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These are pretty cool. I always liked the air galleys, but I hadn't quite cottoned to their strategic usefulness (I didn't really play too much Age of Wonders back in the day.) I'd thought they were neat, but a bit weak in battle.
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Oct 28, 2014 15:23
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Air Galleys have always been a ridiculously strong unit. I remember the original game's campaign was building up to a showdown in the valley of wonders (where you had four factions + the humans all fighting for supremacy) except it fell flat on its face because King Joseph and his air galleys would just march in and kill every leader that wasn't fighting for him by turn 10. Triumph was smart to just get rid of them for AoW 3
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Oct 28, 2014 15:30
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Arrrthritis posted:Just go ahead and do a write up for every SM race at some point- you know you want to and it'll be helpful to the devs to see what about those races resonated with you. Seconding this. I have to say, I liked the line-up of the AoW2 dwarves better than the Shadow Magic dwarves. On the other hand, the SM racial structure for the dwarves was all kinds of overpowered (in single player).
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Oct 28, 2014 15:41
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madmac posted:
Tigrans were my favorite for multiplayer games. Your post is great, but you forgot one other huge advantage: Tigran cities had a bonus to gold production. So while you had small, stealthy squads of prowlers terrorizing the enemy and crippling his economy , your own cities were basically making GBS threads gold. I am a little surprised that Tigrans might be in the expansion, since I always felt that the Rogue class already used many of their gimmicks like concealment, wall climbing or mind control. But then again, I love that pharaonic theme and would love to see the synergies between a Tigran race and the rogue Class. 
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Oct 28, 2014 16:46
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How are you supposed to play arch druids? I just got off a warlord binge and these animals just don't seem nearly as effective as the upgraded soldiers I've been using.
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Oct 29, 2014 23:14
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It's a mistake to look at ArchDruids purely as a summoner/magic class. They have a strong, flexible, playstyle built around mobility, combined arms, and map control. Hunters are amazing. They're strong archers that can zip around any type of terrain, swim, and hide in forests and all for Tier 1 upkeep. Never stop building Hunters and sending them out to look for scouts to kill, neutrals to clear and enemy forces to ambush. Shamans are also very strong and just as mobile/sneaky. They make great muscle to back up Hunters and have the added benefit of being able to charm animals and add then to your forces. Entangle is a death sentence if it works and with the recent buff (It's 13 vs Def now) has a solid chance of hitting even Tier 3/4 units. The various Empire Upgrades buff all animal/monster, archer, and support class units. In tactical combat Druids are mostly about kiting with Cav-Speed ranged armies protected with melee summons and a lot of spells that enhance that playstyle. Savage Rage in particular is a ridiculous buff, I once put a Golem against a Raging Penguin and the Penguin won. All of the summon spells except Horned God are random, but almost anything you get will be good in some way. Several of the Tier 1 animals have swimming or forestry, and like half of them (All the Baby Spiders and Snakes) can be evolved into Tier 3 units. You have to be adaptable enough to work with whatever random-rear end animal you get but that's part of the fun. Eldritch animal will mostly give your more faster or flying type animals, or upgraded Boars/Wolves with elemental damage, with a chance of getting the Tier 3 Cockatrice, which is pretty much a land-bound Watcher and something you want to horde and keep using the rest of the game. Summon Gargantuan Animal is almost better then Summon Horned God. Almost all the Tier 3 animals are very good if used right. (Spiders are wall climbers and web is functionally the same as Entangle, The Tier 3 Snakes can Evolve to Tier 4) You have a 1 in 3 chance of getting a Tier 4 Reed or Shock Serpent and they're both ridiculously strong melee crushers, especially in combination with Savage Rage. Druid is one of the best classes for keeping the pressure on, you should never be sitting in your cities trying to tech up. All your best stuff are summons or low-tier units, what are you even building towards? A lot of the Strategic Spells are good. They have a Global Spell that boosts research, a city enchant that boosts growth, Poison Domain is nasty to deal with, and an empire upgrade that allows cities to spot concealed