IGN: Elemental: War Of Magic - Preview

[theenemy]

Originally Posted by Fantomen

When people discovered he was the enemy, they buried him alive with a laptop and a internet connection.

Haha

They actually tried to smash my head in with the laptop(an Acer Aspire 8935G btw), then left it there when they thought I was dead.
I got the internet connection by plugging in a Staff of Storms into a radioactive dinosaur corpse.

[LDiCesare]

Originally Posted by Foodstamp

So far the beta group has a been a little disappointing to me. They want things taken out like perma-death for Sovereigns and want things added like Legolas elves. I hope the only version of an elf we have in the game is a pointed-ear head atop a spear. And when your Sovereign dies, I hope the game formats your computer.

Perma death for the Sovereign is not an issue to me. Game over on sovereign death is. It's a gameplay issue because Brad Wardell says himself the ai will have lots of computation to do to avoid being killed and therefore he's looking for ways to make it hard to kill a sovereign, which means he's designing the game around a core feature and then trying to work around that core feature because the ai won't handle it.
The current implementation of sovereign death is also particularly annoying: When you kill a soevereign, all his cities just vanish (but not the units).

Now many players in the beta think game over on sovereign death is a good idea, and I haven't seen anyone asking for Legolas elves on the beta forums.

[Foodstamp]

There are many threads asking for stock fantasy races. The reason I like the idea of the Sovereign dying = game over is because the sovereign is supposed to represent you, and also it adds an element of danger to the game that makes it more exciting. The cities vanishing is lame, and I hope they change that.

[NTJedi]

Originally Posted by Foodstamp

There are many threads asking for stock fantasy races.

It's not unreasonable expecting fantasy races since it's a fantasy game. In my opinion it doesn't have to be stock fantasy races, but anything is better than having only human good and human bad.

Originally Posted by Foodstamp

The reason I like the idea of the Sovereign dying = game over is because the sovereign is supposed to represent you, and also it adds an element of danger to the game that makes it more exciting.

Adding an element of danger with the Sovereign dying can be done without meaning instant game over. The dominions series did it correctly because the death of the pretender has a serious penalty.
In Elemental I'd hate to suddenly lose a game because another player got lucky casting a volcano or because some Balrog was released by independent adventurers. Whether or not a player loses the game by the sovereigns death means the sovereign will be more and more likely hiding deep in a tower during middle and late game.

What other recent TBS games makes you believe tying a win/lose event to a single unit would be successful?

[Foodstamp]

For years we have seen games drift from being hard to being very easy. It's refreshing when a game comes around that offers challenges such as the sovereign death = game over. I think Dwarf Fortress is a great example of how a game can be fun and very difficult. It shouldn't be a matter of naming current TBSs that use the mechanic, and the reason why is because I don't want to play a game that has to have rules that have been done before in a TBS. I don't mind if this game strays away from the ordinary. And it sounds like losing your Sovereign isn't going to be a thing that just happens on a dice roll. It sounds like it is going to be very difficult to lose a sovereign. It creates another win/lose condition to the game. Enough people are clamoring for it to be gone that it doesn't matter anyway. They will remove the feature or they will make it where you can toggle it on and off.

[Gregstrom]

I certainly never thought Total Annihilation was a bad game because Commander death = game over.

[sector24]

I'm pretty sure that they won't implement stock fantasy races into the base game. They have the tools that will allow the modding community to do that kind of work for them. As far as the sovereign thing, it really depends on the game balance, especially because the game touts the kind of decisions where your sovereign spends his essence on things which is supposed to make him weaker. Age of Wonders had that game mode where if you lost your "king" hero you lost the game. It was fun actually, but I'm not sure it should be the default.

Either way, keep the impressions/updates coming as new stuff gets released.

[chrispedersen]

Originally Posted by Foodstamp

For years we have seen games drift from being hard to being very easy. It's refreshing when a game comes around that offers challenges such as the sovereign death = game over. I think Dwarf Fortress is a great example of how a game can be fun and very difficult. It shouldn't be a matter of naming current TBSs that use the mechanic, and the reason why is because I don't want to play a game that has to have rules that have been done before in a TBS. I don't mind if this game strays away from the ordinary. And it sounds like losing your Sovereign isn't going to be a thing that just happens on a dice roll. It sounds like it is going to be very difficult to lose a sovereign. It creates another win/lose condition to the game. Enough people are clamoring for it to be gone that it doesn't matter anyway. They will remove the feature or they will make it where you can toggle it on and off.

time and time again I try to get into Dwarf Fortress.

I *don't* care about graphics..
(I loved Rogue, and hack, and asciTrek)

But damn I just can't get into it. What was that//? again?

[Foodstamp]

time and time again I try to get into Dwarf Fortress.

I *don't* care about graphics..
(I loved Rogue, and hack, and asciTrek)

But damn I just can't get into it. What was that//? again?

Oh you should try it with a good graphic mod pack. it makes the game more fun for me . Go to the forum and there is bound to be an excellent one on the first page of the modding forum.

[Sombre]

Originally Posted by Gregstrom

I certainly never thought Total Annihilation was a bad game because Commander death = game over.

It didn't. I'm confused.