Gorde

Oh yeah--great feedback.

Ahh. I had never before heard of the poor cities denigrated down to just their build queues, and that designation was throwing me off, but I guess that makes sense if that's all your interested in them for. *grin* FYI, my units used lightning pikes (about 120 attack per stack of 5), so you know I took my sweet time researching and building (rather than going for the quick domination victory). As a related note, I promise you do not need very many cities for their build

I'm confused about what you mean between queues and growth. I know prestige is split across all cities (so you pay for that expansion, and that seems to be a very balanced mechanic). I built like crazy on my first beta-4 game (large map), out-paced the AI, and gobbled up my nearest neighbor, having 15 cities at the time I could basically bully everyone else into giving me the rest of the world. At no time did I feel the pace was slower than in beta 3--by the time I produ

[quote who="DsRaider" reply="24" id="3209349"] No the problem here is that placing lairs under ZoC causes monsters to attack random things period. They should attack only the outpost or city that aggroed them, and anything that gets in their way. Then they should return to their lair. Problem solved. The whole idea of stupid actions across the map by a AI you never met getting your capital destroyed is stupid. The problem has always been those drakes and ogres that get randomly unleashed

***Oh, and since Derek specifically mentioned " AI units try to maneuver to get the first hit in battle" in his change log, I'll mention that a mixed party really confuses the AI. Enemies will creep forward one space at a time, even when being pelted with arrows/magic, so long as the melee units maintain their distance. This allows a relatively cheesy tactic to kill anything without taking melee damage (even dragons). I suggest making a routine that c

I'd like to give suggestions now that my first win is on the books. I believe the devs want to keep this focused on gameplay mechanics (not on AI and such), and I'll try to be brief. ***The settlement categories are a nice touch, but they still need balancing. For example, I could have easily won a Spell Mastery victory without building a single conclave. They are very much unnecessary (the research they add once fully developed are a case of t

A couple of testers have made this thread (and others) a focus on maul with an apparent emotional investment that makes me scratch my head. Kong, never mind bows or other stuff you get at higher levels to counter that bear--you know how the bear is going to move , it's max move. Is it really so hard to wait for it to get close before pouncing with all your forces to take it out before it can even swing? That's simply using tactics within the tactical combat s

I think a cap is reasonable, if you are assuming each turn represents a certain amount of time (though that's not consistent with moving once your guys can cover 6+ tiles in a turn), but some testers like the (slightly) unrealistic mechanic to represent the "open up a can of whoopass" type of move--that is a pure gamer joy/nightmare mechanic (vs being justifiable by realism). Never mind that most old school (D&D) gamers are conditioned to appreciate the randomness that represent

The trick is controlling your territory lines. You don't have to build that monument, if the expanding border encompasses a powerful monster. Set your builders on something more productive, like a lumber mill or a brothel. See that nasty umberdroth lair nearby? Build your buildings away from them. If your borders do not cross them, they will not awaken to eat you (until you are prepared to pick the fight on your own terms). If you have

It's so very tough to balance this kind of game for the two types of players: those who are cautious, who only pick fights they are well suited to win, and those who push the envelope (for instance, taking quests that have a higher difficulty rating than their current army has--say, Medium rated quest vs a Weak army--in the hopes they can pull it off; often they can, which in turn makes the game too easy for cautious players). That said, both your points got me my first play-throu

In the last month, I've won in every way (with each race-type I could think of), and while the conquest is perhaps too easy (a 12,060 point win on challenging with only melee builds highlights that), there are other situations where the other victories are viable alternatives. One of my first games was against a powerful Empire (I spent too much time exploring, rather than expanding), so I allied with the other Kingdom and used the diplomacy screen to pay him (lots) to go to war wit

I'm amazed so many here remember MoM enough to make a comparison! Heh, my memory must be terrible, because I only have the vague impression of having fun and getting lost in the strategy/puzzles/exploring combo for hours; on top of that, I'm much changed as a gamer (and person) since then. I can only compare FE to recent releases (Civ4 and later), and most importantly, I compare it to the ideal of what FE can be . The balancing and variety of viable play is t

