Conceptiually best heroes game?

[DaemianLucifer]

I consider H4 to be the one closest to the ideal of "each unit should be useful".

Id say that HV did a better job here.

[gravyluvr]

H3 has a lot of "mass" in terms of simple material and "features". SoD has a brilliant editor. There's an rmg and so on.

As a big player of fan made maps I would say that if you had enjoyed HOMM4 long enough for the maps and mods to come along you would probably be more of a fan of the game because the HOMM4 editer is simply awesome.

H 4... is a CONCEPTUAL change that has consequences on how low level units interact with high level units no matter your tactics hero. Simply put, a level 1 unit has no place in your army (except maybe Halflings).

I think that every version has creatures that, depending on your style of play get left out of the army. An HOMM2 Warlock that took Hydras on long journeys was wasting the speed advantage of the BDragon, MK+Gargoyle army. Any Barbarian that took the Molasses Twins (orc-n-ogre) on a long trip died in the dessert. In fact, HOMM3 was the one game that nerfed that tactic for me a little with maybe the exception of the Rampart and Stronghold.

This makes one third of your available units a waste (and this is CONCEPTUAL).

*cough* unupgraded creatures in HOMM 3 *cough*

You don't want wasted units.

*cough* unupgraded creatures in HOMM 3 *cough*

I'll get off my sack'o'potatoes here in a second but the things you are saying sucked in HOMM 1, 2, and 4, like having to make the hard choices on whether to upgrade your troops or build weaker ones earlier versus greater (benificial) troops later, take slow ones with you (especially mid-level troops) or leave them so you can cover more ground with your armies, are what made these games more interesting. HOMM3 gave us so many "more" options however the game let you use all of them which in turn meant you never really had to make the hard choices.

The only decision you had to make was whether you built the creature dwellings quickly or mixed in "key" upgrades and other buildings along the way (Halls, etc.) and all you really had to do was look at the map size and number opf players to decide that one. Name me one wizard or Knight that didn't upgrade the Gremlins to Yota or Archers to Marxers within the first two days. Choice? Not really.

By specials you mean the hero specialties?

Heroes in IV are basically back to those in Heroes II; gone are the specials.

*cough* Eagle Eye *cough* First Aid *cough*

I'll admit that the specials were cool for some heroes but I ended up with the same hero anyway because of the special. HOMM4 heroes start as equals and you develop their specialties, just like in HOMM2. I'll give a 5/10 for the specials, which I forgot to put into HOMM3. But I really didn't miss them (except for the 350 gp per day - of course their was nobility/estates in HOMM2-4 also).

What we really need is HOMM2 redone with a caravan, flaggable mines, a wait button... that I would love.

[ByteBandit]

It would be nice to do to HoMM2 what WoG did for HoMM3. Not so much tinkering with the AI or stuff like that, but towns and scripting. I'd go back to HoMM2 in a New York Minute!

[BoardGuest808888]

Heroes II had the best concept. Uniqueness and originality among factions and heroes, spell point usage, spell level, and battlefield.

I'm not saying other Heroes series are bad ones, but in my opinion, they're not as good as Heroes II.

[Jolly Joker]

First of all, this wasn't intended by me as a Bash-HoMM-IV thread. Going back to what I wanted to say.
Half of the people name HoMM IV as the Homm game with the best concept.
However, the question wasn't:
What heroes game had the most unfulfilled promises Or
What heroes game has the most good ideas badly implemented.

