Octopus Overlords

by **GreenGoo** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 11:28 am

With all the discussion of heroes, my question is about the game mechanics.

Is this a 4x game with heroes, or is this a hero game with 4x attached? Heroes of Might and Magic is a hero game with 4x elements attached imo, if that helps explain the distinction I'm trying to make.

LordPolish · by **KiloOhm** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 11:57 am

4X game with heroes. I don't think you necessarily NEED heroes for anything but it makes things easier to have them. It's very much like MoM in that regard.

by **ydejin** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 12:01 pm

GreenGoo wrote:With all the discussion of heroes, my question is about the game mechanics.

Is this a 4x game with heroes, or is this a hero game with 4x attached? Heroes of Might and Magic is a hero game with 4x elements attached imo, if that helps explain the distinction I'm trying to make.

I tend to think of HOMM as more of a puzzle game, and this is definitely not like that. It's somewhere in the middle although I'd say more of a 4x game with heroes. It's more Civ like than HOMM like.

You can focus on your heroes, but it's really a 4x game, so unless you happen to have a lot of heroes (possible, but unlikely unless you were supremely lucky in your starting position) you'll need to keep all your borders covered with regular units. In other words, if you're in the middle of the map and your main group of heroes is in the North you need something covering your South, East, and West borders. I tend to have a stack of heroes roaming about questing, and then regular army units, possibly bolstered with a hero or two covering my flanks. A warrior type hero can make a big difference in battle, but casting heroes can really turn the tide of battle, so an army with a few heroes and some strong units will do well. Regular units do level up, and at high level they can be quite dangerous if properly kitted out, but in general heroes are more powerful. Also in order to keep your regular units competitive, you really have to have the right equipment researched.

Your strongest stack would probably be composed strictly of heroes, but that's not necessarily the most efficient thing to do, since you don't have very many heroes, and heroes have extreme utility and might be used in a wide range of roles. Some heroes in fact, give administrative bonuses to cities they are stationed in. Stack size is limited, but research in the tech tree can increase stack size up to 9 (although those last couple slots are extremely expensive to research).

In addition to using heroes and armies for regular Civ-like purposes, you can also send your heroes questing across the map. They can pickup a variety of different quests from quest locations, they can also fight monsters, and discover treasure. They earn XP and each level they unlock special perks. Some of these are stat boosts such as +4 to constitution, but others grant special abilities like "Stunning Strike, unless enemy resists it is stunned for a turn" or "Double Strike, strike the enemy twice at -4 accuracy". Some grant army bonuses Tactician improves all units initiative, for example. Some like "Merchant" provide money each turn. Others improve your ability to cast magic, either by unlocking more powerful spells, or by improving your ability to cast the ones you've got (reducing mana costs for example or increasing damage).

Also you need to pay a fair amount of attention to your cities. Cities build various improvements ala Civ. There's also a pretty extensive tech tree that unlocks city improvements, weapons and armor, and magical items and abilities.

I think probably a better comparison than HoMM would be Warlords 3, where IIRC you could do some questing and armies could both operate by themselves and with heroes, but would be better off with heroes. However, there are important differences -- the game mechanics here are IMO much deeper and more interesting. Also in Warlords city placement was already pre-determined whereas here all cities are built by the player or an enemy faction.

Honestly I think probably the best, most close comparison is Master of Magic. There are differences to be sure, and I realize that comparison is likely to lead to disappointment if expectations are too high. I really miss MoM's custom magic item forging ability, for example (here if you research the right technologies you unlock various magic items, but it's not like you're custom forging a sword for a specific hero). FE has some pretty decent magic available, but I think probably MoM had more interesting magic spells (although IIRC the AI was pretty crappy at using them). I didn't think of this until now, but there's also no underground or caves in FE. I also prefer MoM's traditional fantasy races. If you haven't played MoM, probably the next best comparison would be Age of Wonders 2.

As I mentioned the more I've played it the more I like it. I was pretty meh on it when I started playing it last week -- it pretty much felt just like the original Elemental game. But the more I've gotten into it the more depth and character I've found.

by **Sepiche** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 12:09 pm

Yeah that sounds about right to me. The aren't the complete focus of the game like they are in HoMM, but they are can be extremely powerful and you probably want as many of them as you can.

