Stardock's last chance... Elemental: Fallen Enchantress released

[Frogboy]

I sent over your comments to Derek to see what he thought.

I think you make many valid points. However, I think those same points can be made about virtually any strategy game out there. I've seen Civilization V skewered in a similar way and those points are often valid. But, taken as a whole, it boils down to whether those points mean the game is fun or not for that user.

I look at your comments and think "Yea, that's a good point, I think we should keep it in mind in the future." But where it becomes less convincing is when you try to insist that the game "sucks". As a commercial game developer, I can only measure the success of a game based on the reviews and the sales. Since FE's gotten good reviews and made millions of dollars then I have to think we did things right.

FE's success, however, doesn't mean your criticisms are invalid by any means. I think they should be kept in mind for future games and updates to the existing game.

 

[Misconnected]

But where it becomes less convincing is when you try to insist that the game "sucks".

Can't be arsed to re-read the entire thread, but I'm pretty sure I haven't said anywhere that FE, on the whole, "fucking sucks". FE is mediocre to crappy in a great many ways - it's buggy. The graphics are just as unimpressive as the art direction is strong. The soundscape is inoffensive. The systems design is a complete clusterfuck. The tech trees are a complete clusterfuck. The AI is a drooling moron. It is poorly documented. The GUI is fiddly, obscure and uninformative.

Even so, it's much more than the sum of its parts. If I thought FE "fucking sucked" I wouldn't have bothered writing more that. Nor played it enough to know to write all I have.

Moreover, I am not a commercial video game developer. I'm one of those so-called hardcore gamers. The kind that thinks Endless Space is an Endless Failure because there's essentially only 1 match strategy in the game. And also the kind that has almost certainly been critical for the success of games like Galactic Civilizations 2 and their developers.

I hope you do keep my criticisms in mind for the future "not-FE." As for FE, there's obviously pretty severe limits to what can be done at this point. It's not like you can redesign the systems from scratch at this point.

Finally, if you think I'm being harsh, try disregarding my language. Distant Worlds, at this point, my fav space 4X of all time. Easily. And my critique of that game has been just as strongly worded. The difference is there's far less wrong with DW, and even the wrong bits are mostly far less severely wrong.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

The soundscape is inoffensive.

i just remembered that the "bow firing" sound in fe is one of the "male main character being hit" in mount & blade.
weird.

 

[Frogboy]

<Snip>

I'm tempted to scan a picture of all the notes I took from our discussion. Suffice to say, your thoughts and opinions were very helpful.

Regarding the issue of "harshness", I'm a forum guy so no worries there. I'm the last person in the world to be sensitive about what other people write. ;-)

I think (or hope) you are able to see some of this discussion translated into future works.

I've seen people on various forums (including here) wonder why I spend time on various forums. And the reason is to engage in discussions like we've been having. We're out here in Michigan, not a lot of hard core gamers or developers around. The forums are the best place to find people who like the kinds of games we make but at the same time can find holes in the design.

For example, the starbaes in GalCiv? That idea came from forum users. They were't part of the original design. Similarly, in Legendary Heroes, there's a new "swarm" mechanic where lots of wimpy units can gang up on a single tough unit more effectively. That came from talking to people on Penny Arcade.

In our discussion here, I have come away with a better appreciation on the unintentional consequences of mechanics that multiply the benefit of other mechanics. While it's not as critical in a single player game, we have some multiplayer centric games in preproduction that the issues you bring up would be absolutely catastrophic in.

Anyway, very much enjoying this discussion. I do intend to try to spend more time on non-Stardock forums as time permits.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

New patch today and 66% off sale. Can't say as I'd really recommend buying it during the sale though since it sounds like Fallen Enchantress is going to be rendered obsolete once the spinoff hits.

Version 1.30 Changelog:


New Features:

• • Added the Majesty spell

• • Added 115 new unit designs for the AI to use (designs from Kongdej, thanks!)

