Lizardmen rework suggestions

Forumaccountkroqgar · July 2

A couple of simple suggestions for a rework to the two lizardmen features, which are severely outdated and plainly unfun to play.

Blessed spawnings rework

Blessed Spawnings are currently completely random, giving the player no agency, often just give you low tier units, and don't include DLC units.

A simple system that can be adapted to all DLC units is the sacred spawnings mechanic from tabletop (http://sgabetto.free.fr/Telechargements/sacredhosts.pdf)

CA would have to create a blessing for each old one, for example a sotek spawning would have poison and frenzy, a huanchi one stalk and vanguard deployment, chotec gives fire damage and perfect vigour.

There’s a number of ways that they can make it so that all units have access to them, you can create an interface like beastmen or tomb kings have in which you can spend a currency (old ones energy) for buying different spawnings, you would get this energy by fighting enemies of the great plan. What blessing you can get can be random or be influenced by what races you’ve been fighting (for example, you’ve killed a lot of skaven recently and get sotek blessings)

Another system would make it so that every time you recruit a unit there's a % chance it gets one of the blessings. Since you can only recruit from DLCs you own there's no problem. The % could be dependent on both the geomantic web level and the strength of your current enemies, incentivizing tough wars(based on a system like the waagh trophies)

If CA is really opposed to giving us new spawnings they could tie the current ones to having complete provinces of Lustria and the Southlands, just like the empire elector count units work. So, for example, to get blessed solar engines you need to own the complete Hexoatl province and either use Old One Energy or a cooldown like the empire units have.

An expanded suggestion on the blessed spawnings

Geomantic web

The geomantic web suffers from two problems, first is that it isn’t interactive and secondly it’s underwhelming.

To make it more Dynamic the geomantic web shouldn’t be upgraded by a building but instead requiring you to fight ritual battles for each tier you want to upgrade it, like the wood elves tree healing rituals. The web system would remain in place (so to have a tier 3 web in a settlement you would need to be connected to another tier 3 restored province) but linked to the restoration of temple cities through rituals, not buildings.

The bonus that would make all this battles worth it would be a teletransportation system, allowing you to hop one army from the capital of a province to any capital directly linked by the web. It could be either limited to at least tier 4 restored temple cities or have a cooldown based on the tier like the wood elves cooldown.

The alignment of order is pretty bad (untainted+ plague resistance) , it practically only exists as a counter to the mechanic of other race, the skaven plague. The bonus to public order should be moved to it, and replaced with a small construction cost discount in the alignment of crafting.

The skink priest avatar is a underused mechanic that's connected in lore to the geomantic web that could be easily expanded into a dynamic bonus for actually connecting the web. All lizardmen legendary lords should get it in their capital, not just itza and Hexoatl. Then, all settlements connected to the capital via the geomantic web could summon the avatar when defending settlements. If the web tier is 2-3 they only get one summon, if it's T4 they get two summons, T5 three summons.

Another alternative to the teletransportation bonus would be instead giving tier 4-5 temple cities the possibility to terraform through a ritual, so after triggering a ritual like the Wood elves incursions and resisting 10 turns in control, the settlements of that province get improved climate or a climate changed to one lizardmen can tolerate.

Tech tree overhaul

At the moment they have an insanely long tree, on the level of dwarfs, but it doesn’t offer any meaningful choice in terms of playstyle, since every campaign you’re gonna investigate the same branches in the same order. It needs to be mixed up a bit, for example separating the beast branches into two branches, one for the single entity dinos and other for the support dinos like salamanders and terradons.

The Branch of “order” is plainly awful compared to any other race (-3% chance for enemy hero success, +5% chance for hero success), it should give stronger diplomatic bonuses with old ones children (dwarfs, high and wood elves, and empire/bretonnia). The sequence of scrying could give bonuses to line of sight and the sequence of infiltration bonuses to ambush chance.

Stances

Remove channeling, which is redundant on top of astromancy and replace it with raiding. Lizardmen are perfectly capable of raiding for food and sustenance.

Improved astromancy stance, compared with other unique stances like greenskin raiding camp (which asks for zero movement) it’s a useless stance, because most races around Lustria have better movement than LM and the AI always moves on forced march. Astromancy shouldn’t take an extra 25% movement, it should give an extra 25% movement to allow lizardmen to deal with the jungle and river movement penalties, if not permanently at least the next turn, instead of extra line of sight.

An alternative suggested to fix the movement problem is give lizardmen an aquatic bonus that would negate the penalties from river crossings and landings, since most lizardmen are aquatic or semiacuatic.

Economy and buildings rework

Lizardmen have the weakest economy out of any core race of WH1 and WH2, with resource buildings that give no money or upkeep effects but no chance of trading, since even other lizardmen hate lizardmen. It’s clearly balanced around how Itza and Hexoatl start with a gold mine. A simple change would be giving them higher recruitment costs and lower upkeep to represent the nature of each spawning being important, a variant on how tomb kings work.

Part of the economy rework should be a reduction in the number of buildings, lizardmen have the largest number of buildings on top of bad income.The scrying pool and star chamber should be combined. The star chamber also needs to reduce how much it buffs the recruit rank of slann in favour of also buffing other lords.

Slann

Slann should have access to all eight lores and be stronger mages. They are slow, have large attribute, get no mounts and are awful at melee, they should at least be as good as casters which don’t require a rite like high elven archmages or ancient treemen (perfect vigour, spellcaster,armoured and higher health points, capable in melee). I think a simple change for campaign would be reducing the number of skill points it takes to activate all their branches, this would be balanced by slann having a lower recruitment rank via the star chamber.

Tehenhauin rework

Instead of being blocked from the regiments of renown until he sacrifices them, they should be replaced with either original regiments of renown or blessed spawnings.

Change his starting building from a saurus to a skink recruitment building. This is an oversight that shows how little playtested this campaign has been

Change the buffs given by the sacrifices making them more significant but skink exclusive. Tehenhauin sacrifice mechanic bonus should be reworked by looking at Grom’s cauldron , which is mostly centered on buffing goblins, not generic greenskins. Tehenhauin should allow you to play a mostly skink campaign like Grom does to goblins, with buffs to all the different skink units (troglodon, terradon, ripperdactyl, salamanders) and skink adjacent units like kroxigors, instead of being yet another saurus campaign.

