Age of Wonders 4

[Zeriel]

I'm gonna give it a shot when all the DLCs come out and it's on sale. I enjoyed Planetfall (still haven't played the campaigns, maybe it's time). How bad could this possibly be?

It's basically one and done. There's no story and "hook" to the gameplay, but it's fine to play through to see all the tomes/spells once, after that it just feels... empty and hollow. But that's how AoW has felt to me since 3, so whatever. If you have a bunch of friends to play with who don't get bored of it instantly, there's MP. That's really what it's designed for.

It's "okay", but no classic.

 

[Blutwurstritter]

I never got warm with Planetfall, but that was mostly due to the quirky fantasy sci-fi design, rather than the core mechanics. The laser-raptor shit didn't work for me at all.

AoW4 core mechanics are all shallow lacking any consequential choices. It is not a thinking-mans game, but it is enjoyable after long day to wind down, since the mechanics also avoid being outright bad, they are just simple. It manages to hide this superficiality for a while by throwing content at you, but there is little of interest left once you've seen all the tomes and cultures. It is nice to look at, in-offensive and easy to engage with, so its not surprising that it was mostly well received.

It can be frustrating thinking about what the game could be, since it has all the moving parts that would allow for more interesting game play, they simply aren't connected in any meaningful way. The dlc's and patches are mostly just more content, but no major changes to game play. I don't think the game is bad and I have a much better time with it than Planetfall, but having played Spellforce: Conquest of Eo by now, it is also clear how painfully average the game is, when it could be much better.

 

[Axioms]

I can't say I count "teh campaign" among the main issues of the game, both because it essentially has one (in the form of a series of sequential scenarios loosely connected by a metaplot) and because I always considered "campaigns" in this genre little more than extended tutorial and the "big scenarios" are what I play for.

I think the real problems with this one are about its core mechanics.
Specifically the way the game refuses to make anything unique and very few things mutually exclusive. As a result after a while all factions feel pretty much the same, unlock mostly the same shit, pile up largely the same amount of permanent buffs and mutations and play in the same way.

This should allegedly favor "freedom and creativity" for the players but the reality is that it contributes to rob them of the ability to experience diverse playstyles.

This is basically how I feel. The entire Paradox MO these days is this, hurts CK3 as well, although CK# would suckr regardless.

 

[Lacrymas]

The problem with these wishy-washy "create your own experience" type of games is that people like to win and like to win easily at that, so the instinct is to find the most broken shit and do that over and over again. Theoretically, you can create varied factions, but why would you? It's even worse in AoW4 where all factions end up being the same in the end anyway, so why bother. I honestly don't know what they were thinking with this game.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

people like to win and like to win easily

Who?

 

[Axioms]

The problem with these wishy-washy "create your own experience" type of games is that people like to win and like to win easily at that, so the instinct is to find the most broken shit and do that over and over again. Theoretically, you can create varied factions, but why would you? It's even worse in AoW4 where all factions end up being the same in the end anyway, so why bother. I honestly don't know what they were thinking with this game.

CK3 and AoW4 are both basically copying very old school space 4x empire/race mechanics. Think of stuff like GalCiv faction creator or the same from the StarDrive games. Stellaris did it first, greatly expanding on what previous sapce 4X games allowed, and then the other Paradox published or developed games copied it. The problem is they went way too hard, especially in AoW4. So that there's no basis *at all* for thematic or standard factions/empires/races.

And in any case compared to the old games people have higher expectations and they didn't short up the meaningful differences at all in their games. The core gameplay loop is always the same and 85% of all gameplay is the same regardless of all these choices.

Note that Paradox also went ham on the cosmestic stuff for characters or races in their creators and many casuals or Sims players care more about that than gameplay anyways. They never see other people so they don't care if their special snowflak character/faction is identical to whate very other player does.

 

[Fedora Master]

Tried the latest version and while there are some improvements you can tell this is going the way of ALL PDX games, they keep adding more stuff while the fundamental gameplay doesn't improve one bit.

 

[rumSaint]

I think there will be another "season pass" or "batch of DLC", so yeah it goes as another bloated Paradox DLC game.

 

[Blutwurstritter]

Sadly this is exactly what apparently the largest part of the consumer base wants. There are much more request for more cosmetic nonsense like different mounts, forms, equipment, than there are for actual gameplay changes on the official forum.

 

[Axioms]

Sadly this is exactly what apparently the largest part of the consumer base wants. There are much more request for more cosmetic nonsense like different mounts, forms, equipment, than there are for actual gameplay changes on the official forum.

Well stupid people can't tell the difference between balanced and broken or bugged or working but they can count how many arrow keys they press t get through the race models.

 

[The Brazilian Slaughter]

I can't say I count "teh campaign" among the main issues of the game, both because it essentially has one (in the form of a series of sequential scenarios loosely connected by a metaplot) and because I always considered "campaigns" in this genre little more than extended tutorial and the "big scenarios" are what I play for.

The original AOW campaigns were great. I also loved some of the carrier-over mechanics. Not just bringing over heroes, but bringing over veteran units and resources, as well as race relations being retained over scenarios. Being able to choose your campaign branch was great as well.

AOW2 and AOWSM weren't as good, but still good.