We all know that many people have said Communism was a great concept, but badly implemented in the late USSR. IN fact there are lots of examples where something like this has been said. However, and this is a big HOWEVER, every bad implementation of a concept is a point in favor of the fact that the concept itself may not have been that great at all because the implementation is so (too?) difficult.
Take US foreign policy, in fact take EVERY foreign policy in the near east within the last 60 years.
Thinking things through, in my opinion there are no theoretically good concepts, there are only practically good ones. A concept sucks if it cannot be implemented well. A concept MUST work because that's the whole purpose of a concept: it should get something done.
Let's say you want to cross some strait. The concept is: a big bridge. If it takes 10 years to build it, and after that it's closed half the time because of always necessary repair works you CANNOT say the concept was good but it was badly implemented. The concept was instead bad, because someone should have seen the problems and decided to go for a ferry service instead which would have been a much better concept in the first place.
That means, at least for me, to decide whether a concept is good or not, the question of how easy or "naturally" a concept will be able to be implemented is important.
In case of Heroes IV I miss that. There are too many MIGHTS. It MIGHT have been better implemented (but it might just as well not; there is no proof). And since you compare things you could say the same for every other game as well. Heroes III MIGHT have been a better implemented upgrade system as well (mandatory upgrades are certainly not the best implementation of an upgrade concept).

So in the end the result counts not the MIGHTHAVES. And the result is that Heroes IV failed to deliver. Whatever the concept was, it didn't transfer into a better game than their predecessors. And my point is, that it was exactly because of conceptual errors.

To repeat it. The fact that it's "difficult to implement" (think Communism) might ver well be due to the concept being flawed (fundamental compatibility problems of human nature/communist society soncept on one hand and HeroesOnBF/stack-based combat on the other).

[BoardGuest808888]

Yes, exactly my point. Disciples (and AoW) are a lot more... let's call it personal. In Disciples you groom only very few units, while in AoW it's single unit fight.
Now compare that to Heroes. Does it make a lot of sense to have one Hero alongside of a stack of 100 Vampires in H 4 or Cyclopses? I mean, the destructive power of 100 Vampires or Cyclopses (or think of any other comparable stack) is so big, what kind of single being would withstand it? And then the Life Potion: smashed to pulp by the rocks of a hundred Cyclopses and, poof, there he stands again. Ridiculous.
Okay, there's the implementation argument, but the logic is the same: when thousands of Skeletons are battling dozens of Dragons, a mere human (or elf or demon or whatever) looks a bit forlorn.

Hm, I've read these points repeated over and over. Can you please tell me where you get prove for all these claims about different gameplay experience between Heroes IV, Disciples series and AoW series and those of the later two being original while Heroes IV not ?

Even more so, that those implemented in Heroes IV are simply weaker than others ?

Actually, if not because of the changed heroes/faction uniqueness and spell memorization system that began at Heroes II, I'd like to choose Heroes IV as the 'conceptually' best.

[DaemianLucifer]

So,using the power of nuclear fusion to build a weapon is a flawed concept because germans couldnt make it.

[Mytical]

Actually yes DL it is, though not just the germans couldn't use it. Making weapons of mass destruction is always a bad idea. You get into the BBD syndrome. Everybody is still trying to make something bigger and badder. Of course you like that idea, but most of us sane people don't

[DaemianLucifer]

Actually yes DL it is, though not just the germans couldn't use it. Making weapons of mass destruction is always a bad idea. You get into the BBD syndrome. Everybody is still trying to make something bigger and badder. Of course you like that idea, but most of us sane people don't

I wasnt talking about its moral factor but its usefullnes in war and its productability.Concidering that both US and USSSR had thousands of nukes,Id say that the concept works.

[Jolly Joker]

@BoardGuest
I'm actually not really sure what you want me to explain, but I'll try anyway.
Age of Wonders and Disciples were both published in 1999, AFTER H3 RoE, but before SoD in 2000 and long before Heroes IV in 2002.
Those two games clearly had been developed because of the huge success of H 2 (and probably after seeing how eagerly part of the gaming world awaited H 3), however, they didn't just copy Heroes (conceptually).
Both games featured SINGLE unit combat and both did feature fighting heroes on the battlefield with Disciples being the most RPGish game on the market.
So when concepts for H IV were developed those two games were on the market and CLEARLY the decision to try and include Heroes on the battlefield was made with a view on those contenders that sold their games on the popularity of Homm and using the niches HoMM didn't fill. The time was right to try something really different as well, so I don't really mind the decision.

