Age of Wonders 4

[Demo.Graph]

All well and good but does the sovereign fella have to be a caster no two ways about it?

He doesn't since AoW3. And it's a complete for the series.
AoW had always been a game about wizards duking it out from their multistoried phalluses. Just like Dominions is all about demigods duking it out in peoples' heads and incestines.

BTW, if you want axe-flinging demigod roflstomping countries, you definitely should try Dominions.
You can even have a ghost cock to scare people with.

 

[Norfleet]

There's also Fedora Master, who didn't play a fucking game in the past 10 years but he's in every single thread of the forum complaining about everything being shit.

Makes sense to me. The thing with everything in reality is that shit only gets worse over time. This is part of the Laws of Thermodynamics: Entropy must always increase. So if he hasn't played a game in 10 years, that would mean that the level of shittiness he could tolerate in games was reached 10 years ago. Obviously, since improvement is a physical impossibility, it stands to reason that everything since then is shit. It was probably shit before that, but at least back then it was tolerable.

Which goes to prove it could be worse.

Of course it could be. And it eventually will be. There is always more, and it is always worse.

BTW, if you want axe-flinging demigod roflstomping countries, you definitely should try Dominions.
You can even have a ghost cock to scare people with.

Ah, but can I decapitate it by throwing a rabbit at it?

 

[Fedora Master]

>Attack skill 7

 

[Blutwurstritter]

I was never outraged that T4s were better than T1s, I said (and have always said) that the power divide between tiers is too huge, which led to T4 spam.

Same , there's race features that favor T1 unit, reduce upkeep , spawnkin gives +20% attacks , all kind of enchantments , favor the meeks , but this is never as good when stacking all of it than just plain T4 summons. it's especially true on melee units , you can make very good tier 3 (zephyr) archers one shotting stuff. Spamming enhanced T1 is sadly never a good strategy unless i am proven wrong.

You can more than make up for the power difference especially in late game. Take a look at the stats of this tier 1 fellow at measly 4 gold / 4 mana upkeep.

vs a

pure tier 5 unit

that has a base upkeep of 40 gold and 5 imperium.
The tier 5 would be a bit better since it would also get some of the enchantments but the difference is not worth the upkeep.

Here is a Tier 3 summon with enchantments for comparison

Spoiler

 

[Demo.Graph]

Ah, but can I decapitate it by throwing a rabbit at it?

The game is called Dominions, not Dwarf Fortress.
If it helps, the guy can be beheaded by an especially forceful spit.
And if you're really into rabbits, you should be able to mod in a beheader one in about 5 rows of text.

>Attack skill 7

I regret nothing.
Especially because it's a pic from the web. He probably relies on fear+vortex to kill stuff.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

I was never outraged that T4s were better than T1s, I said (and have always said) that the power divide between tiers is too huge, which led to T4 spam.

Same , there's race features that favor T1 unit, reduce upkeep , spawnkin gives +20% attacks , all kind of enchantments , favor the meeks , but this is never as good when stacking all of it than just plain T4 summons. it's especially true on melee units , you can make very good tier 3 (zephyr) archers one shotting stuff. Spamming enhanced T1 is sadly never a good strategy unless i am proven wrong.

That's fine. i don't think low tier units SHOULD outperform high tier ones (and of course Zboj is WRONG about that, too).
What's important is that you are given the tools to make them somewhat viable, which is a good thing, *generally* speaking.

Then again I'm not a fan of unrestricted buff stacking, but that's another matter.

 

[Norfleet]

The game is called Dominions, not Dwarf Fortress.

Yeah, I haven't followed the series in years. Last time I took a poke at was in 3, which was hilarious because it seemed like the sequel was a targeted attempt at nerfing everything I was doing in 2. Couldn't get the multiplayer to work, so lost interest. Last I heard it was thoroughly Steam-infested in its latest incarnations, and I don't do Steam. Maybe if the multiplayer worked like normal Internets multiplayer instead of that Steam shite with mysterious unknown ports and calls to suspicious unvetted IPs, I'd take another look.

On my computers, every act of outgoing Internet access must be manually approved, which means I need to know where it's going: What IP, what port, and for what purpose. Otherwise it's a no-go.

 

[Blutwurstritter]

A full stack of tier 5's is still the strongest but it is no longer so trivially easy to achieve and with production overflow its often more attractive to go for other units. I'd even say that tier 4 and 5 units are overall on the weaker side all things considered. A hero with leadership perks with a mix of tier 1-3 units can go very far. I think I've beaten all maps so far without using tier 5 units. I've built some of them to test them, but the maps were already won at that point.