units. If Rogue is the best class in the game for stealth (and it is) I would put Druid as the best class in the game for scouting and finding concealed units. Druids also have some really nice tactical spells. Hornets is a better Chain Lightning for targets that aren't resistant to blight. Rust Strike just ruins machines. Savage Roar is so good. Wild Vines will just up and remove walls if it's not disjuncted. Ancestral Spirits lets you place an incorporeal Blocker right on top of their annoying ranged unit. Twisting Vines can be hilarious in combination with Wild Hunt. (Also Earthquake, if you went Earth Mastery) You don't want to go quite as summon-crazy with Druid as you can with Sorcerer, you want to have CP free to use on Tactical and Global spells when it counts. Overall, Druid is my favorite class to play and widely considered the most-balanced class in the game. You really have to try and work their various elements together instead of just hammering everything with one or two over-powered things. For Race, Elves, Draconians, Halflings, and Goblins are all good picks. Human is workable. Dwarf and Orc is bad because you need those good Hunters and they give you nothing in that respect. madmac fucked around with this message at 00:26 on Oct 30, 2014 |
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Oct 30, 2014 00:23
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You can easily clear out dungeons with mid to high level defenders using only hunters and twisting vines.
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Oct 30, 2014 00:37
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Fledgling Gulps posted:You can easily clear out dungeons with mid to high level defenders using only hunters and twisting vines. Elf Hunters are goddamn Gods of Ranged Combat.
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Oct 30, 2014 01:07
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Golden Realms: Good, bad? Worth the buy?
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Oct 30, 2014 01:17
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victrix posted:Golden Realms: Good, bad? Worth the buy? Totally worth it, imo.
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Oct 30, 2014 01:20
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madmac posted:Savage Rage in particular is a ridiculous buff, I once put a Golem against a Raging Penguin and the Penguin won. Oh. Thanks for this. It makes a lot more sense now. MadHat posted:Elf Hunters are goddamn Gods of Ranged Combat. See this is the issue I was having. I've been playing elf warlords, and those mounted archers are just too much. After you throw in some empire upgrades they have twice the HP of a hunter, more mobility, martial arts, reduced costs, etc.. It's hard to look at the hunter the same way.
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Oct 30, 2014 01:23
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Fitzy Fitz posted:Oh. Thanks for this. It makes a lot more sense now. Right, Mounted Archers are bonkers good now, but the difference is Hunters are good right out the gate, cost literally peanuts, and still have better Strategic Mobility. You can send Longstrider Hunters anywhere, they're practically Flyers. Also Druid has any number of spells and abilities to just sit back and laugh at anyone trying to close with your Archers, which isn't something the Warlord can pull off nearly as well. Oh, and Hunters get Martial Arts at gold anyway, it's pretty nice. Being able to mass a bunch of 36-40 Move supports with any damage type you need doesn't hurt either. Druid Shock Sisters and Elders are so so good.
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Oct 30, 2014 01:37
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victrix posted:Golden Realms: Good, bad? Worth the buy? What Lobsterpillar said. It's actually a lot of content for the price when you consider there's a pretty nice campaign mixed in. Halfings themselves are interesting, but I really like the improvements it does to the map generation and city upgrades more, personally. The hobbits are just nice for adding a bit more variety.
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Oct 30, 2014 01:45
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victrix posted:Golden Realms: Good, bad? Worth the buy? Very good. The new race and campaign are nice, but the real draw is just all the random structures/spells/creatures/mechanics they added, IMO. It's a whole bunch of small to medium content additions that adds up to make the game feel a lot fresher.
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Oct 30, 2014 02:00
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madmac posted:Very good. The new race and campaign are nice, but the real draw is just all the random structures/spells/creatures/mechanics they added, IMO. It's a whole bunch of small to medium content additions that adds up to make the game feel a lot fresher. It certainly refreshes a lot of the existing mechanics, I like the new loot and empire quests the most. Roided druid phoenixes are total wrecking balls. 
