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blob2
Undefeatable Hero
Blob-Ohmos the Second
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posted September 19, 2014 11:00 PM |
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Edited by blob2 at 23:16, 19 Sep 2014.
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About Endless Legend...
I've decided to buy it. It's a new game, but had a nice price. I've bought it mainly because of the Drakken  . I know AoW III also has a draconian race, but I've played it on my friends computer and somehow the game didn't convince me. Battles are strange, and somehow there's just too many things (each unit has like 10 abilities etc). Only a short time with AoW III was enough to loose my interest in it. I don't know maybe I'll try it some other time...
On the other hand I don't understand the accusation of Endless Legend UI being crappy. It's one of the best I've seen in ages. Design-wise it's very elegant and clear yet everything is nicely detailed, every little thing has a short tooltip that explains it. I won't say it's perfect, but imo it's intuitive and slick (for instance, each sub-menu can be closed with the right click of the mouse button). Overall the game has an incredible amount of detail and "small touches", every object on map has a small (beautiful) piece of artwork and flavor text.
EL has a nice army-building mechanic. Each race has only three combat units, but you can expand it with assimilation of minor factions (each has a unique unit). I think that gives a lot of diversity. I'm yet to find out if there is enough neutral units to give variety though...
EL also has a unique "campaign" mechanic. There's no traditional campaign mode. Each time you play with a faction, the map is randomly generated and you complete a faction specific quest line (I think it's the same each time, but I don't know), aside from random quests you encounter on the map. So the game has an RPG like element to it (you can also equip you hero units, and distribute skill points in skill trees, cause Heroes can level-up).
My impression of the game is that it has just the right amount of features. The game has a lot to it, but not too much to overwhelm you (for instance the research menus are not as over-expanded as in Civ 5 for instance), Still, I think it'll take quite a lot of time to try everything the game has to offer...
Slow building? It's Civ style, so more points, faster construction, plus you can fasten it with the games "gold dust" currency, so I think it's okay.
And one thing with which the game has instantly stolen my heart. It's art (there is a lot of artwork here and its gorgeous, I really like it's style) and atmosphere. The games world "Auriga" is a hybrid of traditional fantasy, dark fantasy, sci-fi (in the style of Warhammer, Mass Effect or and even Fallout) and hmm, "Discovery Channel" (I don't how else to describe it, the element of exploration and discovery of this world feels really nice)? I won't say it's that much original, but it takes a lot of different inspirations from various more or less known works and adds some uniqueness to create a really impressive world. I'm smitten with it...
Not to glorify everything, battles seem to be quite generic and not that much exciting. They seem to be in the game just because...
I'm yet to find out how each race plays, and how much the experience differs between them (and if each playtrough gives enough variety)...
Of course, time will tell if this game was worth the money, but I can already tell I'm not gonna regret buying it.
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Adrius
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Stand and fight!
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posted September 21, 2014 02:00 PM |
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Fallout: Tale Of Two Wastelands.
Had totally forgotten daddy is played by Liam Neeson.
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Doomforge
Admirable
Undefeatable Hero
Retired Hero
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posted September 21, 2014 02:39 PM |
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Reaper of souls. Such a fun H&S honestly. 
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We reached to the stars and everything is now ours
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JoonasTo
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
What if Elvin was female?
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posted September 21, 2014 08:34 PM |
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blob2 said:
On the other hand I don't understand the accusation of Endless Legend UI being crappy. It's one of the best I've seen in ages. Design-wise it's very elegant and clear yet everything is nicely detailed, every little thing has a short tooltip that explains it. I won't say it's perfect, but imo it's intuitive and slick (for instance, each sub-menu can be closed with the right click of the mouse button). Overall the game has an incredible amount of detail and "small touches", every object on map has a small (beautiful) piece of artwork and flavor text.
The UI is very, very unintuitive. The right click to close is a HORRIBLE idea. Everyone has gotten used to right-clicking to get more info and POOF, gone! This is very annoying.
