Come to think of it, why are all the sentient Fallen shades of ~blue? It'd be as nice to see some variation in the skin tones of the Fallen as it would be to see in those of the humans.
[quote]I got annoyed when playing Populous aka the god games. How could those sims have another super mega disaster every 60 secs or less and still not adapt technology to deal with it? That army reeling from Procipinee's shock and awe campaign is another example. "Doh!" or "How many times can we keep doing this?"[/quote] If someone/thing has the ability to call down lighting at will and direct it, then a lightning rod
I'm having trouble understanding the "way to rip off Tolkien crowd." The only real similarity that I can find is that the Fallen were created by powerful beings by modifying the natural sentient beings of the world - a parallel to most of Morgoth's/Sauron's forces being tortured mutations of elves, men, ents, etc. However, that people are complaining about that now would be silly, considering we've had that particular piece of information since pretty much the i
You guys complaining about the pose of the dragon being weird, how it would fall off its perch... The position and form of the foot on the right makes it abundantly clear that the dragon is in motion. Not to mention dragons typically have four legs, and we have no idea what it's doing with its hind two. I think the cover looks good, but I do agree with the criticism that to the random buyer, it might not be eye-catching enough (for precisely the reasons why I like it...). It has muted
[quote]I disagree. Analogy: channeling ability is like athletic ability. One is born with a certain amount of athletic ability. That athletic ability has to be directed/trained to a certain sport, and Olympic/Pro level athletes take years of training, skilled coaching, etc.[/quote] That's a flawed analogy, though. Athletic coaches tend to be athletes themselves, usually very successful ones past their prime. How many athletic coaches have you heard of that have been
[quote]They had volcanos and the volcano spell in the demo at PAX, and that was way back in September...[/quote] But they also said that was jury-rigged, basically hardcoded in for the sake of a demonstration of the kinds of things we might be able to do. I'd like to see a volcano spell come back, but I think their intention was to recreate the spell within the framework of spell creation that they didn't have at the time (if they intended to recreate it at all).
[quote]Wow, I agree.[/quote] Hmm, I don't. While I do agree that having a horde of non-channeler research dudes telling my channeler how to cast spells doesn't make much sense and that the normal magic research methods are a little dry, I don't think MrDelightful's idea is a good way of improving on it. Why? Because it fundamentally favors the people who go out and bash heads. One thing common to many fantasy worlds, particularly those with magic, is the existence of small, re
Regarding penalties for failing quests - I think a lot of care needs to be taken. If I try to get the dragon's egg back, but fail, then chances are I already paid a heavy price, and as I failed I get nothing in reward. For example, let's say I get all the way to the last leg and discover the location of this fortress I need to assault. I gather an army and attack; failing this means I lose my army (or most of it) - having a dragon ravage my lands (for what, trying to help it? be
[quote]I thought that was the entire point of having it in the game. So that we wouldn't be entranced by anything except for the data we need.[/quote] Nah. As it is, even if you replaced the current map with the full 3D version, it would still be boring. It'd look nice, but it'd be fairly boring nonetheless. There just isn't very much there. Some mountains, some trees, the occasional resource or goody hut. Some rivers. I suppose this is what you get in most games, but somehow the Elem
[quote]9. Most important part of the game is the first and last 15 minutes.[/quote] I disagree with the latter half of this pretty strongly, actually (in the context of the TBS genre, anyway). Now, the very beginning of the game is definitely one of the most important parts because otherwise starting a new game becomes much less appealing. The very beginning of the game should be pure fun - most games, in my experience, get this right. The very end of the game will always
Now I like where this is going! I particularly like the whole background story (nice idea Wintersong!). One thing that I notice is that so far the list consists almost entirely of traits that, while appropriate to the sovereign, are actually applied to the faction. This is good - I like that sovereign traits will affect the kingdom to a similar extent as actual faction customization. However, I'd like to see traits that also affect the sovereign personally. Things like:<
Most of those are generic. Ultimately, giving ±1 point in any of their base stats won't really be customization - those effects would be washed out with time and all mid-late game channelers will look the same. The goal of sovereign customization should be have players choose 'picks' for their sovereign that truly differentiate them in ways that cannot easily be done (or can't be done at all) within the game. This could be done by making the numbers big, making them percentage-based, o
[quote]I mean, if the Fallen have been bred to be better killers than the humans, how come there are any humans left?[/quote] There are more of them? They function as a community, whereas the Fallen are more about the individual. Not to mention, cheetahs are better killers than zebras, but there are still zebras...
