Yesterday I read a comment in a thread which I cannot find now for some reason where the poster was complaining about all of us who are offering constructive criticism for LH. The poster didn't understand why so many of us are "trying to force our wills on the game" or something along that line.
That poster obviously does not understand the purpose of a Beta. The constructive criticism us Beta testers are offering is exactly what the Devs have asked us to provide in exchange for free access to the game. Yes, the points we are making are selfish in nature. We obviously want the game to be more along the lines of what we want. And the Devs/Publisher would be wise to yield to the points that get brought up time and time again.
None of the criticism posted in this forum for the LH Beta should get flamed. This is a Beta. All of us users are entitled to express our opinion of what we believe to be useful tweaks we are asking for all the way to pointing out what we believe to be broken game mechanics. If a user doesn't like a post, ignore it or post a counterpoint, don't flame it. (Yes, there have been borderline flaming posts in some of the hotter threads.)
Once LH goes public, then, maybe, some of the stronger language can come out, but please, not during Beta.
Having said this, allow me to start the list of Top Feedback.
1) Please fix the lackluster champions. There are many suggestions in this forum. Please pick one and implement it so that our heroes can truly be Fun and Useful Legendary Heroes and not simply city administrators.
It's constructive criticism if you state a problem and suggest changes that would correct it. It's not constructive to suggest changes for a feature when no problem has been stated.
I think everyone agrees that roads have a problem. Suggesting ways to fix them is constructive and there have been many suggestions.
Nobody has stated that there is a problem with the Beastlord feature. Yet several people have proposed that it be nerfed. Apparently the feature does not fit into their idea of what the game should be about even though they have the choice of whether to use Beastlord. (It's different from the road issue since everyone is forced to use roads.) That's the kind of behavior that ignites flames.
Identifying problems is the primary purpose of a Beta. Suggesting changes for problems and requesting new features is secondary. We are not being asked to redesign the game.
1. Beastlord has 2 problems. {A} Beasts can start out very overpowered and take down dragons with ease, especially Cave Bears. If they aren't exploited quickly, they can obsolete fast, so you are forced to "use or lose". {B}. Beasts have no upkeep costs, and don't have any animal armors. They also don't gain useful abilities, and after a while just feel like "tamed units" instead of "Beasts". There aren't Beast abilities that they get over time which make beasts meaningful as succinctly being a beast.
2. Units level up extremely slow. Even with every exp buff in the game, it takes a while to get a good army. Meanwhile, leveling them up feels minimal in improvement versus waiting 3 techs and building a new unit.
3. Mounted Combat is not fun because it is a forced maneuver. The moment I have access to them, its "Pawn to King 4...". The problem is that animal mounts are limited to Horse vs Warg and any nonmounted version of a mounted unit is worthless.
4. Too many abilities, even after patch notes, come in low intensity stages. Vital Strike and Potential are great examples. I propose that potential1, potential2, and potential3 are removed. Also, remove Trainer 1, 2, 3, 4. Instead, place 2 potential skills with 15% and 25%, and 2 trainer skills with 15% and 20%.
5. Too many spells have little to no effect because they have a small base number + x for shards. This looks good until you realize out of 20 abilities on a unit, only 3 of them do above 6 damage when your level 20.
6. Fix the Unit Design Double Equipment Bug. When you design a Henchmen with 4 accessories, you can purchase and equip 4 more artifacts, which by all appearances, are "invisible in the background", and "stack" the new and old ones together.
7. Champions should have a "choose later" feature, and you should get a board of like 20 champions for your race/faction, and spend Fame to get them. You could also have a system of selecting specific upgrades for Champions instead of a new one. That would be fun, to make my heroes legendary instead of always recruiting heroes worse than units just to steal their spirit.
Roads should be handled as they were in Civ: Call To Power.
You click your town, click "Buy Road" and you click and drag, pay one tile at a time (5g or 10g) and build the network you want.
