Warlock Master of the Arcane - Fantasy Civ5 clone from Paradox

[Jaedar]

Random is random, but letting towns spawn that close to each other is stupid. Not to mention that demo actually isn't random but a preset map. The fact that you can see the other town from your starting location is just :derp:. Means that every game you play(having a town spawn close to you seems to be a feature, looking at the LP going in the official forums) will start with a rush. This is a big mistake imo.

Yes but on the other hand this forces you to actually do something early other than spamming settlers. Since, as I read, currently city spam is the way to victory.

Not really. Your capitol starts at pop 4, and you need pop 5 to build settlers. Before you reach pop 5, you'll likely have conquered this first castle anyway. It just feels like pandering to the attention deficit crowd, starting with ACSHUN right away.

And yeah, city spam seems to be the way to win. No drawbacks to having many cities other than the micro required, so there's no reason to not put a city everywhere.

 

[Angthoron]

Tried out the demo, and despite the ICS abuse and the somewhat questionable AI, I rather liked it. Feels like a better version of Civ 5.

 

[laclongquan]

Where'z mah screenies, faggot?

 

[Angthoron]

Bro, you can get the official demo at the Steam DRM Store.

 

[DwarvenFood]

Whats that, too hard for you? Random is random, deal with it.

But its nowhere near a MoM clone, topic is way misleading.

Bro,

Is Enchantress more of a MoM clone than this in your opinion ?

 

[Malakal]

Whats that, too hard for you? Random is random, deal with it.

But its nowhere near a MoM clone, topic is way misleading.

Bro,

Is Enchantress more of a MoM clone than this in your opinion ?

Didnt touch that piece of shit since the great failure of their release so I wouldnt know. Also unlike Enchantress I am actually interested in this one, watching the development, videos and reading LPs.

From what I know however Enchantress is much more close to MoM. Simply not very good. Heard good things about their recent development of the game but still... hard to believe them again.

 

[Zed]

I think this game is pretty fun. Too bad there's no research (other than spells). They could have done more with randomized events and quests too. I also miss a "scoreboard" thing, like civilization has (richest empire, most food, best standing with gods, most land, strongest army, etc.)

Overall a very good budget strategy game.

 

[Anthony Davis]

Pre-ordered this. Hopefully will be able to play tonight after work. I liked what I saw from Total Biscuit's video where he was playing the video game enough to risk $19.99.

 

[Jaedar]

Played for a bit. World feels very crowded. An enemy capitol spawned 10 hexes from mine, and he immediately declared war. The game also lacks a civilopedia or equivalent to figure out building requirements.

Seems like a pretty decent strategy game, even if a lot of the mechanics are bit underdeveloped.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Banal, shit, boring. And yes - it looks and plays like CiV mod which only adds insult to injury. If paradox want to concentrate on such bs softwarefarts then they can kiss my ass.

 

[Zed]

I think it's fun, but there are a few details that... kind of spoil it:

1) When someone wins the game, it doesn't say through which victory condition. I had a CPU win a game just now and it only said something like "someone has won the game! - Exit Game".​

2) No score screens. No stats. No timelines. Straight back to menu when the game is over.​

3) Severe lack of information regarding what's required for units and other stuff. Needs an encyclopedia badly.​

4) Only basic interaction with other factions, and they never take any initiatives. You must contact them.​

When you spend 2 hours or more on a game (in my case more like 5), this simply isn't acceptable.

 

[Anthony Davis]

I would most certainly say DO NOT BUY THIS GAME.

The first time I launched the game, I can't move a unit, I can't select hexes, I basically can't play the game.

I can press GUI buttons, but for some reason I cannot click an interact with world game objects.

The tooltips that they do have are lacking in helpful information, and usually the game is popping two or three tooltips up at the same time in the same location which makes it difficult to read what the tooltip says.

Pretty disappointed so far.

 

[Marobug]

I actually bought this and well, it's kinda shit. Whoever said this looked and played like a Civ V mod got the description spot on. It's not exactly civ V with magic but certain elements are borderline plagiarism and I'm not just talking about the interface. It's also severely lacking in some areas, diplomacy for instance is a joke. It feels like a budget title (which it is, it's only 20$), it's definitely no mom so anyone expecting a spiritual successor will be greatly disappointed.

 

[20 Eyes]

I would most certainly say DO NOT BUY THIS GAME.

The first time I launched the game, I can't move a unit, I can't select hexes, I basically can't play the game.

I can press GUI buttons, but for some reason I cannot click an interact with world game objects.

The tooltips that they do have are lacking in helpful information, and usually the game is popping two or three tooltips up at the same time in the same location which makes it difficult to read what the tooltip says.

Pretty disappointed so far.

I had the same problems with the demo, and I have a pretty common PC setup. This game wasn't ready for release. This seems like a blatant cash-grab. After buying Crusader Kings II: Tech Demo Sengoku it's becoming clear to me I have to watch Paradox more closely for blatant cash-grap attempts.

 

[Crooked Bee]

Aw, and here I was hoping for an actual Paradox take on a Civ-like game.

 

[Spectacle]

Russian devs with Paradox as publisher really sounds like a recipe for a bugfest
For what it's worth I've played for about 5 hours so far with no technical issues. The interface could use some tweaking, but the game itself is perfectly playable and has been fun so far.

 

[sser]

I'm enjoying it, though it is thin in some areas (for instance, a scorecard; and sometimes units refuse to sentry-up which can be very annoying).

I played a Normal-game on Huge, Supercontinent, maxed-Mages and six "dimensions", though I did not enter a single one (not sure what the point is?).