Now about tooltips, they're great! But you can't see them...BECAUSE EVERYTHING IS IN TOOLTIPS! Wonder what that unit does? No problem, just look at the tooltip by hovering above the unit. Okay, so it has those abilities. I wonder what that ability does? Let's just hover over it -POOF- tooltip gone! They don't allow you to view tooltips within tooltips. Okay, let's just right click on the unit then-oh right- I CAN'T.
It's beautiful? Maybe. Is it functional? Hell no.
blob2 said:
EL also has a unique "campaign" mechanic. There's no traditional campaign mode. Each time you play with a faction, the map is randomly generated and you complete a faction specific quest line (I think it's the same each time, but I don't know), aside from random quests you encounter on the map.
This is called a random map. Not a campaign. It has been there from 1991 at least. 
blob2 said:
Slow building? It's Civ style, so more points, faster construction, plus you can fasten it with the games "gold dust" currency, so I think it's okay.
It's ridiculous for your first building to take seven turns to build while your techs only take 3 turns to research.
blob2 said:
Not to glorify everything, battles seem to be quite generic and not that much exciting. They seem to be in the game just because...
Compared to Civ series they rule.
blob2 said:
I'm yet to find out how each race plays, and how much the experience differs between them (and if each playtrough gives enough variety)...
I would highly recommend you to check out the races distribution of points...
You might find out why the ardent mages suck ass while the vaulters rule
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DON'T BE A NOOB, JOIN A.D.V.E.N.T.U.R.E.
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blob2
Undefeatable Hero
Blob-Ohmos the Second
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posted September 22, 2014 09:26 AM |
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Edited by blob2 at 12:40, 22 Sep 2014.
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JoonasTo said:
The UI is very, very unintuitive. The right click to close is a HORRIBLE idea. Everyone has gotten used to right-clicking to get more info and POOF, gone! This is very annoying.
It's a matter of getting used to. I don't find it annoying. It's not your usual feature, so it can be problematic, but it's nice to see that someone is trying new ways of enhancing the UI. It's true that some things are not clear from the beginning (for instance it was hard for me to find the menu for demolishing buildings), but once you get use to them, they're actually quite intuitive... at least for me. I've had harder time with Civ V's UI...
JoonasTo said:
Now about tooltips, they're great! But you can't see them...BECAUSE EVERYTHING IS IN TOOLTIPS! Wonder what that unit does? No problem, just look at the tooltip by hovering above the unit. Okay, so it has those abilities. I wonder what that ability does? Let's just hover over it -POOF- tooltip gone! They don't allow you to view tooltips within tooltips. Okay, let's just right click on the unit then-oh right- I CAN'T.
It's beautiful? Maybe. Is it functional? Hell no.
I think you're referring to Heroes/Units special abilities that are "attached" to items in inventory. True, normal right-click tooltips would be sufficient, but to check those abilities, you must simply equip the item (you don't have to buy it), and all abilities are shown on the right... The only problem I find with the UI is that managing units must be done by the Army/Units panel, you cannot jump to it through right-clicking or double-clicking on their portraits in the lower panel...
JoonasTo said:
This is called a random map. Not a campaign. It has been there from 1991 at least.
No it's not. You have a unique questline for each faction, from what I've seen with changeable objectives (for instance conquer a specific town which is different each time). It's still better then the same ol' campaigns over and over again. Besides, questlines and random quests are a nice attempt to make the meta-game interesting, the problem which is persistent in games like Civ V where after the the initial phases of your empire building you have long periods of fast-clicking through the "next turn" button...
JoonasTo said:
blob2 said:
Not to glorify everything, battles seem to be quite generic and not that much exciting. They seem to be in the game just because...
Compared to Civ series they rule.
Yeah, I'm getting more and more familiar with them, and they're starting to be quite interesting. The one problem that I've seen so far is that once you get better equipment battles are really easy. I think they are somewhat trying to make them harder with the fact they last only 6 turns so you have to be quick. For instance, if you don't defeat the Militia units defending a town in those 6 turns, they respawn (and units have a HP bonus when defending towns).
