Heroes of Might and Magic

[Mithrandir]

Just ordered HOMAM IV,

played HOMAM 1,2 and 3 with lots of fun. Anyone got HOMAM 4 ? If so how do you like it ?

[Ser Clegane]

I bought HOMM4 when it came out, but while I loved HOMM3 I can only say that I liked HOMM4.

I would not say that it is a bad game (I actually enjoyed it) but it does not quite live uo to its predecessor.

One of the main differences is that the heroes now actually fully participate in battles (i.e. they are units that can fight hand-to-hand and can actually get killed).
While this sounds like a logical development from HOMM3 it does not work out quite well - at least IMHO. The problem is that the heroes either seem to be overpowered or they can be so weak that they get killed to easily (which might lead to the instant end of a campaign (or better a reloading of the last saved game).

Also I think the siege battles are much less fun than in HOMM3.

On the positive side - the development of the heroes got much more detailed and interesting (more skills to choose from, higher classes to advance to) and all the monsters have some special abilities.

Overall a fun game, but I still find myself playing HOMM3 more often than HOMM4.

But as you will probably get it for a very low price now I would go for it as it still gives lots of fun as might be a got way to get yourself in the mood for the upcomung HOMM5

[Mithrandir]

Yup, read some more reactions like that...

However, I bought it for just €7,50 , about 10 dollars ?

Homam 5 looks very promising indeed...

http://www.mightandmagicgame.com/tea...creenshots.php

[Ser Clegane]

However, I bought it for just €7,50 , about 10 dollars ?

For that price you will get your money's worth, IMO - even with the downsides of HOMM4

[Sjakihata]

Just ordered HOMAM IV,

played HOMAM 1,2 and 3 with lots of fun. Anyone got HOMAM 4 ? If so how do you like it ?

I tried HMM4, but it cannot be compared to HMM3. HMM3 have remained one of my favorite games ever.

edit:

ah, I didn't knew a #5 was coming - good news, I hope they'll do well.

[Meneldil]

Any game is worth the money at 5$. Well, most games anyway.

HoMaM 5 looks fantastic. I was kinda afraid when I heard that 3Do went bankrupt, but the guys making #5 already made Etherlords, a great HoMaM clone.

I just hope they won't 'kill' the spirit of Heroes and turn it into Heroes of Ethers and Magic

[econ21]

Homm4 is a broken game, IMO. Rather like CTP2. People bash the AI in RTW but really should experience something like Homm4 to put it in perspective.

Basically, the AI in Homm4 will never give you a good fight[1]. The problem is the strategic AI. Typically, it will get its leaders killed by random monsters, not conquer nearby mines and basically cease to exist as a meaningful opposition. You will end up just fighting the map - the random stacks of monsters - rather than the AI factions. Contrast this with Homm3, where the AI was very competitive and would often kill me off rather abruptly. It is also extremely slow paced compared to Homm3 for some reason.

In the defence of Homm4, it should be said that the battlefield AI is up to Homm3 standards. Plus the character levelling system is superb. Having characters fight in a battle is a joy. The graphics are gorgeous, as is the variety of monsters and stuff. The music is nice as ever. The campaigns are very well written and have more story and RPG elements than some RPGs (such as the lamentable MMIX). It's just a shame there's not a game there.

I've played it co-op a fair bit with my son as I really enjoy developing the heroes and he likes the monsters etc. I don't regret buying it - definitely worth what you paid for it - but I do regret the terrible lost potential. Homm4 with a Homm3 AI... drools.

[1]There was one game, where the AI for some reason built one faction up that could compete with my son and I. It was not something we could replicate however. More common was our experience with the "DragonKing" scenario, where the AI DK starts off with many towns to your one or two. It's a large scenario, but when we finally met the DK with our pumped up stacks of troops, we were appalled to find him escorted by only a few skellies or some such. Talk about anti-climatic.

[AntiochusIII]

HOMM4 is a good game. I especially enjoyed greatly the stories in there. It's just superb and addictive. I want to play just another turn and take another town only to see where the story is going to. However, the expansions are simply "more campaigns" rather than actual expansions.

The heroes aren't very well balanced. A lower-level one can't do a thing while a late-game one is overpowered. But the new skill system is simply awesome. Easy to use and very diverse. The magic system, too, recieves overall interface improvement, and is a welcome change. They also get rid of the upgrade system for units; a mixed change for me, as it helps a lot with micromanaging though the creatures are now far less diverse. Unfortunately, Hero-specific skills (like Gelu's ability to train sharpshooters, which is awesome, if one remembers) are gone. A sad change, IMO. It helped diversify and personalize the heroes in earlier games.