Balance Updates:

• • Conclaves generate more Research but less Gold

• • Forts generate more Production but less Gold

• • Animal Husbandry gives +10 food per grain

• • Granary gives +35 food per grain instead of +25

• • Mill gives +4 production per material instead of +3

• • Slave Pen gives +4 production per material instead of +3

• • Labor Guild gives +6 production per material instead of +5

• • Refined Agriculture gives +10 food per grain instead of +5

• • Overhauled the tile yield system, in general the crappy tiles no longer show up, the good tiles do and are more varied (no more oceans of tile yields, instead you see 5-6 spots with different yields)

• • Increased the base production per material from 6 to 8

• • Towns people automatically destroy the Forge of the Overlord components when they're conquered to prevent them from falling into enemy hands

• • Champion Recruitment cost gets gradually more expensive based on the # of champions the player has

• • Tireless March can only be cast on one unit at a time

• • Blindness lowers the victims Accuracy by 25% instead of 50%

Fixes:

• • Fixed the quest that reduced the occupation unrest penalty (bonus: modders can now modify any elementaldef attr)

• • Fixed the Blood Season event

• • Fixed an issue that caused Deorcnysse to not have any production or food

• • Fixed Shadow World to be castable anywhere

• • Fixed an issue keeping the Confusion spell from showing up as a spell

• • Fixed a gamesave corruption issue

• • Fixed crashes

• • Fixed an issue that can cause bounding boxes to get offset (ie: you click on one tile/unit and it selects a different tile)

• • Fixed an issue keeping the Cloak of Thorns spell from working

• • Fixed the Strange Noises quest to correctly give the wolf pups

• • Fixed a hang issue (game goes not responding)

• • Fixed an issue not allowing players to settle in the Ruins of the Imperium wildland (and therfor be unable to conquer it)

• • Fixed the Loner trait

• • Fixed an issue causing plague stalker lairs to look like empty tiles (this is why many people thought the asaq wildland was broken, there were other goodie huts you needed to clear but there was literally nothing in the tile displaying them or icon indicating they were there)

AI:

• • AI is more aggressive about researching and completing the Spell of Making victory

• • AI more likely to value lumber improvements as production boosts

• • AI players now sell their loot to the item shop

• • Reduced AI valuing of various treaties to get rid of the "If you pay me 120 gildar I'll give you a trade agreement worth 1 gildar per turn" popups

• • AI is more likely to ask for peace in war based on larger strategic considerations (rather than a simple military might calculation)

• • AI is more likely to bribe a player (human or machine) to go after other players IF the other player already has poor relations

• • Modified AI relation weights

• • AI players will try to acquire mounted units more effectively on normal and higher difficulty level

• • Updated Diplomacy Relations system: Relations are no longer calculated. Instead, each turn, a player's opinion of another player is measured and then trickles into an overall bucket that results in relations slowly changing over time

• • AI interacts more with players

• • AI Sovereign does a better job of searching for a good place for its capital rather than relying on its starting tile

• • Only certain types of AI personalities will aggressively target the spell of making victory path

• • AI Sovereign and champions more insistant on having support units before going out into combat

• • AI is smarter about where and when it builds the various Forge of the Overlord components (more defensible)

• • Fixed glitch that caused the AI not to "see" certain tiles as being able to be settled on

• • Added 115 new unit designs for the AI to use (designs from Kongdej, thanks!)

UI:

• • We've add an indicator on the faction power panel when a player controls the towers for the spell of making victory (so players have an earlier indication that the AI is about to end the game)

• Lots of good typo and desc fixes from TBS Gamer (Thanks!)

 

[hoverdog]

New Features:

• • Added the Majesty spell

• • Added 115 new unit designs for the AI to use (designs from Kongdej, thanks!)

 

[DakaSha]

So how is the AI in this? Somebody besides fagboy please

 

[hoverdog]

So how is the AI in this? Somebody besides fagboy please

How did you like MoM's AI?

 

[DakaSha]

So how is the AI in this? Somebody besides fagboy please

How did you like MoM's AI?

It was horrible which is why I dont play that turd

 

[hoverdog]

So how is the AI in this? Somebody besides fagboy please

How did you like MoM's AI?

It was horrible

you have your answer then.

which is why I dont play that turd

 

[Metro]

Decided I'd just rather wait for a 50% off sale on the $40 standalone expansion + base game.

 

[Mraston]

Came here to ask if I should buy this on sale, seems like I would get a resounding "no".

 

[Misconnected]

I'm tempted to scan a picture of all the notes I took from our discussion.

It probably won't matter much doing it here, but doing something like it on your own forum might be a good idea. As approachable as SD is in general, it often feels like we're talking to a wall when it's stuff SD has asked for feedback on.

