have got slight nerfs. This might look as it cripples the Warlock, but most of the units are still bringing about the same power as other creatures on their level.

Warlock changes:

Barbarian: Mostly small changes. More damage for Harpies, less damage for Ogres and Ogre Lords, less health for both Trolls, but more damage for War Trolls. The Cyclops was bringing too much power before and thus he got a considerable decreased in health, but an increase to his damage to match him with other level 7 units with a growth of 2 per week. I know this can seem drastic, but I am open for discussion on this topic.

Barbarian changes:

Witch: Again, smaller changes for most creatures. I am open for discussing the wasp and other creatures. Mantis needed a buff to keep up with other level 5 units, but had its speed lowered to be different from that of the Toad. Wyvern seemed a bit too strong and was nerfed accordingly and was attempted to be designed differently from the Cyclops and the Genie.

Witch changes:

Dervish: Nomads brought too much power, which was also reported by players. The decrease in health and speed was though compensated by higher growth. Medusas got their stats switched around but stay mostly the same. Manticore and Genie brought a little bit too much power and were nerfed slightly. I know there is concern for the health of level 7 creatures, especially the Genie as he is a true glass cannon, but we need to keep his “identity” from H2 while still making sure he doesn’t fall behind. I would like to hear your opinions on this as well.

Dervish changes:

Graphs depicting the changes from v0.8.1 to next version:
This graph shows the cost of one weeks production of creatures levels from all factions. If a creature is upgradable the average cost of the basic and upgraded creature is used. As seen the changes transforms the bars into a stair with little steps between each level representing that the higher level creatures brings more power than lower level ones. The large step from level 6 to level 7 is purely intentional as level 7 creatures should always bring a great deal of power fitting their expensive dwellings and multiple building requirements.


This graph uses the same data as the one above, but it compares the different factions across creature level. Changes have been made to balance out large differences between different factions so that all factions are on-pair and are equally strong across different levels. Again, 7th level creatures are an exception to the rule as these vary greatly among factions, but this is accounted for in dwellings costs and general gameplay.


The graph here shows the percent that a certain level of creature brings compared to the average creature of that level. For instance the Peasant (light blue dot, level 1) used to give only 80% of the average power of level 1 units. Now it has been buffed and is around the 95% of the average level 1 yield. Of course creatures from the same levels across different factions should bring about the same strength and thus the desired look of the lines is about linear. Again, some exceptions are allowed as with level 7 creatures, but the early and mid game have been significantly balanced out.

Wauw, a lot of work here I can answer your questions:
-I feel that golems speed of 3/4 is just right, because even ents on 5th level in H3 have speed of 3/4. I would make gnomes faster instead, they are teleporting so I was expecting them to reach at least 3/4 of a battlefield
-I would keep wasps at 8 speed, thay're simply an equivalnet of serpent flies and are on a level 2 instead of 3.
-There is a very little difference in attack and defence between level 4-7 creatures. I would add 2-3 points for level 5, 4-6 points for level 6 and 2-3 points for level 7. I think that would also be enough to nerf a Death Knights

I am really eager to see your changes in a new version of a mod. During the game I've got overall feeling, that the power of some creatures is just inapropriate and all the castles has very week points or reversely - way too strong. Feels like the range of power of creatures of the same level in heroes 3 was narrower than in H3SW. Step by step we will forge balance for a perfect gampelay

A ton to read!

Iron and Steel Golem speed, should it be 3/4 or 4/5?
closer to H2 ambiance is important , if buff is needed, I guess it can be something other than speed.

All others topics... I did read...and I have no idea.
Congratulations, you did a very important work.

Thanks for your kind words and input, guys

I think I will soon add the changes to the mod for testing.

Edit: I uploaded the newest version of creature stats for testing and applied a slight speed increase to Gnome 9->10 (as suggested by Uhm) and corresponding slight cost increase 225->230 gold. Also, I decided the keep the old cost for Lizardman Warrior which was 225 gold.

Creature balance for H3SW v0.8.2

(This is mostly a revision of my previous post above)
For the release of H3SW a number of changes have been made to balance and that includes creature balance as well. I have looked carefully at the stats and feedback received to make adjustments. In H3SW v0.8.1, the creatures were relatively well balanced. Only a few major points were deemed out of balance and a lot of minor tweaks have been made to give weak classes a helping hand. Though some of creature balance comes down to math and stats, some design is also needed from time to time and this relies on opinion.


