Feedback on v1.3

from Elemental Forums

Just played my first serious game of Legendary Heroes, (been waiting for the major AI work) and must say the game is now very polished and impressive, really good in most areas of game mechanics, gameplay, and graphics - Congratulations!!

For what it's worth, in the never ending quest for game perfection these are the things I found not so good :

1 - In the tactical battles there was insufficient contrast on the potential movement squares for the unit, especially on snow, when I couldn't see the "possible-to-move-to" squares at all. Also, in some of the urban battlescapes with paving slabs it was virtually impossible to see which unit was activated if you had more than one of a given type.

2. - Whilst the AI has definately improved, most noticeably in the use of spells, strategic and tactical, it is still pretty lame. I guess this just shows the near impossibility of developing effective behaviour algorithms for computer games such as this. The subject is vast, but just to mention two specific weaknesses :

The interaction between the monsters and the computer players is not right. As you invade the computer's territory you find loads of monsters that have presumably been hanging about all through the game neither attacking the computer's units or settlements, nor being attacked!

The computer player still tends to react to invasion by spawning loads of pioneers and trying to sneak past you in a hopeless attempt to start obscure new settlements. This is rather like the deliberately vindictive "hide the farm" spoiling tactic used by some people to prevent victory in online multiplayer games!

 

On the whole though, a brilliant game which I can see will be devouring great chunks of my future time! A real vindication of the interactive development process that Stardock has used. Perhaps their achievement has motivated the recent move to develope a successor to the classic old 3DO Might & Magic games by a similiar player-feedback process?

Cheers

Chris

9,447 views 3 replies
Reply #1 from Elemental Forums Top

Agree with all of your points.  1.3 was definately an big improvement in AI competency, I've lost cities to the A.I. for the first time ever.  Saying that there's still a good bit to go and I'm sure we'll see additional patches by Brad focused on this.

1 - This problem also occurs where trying to select the tiles for tactical spells e.g. Burning Hands.  The three squares affected are quite difficult to see with some landscapes (especially snow).

2 - The AI is casting strategic city level spells quite effectivelly now, casting freeze and tremor on units entering their zones and casting enchantments (positive & negative) on cities.  However, I rarely see them cast a tactical spell during a battle except for enchantments on themselves, e.g no summoning, no offensive spells.  This means that you can fight a Weak -vs- Strong battle and still stand a good chance to win because you have spells and they don't (run around the map, sending spells at them and they can't catch you and eventually die).

Have also seen the Pioneer spawning problem.  Playing a small map with lots of players, once the entire map is covered by cities or outposts, the A.I. is still constantly creating Pioneers and trying to sneak past/explore the map even though there's nowhere to settle.

Reply #2 from Elemental Forums Top




1 - In the tactical battles there was insufficient contrast on the potential movement squares for the unit, especially on snow, when I couldn't see the "possible-to-move-to" squares at all. Also, in some of the urban battlescapes with paving slabs it was virtually impossible to see which unit was activated if you had more than one of a given type.


End of quote

This has been reported many times, I have no idea why they refuse to fix it.

 

A lot of tactical square problems.

1 - Many squares not registering when moused over.

2 - Clicking dead center on one row of squares, sends the unit to a row, left or right of the selected row

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Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Tattyhat, reply 2


This has been reported many times, I have no idea why they refuse to fix it.
End of Tattyhat's quote

I don't think they refuse to fix it, I am sure they have a priority list internally with loads of stuff that needs to be fixed and this one is in the bottom. This game is very complex and even minor fixes need time.

 

Quoting Wo1verine, reply 1
2 - The AI is casting strategic city level spells quite effectivelly now, casting freeze and tremor on units entering their zones and casting enchantments (positive & negative) on cities.  However, I rarely see them cast a tactical spell during a battle except for enchantments on themselves, e.g no summoning, no offensive spells.  This means that you can fight a Weak -vs- Strong battle and still stand a good chance to win because you have spells and they don't (run around the map, sending spells at them and they can't catch you and eventually die).
End of Wo1verine's quote

They definitely don't summon creatures in tactical battle, but I've seen them cast offensive spells like Soul Spark, Shadowbolt and Firedart quite regularly if they have the mana. The problem is that they still don't really know how to utilize them effectively, not targeting units that are much lower on the priority list. But this is a general issue with the AI, not knowing when to use special abilities, for example the infamous spider Web and Beguile on ranged units while all my melee troops rush in there to Crushing Blow them.

Which leads to another big balancing problem: Crushing Blow should be toned down from +100% to +50% Attack. It's far too strong as it is and the sensible downside of forfeiting a turn rarely comes into effect.

Which leads to another issue: The AI seems to undervalue Initiative which is the single most important stat in tactical combat. It's nice and all if they have the glorious armor and weapons while sitting there like a lame turkey during Thanksgiving season.