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Oct 30, 2014 02:28
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Do any of the other races have an equivalent perk to Longbows in terms of standing head and shoulders above any other analogous unit? As a general question, I'm having a hard time managing race/class interactions. Even if you start out going for an obvious combo like Elven Archdruid for bonkers Hunters, you're going to end up with a hodgepodge of random races in your empire unless you decide to go full  and migrate everything to maintain racial purity. Chances are that whatever random cities you acquire aren't really going to mesh with your gimmick or they're going to have the wrong kind of terrain preferences for what you're trying to do or something. I get a little overwhelmed trying to deal with so many different possible combinations, especially when I have several full rosters of units to pick from.
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Oct 30, 2014 05:42
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Voyager I posted:As a general question, I'm having a hard time managing race/class interactions. Even if you start out going for an obvious combo like Elven Archdruid for bonkers Hunters, you're going to end up with a hodgepodge of random races in your empire unless you decide to go full I usually play on small or medium maps and find that really makes a lot of problems go away that can show up in long games. Late game top tier spam, game turning into a bit of a slog, AI covering every inch of the map with terribly placed cities - all of these stop being an issue with smaller games. It also helps ease some of the difficulties with multiplayer. Generally though I just leave a city as whatever race it was if it is in favorable terrain. Even if it won't be producing your ideal unit it is going to have something worth building, and worse case scenario you can set it to just focus on economy. Mana and money are always useful. You likely won't have the income to be spamming your ideal units unless you have cities devoted to economy anyway, and having the chance for variety can be a lifesaver if you find your ideal unit lineup beaten by another player's strategy. Racial priests especially can bring different elemental attacks to the table that you might not otherwise have available. Fire is used by two racial priests and not available to your elf druid, for instance. If you are playing a longer game and have the time to build up a city of another race it offers opportunities beyond racial priests for unit variety. If your opponents are expecting you to be running one strategy and instead you pull up with a completely different army composition it can really throw off their plan to counter you. If they are expecting you to spam elf druid archers and got lots of cav/flyers/projectile resistant troops and you show up with a squad of orc facepunchy troops you are really going to ruin their day. Of course this matters a lot less against the AI since it isn't smart enough to participate in that level of strategic depth, it just tries to beat you with a hefty wallet.
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Oct 30, 2014 08:50
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quote:Do any of the other races have an equivalent perk to Longbows in terms of standing head and shoulders above any other analogous unit? Every race has a gimmick with class units, and a lot of them are quite strong. Orcs get Tireless on Warbreed, Crusaders, and Assassins. On the first two especially it's an incredible perk. Dwarves get Projectile Resistance (+2 def vs ranged) on Engineers, Assassins, and Berserkers. Combined with the Dwarf +1 Def/Res bonus you get Assassins with 14 Def against archers. That's kinda good. Draconians get Fire Bolts on Evangelists and Shamans, and Fire Bomb on Apprentices. These are the best versions of any of these units as a result. Humans get Throw Net on Engineers, Scoundrels, and Hunters, and Swimming on Assassins. Goblins get +4 Ranged Blight Damage on Martyrs, Scoundrels, Hunters, and Monster Hunters. It's a huge DPS buff on a lot of units. Halflings get Minor Bard Skills on Shamans, Apprentices, Evangelists, plus Slingshot replacing Throw Stones on Martyrs and Exalted getting +10 HP. And of course all Halfling Class units have Lucky, which is where Minor Bard Skills comes in.
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Oct 30, 2014 09:22
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So as I haven't played awhile, did they address the AI and/or the spell and disenchant system? When I last played, the strategic AI was really passive, and the spell/mana/ai/disenchant balance was all kinds of goofy. The AI issue was the biggest one, it made random maps really boring (outside the fun of building up heroes and bashing monsters of course).
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Oct 30, 2014 11:28
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The AI is noticeably more aggressive then it used to be, though not perfect. It will usually get extremely aggressive if you go for a Seals Victory, so that's a thing to try. The whole disenchantment system was overhauled, the net result being that it's more difficult to disjunct things now and the AI isn't quite as gung-ho about dispelling everything you have up.
