Abyss Town revived!

I am going to consider your balance tweaks Dydzio, those are really good! I would love to hear additional feedback from others, but these are ones I am definetly considering, and misiokles (the guy doing the real dirty work) seem to agree!

Deep One & Dark One will be rebalanced to tier3 eventually. I would want some ideas on what the stats & abilities should be.

I am considering changing “nautiloid” to “Kraken”, if anyone is with me on that one, as I found my original name perhaps scientifically correct but hardly interesting. I know most would probably consider a kraken tier 6-7, but ogres, gorgons and other big meanies have been tier 5 previously, so it wouldn’t be completely out of place. Furthermore, it would help cement the faction as being a bit more… fantastical.

Balance changes will be in the next version, for now enjoy the holidays and have an update!

Changes:
-Fixed Sea Urchins to tier3 population booster (as seemed to be the original intention)
-Fixed Dark & Deep One icons to have the neutral background
-Removed Sea Urchins from town screen before being built
-Additional minor fixes and tweaks

I changed the original post to be less about me talking about what I would like to do and what we are actually doing. A lot has changed since then.

I am reworking unit balance now. Here is what I’ve considered so far:

tier1: Untouched. Due to it being flying (did we patch that in at some point?) I found the stats to be fine.
tier1upg: Lowered damage to 2-3 and increased attack to 6.
tier2: Untouched.
tier2upg: Increased price to 165 and lowered damage to 2-4.
tier3: Nothing so far. I was a bit confused by the word “add” and then “-” before the stats. :wink:
tier3upg: Same as base unit.
tier4: Untouched.
tier4upg: Untouched.
tier5: Untouched.
tier5upg: Hitpoints decreased to 55. Attack increased to 13.
tier6: For now untouched, I would like some confirmation if you meant increasing or decreasing as you used “-” but used the word “give”, Dydzio! :stuck_out_tongue:
tier6upg: Same as base unit.
tier7: Damage lowered to 45-55. Defense lowered to 17.
tier7upg: Damage lowered to 45-55. Attack increased to 24.

Dark Ones and Deep Ones: Reworked to tier 3. Stats are experimental at this point, but should be fairly balanced. I am trying to keep the stats akin of most non-boss neutral units; being somewhere between a base and upgraded unit in stats.

I am fixing the graphical glitch regarding the Sea Urchin right now. I have fixed most of the issue and hopefully it will be fixed entirely in the next release.
The Sea Urchin has been a constant pain in the backside, akin of sitting on one. Hopefully we will be done with this grief soon enough!

I have asked friends what they thought about the nautiloid being changed to Kraken. The response has been a big fat “yes!” so I will go for it… for now!

I am going to work on sounds. As always, feeback is not just welcome, it’s OBLIGATORY! :stuck_out_tongue:

About changing tier 3 and tier 6 units I mean decreasing the stats from the current value of that particular unit - when I talk about upgraded unit I refer to upgraded unit stats. Anyway, looks like upgraded level 7 is still too weak though, when looking at the cost.

Right, I will get to it! I will wait for specifics before I touch tier7 again.

You can use PMs in case you want to discuss technical details, as those can easily clutter a thread.

Hopefully I can get my brother interested in helping with balance, as that is his thang, it’s just hard to get him invested in modding.

New update! Here are the main changes:

-Fixed some of the graphical glitch issues with Sea Urchins. Still needs work but it looks passable.
-Implemented Dydzio’s balance changes.
-Deep and Dark Ones rebalanced for tier 3. Still WiP but should be balanced okay.
-Krakens! Krakens!?

Checking new version (12 days old). Noticed:

  • Oracle, Sea Lord hero classes
  • Was the town water always animated? It looks great.
  • “Kraken” name replacing “Octopus” is ok, but not really needed.
  • New creature names. What the heck are “Feelers”. “Charybdises” is way too long name. Also Murclos was much better than “Deep One”.

“Feeler” is a less commonly used term for an appendage. It’s archaic, so I thought it was appropiate over the to me way too literal original name. Again, it is placeholder until people vote for something else, if so the new name will take it’s place.

The Kraken name was mostly because I felt it anchored the faction more into the fantastical and less into Sea World. Oh, and Kraken also make them cooler for some reason, kind of like how “Winged Accountant” would make Angels less so.