Changelog and comments:

Knight: The Knight really needed to receive a buff since he lacked behind badly in the early game. This has been fixed by buffing Peasants, Archer/Rangers and Pikemen/V. Pikemen. Peasants hopefully become a more valid creature with increased health, to make them stay in the fight longer. Archers and Rangers will benefit from improved damage to help the Knight out in the early game against neutral stacks. They also received a growth increase along with the Pikemen which makes them produce the same power as other creatures on their level. Crossbowmen and Marksmen got a slight buff and got their price corrected as it was too low before. Swordsmen and Master Swordsmen received a decrease in speed. Paladin and Crusader should very well be among the top damage dealers with their strike twice ability and base growth of 2.

Knight changes (click here to view):

Sorceress: Mostly nerfed on certain low-mid level creatures to stay along the levels of other towns. Sprites have been changed to be more aggressive and less numbered. Now they have the same growth as other classic H2 level 1 units aside from the goblin and peasant. Also, now the Sorceress’ bless spell is useful for sprites. Elves were too strong and had their stats decreased a bit while also lowering their growth. Satyr got changed a bit receiving mostly nerfs, but a small damage boost. I decided to change Druids back to a state closer to H2 with them having a growth of 3 instead of the previous 4. To compensate for this the Druid and Greater Druid got buffed in health and damage to be about as strong as before.

Sorceress changes (click here to view):

Wizard: Halflings and Gnomes brought too much power their level considered and thus received a decrease in growth and a slight buff for the Gnome. I decided to decrease the Golems speed to have it closer to its H2 variant. The Roc was also too strong and received several nerfs. I heard some people found Mages too weak and it seemed to be true, and thus they received an increase to their damage.

Wizard changes (click here to view):

Necromancer: Skeletons received a damage boost, which will help the Necromancer out in the early game. There is currently no sign of Necromancy being too strong, so this change shouldn’t be changing that. Zombies will be receiving nerfs as they were a bit too tanky before, which was unwanted. They are still very strong and serves excellently as guarding force. Vampires will be receiving nerfs as they were too strong before, but now they should be in a more balanced position. The same can be said for the Death Knight which was way too strong on all parameters. It has received a major decrease to all stats making it as strong as other level 5 units. I would personally like this creature to be a strong, but a bit slow creature, serving as high level melee fighter which I believe would fit the Necromancer well. As with the Mages, the Liches also received a buff in stats, which was needed compared to other level 6 units.

Necromancer changes (click here to view):

Warlock: The Warlock has got some nerfs to his early game to compensate for the strong late game Dragons. Gargoyles and Griffins were nerfed, and some other units have got slight nerfs. This might look as it cripples the Warlock, but most of the units are still bringing about the same power as other creatures on their level.

Warlock changes (click here to view):

Barbarian: Mostly small changes. More damage for Harpies, less damage for Ogres and Ogre Lords, less health for both Trolls, but more damage for War Trolls. The Cyclops was bringing too much power before and thus he got a considerable decreased in health, but an increase to his damage to match him with other level 7 units with a growth of 2 per week.

Barbarian changes (click here to view):

Witch: Again, smaller changes for most creatures. Mantis needed a buff to keep up with other level 5 units, but had its speed lowered to be different from that of the Toad. Wyvern seemed a bit too strong and was nerfed accordingly and was attempted to be designed differently from the Cyclops and the Genie.

Witch changes (click here to view):

Dervish: Nomads brought too much power, which was also reported by players. The decrease in health and speed was though compensated by higher growth. Medusas got their stats changed a little but stay mostly the same. Manticore and Genie brought a little bit too much power and were nerfed slightly. I know there is concern for the health of level 7 creatures, especially the Genie as he is a true glass cannon, but we need to keep his “identity” from H2 while still making sure he doesn’t fall behind.

Dervish changes (click here to view):

Hello.
I've several balance concerns with 0.8.2. Played several maps and here are my thoughts.

- Peasants/Sprites, I would like them to see weaker and greater in numbers. Heroes 3 already tried to "standarize" everything (every spell has mass version at exp, every unit has upgrade, every artifact follow +2/+3/+4/+6/+12-2 scheme, every town has exact number of dwellings, every L7 creature has 200-300 hps etc.). I think H2 did better thing here, maintaing some diversity, because warlock had 300hp dragons and knight only 65hp crusaders, spells were not as uniform as in h3, various towns had various dwellings, etc.). Please dont go this way, balance != equality.

- Satyrs are useless. Totally useless unit, not worth buying unless you have leftover money. Full-game stack of sprites and dwarves outdamage them and serve much more purpose. I believe this creature needs strong buff.

- Death Knight balance swing is too high. They were quite strong in 0.8.1 but I believe at least damage & hp should be reverted.

