Warlock - Master of the Arcane

[ColdSteel]

They've always all reverted to neutral for me as well.

Me too. Either a very rare bug or an AI captured the city on the same turn it turned neutral.

[silvaril]

Heya

My own experiences thus far have the enemy cities going Neutral after taking the Capital.

What difficulty setting are you playing on?


I find that Neutral cities make excellent buffer states
At least until I clean them up...

[$iljanus]

Heh, I seem to have had a clueless moment. I thought the cities had reverted to my AI ally but y'all were right and they are actually neutral. The thing that worries me now is that I think other than a caravel or two I haven't seen any of my so-called ally's empire. There is a large amt of my map that's unexplored so I think I need to do some flyovers with my fleet of bats. And as Silvaril said, neutral cities do make good buffers...until they become my buffet. Right now I have an uneasy peace with another empire so I've been sending raiding parties to the neutral cities along their border and running back through their territory, instigating some conflict between that empire and the neutral AI while I watch...and wait.

Went through a portal for the first time and my scouting unit just got mugged on the other side. It was surrounded by a horde of earth elementals, imps, wolves and a vampire all seeming to just be waiting for some unlucky sucker to step off the portal. "Hey boyo, I think you stepped off the wrong portal. Nice fur you have there, wolfie....". My next unit I'll send over will be buffed up with all sorts of resistances.

Playing on normal difficulty and actually still on my first game. One of my better gaming purchases!

[ColdSteel]

I haven't seen these posted here sooo..

Download the Warlock Base Tech Trees (right click and 'save target as')
And here's a very nice Resource Guide

[ColdSteel]

A new patch is up on Steam (.27). I have no idea what it does.

[ColdSteel]

Found these notes for the new .27 mystery patch on the Paradox forums:

- Fixed the bug with enchantments staying on an enemy Great Mage upon his/her defeat.
- Dragon Farm now has the correct model.
- The attack of capital cities was improved - damage was increased, attack now have elemental magic damage, and becomes aoe from certain level of a city.
- The attack strength of defence towers was improved.
- The resistances of several units were slightly decreased.
- Appeared the option to switch off the intro movies.

It seems to have mostly made the Capital defenses tougher than before.

EDIT: Seems there's one more: Flying units garrisoned in cities can now be engaged in melee.

[silvaril]

Heya

Some good changes


When scouting portals, I recommend Invisible flying units

Actually, Invisible flying units are great for scouting period

[dbemont]

I get the impression that the game gives you a better run for your money after this patch.

It's not that the AI is good, if you look at particular moves that seem illogical. But enemy mages, independent cities, and individual monsters are all doing things to make life much more exciting. In my current game, I am finding it no longer does to park your units just one tile out of sight of major monsters. Often, you get attacked, as you should. (The human moves ahead a square or two and then back, scouting out the horizon. The AI should too.) Areas with especially valuable resources are not just guarded by major monsters; even after clearing out room for a city, another wave of dangerous monsters arrives. And enemy mages seem to be casting more effective offensive spells.

I have played several highly entertaining games in a row, now, and the current one is the best of all. Really, really liking this game.

[Freezer-TPF-]

I may cave and buy this tomorrow morning. I'm finally getting a little more gaming time and am getting a little bored with Grimrock.

[ColdSteel]

I may cave and buy this tomorrow morning. I'm finally getting a little more gaming time and am getting a little bored with Grimrock.

This is my current GOTY for 2012. Now, I'm certain that may change after Torchlight 2, Guild Wars 2, Borderlands 2, and some others all come out later this year but for right now, it's not even close. This is a very entertaining game if you like the genre at all and a steal at $20 in my opinion. The best thing about it is that it actually is random enough that it stays entertaining game after game. It has some good staying power.

[Mr. Fed]

Playing on challenging. Having a blast. This is the closest since Master of Magic to giving me that Master of Magic feel -- turn-based one-more-turn fantasy bliss. Solid A.

Question: Any way to see how you are doing compared to other mages? Graphs, scores, etc?

[tgb]

Question: Any way to see how you are doing compared to other mages? Graphs, scores, etc?

Unfortunately, no. When you check your relations with other mages, you get -15 for being in the lead, but other than that, no.

[Jaymon]

Found something, I conquered a neutral city that was just exactly in the wrong spot. Razed the city, and it turned into a settler, which I though was an excellent touch.

[silvaril]

Heya

Found something, I conquered a neutral city that was just exactly in the wrong spot. Razed the city, and it turned into a settler, which I though was an excellent touch.

