Great to hear that. No matter how much I disagree with the balance changes you made, I also saw the huge lists of fixes and improvements. And I really appreciate the hard work you folks put into PQ. Great job, please tell that to the rest of your team as well.
Request - 2 Champions per race Just got the Summon Champion spell in my current Bug game. Never really thought about it before, but several races only got 2 Heroes and no Champions. This severely limits options for flavour games where you try to stick with units fitting your race. @doomtrader: Could you add 2 thematically fitting Champions for each race that doesn't have them? E.g. an Attendant or Seer and a Beetlerider for the Myrodants. Wouldn't mind at all if those be a DLC pack (would make sense). And move the Ancient Masters out from the Highmen, they should be in their own category (maybe under monsters/creatures?).
Example change analysis - Flay damage reduction from 1.3.1c patch Here's my take on analysing the Flay damage reduction from 12d6 to 10d6. I picked it at random from the 1.3.1c changelist here http://steamcommunity.com/app/449300/discussions/0/350542683196077028/ . Summary and Conclusion first: Did the damage reduction from 12d6 to 10d6 achieve anything useful? Based on the below analysis, the answer is no: At best, it doesn't have any really noticeable effect. At worst, it put an already trash-tier but high-end unit - Unhallowed Arcane Wraith - even more firmly into trash territory (I do have numbers to back up that claim). For casting it as Lord, the damage reduction is completely irrelevant, reasons covered below. For the Arcance Wraith, it reduced the number of units they can reliably kill with Flay. Worse, with the reduced damage range (see below), the Wraith's overall effectiveness will be lower as well. As they are a very weak end-tier unit to begin with, further reducing their usability and kill potential makes them even less useful. Since I picked the Flay change at random, and it does not hold up well in analysis, I consider it safe to assume that the other balance changes will have similar results. Recommendation: @Wasteland: I strongly recommend to revert all balance changes in the next update, and then put them through the grinder. Even if you do not revert, each change should be thoroughly scrutinised if a) it actually adresses the problem it was meant to resolve b) if yes to #a , how it holds up in a detailed analysis and in actual playtesting However, considering that it took me over 10 hours to do this one analysis - and there are maybe 50 changes , I think that a full revert and start from scratch is easier and more time-effective. I - and others as well, I am sure - would happily sit down with you and other players and discuss things further. Now, on to the meat of things: Establishing baseline, and numbers: - I used Anydice for the probabilities, great tool btw. Here's a link, prefilled with 12d6 and 10d6 for comparison: http://anydice.com/program/a09f The best way to see the numbers I used is to select "Table" and "At Least" / "At Most". - Note that the numbers I use are not mathematically exact, but approximated/simplified. For all practical purposes, the difference between - say - 98.25% and 98.50% is irrelevant. - Flay can be resisted by Spell Resistance, has a 15DC Fortitude Saving Throw for half damage. While it is listed as doing Slashing damage, said damage was NOT reduced by Mundane Resistance in my tests. - The minimum and maximum damage values/ranges we can safely ignore. E.g. the change to roll <=25 on 12d6 is only 0.21% . While the chance to roll <=34 is 10.36%. - Reasonable damage ranges - where we have a roughly 90% chance each to be above minimum and below maximum are: 12d6 = 34 - 50 10d6 = 28 - 42 - Average damage for 12d6 is 42, 10d6 is 35. Note that the 12d6 average is as high as the upper reasonable maximum for 10d6. - While 6 points of reliable minimum damage to do not look like much on their own, when multiplied by a full-stack of 16 Wraiths, we arrive at 96 damage. Which means one less dead higher-HP unit. The tables I made for reference are in the attached textfile. Short part first: Casting Flay as Lord combat spell: While you can cast Flay yourself, by the time you get there you should have better combat spells at hand, and not feel inclined to do so. There are two obvious uses for it, however: 1) Kill an enemy unit to create a Skeleton in a tactical spot. I typically do this to abuse the AI: with a unit directly next to them, AI Archers do not shoot but attack that unit. For this use, the damage range of 12d6 vs. 10d6 is relevant. I do not want to waste 20 Mana on 5hp, most of the time. Simply not efficient under almost all circumstances. Some exceptions of course do exist, mostly highly dangerous units with high damage potential like the Djinn. 2) A poor man's expensive Doom Bolt. This can be handy especially for an all-Death player when you absolutely need something to die right this turn. Now, for progression for total Mana cost when boosting, Damage, and Save, see Table #1. From that table we see that decreasing the base damage to 10d6 doesn't make any relevant difference. The bulk of it comes from the Nd1 part. Which is what we want for reliable damage. However, it's brutally expensive. Here's Doombolt for comparison: it cannot be negated by Spell Resistance, has no Save, and is *a lot* cheaper. See Table #2. Even when not compared to Doombolt, it's a very expensive and risky proposition to use Flay for a more-or-less guaranteed kill. However, that is perfectly acceptable, as Death focus is not on direct damage (like Destruction) . No problem that this School needs to pay through the nose for a guaranteed high-damage spell. If you want those, pick another School. Now, onto the big one, Flay as used by a unit: - The only unit that has the Flay spell is the Unhallowed Arcane Wraith, their end-tier Caster unit. With 30 Mana, they can cast 1 Flay per battle, and one Spit of Bile. - A.Wraiths don't have ranged Magic attacks like most other magic units, so they have to rely on their spells for ranged damage. - This essentially allows for 2 (Flay & Bile) or 3 (3x Bile) ranged attacks before they have to close for melee. What units can a Wraith reliably kill with 1 casting of Flay? Keep in mind this is *before* Spell Resistance and/or Saving Throws kick in. I based the numbers on the reasonable minimum damage listed above: 1 cast: 34 for 12d6, 28 for 10d6. 2 cast: 68 for 12d6, 56 for 10d6. For 12d6 and 1 casting, see Table #3. For 12d6 and 2 castings, Table #4. For 10d6 and 1 casting, see Table #5. For 10d6 and 2 castings, Table #6. Note that for 5 of 8 races, nothing changed from 12d6 to 10d6. Now we need to factor in Spell Resistance and Saving Throws, and the numbers look even worse. I do not have the time to run a detailed analysis on probabilities for Spell Resistance and passing/failing Saves for various units, so I will skip that part. Also, I leave it as exercise for the interested reader to do the same lists with the average damage values.
