Player Input: Talents & Weaknesses

I think that bonuses and weaknesses are too generic. like +% something or -% something. I would like to see more gameplay related things, like acces to some great spells which others can not get, Being able to build unigue buldings etc... no only statistic bonuses.

Simply, not only getting some small bonus to something, but rather get something really cool and unique.

There are already some like that..

There are some of them, but not many and it is just some equipment which I saw. And it is only a minority, like a few. Rest of them are simply generic things, not that much interesting to me. To much + and - amounts, and nothing really cool or interesting.

I would really like to see spells in a tiers, where some of them would be avaible only to those, which specialize in one of the magics.

Being able not only take one book, but also more levels of them, which would increase magic potency of that school but also give me acces to best spells in the game.

I would like to see specializations, where fire mage would ignite everything arround him. Earth mage being able cross mountains, water mage being able cross oceans etc...

Things which one can see and feel. not just statistic bonus to something. Things like this, where you would pick something, and then in game you would be like, ohh that is really cool.

I'm all for traits as long as they are gamechanging and not especially generic. There should be pros and cons with every trait. Even the trait of not having any traits at all! Master of Magic had a great system for this.

Look, guys, we're not getting rid of the talents and weakneses. We like them. They're fun. They're staying. if you don't like them, move along and let others who want to add other talents and weaknesses participate.

Moreover, if you're in the beta, you would already know you can pick out things like what spell books you have and we are certainly open to letting people use points to purchase special items. But we very much like the idea of creating a character and giving him unique traits.

These traits need no be merely stat changes. We're open to talents that do lots of interesting things.

Master of Magic really did.  Though I feel it was a little unbalanced.   

I however, at the same time like the trait system of the Total War games.  Just because there are so many traits.   I have fond memories of laughing when it turns out my ruler in medieval total war was gay, and now he doesn't produce offspring.  

I am not saying you should get rid of them, they should stay, but they should not be majority. It should be nice balance between cool things and statistic things. Where everyone can choose its own.

And just because I have mentioned things, which can affect gameplay in a interesting ways, other then +2 to spell regeneration, does not mean I do not like, statistics.

Books are definitely in the game, but not levels. You get book, and you get spells from it. Or did I miss something? There is nothing like specialization in a given magic. You just have it or dont, but nothing in between.

Anyway, If you are asking just for a stat changes... I will come with some tommorow, it is time to go sleep for today . Have a nice weekend.

I like traits that scale with and grow with your empire. Rather than being some static bonus (of say always getting four free gold each turn) you get a bonus that gets better as your empire grows. Drawbacks should also scale. They are easier to balance this way. With a static +4 gold bonus, that could be too powerful early game when gold is scarce, but utterly meaningless late game when you make thousands of gold.

• Mercantile - gain 1 additional gold per turn for each city you own
• Frontiersman - your people benefit from your hunting skills and huntable resources produce 1 additional food
• Imperialist - the cost of maintaining distant cities is reduced.
• Master Engineer - your walls and cities have +1 hardness/hitpoints/etc

I also like traits that allow one to do things they normally can't. They don't have to be big, just neat little tidbits for added replayability.

• Familiar - You gain a companion familiar who can scout over large distances
• Herbalist - Reveals a normally hidden resource that can be harvested to heal units
• God King - Your followers revere you as a god. Presented with random offerings, unlocked morale boost building
• Heroic - Tales of your deeds reach far and wide. Defeat a foe personally and gain a temporary prestige boost

Since when do rulers have less children due to ugliness? Hehe, good job SD team on fixing the bugs, can't wait for Beta 2.

Yeah, I got a laugh out of many of the traits in that series. I even spent an hour cheating every trait in the game to a character so I could read all of them.

It would be best and most convientent in my opinion if you had for every Talent a weakness associating it. It would simplify the process that I assume you did for most, do it for all of them then.

Since you have Ugly, add Beauttiful which basically means and does "More Children".

As Landisaurus mentioned, the trait system in Total War was great and it some aspects of it should be replicated to better enhance Elemental's system. Nothing I loved more than having the chance that one of my great family members excel at administrating cities, yet receeivng little detrimental traits because he became lax and too comfortable.

It would be an awesome feature that's over-arching over the length of entire games and I'm correct in my knowledge, is implementing researchable technologies that allow your Faction to spend points upon new traits BUT also receive negative, neutral or positive traits as well. If most of my Faction's population has warred for long periods of time, they should become rugged which envelopes my military units abilities and attributes. Same thing for most of your recruiting population hailing in mostly cities that are financial and trade centers.

As I mentioned earlier concerning Total Wars great traits; Frogboy it would be awesome if family members before being eldigble to become Champion can receive traits that acknowledge the state and affairs of the game world relative to that family members Faction. Meaning if my Faction is involved in fighting another Faction in that child's existence, it would receive a "Hate's Carthaginian's" translating into "Hate's Fallen" and yields bonus points to armies it goes along with and battles itself.

I like what you've got so far and I"ll try and brainstorm some more that could be used.

I would like to see different sets of abilities available to different races. For example Fallen Sovereigns might have the "Kind" characteristic rather than "Evil".

Most of all I'd like to see a lot more medieval professions to choose from.

I don't particuarly care for the ones that effect only the city your Sovereign is in.  It seems to me that they would encourage players to just sit that unit in a city and forget about it when it seems like your goal is for people to actually use the unit for things.

Are you open to things with pluses and minuses like the traits from Fallout?

For example:

Heavy Handed - You have a lower chance to hit but when you do you hit harder.

For things strictly in the plus and minus category:

Charming - Your charm monster (and variations of such) are improved either costing less or working on higher level monsters.

