I am really enjoying Elemental. However I feel it needs some more work. It just feels like I have to make too many concessions each game and am not really challenged. Also, the simplicity of the tactical battles was a HUGE dispointment and really kills my desire to start a fresh game... I like indie devs, and support this game as well as Darkfall, just so we can have more variety and push the quality of AAA games. I feel like their hands were tied as far as release date and its either support them or see 5 major studios release all of our content.
Anyways, I keep hearing people mention other RTS games like dominion and MoM etc. I would be interested in trying a new game while I wait for Elemental to get polished. One game that seems similar is HOMM5. I REALLY liked the tactical combat, but the overmap and strategy elements fell flat. Can anyone recommend any other games to try, hopefully one that is still rather recent (past 5 years Id say).
Thanks for any suggestions!
Oh, also has anyone heard the extent of mods? Could we put something as complex as HOMM tactical battles into Elemtental? How about have dungeons actually load up dungeons that are REALLY long tactical battle maps...
Yeah Dominions 3 takes some time to understand but it's part of the pleasure
The forum is still active and that's a good point too.And it has a HUGE universe, plus you have 3 eras early,medium and late, and each faction has different units and strategy in each of them ... A very deep game but you need to spend a good amount of time on it.
Can I learn the ropes myself by playing singleplayer? I belong to a forum that has a huge huge thread on dominions so I can always find a multiplayer game. I just don't want to embarass myself.
Also the Age of Wonders collection is coming out on Steam this week. So there's that.
You can definately learn it on your own, the manual is pretty good. Especially the mod manual, you can use it almost as an abilities guide on it's own.
All of the above are good fantasy games. Which you would most prefer depends on individual taste.
I personally think Kohan (ideally Ahriman's Gift, but the others are OK) is great. As HozzMidnight says it is a RTS - Real Time Strategy game so it doesn't entirely fit with the rest but it has real strategy and isn't purely dominated by micro which makes it stand apart from the crowd of so called RTS games which are really Real Time Tactices games (ie battle micro trumps).
For turn based strategy games Age of Wonders : Shadow Magic is my favourite since MoM. Fall from Heaven 2 and Dominions 3 are also fun.
Kohan is the exception to the normal RTS rule and really is strategic in ways which games like Starcraft can't match. Starcraft is a real time drawn out skirmish while Kohan Ahriman's Gift is a real time war.
The story of 1 is summarised in II, but apart from the different plot the only changes I believe are some optional difficulty tweaks - you can have items degrade over time, require food and drink to survive and similar.
You might also want to check out the Spiderweb Software series of RPG's, they're turn based too. Avernum is entirely turn and party based, Geneforge has a rather unique background and is real time with turn based battles. Avernum 5 and Geneforge 4 are currently on sale at Gamer's Gate (it's the last day though so hurry) and well worth it imho.
If that doesnt scratch the itch, I think I will check out Kings Bounty. I really did like HOMM5, but the campaign just felt kind of flat. .
You might want to try Armoured Princess rather than The Legend, unless you can get the gold edition cheap. There's some minor balance issues in The Legend that were smoothed over with AP, like only having a finite number of recruitable troops so you could end up playing yourself into a no win situation. They're great games though.
On an RTS front you might want to look into Majesty 2. It's a remake of the old Majesty game which has you building a town and setting bounties on various things in order to encourge the local heroes to get off their fat backsides and do something. It's fun, but the remake has some ridiculous difficulty spikes in it.
Civ 5 comes out on the 21st of September. If you like the Civ series you could always hold off for that.
If we start counting in consoles Disgaia 1 & 2 for the PS2 are also quite superb.
Grotesque Tactics is cool. It's not a city builder though, just rpg.
You're going to love it solidsmooky. Give it a little time and you'll see the game is deep and rich. It's definitely expensive, but I know I've already gotten my money's worth out of it and continue to play it. Feel free to pm me if you've got any questions while you're figuring it out.
And if you don't like it...give me a headstart before you come after me.
There is a demo for Dominions 3 on their website. it's only 90mb to download and well worth a look in.
It also includes a tutorial which should help a lot when coming to grips with the game.The game looks to have a lot of variation to it, hopefully this would also lead to a real depth in game play.
Its a pity I dropped my money on Elemental for this month, so now I'll need to wait for a week or two beforeI can justify picking it up. btw anyone have any discount vouchers or coupons for dominions3/gamers front?
Shadow Magic hands down.