Loving the game so far myself too. It's definitely got some bugs still lurking around, but I've still been having a blast playing a game as an empire. Death magic is awfully cool and has some really fun, powerful spells. I also think the whole elemental lord thing is pretty sweet later in the game. Each lord has a territory that they claim, and toward the mid game when you are strong enough you can head into their territory for lots of good loot and each has a quest you can complete to vanquish them. I was able to finally beat the earth elemental lord in battle the other night, and it was a good, tough fight.

by **LordMortis** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 12:10 pm

It's somewhere in the middle

If the original Elemental was an indicator that would have been my guess. Heroes were almost key and out classed other units development, and losing your sovereign could lose you the game, so I'd have put it on the Heroes with 4x category but it was pretty close to the middle as you didn't need heroes in your stacks and you didn't create uber stacks.

by **ydejin** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 1:10 pm

Baroquen wrote:
tgb wrote:
Baroquen wrote:Stupid question, but I can't find the answer. The options mention some sort of "snap" back when rotating the map. How do you rotate the map?

Move mouse while holding down the middle button. There may be a way with the keyboard, but it's a state secret.

Yeah, that's not working for me. Still at a loss. Oh well.

Are you getting any rotation at all, or does it rotate when dragging with the middle mouse button down and then snap back to the original position as soon as you release? If it's the latter, there's a "Snap Back When Rotating" gameplay option that starts off as checked. I think it's a bit counter-intuitive, but it does seem to work for me. If it's the former dunno, sorry.

by **Baroquen** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 5:11 pm

Yeah, no rotation at all. Maybe a mouse issue on my end or something. I don't know. /shrug

Well, I've gotten pretty deep into a game (at least for me) and have a couple heroes leveled up with a couple towns working. Got to a point where i thought the game was corrupted, with crashes happening two turns after the latest save, but managed to get by. Crashes/slowdowns happen, but it hasn't been that unstable.

Been enjoyable so far. My main hero is a spellcaster who uses flame arrow to weaken enemies up for my spearmen and my champion warrior. I like the equipment/magic items. And it's also been nice to be able to actual build up my stacks to be able to take down mobs/NPCs who tormented me early on. Revenge is sweet.

by **TiLT** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 5:28 pm

Baroquen wrote:Yeah, no rotation at all. Maybe a mouse issue on my end or something. I don't know. /shrug

If you've got a mouse with programmable buttons, like a Logitech mouse using SetPoint, make sure you've not configured the middle mouse button as anything but a middle mouse button. Most games won't recognize it unless it's set to the basic setting.

by **Malacheye** » Mon Jan 23, 2012 8:45 pm

I agree with everything Ydejin said, especially about it being most comparable to MoM (isnt that what we were all hoping for anyhow?)

I found out last night that those tech advances that look kind of inconsequential (Like the one that provides "Group") are actually kind of important. They allow you to build units with more troops in them so they do more damage and have more hits. That way, their survivability is better.

I had a problem with scouts' ability to "explore". I couldnt get that button to work. Also, without warning, about 3 hrs into the game, some major deadly beasts just spawned near my capital and began killing all my caravans. I barely managed to kill two of them, lost half my armies and then without explanation, they re-spawned.

I finally wiped out my first AI enemy. You have to capture or raze all his cities and then hunt down his Sovereign so he (and any Champions with him) have no place to rest/teleport to after battle.

I have yet to meet a "neutral" empire. One of the computer players sent a message telling me of a neutral power being on the move, but I didnt meet them before going to bed last night.

Also, I find that advancing in technology takes too long. I will play on fast from now on so that I can get farther into the tech tree before ending the game.

Another issue with quests. Sometimes when you get a quest that has more than one part to it, subsequent parts are not shown on the map, so I dont know what to do to finish it (one last night asked me to track some diseased animals, but gave me no info as to how to do it)

One bug I found last night was when I tried to build a recruitment center on a drake spawning location and the spawn location disappeared...

by **Jaymon** » Tue Jan 24, 2012 10:21 am

I have experienced crash to desktop about once an hour, so thats a problem. i also ran into the bug where the end turn button ceases to working, fixed by relaunching the game.
Got into a bugged fight, my hero was in the casting phase of fireball, when he was struck by Titans breath. I believe he was affected, and should have been laid down, and needed to spend his turn to get back up, but instead the turn gave me the cast fireball option, but it didn't register anybody as an enemy, and I could't not find a way to cancel out of it, so i was stuck.

I still see the issue of certain actions taking an extremely long time when on horseback, in this case the defend command takes about 15 seconds to execute.

