Frogboy

Just 2 things for me.

1) Wish there is a way to disable the count-down timer. I like to take my time, and build cities, not rush off to battle the other cities as soon as possible, that's not my style, just want to take my time. I started a fast tech on largest map. I hardly got started when the timer kicked in, 35 turns.....

2) Game starts off hard, which is great, but after 5ish hours of playing pretty much everything is cakewalk. You have a random event that all creatures gain 2 levels, which is nice. Just wish it happens more often. Mainly, mid game gets stale, need suddenly new monsters (higher level) to appear. I really like the wild lands, just wish there were more of them. I know that you have a map with, like 10, on it. Still having a hard time just getting that map started. I'll get it one day.

As a side note, I'd pay for a DLC that offers 64 bit support, and MUCH larger maps. (More wild / bad lands *grin*)

Most of my complaints about LH come down to a lack of realism. Now obviously we are talking about a made up computer game about a made up fantasy world. How realistic can it be?

Well, rather more than it is I think. So many parts of LH just don't seem to make much sense.

Look at EvilSalmon's recent post about his disappointment in the game. Most of his complaints are actually about a lack of realism. My sovereign has been traveling for years and decides to start a settlement but the starting land is totally inhospitable, why didn't he pick a better place? My settlement builds to beside a nearby forest or river but I can't build a forest or river building, why? Why can the AI settle in places I can't? Why can't I tell the AI that if they enter my land then I'm declaring war on them so that they might think twice about constantly crossing my borders? Why can't I build a wonder just because someone somewhere has laid the foundations for it then forgotten about it? (OK being limited to one of a wonder is a gameplay construct anyway but at least not being able to build it because someone else has already FINISHED it is transparent!). Why do strong bandits have nothing of value while a much weaker bear cub has an amazing treasure?

My list of complaints wouldn't be exactly the same as EvilSalmon's but it would come down to much the same thing - there are still too many things in LH which just make no sense (and it was worse in previous iterations). A fantasy game is by definition going to be an abstraction of reality but that doesn't mean it has to be a random inconsistent abstraction.

If I was to nominate a second major problem it would be bugs or doubtful 'features'. In many cases the ones which particularly annoy me are those which also break realism and hence immersion. Things like growth increasing when I queue settlers, the AI settling in unsettlable places, strange auto-resolve results and monsters not attacking AI settlements then immediately attacking the settlement once the player captures them. (NOTE: I haven't played in a little while, some of these may have been fixed in recent patches).

I absolutely hated the art style for the characters/world and unfortunately as a result barely played. I like to normally play humans and could not get immersed into the world due to art style.

I didn't like the customization for soldiers and would have preferred unique units per race with lots of visual difference per unit and heroes.

I couldn't get into the lore as well. It's ok to have cookie cutter fantasy races. I missed dwarves/elves/beholders/artifacts etc. old school d and d stuff. The fun factor just wasn't there.

Luckily I have getting my fix with Age of Wonder 3. Solid game.

I gave this a lot of thought and reflection before replying - as I know you are looking for accurate, quality feedback.  Dislikes?  (1) AI still plies up multiple armies rather than concentrating on creating a smaller number if more effective armies.  Leads to a boring game of attrition.  (2) Sovereigns still don't seem 'vital' to me - but rather mere caricatures.  (3) Game play when you reach the stage where player has one or two strong armies, and its just matter of taking numerous poorly defended settlements.  (4) Interesting choices have increased - but still too few and far between.  However, the game has come a very long way.  I appreciate the work that has gone into it.  Its still way better than most of the other  4x fantasy games out there. 

I have to agree that although I still enjoy the odd game, faction differentiation seems somewhat poor the technology trees need to be more diverse. I know each race has a few specialty tech items but it's not really enough.

This was improved ad a few factions do feel better for it the undead DLC was great and I like playing the wraiths, Magnar, trogs and undead. I find most the human kingdoms and empires feel a bit similar as do the other fallen.

Generally I find the technology trees bland and Samish.