An example:

Sacrifice of Amaxon: Gives frenzy to skink and skink like units

Sacrifice of Xahutec: Gives +25 armor to skink and skink like units

Sacrifice to incantol: 200 xp per turn to and skink like units

The other adjustment it needs is to make the sacrifices feel less like a gacha machine, the sacrifices of Quetza and Huanabic should give you some choice on what banner/follower you get. Maybe make them limited to stop abuse.

Nakai rework

The problems with Nakai are based on him being a horde that can't raze for money and is stuck defending a vassal which the AI thrases.

His vassal should be removed, giving instead the buildings to Nakai's faction, keeping them unupgradeable as they are.This solves Nakai’s diplomatic and money problems, no longer being forced to beg for money or defend a vassal which doesn't do anything.

The possible downside is you having to defend the settlements, which could be seen as a drag, but you can just autoresolve them, which is exactly what the vassal already does.

His rites could be replaced with generic lizardmen rites and his rite of mastery.

An alternative suggested by sauriandruid:

Keep the vassal but make it unable to conduct diplomacy or be declared war upon, have a periodic event giving you a choice between a gift of gold, relics of the old ones items or buffs to remove the need to beg him for gold, and allow it to form his own armies, which shouldn't be able to conquer.

Another problem about Nakai is that he has no goals, in vortex Markus hunters are destroyed by other AIs and in mortal empires (the only place he can be updated if the update waits until WH3) he just wanders. Maybe his vassal could get some settlement landmarks on racial capitals or on specially magic places like Praag or Middenheim, since he's out there protecting the ley lines.

Changes to rituals

The rite of primeval glory is disliked by both players facing lizardmen who can’t deal with it early game, and lizardmen players who see it as a one shot gimmick at the start of a campaign (and conditioned to getting a random blessed spawning misión), too expensive early on and too unnecesary latter. Instead of creating an army of dinosaurs, it should give you access to a small number (5-6) of blessed spawnings.

Tiktaq’to is a skink commander, so instead of replacing the rite of sotek with the rite of tzunki, he should replace the rite of ferocity or the rite of primeval glory. Just like dark elves factions don’t replace the rite of khaine, which is the most important, lizardmen factions shouldn’t replace the rite of sotek. I also think that the rite of tzunki should be changed like the sacrifice to anath raema was but I know lots of people love it like it is.

Various small changes to units

Ripperdactyl mount for skink chiefs.

Reduce the sacred kroxigor weapon strenght and give it a sundered armour effect. This will allow for sacred kroxigors to have a symbiosis with skinks who aren't AP and give it a niche in the roster.

Salamanders: Increase their health pool moderately, reduce their speed to 45 and give them a higher range, take away their antilarge bonus .

Ancient salamanders:Increase their health pool significantly, reduce their speed to 45 and give them a higher range .

Razordons: Increase their health pool moderately, reduce their speed to 45 and give them a higher range . Give them either charge defence against all or an ability that damages the enemy when charged, like they had in tabletop with the rule instinctive defence (it allowed them to fire after being charged). Give them the current salamanders antilarge bonus

Climates

Lizardmen are currently the settled race with the smaller number of green climate settlements by far in Mortal empires (I'm trying to find the reddit post where someone did the math) due to how small Lustria and the southlands are. It incentivizes you to only conquer Lustria and ignore the rest of the world.
Either those regions aren't shrunk in Immortal Empires, or lizardmen need to either have one more green climate (magical forest, island and mountain could be upgraded from yellow) or have more settlements be given the savanah climate.

Edited with suggestions from comments, lots of suggestions involve giving the lizardmen some kind of resource like other races have scrap, runic gold, influence, prestige, etc, CA should definitely incorporate that.

Trotrorigolo · July 2

the complete lack of rework for LM is indeed quite sad

Prince_Alucard · July 3

Very good ideas, really would've liked to see them this upcoming patch. The Nakai one especially is so simple, but would go a long way. The new buildings and economic ideas I also quite like, really a lot of buildings could be merged.

The only thing is I think Slann are pretty fine casters, perhaps the best in MP. But in campaign, IDK about getting them a mount, but they should get some stuff that makes them pretty capable of melee on their skill tree. I mean it'd still make sense that up close a slann would be able to still blast away enemies with their magics in melee, sort've like the animation implies. I would not mind this for Lord Kroak in campaign either.

Pretty good stuff though as I said. Now we just have to continue to bring it up and pray they notice I guess. lol

brago90 · July 3

The geomantic web could be linked to the reactivation of the technology of the old ones: increase the maximum of recruitable units per turn and reduce their costs and maintenance, increase the movement of the faction around the map (teleportation is one of the characteristics of Oxyotl leave it to him), cause attrition to non-lizardmen races in lustria and daemons on the full map... However, I would not link it to rituals, it would maintain its link to buildings but instead of being a separate building that would be incorporated into the main building of the settlements.

Forumaccountkroqgar · July 3

Prince_Alucard said:
Very good ideas, really would've liked to see them this upcoming patch. The Nakai one especially is so simple, but would go a long way. The new buildings and economic ideas I also quite like, really a lot of buildings could be merged.

The only thing is I think Slann are pretty fine casters, perhaps the best in MP. But in campaign, IDK about getting them a mount, but they should get some stuff that makes them pretty capable of melee on their skill tree. I mean it'd still make sense that up close a slann would be able to still blast away enemies with their magics in melee, sort've like the animation implies. I would not mind this for Lord Kroak in campaign either.

Pretty good stuff though as I said. Now we just have to continue to bring it up and pray they notice I guess. lol

I'll edit that, I didn't meant that I want them to get a mount, rather than since they can't get mounts they should be better caster than those who can get dragons or are themselves a SEM like ancient treemen.

Draxynnic · July 4

My broad, high-level approach (not that I expect CA is listening - for them to be looking for suggestions to rework the Lizardmen, they'd have to acknowledge that there's a problem to begin with):

Geomantic Web generates a currency depending on the number of links above level 1 and the strength of those links. Sacred Spawning missions are replaced by missions themed around reinforcing distant parts of the Web that also reward this currency.

Said currency can then be redeemed for sacred spawning units (which can now include DLC units since they're no longer being drawn randomly from a table), crafted magic items (Lizardmen are the only Game 2 race without access to crafted magic items - perhaps what you actually get could be a bit of a gamble, though, so it's not as reliable as the Mortuary Cult or the dwarf forge), or spent on other campaign effects such as teleporting an army.