I really like the new level up system for heroes. The auto upgrade system for regular units is always very nicely done. design a unit for a role, and then never have to edit them again.
I was frustrated by the 'must create cities in a spot with grain' I could not ever find a spot with grain, always got that error, the computer didn't seem to have that problem. So I compensated by taking the computer cities. He didn't really need them anyways.
When trying to conquer an enemy I got frustrated by having to fight the same emperor and his band of heroes over and over.

The hero stack becomes so powerful that it can only be countered with another hero stack. When the opposing emperor entered my territory, I could not damage it without heroes. 100+ hit points, attack and defense of 50+, its a game of stack of doom vs stack of doom, and I don't know if the AI received a penalty when I whacked his stack.

I am enjoying the variety of quests, and the variety of magic items. Would very much like to create my own items, I don't know if thats going to be a feature or not.

have not yet completed a game or started over, so more impressions to follow.

by **Pyperkub** » Tue Jan 24, 2012 4:28 pm

TiLT wrote:
Baroquen wrote:Yeah, no rotation at all. Maybe a mouse issue on my end or something. I don't know. /shrug

If you've got a mouse with programmable buttons, like a Logitech mouse using SetPoint, make sure you've not configured the middle mouse button as anything but a middle mouse button. Most games won't recognize it unless it's set to the basic setting.

This really bugged me about Elemental, as I was playing on a laptop with no middle mouse button. They should allow remapping of that f(x) to the Page Up/Down buttons or arrow keys.

by **Baroquen** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 12:14 am

TiLT wrote:
Baroquen wrote:Yeah, no rotation at all. Maybe a mouse issue on my end or something. I don't know. /shrug

If you've got a mouse with programmable buttons, like a Logitech mouse using SetPoint, make sure you've not configured the middle mouse button as anything but a middle mouse button. Most games won't recognize it unless it's set to the basic setting.

I was ready to shoot down this idea as I've never fiddled with programming buttons, but it turns out that this was the problem. Silly me that the mouse I was using had the default set to something other than 'middle-click'.

Thanks TiLT.

by **Sepiche** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 2:32 pm

According to Brad a major update to the beta will be out tomorrow. They've been constantly updating the change log here:
http://forums.elementalgame.com/415307

Patch 0.76 (not yet released)

Bugs:

+ Fixed an issue that kept players with captured drake and forest drake lairs from being able to train them

+ Added temp tile designs for Drake camps, Forest Drake camps, Mercenary camps, Naja camps, Ogre camps, Ophidian camps, Troll camps and Wilding camps

+ Naja, Ogres and Ophidians are now recruited as single units.

+ Fixed an issue that was causing swamps in the players ZoC to look like forests.

+ Fixed a lost device crash in desktop mode.

+ Fixed an issue with the arena tactical battle arena.

+ Fixed a crash attempting to fill the environment map if the sectormapper isnt initiated.

+ Fixed a bug with the Run Wild (Varkana's) quest.

+ Ring of Storms isn't available for unit design anymore.

+ Fixed a bug with Mantle of Oceans that was causing it to increase tactical spell cost instead of decrease it.

+ Fixed Throwing Knives.

+ Fixed the Powerful custom faction ability.

+ No more pauses when Air Elementals cast spells.

+ No more pauses when Troll Shamans cas spells.

+ Fixed bug where if a leader of an army was killed, their surviving sub units were not reformed into a new army, which was manifested as if you killed the leader in an army, but ended up losing the battle, the entire other army still died.

+ Fixed an issue that allows the build button to work on resources that are outside of your ZoC.

+ Fixed an issue with a conversation tag from Resoln to Yithril.

+ Fixed an issue with a conversation tag from Gilden to Resoln.

+ Fixed AI bug where pioneers would never look for a city unless they had escorts, even if the destination area is safe

+ Fixed bug where AI would declare war on players it has never met

+ Got rid of several repetiative debug messages.