The map is a bit too colourful for my tastes, though. And the AI isn't very competitive.

I also hate the new cities (factions), especially their look in the city screen. Though Heroes 4 campaigns clearly establish the "origin" of these new factions I miss the diversity of the old Heroes 3. Haven sucks compare to castle, despite identical units (i don't know why); they unite the undead and the demons into just Necropolis, which sucks - badly; the nature forces look much less intimidating despite the addition of the White Tigers. You see, H4 elves sucks. ;) They look weak as hell, unlike their Avlee brethrens. The new Asylum is unattractive and a melting pot of weird combinations: orcs, Black dragons, nightmares, bandits, medusas, minotaurs, hydras, and efreets in one faction? You've got to be kidding. Stronghold changes little but IMO in the worse way; the only redeeming town is "Great Arcan's" Order faction, which is a blast of ranged troops from lv 1-4.

The city sieges sucks badly now. No more tall walls to break with mighty catapults. How sad...

The worst change is now there is only ONE living dragonkind in H4 world: Black Dragons. Though if you include all sorts of dragons only three comes up: Black, Bone (Necro), fairy (Nature, but isn't technically alive), and the Mechanical one I forgot the name, which belongs to Order.

Nonetheless, it is Heroes of Might & Magic and has all the basics that makes the franchise such a blast.

Heroes V are being developed by Tilted Mill, responsible for Etherlords and Etherlords 2, which are great games. The developers state that they are also rabid fans of Heroes and will return to Heroes III style of gaming, rather than Heroes IV. They said something also that they realize this is Heroes and they won't make it Etheroes. :-l The major change, or from what I heard as rumors, is that it'll be one hero per faction. Not sure though; if it is, for me it would be a welcome change. As I liked Etherlords 2's concentration on one hero.

Also, they are Russian.

[Meneldil]

Well, I didn not find the AI to be that bad in Homm4, although the game was easier than Homm3 (but that may be because I only played the campaigns, with AI controling the whole map at the beginning).

And yeah, I was kinda disapointed by the cities : all the same, with just one or two different buildings per faction. Homm3 (and even Homm2) cities were much more detailled and diverse.
Hopefully, things will get better in #5

The worst change is now there is only ONE living dragonkind in H4 world: Black Dragons. Though if you include all sorts of dragons only three comes up: Black, Bone (Necro), and the Mechanical one I forgot the name, which belongs to Order.

And what's the point of calling him black dragon if there's no red, green, gold, blue and crystal dragons ?

[Blodrast]

another long-time player of the homm series here.
HOMM4 has a lot of new, good things, and a lot of new, bad things (according to taste, of course).

I won't reiterate things already stated by posters above, but I'd also like to point out that classes and spells are not really balanced, and it's difficult to abstain from abusing some of them sometimes (other than simply never using certain spells). Order is pretty much overpowered, and so are some of its spells.
The idea with having to decide between 2 branches of creatures is interesting, but its implementation kinda sucked for me. Usually, it's a no brainer, and it means you'll never ever bother with the other branch...

Yes, the AI is by no means brilliant. Heroes in battle is a widely controversed concept - I like it, although it is true that it is not well balanced - you either get no-good wimps, or overpowered dudes that just rip through pretty much anything on their own. A hero taking on alone 10 black dragons is not really balanced, is it now ?

Some of the artifacts are cool, and the building of "sets" is also very nice.
I also feel that some of the "feeling" is gone, when compared to HOMM3. I don't know, maybe the story isn't so good, but then there's the towns - which looked much cooler in HOMM3, some of the creatures are more... realistic, instead of fairy-tale-like, and so on.

Either way, they're all worth playing, if you're a fan. And tastes differ greatly, too, so you should find at least a few things to your liking :)

[ah_dut]

Hey, for 7 euros, it's definitely worth it. I liked Heroes 2 and loved 3...4 is good but certainantly not up to the level of 1 when it came out

[Rosacrux redux]

A bargain price, nevertheless, but the game isn't really worth much more than that. Contrary to HOMM1&2&3 - all extremely good and addictive games - #4 was a terrible flop, despite the niceties and improvements it included. It doesn't look bad, it feels (and plays) bad. One of the two mega-dissapointments I got from a favorite franchise in the past two years (the other being MOO3).

Hopes seem to be high for HOMM5, but there are still many months ahead before this one comes out so... relax and wait for it!

