It's a sequel. However, according to the devs, it's more of a reskinning & update than a true sequel, as I understand it. They've stated that there are minimal gameplay changes; mostly they updated the campaign to be less tediously long, and the graphics are getting a major overhaul. Along with the graphical changes the UI is also being updated/changed. Edit - O HAI YDEJIN, GUY WHO SAID EXACTLY WHAT I DID ONE MINUTE BEFORE ME
Same game design but with modern graphics, sound, and animation. A few of us are actually in the beta test for this and have posted our impressions in this very thread. It looks fantastic and all of the gameplay aspects of Genesis are there. They've still got work to do on presentation, control, and UI in general. Edit: O Hai Ydejin AND Mark M!
Oh... one other thing about the Enchanted Coffers spell: don't use it on your home province in the early or mid-game. Your home province starts out at a fairly low population level, so it has to do a lot of growing to do. And province population growth depends on their happiness; happy provinces grow faster than unhappy ones. (They're also more profitable at any given size level.) Once my home province hits "City" though, all bets are off. It's time for my capital to pay their fair share. I like to imagine my capital as equivalent to Washington DC: they pay a ton of taxes, are usually horribly crime ridden, and don't get to vote on their national leader. Sure, they have a mayor, but he's a Dragonroot junky. And yet they keep re-electing him!
You can be completely evil, summon hordes of zombies each battle and have provinces which shine from happiness. For example, executing deputy in most cases gives -karma -corruption and don't have impact on province mood. Many other events can give -karma without consequences.
Wait... executing deputies give both -karma *and* reduces corruption? Holy crap. You have just sealed the fate of all my deputies in my current game. I hope you're satisfied.
To expand on what Gremlion said: Although keeping your provinces happy tends to give you +karma, it's so easy to gain -karma that evil players still have it easy. To be specific, you get -karma every single time you cast most necromancy or chaos spells. In addition, you get -1 karma every time you cast dark rituals or enchanted coffer. What's more, you also gain -karma every time you recruit an evil troop type. And considering that evil troop types tend to be disposable anyways, you tend to do a lot of recruiting anyways. So it's super easy to remain evil, even if you do keep your provinces happy.
So I *finally* made some headway in an Expert game. There seemed to be a lot of swamps around me, so I decided to go full-on evil necromancer. After exploring more of the map, it appears to be pretty swampy all over, and the 2 AI I've met so far appear to have had the exact same idea as me: all necromancy, all the time. None of us have much money (nobody has horses & there aren't many plains provinces) so we're all fielding a mixture of shitty T1 troops & undead. In this dystopic world corpses are the ultimate currency. I think the slingers are beginning to catch on to their real purpose on the battlefield.
...and that game is over thanks to the completely random strength of provincial uprisings. There's no rhyme or reason to them... one turn a goblin province will revolt with 2 basilisks & 5 goblins, the next time they'll revolt with roughly the same forces, and the next time they'll uprise with 3 trolls and a smattering of other crap. Meanwhile other settlements' uprisings don't increment. Or maybe they do. But seriously... 3 trolls? When everybody (the AI included) has just reached tier 2? WTF? And that was the second vital goblin province that had revolted with trolls. Grrr. I really really like this game, but occasionally things will come out of left field that don't make sense from either a storytelling or a gameplay perspective.
Strength of the revolt based on population(and race) of the province. Goblins have highest growth rate, so very fast reach T3 units. In late game elves can revolt with unicorns and dwarves can deploy 3 cowtapults with 4-5 ballistae. If you expect big amount of revolts in province, but need it as strategic point, pillage it to ground.
Thanks for all the thoughtful insight in this thread, Gremlion. That is what I love so much about this game so far... it seems every system has a thoughtful mechanic or formula behind it. The pillage option is great example of a counter to this tough unit revolt problem, for example. The events don't always seem black and white either and like the deputy event above, can actually have an impact on gameplay. I really need to find a way to get my Dom3 turns done quicker so I can dive into this game more.
There is no manual for a reason. Discovery is fun itself and there are no unexpected illogical things. It's hard to play this game when you know everything.
Plundering can work, and I've done it before, but I don't like to have to worry about them at all. For orc and goblin villages, I usually won't scout new territory until I have buildings there to calm them down or guards strong enough to shut down a revolt. Large orc towns are particularly nasty because when they rebel, they have Cyclopses and Ogres. If you don't scout new territory, they can't grow, and the revolt will be weaker.
(Rough) English translation of the manual: By the way... does anyone know how you embed links in text? On QT3 you could use the [ url ] tag, but that doesn't seem to work on this forum's software. Edit - Holy crap! Thanks, Raife! That's been bugging me for a long time.
The reason was that nobody had bothered to translate the manual from Russian into English. This game gains nothing by being obscure. Sure, it's very easy to experience analysis paralysis when all the details are presented to you at once, but all those details are invaluable once you've started playing a bit & want to figure out what's happening and why.
Highlight the text you want to be the link and click on the chain in the toolbar at the top of the message window.
They just released a patch. It looks like it's pretty minor: mostly in-game text fixes, according to the minimal patch notes they posted.
