OT, Stardock's MOM influenced game news - Page 2

WraithLord · #1 March 3rd, 2008, 12:10 PM

My gripe with equalized balance has nothing to do with difficulty. It has to do with boredom. Lets take the example of AOW-SM,
1. All races has same structures, temple, barracks etc.
2. All races has the same units tier structure, lvl1 with a melee unit, ranged unit < lvl2 < lvl3 < lvl4.
3. All races share the same economy model (gold). Most ridiculously even the undead do.

These are but a few that come to mind after three years I've stopped playing AOW-SM. I recall at the time discussing those issues at length and in much more detail at the AOW heaven forums.

Warcraft II and most RTS are also a good example. 2-4 races, if one race gets a flyer then all the rest must have a flyer, doesn't matter if its thematic or not. Same for stealth units, extra powerful thugs and so on.

I actually kind of like balance, but of a different kind - balance in which races that have different mechanics and concepts match a bit differently according to settings of the conflict. One in which race overall strength is non transitive, meaning race A is considered more powerful than race B, race B is considered more powerful the race C, however race C may be considered to be more powerful the race A because, say, it inherently contains many counters to race A.

I think balance is dominions is more akin to the concepts of balance that I like.

Twan · #2 March 3rd, 2008, 12:05 PM

Quote:

Beorne said:
btw, someone heard something about this turn based fantasy game: "Fantasy Wars"?
http://www.fantasywars-thegame.com/index_uk.html

It's a poor 3d remake of Fantagy General (90% of the rules are a copy, the only differences are : you control far smaller armies in FW but each troop can gain chosen particular skills when they level and mages have access to more spells).

(be aware : FW in publicities is announced with "epic battles of more than 500 units on screen" and "a map editor", and these two things are totally absent)

Fantasy General you can get on any abandonware site has a campaign 3 or 4 times longer than the total FW content, with a research system you don't have in FW, more diversity of troops and terrains and a far better system for customized battles.

Even Wesnoth, freeware inspired by fantasy general, is far richer than FW (with lots of user made campaigns and a more interesting tactic system with a choice between several attacks for each unit).

ps : I discovered dominions 2 on the masterofmagic2.com site too.

Beorne · #3 March 3rd, 2008, 03:35 PM

Quote:

Twan said:

Fantasy General you can get on any abandonware site has a campaign 3 or 4 times longer than the total FW content, with a research system you don't have in FW, more diversity of troops and terrains and a far better system for customized battles.

I had it, I played it up to a couple of scenarios to the end. It was mind burning, like chess, and It had a very nice atmosphere, mostly due to the wonderful soundtrak (that I have found lately

). Very good game.

Beorne · #4 March 3rd, 2008, 04:42 PM

I agree that AoW and its sequel were boring in the middle-long run, but saying I like unblanced games because the color is better is wrong.
Dom3 is very difficult to fine balance, but it is easy to adjust the big unbalances. And much is beng done.
But I'm playing a five player late map and we are four allied against Ermor ... and he is bashing us all ...