[quote who="OrionM42" reply="13" id="3181907"]EXCEPT, a lot of us are not complaining about how easy the game is ... and I think among the future players (people who come new to the game, especially after the retail version is finally released) may well fall into that category. They will probably expect a learning curve, but I would bet that a lot of them will NOT consider the game too easy initially ... [/quote] I agree that most of us beta testers

Kongdej is right on the money here (I think, heh, if I read the post correctly); making better starting cities, "giving" it to the player, loses a golden opportunity to diversify and enjoy more equally-viable-yet-different games. For example, I don't think it should be possible to cast both Inspiration and Enchanted Hammers on a city upon opening--you ought to have to choose (do I research prestige and rush, or inspiration, or enchanted hammers, or...?). Those opening "must-do

I've won each victory type on Normal, and enjoyed the games though they were simple victories (once I learned how to efficiently multitask in the early game). There are definitely many ways to hamstring yourself that aren't readily apparent (at least not to me, though I might be a slow learner), and Normal difficulty seems balanced well to give you lots of wiggle room and still pull out the win. Played a custom (caster-heavy) empire on Challenging that didn't seem an

This post was wonderfully crafted while I was avoiding the beta (call it an aftertaste of WoM), and it seems like hints of these suggestions are now in game. The bulk of the post/reasoning is still valid, because I believe the end goal ought to be making so many valid builds for different situations that it encourages players to have well-rounded armies (with certain units being more effective than others depending on the particular opponent--even more so than it is now). Churning

*grin* Good that you can see your bias. Your plan shows promise for more interesting strategic play, but can the AI even hope to effectively match it, or is it putting something else into the game that gives humans more advantage over the already struggling AI? So many plans look good on paper and then are horrible when implemented--life sucks like that. I won't blame the devs if they adopt a "can't go there" mentality; they have to pick the battles they think

But I certainly don't want to repeat bugs if the devs have already seen them (they already have enough to look at), and I hate to post a new thread for 3 or 4 bugs (that's the rate I find them--3 or 4 every play-through). It would be nice to have a master bug list where only concise bug entries were listed, rather than having any chatter in the thread. That way the devs had a place to go to scan the bugs we're finding. In lieu of any better way t

[quote who="MiamiBigAL" reply="21" id="3177787"]I wouldn't implement a trade system unless it called for a lot of strategy to employ correctly. Otherwise it just becomes another worthless micromanagement time wasting issue if it does not add strategy to the game. So basically they should either go "all out" on implementing a fantastic trade system or none at all, because lets face it... without an intelligent choice-based system trading is soooo booooring.[/quote] <p

It would be such a huge relief to get an action-needed icon that I could click on to center the map on the spot (like units built and building improvements).

"Is each of the paths viable and fun?" That's what we should be asking, rather than comparing different styles/choices in some eternal (infernal) competition. Flavor/variety has its cost, and I believe no dev can be creative and so different in options while having everything equal out--equality leads to blandness, and that's only important if pvp is front-and-center. I have so far won--or was going to win when I stopped playing--using ever combo I could think of, th

Man! I'm glad I'm not that good, because I'd like the game less. :) Well played--glad to see it's at least doable by somebody.

There are a couple great mage staffs out there that I've seen (and I assume I have not seen them all), that add mana and/or spell damage boost. Should a mage also get a powerful, no-init ranged weapon on top of all they already get? I'm not so sure they should, and here's why: Every ability that allows you to do risk-free damage has a high cost, whether that's the magic costs or the init modifier on a bow/staff (which your suggestion for a champ archer build

In agreement with you, Steven--as amusing as it is for my charging stacks to always reach the enemy and kill them the opening round of combat, it's too over the top.

I agree with Lin04, in that there's very little room for merchant-building in this ravaged world--this is simply not the game to be strategizing about trade routes and potential customers. That said, perhaps there is a happy medium more involved than the no-brainer it is now, and a little boost for those players who are focusing on rebuilding a civilization (heavy civics). If whatever system is tedious or overbalancing, then it's better to have it the way it is (not much t