When I came by two years ago and said that Elemental was too bland, I did so because it was a game solely involving differently-hued humans fighting over some huts. It didn't really have anything to do with the AI or bugs or the core gameplay, it was the setting that needed the most help. That's exactly what people were hoping that Kael would bring with him from Fall from Heaven. We wanted a game where a race of fire-breathing golems were fighting against a kingdom of sentient spells in a floating castle while dragon people marched in from the sea to escape the deep ones in their underwater cities. After two years and Kael's involvement we got... another game where differently-hued humans were fighting over some huts.
A fantasy 4X is the perfect opportunity to be, well, fantastic. Weird and amazing and more variety than one could shake a stick at. Kael nailed that with FFH2, so we know he's got it in him!
Of course, it's not too late to add the weird and amazing and variety. I wouldn't have any complaint about buying addons for extra races, units, and features like flying, subterranean, or aquatic cities, because those things add the variety the game so desperately needs.
Not exactly. A redesign of traits and weapon balance forces negative attributes to be taken, which increases tactical depth. If they add unique units and take out the customizable ones, which is not necessary as Hf noted, the same design flaws would be present. You would have a demon fire giant pioneer, a demon fire giant heavy defender and a demon fire giant ranged unit. The problem is with the design of weapons and traits. If they can't fix it with customized units, it won't be any better with predesigned ones.
Now, one could take some time, look at the mods and discussions about tactical battles and start perfecting the system. Or they could hope that in the process of killing one of the best parts of the game, a redesign happens that fixes tactical battles. I predict that course of action would make the game much worse.
You're right, of course, seanw3; I misspoke. When I said units, I really meant the accumulation of weapons, armor, and traits, and these, indeed, are the things that need to get corrected, as you rightly point out.
I'm still struggling with why it's such a bad idea to have traits that allow for normal units to cast fireball every 3 turns, or heal every 2 turns, etc. I can see it quickly being overpowered, but, as you say, if there's a good system in which those plusses are balanced by thought provoking minuses (cannot wear armor or wield weapons other than dagger or staff if casting spell, plus initiative comes with minuses to dodge, etc), then I think the custom designed units is a great asset to the game, it's just not particularly well implemented currently in a way that screams differentiation and strategic choice.
Dunsany is great, I prefer Lovecraft myself.
I disagree, you are one of those rose tinted nostalgia people. If we just took MoM and gave it a graphic update people would bemoan the horrid game design, because it just won't stand up to today's game. The reason it is a classic is because it gave us something new. If I have just experienced a major world changing apocalypse and lost all or almost all knowledge of magic I am going to have to research and study to figure out more spells. Someone just doesn't sit down and write a spell book, there would have to be a study and an understanding. It is a scientific apprach.
Sorry, sir, you're wrong: you have it the other way around. It's "today's game" that doesn't stand up to MoM.
MoM had diverse races, flying units, naval units, alchemy, item crafting, heroes tied to fame, more meaningful tactical battles, the nightshade (!), a magic system that makes sense, awesome effects like Invisibility, Regeneration (I mean true regeneration)... it's endless really. Of course it's aged, that's why I was hoping for a "graphic update", an AI boost and so on. Problem is, we traded one thing for the other.
i'd definitely say no. customising units is a core concept of the game, imo
perhaps some thought could be given to making things a bit more modular. For example, something like a race of humanoid lions/wolves/whatever, with those unusually shaped hind legs and paws that animals have. they would need different boot meshes from other humanoid factions, but that aside they could use the same torso, greaves, bracers, helmets, etc. maybe it's worth exploring the possitility of making units that seem more visually diverse than they technically are.
it WOULD be nice to have a completely non humanoid race though. maybe a tribe of six legged scorpions with their own entirely unique armor and weapons. lots of effort but maybe something to do in a big expansion somewhere down the line ^^
Count me in for more faction differentiation, not just because of MOM / HOMM or AOW done that before
Here is the rational:
Customization might be fun initially, but think about it - if we can have all the diversity available in 1 faction it makes the whole game generic, which is a big hit.
