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No, I don't spend any significant resources on a wall. I use buillders and thus my cities come pre-equip with wooden walls before they're even built. That 100 gold cost is partially mitigated by the fact my cities are mining gold as many as 20 turns sooner. Also, corpse looting, treasure raiding, courtesan ambassadors all boost my income heavily during the early game creeping and city state phases.
Shadow Stalker research is cheaper by 50%. I'm playing elves. I have earth mastery. To be honest, no, for me, it's midgame tech, and if you can't get there fast enough, well then there's only two possible answers. One, we're playing knife fight map size and thus there isn't going to be enough space between us for you to recover from a single assassin strike, or two, you're not teching fast enough.
Crows. Scoundrels. Succubi. My actual army casually camping an erected watchtower nearby. I don't need to use NoSE. It helps for pinpointing all your cities and defenses, but it's expensive and not going to be maintained. As for you slaughtering my scouts. Crows fly. This means they spend less points on movement. They also have extremely long vision range. Have fun chasing summonable units who out-move you. And as the game progresses, I just transition upwards, or are you going to build a defensive network of manticores/draconian fliers/elven gryphon riders to actually tag my crows/succubi. Succubi in particular make wicked powerful lategame scouts because you simply cannot intercept them cost effectively. Any T3 you send at them gets kited until it gets hit with throw curse (flying), then hit with seduce. If seduce fails, they simply fly back out of reach, taking the AoO to their large healthpool and the dance repeats. As I have about a 60%+ hit rate on seduce and get two attempts at it, lets casually assume I take about 80% of the fights as wins, thus gaining your intercepting t3. If you use two T3's I have a 60% chance and if successful, I ram the stolen T3 into the surviving T3, and still win. In other words, to intercept, you need 3 flying units, to my 1. In ADDITION, I can always use lesser shadow stalkers to scout, and if I do, you need to perpetually save CP for dispel, because otherwise, a lone Lesser Shadow Stalker can kill SIX MANTICORES while under the influence of Shadow Form. And they cost me dirt to produce.
Assassins have no troubles breaking ranks and rushing down a hero. None at all. Also stealth, which unlike the AI, actually works vs players. Also, crows and succubi are flying, and succubi require dedicated interception forces.
Seek inspiration tech reshuffles get me what I need when I need it. Contrary to popular belief, I don't need to cast a spell every single turn.
Early game, what economy boosts do you have that outstrip recieving bonus gold and mana off the land, and free gold for every unit I kill. Also, I get a healing spell and you don't unless you go creation, and I have a stronger hero for creeping earlygame as well. War Effort is +10 gold per turn early game. A SINGLE fight for me under corpse looting generates more than that. Also, poison mastery ensures my units are stronger than yours in a straight fight early game. Or do you magically get +2 attack on all of your units in the first 5 turns of the game?
Poorly defended cities? You have the WORST SIEGE IN THE GAME. Bersekers can't survive going over the walls. They drop to a defense of 8 just trying it, which means longbowmen and bards rip them apart. Assuming even numbers (which isn't hard, mine only cost 5 more hammers than yours, and you need to actually transport your units to me), I kill half your berserkers before they even make it over the wall. Plus range advantage from the walls themself. Phalnax don't get wall climbing, mounted archers don't get wall climbing. Monster hunters are not good vs players. And if you honestly, honestly think that mounted archers taking the wall penalties can beat bards with no penalty and range boost. Well, they can't. At all. Our units have similar HP, you're taking a 50% damage penalty, making it a 9 vs 5.5 damage fight. Also, you have to move into range, which means that, at minimum, I get 3 attacks to your two first volley.
Warbreeds? WARBREEDS?!. VS A ROGUE?! Warbreeds have horrible, horrible resistance and come into play alongside succubi, a unit who makes low resist, mind control weak units useless, and if you are playing elf as well, throw curse has a boosted hit rate. I can quite literally take your warbreeds and throw them back into your own forces. So can bards if they actually come up the walls.
Auto resolve does not happen in PvP fights. If you are going to base your argument on auto resolve, do not. It's considered horrible form to do so.
