Coe
 

anyone ever mess around with this? worth the download?

Re: Coe
 

Yes and yes.

Re: Coe
 

I'm playing coe2 right now. I figure if coe3 goes on sale, I'll grab it (I get overexcited about games like that, so I force myself to wait for a sale, so that I can stop myself from making too many impulse purchases. If I still want it when it goes on sale, than it's something I really want).

Re: Coe
 

I'm enjoying it. Lots of surprises. Fast turns. Winning a game on med map on baron level took about 2-3 hrs.
ssj

Re: Coe
 

in my opinion coe3 is like dom3 for kids.

Re: Coe
 

to delve more into details: its much quicker, however i dont find single player mdoe more challenging/satisfacting or more fun than dom3's: the AI seems to be on the same level, and i get bored about as quickly.

i havent tried coe3 in MP yet, i wonder what it would be like.

Re: Coe
 

Single Player in CoE3 also depends a lot on luck, if an AI gets a strong start, it can pose quite a hazard. Obviously it also depends on what class you play and what class the AI players are and other factors. And an AI is never going to be the equivalent of a human.

CoE3 MP is fun, because the games are quick enough that you can get things done and actually finish games in a reasonable timeframe. And the balance between doing things in CoE3 MP is quite good.

Re: Coe
 

I like both MP and SP, but MP is a lot more fun. Other players do unexpected things which makes the game a lot more interesting.

SP is still a blast because it feels like every time I play there is something new I discover, whether it be a new spell, unit, special location, magic item, etc.

I treat SP a lot more like a dungeon crawl. Its all about seeing the land and fighting monsters.

MP still definately has those aspects, but it has opponents that make everything a lot more exciting and unpredictable.

Re: Coe
 

Quite so.

Re: Coe
 

Does it have much of a community? Are people modding it etc?

Re: Coe
 

It has 2 active IRC channels.

Scenario maps and campaigns have a lot of activity.
Not much "modding" yet since modding commands havent been released yet. But you can check out www.CoE-3.com forum for some community. And of course the Desura offical forum

Re: Coe
 

I've watched the videos and feel the battles are definitely a step down or two steps down from what's provided within Dominions3. The battles should have been "at least" the same as what's offered from Dominions3, but realistically an improvement. The battles in CoE_3 have the units all stationary then faded when dead. Something of less quality just doesn't appeal to myself and relatives.

There's many good features in the game, but battles are too important to settle for something less.

Re: Coe
 

I dont think that would have met the goal of a less micro, faster playing Dom3.

Re: Coe
 

An improved combat system with better quality does not mean more micromanagment and slower gameplay... there's plenty of examples in the gaming industry. Even something matching Age of Empires2 or Lord of the Realms2 type battles with a smaller screen would work.
Better game quality doesn't always mean more micromanagement and slower gameplay.

Re: Coe
 

Yes. Absolutely no control in battles (apart from choosing A LIST of what your mages can cast) is a terrible thing. At the very least I wish I could give my mages some sense.

Re: Coe
 

I actually bought both CoE3 and Dominions 3 on the exact same day. I can definitively see the interest in a faster-paced game, but I have to admit that I prefer Dominions 3 by a lot.

The main problem I have with CoE3 is the sheer amount of game-breaking luck involved in absolutely everything. In my limited play experience, it's not uncommon to be gameover by turn 5 because a stack of 6 monsters invaded your capital. Or that you fail to control your very first summon which kills your main character and army early on. Or that the game just refuse to let you buy new heroes for a long time.

It works both ways, too. In my first won game, my witch learned Mass Polymorph and Mass Charm when upgraded. The result was that 1 cast of Mass Polymorph destroys pretty much 50% of the enemy army. Cast it twice? You've just destroyed the enemy 100-strong army with nearly no casualties. Mass Charm was more along the line of 25% each cast. What this meant is that no matter what army my enemies brought, they would lose and my army would get bigger. Since there's no supply issues or long distance attack spells for the vast majority of characters or reliable assassin units, there's nothing they could do to stop it.

Everytime you summon something, it's all random. You might get a pack of useful gelatinous cubes, or you can get a useless cat familiar. Get a few useful summons in a row early game and you are well on your way to win. Get a few useless in a row early on (or worse, fail controling good summons) and you are knocked out of the game.

If the game gave you better starting ressources (Actual noteworthy income or bigger starting army or some starting money/magic) then you could at least stand a chance to get back in the game if luck's against you.

Re: Coe
 

The game actually provides base numbers, which no one will totally agree with so its probably a forever discussion on where they should be set it.

