#The game feels like it lacks the sense of power scaling and epicness that AoW3 had

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gritty oxide
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Either I'm really dumb and missed something, or there's literally no way to get Dragon units, Lost Wizards, the new version of the Eldritch Horror that I keep forgetting it's new name, and several other tier 4/5 units. In fact it looks like the devs went out of their way to prevent you from using them! The mechanics of mind control were changed so that only one of the spells/abilities will actually let you keep an enemy unit that is under your control when the battle ends, and these Tier4/5 units are all specifically immune to Routing which that mind control requires. Why? What is the point of doing that? Having really cool, impressive, etc units in the game doesn't make the game more fun if you can't use them yourself to crush people into paste.

In fact, Astral Affinity in general feels extremely underwhelming. The tier 4 units are a dog that can teleport and a mimic. Why would I want to use a mimic to copy someone else's cool unit instead of just having my own cool unit that fits the theme of the faction? This is doubly bizarre because the Eldritch Horror or "Mage Bane" as it's called now, is in the game already! I'm looking at the unit roster right now and every other tome has a much more interesting Tier 4 unit AND a usable Tier V unit. Again, the Eldritch Horror and the Lost Wizard are already in the game so why can't Astral players use them...?

EDIT: and I just checked the wiki to confirm, you can only get one of the Tier 4 giants, Golden Dragons aren't in the game at all, and the good/evil aligned factions don't have their respective Tier 4 Angel/fallen angel units like they used to.

The endgame spells for Astral Affinity (and most of the other affinities from what I can see) are also pretty lacking. The endgame combat spell for Astral/Sorcerer players used to be that you tore open a hole in reality which constantly spawned monsters while also creating a lightning storm that electrocuted enemies every turn. Now you can... stop time in a 1 hex radius? k

white glacier
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You can get bone dragons, but that really just rubs in the fact that the achievement for owning a dragon is "Fiery Friend" and bone dragons aren't fiery. But yeah, all this.

buoyant topaz
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I think one of the DLCS has "dragon" in the name... so I think we will see more dragons. But in general the power progression is completely broken. I don't know if that was accidental or if their intent was to give players near instant gratification, but its broken.

wraith rose
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We need more ancient wonders in general. There are only 10 types currently and I usually see lots of repeats.

sand bane
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I think this stems from the fact triumph is attempting to curtail the 1 unit type death stacks that was prevalent in aow3

fossil parrot
narrow hedge
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100%

brittle pendant
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By end game you're summoning titans and wielding super powerful spells and heavily buffed armies, I dunno, that's epic to me. Ok you can't spam T5s but I actually like that, that was a big problem in 3.

rigid viper
buoyant topaz
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its not a lack of funds

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its time-gating

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I don't like it either, to be clear

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Its just a grift for more money. The silver lining is that Triumph still doesn't have a cash shop and continues to resist pressure to create one, so I'm thankful for that.

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@rigid viper

sacred quiver
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It is unreasonable to expect the content of every previous game and its expansions to be represented in aow4 on release, for example the lizardmen were missing from aow2 entirely, and frostlings only came to aow3 in dlc. It is also worth pointing out that units and factions have more mechanics to them than they did in previous games (in the same way that aow3 had more than aow2), a lot of faction's basic units had identical gameplay in aow2.

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I say this as someone that really misses dreadnought from aow3 on release

soft patrol
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The endgame spells for Astral Affinity (and most of the other affinities from what I can see) are also pretty lacking. The endgame combat spell for Astral/Sorcerer players used to be that you tore open a hole in reality which constantly spawned monsters while also creating a lightning storm that electrocuted enemies every turn. Now you can... stop time in a 1 hex radius?
they went the Planetfall Void-Tech way and one of the best combat spells is to make two copies of one of your units, which indeed can be a hero, do that once or twice and you have a near unstoppable army if that hero has a high enough level (which they should have in the late game)

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in general the mirror tome is one of the best tomes in the game

soft patrol
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the only difference is that you're stronger against other players, while marauders can still give you trouble, or having to do manual combat

soft patrol
buoyant topaz
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but the staggered release of content in the form of DLC, in my opinion, is more likely a strategy to milk the buyer out of more money than the game is worth.

soft patrol
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I agree very much, though if they do a great job like they did in Planetfall it's fine... that launch was also... bad... and now it's imo the best game in the series

sand bane
# soft patrol that's still a thing in the lategame though

The op was about late game. Or to you expect epic battles right from turn one?