+ Fixed crash bug that would occasionally occur on loading a saved game

+ Optimized load save game code to reduce big game loading times from >2 minutes to <30 seconds

+ Fixed crash bug where unit stats were being modified by multiple threads at once

+ Fixed crash bug where modifiers were being modified by multiple threads at once

+ Removed critical seciton around GetHarvestPerTurn() that caused deadlocks

+ ProcessEvents only occurs every other frame to improve framerate (this should be followed-up with more cleaning of the event queue)

+ Auto Saving now has a Debug.err message around it so we can easily tell if a crash occurred during autosave

+ Fixed bug that caused turns to get stuck on occasion

+ UpdatePioneerImpAssociatedCities() moved to a background thread so that late game animation remains smooth

+ Fixed crash bug related to Pioneer Improvements being reassociated

+ Fixed bug that caused AI to cast strategic spells from the main game thread

+ Fixed AI bug where it would send a pioneer unit to a location too close to a city and try to build there and get stuck

+ More cowbell

+ Fixed crash bug where background thread was trying to update the UI

+ Fixed crash bug related to a unit being added to a city in multiple threads at once.

+ Fixed crash bug related to a unit being clicked on in a city at the same time as a background thread was accessing the unit

+ Moved Increment Hitpoints to the top of the event list because it's one of the most common events (performance)

+ Rewrote OnEndGame() to clean up data more cleanly

+ Fixed deadlock related to GetCityByIndex()

+ Fixed deadlock related to GetCityCount()

+ Fixed AI bug where it would go to a quest location that has already been visited

+ Fixed a missing tile design for the clay quarry

+ Fixed the clay quarry so it correctly gives a material

+ Fixed the empty lairs on the Northern Waste wildland

+ Fixed some empty lairs on the Burning Lands wildland

+ Fixed memory leaks

+ Fixed the white particle effects in the Fog of War

+ Torax's head trophy will now correctly increase the gildar of your city

Balance:

+ Regeneration also works in tactical combat (instead of just on the world map).

+ Magical Bows are more common as loot drops.

+ You can recruit more darkling and wilding warriors from those lairs

+ You can design units with Ignys Bows now with Arcane Weaponry (and archer will upgrade to them).

+ Giant Form and Growth can only be cast on sovereigns or champions.

+ Berserker's Axe reduced from 20 Attack to 10.

+ Berserker's Broadsword reduced from 22 Attack to 11.

+ Made the following level changes to monsters:

Abeix: 15 -> 18
Ashwake Dragon: 10 -> 15
Clambercoil Dragon: 7 -> 12
Delin: 15 -> 19
Drake: 8 -> 11
Fell Dragon: 9 -> 13
Forest Drake: 6 -> 9
Giant Rock Spider: 6 -> 8
Hoarder Spider: 8 -> 10
Morian: 15 -> 19
River Slag: 5 -> 9
Sarog: 12 -> 17
Shrill Lord: 9 -> 12
Slag: 7 -> 10
Storm Dragon: 9 -> 13
Torax: 15 -> 18
Vetrar: 15 -> 20

+ Might now gives +3 Attack instead of +1 Attack per Level

+ Discipline is now a custom sovereign ability

+ Verga starts with Discipline instead of Might

+ Increased the XP needed between levels

+ The Hallowed Rite trait is only available to Resoln (or custom factions using the Wraith race)

+ Caravans are limited per city. 2 become available with Trading, an additional one is added with economics

+ Road Warriors faction trait is renamed Legacy of Serrane and it also grants an additional Caravan per city

+ Champions get injuries if they fall in combat (even if you win the battle)

+ Warrior Temple and Warrior College are both 1 per Faction

+ Late game tech costs reduced

+ Many Mid/Late game Improvement costs increased

+ Ice Elementals can cast Slow

+ Apothecaries produce 3 research per material instead of 1

+ Lightning Pike doesn't require metal to produce (crystal cost increased)

+ Boreal Blade doesn't require metal to produce (crystal cost increased)

+ Maul gives -4 Accuracy per strike instead of -3

+ Merchants reduced from +3 Gildar per season to +2

Cosmetic:

+ Added a description tag to the Adventurer ability

+ Added icons for the Horn of Sarog, Fist of Vetrar and the Eye of Abeix trophies

+ Fixed a minor word wrapping issue with the civics ability

+ Tarth males cant wear the ladies satin shirts anymore

+ Fixed a missing cloth map icon with the Rats Nest

+ Made the prisoner quest text more clear.

+ Fixed a text overlap issue on the Unit screen.

+ New shield idle for the equipment screens (so it doesn't obscure the characters face).

+ Clarified the description text on the infirmary.

+ Fixed missing medallions on the Butcherman (Abandonded Well) lairs.

