UbiSoft is Making Money

[Jolly Joker]

Zam, I don't have a problem with your taste, I have a problem with your INTERPRETATION of things.
For Heroes 3, if everything is so clear: WHY WOULD YOU PLAY CASTLE AGAINST RAMPART, for example? Good in a war versus good? That seems to be paradox. If they really are good it's not possible to make a 2-player map Castle against Rampart, right? Why would they fight each other? Ah, I know, they were framed by some evil Necromancer (a pleonasm, then)who wants to pick up the pieces afterwards.

The simple situation is in H5 that the FACTIONS are not this or that from the outset. It all depends on what YOU as the player and/or the specific heroes are making out of them. If you want to have a faction with "benign" creatures it's paradox to give them battle abilities (always have been a problem with the pixies and sprites).

For the story in H5, I repeat that they did a very good job linking 12 campaigns to a specific story - it's not like they had free reign there. The story IS good, HOWEVER (and if you think about I'm sure you'll agree), it's DELIVERED badly. With a story based on characters like that, what was clearly missing were the DETAILS. You would get a couple of cutscenes - and depending on the language version you have, the performance there is very different in quality with the English version definitely not being the best - while a lot of the available additional informations would HIDE in explanations of the victory conditions (that you would get on clicking on them), town descriptions, tavern rumors and so on.

Which means that the presentation wasn't good. You could have taken the most original story in the world, and the verdict would have been that the good story had been wasted away in the pitfalls of the bad presentation.

Zam, I repeat: If something CANNOT be evil, it cannot be good either. It's like it is then. Which means, if something IS good at any given time it can be potentially become evil as well.

Now, if you don't like factions because the units don't feel right when you want to play them on the good side - like the Inquisitor in name or the Zealot in looks (even though the Zealot isn't better in name and that had been used in H3, too, since a zealot is a religious fanatic) - it really gets subjective. If Inquisitor is bad due to history then what about the Crusader?

Anyway, it's a moot discussion. You don't like it, fine. But don't think your view on fantasy is "better" ("high" fantasy - "low" fantasy).

[Pitsu]

I have to agree that it's a lot more interesting to have good and bad parts and not having "ultimate good" or "ultimate evil" alignments set in stone for the factions or something like that.

----------------------------

First, "ultimate" does not have to be set for each faction. Second problem is that it is rational to think that everyone has a light and dark side and "ultimate" things are only available in fantasy. And some people like fantasy because it can be less obscure and uncertain than the real world. I could call even Bible a fantasy book and say that its success is only due to giving some things "set in stone". So in fantasy story the main characters may be struggling between their good and evil side, but many people like if some characters or forces can quite clearly defined as in one or other side.

[TheRider]

@jj, sorry that I was unclear, "serving" doesnt mean to do be a slave for the interests of others, this simply means to be open to the others and to cooperate with them, to use empathy and compassion (and I dont have much to do with christianity, yes, I have read what it is, but my background is eastern philosophy, not western religion).

Zamolkis hopes to understand you one day, and that you understand him one day, this is not the important thing in empathy and simple cooperation. The important thing always was to TRY and to WISH to understand someone. You are closed for other people and you are not willing to understand others. IMHO you are selfcentered and you are lacking empathy (what makes you this in terms of RPG aligment?). And this is important in the relationships of all groups - no matter if these groups are nations, races or society groups. The way they relate and behave to each other determinates them, if they want to find a way for harmony or chaos, and good is not defined as simple fight v. evil, because that always ends in more chaos.



The aligments in one RPG are what differ a RPG from a strategy game. In a strategy game you are not driven by any virtue or path of development, you can use any opportunity and use it in every way. In a RPG you place restrictions to yourself in order to better understand the hero or the character you are playing with, to embody it. The restrictions (the virtues or the traits you incorporate at the begging) are important to give a life for such a character, it is the same as the spirit of the аge, landmark or Zeitgeist (all of this is important for role playing game). The devs of HMM V divided the charactes only on the line Might - Magic, nothing else, they simply lack any spirit and this is why the heroes seem so materialistic, they dont have something bigger than themselves and their personal wishes to fight for (in the first campaigns I thought all of the huzz was because some guy wanted to coupe with a girl, and the girl couldnt let go from the past and in HoF because some guy wanted to marry a girl, the war was just some insignificant obstacle).