So yes I guess I would want to feel playing each race was a more unique experience.

This is not to say I hate the game as I say I’m still playing on occasions but it doesn’t feel as classic as GC2.

I'm going to hold off on some of my observations until after I give 1.6 a good spin, but off of the of my head...

Diplomacy - Needs much love.  A good example of what I would regard as 'interesting' diplomacy is Alpha Centauri.  There, you had some interesting civilization focus options (planned, green, police state, etc.) that you mixed and matched, and changed up every so often, to tweak your civilization bonuses along the lines of your goal.  However, those very choices affected how other factions reacted to you, and would make/break alliances partially based on you pursuing 'crazy civilization paths' from their perspective.  I haven't tried the latest iterations of Civ (gave up after Civ 4, actually gave that game away 'cuz it diddn't do it foe me), but Alpha Centauri really seemed to hit a sweet spot here.  Sure, improvements are always possible, and it wasn't perfect, but it WAS compelling.

I'd love to see, say, Pariden, favoring one Kingdom over another because of similar outlooks, but others not so much.  Also, it'd be cool if we had those 'culture path sub-options' to play with, that could tie into diplomacy in a major way.  So that say Tarth isn't mad at Magnar because they are Empire (that's a good start), but because Magnar has been gutting the forests in Elemental, which they love.

Lack of consequences for your actions:

An Elemental equivalent of Civ's pollution mechanic could be interesting.  Essentially, the world is trying to rebuild itself, but too much 'industrialization', deforestation, or gutting the local mana flows sets you back, and perhaps triggers 'mana quakes', as the magical energies are not yet back in balance.  Currently, you just build cities up, with some minor choices which feel not all that important to me (note the spreadsheet comment someone made above, the bonuses often come down to math). 

To elaborate on this, other choices should have consequences as well as rewards to consider.  GalCiv 2 sort of did this with their 'Good/Neutral/Evil' mechanic, but unfortunately once your choose your 'alignment' this goes away.  It would have been cool if those decisions played out into the late game.  Unfortunately Elemental doesn't (currently) have small villages to incorporate into your empire, but if it did, this would be a great place to bring out such an aspect. 

I.E. 'the village has a powerful magical shrine that protects it from mana storms.  Such a shrine could add greatly to your power.  Do you

A) dismantle the shrine and move it to your throne room (- to production in this village),

B)attempt to tap into it's power while leaving it in place (random chance of mana storms increased in this area) or

C)leave it alone (loyalty/recruiting bonus from villagers). 

Random events could have multiple choices as well, with each choice having some dramatic impact on the rest of the game (good choice makes you more popular amongst the 'kingdom' type citizens, but more evil monsters target you.  Bad choice sacrifices population in favor of some game effect, with 'good monsters' taking more notice/umbrage of your efforts.

Elemental has the ability to have more 'resource counters', so 'alignment/action counters' can be fairly easily implemented.  So, with some love and a LOT of thought on the next design, a lot of this stuff can be worked out. 

The one thing that I've observed lately is that Elemental always feels like it was rushed into production too quickly, and while 2015 seems like a long ways away, I really think it is time to take a 20,000 foot view look at the game, and some significant time spent on each new aspect individually.  E:WOM is a perfect example of great concepts that fell flat in execution, and subsequent retreat from those ideas because of cost/benefit analyses and such to figure out if they were 'worth fixing'.  I won't harp on many of these (feels too much like beating the dead horse), which ties into some of the comments above...

The above image is a perfect example of how Elemental could still look terrain wise.  The current world feels too flat to me, and if the terrain art for E:LH was applied to this (some coding work, I know), I think that the Elemental world could be a little more compelling visually.  Yes, the coloring of the world in the screenshot above does look bland, but at least it isn't flat.  If I could have the 'ruggedness' of E:WOM back with a lot of new interesting terrain, and the 'improved' E:LH artwork, improved on yet further of course,, well then it would be screenshot worthy, just for the breathtaking views.  Even the above vista does look somewhat breathtaking when you take it all in, even with 'older' artwork...

