[.915] Simple Suggestions (I think)

+1

Except, please stop using realism and start using what feels right in the game as an explanation, might just be me, thought I still agree in the point, it would be way cooler to find the spear in a dead bear carcass

Also, season to week or month... define a "season" within a fantasy world with alternate rules for magic and dragons and hobbits.... ...  Probably could use a new name though, most games use "turn" to avoid people feeling like this.

PS Thank you for spacing out stuff and keeping them short, makes it alot easier to read.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

I disagree with turning the initiative queue upside down. Players have been trained to look at the bottom of their screens (look at AoW, MoM, HoMM, Diablo, etc), thats where they expect important info.

Meaby try figuring out some UI to help simplify this feature, something like the pictures getting larger the closer they are to having turns.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

I agree with Umbral I would not enjoy having to look to the top of the screen for initiative queue aswell as down bottom where the spell list is, but along this line I think the Hiergamenon button should be able to be activated by hitting F1 like many other games help/info screens aswell as be located at top left instead of right to match keyboard location of F1 button, if you get me..

Wargs are faster than horses but horses can carry more, warhorses carry even more than normal horses, boar and lizard creatures both carry more and can move faster than horses.

horses lets you avoid a -2 penalty from load, wargs gives +2 initiative, on average wargs are better cause the always gives a bonus, horses will make you carry more stuff if you are on or near the Maximum!

I would still wish for more mounts and bigger differences

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

How about Wargs scare horses, giving an attack/defense penalty for a few turns when attacking a mounted unit?

Other ideas could be making horses move faster on the strategic map than wargs (I think they should be equal in combat). Giving wargs a howl ability to unsettle nearby enemies, or giving them a melee attack bonus of +2 attack or something. 

I agree with these changes, except for the initiative queue. All of the other important information is on the bottom, and that seems to be the norm for most games. It is also very intuitive: remove the last person who went, and the rest fall down to fill in the space.

Very good post overall. I agree with much of what you said.

The above point, however... Initiative is VERY powerful. I agree that how exactly weight and initiative interact in terms of gear could be changed a bit. I am a proponent of the "only magic GIVES you initiative, and the only thing that takes it away is weight" conceptual build for the system, as you can be quick and get bonuses to initiative, but it is not the fact that you are swinging a hammer that is making you slower, its the fact that the hammer is heavy, and to have the hammer be both heavy and making you artificially slow is a bit strange.

That said, I think initiative bonuses are just fine as they are. It is already WAY too easy to get 30+ initiative with a good sword and the right skills and spells, which allows the character to act nearly twice as often as everyone else. Sometimes three times if they are fighting plate wearing units.

Mounts need sexing up to be sure. Giving horses a charge bonus if the rider has a spear and the warg a 'Savage Leap' ability (or just an attack after the rider does) might make this more flavourful. Also, there is no disadvantage at all to having a horse as far as I can see, and I'm not sure why they get a +12 to ranged avoidence- They are a larger target so +5 seems more reasonable. Fortify shouldn't work for them and spears should get a + attack against mounted units.

I'd prefer a special "lance" category of weapon that could only be equipped when mounted. That would make it clearer than some bonus hidden for spears that was hidden away in the text somewhere.

Oh, and armoured versions of mounts that increased defence.

*Tooltips (that display on loading screens) longer than 2 concise sentences in length are most likely wasted information, since no one has time to read and digest lengthy help/instructions in the time it is visible (roughly 2 or 3 secs, though my SSD storage device might affect that a bit).  Think short and helpful, like newspaper headlines.

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Agreed. Short and to the point on loading screen. Tip on tatics, strategy, RPG, perhaps comments the different factions. Anything to give you a better understand on how to play the game.

*Tutorial vids are a nice touch, good hand-holding for the beginner.  Anyone who needs the vid might be confused when it simply stops.  I suggest putting a "Replay" and "Exit" option on the screen, ala YouTube style to make it more clear that the time to stop watching and start playing has come.

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I've never used a tutorial for a game in my life. Diving right in brings out some interesting and hard learned lessons. That said, many appriciate a tutorial and improving this aspect will definately go a long way to attracting others to this game.