You can give us 1 of 2 options: controlling the placement of our roads, or having them placed for us. I would rather place it myself. If you let me place it myself, I can either do it through a unit, or a click, click, click... maybe even hold shift, click 5 spots away and see if I like the route thus far.
There are a lot of inspiring things in the XML which look like they could be really fun to have used in a specific way, even if not as a feature. For example, units having bonuses or penalties in their own land versus another players land. I would like a faction to make use of this, just not every faction.
I would also like the return of Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence... I suppose the AI doesn't know what to pick... However, it could be scripted to make good choices based on other factors. A fire mage unit going path of the mage might pick Intelligence by default for example. You could even have +1 point per level up, which would help units become legendary over time, and have meaningful growth upon level up.
I would also like monsters in the sea, the ability to build war ships, and conduct naval invasions.
One more problem:
The AI walks into my border. I tell it to go home or die. It agrees to leave. Next turn, it walks back into my border. I tell it to go home or die. Next turn it walks back into my border. I tell it to go home or die. Then, I wonder why it doesn't "have to obey" for 10 turns.
And another:
We can design units but not armies. As such, I might design 5 specific units to be used in a stack in the form of 2 + 2 + 1 + Sovereign. I might be able to take my units and build a nice force by correctly mixing 2 skirmishers, 2 fire/ice staffers, 1 archer and Champ. The AI will instead take my designs and build 4 skirmishers, 1 fire staffer who upgrades into heavy armor then a melee champ.
Let us design ARMIES.
I have to say that I am really impressed with the quality of feedback about the game on these forums. If Stardock has the time to address all the feedback and fix all reported bugs, this game will truly be legendary.
For me, the central issues in the game are:
- Hero leveling needs to become more exciting and faster. All skill paths need to be viable, and all spells useful. Remove boring abilities like Potential.
- Bugs need to be fixed.
- AI improvements.
First of all, i can truly say that i love Fallen Enchantress, or at least the game it will hopefully become. For me, its the game with the greatest potential out there, and i have supported it from the first beta.
Still, after having played LH, in which i have great hopes, a couple of dozen hours, two main problems remain for me, which prevent me from staying at FE:
1) The Interfaces are, in my personal oppinion, a desaster. They are non-informative, non-intuitive, non-attractive.
I like to have all important information in the background or accessable within one click, and i like my interfaces to be well designed. For me, a nice looking game is an important factor for having fun and play at ease.
Its the main reason for me to prefer Civ5 and Warlock right now.
2) I really dislike the missing opportunity to improve my active non-hero-army. I know theres this "upgrade Armor/weapon" button, but seriously:
I want to experiment with- and specify my army in each given situation. I want to buy the stuff i researched for them, i want to upgrade them the way I want, and i want to change their equipment until i'm satisfied.
It annoys me extremely to have to leave my "old", experienced but poor equipped armies in town every time i researched new armory, to be able to design the party i want, and then have to train them again and again!
Disagree totally. If I make a game it's "my" game and though I would like feedback it doesn't mean I would be "wise" to do what a handful of forum members demand or cry about. You have to be realistic those that goto forums are "not" your normal type players. They are the disgruntled or those that want to design their own game but don't have the money to do so. I've laughed for years at the entitlement I've seen in some gamers thinking what they think matters hahahahahah. Forum members represent less than .002% of the whole of the games population and sales clients. That's not even a percent. I got this information directly from a publisher also from the Matrixgames.com company. Sure they like to read feedback and may see some things that might could do with a change but they hardly live for your feedback to try to change their game entirely and I do mean "their" game.
Now when you get rich and can afford more than $39.95 or $49.95 for development of a game then you can talk about how "wise" it would be for them to listen to you because you will be the one who should be the wiser. lol The shoe is always different on the other foot and the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence until you put the shoe on the other foot and actually get on the other side of the fence. lol
Unfortunately that's what the "majority" want to do is redesign the game for the way "they" want to play it. That's always the problems of feedback. The I want I want I want crowd. Those that "think" they know a better way to design a character or a unit. Like the guy up there with a list of changes for just about everything in the game. Just "his" world not mine and probably not yours.