- Hydra nerfs were also unnecessary. This creature needs above-average strength to address its speed issues. With low speed and no upgrade available to boost it, hydra was already in "strong in the paper, useless in reality" state, now its placeholder creature.

- Harpies seem to be a little too strong now, especially since barbarians tend to have a lot of attack.

- I dont understand nerf for lizardmen. They were weak already in 0.8.1, they are even weaker now. Placeholder creature, just like H3 lizardmen.

- I'm not happy with Sorcery skill nerfs. I beliee in H3SW it actually made spellcasters to compete with might based heroes. I've played coop game, where my friend got a lot of good stuff (+9 breastplace, light and dark orb, +2 ring, +50% cold damage want, etc) and had over 40 spell power. Yet still, spells did not compete with army strength. She was doing like 2.5k from cold ray and around 3k from chain lighting. It might seem a lot but in his late game scenario, top tier units were already doing over 10k with a single attack. She would be better to unequip all that spell power stuff and just put all morale/luck artifacts and it would grant better net damage overall.

I believe that good spellcaster build should have power of 8th stack (damage-wise) at least. Otherwise our powerful wizards will always be better equiping attack/def items and casting L1 mass haste. Changelog states that sorcery boosted 33/50/66% on 0.8.1 - I might have memory issues but I think I've seen 25/50/100% in some H3SW versions. And to be honest, I think that +100% boost from sorcery is not that much and it should be left like that. Imposion and meteor shower probably could be tuned down here. For now, in H3SW there is no place for combat spell casters, just like it is not in H3 or HOTA.

Also, spells like cold ring, fireblast needed BUFF instead of nerf. I've played full game with sorceress with cold ring specialty and there were no single use for this spell. It is too mana costly in early game (you need to hit 4-5 units in order to have better dmg/mana ratio than magic arrow), and it was totally useless in late game.

I love new changes, especially fixed necro crash, new visual stuff (lighting bolt is dope), etc. I'm not happy with some balance changes however.

I'll address the whole post later today, but for now I can surely say that increased Sorcery created an exploit for Sorceresses who were swimming in mana points at early stages of the game and overpowered everyone with Lightning Bolts, especially if they get that from 2nd Level Shrines.

This comes from a design decision to give Sorceresses Intellect as the starting skill. IIRC Warlocks also delivered some trouble, but with the magic system being not implemented and even not fully thought out to some extent, it was better safe than sorry.

I am still thinking about reverting faction skills (Sorcery for Sorceresses, oh the tautology, Intellect for Warlocks, pretty lore-wise by the way).

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You see, we still didn't give up on the idea of asymmetric gameplay (Starcraft style). Since we have 8(9) factions instead of 3, this might take forever, but what dreams are for. In this asymmetric balance magic is a crucial thing, and a lot of factions depend on it in order to win. Warlocks are the only faction relying almost solely on damage. Sorceresses were planned to rely on blesses and summons later in the game, Witches have their creatures cursing everyone (and accumulating curses on enemy stacks), Wizards are closer to jack-of-all-trades and using high-level spells earlier, Necromancers are intended to dynamically lose and regain... As of now, nothing of this is present in the game, and that's why all balance talks are half-hearted.

Some details about the magic system: Mass Haste and Mass Slow are separate spells, some of the spells will change schools, Expert Elemental Magic will still matter, spells generated in Mage Guilds highly depend on the faction, no stacking for artifacts of the same ID, the invention of creature curse spells, etc. We are now facing technical limitations for some of those, plus the mod was on hold for a few years. We still need programmers badly.

Hi number128 and thanks for the nice feedback

In addition to Orzie's answer which I agree on I can comment on the creature balance as I was responsible for that.

number128 wrote:

- Peasants/Sprites, I would like them to see weaker and greater in numbers. Heroes 3 already tried to "standarize" everything (every spell has mass version at exp, every unit has upgrade, every artifact follow +2/+3/+4/+6/+12-2 scheme, every town has exact number of dwellings, every L7 creature has 200-300 hps etc.). I think H2 did better thing here, maintaing some diversity, because warlock had 300hp dragons and knight only 65hp crusaders, spells were not as uniform as in h3, various towns had various dwellings, etc.). Please dont go this way, balance != equality.

As you may know in H2, the goblins and peasants come in higher amounts than the remaining level 1 units (10 and 12, instead of 8 for the others (without the well growth boost)). This has been retained in H3SW by having only the goblin and peasant have higher growth than the other level 1 units (the tribal and rogue/bandit have same growth as the other level 1 units). So the diversity is very much intact I should say

number128 wrote:

- Satyrs are useless. Totally useless unit, not worth buying unless you have leftover money. Full-game stack of sprites and dwarves outdamage them and serve much more purpose. I believe this creature needs strong buff.

