/vr/ - Retro Games

>>4802126
For me it is the Mighty Gorgons.

>>4802150
You reminded me of something. My whole family was into Homm3, and on long drives to see relatives, my father, myself, and my younger brother would do this little game, essentially bringing fantasy sports drafting to Homm.

I don't remember exactly how we ordered our picks, but it was essentially you had to build a town lineup from the existing (sans conflux) troops. You had to keep them to the same tier, and every turn you got you would pick a unit, which removed it from the pool for everyone else, and you tried to come up with the strongest town lineup you could.

How do I run this shit in a window? I remember it being possible but the czechbox is no longer here.

FACEBOOK/pg/heroesorchestra/videos/

Heroes Orchestra streaming live. Also playing live 02.06.18 in Warsaw.

>>4802497
Mine is version 5.0RC1 and it has the Full Screen checkbox. Yours is newer RC5.

>>4802497
See the tweak setting. If you understand the language.
https://sites.google.com/site/heroes3hd/eng/description/tweaks

>>4802497
Isn't the issue that you're trying to run h3era.exe? Does it support windowed mode? Have you tried pressing F4 in game? alt+enter?

>>4802764
Apparently this is the case. "Heroes3.exe" works in windowed mode just fine, the checkbox appears.

Strange, I could swear I used to play WoG using this launcher in window ...

thanks

>>4802810
Try pressing the hotkeys I've mentioned in-game, they might just switch it to windowed.

>>4802814
I tried alt-enter previously, tried F4 now and it worked. Thank you anon!

>>4802210
I remember using a Russian forum dedicated to HoMM where you received currency for posting. You could then use that currency to purchase creatures, resources, artifacts and so on. I think you could then use those purchases in tournaments they held. I thought that was pretty cool at the time

Fucking HELL I'm having a hard time getting into and enjoying Might and Magic 6. I always hear praise for it, so I decided to give it a go. It seems kinda nifty, if poorly balanced. Then I made the mistake of clicking on the M button in goblinwatch, and wound up in a tunnel full of a fucking swarm of enemies. Was only level 2, so team got wiped. Last save was from before I cleared the area outside of goblinwatch. Not exactly eager to swing and miss repeatedly at all those goblins again.

Is there any more surprise dick punches like that in M&M6? I have a hard time enjoying any game where the main strategy is to save often to prevent the game from fucking you. The earlier M&M games didn't seem to pull this shit.

>>4802210
>You reminded me of something. My whole family was into Homm3, and on long drives to see relatives, my father, myself, and my younger brother would do this little game, essentially bringing fantasy sports drafting to Homm.
Cringe maximum.

>>4803867

>>4802126
Just soak in this music:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=celP7sgGvjI

I'm thinking of making a clone of 6, 7 and 8.
What made these games so comfy?
What was good?
What was bad?
What would you change?
What do you think sets it apart from others (i.e. Elder Scrolls)?

There's something inherently perfect about these games, and I have my own thoughts about that but I want to hear yours.

Repeating from >>4800532:
What would you change in HoMM3 multiplayer design to make it more multiplayer rather than 'single player vs ai until that final battle'?

>>4803867
I am sorry that your mum kept you locked in the basement, Anon. Maybe if she didn't have slept with niggers, your childhood had been different and you too would have memories like >>4802210 has.

>>4804282
da fuck, meant to this
>>4803867

>>4803867
>Having fond memories of shared experience with family members during childhood is cringe
The epitome of Anglosaxon cold upbringing. No wonder you all grow up fucked up, neurotic and unable to participate in society.

Any guides on how to play Fortress?

>>4804337
Do not

>>4804337
get Tazar

get wyverns day 2

use wyverns and dragonflies as your early game army, leave gnolls and lizards accumulating at home until you need some cannon fodder

start clearing fly nests asap, mass wyverns and MGs is the only way to stay competitive in late game

pray to RNGesus that you get teleport

>>4804337
Drakon as starter, brown shirts (Gnoll Marauders) day 1, bait counterattack with a stack of a single shitter then whoop with your main gnoll stack.
Alternatively, Dragon Flies day 1 for your scouts. Still Drakon as starter.

>>4804337
If you start with Lizard Den, upgrade it first day.
Learn the ropes with Tazar as your main. Then just go from there.
Oh, and DO NOT clear fly nests in first month. If you can, postpone it till the end of first month. You will get about almost 50% more of them.

>>4804494
>>4804565
>pick Tazar as starter
>no troops for day 1 fights
>get Gunnar in tavern

>pick Drakon
>gud 111 creeping ability
>chance for a good main from tavern anyway

>>4804565
So what if you get more wyverns later. The extra striking ability by getting wyverns earlier means you'll clear more turf and get more resources and maybe even knock out an enemy or two.

Clear the fly nests as soon as you can without crippling losses.

>>4804107
>What made these games so comfy?
Good illusion of living cities, where all the wackiness is omnipresented from the dungeons to the outdoor battlefields.
Meaning when something doesn't make sense for villagers, it doesn't make sense for monsters either, so you stop thinking about it.
At further glance: A genocidal world is accompanied by bloodthirsty quest givers, including the quest NPCs.

Its very different from playing a JRPG, where the story side is about love and friendship.
But the gameplay side is about conquest, genocide, extermination or just getting really really swole.

>>4804875
I don't get that gif

>>4804879
If you go over the top edge of a square projection map, you come out on the same edge going south. You don't wrap to the southern hemisphere.

16bit rpg maps are square projections on a toroidol world

>>4803426
Read the pastebin and get bows first. About Goblinwatch, go right at the start, one of the chests has the Goblinwatch Code which says what the buttons do. 6 is easier than 3-5. Also, use autosave which will take you back to when you last changed zones (in this case entering Goblinwatch).

Is it even possible to do a no magic play through HoMM3 campaign at higher difficulty levels? Or am I just not good at this game?

>>4805568
I'm not sure why you would want to try, but I never had any particular difficulty with the Yog campaign which forced you to do that.

>>4805732
Just because magic is so OP

>expert earth magic
-town portal and mass slow

>expert air magic
-dimension door and mass haste

And I prefer amassing huge armies over a few months. Which isn’t great tactics on harder difficulty. Nothing more comfy that putting 20 archangels vs 15 black dragons. I guess I prefer might over magic.

>>4804886
I still don't get it.

>>4804857
You can't clear those nests faster than week 3 anyway, so waiting till week 5 is not a big deal, while gives you significantly more troops. And wyverns are fucking fodder, so you need those numbers.
Let me guess - you charge into Griffin Conservatory in the 9th day of the game, right?

>>4806180
>You can't clear those nests faster than week 3 anyway,
Are you high? Sure you can.

>so waiting till week 5 is not a big deal,
It's two weeks by your own ridiculous assumptions, easily enough of a margin to win or lose an entire game.

>. And wyverns are fucking fodder, so you need those numbers.
They're a level 6 monster. A weak one, to be sure, but they'll still run roughshod over

>Let me guess - you charge into Griffin Conservatory in the 9th day of the game, right?
I'll charge in as soon as I have enough cash to send in an expendable scout hero to confirm how many griffins are there, and a main hero that can beat them. That's usually somewhere in week 2, maybe 3 depending on when I find it (should it exist).

>>4806180
>so waiting till week 5 is not a big deal
Do you only play on XL maps with one AI opponent while skipping turns until you can buy troops? Jesus. Two weeks is fucking huge. And you can totally break a serpent hive before week 3, hell, you can break conservatories and even an easy utopia week one.

>>4806180
Sounds like you have some getting gud to do.

>>4806359
I'm not him, but how do you break even a weak dragon utopia on week 1? At the bare minimum, you're facing 8 greens, 5 reds, 2 golds and a black dragon.

>>4806381
Maybe I am wrong. First month utopia is of course fully doable, but I remember seeing a claim that Shakti can do it week 1 if he can get ~200 Troglodytes.

>>4806385
how can he get 200 troglodytes in week 1?

>>4806471
Shakti starts with up to 120 troglodytes + another Dungeon hero with 30-40 trogs + 14 from the dwelling, up to 174 trogs. If he can also find an external dwelling or some joiners, that can bring him over 200 trogs. Even 150+ infernal trogs are nothing to scoff at, and with some fodder they could probably take a weak utopia. Maybe not sure.

I'm a Troglodyte in IRL.

>>4806485
I still don't see how it works. Say we have a level 3 Shakti, who managed to get both of his level advances into Offense, a 3 attack, and with with 200 infernal trogs; (and as an side, about 75% of the time, Shakti only starts with about 70 trogs, you might sometimes get more, but not reliably so).

That means they have an attack score of 10, and a 30% bonus to damage on top of it. if they're attacking the Red Dragon stack, with their 19 defense, they'll average a hit for 403, which will kill 2 reds and wound a third; so you'll need 3 attacks (assuming your big trog stack takes no losses whatsoever) just to deal with the reds, and you'll probably need another 2 for the golds, 1 for the black, and 4 for the greens. You can have at most 6 sacrificial stacks, and they'll get nommed pretty fast.

I just don't see how this can work, even if you cast things like bless to rapidly increase your damage.

>>4806597
One way to prove this theory is creating a custom map. Give starting hero Shakti some levels, custom skills, custom troops (~200 trogs), custom spells, maybe custom stats too. Place a Dragon Utopia near starting castle. Do the battle. Post video here if one can prove this theory.

>>4806645
I just tried that and it isn't possible. I made a map with a level 3 Shakti with 175 Infernal Trogs, 20 Harpies and 4 Beholders. The 8 Green Dragons will annihilate your trogs no matter what you do. I must have really overrated them here.

It does however appear possible to take any conservatory with just this Shakti. Especially if he picks up some stats on the map and learns Bless or Shield.

>>4806765
Did you split the trogs to make some fodders? Like 1 trog for each unit. You can make 4 fodders since you have 3 main units. Although I'm not sure the fodders is enough because there're 4 dragons and they can wipe the 4 fodder in 1 turn.

>>4806776
The thing is that dragons go first.

>>4806781
Yeah, I know. That's why I said the fodders would die in turn 1. Then you're dead because no more fodders in turn 2.

>>4806786
They go after the main stack turn 1.

>>4806787
Whelp, then we can say the theory is impossible. I'm not the one who mention this theory. I'm the one who suggested testing it in a custom map.

>>4806776
I made fodders from Harpies. Unfortunately Green Dragons will go after the trog stack on turn 1 even with fodders.

I did make good progress against a max conservatory though, which is rather impressive by itself.

>>4806810
What are the losses? Both you and the griffins.

That Dragon Utopia business could maybe be doable with some minus enemy morale artifacts (possible to have by week 1), spells and a blessed RNG.

>>4806818
I managed to kill almost half of the griffins until I lost too many trogs. I also forgot to split the harpies into fodder or give Shakti a spellbook. I'll need to test this again more seriously, but it appears doable - 175 infernal trogs with advanced offense kill like 35 royal griffins in one hit. In a real game Shakti would probably have less trogs but would be more powerful, especially if you take exp from chests in preparation.