There is no manual. It's not manual, just info gathered by fans. There was one guy who reverse engineered game files. Creator respects rougelike approach. Eadorpedia was created in a few years after release.
Nah, I'm not buying that. There are games (see: Dominions 3) that leave tons of things open for discovery and provide swathes of basic information to the player. It is not a mutually exclusive concept. These days, games that intentionally obscure mechanics by design, presumably to add gameplay or inspire the generation of a community via a wiki project, tend to either suck or have something to hide. Since Eador doesn't suck and has little to hide if you go looking for it, I'm just going to conclude that producing external documentation was a very low priority, probably because the creator believed there was sufficient information in-game to not necessitate a manual. That's an understandable priority rank considering he was working totally alone, but there's not going to be any excuse for a missing manual in the remake.
Speak of the devil! I just found my first horse resource. It's so.... weird... to find a resource out in the plains. Where the hell were they? Cleverly camoflaged as large blades of grass? In addition to finding horses when exploring, I got an event yesterday which allowed me to pay 50g to tame some wild horses, which also created a resource in the province. That was the first (and last) time I'd gotten that nifty event.
Quick FYI: you may have noticed that there are a bunch of buildings that add X experience to new recruits. I just did some quick tests, and it looks like units need 20 xp to gain their first level. I would imagine the xp requirements per level go up from there, but I haven't had the opportunity (or inclination, really) to test the higher levels. But those numbers should help you judge the early +xp buildings. They helped me, at any rate.
WTB a competent combat auto-resolve. It's gotten to the point where I now have a hero dedicated to running replacement units to my invading hero because I can't be asked to manually fight all those battles against provincial defenders. Yeah, I lose half my force every battle when I wouldn't lose any if I did it manually... but I don't spend 10 minutes on each province, either.
Anyone have a list of thIngs that affect karma? I hadn't realized that chaos ammo vs caused a bit - no wonder everyone thought I was evil!
Hey - glad I found this forum. I signed up specifically because this was the best thread I could find on this game. I'm playing on skilled and have been getting my ass handed to me. However, the latest game I was doing really well but I am troubled by something and I'm wondering how the AI pulled it off or what I missing. Like other guys, I find that not understanding the mechanics can be frustrating. Anyway, think of a triangle with the base two points my provinces. Top point belongs to AI opponent. He keeps invading the left base point every turn, kills my guards, can't break my garrison, I come in from the bottom right point, whack his ass, move my hero back out to try and reduce his provinces and then have to come back in and drive him out again. Ad infinitum. So, this time I decide to reduce his province at the top of the triangle instead of continuing to fight westward as his hero group is besieging my outpost. After he invades my province and wipes out my guard he has his Ranger hero and a thug remaining. I then move north to check out his province and take it if possible, hoping to cut off his retreat. Guard is a phoenix. Fuck that - I get the hell out of Dodge and go back whence I came My garrison is still holding. Fine - I'll attack the remaining hero group again this turn. When I move in to rescue my province his devastated hero group has ballooned from a half dead Ranger and Thug into 3 executioners, 4 thugs and various other shit. Twelve fucking units. He couldn't have/ or didn't leave the province to reinforce. How in the fuck did he go from two half dead units into 12 with fucking 3 executioners while he's besieging my province? I couldn't beat them at that point. I was so goddamn mad. I finally had a chance to beat this fucker and something like that occurs. Does my illustration make any sense? Anybody have any ideas? From now I on I will just hammer on the weakened hero groups and not worry about cutting off paths, etc. The game is really great. But, fuck, did that piss me off. I can't figure out why/how he reinforced.
I know that AI can hire units without moving into den (so, if AI get gargoyle shop in demesne, he can hire them on the turn he was resurrected) - and Labyrinth can be a problem. But I think that you mixed different heroes. Ranger can have only 1 Tier 3 unit. Maybe it was Raider. Probably AI have 2 similar heroes - both attacked, one got decimated but won, another left to siege and first leaved. Although, post save (gameX.sav and mapX.sav, where X - number of your profile), I will send it to developer to look at this.
There are three main sources of karma change: units, spells, and events. 1) Units - You gain or lose karma when you hire an alignment-based unit. It doesn't matter if you end up using that unit a lot or a little; it's only the hiring that affects your karma. The karma changes are as follows: Unscrupulous/Unprincipled -1 karma Evil -2 karma Evil Fiend -3 karma Lawful +1 karma Good +2 karma Defender of the Light +3 karma I've read that you can manipulate your karma by repeatedly buying & deleting alignment-based units. (i.e. buy a swordsman & immediately delete him. Rinse and repeat.) However, I've tested this method out & it simply doesn't work. I've bought & deleted over 40 swordsman, which should easily move me up one karma category. But my karma didn't budge. I'm not sure what algorithm the game uses to catch this exploit, but it does catch it. Buying alignment-based units on a regular basis throughout the game definitely does seem to affect your karma. (As it should.)( 2) Spells - You gain or lose karma every time you cast certain spells. I don't know how much karma for each spell, but here are the karma-affecting spells: Negative karma spells: -Almost all necromancy spells & rituals (there are a couple, like fear, which don't affect your karma for some reason) -Almost all chaos spells & rituals (again, the more innocuous spells, such as Vulnerability, don't affect your karma) -Enchanted Coffer (this one's a doozy, since I use it all the time no matter what karma I'm playing for. When I'm trying to be Good, I just have to use the spell slightly more selectively so my karma doesn't take too much of a hit.) Positive karma spells: -Exorcism -Heavenly Light -Heavenly Guards -White Magic 3) Events - These are pretty self-explanatory. In addition, your karma shifts based on which independents you attack. For example, you lose 1 karma for every free settlement you attack, and you lose something like 3 (or maybe 4) karma if you attack an elven forest. Conversely, you gain karma if you attack a goblin province. Although it's kinda interesting to know that who you attack affects your karma, you shouldn't change your gameplay because of it. When expanding, just expand wherever you can, however you can. But at least you'll understand why you became slightly evil after killing all those dwarves & halflings. I'm not sure if pillaging affects your karma in the same way that attacking independents does.