[Martok]

A bargain price, nevertheless, but the game isn't really worth much more than that. Contrary to HOMM1&2&3 - all extremely good and addictive games - #4 was a terrible flop, despite the niceties and improvements it included. It doesn't look bad, it feels (and plays) bad. One of the two mega-dissapointments I got from a favorite franchise in the past two years (the other being MOO3).

GAH!! You just *had* to mention that game, didn't you? Okay, okay, I just gotta remember to take regular, deep breaths..... Sorry for the panic reaction, but simply speaking that game out loud makes me wince. For as much as I criticize Rome, and what a letdown it was after Shogun and Medieval, it's nowhere near the horror that was MOO3. I had so looked forward to that game, and I wanted to like it so badly; but in the end I simply couldn't make myself enjoy it. Anyway, onto other topics.....

Speaking of Rome, there is one feature I would love to see HOMM5 borrow from it: The ability for standard units to become Heroes (or at least "Champions", if there's only going to be one main "Hero" per faction). I really liked Rome's mechanism where an "average Joe" leading a stack into battle could be "promoted" from a mere Captain to an actual General after a certain number of victories. I think adapting this feature for HOMM5 would be a great idea.

[edit] Hey, my 350th post! Only took me 2 1/2 years.

[Mithrandir]

Got it today and been playing it for a few hours, with fun.

Not as lively as the previous ones indeed, but that might just be the campaign...

already worth it's money so far :).

[econ21]

Not as lively as the previous ones indeed, but that might just be the campaign...

The campaigns are better done than the standalone maps, IMO. (Whereas in Homm3, I never cared much for the campaigns).

I really liked the story telling and writing in the Order campaign - Emilia and Solymer etc. It seems to have a lot of role-playing elements.

The Nature town campaign was fun too. I really liked marching my kick-ass druid hero up to the gates of a city alone and then watching him smash up the defending army solo.

The "introductory" campaign - the Life town one - really dragged, despite it being for my town of preference, I couldn't get past the first map.

[Alexanderofmacedon]

I looked up some screenies, and I have to say it doesn't look to...fun...

I probably have to play it though to get full effect...

[AntiochusIII]

I really liked the story telling and writing in the Order campaign - Emilia and Solymer etc. It seems to have a lot of role-playing elements.

This is clearly intended to be the best and largest campaign in the game. It is really well done. The mission before the last one let you play Solymr solo and Emilia with only heroes - kind of like a "fellowship of the ring" party. You can see from the intro movie that this campaign is the main driver of the game's storyline.

The Nature town campaign was fun too. I really liked marching my kick-ass druid hero up to the gates of a city alone and then watching him smash up the defending army solo.

The nature magic-using heroes are the strongest, IMO. If you managed to rank up to Grandmaster Summoning your lone hero can take on anything, given time. However, I am GREATLY disappointed by the lost of the Gold dragon (replaced by the equally powerful, but somehow less attractive fairy dragon - I think it gave away to feel of military might associated with those precious Golden dragons) and the weaker looking elves they have. The original grand elves (and the special unit Sharpshooters) look really cool, compare to these weaklings. The campaign, though, was good - it had a lot of romance story in it, and I actually decided to use Elwin as my only hero all the way to the last scenario (I know it's harder this way, but it gives the "adventure" feel).

The "introductory" campaign - the Life town one - really dragged, despite it being for my town of preference, I couldn't get past the first map.

I hate that campaign, despite my love for the Life/Castle faction. Order is now far more dynamic, as Haven fails to capture the "Arthurian" glory of the old Castle. The campaign is unbalanced, IMO. With too much heroes to start with and unbalanced enemies, and especially the unattractive story (Lysander doesn't make such an impressive character - I'd rather think a campaign to establish Palaedra would be much better to play as a Life faction) makes it quite a chore to play through.

[Mithrandir]

I'm playing the life campaign now, can't wait to train phoenixes again :).Btw. aren't they imensely overpowered ? I haven't played another faction extensively yet, but what I've noticed is that you can build a summoning portal which can summon mantisses, which is a superunit, if you can build phoenixes as well, you'd have 2 level 5 units , no ?


Things which I don;t like so far :

-Having to chose between creatures, this would've been fun if it was just the highest level creature.
-Where are all the upgrades ? I didn't see a single upgrade for a unit yet...
-the castle sieges

Thing's which I do like so far :
-armies don't need heroes anymore to move
-Caravan's --> GREAT


Neutral on :
-Unit spawning, I was really used to having units available once a week...
-Heroes fighting, overpowered indeed,then again also fun.