>>4806359
>>4806381
>>4806385
>>4806471
>>4806485
>>4806584
>>4806597
>>4806645
>>4806765
>>4806776
>>4806781
>>4806786
>>4806787
>>4806795
>>4806810
>>4806834
Are you a bad enough dude?
http://www.mediafire.com/file/o1eqpna58hhi819/Bad%20Enough%20Dude.h3m

>>4806961
Damnit, 3 dragons attack my main stack in first turn. Only have 78 trogs left. Quit the game lol.

>>4806834
I don't think the vanilla HoMM3 has minus enemy morale artifacts. I know some are added in HotA. Don't remember WoG since it's been years since I played it. I haven't tried Era II or other mods.

Relying blessed RNG is not a good strategy. How many times are you gonna restart the game before you get good RNG? In fact, some puzzle battle maps gives you Spirit of Oppression to ignore any morale bonus because it requires specific strategy to win the battle.

>>4806994
>I don't think the vanilla HoMM3 has minus enemy morale artifacts. I know some are added in HotA.
Yeah, I was testing the map on HotA and got a minus enemy morale artifact as a random starting bonus.

>>4807001
The only way to get a minus morale on enemies in vanilla HoMM3 is using Bone/Ghost Dragons.

I read some "strategy" on how to attack Dragon Utopia in week 1. It involves using lots of heroes as scouts. The scouts use certain formation so the green/red dragons' breath attack will kill the black and gold dragons. It requires lots of heroes, might be 10 heroes before the main hero enter and kill the green/red dragons.

http://heroescommunity.com/viewthread.php3?TID=37106

>>4806359
I by default don't play on maps smaller than L. When you are playing with your 5 friends, anything smaller is literally too small. There is no fun to play a game with six people in it only to rush.
Hell, there is no fun in rushing in general, but for HoMM multiplayer I find it simply pointless, unless it's a tournament.

>>4806371
Sounds like I don't see the point of rushing. I'm not a Slav, hence I don't attend tournaments, hence I don't give a fuck about winning the game in 30 or less turns. ESPECIALLY on multi.

Is this game actually good and worth playing? Every review I watch on youtube says it's a masterpiece, but then they admit that many elements in the game are garbage. It just sounds like a mixed bag.
Is this praised just because it was rivolutionary when it came out?

>>4807909
Why even offer your opinion on strategy if you don't care about playing optimally?

>>4808276
Play VII instead.

>>4808276
I play because I like Might & Magic series.

hello where are the new posts

>>4808721
The bully >>4808276 chased them away.

>>4808729
That ain't no bully.

>>4808276
It's an amazingly fun game to me. Except that one dungeon.

>>4808298
Not him, but there is a massive difference between playing "optimally" and "min-maxing". Raiding banks before the end of week 2, while perfectly doable, is a case of min-maxing, not optimal gameplay. Optimal gameplay assumes you have enough units of high enough tiers to just take on guards without losses, rather than exploiting AI's retardation while having Day 3 army.

>>4808276
I absolutely love it and make a new playthrough every year or so.

I don't know how I would feel picking it up today, with the modern standards in mind when it comes to interface and gameplay, though.

>>4808276
It is still a very good game, but as with anything it has faults. As a dungeon crawler is holds up fine even now. Read the OP pastebin and make sure to get bows.

>>4808987
You mean all of the dungeons?

>>4808276
Love this game to bits.

>>4809018
Please tell me more about this exploiting AI thing.
It could come in handy in my next replay.

>>4809986
See >>4776251

>>4809742
No.

Damn, I really wanna pick up Majesty now only the most high IQ posters will understand how this is related to this thread

>>4805908
>I guess I prefer might over magic.
Magic wins games in extreme early or extreme late game, because early on you can zap things or have that one spell that lowers your losses (Arrow, Haste, Slow, Blind) and you also should have an advantage in skirmishes due to this, and also in the extreme late game when you have hundreds/thousands of mana points, fly around the entire map and Ressurect/Elemental/Clone can get you a shitload of free value.
There is no such thing as pure Might really because you hardly ever want to run around without a spellbook, but there's this sweet spot that most multiplayer meta is based around where you:
>scarcely have level 4/5 spells (no ez access to Resurrect / Implosion / Armageddon / Clone)
>army size is large enough to no longer really care about direct damage spells (save Implo / Armageddon), so battlefield buffs / debuffs are king
>there's enough Mana to have a constant back and forth with Mass Haste / Slow / Bless, Blind and other efficient, low-level spells like that, but not enough to just keep spamming Elementals/Resurrect
>Might heroes generally have an easier time creeping because of their better ATK/DEF and higher chance to get stuff like Tactics / Arcehry / Offense, so they take fewer losses and claim easier Utopias, Conversatories, Crypts and whatnot
>Might heroes are guaranteed to be offered some magic school by level 4 and the best Might heroes get early Earth / Air
Ergo, in MP, the best hero is a powerful Barbarian / Overlord / Beastmaster, because you basically start a fight right off the heels of getting all your secondary skills and you have really, really good growth curve up to around level 20-25.
There are some strategies in 1v1 where you can manage to get a solid opener with someone like Luna, Grindan or Ciele, get lucky with a Pandora Box spell or artifact reward from utopia (Spellbook of Earth or sth) and erase enemy with Implosion or Armageddon, but Might is more reliable.

>>4807903
>There is no fun to play a game with six people in it only to rush.
Fortress in an FFA environment is an excellent town precisely because you have strong tempo early on and a fantastic hero (Alkin, Drakon, Wystan, Tazar, Bron are all good), so you can use those Wyverns and claim a neighbor's town to strengthen your own chances. Or, hell, just claiming a neutral town near you the fastest and snowballing, because Fortress is cheap and even if it falls off later, having a stockpile of Gorgons and Wyverns building up while you double-build something more late-game oriented like Tower or Dungeon or Castle is great.
But if you have issues with Fortress specifically because you refuse to utilize its strengths, whether it is due to some "honor" or simply being unfun, hey, more power to you. Just acknowledge that you are probably limiting your own expertise, and that there's plenty of evidence to suggest Fortress as being pretty damn top notch.

>>4809018
>Raiding banks before the end of week 2, while perfectly doable, is a case of min-maxing, not optimal gameplay.
Any Rampart start (but preferrably Ivor) can probably just take all the Elves and Centaurs they can afford and break stuff like a full Crypt by week 1 without any excessive micromanagement, though. The point here is, if you have some sort of an advantage, you should exploit it. If Luna's Fire Wall is exploitable against dumb AI, well, that's just one hero you do not often have in the tavern (not any more than any other hero).
>rather than exploiting AI's retardation
It's a game with a strong Player vs Monsters element to it. What's wrong with simply using the limits that the game has set for itself? Being able to kite or accurately predict if the AI will choose to attack your fodder or your more important stack is a skill in itself. If you whiff it, you can lose your hero and fuck up royally. Why give such an antagonistic "not muh heroes" challenge? If you don't want to play competitively, no one is forcing you to play like this anyway. Towns like Fortress can still be very competitive without this sort of "exploitation" solely off of the early game tempo they offer.

Wanna reduce the "AI exploitation" from the equation? Use the new HotA feature that lets another player in the game take over the neutral monsters while you're creeping. Or just use the regular option that's been here from the start and set a prohibitive chess clock so that people who decide to take on a Legion of Dendroids with a single Archdevil won't get much else to do in their turn.

Likewise, there's plenty of maps that simply can't be beaten without having intricate knowledge of the battle system. Hell, I know plenty of people who never managed to conquer Steadwick without cheesing General Kendall and capturing Steadwick when he leaves to do some bullshit.

I don't see the point of artbitrarily deciding something is worth deriding by basically going "lol it's for nerds".

>>4804107
Gimmie Might and Magic
I know the time is right.
Gimmie Might and Magic
A goblin, I will fight.

So, I've been lurking these threads for quite some time. I started my HOMM addiction with Heroes 2 back in the day. What are your favourite factions in HOMM 2? The strategy compared to 3 is vastly different - Magic plays a more important rule, troops have low hp, barbarian heroes are kings etc. It is all very interesting and endearing for me, since I haven't grown tired of the sprites after all this time. Too much of a brainlet to finish the campaigns though, so I just watched them on YouTube.

Do you guys watch how other people play? Twitch is supposedly full of slavs who play the game, but I've been watching some channels on YouTube for fun.

>>4811007
Not him, but does
>Not ever flagging any dwelling except that one Red Dragon lair
>Building a portal of summoning
>Using the extra dragons every week to build up an early, quick force
>Gobbling up the entire map by about week 3
>Building an overwhelmingly huge army and then just crushing Kendall

count as cheese?

>>4812416
No, it's perfectly legitimate.
It's even a strat in regular, random games, given that in order to reliably get drakes from Portal of Summoning you have to never flag any other dwellings, which might suck (I love amassing Harpy Hags for early expansion if I roll dung).
>>4812363
>The strategy compared to 3 is vastly different
>barbarian heroes are kings
So what changed?
Anyhow, for HoMM2, my hot take is generally:
>Knight is a double-build town, their early game is actually fairly poor without a 2nd town to quickly conquer and mix and match because Peasants are shit and even their cheap units aren't efficient against, say, shooters; Ultra Fast Champions are cheap and make for great magic hero vessels
>Barbarian is the S-map / campaign speedrunner winner town, ridiculous powerspike with War Trolls and Ogre Lords, prob. my favourite faction
>Sorceress has low HP but is potentially the strongest faction if you can abuse hit'n'run with Phoenixes, as speed and fliers are king in HoMM2
>Warlock is broken, Gargoyles invalidate any pretense of "this town struggles in early game" as you can just buy a few heroes on Day 1 and run around with Very Fast tanky fliers. They gain good Spell Power, too, which helps creep. Best town by far.
>Wizard has weaker heroes than Lock and lack of fliers makes them less versatile, also the cost of Mages and Titans is bullshit. Hiring Giants is usually a mistake because HoMM2 upgrades cost more than buying the unit raw and Giants aren't great for making tempo plays on the map.
>Necromancer, as always, dominates XL maps and Vampire Lords are great, but loses to Barb, Warlock and even Knight rush.

>Monthy Succ wars check

>>4809018
>there is a massive difference between playing "optimally" and "min-maxing"

let's just redefine what words mean for arguments sake

>>4812603
Not him, but let's try
>Optimally
Efficient use of resources at hand
>Min-maxing
Exploitatively uses every single loop-hole in the system for maximum bang at (usually) minimal effort

>>4812659
Akschually...That's not even what minmaxing means, minmaxing is when you focus on one optimal thing to the detriment of everything else. The term comes from tabletop RPGs where during character creation you would often put all points into your most important stat while leaving the rest at the bare minimum. It's not the same thing as "tryharding".

Also you do know that HoMM3 has a scoring system right? It's arguably the whole goal of the game, clearing maps quickly to get a high score. Calling strategizing around the AI "minmaxing" or "tryharding" doesn't make sense if that's what the game actually expects of you. See Kendall or the 4,000 Naga Queen fight.

>>4812363
My favourite HoMM 2 faction is Warlock. I used to exclusively play them as a kid, though my play style was basically "get sulfur mine and wait in castle until black dragons".
>Too much of a brainlet to finish the campaigns
I know that feel. I'm trying to finish Archibald's and this map (scenario 8) is already too brutal for me.