- The AI does conduct diplomacy. They were constantly badgering me for tribute when I weak; and for non-aggressions/alliances when I was strong. Only the Skeleton king refused to play that game as he was on my border. We eventually went to war.

- Battle AI is shitloads better than Civ5. The AI seems to understand the nature of fronts and personal objectives; initially was trouncing me in my war. I lost a city fairly quick. That said, I'm not sure if I had "lucked out" with a spell, but I had Firestorm and that pretty much shit all over the skeleton hordes cramping my borders. The AI summoned tons of ghost wolves, while I on the other hand got the hand of fire elementals. The lack of a tech/spell tree leads for interesting random-gameplay, but I'm not sure I like it. Firestorm's ability to AOE-curbstomp the enemy completely changed the battles. I can't imagine playing the game and having that turned on the player -- watching your armies get fucked in one go is pretty brutal. When Civ came out there was a lot of talk about "field warfare", armies fighting out in the terrain. There is a lot of that in this game. Multiplayer should be very good.

- "Rebel" cities are the start are a great way to attain "foreign legions" of sorts. You get lots of unity variety in the game. My armies consisted of fire golems, goblin shamans, dwarves, the undead, and humans.

- Lots of interplay between units. Clerics healing, Mages throwing out spells, and forts/towers firing on units, for example. There is very good reasons to keep your units alive for as long as possible. The game works towards this goal by having severely beaten squads automatically retreat.

- Unlike Fallen Enchantress (which I am enjoying), the gameplay is fast and to the point. Constructing buildings is simple and you get instant feedback on the process. Unit-recruitment is couldn't be easier to manage. The game is mechanically sound. Your empire builds up the reserves to host its units and buildings; simple enough, and yet the player must seek balance.

- Insta-defeating a Great Mage by taking his capital is kind of stupid. That said, it takes a lot of manpower to bring down a capital.

- Still not sure what to make of the spell tree. On one hand it is okay, on the other you don't have any sense of direction. After a certain point I could only pick from 4-spells; and they were low-level rubbish. I could not figure out if I was close to the bigger guns or what.


Anyway, the game is pretty fun so far. I didn't experience any bugs or crashes like I did in the demo, so that's a plus.

 

[Berekän]

It's fun, the combat is p. well done, but it needs tweaking in some aspects. I'm playing in "Challenging" mode and it doesn't seem challenging at all so far.

 

[Spectacle]

Lol apparently the "Unity spell" that is one of the game's victory conditions isn't available to the player until the patch comes! The AI can use it though
Never change, Paradox.

 

[Anthony Davis]

Ok, so after rebooting, updating my drivers, and doing some tweaking, I was able to play the game.

Like already stated, this game has issues, but I can now see the potential.

-tooltips and info is still not 100%. Hovering over race selection in character creatioin tells me nothing. Clicking on the race tells me nothing.
-the character creation is VERY THIN compared to MoM. They should just steal the character creation from MoM whole cloth.
-placing of your capital is CRAZY. I had to restart multiple times just to get a decent starting location. One time my capital was in the middle of a field of volcanoes. I had ONE hex available to place upgrades on, that was it.
-spell research is random, which is identical to MoM, except that in MoM you could sort of direct your research by selecting spell books in character creation. No such mechanic exists here.
-combat is good, but again, without complete tooltips I can't reliably tell what is cover, what is rough terrain, what is clear terrain.
-no clear or obvious way to remove building from hexes. Clicking on them makes an explosion and dust appear, but it doesnt seem to remove them.
-even huge maps are not very big by Civ5 standards. I don't see the point of the "other worlds" since other wizards don't start there or go there that I can tell.

The good news, its only 20$ which is about what a Civ Expansion costs these days anyway. Part of me wants to say buy this because with more money maybe they will fix these issues and add some actual good content. The other part of me says run away, run far away and preserve your precious monies.

 

[Anthony Davis]

Lol apparently the "Unity spell" that is one of the game's victory conditions isn't available to the player until the patch comes! The AI can use it though
Never change, Paradox.

That's amazing.

 

[sser]

Yeah there are a lot of features missing, but I think the game works mechanically and should be easily improved. Could not say the same for Civ5 when it came out and I dropped $50 on that one.

And the starting zones are hilarious. They could use a 're-roll' option. I once started on what essentially was a floating iceberg out in the ocean.

 

[Anthony Davis]

Yeah there are a lot of features missing, but I think the game works mechanically and should be easily improved. Could not say the same for Civ5 when it came out and I dropped $50 on that one.

And the starting zones are hilarious. They could use a 're-roll' option. I once started on what essentially was a floating iceberg out in the ocean.

Part of me WANTS to like the horribly random starting city locations. I mean let's be honest. I'm a super duper archmage, where is my tower going to be? In a field of lush green grass, maybe with a rolling hill nearby, or on an iceberg or in the middle a giant volcano field?

The fact that I can START there is cool ONLY if the stupid terrain didn't matter for what I can build.

 

[Jaedar]

Just lost a game. Don't ask me why, I have no idea. Game won't tell me. I assume he cast the unity spell but even so...

Anyway, the random magic system is pretty bad. Some of the enchantments and spells are really good, some are useless. No way to plan with this.

Oh and also, here's a fun bug for you. If you enter ai diplomacy and declare war, the AI is (presumably) scripted to always accept, even if the deal is "Give away all your money and your mana for the privilege of going to war"

 

[tiagocc0]

Oh and also, here's a fun bug for you. If you enter ai diplomacy and declare war, the AI is (presumably) scripted to always accept, even if the deal is "Give away all your money and your mana for the privilege of going to war"

..oh my gosh!