Relatively simple, largely based on repurposing existing mechanics, and would fix the problems with the Geomantic Web and sacred spawnings in one go. Could also be used to fix the problem with the Slann dilemma - for instance, perhaps you could spend a small amount of currency to focus the Geomantic Web into different energy configurations which influence which types of Slann you have available when you perform the Rite of Awakening.

SaurianDruid · July 4

I actually don't think upgrading the Geomantic Web needs to be interactive itself. You're already conquering those regions and building the pylons to connect your cities along the Geomantic Web.

The interactivity should come from what you can do with the Web once it is up. Right now it just gives minor economic buffs. It needs to do more than that.

You suggest removing the Channeling stance. What if we change it to directly enhance itself based on how strong the Geomantic Web in the region you use it in is? The Casualty Replenishment you get from it could dramatically improve based on the Web's strength, and when you have a max level Web you could even recruit troops from any city your web is connected to as if you were standing in that city yourself. Similarly the Winds bonus you get could be boosted and maybe you get a bound spell or two at max. You are channeling the power of the Slann after all.

Astromancy could be boosted by the Geomantic Web by giving you a larger vision radius the stronger the Web is. Maybe when you're in a city with a strong Geomantic Web you can even project the vision across a large distance to other continents, allowing you to keep tabs on what is going on in the greater world.

Beyond that I like the idea of the Web giving a resource that can be used to purchase our sacred spawnings as well as items flavored as relics of the Old Ones to boost out generic characters. Using it to teleport armies around would also be huge.

As for rivers, I'd just give the Lizardmen's standard movement type immunity to river penalties. Half their armies are aquatic and those that aren't are generally big enough to ford most rivers. It'd give them the mobility edge in their own jungle that they need.

As far as Nakai, I actually like the concept of his campaign. It just needs to be fixed.

1. Make it so the vassal does not conduct diplomacy on its own. It should all go through the player.
2. Have an event pop every few turns in which the vassal offers you a choice between a large sum of gold, special relics of the Old Ones to give to your characters, or some other buffs. This prevents the player from needing to constantly ask for more gold and frames it as a fun form of tribute that your thankful vassals bestow you with, which is true to Nakai's lore.
3. Either allow the vassal to form armies or make it MUCH cheaper for Nakai to field multiple hordes. Maybe the vassal pays for 50% of Nakai's army upkeep. He needs more armies than he can field now to both defend the vassal's lands and stay on the offense.

Also, and this is a small thing, Nakai shouldn't suffer diplomatic penalties for trespassing in land controlled by other Lizardmen. He's the Wanderer. He should be able to move around Lustria without consequence.

Pr4vda · July 4

There are pretty good ideas here. I hope to see some in a future LM update one day.

That is true the Geomantic web is ... not that impressive. And not funny at all. Improving edicts is very meh. Your main goal as LM should be to restore the system, which should be hard but very valuable. Like if you manage to restore 25% or a certain portion of the map, you could get "X bonuses". You should dedicate yourself to follow the Great Plan. The game should really motivate you to take back and restore the Web to give huge bonuses or actions. A teleport moove would indeed be very interesting. But a fast travel or a special stance (like +200% campaign movement with impossible to be ambushed for 1 turn but no attack option) could be fun. Very limited ofc with a huge cooldown. But LM should have the option to unlock powerful abilities. They are the true children of the Old Ones after all. They left them some toys to play with if they find it !

Concerning Nakai, I think Hordes have to get some form of settlements. The BM update is the perfect example. But just giving Nakai the possibility to own each settlement and put a single building on it seems underwhelming imo. His vassal must be deleted ofc because each thing owned by the AI tends to create dumb things. Again, CA cut those things (the Waagh have left, as well as the bray herds etc.). But I would like something innovative. Hordes are interesting if they have clever and innovative gameplay. Otherwise it is just moove / take or raze / do it again. Boring. Again the BM update shows the things can be improved.

ladymissfit · July 4

blessed spawnings

I think you could incorporate the scrap mechanic for this but maybe flavour it differently. Otherwise just making it, if not reliable, at least give you some method of filling out your armies with what you need. maybe just put them on a timer that adds to the recruitment tool and you know what it will be in advance? and yeah absolutely give blessed versions to more units, including DLC ones.

Geomantic web

for the geomantic web i see two solutions, either make it more active and give some genuine bonuses and abilities once it's up and running (teleporting between 5th level regions would be a neat, loreful and useful tool) or make it quicker to get to t5 web by reducing the building tier of the building. waiting for a t5 settlement just takes too long and the fact that the growth commandment gives more growth at tier 5 despite absolutely not needing it anymore is just weird.

Nakai

just make the vassal a normal faction that can recruit and defend like any other. i did a campaign with a mod that did that and it was sooooo much more enjoyable. if you really don't want to you can remove the ability for the vassal to attack or at least annex settlements but the fact that they're so weak and incapable of defending themselves make them next to useless and an automatic target for anyone, especially your allies.

endikux · July 4

I would love a system that made Slann more impactful in a strategic sense. Slann are not known for their active nature. Even when awakened they are more likely to command from the temple cities, not wade directly into battle. So it would be great if slann could garrison in a city at a reduced cost. Then they could perhaps grant magical bound spells during combat within the province or even channeled further through skinks.

Something that would allow you to park solitary slann in cities that still have some effect on battles. That would be a very unique Lizardman type of faction benefit and fit the slann very well. And again, it's not something drastically groundbreaking. There are already "battle spells" that are not tied directly to a character. It would be a campaign-specific thing and fairly minor. Kind of akin to the Skaven's ultimate abilities.

Draxynnic · July 4

Pr4vda said:
That is true the Geomantic web is ... not that impressive. And not funny at all. Improving edicts is very meh. Your main goal as LM should be to restore the system, which should be hard but very valuable. Like if you manage to restore 25% or a certain portion of the map, you could get "X bonuses". You should dedicate yourself to follow the Great Plan. The game should really motivate you to take back and restore the Web to give huge bonuses or actions. A teleport moove would indeed be very interesting. But a fast travel or a special stance (like +200% campaign movement with impossible to be ambushed for 1 turn but no attack option) could be fun. Very limited ofc with a huge cooldown. But LM should have the option to unlock powerful abilities. They are the true children of the Old Ones after all. They left them some toys to play with if they find it !

