Heroes of Might & Magic 4 Defense Thread

[Darth Roxor]

Saying that HoMM4 isn't a jumbled mess of incomplete and disastrous features is some serious reality bending, and I'm saying that as someone who actually liked the fucking game.

It isn't just about "waah they changed things so fanbois branded it shit", the deal is that most of these changes were uncalled for or idiotic or unfinished, which made them an objective step back from the previous games.

Why would you ever want to drop unit upgrades?
Why would you fork units of the same tier at castles AND make them so ridiculously unbalanced? (My favourite example is the choice between minotaurs and medusas - nigga, why would you ever consider minos)
Why would you drop spell effects scaling with magic skills (like omni-slow/omni-haste)?

The list goes on. And then you have shit like castle sieges which are super-terrible, OP heroes in combat, critters moving around the overworld without heroes, eeeeetttttcccccccc. Obviously it had a few good ideas, like caravans or hero classes changing with skill selections, and even some of the terrible ones had some aspects to which you'd see sense, but nearly all of them were made better (or rather repaired) in HoMM5.

The SP campaigns in HoMM4 were also pretty bad. Well-written, perhaps the best-written across the entire series, but who gives a fuck? The campaigns were full of mirror matches everywhere, which was idiotic, and they also abused the retarded map design from Shadow of Death, aka "enemy castle is behind a border gate and also happens to have a one-way teleport to your base, HF!"

 

[Dr Skeleton]

I don't think 3 is perfect, it has plenty of problems. The thing is, a whole bunch of people loved 3 despite its problems, if you change so much about it and have a whole new set of issues in these changed of course people are going to hate it, but it's both because it was changed AND because it has glaring issues in these changes. I don't think it's just the heroes, to me the combat screen was badly designed and frustrating. You also have the issue of graphics, no multiplayer on release and questionable design decisions like 1 of 2 creatures per tier, no upgrades, no hero specializations, reworked sieges, some of which might’ve even been good but get lost in the overall messiness of the game.

 

[Cyberarmy]

I only found out 4th game haven't got multiplayer long after finishing the game. Read it on some site i think (celestial heavns?)
Never thought to multiplay that one for sure.

 

[Lacrymas]

Why wouldn't you want to drop unit upgrades? What do they add to the gameplay when you have no reason to use unupgraded ones? It's not like it's a choice which ones to use. The expansion of 5 had the good idea of having 2 mutually exclusive upgrades and forcing you to choose each time. We've already covered the OP stuff, so moving on - the mutually exclusive buildings were there for the same reason as the branching updates in 5, to force you to choose. Again, an issue of numbers rather than design philosophy. There are still mass versions of spells at high skill levels, they are just counted as separate spells, rather than upgrades of the base ones.

 

[Revenant]

Yup, all upgrades ever did was force stacking problems upon the player without any game mechanic of relevance, i.e. inconvenience for inconvenience's sake.

 

[cvv]

I can't even remember why I didn't like IV anymore but I don't think the main reason were the gameplay changes.

I've always said the whole series was killed by the scores of overly conservative III fans. They loved the game so much they've strangled it to death by furiously shitting on everything that was not exactly like in III. And while new wonderful and innovative games like Disciples II and King's Bounty started growing all around it the mother of the genre stagnated and ultimately turned to a dreary fossil.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Why wouldn't you want to drop unit upgrades? What do they add to the gameplay when you have no reason to use unupgraded ones?

Play the game on impossible difficulty level with people who can play it and find out.

The expansion of 5 had the good idea of having 2 mutually exclusive upgrades and forcing you to choose each time.

They weren't mutually exclusive, which was actually one of the best things about it. It's not the Disciples 2 system (which was also tons better than IV, but which mutually exclusive units in a strategy game system wasn't). Just another example of the fact that you have little to no idea what you're talking about while pretending to be an expert.

We've already covered the OP stuff, so moving on - the mutually exclusive buildings were there for the same reason as the branching updates in 5, to force you to choose. Again, an issue of numbers rather than design philosophy.

