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Jiriki9
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posted January 24, 2012 05:35 PM |
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Poll Question:
Absolutely necessary features of HoMM - ?
Well, this poll shall be about thigns which one could consider absolutely necessary for HoMM - but are they? THe question is up to you...what is, for you, the most necessary aspect of HoMM, which should ABSOLUTELY NOT be changed?
Note: I took one, and only one, thing for absolutely granted: HoMM is TURN-BASED. thus, I did not gave this as option and neither is it part of "other"!!!!!!!
also, I hope I forgot nothing vitally important
Explanations will be in post 2!
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Jiriki9
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posted January 24, 2012 05:35 PM |
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Edited by Jiriki9 at 17:45, 24 Jan 2012.
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Adventure Map and Battle Screen
This simply means that the Battle takes place in a different screen than the rest if the game. An example for the opposite are most Non-Turn-based Strategy games, for example Age of Empires or Warcraft 1-3...
Unit Stacks
This means nothing but the fact that not every individual unit takes a place but same units are gathered in stacks.
Heroes
This means that heroes are in, as leaders who enhance the strength of your units, cannot travel without them, and level up through an EXP-system.
Distinct/Unique Factions
THis means that the factions in all HoMMs so far are clearly distinct from one another: They have different hero classes, and different units, and of course a different town (at least!). This does not mean that factions cannot be similar!
I think making an example of the opposite makes it clearer most easily: Age of Empires is an opposite example, where the factions share most of the buildings, units and everything and vary only in some points (like which units are available. In HoMM so far, that (at least for units and hero classes) is NOT so, but the factions are unique.
Towns
Well, this means the existence of Towns as single, yet complex objects, in opposition to every building of a town being seperately reachable on the Map (again, like it is in AoE^^).
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hobo2
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posted January 24, 2012 06:10 PM |
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I totally can't answer this poll as it is currently formulated. Obviously there have to be heroes and battle screens for it to be a Heroes game. But I could easily see the game handled without Towns. A series of external dwellings like in King's Bounty would work fine. Heck, it works fine in King's Bounty and those games are essentially the RPG-end of the same series.
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OmegaDestroyer
Hero of Order
Fox or Chicken?
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posted January 24, 2012 06:12 PM |
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Being able to load my !@#$%^& campaign in single player would be awesome!
Whoever thought the Conflux was a great idea needs to be shot.
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You drink my blood and drown
Wrath and raving I will not stop
You'll never take me down
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Jiriki9
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posted January 24, 2012 06:13 PM |
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But KB is NOT heroes, still^^ yet, I definitely see your point, yet it would not have fit into the maximum of 10 answers to also give any possible combination of the points...
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hobo2
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posted January 24, 2012 06:16 PM |
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Heck, there don't even have to be "factions", let alone distinct factions. If you go for the stand-alone dwellings model, you might not be able to field an army that was all from one morale class. Heroes is often about getting disparate groups of monsters to fit together into a tactical whole, there's no reason it couldn't be a total mix-n-match every time.
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Jiriki9
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posted January 24, 2012 06:22 PM |
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that's how you view it.^^ an interesting opinion. Yet however others may see that differently. that's why I started a poll, actually, to see which points are seen as important by most people. And also to see if people see very different game features as absolutely necessary and maybe alter the poll after that. Just as a brainstorming.
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Zenofex
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posted January 24, 2012 06:42 PM |
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To be sold to a company which doesn't treat it as Tetris' poor cousin. Once we have this, everything else will fall into place.
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Adrius
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Stand and fight!
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posted January 24, 2012 07:09 PM |
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Atmosphere.
H5 had it... just letting the camera flow in a Haven town... listening to the majestic soundtrack as the camera passes by the angel statue...
Or when the sunglare focuses perfectly through the ring of the Sylvan Tier 7 structure... along with the drums...
The peaceful feeling of adventure as you ride through the lands, collecting treasures and fighting creatures...
It's not something that you can put a definitive label on... it's rather when several different elements work perfectly together to create an experience.
If I had to choose something specific, I would say the soundtrack. The Heroes series has always had epic music, and without it all the other essential parts feel much less fantastic. It enhances every moment.
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MattII
Legendary Hero
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posted January 24, 2012 07:26 PM |
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Edited by MattII at 19:12, 25 Jan 2012.
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Just can't choose.
Quote:
Heck, there don't even have to be "factions", let alone distinct factions.