The ideal is to have a slow build, from mundane to truly epic at the end of the game.

As for your comments on the dsync, have a little patience. I'm sure they'll fix it. It certainly has to be a top priority.

sand bane
soft patrol
sand bane
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i wouldn't call t1 stacks of 6 a "death stack"

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that term refers to t4 units rolled into a 6 stack army

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t5 didn't exist before

soft patrol
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they were easily to build and buff up, and having 6 cities was also quite easy to do, so you basically produced a whole stack, or even more, per turn without making use of hurry production

sand bane
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yeah, having more cities was certainly much easier. there was no soft cap. I'm undecided if i like the change

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on one hand... it takes some of a tedium out of the game... having less cities. but it does take some of the grandeur out of the experience too.

soft patrol
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and yes, there was either rampant T1 spam, or having just a few high tier units in a stack, nothing in between

sand bane
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you did say you were playing mostly mp... so yeah, you'd see a lot more low tier units in that sort of game

soft patrol
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AoW4 made tiers having a way wider gap, making T1, even with loads of buffs, useless lategame, while at the same time making higher tier units less accessible (though Astral gets a T3 summon in a T2 tome, and T4 summon in a T3 tome, while if you're lucky you get the option to summon a T3 animal the moment your first hero reaches level 5)

sand bane
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meh... I've seen some pretty successful t1 spam builds in the current build...

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you just need to load on the enchants

soft patrol
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1v1 sure, I'd guess

sand bane
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and like you said... the ability to get too many high tier enemies is limited..

soft patrol
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later those T1s sadly get oneshot

sand bane
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so you can kind of drown the enemy high tier units on low tier spam.

soft patrol
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doesn't really work against Astral though as their access to high tier units is super fast

sand bane
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well.. i wouldn't expect a t1 unit to come out of a fight unscathed. you certainly need to overwhelm with that sort of tactic

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true... summoning is a bit of a workaround

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but other affinities have their tricks too

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it'll take a while to iron out the meta... so things can be balanced a bit more

soft patrol
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sure the others can also summon higher tier stuff, but they generally cost a lot more, and have more weaknesses in general

sand bane
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there's also lower tier summons. which are more spamable

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but tbh... astral should have the advantage in summoning... it's what the affinity is all about

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Triumph is going for an asemetic balance

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which imo... is the best way to balance a game

soft patrol
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yes, but they suffer the extreme weakness of being lower tier, in addition to them not profiting from any transformations and usually not really synergizing with the buffs

sand bane
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if everyone is exactly the same.. the differences have no meaning

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not sure what you mean by not synergizing with the buffs. from what i've seen there's tons of synergies...

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the nature beast stuff is one route

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order has a bunch of healing beacon craziness

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choas has teleporting summons. (so your units cna't be hit more than once.)

soft patrol
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if the unit after teleporting is still in range of the ranged unit it will just continue

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could be wrong, didn't happen for a while

sand bane
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fair enough, but the army needs a good mix of both

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ranged only armies tend to get obliterated

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unless you're relying on some sort of cheese

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like spider mounts or vines

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imo... the best way to bring the lower tier units up in terms of power.. is to give them hero levels and allow them to equip items once they reach legendary rank

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granted, your t4 and 5 units could do the same.. but it's much harder to get xp on them

soft patrol
sand bane
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the last rank of unit veterancy is "legendary"

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they could effectively be turned into heroes (without paying heed to the hero cap) once they reach the rank

soft patrol
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is that something I missed, or a suggestion? I mean stuff getting to legendary doesn't happen often anyway

sand bane
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just a suggestion ... it's not in the game

soft patrol
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ah

sand bane
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right.. and it shouldn't happen often.

