First Impression and wishlisting

Ok, been wandering these forums for a while and thought it was time to chip in.

Bought the game some 3 weeks ago, and it has to a large degree swallowed my free time whole. I've been looking for a successor to MoM for ages and this game has the potential to exceed it. The core structure of the game is fantastic and very malleable, the fluff and background, although very generic has a lot of work poured into it and they help with the immersion in the game. Plus the strategy/rpg elements of the game blend very nicely.

There are a few points that stand out and I want to address directly. Please note these represent my limited and humble opinion and preferences when playing the game, and not how or what I demand the game become. Heck, for a lot of these I think the settings I use are responsible:

1) Hero based strategy vs Sovereign based strategy: Sovereigns and heroes seem to overwhelm the more "traditional" 4x style but are also absolutely mantatory at the harder levels. But I guess this is rather the intent of the designers, so I can live with it. Ill work on my settings see if I can change them to alter the game. I'm certain my preference for playing on EPIC speed helps heroes more than units (normal is too damn fast on the other hand ), while my almost OCD for the perfect troops makes me under-appreciate non-perfect units.

2) It would be nice if the starting locations could be a little less random. Not so much your starting loacation being amazing, but ensuring you can settle more than one city would be nice. No other 4x game has this equivalent problem as all tiles are settleable, but it would be nice if there were a string of code that ensured that your starting location has one high material and one high essence settleable square within X hexes. Again, I would make this a map selection option.

3) More of a pet peeve than anything: Would love it if one could retrain his troops rather than just upgrade their equip. A) This would use time and production rather than Guildar giving us the strategic choice it would let troops from the early game gain the armorer and command post benefits.

4) Quests, Wildlands, random events and unique monsters are fantastic. Please continue including more of these in future expansions. I would also recommend making a series of win the game quests and making those random per map (also harder... currently by FAR the easiest way to win the game). Tired of beating on the poor dragonlord But can't stress these enough.

5) Two fantastic things I liked from MoM that aren't here: Global enchantments and sijunctions and greater spell variety. Hoping those get modded or included in expansion/dlc (of which I hope there are many... you will get my money for all)

6) High end quests tend to give rather meager rewards, upping them would make them more memorable and sought after.

7) End game difficulty is not as good as mid early game. Early and mid game the computer is challenging, but late game it slowly vanishes. On the other hand I am thrilled that I see the computer actually playing the game. Its heroes go on quests, gain good items, etc. Teaching the computer to mass more armies and compose those armies would go a long way. Right now if I survive to mid game, I've won. I understand a lot of games are like this, it's just that coupled with the sovereign snowball its a little too pronounced.

I'm sure more things will come up. But let me sum it up. You guys made a fantastic game with a very solid base and exceptional potential. Congratulations!

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Very good reading your points, I agree with most of them (and probably most people here too). Same like you, I expected a sucessor for MoM, and although FE still needs some more work, it is providing a lot of fun. With time and modding, I think we will get a super game. In the meanwhile, playing it now is very very funny, and I'm expecting each new patch and more content (more heroes, quests, items, monsters ...).

I share your point of view of the end game. I most enjoy in trying to survive the first moments. Once I get cool weapons and armor, and the champions are leveled, there is little challenge. But arriving to that moment is what most I like. Once I can kill dragons, the challenge seems to fade.

This is in part related to the AI. Developers are working on it so we can expect improvements in future. Diplomacy is other bland part, that is long discussed in these forums. I guess we will see news here. Global enchantments is one of the most demanded things too. Take a look at the mods forums sometimes to see what is boiling.

About randomness of starting point, it is complicated. I think it adds a component of "how can I survive in this crappy place?". So I find interesting, as it makes you to adapt each game to the new map, and forget the typical order (1 pioner 2 civics 3 ...). If you find it very bad, just ctrl-N and a new map is presented. Games without horses or crystal available can be a pain, but that is what improves challenging and adaptation, and encourages to learn new strategies.

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