Brad Wardell's views about technology, politics, religion, world affairs, and all sorts of politically incorrect topics.
Published on February 1, 2009 By Draginol In Demigod Journals

Beta 2D is the last of the Beta 2 builds which were designed to test connectivity.  Over the weekend we spent a lot of time working on the connectivity server – the “magical” feature that Demigod makes use of to make connectivity a lot better and easier than what has been seen in typical RTS.

The release of Beta 2D showed a killer bug in the Impulse Reactor back end that caused it to just fail in setting up connections after a couple hours.  That got fixed (we hope) on Sunday night. We’ll know more soon.

That leads us to dealing with the remaining biggest challenge with regards to connectivity: The peer connectivity.  Right now, it only takes ONE person who can’t be connected to in a given game to cause the infinite “connecting” dialog to come up.

We have to do two things still:

1) We need to improve this substantially.  Beta 2D increases the likelyhood of success to around 80% (needs to be 99% by ship date).  Ironically, my work machine is one of the machines that can’t easily be connected to when it’s hosting.

2) We need a better way to eject players who can’t connect so they don’t hold up everyone else.

But at this point, we’re at a stage where we can start debugging that and move to Beta 3 which has the tournament code and we can really get into the balance part of the game.

We’ve learned a lot from this beta.  One of the things we’ve learned is that we really need to do a better job conditioning beta testers that the Demigod betas are just that – BETAS. They aren’t marketing experiments.  We’ve had lots of posts complaining that the game is (wait for it) “buggy”.  Or comparing the game’s balance or features to some shipping game.

Having shipped the “Strategy Game of the Year” for the past 2 consecutive years (GalCiv II and Sins of a Solar Empire) I would hope that we would get cut some slack that we know something of what we’re doing but then again, it is the Internet.

Here’s an interesting factoid that Sins of a Solar Empire players can tell you:

The economic model in Sins of a Solar Empire didn’t get its final version until GAMMA (that’s after the betas).  Before Gamma 3, asteroids and such ran out of resources (metal and crystal) eventually.  Imagine how different Sins of a Solar Empire would be. There also wasn’t an “unfair” difficulty level in Sins until the gammas.

With Beta 3, we get to start finally getting into the actual balance and game play a lot more.  Obviously, the game isn’t going to radically change in terms of scope. It’s not going to become a first person shooter.

So here are a few things that we’re looking at as a sample:

image

MY  personal opinions:

  • Currencies should increase gold income by a % not a raw amount.
    • Currency I: Increases gold income by 20%
      • Cost increased to $2000
    • Currency II: Increases gold income by 40%
      • Cost increases to $4000
    • Currency III: Increases gold income by 60%
      • Cost increased to $6000
  • Experience I
    • Experience I: increases XP generation by 10%
    • Experience II: increase XP generation by 20%
    • Add: Experience III at level 5: Increases XP generation by 30%
      • Cost $2400
    • Experience IV at level 6: Increases XP generation by 40%
  • Graveyard
    • Graveyard I moved to war rank 1. Lowers Death Penalty by 10%. Cost 600
    • Graveyard II moved to war rank 3. Lowers death penalty by 20%. Cost 1800
    • Graveyard III. Lowers death penalty by 40%.
  • Priests moved to war rank 3.
  • Angels should be moved to war rank 10, made a lot tougher, should only be 1 of them.
  • Catapultasuri should be moved to war rank 5. Should only be 2 of them but tougher (more HP).
  • Giants should be moved to war rank 7.
  • Requested new item: Totem of Cancelation: (replaces totem of revelation if necessary)
    • Cost: 200
    • Wipes out any mines or similar things in an area when placed.
  • Requested new item: Scroll of Health
    • Cost: 1000
    • Casting time: INSTANT
    • Restores 1000 health
  • Restorative scroll should eliminate Regulus tracking device
  • Requested new item: Gauntlets of Demolition
  • Requested new item: Scroll of Demolition
    • Does 2000 damage to a structure
    • Cost $2000
  • Requested new item: Scroll of Invincibility
    • Unit is invincible for 3 seconds
    • Instant cast time
    • Cost: 200
  • Eliminate:
    • Combat health potion
    • Combat mana potion
    • Rejuvenation Elixir (the cheap one)
  • Armor: Need to be careful about how much armor we give players so that they don’t become invincible.