When casting a buff on an npc, please allow players to select multiple npc's at one time instead of having to cast the same buff over and over again.
Ranged seems completely lackluster compared to the upfront attackers now. Theres this awesome swarm bonus for melee and I even put a caster in the mix to bonk stuff with a staff because it's going to likely contribute to the attack more than casting a spell for 5 damage or whatever if 2-3 people are attacking. I think we have the best idea possible, but the worst way about doing it. I think there needs to be a /chance/ for a party attack and perhaps certain units would have better or even 100% chances to get in on the action. I seriously just want to have my whole attacking party in a straight line and then encircle enemies as I pick them off. While this is a justified tactic, it seems like the concept of having a balanced army with frontline/backline is actually disadvantageous and bringing a caster to bonk something to trigger 2-3 attacks from melee units is just plain silly. I know we can argue logistics all day long, but calling it how I see it.
I still hate the clunky bits of the UI and movement in this game. The meter that shows how many moves it will take a unit to get somewhere is a HUGE plus and I love it, but we are still way back in Civ2's way of thinking nearly when it comes to routine actions on each turn. I've been spoiled by the likes of Endless Space with it's button that allows me to simply move all my units that have had moves issued on previous turns or CIV 5 that auto directs me to each unit when it can or should be moved again unless it's guarding. A tickbox that would allow focus on a city that just finished construction but has no construction would be great.Tickbox options are GOOD in 4x for UI things and control options that people are begging for. Can turn it off if you don't want it, but adds a lot of "quality of life" to people that do really want these things. I hate to sound too negative but this game LOOKS and FEELS like a modern 4x until you actually play it. End turn to move things means I'm making my actions next turn, not THIS turn as I wanted.
Champion recruitment really doesn't seem... legendary. It seems more like a multiple choice question followed by a hero being put beside you on the map. I really envisioned something along the lines of Dragon Force or Romance of the Three Kingdoms or even Crusader Kings where I have this nice list of nerdy options to ponder over for 20 minutes. Pick or A or B RIGHT NOW THIS SECOND, is just sad for this type of game. I understand by logic we are using fame to attract them so beggars cannot be choosers. Quantity and quality could not be asked for and I really don't mind that initially we'd have a couple guys interested and no others, but as fame progressed and word of your fame travelled, surely you'd have more varied interest. I know the theme is speeding up the game and combat, but really this guy with a sword and this perk v/s this guy with a staff and this perk is the kind of choice I'd expect in Starcraft. Not a 4x game. 4x players DO have a bit of patience, so this kind of choice on the very focus of the xpansion itself needs to be a bit more fleshed out I'd think.
For the record I haven't spent a ton of time with this series, and check on it now and then, but I've followed the development since WoM and bought all of it. Things that people normally complain about (city razing and generally steep difficulty from time to time) really don't bother me. I've just reached a state of indifference from simply trying to just play the game period. This game still has the potential to become a massive time vampire.. right now its more like a now and again hour filler for me. I want to see this game just take some basic polish before vast huge content improvements. Both is fine, but there's been somewhat perplexing choices in a few very basic ideas that would push this game more towards a modern 4x. Things that eat points off your final metacritic so to speak. It's always the small ones. Borrow, steal, whatever you have to do. This game just feels like it's fighting against being a 'standard 4x' in the worst way possible every time I turn it on, but because it doesn't benefit from a really fluid way of control and a UI that's keeping actions and information embedded in more menus and generally moving units around on the exploration map is still a bit tedious.
Please provide a link to the quoted sources that specificies the percentage you mentioned.
If developers didn't want feedback, they wouldn't have forums, or they would explicitly state in the forum rules that they aren't interested in feedback...
Yea, it's their game, but a players strong opinions about what would make the game better doesn't equate to entitelment.
Entitlement is the belief that you have the right to something.
I don't think I've ever heard anyone claim that they have the right to one improvement or another...