[quote]The thing is, this is a game. If I have no forest around me and I get the optional forest defense tech, theres no gun to my head forcing me to research it. The thing is, as soon as you start ladening the game with all these layers of complexity, you are starting to move it away from "fun" into "tedius". Does the desert kingdom knowing how to fight in the forest make sense? There are arguements I could make saying yes, but thats not the point. The point is that it is just a game, one wh
[quote]Again, not sure why how much forest is in your territory would be a factor. What if you are an expansionist and although you are in a desert, your neighbor (where you are doing most of your fighting) is all forest. It seems like you would still learn about forest defense/battle based on your experiences, not based on how many forest squares you have in your borders....[/quote] So you're saying someone who has lived in a desert his whole life would be as likely to figure out how
[quote]Ratherthan basing it on how many forest squares on in your territory (that could be changing all the time) I think that actually fighting in a forest square would be what triggers a possibility of it showing up in your tech tree - since fighting in a forest is what is going to teach forest defense, not just having one in your territory.[/quote] Or, fighting in a forest could act as the trigger, but the probability for a forest-fight to actually activate "Forest Defense" as a re
[quote]If my understanding of Frogboy's quote is correct, there is no local inventory of Plate Mail at all. There is no warehoused Manufactured Goods like Plate mail. That means, those in the far away wilderness will get the plate mail at the same time as those garrisoned in your city (if they are not across ocean or in enemy ZOC)[/quote] There is no global storage, either. There is no storage at all in Elemental. To train a unit with plate armor, you'll need the resources
[quote]I just now read this whole post. I'm glad to see this last part. Hopefully that will appease Pidgeon's objections. I think this is a pretty good thing to add the the game. I see this as simply a more fleshed out version of the Civ IV draft abilty, but one that everyone has throughout the game. I think your last point is key: the militia units should never be better than a basic professional. So pidgeon can have his 'professional peasant' army b
[quote]Yeah, is not valid because you say so, great [e digicons]:)[/e] [/quote] No, I gave a very good reason why it's not valid (and I've given more in the other threads that you've brought it up in). But of course you completely ignored it, you even left it out of your quote of my post despite it being a very short post. I suppose anything that contradicts your inherently flawless arguments (they are, after all, coming from you) are just so obviously irrelevent that they don't even
I was under the impression that the spell editor was intended for modding purposes only. I would love to be wrong, or if I'm right I would love them to change their minds (at least in an expansion or something!) because dynamic spell-creation within the game itself (ie, as part of gameplay) would be awesome.
[quote]Based on the Frogboys statement I'm worried we'll end up with a game using the following model: Basic Soldier 10Hitpoints Trained Soldier 25Hitpoints Advanced Soldier 45Hitpoints Expert Soldier 70Hitpoints Elite Soldier 100Hitpoints Battles would not feel fun watching an elite enemy soldier wearing only leather fall asleep on the battlefield then two of my soldiers stick him with short swords and
[quote]I suppose you could use a giant crystal with smaller crystals around it. Still, I think any kind of interactive interface would be funner then just clicking a picture on a graph. There could be an indicator of some sort as you mention or you could be following a recipe one of your adventurers find while on a quest. There's lots of things you can do with it honestly.[/quote] It's not as much the user interface I'm opposed to as the mechanic itself. It's either too vague and rand
[quote]But taking that out, you don't understand the most basic part of my argument: there are so many things to make in Elemental, that it's a pitty they waste their time in things that are going to be rarely seen or used. They could be using their time in far more interesting things.[/quote] Magical creatures in general, and particularly the upper echelon of them, will be rarely seen or used. I suppose it's a pity that Stardock is devoting any attention to them at all - they could b
[quote]I think that buildings to modify gold and research income is probably all that is needed, any extra "wealth" mechanic might be interesting, realistic, and possibly fun ... but I just can't seem to wrap my head around a concept of intangible wealth which gives hidden bonuses which is "interesting, and possibly fun."[/quote] I think trade-based wealth and/or prestige would be an incredible addition, especially if it is done on a per-city basis. It'd open up a whole new potential
[quote]I hope you aren't working on any NASA rover missions, Pidgeon [e digicons]:)[/e] 20 percent is not the same as 40 percent and I really, really hope that an army that is composed of more than 60 percent of anything isn't rewarding to the player in game.[/quote] In many fields of physics, 20% really is the same as 40% :P Admittedly, planning out trajectories or engineering some complex piece of machinery with that kind of (non-)precision would be disastrous, haha.