Illwinter announces Conquest of Elysium 4

[Bison]

I've only had one summon fail so far a couple of higher level demons that were summoned by my main necromancer.  My low level necromancer hasn't failed to control any of his summoned critters.  I'm sure there will be more but I'm averaging around 90% summon success rate. 

[Huw the Poo]

I thought summoning was guaranteed for necromancers, with the tradeoff being the increase in insanity?

[bbmike]

Two nice tips concerning recruiting from the Steam forum (that I didn't know):

You can also right click the citadels from the list and the camera centers at that location. Hope this helps!

Also, a long right click on the site on the map, where you want to recruit, will give you the recruit screen with the right site preselected.

[Bison]

I thought summoning was guaranteed for necromancers, with the tradeoff being the increase in insanity?

I meant demonologist.

[Nefaro]

The Lesser Summons on my High Priestess, at regular 100% sacrifice level, were hitting 50% success rate at best.  Pretty sure it ended up being a bit less.

I realize some classes have different success rates but I was pretty sure the lower level stuff was pretty high control success by default.  Didn't end up being so for me. 

Maybe RNGesus was being wrathful, per usual, but I had so many back-to-back failures (and ensuing fights) it is hard to believe the chances weren't lowered since CoE3.

[Wolfe1759]

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.

Agree with you on the battle mechanics.

The Legion / Chariots of War / Spartan / Gates of Troy series did the same sort of thing as did Legion Arena at a tactical level.

[Huw the Poo]

With regard to summoning, someone on the Steam forum is complaining that even the Baron's "raise levies" has resulted in him getting hostile units!  I'm starting to suspect the devs got a bit lazy and copied/pasted a load of summoning code and haven't properly tested it.  I'm sure this will all get addressed soon though, Illwinter are really good at supporting their games.

[Nefaro]

Also ... don't press the 'L' key.

If you have a leader selected, it will send that single unit to Hades. 

You can still press 'L' again to get them back, but make sure you do so before ending the turn or he will be stuck there and gobbled up by very bad things.

Another bug.

[Huw the Poo]

Heh.  How the bloody hell did that one slip through?

I think I might give up for a couple weeks and watch the patches that come in.  I still have the lovely Shadow of Mordor to keep myself occupied. :)

[Nefaro]

I've not struck any bugs other than that 'L' key one, which is easy to avoid, in over 20 hours play time. 

While there are likely some bugs under the hood here & there, it's nothing anywhere near game-breaking and far better than most new releases. 

I've spent long hours stuck in this over the weekend, which is a rarity with new games for me.

[Nefaro]

My necromancing Hobbits just summoned a Dracolich.  Proceeded to destroy Dirt-Digging Dwarves and Filthy Tree-Hugging Druids.  Then turned their corpses into zombies & skellies for garrison duty.   
10/10 
>:D

[Huw the Poo]

I've not struck any bugs other than that 'L' key one, which is easy to avoid, in over 20 hours play time. 

While there are likely some bugs under the hood here & there, it's nothing anywhere near game-breaking and far better than most new releases. 

I've spent long hours stuck in this over the weekend, which is a rarity with new games for me.

It's just that a lot of classes rely on summoning (even unwittingly using the summoning mechanic like the aforementioned Baron class) and I am very suspicious of summoning right now.  Plus there's an absolute litany of bugs being posted on the forum right now; whether I would have noticed them myself or not, I don't want to play in the knowledge that some of them may be affecting me.  No harm in giving it a couple of weeks while I play other games.

[Nefaro]

Well.. I did just see my Dracolich friendly fire AoE himself with his Decay breath weapon. 

Didn't think I was mistreating him so much that he had to suicide like that.   ;D


The AI is a bit loose with it's AoE spells after the front line melee has become interspersed, late in the big battles.  Looking back, I probably should've just sent Mister Dusty McBonesalot off by himself or with some disposable undead fodder to keep him from getting too surrounded.

[mikeck]

So what is the "goal" of the game? Is it like Dominions where you basically build armies and generals and kill everyone? Do you build towns or just raise units?

Also, what is the difference between COE4 and Dom4?

[Nefaro]

So what is the "goal" of the game? Is it like Dominions where you basically build armies and generals and kill everyone? Do you build towns or just raise units?

Also, what is the difference between COE4 and Dom4?

You kill everyone else by building units and improving your casters to summon all kinds of beasties.  But you also have to explore the map, which not only has neutral armies to squash, and towns to take, but some special sites of import to certain factions' resource gathering and unit progression.

As with Dom, each faction is different.  I'd even say that, despite CoE being the faster & more streamlined game, it's "classes" tend to have even more varied gameplay styles.  Each one starts off deceptively simple with a handful of units and a town or two, as with any turn-based strategy game.  But as you gather & use your special resource(s) through each game, it gets more unique. 

As a couple examples, the last two I've played were the High Cultist and the Markgraf.  The High Cultist needs sacrifices which they get from holding settlements, the larger the better.  But in order to summon bigger nasties, like the Deep Ones, they have to cast summon rituals in coastal areas/towns.  Some of the summons at that mid-level (Starspawn?) are the only ones that can be fed enough sacrifices to summon the highest level stuff... like a Great Old One.  In contrast, the Markgraf is a class which consists of Hoburg halflings who left regular halfling society and began using necromancy for a means of cheap labor and such.  They collect 'Hands Of Glory' for their Necro rituals, like the Necromancer class does, but one of the classes' big end-goal power plays is to turn it's Markgraf into a Vampire at a specific map location (to be discovered) and it's Hog Rider nobility into Vampires or Ghoul Lords, and their necromancers can become Wights & Ghosts retaining some spellcasting.  There are special transcendence possibilities like this in some classes.  IIRC, the High Priestess can eventually turn into her Demon God incarnate once all the footwork is done & she achieves the ritual to have him take possession for the ensuing rampage.   8)


TL;DR
It's not quite a 4X, not quite a strategy-roguelike, but has some elements of each.  I've been hooked due to each class having a different style & range of unique mythical units.  Mixed with the exploration of the fog of war whilst searching for certain class-related things.  There is a good bit of randomization to it all so each game is different.


Tokshen and Das have both begun CoE4 LPs on YouTube, if you want to see it in action.  I'd recommend Tokshen's vids for a faster glimpse.