How do you outproduce me. I make more gold than you. I steal your gold from you. I pay less when dealing with city states and have stronger early game units to take cities due to poison mastery. I can make my own shadow stalkers out of scoundrels earlygame, and lesser shadow stalkers still have 60% phys resist and thus with shadow form can solo your cities. I don't need full T3 shadow stalkers to get shadow stalkers. I can just pop them off scoundrels I pop out at silver.
You will not out expand me. My army is stronger than yours earlygame. Poison mastery tends to be an out of the gate thing and is a flat +2 damage to alot of my units. Courtesan ambassadors makes allying with city states cheaper, and I can just tear through the ones I want with scoundrels and my hero stack. Quick Dash and sprint lets me hop walls in a single turn and still kill people on the other side.
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Honestly, alot of what you wrote sounds like a fundamental misunderstanding of where and how the rogue economy works. Warlord's eco is simple to understand. Rogues is not, as we get money from alot of secondary sources, and armies from unusual places as well. Our t1 irregular becomes an ultimate unit with a little loving care. Please, Please read up and study how rogue economics work. It's not nearly as simple as warlord eco, and judging by alot of what you wrote not even considering corpse looting, treasure raiding, mind controlling, or cheap city purchasing, while valuing war effort's flat +10 gold so highly really does suggest you do not have the requisite understanding of rogue to know how it functions.
I wouldn't bet that Malaficus wins in a hypothetical match with AnemoneMeer at all.
1. The amount of time logged on a game you see on someone's profile is often misleading and sometimes outright inacurrate:
On the one hand, AnemoneMeer could have another Steam account (as I do) where she has more hours logged in AoW 3. Conversely, Malaficus' 1200-some hours could be meaningless, if he leaves games turned on and do not bother to turn it off to do other things (as I do). For instance, I suspect this account will say I've played 100-plus hours on AoW 3 the last few weeks when I've actually played 2-3 hours at top. (I've been modding, and I have left the mod editor on even when I was away from the desk.)
2. Even if the amount of time logged on a game is reasonably accurate, the sheer number of hours someone spend on a game is not always indicative of their skills. For instance, I've played a lot of MMORPGs back in the day, and I've seen folks with literally thousands of hours logged who did not even understand the basic rudimentary things about how their class functioned (I used to see in WoW Warriors who thought taunt increased mob hate or threat when it in fact re-set it).
So I wouldn't bet Malaficus is the superior player even if he in fact has played the game more.
I don't play PvP; further, single games between disparately skilled folks are meaningless in terms of resolving this argument.
My point was merely that the number of hours you logged on a Steam account is not indicative of skill.
An actual match brings the human element into play, which swings stuff, while the goal of my replies here is to prove just how linear and easily countered the warlord is, and how alot of its vaunted strengths are not really that strong, as it's a balanced class who's simplicity and input:output ratio gives the illusion of being stronger than it is.
I'm not trying to prove that I am better. I am trying to prove that warlord is not overpowered and in fact has glaring holes in its gameplan to make up for its statistical advantages. A fact that my rogue scenario (rogue being one of the primary counterplay classes) can particularly show. Warlord doesn't have the means to fight an eco war, and doesn't have an effective method of city siege (climbing walls is not. Shooting through walls is not). Compare this to dreadnought cannons, sorceror's ready access to phys resistant summons that don't care about walls, druid's ability to just flat out strip walls outright. Theocrat also lacks effective wall siege, but has greater attritional power due to mass support with mass healing.
The warlords unlike the other classes dont have drawbacks.
If you can do that then we can claim warlord isnt overpowered.
But so far all the responses are about how to beat warlords.
I know how to do that.
I am looking for a justification why it gets all the best stuff without any downside.
Every other class has a downside.
Mono-phys damage focus means it puts all its eggs into a single basket. Downside A.
Armor > resistance on 90% of units. Downside B.
No ability to fight an eco war. Downside C.
Dearth of unit abilities. Downside D.
Lack of effective wall siege units. Downside E.
Lack of effective combat spells that are not crushed by dispel magic. Downside F
Lack of ability to summon units. Downside G
Lack of debuffs. Downside H
Lack of healing. Downside I
Are you seeing where this is going? Your units are statistically better in exchange for sappibng that power from elsewhere. You do not have a competitive list of spells, a competitive list of upgrades, or any units designed around counterplay besides the phalnax. You have beatsticks.
