This game has entertained me for quite a while, but it has started to burn out on me. I find it to be a way better game than Civ 5, yet I'm getting bored of it twice as fast. The reason is mainly because there's only one way to play that's most efficient. I've come up with a decent list of things I'd like to see changed.



1) Increased Fire on the Ardent Mage hero is virtually useless. They have very high damage so chances are you'll want to attack with them instead of buffing other units. They also have low initiative so they tend to buff units that have already moved. There's plenty of ways to change this, but right now they might as well be Ranged instead of Support since I've never willingly used them to buff my units.



2) Wayra Sigo and Strikes Far are way too powerful. 2 Boosts of highest importance on one champ is kinda messed up.



3) Daily/Weekly Challenges. I'm putting restrictions on myself to find more ways to enjoy this game, but I'd rather have challenges set up for me.



4) Imperial Coinage shouldn't be a starting tech, whether it's Roving Clans or a custom faction. It shuts down any option of a 'science rush' strategy, since the most valuable era 2 tech to rush for can be taken for free. It's also completely OP as a custom faction trait at 15 points. I gauge it at around 25-30 trait points, but I'd much rather have the option not be available so there's more value to be had in science-heavy starts. Right now, Industry is king for the early stages of city development followed closely behind by Food.



5) The best opening move on any faction for any strategy right now is to split your starting two military units and settle, leaving your hero with 0 army and 2 'scouts' to scrounge all the ruins. Equip them with +1 movement trinkets so they can outrun almost any encounter. It's all personal preference, but I feel like the original design was intended to have one exploration party to complete quests and map out uncharted territory. It was way more fun that way, and I don't really feel much enjoyment out of sending my initial units on suicide missions for ruins rewards. I suggest heroes being required to perform a ruins Search. This is another restriction I've put upon myself and it's way more fun this way, since every game pans out very differently based on what kind of quests you have.



6) The Militia techs could use some love. They're so useless to start with, and having 1 more militia doesn't really add much. This is especially true since you usually have to fight outside of the city to break a siege, and the militia reinforcements tend to come one by one. I think it'd be much cooler if the Militia techs upgrades them to stronger versions, with the final upgrade turning them into cavalry. It could add an interesting tactic of building a city on a border just to take over an enemy city that's close enough with a militia-heavy army. At the very least, it'd be nice if the upgrades gave them significantly more initiative. They're only useful as cannon fodder right now, and I think a tech should at least give them faster legs for them to suicide with.



7) Ranged units are way too powerful to the point where there's no reason to use anything else. I suggest Infantry units automatically receive the "Phalanx Cover" modifier which lets them take 70% less damage from all ranged attacks for the first phase of combat.



8) The middle section of the hero Skill Tree is mostly useless, along with some of the skills that leaked over to other sections. Increased health regen, shorter "Disabled" period, etc. are just in the way of some of the few useful skills higher up in the skill tree that aren't worth taking all the useless ones in the lower areas. Aside from that, many heroes have those virtually wasted skills on the wrong side. For example, the increased Garrison range could see some use once in a blue moon if it wasn't on the left side of the skill tree and only Governors would ever even remotely consider taking it. I would also prefer being able to go 'backwards' along the skill tree so I can at least try to avoid all the useless stuff on the bottom of the middle section while grabbing Cold Operator from a side route.



I know that there's always going to be some skills that will feel weak compared to others, but there's some in there that I would never, ever willingly take unless it's in the way. It's unfortunate because it's all the skills that aren't just raw strength and production boosts that feels weak. The only good one (and a great one at that) is the +XP to units. Not only that, they're just so boring. "Increased Health Regen", ho man I always wanted that! There's probably a brainstorming session to be had to make the skill tree more interesting. Forestwalk, chance at Double Search on ruins, getting 10 gold gifted when Parleying for the first time...I'm sure there are many others that people have thought about that can make it better.

1) Not sure ardent mages need any buffs but apart from this I agree. They are very strong on small maps.

2) There are for sure some powerfull starting heroes. The +3 industry per population hero for me comes out as far and beyond anything else.

3) Yes or even monthly challenges

4) For sure. I always use imperial coin as a custom faction and it is by far the best tech to get if you pick any techs for your custom faction.

5) I do not mind this but with the retreat button working so well it is more powerful than it used to be.

6) Agree 100%.

North2 wrote:
This game has entertained me for quite a while, but it has started to burn out on me. I find it to be a way better game than Civ 5, yet I'm getting bored of it twice as fast.

I couldn't agree more, well except with the burning out on you. For me it's the bugs and balance issues more than anything else.



There seems to be a severe balance issues with Ardent Mages. We're talking mid to late game here, I'm sure they can somehow be rushed.



But let's face it, the most valid strategy for any game that goes on for more than a few turns is tech and ranged units. Ranged units are the key to stomping someone.



The fact that Ardent Mages are the only race with AOE ranged units is already a problem, you add the stun spell to that, and you are guaranteed to have an ardent mages army wipe your ranged army on the first turn. In most cases, in cases where it's an evenly matched battle, the mages will eventually win against you due to the AOE attacks and stun.



If you want to keep the spells, which is perfectly fine, the units need to be nerfed. Take away the AOE attack. Yes it makes sense for a game designer to have this nice element of aoe spells and attacks, but it doesn't work out.



I had 2 eras more tech than the ardent mages player, and I was buying out/producing a lot more units. However there is only so much hp and untis one can buy. It didn't help that I was 3:1 outnumbering the guy, he had enough tech for t2 glassteel weapons, and I got my ass handed to me with my palladium/etc... units.



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I'm sure necro/cultist can counter this with an overwhelming spam of units. That's something else that should probably be looked into.



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This is just a little writeup of my observerations. I haven't had the chance to play lately, I'll test some of it in more depth when I can.

Support units in general need to be made better - including hero support abilities. Perhaps they should be global, or aoe. This could add more positioning strategy.



And yes, balance needs a huge pass. AI can't fight battles, city defenses are made of paper, ranged units massively overshadow all other types, op hero skills (either the food / industry boosting ones, or ones that start with huge army boosts. Mages start with army damage 3 boost from turn 1!), etc.

Just wondering, but have you only been playing the Ardent Mages, or have you played some of the others as well?

Why are there no Flying or Cavalry heroes? No Flying heroes on the Drakken makes me sad.

Adventurer_Blitz wrote:
Just wondering, but have you only been playing the Ardent Mages, or have you played some of the others as well?

I've played every faction. There's a whole lot of balance issues for every faction, but the Ardent Mage's Increased Fire ability is just annoying that it exists. For example, the Cultist's Preacher doesn't annoy me because it's a crappy unit and the buff is the only thing that makes it even remotely useful. It's just irritating when the Ardent Mage hero takes a turn buffing a unit instead of just killing the last standing enemy. The whole hero doesn't make sense...I mean, why make a 'Support' hero with really low initiative and higher damage than all the Ranged heroes? I'd be much more pleased if he had the 'low damage' modifier, very high initiative, and the buff gave maybe 80% Attack. He'd be a weaker unit overall, but I'd have more fun playing him.