Beta 2 preview: Thumbs mostly up

from Elemental Forums

Warning: This will be long…

Had a chance to play through with all 3 sovereigns, so I wanted to put down some thoughts on my experiences. Not sure if it’s worthwhile to list out bugs as well…like the disclaimer said, it’s rough, very rough. But if you guys still want the list of bugs, I’m happy to post a new one for that.

First off, great job on the new sovereigns. They’re very distinct in their theme and how they play out in the game. Though this has also highlighted how generic and bland the wizard sovereign is as there’s no defining characteristic for the wizard. The wizard’s whole shtick is that he can cast spells! But so can everyone else… He doesn’t really have anything specific in his skill tree (Aside from his signature spell) that makes him feel like his own arch-type rather than just the generic template for all sovereigns.

I’m mixed on heroes as well. The slayer, warlock, and ranger are all great in their own thematic way but the warrior and wizard just don’t have any personality in their skill trees.

Overall I’m starting to like the gameplay. I was originally not planning to pre-order and was just going to sit it out and wait for release before deciding to buy, but after I saw the concept and some news about beta 1, I ordered so I could try ahead of time. I enjoy the concept, but I rarely ever felt like the sorcerer king was a threat. It never felt like the sorcerer king took me seriously even though I slaughtered all his garrisons. I feel he needs to be much more aggressive. It’d be great if there was a big consequence to attacking his troops. It’s practically a declaration of war, yet the sorcerer king keeps on moping around in his fortress without any care at all about what I’m doing. So I just ignore him back and quest around until I’m tired and feel like ending the game by taking him out. (Ps Now that you’ve reintroduced mana blast, you need to make him MUUUUCH tougher. A couple of sacrifices on a big city and it’s usually a 1-hit victory, even if he resists)

It’s also weird to have the lieutenants wandering around the land not doing anything. SK really needs to hire some better help aside from these loafers. Maybe put them in a citadel where they’re commanding lots of troops and don’t come out until you’ve upset SK, at which point, they come hunting you down. They’d feel much tougher if they had an army and were gunning for you when you encounter them.

Items: I’m not going to comment on this as I know you’re already planning a revamp of it, but thank goodness you are planning a revamp of it!

Spells…I’m still not feeling like there’s a lot to be excited about here, especially in tactical combat. I think in an ideal game where I’m feeling challenged by SK, I’d only expect to have maybe 3 or 4 shards under my control meaning I get very little mana per turn, which means I’m hoarding magic and very loath to cast. Yet, all the damaging spells have such ridiculous costs that I would never even think about casting them. Considering that you already limit the number of times you can cast in a single combat, it feels doubly restricting that they have such high cost especially considering the amount of damage they do (I mainly play on the setting before insane and the damage done by the spells rarely feel like they’d help turn the tide of battle any better than just using the hero’s abilities). For most games, I’m content to allocate 1 point to research and everything else to leveling or mana as I don’t use any of the spells. The spells I cast the most are the signature ones. - that’s about it.

10,540 views 4 replies
Reply #1 from SorcererKing Forums Top

Good stuff.  And I am very glad we have similar likes and dislikes.

A lot of it comes down to content, particularly on the spells.  That's a big part of the Beta 3 push is to get the exciting spells in.  

You can definitely tell which hero skill trees we did first.  But they're not set in stone.  I feel like we have this huge toy box now of stuff and now it's time to start getting it into the game.

Reply #2 from SorcererKing Forums Top

The Wizard tree is surprisingly tricky because you actually WANT that generic 'starting players know what they're getting' option. So we still need to make him awesome, but not in some crazy way :)

And thanks for the great feedback!

The Political Machine 2024
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

That totally makes sense for the wizard. Maybe replace a few of those + bonuses with a few unique wizardly spells will be enough. Anyway, look forward to all the continued tweaks.

Off to play official beta 2.  :beer:

Reply #4 from Elemental Forums Top

Some comments:

 

Pacing seems improved.  Game is more enjoyable now due to this.

 

Army management screen like what LH has - this is something that should be implemented.  Right now to get a unit out of your stack you need to move it out.

 

There is a need for more variety in craftable weapons.  Such as magical bows for the ranger. 

 

I'd like to see the return of some of the cheesier LH magical items as well as rare drops.  Open the toy box!  Maybe tie them in to some real nasties so it's lategame stuff.

 

I'd also like to see more variety in lieutenants, I keep thinking of the stalkers in the Running Man when I think of the Lieutenants, or henchmen from a magical girl or sentai show.  There needs to be a good bit of variety here.

 

Right now what I'm seeing is a game that has a good chance to finally fulfill Stardock's potential.   Random maps and the fun/size of the toybox are what I think will be the key to whether this game truly becomes an all-time great or just very good.