Came here to ask if I should buy this on sale, seems like I would get a resounding "no".

I'd say it depends on how desperate you are for a 4X fix. FE is, to put it politely, a very uneven game. But there is a lot of cool stuff in it and if you're fine with having the odds stacked against you rather than challenge through competent opposition, it absolutely can keep you busy for a very long time - FE's AI is a retarded puppy compared to Civ5, but FE's third highest difficulty is arguably harder than Civ's Deity difficulty. Just remember kiting is something little boys do at the park, not something 40yo virgins do in their mum's basement (aka Bows Break The Game).

 

[MicoSelva]

I've read the posts above but am still on the fence. Is it worth to spend 10 euro to get this? The -66% off lasts until March 1st. What is the Codex Consensus (TM) on this game?

 

[DakaSha]

That it sucks massive cock

 

[Ulminati]

Biggest Disappointment of 2012™

 

[MicoSelva]

Ok, I'll keep my euros then. Thanks.

 

[Tytus]

Ok, I'll keep my euros then. Thanks.

You mean your precious Jew gold, right?

 

[hoverdog]

Ok, I'll keep my euros then. Thanks.

You mean your precious Jew gold, right?

He means he will save his potato, to eat for winter.

 

[MicoSelva]

You mean your precious Jew gold, right?

He means he will save his potato, to eat for winter.

I mean whatever currency is accepted by stores selling board games because that's where all my excess money ends up recently.

 

[Frogboy]

I'm tempted to scan a picture of all the notes I took from our discussion.

It probably won't matter much doing it here, but doing something like it on your own forum might be a good idea. As approachable as SD is in general, it often feels like we're talking to a wall when it's stuff SD has asked for feedback on.

I think (hope) you are able to see some of the things we discussed pop into future titles. I talked at length to Derek and I'll be talking to Soren about this next week about it.

 

[Metro]

If you've played FE 1.3, you may have noticed some of the new features such as champion recruitment cost changes and the Majesty spell. These represent a true fork in the road in support between it and Legendary Heroes where champion recruitment is fame based and city growth based on food supply. The point being, as long as there's strong demand for FE updates, we plan to keep doing so (strong demand to be understood as not 1 guy on the forums 4 years ago demanding us to update it to support their holographic iWatch display but rather a significant number of people playing the game).

So FE will continue to evolve down its own road for the foreseeable future and Legendary Heroes will go down its path.

This makes absolutely no sense. Would be like 2K treating Gods and Kings and Civ 5 as two separate games. I took issue with the fact you're marketing LH as a standalone expansion especially since half or more of what it includes is little more than corrective work on flawed mechanics in the base game... but this? Man oh man...

What incentive do I have to buy Stardock games when you keep spinning them off into separate iterations versus treating them as a whole and improving existing mechanics versus charging for such services (with the possibility of no future support on the older iterations if insufficient amounts of people are playing it)?

 

[DakaSha]

If you've played FE 1.3, you may have noticed some of the new features such as champion recruitment cost changes and the Majesty spell. These represent a true fork in the road in support between it and Legendary Heroes where champion recruitment is fame based and city growth based on food supply. The point being, as long as there's strong demand for FE updates, we plan to keep doing so (strong demand to be understood as not 1 guy on the forums 4 years ago demanding us to update it to support their holographic iWatch display but rather a significant number of people playing the game).

So FE will continue to evolve down its own road for the foreseeable future and Legendary Heroes will go down its path.

This makes absolutely no sense. Would be like 2K treating Gods and Kings and Civ 5 as two separate games. I took issue with the fact you're marketing LH as a standalone expansion especially since half or more of what it includes is little more than corrective work on flawed mechanics in the base game... but this? Man oh man...

What incentive do I have to buy Stardock games when you are unable to make them fun and engaging?

Fixed for you

 

[Zed]

was given access to the beta of FE: legendary heroes.

