Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

The new Heroes games produced by Ubisoft. Please specify which game you are referring to in your post.
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Derek
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Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

Unread postby Derek » 27 Jan 2006, 02:43

I have played one map thus far, more like part of one as I was kicked out. The best thing that I could notice about the game, in the time that I played, were the graphics. Wow, they are very good. I can only hope that the finished product fixes some stuff, like the slowness, but the little touches are brilliant. The birds flying in the air really caught me by surprise, I was playing as Sylvan so it was very good.

The town layout wasn't as good as I would have hoped for. It seems that I have to scroll amongst the many structures at my disposal instead of having the giant screen of building that was in all the others. The creature selection page was interesting, but I cannot see myself getting to the higher level creatures on the beta because of the lag. The town music, at least for Sylvan, was incredidible. I loved the music, to be blunt.

Combat needs a bigger hex grid. All my units could run more than half the length of the field, this is a huge problem. I greatly enjoy the unit order that is shown a the bottem of the screen, big help. It seems, however, that certain units have un listed abilities. I fought a group of ghosts and my attacks 'missed' them. WHAT! Outrageous to think this. This ability did not seem to be listed for them, correct me if I am wrong.

Anyone else have anything to say about the game thus far?
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Unread postby ThunderTitan » 27 Jan 2006, 10:16

If you don't like the BF please complain on the official forum. Also vote here: http://www.celestialheavens.com/forums/ ... .php?t=597
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Re: Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

Unread postby jamsz » 27 Jan 2006, 12:48

Derek wrote:The town layout wasn't as good as I would have hoped for. It seems that I have to scroll amongst the many structures at my disposal instead of having the giant screen of building that was in all the others. ...
Similiar experience here to yours, had trouble getting a game started, then got disconnected in the first game after some two weeks (which went by very slowly, took 2 hours). As for the city building, there is a City Planner or something like that button when you go to Buy Buildings, I think its the rightmost icon. It shows a nice map of all buildings with dependancies and requirements.

A thing that bothered me a lot is the inablity to do anything on the opponents turn. I understand the simultaneous turns and ghost options are not in this beta, but not beeing able to look at hero stats/skills or look at your towns really sucks. I found myself trying to play as fast as I can on my turns and then not beeing able to even read unit decriptions during the opponents turns. Would have been much leaner learning curve with the lack of single player, if the turnbased multiplayer had these features. This would have helped speed up the games too since we could at least do some planning during the wait.
Derek wrote:Combat needs a bigger hex grid.
Yeah, I agree the battle filed feels smalish. Didn't bother me too much though. I really liked the initiative based so called "realtime" battles, however I wander if they'll be able to balance it out with the turnbased (I assume turnbased is the traditional homm3 style as I didn't play any "turnbased" duels). * EDIT: Obvously both are the same initiative system, thx. Gaidal Cain for the correction

Finnaly, the game looks really unfinished at this point. There is a lot of potential in every aspect, but the unstable multiplayer, general slowness and glitches don't look very promising with the release so close. I just hope HOMM5 doesn't follow in the Etherlords footsteps, with the memory leaks and neverending promises about editors...
Last edited by jamsz on 27 Jan 2006, 15:10, edited 1 time in total.

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Gaidal Cain
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Re: Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

Unread postby Gaidal Cain » 27 Jan 2006, 13:03

jamsz wrote: I really liked the initiative based so called "realtime" battles, however I wander if they'll be able to balance it out with the turnbased (I assume turnbased is the traditional homm3 style as I didn't play any "turnbased" duels).
Nope. Both uses the same Initiative system. The difference is that with "Dynamic battles", you get a timer on your turn. Compare with the turn timer in the old games if you like, or with speed chess.
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Unread postby Arzang » 27 Jan 2006, 13:26

impression?

here:

1. town screen is too hard to utilize. you pretty much have to use those two circles on the bottom to use your town (at least in academy) since rotating and such is too icky.

2. the tech tree in the town seemed sweet. I didn't have a chance to fully learn it though.

3. balance. the genie's lamp says each town has their level 7 units grow with 1 per week. this despite the fact that some level 7 units are much better than others.

4. I found duel to be unbalanced too. with academy being the weakest and inferno being freakishly strong. do they really need 70 succubi?

5. the skill system seemed cool as well although it overwhelmed me when I first played the game.