That term is grossly overused by blind faith fan boys whenever someone has an opinion that they don't like, or is contrary to the direction the developer is going.
Derek, Brad: please pay special attention to Haydun and mangadrives posts. I am currently playing Age of Wonders 1 more than FE for one reason above all else - the UI.
Playing FE can feel like work; the UI lacks design cohesion. Data is just spread all over the screen and buried in sub-screens, with what seems to be little consideration for the user experience and flow of a turn. It appears more like an application for managing a bunch of economic data than a game.
edit:.. and I really don't think this issue can be solved just by plucking the lowest fruit on the tree.
Forgive the bluntness of my criticism: the game is great - it's potential to be amazing is painful.
edit 2: it seems like all the right pieces are in the box, now they just need to be assembled with a clear goal in mind.
this forum is nice, but at current stage, there is no evidence about devs actually reading forum and adressing reported issues.
AI message spam was here from very first versions of original elemental and still here two years later...
If game position itself as sandbox, it MUST provide freedom. (get champion i want when i want)
If game position itself as comptitive, it MUST be balanced, atleast it shoud provide some illusion of balance, also it shoud be MP but just leave MP part alone for now.
Spell system currently is joke, only few spells actually usefull (grow, shrink) all others usefull only in narrow conditions and cannot be used constantly.
Cull the weak nice sample of bad design, it provide constant 20 mana\hp per unit, no matter what unit, no matter what level of hero, it makes this spell very imba at early stages (basically it allow to generate 20 mana per turn) and useless later on.
Current implementation does not provide anything, there is no balance and no freedom.
lol @sharpxe
"you must make your game conform to my preconceived notions"
I'd like to add that I too don't intend to sound entitled to more, just really would love to have this game take the same place in my gaming tops along with the Civ series and the likes. "painful" is a good description too how I feel These are complaints a few friends have had too, and they aren't the type to come report. I am though.
On movement: I will note that just tonight I finally sat down and began to understand what "auto next unit" actually does. It works, just a bit awkward to understand at first. Combined with the move-o-meter line it really did help me enjoy things significantly more. Most of my problems now would just lie in management of buffs and embedded info in general.
Example: Buffs. Just an idea: Put the spell icon above the unit's name bar somehow similar to what you have going on with the icon above the city focus bar. I know it shows on the mouseover popup, but read on. To dispel a buff you could add alt/ctrl + right click functionality on that buff's icon instead of having to do it in another menu and it stops accidental clicking to debuff. Let me buff from the army selection circles when I click on it. The extra pop up to select a target just seems needless.
I could make a grocery list of things like this, and I'm sure to some that have played 100's of hours it just sounds like laziness but really its more or less polish and that's important to a game. Me personally? I still play it, but I can't get friends (that are big Civ fans and the likes of) to understand the magic of this game because it's a bit hard to steer.
I second this. Annoys me every time and should be easily implemented (I guess).
Not true! There is one that becomes very valuable as it levels up.
Why are these to be considered problems?
Are Juggernauts and Garrotes also too powerful?
If I can recruit a storm dragon, why not a cave bear?
In my experience, cave bears do not take down dragons with ease. When starting out they on get about 3 hits before ceasing a maul.
I like the idea of having the option. Many times, I have needed a road but it is not provided by the auto-build. The existence of the Road Building trait is evidence that this need is valid.
Could also let us attack such units without declaring war. Real countries get very upset when a neighbors army invades their territory. Could require that permission be obtained before entering.
Roads: There are a couple issues I've observed with roads:
* building through wildlands, this shouldn't happen, even if it is a long way around.
* building through monster lairs, again roads should go around monster lairs, at least 1 space away. I've seen roads build through dragon lairs, which makes using them incredibly dangerous.
In both these cases, one wonders how those poor road builders managed to live through the road building experience. Manual road specification, in ways mentioned above seem like a nice to have not a need to have imo.
Diplomacy: I like mangadrive's 10 turn stay out of lands timer to the option.
