Improvement ideas

[Emanuele Fiori]

Hello edain developers, i used to play BFME when i was really young and then abbandoned it. I started to play it again like 3 weeks ago with a more critical point of view since i grew up and in theese 3 weeks i thought a lot about what needs to be done in order to improve the game to be really at the top. In my opinion this game has the highest potential of any other Real Strategy Games out there and you guys did and still doing one of the greatest modding job and i want to thank you because this is one of my favourite game and i would like to help you develop it as much as possible. Unfortunately i’m not a content creator nor an informatic otherwise i would have created my own mod. I’m writing you because i think your work and dedication are the best one to possibly fit my ideas. Without any further delays let’s jump into it:
-   I’v been playing every feature of edain mod and almost any other major BFME 1, 2 and RotWK mods (campaign, war of the ring, skirmish) and what i found is that there is a lack of FACTIONS UNIQUENESS, let me explain: when i play skirmish or war of the ring i feel like it’s the same pattern strategy and playstyle for every faction. You just start with cheap units and buildings to grow up until you can purchase stronger units and that’s ok but if you take it long it’s boring. Every basic unit has no abilities at all so the only difference between a silvan archer from Woodland realm or a basic archer from Lothlorien is the price and CP nothing else. I feel like the units are too much standardized. There is really no point nor the will to advance a unit to its maximum level without any rewards (abilities). I think every unit and hero must have AT LEAST a starting ability, a mid-tier ability (lets say at lvl 3 for units and 5 for hero) and a max level ability (when i talk about abilities they can be either passive or active). Tier 2 units do have 1 ability and hero units 2 or 3 but in my opinion does not make any real difference between one another. I think you should implement much more abilities and unique skills even for basic units so that each facions has it’s own playstyle and strategy. For exemple we can see from moovies and books that archers from Woodland Realm use short bows in order to fight in the forest against goblins who are much faster and agile than normal orcs or uruk-hai and it makes perfectly sense. We can also confirm that since Legolas is given a longbow by Galadriel when before he leaves Lothlorien. With theese information you could just simply make Woodland basic archers have less range than any other basic archers in the game but much more attack speed due to their skills and short bows. In addition you can have them learn an ability at level 5 that makes them be able to shoot while mooving for a while at a reduced attack speed. The same concept can be applied to any other basic units of each faction. Another exemple could be with Lothlorien: we see that they use longbows and that their are very skilled at distance so you could build this faction’s strenght on archers by having them have much more range and damage than any other archers at a reduced attack speed and maybe having an ability to bleed and slow targets. Same thing with tier 2 and heroic units and also you should give the opportunity to have more than 1 or 2 battalions of heroic units. What’s the point of spending so much money and waiting so long to have just 1 or 2? It is all a matter of implement more and more abilities and skills for each units and heroes in order to jump deep and feel the uniqueness of each factions.
-   War of the ring. I think WotR is the biggest idea ever made to play different factions istead of the boring skirmish because i really enjoy the idea of level up units and heroes and bring them with me during all the “campaign”. Since making a single campaign for each faction would be really long, WotR is a perfect compromise and i like the old BFME 1 build system beacuse if you are using free building system every game will lasts at least 1 hour (unless you are playing easy or medium difficulty of course) and it is really frustrating. What needs to be done is improve the AI because in WotR AI does not work correctly even at the highest difficulties. Another feauture that should be added is the opportunity to play with fortress and other buildings you created in a specific terrain before starting the fight.
-   Last but not least you should add more campaigns or at least a campaign focused on the war of the ring from book and moovies like BFME 1 (i love that campaign so much).
With that being said there are really endless ideas that could fit into the game with just some immagination. I know that with theese changes i listed above all the math should change as well to balance the game and it’s a lot of difficult work but i feel like this game could improve so much. I really appreciate your hard dedication and i thank you again for constantly trying to improve the game. I hope my ideas will be taken in consideration.
Thank you

[The_Necromancer0]

Hello,
Welcome to the forums, that's quite a huge first post you've got there. Just a small tip, in the future, try splitting up large paragraphs into multiple smaller ones, it really helps with comprehension. There's also an English section for Edain so your posts will probably be moved there soon, it's under the German section if you keep scrolling on the main page: https://modding-union.com/index.php#c43

Now, about your suggestions. The team is always happy to receive feedback, but it seems like a lot of your information is wrong to some extent. Let's break it down.