6. looking at creature stats and hero abilities in battle was hard. it would've been nice to see those things in duel.

7. the hero screen seems half-done.

8. artificer was kinda strange. I bought two artifacts, gave first one of them to a stack then the other one to the same stack and the game asked if I wanted to replace the artifacts. I said yes: and the old one was vanquished. however that's spelled.

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Unread postby Bandobras Took » 27 Jan 2006, 14:13

My impression:


The beta seems to work well, given that I'm using it with only half the required RAM.

Played the Inferno, got pasted when I attacked some creatures that turned out to be incorporeal (did anybody else notice that's a feature kept from Heroes IV?)

I can't comment on lag or slowness because I'm playing the game with half the RAM, but there seemed nothing insurmountable about the slowness I experienced.

I'll have to play a lot more before I can comment on such elusive concepts as balance.

The Inferno seems to be a might-based faction; until I ran into the incorporeal troops, I was mowing over the things you'd expect to mow over in week one, while my opponent was complaining about all the creature stacks being too difficult. Repeated play will tell me more.

Overall feeling? Positive.

It seems a lot like Heroes 3. I don't mind. Heroes 3 was fun. Still is.
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Unread postby schaf » 27 Jan 2006, 14:26

Just tried the game, i was a bit, well shocked. :) Just did 2 duels with inferno hero, 1st against haven, 2nd against dungeon. Won both (braging bastard ;) ).

The graphics are just WOW, breath taking, nice, i was surprised to see so nice game. Game interface is cool, the only thing that bothered me is the position of spell book, it is angled way to much for my liking. Units have great abilities, there are a lot of options to chose about attacks/abilities. Succubi rock :), devils seem to be on the weak side, horned demons are cool, but i totaly missed with there explosion ability, as i didn't know how to use it, hehe. Cerberi were always wasted before i could even attack with them ;), balors fireball spell has great damage (compared to hero and i know it is dependent on the number of creatures, but still, it was twice as more powerful). Sounds also amazed me and spells have fabolous effects.

Battles can be quick, but there are some major issues. At first (with haven) i had 1fps, after some time everything was normal. The battle was progressing fine till the end, no fps issues. I'm running the game at 1280*1024 on normal settings. Then, as the duel with dungeon began, again i had 1fps, but it was going on forever. I was pissed off, because everything is sloooow, you loose time and the game is nearly unplayable (yes, even if its turnbased, where speed means nothing). But then black dragons destroyed my ballista and woosh, fps where normal, no stutter and it was all ok. Wierd.

I was trying to join map games, but i just couldn't get in. No error msgs, it just wouldn't let me in. Is there a player limit? Anyway, hope i'll get to try the map game sometime.

Oh, it is sad that there are just 4 factions presets in duels, i miss necromancers.

Hmm, i forgot so much what to write. Oh, black dragons are nasty and very powerfull, their attack combined with luck does enormous damage, it happend several times in 2nd battle! Hydras are slow and they seem to be quite tough for their level. And those redheads in dungeon are the biggest pests after harpies. Then can really get on your nerves with their hit&no retaliation&run double attack (they strike twice).

Aa, the game starts very slow, it takes quite some time on my machine for the game to fully load up.

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Unread postby Gaidal Cain » 27 Jan 2006, 14:32

Bandobras Took wrote: did anybody else notice that's a feature kept from Heroes IV?
Yes :disagree:

As for duel mode: More heroes are planned, and hopefully a rebalance as well.
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Unread postby Orfinn » 27 Jan 2006, 15:29

schaf wrote: Hmm, i forgot so much what to write. Oh, black dragons are nasty and very powerfull, their attack combined with luck does enormous damage, it happend several times in 2nd battle! Hydras are slow and they seem to be quite tough for their level. And those redheads in dungeon are the biggest pests after harpies. Then can really get on your nerves with their hit&no retaliation&run double attack (they strike twice)
Im curious are the black dragons really black, as black as those in H3?

Is this the black dragon?

https://www.celestialheavens.com/images ... 723_05.jpg

For me it looks like a shadow dragon when it comes to the color with just a few adjusts like spine armor and blood weins in the wings.