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should be a reward for keeping your units alive

soft patrol
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I really liked the mods in Planetfall

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which is kinda similar

sand bane
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yeah, there's been a good modding community.

soft patrol
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no I meant unit mods 😛

sand bane
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oh .. those too

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i prefer the gear system for heroes

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though... the amount of items seems a bit lacking

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hopefully they'll add a lot more with the up coming expansions.

soft patrol
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there's also too much x equip prevents y from being equipped imo

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like why would some weird greaves which have atrocious stats prevent me from using a mount

sand bane
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ive not seen that be a thing

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just that most two handed weapons prevent mount usage

soft patrol
sand bane
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weird...

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probably the heavy armor aspect

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also... +3 armor isn't bad

soft patrol
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notice the slow movement

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it's 2 drawbacks for just a bit of defense

sand bane
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sure... that's not amazing... but it's meant for a melee hero. put a teleport on the hero.. and it wont be that big of an issue

soft patrol
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it still feels bad whenever I roll them, as there's so much better equip to roll

sand bane
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depending on how much armor your hero has... +3 armor is 20 -30% physical defense

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that's huge

soft patrol
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it's a nice starting armor, but I actually actively remove it in mid game

sand bane
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that's reasonable

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heroes tend to be much better off in an assault role

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they mgiht be good tanks... but you're better off with some other meatball of a unit absorbing damage

soft patrol
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yes

sand bane
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so the hero can be used to full effect

soft patrol
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heroes have massive damage potential

sand bane
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but at the same time... it's good that there are items that can be usef for defense like that... so people can play with that play style if they want.

soft patrol
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I two shot a Bone Dragon with my hero last game, at level 8

sand bane
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nice

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what turn in the game?

soft patrol
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the item RNG is a bit strong in 4 imo

sand bane
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agreed

soft patrol
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somewhere around 40 I think

sand bane
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3 had a way to make your own items... hopefully that will return in some way

sand bane
soft patrol
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ya, I just had the damage types which it had resistance to actually 😄

sand bane
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hmm... so maybe a one shot if you had the right damage then. 🙂

soft patrol
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tried to make t1 lategame spam work, picked about every tome which gave me x Arrows, at the time I had poison and frost

sand bane
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i assume you're using tome of the horde?

soft patrol
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tbh I gave up on it midgame as my archers just died and the research I rolled didn't give me more of those enchantments

sand bane
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t1 archer spam is pretty difficult.. since there are great t2 and t3 options

soft patrol
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ya, but even with support they just died in auto combat, and I didn't want to manual everything

sand bane
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yeah, auto is a bit finnicky... you need very specific builds to make that work out well

soft patrol
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idk, just going astral and spamming summons works quite well

sand bane
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i'd suggest running barb t2 archers with spider mounts. those are much more favorable to auto

soft patrol
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true

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but wasn't really the point, also even those will loose in late against t3/t4 stacks

sand bane
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meh...

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to be fair.. they should lose.. in terms of resources

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but...

