Age of Wonders 4

[Johannes]

Is that more of a thing for Sorcerers and whoever else could summon t4's? Even if that works, you're still buying gold troops from cities on top of that, so lower tier units are not made redundant regardless.

In theory no, but in practice yes. The more and the faster you churn out T4s the better.

How is/was MP usually played in AoW3? 1v1ss, ffa's, how big maps/other settings?

From what I remember lower tier units weren't so bad vs the higher tiers at combat effectiveness per cost, especially when you had a combination of both, the lowliest unit could serve a purpose if it tanked a hit for someone else, set up flanking etc.

Though the logistics of getting spread out, slower units to position on the strategic map could be a pain. Aiming for a simple doomstack of t4's is a simple way to play also, so not surprised many would gravitate towards that even if its not optimal.

 

[Gangrelrumbler]

Why the fuck is everything so dark on these character select screens? It's called Age of Wonders, not Age of Darkness.

 

[Johannes]

Btw one of the weirdest things in AoW3 was that the big draw was the customization of your empire, race / class / magic specializations. But in the campaigns and scenarios, you were not allowed to do that at all. That mismatch made me skip the campaigns mostly.

 

[Lacrymas]

How is/was MP usually played in AoW3? 1v1ss, ffa's, how big maps/other settings?

It depends on what you mean by "usually". Iirc, tournaments were 1v1 on an 8 player map.

 

[Reality]

In PBEM there are no t4 snd games will end turn 20-35

but Im a live MP game where you have to autoredolve all independents you can't be as aggressive site and level up your starting stack along the way to opponetd capitol.

T4 research finishes around turn 32 and largely because of low price of settlers you can certainly afford a stack of them and 2 stacks of racial T3 for your first serious fight with opponrt around turn 45. If game goes longer (2v2 or FFA) this will become 3 stacks of t4 by turn 70

 

[Raghar]

Does armor now reduce by a percentage instead of absolute value as in AoW3? And does AoW4 reintroduce hit chances?

I think melee is always gonna hit, not sure where I read that though.

This is true and it's a holdover from PF. It's a subtle way to make melee more viable.

So its going to be like Planetfall. And damage taken is damage*0.9**armor? My initial impression with Planetfall's combat was not so good, but I haven't spent enough time with it yet, especially compared to my hours with AoW3. I don't think that ranged is too powerful there, but resistance clearly had an edge over physical armor, due to blocking much more damage types and effects and way how flanking works. Overall, I would have liked a return of AoW3 combat mechanics with some tweaks.

Frankly armor reducing damage to 0.9^n is quite bad idea.
For example Eador used a simple (a - b) > 0 = (a-b) damage equation which worked flawlessly. Eador even has stamina, and losing stamina drastically lowers attack. Becoming exhausted makes nearly everything a sitting duck.

It's simple system that don't have to handle irregularities in floating point calculations.

Ghost: Armor - 20.
Minotaur: Weapon strength - 23.
Average damage per turn - 3. (Which means minotaur squad would spend a lot of valuable time by not murdering everything in sight.)

Another somewhat sensible system is used by WH40 tabletop, where player is rolling if the attack penetrated armor. Some attacks are armor piercing which subtracts from armor roll. That's also decent system.

Behemoth: Armor - 10
Total brutal cannon AP at -6, damage after penetration 1D3.
The Behemoth has drastically smaller chance to resist attack, and if the attack penetrates the victim can lose a lot more HP than from that fluffy anti tank weapon used by infantry.

Both systems allows fate of combat to hang on a thread. The Planetfall system had a simple solution: "You face tank that has armor 10, spam 3x more anti infantry weapons against the tank."

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Eador is just

 

[Suicidal]

In single you can do anything, and have fun of course, since AI isn't very good in these games and also can be cheesed very easily. In multiplayer tech-rushing for t4 and making balls of them is very much a thing.

Ever since they introduced the race+class system in AoW3 I was hoping they would improve upon this system and add something like class+race specific buildings or units for each combination. Planetfall took baby steps in that direction by having unit upgrades and you could do interesting things with different race + tech combos but it still wasn't quite there.

?? Literally all PF did was switch focus to race vs class, whereas in AoW3 it was the other way round. AoW3 also had way more permutations, because apart from race and class you also chose perks. And they had not only spells, but also upgrades and units. Then they added race xp on top of that. Which is yet another cool and huge thing that went awol in PF for some inexplicable reason, replaced with precisely nothing. And I'm willing to bey my left bollock that it will be absent in AoW4 as well, especially with all this "race is only cosmetics" talk.

In AoW3 there was next to 0 difference between picking, for example, human dreadnought or elf dreadnought or goblin dreadnought - past the initial part of the game all 3 would start spamming the dreadnought-specific units anyway and the only differences between these units would be the racial modifiers on the infantry units of the class. But there was a lot of difference between a dreadnought and a sorcerer or a druid or a warlord.