Yup. Generally, if a City is large enough to be able to produce Settlers, razing it will produce one by default.

I find them quite handy for exploring Coastlines et al, if I feel they are the wrong race for what I want to do next, or if I have a surplus of that race.
( have Harbour, have Settlers be transport ships, and maybe even land a new City eventually.... or not )

Pushing them off as a transport ships also gives them a range attack, which can come in handier than having them as ground troops...

[Freezer-TPF-]

I finally got a chance to play this last night for about 45 minutes. Looks very, very promising. I've looked through the Beginner's Guide and glanced at the city building trees.

Does anyone have any good starting out tips--what resources/buildings/units to prioritize in the early game, should I pump out settlers as fast as possible, is it feasible to rush nearby enemy/neutral cities, etc?

[Sepiche]

I finally got a chance to play this last night for about 45 minutes. Looks very, very promising. I've looked through the Beginner's Guide and glanced at the city building trees.

Does anyone have any good starting out tips--what resources/buildings/units to prioritize in the early game, should I pump out settlers as fast as possible, is it feasible to rush nearby enemy/neutral cities, etc?

Yeah I usually keep up a fairly steady stream of settlers, but only as I use my troops to explore and secure new areas to settle. I think it's also pretty important to get the ability to build some sort of advanced unit as soon as possible. That will at least ensure you have a chance of fending off most early threats.

Level 1 neutral cities aren't too tough and you can generally take them with 2 or 3 basic units. Level 5 will take more of an effort and I usually hold off on attacking them until I've built up a little.

It's also probably good to get at least one harbor fairly early on so you have the option of putting your units on transports should the need arise.

[Freezer-TPF-]

I finally got a chance to play this last night for about 45 minutes. Looks very, very promising. I've looked through the Beginner's Guide and glanced at the city building trees.

Does anyone have any good starting out tips--what resources/buildings/units to prioritize in the early game, should I pump out settlers as fast as possible, is it feasible to rush nearby enemy/neutral cities, etc?

Yeah I usually keep up a fairly steady stream of settlers, but only as I use my troops to explore and secure new areas to settle. I think it's also pretty important to get the ability to build some sort of advanced unit as soon as possible. That will at least ensure you have a chance of fending off most early threats.

Level 1 neutral cities aren't too tough and you can generally take them with 2 or 3 basic units. Level 5 will take more of an effort and I usually hold off on attacking them until I've built up a little.

It's also probably good to get at least one harbor fairly early on so you have the option of putting your units on transports should the need arise.

What is the best early route for gaining access to advanced units--building on special resources (iron, other special nodes)?

This game really needs an ingame Arcane-opedia.

[Sepiche]

What is the best early route for gaining access to advanced units--building on special resources (iron, other special nodes)?

This game really needs an ingame Arcane-opedia.

It varies by race, but one advanced unit I always look for if I can is the Donkey Knights. You can build them off the donkey resource, and they are a good, well armored advanced unit. For the racial ones I'd just look at the building tree and see which ones you can get to easy. For beasts the trolls are quite strong and for the undead vampires are excellent ranged units. I haven't played the humans enough yet to know their good units though.

[Zurai]

Stubborn Knights are probably the best all-around unit in the game for their price. They're fairly cheap, fairly easy to get, and very tough with a lot of hit points and good damage.

[$iljanus]

Stubborn Knights are probably the best all-around unit in the game for their price. They're fairly cheap, fairly easy to get, and very tough with a lot of hit points and good damage.

I gave my Stubborn Knights the power of levitation, turning them into Flying Asses. I would laugh if I saw a group of flying donkey's coming my way but with a bunch of perks and magic buffs they were able to take on dragons.

Other units I like are my fire elementals. Very tough after some buffs/perks.

[TheMix]

I gave my Stubborn Knights the power of levitation, turning them into Flying Asses. I would laugh if I saw a group of flying donkey's coming my way but with a bunch of perks and magic buffs they were able to take on dragons.

Heh. That reminds me of Master of Magic. One of my tactics was to go with Life magic and humans. I'd make the knights and then throw invulnerability on them. They were virtually unstoppable. If I had enough points in Air magic, I'd toss flying on them. Once I had a stack of them going, it was basically game over.

[silvaril]

Heya

I must be alone is disliking the Knights then
I generally prefer to turn their stabling areas into +10 Gold money makers... ( plus percentages for extra boost )

I personally prefer Minotaurs and Dwarves for melee units, with the eggshell armoured, sledgehammer toting Elves for missile support...
Minotaurs have Frenzy and level up to get the sweep attack, while Dwarves seem amazingly tough and are good for cracking cities et al.

