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Core gameplay goals not met

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Core gameplay goals not met

from Elemental Forums

First of all, I would like to say that War of Magic's main problem in my mind wasn't a gameplay concern, it was blandness. And that's fixed. Derek and Dan Stern have gotten that taken care of just fine.

 

But the main gameplay issues that Fallen Enchantress were supposed to fix remain.

The best unit is still the one that you pile all your best stuff on. Once your best stuff starts taking up too much encumbrance, stick a horse under them. This makes your units expensive, but a stack of them is the toughest thing around, no matter what.

Second issue is that champions are still not very important. Champions simply can't match the damage output of a group, and even as capitar, the gold costs are such that hiring a group of soldiers is easier than outfitting a champion. Now, Champions do last longer since they don't usually die, and thus will be better able to get to a higher level quickly. And early on, a dedicated melee champion can be pretty tough. But if a well equipped group gets through the first few levels, it won't die either and will be more effective in combat.

This means optimal strategy is the same as it was in WoM: Make a big stack of identical units with all your upgrades slapped on. Put a champion with them in a support role, with enhancing magic and abilities. But don't bother using tactical magic in most cases, it will turn the tide of a close battle but it isn't enough if you're totally outgunned and it's a pointless waste of mana if you'd win with no losses.

Monsters are very strong early on. I happened to spawn on a spit of land blocked off by trolls on each end and they were able to hem me in. The monsters from quests were also too much for just a couple champions. Later in the game, once some uberunits have been made, everything becomes easy again. A killer stack can wipe out just about anything. Although this could have been an issue with my random start, and not finding more powerful monsters later.

 

Now, the biggest problem: Tactical battle is not fun. I find myself auto-resolving battles even when they should be exciting. It still amounts to directing your units to go kill the enemy. There's a few little details where you make decisions, like who to kill first and how much mana it's worth expending in this battle (most of the time the answer is zero) but overall there's not much gameplay.

The worst part is, there's lots of things that can be done to fix this which have been suggested on the forums. Mostly they amount to making good tactical maps. Add elevation. Add impassable terrain, and terrain which blocks sight/targetting. Maybe add army facing, to allow for better maneuvering, but only if you can make a good interface and turning system.

Until features like this go in, tactical battles will continue to not be fun, and will only be used in situations where the auto resolve button would cheat the player out of something.

 

26,004 views 31 replies
Reply #26 from Elemental Forums Top

Well, you make some good points about things to put in tactical battles to make them sparkle with polished fun. I wouldn't say the current battles are boring. I find them immensely fun and we don't even have a good AI for them yet. 

Elevation seems like something that will easily be possible. The map is designed around having versatile terrain, so why couldn't there be a hill with a bonus to defense and accuracy?

Tiles do absolutely need bonuses and penalties. This is already a feature, just not used on any maps. 

Blocked terrain is somewhat present in the form of a wall on some maps, but we all probably would like to see some more uses of this feature. I am thinking of designing some tactical maps with a good example of what that means.

It has been decreed that there will be no LOS and no facing tactics. I find LOS useful, but not a deal breaker for combat. facing seems very complicated and not all that useful for my personal tastes. 

Some bonuses to units in a wall formation would be nice. Backstabbing would be sweet. That kind of thing might be possible, but we just don't have any evidence of the game knowing where the back of an enemy is, or for that matter, what units are adjacent. So much of that may be a pipe dream. 

So maybe as a group we should focus our collective voice about the ones that the devs may be considering. I am sure at the very least Derek would be willing to tell us no. More than I ever got from C&C4  :(O

Reply #27 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting seanw3, reply 26
Elevation seems like something that will easily be possible. The map is designed around having versatile terrain, so why couldn't there be a hill with a bonus to defense and accuracy?

Tiles do absolutely need bonuses and penalties. This is already a feature, just not used on any maps. 
End of seanw3's quote
I was not aware that this was a feature that already existed. In that case, making use of it is an obvious thing that needs to happen.