Demigods

Assassins

  • The rook moves far too fast by default. He’s a walking castle! Super tough but super slow.

Generals

  • Fewer minions that are a lot tougher.
  • 1st level minions can only have 2 of with you.
  • 2nd level minions can only have 4 of them with you.
  • 3rd level minions can have 4 of them with you.
  • Generals should do less damage in battle. (the Oak, for instance, starts out doing like 150 damage per second).

Misc.

  • Edge scroll should be on by default
  • Multplayer is set to a threshold of 200ms. Can we increase this to 350ms?
  • Is the game clock a real clock or one based on performance?
  • Still need a fancier progress bar displayed when taking a flag
  • Amount spent in upgrades should be displayed in the final game score
  • # of upgrades paid for should be displayed in the in-game score screen
  • Damage done by the general’s minions is not displayed
  • The voice acting on Regulus could use some work. The original Regulus voice was much better.
  • War score and war rank need to be synched up so that war rank is simply war score / 1000.

image

Those are just my personal thoughts.  The next step is that we talk it over and decide what makes the most sense to do.


Comments (Page 3)
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on Feb 02, 2009

One of *the* reasons I never got into SupCom was the "500ms tolerance" that was built in. Every time I tried to move my units, I felt that delay and it drove me crazy. Which was why I *hated* the thought of Demigod going from a 200ms to a 350ms default.

I liked, and think it makes sense, what some people said about making it NOT have a "fixed" delay, but make it depend on the players IN the game. So if someone joins with a 300ms ping have it automatically raise the "tolerance" appropriately. Or if everyone who joins is sub-150 ping, LOWER the "tolerance" down from 200ms .

Also, please give the host of games a "filter" to NOT allow people OVER a certain ping to join the game. Personally I'd never want anyone with a 300+ms ping to join my games.

 

-Drexion

on Feb 02, 2009

Increasing a delay between command and execution will make the game more of a plot & react experience than a twitcher, won`t it? You`ll have to be more deliberate in committing The Rook to a Hammer Slam for example. It`ll be trickier to time things. Personally I like that.

Regarding unit counts and Minions, I theorize that reducing the count of General units will also help mitigate pathing/clustering problems in tighter map areas (?). I like having a horde, so I`m hopeful that perhaps some Generals might still rely more on numbers than quality, though I understand both how that makes them more vulnerable to area effect annihilation and how that may go against the grain of the intent of the change (to toughen up Minions).

on Feb 02, 2009

 

Various citadel tweaks, Remove combat pots, Balance armor, Fewer but tougher grunts and minions

Agreed

Requested new item: Scroll of Invincibility

Unit is invincible for 3 seconds

Instant cast time

Cost: 200 

Up cost to 1200 if you really want this. 

Requested new item: Totem of Cancelation: (replaces totem of revelation if necessary)

Cost: 200

Wipes out any mines or similar things in an area when placed.

Alternatively - make mines which have been decloaked by Totem of Revelation destructible. 

350 ms also isn't that good because the range 250ms to 350ms is nearly unoccupied - its either below 250 or higher than 350 mostly, at least for europe, I have no clue how its for north America. Its a very unpleasant topic but ignoring that issue won't help and it needs a good solution.

Latency from Santa Fe, New Mexico, with a 12 Mbps down and 1 Mbps up connection -

Europe - between 200 and 300 ms, usually right at 250.  Portugal seems to be slightly higher and England slightly lower. 

North America East Coast - usually right around 100 ms

SE Asia and Australia - 400 ms or higher

At some point the back end should incorporate dynamic net_lag adjustments, but if it's too early for that with Demigod a selection of presets in the game lobby with the default as low as possible, as TBO, suggested, would be great.  A default of 350 ms would be rough, frankly.

