Propbuddha wrote:
The Economic Victory is a tally of all Dust generated by everything over the entire game. I'm unsure if selling on the Marketplace counts for this.

It does. You can farm economic victory points by buying and selling resources repeatedly, but you lose some dust each cycle.

Long bow arrows were cheaper than crossbow arrows and regular long bows were easier to maintain.

they were more inaccurate at longer ranges though, plus as they were commonly used for defense at close ranges, long range volley fire wouldn't be very effective. True medieval crossbows were also very low to reload, so fighting an opponent at close range without protection would be very difficult. Besides, a bow can fire faster than a crossbow, which is an advantage that can be used in any situation.

Crossbows were very effective in defending castle due to their lethality in close range. They can also shoot farther than arrows.

Crossbows have more parts than bows, true but bows have always been better than crossbows in every aspect except for the fact that bows require more training and skill. So, while a feeling of progression through the ages would be nice, it could be expressed better than just making crossbows move into later eras, which would also have the side effect of making ranged units have no weapon choice.

Absolutely, you could even just stagger availability of weapons already in the game. Crossbows are far more mechanically complex than bows, so they could come later (with potentially something of a rebalance to stats to make the choice more interesting); I would also assume that to have a longer sword (2H) you would need higher quality foundries and blacksmithing.



I don't want to see assault rifles in EL, that would be silly, but a feeling of progress might be nice

synra wrote:
While I like as many systems of possible to make choices and grab buffs; I noticed that EL really is more of a snapshot compared to other 4X titles. In that sense "Eras" might be a little misleading. Many games have you going from slingshots to assault rifles... while EL has you go from bows, to um... better bows. You don't really look at an EL empire and think "Ah, that's an Era 4 city", differences are almost all basically numeric. The only real "form" type deviations are things like sea travel, roads, and watchtowers (all Era2?).

Yes, there are a lot of things, that can be done to make a player feel, like the empire really strives forward in development. Like changing visuals of the cities from era to era, changing weapon/armor types and visuals and so on. Hopefully it will be implemented in the future. It's a lot of work I bet.

While I like as many systems of possible to make choices and grab buffs; I noticed that EL really is more of a snapshot compared to other 4X titles. In that sense "Eras" might be a little misleading. Many games have you going from slingshots to assault rifles... while EL has you go from bows, to um... better bows. You don't really look at an EL empire and think "Ah, that's an Era 4 city", differences are almost all basically numeric. The only real "form" type deviations are things like sea travel, roads, and watchtowers (all Era2?).

The logic problem of being able to invent cars before the wheel may make since if you are using a civ style tech tree, with techs leading to other techs, but in this game there aren't wheel or car techs. Techs in this game usually are unconnected o each other. And techs in earlier eras are cheaper than techs in later eras, the cost just goes up for all techs to keep pace with your increasing amount of science per turn.

Adventurer_Blitz wrote:
Techs increase incrementally in order to force you to make harder decisions regarding which techs to get. The game doesn't want for you to have researched everything in the first era by the second era, it is not Civ, it will benefit you for following a strategy rather than for picking techs at random. Plus, this system helps balance a faction going for high eras from just researching all era 1 techs, or something similar.

It doesn't make any sense to be able to build cars when you didn't discover the wheel, nor that discovering the wheel could take as much effort as inventing spacecraft...

And gameplay wise it doesn't work, it just make the player go for the the same most effective techs always and skip the rest. I agree that a player should not be able to get the whole tree by game end, but for that we need more techs and a better balance of research: now by era 3 I'm able to get a tech in as few as 4-5 turns...

Techs increase incrementally in order to force you to make harder decisions regarding which techs to get. The game doesn't want for you to have researched everything in the first era by the second era, it is not Civ, it will benefit you for following a strategy rather than for picking techs at random. Plus, this system helps balance a faction going for high eras from just researching all era 1 techs, or something similar.

I admit that I'm not the biggest fan of the current tech tree either.



It doesn't seem right that researching a tech that would have cost you 300 research points 10 turns ago, all of a sudden costs you 650.



I also think that techs in groups should have a hierarchy with prerequisites even if the requirements to change eras are kept the same.

pdifolco wrote:
Techs should have some consistency so you can't get things without prerequisites, and a fixed cost, according to Era and power of the tech.

sounds good.