What a pointless, empty talk. 7 units with upgrades vs 7 units with 2 upgrades vs 5 units with no upgrades per castle which is better any why discuss!

There are still mass versions of spells at high skill levels, they are just counted as separate spells, rather than upgrades of the base ones.

Cool HoMM I you have there, I'm cumming with innovation.

 

[Revenant]

Less is more.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

I've always said the whole series was killed by the scores of overly conservative III fans. They loved the game so much they've strangled it to death by furiously shitting on everything that was not exactly like in III.

Yeah, it was that. Or maybe it was Ubi going all shovelware on it instead of developing on V (which was both much more innovative and much better received by these grumpy old fans than IV was) and running the series into the ground. I dunno :itisamystery:

And while new wonderful and innovative games like Disciples II and King's Bounty started growing all around it

I think we had this discussion before too and I don't really feel like getting into much details, but again, comparing the whole picture of HoMM with Disciples and KB makes very little sense. They are different games for different needs.

the mother of the genre stagnated and ultimately turned to a dreary fossil.

Completely unlike KB and Disciples, right?

And I heavily disagree with the very last statement anyway. With ubi finally raping the nu-homm to death and the continuous development of HD an HotA, the actual homm is in fine shape and in proper hands. Which is definitely not something you can say about the games you guize are so vehemently championing for. Just a pure coincidence, I'm sure. Or fault of women and people (women?) who couldn't find market in IV. Ask lujo, he has the details.

 

[Archibald]

Why would you ever want to drop unit upgrades?
Why would you fork units of the same tier at castles AND make them so ridiculously unbalanced? (My favourite example is the choice between minotaurs and medusas - nigga, why would you ever consider minos)
Why would you drop spell effects scaling with magic skills (like omni-slow/omni-haste)?

Why wouldn't you? None of these things are a game breaker or essential to HoMM "experience". Could they have been done better? Absolutely, but that doesn't mean that there are some fundamental problems with these ideas.

 

[cvv]

And while new wonderful and innovative games like Disciples II and King's Bounty started growing all around it

comparing the whole picture of HoMM with Disciples and KB makes very little sense. They are different games for different needs.

Yeah, we can safely agree to disagree on that point.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Why wouldn't you? None of these things are a game breaker or essential to HoMM "experience". Could they have been done better? Absolutely, but that doesn't mean that there are some fundamental problems with these ideas.

Is that supposed to be an argument or just a philosophical question? Why wouldn't I want to go back to the times of I, or even worse (after all it offered whooping 6 units with no upgrades)? In a fourth installment? And the one that supposedly meant completely new quality in the series according to some? Why indeed!

Literally :itisamystery: - the thread.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Why wouldn't you?

Because each and every single one of these things is a step back?

holy shit you niggaz

 

[Maculo]

I enjoyed HoMMIV, but I got the impression the game tried to add multiple layers of complexity that were either left unfinished or in some cases backfired. For example, I believe the mutually exclusive tier buildings were meant to create a series of trade-offs for the player. A player could not acquire every creature (immediately) and had to select the creatures that best suited the hero. The hero could be melee combat oriented, a squishy spell caster, a economy/macro hero with Nobility, or some hybrid. Ultimately, I can see a logic to it, but the balance was not there to support it. The Equilibrium mod lessens the disparity to an extent, but you still have Arch Angel (resurrection spell) and Cavalier (charge bonus) on the same tier.

I also get the sense the game tried to make a leap similar to that of the Warcraft series. Specifically, between Warcraft 2 and 3, heroes became a primary staple of combat. By primary staple I mean in the sense that the heroes served as an active unit on the battlefield, with combat stats and potions. I understand the two games are apples to oranges in terms of comparison, it just strikes me as coincidental that both games released in 2002 and made this leap to hero-centric combat.

