That's cool.  I know a lot of people love TC.

First and foremost I wanted WoM to be a good successor to Master of Magic finally, which it utterly failed to do. Dynasties, Good AI, modding where all very nice extras but they were still extras (actually modding became less of an extra after it was promised during beta as a remedy to some of the rather unpopular directions they were taking the game).

If they can just make a good successor to Master of Magic, then FE will be a success to me. After they've proven they can do that then I hope they come back and put all the extras back into a new version of the game.

Well I think AOW then AOW:SM were good successors to MOM..  I was hoping for a goos successor to AOW:SM

The problem here though is that not all of us thought AoW:SM was that great. I for one did not enjoy that game nearly as much as I have enjoyed WoM. In general, the AoW series attempts to be a fundamentally different experience than that which was presented in WoM, with tactical battles being the general focus of the overall game experience and all other systems pushing the player to those battles. From what the developers have said about FE, the focus seems to be more on creating an interesting rpg/war experience over the more traditional 4x elements. This focus will probably result in a more popular game experience, but it is also moving away from what I would have preferred. In my mind, it would have been cool if the focus was more on the factions and their overall history.

I welcome it, E:Wom is too focused on citybuilding and the strategic nature for my taste. More RPG elements and a better tactical combat will only make the game better.

Well I guess different strokes for different folks. For me and several of my friends AOW:SM is the best fantasy 4x game to date which sadly WOM does not yet hold a candle to. And is more fun than MOM. But then we have modded a lot of units and maps for that game.

When you said "AoW series attempts to be a fundamentally different experience than that which was presented in WoM, with tactical battles being the general focus of the overall game experience and all other systems pushing the player to those battles." were you referring to WOM or AOW:SM being the general focus of the overall game expereance and all other systems pushing the player to those battles?  Because they both do this (which I have no problem with because my favorite element in these types of game is the TC, I never in AOW:SM or WOM use fast combat no matter what.)  Unfortunatly WOM TC still needs work to make it as fun as AOW:SM.

Well I think FE will be the game for me that will replace AOW:SM in both SP and MP as my main Fantasy Trun based (hate RTS games) 4x game .....hopefully

Thing is, AOW:SM is not a 4x - it's more of a 2-3x, so to speak. It has no technology research (spell research doesn't really count), city founding and development are very minimal, little diplomacy, and so on. Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy the game for the tactical combat, which is quite good; when it comes to redesigning tactical combat for FE, the more ideas they inherit from AOW:SM the better in my opinion. I just object to it being put in the '4x' category - the game is tactical combat, the rest of it is a minimal wrapper around combat.

WoM is nearly the opposite of AOW:SM as far as TBS games go - most of the focus is on the relatively complicated city development, research, and unit design, meanwhile the combat is very simple and minimal. Yes you have to do it anyway because the autoresolve is even worse, but it's not the game's best feature either way. Hopefully FE combines the best of both.

The Dynasty factor and the mod-ability are my two favorite things about this game. Its a great game despite all its flaws.

Except that's not really true. AoW also had the skills you could pick up to improve your empire in addition to spells, so you had two things to research. WoM's research isn't particularly more complicated except you pick an area to go into (but after that just pick the best of whatever comes up from it). And I don't find city development any more complicated except that you have to spam studies and houses in one game and in the other that's done for you as the city grows.

AoW actually has a wider range of buildings if you look at all the city defenses, of which WoM has next to nothing. And unit design basically never matters in WoM and is really just "build something cheap or something expensive?", the units are actually more diverse in AoW.

That's the whole problem with WoM really. AoW didn't try to do this stuff, it did one thing really well and had the rest support it. WoM tries to do 50 things and none of them are done well enough to stand on their own.

Judging by your last line, I think we're agreeing in different words. I appreciate all the buildings that have an influence on combat, they're a key part of why the combat is so good, but if you take the city development on its own it has little depth. You have like 8 or 10 buildings to develop your economy with, that have to be built one each in a very linear way, there's little choice involved except "build unit" or "build next building".  The only interesting part of city development is the influence it has on combat, which I didn't intend to downplay, it is amazing to build city walls and wizard towers that shoot at attackers and have them actually appear in combat and drastically influence it. Spell/skill research is similar, most of it exists solely to impact combat somehow (and many of the combat spells are admittedly cool) - but if you take all the spells/skills that aren't about combat you have a pretty linear progression of +10% whatever per turn without many interesting choices.

Your last line is exactly my point, that AoW focuses on combat - and does it very well - but its other systems are only interesting insofar as they impact combat.

Also I didn't say WoM did city development or research or unit design well - but those systems are more complicated, more fleshed out than anything comparable in AoW. You do have more choices to make, even if many of those choices are 'no-brainers' due to bad balance (i.e. you have a hundred combinations possible in unit design, but most of them aren't viable, so in reality you have 1-2 choices). Still, there is a well developed unit design system, which doesn't (imo) need to be redesigned from the ground up for FE, it just lacks balance/polish.

