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Guest mrchak

Tower Upgrade Costs Imbalance

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Guest mrchak

Hey, I've been thinking about something and I want to bring it to people's attention as a potential rebalance in the map. I've always felt that the cost to upgrade the dual-element towers seemed kindof low compared to the triple element towers considering either way you (supposedly) get an increase in effectiveness by a factor of 5.

Relatively speaking, I think it should be cheaper to upgrade a triple-element tower than a dual-element tower. The more elements in a tower, the cheaper (relatively speaking) it should be to upgrade it to the next level. That's my feeling.

In the spreadsheet I link to I have some numbers that show the current calculated value cost-to-effectiveness-increase for upgrading the different towers (no element, 1-element, 2-element, 3-element). I think the upgrade value should get better the more elements a tower has... Currently it is as follows:

No elements 1.05

1 Element 1.11

2 Elements 1.54

3 Elements 1.25

(this number is calculated as Increase in damage / Increase in Net Cost of tower)

Does anybody see anything strange here? I think the upgrade value for dual-element towers is out of whack. I propose a rebalance:

No elements 1.05

1 Element 1.11

2 Elements 1.30

3 Elements 1.50

What this would mean is that the most expensive Towers (that don't require Essence) will be Lv 3 Dual, at a net cost of 7,396. Lv2 Triple will be less powerful, a net cost of 4,390. I think this is fine, as long as the towers abilities and attributes are balanced accodingly.

Thoughts?

http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key= ... 4L5cqoTgYw

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Karawasa did quite some thinking on this, and he had very good reasons for it.

He will probably tell himself, but for what I know, the duals were underpowered before that change, and "sort of a laugh". Also using high level duals greatly limits your tower variety. For 6 picks you get either 3 different towers with a maxed dual or 7 different with a maxed tripple.

(Examples: Goldmine, refined earth, refined light vs incantation, sorcerer, lightning, lunar, focused dark, focused light, focused fire)

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Guest Sancdar

Additionally, many 3-element towers are defined primarily by their special abilities, which tend to be more powerful than those of the duals. I mean, the effective boost in upgrading an Acid to a Hydrochloric is amazing.

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Guest mrchak
For 6 picks you get either 3 different towers with a maxed dual or 7 different with a maxed tripple.

I can see that point, but I always play random, so I don't think of it this way I guess. Are you saying that you do 6 picks and 5 interest, and work with that? I still think the upgrade to a lv 2 triple is imbalanced.

If its a problem with the upgraded duals being a joke, then the answer lies in having the dual upgrades be made more worthwhile, rather than making the upgrades cheaper.

Additionally, many 3-element towers are defined primarily by their special abilities, which tend to be more powerful than those of the duals. I mean, the effective boost in upgrading an Acid to a Hydrochloric is amazing.

But for something like a Rainbow, Infernal, Metal, etc... Its just a damage increase.

Maybe this wraps up into the whole discussion of redesigning all these towers, but I haven't been convinced yet. I'm eager to hear a convincing argument though.

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Guest Sancdar

Well, if you look at Rainbow, Infernal, Metal...you're looking at towers that people don't use. Metal was ungodly back when it could upgrade. Unsurprisingly, the value was in its special ability (upgrading).

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Guest mrchak
Well, if you look at Rainbow, Infernal, Metal...you're looking at towers that people don't use. Metal was ungodly back when it could upgrade. Unsurprisingly, the value was in its special ability (upgrading).

That's a very broad statement. People use them, especially when you're playing random, you build with the best mix of towers available to you. But I don't want to get into an argument about the usefulness of towers that are going to change in this overhaul anyway, my point is simply about the concept of the upgrade costs. It looks like I have myself an uphill battle...

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Guest MasterTenor

I've always thought that the level 3 dual towers should be at least on par if not better than level 2 triples. Despite the fact that each of them has 6 elements, you have to sacrifice a lot of diversity to get level 3 dual towers.

Ideally, the level 2 dual towers outclass level 1 triple towers in damage (but not abilities), and the level 3 duals come close to matching the level 2 triples.

The only level 3 dual I've seen successful work with was volcano, and that's mostly because it complements level 3/4 Earth towers so well.

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Guest Sancdar

Wizard, Goldmine, and Waterfall are all pretty good level 3 duals.

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I've always thought that the level 3 dual towers should be at least on par if not better than level 2 triples. Despite the fact that each of them has 6 elements, you have to sacrifice a lot of diversity to get level 3 dual towers.

Ideally, the level 2 dual towers outclass level 1 triple towers in damage (but not abilities), and the level 3 duals come close to matching the level 2 triples.