Blocked terrain is somewhat present in the form of a wall on some maps, but we all probably would like to see some more uses of this feature. I am thinking of designing some tactical maps with a good example of what that means.
End of quote
It doesn't normally come into play. We need circumstances where it matters.

It has been decreed that there will be no LOS and no facing tactics. I find LOS useful, but not a deal breaker for combat. facing seems very complicated and not all that useful for my personal tastes.
End of quote
Excluding LoS is a poor choice in my opinion, and it should be reconsidered. Facing can indeed be very difficult to implement in a satisfying way; as far as I'm aware only Warhammer Fantasy Battle and probably other similar games have in-depth thorough facing and turning rules, and that's a far more hardcore game than what Elemental.

Some bonuses to units in a wall formation would be nice. Backstabbing would be sweet. That kind of thing might be possible, but we just don't have any evidence of the game knowing where the back of an enemy is, or for that matter, what units are adjacent. So much of that may be a pipe dream.
End of quote
Formations should be recognized, sure. One thing we need is more of a flanking setup, which would inherently reward walls. Frogboy mentioned that there was such a thing, but I've not seen evidence of it in play. It needs to be made actually visible if it is in the current build. "Backstabbing" and any other sort of rear attack is impossible as long as there's no facing.

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Reply #28 from Elemental Forums Top

In WoM late beta we had tiles that would get attributes, like hills with +25%. If you can add defense percentages in this game, you can add pretty much anything. The parts I don't know about FE are how a tactical map is chosen. I know it picks one that is similar to your surroundings and can even give you a special one in wildlands.

I want to make a few mock ups of swamp with movement and defense penalties and the like. IMO you should note while playing that finding a tile with no bonus or penalty is much less common. Almost any tactical tile should add something to the game. It should end up being a dance between bonus tiles and penalties. 

Your opponents are wearing heavy armor? fight them in the swamp. 

Your opponents are going through a valley? Strike at them with archers from the hills. 

Your opponents are in the ruins of a city? Use your heavy troops to block any avenue of attack and pepper them with fireballs. 

Reply #29 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Sanati, reply 4

The more I play the more I see this isn't the case. People are just focusing on the champions because they are fun, and because they are focused on they are decently powerful.

A single 5 stack of spearmen in leather, with +str and +con talents and maybe some cheap magic rings will make level 10-12 champions look like a waste of time. Level them just a handful of times and they become unstoppable gods with hundreds of health and damage, all while using the lowest level equipment in the game. If you marked them as upgradeable though you can just make them exponentially more powerful with each tech upgrade.
End of Sanati's quote

 

I had a stack of champions that also included 2 units of spearmen in leather as my main force. The spearmen hit hard but are much more fragile than champions in my oppinion. Reason is that when they get hit they loose power (men) while a champion is the same to the end. And once my champions had mauls and or high crit chance they were hitting as hard or harder than the spearmen. Two of my champions also had the retaliate ability which is a huge bonus.

 

Also troops get absolutely murdered by monsters with the overpower ability.

Reply #30 from Elemental Forums Top

I was thinking of something : even without orientation you can add bonus from position.

 

Pincer attack : when a unit attack, check if there's another friendly unit on the opposite side. Reduce dodge

Movement hampered : when you enter a square that has 2 or more adjacent enemies, then you have to pay one more MP to quit the square

Shield wall : adjacent friendly units can benefit from each others in defence.

Evasion : instead of taking damage you can halve the damage but you have to get one square back from the attacking position (so you have to let empty squares behind your lines to retreat if needed)

Attacks of opportunity : when you're in close combat, and you want to disengage, all adjacent units will have a free attack (only one per unit per turn).

 

The ability to retreat instead of taking damage is really important, for me. Because you just can't attack blindly, you have to position yourself well to cut your enemy retreat lines.

Reply #31 from Elemental Forums Top


I have yet to get the beta (bought WOM 8/2010) but I support all of the ideas mentioned above that will improve/enhance tactical battles.  I don't play fantasy 4x tbs to build pretty cities... I want exciting battles where terrain and tactics can help a smaller force defeat a larger one.  Thanks for posting all of the good ideas!