Improving Unhallowed Arcane Wraiths? As a sidenote, coming from my tests for the Flay analysis: I think the Arcane Wraiths might need a bit of a boost, to make them a viable choice for Unhallowed high-end units. Even before the more extensive testing I did over the last days, I always skipped them in favour of Lancers and Deathguards. With the exception of using a fullstack for flavour now and then - *not* for their combat prowess, mind you. My suggestions to get the ball rolling: - Replace Levitation with Flying. This would make them the only viable (some Summons aside) Unhallowed unit for crossing water - e.g. when you play on an Island map. This alone would hugely offset their lower damage potential and survivability compared to the Lancers and Deathguards. UPDATE: Forgot that earlier. On the other hand, the Deathguards can do a lot of damage with their Fireballs. So having a more melee-powerful Caster isn't a no-no per se. Also, e.g. Dwarven Casters are melee monsters as well. - Replace the useless Mana Drain with Lifedrain. Mana Drain only works on their attacks, not on spells they cast. And since they have to move into melee range for that, by the time they get there any enemy unit should not have any Mana left anyways. Lifedrain looks like a good replacement at first glance, increasing their melee prowess. However, I am concerned that this will make them a tad too powerful in melee, combined with their Mundane Resistance 10. The role of melee powerhouse (with added bonuses to boot) is already very well filled by the Lancers and Deathguards. - Possible alternatives: Cursing Touch. Planar Travel - thematically fitting, but also very powerful; nice idea, but can't really recommend it without analysis/playtesting. Spell Penetration - worth a look, should make their casting way more potent.
I have been told that the build has been submitted to Apple, so you can expect the game to be available any time now. There is a list of changes: http://planarconquest.com/planar_conquest_131f_changelog.txt
Thanks for the changelog, doomtrader. Quite impressive, even for rolling several earlier builds into it! Could still take a day or three till we see the update, depending on how fast Apple reviews it. Fingers crossed they are not halfway into holiday/Xmas mode already
Honestly it would be cool to release some smaller or larger DLCs, but actually the sales level for all platforms is still a little too low ATM.
Hhmm ... wonder if you can drum up more interest with that. The first big iOS update after almost half a year, upcoming XBOX launch, and announcement of some small new DLC (plus eventual future plans to make more) should make for a nice press release. Did you talk to TA staff, if they can do a feature for the iOS update? No idea if advertising on TA is within your budget and plans, but might be worth a shot too.
Assuming the update makes things more stable on my iPad (Air + 8.3) then I'll be shelling out for the current full game expansion. Appreciate you need more than an uptake of 1 but hopefully it'll buoy your spirits a bit! #
The biggest chunk of the sales for us is still the PC version and as you can see on STEAM the userscore is around 50%
Yeah, I saw that and I also saw the sales numbers - or at least how many people own it on Steam. The number was worryingly low. No idea how Steam calculates the userscore, so I cannot comment on that. But from what I know of that ecosystem, 75% and more seems to be the magic number where people don't give it a pass right away. On the plus side, if someone takes the time to look at the user reviews: when I did that, I got a page full of pretty good ones, and only one negative in the mix. Fingers crossed your sales pick up with christmas. The one thing that left a bad impression with me are the - put bluntly - rude uncouth morons on the PQ Steam forum: Sure, the overall tone on Steam might be a lot rougher than on TA. But if, as a new player, I stumbled onto one of the threads where people keep attacking each other personally, I wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole. Maybe buy and play, but quite certainly not join the discussion. No idea if you can clean up there and/or call people to order, or if that is solely in Steam's hands. When I was moderator (other place, other time) I called people to order for less. And I still do it here, as a regular user
This game is $30 on PS4 and $25 on Steam. Are there any major differences between those versions and iOS?
[BUG] Weapon Finesse has no description @doomtrader: That was reported earlier for Android, here : http://forum.wastelands-interactive.com/showthread.php?11879-B0016-OPEN-Missing-description-Weaponfinesse-WeaponFinessedesc I just got that ability from an Obelisk, and in 1.2.5 iOS it lacks the description as well. I didn't see it in the changelog, is that one fixed or still open? If open, what does it do? It's not in the manual either.
