5/24/06 - Heroes of Might and Magic V (PC)

[schild]

Sure, we already have a couple threads that talk about it, but let's make this one the official one. OK? Awesome.

[Strazos]

Did Starforce make it in somehow?

[schild]

Yes. Starforce's new defense system includes installing itself on optical media. It's a breeder!

No, it didn't.

[Signe]

Why do you tease the kids?  You know better.

(oh wait... that's me, then, is it?)

[NiX]

One of the monsters in the game is a Gremlin. They even modeled it after the gremlins from the movie. AWESOME! God I can't stop playing this.

[tazelbain]

One of the monsters in the game is a Gremlin. They even modeled it after the gremlins from the movie. AWESOME! God I can't stop playing this.

Clealy, that cat is controling your mind and using your hands so he can play the game.

[Strazos]

So anyway, I picked this up today.

My thoughts:

It's good, very good.

The graphics remind me of Civ4 for some reason. While the graphics are still good, this comparison keeps nagging me.

Also, where is the random map feature?

[Sairon]

My impression is that it's not such a large upgrade of HoMM3, in fact with expansions I'm not even certain there's more stuff in HoMM5 than there were in HoMM3. The maps are way to small, very big maps are like medium maps in HoMM3, there's no neutral cities to capture anywhere. It also doesn't seem to be possible to play vs 1 computer and have all the other cities being neutral, instead the computer gets to start with all cities. There's new special skills for all the diffrent factions, but some are fairly useless. The sylvan skills for example are inferior. Also, I found the diffrent factions fairly imbalanced. Necromancing for example has been made heaps better now that you get archers. Bonuses to necromancy has also increased.

All in all there's not much new stuff in here, the big thing being the transition to 3D, something which imo has added nill.

These thoughts are based on the skirmish mode, since I haven't played, or even want to play the campaign mode.

[schild]

Yea, my purchase was made worthwhile due to the inclusion of HoMM3 for XP. In fact, I'd say HoMMV was the bonus disc I got for tracking down the Ltd. edition.

[Righ]

That doesn't sound promising. HoMM3 already runs on my Mac so I don't need it to run on XP. There should really be a free patch for the PC version (which I also have) to run on XP. Are the main selling points of HoMM5 the inclusion of the patched HoMM3, a lack of Starforce and baboushka packaging?

[schild]

The packaging is shit.

[Lum]

Are the main selling points of HoMM5 the inclusion of the patched HoMM3, a lack of Starforce and baboushka packaging?

There's also a game called "HoMM5" included.

[Righ]

Have you been drinking again?

[Strazos]

Where the heck is the skirmish mode? I just have Campaign and Scenario modes....?

[Sairon]

Where the heck is the skirmish mode? I just have Campaign and Scenario modes....?

I probably do too, in fact when you mention it, what I called skirmish is when you pick a multiplayer map in scenario mode.

[Strazos]

I just read something over at Gamespy mentioning my problem. It's apparently going to be patched in later this summer or some shit.

[Calantus]

Yea, my purchase was made worthwhile due to the inclusion of HoMM3 for XP. In fact, I'd say HoMMV was the bonus disc I got for tracking down the Ltd. edition.

Oh sweet, I lost all my HoMM3 shit some time ago. Does it include the expansions? If so I'll be buying this ASAP and later seeing if HoMM5 is worth the space on my HD.

[schild]

Don't even know. I would assume it's a compilation of HoMM3 stuff. I can't see why it wouldn't be since the second disc with 3 and 4 is a dual layer dvd. It doesn't explicitly say it on the box.

[Sky]

Again...HoMaM3 works on XP. It's been on my computer for years, it's still on there.

I'm in the fourth mission in the campaign, so far it's been a great experience. Takes some getting used to the 3d map, I occasionally miss a resource pile, but it's definitely cool to zoom down so you can see across the entire map. I still haven't wrapped my head around rotating the map, I tend to play with the old camera angle anyway. The rotate and zoom in combat is nice.

There are some nice tweaks that enhance the gameplay, like having the subskills, so you don't have to dedicate an entire hero to pathfinding type skills (the taxi hero is alive and well, which is ok in my book since 4's ability to move creature stacks hampered gameplay imo). Lots of small tweaks, but so far they've made gameplay nicer.

I'll gripe if the scenario maps aren't up to snuff once I'm done with the campaign mode. But right now HoMaM5 is a welcome upgrade to the series. I say this as someone who is a big fan of the HoMaM series, it's probably my overall favorite, edging out Civ.

[Lum]

The only gripe I have with it is one I've had since King's Bounty; namely that you can happily build up your empire for hours only to be struck down by a CPU-driven hero stack that effectively made the game unwinnable 3 hours ago.

[Sky]

That happened to me in the demo. I'd get started and the enemy hero would show up and stomp me every time.

I took that experience to mean I should build toward a big, strong army very quickly.

Peasants are an odd mechanism. Until you're rolling in cash, you don't really want to upgrade to the better tier 1 troop because each peasant pays taxes (and the tier 1 upgrade doesn't, the dirty dodgers). I had my taxi hero making rounds picking up peasants like crazy, in the third campaign scenario, I had several thousand peasants :) But that was as good as a couple gold mines. The 500 or so I had fairly early in the game helped shoehorn me into a decent army a lot quicker.

[Strazos]

I take it the inclusion of HoMM3 is a Special Edition-only deal?