Retreat from multiple tech trees.  at least E:WOM had Kindgom and Empire tech trees, and the code in Elemental can (still) allow each empire to have it's own unique tech tree.  Modders have been too focused on other stuff to attempt this (a handful did back in the E:WOM days), but spending some time on unique tech trees for each faction could help flesh each of them out considerably.

Lack of unit differentiation.  The faction bonuses we have now are a good start, but it'd be cool to see each faction having unique units that only it can build.  Warlords III manages to give each of it's many factions unique unit mixes, and Elemental just cries out for it.  Wargs vs Horses is a minor way to do this, there is potential for so much more.  Sure, summoned creatures mix things up a bit, but that's a Sov thing, not a faction thing.

The various paths to victory seem bland to me.  Really it boils down to Conquer or Spell of Making.  One modder has introduced a City Victory, which is interesting (I like the idea of the 'Ultimate' Civilization as a victory condition), but my games generally fall along the lines of Spell Of Making unless I manage to gut all of the AI factions first.  No real curve balls here...

The 'hero joining your service' mechanic has always bothered me.  I like the 'acquiring fame to attract heroes' idea, but I think you should have more options here.  Mainly, not be limited to just two heroes, but from a pool of heroes, perhaps with associated quests that tie in to each hero to 'earn' their loyalty.  Maybe a mix of how heroes USED to be handled and the current form (i.e. certain locations on the map can be visited to recruit new heroes, if you have enough fame points to 'spend' to attract said heroes).

So to summarize, Diplomacy is weak, lack of important 'moral' game choices with associated consequences, non-differentiated tech trees, lack of unique and interesting faction units, and the current 'Flat/Tabletop' feel of the Elemental World are things that detract from my Elemental experience.

Some other things I dislike are lack of unit formations, no city walls siege mechanic, late game weapons are too OTT, too few 'classes/paths' to choose from, and the map is too small/cities too close together/units move too slow.

There are a lot of things I like about the game as well, which is why I still tinker with it after all these years.  But I REALLY think that (other than DLC), it's time to take a big step back, and look at some of the overarching components of the design.  E:LH has done well, but I still see a LOT of untapped potential...

Addendum to my comments earlier.  The tactical combat system is one I dislike.  I would prefer a turn based system where all the orders for each side are imputed, and then the PC enact those orders.  Conditional orders, like archers firing on first unit that closes with it, melee unit stands and defends (exerting a ZOC), or advances towards selected enemy unit to engage in melee, etc. 

It has been a while since I have played, but my top two biggest issues are: 

 - One caster class vs 4 non-caster classes.  In a game about magic, this has always bugged me.  There should be 2-3 caster classes to choose from.  Magic could be split into Combat (direct damage spells), Summoning and Enchanting (troop/city buffs/debuffs), allowing much more variety in hero choices when it come to magic. (these would be the focus of the caster.  They could still cast spells that were not their focus, they would just be less impressive.  eg: Summons could be capped, while the summoning tree would greatly increase that cap and lower their upkeep, while also introducing more summons.)

 - Factions are not distinctive enough.  They look too similar and lack unique unit/building/tech options.  The faction traits don't really do enough to make them feel that much different.

With the update and DLC due this week (and Tesla Effect getting a two week delay), I'll be jumping in again and I'm sure I'll be able to add to this list.

I have never been able to get into any of the Elemental games. Each time a new iteration comes out I fire it up, play for about an hour or so and then shut it off for good. It just won't hook me, even though I really want it too. There are several reasons:

• The fantasy universe does not engage me. I just think the races, characters and creatures are all really weird (not in a good Cthulu type of way) and bland. I would almost rather the world building to have been classic high fantasy, despite the fact that so many of those games exist. 
• The art style is very uninteresting to me. I like the look of the trees and mountains, but the artwork for Cave Bears, Humans, etc. all look off or unfinished. 
• Some things still don't make sense after all these years. Ex: a leg of meat costs like double the price of a spear or club at the beginning of the game. WHY? Why is food so damned expensive and nicely made, sturdy weapons are practically given away. 
• The tutorial just stops without notice. The last time I tried Legendary Heroes I thought I would run the tutorial to re-familiarize myself with the world. After several videos it just kept on going. I didn't know if the tutorial was finished or what. 
• Tactical battles are boring and don't make a lot of sense. Like, why is it that when I finish moving a unit I have to choose pass? Either I used all my action points moving or I didn't. I shouldn't have to "pass" when I just took a turn!

