As was posted earlier the human alternative would be to focus on techs like entertainment (so population growing faster means more troops can be trained) or warfare (training for tougher units), equipment (better armor and weapons), or logistics (for group unit training). remember he was only able to go through the diplomacy tree and get the spiders because 1) there was a spider nest in/near his area of control (hmm not sure now if diplomacy simply allowed him to build these in his city or if he need the resource i.e. spiders nest in area of control but leaving statement in until clarified) and 2) he choose to go after the the spiders over the other possibilities.. he could have also been studying magic going for more summons but did not choose to .. at least not yet that i have seen heh heh...

I hope / would like to see neutral recruit-able creatures (for example, the spiders) but also some kingdom / empire unique ones - just to spice things up .

I'm concerned with all games turning out in a similar fashion to the one above. I mean, there's seems to be nothing like nature books or anything separating one individual from summoning a bear over another, and there's nothing separating people from all calling upon the help of spiders. Of course, I can't be certain as I haven't even been able to participate in the the beta for at least the last 4 months due to CTD errors. I suppose I'll have to wait for the game, but this play through isn't making me feel any better. It just isn't as engaging as the GalCiv II AARs were..... and it saddens me just a tad. 

"Brilliance" has a duration of indefinite - which means without definition, so it could be 1 turn or 100 turns. 

Is it meant to be Infinite, or a random duration spell?

It means that it lasts until you decide to cancel it.

as was mentioned it lasts as long as you want it to however it takes one of your Sovereigns enchantment slots.. the number of  slots available are the limiting factor on these spells...

How do you find out how many enchantment slots you have?  I have tried to find it in the beta 4, but have yet to see how many I can have.  I also have been wondering if there is a way to increase it.

Good question I can see my currently cast spells under the enchants tab but I do not see a limit used to be x number of boxes I assumed that was the limit but now that I think of it I do not know if that was it or not LOL.... any one else got info in this?

My goodness, man!
This is evil, sheer evil!

But so, so good.

Finish it! Finish it all! Tomorrow!
Wake up early and do nothing else!
I want a full AAR on my desk tomorrow night, detective!


I squirm in anticipation of this game!
Teasing me with this stuff...you know how to get to me.


EXCLAMATION MARK

Well there's still the issue that your initial pop is going to be low, unless you went for some pop raising tech, but then you also need some warfare tech(s)...  Spiders, along with summons, appear, so far, to be easier to get, and the bear at least, vastly more powerful than any early game unit.  Summons are limited to an extent by mana and essense, though they just seem a complete no brainier to me.  Every play through I've seen so far has had almost no built units worth much of anything, while they all have had summons.  I understand that the development of the game seems to have shifted away from 'big armies' into small groups of specialize units, and that's not really what I wanted to see.  So 'big armies' might come into play 'late game' but if the other tech trees are superior early game, then what's the impetus to go down the warfare tree to allow you to make the big armies, when you simply won't have the population to fill them anyway?

So my question stands, where is the balance?  It might be there, none of us know, none of us are playing the version Brad is, which is why I'd like his opinion.  I went through this with GalCiv2, it's not as though there isn't precedent for me with the game not quite being where I want it to be balance wise upon release, or even a fair bit after.  I had better hopes for Elemental, but frankly, I've not seen much to bolster them lately.

I am still confused why there is no Wisdom stat on the character sheet. It seems Wisdom is replaced by Essence, but at the character creation you have a Wisdom stat.

Maul: In my opinion "The attack inflicts normal damage and the enemy unit looses its next turn" sounds better

Great Stuff. Not as long as yesterday's, but still good.

Or the unit can just loose its stool.

I only hope the early game will provide enough options so that we won't be forced to take the same development path again and again.

I wonder how the character stats will affect his powers and if there is indeed some balance between stats so that putting points into charisma for example would be of any benefice. I would really hate to find myself in a game where all you have to do is to pump up only one or two stats.

Yep, after i saw the character sheet in the first gameplay preview with a charisma stat of 9 i thought the same.

I hope the unit brought clean pants?

I too am a bit anxious about the balancing and variety to be had within the game, but I don't see much to worry about based on this.  So far Verga hasn't shown up yet, and he has actual soldiers.  Plus, Brad is role-playing with his character, choosing perhaps not the best techs or even building efficiently.  One thing I hope to see, though, is a good variety of play not just divided by faction specific techs, but by particular AI personalities, if not now, then in future updates/expansions/mods.

Can't wait to have some of my own adventures.

I actually was sad to see 8 attack, 2 defense on the unit stat. Armor is so much more expensive than weapons, but vastly underpowered compared to them. Combat is still going to end up in one-hit-kills unit trades with stats like these

By the way...

From reading the description of Unlikely Friends, and looking back at the initial city location (though I cannot say this for sure), it appears that gaining that tech allows the player to build the spider nests, not that they have to have the spider resource available to do so.

This would be different from weapons/armor techs again, where it seems you do have to have access to certain resources to produce certain items.  Of course spiders may be wimpy, or I may be wrong about the resources.

So again...

What is the balance here?  Because I assume it exists, I just haven't seen it yet.

That sentence seems to indicate the Research (Unlikely Friends) adds the Spiders to the Map such that they can be recruited. Similar to how Quest operate.

Although I am not sure why selecting the Nest proper would show the Build/Construct icon under "Actions" as it does?

But after reading this from FB, I will obviously be chronicling my first Kingdoms (The Hughonians(tm))  growth, conquests and eventual rise to become the ultimate power in the land.  LOL 

Perhaps if Brad has not gone exploring, he would not have ended up meeting the Empire of Yithril and, as such, early soldiers would not have been needed.  Then again, this is on a smaller map. where early conflict always occurs in similar games.  I imagine on larger maps there will be more time to develop and the player will have delved deeper into certain tech trees, allowing for greater strategic choices.

Ultimately, the best players will be able to respond to threats using the least amount of resources.

and in a variety of differing ways... even in beta 4 there are several way to get faster troops.. I usually start making peasants on turn 2 to slow population growth while i build my housing... so as not to have a turn or two, stuck at max population.. these usually suffice as early troops when backed up by Sovereign and/or summoned help.. not to mention if a few heroes wander by while I have the extra gold heh heh.. again multiple paths to same goal..

Not to say the Lead Designer is doing it wrong but his City Build List and Research Path, given the early enemy neighbors piss poor attitude, leaves something to be desired.

As Twohawks so aptly mentioned. There are many paths, even under the Beta, with which to proceed.

One has to assume that Brad is wanting to show some aspect of all areas, Magic, Research, Questing, sprinkled with Adventuring and Diplomacy, all under 40 turns. He has done that well, but he may have some Defensive issues if the neighbor, who has obviously gone straight up Warfare, gets friskier sooner than later...

Why is the attack so much more than defense in the combat? Isnt this going to cause issues on whoever hits first, wins?

Yes Looks like they didn't revisit this stat balance from beta, though a lot of us pushed for more equalizing of attack and defense. Maybe in the day0 update, but I don't know.