Is Dominions 3 a good single player game or do most people play it for the MP?
I am getting convinced to give it a try but I would be in it more for SP.
king's bounty
age of wonders shadow magic with some mods...
i also hope one day someone will make a mod for elemental to add race from age of wonders like the shadow demons (which are cool) and/or some more (maybe heavy) tiles and geographical objects to like in king's bounty...
I play it in SP mostly. AI is good enough on higher difficulty.
I've almost exclusively played it single player. You will eventually "learn" the AI though.
video of Dominions 3 tactical battles
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlsIzDg7dqk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g6GjkdWXiVE
Lords of Magic tactical battles
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggHO027istI&feature=related
Lords of the Realm Tutorial Video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mFqY7z8K-A0
HoMM 3 Tactical battle
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=npUzFeLM_a0
Galciv 2 Tactical Battle
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zogrM0OZhEw
King's Bounty Tactical Battle
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kyK4LORXQQQ&feature=related
Age of Wonder Shadow Magic Review
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2clnO6zB6J4
notice anything?
Lords of Magic SE turn based fantasy strategy with real time pause-able battles
Lords of the Realm II also turn based with RTS battles
GalCiv II
HoMM series
Disciples 1&2 maybe 3 but haven't got to it yet\
AoW-SM, Dominions 3., MoM & EWoM of course...
I would vote for Fall From Heaven 2, especialy its mod mod, Wild Mana.
I say fire up the MoM and enjoy it. I really wish someone would do a graphical upgrade on it, because the game mechanics are very good already. Speaking of that, I think I'll start a new game on Impossible difficulty while using Death Magic. It's tough but it's always enjoyable.
I love MoM. It great to wage war with that killer stack. If someone would be willing to do the program part, I wouldn't mind working on the graphics. I do a bit of fantasy illustration and cel animation.
Sorry for you MOM lovers, but for me the best Fantasy TBS game continues to be Heroes of Might & Magic III after... ¡11 years!
Nowadays computers have for superior power, but I have not found yet the game that replaces HOMM3. The truth is, when I get tired of the other games, I keep coming back to old HOMM3. With a bit of luck, Elemental will replace it, but there is yet a bit of work to do for it
Also, searching the Internet I have found there is a Warlords 5 in the works. Could it be interesting?
Oh, and I forgot to say. Kings Bounty is very good. The "problem" is that it is not an strategy game. Only a tactical game. But is surprisingly good.
Dominions 3 is awesome. It looks pretty ordinary but seriously, its very deep and ever so rich with imagination juice.
Check out this AAR in progress:
http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3302467&userid=0&perpage=40&pagenumber=1
Note that the opening post has direct chapter links but there are more chapters than links listed so keep reading after the mini-magic update.
I tried Dom3 and shelved it, came back to it after 6 months and now its won a permanent place on the hard-drive.
Well I'd have to say WARLORDS started it all then WARLORDS II then the III series which is truely the best and then finally WARLORDS IV with the 1.05 patch is really good now and the ai fantastic.
Then came MAUDE or MOM as some like to call her. ) Best civilizationlike fatasy strategy game to date.
Others tried to take the throne and the HOMM series was pretty good with II & III
Age of Wonders first game was really good but they didn't add a random battle generator and by the time they added that in AOW:SM the ai was pathetic and they never fixed it.
DOMINIONS III is ok also and I'd say it probably has the most robust magic system but the combat engine is pretty boring. No hands on ability and that's no fun to me.
Now we have ELEMENTAL and over time it's going to move right up the line and at least be 2nd to MOM if not in front. The AI alone will destroy the AOW series when it gets tweaked.
So right now for me it would be
1. Master of Magic
2. Warlords III - IV
3. Elemental
4. HOMM II & III
5. Dominions III
6. Age of Wonders 1st game.
7. Age of Wonders Shadow Magic
8. Disciples series
9 Celtic Kings
I find that way to battle at least as fun as your typical tactical battle on the grid. And I loved lack of limit on the amount of units. Nothing feels better than watching your 1500-2000 soulless Ermorian army stomping everything. You may lose many, but who cares when fallen enemies join your ranks?
(I hate the way they cast spells one by one tho. One of my favorite tactics is to rush with lots of spellcasting leaders stacked together, and watching the combats becomes unbearable)
You define strategies for your squads, and then let AI do the rest. Its realistic and it saves you from repetitive and boring combats in late game, while keeping actions sensible.
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