It is really frustrating to me because I feel like these games should be right up my alley. I'm a Stardock fanboy; the GalCiv games are my favorite series of all time! I wish the Elemental universe hooked me the same way, but . . . it just doesn't. I guess for me it'll always be the one that got away.

Lot's of good points in this thread.  The ones I agree with most are: 

1. tactical battles look too small (even if the code didn't change, adding tons more troops on the field later in the game would be better).  

2. tactical battles could use more detail.  I liked Heavenfall's suggestions of adding LOS, morale, flanking, etc.  I know you didn't want to make them too complicated, but maybe some model animations or other graphical indicators could make it more intuitive?  Also, might I suggest soft-counters for weapon types?  The weapon-abilities a step in the right direction.

3. The factions do feel too similar, especially with tech and weapons.  Maybe there were too many to balance well?  A lot of games these days have three(ish) factions.  Maybe a smaller number with sub-factions (with more minor differences for flavor) would have been better?  Sins Rebellion kinda did this with the Loyalists/Rebels additions.  Also, look at the Sins tech trees; many of the tech's are shared but in different places with different pre-req's.  (I love custom factions and don't want to lose them, but I do get how they can un-balance the game, and I'm totally ok with that so long as there is a check box on the faction to allow custom factions as enemies or not).  

4. The difficulty between difficulty levels can be a little drastic (like with many games and I'm just bad at video games anyway).  A handicap modifier would be nice to help me get to that next level.  

5. Could weaker monsters just damage a city (destroy certain buildings/improvements) and leave instead of always razing?  That might allow you to make the world a little more dangerous, but in a more scalable way.

That said, I'm looking forward to 1.6 (and holy crap, the Leader DLC, I'm so buying that) and am actually going to play 1.5 now (so I might have a few more quibbles).

I disagree Firefly. I like random placement...

I like it too. If I find the game too easy I just put the difficulty higher.

Quick followup on combat.

While I actually prefer the squares on the strategic map (hexes seem like the latest fad with me, btw, I've worked with hexes since the late '70s in boardgames so they aren't new to me at all), I think they may make sense on the tactical map, IF we don't have facings.

With the limit of 6-9 units, it's hard to pull off a good line abreast, to protect each other's flanks.  In 'normal' mass combat, the units on each end of a line are of course more vulnerable, but the units in the middle have their sides protected.  So essentially they may be fighting off one, maybe two units at a time.

In Elemental, units often don't last long enough to pull off an effective line formation, so it is very easy to surround units, getting 4+ attackers in position on any unit.  Then swarm kicks in, which makes that unit even more vulnerable.

While I don't mind 'diagonal' attacks, perhaps there should be a to hit penalty when attacking from a corner of a square instead of a side.  This would help mitigate the '3 on 1' attacks, even when you are able to set up line versus line.  This is in relation to one of the comments above, about 'ganging up' on units being too easy in Elemental.

With hexes, you only have 6 'connected' hexes, versus the 9 squares, so this would mitigate this a bit.  However, I like the squares well enough, so simply penalizing the diagonals (disallowing I think is too extreme) should help a lot.

Facings might be fun too, with bonuses to attack flanks or rear (with some exceptions for certain creatures and such), but that'd require more involved combat mechanics, specifically having the ability to 'face' your unit after you complete movement.  This is more of a thing for a true tactical game, and combat in Elemental is sort of a hybrid.  That being said, as long as facing could be done easily, I wouldn't be opposed to it necessarily.

Just a thought!