Distinct factions are a central feature of the series, if you remove them you end up with King's Bounty, which I don't know about anyone else, but I certainly don't want
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blizzardboy
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posted January 24, 2012 07:49 PM |
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There has to be heroes of might and magic, and it has to be turn-based strategy.
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"Folks, I don't trust children. They're here to replace us."
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Jiriki9
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posted January 25, 2012 03:55 PM |
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@adrius. I liek your point, which is quite constructivistic 
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Avirosb
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No longer on vacation
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posted January 25, 2012 04:14 PM |
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Edited by Avirosb at 16:15, 25 Jan 2012.
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I like his point too, just not his example.
Of course, it's a subjective thing.
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Miru
Supreme Hero
A leaf in the river of time
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posted January 26, 2012 09:01 PM |
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Quote:
Being able to load my !@#$%^& campaign in single player would be awesome!
Whoever thought the Conflux was a great idea needs to be shot.
It's very convinent if you play on multiple computers. It is POSSIBLE to get around it, so that your single player campaigns are on your computer and not the internet. If you block HoMM from accessing the internet then play in offline mode then you can continue when offline. Switching between online and offline is hard, but I know that the games are stored on your computer and only synced when you close/open the game, so it should be possible.
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I wish I were employed by a stupendous paragraph, with capitalized English words and expressions.
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Tsar-Ivor
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Scourge of God
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posted January 26, 2012 09:09 PM |
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"Heroes"...Obviously 
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"No laughs were had. There is only shame and sadness." Jenny
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PoserElf
Tavern Dweller
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posted January 27, 2012 06:15 AM |
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Quote:
Well, this poll shall be about thigns which one could consider absolutely necessary for HoMM - but are they? THe question is up to you...what is, for you, the most necessary aspect of HoMM, which should ABSOLUTELY NOT be changed?
Note: I took one, and only one, thing for absolutely granted: HoMM is TURN-BASED. thus, I did not gave this as option and neither is it part of "other"!!!!!!!
also, I hope I forgot nothing vitally important
Explanations will be in post 2!
Everyone here is making good points...but in my opinion, HOMM V achieved a perfect system. It reminds me of a mix of Age of Wonders and Civilization gameplay-wise, and the powerful effects of your heroes skills and leadership on a battle's out come and the customization those choices provide, have given me many hours of distinct and fun gameplay.
The option for standalone dwellings intrigues me though; it makes me remember the good old days of Heroes of Might and Magic on the Playstation 2, before I even owned a personal computer. Not to mention it provides more customization options(but would make the ai more vulnerable if they were not programmed to defend all of their dwellings in a certain area, and ignore dwellings that would be impractical to hold).
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Jiriki9
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posted January 28, 2012 11:46 AM |
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Quote:
Everyone here is making good points...but in my opinion, HOMM V achieved a perfect system. It reminds me of a mix of Age of Wonders and Civilization gameplay-wise, and the powerful effects of your heroes skills and leadership on a battle's out come and the customization those choices provide, have given me many hours of distinct and fun gameplay.
ehm. H5 was good, sure, but, to me, not perfect. In some ways, H3 was better to me - defintiely for the time, but even today: smoother in running, better atmosphere (graphical style), better factions.
Also I can not see the connection to AoW and Civ gameplay-wise, at least not more than in HoMM3...was HV your first HoMM after the ps2thingy? Overall, H5 to me was HoMM3 advanced. To AoW I see more differences than connection: different spell learning (AoW: Research instead of Guild learning), different hero style and role (AoW: participating Fighter instead of invulnerable Leader), different unit system (AoW: individuals instead of stacks), differently working skill system (AoW: points instead of choices), very different town system (AoW: not really individual buildings), no warmachines in AoW (they're jsut units), highly different diplomacy (AoW: changin during scenario). The only basis they share in my eyes is, I think, the basis of any turn-based strategy game in fantasy setting.
And to Civ...it would be interesting to know WHICH civ-game you mean, but in my eyes anyway: even LESS connection!!! the whole game is on a different scale (civ: thousands of years instead of weeks-at most soem years[which would be a long HoMM-game]), the gameplay is very different (much more economy factors in Civ), the goals are different (CIv: not only military, again), there is research in civ, you can found new towns in civ, there is no battle-screen in civ... Thus, the common basic is even less...despite both being strategy games and the things coming with it and both being turn-based, Isee nto really important common things.
...and I also wouldn't see H5 as a combination of AoW and civ...