+ Fixed a typo in the Vetrar conversation

AI:

+ AI less aggressive in dealing with trespassers on its territory

+ AI more aggressive about recruiting champions

+ AI Scouts will now move towards unrecruited champions that it finds to recruit them

+ AI less cautious about going on quests

+ AI will defend its bigger cities better

+ AI handles strategic spells much more intelligently

+ AI sovereign will cast spells that only can be cast on champions

by **Smoove_B** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 2:35 pm

So...would it be safe to say this is what Elemental should have been when it was released? I'm seeing what appears to be a mostly positive impression, yes?

by **Teggy** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 2:38 pm

How's the story in this? Does it just kind of guide the game along or is it very central to what you are doing?

by **Sepiche** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 2:40 pm

Smoove_B wrote:So...would it be safe to say this is what Elemental should have been when it was released? I'm seeing what appears to be a mostly positive impression, yes?

Yeah, it's definitely getting there. There's quite a bit of balancing, bug fixing, and polishing needed, but I've had more fun with the FE beta than I ever did with E:WoM. E:WoM feels like an alpha proof of concept compared to FE even at this point.

I'm waiting a bit to see how the changes to the next patch look before I gush too much more, but I'm pretty optimistic that Kael's got the basic formula right.

by **Sepiche** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 2:44 pm

Teggy wrote:How's the story in this? Does it just kind of guide the game along or is it very central to what you are doing?

No real campaign in the beta yet, only sandbox games, but I believe it's coming at some point. That said they have cutscenes similar to GalCiv spread throughout the game that give a nice storybook feel to even the sandbox game. Things like founding your first city, imbuing your first champion, discovering Wild Lands, etc.

by **$iljanus** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 2:59 pm

Sepiche wrote:According to Brad a major update to the beta will be out tomorrow. They've been constantly updating the change log here:
http://forums.elementalgame.com/415307

Since I just received my beta invitation saying that I can download the beta tomorrow this is welcome news! Looking forward to getting on the bandwagon and trying this puppy out.

by **ColdSteel** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 4:19 pm

Damn it, I was hoping I'd get into the beta this week. They're letting those that bought it up through November 2010 in and I bought mine in December. Oh, well. Hopefully next week. I'm starting to really look forward to this game.

by **Butterknife** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 10:08 pm

Honestly guys, it is looking pretty good. I've seen most of the bugs that are listed so I am really looking forward to the next patch. I intend to play some tonight, even though I would rather wait for the patch. I just don't want to wait until tomorrow, even though it would fix many bugs for me.

by **tgb** » Wed Jan 25, 2012 11:14 pm

It really is a struggle to keep from playing. I just don't want to get burnt out on it before release, which so often happens when I get my hands on a beta. But it really has the "just one more turn" appeal that so many recent tbs titles <cough>Civ V<cough> seem to lack.

by **Malacheye** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 1:45 am

One frustrating bug is some of the harder quests that require more than one step to complete. Often times the second or third step disappears from view and I cant figure out how to complete it. Also it kinda sucks when you defeat a Strong or deadly army, or complete a medium or strong quest and get a puppy dog idol or a mushroom as a reward. Some games I get tons of magical weapons and armor, others my level 15 Champions are still using basic weapons and wearing mostly leather armor.

Still loving the game. Does anyone know if we can customize our Sovereign? I saw some of the patch notes address a personalized Sovereign, but I havent seen how to do it.

by **ydejin** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 2:50 am

Malacheye wrote:One frustrating bug is some of the harder quests that require more than one step to complete. Often times the second or third step disappears from view and I cant figure out how to complete it. Also it kinda sucks when you defeat a Strong or deadly army, or complete a medium or strong quest and get a puppy dog idol or a mushroom as a reward. Some games I get tons of magical weapons and armor, others my level 15 Champions are still using basic weapons and wearing mostly leather armor.

I try to keep in mind that one of the most important rewards is actually xp gained from killing tough monsters.

Malacheye wrote:Still loving the game. Does anyone know if we can customize our Sovereign? I saw some of the patch notes address a personalized Sovereign, but I havent seen how to do it.

You can create a custom sovereign on the "New Game" page (just go down to the bottom of the Sovereign list and you'll see "Create Character". I don't believe there is a way to customize the look of a Sovereign while playing (other than of course changing their equipment).

by **The Meal** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 10:43 am

If anyone's looking for an excuse to not jump on board... the late game is still a slog (and that's with only 3 cities to keep track of). Leveling up heroes is a lot of fun and picking up new loot is exciting, but for this player it's tough to find the motivation to mount a full-scale assault on your oppositions cities. Maybe this'll change for me as things get more polished, but at the moment the late game feels more like work than fun.

by **Jag** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 10:57 am

Not defending the devs, but they said this was more of a tech demo to flush out bugs when released in the wild. I'm willing to give it a chance. I just don't know how much is still left to do.

