Crimson Caldera Critique

[R a d d e r s]

So, this is my first time (properly) playing Caldera.

The Scenario gives a choice early on of whether you want to 'mind scry' the opposing rulers for a discernable weakness so that they immediately will leave the game (at least in Karissa's case thus far, and in my opinion a bit of a cop out, but at least her heroes and units.. Sort of.. are still there) but that brings up a problem.

Karissa retreats into the void, and most if not *all* of what once her units change into T3 Berserkers. Personally, I was looking forward to seeing how I would deal with her Houndmaster/fury spam, so it really bummed me out to see that her units transmogrified themselves as soon as their Leader declared the game was up.

Now, you could say that -- yes, the quest battle to insta-defeat her, or whathaveyou, is an optional choice, and therefore that because of this, if I wanted to fight her armies as is I should've just bought the bullet and faced them..

But if anyone has played this scenario may tell you, Karissa is by far the most dangerous unit in her own arsenal (at least early-mid game as you can imagine) as a level 14 hero wielding the anathema and deadly momentum (etc) so it makes a lot of sense to get her out the way first if you want a better shot at taking out her army spam.

And despite that, why would all her units change anyway? Why does that need to happen at all? There are units from tomes that exist as independents with no rulers, why do all Karissa's units need to be changed when she folds?

And just my two cents, I don't like it how Karissa is instantly defeated instead of.. Like weakened or something (level drain//Economy break//Mass defection//0 draft?). I get that it's a long scenario, and you could just say 'OR DON'T DO IT.' Yea. That's an option. But what if..?

[Mechalibur]

This isn't a mechanic with Crimson Caldera specifically. If an empire is defeated, all their remaining unconquered cities become free cities which spawn a stack of tier 3 cultural units. So like if you take out a leader and their throne city in a traditional game, their remaining cities will have the exact same thing happen.

I don't know why the game does it this way, it's pretty weird and lacks variety.

[GrandMajora]

Mind you there's an achievement for beating all these factions through normal military victories. So of course the alternate methods are going to be an easy way out.

[Raelic]

I just did the achievement and fought them all. I only tried once so I'm not sure everyone gets this lucky but I started in an upper corner and could just go one by one around the lava pit. There was a VERY small mountain pass that they could get around to my backside, but it was slow movement and They stopped even bothering after I left a single unit on my home city.

[R a d d e r s]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Mechalibur:

This isn't a mechanic with Crimson Caldera specifically. If an empire is defeated, all their remaining unconquered cities become free cities which spawn a stack of tier 3 cultural units. So like if you take out a leader and their throne city in a traditional game, their remaining cities will have the exact same thing happen.

I don't know why the game does it this way, it's pretty weird and lacks variety.

Yea this definitely sucks. That's my chief concern with it really, I'm interested that it's not just crimson caldera then