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PoserElf
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posted January 28, 2012 06:26 PM |
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Quote:
Quote:
Everyone here is making good points...but in my opinion, HOMM V achieved a perfect system. It reminds me of a mix of Age of Wonders and Civilization gameplay-wise, and the powerful effects of your heroes skills and leadership on a battle's out come and the customization those choices provide, have given me many hours of distinct and fun gameplay.
ehm. H5 was good, sure, but, to me, not perfect. In some ways, H3 was better to me - defintiely for the time, but even today: smoother in running, better atmosphere (graphical style), better factions.
Also I can not see the connection to AoW and Civ gameplay-wise, at least not more than in HoMM3...was HV your first HoMM after the ps2thingy? Overall, H5 to me was HoMM3 advanced. To AoW I see more differences than connection: different spell learning (AoW: Research instead of Guild learning), different hero style and role (AoW: participating Fighter instead of invulnerable Leader), different unit system (AoW: individuals instead of stacks), differently working skill system (AoW: points instead of choices), very different town system (AoW: not really individual buildings), no warmachines in AoW (they're jsut units), highly different diplomacy (AoW: changin during scenario). The only basis they share in my eyes is, I think, the basis of any turn-based strategy game in fantasy setting.
And to Civ...it would be interesting to know WHICH civ-game you mean, but in my eyes anyway: even LESS connection!!! the whole game is on a different scale (civ: thousands of years instead of weeks-at most soem years[which would be a long HoMM-game]), the gameplay is very different (much more economy factors in Civ), the goals are different (CIv: not only military, again), there is research in civ, you can found new towns in civ, there is no battle-screen in civ... Thus, the common basic is even less...despite both being strategy games and the things coming with it and both being turn-based, Isee nto really important common things.
...and I also wouldn't see H5 as a combination of AoW and civ...
I meant Civ IV(previous Civ games are not even in true 3d, i.e. they use images instead of 3d-ish models), and I meant to the extent it has a turn system that is basically the same as HoMM V's, by which I mean you take turns that represent a set period of time, as well as having turn limits. Civilization IV is not really a closely matching game, but it also uses unit graphics to represent armies and you build buildings in your cities that take up a certain amount of resources that are represented by graphics added to the city's graphics.
That's true that the unit stack system is different, but I meant HoMM V is like a mix between Civ's unit system of thousands of units represented by a 3 unit graphic and AoW's one per one unit graphic representation. True, heroes are more involved in AoW's combat, but they are quintessentially used as uber units on steroids in both games(you lose your hero units in both games when you lose a battle, and must use resources to bring them back). The leveling up system is pretty much the same to me though; basic-ultimate skill levels is pretty much the same as skill ranks. You also see "perks" in AoW that require certain levels of other skills(if I remember the level system correctly). I never really used diplomacy in AoW(all of the AI players back stab as soon as they get a chance), so I'll agree with you on that. I do think I allied with an AI player in one game of AoW though, which I've never been able to do in HoMM.
HOMM V was my first Heroes' game after my PS 2 experience though. Am I missing something by not having played HoMM 3 before?
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Jiriki9
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posted January 29, 2012 09:26 AM |
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Quote:
it has a turn system that is basically the same as HoMM V's, by which I mean you take turns that represent a set period of time, as well as having turn limits. Civilization IV is not really a closely matching game, but it also uses unit graphics to represent armies and you build buildings in your cities that take up a certain amount of resources that are represented by graphics added to the city's graphics.
the first is the definition of "turn-based" games, thsu jsut representing both games are roughly in the same genre (turn based strategy). the point with single graphics representing armies is true, but also used in more games, I think.
Quote:
True, heroes are more involved in AoW's combat, but they are quintessentially used as uber units on steroids in both games
But their use is quite different!!! In HoMM (except 4) heroes are not strong fighters of any kind, and heroes cannot die before all the army is dead. Also, heroes allways have an effect on the whole army, strengthening it - which is only managable with few skills in AoW I think, maybe only one...
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The leveling up system is pretty much the same to me though; basic-ultimate skill levels is pretty much the same as skill ranks. You also see "perks" in AoW that require certain levels of other skills
It is not! There are several differences which re quite important to me. First, in HoMM you get a stat bonsu ON EVERY LEVEL - not in AoW wheere you buy stats and skills from the same points. Second in HoMM there ARE no such points, but you get a choice of skills, leading to two distinct effects: in terms of leveling up, all skills are equal in HoMM, there are neither skills which require two level-ups (like a better casting skill does in AoW, unless I remember wrong), nor skills of which you could buy 2 with one level up (as there are in AoW). The other effect of this is that (before H6, which I did not play and do not have desire to play) the development of your hero is not only decided by you, but an element of randomness comes in.
