Warlock Master of the Arcane - Fantasy Civ5 clone from Paradox

[RK47]

Well. Late game fights is like that. That's why I always go for early victories by using unit support spell (Frost Weapons etc) on my archers while the melee boys gets heals and regen.
I'm on impossible difficulty at the moment and one fight impressed me. This kraken has survived for over 70 turns already. I tried having two ships hunting it down. But they always gets too badly damaged to deliver the killing blow. So I kept dancing the two against the Kraken, till one turn I decided it's time to wipe this bastard off the face of the earth. he's at 25% my 2 carravs are at 50% and 33%. Good odds. Closing for the kill. Kraken at 5% Hp by end of turn.

Next turn Kraken uses tentacle swipe and cleaved BOTH ships. They sunk. Fucking shit. I gave up hunting it down since.

 

[Malakal]

So I had a bunch of units ready to attack an enemy and he used a spell that just literally obliterated the whole army.. It wasnt even a very high level spell I think (lightning storm or some shit)
I'm not complaining.. It was a great use of a spell by the ai and it impressed the shit out of me

Lightning spell deals relatively low damage but it can score a critical aoe damage hit on units with metal armor. So it can be very good for its price at certain situations.

 

[DakaSha]

Bros I have to say that im fairly impressed with this title and it seems pretty underrated to me. I havent played it *that* much but so far its good.
I never played it before the patch of course but from what I can tell it has simple, streamlined mechanics that allow for quite a bit of strategy and the AI is better then most if not all games of its type (unless ive just been lucky). It has a few quirks like retardedly not having a fortify command (if the game was perfect in every other respect id still refuse to give it a perfect score just because of this one thing)and horrible diplomacy but overall its a polished and fun game. also no crashes and it runs on my shitty old laptop.

Even the (graphical) presentation is good (fuck the writing, art and voice acting though).

Of course maybe ill play it 3 more days and realize its a steaming turd but for now im pleasantly surprised

 

[The Brazilian Slaughter]

Can you detail it better, DakaSha?

 

[DakaSha]

Can you detail it better, DakaSha?

I got this in the 40 buck paradox bundle during the steam summer sale so i have been playing all the crap that came with that (now on CKII) and I wouldnt want to "review" warlock without understanding it a bit better. When i get some time ill explain a bit more in detail why i find it pretty cool if you havent picked it up or tried it by then.
It's nothing "special" it just seems to work and is enjoyable (which i guess can be considered special to some extent)

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Two new pieces of DLC coming, "Master of Artifacts" which lets you create artifacts via spells ($2), and "Return of the Elves" which adds a new playable race of 18 units, 20 city buildings, new perks/abilities, new wizard, and a couple wizard perks for $3.

Seems odd the artifacts DLC is kinda questionably priced for a relatively minor addition but the new playable race seems decent for $3. Kinda curious what the racial city specialty will be for elves since humans are gold, monsters are food, and undead are mana.

 

[Malakal]

Arent elves already in as units from a unique location? We know what to expect unit wise. For their specialty I would go with either mana or some unique ability.

Wouldnt pay 2 dorra for artifact creation unless there were hundreds of prefixes and suffixes on items creating items randomly.

 

[Kane]

Arent elves already in as units from a unique location?

Yes.

 

[Azira]

This game.. I only slept 3 hours this night because of this game. And I have work until eleven o'clock tonight, no chance to sleep in between.

I like the elves. Haven't read the whole thread, so can't tell what you've been discussing. But I got the artifacts and elves dlc's yesterday from my "blue coins" I'd saved on Gamersgate, and I'm enjoying the experience. Elves have flying siege-fortresses. Their units seem to be relatively frail, but hardhitting. The temple-spawned units are wholly different from what you get as humans. For lunord for instance, you don't get assassins, instead you get a shadow-dragon riding melee attacker. But it has many of the same traits as the assassins.

I'm not coherent, I really shouldn't be writing this. I just thought I'd chime in and say that the 5€ I spent on this when it was on sale on Gamersgate the other day was 5€ well spent.

 

[Azira]

- It is not clear how buildings lead to other buildings.

I only got the game three days ago, so I don't know if it was implemented in a patch, but once you enter the city screen, you can click a "show all buildings" button just beneath the building drop-down menu. The greyed out buildings are those you cannot build yet, and hovering your mousepointer over them will display what the building does, and what is required to build it.
It's a bit cumbersome, as it will list the required building needed for said building. But if the required building also requires something else, you'll need to trawl backwards through the buildings to get an overview.
Planning how to develop cities will be important, so you can get the units you want.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

The Warlock wiki is handy to figure out cities and unit build paths too.

http://warlockmota.wikia.com/wiki/Warlock:_Master_of_the_Arcane_Wiki

 

[IDtenT]

So this one has really come into its own then? Have you guys played a multiplayer game yet?

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

So this one has really come into its own then? Have you guys played a multiplayer game yet?

As long as you go in to it expecting a wargame and aren't really looking for diplomacy/advanced magic/in-depth city management it's damn spiffy. Almost not sure I'd want them to put more MoM-esque depth to it for fear they wouldn't implement it well and would crap up the game as-is. More combat depth is fine though, like the heroes and artifacts recently added.

Haven't tried multiplayer, not really interested. Plus I heard the multiplayer was kinda clunky and leaves you stuck on a waiting screen until your turn rolls around or some shit. Supposedly can't even mouse around your empire and plan. It is early days for the multiplayer though so they'll probably clean it up down the line.

 

[Misconnected]

So this one has really come into its own then? Have you guys played a multiplayer game yet?