UI this thread has made some good suggestions for streamlining it. Other threads have additional suggestions but this thread includes some of the ones that still annoy me the most after having spent many hours playing the game.
Having been in the FE beta I can assure you the devs are not ignoring the forum feedback, many changes interacted with forum input, though their time is limited, and thus even easy fix issues often go unimproved.
As I recall hero leveling varied quite a lot in the FE beta both too fast and too slow, I'm sure they will continue to play with xp rates in LH.
When you cast a spell:
Enable the player to hold shift + click, click, click to hit multiple targets.
1. Juggernauts and Garrotes are exclusive to a race, unlock in the tech tree and require support, they aren't expendable.
Bears and wolves are easy to do, dependent only on luck of strong bears/cave bears near you and give you a powerful edge right away. Storm Dragons come at the end of a tree, while Bears come right away. Also, you don't need a bear. You need 3-4 Cave Bears, 1 archer, 1 mage, 1 champ (who can be your mage or archer). You can also lose a bear if you have a Spider. The spider will tank enemies, and web them, the bears will maul + swarm anything and the rest of the army will hit hard any enemy who can survive the bears. Life magic is good for this end, to keep the bears alive. Bears have less efficiency against some enemies, which is where frost staff users come in handy .
2. Bears and Wolves start out very powerful if you get a "good copy", and over the course of leveling, don't get much better.
I believe the system should allow any recruited monster to be de-leveled to that of the casting unit. The monster should gain "better levels" over time, to symbolize training and improving. The Beastlord Trait should give +2 Levels of All Tamed Beasts, and the Collar should give -1 Level of All Tamed Beasts. This makes Beastlord "special". This makes "weak nearby beasts" as good as "strong nearby beasts" and give "all cave bears" the same potential. Animal Units are also missing flying beasts in my opinion, which would add a whole new fun, but I digress.
And for your criticism of my criticism; sometimes us critics need to be kept in "check" regarding specifics. I might think I am giving good feedback but don't know I am not. Thus, people like you help people like me communicate, something I admit I am bad at. Thank you and keep criticizing. Those of us who actually want our feedback to be listened to, will also want to present listenable and workable feedback. Therefore, I hold with appreciation anyone who makes me change angles and try to define things better.
If anyone has specific UI requests please visit the UI Community Suggestions thread. Thanks!
I tend to find myself holding off on building units until fortress upgrades like Armourer are complete, because I can get an extra couple of points of defence on trained units that way.
More to the point, any old units that I have kicking around do not benefit from those upgrades. Ever.
And yes I know, this has been around since FE, well I think it's silly and it encourages turtling instead of seizing opportunities to win the game. Or training cheap throwaway units (which oddly enough, seem to go on to gain a few levels and not die, damn it).
Give me the ability to re-train and re-equip these veterans. Heroes get to choose new abilities when they level up, so wouldn't it be nice if regular units could change their ability or equipment loadout at certain level milestones?
Another idea that I had just now was, if a unit is reduced to one man (or woman) during a battle, a random event could turn the sole survivor into a new hero. Well, I don't know if that would even work, but I suppose it would be cool the first time it happened. What I'm getting at is, the fame system is nice and all, but heroes aren't just attracted by that, sometimes they're forged in battle.
And what's wrong with asking for changes? You're right, the devs don't need to utilize any of the suggestions the users come up with. And from reading this forum there are features the users have been asking for from the beginning which have gone unimplemented.
The poster with the list has I think 2 requests I have read over and over. Those are the only ones that probably should have been listed in this thread, but then I'm not devoting hours and hours to the forum so I could be wrong.
Most of the frequently requested changes I have read are similar to (if not exactly) like game mechanics from some of the most successful and/or longest "cult" following games of all time which get played over and over when the shiny new games fall flat on their faces and get deleted. So since Elemental got horrid reviews (after the press was SUPER excited about the first previews) and didn't sell well, yeah, I'd say the devs would be wise to look at the requests which show up time and again.
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