>>4813209
>I know that feel. I'm trying to finish Archibald's and this map (scenario 8) is already too brutal for me.
Do you have Dragon Master from the previous mission? Because that really helps.
Generally having Ogre Alliance and Dragon Master really trivializes Archie's campaign, but it's doable without as well.

>>4802210
Okay, I'm picking first: Base Game Archangels.

>>4813490
I'll go for Gorgons/Mighty Gorgons for my 5th tier.

>>4807909
If you don't rush yourself you'll still lose to those that do.

>>4813513
Tier 4 Vampire Lords.

>>4813473
I had 2 reds and 4 greens but they had to die at some point against these hordes of crusader and champions. Based ogres single-handedly defended a castle three times.
The AI just builds crazy fast in this scenario. You let them take a castle with only a blacksmith and less than a week later they've already got the upgraded cathedral on top of being able to afford every troops.

>>4811443
More Might and Magic poems please!

>>4813810
Hm, perhaps the issue is that you're not moving fast enough. Just collecting all the Ogres and Dragons is extremely strong tempo to claim a few towns here and there, and you can even hire multiple heroes just to walk around everywhere and claim as many of those off the map as possible. Maybe try restarting if it's too much of a slog?

Also, if you're struggling and just want to close out the campaign, after you beat that mission you should pick the mission that is about amassing an army to face Roland and not searching for the Crown. With enough waiting around for a critical mass of Black Dragons the final mission becomes ezpz.

>>4813829
No need to restart, I beat it right before I made that post. But you're right, I'm really not fast enough.
>critical mass of Black Dragons
So it will we be like the good old days of 32167. I planned on doing every scenarii anyway so I'll just get the crown then reload.

>>4812739
>1999+19
>He doesn't know how points are counted
Top lel. And you have the audacity to talk about anything at all?

>>4813884
Reminder that we're enjoying a bully-free zone here.

>>4813868
>good old days of 32167
?

>>4813934
It's a cheat code to get a stack of Black Dragons.

>>4813884
It's based on days spent and towns owned multiplied by difficulty. Not sure how that contradicts what I said

>>4813594
I'll take death/dread knights for my 6ths.

>>4813998
Not him, but there's a minor correction. It's based on the number of days spent and whether or not you defeat all opponents and collect the grail multiplied by difficulty.

Towns on the map (but not necessarily owned) go into how the penalty for taking longer is calculated, but you don't necessarily need to hold them all for an impact on your score; if you're say playing a map where there is some objective instead of just kill all the other players.

pls tell me there is homm cosplayers out there probably some pixies

>>4813209
expansion campaigns are much more difficult imo, there were quite a few times I had to get lucky with retard AI

>>4814096

>>4814121
Bless you for putting a spoiler on lewd (I presume, didn't actually see it).

For those interested, HoMM III polish tournament's finals will start soon on
twitch.
tv/
teamfrenzygg

>>4814173
Good lad. Must see.

>>4814173
Good lad. Must-see.

>BO1 Mirror Jebus
wew lads

>>4814121
2nd from the left = me

Do both players get the same heroes from Prisons in Mirror Jebus?

>>4814408
Ok, somebody asked in stream chat. You get same hero class (say, both get Overlord) but the heroes and their skills are different.

Have you learned to appreciate some oddball troop lately?
For me, it's the Royal Griffins. On the surface, they aren't anything special compared to other t3 units like Grand Elves, Evil Eyes, or Dragon Flies, the scout's fever dream with an amazing ability. But they do have a horde building going for them, so by the time you're fighting large battles, you have a big-ass stack of them. Nobody ever hits them because Castle has so many better troops like Crusaders and Marksmen.
All in all, they're very often the last relevant stack in huge battles and very hard to bring down even with multiple near-dead stacks of higher tier troops thanks to their unlimited retaliations.

Guys how do I make the cloak of the undead king fast? Help

>>4814475
http://heroes.thelazy.net/wiki/Cloak_of_the_Undead_King

>>4813209
Warlock is allah(pbuh) bout GARGOYLES my dude.

>>4814465
>Have you learned to appreciate some oddball troop lately?
I just had a Lorelei game where I won a shitload of clutch fights with the 30 starting Harpies (upgraded to Hags day 1). HotA really made Level 2 specialists worth picking and Lorelei is a valid alternative as a power starter to Shakti. Too bad her skills suck in general, I ended up transitioning to Damacon and breaking all the banks with him.

Also the Paul Romero's best wishes were cool as heck. Good stuff.

>>4814698
What did they say? I don't speak Polski.

>>4814708
https://www.twitch
.tv/videos/268481896?t=30m38s
>Hey guys it's Paul "Arms" Romero

>>4814465
Thunderbirds.
The 1/5 chance to get lighting strike is absolutely amazing, especially if you have two stacks of them, as the chance for triggering it is "shared".

>>4814508
Yeah but how do I get all of those artifacts fast so I win the game

>>4815195
The common pieces are sometimes sold in Artifact Merchants. Otherwise, it's really luck of the draw, nothing else to it.

>>4813824
Might and Magic Haiku:

My level 5 guild
Just unlocked Dimension Door.
GG, play again?

Might and Magic Limerick:
(with fake Transylvanian accent)

There once was a Death Knight Vampire
Whose skills with the skellies was higher
than anything fair
and so without care
he went into the HoTA ban pyre.

>>4815195
It's not a strategy, it's a lottery.
>>4814465
I like royal griffins, highest weekly HP among fast/flying creatures on lvls 1-5.
>>4814771
Statistically, this ability is just +2 damage per bird on average, nothing amazing.

>>4815262
good stuff!

>>4815326
>>4814771
Honestly, the Thunderbirds are great just for their raw speed and power. Aside from the MGs, they're easily the best 5th, and I'd probably rate the unupgraded Rocs ahead of the unupgraded Gorgons, that extra movement and flying is worth the extra power and HP.

>>4815573
>MGs
>master gremlin?
>best 5th
>master genie?
>unupgraded Gorgons
>damn

>>4815326
Or, realistically, it's +10 damage per bird if it triggers, which is much more appealing. Thunderbirds come with nice speed, they fly, they can be unlocked on day 1 (well, Rocs can) and their only real downside is the price, since they cost whooping 700.
Still enjoy them and just like the original anon asked, they are an oddball unit that most people just scoff off and so did I. Then I've started to split them in half and suddenly they've started to kick asses and taking names.

>>4814465
Summoned Earth Elementals. Not the one you hire, but the ones you summon with a spell. With Expert Earth Magic there is a fuckload of them (Power x4) and they make a fantastic fodder, despite Earth Elementals being the worst tier 5 units.

>>4814465
>>4816167
Also, Iron Golems if you are able to stomach maining Josephine. Suddenly they are fast enough to be useful, while all their other stats make them truly awesome tier 3 unit and the -75% spell damage is something that can really make a difference. I wish there was a way to hire Gold Golems from regular sources, rather than one of the rarest spawning sites.

Map spotlight: Resource Wars
3 players, medium map, no underground
Victory condition: flag all mines
The map started off well, with lots to explore and a lot of resources to grab, and I got lucky and had Crag Hack in the tavern (played Dungeon, chose Shakti). You start with a town and a sawmill+ore pit flagged for you, all the other mines are guarded by a quest guard. Quests include "bring me ~50 [resource]", "reach level 5", "find a specific artifact", "have 7 [stat]" and "kill this stack of enemies." One AI killed the other off early on and offered surprising amounts of resistance and only lost because they sent a million heroes with a little troops each at me instead of all at once. Turns out the AI had 5 out of 6 pieces of the Statue of the Legion. In the end, Crag Hack minced the AI with black dragons - but of course, the scenario didn't end there. No, I had to scour the map and hire additional heroes to meet the "have 7 spell power" quest, and then to have a specific artifact that didn't exist on the map. In the end, the artifact was on a stack of neutrals guarding an irrelevant dwelling that was of a town nobody played.

Final grade: 2/5
Starts of well but not worth wasting time on.

>>4816159
I never said birds are bad, I said their special ability is not amazing at all.
> if it triggers
Yea, and if resistance triggers, it means your units are completely immune to enemy magic. If it was 0.1% chance and 1000 damage per bird, will ability be even more awesome, according to you? On average, this ability is just +2 damage. And low chance/high damage means ability is not reliable.
> an oddball unit that most people just scoff off
Rocs are key early unit for Stronghold.
>>4816171
No, golems are garbage and Josephine sucks (Mysticism and Sorcery). Are you same person who posted that Tower is a very good town, much better than Castle?

>>4817159
Not him, but you know HoMM3 doesn't follow statistical probability, but simplified "random" generator that favours certain values... right?
In case of Thunder Birds, the real chance of triggering it is equal with 5/12, or 41.(6)%.
For similar reasons, Thorgrim is one of the most broken (and utterly overlooked) heroes, despite having just absurd probabilities for blocking spells.

Why are firebirds +2 growth??

>>4817439
I ran a test battle right now. During the battle, thunderbirds hit enemy 61 times, there were 11 lightning bolts. 11/61 = 18%, so original 20% looks correct and your "real" 42% looks like made up bullshit.

>>4817751
Because the Conflux is an entire town of unmitigated bullshit.

>>4817023
Good review. Would read again. 4/5.

I picked up pic related and found myself playing til 2 am. One of the best games iv played. I love how the game just throws 100's of enemies at you, where in any other game it would be maybe 12 enemies with giant hp bars and then a boss. What are some other games like this?

>>4817751
The idea was that they're weaker than most level 7 units so there'll be more of them, but they failed to account for the fact that it also has the highest speed in the game, immunity to fire, a self-resurrect and other stuff.

HotA, as always, makes it better by simply relegating the bonus Phoenix growth to a late-game, expensive building, so you no longer get a shitload of Phoenixes solely from running Pyre + Castle.

In spite of that (and numerous other nerfs), Conflux still manages to be a top tier town - just no longer one that has multiple answers to a shitload of challenges in the game and an explosive power curve.

>>4817919
>this pic
I have the weirdest boner right now.

>>4817919
in terms of enemy numbers in each area MM6 > MM7 > MM8 > everything else. I don't know what else besides MMOs do this, while being in real time. Wizardy might have a lot of monsters, but fights are so slow.

>>4818264
>horde co-op games (l4d, vermintide)
>dynasty warriors

>>4818331
I guess Vermintide is pretty close, though I was thinking about games with open world, like Daggerfall. TES games, in spite of potential to have giant aoe spells, rarely give a enough targets to justify using something like that, though their melee/ranged combat is pretty slow, I guess that's why.

>>4817919
Shattered Lands has tendencies in that direction.

>>4817439
>Thorgrim is one of the most broken (and utterly overlooked) heroes
His speciality takes a while to get noticable, but yeah, by level 30 that asshole deflects half of spells thrown at him. Each level is essentially 1% of Resistance once he is an Expert.

>>4817765
Also different anon, but HoMM3 is rolling a virtual d12 for the purpose of all special attacks, morale and luck. It's just that Thunderbirds' probability is 2.5/12, which is 20%. So he made up the value, but die itself is true.
Unless we stick to the version of doubling up things if you have two stacks of the same unit, which would be a nice exploit if it was real. Do you feel like checking that out? I'm curious if it would work.

>>4818456
And semi-related:
Does anyone know if Bow of the Sharpshooter still add 30% to Archery or only the artifacts that make it add that bonus?

