The herbalist class is being added so it can add way more challenge to combat, When footmen get hurt there health won’t increase as easy as now. I also believe enemys are being made stronger so its more challenging. The herbalist is there to heal injured hearthlings. The games still in an early stage of development, the herbalist is a step forward to making combat more enjoyable and challenging. I see it as there’s no point in adding anything until the herbalist is added, because the same scenarios will be repeating if health isn’t being truly effected. As for the second biome, Its only just been added, give it some time
As said, Be patient and the game eventually will be more challenging and demanding. The devs are working as hard as possible for a small team, And by no means is any potential of this epic game being wasted!
All your ‘problems’ aren’t so much problems as they are stuff you want added before things you don’t care about. I think it’s reasonable to assume that TR have put a lot more thought into what order is best to implement things than you have.
I think you answered your own question there. Once the herbalist is added, auto-healing will be mostly removed, so it adds challenge to combat. and its aftermath.
There can’t be more encounters nor any real tactics until there’s more mechanics coming into play in combat. The herbalist will be one, ranged combat will be another soon, and the party system will probably be gradually improved as combat is.
I simpy do not agree with all the responses saying “the herbalist adds to combat”.
Maybe to the aftermath of it, but not to combat itself.
And imho there is no “playable” combat at all…
On “wasted potential” beeing rude: I’m developing software and managing software projects for 35 years now - and one common killer mistake is to add features before existing features are fully implemented and well understood (the latter meaning to learn in every iteration).
To be managable the “wider” software gets (by adding features) the “deeper” it has to get (well defined features, solid reusable components, test protocols…).
And I see too many unfinished (in the sense of neither well understood nor implemented) “features” atm - in this topic I tried to stick to combat related ones, but the build process has obvious problems as does the task scheduler as does the pathtinder…
Every game developer who has responded on their games have said that adding stuff breaks other things in the code. Is that how they make games? Fix things, then add stuff, fix the stuff but ignore what the stuff added broke in the code?
Why is it that big game companies think they’re the only ones who know how to make games but on release of their game it’s as buggy as an early access game is? I’m talking about big names here like, EA, Ubisoft, etc. I can understand why Bethesda’s games are buggy because they’re huge open world games.
But if what you say is how it’s done. Then I think they need to change it. Who wants to go through the same code several times after each feature is added? Wouldn’t it be better to add everything and then go through the code once?
along with what everyone else said, if everything goes to plan Alpha 14 should be giving us a massive combat overhaul, not just the herbalist. with all the changes that will be made the herbalist wont just be a useless feature, but rather an important one in order to survive.
What would archer add in the current state of combat. Actually it wouldn’t add much since combat is… Mainly too easy. Archers would just show that even more than it is already. So I would think it would be best to add something to alter the way you go about combat.
So I can see why they are adding the herbalist. It adds a mechanic that will cause for alarm or careful planning. Of course that is not the only thing they are planning to add… There are other mechanics on top of that. Namely the regen thing mentioned above.
Right now having archers would not have any benefit. It would be exactly the same as footman. In that it is just damage, with no worries to health; since that at the moment regens. Sure, ranged element, but when combat has no forethought, or rather I should say repercussions; then what would be the difference between the two classes beyond one is close and one is ranged. Mind as well choose footman, as hearthlings tend to regen rather quickly, even in combat.
I could imagine that what the herbalist will add is the sense to pull back when low on health, hence the need for ranged. But to have archers before the need is almost making a shooting gallery; which is not what I think combat should be. So on end note for archers, there has to be a reason to go Ranged in order for there to be that type of unit.
As to the other stuff listed… One thing at a time, or in this case a few. Which seems like to some degree there will be more than just a new class and mitigating regen mechanic. It is like the old paper and pencil type games, You don’t immediately throw people into a game and then setup the stage for the combat. So I have to say herbalists is an indirect thing that probably is needed in order to add reason for many of the other things. Plus I am sure there will be things over time that will be tuned or add a more diverse way of combat.
Always the need to be crafted first, before the need is to be used.
couple of good questions raised here…
starting from bottom:
basically you go to “your code” every set of features you add, “set” because usually you try to group what you add (thematically as technically) to control test and deployment time.
why release big companies buggy products:
in every project you have three main factors to handle:
the features you want to have in,
the time youre willing to wait, and
the resources you want to throw in
finally leading to a distinct quality of your product.
if you announce “this and that” for “xmas” the only screw left is resources - or quality.
resources often are limited (either because of monetary issues or the lack of hirable skills) so quality has to pay the bills …
now were back to the original intention of my post:
resources are obvisiousliy limited here, even tough time is not that much of an issue (assuming a dedicated community) I would carefully evaluate spending it on features prior to quality
This game is in the alpha stage. That means that new features are being implemented more than things are being fixed. Content is the main priority of an alpha. Once the game hits Beta will they start fixing bugs. Of course, if something gamebreaking pops up they’ll deal with it in alpha.