Concerning diplomacy: Yes, that's one big difference between the games. In AoW you theoretically can change diplomatic statuses in game (though, because it's poorly done, it indeed makes not much sense unless in multiplayer), and in HoMM NOT AT ALL.
...personally, I'd say you have, but you said you did not even count Civ3 in because fo the graphics...HoMM3 is probably lower on graphics than civ3. The strength of H3's graphic is not 3D (and I'm not so a fan of introduction of 3D in both Civilization and Heroes! it's unnecessary for a turn-based strategy game in my eyes!) but the style, which is smoother, and...well, less obviously unreal than for example H5. Also, H3 is just a classic and for me probably the game with the highest replay value (not considering boring but addicting games like Tetris  )
...but this discussion leads a bit off, I think
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PoserElf
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posted January 29, 2012 11:03 PM |
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Quote:
Quote:
it has a turn system that is basically the same as HoMM V's, by which I mean you take turns that represent a set period of time, as well as having turn limits. Civilization IV is not really a closely matching game, but it also uses unit graphics to represent armies and you build buildings in your cities that take up a certain amount of resources that are represented by graphics added to the city's graphics.
the first is the definition of "turn-based" games, thsu jsut representing both games are roughly in the same genre (turn based strategy). the point with single graphics representing armies is true, but also used in more games, I think.
Quote:
True, heroes are more involved in AoW's combat, but they are quintessentially used as uber units on steroids in both games
But their use is quite different!!! In HoMM (except 4) heroes are not strong fighters of any kind, and heroes cannot die before all the army is dead. Also, heroes allways have an effect on the whole army, strengthening it - which is only managable with few skills in AoW I think, maybe only one...
Quote:
The leveling up system is pretty much the same to me though; basic-ultimate skill levels is pretty much the same as skill ranks. You also see "perks" in AoW that require certain levels of other skills
It is not! There are several differences which re quite important to me. First, in HoMM you get a stat bonsu ON EVERY LEVEL - not in AoW wheere you buy stats and skills from the same points. Second in HoMM there ARE no such points, but you get a choice of skills, leading to two distinct effects: in terms of leveling up, all skills are equal in HoMM, there are neither skills which require two level-ups (like a better casting skill does in AoW, unless I remember wrong), nor skills of which you could buy 2 with one level up (as there are in AoW). The other effect of this is that (before H6, which I did not play and do not have desire to play) the development of your hero is not only decided by you, but an element of randomness comes in.
Concerning diplomacy: Yes, that's one big difference between the games. In AoW you theoretically can change diplomatic statuses in game (though, because it's poorly done, it indeed makes not much sense unless in multiplayer), and in HoMM NOT AT ALL.
...personally, I'd say you have, but you said you did not even count Civ3 in because fo the graphics...HoMM3 is probably lower on graphics than civ3. The strength of H3's graphic is not 3D (and I'm not so a fan of introduction of 3D in both Civilization and Heroes! it's unnecessary for a turn-based strategy game in my eyes!) but the style, which is smoother, and...well, less obviously unreal than for example H5. Also, H3 is just a classic and for me probably the game with the highest replay value (not considering boring but addicting games like Tetris )
...but this discussion leads a bit off, I think
Can I add one last thing? I think heroes can be very powerful in HoMM V, and I've even had early, late-game battles where my heroes alone won the battle for me. For an example, my game where my main hero was a wizard; I had around 600 mana, and I could deal out 800 or so damage with each casting of ice spike(at 3 mana each casting). This is around the damage of 8-10(or more for some factions) eight tier units, being led by a hero with a decently high attack.
With spells like armageddon or implosion I would deal over 1000 points of damage per casting, making your(mine in this case) hero a force to be reckoned with. And even low level knight heroes can deal out 100+ damage with a direct attack.
I guess I don't need a 3d game(the playstation 2 HoMM just makes me automatically think of HoMM as a 3d game). But I guess another big reason I didn't include Civ 3 is because combat is just too...random, any game where a highly-promoted archer(who could have more bars of health) can beat a tank during a siege has something wrong with it in my book.
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