I still didn't fight my strongest AI opponent, and I've seen that he has higher level units so things can get ugly BTW I'm playing on Normal so this is still in the testing phase We'll see...
JoonasTo said:
I would highly recommend you to check out the races distribution of points...
You might find out why the ardent mages suck ass while the vaulters rule
Well, balancing is/was the problem of probably every strategic, faction-based game that ever existed, so, as always, patching will be required. From what I've seen the game had quite a long beta-testing phase so I think they've already tested various aspects of faction vs faction gameplay...
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mvassilev
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 22, 2014 12:40 PM |
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Replaying Might and Magic 6. It's a fun game, but the resolution is so low it causes eye strain.
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Eccentric Opinion
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JoonasTo
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
What if Elvin was female?
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posted September 22, 2014 06:28 PM |
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Item abilities or any unit abilities in general when you're on the strategic map, for example. You can't just right click or double click the unit. You need to open the army management panel and select the unit to see what the abilities do. Very annoying.
It's a random map dude. Quests don't make a map a campaign. Of course the town will be different each time because the map will be different too!
Oh yeah, the AI sucks(as in it is very easy) pretty royally. The native villages are far more challenging than opposing empires.
I don't mean balancing per say, Ardent Mages are totally OP in combat. Just look at their racial point distributions in the starting screen. Mages have 55 and Vaulters have 115! So much for balance
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DON'T BE A NOOB, JOIN A.D.V.E.N.T.U.R.E.
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blob2
Undefeatable Hero
Blob-Ohmos the Second
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posted September 22, 2014 10:28 PM |
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Edited by blob2 at 22:41, 22 Sep 2014.
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I finished my first playthrough by Wonder victory, cause I wanted to see Drakken quest line from start to finish. It was quite nicely done, it encompasses this factions struggles in choices between subjecting other races or living in peace with them, while staying true to their "knowledge is power", and "history is all-important" policies. I must say it's unusual for Dragon-kin, and that's what makes this game cool, it kinda breaks with schematics...
@JoonasTo
1. True, some additional info (or easier to get) would be nice, but there aren't that many abilities to choose from (aside from some special ones most are Attack boosts lvl 1,2,3,4 etc), so after a while I think I'll learn them all... but like I said, lack of "expanding" tooltips not that big of a deal for me.
2. Ok, be it as you will, let's say that 4X games don't have campaigns in general. Satisfied?
3. Well, AI needs more testing, I won't call it weak until I try higher then Normal difficulty levels. Neutral armies, and other factions main armies tend to be troublesome in the first phases of the game, when your units have similar strength, but with better equipment I run through them like a train  But all in all, I don't think warfare is the main focal point of the game, it's one of it's features, empire-building being the main focus.
BTW Managing Armies gave me a lot of fun, it has quite a bit customization options, this RPG aspect of the game is really nicely done. It's probably the best I've ever seen in this kind of games...
Overall, I'm rally enchanted by this game. When it comes to TBS games, it's the best I've seen in quite some time. I'm completely into it right now
PS: Besides how can a game with something THIS cool be bad
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OhforfSake
Promising
Legendary Hero
Initiate
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posted September 23, 2014 11:48 PM |
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Adrius
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Stand and fight!
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posted September 25, 2014 02:14 PM |
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If I knew about the Mad Bomber perk from GRA dlc for New Vegas I would've bought it way sooner.
MFC grenades are absolute win. Cluster of 6 plasma proximity mines that you can throw in your enemy's face. Beep beep boom! So damn satisfying, hilariously OP as well but at least you need to spend a perk to get it.
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OmegaDestroyer
Hero of Order
Fox or Chicken?
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posted September 25, 2014 02:33 PM |
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Wasteland 2.
