I’ll second the motion. Great game, very good price.
I’m not sure if there is anyone on this forum that wouldn’t recommend this game, as well as the expansions.
Thanks for the heads up, just grabbed the full collection. Am I right in saying that I avoid the campaigns/tutorials and just play the random game mode?
Well, you know, tutorials are tutorials. You decide if you need them or not. I found the campaigns very difficult, so there’s that if you want it, but I don’t think I’m being controversial when I say the game really shines with random maps and the like.
Yeah. The expansion campaigns are inoffensive, vanilla campaign is mediocre to bad, and random maps are A++ amazing.
Hard to pass up at that price. Has anyone played it PBEM? A buddy and I were thinking of playing it but thought I saw where the PBEM feature is still in beta.
Yep, PBEM works just fine. You guy should have a great time.
-Tom
Man I love this game, set up a random map, put an AI on your side and 3 or 4 on the other side and have at it. Good times, good times…
Thanks Tom. I “assume” tactical battles have to be auto resolved in PBEM games? That’s fine, just checking.
Battles between players yes. Battles against computer player and independents can be done tactically.
Basically the inverse of live mp, meaning classes and races with a bias towards special abilities will do better in pbem, where the Human can maximise their use against independents.
For example, relying on frost damage or Necro abilities, make Frostling Necromancers a good bet in pbem but less so in live mp.
Necromancer in general is considered OP in pbem, with unmodded games.
OK, thanks again. Guess I’ll play Necro against my buddy then! :P
If unmodded, then be sure to (ab)use stiffen limbs.
Search for Hiliadan’s videos where he details how to clear legendary sites in 20 turns or less.
Or don’t seek out cheese in your first tour through the game ;)
Yes, please do not do this.
Just to clarify, Necromancer is considered OP in the hands of a skilled player, i.e. one who knows all the exploits for tactical combat.
I have 1800 hrs in the game and I still make mistakes in tactical combat and I have still triumphed against Necromancers in pbem.
If I’m reading this correctly then @Ironsight is new to the game. In that case, I would actually recommend Warlord or Theocrat, as they are pretty straightforward, or Sorceror as they are very flexible.
Also, for someone who knows how to “cheese,” for lack of a better word, Druid is potentially extremely powerful, because of the evolve.
Ditto Rogue in pbem, because concealment comes into it’s own, and you can do some wonderful Bard stuff.
I’m just encouraging a new player to not worry about what’s “overpowered” in games between thousand-hour players, that’s all ;) Age of Wonders 3 is an absolute joy to explore mechanically, and it would be a shame to discourage someone from discovering all the awesome stuff you can do (Elf Druids, man. Elf Druids).
Beyond that, I have a particular distaste for things like “use this one skill with this one particular loadout of units to clear this one type of legendary ruin on turn 15 by kiting the boss.”
I’ve done my time counting whip hammers and pre-chopping forests.
http://www.quickmeme.com/img/7c/7c9b03d033a74176fd88bd99864ab7d728a3e3502ed83f1f848348ef6d1afd8f.jpg
Well there are so many variables in this game that imho you can’t really rely on any one skill.
Anyway, maybe I should have just kept the advice to:
it’s important to clear sites properly, using tactical combat abilities.
When levelling up your leader, heroes, and when composing your armies for player to player combat, bear in mind that fighting the opponent will be done with auto combat, and the autocombat favours simple to use abilities, like archery, melee.
Don’t rely on fancy abilities for autocombat, but conversely you will need those for tactical combat. Central tension of pbem!
My buddy and I will be new to AoW3 but not the AoW series. We played, IIRC, the first game many moons ago. We also played most of the HOMM games so we generally know what to expect in AoW3. We play for fun so I was only kidding about using Necro against him just because it’s OP.
Edit - Just picked up the game and expansions for $12.50. A steal! Starting that first elf campaign for the tutorial as recommended. Looks like many hours of fun ahead.