>>4818019
I still remember trials for a tournament and Conflux was supposed to be un-banned. So one of the guys picked Conflux for the purpose of tests...
... and had a Pyre right next to the starting castle, with Hill Fort a day of travel away from that.
And so Conflux remained as banned.

>>4818380
>TES
the only time in a vanilla TES game i can remember where they have that many people on the ground fighting at once are the sieges and fort battles in skyrim's disappointingly repetitive civil war questline; you can very regularly fight against a good 16+ stormcloaks/legionnaires at once

>>4818464
All of the combination artifacts include their component artifacts bonuses.

Rebuilding Mage Guilds: yes.
Rebuilding individual spells: no.

>>4815262
Top notch.

>>4818380
>in spite of potential to have giant aoe spells, rarely give a enough targets to justify using something like that, though their melee/ranged combat is pretty slow, I guess that's why.

This hit the nail on the head. An Armageddon spell in TES would be game breaking by design. You can't really find a game that gives you an experience like the MM's.

>>4818456
> Do you feel like checking that out?
Already checked - in that test battle I used 5 stacks of birds.

>>4814121
moooooddds!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGfnlwbDjj4
the absolute heroes kino

>>4820057
>Piękne, it's beautiful

>>4820057
>Three commentators
>Not even one of them can properly use declension with word "morale"

>>4820057
>the absolute heroes kino
Only if you mute sound to not hear that trio. They are the fucking epitome of stereotypical Polish commentators: know shit, speak shit and can't even into Polish grammar.
Or if you simply don't know Polish, but holy fuck, those guys are terrible.

>>4820175
It's confirmed that next year they're hiring Dariusz Szpakowski. The official reason is that Veggie after the tournament zajebał wiadro

>>4820057
Literally what the fuck was the point of that?

Also I hate race mixers so much. Only tolerable race mixes are evil with evil (Dungeon/Inferno) good with good (Rampart/Castle) and neutral with neutral (Fortress/Stronghold)

>>4820315
>Literally what the fuck was the point of that?
Claiming a full Griffin Conservatory and gaining 3 Angels from there with a small army and comparatively few losses.
>Also I hate race mixers so much.
Yeah, well, mixing races was part of the game from the start and lend themselves to much more interesting gameplay. The entire strength of the Knight hero in the original 2 games was always the guaranteed Leadership precisely to claim another town quickly with your early game presence, double-build and use their units for good.

Also, it's a fucking tournament with money on the line, I don't think anyone minds the fact that Angels work with Demons in this setup.

I'd argue it's fun and makes HoMM less cookie-cutter fantasy that you can have a knight with control over some squad of vampires or a beastmaster who tamed dragons.

>>4820315
Also
>neutral with neutral
Literally the entire point of being "neutral" is that you don't give a shit about your alignment allegiance because you have better reasons to fight than some good vs evil bullshit (most likely money or position). "Neutral" Barbarians were "Evil" in HoMM2; Crag himself fought for Archibald.

>>4820315
>race mixing
Anon, this is a competitive tournament. It's not a place for 'muh immersion'.

>>4820057
This made me watch the the final and holy shit the middle guy is such a troll lol.

>>4820315
>Also I hate race mixers so much
>>>/pol/

>>4810630
Go to sleep Sseth

>>4820593
cringe

>>4810630
its only $2 on gog right now

>>4820315
>What's the point
Are you seriously asking what's the point of trading 7 magogs, 1 demon and 1 giant for 3 angels?! In a tournament, with monetary prizes for winning?

>Only tolerable race mixes
>race
Ignoring /pol/-tier idiocy, the only UNtolerable faction mix is anyone else with Necropolis, due to the massive morale hit that's simply not worth it.
But if you are limiting your choice of unit based on some retarded head-canon rather than game mechanics, you sir are a moron. Especially if said unit grants +1 morale, thus not affecting the overall mood of your army.

>>4821045
Dungeon Keeper 1 and 2 aswell hnnngh

https://www.gog.com/game/dungeon_keeper

>>4821387
>massive morale hit
Undead creatures only give -1 morale to living creatures in the same army. Easily corrected with leadership, artifacts or visiting some adventure map locations.
>retarded head-canon
Faction alignment isn't head-canon, it actually affects the game in some (almost unnoticeable) ways. The other guy is still an idiot because alignment-mixing has no impact on the game.

>>4818925
>Game is filled with a lot of great single target spells
>And some very quirky aoe spells(most are weak)
>Also have literally nuking the screen(!)
I think i agree. Its even true in Magic and Magic

>>4821045
NICE! Day 1 purchase!

>>4820057
>6:00
>advanced scouting
>basic resistance

>>4821919
hoyt

>>4821919
scouting is underrated

>>4821919
One dud skill doesn't invalidate a main. Besides, in the early game, Scouting is actually kind of valuable for planning out turns better.

Calh is currently one of the more desirable starting heroes in Inferno because HotA improved level 2 unit specialists across the board and buffed Magogs to be more reliable. Calh and Ignatius are the best way to bolster Inferno's lackluster early game.

>>4821919
Would you nut to this?

>>4820057
Are there mods for the game that make AI not retarded?

>>4822148
In a way you could use what >>4811007 said:
>Wanna reduce the "AI exploitation" from the equation? Use the new HotA feature that lets another player in the game take over the neutral monsters while you're creeping. Or just use the regular option that's been here from the start and set a prohibitive chess clock so that people who decide to take on a Legion of Dendroids with a single Archdevil won't get much else to do in their turn.

>>4821919
Scouting is priceless for the first half of the game. The more that you can see the more efficient you can be.

>>4822148
AI with HDmod+ is not retarded. You can kite it around if you know how target priority works, but you still gonna get fucked by morale from time to time.

So... the grand question:
Pasis or Monere? Or some other Conflux hero?

>>4822284
Lacus
Advanced Tactics, +1 speed to Water/Ice elementals (moving them from 3rd to 2nd best unit of tier 3)
And of course Luna, for cheesing things up using Fire Wall.

But if you really want results, get yourself Orrin or Sir Mullich. They make absolutely great heroes for Conflux, despite having Leadership (elementals don't have morale, but Phoenixes and Sprites do).

>>4822284
Pasis is a woman, so Monere is better

>>4822284
Thunar and Erdamon, despite having fucking Estates. They are the only way to make Earth/Magma elementals useful (in fact, very fucking useful).

>>4822294
Planewalkers only provide bonuses to stats and/or damage, but not unit speed, you moron.

>>4822284
Of those two, Monere has Logistics, while Pasis has Artillery. Go figure.
And as pointed already, the guys granting bonus to Earth Elementals are worth it for that sweet +5 damage alone

>>4822296
Women are fine.

>>4822284
Monere for main, Grindan or Labetha (in that order) for starter.

>>4822284
If you play WoG with enchanced skills Kalt gets insane on XL maps.

>>4823379
But i usually give it to AI and pick Monore for myself.

Am i the only one who wishes the HoMM series had more fanart?

>>4823379
>if you play with some shitty russian mod that ruins the balance, then balance is ruined

waiw

>>4802126
What is the general consensus on Horn of the Abyss? Worth getting?

>>4823896
IMO it's the renaissance of HoMM3

>>4824173
Which means what exactly?

>>4824312
Which means people are picking it up again because of HotA, especially for it's multiplayer features (online lobby, simultaneous turns). It's lively.

>>4824321
I don't really like to play multiplayer though. I had a few bad experiences with some jackasses, and while maybe I shouldn't put it aside for that, it's just left an unpleasant taste in my mouth. When I play, I do so to play the AI. Do they really add stuff for non MP environments?

>>4824365
>Do they really add stuff for non MP environments
Tons. New campaign with a new town, new objects on map, artifacts, everything.

>>4823379
>Using WoG's skills
Neck yourself. Literally the worst part of the entire mod. Nothing is so bad in WoG as "fixed" skills.

>>4823842
Playing a bit of devil's advocate here: I absolutely adore the option allowing accumulation of creatures and guards in on-map dwellings.
Fortunately, WoG is modular, so you literally can turn everything off and only apply those two rules.

>>4823896
No.
It doesn't really add anything new (the new faction is a meme), it doesn't fix anything, the new campaign is meh and it's about 10 years too late to have any real revelance or simple point of existing.

>>4824173
>>4824321
Don't want to break it for you, but it's much, MUCH easier to get people for vanilla HoMM3/SoD than any kind of mod, HotA included. Most people don't even touch mods on the principle of them being mods.

>>4823842
>caring about balance in a mod where you can't play multiplayer
Do people really prioritize balance above fun in SP games? I can't even...

Anyways you can just turn off shit you don't like it don't play with every enchanced skill, i just use those that are shitty without the completely overpowered ones.

If you played WoG with Era 2 for years and moved to HoTa you will just feel like you play stripped version of H3 theres a lot less shit to do and tweak.

>>4825405
>use
buff

>WoG
>HoTA
Faft: Heroes 4 is superrior to every of your shitty mods

>>4825405
The only good thing about WoG is modularity. So you can turn off everything, add few options that always should be in the baseline game (recruit all button, send all resources button, prompt showing your current movement/mana points, quick combat with/without magic, guardians' growth) and ignore everything else.
HotA doesn't even allow doing that, so you are stuck with all the options in "on" position, which makes it inferior in my eyes. The only good thing about it (but only in multiplayer) is other player controlling neutrals, making it more challenging, but it doesn't outweight all the issues HotA has.

tl;dr both mods are shit, at least WoG can be reduced to what you need/want to have

>>4825426
>Pirate's Daughter campaign

>>4823896
It's generally worth a spin.
>>4825382
>It doesn't really add anything new (the new faction is a meme)
The Cove actually manages to be an interesting town choice - it's a "specialist" town in many ways, the new units sometimes even have unique mechanics, but even then, the developers managed to avoid making it too OP. Right now it's a decent-tier town but not seen as OP or UP. I don't see what makes it a "meme" other than the quirkiness of stuff like Cannon or the triple Pirate upgrade.
>it doesn't fix anything
Inferno fans love HotA for giving them more decent starting her options (level 2 specialists buffed across the board and Magogs have been made to be a more strategic unit). Necropolis got nerfed and no longer dominates. Conflux got nerfed but remains a top tier town without completely outstripping everyone else. Tower building costs have been adjusted so that the town's overall downfalls that made it situational and hard to play stop being so apparent, and even then it still retains most of its flavor.
>and it's about 10 years too late to have any real revelance or simple point of existing.
Poland just had a tournament of HotA and HotA certainly revitalized the online scene solely because of its QoL multiplayer features. When you have people playing HoMM3 for (not groundbreaking amounts of but still) money and the streaming flourishes you can't say HotA hasn't made an impact.
>Don't want to break it for you, but it's much, MUCH easier to get people for vanilla HoMM3/SoD than any kind of mod, HotA included
Again, HotA has a lobby system, an extensive MP community that plays mostly HotA for the balance improvements and overall more content, and Gameranger has plenty of lobbies for both SoD and HotA. Even the HoMM3 streamer niche sees a lot of HotA representation.

