Way too easy
Elemental Forums
Hi,
Full disclaimer: I want to love this game. I loved MoM, and have loved all of this games cultural influences, like HoMM (played them all, including the 1st King's Bounty), The Civ series (including the Fall from Heavan mod for Civ 4), most other Stardock games (MOO series, Sins, GC series etc). This is EXACTLY the kind of game I love.
I know this is beta, so I would like to share what I think makes this game somewhat unenjoyable at the moment.
It is WAY too easy. I have beaten it 4 times on the hardesst difficulty with unfun ease. I collect 4 heros in a pack, level them up on creeps that give way too much experience (and it seems they give more experience the more people you have in your party, which makes no sense to me), and just take city after city. The fireball spell pretty much wipes out any non-champion units on the map, and AI champions are so busy moving uselessly, or casting useless spells (like obscuring fog for 15 combat rounds in a row - never seen a fireball cast at me), to ever win the fight. Heroes need some serious balancing, in terms of the experience they gain from fighting monsters, the rate at which they level (should be way more exponential), and the skills they are allowed to accumulate.
City building is tedious and irritating. It adds nothing to the game except graphics you can't eve see unless you zoom right in. Why does nothing cost anything? I get that production determines how many turns it takes to build things (aka Civ), but should they not cost resources as well, or at least maintenance? That would make building things a meaningful excersise, instead of just spamming every building in every city because why not. Cities should be 1 tile, maybe increasing in size as they increase in level, and buildings should be much more expensive, forcing specialization.
What the hell is with caravans? In one game, I had 18 cities. This becomes a spreadsheet problem in large empires. Probably the least fun thing currently in the game.
The UI needs some adjustments. The trade/equipment screens should be merged. There should be some indication of the route units will take to their destinations (ie HoMM series), and units should have movement points clearly visible so you know who you still need to move. There should also be an automove funtion for all units with preselected paths. If a unit can reach an enemy in combat, it should be able to use abilities with a range of one, instead of having to move next to it first. I will add more here as I remember them.
The tech tree is rediculous. I have never come close to researching the whole thing. I have never even needed military techs, as my champions are all the firepower I need. However, if I DID need actual units, it takes several hundred turns to get even semi-decent troups - especially considering I would have avoided civic techs which speed up research in favour of military ones.
Heroes should die like in HoMM, with an option to flee or surrender.
Resouces don't really seem to matter. In Civ, controlling a strategic resource like copper or iron would completely alter the way you played. It forced strategic placement of cities, tech choices, and added a layer of strategy and competition that you could not plan for before the game began. This is needed to make the whole concept of map based resources fun. Resources in FE are much less dramatic, and often unnecessary. Outposts are also bland, and should (1) cost upkeep so I dont cover the map with them and (2) have upgrade paths for deeper strategic immersion.
This is a great start, but lots needs to be done to make this game great.