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Unread postby Gaidal Cain » 27 Jan 2006, 15:36

Orfinn wrote: Is this the black dragon?
:yes:
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Unread postby niteshade6 » 27 Jan 2006, 15:39

I definetely liked the game, but I felt that being forced into multiplayer prevented me from testing it all that much. I couldn't really take the time to experiment and play around with things, and inevitably before too long my opponent disconnected and I won.

Ultimately my final impression was of great potential, but still the need for significant polish. And of course the fact that they would force us into multiplayer (which is clearly the worst possible medium for testing) suggests that the single player experience is nowhere close to being done.

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Unread postby schaf » 27 Jan 2006, 15:45

Yep, that is the black dragon. I got impression that is more like greenish grey with rusty wings, i now see that is not rust but the veins. It is on the big side, but still smaller then hydra or devil, which is somewhat wierd, because it really is mighty creature, to bad it is not bigger. Maybe it is because of the length, if it was bigger it would also mean that it would be longer, which could present problems on the battlefield, cause of it size. Black would have suited it better, much better than this texture it has now.

Overall i'm impressed, except for the looong startup which takes here 4 minutes and you don't now if it is really loading, as the screen is black and there is no progress bar. At first i thought my comp hanged, but thankfully everything was ok after few minutes. :) Balance and other topics i'll leave to the experts, i'm not one of them for certain. ;)

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Unread postby Derek » 27 Jan 2006, 17:34

Right now the biggest imbalances that I have noticed, after doing like ten duel rounds( :D ), are luck and Balors.

Lucky magic to be precise. If you play as the Warlock, Storm Lord, you can feasibly get a lucky Meteor Shower that cuts through all magical defenses that easily annihilates anything in its path. A lucky implosion I used killed 7 Titans! Ouch! This needs to be worked on a bit, but the spells look great.

Balors are way too strong. I was greatly intrigued by the idea that they would be a melee and caster unit, but they're too good on both counts. Their fireball, from 20, does almost 600 damage. And since it's AOE, well, you can figure it out. Also they're tricky to engage in melee because of their 'vorpal swords'. This seems to be a Might Gorgon like ability, but I'm not sure. Does anyone know for sure?

Duel mode, for now, is where the game is for me. I had a blast playing it, and I hope they keep it in the game when it ships. Obviously some balance is needed, but if they had about 12-15 heroes in it I could feasibly see myself playing for quite some time.

Oh yes, the Battlefield needs to be increased by about 2 on both sides.
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Unread postby Arzang » 27 Jan 2006, 18:13

yeah balors are too good. not only that, inferno in general in duel is way too good. Haven though seems pretty inferior (almost sounds like inferno).

Academy is pretty good actually although they only have three different kinds of units. the titan is a very sturdy creature.

I still haven't understood the elemental chain thingy. has anyone utilized it yet?

oh and derek: duel mode will be there when the game is released. it's not beta-exclusive. and the good part about duel is that they could easily rebalance the heroes whenevet it's necessary. and with 6 towns we should have over 10 heroes for duel mode.

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Re: Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

Unread postby Psychobabble » 27 Jan 2006, 21:27

Derek wrote:I have played one map thus far, more like part of one as I was kicked out. The best thing that I could notice about the game, in the time that I played, were the graphics. Wow, they are very good. I can only hope that the finished product fixes some stuff, like the slowness, but the little touches are brilliant. The birds flying in the air really caught me by surprise, I was playing as Sylvan so it was very good.
I have a bad feeling this is the old "distract the masses with the pretty shiny things" tactic. Graphics shouldn't be the most important thing in a game but it's the first thing that everyone says about it...

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Re: Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

Unread postby ThunderTitan » 27 Jan 2006, 21:53

Psychobabble wrote: I have a bad feeling this is the old "distract the masses with the pretty shiny things" tactic. Graphics shouldn't be the most important thing in a game but it's the first thing that everyone says about it...
The WCIII style graphic doesn't impress me at all. Like I said before, I think that the Disciples 2 graphics looked better.
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Unread postby umfridus » 27 Jan 2006, 22:09

I tried for hours but just couldn't get into any normal game. Kept seeing dialogues like "entering game" or "creating game" but frustratingly, nothing ever happened after long periods of wait. However, I did manage to play two duel games, or more like one game since I was disconnected one minute into the first duel. The second duel lasted about 20 minutes, and I suspect my opponent was kicked out at the very end because the army took action immediately at its turn.

