Illwinter announces Conquest of Elysium 4

[Bison]

I have a man corner.

[Bardolph]

>Hello Sailor

[Sparhawk]

I am subjected to the dining room as well.  :-X

[Nefaro]

That's all I want!  CoE4 doing to CoE3 what Dom4 did to Dom3 sounds blissful.

That  has been my impression, after forcing myself to take a break from it after a few hours. 

On the surface it's still pretty much CoE3, but I keep noticing small content additions that provide more variety & refined gameplay.

O0

[Bison]

The only real complaint I've read so far has been in regard to melee commanders outrunning their units into combat and dying.  In COE3, your leaders were always on the back rank, which makes sense.  I'm not sure why they'd be coded to be in the front rank in this game.  It seems an odd choice, which I hope Illwinter can fix, because there are a few of the cultures that have melee commanders only until they can recruit casters. 

[Nefaro]

The only real complaint I've read so far has been in regard to melee commanders outrunning their units into combat and dying.  In COE3, your leaders were always on the back rank, which makes sense.  I'm not sure why they'd be coded to be in the front rank in this game.  It seems an odd choice, which I hope Illwinter can fix, because there are a few of the cultures that have melee commanders only until they can recruit casters.

I recall a few CoE3 melee commanders being in the front, or very near it.

It does cause a problem because they're always placed right in the center front.  It's okay when it comes to the behemoths like the Troll King, who needs to pummel peeps into paste, but the regular-sized commanders just end up getting dead early on in fights.  I try to wait for casting commanders who are listed as Back-line.  Or add a caster to the melee commander's army ASAP for backup.

There's a minor adjustment that could be made in CoE4.  I noticed that there is a "Front-" line value for some units (pikes?) which preferentially places them towards the rear of that Front melee line.  Some of the weaker melee commanders could use that.  Or add some kind of spellcasting ability that lets you switch it, just like the checkboxes between different active spells in a caster's list.

[Bison]

I need to just buy this game.  With that being said, in COE3 your lines didn't actually move as they do in this one.  The lines were fixed but your units would rotate up as the one died in the frontline.  Also I don't recall the damage so much being done in a straight across manner.  So the guy at the top of your line could take damage even if there wasn't an opponent across from it in an equal size line.  Anyway, I'm sure there are ways and tactics to work around this issue and most like the simple fix is just insuring you are travelling with multiple commander types with large armies.  That way if the front line guy dies and he was the main commander there is one to fall back on as a replacement commander.

[spelk]

CoE4 has multiplayer, did CoE3 have that? I give it a brief try last night, and it works ok - pausing between players goes, but it seems to move at a swift pace - was "comp stomping" however, it did have network issues about an hour or two in, and I tried to save the game state, but we couldn't get the thing to load back up and have us back in playing :(

I did manage to save the game state out as single player, and then we could at least keep going separately... but I guess that's not the ideal situation in a multiplayer game.

You need to run a server, and also run a client - to  play in your own multiplayer game. And Steam didn't seem to like running two instances of the game from its UI - but if you run the exe file from its Steam directory, then it worked ok.

[Huw the Poo]

Doesn't the server program show up separately in the steam tools menu?

I just bought this.  Can't wait to give it a try this evening!

[Yskonyn]

I am a huge fan of Dominions, but I am not sure what kind of game to expect with CoE?
Is it a strategy game as well? Is it a roguelike? Is it an RPG?

The screenshots are (just like with Dom) not a very good indicator of the quality of the game.

[Bison]

I am a huge fan of Dominions, but I am not sure what kind of game to expect with CoE?
Is it a strategy game as well? Is it a roguelike? Is it an RPG?

The screenshots are (just like with Dom) not a very good indicator of the quality of the game.

It's really a roguelike strategy game.  Rogue in that you can die within turns if the randomization is not in your favor and there are a number of tough hombre's that will wipe out whole armies on their own.  It's definitely a strategy game, but it's more limited in it's options than Dominions.  For example, you cannot make magic items instead you find them.  However there are strategic spells you can cast like Dominions.  And even with the new combat mechanics, you have less customization of your armies than in Dominions.   So you cannot set squads or position, those are automatically done when you assign a unit to your army.  IMHO I think COE is in general a better single player game than Dom, because the AI is active and since there limited customizations you cannot maximize research/item building/army construction in a way that the AI cannot.  Good times.

[TacticalWargames]

Funny enough in Dominions it's the battle mechanics I actually love about the game. Infact I'd like to see more war games where you give intial plan\instructions then watch it play out, abit like a wargame version of Football Manager.

The COE games though have even less input which I too find alittle to hands off.

I just wish they'd allow more manual control of the battles for once.

[Nefaro]

I can't stop playing CoE4.  Been at it the last two days, in hours-long stretches.   Already have 17 hours crammed into it.  Sleep can suck it.

I enjoyed CoE3 but I've been seeing some great improvements with this one.  The faction spellcasters seem to have more depth regarding spells & rituals. 

IIRC, that's one of the things mentioned in the new feature list, but with CoE you have to explore about and find stuff for yourself.  Which is immensely fun for those of us who enjoy learning the special little details in a game system with widely varied faction powers and roguelike randomization/exploration that helps it continue to retain some mystery through many play throughs.

[Huw the Poo]

Well, one thing I've learned is that you need to have a decent front rank to protect your ranged units now!  Otherwise your ranged units can very quickly get flanked and massacred.

Loving this game, although I haven't had much time to put into it yet.  It's all there, everything good about CoE3, just improved in so many little ways.  I really like the new combat system in general and the initiative values in particular, which have made spearmen more useful.

I've mainly played as a demonologist.  Binding demons is proving difficult; I'm always using twice the number of sacrifices required for a summoning but so far nearly all attempts have failed.  I don't remember it being this difficult in CoE3.

[Nefaro]

I've mainly played as a demonologist.  Binding demons is proving difficult; I'm always using twice the number of sacrifices required for a summoning but so far nearly all attempts have failed.  I don't remember it being this difficult in CoE3.

I had the same summoning control issues in a game with the High Priestess. 

Even began increasing my sacrifices by 10% to get a better chance at controlling my summoned monsters but I still failed more often than succeeded.  I spent a lot of time fighting my own summoned creatures.     Not sure what percentage is the magic tipping point, but 110% isn't enough.

Does this mean the control rolls for demons & such are now more difficult?  Seems that way.