In PF there were a lot more differences between different races, but also non-trivial differences between the same race picking a different starting tech. Playing vanguard celestian would feel quite different from playing assembly celestian, but also playing vanguard celestian would differ from a vanguard promethean or voidtech because you'd use unique upgrades from those tech trees to modify your units. Sure not all of the combinations are effective or synergistic, but when you're playing single player against dumb bots, trying weird shit is more fun than using effective shit.

 

[octavius]

I've been angry and disappointed when I think about what could have been.

Age of Wonders in a nutshell. But I still love AoW and SM (haven't tried 3).

 

[Edgetard]

In single you can do anything, and have fun of course, since AI isn't very good in these games and also can be cheesed very easily. In multiplayer tech-rushing for t4 and making balls of them is very much a thing.

Ever since they introduced the race+class system in AoW3 I was hoping they would improve upon this system and add something like class+race specific buildings or units for each combination. Planetfall took baby steps in that direction by having unit upgrades and you could do interesting things with different race + tech combos but it still wasn't quite there.

?? Literally all PF did was switch focus to race vs class, whereas in AoW3 it was the other way round. AoW3 also had way more permutations, because apart from race and class you also chose perks. And they had not only spells, but also upgrades and units. Then they added race xp on top of that. Which is yet another cool and huge thing that went awol in PF for some inexplicable reason, replaced with precisely nothing. And I'm willing to bey my left bollock that it will be absent in AoW4 as well, especially with all this "race is only cosmetics" talk.

In AoW3 there was next to 0 difference between picking, for example, human dreadnought or elf dreadnought or goblin dreadnought - past the initial part of the game all 3 would start spamming the dreadnought-specific units anyway and the only differences between these units would be the racial modifiers on the infantry units of the class. But there was a lot of difference between a dreadnought and a sorcerer or a druid or a warlord.

In PF there were a lot more differences between different races, but also non-trivial differences between the same race picking a different starting tech. Playing vanguard celestian would feel quite different from playing assembly celestian, but also playing vanguard celestian would differ from a vanguard promethean or voidtech because you'd use unique upgrades from those tech trees to modify your units. Sure not all of the combinations are effective or synergistic, but when you're playing single player against dumb bots, trying weird shit is more fun than using effective shit.

Hopefully we will get more of the later then the former, but this galactic civilizations all custom races shit has me doubtful

 

[Lacrymas]

In single you can do anything, and have fun of course, since AI isn't very good in these games and also can be cheesed very easily. In multiplayer tech-rushing for t4 and making balls of them is very much a thing.

Ever since they introduced the race+class system in AoW3 I was hoping they would improve upon this system and add something like class+race specific buildings or units for each combination. Planetfall took baby steps in that direction by having unit upgrades and you could do interesting things with different race + tech combos but it still wasn't quite there.

?? Literally all PF did was switch focus to race vs class, whereas in AoW3 it was the other way round. AoW3 also had way more permutations, because apart from race and class you also chose perks. And they had not only spells, but also upgrades and units. Then they added race xp on top of that. Which is yet another cool and huge thing that went awol in PF for some inexplicable reason, replaced with precisely nothing. And I'm willing to bey my left bollock that it will be absent in AoW4 as well, especially with all this "race is only cosmetics" talk.

In AoW3 there was next to 0 difference between picking, for example, human dreadnought or elf dreadnought or goblin dreadnought - past the initial part of the game all 3 would start spamming the dreadnought-specific units anyway and the only differences between these units would be the racial modifiers on the infantry units of the class. But there was a lot of difference between a dreadnought and a sorcerer or a druid or a warlord.

In PF there were a lot more differences between different races, but also non-trivial differences between the same race picking a different starting tech. Playing vanguard celestian would feel quite different from playing assembly celestian, but also playing vanguard celestian would differ from a vanguard promethean or voidtech because you'd use unique upgrades from those tech trees to modify your units. Sure not all of the combinations are effective or synergistic, but when you're playing single player against dumb bots, trying weird shit is more fun than using effective shit.

PF exchanged class for race, but didn't think to give us anything that would compensate for racial governance or the mangled hero inventories. And I don't know how well the secret techs do compared to the specializations. There are certainly less techs than specializations and you can't freely combine techs like you could with the specializations. As for race/class combos in AoW3 - there are differences even without taking racial governance into consideration, some classes worked the best with certain races. Orc Theocrat for example. I think halfling Warlord as well iirc. There were some very bad combinations too, depending on your enemies. Goblin Theocrat was notoriously weak against a Dreadnaught because machines were immune to both their primary damage sources, poison and spirit.

 

[Suicidal]

In single you can do anything, and have fun of course, since AI isn't very good in these games and also can be cheesed very easily. In multiplayer tech-rushing for t4 and making balls of them is very much a thing.

