I believe that Fallen Enchantress has a problem. It's a great game, and I find myself enjoying it a lot every time I come back to it. I must have put more time into it than I have in any TBS since the original Age of Wonders and Rome Total War.
I love it, but everytime I play it I find myself not quite satisfied. I have been trying to figure out why, and here is what I have come up with.
FE is meant to be a strategy. A lot of effort has been put into fleshing out city management, troop design, diplomacy, etc... But unless I make up home rules I end up leveling two or three heroes, and conquering the world with them. Usually they are assassins, sometimes they are fighters or mages, but at the end they make troops irrelevant. I do not think I am the only one who plays this way. At higher difficulty levels, it's the only viable choice, and even at lower ones, it's the most effective style of playing.
Is this a problem? It is for me. Is this an easy problem to fix? No. AoW1 never did. AoW2's heroes were unsatisfying. Some HoMMs were ruined by it. Even some Total Wars had it - Armenian, Egyptian and Sassanid generals could kill a few thousands of soldiers with just their bodyguards. So can anything be done about it? Lets try and figure it out.
Why is this happenning? Because a properly leveled hero will be more or less untouchable by trained troops, even as early as turn 50, when heroes pass level 15 or so. By turn 75, when even Insane AIs have barely started mass producing the highest tier troops, heroes dodge almost every attack, absorb/resist any damage that can be mitigated, and shrug off anything that cannot be. For an example, check out this playthrough, in which by turn 70 I had three heroes that were each taking level 5 cities defended by dozens of plateclad enemy heroes and nine men units.
It's unrealistic, unsatisfying, and a waste of the attention that went into crafting the strategy part of the game. I would like to see it fixed, but let us first look at the pitfalls that have to be avoided.
The worst that can be done is to nerf heroes to the point they have no function in the game. Heroes must remain the most valuable units even in late game, because having a badass avatar is what many players appreciate above all else.
Another thing to avoid is to introduce obscure, unrealistic and unintuitive game mechanics like hard counters. No player wants to see his carefully nurtured and equipped hero shishkebob'd by three peasants with pointy sticks.
A third pitfall is to introduce a new type of strategy that excludes all others by being too effective.
And finally, whatever fix is brought in, it should not change the existing balance in areas outside of hero/troop interaction, and should be at least somewhat intuitive.
So, for those who have read so far, here is what I suggest.
Keep champions as the glorious heroes of legend - dragon slayers, dungeon crawlers, powerful casters. But let them bow to the fact that even the greatest human swordsman cannot just brush away a shieldwall of well trained sword infantry. Let them fear being surrounded by 72 spearmen. Force them to have to prepare if they want to survive a rain of arrows. How?
Introduce bonuses and penalties based on the number of separate individuals (models) in an unit. The numerical values of these bonuses will have to be tuned during Beta 5.
1. Every attack by a separate model reduces the target's dodge value by a fixed amount. This amount is divided by the number of models in the target unit. At the beginning of an unit's combat turn, the penalty is cleared.
2. Every successful melee hit reduces the the target's defense value by a fixed amount. This amount is divided by the number of models in the target unit. At the beginning of an unit's combat turn, the penalty is cleared.
3. No matter how high the attack value of a model, one model can only kill a limited number of models in one attack.
4. Introduce units and champion traits that affect the above bonuses. Champions who do not lose dodge for the first X attacks, creatures whose defense is not reduced by multiple hits, monsters that can attack every model in a unit at once, masters who can kill multiple models in one attack. Of course, have also traits that enhance the bonuses. Nets that multiply the dodge penalty, weapons that increase the defense penalty after a hit.
5. Restrict some of the unit traits based on unit size. This way you can have elite units with fewer models with specialist functions.
How is the above going to solve the hero problem? Well, a hero trying to take on a big army singlehandedly could be simply overwhelmed - a bit like being dragged down by the mob and kicked to death. He will not be able to kill them fast enough, and his dodge and defense will be mitigated if enough enemies surround him.
But it will not be a hard counter. A high level hero will be able to deal with a limited number of enemies, especially if he specializes in mob fighting, and/or has a few friendly units watching his flanks. And the heroes will be just as effective in the early game, when fewer models can be fielded at once.
Furthermore, heroes will never be made irrelevant. They will still be monster slayers, and useful against trained units when supported. We will just not see ridiculous situations like a lone hero being pounded by 72 heavy troops, being shot at by 100 archers, and not suffering a scratch.
And best of all, by tuning the numerical values of bonuses and penalties, the effect can be made as small or as pronounced as needed