>>4825429
>HotA doesn't even allow doing that, so you are stuck with all the options in "on" position, which makes it inferior in my eyes.
The difference being HotA is trying its hardest to be a new expansion pack for the game and attempts to limit its influence to fairly small changes. HotA doesn't attempt to cause a revolution of HoMM mechanics. It's an iterative patch and an attempt to add to a great game but without completely overhauling its inner workings. HotA is also made by a community that listens to the best players of the game so that the experience doesn't intrude on your 1v7 200% Capitol first games for farming Archangel ranks but is more enjoyable to those who care about multiplayer.
WoG is primarily a tool for customization and modding. Fantastic maps and campaigns have been made with the tool, but it was never meant to be a golden standard of playing HoMM3. The bad rap WoG has always gotten was from people who just installed everything raw and ended up bloating their game. Without WoG we wouldn't have some really amazing campaigns and maps.

>>4825643
Conflux being OP is great for SP actually since enemy AI is not that great so if you want to have a a little bit of challenge give enemy AI's conflux towns.

Theres rebalanced creatures option in WoG that buffs inferno and fortress to make them better on larger maps.

>>4825723
>Conflux being OP is great for SP actually since enemy AI is not that great so if you want to have a a little bit of challenge give enemy AI's conflux towns.
I disagree.
The AI does not use Conflux well. The strengths of Conflux are entirely player-centric.
If the AI lucks into Resurrection, congratulations, they can't use it on much of their menagerie.
The AI is incapable of cheesing fights with Luna and Ciele.
The AI is incapable of microing upgraded Sprites in such a way so as to minimize losses; the AI loses Sprites like crazy because they're made of paper and the AI will only use the Wait command to reach shooters in one turn and for nothing else.
The relatively weak Conflux statlines (especially the dud Tier 4-5) aren't good for the brute-force oriented AI, and the AI is also incapable of getting Firebirds and Castle early enough to play on tempo.
Conflux is a tempo faction. It's entirely player-centric. The AI is much, much better on value-oriented factions with solid statlines across the board.
You want to give the AI Castle, Dungeon and Necropolis, not Conflux.
>Theres rebalanced creatures option in WoG that buffs inferno and fortress to make them better on larger maps.
That opens its own can of worms and also Fortress really does not need a buff to be better on larger maps, because it's also a tempo faction - you win as Fortress through stronger early development, claiming other towns faster than the opposition, and leveraging your strengths to get a higher level hero faster. You also are a beast at clearing Dragon Utopias and your town only needs wood/ore, so you do well with double-building.
Neither does Inferno if you know how to demon farm or simply if you're aware that the most efficient way of clearing Single Player scenarios is flying around with a single stack of fast and strong level 7 units and murdering everything with spells and strong attacks, letting your slower armies do cleanup or congregating them for an Utopia.

>>4825763
I played vanilla ages ago my observations are based on WoG and XL maps.

Conflux AI become the strongest on them thanks to sacred's phoenix speed and ability to revive multiple times, they can easly get stronger thanks to having inititative over everything they face, most of times conflux heroes have highest stated heroes compared to other AI's from diffrent town from my experience.
Other towns can catch up to that or surpass it only if they get dimension door.

>fortress buff
Fortress buff is little but it helps when you activated options that strengthen the enemy neutral stacks.
It really depends what options you activated really.

>>4825812
Okay, in which case it's hard to argue that HotA does things badly, though, when your primary baseline involves stuff at a much higher power level.
I'd also note that WoG mechanics also mostly seem more abusable by the player than the AI, but that's a different story.

>>4825643
>Poland just had a tournament of HotA and HotA certainly revitalized the online scene solely because of its QoL multiplayer features. When you have people playing HoMM3 for (not groundbreaking amounts of but still) money and the streaming flourishes you can't say HotA hasn't made an impact.
Not the anon you are replaying to, but we also have regular HoMM3 tournaments. More of them. Drawing more people. HotA is what "younger brother" generation plays

>>4825816
HoTA its clearly superior to everything else multiplayer wise even vanilla but for a guy like me who likes to play randomly generated XL maps its just get uninteresting because of lack of extra content that i got used to in WoG. Tho i would love to have new town from HoTA in WoG, units art and town's main theme is super good.

>>4825856
>we also have regular HoMM3 tournament
Russia? China?

>>4825863
>Quote about Poland
>B-but where!
Reading comprehension is not your strong side, anon

>>4825871
It's probably because what you said is not true. Where are those tournaments?

>>4825880
Last one that wasn't "big-ass Polish championship" bullshit (since those are still local, but just pretend otherwise) was in Racibórz in mid-May, weekend after the long "weekend". Entering fee 5 złotych, winning prize - a crate of Czech beer.

>>4825905
Anon, that tournament is so obscure that it can't even be Googled. The "totally local" tournament you're talking about had a studio with three commentators from the scene and an actual cash prize pool instead of a duel of Capitols between your friends Zbynio and Henio.

The actual PvP scene is in HotA, absolutely everywhere.

>>4825905
What kind of beer?
t. curious Czech

>stable (map object) upgrades cavaliers for free

>>4804107
Idk if you're still here, anon, but the thing that makes me love them so much is the "realism" of the adventuring and progression. You start off fighting spiders and rats and goblins, and you have to keep running back and forth between the inn because they're killing you. Then you start needing to run to the inn less and less, so you get confident, but you know there are other areas out there that have fucking dragons and devils, which will wreck you. And soon enough, hours and hours later, you're not even using the inn because you're using Lloyd's Beacon, and you're flying everywhere. So it feels much more like a progressive sort of adventure. This is something that Morrowind also does well. It also makes for better replayability because after you finish the game and are familiar with it, then you want to challenge yourself with new builds, or just use some of the skills/spells you only learned about near the end and test out how they work during an actual playthrough.

>>4826450
>Morrowind
Wealth beyond measure, outlander.

>>4826460
Someone's watching me...I can tell

Anyone know where I can get a copy of the Loki HoMM3 linux port?

>>4826575
nvm found a torrent

>>4825916
>If the facts don't fit into my projection, then they don't matter
>If it's not in google, then it doesn't matter
You must be fun at parties.
The actual PvP scene doesn't exist since late 00s, early 10s. What tries to pretend to be PvP scene is entirely made out of "younger brother" generation. Including that video with Champion of Poland clearing Conservatory - fucking '91. So he barely even qualifies for "younger brother" generation.

>>4826014
Holba. As you might notice, it wasn't particulary expensive tournament (sign-up was a price of a single bottle)

>>4826615
It's extremely difficult to infer that the tournament you're talking about actually had any players worth their salt if nobody heard about this tournament. The Polish championship you are deriding was broadcasted in various places and players from across the country were participating in the eliminations.

For what it's worth you guys might have simply decided to get drunk and play a hot seat together. A remote tournament in Racibórz that nobody heard about really has no worthwhile credentials.

I also bet the younger brother generation would mop the floor with you.

>>4825916
Not him, but just this year there have been four local tournaments organised in my area (Upper Silesia) and all of them were on vanilla SoD.
So when there is a handful of tournaments here, another one in Racibórz, and I'm going to bet a dozen or so in other places so far, how does that exactly compare with the "national tournament" that nobody really cares about (just like for every other tournamentm really) using HotA?
That's literally one event vs what is actual, real mainstream. No matter how hard you are going to pretend otherwise, nobody really cares about your Russian potato mod nor considers it in any way better (not to mention superior or "future of the game"). Aside maybe kwejk, but they don't matter either

>SoD tournament
>tons of custom rules, some content is banned by default

>HotA tournament
>minimal custom rules (no 121 red rush and no hopping over border guard on Jebus), no content banned by default

>>4822284
Monere is literally the best Conflux hero, unless you want to cheese things with Luna, Brissa and Ciele. But without any gimmicks in the equation, he is by far the best Conflux' hero overally: good starting skills, nice skill progression and his bonus makes already powerful magic elementals even stronger.

>>4827391
How exactly Ciele's bonus is added? It's just 50% increase of the final damage (good) or 50% to any part of the damage equation (sucks)?

>>4827391
>Brissa cheese
How is starting with Haste cheese?

>>4827413
>How making Sprites, Storm and Ice Elementals faster by 8 points is cheese in a faction that by default has first move?
Here, ftfy. Oh look, it's now a rhetorical question!

>>4827374
>Racibórz
Well that explains a lot.

>>4827374
>"national tournament" that nobody really cares about (just like for every other tournamentm really) using HotA?
The 50k viewers from all across the community beg to differ. This shit was watched even by our friends from beyond the Bug.
>That's literally one event vs what is actual, real mainstream
All the streamers on Twitch that don't play SoD anymore beg to differ. All the actual people who provide content for the community beg to differ. Jaskinia Behemota was in charge of this tournament, which *is* the mainstream website for this tournament. Even if Veggie is a humongous faggot, he has 30k YouTube subscribers and he *was* at the event solely for the purpose of making it more accessible to normies.
The only SoD players I know that still remain are Jelen117, and they're still the minority. What is broadcasted out there, what is actually played, is HotA. And why wouldn't it? HotA actually has a lobby function. SoD *used* to outside of Gameranger, but now you have to pay for it.
Once again, you and your friends from Wroclaw getting together for beer wages and racing to Capitol on Crimson and Clover aren't really a good representation of what is mainstream, since nobody even hears or knows about those tournaments if they're not sitting in some Friends-and-Relations of Rabbit circle.
And I wouldn't even be this assblasted about this if the guy wasn't like "hurrdurr only US OLDFAGS have real tournaments, that babyfaced guy probably can't tell a Magog from a Mage lmao". Even the retired maretti0 in the peak of his performance would be having a hard time against this "younger brother generation" you so despise because the metagame has evolved greatly.

>>4827476
>mainstream website for this tournament
mainstream website for this community*

>>4827476
>50k viewers
On Twitch it peaked at 5k.

>>4827667
There was a concurrent YT stream.
Nevertheless, however many "k" it was, it was still more people than on the epic Racibórz tournament.
Anyhow I don't have time for this anymore, I'm off to set off my own tournament in Reda. Winner gets a bottle of Ćerny Kozel from Biedronka. We ban Sandro because he's OP.

>>4827476
>metagame has evolved greatly

heroes is the same since forever except for mods (which makes them some heroes' game not worth arguing over), it is fully and well understood, what metagame are you talking about?

>>4826417
WHAT

Just came home to see a written list of the ranges for each stack. She has a ways to go but I'm overjoyed my gf has picked up my favorite game

>>4828239
>heroes is the same since forever except for mods (which makes them some heroes' game not worth arguing over)
People didn't know how to play Stronghold until maretti0 came over and people thought Fortress was garbage until people found out it wasn't when you open Drakon/Wystan/Bron and farm Dragonfly Hives for ridiculous value.
Luna was discovered only a few years ago and wasn't there "from the start" because people always preferred might starters.
Different templates are being played including constant refinements to the most popular ones like Jebus and Balance
Even within SoD people constantly find new ways to improve themselves and play the game better.
If you read the ToH forums for example people used to have extremely differing ideas on how to play, say, Tower years ago, because Tower was always hard to play.
The game is constantly thriving. Even that guy I told you about (Jelen117), who actually does stick with SoD still evolves his playstyle, because people play the game and they get new ideas.
HotA doesn't change enough to completely challenge any of that. Even on SoD people are still learning.
I'm sorry, Zbigniew, I know that when you sit for 3 weeks on your Capitol nothing is happening. Go to a HoMM2 alchemist lab to remove that cursed Stick Up Your Ass. But please, if you're going to shitpost about your favourite game, give it some more credit.