But the late game economy needs a lot of tweaks. Especially when the higher chaos imperium empire upgrades come online and wars are wagged. Razing towns and plundering sectors yields silly amounts of gold. And getting a whopping 50 gold/mana income per declared war is also a large boost in mid game. My gold account usually explodes once I start pillaging, which you can also see in the screenshot. And the gold rush comes at a time when you no longer need it, since you most likely have most of the buildings and units at that point. I usually wait a fair amount of time until I start wars but you could probably expand even faster if you act aggressively from the get go using the gold income from pillaging.

 

[Lacrymas]

I'd say there should be a counter to every strategy, including T4/5 spam. That way you wouldn't feel the need to artificially limit their numbers (like a flat cap like with cities f.e.) and it creates another dynamic. A strategy that is countered by the same but more efficient one is dumb and creates these endgame problems.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

That's fine. i don't think low tier units SHOULD outperform high tier ones (and of course Zboj is WRONG about that, too).

You realize you were just shown a screenshot of a t-fucking-1 unit having more hp, more dmg, more defense and 2 less resistance than t5... right? (and I ain't even sure if those stats show ridiculous +dmg you can stack from non-enchantment sources for low tiers, though they probably do)

Regardless of what it takes to achieve this, this is dumb as hell.

In PF you had to pay through the nose to mod t1-2 to make them powerhouses and t4 had, in theory, the same modding potential and would easily beat t1-2 1:1 and it still made little sense to produce them in most cases. It's much worse here.

 

[Lacrymas]

This is strictly caused by stacking race transformations, which seems to me to be unintentional. That warrior looks like a genetic mistake.

 

[vota DC]

I was never outraged that T4s were better than T1s, I said (and have always said) that the power divide between tiers is too huge, which led to T4 spam.

Same , there's race features that favor T1 unit, reduce upkeep , spawnkin gives +20% attacks , all kind of enchantments , favor the meeks , but this is never as good when stacking all of it than just plain T4 summons. it's especially true on melee units , you can make very good tier 3 (zephyr) archers one shotting stuff. Spamming enhanced T1 is sadly never a good strategy unless i am proven wrong.

You can more than make up for the power difference especially in late game. Take a look at the stats of this tier 1 fellow at measly 4 gold / 4 mana upkeep.

vs a

pure tier 5 unit

that has a base upkeep of 40 gold and 5 imperium.
The tier 5 would be a bit better since it would also get some of the enchantments but the difference is not worth the upkeep.

Here is a Tier 3 summon with enchantments for comparison

Spoiler

Awwww I was attacking an independent city, they were too many so I retreated and they split, I ambushed a stack of 5 (4 tier 2 and one tier 1) with my two stack of 12 (10 tier 2, an eagle rider and a battlemage)....well they always kill at least two units because the rainbow power whatever they deal 20 + 5 + 5 damage but UI doesn't even explain where they get that.

 

[Fedora Master]

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2975579768

 

[Reality]

The sweet feeling of having 3 siege slots, paying 450 gold to use them and still needing 7 turns to fight that lategame city

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

That's fine. i don't think low tier units SHOULD outperform high tier ones (and of course Zboj is WRONG about that, too).

You realize you were just shown a screenshot of a t-fucking-1 unit having more hp, more dmg, more defense and 2 less resistance than t5... right?

Yeah, it's also the comparison between a T1 unit leveled up to "Legendary" (max rank) vs a tier V one just spawned and with no rank at all, you fucking dimwit.
Not to mention several high tier units have spells and special abilities that go past the merits of just their base stats.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Ah, yes, the amazing benefits of unit medals in this game are obviously the crux of the matter and make it a-ok, no issues there.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Btw, playing a bit of PF from time to time, I sort of start to understand the decision to just try and drop writing from the latest game (unit backgrounds, campaigns etc).

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

Ah, yes, the amazing benefits of unit medals in this game are obviously the crux of the matter and make it a-ok, no issues there.

It's where ALL the HP increases and some of the major perks come from, for a start.
Which you would know, if you actually played instead of just bitching.

