Ganrao wrote: I do have a comment about the Dwarf class itself, and that is that it does not have enough variety of units (unless I'm missing something...). Essentially, you have 1 class of offensive spellcaster with a single (very expensive) upgrade that doesn't greatly alter their functionality, 5 varieties of melee without shields, 4 varieties of melee with shields, 2 types of commanders that are not greatly different (functionally identical, slight stat difference), and 2 types of range that are greatly different, but one of which cannot be recruited in sufficient quantity to be mainstay of your forces and isn't really meant to be (so they are more utility than ranged really).
Now that sounds like a lot of variety, I mean hey 9 types of melee right? Well, it would be, except 6 of those are upgraded versions of either Dwarf w/ a Shield or Dwarf w/o a Shield, and those upgrades are split into 2 groups of palettes swaps that influence their cold / fire / piercing resistance. Functionally they are exactly the same as their base class, a guy with a shield or a guy without a shield, they just have a few more hp / dmg and a new resistance. Oh and the guards with a shield are slow, no matter what upgrade path they take.
Now that is fine, except that it makes army composition very boring and leaves it with no depth or player agency. Every respectable Dwarf army will have 40+ Warriors (upgrade variety only matters situationally, assuming you have enough of the right gems to make actual decisions), 1-2 Outdoor Dwarf (scout), 1-2 Commander or Queen's Council (leader), a Rune Smith or two (they are very expensive, and actually more useful for their rituals than their combat presence), and a huge gaggle of Arbalests (your only real ranged unit). Formations are static because you have no 2nd row melee and only 1 type of mass recruitable ranged unit. Temples don't let you recruit any special spell casters (not necessarily a bad thing and fits the theme, I'm just pointing out a difference with other races and their variety of units). None of your rituals summon random creatures, another factor causing every army to look the same. Every combat consists of hoping your front lines hold out long enough for your agonizingly slow Arbalest gaggle to reload before they become dog food.
I don't think the existing units should be changed (except for the Queen's Councilor), but I do think the Dwarves would benefit greatly from a few new units to add much needed variety to their army composition options. For example, a type of expensive elite ranged unit that has better sustained damage, and a spell caster that can summon permanent elemental type creatures, but shares NO spells with Rune Smiths would spice things up nicely.
Leave stats the same, but add Local Leadership 1 to the unit. Dwarves fighting alongside high nobility are inspired, as they have such reverence for tradition and authority. Possibly increase Emerald cost to 15 if this would unbalance the unit. As it is, the Queen's Councilors are just Dwarven Commanders with a few more hp and 1 more armor, nice to have but hardly game changing or worth much consideration. The Emeralds would be better put to use making Dvalin's Best as things stand right now.
As well, giving them a Ritual for 100 gold that allows them to promote Dwarf Commanders into Dwarf Field Generals (by the will of the Queen) with improved combat statistics and the Army Trainer ability would be pretty awesome and stop them from just replacing Dwarf Commanders entirely once you have Councilors. It would also be a welcome gold sink, possibly making that resource matter more for Dwarves.
- Dwarf Arbalest (Just Throwing This Out There...)
This unit is unwieldy to use because they spend more time during battles reloading than they do fighting. While they do not feel unbalanced as they exist now, would it be possible to consider modifying them to only need 1 round to reload, but become a Slow unit like the Guards as a tradeoff? They do have to lug those huge arbelests around. Making them more appealing as a defensive ranged unit that complements Guards would be lovely, especially if new ranged units were introduced to make up for the lack of a regular speed ranged unit.
- Dwarf Sniper / Elite (Pick one)
A regular recruitable unit that costs 50 iron per 5, making them the most expensive basic dwarf unit. Give them an improved semi-automatic crossbow that can be fired for 3 rounds (doing d8 damage) before needing to be reloaded for 1 round. Their high price tag would discourage use in early game. They would also have less up front damage than Arbalests, so you would be taking a tradeoff to gain more sustained damage when deciding to use them. They are still considerably stronger than human Crossbowmen due to their ability to fire 3 times in succession, but this is balanced by the Dwarven mechanic of requiring Dwarven Workers available to produce them and their high cost in iron. Give them the same stats as Arbalests, but 1 point of armor due to the fine crafted dwarven chain-mail they have earned along with their elite status and 1 higher point of morale due to their ability to stay calm under pressure and make their shots count.