If you, jj, have dificulties to take my words as something else than an arguement opportunity, for best understanding what a rpg aligments are and why HMM lacks that, just google it, there are many essays on internet.

[TheRider]

@pitsu, the conversation is about why in HMM we have only dark aligments, and why when the devs removed the "ultimate", the free will of the races drove them to be only grey-dark, not light-grey-dark. Only the simplistic mind devides everything in oppostions or dichtomy, everything is a degree of something, and nothing exists outside of its opposite, but I wonder where the light side is in heroes V? In the peace moments, when everyone is exhausted from wars and destruction? Why there is no light and hope during the struggle, when all social masks are stripped and the real nature of someone is shown? In Lord of the rings there are plenty of moments during the struggle when the light and dark nature could be seen through the shadows of grey. The problem is not there are or are not degrees of grey , but because the game lacks true recognition of light or sometimes even darkness. Why the story (besides it is poor written) lacks depth of the motives. The game tries to be high fantasy game in the part where hundreds of ordinary people follow or obey the heroes. Here is a quote from D&D about how a here differs from the masses and why the masses follow a hero (simply because the hero is set more on the light or the dark side and the shadows are less visible):



In the heroic tier, your character is already a hero, set

apart from the common people by your natural talents,

learned skills, and some hint of a greater destiny that

lies before you. Your capabilities are largely determined

by your choice of character class and to a lesser extent

by your race. ... The fate of a village might hang on

the success or failure of your adventures, to say nothing

of the risk to your own life. You navigate dangerous terrain

and explore haunted crypts, where you can expect

to fight sneaky goblins, savage orcs, ferocious wolves,

giant spiders, evil cultists, and bloodthirsty ghouls. ...One, in

other words, that is much like you.

In the paragon tier, your character is a shining

example of heroism, set well apart from the masses.

Your class still largely determines your capabilities. ... Death becomes a surmountable obstacle,

and the fate of a nation or even the world might hang in

the balance as you undertake momentous quests. You navigate uncharted regions and explore long-forgotten

dungeons, where you can expect to fight sneaky

drow, savage giants, ferocious hydras, fearless golems,

rampaging barbarian hordes, bloodthirsty vampires,

and crafty mind flayers. Again, much like you.

In the epic tier, your character’s capabilities are

truly superheroic. ... You travel across nations in the blink of

an eye, and your whole party might take to the air in

combat. The success or failure of your adventures has

far-reaching consequences, possibly determining the

fate of millions in this world and even planes beyond.

You navigate otherworldly realms and explore neverbefore-

seen caverns of wonder, where you can expect to

battle savage pit fiends, the ferocious tarrasque, sinister

sorrowsworn deathlords, bloodthirsty lich archmages,

and even demon princes. The dragons you encounter

are ancient wyrms of truly earthshaking power, whose

sleep troubles kingdoms and whose waking threatens

the world.
Edited on Tue, Oct 28 2008, 06:10 by TheRider

[Jolly Joker]

I'm not sure I understand you, TheRider, except your tries to put me in some self-centered desk drawer because I disagree with you, but HoMM is a strategy game with tactical battles and rpg ELEMENTS; it's no rpg game, so I'm not quite sure what your point is.

MY point is, that I understand Zam full well - I just DISAGREE with him.

Moreover I don't think that if a couple thousand years of human history haven't managed to define good and evil in a satisfactory, general way, an rpg game will manage. If you think so, fine. If you think, all fantasy has to look like LOTR, fine, but that's STILL your very personal opinion and you should allow people to differ without judging them.

[Roman]

I like how the factions are structured in HOMM V. The one thing I do wish for from HOMM III is that they would start with 8 initial factions rather than 6 as in HOMM IV, but I do understand that this is difficult given that each faction now has much more mechanically unique creatures and a greater diversity of options and so on. I am, therefore, fine with starting with 6 factions and then adding on more, but any less than 6 factions at the outset and I would be pretty angry.

[Asheera]

I myself prefer to have 6 factions (and more from expansions, like in TotE) but varied and diversified (like they are in Heroes 5, with Racials, and unique creature abilities, etc) than 10+ factions which are similar, so I hope they will still make each faction unique in H6 even if that results in not many factions...