Not that it matters for me. I still have my HoMM3 Complete CDs.

[Righ]

I take it the inclusion of HoMM3 is a Special Edition-only deal?

Yea, my purchase was made worthwhile due to the inclusion of HoMM3 for XP. In fact, I'd say HoMMV was the bonus disc I got for tracking down the Ltd. edition.

[Strazos]

It was 9am, gimme a break.

[Chenghiz]

Wow, either the system requirements for this game are higher than I thought or I'm doing something wrong. I downloaded the demo, ran it, and got something like 2 fps on the menu screen, at low settings and 800x600 resolution. Does a Radeon 9800 just not cut it for this game?

[Strazos]

I'm running the game with a 9800Pro 256, and it runs great.

[Sky]

Ditto, but there's a lot of slowdown if I pan the camera too low.

1280x720x60Hz, not sure where my FSAA/AF is set.

[Rasix]

Only real time I get video lag is when I do some zooming and rotating of the camera.  Some slight hiccups when there's 3D closeups of mobs doing their thing.

I'm having a similar problem as Lum mentioned, the game makes you play too goddamned perfect even on Normal difficulty.  I had to basically cheat to beat missions 4 & 5 of the Inferno campaign.  Mission 3 was bad enough (I had to soften that cheating bastard ranger up by throwing a damn near full army at him as a sacrifice), but 4 is a goddamned nightmare.  By the time you get a decent army going and could possibly take out one of the 3 towns (4th town is just there for the conquering) to slow down the onslaught of troops, you're getting armies assaulting you that contain up to 200+ master rangers or more not counting 30+ elder druids, dragons, treants and as much as 70 silver unicorns.  This happens continually. You venture too far out and they just send one of those demoralizing super armies to take your town.  I ended up having to just build a monster army (took out the dragons, no way I would be able to get those 100 elves) and then you encounter ANOTHER hideous stack at the end town you have to seige.  Yah, 14 emerald dragons, 30+ ancient treants, 150 master rangers, 300+ sprites, etc etc sitting behind a wall, woo fucking hoo.  @Win(); ftw.

The last mission is just kind of ridiculous too.  You have to play it too perfectly (or you have to sail back to the two recruiting spots and game the shit out of it, hope the dragon stack doesn't get too large).  Either that or you end up with 5 succubi, a handful of minotaurs and a couple pit lords  v. 7 emerald dragons because the 58 elder druids you had to beat decided to gang up on the only thing you had that could tank.  add_army 5 1

I'm enjoying the game but you just have to play it too perfectly for a game that takes hours to beat a single mission. I guess I just suck at this game. 

Ohh, and the documentation is horrible. For shame. 

Edit: I'll say one thing positive: so far the undead team is really fun to play.  Seems a bit overpowered though.

[Sky]

I was having that problem with the demo mission, which I just hit last night (Haven campaign mission 5, Fall of the King).

After a week or so, the red player blasts you with a loaded army, including a stack of devils. After playing through a couple times trying different things, I just loaded up my higher level hero with the starting griffons and knights and left her in town and used the other hero to explore the map and beat up mobs. So far it's been working pretty good, but having my forced split has been tough, because I need a decent army to pound the random spawns but also need a good army in town to withstand the gated-in demon armies.

It's definitely been an enjoyable game so far, and will take me a while just to get through the campaigns. Not sure it'll replace HoMaM3, though. The first expansion, when we can do random maps, will tell it true imo. That was the best part of the series, amazing they left it out.

[Strazos]

The first expansion, when we can do random maps, will tell it true imo. That was the best part of the series, amazing they left it out.

This alone almost makes me dislike the game.

[Train Wreck]

The only gripe I have with it is one I've had since King's Bounty; namely that you can happily build up your empire for hours only to be struck down by a CPU-driven hero stack that effectively made the game unwinnable 3 hours ago.

I hate that.  This is why the HOMM series is the poster child for the merit of saving games to a new file every time.  It's like hitting the "last turn" button in a chess game, only a bigger pain in the ass.

[Train Wreck]

Mission 3 was bad enough (I had to soften that cheating bastard ranger up by throwing a damn near full army at him as a sacrifice),

I managed to beat this one without cheating.  Perhaps by luck, I ran into the ranger within the first month of the game and stomped him.  He already had dragons but Agrael's magic was a major mitigating force, and gated demon stacks are good, if for nothing else, getting enemy stacks to waste their retaliation strike.  That's the way to deal with horrendous numbers.

  I ended up having to just build a monster army (took out the dragons, no way I would be able to get those 100 elves) and then you encounter ANOTHER hideous stack at the end town you have to siege.  Yeah, 14 emerald dragons, 30+ ancient treants, 150 master rangers, 300+ sprites, etc etc sitting behind a wall, woo fucking hoo.  @Win(); ftw.

I managed to get a stack of 100 archers to the dragons, only to discover that 8 of them had deserted during the trip.  After that it was add_army 5 1 until I had a 100 of everything.

[Strazos]

Has anyone tried the multiplay yet? I heard it sucks ass.

I tried, once, to play Heroes 3 online.....Too Fucking Long, though I had done TONS of hot-seat games.

[Sky]

My ADHD is too strong for multiplayer in most games. I like the occasional BF2 online, but there's no way I could sit through a strategy game.

I don't want the games shorter, though. I love a godawfully long strategy game.

[Lum]

Sky, have you tried Civ4 online? It actually is paced really well.