My impression was thus based on very limited experience, but here it is. My computer has only 512M RAM and 32M video RAM, so I opted for the lowest quality at 768X1024. Even so the graphics are decent, and lags weren't a problem. So I'm less terrified by the system requirements now. I didn't find the battle field overly small; it's a bit cramped, sure, but doesn't need to be too much bigger, either.

Now that creatures move based on initiative, some move much more often than the rest. This could be give fast, high-damaging creatures too big an advantage. During the duel my hastened, blessed Titans obliterated the enemies almost single-handedly, while my hero waited forever for his turn. Speaking of bless, its effect seems bugged. My 14 Titans could kill 1 Archangel pre-bless, but 4-5 post-bless (luck not being a factor). Ballista is almost overpowered, being able to shoot thrice and deal hundreds of damage.

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Re: Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

Unread postby Bandobras Took » 27 Jan 2006, 23:32

Psychobabble wrote:
Derek wrote:I have played one map thus far, more like part of one as I was kicked out. The best thing that I could notice about the game, in the time that I played, were the graphics. Wow, they are very good. I can only hope that the finished product fixes some stuff, like the slowness, but the little touches are brilliant. The birds flying in the air really caught me by surprise, I was playing as Sylvan so it was very good.
I have a bad feeling this is the old "distract the masses with the pretty shiny things" tactic. Graphics shouldn't be the most important thing in a game but it's the first thing that everyone says about it...
Though one of the more negative aspects of Heroes IV for me was that nothing was that visually impressive. In Heroes II, there was that wonder in stretching a rainbow across your town or watching a clear sky become murky and stormy. In Heroes III, the Deity of Fire was a magnificent piece of art. It's enough of a reward just to see it in your town. But Heroes IV didn't impress me visually.

And actually, looking at my post, the first thing I mentioned was getting by without meeting the system requirements. The second was being surprised by incorporeal creatures being stronger than I expected. The third and fourth were about slowdown and balance, respectively.

I ended by characterizing the faction I played.

I didn't once mention graphics; I really should have. I was delighted to see ore coming out of my mine when I flagged it. Not to mention the Inferno symbol hovering above it as a flag. Graphical details will not give a strategy game depth -- but I see no reason to complain about the graphics unless it can be shown that those who worked on the graphics could have been used for gameplay considerations instead.

This is a vital point. With any development team, you have different functions for different people.

Essentially, once the presentation engine was done, the art department was free to do whatever it wanted, graphically. I don't think anybody in charge of visuals was hired for their extensive knowledge of AI programming or capacity to Design a simultaneous turn-based mode for early game. If they were, we'd have cause to complain that Ubi's wasting it's time on graphics instead of gameplay.

But if they're hiring AI designers to do visual work, they're already insane enough that I don't think our complaining will make a difference.
Far too many people speak their minds without first verifying the quality of their source material.

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Re: Heroes V Impressions: Post yours here

Unread postby Derek » 28 Jan 2006, 01:45

Psychobabble wrote:I have a bad feeling this is the old "distract the masses with the pretty shiny things" tactic. Graphics shouldn't be the most important thing in a game but it's the first thing that everyone says about it...
Sorry if you didn't understand me. The beta made it so that there were numerous stretches during my opponents turn where I was forced to stare at the screen for great lengths. This showed me the detail of the graphics, but did not make me fall in love with the game. I'm no Raven, graphics are the least important thing.

I imagine everyone is mentioning graphics because of the long turn delays, and it is an easier thing to discuss than getting into the nitty-gritty of combat balancing. It's only been out for a day, you musn't expect incredibly deep conversations at this point. However, if people are still mentioning it a week from now...I'll be agreeing with you 100%.

Glad to hear that the duel mode is going to be in the final game. There needs to be about 10 more heroes...but this is a good start.
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Unread postby omegaweix » 28 Jan 2006, 02:05

Arzang wrote:impression?


4. I found duel to be unbalanced too. with academy being the weakest and inferno being freakishly strong. do they really need 70 succubi?

.
Funny thing!
Played my first duel with Academy against a player with Inferno!

First i thought "I' won't survive a bloody minute".... but at the end i won
8| :D .... with only 3 golems and 6 Titans left though....

....was some kind of a miracle to me, because Academy(in duel mode) still appears weak to me
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