Suggestion on Terror (SEM something something)

Disposable Hero

So I think the complaints about SEMs from some are exaggerated a lot, but there is one thing that I do agree with and that is that late game cycle charging by terror causing monsters is a bit too strong, and the reason for that is two things imo:

1. Terror
2. Animations

I don't want to go deep into that discussion now, but one idea that popped up that I actually think could improve the late game situation without messing up the over all balance or gameplay would be to:

* Add a condition to Terror, inactive if HP < 20%. (Fear stays until 0%)

What this would aim to achieve would be to add more incentive to bring SEMs to low health, and in general to make late game mass terror routs a bit more avoidable. It woudl avoid blanket nerfing SEMs in the early/mid game, and give both players something to aim for/avoid in the late game.

TheShiroOfDalton

What about SEMs with regeneration or healing?

Disposable Hero

Ephraim_Dalton said:

What about SEMs with regeneration or healing?

Nothing, if you are healthy you are more terrifying than if you're about to die.

TheShiroOfDalton

Disposable Hero said:

Ephraim_Dalton said:

What about SEMs with regeneration or healing?

Nothing, if you are healthy you are more terrifying than if you're about to die.

The concern is that this would only really affect factions with SEMs that don't have access to regeneration or healing whereas it would be trivial for factions that do to keep their SEMs above that threshold and therefore be able to cause terror right up to the endgame.

So I would not tie this to HP unless healing on SEMs was nerfed at the same time.

ETA:

Or of course the calculation could be about having lost HP equal to 80% of starting HP instead of remaining HP, so healing would not affect that cut-off point.

yst#1879

In other words, faction with heals have EVEN better monsters than others.

Witchblade

Can you provide any evidence that terror per se is OP? There's a very cheap spell in lore of death that provides terror and nobody takes it. Monsters pay for terror as well as being a SE. I see no reason to nerf all terror causing units across the board, as many are not OP at all: ethereal units, medusas, hydras, giants, stanks, sun dragons, phoenixes (except maybe peclis), most/all gryphons, etc. In fact, it's clear that the vast majority of terror causing units are not inherently OP.

TheShiroOfDalton

Witchblade said:

Can you provide any evidence that terror per se is OP? There's a very cheap spell in lore of death that provides terror and nobody takes it. Monsters pay for terror as well as being a SE. I see no reason to nerf all terror causing units across the board, as many are not OP at all: ethereal units, medusas, hydras, giants, stanks, sun dragons, phoenixes (except maybe peclis), most/all gryphons, etc. In fact, it's clear that the vast majority of terror causing units are not inherently OP.

Terror on monsters is always on, so you don't need to cast any spells and can save your WoM for Spirit Leech.
Terror on monsters is most useful in the lategame when there's a lot of stacking ld-debuffs due to losses and any terror-routed unit can cause a chainroute since it adds even more debuffs to that cocktail. Add to that that more units are susceptible to terror than should be (for one, no fear causing units should be) and you have terror as a way too powerful tool in the game.

yst#1879

^ lol thats complete bs and u know it. 0 impact on helf and welf.

Gone thru all the hoops just to nerf all other sems. Lets see, chaos, nosca, orks, tombs, prolly enough at this point really why continue

Its better to change the misleading topic. Nerf other faction sem terror. Thats more suiting.

outrage4

Healing SEM are strong enough.

Cadia101

outrage4 said:

Healing SEM are strong enough.

It do feel like a punishment for factions that don’t have healing.

Tho if you go with to suggestion Dalton said about being 80% of the base hp, and thus ignoring healing, it could be more fair across the board.

Disposable Hero

Healing is a nonfactor for this suggestion. The starting point is that sems have 2 threshold conditions, ld = 0 and hp = 0. This would add a new one, hp = 20. Healing has the same importance as before, we just add one performance threshold that affects the late game primarily.

Dustin_

SEMs are not OP, and certainly not terror. There is a count down to terror so once you terror rout them, you can't do it again for some time. To fight against SEM, just bring missile troops and focus fire when they land. If you are constantly losing to SEM, you have a bad army. If you let your opponent rout your cav and missile troops, so all you have left are inf that can get terror routed, i think you just played badly and deserve to lose.

SEM + healing is the only problem.

blindjonn

It's not very intuitive to drop terror from SEMs at a certain HP point without doing the same to non SEM units, who visibly diminish as they lose health. Sometimes units are brought exclusively for their terror: weaker SEMs in a morale bomb build or ghosts, for example. Suddenly losing Terror at 20% health would hurt those niche options.

Imagine attempting to terrify an enemy army with a 19% HP SEM, it would be frustrating to people who don't constantly check unit sheets. Conversely, imagine desperately trying to whittle down an enemy Hellpit to save your army from a mass route, only to have a combination of regen and random procs make it scary again. If Terror became a numerical statistic instead of an on-or-off ability, this suggestion would be great.

SEMs should lose effectiveness on a gradient as they lose health and/or vigour. None of this deals with their powerful healing synergy, but it does help gameplay overall. That plus a healing rework and more nuanced counters would stop juggernaught SEMs being oppressive.

As for animations, only the ugly ones are likely to be changed.

Disposable Hero

It's not true that sems should lose stats at all, no. They could be completely redesigned and rebalanced like that in another game but this is not what we play today.

However, lots of traits have conditions in this game, like frenzy etc (it would of course apply to all terror causing units). Terror is a big part of why monsters are strong late game, this is one way we could address this without mucking up early game balance.

blindjonn

SEMs losing effectiveness over time is not suggested because they have high stats (as you both know) but because it brings them in line with every other kind of unit. This in turn would preserve the current early game balance and fix the late game balance. SEMs could then be retuned and recosted accordingly.

Disposable Hero said:

However, lots of traits have conditions in this game, like frenzy etc (it would of course apply to all terror causing units). Terror is a big part of why monsters are strong late game, this is one way we could address this without mucking up early game balance.

Frenzy is a more moderate buff attached to morale, which fluctuates up and down more frequently. Its only binary feature, Immune to Psychology, is less important when morale is high. This stops Frenzy from feeling jarring or unintuitive. Sudden loss of terror would feel very different, especially because monsters would now be vulnerable to terror.

mightygloin#2446

Mad animations like warkitty jump or stegadon rampage could be also tied to vigour.

mightygloin#2446

Mad animations like warkitty jump or stegadon rampage could be also tied to vigour.

blindjonn

mightygloin said:

Mad animations like warkitty jump or stegadon rampage could be also tied to vigour.

This is a great idea.

saweendra#3399

mightygloin said:

Mad animations like warkitty jump or stegadon rampage could be also tied to vigour.

Great idea. Its actually a better much better way to represent vigour.

The_real_FAUST#6885

I don't have any issues with terror.

This proposal also favours healing entities over non healing.

It also doesn't recognise the difference between HMASEM and non, and SE spam.

The problem is mass & speed, cycle charging, animations and 100% output throughout the whole life of the beast.

Terror isn't the issue.

I like the planning around it but I don't think it's the answer here.

Disposable Hero

The_real_FAUST said:

I don't have any issues with terror.

This proposal also favours healing entities over non healing.

It also doesn't recognise the difference between HMASEM and non, and SE spam.

The problem is mass & speed, cycle charging, animations and 100% output throughout the whole life of the beast.

Terror isn't the issue.

I like the planning around it but I don't think it's the answer here.

Late game terror is totally a big part of the problem. You bring terror for the late game, and it wouldn't really favour healing any more than keeping your unit alive for wom already does.