>>4828418
>Go to a HoMM2 alchemist lab to remove that cursed Stick Up Your Ass
kek

>That butthurt Pollack who thinks his country, tournaments or HotA matter

I have started making maps (mostly so I don't have to play Jebus all the time), anyone want to give them a try?

http://www.mediafire.com/file/svnrua5o1gnnldp/Under+the+Spell.h3m

http://www.mediafire.com/file/qmywdk9dwantco2/Yowler+Must+Die.h3m

Just simple skirmish maps in the spirit of Divided Loyalties and All for One. Nothing too fancy. Let me know if they're broken or anything.

>>4829191
Noic, I'll test them out next weekend when I'm off work. Good to see people here still putting in work.

It's time to play HOMM7!

>>4829426

>>4829426

>>4828797
REKT

>>4829426
I literally didn't even know there was a 7th one

>>4829643
Well its supposedly better than VI, then again it's not exactly a bar set very high

>>4829191
Under the Spell is fun. Good job making it feel balanced for all 3 players. Maybe the underground path between blue and tan could be a bit longer and/or have a lv.5 guard in the middle to prevent week 2 day 1 rush.

Yowler Must Die is not as good imo. I like its concept but it is too easy to get to the enemy's main castle without feeling the need to capture any other town. I think a 4 players version would work better.

Both feel very professional. They are balanced without looking too symmetrical. If you ever make more post them here.
And stop making every single town have the town hall built right from the start.

>>4829643
This.
5 already thrown me away, then I've learned 6 was made and it was shit and I've lost any interest in the series.

>>4829749
Guess it's kind like Settlers series then. Settlers 1-4 are eternal classics. Then 5th game happend, then there was 6th one... and everyone lost any interest in the series, while supposedly the 7th game is pretty good.
Can't tell, because 4th was the last one I've played.

>>4827476
Matagame didn't moved an inch for past... How old Tribute to strategists is? 10 years? 11? That was the moment when the meta-game was set in stone, after being already well-established for prior 4-5 years. And it didn't evolve at all ever since, because there is nothing to evolve.

>>4812193
>Monday tmr

>>4812363
Wizards are great. My dad liked warlock castle

>>4830732
>And it didn't evolve at all ever since, because there is nothing to evolve.
You completely ignored any and all examples to the contrary that I had already written here >>4828418 - didn't you?

How do I make it so that clicking 'restart scenario' on a random map also regenerates the map? Is it a multiplayer feature only?

Also how can I see how many movement points moving to a certain square will take? (HotA + HD mod)

>starting as Dungeon, picking Gunnar as starter
>mfw Lorelei day 1 in tavern

Let's rejoice, ubikikes didn't do any shit with this franchise on E3.

>>4832112
neat, I like fast Harpy Hags openings.

>>4832409
Wonder what the hopes are of them selling the IP to an actually competent studio instead of just sitting on it

>>4833327
Probably veeeeeery slim, but I am fine with them leaving it to collect dust if it means something similar to the E3 C&C shitshow won't happen.

>>4831106

Yeah, wizards are great but they gain more knowledge than power. Getting spell power is pretty crucial in H2, as you can take large groups of monsters by spamming lightning bolt or cold ray. If you can find an artifact that increases your elemental damage by 50%, you're good. Castle building doesn't really work as good as it does in Heroes 3. Warlocks are great heroes for the lategame. The only thing that bothered me was their chance to get necromancy as a skill.

Now, an important question: Favorite portrait in H2?

>>4831495
>Here are the examples based on shit everyone and their dog was doing since early-mid 00s
>This somehow contradicts the fact the metagame didn't move by an inch since then
You aren't the smartest person, are you? Or simply started playing HoMM3 quite recently, as in - this decade?
Also, if you are bringing HotA to the equation, you are making your own arguments invalid. Not to mention all that mod does is slight change of stats and everything else remains the same. If you want to talk about mods that change/challenge meta, at least bring WoG, which puts the game on its head with the amount of changes it can provide.

>>4832096
You just generate new map from menu

>>4832107
You can't.
The game never displays this info and unless you are using WoG, there is no option to display your movement points. You can count your total movement points and cost of each move if you know the mechanics for it, but other than that, not even mods display it (WoG has option for displaying your current movement points)

>>4833423
>Getting spell power is pretty crucial in HoMM games
Here, ftfy

Other than this, agreed on everything else

>>4831495
It's truly ironic how you want others to remove sticks from their asses, but are the only butthurt person in the entire thread.

>>4833431
>You aren't the smartest person, are you? Or simply started playing HoMM3 quite recently, as in - this decade?
If you had actually played online, you'd know that people constantly find new refinements to their playstyles and on how to play the game. I actually bothered to name the phenomena that changed from the start of the game's inception. Even the old HoMM3 Tactics thread in HeroesCommunity is full of great, but still somewhat outdated, info as we have simply found new and better ways to do things.
And no, I *explicitly* decided to put the ball on your side of the field by stating that people playing SoD constantly keep getting better and finding new ways to dismantle stuff. As great as old ToH players and revolutionaries like maretti0 were, without practice they'd be unable to win against the best players of today, because they simply refined their techniques and got better. The understanding on how to play underplayed towns has improved over the years.
Of course, if we *do* bring HotA into the equation, then HotA completely shakes up the game on many fundamental levels, if only through some refinements to stuff like balancing out level 2 heroes and giving a whole bunch of new neutral objects to get new units from.
You keep dismissing everything I said as if it happened "forever ago" because you yourself probably weren't around to witness any of the evolution.

>>4833496
I guess >>4833474 is right

>>4833685
>guy says HotA isn't worth playing on flimsy arguments and is projecting it's only played by faggots from the "young generation" that only recently bandwagoned on the super highly popular esport that is HoMM3 (lmao)
>say why he's wrong
>another anon poses as this super oldfag who plays super high profile tournaments for oldfags where they're totally more skilled than everyone else
>point out why this makes no sense
>more (or the same?) people proceed to shit up the thread as to how HoMM3 is stale and not worth playing
>most of those people refuse to acknowledge I've stopped even talking about HotA itself and primarily mentioned SoD
>provide constant examples to the contrary
>"lol you must be butthurt"
You're calling me butthurt over the fag who plays HoMM in Literallywho in Gmina Chujwiegdzie and considers it to be the pinnacle of gameplay and calls everything else "not muh heroes".
In which case I don't know what to tell you, I just think this game is deep and rich enough to warrant some quality conversation over and actually acknowledging that people in 2018 play differently than people in 2008.

>newfren who subscribe to youtubers and extrapolates from twitch what it was like to play heroes almost 20 years ago

>>4833827
20 years ago it was all about Red week 1 rush and hiring infinite heroes from tavern

and of course people who were still figuring out how to conquer Steadwick :^)

no but seriously
why does it even matter for you if someone started "a long time ago" or "just recently"
if someone is bringing results and winning and carving out how the game is played, they can do that regardless of whether they bought RoE on release or not
you have no leg to stand on other than "i'm an oldfag"

>That one Pollack who is still ass-blasted and shits up the thread with his drama

>>4833881
at this point it's three Polacks, at least one from Racibórz
but I concede your point
I won't speak of this matter anymore

>>4833909
YOU are the guy shitting up the thread.
Nobody gives a fuck about what you have to say and this is fucking ANONYMOUS imageboard. Normal person would get the fuck out long time ago

>>4833435
>You can't.
>The game never displays this info and unless you are using WoG, there is no option to display your movement points.

>trump_wrong.mp3
See here, Lech did it at the Polish Champs:
https://youtu.be/FVtP0xeQsGs?t=17313

The question is: how?

>>4833976
HD mod.

poland we hate

>>4834416
What button to do it?

>>4802126
What gud my niggas?

>>4835153
Nice Warframe art. New WoG town?

>>4827413
>>4827415
I just picked her as a kid because I thought she was cute.

>>4825430
>half-dead campaign

>>4829426
No, it's time to play HoMM 6!

I've been thinking about playing HoMM4 again. Which of the 5 magic types are the most useful in terms of the spell utility and the secondary skill?
Back when I played I always gave my main heroes combat, tactics, 2 magic types and then the last one was whatever I felt like or whatever they had from start.

How do I play tower? Just chain lightning shit with Solomyr?

>>4835548
Master gremlins and stacks of single genies for buffs and 1 mage for reduced spell cost.

>>4835548
Tower is difficult. if the map is superduperultra rich, you can go Giants Week 1, which is super-powerful for stockpiling them to upg later, but you can't upgrade Master Gremlins to fit the Cloud Temple in, and that sucks ass.

Personally my standard cookie cutter Tower build is either Upg. Workshop day 1 or Mage Guild day 1, and then try my best to get Nagas + Castle or at least Nagas + Citadel by the end of week 1. 5-6 Nagas are a really powerful force on the map. You can often delay your Mage Guild because chances are you will start with a Scholar hero.
Also, I tend to ditch the Tower selection of heroes (Solmyr is great for clearing stuff like tough packs of archers without losses, but his growth curve is nothing to write home about; Aine is nice on 200% but not a great main hero; Neela has Armorer specialty, which is awesome, but a pretty bad primary stat distribution) and try to pick a high attack hero class like Barbarian or Overlord, or Orrin, ofc. This is because for creeping early on you rely on Master Gremlins or Nagas, and those two are all about killing things before they have a chance to strike you, which means you want to pile up on burst damage as much as possible. High Attack will also help those full shooter armies you're going to be packing later. I honestly would pick even a vanilla Barbarian with a dead specialty like Krellion, or even a subpar secondary skill like Shiva, before I'd settle on a Tower main. So yeah, scour the tavern.
Also, be prepared for Utopias to be really painful as your army is really slow, so most of the time you can't get a first strike and your low level units get raped. Ideally, unless you already lost so many Gremlins that there's no point in trying to make them work anymore, leave your Gremlins at home before taking on Utopia. Sacrifice Gargs and Golems instead.

>>4835687
>You can often delay your Mage Guild because chances are you will start with a Scholar hero.

explain

>>4835853
Five of the tower Heroes (including the fairly desirable starters Neela and Aine) start with Scholar, so often you can afford to upgrade MGs in week 1 and have the hero who's already on the road learn spells through Scholar.

>>4825430
>>4835475
I kinda liked the "main" campaign. It was basically a glorified tutorial, including mission where you had "hero army", but it was still a nice thing overall

>>4835548
Pick Neela.
Then act as if it was Fortress with lots of shooters.

>>4835687
>leave your Gremlins at home
You want to be leaving them at your secondary hero or guarding a nearby mine (if HotA), leaving at home town is least preferable. Good post nonetheless.

>>4830335
Thanks for checking them out anon. I'm glad that Under the Spell works for you. Yowler needs a revamp of the underground passage connecting the starting areas I think, or like you suggested a four player version with one in each corner and the neutral towns in the middle.

I'll probably make a couple more over the summer. Will post them here then.

>>4835548
somehow obtain titans and shit on everything

>>4835505
Spell utility is Order>Life>Everything Else
Necromancer GM is OP just like in any other HoMM game.

I see you M&M anons.