I have swept through various maps with Minotaurs alone, with Elves alone, or with some combination of Melee and Missile.


I do like Vampires, though mostly because of the Vampiric health regen they do.
One of the reasons I also like the Vampiric weapon buff.


One thing you should look at in more advanced games is which God(s) if any you want to support.
The starting units you get are able to upgrade into Elite God Units depending on your choices.
Human Rogues can become Assassins for instance, Goblin Archers turn into Chosen of Grum-Gog.

This way you can take your starting units, get them highly experienced throughout the game, then turn them into slaughterhouses

Alternatively, having built a Temple, you can just recruit that specific unit directly, which is also useful


I find that the Neutral cities are spaced reasonably around most maps, such that I don't need to throw many settlers out in the early game.
I tend to backfill with Settlers, taking Neutrals for myself.
While the -20% penalty from differing Races precludes the other Races from being as useful as your own starting Race, the benefits gained from Resources vary by Race, so it pays to have some of the others around...
( similarly, which Races can build which Temples also varies, so if you want to mix Adepts of Lunord with Paladins of Life... )


When I first started playing, I tended to turn my Capital into a Money and Food/Mana hub.
The last few games, I've spent getting the Capital to the point where it can support differing troop types instead, usually going with the Physical Troop types when playing Monster or Human, Magical when playing Undead.

Typically in each City you have to choose between Money, Mana, Food, Physical Troops and/or Magical Troops.
A City can typically produce 2 of that list to the highest level, with a little bit of scope for additional items so as to take advantage of resources.

Most of my cities focus on producing Gold and food ( Food or Mana ).
This gives me an underlying economy of support for those few Cities where I pump out Troops.

[silvaril]

Heya

Another update coming down today:

Patchnotes v.1.1.4.28

- Changed Domination victory conditions - now it is enough to control >50% of Holy Grounds in all worlds combined (it was needed to control all of them before)
- fixed crash with click on news about new building in destroyed city
- fixed no upkeep bug with units in transport stance
- fixed exploit with clicking on debuffs
- fixed difficulty settings bug
- fixed experience gained by Powerful Lords

[Jaymon]

Yeah, I also have found that specializing some of the cities is really helping the economy. Check the resources, like pis or a gold mine, then build out specifically to take advantage. I even rename the city, so I can easily remember later on. I think I have about 6 cities called Mana, three or four called Food, and several called Money.
The other places that have unit resources like dwarves, iron, or minotaurs, I build those up as unit producers.

I have found it hard to specialize a city for research, anybody got tips on that?

[Fretmute]

I can't stop building trolls. Add in the right god spell, and they regenerate nearly 40 HP per turn. A few of them in a pack is next to unstoppable.

[silvaril]

Heya

I can't stop building trolls. Add in the right god spell, and they regenerate nearly 40 HP per turn. A few of them in a pack is next to unstoppable.

Yeah, I deliberately restrict myself from tactics that worked easily the last couple of times I tried them.

For instance, this game I've not used any of the resources for recruiting Troops.
Instead I built up the Troop buff City buildings.

Playing as Undead, I had a blast with Vampires and Veteran Skeleton Warriors, but managed to get enough of an economy together for Dracolichs' and haven't looked back since

I have found it hard to specialize a city for research, anybody got tips on that?

My best research cities are resource dependent.
Demonology Workshops on Infernal Rifts, Excavations on Ruins and the like.
Both cost Money et al, so having a city able to absorb the cost of them is good.

Otherwise, check out the Magic Troop building requirements.
Things like the Vampire Mansions produce some research, as does the Library in Human cities from what I recall.

[ColdSteel]

Patchnotes v.1.1.4.28
- fixed difficulty settings bug

Apparently the problem was that if you saved a game and then reloaded it, the difficulty level was reset back to normal. So everyone that was thinking those large, challenging or impossible maps were too easy, might want to try it again after the patch.

Silvaril, what allows you to build elven archers? I got some as a reward once and they kick butt. I especially like the heal and move perk they have.

[$iljanus]

Patchnotes v.1.1.4.28
- fixed difficulty settings bug

Apparently the problem was that if you saved a game and then reloaded it, the difficulty level was reset back to normal. So everyone that was thinking those large, challenging or impossible maps were too easy, might want to try it again after the patch.

Silvaril, what allows you to build elven archers? I got some as a reward once and they kick butt. I especially like the heal and move perk they have.