If they made it explicitly a campaign objective, I'd like to see some recognition that other races also contribute to maintaining the Web, even if they don't think of it in those terms. For instance, in the fluff there are certain sites that the Lizardmen allow the High Elves to occupy (and may even help defend the High Elves if the site is attacked) because the High Elves guard and maintain the site. Teclis, in turn, trained some of the Colleges of Magic to perform at least some basic maintenance of the magical currents within the Empire.

So one approach could be that:

*Province capitals of Order races count as level 2 nodes, potentially level 3 if they reach a certain level of development and you have good relations with them.
*Province capitals held by High Elves, Wood Elves, and possibly Kislev can potentially count as level 4 nodes, depending on their level of development and your relations with them.
*Province capitals held by other Lizardmen have whatever level of node they have for their own faction, as long as you have good relations with them.

This does have the potential to blow out rapidly if my suggestion of having a secondary resource linked to the Web was adopted, but if balanced accordingly it could really encourage the Lizardmen to have a global focus. Alternatively, you might only get a benefit if a node has at least level 2 links back to your capital, so you do have to focus on expanding the Web outwards rather than suddenly benefiting from a web that forms spontaneously on the other side of the world.

SaurianDruid · July 4

Draxynnic said:

This does have the potential to blow out rapidly if my suggestion of having a secondary resource linked to the Web was adopted, but if balanced accordingly it could really encourage the Lizardmen to have a global focus. Alternatively, you might only get a benefit if a node has at least level 2 links back to your capital, so you do have to focus on expanding the Web outwards rather than suddenly benefiting from a web that forms spontaneously on the other side of the world.

Needing a connection would make the most sense. It'd encourage you to form alliances and conquer settlements in a specific pattern in order to get more geomantic energies flowing back to your home regions so you can actually benefit from it.

It'd give the player a mentality kind of similar to the wood elves right now. You're doing nice things for these other factions not because you're benevolent but because you're benefitting from it in a way the other faction doesn't understand because they don't see the web like you do.

I really enjoy that mentality when I play the new wood elves. I feel more immersed in the game because I am thinking like a wood elf and making strategic choices that benefit Athel Loren and the Oak of Ages. The fact saving Nordland from Norsca and then later the Empire from the vampires was good for Order was kind of irrelevant. I did what I did to save the forests.

The Lizardmen mentality should be similar. You're making strategic choices based on what helps you build up the Geomantic Web to strengthen your own faction (Which in turn makes it easier to defeat Chaos at the end). Whether those choices help or hinder the warmbloods is entirely secondary to that. The Web being more of a global consideration that you can strengthen by helping or destroying other factions reflects the Lizardmen even more in mentality because they're all Big Picture strategists. In fact it isn't uncommon for Slann to focus too much on the long term and end up making short term mistakes.

Draxynnic · July 4

SaurianDruid said:

Draxynnic said:

This does have the potential to blow out rapidly if my suggestion of having a secondary resource linked to the Web was adopted, but if balanced accordingly it could really encourage the Lizardmen to have a global focus. Alternatively, you might only get a benefit if a node has at least level 2 links back to your capital, so you do have to focus on expanding the Web outwards rather than suddenly benefiting from a web that forms spontaneously on the other side of the world.
Needing a connection would make the most sense. It'd encourage you to form alliances and conquer settlements in a specific pattern in order to get more geomantic energies flowing back to your home regions so you can actually benefit from it.

It'd give the player a mentality kind of similar to the wood elves right now. You're doing nice things for these other factions not because you're benevolent but because you're benefitting from it in a way the other faction doesn't understand because they don't see the web like you do.

I really enjoy that mentality when I play the new wood elves. I feel more immersed in the game because I am thinking like a wood elf and making strategic choices that benefit Athel Loren and the Oak of Ages. The fact saving Nordland from Norsca and then later the Empire from the vampires was good for Order was kind of irrelevant. I did what I did to save the forests.

The Lizardmen mentality should be similar. You're making strategic choices based on what helps you build up the Geomantic Web to strengthen your own faction (Which in turn makes it easier to defeat Chaos at the end). Whether those choices help or hinder the warmbloods is entirely secondary to that. The Web being more of a global consideration that you can strengthen by helping or destroying other factions reflects the Lizardmen even more in mentality because they're all Big Picture strategists. In fact it isn't uncommon for Slann to focus too much on the long term and end up making short term mistakes.

Pretty much, although I would note that according to the Great Plan, it's supposed to be the warmblooded races that fight on the front lines against Chaos, not the Lizardmen themselves. The job of the Lizardmen is to keep the Great Plan on track until that can happen.

My pipe dream of old was to have something like the Web being a push-and-pull mechanic between the forces of Chaos and the more magically attuned forces of Order like the Lizardmen, High Elves, and Wood Elves, with strengthening the Web resulting in weakening Chaos and vice versa. So a possible implementation of this for the Lizardmen in a Mortal Empires context is that the strength of the Chaos invasion is inversely proportional to the strength of the Web when it happens. So if you've done a good job of establishing the Web, the invasion is something piddly that the Empire can easily deal with, while if you've done a poor job, it's a massive tide that will require more direct intervention to deal with.

Harder to pull off in a Game 3 combined campaign that will likely have a more organic treatment of Chaos, but there could still be a general concept that when you're playing Lizardmen, strengthening the Web applies nerfs to Chaos factions, making them easier for everyone to fight back and defeat.

SaurianDruid · July 4

Draxynnic said:

Harder to pull off in a Game 3 combined campaign that will likely have a more organic treatment of Chaos, but there could still be a general concept that when you're playing Lizardmen, strengthening the Web applies nerfs to Chaos factions, making them easier for everyone to fight back and defeat.

That could be interesting. Maybe being in an area with a strong Geomantic Web could reduce the Winds of Magic available to Chaos aligned factions while boosting the reserves for Order factions.

It'd be a small but noticable advantage and something you'd actively try to disrupt when you played Chaos. It could have a more negative effect on daemons especially depending on how CA implements daemons. If they have a "withering" mechanic kind of like summoned units that happens when their morale gets low maybe daemons suffer a morale penalty or something.

Personally, my dream mechanic was something involving recovering Old One plaques. Many years ago now I had an idea pretty similar to the Pieces of Eight the Vampire Coast have now, only they could change hands when a rival army beat an army holding it. So part of your campaign would be seeking out these relics and returning them to their proper place.