Various "slayer" traits - bonus against specific types of enemies

Flammable - Takes increased fire damage (works for other elemental damage types too if those go in)

Arrow Dodger (shitty name) - Ranged attacks have a higher chance to miss against the sovereign

Scoutmaster - you start the game with a basically equipped scout

Thrasher - x% chance in combat for an attack to hit twice

Road Speedster (bad name) - Your sovereign travels faster on roads in your domain

Trader - Your sovereign receives bonus income from trade

Some off the top of my head.

• Bumbling: 10% chance of spell failiure
• Reckless: Can be killed even on home turf
• Stealthy: When travelling alone (or maybe with fewer than X troops?) can only be spotted on the strategic map if within 1 square, regardless of opposing unit's Sight

How about things like being a werewolf or vampire, and the associated bonuses and drawbacks of each.  Or whatever other magical ailments you prefer

The details on the first three here would depend on how you guys ultimately limit city spam/growth.

• Administrative: Can run more/larger cities
  
• Barbaric: Limited to fewer/smaller cities
• Provincial: Harder to grow cities large, but can generally run more cities in total
• Tuned: Can see the location and type of all shards from the start of the game
  
• Fanatic: Unable to form treaties with Empires if Kingdom, or with Kingdoms if Empire

I absolutely agree. This is a neat little feature.

I think I made a list, but I can't find it right now...

Here a are a few quick thoughts without my list:

-Massive Dept: The soveriegn owes a lot of money to other people. Once the soveriegn builds his first town, the collectors find him and start hauling away 50% of the soveriegn's income. This continues until the dept is paid back in full, or the soveriegn somehow deals with the people he owes money too (plot hooks for a quest ideas).

-Strange Pet: The soveriegn has a strange/exotic creature that serves the soveriegn as a pet. It helps in combat.

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Actually, before I continue, whats the scope of soveriegn traits? Can they only affect the soveriegn on a personal level, or can the soveriegn have traits that affect the entire civ?

• Blessed: Any army he's with, or city he's in, is immune to enemy "strategic map" spells
• Beguiling: When personally meeting an enemy champion in combat, can try to lure him to switch sides (done from the pre-combat screen)

Elemental harmony (earth, fire, etc) 5% reduction in mana cost for spells in the selected element(s) 10 point cost per pick and could do multiple picks in the same element. (40 points spent in earth harmony would result in 20% reduction in cost of earth based spells. Cost and amount of bonus obviously need to be tweaked during beta.

Weakness Elemental disharmony - 5% increase in mana cost for spells in the selected element(s). 10 points given per pick and multiple picks per element.

Both of the above probably also need a maximum increase/decrease range. Maybe a maximum of a 50% reduction per element, and a maximum of a 50% increase on the weakness side.

Essence miser - all essence usage reduced by 10% (fractions will be saved) Either that or you could increase all essence calculations by a factor of 10 and then deal in whole numbers. This should be a costly ability.

There could also be abilities that affect the starting essence amount, the amount of essence gained per level. This would have to be carefully balanced as essence plays such a critical role. (right?)

Cursed - wild animals/NPC's are unusually drawn to attack the city that the sovereign is in.

Blessed - opposite of cursed, those critters tend to acoid the sovereign's resident city.

I like drawbacks. I just do.

• Coward - When your Channeler is alone, he suffers a -1 in combat.
• Arachnophobia! - Little Miss Muffet ... spiders are particularly effective against you! Take +25% damage
• Technophobia! - techonology is bad mkay, -10% research penalty
• Hemophilac - wounds hurt, they Really hurt. +25% damage from everything
• Bureacratic Excess - you stifle your kingdom in red tape and take an efficiency penalty
• Murderous Paranoia - You eliminate the spies and traitors ruthlessly. the city your channeler is in suffers growth penalty best summarized as an increase in unexplained and sudden emigration.
• Heavy handed - When you want to do things your way, you do them your way! Attitude penalty with adventurers and governers
• Hedonistic - The benefits of luxury resources are reduced by your consumption of them.

I'm not sure wether these would be Talents or Weaknesses:

• Henry the VIII - can only produce female offspring
• non-Henry VIII - can only produce male offspring

I prefer to think about talents and weaknesses based on the lore/setting. For me it becomes easier that way. When I did this: https://forums.elementalgame.com/366003 that was for my Dying Sun mod and it shows (Blood of Ice, Children of Winter...). From that list maybe Blood of the King/Emperor could be applied (especially Procipinee, being the daughter of an Emperor; don't know the lore about the others), she/he can trace her/his lineage to one of the Kings/Emperors of old (a century or more). Increases the Prestige of every city you control and get and extra Prestige bonus in the one your sovereign currently is.

Considering that Lucky and Unlucky are already in and that I'm still exploring the new build (hell, where are Heroes?? and quests?? I see none ) and what it offers, I'll restrain myself for now until I've something useful and 1G based.

And for the record, some talents and/or weaknesses scream "Related Quest!!!".

One thing that typically happens with these traits is a few end up just clearly inferior or superior and always chosen. Maybe not by a bunch, but such that the community consensus always ends up with something like "Never choose ugly." However, that leads less variation in actual characteristics used.

I'd like to propose the computer randomly assign 1 positive and one negative attribute you're stuck with. You can then spend points on more if you want. Perhaps an optional thing or something that only kicks in on "Hard" difficulty or such. Part of the fun I have in any strategy game is coping with the unknown. Usually that's map stuff, but there's no reason that concept can't extend to channeler creation.

What I would like to see, and what might perhaps be an incentive to choose these "less useful" traits is if you could pick two or more of them and they would combine to unlock a third more useful trait- for example, if you chose "lucky" and "outcast," you could pick something like "Leprechaun background" which would allow you to recruit a hero from the Lucky Charms clan. This could provide for some fun gameplay options and would incentivize the inferior choices.