The satyr brings some mid-level melee damage to the Sorceress' diverse line-up. It is quite balanced in terms of offensive to defensive stats (whereas the dwarf is more defensive and the unicorn more offensively oriented). I would though be open to take the satyrs in a more offensive way or give them some interesting ability (Ability to cast 'Mirth' comes to mind, but spell casting units in H2 is not a thing, so don't know). It is not true about the damage dealing though, a week worth of satyrs deal about 15% more damage than battle dwarfs and almost double the damage than Sprites.

number128 wrote:

- Death Knight balance swing is too high. They were quite strong in 0.8.1 but I believe at least damage & hp should be reverted.

Death knights is probably the unit which changed the most since last release. This was due to it being very strong in all areas (offensive, defensive and even speed) while costing about the same as other level 5 units. I felt the high speed stat was unfitting, so that was lowered the most which allowed for a moderate reduction to the other stats, keeping the unit's identity intact. It is still the level 5 unit with the highest raw power, even better than minotaur kings when factoring in the 20% chance to deal double damage.

number128 wrote:

- Hydra nerfs were also unnecessary. This creature needs above-average strength to address its speed issues. With low speed and no upgrade available to boost it, hydra was already in "strong in the paper, useless in reality" state, now its placeholder creature.

The hydra is iconic for being the absolute best guarding unit in the game and that is still the case. The combination of 'No enemy retaliation' and 'Attacks all adjacent enemies' makes it a pain for melee attackers to deal with. All this power comes with the price of being, as you say, very slow, which it undoubtly still is. In H2 it would typically be the creature stack left at home as that is where it shines. I believe this feature should be kept in H3SW. Its raw power is only surpassed by the Anubite and treant on the same level, but neither of those have any of the hydra's special abilities.

number128 wrote:

- Harpies seem to be a little too strong now, especially since barbarians tend to have a lot of attack.

The harpies are quite strong, but should still be balance due to their very squish health of only 20 hp, the same as the wolf actually. They are similar to the goblin in that it is import to strike first as taking a hit can be devastating for harpies.

number128 wrote:

- I dont understand nerf for lizardmen. They were weak already in 0.8.1, they are even weaker now. Placeholder creature, just like H3 lizardmen.

The lizardman are 'boring' ranged troops in that they are very defensive. The change was made to differentiate the base and upgraded version as lizardman warriors actually receive a nice boost to their damage going from 2-4 to 2-6. So the upgrade focusses on addressing this lack of attack power for the unit.

About spell damage, as Orzie said, it is important to note that we haven't implemented the spell system we want yet, so a lot can change in that regard. That said, the sorcery skill was utterly broken in the previous version. You can find many examples on YouTube with people steamrolling maps using damage spells with sorcery specialists or other heroes with the skill. The skill may have seemed quite balanced in the scenario you describe, but in most cases I would argue otherwise. There was very little reason to use other spells than damage spells and creatures where almost without purpose as it was about who could cast the first and strongest damage spells first. Damage spells should be strong and viable in all parts of the game, but they completely ruled most games in the last version.

I guess I should add that Hydra is a powerhouse if used with Teleport spell (which the Hydra specialist currently has at start).

Also, as a side note, I should remind that 'true' balance can be achieved only in certain conditions, which do not include any of the maps currently available. There should be a set of RMG templates specifically created for this purpose, and tournament-oriented balanced maps, sometimes with some factions restricted, to provide a required experience. Such templates will require such things as specific dwelling mechanics and the concept of neutral terrain (which probably Snow is going to become), to name a few.

In classic Heroes 2, when you see a map with a decent amount of water having flotsam floating around (hello, Surf and Turf!) - expect Knights and (less) Sorceresses blob in the opening, any previous attempts to balance the game will automatically bid you farewell.

Continuing to enjoy this game with my son. I have a few thoughts to post.

First, I like that you slowed down the iron golems and the death knights. That really helps make them feel more like an unstoppable force (with a definite weakness). For the flavor it also reflects the old 2-speed iron golem from original H2.

Second, I am in love with the anubites. They are a basic melee creature, but they're so well-rounded: fairly tough, fairly dangerous, fairly fast. I find that being able to recruit them early (Wagon Camp > Nomad Tents > Ancient Tomb) makes the creep phase of the first few weeks much easier for the Dervish to avoid casualties despite their weak ranged option.

Lastly, it's comical how many tribals get spawned by the random map generator. Why is that?