This AAR + available for Macs (this sort of game really needs to be played on a laptop, imo) = sold.
I’m glad I bought this when it was first mentioned on QT3.
Haven’t played it much, but as this AAR shows it’s a quality indie game that deserves every sale. I wow to play it more.
As soon as I learn how to play this game, I would love to get involved in some PBEM.
So would those of us who have already learned how to play this game. Vic, can you help us out? :)
-Tom
Ack. You mean it doesn’t have PBEM yet? Oh well, it’s going to take me a little bit to figure things out. I’m still working out the basic turnflow.
Sorry PBEM is going to have to wait for AE 2 someday :) The game I’m working on right now will have PBEM with simultaneous turns (Dominions style)…hot seat as well. And you can always play against all AI opponents.
Man, PBEM Armageddon Empires would be awesome. At least SI will have it!
Bummer on the PBEM, but that doesn’t prevent me from, based solely on my learning-to-play experience thus far, rating this an excellent game. I’ve played too many board games/card games that I thought really needed to be computer-based to be fun and too many computer strategy games that don’t take advantage of the fact that it’s on a computer and is just a simple board/card game on a computer screen. Armageddon Empires really does seem to be the best of all worlds.
We have contact: Chameleons operating a mere three hexes away from base encounter Xenopod recce. Fortunately, the Xenos are weak and out of supply range. The Chameleons unstealth and kill them as they try to retreat.
The fact that the Xenos recce was out of supply indicates the Xenos don’t have any bases too close to me–a unit is “in supply” when within a certain range of a friendly base. It’s starting to seem like there are no bases at all within supply range of me, in fact; I’m probably going to have to build an outpost to extend my supply range so I can reach the enemy.
I draw more cards, and deploy some of them: Pack Rockets to augment my army, an Intel Center to defend against enemy espionage and boost my AP, and Necrosis.
Necrosis is an assassin. He can employ stealth, and is capable of making a kill attempt against an enemy hero without engaging that hero’s army. Assassinating the CO of an army can turn a tough fight into a cakewalk, so I may want to keep him in reserve to defend against any opposition that shows up. On the other hand, I could send him out to preemptively strike at any enemy heroes. Decisions, decisions…
Speaking of those Pack Rockets, I really like the artwork on the various Pack cards. I wish there was some way to call up a higher-resolution version of the images. (Hey Vic, how about that as a feature for the next expansion? :>)
I just realized that this will also run on my work computer.
Problem solved ;-)
I just came to that very same realization. I think I’m gonna buy this, even though Vic sent me a review copy way back when for the Tac Cancer review. It’s fully worth it, so that should say something to those people saying $30 is above their impulse buy limit. DON’T buy it on impulse, check it out, THEN buy it ;)
Bought this for myself this christmas. These AARs (plus Bill Harris’ blog posts on them) have pushed me over the edge. Tried playing on Saturday and realized it wasn’t terribly user friendly (without reading a little manual.) I keep failing on my reading about two pages in. sigh I’ll get through this eventually!
I’ve already bought Armageddon Empires and played the heck out of it (Tip of the Spear brought all the original love back and more), but I always love seeing these AARs.
And I keep hoping, beyond any rational hope, that Vic will somehow magically implement multiplayer. :P
BTW, I need a little feedback. There have been two free expansions to Armageddon empires. I just downloaded mine on Saturday after buying it, and I can’t tell if I have them. I’m running version 1.08 and there is a Cult of the Wastelands checkbox on game setup. Granted, this is my first time booting up the game, so I just may not know what I’m looking for.
Tom T.
If you have version 1.08, you have them. The expansions are part of the game, not distributed separately.
Incidentally, I recommend keeping the Cults checkbox off until you’ve won your first game. (You really don’t want to have the Great Kabaagh show up while you’re still getting the hang of the mechanics!)
I hope it’s ok we’re mucking up your cool AAR thread with questions/comments, Damien. I figure posting in it will keep it bumped to the first page where it belongs so others can discover this cool gem of a game.
I have a question about army experience, battle honors, and prestige: I’m just in my first play on the full game after getting smoked in each of my three learning games in the demo so I haven’t found/earned any “battle honors” but my armies seem to accumulate experience on their own over time, and seem to gain prestige by winning battles. What exactly do these values do for the army? I don’t see any indication of extra dice being awarded or anything.
By the way, I think I’m winning against the Xenopods, but it could of course (as Alan would say) be a trap.
Any chance someone will upload a tutorial/AAR on youtube?
- I’m sure I’m not the only one who’d appreciate it, considering the rather unhelpful manual and indecipherable UI
Hey Disconnected, reading Damien’s AAR here was the best starter for my wrapping my brain around the UI, etc. Of course this wasn’t enough to really understand how to do much of anything once I downloaded the demo.
This is the best resource I found. There is a decent FAQ there but the best help is the turn-by-turn tutorial at Dubious Quality that is linked there. I think it’s the only way to find each step of the Dubious Quality tutorial because I couldn’t see any rhyme or reason to how that blog is organized, but then I hadn’t ever read it before googling for Armageddon Empires newbie guides.
Thanks Ryan A, looks like just the thing :)
Good lord, you kids these days. In my day, we had to read manuals and we liked it.
I do think that the manual is really all you need for AE. That’s easy for me to say, though, since I love reading manuals. Seriously. I love manuals, rules booklets, owners guides, all forms of documentation. But if it’s a chore to read a manual, I can’t imagine it’s going to be any easier to plow through Bill’s blog entries about the game.
-Tom