I am a little bit frustrated because some special abilities have often no effect on a battle. For example, if a dragon gets an orb, it often occurs that there are no enemy triangle units that could be destroyed – so the special ability of this mighty creature simply fades to nothing.

The same result occurs when you have a bunch of fleshrippers or sorcerers and all of them get orbs. And those are not the only examples of special abilities that can lose their impact, there are many other examples that could be mentioned here.

So I think about establishing the following houserule: An orb can be transferred into causing one damage. (comparable to hero duels where orbs can trigger special effects or simply cause one damage).

What do you think about this houserule? I think it sounds pretty fair and should work very well – or do I miss something?

I think if you were to use that ability with Sorcerers, they would be far too powerful - they get Orbs on 40% of their draws, and their main purpose seems to be damage absorption, not actual damage dealing. Giving them each 2 health PLUS dealing 1 damage per extra orb would turn Sorcerers into probably one of the best neutral units (especially considering they go first).

With Dragons, well, it depends on what you are fighting. Hexagon units are still nice to soak up some late damage, and have the highest damage potential. If you are on the attack, and aren't fighting against many Triangle Units, though, you probably shouldn't bring your dragon unless you just want an extra big unit there (it COULD still deal it's 3 damage though). For the dragon, doing the orb=1 damage may not be gamebreaking, though (not nearly as much as the Sorcerer).

With Flesh Rippers, like the Sorcerers, I think it would tip the scales too much to making them more than just a "good unit". Unlike the Sorcerer, they only get orbs 20% of the time, but they will do damage more often than getting an orb. Thus, if you pull two orbs, that's just unlucky. But if extra orbs start dealing one damage, then you are throwing off the damage-dealing potential, and possibly making them more powerful than they should be. Again, while their damage-absorption ability isn't quite as pronounced as the Sorcerers, it does seem to be one of their purposes, and thus combining that with dealing more damage at initiative 1 could make them too powerful for what they should be.

It can be frustrating to draw Orbs when you don't want them, but I think it's just part of the game - from my experience with combat, things are balanced pretty nicely overall and tweaking with it, even in small ways, could have more drastic consequences than it may seem on the surface.

Of course, the only way to really know for sure is to try it. I suspect for Flesh Rippers and Dragons, the effect won't be as pronounced. But I suspect for Sorcerers, it will turn into a very nasty unit, more nasty than it should be.

Graf said:

I agree with Sigma's assessment, especially concerning sorcerers. In the games we've played, whenever sorcerers are involved in a battle, they almost always draw two or more orbs. Frequently they all draw orbs. Not surprising considering circle bases are statistically more likely to get an orb than any other base type.

But furthermore, the way you've written this house rule, it isn't limited to "useless" orbs. A player could choose to make ANY orb draw into a damage. That makes the elven sorceresses more potent as well. Their ability to force a unit out of the hex can be useful at times, but I rather suspect 1 damage would be equally useful in ridding the opponent of a unit in most battles, and this way it's not on the board elsewhere and has to be re-purchased. All circle base units now become significantly more dangerous as damage dealers, when they were designed to be primarily "hey that's cool" units that do weird things to the battlefield. Necromancer no longer mourn the event that all the Reanimates are already on the board, although I rather suspect they will choose to summon so long as the supply exists.

The bottom line is armies will get killed faster and recruiting new units will become more frequent and more important to the game. Waiqar gains the most advantage in that his circle unit (the necromancer) can choose to boost his own ranks OR reduce the enemy ranks with each orb drawn, as he sees fit. Harvests will become even more tactically valueable as they influence how much you can recruit per recruiting action. Droughts and other effects that reduce resources will become more costly. Building strongholds and developments will be a bigger expense because of the lost resources. I'm not saying the game will be completely broken, but it will definitely be more... hectic.

By all means, try it out. Let us know how it works out for you. I, for one, would be interested to see what happens.