Respectively, yes & no. I have no experience with MP yet.

Warlock is exactly the kind of refined throwback I'd expect the Codex to be falling all over itself to praise. It isn't a proper 4X, it's a hex-based wargame where the puzzle elements have been replaced with fairly simplistic 4X elements. In a lot of ways Warlock is to strategy games what Knights of The Chalice is to CRPGs. Except Warlock has some of the very best AI you'll find, lots of diversity, and reasonably pretty graphics.

My initial reaction on playing it was "Holy fuck, something must be horribly wrong somewhere. I know nobody would ever make the kind of wargame I've been wanting for over a decade". But that is exactly what someone did. It's not a huge game, it's a fairly small and simple one. It's also a little bit too random at times, and it's sad nobody told InoCo Plus that the "right click to deselect" interface convention died for a reason. But seriously, it's hard to think of a game with smaller problems.

Warlock is fucking great. Other than KoTC I can't think of the last time I was this pleased with a game.

 

[DwarvenFood]

But have you played Civ5 ? I have and dislike it mostly - is it still possible to enjoy Warlock ?

 

[Azira]

I have played Civ5, but I actually enjoyed it, so maybe you'll just ignore me. M:

That said, I enjoy Warlock more. The two games are not the same. The spells in particular make them stand apart. A well-chosen and placed spell can wreak havoc on any battleplan, so it's not just a question of splurging out stealthbombers and rofl-stomping all opposition.

I like Warlock.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

But have you played Civ5 ? I have and dislike it mostly - is it still possible to enjoy Warlock ?

As a companion to Azira's post, I've played Civ5 and thought it was just kinda ok.
That said, I enjoy Warlock more too. The two games are not the same. The city management in particular makes them stand apart. Civ5 has a lot of building fiddling and worker fiddling, Warlock has you plopping buildings down on tiles, and those tiles then act as "Worked" and remove movement penalties. Was helpful in my first Warlock game, since there was a narrow pass to the west that was only 1 tile big for part of it, and that was going through swamp (Big movement penalty). Captured a nearby city and started plopping buildings down and turned it in to a nice highway to the west side of the map.

I like Warlock.

(not to say city management isn't important in warlock, but it's far more straightforward and in my opinion enjoyable given the nature of the game and in general)

 

[Misconnected]

But have you played Civ5 ? I have and dislike it mostly - is it still possible to enjoy Warlock ?

They're very different games. Despite the visual similarities, comparing Civ5 to Warlock is kind of like comparing Anno 2070 to StarCraft2. Civ5 - which I don't like, mainly because of its terribad combat AI - is pretty much the definition of 4X gameplay. Warlock is a wargame through and through. Its city building element functions like the base building in a traditional RTS; unlocking units and generating the resources to buy them.

 

[DwarvenFood]

But have you played Civ5 ? I have and dislike it mostly - is it still possible to enjoy Warlock ?

They're very different games. Despite the visual similarities, comparing Civ5 to Warlock is kind of like comparing Anno 2070 to StarCraft2. Civ5 - which I don't like, mainly because of its terribad combat AI - is pretty much the definition of 4X gameplay. Warlock is a wargame through and through. Its city building element functions like the base building in a traditional RTS; unlocking units and generating the resources to buy them.

Thanks, that really helps !

 

[Metro]

They sure are milking the fuck out of it for DLC (although that's Paradox's new strategy). MHC pointed out a $5 sale the other day but I think I'll wait a little longer for them to crank out more DLC and pick up some big bundle. Would be sort of lame to play the game to the point of getting tired of it only to have some new units/features/whatever added two weeks later through DLC.

DwarvenFood There's a demo on Steam (game is Steamworks anyway) so that should give you a pretty good idea.

 

[Tommers]

Yeah. Another vote for warlock. It looks like civ v but the resemblance is superficial. It's a great little wargame. Reminds me of kings and things for some reason.

 

[Hellraiser]

I played the demo until I reached its end.



I crave more, it's pretty solid from what I experienced. It's now on my "to buy" list.

 

[DakaSha]

I played the demo until I reached its end.



I crave more, it's pretty solid from what I experienced. It's now on my "to buy" list.

The demo is also a bit shittier then he full game iirc. ran like shit and still uses the crap AI.

Having said that the game still isnt that challaneging even on impossible. the AI doesnt do any immersion destroying shit.. Its sound. But for some reason it just never manages to put me in any kind of scary situation. I think it needs to be made a bit more agressive.

Overall its still a good AI. I think with some tweaking it will get quite a bit better

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Having said that the game still isnt that challaneging even on impossible. the AI doesnt do any immersion destroying shit.. Its sound. But for some reason it just never manages to put me in any kind of scary situation. I think it needs to be made a bit more agressive.

Haven't played on impossible yet, but I kinda agree. I noticed it seemed way better in the immediate tactical decisions (Moving archers forward a little to get in range of my units in the back, firing at them, then flanking with a weak flying unit to finish the job, good spell use in battle, etc) than it was at strategy and planning. It would send attack forces at my capital city of 3-4 standard units, despite the city's defenses being strong enough that it could completely decimate the attackers with no defending units around. A force that size could do some damage to other, SMALLER cities, and the AI probably should've been smart enough to realize that and either build up a larger force or change targets.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Wandered by the Paradox Warlock forum and found this. A guy doing a (Looks pretty decent from the hair I watched) video LP of Warlock with the elves.

http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?624097-Video-Let-s-Play-Return-of-the-Elves

From the bit I watched he seems to go pretty in-depth, so it might be a decent watch for people unsure about the game in general.