Swamp/desert adaptation pointless?

[machinecode]

I wanted to ask about the new teraforming situation.
As a reminder: You now acquire a free teraforming spell when you select an adaptation trait (except underground adaptation). So that's arctic, desert, and swamp adaptations.
Arctic adaptation has a clear affinity with shadow, and it totally makes sense to me why you would invest in it.
But swamp and desert seem pointless? Nothing really benefits from them. The Herbalist improvement has a swamp/forest tag. but that's all I can find.
I could see some defensive benefit because enemies will move slower. But the spell is 60 mana and that really doesn't cover the costs at all.
AOW3 had morale tied to terrain conditions, which was pretty cool. Is this just an oversight in AOW4 and a vestige of the older systems or am I missing something?

[Holy Fool Sehrael]

Dunno but Swamp strikes me as a second (You forgot Arboreal adaption btw which also doesn't get a terraform spell) nature adaption type and desert seems fitting for anything Materium/Chaos ^^

[Aurumworks]

Do farms with swamp adaption still have the food penalty for being build on swamp?

[gizmo]

In my last game, I've created a race with desert adaptation. I can only build farms on desert terrain which gives 5 food. Nothing more. It's not a bonus, because terrain surrounding my main city was exclusively desert. So I couldn't benefits from anything giving more food like pastures. Every food province was giving me 5 food. Not 10 or 15.

I can move slightly faster from what I remember but all in all, when I can build roads, I do so and this bonus become irrelevant.

All in all in my view adaptations need a total and solid rework. Not just in numbers but in what are they supposed to serve. They need A LOT more functionality.

[Aurumworks]

More functionality? How about +5 health regeneration on adapted terrain when in enemy territory and treat it as friendly terrain everywhere else.

[Fendelphi]

It is a benefit in the sense that noone else can really benefit from it.
So if you play on a desert realm(or just one with a lot of deserts), it provides a pretty decent benefit(being able to use that area and move faster on it) compared to not having it(it works in combat too).

Swamp adaptation greatly speeds up traveling if there are many rivers as well, which could be a strategic advantage.

So they are situational. Just like the Seafarer's Society trait is very situational(requires that the realm has a decent amount of water to beneficial).

Another example: Scout your enemy. Start proactively turning nearby tiles into "bad" ones, lowering your opponent's potential gain as they expand and slowing down their movement.

The big issue for me is the mana cost. It is just a tad too expensive when it only affects 1 tile at a time.

[machinecode]

oh yeah I forgot about the farm bonus. if it even works.
I was thinking more about the teraforming spells though.
Another idea would be to have an affinity bonus in each terrain type, like nature is stronger in forest/swamp, fire in desert, ice in snow, etc.
like I said, terrain seemed much more important and worth investing in for aow3, and it seems like they carried some of it over but it doesn't really make sense without the full system.

[ethorin101]

Honestly the only reason to take the Desert Adaptation is if you want to play with the Barren Oceans realm trait.

[Holy Fool Sehrael]

Originally posted by Fendelphi:

The big issue for me is the mana cost. It is just a tad too expensive when it only affects 1 tile at a time.

The thing is, that there's an T3 enchantment on cities for frost tomes, but the forest enchantment (or was it grass?) is a T5 enchantment. I don't know about you, but I felt pretty bad wasting my mana for 60 turns for one tile each until I could just pop the enchantment ^^ And! The forest enchantment is only 1 tile per turn while the snow enchantment is 2 tiles per turn. Talk about unfair. I hope someone makes a mod to improve adaption and the respective spells x)

[Kit Fulvas]

Originally posted by Holy Fool Sehrael:

The thing is, that there's an T3 enchantment on cities for frost tomes, but the forest enchantment (or was it grass?) is a T5 enchantment. I don't know about you, but I felt pretty bad wasting my mana for 60 turns for one tile each until I could just pop the enchantment ^^ And! The forest enchantment is only 1 tile per turn while the snow enchantment is 2 tiles per turn. Talk about unfair. I hope someone makes a mod to improve adaption and the respective spells x)

i actually made a post about this yesterday as a buff to the adaptations. When you reasearch X ammount of Tomes, unlock a city spell that converts tiles in domains 1/2 per turn like the Grassland (Nature) and Artic (Cold) tome adaptations.

There's almost no point in using the single target ones as thats just a waste of casting points and mana (especially Natures cause the Grassland one seems to create forrests as it spreads too, so thats 2 spells on a continues application)

[machinecode]

another idea would be to add tags like "fire power" "ice power" that scale stats in desert or arctic.
it's just disappointing that they have this whole climate system but it's overall fairly inconsequential.
In many ways it's a downgrade from Planetfall too because at least the climates made a difference for resources and city infrastructure.

[gizmo]

Originally posted by Aurumworks:

More functionality?

Yes, like unique buildings, units, special effects like firing up sandstorms to trap enemy armies, maybe digging on these terrains. A LOT more than just able to build farm with +5 food.
Also - freeze water/lava and more. Fundamentally more.