 

[Lacrymas]

Zboj Lamignat, the only thing we hear from you is non-arguments and demagoguery. "Uuugghh, yeh, upgrades matter because impossible difficulty, so shut up!", that doesn't tell me why they matter. Also, reading comprehension much? I said you have to choose each time. I meant each time you recruit a unit, not each time you build a building, but you will latch onto every perceived mistake I make, so whatever. The upgrades in 5 are mutually exclusive because you can't have a single unit with both upgrades at the same time, i.e. mutually exclusive. The difference is that you can upgrade from a single town, while you have to have 2 towns in 4 to have both types of mutually exclusive buildings. Here's a mistake you made, though, which tells me you haven't actually played HoMM1 - there are no mass versions of debuffs and buffs in HoMM1 at all. Even if you didn't mean that, now we are even in the perceived mistakes field.

Because each and every single one of these things is a step back?

Why? They are mostly removal of excess fat (upgrades) or transferring that fat elsewhere (mass spells just being a different spell, rather than an upgrade of the base one).

 

[cvv]

Upgrades are not excess fat, what are you smoking. Aside from their meaty fun factor they make you prioritise. You want stronger units or the next Mage Guild level? And if the former, which ones? Or maybe you'd be better off taking a detour to Training Grounds and upgrade there. Plus I imagine they're a huge factor in multiplayer altho I've never played MP in any Homam.

 

[Lacrymas]

Choosing between various buildings is always a factor, it's not upgrade specific.

 

[Darth Roxor]

the only thing we hear from you is non-arguments and demagoguery

They are mostly removal of excess fat

 

[Archibald]

Because each and every single one of these things is a step back?

holy shit you niggaz

So why exactly some spells being upgraded via skill increase is superior to some spells having two different versions? If anything it adds some slight additional complexity to the game since by getting haste at level 1 you are not guaranteed to automatically get mass version of it via skill increases and you might need to look for additional magic towers.

However main thing that it does is that it makes mass versions of spells more of an exclusive thing for magic heroes since you'd need to invest something like 8 skill points to unlock level 4 spells that have mass versions. While in HoMM3 you could get it rather consistently with might heroes at much lower more price.

From what I remember one issue in HoMM3 balance was that might heroes were considered stronger due to getting rather easy access to utility spells and combat stats scaling better to late game than spell power or wisdom. I'd assume that by making mass versions into separate spells they tried to give less utility to non-specialized heroes. For example blind was also moved from level 2 to level 4.

Upgrades are not excess fat, what are you smoking. Aside from their meaty fun factor they make you prioritise. You want stronger units or the next Mage Guild level? And if the former, which ones? Or maybe you'd be better off taking a detour to Training Grounds and upgrade there.

And that is different to any other building choice in the game how? Granted, due to lack of upgrades HoMM4 had less shit to build in towns and reduced amount of such decisions. But what that means is that HoMM4 needed to add more meaningful stuff to build.

 

[Lacrymas]

I have explained why I think they are excess fat, so the two things aren't comparable. I said they have no practical gameplay benefits because you won't ever use unupgraded units once upgraded ones are available and it simply adds an unnecessary middleman.

 

[Darth Roxor]

in this thread we learn that oblivion removed a lot of excess fat from rpgs

 

[Lacrymas]

Nice strawman there. Is this all the radical HoMM4 deniers/opponents can dish out?

 

[Darth Roxor]

it aint a strawman when its true

 

[CptMace]

Nice strawman there. Is this all the radical HoMM4 deniers/opponents can dish out?

Caution, Lacrymas, you're starting to sound like a particular bethestard who recently signed up on the codex.

perhaps the best-written across the entire series

perhaps ?

 

[Darth Roxor]

perhaps ?

yes, the only thing that makes it "perhaps" to me is the fact that all the campaigns are nearly the same plot-wise, which is necessary cuz of the mirror matched maps

"hello i'm [x], i'd really like to be more important in my land of [y], but i can't cuz of that asshole [z] who is holding me back!!!" - and then usually it turns out [z] is a traitor, you vanquish him, get the girl, and all live happily ever after

^ homm4 campaigns in a nutshell

i'd hazard saying that shadow of deff also had pretty strong writing/plots, especially all the shenanigans by Sandro leading up to the start of restoration of erathia