Edit: Why Homm IV's HoBF didn't work as well as the others? Because Odysseus didn't fight a hundred Medusae at the same time, but just one, to answer on some people's points here. And Siegfried didn't beat a DOZEN Wyverns, but just ONE. And so on. A hero may beat a dozen thugs, but not a dozen Wyverns in one battle. That doesn't make sense. As a consequence, while fighting with a hero on the battlefield is actually a necessary and very interesting and in fact central part of the AoW and Disciples gaming experience it's rather awkward in H IV.

[Jolly Joker]

So,using the power of nuclear fusion to build a weapon is a flawed concept because germans couldnt make it.

This is actually the wrong question. The Germans started research on it, but when the Americans began Germans were still at it, albeit they had made sure the personnell that could have done things for them either had left the land (mostly into the US) or were imprisoned.
Basically, in a war situation, I'd think, that the concept of putting research effort into anything the enemy puts it into is a rather sound one to make sure you don't esperience nasty surprises.

[EliteKill]

Heroes III for me. Heroes II second, and 5 third. Never played 1 so can't decide, but I really didn't like 4.

[Gaidal Cain]

I'd say it makes more sense than having knights galloping through walls and hitting a stack on the other side...

(Oh, and in case you're forgetful- there are plenty of examples through history of generals or even kings falling in battles. Being on the filed isn't the same as having the same destructive power as the other stacks).

To quote DL: it makes no sense to justify something stupid with something that is equally stupid. And it doesn't make even less sense to sell human idiocy as good game concept.

Heroes on the field would remove that first stupidity. And what'd be seen as stupid today wouldn't necessarily have been 500 years ago, when there simply wasn't safe connections as radio and personal leadership in battle could make a huge difference. Go read the Illiad- the heroes are on the field of battle, fighting in person, occasionally getting hurt. They're not sitting on their asses a safe distance from the battle (well, apart from Achilleus... but he's not commanding the armies either).

[Jolly Joker]

GC, we don't talk about the sense it makes that "Heroes" are fighting on the battlefield. In fact I already did say quite a lot of time that this concept works well in AoW and Disciples. So it's not the general principle that's under fire here, it's only the principle in a game environment that has certain key features of the HoMM game.
Militarily spoken, Homm organizes battle on at least regimental level. On that level a single unit can and should not make a difference in direct combat. IN all Homms except IV the hero is basically what I would call HQ support, technical development, artillery strike, moral support, help from the gods (Luck) and so on, concentrated in an icon called a hero (a very good concept, actually). It makes no sense to put all that into the line, and into an actual fighting hero. If you want that you have to change the level.
You cannot have the Icon AND the actual person fighting on the BF. It's a change in concept that makes no sense for the game environment.

[BoardGuest808888]

Well JJ,

That part about HotBF is hardly original to either AoW or Disciples. Many other games had already done so in various time with various result. Civilization II, Master of Magic, Gemfire, Balor, Uncharted Waters, you name it. Actually, when those two appears, I immediately recognized them as copies from many other previously-released games.

The way you play AoW with single units or Disciples with RPG style is your own choice, not a conceptual one. In this respect, that also goes for Heroes IV thus Heroes IV is neither original nor less than those two.

Yet since Heroes IV has more ways to implement the battlefield tacticals than the other two, actually it is far better. You can see to it yourself in our Mapmaking Guild. If I remember correctly, Veldyrnus and Peepak are masters of those styles.

And well.., your example about HotBF in Heroes IV compared to old myths can also be done in both AoW and Disciples. It is neither more nor less awkward.

[Jolly Joker]