I mostly agree with the remarks on the tech tree : it's not even a tree, no prerequisite for anything, and the cost which is an increasing number whatever you research is broken...(eg the same Era 1 tech costing 100 at start will cost 4000 300 turns later !)

Techs should have some consistency so you can't get things without prerequisites, and a fixed cost, according to Era and power of the tech.

I think I basically agree with the entirety of the original list, with a few additions of my own that I've gone into enough times for no one to be interested in hearing them again.

So, a few weeks after release, I've really narrowed down some impressions -



1) Starting out next to the Cultists, is very annoying. They are more combatative than the Necrophages, and more ambitious than the Broken Lords. I have yet to have a winning game when I start next to them! Thanks Nos.. /shakes first



2) Zone of Control is a must. You can't properly tank when a high move cavalry unit is able to run right past everything without even slowing down. I think that if that mechanic is kept, the cavalry unit needs to take some nominal damage because they throw caution to the wind. Another possible solution, is that you add a skill to tanking units that draw fire to it to give your other units a chance to do......



3) If the combat area is to be kept the size that it is, I think that all ranges need to be reduced. In the winter, the archers are death. So reduce their range in the winter as well (since movement is reduced) because the wind is too strong, the snow to blinding.. whatever.



4) Combat damage is better than before, but still needs more tweeking (especially if the mechanics wont change).



5) The score victory condition needs to be more transparent. How is it calculated? What does everything mean?



6) The economic condition needs to be more transparent. Your wealth should be spread out over the total number of cities you have, unless it's (new tech opportunity here) stored in a single city (capitol) that gets extra defense as a result.



7) What's the distance of reinforcements? Why can their city be involved in combat affecting my city? 1st - we need to understand th emechanic better, 2nd - (new idea) each reinforcing army should be represented by a single icon with combined stats (how to utilize the large number of armies towards the end of the game and speed up combat).



8) City defense - mix up the militia (fine, no cavalry) with both spear carriers and ranged units.



9) Until Naval combat is introduced slightly adjust winter - If you are caught in/on the oceans during winter, after a few turns (to give your fleet enough time to get to land), your units start taking damage. High HP units will last longer, but they'll die just the same (Introduce a late game tech to keep your units alive since the winters are so long).



10) Diplomacy - at the moment, it's just a place holder. Everyone says the same stuff and does the same things. BORING! New faction specific text needs to be added for each situation. Why would the Necrophages speak as eloquently as the Broken Lords or Vaulters? How about a few more diplomatic options for different types of alliances (create an alliance long enough to wipe someone out and then it dissolves).



11) I'd like an option to toggle the city name on/off during the zoomed in strategic view because it's hard to see what hex is ready for exploitation.



12) I'm excluding the usual 4 or 5 complaints suggestions that require a lot of art assets or major mechanics. I have said them enough for it to be known, though if you ask, I can always repeat them.



It's not an exhaustive list, but it covers a lot of the current issues i see.



What do you think?

1) I understand the Problem, but I think the effect is mainly existing because of two other things: Because as you mentioned the other fractions seem to be less ambitious / interested in what is going on in the world / offer interactive challenge to you.

I read about cattily Roving Clans mercenary armies but never saw one... And because there are no deeper diplomatic options. It is not easy to solve, but the strange thing is that on one hand it is the trait and the strength of the cultists to do this village-thing, but on the other hand they have to know that you will not like it when they do it in your territory, but you can not "talk" to them about this little problem...



2) Perhaps it is even more interesting / traceble, but anyway I would not say it "is a must", I give no priority to that. I think when you understood the whole combat-system and enjoy the mixture of traits the game offers, it makes sense that there is no ZOC AND combat is interesting and fun. There are units with double block, sweep defense, there are impassable cliffs, buffs, move-points, flying Units, forests.... I learned to like the combat System very much, also I see here the problem somewhere else: The combat System makes sense (and even fun...) when there is "real" combat, many Units on both sides for example, for the "kill one unit"- fights on difficulty "normal" it is oversized and to complicated for its purpose in the game.



3) Had no Problem with that. For me the game offered always a solution for every combat-challenge (Terrain/strategy: initiative, attack or wait/heroes/buffs/more movement Points...). Also I think the only advantage of the archers IS the range.