>>4835687
Upgraded Workshop day 1 is the only real way to play Tower. Gremlins might deal anemic damage, but at least you have shooters. Otherwise things look grim more often than not.
And why not Fafner? He suffers from the same issues as Neela, but that +1 to Naga speed really makes a difference. Still, if I only could, I would go straight for Orrin. With a faction packing three shooters, he's the best option imaginable.

>>4837429
Ugly thot. Another thing that makes MM7 the best MM of all time is the fact that it doesn't have 3DPD thots.

>>4836835
>Life

iirc there is a bs spell that makes your troops invulnerable

>>4835230
Its Natural Selection 2 f a m
I wish it was a town. How is SUCC coming?

>>4835505
The schools in IV look like they were based on the magic colours in MtG and not in a good way, because Order is so much better than the others, it's like the devs decided that Spells That Win The Game should be a separate school of magic. Its bonus skill is okay but not really worth the points.
Death has a few decent spells, and then it has Vampiric Touch, which is fucking insane in a game that doesn't have a Resurrection spell for your heroes to cast, and makes you wonder why Life Magic even exists. Its accompanying skill, Necromancy, is completely ridiculous and makes the Cloak in III look like the fucking stoic watchman. Strongest Necromancy in the series by an order of magnitude and by far the main reason to pick up Death Magic. Also, depending on which version of the game you're playing, Hypnotize makes enemy units a valid target for Sacrifice, which is precisely as broken as it sounds and makes the Shadow Mage the God-Lord of all He beholds.
Chaos is crazy awesome in the early game and makes your hero the strongest unit in your army. It runs out of steam in really long games, but it takes a while for that to happen, and even then it has crap like Cloud of Confusion and Mass Misfortune to keep it afloat. The bonus skill is obviously useful for any Chaos user once you've maxed out the main skills.
Nature is a bit like Chaos in the way it gives you the ability to do damage in a way that isn't beholden to the calender, and in the way that it can't meaningfully harm the enemy once 7 Phoenixes stops being a relevant force. But also like Chaos it has a bunch of other spells that keep it in the game, and in the Life campaign, where all summoning spells are banned, it's still better than Life magic. It's bonus skill is, however, the absolute worst in the game and isn't worth any points at all.
Cont.

>>4838334
Life magic is the school of also-rans and I honestly don't know where they were going with this shit. It's nominally supposed to be the buff school, but most of its buffs just sort of fall short of stuff like Mass Fortune, Mass First Strike, Dragon Strength, Cat Reflexes, Vampiric Touch etc. and you're completely at the mercy of the RNG to get the Mass Ward you need for the enemy you're fighting. It does have a few spells like Mass Bless, Song of Peace, and Martyr that can be gotten with a relatively low skill investment and can kinda justify taking the skill, but mostly I just don't see the point compared to what those six skills points could have gotten you instead. The Resurrection bonus skill is kind of so-so, in an ideal situation it wouldn't actually help you at all, and even when it does pay off, you're still taking unacceptably huge losses. It's a pretty big step down from III Blind+Rez spam, although I guess that's what the devs were going for; it's just odd that they chose to create Vampiric Touch then, and on top of that also include the Order Magic BS you need to replicate a circuitous rez chain.

mm3 or mm7 for playing on a laptop while traveling
already played mm6

>>4838389
Both should work although I would lean toward MM3 because everything is forced to be turn based, and can be played without a mouse (also remember to set the delay to 1 in the tab menu, the default 5 is idiotic). The flight (Insert/Home/Page Up) and camera view (Delete/End/Page Down) commands for MM6-8 can also be hard to find/reach on a non-standard keyboard and don't really make sense.

>>4835505
The disparity between Order and every other magic is just insane. There is hardly any point trying anything else. Illusionist and Battle Mage class bonus makes it even more OP.

From all Might skills, Tactics are just as OP when compared with everything else.

>>4839303
Oh, and there is also Enhanter bonus, which is harder to get than Illusionist, but twice as good.

>>4837497
>Upgraded Workshop day 1 is the only real way to play Tower.
Sometimes Mage Guild Day 1 is the right play, mostly if you're playing Jebus, found an amazing hero who's much better than your starter, but he needs to have a spellbook bought.
I also have seen firsthand some amazing displays by absolutely top-shelf Tower players who broke creature banks with just regular Gremlins by impeccable positioning. It's really hard to play, though, as Gremlins are nowhere near as fast as Imps or Centaurs, and not nearly as sturdy as Gnolls or Pikemen, and can't come from a level 1 specialist.
Most regular Tower mortals should just pick Workshop Day 1, sure. It's never a really bad choice. It's only if you know you can take the Week 1 Giants gamble that you should try and bite the bullet, because the dividends might be great, Tower's full army is scary as fuck.
I suppose Fafner is an alright starter as well, I mostly just pick a Wizard starter when I'm playing Tower because my pre-game plan most of the time assumes that I'd not want a main hero native to Tower. Still, Fafner works in a pinch. I used to experiment with Torosar and baiting things to hit the Ballista, esp. since the dude has Tactics, Torosar's problem is that without an early +Attack weapon his ballista hits like shit and he doesn't actually start with Artillery.

>>4835687
I don't really think Tower is difficult. The entire "difficulty" comes from how expensive certain buildings are, but that's literally it. People keep crying about "bad" hero selection, but they are nowhere near as bad as everyone makes it. Sure, most of them have Scholar, but it could be worse. Units are pretty potent, comes with three shooters, has extra spells at lower mana intake... so unless you are playing on small map, there are no issues whatsoever.

Map-maker autist here with another concept map - this time I'd been trying to create one for Dungeon (at the request of one anon from the previous thread). I like how it turned out but, frankly, I work too slow (due to being needlessly OCD about it) and have too little time to create a full-fledged 72x72 campaign/competitive map. I do hope, however, some of you may decide to use these concepts and actually make something playable. Here's the link to the .7z file containing the Dungeon as well as the previously posted Tower, Castle, Necropolis and Stronghold concept maps.
>https://www89.zippyshare.com/v/9HcyELYD/file.html
[Note: These are maps made in HotA map editor so I apologize for not making the SoD equivalent]

>>4829191
>I have started making maps
Both look really nice! Have you thought about sending them to the HotA team? No idea if they'd pay for your work but I reckon they would be grateful for having even more well-made competitive maps that the Heroes community can enjoy.

>>4839451
>I don't really think Tower is difficult.
It has probably the worst growth curve of all towns, which means it struggles in the first weeks, and first weeks often define how well you do later, so it's probably the hardest of all the towns to develop.

>>4840375
Which brings us back to the fact the whole difficulty boils down to how expensive it is.

>>4840394
That's already quite a big difficulty issue, but it's not even about that. The build tree is kinda annoying and even on very rich maps you can't have Giants Week 1 without also hampering your early game; strict build trees *are* at disadvantage or people wouldn't be hyping up day 1 rocs day 2 behemoths as much. Your units are slow and easy to kill in banks due to that factor. Heroes get poor stat gains and the best one is just a watered down Mephala/Tazar. The bad skill selection also pertains to the skills you're offered at level up. Giants are underwhelming level 7 units and you really don't want to lose them in order to maxmize the Titan prize, but Giants aren't very self-sufficient as they don't fly, are on the slower side, and don't have utility like 2 hex attack, so they are likely to get pincushioned and outmaneuvered compared to stuff like dragons while not being that impressive a beatstick until the upgrade.

Compare to stuff like Rampart where you just get Elves and you just take a full crypt with 0 losses and it's gg. Or the counterpart "expensive but strong" towns like Dungeon, which has a plethora of amazing heroes, great starters like Shakti, and a more flexible set of units for creeping.

>>4839884
this one feels too symmetrical and ordered to be a good-looking cavern system
if it were more natural looking it would look way nicer
the individual rooms look great, though

when is SUCC wars?

>>4808276
A bad game that tried to cash in on the homm fanbase.

>>4833423
>Favorite portrait in H2?
Carlawn is pretty good, but I think my favourite is Charity.
Kalindra is up there.

Carlawn has one of those portraits that are very different in different screens right? Like she shows her teeth in one?

>>4840817

>>4839884
>those mushroom decorations next to the mushroom seer
This pleases my autism.

>>4840640
>this one feels too symmetrical and ordered to be a good-looking cavern system
I don't know, I think it can make sense that sapient species have made it a bit more uniform while digging out tunnels by the natural caverns

>>4833423
Patrician's choice coming through

>>4840962
I always found it hilarious that a goblin in plate armor is a hero of entirely human faction.

Should I get King's Bounty: Crossworlds GOTY? It's on sale on GOG

>>4840640
>this one feels too symmetrical and ordered to be a good-looking cavern system
Yeah, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to make the cavern system look natural while still trying to fit every dwelling and resource generator (aside from sawmill, since trees can't grow underground) in a 50x27 grid (Map Editor screen dimensions). The original iteration had a underground river running across the map with all those interactive objects being just next to it. I also wanted to include a Dragon Utopia but wasn't sure how I'd connect it with the river. Eventually I decided on creating a central cavern and connecting it to the four separate caverns through artificial symmetrical tunnels (most likely created by Troglodytes) - basically what anon here said (>>4840958).

>the individual rooms look great, though
That's nice to hear! What room is your favorite?

>>4840952
>This pleases my autism.
Oh man, if you want to talk about autism, I spent a week or so just making the canyon in my Stronghold map. I would probably need half a year to make a playable 108x108 grid map with the same amount of detail.

>>4833423

>>4841159
Don't. It's Russian. It's like paying for HotA.

>>4841192
BTW, here's the animation loop of the image for anyone interested.

>>4841192
BTW, here's the animation loop of the image for anyone interested.

>>4839303
>>4838334
>>4836835
Thanks for the great advices guys.
I like the bit with vampiric touch and hypnotize + sacrifice, hope that still works in the H4 version I got from the pastebin. I'll try order + death then. Otherwise I'll probably do order + nature.

>>4841159
>Guys, guys, should I spend my pocket money on this or not?
I've got a better advice - grow the fuck up. Because if you need to know if you should spend or not 3 euro on something, you either are underage or never matured past being 10

>>4841263
Generally speaking, the main issue with Order is that all the already powerful spells from HoMM3 got their downsides removed.
Illusion works like Clone, but clones have regular HP rather than being one-hit unit. Hypnotize works on pretty much anything, so you can open the combat with taking over tier 4 stack and fuck up enemy lineup completely.
Order also has Town Gate, Teleport and fucking Mass Precision. Combined with few bits of Nature and/or Life and you can can outspell everyone, to really unfunny degree

>>4841292
*Mass Slow
But Mass Precision is also nice.

>>4841151
Technically he's a half-orc. Tyro the Knight is one, too.
Both come from M&M3 and World of Xeen respectively.

>>4841192
>favorite
definitely the upper-left one

>>4841159
It's not good, play heroes 6

>>4841159
no
go back playing Homm3 and replay all 3 of the campaigns if you have or have not complete them

Which game is your favorite?

>>4841159
I'm assuming you know what king's bounty is? Despite the similarities KB is still rather different from Homm and if you like the idea of a massive single player Homm map then do it.