Happy Birthday Trigeminal ^^

 

 

 

on Feb 02, 2009

Ke5trel
 
Happy Birthday Trigeminal ^^
 

Thanks, I was starting to feel lonely.

on Feb 02, 2009

Ya Happy B'day

Now i do think we need some instant items that will work when stunned like a heal items. I also believe your favor item should be instant if you chose a heal or mana. Because he who picks 800 hitpoints gets it right away. The Heal should be instant and can be cast even when stunned.  I am not sure I like the level 20 cap Makes choosing skills a lot harder. If winning I go with one skill set if behind I have to choose another route which then sets me back late game.

on Feb 02, 2009

but I like the sniper guy's current voice.     it makes him sound super cheesy and fun to mimic....   the 2nd best voice is oak.

I disagree a little on the minions.   I like having huge swarms of minions when I play generals, though I understand why you might want to have a few strong minions rather than a swarm of weak ones.   If only there was a good way to let us both have our way.

 

on Feb 02, 2009

HorseRadish

I am not sure I like the level 20 cap Makes choosing skills a lot harder. If winning I go with one skill set if behind I have to choose another route which then sets me back late game.

To me this says the level 20 cap is working.  They want you to make choices and say wow, should I get that or this this time.  I think about who I am fighting and after 20 games with sedna between 2c and 2d, I still don't choose the exact same build or build order.  If you throw in items you can see I am actually making chooses based on how my strengths match up against an opponents strengths and weaknesses.  I think this is a very good thing.

on Feb 02, 2009

Requested new item: Totem of Cancelation: (replaces totem of revelation if necessary)

  • Cost: 200
  • Wipes out any mines or similar things in an area when placed.


Sounds good. Do not remove Totem of Revelation please. Its a great item imo...Maybe increasing its price to 100, or making it have shorter duration (lasts for less time), visual radius of it decreases, it can be destroyed (decent amount of hp) etc. Do one of those things to the Totem of Revelation, but keep it Nothing wrong with it atm

If you are going to introduce totem of cancelation I think mines didnt really need that really low cap nerf it got. Maybe keep them but put up cap by a bit?


Rest of the changes sound great....Like the fewer but stronger suggestion.

350ms is too much...specially when we only have one unit to control. The only reason I can imagine for not having a dynamic net_lag is because its too hard to implement? (Is it? I have no idea...someone please enlighten me on this).

on Feb 02, 2009

I still highly recommend trying out the proxy connectivity methodology. It will increase lag but will definately give the ability to play.

 

Speaking of which. Beta 2C is HORRIBLY riddled with lag. I mean many games are plain ol' unplayable. 2v2 is pushing it, 3v3 is bad, 4v4... I can't imagine it working smooth, I have to say you guys need to do a whole lot better. Sorry to just bluntly say it.

on Feb 02, 2009

astonerbum
I still highly recommend trying out the proxy connectivity methodology. It will increase lag but will definately give the ability to play.

 

Speaking of which. Beta 2C is HORRIBLY riddled with lag. I mean many games are plain ol' unplayable. 2v2 is pushing it, 3v3 is bad, 4v4... I can't imagine it working smooth, I have to say you guys need to do a whole lot better. Sorry to just bluntly say it.

Dude we are on 2D now, and the lag isn't an issue in too many of the games I've played.  The netcode still needs work, but only 1 of the last 5 or 6 games had any lag.

on Feb 03, 2009

Well my orginal thought on generals was that they would each work a diffrent way. For example (because dota is commonly used, and is appropriate for a rough tool) take chen, brood mother, furion, and keeper of light (though KoL recently got a rework, but I'm talking about the orginal version). Each has it's own method of having units, chen steals neutrals, brood gets them from killing units with a buff on and her minions can make subsequent minions through the same buff, furion makes only one unit type from trees, kol makes a unit which makes more units, which heal. Dota has some varied (partial) general, with varied minions. QoT and Sedna summon the exact same waym vampire and oak basiclly both summon off dead units. And all these units are barley varied, the two largest variations are shamblers have some slight range, and spirits fly and some simple stat adjustments. No special abilites, only one unit each, 2 spawning methods, only 2 unique variations. Thats WEAKSAUCE!