I realized some of the things I miss from the game.
There should be a town screen. Even in Civ V, it feels like you "enter" a town when you open it. It doesn't have to be like in HoMM3, just make it more 'separate' from the World view.
Auto-resolve. Either it should indicate win% and potential losses, or removed from the game. Combat should be fun anyway -- no one should want to skip it. It should be more rewarding to fight stuff too. Exploring loot tiles is too rewarding in comparison.
I feel like the game would be better with either not having hero units at all, or having hero units be a requirement to lead an army (like HoMM).
Only heroes should be customizable. Having customizable factions just makes existing factions as interesting as nothing.
There should be a bigger focus on narrative. Have the game tell you about shit that happens in the game as you play. Say there's an opponent called Bajskorvmannen. "There are rumors of Bajskorvland researching new powerful magic!", "Bajskorvmannen's dynasty grows as a child is born!", "A traveling merchant visiting <our town> talks about Bajskorvmannen's new legendary item called <item name>", "Bajskorvmannen's hero <hero name> fell in battle against wild monsters!"

There's no story to it. Playing a game of Civ V, I meet new civs with their own agendas, interesting shit happens like a Civ suddenly going fucking nuts and declaring war on everybody, or a civ building a wonder, or someone founding a new religion. Stuff that affects all players and is told like a narrative.
This game will probably never be fun. You just sit in the dark and do boring shit until you've amassed enough shit to kill other shit.

Someone should make fall from heaven for Civ V, I want a fucking good fantasy civ-game. Warlock is pretty good but like FE it lacks a "narrative", a story told from all the random and AI elements.

oh and they added auto-turns, which is nice, but doesn't work every time. also the 'next turn' button is way too small. I don't play with a keyboard when I play tb strategy games.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Was generously donated Legendary Heroes by Ulminati (Thank you again bro ) so I'm fucking with LH now. Initial impressions are... It's exactly like Fallen Enchantress. Seriously, so far the changes are so minor I'm having a hard time giving a shit. I'll take some comparison shots between LH and FE to compare graphics in a bit but my gut feeling of not playing FE for a few months (Probably haven't played since version 1.1) is it's much the same.
Heroes joining due to "Fame" rating instead of you recruiting them manually from the world map also seems a bit questionable since heroes still have wages. For example my first city just reached level 2 and my whole empire is making 0.8 gold a turn. I was paying 0.5 gold a turn in unit wages, but as soon as I hit the fame threshold I had a hero forced upon me and now my wages are 1.5 and my income's still 0.8. Not a huge problem but in a normal game of FE I wouldn't have recruited a new hero so fast. Haven't played enough to comment on the non-randomized skill selection other than grunting that I don't like it in theory. Also sorta hope they make "Governors" (Now commanders) actually useful.

Commenting on Zed's issues, yeah the town stuff's not that great. The details button gives you a bit more information but all it is is an info dump.
Auto-resolve is weak, yeah. Only really seems worth it if you ridiculously overpower your enemy just to cut down on time.
Heroes are kind of a mess, yeah. Sorta feel like they could stand to be made more powerful but less numerous if you want to make heroes a bigger part of the game. Especially given a title like Legendary Heroes.
I'm fine with customizable factions, though I basically never use them. Which might explain why I'm fine with them.
Really agree with the news popups. Could also go hand in hand with trying to make the diplomacy more interesting, which I feel like it could use a shot in the arm of more personality.
And the auto turns seem to work if you repeat an order on a unit, say. IIRC that's how it worked in FE as well, I may be misremembering but I'm fairly sure it had the same feature. At least I immediately fell into the same pattern of repeating move orders to end turn instead of hitting enter or space or whatever the fuck key ends turn.

Edit: Had this show up. http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/864962886574059499/95913A09112F7E875A7606E6E474D0C62D32C523/

Edit 2: Played more. Does look like the AI was most likely improved during 1.2 or 1.3 at least on the strategic level. Going by empire scores at the moment all known AI players are a few points ahead of me. I'm also a bit out of my element and playing the lizard guys and going for wizard heroes instead of my usual smacking people with hammers so that might be contributing to it a bit but still.

Not sure how I feel about the rejiggered combat maps. Initiative seems even more important now which I'd say is a good thing, more likely for slow units to move every 2-3 moves for an enemy so speed's pretty important. Also not sure how I feel about the swarm mechanic. May not belong in a post talking about Legendary Heroes since I think it was added in 1.2 or 1.3 of FE but since I haven't played with it until now what the hell. Kinda makes heroes seem even MORE useless on the battlefield since groups of units already tend to do so much more damage, and on top of THAT now you can get swarms of groups of units which causes things to get out of hand really quickly.

That's all that's come to mind so far. Still feeling awfully Fallen Enchantress.