Of course plaques were used as the Vortex currency for Lizardmen so now that is unlikely to happen.

Trotrorigolo · July 4

It could be cool if LM ha a mechanic aroun the great plan, that would be linked to both the geomantic web and to the blessed spawn

Nazjax · July 4

I like most of your ideas but I dislike the Buildings, the economy and Slann changes, the first one is not a problem IMO.

Honestly it's cool to have more variety of buildings. Yes it's less broken but campaign are mostly solo players or with friends and not meant to be ultra competitive.

Unlike MP, and it's why I will talk about you Slanns changes : Having all lores would be just totaly broken, and with the actual UI of magic I dont even think it's possible, of course could be easy to change but I dislike this one. Sometime you need to do balancing arround gameplay and not lore.

For the economy changes, yeah lizardmens are not the best in economy but they are not THAT bad, you said they are the poorest, like... Old Beastmen, Chaos Warriors, Norsca and Tombs Kings are so much worse !

I dont think this change is truly needed, as Lizardmens are not traders, and use to collect wealth. Gold for them is like wood or iron, not ''high money value'' and giving them too much buffs on economy would be too broken.

Apart that, the others ideas are very nice, and I truly hope they will rework Nakai cause actually he is just so annoying, only way to enjoy him is to confederate him but you dont play his special mechanic...

And the geomantic + blessed spawn REALLY need some changes, they are mediocre. With Nakai and Tehenauhuin they need the most reworks IMO.

Forumaccountkroqgar · July 4

SaurianDruid said:
I actually don't think upgrading the Geomantic Web needs to be interactive itself. You're already conquering those regions and building the pylons to connect your cities along the Geomantic Web.

The interactivity should come from what you can do with the Web once it is up. Right now it just gives minor economic buffs. It needs to do more than that.

You suggest removing the Channeling stance. What if we change it to directly enhance itself based on how strong the Geomantic Web in the region you use it in is? The Casualty Replenishment you get from it could dramatically improve based on the Web's strength, and when you have a max level Web you could even recruit troops from any city your web is connected to as if you were standing in that city yourself. Similarly the Winds bonus you get could be boosted and maybe you get a bound spell or two at max. You are channeling the power of the Slann after all.

Astromancy could be boosted by the Geomantic Web by giving you a larger vision radius the stronger the Web is. Maybe when you're in a city with a strong Geomantic Web you can even project the vision across a large distance to other continents, allowing you to keep tabs on what is going on in the greater world.

Beyond that I like the idea of the Web giving a resource that can be used to purchase our sacred spawnings as well as items flavored as relics of the Old Ones to boost out generic characters. Using it to teleport armies around would also be huge.

As for rivers, I'd just give the Lizardmen's standard movement type immunity to river penalties. Half their armies are aquatic and those that aren't are generally big enough to ford most rivers. It'd give them the mobility edge in their own jungle that they need.

As far as Nakai, I actually like the concept of his campaign. It just needs to be fixed.

1. Make it so the vassal does not conduct diplomacy on its own. It should all go through the player.
2. Have an event pop every few turns in which the vassal offers you a choice between a large sum of gold, special relics of the Old Ones to give to your characters, or some other buffs. This prevents the player from needing to constantly ask for more gold and frames it as a fun form of tribute that your thankful vassals bestow you with, which is true to Nakai's lore.
3. Either allow the vassal to form armies or make it MUCH cheaper for Nakai to field multiple hordes. Maybe the vassal pays for 50% of Nakai's army upkeep. He needs more armies than he can field now to both defend the vassal's lands and stay on the offense.

Also, and this is a small thing, Nakai shouldn't suffer diplomatic penalties for trespassing in land controlled by other Lizardmen. He's the Wanderer. He should be able to move around Lustria without consequence.

I think replenishment bonus are already quite OP, I don't think giving them to channeling would be a good idea. I like the idea of increasing the amount of winds of magic you get, but isn't that already represented with the alignment that gives extra WoM?

I'll include the idea about river crossings and landings as an alternative to movement speed.

Your Nakai suggestion fixes the three problems (no diplomacy, no economy, no selfdefence) of Nakai while keeping the vassal, great idea! I'll put it as an alternative fix.

Nazjax said:
I like most of your ideas but I dislike the Buildings, the economy and Slann changes, the first one is not a problem IMO.

Honestly it's cool to have more variety of buildings. Yes it's less broken but campaign are mostly solo players or with friends and not meant to be ultra competitive.

Unlike MP, and it's why I will talk about you Slanns changes : Having all lores would be just totaly broken, and with the actual UI of magic I dont even think it's possible, of course could be easy to change but I dislike this one. Sometime you need to do balancing arround gameplay and not lore.

For the economy changes, yeah lizardmens are not the best in economy but they are not THAT bad, you said they are the poorest, like... Old Beastmen, Chaos Warriors, Norsca and Tombs Kings are so much worse !

I dont think this change is truly needed, as Lizardmens are not traders, and use to collect wealth. Gold for them is like wood or iron, not ''high money value'' and giving them too much buffs on economy would be too broken.

Apart that, the others ideas are very nice, and I truly hope they will rework Nakai cause actually he is just so annoying, only way to enjoy him is to confederate him but you dont play his special mechanic...

And the geomantic + blessed spawn REALLY need some changes, they are mediocre. With Nakai and Tehenauhuin they need the most reworks IMO.

I said the poorest core race, which doesn't include all of those DLC races you listed. Beastmen have just been fixed, and I think TK economy works fine, but you're welcome to make suggestions on how to improve TK.

I actually just meant having access to a slann of metal, slann of shadows.. but having a multi lore slann should be the goal, it's something that some mods already add.

Indeed lizardmen aren't traders, but the economy doesn't represent some idea of commercial capitalism but the ability of the race to field armies and build infrastructure. Lizardmen armies lore wise need no more upkeep than prey to eat and a bit of obsinite for the weapons, so they don't need to have such a bad economy.

