Potions, Teleport Scrolls, and Map Size

from Demigod Forums

This game has a map setup much like DotA, with creeps pushing through separate lanes towards an end goal - in this case the Citadel.  A large part of DotA is pressure: gaining an advantage and pushing ahead to enemy towers by forcing opponents to retreat to their base. Another large part of DotA is resource and time management: deciding when to spend gold earned and choosing the most advantageous times to return to the base and buy items.  Finally, a large part of DotA was knowing where to be at what stages of the game, and coordinating with teammates to that end.

To an extent, these elements are present in Demigod.  However, the ease with which players can obtain health potions, mana potions, and teleport scrolls significantly lessens their importance.  The sizes of the maps also play a role in lessening them, especially the last one. 

 

The problem as I see it is that players are not sufficiently rewarded for pressuring opponents, as it is too easy to stay in a lane and maintain a push due to health potions, and it is also too easy for a player to teleport either to another lane, or to the main base and back.  Returning to the base to buy items, get more potions and scrolls, and regain health, ought to have far more of a trade off than it currently does.  Forcing somebody to leave their lane and fight in another should have more of an impact. 

Without more cost or penalty for moving around the map or returning to the base frequently, players are not penalized for playing recklessly (for instance hard pushing a tower, teleporting back to base, regaining health, and then teleporting back).  Players may say that the increased mobility allows for better team coordination, but cheap, low cooldown teleport scrolls and health potions allow players to fairly easily evade gang-up situations, which actually discourages teamwork.  I have a difficult time imagining, for instance, seeing any of the kind of coordinated group "ganks" that are very common in DotA. 

 

I feel I'm not conveying fully the negative impact that the ease of mobility and regeneration have on gameplay, but I feel that it is an important issue which ought to be addressed.  Health potions especially ought to be, more than anything, emergency measures which cannot be used with much frequency.  Teleport scrolls ought to have a longer casting time, and a longer cooldown.  It is true that in DotA there are teleport items like the teleport scrolls in this game.  However, it is not possible (if I recall correctly) to use them with the same ease and frequency that it is currently possible to use them in Demigod. 

 

Finally, I would like to see maps be a bit bigger than they currently are, because this would again emphasize a players decisions in where to go and when; currently it's too easy to reach almost any point on a given map fairly quickly, so you aren't nearly as penalized for not being where you need to be.  A response to this point may be that this ease of mobility quickens the pace of the game, but it also makes it much easier to play - it removes certain tactical elements from the gameplay.  For example, there's not nearly as much use in trying to surprise or confuse your opponent with feints or sneak attacks if it's a simple matter of seconds to get from any one point on the map to another.

demigod
9,349 views 17 replies
Reply #1 from Demigod Forums Top

I agree that potions and tele's should cost more than they do because no people are relying on potions and tele's to win not skill. I mean potions and tele's are extremely powerful items yet they are dirt cheap which I think should be changed. they should atleast be changed because people with like 20 potions can fight some one far more skilled because everytime they are even close to low health they just use a potion. Maybe not increased cash but something. i mean people are using tele's to just get into battle, I mean people should be forced to use them less. Also those u have stun can make tele's practicly useless so if its one vs one is only one person has a stun they are effectivly unable to tele out. that gives the opponet a great advantage, may allowing them to win even though the other player is better at fighting.

Reply #2 from Demigod Forums Top

First of all I think the main flaw in your post is the fact your comparing strategies and tatics from one game, to a different game. You cant really compare tatics from AoE (Age of Empires) to tatics from ccg (CnC Generals) because - although they are the same genre - they are essentially different games. The same is with Demigod...you are comparing it to the way DotA plays and trying to make strategies and tatics that were important in DotA, important to Demigod, which I think just doesnt work at the end day (unless you want to end up playing DotA 2.0, which is not what Demigod is aiming to be).

When you are having tense 1v1's you do get rewarded for forcing players out. If you can stay in one lane and force a player back to his base twice you will be at a great advantage. Firstly, you will be a higher level/have more experience. Secondly, you have time to capture flags etc., Thirdly, you get more time to push further towards the enemy and take out towers...all this also adds up to you recieving more gold, meaning you can also purchase those important citadel upgrades or get those important items earlier on in the game then your opponent. You will also have a higher War Rank/Bonuses if you keep the flags while the other player is forced back to his base. Well I could maybe mention more but I think you get the drift of it, the penatly for being forced out a lane now is fine. Its not as big as in DotA, but then again this isnt DotA. And well, you have pretty much mentioned all of the good points about having Teleport Scrolls the way they are now (e.g increased mobiliy and faster paced game) which I think is great.

However, with the health potions, I perhaps can agree with you on that one but if someone goes for health pots they are denying themselves early access to citadel upgrads/items which can be quite punishing. The fact that both sides as well can go for health pots automatically balances it out, and if you fight the enemy Demigod correctly, these health pots shouldnt be a great problem.

Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion
Reply #3 from Demigod Forums Top

But allowing one player to use teleports and the other not because if one tries to tele out the other can stun him/her. Also health pots are cheap and inexpensive so people can easily get a ton of them and other items because they have health pots they'll be able to kill more people because everytime they get weak they use a pot than kill their opponet getting them more gold.

tele's also are really annyoiing for people without stun cause they can do nopthing about it, making people without stun unable basicly to kill someone who's good at tele's. Take Rook, if he uses a tele to get everytime he's in danger than he'll be unkillable. he has alot of health so u need to do alot of damage than chase him down, but if he can just tele out it will be basicly impossible. lats say Rook has items that give him increased speed, than he can tele too u can chase, and slap u till your dead. U can't tele out though cause he'll than boulder roll u, stopping your stun than hammer slam u and u'll be dead. i like tele's mobility but when it comes to retreat methods i dislike it.

Reply #4 from Demigod Forums Top

in my opinion the way how the scrolls and potions work have to be changed. an instant impact of life-regen is just overpowerd. you can change the flow of battle with another demigod on instant by this. in my opinion there should be 2 different kinds of healing and no one of thoseshould be imbalanced like it is at the moment.

1. a major healing potion which will give you a good health regen of .. lets say 1000 HP - with an cast time of 2 seconds standing still and in over 12 seconds. if you get hit by somethin what damages you, you will lose the effect of healing instantly.

 

2. a less effective healing, which is cheaper but which cannot be interrupted. maybe something like the tangos in dota. you will have 3 charges of it, and to be able to use it you will have to consume one of your units. relying on what unit you consumed, you wil regenerate a prozentual ammount of its life over seconds. for example:

the unit got 1000 HP, so you will regenerate 60% of its current healthpoints in 20 seconds. what means you will regenerate 30 HP / second.

thats not much if you are getting attacked by an oponent. but it will help you a bit and its not interruptable. in change you will lower the strength of the current wave of grunts...

 

this mechanics would pretend using healtpotions at beginning for beeing in something like a godlike mode...

 

for the scroll i think a visual effect should be implemented, so that enemys can see if someone is using a teleportation scroll as well as where he is teleporting to, if it is in range of sight. the time between teleportation and activation of the scroll should be at leasst 4 seconds.

 

something i was missing since the first map were some elements in the map which you can interact with like trees and so on, which you can use to hide behind to rush in an instant on an enemy demigod which could not see thet you and 3 mates are waiting for him. that would bring some "oh i cant see them, are they right now behind me?! OH NO!"-characteristics into the game.

Reply #5 from Demigod Forums Top

But allowing one player to use teleports and the other not because if one tries to tele out the other can stun him/her. Also health pots are cheap and inexpensive so people can easily get a ton of them and other items because they have health pots they'll be able to kill more people because everytime they get weak they use a pot than kill their opponet getting them more gold.
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I agreed earlier that Health Pots are probably too cheap, but even if they are a bit cheap, i still dont think its a major problem. Your saying everytime your fighting a Demigod with health pots he will kill you? If thats the case than imo you deserve to die as you are not playing with caution and you are not playing with the fact that the enemy Demigod may have a health potion or something else up their sleeve. And thats also why you cant play recklessey and without a plan agaisnt other Demigods. For example when Im Regulus and I feel the enemy has a health pot, when I get them down to a certain amount of health (let say 2k?), Ill chuck my 3 mines at him and follow up immediately with a snipe. That way he will be dead before he has time to use you the health pot as I would have dished out a quick 2k. However, if I just went straight in and used snipe/mines immediately on the enemy Demigod, he would be left with HP (lets say 1k?) and so have enough time reheal with health pots.

 

And for 7hyrael I agree at the moment that health pots are too cheap and maybe a bit imbalanced, but I think teleport scrolls are fine. As you mentioned, "there should be an animation whilst someone is teleporting", there already is :D However, I think the location they are teleporting to needs an animatio aswell (for example a small whirl of dust or something appears at the location they are teleporting to).

something i was missing since the first map were some elements in the map which you can interact with like trees and so on, which you can use to hide behind to rush in an instant on an enemy demigod which could not see thet you and 3 mates are waiting for him. that would bring some "oh i cant see them, are they right now behind me?! OH NO!"-characteristics into the game.
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Again, im not so sure that implementing a tatic/strategy (ganking) from another game into this one would work very well. Im not really up for a Rook hiding in some trees, throwing a boulder stun out of them and then hammer slamming me. Thats too OP imo...And you already have this element of "OH NO!" with teleport scrolls. You could be capturing a flag and out of no where two Demigod's teleport to that location and rape you :P

 

Reply #6 from Demigod Forums Top

You should definitely see when someone is using any kind of portal item or skill. The Rook can realy portal out FAR too easy. It should be like when using the portal and waiting the few seconds that the portal should be interrupted if anything hits you, so that you can't portal out from every fight.