>download H3 alternate portraits
>Kyrre is a grill
What the fuck

>>4841896

Heroes of Might and Magic III = Might and Magic VII >>> Disciples II > Might and Magic VI > Heroes of Might and Magic V > Heroes of Might and Magic IV = Might and Magic VIII >>> nU-bisoft games

Haven't played the rest.

>>4841991
I can hardly tell who is who on that portrait pack, and most of those are ripoffs from stuff like WoW. Who is supposed to be the Gnome Warlock at HPL032AL? Without the prompt that Lord Haart is Lord Haart I wouldn't have a clue.

>>4841991
Heroes.hlp -> section 3 -> individual heroes -> Kyrre -> "Female elf". Or map editor -> heroes -> Kyrre -> "Gender: female".
>>4841292
> all the already powerful spells from HoMM3 got their downsides removed
The most powerful spells H3 spells (with relevant expert magic) are Town Portal, Dimension Door, Mass slow, Mass haste, Resurrection, View Air, Flight, (Mass) Berserk. The only thing from the list in Order magic is Mass slow (and it's level 4, not 1). Town Gate teleports only hero alone, not army, and doesn't allow to select a city. Mass haste is Nature. DD, resurrection (as a hero spell), mass berserk aren't present in H4. Clone gives you whole stack, but without hp, illusion has real hp, but number of units cloned is limited. Blind is 3 turns only and level 4 in H4. Hypno is excellent in H4, but i can't call it "powerful spell from H3", in H3 it's useless.
>>4840812
M&M series appeared before HoM&M series.

>>4843092
>M&M series appeared before HoM&M series.
Yes, but the initial post homm mm games took place in the world created in homm to cash in on that fanbase

>>4841896
homm2, it is less balanced but twice as charming as the rest

>>4841997
>Heroes of Might and Magic III = Might and Magic VII
Please tell me this is a bait

>>4841997
>>4843495
Never mind, my mind read "M&M VII" as "HoMM VII", sorry, my bad

>>4841896
Depends on the goal, really
>Single player random map
HoMM3. Part of the reason why the game is so popular and long-lived is the great map generator.
>Multi-player random map
HoMM3 + WoG for the few tweaks in map generation it allows. WoG by itself is shit-tier mod, but the fact it can affects the procedure of map generating is great, while all the shit options (so 99% of them) can be turned off.
>Campaigns
HoMM4. It sets the bar so fucking high, the series will probably never exceed it, especially not under Ubishit. SoD is very close to it.
>Aesthetics
I really wish HoMM2 and 3 had a baby, but oh well... 3 then.
>Music
HoMM4 >= HoMM3
>Guilty pleasure
HoMM1

>>4841991
>He didn't know
I mean... how?
Also, most of those portraits are shit tier and I have hard time guessing who is who.

>>4843092
>Let's pretend Illusion isn't broken in HoMM4: The Post

>>4842054
>>4843520
Here, grab a comparison table.
It's fucking horrible

>>4843092
>Hypno is excellent in H4, but i can't call it "powerful spell from H3", in H3 it's useles
I can't agree with either of you.
On one hand, you are right, Hypno isn't all that great in HoMM3. On the other, you are much more likely to get Air than Fire Magic when it comes to utility, so Hypno is going to be your poor man's substitute for Expert level Berserk.

>>4843529
Expert berserk affects many units at once and always works (unless unit is immune or resistance). Hypno is 1 unit only and stack must have less hp that damage of lightning bolt, you can't cast it on main serious stacks. Using it against weakest neutrals is a waste of mana.

>>4843554
That's why I've called it poor man's substitute of Berserk, you know....
>Using it against weakest neutrals is a waste of mana
Aside of course casting it on mid-tier, high-HP units. Or just mid-tier units and completely disrupt enemy ranks this way. It's not as good as Berserk, but it's good enough.

>>4843525
Top kek Galthran turned into Batman

Daily reminder.

>>4843525
>Top 7th from the left corner
"This is jimmy"

>>4843660
get your eyes checked seriously

>>4843525
All of these are shit

>>4843718
>>4843660
it looks way more like SC2 jimmy

>>4843751
Not shit sherlock i posted it only because sc 1 jimmy > sc 2 jimmy

>>4843525
Bout... dozen of them or so is good. Rest is fucking awful.
But what really annoys me is that those are just images selected from other sources. Not a single original thing, just copy-paste from other images.

>>4843092
>>4843529
You could probably use hypno in H3 with decent reliability to open drawbridge for your walkers.
And what about units that have abilities? Can you use their abilities for your benefit, like enemy archangel resurrecting your troops or enemy cyclopes assaulting their own walls?

>>4843525

>>4843918
>picking some fucking zombie over based isra
Explain yourself.

>>4843992
Mummy. If I'm correct, that's a fan-art for Warhammer Fantasy.
And I never said I would pick it over. I just point out that's a good one. The only ones that I would pick over are Mutare and Mutare Drake.

>>4843918
Grindan is S M U G G

>>4843884
> You could probably use hypno in H3 with decent reliability to open drawbridge for your walkers
You can't. Drawbridge doesn't open for hypnotized creatures.
> Can you use their abilities for your benefit, like enemy archangel resurrecting your troops or enemy cyclopes assaulting their own walls?
Yes, you can.

>>4844127
>You can't. Drawbridge doesn't open for hypnotized creatures.
Ah well, that's a shame. Could have been a fun use for the spell. That pretty much leaves it only for taking over small stacks of genies, cyclopes, ogres and enchanters, since their abilities are independent on the size of the stack. Although another way you could use it is for blocking enemy shooters with their own allies.

>>4844440
I think blocking the shooters with hypno stack doesn't work either, that shit is just useless

>>4844440
But allies don't block shooters.

Hypno is good for 'blinding' trogs before going into resurrection mode, but that's about the only mileage I've ever gotten out of it.

Hypnotize can also be used like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjsRL4qDQ6Y
Leave it to mapmakers to implement a borderline useless spell into a puzzle.

>>4843092
>>4841991
Actually, anons, both of you have reason. Kyrre was a male in Heroes IV, and a female in Heroes III.

>>4845349
Kyrre looked like a tranny in Heroes III so it is safe to assume that he just stopped pretending to be a "girl" in Heroes IV

>>4844797
>>4844918
Yeah well, fuck that spell then.

would anyone be kind enough to give a very brief description of the main difference in terms of gameplay between the MM and Ultima games

>>4841159
Crossworlds is shit. Just stick to the legend and armored princess

>>4843525
>nimus is a grill
>even looks like one
>use an obviously male picture
Whoever did that was an idiot

im playing mm7 and i just got all my party grandmaster in blastere. how mant skillpoints should i put into it before it has diminishing returns?

also fuck anyone that doesnt like the sci-fi elements at the end of vii. liches with ray blasters bitch

>>4845717
Every M&M game has sci-fi elements, "Advanced societies regressing to feudalism" is the backbone of the entire setting. Hell, you could tell me the buildings in Heroes were actually cloning facilities and I would believe you.

>>4845740
Nah, they are normal buildings. According to some fluff from Heroes I manual, when you build a certain building in your town, creatures just start rolling in.

>>4845657
>Nimus
Who?

>>4845717
I think it all boils down to Forge. It was a really ill-concieved faction. Not because it didn't fit the setting, but because it had just silly design.

>>4845873
The scrapped and resurrected Forge with doesn't accurately describe the kind of sci-fi that would've been in HoMM, if the game had been a direct continuation of MM except 3rd person, tile-based etc. it would've be much more tied in with all the lore. Pretty sure the problem was people just liking the standard high fantasy setting over sci-fi, not that it's my problem, I barely ever care about the fluff in any game anyway.

>>4846006
The Forge was just "too sci-fi", while also cartoonishly and awfully designed to pretty much everyone taste. Even people who didn't mind sci-fi bits were put off by the poor design.
If Forge was done properly, it would be in the game. Instead, it had the same issue as HoMM4 - too radical change cokmbined with "ugly" design.

>>4845717
>ywn be a laughing skeleton shooting people with a ray gun

>>4845717
>>4846235

>>4846068
Yeah, pretty much. I like the 1970-1980s sci-fiesque fantasy settings, but buzzsaw zombies? Hobo jeptack rocket orges? Bumfuck barbarian orcs with lazer guns? Could've at least given them cool vaguely medieval uniforms, with a dash of bond villain henchmen feel to them.

>had three weeks off so far
>two more to go
>slavniggers still haven't released the Succ
I'm beyond mad.

>>4839884
God this is beautiful, troglodyte/seer's hut portion is just so pleasing. Also what is that woodcutter's shack in the middle?

>>4846512
god i wish that were me

>>4846810
>God this is beautiful
I'm really happy you like it so much! I've been playing around with the Map Editor for a decade now (although I would rarely complete the maps I'd started making).
>troglodyte/seer's hut portion is just so pleasing
I originally preferred the medusa/harpy cave over that one, but now I feel that the latter is just more comfy thanks to how mushroom decorations flow into each other.
>Also what is that woodcutter's shack in the middle?
It's a structure introduced in HotA that is called 'Warehouse of Wood' - it's a resource-producing structure similar to a Water Wheel or a Windmill where you can get a fixed amount of wood (+10) every week (in comparison, Sawmill produces 14 wood/week and you don't have to visit the structure). The reason I put that structure instead of the Sawmill is mostly due to logical consistency and overall aesthetics - trees can't grow in the underground, thus the city would have to procure wood from surface and transport it back to the city on a weekly basis. Also, from a gameplay standpoint, having less wood serves to nerf the faction that can eventually claim the Abandoned Mine and thus gain another random resource structure.

>>4845871
Demoness, specializes in whips, adv offense.
>>4845349
Who said they are the same hero and not just heroes with the same name?

>>4841997
4 > 3 = 6 > 2 > 5,7,1

>>4847731
You're barely a sapient person.

>>4847731
>3=6

>>4828274

>he didn't know

: ^)

>>4828274
Oh man, I remember the first time I accidentally upgraded my Cavaliers at the stables and retroactively realized how much money I had wasted on doing it manually. The game is imba as fuck though, so I'm honestly not surprised you've never learned of it unless you played it for more than several hundred hours.

>>4848942
Using Foundries and Hill forts can be incredibly useful in homm2 since money is a lot tighter.

>The game is imba as fuck though
So weird reading the short for imbalanced in that context.

>>4849021
>So weird reading the short for imbalanced in that context
Well, the game has a multiplayer component and pitting a Castle player with an access to stable against an Inferno player of the same skill level will undoubtedly result in the latter losing the match. That's why I used 'imba'.
That being said, the game is rather fun despite its balancing issues (Earth & Air Magic, Necromancy etc), and to this day it's still one of the comfiest single-player games I have ever played.

>>4847942
>>4848131
I listed them in order of my most to least played. I liked the game mechanics of 4 above those of all other ones, and i played 6 about as much as 3. 2 is above 5, 7 and 1 only because it was my first homm game so i played it until 3 came out, when i dropped it. The other 3 never got me interested.

>>4847603
Oh, you mean Nymus

>>4849021
I wish Hill forts weren't this super-rare object that barely spawns in random HoMM3 maps. Seriously, you can get 10 maps and not a single Hill fort.
But I remember from ages ago a high school-held tournament when one of the guys openly asked if everyone else wants to surrender now, because the map generated a Hill fort next to his starting town, guarded by imps. Half of people just walked out at that point.