Something like this happened to me too. I was pretty sure I cut off his scout from his capital by capturing the provinces in between. His scout kinda moved around in the pocket of provinces that he owned that I had surrounded, and then... he came at me with a whole bunch of new units. Like... regular units, not faeries or trolls or whatever. I'm talking swordsmen & healers & whatnot. I've only seen it happen once, and he was definitely doing *something* in his 4 or 5 isolated provinces. But I couldn't for the life of me figure out what happened.
1) once per unit type per turn, it seems. You can see amount in unit.var 2) You can check spells.var, there is variable "Karma", pretty selfexplanatory. Worst - summon devil, -3. 3)Events - if you really want to find, you can compare event.var + dialog var. Index: 7 -karma. PS: Index 22 - corruption.
Ah, good point. Maybe it was a different hero but that would mean he had two of the same class. Very cool. Also, he had Commander running around. However, I thought I would have seen the other adjacent hero. All three of the demesnes were connected in the shape of a triangle. Well, maybe he could have moved in from outside the fog of war. I guess I didn't pay close enough attention. I have already started a different game. I only have the one profile set up so far. So I imagine the game in question is gone. Is the save file backed up or is there just the one that is continuously re-written? I don't see any others. Anyway, great game. Really. Even with the ass beatings I'm receiving on the easier setting. I haven't been this sleep deprived in a long time.
I've personally never seen a situation where the AI recruited new units out of thin air, and I've definitely worn AI heroes down over multiple combats on multiple turns where they sustained their losses the same as I would have. Although unlikely I'd probably have to chalk this up to Gremlion's explanation because if it were programmed in that they could do this I think it'd happen more often.
Someone earlier in this thread mentioned tactic with commander and range-only units. I tried this and i must say i never lost so badly in Eador. Its just doesn't work - at least on expert. In other news i experimented a bit with various warrior starts. Looks like with chainmail and magic armor you can start soloing at level 2, my personal record for the time being is level 10 on turn 35 and level 20 on turn ~70.
Commander(into strategist) + crossbowmen works wonderfully on beginner. Enemies have heavy penalty to hp (45%), starting gold enough for platoon of high cost units, and when all enemies have 10-12 hp (4 for skeletons, 12 for zombie - toughest T1 unit), you can snipe them in 1-2 shots. On expert people usually start with commander and only when he is ready to become tactic, start to hire ranged units. Example from old hotseat game http://savepic.net/944002.htm Horse archers + pathfinding + tactic bonuses = very good combo. In gog version horse archers receive doubleshot after 10th level, so they become even more stronger. With chestpiece+magic armor+2 astral energy you can go solo from 0 level. Because of this I usually hire warrior after scout - scout don't need items and schools to be effective.
Wow. So apparently the AI plays by *very* different rules. An enemy AI had 4 provinces next to me, and he invaded and took one of mine. So now he has 5 provinces next to me. None have provincial guards. I counter-invade my taken province, and I run into guards there. Alright... he bought them the turn after taking the province. Fair enough. I then check out his other 4 provinces to see where I want to go next.... and they all have defenders all of a sudden. And not just any old defenders... no, he had cavalry defenders, which were top of the line at that point in the game. So not only did he have the cash reserves to buy all those awesome defenders, he was able to buy 5 of them in one turn. I think I'll revert back to Competent. If the AI is getting that many bonuses, I need the easier difficulty level for awhile longer.
Playing on easier setting harder, because hp penalty decreases chances to get medals :). Formulas here When you start to consistently get medals (will for victory for barbarians or resilence/defender for swordsmen), battles like this will become easy and trivial.
I need to do some critical thinking about medals. Right now I just award them no matter what, since my troops rarely make it above level ten before I'm done with the shard. Is there a limit to the number of medals a troop can receive?
Heh. I turn down medals for my barbarians. They're disposable troops; I have no intention of letting them stay alive a long time. When I accept medals, they start accumulating them... and their upkeep slowly grows from a manageable 6 gold/turn to 10, 15, 20 gold. No thanks. The +healing medal for my healer, on the other hand... I accept that sucker with a quickness.