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if you get the right enchants.. they're really powerful

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ive seen them auto high tier stacks without losing anything

soft patrol
sand bane
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there are ways to reducing upkeep

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if you plan to enchant spam... going with the culture trait that reduces enchant is a good way to go

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also.. there's a tree unlock that drops low tier upkeep in the chaos tree

soft patrol
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of course, but you're basically forced to heavily invest imperium, and get lucky to roll the correct spells or prepare to spend a ton of mana in rerolls, while the Astral /Shadow player has nearly 100% synergies (just don't pick anything with necromancy, it has such a roundabout way of generating souls that it's basically useless)

sand bane
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i guess i'll have to look into that, but from what ive seen thus far it hasn't really been that much of an issue

soft patrol
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dunno about 1v1, but for bigger games, or esp comp stomp:
Wizard King, Tome of Cryomancy for the early Shadow Affinity, Hearty so stuff is able to survive the early game easier, Tenacious, Mystic obviously, Mana Addicts, Prolific Swarmers to survive early game and expand quicker
Shadow Affinity picks: Shadow Binding, Death Magic, Exalted by Shadows, Dark Vigor
Astral Affinity picks: everything but Adaptive Research and Teleportation Mastery

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basically everything there is synergizing, you'll have thousands of mana even though you're doing 1-3 summons every turn

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  • because of Mana Addicts everything has life leech, so nothing actually dies
sand bane
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that does require you to actually cast spells... something like a mage bane or a spell jammer is a pretty hard counter. but yeah, it's a pretty strong play style

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I would like to see some more anti spell stuff in the materium line

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i think that would be pretty thematic

soft patrol
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if your enemy builds a spell jammer that's obviously a top priority, but they need it in every city, if not just spread out a bit and devastate every province they have

sand bane
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and a good addition for balance

soft patrol
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also I am actually unsure how one would acquire a mage bane

sand bane
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there's a tome for it

soft patrol
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I just searched all tomes, no mage bane

sand bane
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hmm

soft patrol
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iirc you can only roll them as a random reward from a dungeon

sand bane
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guess im wrong... thgouht for sure it was in there

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you might be able to get the summon spell from a ruin

soft patrol
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so basically the only reliable hard counter are mass spell jammers, which still means you'd need to heavily turtle, but that only drags out the game as you'd need one in every city, and be able to defend them in every city

sand bane
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fair enough.

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thoguh i'd expec that to change in the future.

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the empires and ashes expansion will likely include some counters

soft patrol
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I would hope so

wintry quiver
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Id honestly get the feeling of scale if every friggin bandit camp and node didn't have tier 5 units after a while...kinda kills all sense of scale. They should be big rare and scary. It like oblivion with the every bandit has daedric thing... except no one defended that

sand bane
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that's a good point.

wintry quiver
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Like those t5s are huge and scary often. If they were rare, youd definitely feel it fighting or finally fielding em... but if they're everywhere you lose the feeling pretty quick and it just becomes normal

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Especially as early as it happens

sand bane
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would be nice to be able to control that a bit better in game set up.

wintry quiver
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Agreed...if you lower it they also attack less as it even states its synced which is kinda lame

sand bane
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one of my favorite things in civ 5 was to pump up the barb camps.

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they weren't really a threat except in the very early game

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but they did present a bit of a challenge

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and they were good for the xp grind later in the game since they'd respawn

buoyant topaz
# sand bane Do you have any idea how expensive it is to create a video game? Especially one ...

If you've been gaming at all in the last 15 years you'd know that staggered content-releases are literally designed to get more money out of a fully-built game by dividing it into pieces and selling each part. The intimation that companies do this out of necessity is silly as there are myriad examples of studios which sell their title as a one-time purchase for less than the 100+ dollars that this game and all of its DLC will eventually equal.

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I have no Idea what you mean by entitlement either as its pretty normal as a consumer to valuate an item before purchasing it... if we didn't do this, we'd just buy everything, all the time...

sand bane
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It's fine to want more for your money. But to complain about what was delivered is silly. I'd be with you if the product felt unfinished, but it doesn't.

Expansions also allow for more content to be developed. I can nearly guarantee you, if no expansions were in bound, we wouldn't have gotten any more than we already have. Triumph would just be developing something else instead. And the community would complain about not getting any expansions.

soft patrol
dense tree
sand bane
soft patrol
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damage wise sure, but the T1 archer gets one shotted by everything at that point

dense tree