Draxynnic said:

Pr4vda said:
That is true the Geomantic web is ... not that impressive. And not funny at all. Improving edicts is very meh. Your main goal as LM should be to restore the system, which should be hard but very valuable. Like if you manage to restore 25% or a certain portion of the map, you could get "X bonuses". You should dedicate yourself to follow the Great Plan. The game should really motivate you to take back and restore the Web to give huge bonuses or actions. A teleport moove would indeed be very interesting. But a fast travel or a special stance (like +200% campaign movement with impossible to be ambushed for 1 turn but no attack option) could be fun. Very limited ofc with a huge cooldown. But LM should have the option to unlock powerful abilities. They are the true children of the Old Ones after all. They left them some toys to play with if they find it !
If they made it explicitly a campaign objective, I'd like to see some recognition that other races also contribute to maintaining the Web, even if they don't think of it in those terms. For instance, in the fluff there are certain sites that the Lizardmen allow the High Elves to occupy (and may even help defend the High Elves if the site is attacked) because the High Elves guard and maintain the site. Teclis, in turn, trained some of the Colleges of Magic to perform at least some basic maintenance of the magical currents within the Empire.

So one approach could be that:

*Province capitals of Order races count as level 2 nodes, potentially level 3 if they reach a certain level of development and you have good relations with them.
*Province capitals held by High Elves, Wood Elves, and possibly Kislev can potentially count as level 4 nodes, depending on their level of development and your relations with them.
*Province capitals held by other Lizardmen have whatever level of node they have for their own faction, as long as you have good relations with them.

This does have the potential to blow out rapidly if my suggestion of having a secondary resource linked to the Web was adopted, but if balanced accordingly it could really encourage the Lizardmen to have a global focus. Alternatively, you might only get a benefit if a node has at least level 2 links back to your capital, so you do have to focus on expanding the Web outwards rather than suddenly benefiting from a web that forms spontaneously on the other side of the world.

That's partly how it works now with allies right? They just need to turn down a bit the animosity towards lizardmen from the children of the old ones (order humans, dwarfs, good elves), I find it weird that playing as dark elves it's easier to play the diplomatic game than with lizardmen.

Pr4vda said:
There are pretty good ideas here. I hope to see some in a future LM update one day.

That is true the Geomantic web is ... not that impressive. And not funny at all. Improving edicts is very meh. Your main goal as LM should be to restore the system, which should be hard but very valuable. Like if you manage to restore 25% or a certain portion of the map, you could get "X bonuses". You should dedicate yourself to follow the Great Plan. The game should really motivate you to take back and restore the Web to give huge bonuses or actions. A teleport moove would indeed be very interesting. But a fast travel or a special stance (like +200% campaign movement with impossible to be ambushed for 1 turn but no attack option) could be fun. Very limited ofc with a huge cooldown. But LM should have the option to unlock powerful abilities. They are the true children of the Old Ones after all. They left them some toys to play with if they find it !

Concerning Nakai, I think Hordes have to get some form of settlements. The BM update is the perfect example. But just giving Nakai the possibility to own each settlement and put a single building on it seems underwhelming imo. His vassal must be deleted ofc because each thing owned by the AI tends to create dumb things. Again, CA cut those things (the Waagh have left, as well as the bray herds etc.). But I would like something innovative. Hordes are interesting if they have clever and innovative gameplay. Otherwise it is just moove / take or raze / do it again. Boring. Again the BM update shows the things can be improved.

I like your Nakai suggestion, maybe he should have unique landmarks for his vassal that he's focused on taking over. The issue with it is that it requires a real rework, my Nakai suggestion was on how to fix him with as little work from CA as possible.

davedave1124 · July 4

I'm picturing something to do with the Slann and Skink Oracle mechanic. The screen opens up like the Skyrim skills tree and your LM faction must follow their version of the great plan opening up bonuses, missions and RoRs

Forumaccountkroqgar · July 4

davedave1124 said:
I'm picturing something to do with the Slann and Skink Oracle mechanic. The screen opens up like the Skyrim skills tree and your LM faction must follow their version of the great plan opening up bonuses, missions and RoRs

I take it that your vision of the great plan is supposed to be the tech tree, which is why I think it should offer a bit more choice. I also tried not to stray too far from the current mechanics so it's more a rework of the mechanics to make them fun than a whole new update with new mechanics like the beastmen or wood elf patchs.

davedave1124 · July 4

yukontherun said:

davedave1124 said:
I'm picturing something to do with the Slann and Skink Oracle mechanic. The screen opens up like the Skyrim skills tree and your LM faction must follow their version of the great plan opening up bonuses, missions and RoRs
I take it that your vision of the great plan is supposed to be the tech tree, which is why I think it should offer a bit more choice. I also tried not to stray too far from the current mechanics so it's more a rework of the mechanics to make them fun than a whole new update with new mechanics like the beastmen or wood elf patchs.

You could have it then where the tech tree is the overarching plan for all LM while the Oracle based function is controlled locally. A more complex version of personal Dwarf Grudges' as well as adding an RPG element which I really liked in the Empire DLC.

KirGeo · July 4

These Ideas are so good I hope CA looks into them and makes upgrades.
I like the Idea of blessings of the old one being like the scrap mechanics that can be added to all units or like the new ruin system for dwarfs.
Maybe tied to who you battle over crafting to get specific blessing to apply to units if they go the DW route instead of GS.

One thing I want to ask. Does Nakai really need a Vassal? Can't he just give the provinces to actual factions and get boons from the god and resource from said faction for doing so?
Like I dedicate this city to 'x' god and give it to Hexoatl or 'y' god and give it to Tlaqua?
The god and faction don't need to be tied. Just who ever you feel is appropriate. Like region trading mod.

Forumaccountkroqgar · July 4

KirGeo said:
These Ideas are so good I hope CA looks into them and makes upgrades.
I like the Idea of blessings of the old one being like the scrap mechanics that can be added to all units or like the new ruin system for dwarfs.
Maybe tied to who you battle over crafting to get specific blessing to apply to units if they go the DW route instead of GS.

One thing I want to ask. Does Nakai really need a Vassal? Can't he just give the provinces to actual factions and get boons from the god and resource from said faction for doing so?
Like I dedicate this city to 'x' god and give it to Hexoatl or 'y' god and give it to Tlaqua?
The god and faction don't need to be tied. Just who ever you feel is appropriate. Like region trading mod.

The old one blessings should have the difference with scrap and runes that you don't get to choose them, lizardmen don't get to decide "we'll have a chotec spawning because Grom is spamming trolls which are fire vulnerable" but they aren't completely random, they get the spawnings that they need to fight their enemies, i'll try to develop the idea in depth latter this month in another post.

Nakai giving his cities to another lizardmen faction makes sense thematically but I see it being a mess for campaign because of climates/corruption. If you gift settlements to Tiktaq'to in norsca his faction will probably collapse.