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Oct 30, 2014 11:57
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victrix posted:So as I haven't played awhile, did they address the AI and/or the spell and disenchant system? The game still has some kinks with the AI, but overall it has vastly improved since vanilla. Global spells are a lot more viable now, with the AI being a lot less disjunct happy. I'd give the game another shot- they've done a lot to improve the overall experience. (and yes Seals victory will give you a really fun, defensive experience.)
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Oct 30, 2014 16:35
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The AI actually attacked me in my current game when I moved my armies a little too far from my throne city. He captured it, we had a pretty big showdown in which I killed his wizard, and then I managed to take his poorly defended throne while his wizard was still dead because he had outstretched himself going after me. It was exactly the way I would want risky AI behavior to play out. He gambled on a big prize instead of just sitting on his cities until his armies were bigger than mine. It really helps to play smaller maps with seal victory on. I've got my medium map crammed with 8 players with small starting cities.
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Oct 31, 2014 02:12
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Halloween Dev Journal up! http://ageofwonders.com/halloween-journal-necromancer-skills/ Ah yes, exploding corpses gif is much appreciated. Some very interesting spells. Oh, and as it was mentioned on the official forums it seems the Necro Tier 4 will in fact be the Reaper and they're looking at giving it an "Invoke Death" active instant death ability with a fairly low success chance. (Strenth 10 vs Resist or thereabouts.)
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Oct 31, 2014 17:22
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Continue to enjoy the direction the Necro is taking. It really feels like you're the evil mastermind here, hanging back and immediately knowing what happens in your domain until you pour across the land burning everything in your path.
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Oct 31, 2014 17:32
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Interesting skills, although none of them actually look good. I guess corpse explosion could be decent if you get a ton of cast points and also luck into an elemental spec nuke, and aren't fighting a goblin or dread. AoE centered on a corpse is likely going to incur friendly fire, which is a huge liability when your armies don't heal. As with other revealed skills it would be a lot more useful if the necro had a way to create a corpse on demand at the start of a fight. Whispers of the fallen looks like it would be useful if it expanded based on the domain growth of your city, otherwise it looks really difficult to balance. It would only give useful intel early, when mana income is at a premium and people are punching neutrals, and other players aren't likely to have armies punching neutrals next to your city. They'll just kill you if they are rushing you, they won't stop to take attrition for minimal rewards. Also, the necromancer already has a 100% chance to get a scout unit in it's main lineup. The idea is cool, but having to research and cast and maintain this seems REALLY terrible unless it gives a ton of intel for cost compared to just keeping a scout or three around with the same mana, which also let you see everything and pick up treasure and even kill enemy scouts, meet neutrals, etc. You are always going to get those scouts and you will always need to use them whether you get whispers or not, so it seems really underwhelming as-is. I really hope the dev team hears some of the comments on the official forum (I don't say this often) regarding the reaper. A low chance to auto kill a unit is a pretty terrible way to use a turn on a top tier unit when battles only last a few turns. Balancing it would be a nightmare and the ability wouldn't be fun to use or have used against you. Using it you have a really inefficient and likely to fail ability that isn't even worth using unless you target something that is going to have the highest chance to resist (powerful units) since even a mediocre combat tier 4 will kill lower tier units in one attack. On top of that almost all the existing classes in the game are outright immune to it or heavily resist it as a spirit based attack by the time tier 4s hit the table. Dreads have machines (immune) Theo, Sorc, and Druid have spirit resist army passives, and warlords have strong will (spirit immunity) to their entire army. Having it used against you wouldn't be fun either as it is absolutely going to work when it targets your most important/expensive unit in a pivotal battle. There have been a bunch of good ideas tossed around in the thread though, from having the resisted effect be something more nasty than the usual minor movement penalty to outright changing the ability to be irresistable but reduce max hp and/or resistances by an amount instead of auto-killing a unit. Someone mentioned keeping it as-is but making it an on-hit effect similar to the glutton's devour so using it wouldn't mean throwing away the turn of your most powerful unit on an ability with a slim chance of working, and it would still scale in chance based on the power of the target (it could use the exact same glutton code and just not give health back). People have compared it to eldritch horror's dominate, which has all the same problems except stealing a unit is inherently more powerful than killing it, so there is more reward for your risk, AND if you are on the receiving end you can dispel the charm or kill the horror to fix the problem, so players on both sides have a lot less to complain about.