I don't think, I understand that last post, BoardGuest.
1) The hint on AoW and Disciples was not made because of a general originality. It was made to illustrate the situation at that time. Heroes was uncontested in 1998, but got contenders in 1999. Since it was THEN when conceptual plannings for H IV began, the impact of those games had to be put into consideration (and was).
2) The way you play AoW and Disciples doesn't change the fact that you'll play it always with single unit entities (i.e. you cannot stack units). The maximum amount of creatures that could take part in AoW in one battle is 56 and here creatures equal stacks. I'm not exactly sure whether you could cram 6 or only 5 units at most in one party, but the maximum creature number in Disciples per battle is 10 or a dozen at most.
No matter the way you play it.
As opposed to that the number of creatures you can face in any battle in H 4 is basically unlimited, again no matter the way you play it. The creatures in itself aren't different in those games, though. The level 3s and 4s in AoW as well as in Disciples are rather powerful.
You could say that in AoW and Disciples the level or magnitude of any given battle has a very strict and final limit that is in accordance with the fact that single heroes are actively taking part in it, this restriction is not there in Heroes.
Essentially this is the same flaw that leads to the distortions in the game later on when Hero spellpower will create just so much destructive power (for example) while a stack buff will have a much bigger effect once the stacks become large enough.

Heroes on the BF widens that flaw again. A much more limited scope of battles would have been necessary here.

[Gaidal Cain]

GC, we don't talk about the sense it makes that "Heroes" are fighting on the battlefield. In fact I already did say quite a lot of time that this concept works well in AoW and Disciples. So it's not the general principle that's under fire here, it's only the principle in a game environment that has certain key features of the HoMM game.

The above was a direct answer to your notinon that it's "idiotic" to have generals on the field. It might look so from a modern point of view, but it's a statement that would be foreign to those times.

Militarily spoken, Homm organizes battle on at least regimental level. On that level a single unit can and should not make a difference in direct combat.

That's not the question at hand either. The question is about heroes on the field, not whether those should be doing damage on the same levels as stacks. Heroes on the field has more to do with changing tactics than adding raw firepower.

IN all Homms except IV the hero is basically what I would call HQ support, technical development, artillery strike, moral support, help from the gods (Luck) and so on, concentrated in an icon called a hero (a very good concept, actually). It makes no sense to put all that into the line, and into an actual fighting hero.

It might look like a bad tactical choice, but that's not really an argument for whether the concept is good or not either. One could easily add some rationale like spells only having a limited range or needing to shorten the command lines, or say that it's equally bad to never be able to take a strike at those facilities. Gameplay first, then we add the rationales for it (an excellent example of that is, IIRC, the manual for H1 which explains the concept of "dwelllings").

[igoraki]

Why Homm IV's HoBF didn't work as well as the others? Because Odysseus didn't fight a hundred Medusae at the same time, but just one, to answer on some people's points here. And Siegfried didn't beat a DOZEN Wyverns, but just ONE. And so on. A hero may beat a dozen thugs, but not a dozen Wyverns in one battle. That doesn't make sense.

this is really interesting

if i recall correct,we did argue about simultaneous retaliation once long time ago and my argument was that it makes no sense that defending unit in real battle will wait for attacker to strike it first and then retaliate, and you said that games dont have to follow real life logic and give me good example with single peasant defending stack of archers,in real life no army(stack in games language) will stop to kill single peasant and then in the next turn attack archers,they would simple walk over it...and that is the truth and good example that in-game logic dont need to be exactly as the one in real life

however i still think sim-retaliation makes more sense in game

so you where the one who didnt want reality in game back then,so am suprised you are using it as an argument against heroes on battlefield

[Jolly Joker]

Let me add something here to counter the impression that Hobf was the only big conceptual H IV flaw.

Instead ask yourself the following: If you have a non-magic faction which is supposed to be able to hold its own against the other factions (i.e., Barbarian faction is balanced in direct comparison with the others), what would it mean if the non-magic faction got their fingers on a non-barbarian town with the ability to hire magic heroes and learn spells in addition? There's easily room for one spellcaster in a Barbarian army. What kind of limitations does this impose onto map-makers?

[Mytical]

I certainly do not mind the concept of a hero on the battlefield, and yes they can be powerful beings. However, there is a limit (baring demi-gods or gods) to what even the strongest heroes should be able to do. Can you actually picture a single hero fighting say 10 dragons and surviving? 1 dragon sure, 2 possibly, but the more their are the less sense it makes. Even with a horde of protectors arround him, there is a limit to what a hero should be able to add to combat. So while I have no problem with the concept of a hero on the battlefield, I do have a slight problem on how powerful they could become in H4.