SaurianDruid · July 5

davedave1124 said:
I'm picturing something to do with the Slann and Skink Oracle mechanic. The screen opens up like the Skyrim skills tree and your LM faction must follow their version of the great plan opening up bonuses, missions and RoRs

This is pretty similar to my vision of a Great Plan mechanic from before Warhammer 2 launched.

Basically...

There would be a set number of plaques that spawn randomly around the world at the start of a campaign. Each plaque, once recovered, filled in a piece of the Great Plan, which gave you instructions on what the Old Ones wanted you to do.

The Great Plan itself would be somewhat randomized but always lead to a defeated Chaos. Some games it'd ask you to purge the Greenskins. Sometimes it'd ask you to remove the elves from outside Ulthuan. Sometimes it might even ask you to destroy Ulthuan so the Slann can take direct control of the Great Vortex. But the final plaque would always lead to destroying Archaon/saving the Vortex.

Completing steps of the Great Plan could lead to sacred spawnings of special units, uncovering relics of the Old Ones as items for lords and heroes, or just give a big boost to your economy, or maybe unlocks something new you can do with the Geomantic Web.

Maybe to give players more agency whenever you uncover a new plaque you're given a dilemma that allows you to "interpret" the plaque, choosing between four possible tasks the plaque could be giving you. Whichever interpretations you choose becomes your goals for the campaign.

Victuz · July 5

I'm going to save this to mention this in case of riots after July 14th.

Draxynnic · July 5

yukontherun said:

KirGeo said:
These Ideas are so good I hope CA looks into them and makes upgrades.
I like the Idea of blessings of the old one being like the scrap mechanics that can be added to all units or like the new ruin system for dwarfs.
Maybe tied to who you battle over crafting to get specific blessing to apply to units if they go the DW route instead of GS.

One thing I want to ask. Does Nakai really need a Vassal? Can't he just give the provinces to actual factions and get boons from the god and resource from said faction for doing so?
Like I dedicate this city to 'x' god and give it to Hexoatl or 'y' god and give it to Tlaqua?
The god and faction don't need to be tied. Just who ever you feel is appropriate. Like region trading mod.
The old one blessings should have the difference with scrap and runes that you don't get to choose them, lizardmen don't get to decide "we'll have a chotec spawning because Grom is spamming trolls which are fire vulnerable" but they aren't completely random, they get the spawnings that they need to fight their enemies, i'll try to develop the idea in depth latter this month in another post.

Nakai giving his cities to another lizardmen faction makes sense thematically but I see it being a mess for campaign because of climates/corruption. If you gift settlements to Tiktaq'to in norsca his faction will probably collapse.

Yeah, I think this is an important distinction. The Lizardmen don't have any conscious control over what the special spawning might be, but one way or another, they always seem to get what they need the spawning to be.

That's something that's hard to model without just giving the player the ability to choose which sacred spawnings are best aligned with their needs and goals. Given that the identity of the player is already a bit abstract, this could be viewed as the player partially representing the Old Ones setting down the programming as well as the modern Lizardmen. One could, theoretically, imagine an algorithm that tries to predict what the player is going to need (including potentially knowing some things that the player doesn't, such as whether a particular AI faction is going to declare war in the next few turns), but I think it'd be hard to make an algorithm that can match the predictive ability of an experienced player.

SeanJeanquoi · July 5

on the topic of how to fix Nakai:

- I said it years ago before Nakai was even a thing and I'll say it again: make him a vassal of all the other Lizardmen factions like Belisarius and the Byzantine Empire in "The Last Roman" DLC for Attila! remove "the Defenders of the Great Plan" from the game.

- Nakai would have no diplomatic penalty for moving through any LM territory. He'd be allied with at least one of them from turn 1.

- As well as choosing which god to dedicate a settlement to, he'd be able to choose which Lizardmen faction to bequeath the territory to, able to capture it on their behalf.

- Keep his god-devoted temple as building that occupies the first building slot of every territory he takes and offers a slight garrison boost to whoever owns it, as well as bonuses to him.

- Nakai should have the ability to 'liberate'/resurrect dead and gone Lizardmen factions.

- Like the Tanukhids from Attila, Nakai would be a pure nomad, unable to confederate or hold land of his own, until a point in his campaign, where he's offered a choice: remain the Lizardmen's guard dog or settle down and auto-confederate all the territory you've gifted unto others.

- They could even give him his own home base settlement like the Oak of Ages 'the heart of the jungle' (maybe even use the Wood Elf settlement in Lustria for that purpose) giving him a base to upgrade in the background and go back to would anchor him, give him a better sense of growth and progression and allow his faction to be more survivable.

- Remove the massive focus on global recruitment from his buildings (restrict it to the tech tree) and instead have horde army buildings that allow you to tailor the playstyle of that particular army.

Want a Scouting/raiding army? construct buildings that offer raiding income, campaign line of sight and movement range, etc. Want an army focused on support and recruitment? construct buildings that boost recruit rank, recruit capacity, increase casualty replenishment for local friendly armies, etc.

- Also, allow secondary armies to become just as strong as the main army, able to built to tier 5. This would make them more useful and remove the bs where you lose a campaign if Nakai loses a fight one time.

SeanJeanquoi · July 5

In terms of campaign goals for Nakai outside of fighting Wulfhart? that's a bit of a tricky one.

I think they should change it so his final battle only occurs when Wulfhart's faction is down to 1 settlement or has been wiped completely. Then he comes back for one last push in the final battle and completing it actually spells the end of the humans in Lustria, unlike how it works right now where it's completely disconnected from the reality of your campaign.

How about, after you defeat Wulfhart, other objectives become available to you, older grudges and things from his lore.

If they add a Terraforming mechanic, he could be tasked with capturing Albion and making it Lizard-friendly. This could involve him fighting off waves of chaos while a Hexoatl settlement terraforms the area.

They could also make it a long campaign victory condition that every Lizardmen faction is alive and well and that all ancestral Lizardmen territory is under Lizard control. This would encourage him to travel to the Southlands and get things under control there.

Perhaps he has a unique map UI of the old Lizardmen Empire that shows you who should be in control of what. They could even make it that you have to give specific factions specific areas, so you aren't just randomly gifting territory to whoever you want, you have to actually follow the Great Plan and give Tehenhauin this and Mazdamundi that (there are pros and cons to this approach).