Charybdis is a monster from greek mythology, the unseen beast that creates whirlpools, drags ships into them and eats them. “Sea worm” is a tree of not so very scary womy water-dwelling things. The name is long in plural, sure, and I am considering the proper greek form, which I believe is “charybdiae”. Hardly the longest, though.

And due to copyright reasons, I don’t want to return the murlocs. Since they are also so incredibly heavily associated with Blizzard, it wouldn’t feel right. It’s like throwing in the Uruk-hai from LOTR or Daedra from the Elder Scrolls. It’s out of place. If you have another name idea, I want to hear it! Public domain is the key!

Update!

-Gave Charybdis greek plural (Charybdiae)
-Due to misiokles being awesome, Verna is now a super badass extrordinaire as she can upgrade Hippocampus into Golden Hippocampus, otherwise unavailable in the world, not even as random monsters! This hero was previously “broken” as her special did nothing.

Keep in mind the Golden variant will require some tweaking in terms of balance (as do heroes still) so suggestions are very much appreciated, if not vital!

When I feel the mod is more or less complete, I will, if people want it, release an alternative version with all the original names restored. I feel that while I wasn’t satisfied with some names, others were, so the alternative will be available then. In the meantime, you can just go into the various files and restore them.

Download link at the first post is not working!

I think there’s no need to make alt version, but to make a submod with original names to easily switch between two versions.

Link fixed!

That could be achieved, however, I believe this subject will be further explored once we get there!

New update! 0.6 contains:

-Unit balance tweaks
-New unit sounds!

Big thanks to an anonymous helper for sounds and balance. Additional balance help from my brother!

New update! 0.7 contains:

-Grail map! Big thanks to the ERA modder StasPV for this!
-Two new neutral units: Winged Lamprey and Mana Lamprey. These are neutral variants of the feelers/surgers. Backgrounds on icons will be changed to neutral later. They are still wip but should be fairly balanced… for now.
-Balance tweaks

I have been a bit busy so forgive me! :wink:

Good job, great you’re continuing your support for Abyss town :slight_smile:

Thanks, I really wouldn’t have gotten anywhere without Misiokles, Anonymous and others and their hard work. Not to mention everyone’s creative input!

0.71 released due to me having time to kill. It’s just a cosmetic change to the icons of the two new neutrals (proper neutral backgrounds).

I really like this town a lot, I think it is visually stunning. In the future I want to make a map to share that utilizes many town mods in various places, and I always envision doing this town in a subterranean area with lucid pools covering the ground completely to enhance the “undersea” feel. Now what would be a neat add on to the town would be a underwater terrain as a new terrain, and a special kind of two-way portal unique to this town that whenever you portal into the underwater area sparks a story something like “Magic courses through the bodies of you and your army, granting them the ability to breathe under the water.” and of course an event when teleporting out to “dry land” that sparks an event as above but air instead of water. Just a thought.

In any case this is an awesome town!!! Thank you for creating and sharing it!

We’ve had ideas regarding a coral reef terrain for the faction, and yeah, when possible I would love to get that implemented, the castle siege already got the battleground for it. The portal idea is awesome, too. Definetly worth considering!

Glad to hear you enjoy the mod! This project is a joint effort by modders old and new, and I always thank my predecessors (and current team) for the hardwork they put in. It’s a “thank you” extravaganza! :wink:

I’ve recently found this topic and I just had to say I love your naming sense Troggly. I dig every name you came up with. Most of them perfectly resonate with the HoMM spirit and this town. That said, some of them are little over the top, at least in my opinion.

While I like the mystical approach of “Floating spires/sceptres”, the things are clearly jellyfishes. They resemble “Men-of-war”, which is definitely less timid denominator than a “jellyfish”. For the upgrade I can only think of a “Storm Man-of-War”, or just “Storm-of-War”. Maybe someone else can come up with a better term.

The “Hippocampus” seem too long for a name. I think the “Hippocamp” (without the ‘h’ at the end) would be more neat and easy to use.

The last gripe I have is with “Lurid Charibdae”. As with “Hippocampuses” it feels hard to pronounce, use and seems just… clumsy. Charibdis could be a name of the upgraded creature and the basic one could be just left as a “Sea Worm”.

That’s all regarding the names. And I can’t stress it enough. Merrows, Krakens, Feelers and Charybdae are wonderful ideas. Thanks for your initiative : >

Abyss+New war machine Harpoon

It’s technically possible now, it would be great benefit for this town, especially if the terrain would be underground (like lava, or ice sheet).