If I’m not wrong they have not only a roadmap but a page about their development anyway. The game is also built on an entirely custom engine. Honestly, it doesn’t really matter how other things go down. Have faith in TR and let them develop their game.
Considering most of the developers have had long careers as software engineers (i know at least tony, tom, albert and steph have) I find it hard to believe that Radiant has no idea what they are doing.
Usually, this stuff happens in parallel, so you might have the building guru figuring out new roof/stairs technology, the AI expert fixing pathing/placement bugs, the combat guy implementing new units alongside the artist and animators, etc. It’s a mistake to think that because the Dev Blog is previewing the Herbalist, the entire team is working on the Herbalist. Herbalist is probably just the next deliverable, and everyone else is still working on their own milestones.
Our Hearthlings don’t build their houses one section of the wall at a time, and I’ve never seen a game where the different systems like combat, level design, graphics and scenarios happen one at a time. Anyway it would be impossible to test a game with only one system complete.
no ranged combat (so basically no tactics in combat at all)
They haven’t even hashed out melee combat, so it’s strange to expect ranged combat when you’re specifically criticizing them for “adding stuff before fixing problems”.
a level 3 (i guess) attack that is so slow it makes the footman useless
This is a balance issue. That’s more late-beta than mid-alpha.
no equipment management
UX issue. Again, tends to be left to beta than alpha.
no (usable) control over your units in combat
I got the impression that Hearthlings wouldn’t be controllable like in an RTS. They were supposed to be semi autonomous. That’s why we have the Therapist. The party mechanics needs polish because it’s not pleasant to use at the moment but I’m sure they’re still figuring that out.
only repetitive, boring encounters.
Content is usually a beta issue. An RTS, for example, doesn’t design the full campaigns before creating all the units, since the creation of the campaigns depends on the balance of the units themselves, which can’t be done with only paper prototypes.
I just wanted to confirm that @haly is absolutely correct about the way Team Radient is developing the game. There are currently 7 developers (Albert, Chris, Linda, Stephanie, Tom, Tony, and Yang) working full time on Stonehearth (plus Brad on user experience, Doug on sound, and Allie on art), and they most certainly do not all work on the same feature at the same time. While Yang is doing a lot of the work on the Herbalist, Tony was working on some performance related improvements, Albert on a memory leak, Chris on building, etc. Hope this helps!
To also chime in on what’s being said Alpha 12 spent a lot of time looking at pathfinding and (I believe) that took up a lot of team resources. I think a result of this was people saying, “Where’s this? Where’s that? No new content?”
I could be wrong but I think there’s a balance that needs to be struck and I think the team is doing that VERY well! I think they’re listening to what the community is shouting the most about and taking those things into careful consideration whilst prioritizing all the cool amazing idea they have!
I mean…correct me if i’m wrong…but i’m pretty sure @sdee has talked about the Bunny people!!! So new content is coming in and they’re still whacking bugs as well! (I know a release was sent last week to fix a major bug).
They are continuously improving upon existing code (they have UNIT TESTING…UNIT TESTING in a game…it’s amazing to me as a dev!) So don’t think that mechanic and code is being put on the wayside for new content. And, besides that, it’s not like there’s this HUGE boat load of new content with no existing improvements…
Herbalist is added with changes in combat. Yeah there are a ton other things that haven’t been added yet that could use improvement or could help enhance other areas of the game but I believe the team is doing a WONDERFUL job of keeping the balance of new content vs improving existing content.
Not EVERYONE will be perfectly happy with what’s done…even when the whole thing is done. But I think everyone will be content at the very least… (i’m beginning to rant here so i’ll sum it up)
TL;DR Radiant is trying to balance new content with improving existing system with only 7 devs and doing a good job at it IMO
EDIT: I do understand where your worry is coming form @theWul but @sdee has said they love this game as much as we do and will do everything possible to ensure it is the game they set out to make it as well as the game that we want to play! They are doing things “slowly” compared to other companies but they’re taking the time to do things right in their framework and in the core mechanics of the game. Don’t worry about this game just “disappearing”…they won’t let that happen without a fight! Neither will we!