A new type of Dwarf caster unit that specializes in making iron and gem elementals. These could be considered "Deep Dwarves" in other lore due to their connection with the deep underground places in Elysium. They would be recruitable in the same manner as a Necromancer's Apprentice, which is to say rarely available and always worth picking up if at all possible, though your odds of getting an offer would not increase with temples or libraries because these are not "wizards" in a traditional sense. Earthshapers can be leaders or not, the real point of the unit is increasing diversity of Dwarven army makeup and changing things up game to game by introducing a hard-to-get unit.
Giving them rituals to summon permanent Ruby / Sapphire Elementals would be a nice alternative use for those gems besides just upgrading fighters, giving the player more meaningful decisions to make. The elementals themselves could differ in that Ruby are large melee range elementals with crushing damage (which Dwarves lack in general) while Sapphire are mid row ranged attackers that generate and propel sapphire shards which negate armor. Diamond Elementals could resist slashing / piercing / crushing damage, be slow on the map, and do the most single hit damage of the elementals, but only attack once per round. Emerald could reflect magic spells cast on it back to attackers (not sure this ability actually exists in the game yet...).
Being constructs, they would not heal between fights and would be immune to charm / fear / sleep / poison. Iron Elementals would be the most basic form, having those traits I just described, but being weaker than the gem elementals and serving in a similar capacity to Dwarven Warriors. Essentially Iron elementals would be a good Iron dump if your dwarf production wasn't keeping up with your Iron production, or an easy way to quickly reinforce your front line away from home (though not cheaply). Because they would not cost a dwarf to create, they would need to cost more than 30 Iron for an equal amount of power produced by 5 dwarven warriors. I'm not sure what that is worth in resource terms, but I could see making them cost 40 Iron and having 25 hp, 2 armor, and doing 2 attacks for d8 damage per round. The Gem elementals would all have 40 hp and 2 armor, along with all the other differences described above, and do more damage per round due to their components being harder to get in large quantities. Cost to make any gem elemental would probably be 25 of the proper gem.
As for the Earthshapers' combat spells, they would not be shared with Rune Smiths at all, because they are not at all like Rune Smiths. Earthshapers are more primal and somewhat removed from standard dwarven society. They are outsiders, closer to shaman than priests, but feared and respected for their ability to command the gem elementals. Their combat spell selection does not include any buffs (they are used to working with fairly self-sufficient elementals, after all), and instead focuses on damaging and hampering foes by turning the ground they stand on against them. If 25 of each gem is spent at once to upgrade the Earthshaper, they ascend into Earthforgers and gain the ability to cause Rockslides which damage entire random rows of enemies greatly in addition to their other spells.
If you've made it this far... I wrote this before I played as the Hoburgs and did not realize one of their 2 casters does something almost exactly like this! Back to the drawing board, but I am convinced a rare unique dwarf caster is still a good idea and will spice up their gameplay.
- Dwarven Berserker (Just For Fun...)
An alternate 20 Iron unit to the "Dwarf" that eschews using a shield in favor of gaining the Berserker ability. Berserkers are the lowest rung of Dwarven society, individuals who have shamed their clan somehow, and may only redeem themselves by dying fearlessly in battle. Their families have disowned them, which is the worst thing that can happen to a Dwarf, and so they consider themselves already dead. They have no armor, 7 hp, and fight using a d5+1 axe.
So the idea is, I would use all of these concepts to make a remixed Dwarf class. I would not be able to solve how annoying their micro-management currently is entirely, but I could make them much more varied and interesting to play once you get over that aspect. Any suggestions that could improve any of this are appreciated. One idea I am considering is getting rid of the current upgrade system that turns Guards and Warriors into their 3 gem forms, because that extra layer of micro is just really annoying to deal with on top of the whole Dwarf Worker thing. One possible way to improve that would be to just transfer the upgrade rituals out of Rune Smiths and into the units themselves, and require them to be in a mine to perform the ritual. Of course, taking that away from the Rune Smiths would necessitate altering them to be more useful / interesting since all that would be left to them at that point is summoning more Queens. Not having any alternate use for Rubies and Sapphires means upgrading all your Warriors and Guards is a default action that should always be taken as things are right now, which means you'll almost never field regular Warriors or Guards. It is a non-decision and there needs to be an alternative use for those resources to make creating Rim / Furnace units something that requires consideration instead of being automatic, an extra layer of micro on top of the Dwarf Worker management that doesn't really enhance the class experience as things stand.
