Single player is not perfect, but certainly not unplayable. None of the AoW games are particularly well-balanced, not that it matters much for the single player experience. I am rather impressed how "unbroken" the game is, given the ruler options and the tome system. This could have turned easily into a much bigger mess.It's bad and literally unplayable in both single and multiplayer/PvP due to horrendous balance issues.
translation: "we want more money so we're taking our established fans for granted and changing a bunch of shit also u want archons that'll be $20 + tip lol""It is quite literally what we've done with AoW, 2, SM, 3 and Planetfall. Each title was it's own unique game that diverted from it's predecessor and allowed both to exist within in the same space."
Wait what? Assistant?a hentai fapping assistant.
Oh yea, AoW, 2, SM, 3 and Planetfall are completely unique, totally unrelated, they're literally ranging from an RTS to a shooter, a survival game, a football manager and a hentai fapping assistant.
What a load of bull, jesus.
Exclusive aficionados, to be precise.What fans?
People who pay money for theirs game, charming people: fanboys who have money.What fans?
So they even adopted the "completely replacing a mechanic with another one at random intervals long after game's release" from paradox now, huh? Not very subtle.I didn't want to copy the whole thread, so the quote that I gave sounds more unreasonable than it is within the context of the discussion.
There is a interesting answer to a question about the goals and audience AoW4 is aiming for. Also a tidbit about AoWIII requiring a private investor to be released. But anyone interested can read it on their own,
https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/threads/aow-4-vs-aow-iii.1706930/post-29920668
The next dlc also comes with a free patch, and it seems that the hero skills got a large rework. There are now proper skill trees and hero classes, and tomes do no longer include hero skills. The governor stuff also got reworked and heroes can unlock larger economical boni by earning renown, which is obtained by full filling conditions. The skill tree stuff is shown in the dlc dev steam at ~35:30.
https://www.youtube.com/live/cWjtLmVqxs0?si=4H4VOmBywwjjl7MQ&t=2127
But is it that worse than custom factions in Master of Orion 2?Even ignoring the massive balance issues, this game is just bland and has no identity. Everything is just too free, so there's never creativity involved in making a faction, the best things are simply the best always.
Most of the old AoW games (AoW, AOW2, Shadow Magic) had flaws IN SPADES as well.The people who enjoyed the older AoW games surely can't be fans of this one, so the only people left are Reddit zoomers who don't know any better.
Yeah, too bad the scenery was just a portion of the art.shadow magic looks great
The next dlc also comes with a free patch, and it seems that the hero skills got a large rework. There are now proper skill trees and hero classes, and tomes do no longer include hero skills. The governor stuff also got reworked and heroes can unlock larger economical boni by earning renown, which is obtained by full filling conditions. The skill tree stuff is shown in the dlc dev steam at ~35:30.
And instead of iterating and fixing they just made a different game entirelyMost of the old AoW games (AoW, AOW2, Shadow Magic) had flaws IN SPADES as well.
Tomes seem still to matter somewhat by means of affinity points. Your empires affinity points apparently unlock affinity skill slots, which presumably contain skills that were formerly part of the tomes. It is shown shortly in the video around the 1:29:00 mark. But the information available right now is pretty sparse, I'd wait for the release with a proper change log to make up my mind about it.The next dlc also comes with a free patch, and it seems that the hero skills got a large rework. There are now proper skill trees and hero classes, and tomes do no longer include hero skills. The governor stuff also got reworked and heroes can unlock larger economical boni by earning renown, which is obtained by full filling conditions. The skill tree stuff is shown in the dlc dev steam at ~35:30.
Wow, so now every hero of the same class will have the same pool of skills? At least before the heroes of different players had different skills from the tomes, making them more thematic. The only difference that remains if true is the mayor buffs. And many of the hero skills contained in the tomes were minor enchantments buffs in skill form that the heroes were unable to get otherwise, like lightning blades.
Making the heroes more generic and samey and decoupling them from the rest of the faction seems like a terrible idea. Even if they slap a more bigger common skill tree to compensate. They are leaning towards what the game is most criticized for, being generic and lacking cohesion.
only flaw with shadow magic is that the ai is really dumbAnd instead of iterating and fixing they just made a different game entirelyMost of the old AoW games (AoW, AOW2, Shadow Magic) had flaws IN SPADES as well.