4) The damage of ..what is it called? this exotic staff is very very strong when you are the only one who uses it. Alternatively it could be very very expensive...? On the other Hand I find the quest-weapons you find not sooo interesting because they mainly have + x %. But xx + x % is nearly always better than + x %. And to pay the 50-150 extra dust instead of only the ressources is never a problem for me.



5) Yes!



7) It is even strange that you wipe out sometimes militia/City defenders (without their bonus then) because they were in range... perhaps armies should be "asked" if they WANT to participate ?



8) AND implement special militia upgrades or militia hero-skills. Does Militia level up? Would make the XP-skills more maemaningful for stationed heroes. Perhaps a combination of both: Also choseable Upgrades when leveling up.

City defense is very passive...why not rob some HPs with City archers while the attackers are on siege? The "problem" is, siege is only a matter of time in this state of the game and apart from the chance of external reinforcements the attacker has all the Advantages on his side. When he kills the walls the Defender looses XP, but when the attacker ignores the walls or the siege lasts very long he looses no HP. Why not? What is happening there? When the City is only defended by militia the xxx-wall Bonus even is totally irrelevant. This is a strange Picture: There are walls with defenders behind, so you make a siege. OK, that makes sense. There are still walls, but you see that there is militia behind the walls, so you walk through the walls and kill the milita? Ok, strange.... While you make a siege the defenders sit behind their walls and wait till you are ready,they chose spears instead of wepaons that can shot down the walls, ok, strange...



9) cool



10) yes, boring. No feeling of threat either, their armies are happy when they can defend their own land. Saw even no wild mercenaries running round.



11) In a later version it could also be helpful to toggle between several views of "meaningful ressources" (forest, anomalies) for city-planing. When I want to hire a hero it is a Little bit annoying counting/finding the relevant terrain...

Things that could make me easily very happy for the next update(s):



-Stronger militia / perhaps possibilities to get or research "militia Upgrades" or "militia hero-skills"



-3 or 4 Units defending villages (perhaps even villages with "chieftains" (minor fraction Heroes) and more mixed enemy armies walking around)



-Necros with defense



-AI planing and making war against you / trying to conquer not well defended border-cities or outposts



later:



- Ships or any kind of naval battle, it is a Little bit crazy that you can not care about lonely units Swimming around



- AI recognizing the threat that s.o. else is close to victory

Wake me up when they've fixed the crash bugs and lock ups.

Nasarog wrote:


1) Starting out next to the Cultists, is very annoying. They are more combatative than the Necrophages, and more ambitious than the Broken Lords. I have yet to have a winning game when I start next to them! Thanks Nos.. /shakes first

Tbh I find cultist to be the easiest ones to crush. Preachers are a joke and they need some time to gather enough MF units. Once you besiege their capital they're basically done for, since their eco is crippled and they have nowhere else to bring reinforcements from. The annoying part is that they can convert villages on your territory and you have to destroy and rebuild them. It costs them more than it costs you but for me it's highly annoying.

Nasarog wrote:


2) Zone of Control is a must. You can't properly tank when a high move cavalry unit is able to run right past everything without even slowing down. I think that if that mechanic is kept, the cavalry unit needs to take some nominal damage because they throw caution to the wind. Another possible solution, is that you add a skill to tanking units that draw fire to it to give your other units a chance to do......

Either ZOC or all tanking units should be equipped with slows/snares/damage redirection.

Nasarog wrote:


7) What's the distance of reinforcements? Why can their city be involved in combat affecting my city? 1st - we need to understand th emechanic better, 2nd - (new idea) each reinforcing army should be represented by a single icon with combined stats (how to utilize the large number of armies towards the end of the game and speed up combat).

That would help.

Nasarog wrote:


8) City defense - mix up the militia (fine, no cavalry) with both spear carriers and ranged units.

I think militia needs more upgrades (buff up the defense tech as its quite weak right now), including maybe other militia types. It's too easy to deal with.

Nasarog wrote:


10) Diplomacy - at the moment, it's just a place holder. Everyone says the same stuff and does the same things. BORING! New faction specific text needs to be added for each situation. Why would the Necrophages speak as eloquently as the Broken Lords or Vaulters? How about a few more diplomatic options for different types of alliances (create an alliance long enough to wipe someone out and then it dissolves).

Implementing a good diplomatic system is a ton of work. Right now it's nowhere near as good as it could be.