LordPolish · by **KiloOhm** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 12:45 pm

The Meal wrote:If anyone's looking for an excuse to not jump on board... the late game is still a slog (and that's with only 3 cities to keep track of). Leveling up heroes is a lot of fun and picking up new loot is exciting, but for this player it's tough to find the motivation to mount a full-scale assault on your oppositions cities. Maybe this'll change for me as things get more polished, but at the moment the late game feels more like work than fun.

I agree, but I'll also say that personally - I have yet to encounter a 4X game that doesn't suck late game.

by **LordMortis** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 12:59 pm

KiloOhm wrote:
The Meal wrote:If anyone's looking for an excuse to not jump on board... the late game is still a slog (and that's with only 3 cities to keep track of). Leveling up heroes is a lot of fun and picking up new loot is exciting, but for this player it's tough to find the motivation to mount a full-scale assault on your oppositions cities. Maybe this'll change for me as things get more polished, but at the moment the late game feels more like work than fun.

I agree, but I'll also say that personally - I have yet to encounter a 4X game that doesn't suck late game.

I like some long in depth late game 4xing. I tend to play most games on humungous maps. What I hate about long in depth late game 4xing is micromanagement. By the time I get to the stage, I'm more in to the strategy and less in to the tactics, so having to look at ever towns production to maximize efficiency in tight rope ace every turn while balancing troop deployment around an entire globe while playing out every tiny skirmish is tedious, I love the grand direction and watching the overwhelming tensions, advancements, and empire building.

I can't speak for this one yet as I haven't even played the opening much less seen how the end game works. Maybe I'll try to get it set up next weekend if I can find time. I'm left encouraged by the beta reviews so far.

LordPolish · by **KiloOhm** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 2:57 pm

Not to derail the FE talk - but one 4X game that gets the end game right is Distant Worlds - you can automate almost everything (in fact you kind of have to it's so damned detailed). Early on you're micromanaging everything but towards the end of the game you're doing exactly what you're saying - focusing on the strategy and not every individual battle or planet. Give that game a look.

One caveat with it, you really need at least the first expansion as it has UI and control improvements that are essential, really I think both expansions are must have's because they add a lot to the base game but because it's a matrix title you won't get much of a discount so you're talking a $60+ to buy everything.

It completely slipped my mind until you mentioned the micromanagement aspect of late game stuff.

by **TheMix** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 6:34 pm

What about Master of Orion III? You didn't have to micromanage there...

:ninja:

</slinks off quickly>

by **The Meal** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 7:22 pm

KiloOhm wrote:I agree, but I'll also say that personally - I have yet to encounter a 4X game that doesn't suck late game.

Yeah, that's not me. This is the first time in ages I'm really not motivated to finish a 4X game. Maybe something has changed with me, but it really feels like the late game offers little in the way of incentive. Maybe that's just symptomatic of the UI which doesn't really appeal to me. Maybe it's only a partially finished beta which will have a more-fun backend upon release. But as of right now, I can imagine starting many games, but finishing few.

by **TheMix** » Thu Jan 26, 2012 8:09 pm

On a serious note... wasn't there something in one of the early Civs (probably 2) that would credit you with a win after a certain point? I remember those games getting so big that it would take 30+ minutes just to complete a turn. For most of them I'd just play long enough until I was sure I'd won and then quit.

That's what I'd want. I'd want credit for the win without having to slog it out to the bitter end (or at least the choice).

I like when they add the option for city managers. Or, in Civ 5, the option to not even bother fully taking over a city. If I want to go for global conquest, I like having the option of just setting up a puppet ruler and getting the cash. By that time I usually have enough of an army that I don't really need to engage the cities that I conquer.

by **Moat_Man** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 1:44 am

From the 0.76 beta patch released today: (wasn't someone complaining about this?)

Features:

+ Added Edge Scrolling (defaults to on, can be disabled in game options)

by **tgb** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 8:20 am

Moat_Man wrote:From the 0.76 beta patch released today: (wasn't someone complaining about this?)

