LEGENDS OF EISENWALD from gog.com is a Heroes Of Might and Magic type game, but with deep army custimisation, you can give your men armor and weapons like bows crossbows shields, its more real though dosnt seem to do magic. Its the only HoMM type game Ive considered as a real improvement on this type of gameplay
I bought it and am waiting for the download to go live, I think gog galaxy has it ready.
It's been on Steam for a while and I've played it. It's refreshingly deep. And you've got to pay careful attention to conversations when you get some of your quests, or you'll spend a lot of time wandering the campaign map looking for a hidden trail in the wrong place!
Overall, it's quite fun. A slightly different spin on King's Bounty or Eador...
I haven't played much of this game so I'd prefer to reserve judgement.
I've owned it for a while but have left it alone to give it a chance to get past the shakedown period.
I'm a bit puzzled by the combat system. I'm all for innovative combat systems, and this one is certainly different from anything I've played before. But I'm having a little trouble translating in my mind what happens on the screen into what would have been happening in reality. I think what is putting me off is the prayer and healer mechanic. But if I play a bit more and try a little harder to rationalize the mechanics, maybe something will click.
A week or so ago I had to stage a raid on an intransigent neighbor's castle and capture it while he was out running around the countryside performing nefarious deeds. Fine and dandy. There was a little fight to overpower the token garrison, and then I settled in for the inevitable counter-attack. When it came, the neighbor's army (which I expected to be larger than mine) was quite a bit smaller (?) and though I was supposed to be fighting him by defending behind the walls, the fight took place out in the open. Needless to say I slaughtered my opponent, but the whole thing was very puzzling.
Unfortunately for Legends of Eisenwald I've been playing Age of Decadence lately, so the thing that I find really striking is the writing. I love the writing in Age of Decadence (with a few minor quibbles about style and vulgarity here and there). I can't say the same thing about Legends. Perhaps it is because the writing was not done in their native language, but it feels a bit jejune as if it were written for adolescents.
I'd love to hear from someone telling me that I'm wrong and that I need to play it a bit more. I recognize that some games are a bit like wine and need a little time to grown on you. But this game invites comparison with Darklands and Expeditions: Conquistador, and from what I've seen so far it isn't living up to either of their standards. And for all of its faults, I kept wishing I was playing Real Warfare: Northern Crusades instead.
It's a decent little game, a bit rough around the edges but refreshing for being a fantasy light RPG in a historical setting, a bit ala Darklands.
The combat system can be fun, especially once you've got a few mounted Knights ripping through opponents. The main story is also fairly engaging, and there's a palpable sense of getting stronger as your people level.
The story has some good, meaty moments of decision with a lot of consequences. Not going to spoil anything, but lets just say that trying to stay honorable is essentially like playing at a difficulty level two times harder than where you're at. You are deeply and richly rewarded for backstabbing and treachery. You are punished, although with later payoff, for chivalry and decency.
Downsides? The quests can sometimes be a bit hard to follow and clunky. I've gotten lost more than once not knowing what to do and exactly where to stand.
You occasionally lose everything between chapters, and I mean everything, gold, inventory, followers. This is by design and can ratchet the difficulty up massively in the later chapters. It also makes it very hard for you to build up followers, which takes a very, very long time. Enemies sitting in castles will level faster than your army if you aren't constantly fighting and rotating your people in and out of your own holdings (your followers gain xp when sitting idle in a castle or garrison faster than if they fight with you).
I'd still give it a recommend despite getting occasionally frustrated.
I still owe our hosts a review, and will try to finally finish it later this month.
As a very short summary: if you will like the game or not might depend to a significant extent on if you can appreciate what the game offers, and don't miss what the game doesn't offer. In my opinion, it's certainly no HoMM, not by a mile, but when I'd rate it for what it wants to be I'd give it a 7 out of 10 for what it currently is and an 8 out of 10 for potential. Not being able to move troops around yourself during combat is one of those things that you can either live with or will hate.
It's a pity that it has its Russian/former Warsaw Pact rough edges. I'm always puzzled by how there can be a steady number of games that are good on paper coming out of that area with questionable design decisions, bad UI's, poor documentation or loads of bugs. Legends of Eisenwald doesn't really have bugs or a bad UI, but the documentation and particularly some design decisions (like how often you lose your followers, as has already been mentioned, which just ends up feeling like padding of the difficulty) can be frustrating.
I also don't like that the main difference between the various difficulty options seems to be how strong the enemy is, instead of giving the enemy better abilities. I tried playing it on super hard or whatever the highest difficulty is called, but it seemed it only involved more grinding instead of making the game more difficult in a satisfying way.
well I just played most of the tutorial, and it kept my interest to see what it was about, but the combat is boring, this could of been a knockout HoMM successor but it failed in my humble opinion, you may as well auto combat. the back row of healers and priests was nice but still didn't makeup for the boring combat. the game world was nice, and the story was ok, but I just felt it was all for nothing as the main combat may as well have been omitted. when I bought it I was jumping at the chance of playing a new system like HoMM with army customisation, but it just fell flat as I didn't feel I was in control of My army combat.
I thought the game was interesting, but I wont bother playing it any further. you may like it as an RPG type game , but building up your army to fight still feel would be boring.
when I say boring combat, its using a new way to resolve a combat, it does seem intelligent to try a system like this, it could of been a hit, but just a 2D basic combat system that allows you to move would of been better for me, I would love to see an update that makes the combat less constricted.
the map and UI was ok the buildings were nice little castles etc...
If you think you would like a strategy game with auto combat with some good customisation of your army go for it
Judging from reader reviews on Steam, and having played it a bit more, the combat is deeper than you think. It's definitely been interesting getting a feel for how the combat plays out, and the strategic trade-offs one has to make as one selects different force mixes.
You can walk away if you like, but I'd recommend trying one more campaign where the battles grow a bit more even (and it's much easier to blunder into a combat for which you are totally underpowered).
On sale : -33%
http://www.gog.com/game/legends_of_eisenwald_special
Quote from: FarAway Sooner on November 10, 2015, 09:42:27 AM
Judging from reader reviews on Steam, and having played it a bit more, the combat is deeper than you think. It's definitely been interesting getting a feel for how the combat plays out, and the strategic trade-offs one has to make as one selects different force mixes.
You can walk away if you like, but I'd recommend trying one more campaign where the battles grow a bit more even (and it's much easier to blunder into a combat for which you are totally underpowered).
Ive thought about the combat a little bit more, and I am thinking its like 'crown of glory' quick resolve method where you had a front line back like and rear, so I think its a better graphical experience than crown of glory quick combat, its NOT a HoMM combat that it looks like, so if you think of the combat as a simple tool to get the job done its probably suitable.
I'll be diving right in when the promised Linux version finally shows up...