Dynasty - False
Master of magic copy/paste - True! (yes!)


ahh..if only.....one can dream

Well maybe after FE has a solid start it can be added back it was a hell of a good idea, very original, hate to see it droped I liked it alot.

I'd certainly like to see dynasties in FE (or later, but as soon as possible)

Dynasties and the concept of marrying off your successors with the idea of acquiring some benefits in the future, like alliance or even the whole other kingdom/empire were some of the most interesting things for me in the E:WoM. Sadly, the concept wasn't fleshed out in the most fortunate way, but the idea itself was great!

In my opinion, the best thing to do about the dynasty system would be to allow the succession with the heirs (at least for the AI if not for the human player) and as a few posters already stated if done in that way it would not go against Derek's philosophy and idea how the game should look like.

I'd even say that for the human player, the "problem" of succession could be done via some expensive spell (enchantment) which would transfer your "essence" into a body of one of your children if some prerequisites are fulfilled after your death, i.e. the spell is researched and active, you have suitable children (going into rpg area here, perhaps you should "tweak" or train your children in advance to make sure you'd be able to "transfer" - I suppose that you could do it only if you have a weak-willed child or if your magic power is extraordinarily strong -> so basically two different ways to go, maybe one for kingdoms, other for empires).

So, that would

a) ensure you take a very good care of your sovereign until you're ready with the "backup"

have the rpg elements in the whole story about the "preparations for transfer"

c) AI would have the possibility to continue fighting on after sovereign's death

d) give some practical meaning of fathering dynasties except for more champions.

I'm sure I could lost many more benefits of this system. The bottom line, such a concept would not go against the idea which Derek conveyed, that people play as "themselves" (as sovereigns) and not as their civilization.

What do you mean Populations to go? You can't have growth without population it is one of the MAIN CORE ELEMENTS of MOM. So I doubt population is going anywhere.

Well I'm glad you're the ONLY ONE thinking that crap. AOW:SM was a pile of crap and they ruined it even more allowing the multiplayer base to modify the core game. It's the worst of the bunch in the solo single player game. The AI is pitiful and worthless waste of time to play against. Now DOMINIONS III on the other hand is a worthy successor to MOM.

You do know that the whole food/housing/prestige system has already been confirmed as cut, right?

Perhaps a an alternative viewpoint to help clarify this gaming philosophy "stuff" is the obvious inherent conflict between developing a totally neutral---but balanced--- sandbox mode game versus a game that appeals to those who want more of a storyline and character depth and rely upon campaigns and more structured gameplay.  Both genres have their adherents. But developing a game to satisfy both camps is extremely difficult. Indeed, there are some who say that both goals are totally incompatible.  I have personally been on both sides of the issue (depending upon the game), and see the merit for both viewpoints. Balancing the two viewpoints is a bugger though, and I don't envy game designers when they have to make some difficult decisions about this during the design cycle.

A close parallel to this philosophy is trying to satisfy the hard-core multiplayers out there who demand an extremely balanced game between factions with a minimum of random events that give an possibly unfair advantage to a player, and single players who want a great level of detail and differentiation amongst the factions to make the environment more interesting and challenging by requiring different tactics to counter different foes.  In this case, it is almost impossible to satisfy both groups of gamers.  As with politics, there is no way to satisfy the extremists of either camp. Compromises have to be intelligently crafted and options given to disable some elements of randomness and game balance for multiplay is mandatory for any game that is developed to appeal to both.  I might add, that Heroes of Might and Magic III and II did a pretty fair job at this. 

i simple cant accept no dynastie

Why do you care about a broken feature?

Do you like its potential?

Do you have visions of how it should be done?

If not the above two, then what is it about dynasties that you desperately want?

It's not a broken feature, it's an incomplete feature that is being cut because finishing it takes too much work at the moment.

Probably most of us who are unhappy about this decision have "visions" along the lines of the early and pre-beta talk from the devs--a way to link a special class of champion units to the diplomacy system and to influence how new loyalties would fall out after an AI sovereign died.

It also had great immersion potential, even with the very limited range of customizations available. Hopefully the first expansion will include a fuller version of dynasties, perhaps training options for the kids and definitely a more interesting range of options for arranging marriages based on both faction customs and current power differentials. 

I'm not the only one that thinks that. And what is wrong with Modding the game? The mods enhanced the fun of the game even more. The game was IMHO the mest fantasy TBS ever made so far and yes I was a good successor of MOM. Now obviously you and I will never agree on this issue but I still to this day play AOW:SM both single and multi-play and it is still fun to play a lot more fun that the current E:WOM. 

Now I did try Dominions III and no it is not a very good game at all and is not a good successor to MOM.

Ok I take out the 4x part then. So I will say it is so far the best Fantasy TBS IMHO to date.

There is a fantasy empire building game that will feature dynasties in development.

http://www.lookatmygame.com/Games/Fantasy-Dynasty

I don't know much about the game to be honest. Looks kind of cool though.

I could say the same thing about the tactical combat piece.

Thanks for that link. Graphics of the main map aren't much to look at, but the game looks very interesting indeed.