I rescued a besieged town from raiders with my 5-man team of Rangers. The raiders were launching mortars and unfortunately killed the mayor in the initial attack. Once the raiders were dispatched, I met the interim mayor who proceeded to fire off a litany of why the Rangers can go !@#$ themselves and how my team was worthless protecting them. What he failed to realize was that my Rangers don't take kindly to criticism from those who they just rescued. He also didn't notice one of them was carrying a missile launcher.
We can only hope the third mayor will be a bit more grateful.
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The giant has awakened
You drink my blood and drown
Wrath and raving I will not stop
You'll never take me down
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Adrius
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Stand and fight!
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posted September 25, 2014 02:43 PM |
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Lol.
I kind of wish it was a Fallout game. I enjoy immersing myself absolutely in game universes... reading all the backstory, every little bit of lore... can enjoy it so much more then. I usually spend as much time on wikias as I do in-game haha.
So when I buy a new game it's always heavier than buying something that takes place in a universe that I'm familiar with.
That said, being the origin of Fallout I bet I would still feel kind of at home.
It's on the to-buy list now.
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Storm-Giant
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
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posted September 25, 2014 11:31 PM |
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After over 7 years despising its gameplay, I'm playing Heroes IV again!
After completing the two campaigns, the battles are getting a bit...dull, but the story is so awesome I won't stop 
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JoonasTo
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
What if Elvin was female?
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posted September 26, 2014 07:50 AM |
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The nature campaign is just sooooooooooooooo good
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DON'T BE A NOOB, JOIN A.D.V.E.N.T.U.R.E.
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Doomhammer
Known Hero
Smasher of pasties
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posted September 26, 2014 10:26 AM |
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Storm-Giant said:
After over 7 years despising its gameplay, I'm playing Heroes IV again!
After completing the two campaigns, the battles are getting a bit...dull, but the story is so awesome I won't stop
the campaigns on H4 are the best by far
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blob2
Undefeatable Hero
Blob-Ohmos the Second
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posted September 26, 2014 04:30 PM |
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Gauldoth, Tawni, Waerjack... I remember those names after so many years because their stories were so memorable. Full of great moments like how Gauldoth came to be, or Tarnum's fate in the Barbarian campaign (the famous back-breaker scene).
On the other side of the coin we have H5 and H6 campaigns, which protagonists I wouldn't probably even remember if their names wouldn't been reminded from time to time on this forums in some context... And if someone asked me what was the story in those games, I couldn't give him/her an answer.
A short while ago I was thinking of installing H4 cus I was looking for a TBS game to play, but then I've stumbled upon Endless Legend...
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Storm-Giant
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
On the Other Side!
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posted September 26, 2014 07:45 PM |
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Waerjack campaign was an excellent example of how to become a good king. The moment you have to leave Tarnum to his death is though, just damn.
This one and Shadow of Death (as a whole) are my favourite HoM&M campaigns that I've played so far. I may add more soon
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Kareeah_Indaga
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 27, 2014 12:13 AM |
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blob2 said:
On the other side of the coin we have H5 and H6 campaigns, which protagonists I wouldn't probably even remember if their names wouldn't been reminded from time to time on this forums in some context...
I only remember Isabel because of how big an idiot she was.  She wasn't even an entertaining variety of idiot! To this day I have yet to beat the H5 campaigns, and I have no desire to ever do so.
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Adventures in Helnith has moved!
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DoubleDeck
Promising
Legendary Hero
Look into my eyes...
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posted September 29, 2014 01:27 PM |
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Vanishing of Ethan Carter
Best graphics ever, photo-realistic.
A short game, with story driven narrative but good.
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Adrius
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
Stand and fight!
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posted September 29, 2014 04:50 PM |
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Felt like playing Chivalry again but then remembered that I still haven't gotten my prized peasant hat that I won in a competition back (disappeared in a patch), and that they even made another competition and gave it to other people.
I bet the damn emblem I designed is still in game and used by players though.
This is Valve's fault somehow, I refuse to play without my special hat.
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