[Grumpy Old Wizard]

Yeah, 6 unique factions is a good number for the initial release. I'm hoping for more neutral creatures next time around though.

[Moragauth]

4e D&D is even more stupid than 3.5e when it comes to alignments.

[Roman]

4E is just stupid overall - not just in alignments!

[Roman]

Back to the factions - yes, I do like uniqueness too. That's why I am willing to settle for 6 factions. I would not, however, accept say only 3 or 4 factions, no matter how unique they were.

[Gaidal Cain]

Zam, I don't have a problem with your taste, I have a problem with your INTERPRETATION of things.
For Heroes 3, if everything is so clear: WHY WOULD YOU PLAY CASTLE AGAINST RAMPART, for example? Good in a war versus good? That seems to be paradox. If they really are good it's not possible to make a 2-player map Castle against Rampart, right? Why would they fight each other? Ah, I know, they were framed by some evil Necromancer (a pleonasm, then)who wants to pick up the pieces afterwards.

I find this point strange. We have two very different things here: town lineups, and campaign storylines. It's entirely possible to have a heroes map where the elves are evil creatures, because there is ultimately very little that is decided by whether the developers think a faction is good or not (altars of sacrifice in and the angelic alliance in h3 are probably the most clear-cut examples). For me, it's better to try to leave things as undefined as possible, and let mapmakers use the fractions for other kinds of storylines than the developers.

[Jolly Joker]

That's my point exactly. And that's what they did in H5.

However, in H3 there is the good side, the evil side and the neutral side, which we do not have in H5 where we don't have "sides", execpt that everyone is against the Demons, even though some parties within factions cooperate with them. Which means we have evil Dwarfs and good Dark Elves, for example.

[astral76minor]

It all goes back to Ubisoft and Nival for ignoring us all these years about all the ideas presented below. If someone had the financial power to program a new H6 and spend 5 years doing it while listening to all the "ideas" from players, I think the end result would be the same as H5. They would not program all the great ideas into it since it would take too much effort and money. We all know game companies settle on a theme and generally never go any further. I welcome an H6 with the functionality and themes of the entire series! That should not be too difficult, I hope. There is a reason to be eccentric, however.

[Asheera]

The problem is, some "ideas" from players will always annoy some other players, and vice-versa. As I've seen from many discussions from HC's Altar of Wishes for H6, the users can't agree on even small things (although a few ideas are indeed excellent and agreed by most). What should Nival/Ubi listen to?

[Pitsu]

That's my point exactly. And that's what they did in H5.

In H5 they left nothing for the mapmaker to decide. As for that they should have released a map editor, which they failed to do.

[Angelspit]

What should Nival/Ubi listen to?

Given how they reluctantly implemented some highly popular features (think of the paper doll of an early patch), I don't think we need to worry too much about that.

[Asheera]

@Pitsu: Given that they gave us the same editor they used, I don't think we are to complain about the Map Editor. I mean, this is the editor that they used - and they didn't need any other extra feature themselves, so why would they create a new 'better' editor? A game is not based around the Map Editor.

At least Nival gave us a map editor - I know some games who have no such thing at all, or like in Spellforce where they gave us a crappy editor instead of the one they used to develop the game.

[Pitsu]

Ok, there is some kind of editor that some hardcore people can manage. But the game was not built to leave the player to decide who is evil and who is good (H1 had no editor either), but the game was built around the storyline. There even was danger that the initial release will be only campaign and no SP or MP maps. Isn't the engine still treating maps basically as "modifications" to the original game? And coming back to the editor, then storytelling, which is essential for (re)defining good and evil sides was among the weakest sides. Campaign used cutscenes. Mapmakers had to mess with external text files and extra tiny messagebox. Thus, saying that the developers left the goodness or evilness to mapmaker to decide is nonsense. This was not in their minds at all. It is not that they banned the possibility, but they did not create it either.

[Asheera]

btw, I forgot to tell you all that there is a more complex editor for Heroes 5 hidden by Nival (yes I know, they're nasty)

You can 'enable' the other editor mode by doing the following:
1) Open the following file: H5 Directory\profiles\editor_a2.cfg

where H5 Directory is the path where you installed Heroes 5 Tribes of the East (if you don't have TotE then open editor.cfg in the same path)

2) Find the following line: setvar map_editor_mode = 1

and change it to: setvar map_editor_mode = 9