Don't forget that some campaigns have great and memorable scenarios which don't work outside of campaigns. United Cities, Hall of Heroes, Valley of Wonders, Death 1...

I think the way to go with campaigns is treat them as a campaign of Challenge Scenarios, after the first easy campaigns.

Honestly I would have loved an AOW-style non-linear campaign with a structure closer to that of the original game, mixed with the one done in the RTSes Earth 2150 and Warzone 2100:
- Multiple branching missions like in 2150 and in the original AOW
- Not just win-case but also lose-case. Lost a mission? You can still continue the campaign, but your enemies get buffed in subsequent scenarios. You might even have some loss-only scenarios.
- Goal not mission-oriented meta-campaign (like how in Earth 2150 you need to get enough resources)
- Missions with carry-over map which retain what you built up before

imagine starting a campaign, building up in the first scenario, going on an expedition to a different scenario for mission 2 (bringing over heroes, and being able to choose units and resources to bring over, akin to AOW), then coming back to mission 3 an expanded version of the first map which carries what you did in the first, and also expands the "Mission 1 map" out, revealing new lands in a bigger map. Let's call them "Home" and "Away" missions.
It would really make the 4X-esque elements pop out, if you could go back to what you built up previously.

 

[Blutwurstritter]

Content of the next update with a fairly exhaustive list of changes:

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/developer-diary/dev-diary-33-mystic-update.1687792/

Pretty juicy for a free patch. Contains some major changes to mystic culture, the unit experience system and ties hiring of units to town level and summoning to mage tower level.

 

[razvedchiki]

how is this game different from age of wonders 3?

 

[Blutwurstritter]

how is this game different from age of wonders 3?

There are so many differences that I doubt anyone is going to make the effort and write the text of wall that would be required to list them.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

I took a brief look at the incoming dlc and the best thing I can say about it is that it seems that prosper is working with them as a 3d model designer, particularly when it comes to the new units.

Since eldritch realms are coming out tomorrow and that makes it a wrap (I know they technically said they will still be working on it and maybe even release more content, but whatever) I'll give the final version a serious go and see what happens. The thing I'm most afraid of is that, even before getting into details of all the decline compared to previous parts, I won't be able to push through how boring and crap the 4X strategic layer is. Did they add anything that would make it even slightly involving?

 

[Axioms]

I took a brief look at the incoming dlc and the best thing I can say about it is that it seems that prosper is working with them as a 3d model designer, particularly when it comes to the new units.

Since eldritch realms are coming out tomorrow and that makes it a wrap (I know they technically said they will still be working on it and maybe even release more content, but whatever) I'll give the final version a serious go and see what happens. The thing I'm most afraid of is that, even before getting into details of all the decline compared to previous parts, I won't be able to push through how boring and crap the 4X strategic layer is. Did they add anything that would make it even slightly involving?

Nah, strategic layer sucks. Also the best part of the game, the Tome system, is criminally underutilized. There's so much room there for awesome stuff.

 

[Fedora Master]

While the DLC looks cool, it's just more stuff thrown on top of other stuff, as expected. Some QoL improvements, some cosmetics, some new resources but all just more of the same.

 

[Lacrymas]

It also doesn't really gel with AoW's iconography. When have we had Cthulhu monsters in this franchise? The shadow demons were more insect-like.

 

[Suicidal]

It also doesn't really gel with AoW's iconography. When have we had Cthulhu monsters in this franchise? The shadow demons were more insect-like.

Shadow Demons had some Cthulhu-ish monsters as well as their leader

Also AoW 3 sorcerer had tentacle monster summons that could mindrape enemy units.

 

[Lacrymas]

It also doesn't really gel with AoW's iconography. When have we had Cthulhu monsters in this franchise? The shadow demons were more insect-like.

Also AoW 3 sorcerer had tentacle monster summons that could mindrape enemy units.

And it looks out of place in AoW3 too.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

I run the game yesterday for like 30 minutes with and eldritch leader or whatever, had to go make some chow for the kids, have zero will to get back to it now.

I still scratch my head at how they didn't understand that different classes/combos having their unique ways of interacting with the strategic map, actually varied abilities that gave them flavor and units having unique quirks or even weapons/abilities based on the race was one of the coolest things about previous games and something that made them really stand out. I ain't even talking about necro now, I'm not expecting such standard, but something like human theocrat or elven sorcerer, the most basic bitch combinations from vanilla 3.

Instead we have this samey mishmash of whogivesafuck. The strategic map is DEAD, there's literally nothing to do there. How can you drop even the absolutely baseline stuff like node alteration. The combat might be OK, but it was better in both 3 and PF, why bother.

 

[Lacrymas]

My guess is that they thought they can provide us with even more interesting combinations by uncoupling everything from each other, but alas it just made everything samey instead and the balance problems even more pronounced.

 

[His Dudeness]

Gave it a go and after a while I found it repetitive and shallow.

 

[Tyranicon]

-sees semi-interesting trailer for lovecraftian bullshit-

-game is on sale, worth a buy?-

-goes to codex to read up on opinion consensus-

-people hate it-

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Just buy AoW3 collection when it'll be sold for a bag of peanuts during the incoming Summer sale. It's a gr8 gaem.