Yannir · July 5

SaurianDruid said:

Also, and this is a small thing, Nakai shouldn't suffer diplomatic penalties for trespassing in land controlled by other Lizardmen. He's the Wanderer. He should be able to move around Lustria without consequence.

On a slightly unrelated note, I think Skaven shouldn't care about trespassing.

It makes for a bad mechanic when you have a faction you can accidentally trespass and put on your bad side. It doesn't make much lore-sense either, skaven barely care what goes on above them on the ground.

eomat · July 5

I want access for Slann to all the Core Winds of Magic and CA to properly colour code them as per the Magic Wheel.

SaurianDruid · July 7

You know, way back before Game 2 released I had actually suggested some kind of FOOD mechanic for Lizardmen because Lizardmen don't use gold to pay their people. Gold is worthless to them. The only resource they care about aside from magical energy is food.

Obviously this became a Skaven mechanic, but do you know what mechanic would be super loreful for the Lizardmen and their unique means of not paying their troops and recruitment via spawns?

Tomb Kings/Beastmen style recruitment.

It would be incredibly thematic for the Lizardmen. Their Geomantic Web could generate Geomantic Energy the stronger it is in each connected city leading back to your capital, which could then be spent unlocking new spawnings of troops that you don't need to pay upkeep on because, much like the Beastmen, you don't actually need to pay them.

It could be flavored as channeling Geomantic Energies into the spawning pools to accelerate their production. Sacred spawnings could be something you have a random chance of spawning whenever you do it. Maybe with an added ability to spend more Geomantic Energy on the spawning for a higher chance to get sacreds.

Granted the dinosaurs don't come from spawning pools but that can be re-flavored as using magic to accelerate the taming process or something.

Then you just apply some of the other suggestions here. Draxynnic's ideas about being able to gain Geomantic Energy from allies would work really well. Hard-code Lizardmen AI to always dedicate one building slot to their Web building. Then have the Incursion mechanic from the Wood Elves pop up in yours and allied lands that can be resolved to help or hinder the Geomantic Web of your allies.

Ideally even if your allies are mere elves or humans who can't build a Geomantic Pylon you could still get a lot of Energy from their Geomantic Web by strengthening it through your handling of Incursions. This would simulate the times the Lizardmen have just shown up, defeated a foe that threatened the High Elves, and then left without saying a word.

Ultimately this would make it possible to build tall instead of wide, which I feel is a lot more fitting for the Lizardmen. They aren't expansionists. They just want to maintain the Geomantic Web and use it to defeat Chaos and bring about the Great Plan.

Any kind of corruption would also weaken the Web though, so you need to be VERY aggressive with Skaven, Chaos, and Vampires who spread it not just through your lands but the lands of your allies.

MadDemiurg · July 7

I'll post my spawning pool idea from the other thread here:

"Spawning pool mechanic could replace both the current recruitment system and the blessed spawnings mechanic and look like:
-There are no recruitment buildings anymore. Instead, you can "reclaim" spawning pools in a particular temple-city (each can have more than one pool).
-Spawning pools have several types are different in every temple-city, this gives you strategic choices in terms of which one to conquer next depending on which units you need more. It's possible (and beneficial) to have several spawning pools of the same type.
-Rather than allowing to recruit units directly, spawning pools periodically add units to the local recruitment pool. Actual unit types are based on the kinds of the spawning pools you have in the region. It's a bit trickier with dinos but it can be explained that skink handlers that can ride them are pretty rare and are spawned separately.
-No global recruitment and no spawning pools outside Lustria, Southlands and some other select locations. How do you conquer anything outside of Lustria then? That's where geomantic web comes into play. If you rebuild geomantic web you can teleport armies from Lustria to the geomantic web nodes in other continents.
-Smaller chance to spawn "blessed" units with extra traits from a random pool of traits."

SaurianDruid said:
You know, way back before Game 2 released I had actually suggested some kind of FOOD mechanic for Lizardmen because Lizardmen don't use gold to pay their people. Gold is worthless to them. The only resource they care about aside from magical energy is food.

Obviously this became a Skaven mechanic, but do you know what mechanic would be super loreful for the Lizardmen and their unique means of not paying their troops and recruitment via spawns?

Tomb Kings/Beastmen style recruitment.

It would be incredibly thematic for the Lizardmen. Their Geomantic Web could generate Geomantic Energy the stronger it is in each connected city leading back to your capital, which could then be spent unlocking new spawnings of troops that you don't need to pay upkeep on because, much like the Beastmen, you don't actually need to pay them.

It could be flavored as channeling Geomantic Energies into the spawning pools to accelerate their production. Sacred spawnings could be something you have a random chance of spawning whenever you do it. Maybe with an added ability to spend more Geomantic Energy on the spawning for a higher chance to get sacreds.

Granted the dinosaurs don't come from spawning pools but that can be re-flavored as using magic to accelerate the taming process or something.

Then you just apply some of the other suggestions here. Draxynnic's ideas about being able to gain Geomantic Energy from allies would work really well. Hard-code Lizardmen AI to always dedicate one building slot to their Web building. Then have the Incursion mechanic from the Wood Elves pop up in yours and allied lands that can be resolved to help or hinder the Geomantic Web of your allies.

Ideally even if your allies are mere elves or humans who can't build a Geomantic Pylon you could still get a lot of Energy from their Geomantic Web by strengthening it through your handling of Incursions. This would simulate the times the Lizardmen have just shown up, defeated a foe that threatened the High Elves, and then left without saying a word.

Ultimately this would make it possible to build tall instead of wide, which I feel is a lot more fitting for the Lizardmen. They aren't expansionists. They just want to maintain the Geomantic Web and use it to defeat Chaos and bring about the Great Plan.

Any kind of corruption would also weaken the Web though, so you need to be VERY aggressive with Skaven, Chaos, and Vampires who spread it not just through your lands but the lands of your allies.

I think new BM recruitment looks a bit boring tbh, though it might be ok with more casual players or just people that like OP stuff. The main problem with it in my opinion is that it's completely risk-averse because there's no way you can lose caps after increasing them and if you lose an army, you can recruit a new one just like the lost one very fast. With TK you have to keep control of the settlements to maintain your caps, which is a better model imo. In either case, I don't think it quite captures what the spawning pools are but it can be used as a satisfactory approximation.

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