If you can manoeuvre one unit to flank another there is a bonus to the attack, or if a unit is behind cover archers will do far less damage. Each army can only hold six individual units and this tends to keep the combat relatively fast paced, with a focus more on unit positioning and flanking than in a balance of unit stats. Here combat is not just a case of balancing the numbers and hoping your units come out on top, Age of Wonders 3 has a full turn-based combat system, with each side taking a turn to move their units in to position or to attack. While there is a diplomacy system I found that this was rarely an option in the main story campaigns where it made sense for the enemy to hate you and want to stop you, so I rarely used it. Looting a tomb, for instance, not only rewards that hero with loot but, if that tomb is also within your borders, provides an empire-wide resource boost, which again provides another incentive to explore the world and create outposts.Īs you spread out and expand your empire, clashes with enemies will become a regular occurrence. The only real difference here is the breadth of resource nodes and that, more often than not, they are inhabited by independent armies that your hero will have to chase off. There’s little to say about the mechanics here cities have a sphere of influence and take bonuses from resource nodes found on the map, working in a similar vein to Civilization and the Total War series. Like many other turn-based strategy games, empire building is very much about the balancing of resources and the building of cities. Eventually, you even gain the ability to terraform the world map, transforming swathes of your empire into lush fertile plains, or your enemy’s land into a volcanic wasteland. Research and magic play a big part in the expansion of your empire through research you unlock new class-specific unit types, such as the Shadow Stalker or the Land Tank, unlock empire-wide buffs and gain access to new spells. Triumph have really added something unique to the turn-based strategy genre with Age of Wonders 3, and have carved out an amazing little niche. I found that missions lasted a few hundred turns longer purely due to my need to explore the map and adventure. Where the game may have become somewhat stale after a while if all you were doing was roaming around conquering cities, this addition of RPG elements keeps the gameplay fresh, as you are always coming across random locations or cave systems which lead to underground lairs. You head to this location and find yourself battling giants or dragons for loot – the loot itself is a little random, though, and I did end up with one character riding a unicorn, sporting a harp and some lovely black high-heel boots. For example, as you move through the world you might happen to find a cartographer’s hut, which reveals an ancient tomb some distance from your hero. The world map, while mainly about taking over cities and matching the strength of your army to others, also contains a huge variety of tiles that are more about adventuring as a hero in a magical land. As you make strides through the game – and as the heroes gain experience – you start to unlock more advanced abilities, improving their stats and uniquely finding random loot items that give various stats buffs and abilities. Each hero has a class, and there are six in total, ranging from the classic magic-wielding Sorcerer to the tech-wielding Dreadnought. As you progress, other heroes join and become the leaders of your army units. This focus on heroes is what really sets this game apart from its peers. While it is a turn-based strategy there are a large number of RPG elements, as you level up your heroes, gaining new skills and abilities and discovering loot. The skirmish mode even allows you to create your own hero units and take them online. With the two campaigns there are also a number of additional game modes, such as the typical skirmish mode, a series of scenarios and an online multiplayer. Both sides of this story are open to the player, one campaign following the adventures of the young High Elf princess Sundren, while the other has you playing as the dour-faced Commonwealth commander Edward Portsmith. The main conflict in the game centres on the expansion of the Human lead Commonwealth and the resistance of the High Elf Court. Age of Wonders 3 is the sequel to Triumph Studios’ turn-based strategy series of the early 2000s and gives you the option to do both. If your foe sits atop his high stone walls and you don’t have any siege weapons, how do you get to him? Do you sit there while he calls your mother a hamster and farts in your general direction, or do you use your unicorn mount to phase through the walls and surprise him? I’m thinking the second option sounds better, or perhaps a dragon might do it.
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