But CoE3 also provides (unlike Dom3) working Scenario commands. So downloadable maps can have full storyline scenarios and campaigns. There are maps which create more resources, or less resources. Some which provide more magic items scattered across the map. And some which can give the player extra gold/iron/whatever at the start of the game. Or extra units if you feel its needed (like giving the Senator some War Elephants)

You can also create campaigns, quests with rewards, DnD situations, and mid-game worldwide events.

AND with the next patch we should start seeing modded nations. Time to browse thru the Dom3 mods for crossover ideas. :)
http://www.llamaserver.net/globu/Dom...neralMods.html

Re: Coe
 

After playing the demo is glad i didnt purchase the game. It feels very bleak and shallow and far, far too luck-based to me. Im glad i didnt waste 25 € on it, because im pretty sure i would have regret spending them at this point. User Interface is one hell of a ride. Dom 3 is already "difficult" in the beginning, but CoE 3 ? I took me 5 minutes to figure out how to transfer units from one commander to the other.
sorry

Re: Coe
 

Really? It took me like five seconds. And thats mostly because my mouse froze up.

Re: Coe
 

And it took me less time to realize that the crowd that plays CoE3 isn't as friendly as the crowd that plays Dominions 3.

Re: Coe
 

haha ooOoOoo

The community is actually pretty great. I think on the whole sometimes we get tired of hearing people make complaints about the game that are quickly and easily answered by reading the manual. Especially from people who are familiar with Illwinter games and know the necessity of familiarizing themselves with the mechanics of the game before jumping in.

Re: Coe
 

Well, while it didn't take long to figure out how to transfer troops, I cannot stress enough that it's needlessly unintuitive system. Of course when you figure it out it isn't that horrible for gameplay, but it's still vastly inferior to Dom3 system.

Re: Coe
 

Well having to read the manual to learn the ****ing interface is very bad interface design. So Illwinter should not be proud of that. (Also, userability testing should have caught that).

Re: Coe
 

Isnt that something that was in CoE2?

Also, a helpful button is the ? key. In the main map screen it has an informative response. In the battle views it has a different informative response. And in the army transfer screen yet another display of keys.

All 3 of those keep changing so its worth checking them again once in awhile also.

Re: Coe
 

I do agree that Dominions 3 is the superior experience overall. As much as I enjoy CoE3, I don't think I'll end up playing it nearly as much or nearly as long as I did Dom3. I don't think I'll play ANY game that much, for that matter. I still enjoy CoE3 a lot and think a lot of people might like it more if Illwinter hadn't spoiled us with Dom3. They're a victim of their own success!

Re: Coe
 

I bought COE3 but after a couple of games I really wanted more depth so I bought DOM3. I cant seem to find any MP games tho!

Re: Coe
 

Just thought I'd throw my two cents in (I'll try not to make it a nickel). I actually bought Dom3 a few years ago, but sold it because there were many unappealing factors. CoE3, on the other hand, is right up my alley, and I consider it the better game. All about taste I guess. :)

Re: Coe
 

Probably :) I'd say it heavily depends on some characters, though. Some like the Senator do okay if something bad happens since they have a 9 gold base income (although it also means 2 critical spots to protect at game start instead of 1).

On the other hand, a witch losing the apprentice early on (invisible unit stacks for example, or actually failing the first summon with regular fungi usage: Seen it happen) is nearly a game-crushing blow: She has a base gold income of 0 gold so even if you are lucky enough to snag a few undefended farms, it's going to be around 30 turns before you can buy a second commander. I know it's sort of balanced by the fact that her primary resource is consistantly everywhere and unguarded, but it's still a long, long time before you can grab new commanders especially since they have no summonable commanders (Never seen any in the three games I've played as Witch, at least) and it's not enjoyable that an early set-back takes so utterly long to recover from (Odds are you'll have the enemies armies at your gate before you have recovered). You have to take a lot of turns to be able to buy units early on (especially since you HAVE to buy them in groups of 5 or 10), commanders can take forever to aquire depending on faction, ressource presence and plain luck, but later on in the game you have so much money you don't know what to do with it.

Like in Dominions, your starting city gives around 400 gold per turn. Getting a new city doesn't improve you to 800: It gives a modest increase. In this game, getting one badly undefended town will often more than double your gold income: It puts any player who can get some very early leagues ahead of the others.

Still... I'll admit that there is a lot of personal preferences involved and that everyone could argue for days on the subject. I'll certainly keep an eye out for the development of the game, and I'll definitively play it Hot Seat with some friends (Dominions' really not viable for that due to turn length), but as of right now most of my playtime will definitively be dedicated to Dominions. Maybe I'm just not a fan of that much randomness. That's okay though: as vladikus said, different tastes for different people! :)