Ever since they introduced the race+class system in AoW3 I was hoping they would improve upon this system and add something like class+race specific buildings or units for each combination. Planetfall took baby steps in that direction by having unit upgrades and you could do interesting things with different race + tech combos but it still wasn't quite there.

?? Literally all PF did was switch focus to race vs class, whereas in AoW3 it was the other way round. AoW3 also had way more permutations, because apart from race and class you also chose perks. And they had not only spells, but also upgrades and units. Then they added race xp on top of that. Which is yet another cool and huge thing that went awol in PF for some inexplicable reason, replaced with precisely nothing. And I'm willing to bey my left bollock that it will be absent in AoW4 as well, especially with all this "race is only cosmetics" talk.

In AoW3 there was next to 0 difference between picking, for example, human dreadnought or elf dreadnought or goblin dreadnought - past the initial part of the game all 3 would start spamming the dreadnought-specific units anyway and the only differences between these units would be the racial modifiers on the infantry units of the class. But there was a lot of difference between a dreadnought and a sorcerer or a druid or a warlord.

In PF there were a lot more differences between different races, but also non-trivial differences between the same race picking a different starting tech. Playing vanguard celestian would feel quite different from playing assembly celestian, but also playing vanguard celestian would differ from a vanguard promethean or voidtech because you'd use unique upgrades from those tech trees to modify your units. Sure not all of the combinations are effective or synergistic, but when you're playing single player against dumb bots, trying weird shit is more fun than using effective shit.

PF exchanged class for race, but didn't think to give us anything that would compensate for racial governance or the mangled hero inventories. And I don't know how well the secret techs do compared to the specializations. There are certainly less techs than specializations and you can't freely combine techs like you could with the specializations. As for race/class combos in AoW3 - there are differences even without taking racial governance into consideration, some classes worked the best with certain races. Orc Theocrat for example. I think halfling Warlord as well iirc. There were some very bad combinations too, depending on your enemies. Goblin Theocrat was notoriously weak against a Dreadnaught because machines were immune to both their primary damage sources, poison and spirit.

It's been a while since I've played AoW 3 but was racial governance that big a deal? It gave you like 5 choices during the course of a match that usually amounted to "a minor upgrade to one of your units vs. a minor economy upgrade". I don't remember it being all that impactful or interesting.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

As compared to what impactful or interesting choices in PF? Also, it was anything but minor and a very good addition to many race-class-perk combos.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Is that more of a thing for Sorcerers and whoever else could summon t4's? Even if that works, you're still buying gold troops from cities on top of that, so lower tier units are not made redundant regardless.

It's a thing for everyone, it's just that sorcerer/druid makes the logistics easier. When playing a "serious game" of AoW3, race units are hugely meh so when blowing through research to get the class ones, beelining for the best stuff asap is more often than not the right choice. You also have to factor in how the economy works in this game. It is very much possible to create a city that can churn out t4 every turn. Once that happens... yeah.

I don't see this as some huge problem tbh. I got lots of mileage from all kinds of units in my games and think the fact that t3-4 actually comes into play, often quite early, is better than the "fix" they did in PF, where on standard pace you usually have to literally skip dozens of turns and delay your victory to see t4 at all.

 

[BING XI LAO]

So, the game in the series with most racial diversity is still the very first entry, with its Lizardmen ruling the waves. Honourable mention to pre-patch AoW2's draconian heroes with their flying.

I was kind of hype about this game, never played aow3/planetfall because the gameplay mechanics weren't good enough to make up for utterly shitbad artstyle. Thought that maybe AoW4 would be good enough, albeit more of the same, to make up for the weak points. But this racial design thing... utterly sad. Race doesn't even exist as a mechanic if there's nothing immutable to it. Is it really the case that the frogmen don't even have an immutable advantage on water? I don't know how one might best describe this approach to design. Imagine reducing "races" to arbitrarily recombined pairs of of Civ-esque bonuses.

Modders will unironically fix race design since that's just assigning traits to units. But this attitude suggests the game as a whole is creatively bankrupt, and will be nothing more than an upgraded AoW3. No repulsion of incline, merely a more polished form of decline.

It's things like the shitbad garbage restrictions on spellcasting that are unfixable by modders (unless?). In Master of Magic even some units had spellcasting. In AoW1 you can have heroes running around completely alone anywhere on the map casting spells independently. They could've made units able to use the Spellcasting ability but they just didn't. Then in AoW2, most spellcasting was restricted to the Wizard, a completely fucktarded decision. Heroes could only do battlefield casting - so if you wanted to heal or cast and enchantment with a hero ,you had to find a battle for them to join to cast it :death-claw: And then in AoW3, no more enchantments, because figuring out how to balance enchantments with things like scaling mana upkeep penalty from stacking enchants on the same unit - too hard.... just remove the mechanic. Dickheads. DECADES of gradual, inexorable decline seen in this one mechanic. The only solution is killing normies, especially the civ 5 players that somehow ruined the entire fantasy strategy genre.