Features:

+ Added Edge Scrolling (defaults to on, can be disabled in game options)

That was me, and that is indeed good news. Not having it was a minor annoyance, but an annoyance nonetheless.

by **Butterknife** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 11:02 am

I played for another 4 hours last night (for a total of about 8 hours now). I was able to finish a complete game. I used one of the pre-generated rulers, and was the leader of the wraiths and played primarily a magic hero. Or at least, that was the plan -- I had to change my plans up once I was actually in-game and couldn't find any shards.

I should have stopped playing about an hour before I did, but I knew that I could win in another hour or so and I stuck with it. End game has some nice stat screens, very Civ-like with the exception of no map showing conquering over time. It did however rank me in a list of rulers, and I got the worst one. I won the match by simply conquering my enemies -- one had apparently died very early in the game by some wandering monsters, and the other two weren't too hard to beat. One thing I did notice when I beat the AI, though -- it really hadn't put its cities in great places. Hopefully they improve that. Luckily, AI has always been this studio's strong point.

There are still many bugs. I cast a spell that was supposed to let my tactical battle spells cost half, but when I got into the next fight they had doubled. As my main hero was a caster, it was almost the death of me right there! Luckily I also built up an absolutely kick-butt fighting hero and he managed to save the day. Maul has got to be the most overpowered ability in the game -- at least against a lot of the slower monsters that can't dodge.

I'm still liking it. There are many things I would change -- summons aren't as cool as they were in War of Magic, research takes too long even with it set to fast, bugs galore (less crashing with the new patch, though), AI still needs some work (I watched it walk away from a city I had left unprotected during a war, only to return 4 turns later and take it), cities should display how far they are from max growth without having to dig for the information, I'm concerned that every game will devolve into the same thing (build an uber-stack and smash everything, Disciples style) and so on. But I think this will be a good game. Not great, not a must-have. But it is shaping up into a good game.

by **tgb** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 11:42 am

Butterknife -

What difficulty and size map were you playing?

by **ydejin** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 11:50 am

Butterknife wrote:I should have stopped playing about an hour before I did, but I knew that I could win in another hour or so and I stuck with it. End game has some nice stat screens, very Civ-like with the exception of no map showing conquering over time. It did however rank me in a list of rulers, and I got the worst one. I won the match by simply conquering my enemies -- one had apparently died very early in the game by some wandering monsters, and the other two weren't too hard to beat. One thing I did notice when I beat the AI, though -- it really hadn't put its cities in great places. Hopefully they improve that. Luckily, AI has always been this studio's strong point.

I think it's bugged. I've only ever ended up with the bottom ranking, even when I thought I did quite well. Of course it's also possible I just suck. But I did think I did a lot better in my second win.

Butterknife wrote:There are still many bugs. I cast a spell that was supposed to let my tactical battle spells cost half, but when I got into the next fight they had doubled. As my main hero was a caster, it was almost the death of me right there! Luckily I also built up an absolutely kick-butt fighting hero and he managed to save the day. Maul has got to be the most overpowered ability in the game -- at least against a lot of the slower monsters that can't dodge.

Hmm. Was that Mantle of the Oceans? That was definitely bugged in 0.75 and doubling the cost of spells, but it's supposed to be fixed in 0.76 and it does appear to be working correctly for me now.

by **Sepiche** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 12:01 pm

Seems like there's just a few bugs keeping the AI down at the moment. In my game the other night, based on their scores a couple of the AI nations really floundered and had nothing more than their main city and a few units, but one of them had 3 or 4 cities and a number of good sized armies and heroes. Not sure if it's just a matter of starting location or what, but the AI's seem to do okay in some circumstances which gives me hope.

by **Brad Wardell** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 12:21 pm

The end game slog is something that Derek has plans for. One nice thing is that since this is a magic-based game, there are lots of interesting things you can do to make the late game different.

There's probably going to be an update today -- 0.77 to fix the maul bug but I snuck in some AI stuff too.

by **$iljanus** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 12:33 pm

Brad Wardell wrote:The end game slog is something that Derek has plans for. One nice thing is that since this is a magic-based game, there are lots of interesting things you can do to make the late game different.

There's probably going to be an update today -- 0.77 to fix the maul bug but I snuck in some AI stuff too.

Bummer. Although the maul ability is overpowered it was sure handy to have around.

Nice work on the game. This is one case where I'm glad it crashed on me or else I would have been playing it into the wee hours of the morning.

by **tgb** » Fri Jan 27, 2012 3:39 pm

With these updates do you have to download a whole new build, or can you patch the one that was released initially?

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