*There is no explanation of "Prestige" in the Hiergamenon.  It's not an intuitive concept, especially when encountered on a building tooltip that simply says it adds to that stat.  Consider an info page for it under the Game Concepts section.

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I'm sure FE will update their Hiergamenon as the game comes to flourision. With so much time put into the fantatic detail of this game, it would be a shame if they didn't mirror that in the descriptions.

*I suggest replacing "seasons" with "weeks" or "months" to make your builders seem less lazy/retarded/stoned.

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I happen to really like the term 'seasons'. Gives me a bit of a sense of the passing of time in a fantasy setting.  

*So, my guy was roaming around and found a random spear in a case on the ground.  Consider making it more realistic/in line with the other goodie hut texts (such as having it stuck in some bear's skeleton).

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I was kinda hoping that quests like this would generate larger quests. Perhaps there is some marking on the spear that leads you to another point? You get to use the spear in the meantime, but eventually you give the spear to the rightful owner who rewards you with something better? Maybe even rewards you with information of yet a larger quest to come?

*Any reason you cannot switch the build order in the town's queue?  Would sure be handy (and in line with similar games) when faced with the alternative of losing progress on one item to build another (unless there is an non-intuitive way to already do this?).

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I like the fact that you lose your production if you change your mind. 4x is about decision making and living with the consequences of your decisions.
 

*On certain tactical maps, there is some kind of bird or winged gremlin moving around the bottom right corner of the default view.  It adds nothing but distraction (and you ought not to assume players will scroll the screen down), so consider changing its flight path.

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No comment. Haven't seen it or it hasn't distracted me.

*Also, most humans on this planet view items from top-to-bottom as a natural orientation, so the initiative queue in tactical is mighty confusing until you realize that world is upside down!  In all seriousness, consider revamping or at least mentioning the orientation in the tutorial vid.

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lol. True. I was confused about this as well at first. Perhaps consider making smoother animations of the portrait icons sliding in a downwards motion to indicate the direction of initiative more clear....

*Not sure why the seemingly cosmetic choice of warg mount takes extra research.  Since they run lower to the ground, perhaps making their arrow dodging ability higher (say, +15 instead of +12) to justify the separate research item (or make it a research choice parallel to horses).

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I've been trending this tech to that of horsemanship in civ 4. It's not needed the entire game....only if you want to have it. For such a deadend tech that takes your time of progression, the tech should be pretty good, out weighing the chance of progression. IF this is indeed the case, more techs like this would be added benefit. aka: Choose a lesser tech that progresses you down the tree OR choose a greater tech that deadends. Decisions are tech.  

*Negatives to initiative (like weight and the slow debuff) seem out of balance with the character customization choices, where the one-time buff is only +1 yet you get -4 or worse from certain weapons on top of other factors.  Consider doubling the buff line to not be so insignificant.

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No comment. I'm sure FE will spend a great deal of time balancing and rebalancing the game.

*I'm going to slip this [BUG] in here since it's so minor: For the city improvement "Training Yard," the info text says it adds +15 accuracy, yet the tooltip popup from hovering your mouse over the building states +10 accuracy.

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Good find.

Keep up the great effort.

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Agreed. This game is looking to be on my top 5 list! Keep up the good work!

EDIT: Having dificultly multiquoting....will correct as soon as I read up on how to do it in this thread.

Umm...now I can no longer edit my post. I think I broke it.

Umm, I've played some of those games, and this configuration still looked counter-intuitive, but I'm fine with it as long as it's explained (please see outside your perspective to understand how confusing it is to any gamer not expecting to see it oriented in that particular fashion).  And actually, I think I've already seen improvements (based on our discussion, maybe? are the devs that quick?) with the small "Next" on the bottom tile and it's slightly larger appearance--this goes a long way toward alleviating any possible confusion.  However, now I think I have noticed the queue order being wrong, in that sometimes it said my leader was up next, yet it was another one of my champions who went next instead.  I will keep a close eye on this to verify.

LoL, Firefly, I guess you did indeed break this thread.  My above post was trying to quote UmbralAngel (reply #2).  It's great to see such thorough discussions about the gameplay mechanics and such, because we know window dressing gets you in the mood, but it's the gameplay that will keep you coming back.

Broken post makes it very difficult to continue arguing

Sincerely
~ Kongdej