Except dom5 of course. Why does dom5 have better wound/stamina systems than most tactical games and rpgs lol? Blinkered-vision dogshit everywhere.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

In AoW3 there was next to 0 difference between picking, for example, human dreadnought or elf dreadnought or goblin dreadnought

Well, no, because AoW3 actually has multiple mechanics and systems that go beyond race and class choice whereas in PF that's all there is, because all the AoW3 incline is either completely gutted or just plain gone. Both games have exactly the same approach of certain class units being different depending on the race (which is cool). Like I said, the main difference is that AoW3 puts a very strong focus on the class, while in PF it's the race.

I have voiced my opinion on the mod system a lot of times (tldr: nice idea, mediocre execution, the reality of how the game plays turns it into largely meaningless theorycrafting), but the main issue I have is that despite there just being choice of race and class, there's very little interesting combos in PF. The class is often literally obsolete and something like hereditor, for example, was just "spam only hereditor units... or don't", cause it synced with literally nothing before the final dlc race arrived. There are multiples examples of classes giving almost fuck all to certain races and for the rest it's usually just "yeah, having some units/mods that share dmg channel might be good". Mindblowing. I know there are some exceptions to this, like my favorite syndicate+promethean, but they're far and few between.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

I was kind of hype about this game, never played aow3/planetfall because the gameplay mechanics weren't good enough to make up for utterly shitbad artstyle.

I't not like I'm hoping to convince you, but AoW3 is very much worth playing and stomaching the, admittedly very bad, artstyle. It has a lot of objective decline from previous entries, but also lots of incline. The combat is great, all the combos of races/units/skills/spells/perks/yada yada rival any crpg out there and a lot of the changes to strategic layer ain't bad, either. If you're basing your impressions on the vanilla game then it is important to underline that the game has improved immensely with the dlc.

 

[Johannes]

Is that more of a thing for Sorcerers and whoever else could summon t4's? Even if that works, you're still buying gold troops from cities on top of that, so lower tier units are not made redundant regardless.

It's a thing for everyone, it's just that sorcerer/druid makes the logistics easier. When playing a "serious game" of AoW3, race units are hugely meh so when blowing through research to get the class ones, beelining for the best stuff asap is more often than not the right choice. You also have to factor in how the economy works in this game. It is very much possible to create a city that can churn out t4 every turn. Once that happens... yeah.

I don't see this as some huge problem tbh. I got lots of mileage from all kinds of units in my games and think the fact that t3-4 actually comes into play, often quite early, is better than the "fix" they did in PF, where on standard pace you usually have to literally skip dozens of turns and delay your victory to see t4 at all.

I guess it's mostly down to the map size and settings, how much it makes sense to rush t4 tech or something else. The most powerful units are obviously the optimal way to compose a main army when you've got a limited number of units you can field, just a question of when you get them, when can you get full armies of them, how much you can afford to invest into longer term investments like that early, and when you start getting them, what role lower tier stuff still plays.

There's still more to the game than what your main stack is, less costly armies raiding around can still fuck shit up when the main stack isnt in position to fend them off. Though you'd generally want more mobility for that than the basic recruits have.

I doubt the game was played seriously for long enough to really flesh out the top strategies either, even for a specific map/game setting. Not that I can claim to know the optimum way to play either, of course.

 

[Gaznak]

reducing "races" to arbitrarily recombined pairs of of Civ-esque bonuses.

It's just because the very concept of "race" has been banned now from public discourse. There is no more "races", everyone is just a set of (changeable) traits, like citizenship, living location, form of nose and tits, 'gender' and so on.
After all, they are Dutch guys working for Swedish Paradox, it's like being the shining spearhead of 'progress'. How could the shining spearhead be stained with such mesozoic ugly rusty spots as "race" concept?

 

[octavius]

They could still have different races and racial traits, by just using the word "species" instead, and still stay PC.

 

[Lacrymas]

Yes, I also think it's because of trying to be PC. Failing miserably at that too.

 

[<3sRichardSimmons]

"Each subsequent AoW has added gameplay depth"

And yet the first game is still the best.

 

[Ryzer]

"Each subsequent AoW has added gameplay depth"

And yet the first game is still the best.

They didn't mention the quality of said depth.

 

[Lacrymas]

"Each subsequent AoW has added gameplay depth"

Depth as in discovering never-before-seen lows.

 

[octavius]

"Each subsequent AoW has added gameplay depth"

And yet the first game is still the best.

I think I'll rate Shadow Magic a bit higher, altought I actually enjoy AoW more now than I did fifteen years ago.
But there's certainly lots of great user-made maps for the first game (and SM for that matter)!