Qt3 threads go on the weirdest tangents.
(This is not a complaint)
It’s a feature, not a bug. :)
I’m sure this thread will snap into focus more as more information about AoW4 comes out. There’s clearly no lack of enthusiasm for the topic!
Fixing it. ;)
LOL, thanks that looks better. I woud have also been cool with an “!” or two, now I think of it.
I would recommend neither.
Best approach the new game without thinking of the old ones.
Many people who liked SM and went straight from SM to AoW3 found the change jarring.
Ditto AoW3 to PF.
I thought of adding -made for jpinard to the title.
Now this is solid advice if you have a AoW itch that needs to be scratched
AoW3 for me. It is more than just the setting. I think Planetfall has some things that just makes it cumbersome to play - like unit mods and the map is more difficult to digest.
@TriumphJordi Would you be willing to give us some insight into the AI? AoW3 and Planetfall (imo) had pretty solid AI that both knew how to play the game and mix things up, but of course there was always room for improvement. Is that something you guys are taking a closer look at evolving, and if so would you be willing to talk a bit about it?
As you might have seen during the Announcement Stream the AI personalities from Planetfall are back. Of course it has seen it’s polish but like in Planetfall it affects multiple aspects of AI behaviour. That’s all I’m going to say on the subject for now.
The AI personalities and the diplomacy system of Planetfall were both upgrades from AoW3 IMO and were positive evolutions in the AI area for 4X games IMO - it was possible to have a sense of how an AI was going to react, not in a mechanically simple way but in a general way, and it was also possible to have meaningful diplomatic strategies. For example, for both the diplomatic type victory (I forget what it was called) and the Voidbringer Invasion, maintaining good relations with the AI could buy you some significant time to win and useful alliances.
I did miss that, but it sounds excellent!
The personality stuff in PF was neat but the actual strategic AI was pretty weak (and not aggressive enough).
Tactical AI was good but not great, very similar to 3’s. Good at killing your units, bad at self-preservation. Exploitable but pretty decent.
I really hope Jeff gets put into some sort of early beta if that’s at all possible.
I always thought that the map in Planetfall looked rather busy and could make it difficult to see everything. From what they’ve shown of AoW 4 this looks to be fixed. Still very detailed looking but just seems much cleaner. The art in general looks top notch here. I really like the unique look of each time. Little things but seemingly a really nice presentation all around.
There’s all these amazing Tomes that are scrolling on the dev diary page. But @TriumphJordi I see no Tome of Leeks. An oversight perhaps?
Obviously that is the ultimate Nature Tome
Ah, I see. Provided we can summon onion knights brandishing sharpened leeks, I’ll be happy. Might be a nod to a few franchises too, alas.
I think that’s where you can start getting into issues where a good AI may not be a fun AI, where it will constantly sit and wait a player out until the player attacks from a bad position. The player has time limits and will get bored, AIs don’t!
Then you have issues where if the AI weighs unit preservation too much, it’s easy to get into a situation where it moves forward to attack, takes damage, retreats to preserve the unit, and repeat. Basically, flail around ineffectually.
I think given the limits of game AI development resources, choosing to focus on killing units effectively even at the cost of not preserving units well was probably the right call for those reasons.