Reply #7 from Demigod Forums Top

In beta 1A there were lots of stuns and such so you always got interupted when trying to teleport. It didnt work at all...and was just horrible. You need to be able to teleport out of battles

Reply #8 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting DalzK, reply 7
In beta 1A there were lots of stuns and such so you always got interupted when trying to teleport. It didnt work at all...and was just horrible. You need to be able to teleport out of battles
End of DalzK's quote

 

i agree that you should be able to jump out of battles with somethink like a teleport which works over a little distance and is given by an item. but not a world-wide teleport from everywhere to you base and vise versa. you teleportation has to be visually underlined, so that enemys know, what you are trying to do, to be able to interrupt you in getting away effectively. its not like the scrolls are expensive, so that you would think twice about using them...

 

something like the blink dagger is ok, for a lot of money, because it prevents you from beeing killed and giving a lot of money to an enemy.

if you can escape out of nerly any situation just by using a cheap item this fastly is getting OP. think about the money the "better one" who would have killed you because hes stronger and/or maybe better than you, has lost because of the scroll. that can be houndreds of gold to thousands over the game... and what does the scroll actually cost? nearly nothing.

Reply #9 from Demigod Forums Top

you teleportation has to be visually underlined, so that enemys know, what you are trying to do, to be able to interrupt you in getting away effectively
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As i've said before, there is a very obvious animation that visually shows you are teleporting.

if you can escape out of nerly any situation just by using a cheap item this fastly is getting OP. think about the money the "better one" who would have killed you because hes stronger and/or maybe better than you, has lost because of the scroll. that can be houndreds of gold to thousands over the game... and what does the scroll actually cost? nearly nothing.
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No one is losing houndreds to thousands of gold anytime. They are perhaps losing potential gold, but thats an entirely different story. If my Regulus couldnt teleport out as he can now, then everytime a melee Demigod (e.g Rook, Unclean Beast, Oak) got the better of my Regulus I would be dead. If you play games there always plently of deaths, that in itself says enough about teleport scrolls...If its as easy as you say it is to escape from battle when fighting enemy Demigods why are always deaths each game?

Reply #10 from Demigod Forums Top

What about Reg he can't stun Dg's while their teleporting and most other Dg's can. SO if its reg against lets say ROok. Rook will always be able to tele out but when Reg tries to Rook can stun and kill. This is to an extremeadvantage to people who can stun so basicly one player can use tele away but the other can't which I think is too much of an advantage. When i say lots of health pots I mean when he/she gets to like 3k health they use pot making it impossible to kill almost and than it just gets boring because none can kill each other except ROok because He can kill u in like 2 hits.

Reply #11 from Demigod Forums Top

First of all if they are spending money on 3k worth of health pots, then let them. The money they waste on those is enough of a penatly. About this whole stun thing...If you let Rook stun you, you are dead anyway. teleport doesnt effect that...and if you try to teleport next to a Rook who has a boulder stun ready, then you deserve to die..lol

Reply #12 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting 7hyrael, reply 8


i agree that you should be able to jump out of battles with somethink like a teleport which works over a little distance and is given by an item. but not a world-wide teleport from everywhere to you base and vise versa. you teleportation has to be visually underlined, so that enemys know, what you are trying to do, to be able to interrupt you in getting away effectively. its not like the scrolls are expensive, so that you would think twice about using them...

 

something like the blink dagger is ok, for a lot of money, because it prevents you from beeing killed and giving a lot of money to an enemy.
.
End of 7hyrael's quote


Its already implemented, called Warpstone, except can be used anytime, unlike blink dagger.

Reply #13 from Demigod Forums Top

i know that its implemented. i just wanted to say that the way, the teleportations scroll is used, is not the way i think its thought. it not a infight item. its originaly to fast move from A to B when out of fight. i realy dont think it was thought for getting easily out of a close-to-death situation or a situation when you get ganked or something like that. i know dota and demigod are different games and always to come up with it sux, but those guys made many things the right way. one was that using a town portal is not such a cheap thing. there it was much more expensive, as well as it needed a lot of time to be casted, and the target was clearly visible...

something like a abort or interrupt if you get attacked while casting the teleport with the scroll would be some good advantage to it.

maybe something like if you get attacked while teleporting, you will port into the direction you wanted to teleport but just for 10-20% of the original way... so that the other one has even the possibility to get you, as well as you can still escape with it.

Reply #14 from Demigod Forums Top

7hyrael try playing a game without using teleport scrolls and let yourself buy one every 10 mins or somethin (vs good players). See how fun the game is then :P (P.S - you will die a lot)

Reply #15 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting DalzK, reply 9

you teleportation has to be visually underlined, so that enemys know, what you are trying to do, to be able to interrupt you in getting away effectively
End of DalzK's quote

As i've said before, there is a very obvious animation that visually shows you are teleporting.
End of quote

 

People on the forums keep saying this.  Other people (like me) have never seen this animation.  I wonder if there's a bug somewhere?  e.g., could it be broken at low detail levels, or on some video cards?

Reply #16 from Demigod Forums Top

hmm perhaps actually. My settings are now on lowest, and I dont think I see it. Must be to do with gfx setting...But still, I can tell when someone is teleporting. If they are standing still not doing anything or you see them completely still and just breathing...then they are probably teleporting :D

Reply #17 from Demigod Forums Top

For me theirs lots of blue enery around the Dg thats teleporting.