I've never played an AoW game, what's this game like? Youtube video?

[tiamats4esgares]

I don't want to go research AoW3 and then research differences between that and AoW4. I want a youtube video or something to just explain to me what AoW4 is going to be like, but I can't find anything like that. Anyone have suggestions?

I've played all the Civ games, Old World, Endless Legend, and a few other games like that.

[Gaius]

The 4x, strategic map is pretty much like Endless Legends. The combat is tactical in a isometric, hexagonal map, and turn based.

Of course, there ate tons off mechanical diferences and game direction choices, bu in a huge oversimplification, that's the idea.

Just look at the official Age of Wonders or Paradox channel on youtube, there re several preview playthroughs to watch.

[Von Herbst]

Like Gaius said, there isnt much content at the moment outside of the official Age of Wonders 4 channel but they have a few hours vod and some shorter Videos about Features like Combat and Fraction Building.
The embargo for content creator falls at ... the 22th i belive, guess we will see some more at this point from the usual suspects.
Honestly I wouldnt compare AoW with any of the listed titel. Its more of a wargame and less of an civbuilder. Soooo Total War but also with turn based combat? Heroes of Might and Magic, but with Xcom Battles, but you dont comand individual units but ombat units?

[tiamats4esgares]

Never played HOMM but I've played the crap out of every King's Bounty game. :P

Yeah all I see are videos about the faction building. Which is cool, I guess, but I wanted to see more than just that. Like everyone else watching these videos just knows what to expect and I don't. But I know if I look at some kind of AoW3 video it wouldn't do it justice.

[Gaius]

Originally posted by tiamats4esgares:

Never played HOMM but I've played the crap out of every King's Bounty game. :P

Yeah all I see are videos about the faction building. Which is cool, I guess, but I wanted to see more than just that. Like everyone else watching these videos just knows what to expect and I don't. But I know if I look at some kind of AoW3 video it wouldn't do it justice.

You could have a genral idea watching Planetfall videos, because the systems are more modern and probably closer to those AoW 4 will use (other than the way factions are "built", or course.

If you just skip the firstpart of the dev streams and just watch the gameplay. I.E:

Pink Elves:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoJiIUyYapg&t=33s
In this one, skip to 14:45

Evil Toads:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwZuTB3Zocw&t=509s
In this one, skip to 18:35

[darkholyPL]

Imagine a Civ game that focuses more on combat than diplomacy, with battles taking place on separate strategic hex based maps, something like in King's Bounty and you pretty much get AoW, more or less.
It's pretty unique as far as 4x goes. There are other games that are simillar but never quite the same (like Endless Legend for example).

[Lordofriva]

It's a war-game in a 4X skin, rather a normal 4X. If you do not like, in detail and complex, combat you should look elsewhere.

Otherwise the series is a really nice blend of the tactical and strategic layer it's excellently interlocked, at least thus far, so if you want to handle complex mechanics to juggle how you perform in a Wargame, this game is most likely for you.

Just with the caveat that we all have not played four, at least 1,2,3 are excellent though, planetfall is somewhat weaker but still good imho.

[tiamats4esgares]

Originally posted by Lordofriva:

It's a war-game in a 4X skin, rather a normal 4X. If you do not like, in detail and complex, combat you should look elsewhere.

Otherwise the series is a really nice blend of the tactical and strategic layer it's excellently interlocked, at least thus far, so if you want to handle complex mechanics to juggle how you perform in a Wargame, this game is most likely for you.

Just with the caveat that we all have not played four, at least 1,2,3 are excellent though, planetfall is somewhat weaker but still good imho.

I love King's Bounty, so perhaps it's right up my alley.

Originally posted by Gaius:

Originally posted by tiamats4esgares:

Never played HOMM but I've played the crap out of every King's Bounty game. :P

Yeah all I see are videos about the faction building. Which is cool, I guess, but I wanted to see more than just that. Like everyone else watching these videos just knows what to expect and I don't. But I know if I look at some kind of AoW3 video it wouldn't do it justice.

You could have a genral idea watching Planetfall videos, because the systems are more modern and probably closer to those AoW 4 will use (other than the way factions are "built", or course.

If you just skip the firstpart of the dev streams and just watch the gameplay. I.E:

Pink Elves:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoJiIUyYapg&t=33s
In this one, skip to 14:45

Evil Toads:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RwZuTB3Zocw&t=509s
In this one, skip to 18:35

I will definitely check out those videos and skip to the part you said to. Thanks!

[Reality]

It's okay to simplify it down to

"its the city and army building of civilization 5 but when units meet on the world map they are taken to a 40x40 hex grid to duke it out In fire emblem/xcom style combat"

[avenger711]

4x TBS concentrated on production control and combats with up to 7 armies involving with relatively simple (compared to Civ or Endless Legend, compared to HoMM it's very complex) empire and city managment system. In fact the greatest seria in the genre.

And rather easy to understand because of well-developed intarface since at least AoW 2.

The closest analogues will be another MoM descendants like "Fallen Enchantress" or "Planar Conquest" (don't play it or you'll have nightmares so bad it is) but they're 10 times cheaper and 50 times worser. New "Spellforce Conquest of Eo" is hybrid of MoM and simplified AoW 3 combat mechanic but for me it looks more like a half-finished product.

One thing pisses me off. There tonnes of long videos from HoMM fans how great HoMM was and how bad Ubisoft destroyed it. But there's nothing about AoW and it's history but unlike HoMM which practically didn't change from the 1st to the 7th game, AoW evolved like aircraft evolveded from Wright brothers' plane to modern jet fighter.

I really met people who dared to speak about TBS but didn't hear about AoW 3.