There's a resource where you can build an elven village which allows you to build the archers. One of the stranger things you can unlock afterwards is the elven casino.

[Sepiche]

Another trick is specializing your neutral cities by what they are best at... undead cities produce more mana, beast cities make food, and human cities gold. There's no set bonus, but just different buildings you can make that are unavailable to others that give you a big boost.

[Jaymon]

Turn 170, went into the magic portal. Egads!. Sent in a few tough troops, black minotaurs, dracolich, dwarven overseers, all high level and buffed up from the Warlock killing campaign they just finished.

After sending them through, there were 40 something tiles revealed. I counted 35 monsters including 11 dragons. Seriously there wasn't even any place to walk to. I left because I was tired of waiting the minute it required for the turn to do the x-com shuffle with all the monsters. I have heard there are good resources in the alternate worlds, but if the entire place is packed wall to wall like that, it seems like too much of a slog.

Anybody have good experiences with the alternate worlds?

[Zurai]

Turn 170 is a bit late to be going into a virgin portal. A decent level, buffed (preferably with Vampiric Weapons and a good amount of elemental resist) Stubborn Knight can clear out everything in a portal by itself, mostly through counter-kills. You'll have to give it Levitation if you want to attack Dragons, but nuke spells once they've almost killed themselves attacking will work too.

[Jaymon]

Well its a large world, and this was only a few turns after I first encountered the portal.
I didn't have any trouble with my troops being killed, it was just the impending slog and the time spent waiting for the turn to pass that that made me cranky about the visit.

[silvaril]

Heya

Silvaril, what allows you to build elven archers? I got some as a reward once and they kick butt. I especially like the heal and move perk they have.

There's a resource where you can build an elven village which allows you to build the archers. One of the stranger things you can unlock afterwards is the elven casino.

Yep, there are Elven Villages dotted about the landscape in the same way there are Dwarven Villages and Minotaur Caves.

The Minotaur Caves will let you build either a Palace for recruiting Minotaurs, and subsequent Corrida Pen for upleveling the Troops, or a Labyrinth which gives you a Perk that adds +30% Melee for Creatures and Melee Troops at a cost of 100GP each.

The Elven Village lets you build either an Elven Casino, for +50% Gold production in that City, or an Elven Bungalow to recruit Elven Archers, with a subsequent Elven Shooting Grounds to upgrade them to Elven Sharpshooters who, at a Base of 18 Missile + 18 Elemental are one of the better ranged units in the game...

[Freezer-TPF-]

How do I get my cities to grow population and gain territory faster? Do I just need to get them to produce more food (build farms, etc) or is there another factor?

[tgb]

How do I get my cities to grow population and gain territory faster? Do I just need to get them to produce more food (build farms, etc) or is there another factor?

You can't, other than with a spell (I forget the name).

[Stuie]

New DLC is available on Gamersgate for pre-order. Release is May 29th.

Power of the Serpent

For $3 I'm ok with this (also helps that I have just enough blue coins to cover it ).

Play as the all new Great Mage, Malixalxochi, Wizard Queen of a powerful race of reptilian warriors known as the Koatl. Renowned for her cruelty and ferocity, she is a formidable foe to anyone in Ardania who dares oppose her.

The new Mage brings two new perks to the battlefield: Lord of Koatls and Koatl Training. As Lord of her race she can hire fierce reptile Spears, Hunters, Warlocks and of course the powerful Giant Turtle. Then instruct any of your units with Koatl training for increased protection from ranged an Melee attacks.

Crush your enemies with the Power of the Serpent!

Features

The Great Mage Malinalxochi, the Queen of Serpents.
New perks for Great Mages:
Koatl Training – Increased protection from melee and ranged attacks for all of your Great Mage's units.
Lord of Koatls – Ensures the appearance of a Koatl village near the capitol of a Great Mage.
The Koatl village is a local resource that allows for the construction of buildings that enable the player to hire Koatl Hunters, Koatl Spears, Koatl Warlocks, and a powerful Giant Turtle.

[tgb]

......, and a powerful Giant Turtle.

Really? I'm all over that like stink on a monkey.

[JonathanStrange]

No one said aught of turtles!

I think I'll choose to see the DLC as food of the gods.

And buy into this gimmicky promotion.

[Exodor]

$3?

I just spent more than that on lunch at Taco Bell.


I was wondering how they'd price the DLC with the full game only $20.

[Mr. Fed]

Another very dumb question.

Where does it show the maximum mana/turn you can cast? It's not the same as your mana income/turn, is it? How do you improve this number (other than the perk)?