So what I think could improve are the folowing: make more spawn methods, wheather it's on attack/kill, buy from base, on cast, on being hit, or anything else. Also more actual abilities! make shamblers able to root or something(they're not too bad range+eatble is not half bad), make yetis able to jump,  make vampires minions able to death explode or something. And also more variety! When I orginally thought of generals I thought of multipule units and specialized units and other things, not: oh I can spawn lots of one unit. I saw things like diffrent forms of shamblers, thorny shambler(dmg return), spindly (long range) shambler, burnt shambler(high armour/fire resist). Or vampire minions like maybe the spiny things in combat, but also able to buy vampire eliminators, fast high damge to demigod units, or buy blood sappers, little building bombing units. Or in the case of sedna, as shes more a healer, crowds of yetis make good sense, but maybe throw in a captain yeti, or ranged yetis for good taste, and make like the third summoned yeti the captain and the 4,6,8 th ranged. And for the spirits, maybe make them retain aspects from which they died, minatours are generic, archers are high damage, priests are hp regen, angeles are move speed, ect. ect. Thats what I orginally thought of as I heard about/saw generals. While the Idols are nice, I would rather have more special unit variety before being able to summon bunches of units which are already on the field (though a mind control device, or scrolls (one use items, multi use trophy) of that type could be good items/trophies(?, is that what theyre called?))

Also a balance thing that bugs me is that a melee general (specificly sedna) has no way to stop air (specificly spirits) as the siege archers can't hit air (archers? really now?). And demigods are probably epic enough to figure out how to hit air units in most cases (rook i can understand, he has arrows, maybe UB not being able to as well, but he needs a way to stop air, qot (I haven't checked her) would be just fiable, oak has spirits, and vampire can floaty jump?), sedna has a pretty long spear and that... thing can prolly jump, so please some air cover please? relying on base defences wave creeps is not a viable solution.

P.S. I can still barely connect so the net code hmmmm, its first priority in my mind.

P.P.S. The game is definetly looking better each beta, skill trees are evolving to forms that I like better, so keep up the good work! also if your reading this... then you are keeping up the good work anyways! (most game companines would go: oh look 100 new posts, lets go play madden football 2005 for 4 hours for inspiration on the 2009 version)

on Feb 03, 2009

mOoEyThEcOw
Well my orginal thought on generals was that they would each work a diffrent way. For example (because dota is commonly used, and is appropriate for a rough tool) take chen, brood mother, furion, and keeper of light (though KoL recently got a rework, but I'm talking about the orginal version). Each has it's own method of having units, chen steals neutrals, brood gets them from killing units with a buff on and her minions can make subsequent minions through the same buff, furion makes only one unit type from trees, kol makes a unit which makes more units, which heal. Dota has some varied (partial) general, with varied minions. QoT and Sedna summon the exact same waym vampire and oak basiclly both summon off dead units. And all these units are barley varied, the two largest variations are shamblers have some slight range, and spirits fly and some simple stat adjustments. No special abilites, only one unit each, 2 spawning methods, only 2 unique variations. Thats WEAKSAUCE!

So what I think could improve are the folowing: make more spawn methods, wheather it's on attack/kill, buy from base, on cast, on being hit, or anything else. Also more actual abilities! make shamblers able to root or something(they're not too bad range+eatble is not half bad), make yetis able to jump,  make vampires minions able to death explode or something. And also more variety! When I orginally thought of generals I thought of multipule units and specialized units and other things, not: oh I can spawn lots of one unit. I saw things like diffrent forms of shamblers, thorny shambler(dmg return), spindly (long range) shambler, burnt shambler(high armour/fire resist). Or vampire minions like maybe the spiny things in combat, but also able to buy vampire eliminators, fast high damge to demigod units, or buy blood sappers, little building bombing units. Or in the case of sedna, as shes more a healer, crowds of yetis make good sense, but maybe throw in a captain yeti, or ranged yetis for good taste, and make like the third summoned yeti the captain and the 4,6,8 th ranged. And for the spirits, maybe make them retain aspects from which they died, minatours are generic, archers are high damage, priests are hp regen, angeles are move speed, ect. ect. Thats what I orginally thought of as I heard about/saw generals. While the Idols are nice, I would rather have more special unit variety before being able to summon bunches of units which are already on the field (though a mind control device, or scrolls (one use items, multi use trophy) of that type could be good items/trophies(?, is that what theyre called?))

