First of all this is a great list of changes, and it should definitely be a move in the right direction balance-wise. However, I do have a few things I would change/add:
-As others stated, I don't think Valkyrie+++ needs a nerf, I think the problem is that the + and ++ tiers do not currently justify the extra cost from tier 0. Instead of nerfing the final tier, I would change the previous tiers like this:
1)Valkyrie+ and above can teleport the king before any pieces were lost
(Giving Valk0 the weakness of leaving the king vulnerable to
immediate sniping attempts)
2)Valkyrie++ and above can move (but not take pieces) before losing a
friendly piece (this removes its current vulnerability against
immediate thundermage/summoner/wrath attack)
-Bat gaining a backwards attack with mini vampirism sounds both interesting as well as thematic, but harder promotion at final tier seems like yet another nerf to the vampire which, at 25 cost, doesn't deserve it in my opinion.
-Spider promoting into an arachnid could be interesting if the correct method is chosen for promotion. Personally I think with how cheap and mobile the spider is it would be OP if it promoted on the backline or on its first usage of poison (at least without a cost increase) but promoting on its second poisoned unit would seem balanced as well as fun.
-Finally, Royal Guard++ already has great Synergy and is very powerful with a queen, so I really think it needs +1 cost as well.
This honestly looks like a solid rebalance update and I look forward to more of these in the future. The Balance Preview might be extra work but I think it's a great way of getting extra feedback from the community, leading to better balance overall.
I feel like the effect/limitations morphing across tiers idea is better expressed as limitations changing across units, if that makes sense. A patience or fire elemental effect is gradient and numeric so it can be intuitively 'learned' rather than 'remembered' so while I do kinda agree how Valk+/++ are the main problem, I'm not sure this is the solution.
It's kinda like the general view is valk consists of 2 units and some transitions used rarely for niche purpose, so maybe at least 1 of them could be removed as a fragmented tier shift into new final tier that leaves existing Valk+++ intact? I think of all the Valk tiers + is the most boring, so tier shift from there is maybe an option.
probably it would be something like, 1 max range of move only on +++ in exchange for the attack/effect on all bats, which vampires could use in emergency or tactical scenarios as an actual attack, instead of only escapes. I think the new bat is going to be super fancy, but main point is to avoid it always being tilted toward "bat+++ or nothing" style balance that a few units have fallen into.
I guess it's a pretty universal consensus that this won't work, so probably I'll just scrap it
There is still the skeleton experiment to find some interesting things, but much less volatile than spider.
Maybe some other time a slow version of spider could have promote though?
maybe range of moves 1,2,3 then tele, or something, with the promote.
does that sound more containable if it were too strong?
I will consider this more, but lean towards ghost++ > RG++ atm.
thanks for showing up to the new forums by the way. I know the entry barrier to get in is strangely massive and tedious compared to basically any game forum ever, but I think we can remedy that in various ways over time. Eventually it will be common CEO knowledge how to navigate this place in much more effective ways that have less friction involved, but for now it is how it is, so I'm glad you got your foot in the door.
I like the sound of skipping rank+ for Valkyrie and getting a new +++ as long as the new moveset is interesting. Perhaps some really long range king teleportation spots to allow using the king more on the offensive.
Now that I think more about it I think the new bat might indeed have some very neat uses, and if the mobility loss is minimal then I'm all for it.
I actually like the idea of spider promoting into arachnid, I just find alternative promotion methods that don't involve getting to the other side of board more interesting, and more fitting here. Perhaps the poison squares for the spider could be changed into "poison unit or devour poisoned unit" allowing the spider to kill an unit that has already been poisoned and turn itself into an arachnid of the same tier.
As for the RG++/ghost++ dilemma, I don't think that the ghost is strictly stronger at all.
Ghost is a defensive piece that can offer an advantage to initiative in the early game in exchange for reduced ability to protect vital units in the late game.
Royal guard, on the other hand, is a powerful offensive piece when used together with a queen, a strong control piece when used together with an offensive prince, and a decent bodyguard when the allied king is about to be cornered.
While I agree that both pieces deserve nerfs, Royal Guard has some amazing synergies and currently performs way too well for its cost even without using its unique ability. In my opinion, it is even more in need of a nerf compared to a strictly defensive ghost.
Also worth mentioning, phoenix0 at its current price of 14 can be resurrected by lifestone+++, leading to some situations where a single phoenix can essentially multiply an absurd number of times. While it is indeed morale intensive, this many units with 'kill attacker on death' can be very strong against melee focused armies, and together with enough utility to move the eggs around and put them behind the newly created phoenixes, this type of army can be extremely cancerous to fight against. I have only encountered this once about a week ago, and I can say if that army was played well it would dominate the meta. I can see it soon becoming a problem if it is not fixed.
it is decided, valk+++ will not be nerfed, and instead valk+ will be removed, collapse into a new max tier but not sure what it looks like yet.
the bats will be super fancy, but spiders I think everyone sees a problem.
for Ghost vs RG, I think they are strangely hard to compare depending on tier, but my intuition says that RG should stay same costs, because the big change to RG is the new +++ looking like current Ghost++ which will hopefully mean that someone will finally use them. It would seem silly to do this, and then nobody uses it again in favor of Ghost or Butterfly. RG is strange to balance however, because even one that has no moves would act as a kind of pseudo-wisp for royal units. I think you are probably right that it will be the stronger between the two if only ghost increases in cost, but I am somehow inclined to do it anyway to see the fancy RG swaps, maybe even to combo with the new valk+++
Current Ghost++ I see as having one too many advantages: swaps, unblockable, and transparency - which is a double edged sword, but then, so are things like Lust magic.
I think people using ghost become quickly attuned to using the transparency in their favor and the added armor breaking and swaps really start to push it over the edge in my view. RG queen synergy is quite extreme, but it involves a very high cost unit where ghost may not.
I guess a better way to describe my view on these is that it seems like ghost belongs 0.5 above RG, but as it is impossible currently I am leaning in favor of making RG+++ a more interesting unit for a while, even if it is a little too strong.
Phoenix-LS+++ I think was some thematic choice.
I'll give it some more recent thought.
I think RG++ is better than Ghost++, but it is obvious to me that most armies that use Ghost+0, Ghost+1, or Phantasm should be using Ghost++ instead if possible. The issue is that rush armies (the favorites for Ghost) do not particularly like a slow unit that moves 1 space over and over.
The irony is I probably contributed a few hundred games to the Ghost++ win metrics, as I was running a double Ghost++ army that uses it for a quick development purpose (Behemoth Minotaur) not a rush purpose.
I'm also not sure if Spider promote isn't going to work. It'll certainly be silly and maybe warrant a -1 range increase so it's not literally instapromote for 2 cost, but I like units with promote than not because it's an extra goal, especially for pieces with ordinarily no reason to go to the other side.
-main_gi
I think if spider actually gains a normal promote it may need more than just range-1 on move, but for now I'm thinking the experimental ideas on skeleton/spider may cause too many problems.
Hey glend, nice to see you here!
-main_gi
Nice to see you as well!