You still have no counter to shadow form. You have no counter to turn 20 lesser shadow stalkers packing shadow form just obliterating armies. You do not have a cost effective means of killing my scouts when I transition upwards in preperation for GoST spam. You do not have the ability to siege bards off of walls.
Again, please take some time to truly study what makes rogue economies and playstyles work. Alot of what you have said or argued I have a simple one-step counter for.
Facts are facts. Hours played does not magically dictate the effect of abilities. It's actually considered a logical fallacy to assume that the person with more experience is correct just because of it.
The scenario I described is simply there to point out the myriad weaknesses of a warlord and how they can be exploited mercilessly with the proper tools.
Don't really need to "fight" an Eco War when you can easily take Cities or use units to deny Treasure Site income, baiting battles.
Uhh, Warbreed says hello. Those things are fairly effective Siege Units due to Wall Crushing and Regrowth, making excellent Aggro. Their drawback is Melee so a competent Warlord would need to spend time/money on a Trebuchet too. If it's the early game, then he'll need to pony up for Battering Rams.
This is where Sphere Skill choice comes to play. A Warlord could grab Earth Adept/Mastery and now has access to Sieging and a solid Summon spell. He could grab Air to get a Flying Scout and buff Archers. He could grab Fire and get AoE/Single target damage ... you see where I'm going.
The summon units will rely on Skill choice, as stated above. However lacking a native summon unit, especially Early game is certainly a drawback. Though Crows are pretty garbage in a fight and only good at Scouts. Basically everyone's Early game summon sucks except Sorcerer.
Lack of Debuffs? Totally, even with Skill choices you can't get any "good" ones unless you grab Wild Magic or Fire for Skin of Oil if you are playing Draconians.
Lack of Healing? That's mitigate due to Medic Leader skill, Human Priests or grabbing Creation Adept. Though in combat healing would be difficult in most situations even with Creation.
Shadow Form is difficult to counter natively yes. However Race and Skill choice will be a large factor determining whether a Warlord could Laugh or Tremble at it. You figure, Warlord would be bound to having Support Units ... which it would anyway thanks to Shadow Stalker potential. Then you have Skill choice that would allow a possible counter through spells. Also, Shadow Form is Dispel-able, anyone can get Dispel. Plus Storm Sisters get Dispel at Veteran Rank, which would be easy for a Warlord to attain. They also do Lightning damage that would be a solid option against your Shadow Form units and Stalkers.
With that said, Warlord still isn't overpowered. It's a class that becomes dependant on Player Choices. What if the Warlord grabbed Earth + Air and was Goblins? He'd be pretty screwed against any non High Elf Rogue. This is the Warlord's greatest weakness or potentially greatest strength; Dependency on Choices. Thus Player Skill will always be a major deciding factor in any and all situations. Wait a minute ... isn't that the definition of balanced? Huh go figure.
I personally do not consider warbreeds capable siege units. They don't have particularly good mobility for getting into range of the walls, and have lower than average resistance for their tiering (10). This leaves them very open to spell or ability based disruption.
Thanks.
Well yeah, against Classes with solid debuffs/Spells they are certainly not optimal. However I would argue that because they are such easy targets for that, they are fulfilling their role as Meat Shields and Target Aggro. The fact they are actually capable of busting Walls is just a bonus. :P
Lately I prefer Sorcerer or Theocrat due to Flying/Pass Wall units or Y'know just nuking things from orbit with Spells/Shrines. To each their own.
i dont think any class is really op against a smart enemy, the physical resistance of rogues can be countered in multiple ways, the strong units of warlords can be countered in multiple ways, it just depends on how smart your opponent is and take advantage of it, and thats something the ai struggles. so the ai is best at brute force methods and thats totally a warlord thing
Aren't PBEM tactical battles entirely done by AI algorithms? So the results mean absolutely nothing, as AI does not understand how to use different abilities - or even maneuver or select targets properly. I've had multiple auto-resolves where I was beaten where I was able to come away with 0 loss when re-done myself. You'd actually get more meaningful results by playing hotseat against yourself.