Anyway I recomend to play every game since AoW Shadow Magic (addon to AoW 2 released as stand alone game).

[darkholyPL]

Originally posted by avenger711:

One thing pisses me off. There tonnes of long videos from HoMM fans how great HoMM was and how bad Ubisoft destroyed it.

As a long time HoMM fan I don't agree with that 100%.
Sure HoMM6 was bad (tho the best looking one) but HoMM7 (after patches) was pretty great. I actually do like playing it and still do to this day from time to time.
HoMM fans are somewhat biased, because HoMM3 with the HoTA fan made expansion is the best version of HoMM to play PvP with. No other version comes close, but that's down to fans and the amazing amount of work they've put into it.
As a single player experiance both HoMM5 (+DLC) and HoMM7 (this is from Ubisoft) are great. Hell I even enjoy HoMM4 for some singleplayer fun.

[tiamats4esgares]

All the videos I see (including the 2 posted in this thread) are just people who assume their viewers already know everything. Nobody is explaining anything. So I'll just wait until reviews come out. Guess I won't be pre-purchasing this game. I'm really in need of a new strategy game to play and I hope I don't have to wait for Civ 7 but I will if I have to. lol

[Balekai]

Originally posted by tiamats4esgares:

All the videos I see (including the 2 posted in this thread) are just people who assume their viewers already know everything. Nobody is explaining anything. So I'll just wait until reviews come out. Guess I won't be pre-purchasing this game. I'm really in need of a new strategy game to play and I hope I don't have to wait for Civ 7 but I will if I have to. lol

Well you still may be able to see the info you want before release. There's going to be streamers able to talk about a lot more and show in-game play on April 22 and 29th (?) I think. Maybe you will be able to see someone playing the first story mission of the game which may be set up like a tutorial like it was in AoW3 and Planetfall.

The dev streams right now are mainly focused more on showing what's new to Age of Wonders 4 compared to past instalments or explaining simple mechanics.

Don't be too confused though the game is basically this step by step compared to Civ games:

1. Take any civilization game you can think of.
2. Take away ages (Stone Age, Tool Age etc.). Add in more immersion since you don't have stone age units fighting fighter Jets. :D
3. Add in lots of magic, spells and wondrous creatures.
4. Reduce the amount of things to be built in cities, while also increasing what buildings actually do and effect.
5. Keep a similar if not more in depth territory improvement system (it's been a while since I have played a civ game so I could be wrong when it comes to later additions).
6. Replace really boring world map basic "bash two armies" together in combat, with tactical turn based combat that you see in other genres like crpgs, other 4X, HoMM from back in the day etc. (easy to see in the streams).
6. Add in a lot more innate RPG elements into the game with your leader being a Unit that is basically on an adventure to unlock magical power etc., just with an army, other heroes and a civilization behind them. You will be dungeon crawling, exploring ancient ruins and the like with storyboards and combats. Quests to do for NPCs and Minor Settlements. Also almost all the game features are more RPG influenced than Civ games because of the nature of the play.
7. Reduce the time it takes to win a map by about 75%-to 90%. Also reduce travel time by about 50%-75%. :p
8. With Planetfall's Empire Mode and by extension AoW4's Pantheon System, there are now "new game +" mechanics in AoW where your leader's progress carries on and they gain new traits, abilities and starting bonuses as they win/lose maps. A blending of a story campaign into scenario maps as you continue your leader's story beyond the original campaign elements. This worked really well in Planetfall's Star Kings story campaign which led to the newly added Empire Mode with a special Empire bonus.

Edit: A new dev video that starts out a bit slower focused on diplomacy play:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sukhd2769U

Note the game starts out very much like a Civ game but much faster. Instead of looking for a good place to settle with good resources at first, in AoW games you're already settled looking to clear an adjacent province/node of hostiles that you want to annex, or looking for pickups, or interact with a minor faction so you can get a quest going. There's more stuff you want to do in the first couple of turns.

[Ddraig Lleuad]

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[BBB]

Originally posted by Lordofriva:

It's a war-game in a 4X skin, rather a normal 4X. If you do not like, in detail and complex, combat you should look elsewhere.

Otherwise the series is a really nice blend of the tactical and strategic layer it's excellently interlocked, at least thus far, so if you want to handle complex mechanics to juggle how you perform in a Wargame, this game is most likely for you.

Just with the caveat that we all have not played four, at least 1,2,3 are excellent though, planetfall is somewhat weaker but still good imho.

AoW4 is very much a 4x with some wargame elements, quite different to previous agmes in this respect.

[BBB]

Originally posted by avenger711:

4x TBS concentrated on production control and combats with up to 7 armies involving with relatively simple (compared to Civ or Endless Legend, compared to HoMM it's very complex) empire and city managment system. In fact the greatest seria in the genre.

And rather easy to understand because of well-developed intarface since at least AoW 2.

The closest analogues will be another MoM descendants like "Fallen Enchantress" or "Planar Conquest" (don't play it or you'll have nightmares so bad it is) but they're 10 times cheaper and 50 times worser. New "Spellforce Conquest of Eo" is hybrid of MoM and simplified AoW 3 combat mechanic but for me it looks more like a half-finished product.

One thing pisses me off. There tonnes of long videos from HoMM fans how great HoMM was and how bad Ubisoft destroyed it. But there's nothing about AoW and it's history but unlike HoMM which practically didn't change from the 1st to the 7th game, AoW evolved like aircraft evolveded from Wright brothers' plane to modern jet fighter.

I really met people who dared to speak about TBS but didn't hear about AoW 3.

Anyway I recomend to play every game since AoW Shadow Magic (addon to AoW 2 released as stand alone game).

Just a note, it is 6 armies now, fwiw.