That doesn't make sense, does it? :shock: You say that duals restrict you in your build ("have to sacrifice a lot of diversity to get level 3 dual"), so duals are structurally a disadvantage, and then you demand them to be made weaker than the allready stronger triples ("dual towers should be at least on par if not better than")?

The other way around: Duals are a disadvantage buildwise (3 towers for 6 picks instead of 7 towers), so they need to be stronger than triples of an equal level:

Dual 2 > triple 1 and dual 3 > triple 2.

The only level 3 dual I've seen successful work with was volcano, and that's mostly because it complements level 3/4 Earth towers so well.

There are more very strong duals. Of course you know of gold only gaming? (Replay of gold only.) And poison can be very strong too. (Example of lategame poison slowing.) Magic can solo the map too, just like gold can, and electricity is about the only long range tower that can be used as a main damage tower w/o losing. (Combine it with nova and enchantment and get a leaky win.) And don't forget sun, the only splash composite tower on the map. (Or aoe damage? Nevermind, here's the replay.)

Many of the duals are support towers, but they do a great job as that.

I challenge you to challenge me: Which dual sucks? I'll try to impress you with it. :)

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Guest Sancdar

Life Towers only in multiplayer! I guess you can use Tech too if you want, you probably need the damage, especially for earth levels.

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Guest MasterTenor

Cisz, gold and magic I was aware of, I just wasn't thinking.

You're right -- I mistyped. Level 3 Duals should be slightly more effective than Level 2 Triples.

As far as support, it doesn't get better than Ice and Well.

However....

The rest of them are very good early game, but fade away in the late game (steam, death, clay, moon, life, tech). Especially moon / roots -- I don't think I've ever seen people use level 3 moon towers, and level 3 roots is redundant (build more level 2 instead).

So, impress me with moon towers and clay towers. They slow, but single target slow is no good without a lot of damage (poison is a good example of how it should be). Life and tech towers just don't have the damage after a while...

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I admit it, moon can't solo or deliver any substancial damage, and their slow doesn't get stronger with leveling, so they are just support.

But clay gets and impressive slowing power. I played a game to demonstrate. Notice that I don't use sludge or poison and play on 4 (numpad notation).

>> Replay - Clay extreme <<

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Guest Sancdar

How would Moon slow get stronger? They make creeps move backwards!

Clay gets the same slow as other single targets (sludge, poison), doesn't it?

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How would Moon slow get stronger? They make creeps move backwards!

That's not all, even while running forward as a wolf the creeps are slower. The turning around is just a bug that ended up beeing the main effect.

Clay gets the same slow as other single targets (sludge, poison), doesn't it?

Not entirely. Apart from affecting all targets (unlike poison, but you knew that), clay, moon, and sludge have a slowing spell that recycles and don't do their slow on every attack. Clays slow is a bonus efect on an attack while sludges slow is an independant second ability. As a result, poison can slow more targets with well, while all other single target slows can't.

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Guest Sancdar

Oh, right. You can tell how long it's been since I've really used some of these towers...

I meant that Clay gets the 33/66/99 slow, right?

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(..)Clay gets the 33/66/99 slow, right?

Yes, thats what I remember.

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Is this supposed to add the cost rebalance for uppgrading in whatever order.

I mean so it cost exactly the same to uppgrade a tower whatever is uppgraded first.

Example

Dual level 1 -> triple level 1 -> triple level 2 = cheap

Dual level 1 -> dual level 2 -> triple level 2 = expencive

Or it could have diferent costs but you get the right selling price for the tower even but you uppgraded the expencive way.

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Guest mrchak
Is this supposed to add the cost rebalance for uppgrading in whatever order.

See topic: http://www.eletd.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=2326#2326

I think that is a good thing, but this upgrade cost rebalance wouldn't directly relate to it. All this topic is suggesting is that because you need to spend 2 lumber on elements in order to upgrade a dual-element tower, as opposed to upgrading a single-element tower, the upgrade cost/effectiveness ratio should be less (you shoudl get a better value when upgrading). I think the same reasoning should apply to triples vs duals (since you have to spend 3 lumber to upgrade a triple, the cost/value should reflect this)

BUT NOBODY AGREES WITH ME!

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Alright, time that I finally respond to this topic. MrChak, the problem is that you seem to be approaching this with math based logic (not surprising). The main reason as Cisz pointed out, is lack of diversity. Take one level 3 dual, that is 6 elements needed. Now, take a level 2 triple, that is also six elements needed. But, the latter provides THREE different level 2 duals as well! Even with duals being cheaper in 3.0, they STILL pale in comparison to triples. With the new tower distribution, Duals will not only keep their cost, but also get a power boost to make them competitive. Long enough have level 3 duals collected dust.

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