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Oct 31, 2014 18:27
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An ability like that will also encourage Tier 4 spam as it gets stronger the more units are using it.
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Oct 31, 2014 18:35
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Carnalfex posted:Interesting skills, although none of them actually look good. It's all in the details, which is why I don't sweat these things much early. It will go through a beta phase at the very least. Undead are already immune to blight, which cuts friendly fire on Corpse Explosion in half, and I expect the explosion will be quite powerful given it's limitations. Likewise Dark Ritual should be quite handy, it's like Raise Militia with actual good units and I personally get a lot of use out of Raise Militia. Whispers of the Fallen really depends on range, as long as the range is large enough it could be a very effective method of scouting. You have to figure the psychological effect of making players reluctant to fight battles that give too much away, especially as the spell also grants vision in a small radius around the fight location. Plague is quite interesting, I like the two-for of restricting rival growth while boosting your own.
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Oct 31, 2014 22:29
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In the King's Bounty remake, skeletons can scatter bones around the battlefield and use them to teleport. I think necros from KB could even raise more skeletons from the piles. I was thinking if there was a necro skill that litters the field with dead bodies (Mongol style  ) for dastardly necro purposes, you could allow spells/abilities to do with corpse exploitation to see use outside of multi-stack battles. It could even be the necro's instant spell, lobbing dead bodies at an army to demoralize it and do minor damage.Whispers of the fallen is a neat concept but fairly situational as it will compete with traditional scouting and the utility from having scouts steal buffs or unguarded treasure. If it's cheap to upkeep, then there's no reason not to have it activated all the time like some of the rogue strategic spells and it's just an opportunity cost to choose it over other class spells. Plague could be decent but impairing growth won't be as detrimental as tanking city+garrison morale or directly affecting city output. Population does not translate directly to output like other 4X games.
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Nov 1, 2014 03:17
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Are there any recent high quality YouTube videos that cover game mechanics in detail? Combat, morale, city development, hero picks, etc.
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Nov 3, 2014 01:28
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victrix posted:Are there any recent high quality YouTube videos that cover game mechanics in detail? Combat, morale, city development, hero picks, etc. I have done extensive research on this topic and come to the conclusion that youtube videos of this game exist to make fun of people being incredibly bad at video games. Your best bet is probably Das's channel, he's a slow and patient player who takes the time to explain everything. https://www.youtube.com/user/Das24680 Though on the other hand, a lot of his strategies are highly questionable in their effectiveness... Now that you mention it I think Hero skill picks might be the most consistently infuriating thing about Youtube AoW 3. I may have to put together my own quick guide on why Holy Crap Theocrat Heroes Are Not Bad Are You Insane? and Stop Building Your Rogue Heroes around the Stupid Blowpipe, Seriously.
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Nov 3, 2014 03:59
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madmac posted:I have done extensive research on this topic and come to the conclusion that youtube videos of this game exist to make fun of people being incredibly bad at video games. Yeah rogue heroes are made for melee, not ranged combat. Sorceror heroes, now there is a ranged hero if I ever saw one. What isn't there to like about theocrat heroes? Healing, touch of faith, convert, divine justicars...
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Nov 3, 2014 04:26
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Yeah with the new unit leveling system Theocrat heroes are pretty much a guaranteed stack of Champion I -> X, depending on how long the game goes on, plus you can get away with reckless strategies and not have to worry about losing your dragons. Resurgence is really good, guys.