Every basic unit has no abilities at all so the only difference between a silvan archer from Woodland realm or a basic archer from Lothlorien is the price and CP nothing else.

Edain does have a lot of standardisation that's true, it makes it easier to balance everything. However, most units already have either an active ability, a passive ability or a formation. The Mirkwood Archers have their Disruptive Shots and Ambush of the Woodelves and the Lorien Archers have Patrol of the Marchwardens and Ambush of the Woodelves. A lot of units, such as these two, even have two abilities already. If there are specific units that you think have the problem you mentioned then specify them but this blanket statement is just false?

There is really no point nor the will to advance a unit to its maximum level without any rewards (abilities).

On top of the banner carrier, units get +15% damage and health per level (+8% for elites).

Same thing with tier 2 and heroic units and also you should give the opportunity to have more than 1 or 2 battalions of heroic units. What’s the point of spending so much money and waiting so long to have just 1 or 2? It is all a matter of implement more and more abilities and skills for each units and heroes in order to jump deep and feel the uniqueness of each factions.

First, more does not always equal better. Second, heroic units are limited to 3 battalions. Third, giving too many abilities to units makes it a micro nightmare, if you have 3 units heroic units that each have 4 abilities you're gonna have to do a lot of micro unless you always activate the abilities for all the units at once.

What needs to be done is improve the AI because in WotR AI does not work correctly even at the highest difficulties.

Last but not least you should add more campaigns or at least a campaign focused on the war of the ring from book and moovies like BFME 1 (i love that campaign so much).

It is all a matter of implement more and more abilities and skills for each units and heroes in order to jump deep and feel the uniqueness of each factions.

Lastly, this kind of feedback is not useful on its own. The team is aware that there is always more to do, make the AI better, make more maps, make more campaigns, make more factions with better graphics and cooler abilities. What the team is really interested in is specifics, what would the cooler abilities looks like, how could they make the AI better. They need specifics.

Concerning War of the Ring, have a look at these articles:
https://www.moddb.com/mods/edain-mod/news/edain-mod-campaigns-in-war-of-the-ring
https://www.moddb.com/mods/edain-mod/news/edain-46-war-of-the-ring-overhaul

[Emanuele Fiori]

Hi, thank you for your reply
I’m really sorry this post was meant to be for another mod and not for edain i don’t know why i put edain name there maybe because i saved and copy the wrong file. You are absolutely right in your reply 😅

Anyway i would like to talk a out a couple of things:
-is there why chance to get back the possibility to unify and dissolve groups of units like the old BFME 1 style? It would be really amazing having archers moving at the same time with pikes without checking constantly if they are being attacked by cavalery
- i also would like too see back the old BFME 1 guard system because with that feature you could just have units fight in a specific area engaging automatically enemies without going too far, now you find yourself loosing units because they fight and keep moving forward until they are in enemy base

[Elendils Cousin 3. Grades]

I’m really sorry this post was meant to be for another mod and not for edain i don’t know why i put edain name there maybe because i saved and copy the wrong file. You are absolutely right in your reply 😅

How did you make your way onto the MU into the correct board into the correct thread to then... talk about an entirely different mod? I'm genuinely curious here

The ability to combine different hordes is a unique ability for Isengard in Edain, and we like it better that way. It makes the Shield Uruks stand out as a powerful support unit.

[Halbarad]

- i also would like too see back the old BFME 1 guard system because with that feature you could just have units fight in a specific area engaging automatically enemies without going too far, now you find yourself loosing units because they fight and keep moving forward until they are in enemy base

I'd like to see that. Is this possible to implement?

[Elendils Cousin 3. Grades]

Maybe theoretically, not realistically.