Battle for Wesnoth

[KaiserJ]

yeah, i know im late on this one

anyone play it? got favourite strats / campaigns / units?

if you haven't, its a turn based strategy game on a hex map, with a fantasy theme. idk how much fun competitive play would be, but it ships with an assload of campaigns, and i've enjoyed the ones ive tried so far.

the music is pretty awesome.

its open sauce

[Auswaschbar]

Don't play that much, but I like to play elves, as the fighters / bowmen are good alrounders, and cheap.

Finished the first campaign, thought that was when wesnoth was in pre-1.0 version.

[Sindwiller]

Finished the first campaign, thought that was when wesnoth was in pre-1.0 version.

Me, too. It has gone a long way since that. Lots of new campaigns, lots of awesome graphics and music and lots of balancing. I still play it every now and then, just for fun :)

[Otherside]

to much luck involved so i stopped playing

[JohannesH]

Randomness doesnt mean less skill, think poker.

I played it a bit a year or 2 ago, mostly single player, as far as turnbased strategys go I think its good, maybe I'll pick it again someday.

[Umrug]

Devs said: from now on there will be no gameplay-altering changes, thats it. No new ideas, thanks.
Result: incredible for open-source game quality, clean, beautiful, translated into most living languages, several balanced races, many campains. LICKED INTO AWESOMENESS.

[pintle]

Shame that people still pretty much only play on Ishar's Cross, and 90% of the community are noobs.

I guess every online strategy game has to have it's Twilight Flame/Dsd/A Path Beyond/Ishar's Cross

Tbh I have only really found the luck element to be frustrating when my knight/lancer manages to miss all hits and then get dropped by a lowly gobbo or something similar. There is infinitely more frustration to be found in the player base than any of the game dynamics :)

[Gota]

Devs said: from now on there will be no gameplay-altering changes, thats it. No new ideas, thanks.
Result: incredible for open-source game quality, clean, beautiful, translated into most living languages, several balanced races, many campains. LICKED INTO AWESOMENESS.

That's what happens when the engine needs to support one game instead of a gazillion games.

[1v0ry_k1ng]

to instawin, spam goblins

[KaiserJ]

the luck aspect threw me at the start; i was a lot more used to TBS games like xcom where i had a lot more control over my units and what they did;

once i got into the swing of it though i was hooked. just started a few weeks ago, i've beaten a few short campaigns and now i'm trying the HttT campaign, seems like a lot of fun.

i haven't really had any really bad luck per se; but i've had really GOOD luck, in the form of an elvish fighter managing to take out 5 or 6 of those wolf riders and levelling just by sitting in a house and fighting defensively.

im liking the elves; mages are super potent also it seems.

err... i didn't really want to be looking too much at guides for the game as i like to discover things myself, but how do you get a level 5 unit? all of mine seem to max at level 3, maybe im not doinitrite... is there some rule im missing?

[JohannesH]

err... i didn't really want to be looking too much at guides for the game as i like to discover things myself, but how do you get a level 5 unit? all of mine seem to max at level 3, maybe im not doinitrite... is there some rule im missing?

Different units max out at different levels, most usually at 3. Maybe mages get up to lvl 5, or something else, cant remember.

[pintle]

Very few units go beyond lvl 3, you just get a bonus to max hp once a unit starts to level beyond its cap.

[Otherside]

luck can be to game deciding in Wesnoth especially since if you level up you regain full hp.

imagine a 1 hp elf fighter who needs just 1 exp to get to next level fighting an orc and the orc missing both his swings and the elf fighter leveling up now you got a level 2 Elf at full HP rather than a level 1 elf with 1 hp it totally throws the whole game off balance.

[pintle]

It's more a question of risk/reward though otherside. On very small maps, like Ishar's Cross, lucky levelling units can decide the game, definitely, but on larger maps, such as Clash, with many more units in play, it is very rarely the deciding factor.

As with all "dice roll" strategy, the philosophy is one of stacking the odds as greatly as possible in your favour, and then, well.. rolling the dice.

Plenty of people play WH40k competitively. I have lost count of the amount of games I have seen decided by a single to hit roll on a Fire Prism, or a Hammerhead rail gun, or the roll off on mind war.

[Gota]

Like poker,it's about the long run...a long series of games.
What about HON?
There is also a big element of luck in it.

[JohannesH]

Theres random elements outside of player control in *A mods too, like wind speed and radar dot positioning.

[Otherside]

Like poker,it's about the long run...a long series of games.
What about HON?
There is also a big element of luck in it.

Luck on HoN is hardly a factor even with percentage based skills like critting or procing. Even being super lucky with blacksmith wont decide a game :p.

[ChaosMonkey]

luck gets boring quick. its so much better when your proness is just baed on skill and not the amount of time youve wasted on it or luck. Good games involving skill are: halo, gunz, spring.

[Gota]

Isn't halo about trying to hit a target with a joystick?
Not a skill I'd want to posses

[pintle]

Lol you think Halo is a skill based shooter?

Try it with keyboard and mouse. Notice how nobody online uses keyboard and mouse. Go play CS:S/UT

Online multiplayer Wesnoth can potentially become a fluid, complex and engaging game, it just needs an adequate standard of play, and a good turn time limit.

People bitching about the luck element are very likely extremely inexeperienced, if they have even played the game at all. Factors like the day/night vs lawful/neutral/chaotic, and balancing "compush" vs recruiting more units, use of leader units, terrain modifiers, healers... there are so many variables which you have a fine degree of control over, it is absolutely not just wading in and hoping you win.

Without any luck element, there would be perfect builds for X faction vs Y, on Z map, massively diminishing the depth of the metagame.

/rant