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Nov 3, 2014 06:37
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In a game that is 'quality over quantity', being able to preserve your troops even when your own stupidity makes you lose troops is the biggest godsend you can have. Hell, Shadow Magic doesn't get that option(At least early), and Lord knows I'd like to have that.
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Nov 3, 2014 07:21
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Edit: Wrong thread, dummy!
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Nov 3, 2014 07:31
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Bloodly posted:In a game that is 'quality over quantity', being able to preserve your troops even when your own stupidity makes you lose troops is the biggest godsend you can have. Hell, Shadow Magic doesn't get that option(At least early), and Lord knows I'd like to have that. Being able to preserve units means you don't need to waste precious time replacing them.
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Nov 3, 2014 07:41
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Still bugs me that city queues are 5 and armies are 6  Any good tech tree images for city/race/class buildup?
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Nov 3, 2014 14:07
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City Tech Tree is pretty simple, everything is just a series of chains with one or two exceptions. Barracks Chain: Barracks, War Hall, Tier 3 Building, each main building unlocks a new tier of racial units and the associated training buildings. Temple Chain: Shrine, Temple, Great Temple. Each new building increases mana production and the Temple unlocks Tier 2 support units. Research Chain: Lab, Observatory, both boost research. Lab also gives Tier 2 supports a medal and Observatory increases domain by one step. Production Chain: Builders Hall, Siege Workshop, Masters Guild. Each building increases production and unlocks a few units and upgrades. Builders Hall allows settlers and rams, Siege Workshop allows builders, Trebuchets, Racial Defense Buildings, and Stone Walls. (IIRC) Masters Guild also repairs machine units inside the city. Happiness Chain: Storehouse, Public Baths, Hospital. Increases City Happiness and Population, Hospital heals injured units. Walls: Wooden Walls, Stone Walls. Self explanatory, but Stone Walls also increase city domain. Class Chain: Each tier of class building allows more units and provides some other minor benefit, varies widely with class. Finally, the Grand Palace (+10 CP) requires you to max the Temple, Production, Research, and Happiness Chains before it can be built.
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Nov 3, 2014 15:08
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madmac posted:Now that you mention it I think hero skill picks might be the most consistently infuriating thing about Youtube AoW 3. I may have to put together my own quick guide on why Holy Crap Theocrat Heroes Are Not Bad Are You Insane? and Stop Building Your Rogue Heroes around the Stupid Blowpipe, Seriously. Please do this thing. I have some pretty huge choice anxiety trying to figure out how to build my heros in this game. How often is it worth it to get the +Stat purchases given how their price scales? Also, Greblyn, is there any chance you guys could add a little more oomph to the visual and audio effects of a hero firing a musket? It's a bit incongruous at the moment when he lets off a little 'pop' and then a whole units of dudes falls over dead. Voyager I fucked around with this message at 19:02 on Nov 3, 2014 |
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Nov 3, 2014 18:57
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Honestly Voyager you just pretty much need to decide on what kind of hero you want it to be and build accordingly. If you need a big strong fighty hero build that with +stats and class-specific buffs (warrior and rogue do this well) if you need +army buffs then you can use a theocrat or druid for this, if you need more magic build a sorcerer like that. The only real important thing is to build your main hero with enough resists that they can't be sniped out by enemy spells when you deploy them in an army.
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Nov 3, 2014 19:01
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Voyager I posted:Please do this thing. I have some pretty huge choice anxiety trying to figure out how to build my heros in this game. Depends on the hero and the abilities they have available. Sorcerers/Theocrats/Druids I invest much more in the army skills/spells/ranged, Warlords/Rogues/Dreadnoughts I typically build for melee & army skills (with a bit more ranged focus on the dreads b/c holy poo poo i love rifles) Generally stats are a good investment until you hit 3 points per bonus, then at that point ymmv. Although I do like to make my sorcerers a little more glass-cannony because holy poo poo Chaos Rift.
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Nov 3, 2014 19:10
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