Are there any good sites for HOMAM 4 ?

[econ21]

I'm playing the life campaign now, can't wait to train phoenixes again :).Btw. aren't they imensely overpowered ?

It's been a while, but you may mean Nature - Life is like the old Castle town. Phoenixes are good, but not vastly better than other level 5 stuff, IIRC. Black dragons, for example, must be competitors for best level 5 troops even taking into account their rate of lower production.

I haven't played another faction extensively yet, but what I've noticed is that you can build a summoning portal which can summon mantisses, which is a superunit, if you can build phoenixes as well, you'd have 2 level 5 units , no ?

I think you get rather less mantisses than normal level 5 troops but they sure are welcome. Every town is supposed to have some special features - this is one of Nature's (summoning being the other, I guess). Most of the other factions get good unique stuff too - e.g. raising Vampires (Death), tons of hard units (Might), lethal ranged/magic attacks (Order) etc. Look out for the water elementals, though - they are nice additions from the portal too.

Are there any good sites for HOMAM 4 ?

I just went to the old Homm3 ones at the time, though some have closed. I printed out a few useful things - one was a list of all the advanced hero classes and their bonuses. But it took me time to understand that you should work towards an advanced class that gives you the two skills (generally one active - magic or combat - and passive - tactics, scouting, nobility - is best) you want to develop rather than fixate on their specific bonuses.

[Rosacrux redux]

Are there any good sites for HOMAM 4 ?

Methinks Celestial Heavens is the best choice.

[Blodrast]

yup, celestialheavens is prolly your best bet.
Mantisses: too few, too slow. Rarely worth it, really. Phoenixes tend to be nicer.

And no, no upgrades for ya. :(
Phoenixes aren't really overpowered, imo. Should see the Black Dragons... Genies are overpowered. With an army of genies you can kill anything.

[econ21]

Genies are overpowered. With an army of genies you can kill anything.

Heck with three genies, you can horribly mess up an opposing army. Song of peace and slow can really ruin your enemy's day...

[Mithrandir]

Still having fun with it :).

Good money I spend... AI. indeed isn't too active,but they manage..
I only played the campaigns so far, so maybe that's why...

Genies are nice, but so are Mages...poison can really annoy an enemy beind castle walls :).

[Kekvit Irae]

I have the Compendium and two of of the campaigns of (I think) HOMM3 that were sold by themselves in seperate boxes as seperate games. Hated all of them. They felt more like boardgames than actual fantasy strategy games. While Might and Magic 6 & 7 will always be praised, Heroes does not even deserve a mention from me.

[econ21]

Homm3 lacked a certain je ne sais quoi with me too - maybe too "gamey", with hero chains etc.

But did you try the Mandate of Heaven scenario? If you liked MM6, as I did, it's worth a play for old times sake.

Also, there is an absolutely stunning Lord of the Rings XL map made for Homm3 that you can download from the internet. 4 players with 2 sides - Saruman, Sauron, Gandalf, Aragon. If you like Tolkien, this is the best game product I've experienced. Playing Gandal, with Lorien, Rivendell and Grey Havens as Elf starting towns is particularly fun.

[Lonely Soldier]

I'm not sure if anyone saw the thread, at the forge, but I suggested that someone could work on a HoMM mod for R:TW, seeing as how the mechanics, at least on the campaign map, are very similar.

[Mithrandir]

(still enjoying the game :o)

[TinCow]

While I enjoyed HOMM 3 & 4, I must say I think the series has been on the downslope since HOMM 2. They changes they have made to try and keep the series fresh have more diverted from the classic format that I enjoyed more. The new features seem to me to be flawed 'enhancements' to less detailed parts of the other games. The more complex they try to make it the more I think they stray from what made the originals great. I'm very worried about HOMM 5.

[Blodrast]

TLOTR map is only one of a good number of maps that are out there (and celestialheavens is a good place to start). For instance, I love megalomaniac-style maps, where you get to have (and fight against) armies with tens of thousands of troops...and there's quite a few of those out there.

As for the game's trend, well, I guess most people feel that if homm5 doesn't get it right, the series will sink for good (or at least for a long time). There has been too much change from 3 to 4, and there will be change again from 4 to 5...so that there's a risk that the series tends to lose its identity by oscillating among so many paths...

[Alexanderofmacedon]

Once again, I played this game after RTW, and there is no match. I don't ever play it and I'm trying to sell it...