Also a balance thing that bugs me is that a melee general (specificly sedna) has no way to stop air (specificly spirits) as the siege archers can't hit air (archers? really now?). And demigods are probably epic enough to figure out how to hit air units in most cases (rook i can understand, he has arrows, maybe UB not being able to as well, but he needs a way to stop air, qot (I haven't checked her) would be just fiable, oak has spirits, and vampire can floaty jump?), sedna has a pretty long spear and that... thing can prolly jump, so please some air cover please? relying on base defences wave creeps is not a viable solution.

P.S. I can still barely connect so the net code hmmmm, its first priority in my mind.

P.P.S. The game is definetly looking better each beta, skill trees are evolving to forms that I like better, so keep up the good work! also if your reading this... then you are keeping up the good work anyways! (most game companines would go: oh look 100 new posts, lets go play madden football 2005 for 4 hours for inspiration on the 2009 version)

I like your ideas in general for, umm, Generals. I wouldn`t change the Oak`s Spirits though... they seem appropriately uniform to me. Queen Of Thorns and Lord Erebus might be the most sensible candidates for randomized variety in their summonings.

As for striking air units, if Angels are going to be reigned in to a single unit spawn per wave, I am okay with leaving certain Demigods (including some of those I love playing!) wide open to air. That forces the player to utilize elements of their faction such as defenses to defend against them... or to seek the assistance of friendly folk like The TorchBearer... . More reason to cooperate.

Back to General summonings, I don`t think I`d change how they summon at this stage in the game. A little late for something as core as that to mutate a great deal, plus I think the idol system works well in conjunction with both inherent generations and ability summoning. Mind you I am very pleased with the shape Demigod is taking.

on Feb 03, 2009

They can change something like that realtively quickly, in most mods mind you it takes time, but at a place where they have multipul programmers and developers working for 8+ hours a day, they can change it easily, it is no where near too late to change something like that. It's just that they have decided to put their foot down on the issue I guess (which seems stupid to do before the 'gamplay' beta).

Also in general I wasn't talking about randomized spawns, but those could be a way of doing it, I was think of completly diffrent methods in each case, QoT could pick a version to use (which gives me an idea, right clicking a skill could give you an alternate version/change it for the next left click! could be a way to implament more in mods), eurabus would have a vampires lair building (i.e. barracks), spirits would just be randomized at spawn, and sedna would be more structred were my orginal ideas.

on Feb 03, 2009

something i am missing with generals is any kind of direct link to their summons... like a live bond.

i would prefer very strong summons, which share their life with the summoner, for example if the summoner has got 5 strong summons, each of them with arround 1,5K HP, the general would have his own... 1,5K HP + 50% of each of the summons current life. means, if the general stands alone, hes an easy hit. and while he is surrounded by his own units he is a hero hard to be killed.

the way to kill a general should be to first kill some of his minions. without killing them it should be very hard to come up with him.

not that he should take down other demigods in a second, but taking their attacks without big problems for some time before getting in real danger until his minions are alive.

on Feb 03, 2009

7hyrael
something i am missing with generals is any kind of direct link to their summons... like a live bond.

i would prefer very strong summons, which share their life with the summoner, for example if the summoner has got 5 strong summons, each of them with arround 1,5K HP, the general would have his own... 1,5K HP + 50% of each of the summons current life. means, if the general stands alone, hes an easy hit. and while he is surrounded by his own units he is a hero hard to be killed.

the way to kill a general should be to first kill some of his minions. without killing them it should be very hard to come up with him.

not that he should take down other demigods in a second, but taking their attacks without big problems for some time before getting in real danger until his minions are alive.

 

Interesting idea.  Something certainly needs to be done about the weakness of generals who focus on minion play compared to assassins suh as the rook.  Of course the rook is very overpowered, but no matter what I should not be one shot killed.  I think it is clear to everyone generals are getting better, but they still need a ton of focus to get them to where they need to be.

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