I think Shafer has an excellent article on how limitation that promote gameplay, something like it is because land unit can not go into sea, it makes naval unit so important and specials.
The more customization we have the more generic it will be
My take is not on the "visual difference" but more on the "gameplay / stat" difference which is more cost effective for the meat of the game.
Instead of adding more units, consider eliminating 1 or 2 common units to some factions, this will be even more cost effective based on concept of good limitation.
Example:
No spear men for Tarth since spear men is too common to all they can hire many monsters
I missed MoM when it first came out, and only played it for the first time last year. Its a great game and having only just played it, I can vouch for the fact that "rose tinted nostalgia" has nothing to do with why it is so highly rated by people.
Franky, MoM design is still head and shoulders above any competition since - be it AoW, Elemental, Warlock:Master, whatever..
Just play it a bit and look at how mages are customized, how spell research and casting work, the combat mechanisms.. Sure it's now more than 15 years old, and there was way much limitations in what could be done at the time. But why is everyone trying to reinvent the whell and finally make blander, simpler, less rich, less fun games ? Go figure...
You guys are seriously confusing the'fun-ness' of the game with the actual facts. The game was fun, it was different, it was new - but it was pretty badly put together. It took a decade of patches and unofficial patches to make the game even somewhat balanced and playable and even then it is buggy as hell and as unbalanced as an alcoholic soccer mom on Prozac. If you go back and play the game without the decade of patches that came afterwords you would realize that. I am not saying it is fun, but you're just knitpicking around and pulling out things that you like and not painting the entire picture.
I loved the flying units and the item crafting, the wandering heros, and the magic system,(though I don't really agree that it was the best, it could have been done a lot more interestingly.) but I also remember the bugs, the unbalance, and the general blandness of the game.
A better solution to me would be having bloods unlock unique promotions ,both on champions and regular units.
That could provide your uniqueness. Could have some negative things in there too, like tarth units adding 1% unrest if stationed in a city, stuff like that.
Fewer unique weapons, more unique traits.
It seems that would be kind of contra productive since thats what henchmen are for which are unique to the kingdom of Altar and that is what the OP (and lots of others how posted) wish to see for all factions.
All in all I am not realy sure where I stand on this issue. I made the mistake of rolling Tarth beastlords the first few games and while their tactical boni (+ 3 init and attack for army size <4) is nice in the very early game, their items(masterwork chainmail and strongest bows) are mid-/late-game but their stratigic bonus of not having any movement penelties (forest, hills, even rivers) combined with the beastlords ability to charm units multiple lvls above the sovreings invites to rush things. So basicly after 125 turns a challanging, epic game on a large map is done (I control 30% of the map, all empires exterminated and at least twice the power rating of the 2nd place kingdom).
The first game I picked another faction and profession I was actually annoyed because the game suddenly became very slow paced compared to what I had become used to (takes twice as long to scout and lvl your sovreign because of movement, settlements have to build units and not lvl 10 ones by turn 50-75 like the beasts I used to tame not to mention that I actualy needed military research beside mounted warfare). Around turn 90-100 I had build my first hentchmen and not even sacked a single enemy city.
So imo the factions seem to be quite differant considering the overall gameplay but their boni are hard to compare because while some have huge tactical ones (hentchmen -> a healer and/or mage in every army or +25% accuracy -> basic hit chance of 90%+for all units) others have strategic ones. While I realise that those that have only minor tactical boni end up building the same units resulting in being nearly identical in combat I am not sure if that is reason enough to ask for tactical specilization/unique units for each faction.
Giving Tarth a Treant as a counterpart for Golems and Juggernauts would imho make the factions even more simular since everyone shows up with his one slow giant tank unit maybe with a different focus on Armor, HP or dodge but basicly they all do the same job. On the other hand, if you go for real specilization you might end up loosing flexibility since a faction gets unique units, items, buildings, tech and boni and to make them all work together leaves you with limited options -> while each faction plays different from the others it plays the same in every game. (replayability = #of factions, like in HoM&M)
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