 

[Blutwurstritter]

The Gold golem would be more powerful at the same experience level, in the same stack with the heroes support skills applied, and it would benefit from most of the same enchantments, except the transformations which add a ton of hitpoints. The point of the post was to show that tier 1 units are not useless later on but scale very well if you go for it. Relatively bang-for-buck, the tier 1 unit is much better, even if the tier 5 outperforms it in absolute terms. This is of course how it should be. The tier 5 would be pointless if it was worse in all aspects. The point was that spamming tier 5 units is not the only thing to do at later stages in the game. Tier 1 units can stay relevant for games with "normal duration".

I would prefer it if tier 5 units would break the mold a bit more. They are fairly boring as of now. I want tier 5 units that bring something unique to the table, rather than something that can be spammend while being mostly bigger and stronger, even if that means that number has to be limited or that the cost of fielding them increases exponentially. It could be done similarly to the way heroes are handled. One or two tier 5 units at normal cost per town, and additional ones at a large additional cost. The power should be increased accordingly of course. There should also be an alternative to towns to increase the limit but it would be a good start. Perhaps some province building in addition.

Before there is any speculation, the hitpoints of the tier 1 unit are as follows

70 base hitpoints
20 medal hitpoints (5*4)
10 Super Growth Minor transformation
20 Gaias Chosen Major transformation
15 Hero support Skill
15 Overland Spell for 2 turns
--
= 150 HP

This means that you could apply all of those except for the 30 hitpoints of the transformation to the golem. The golem would end up with even more due to medals giving more hp for tier 5. The Gold Golem would have

145 base hitpoints
60 medal hitpoints (5*12)
15 Hero support skill
15 Overland spell
--
= 235 hitpoints

but getting a golem to legendary medal takes a lot longer of course.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

This obviously goes well beyond "staying relevant". Anyone who played an AoW game in their life surely understands how utterly ridiculous giving t1 unit 150hp and 25dmg spread over multiple channels is. I'd understand the ability to create t1/2 units that are able to trade cost-effectively with some t3-4 under certain circumstances (sort of like properly upgraded pikemen sometimes could in AoW3), but not something like this. They fixed the pace of higher tiers appearing on the battlefield compared to PF, but their attractiveness is even worse now.

 

[HeroMarine]

>Attack skill 7

>Prot 40

 

[Infinitum]

This obviously goes well beyond "staying relevant". Anyone who played an AoW game in their life surely understands how utterly ridiculous giving t1 unit 150hp and 25dmg spread over multiple channels is. I'd understand the ability to create t1/2 units that are able to trade cost-effectively with some t3-4 under certain circumstances (sort of like properly upgraded pikemen sometimes could in AoW3), but not something like this. They fixed the pace of higher tiers appearing on the battlefield compared to PF, but their attractiveness is even worse now.

It's a start. In an ideal game, I see no problem with having early units being more cost-effective in a straight trade, with subsequent tiers adding versatility and force multiplying effects. I guess until patches/expansions fixes it there's also stacking Keeper's Mark with Swarmers (or the Shadow magic unit upkeep reduction) and the support hero upkeep reduction ability for a -40% upkeep reduction for elite stacks.

 

[Norfleet]

The Gold golem would be more powerful at the same experience level

I don't think higher-tier units gain medals at the same rate as low-tier units. IIRC, from previous editions, higher tier units require more XP to level up. Can't get this to run on my computer so I don't know how it works here, but if it's the same, a straight medals-to-medals comparison isn't necessarily accurate given the differing XP costs to accomplish it.

 

[Oreshnik Missile]

A classic way to counter a high-level unit (if it only has single target attacks) should simply be an archer stack, since only one archer will die per turn. On the other hand if a high level unit has AoE, then maybe it shouldn't be beatable by low tier units generally, better to approach with a buffed tier3 1v1, say. There are so many ways to approach the problem with basic mechanics. Limiting production of high-tier units is still done best in AoW1 where city sizes are preset, so if you have a city producing dragons, most of the rest of your holdings is still stuck making archers and swordsmen. Hearing that there is an "imperium" cookie clicker resource mechanic is just another reason to never play this game. Instead of faggy "imperium" should've added a HoMM-style resource set like mercury, sulfur, gems, crystal. If gold and mana weren't enough. Maybe tier4s would pay upkeep to use their powerful attacks, then you would want to have mundane troop backup for non-crucial battles. SO MANY WAYS to handle this without whatever turbofaggotry "imperium" is. Stellaris is shit btw

 

[Norfleet]

The problem is that you don't have "A" high level unit, you have multiple, and you can't counter them with archer spam because of the arbitrary stack size limit, meaning you will not be able to outnumber the enemy with cheaper units.