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LAN 2018
Invitation to our Autumn LAN 2018 in Homberg (near Kassel)
2018-01-29 12:27:10| Écrit par myl_supporter
We will invite all AOW3 players to our LAN 2018 in Germany.
Beside AOW3 we will play CIV6 too, when you have an idea about other games for BF, then let us know.
When you have interest to come, please contact me (Markymark) via PM.
For Germans-> Check our LINK here ->
https://www.civforum.de/showt...
Check the date 01 November since 04 November, 2018 if you can come !
Places are limited to 16, so please say it earlier.
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Want to quickly fight epic battles? Play the new Arena game mode
The Arena is a new game mode developed by the AoW3 community to allow epic PvP and PvE battles, putting one of the biggest strength of AoW at the centre of gameplay: tactical battles. This article presents the Arena and provides an introductory guide for new players.
2018-01-24 15:40:34| Écrit par Hiliadan
What is the Arena game mode?
The Arena allows to fight epic, large-scale battles against humans or against the AI after a relatively short preparation period where you select skills, armies and hero upgrades. It is an additional game mode developed by the AoW3 community that brings a 4th way to play the game in addition to Single player (campaign, random maps, custom scenarios), Play by email (PBEM, which actually does not use emails), and Live multiplayer (live MP). A 5th mode is Hotseat, but is relatively rare.
A massive Shrine of Smithing fires a blast toward the enemy infidels! No need to spend an entire game researching T4!
The tactical battle system of AoW is often considered the best ingredient in the recipe of the game`s success but, for most people, playing live MP takes too much time in a row and that makes tactical battles vs humans impossible to access. In addition, depending on the map, duration of the game, etc. you may not get a chance to use the Dwelling you love, or the epic high-level spells you crave. The Arena mode is entirely focused on tactical combat: it keeps the best part of AoW3 and put all the rest to its service: you can now select any spell, unit or upgrade of the class, race and three specializations you picked, as well as units from one Dwelling of your choice! A short preparation phase (10 to 30 min to pick your units, etc.) is followed immediately by an entrance into the central Arena, and the s tart of the battle vs your opponent, on any of AoW3`s battlefield.
Comparison of the Arena to other game mods
The current strategic map of the Arena (will be simplified): two production centers on each side and a central Arena with all overlays and climates
The Arena mode can be used to organize epic battles vs the AI: you can enter the Arena in hotseat mode, prepare both teams` armies then launch the fight and put the `AI player´ in auto: it will then fight against you.
How to set up the Arena?
You`re interested and want to use the Arena mode? It's quite simple! The Arena is currently in early beta and things will get even simpler in the future (see the last paragraphs of this article; for instance only 1 mod will be needed in the future).
You can check the latest instructions on how to set up the mode in the Arena Pool on the-Battlefield.com/aow3, the community website for AoW3. You can watch the first 5 minutes of this video to learn how to set up the Arena (thanks Marcuspers!), and then continue watching to see the preparation of a battle (part 2 for the rest of the preparation and part 3 for the battle):
And here are some written, step by step instructions:
1. get the following mods from the Steam Workshop:
Decodence Map Content
Elemental Mod
No Domain Structure Minimum Distance
2. download the 2 .taf files here
3. put the 2 .taf in this folder in your C:\Users\[your user name]\Documents\My Games\AoW3\UserContent
4. activate the Arena and Arena balance mods in your launcher, as well as the Decodence Map Content, Elemental Mod and No Domain Structure Minimum Distance mods (5 in total). Launch AoW3.
Note: you should not run any other mod that modifies units, skills or hero upgrades with the Arena as they will probably conflict (e.g. the PBEM & Single Player Balance mod will cause units in the Arena to have an upkeep whereas they should be free from upkeep).
5.
a. If you want to play vs an AI: select `New Scenario´, move from the `Official` to the `Community´ tab and use the "Arena map v2.0X" custom map. Keep the first two players as Humans and select `Classic Turns´ instead of `Simultaneous Turns´.
b. If you want to play vs an human, go to Online Multiplayer then Internet, host, select `Host Scenario´, move from the `Official´ to the `Community´ tab and use the "Arena map v2.0X" custom map.
(later, you may want to delete the .sam and ~sam files in the \UGC_ARENA [76561198121141565] folder to prevent them from appearing in your custom map selection screen)
6. Once in game, you can pick the 6 research stashes on the ground near your Throne to get 4500 RP. Choose if you want a Dwelling or not in the research book, then pick the rest of your skills. You may use Seek Inspiration for free to find the skill you want. Build your units in your 7 cities and the Dwelling you chose (or not). Your Leader is level 13: pick his upgrades. Then you can use the 4 medal stashes to give up to 6*4=24 medals to your units (you can get 6 Elite units or 12 Veteran units for instance). Move through the Teleporter to reach the central area, wait/find your opponent, decide about a battleground, move there and engage the fight!
What should I know when I play the Arena?
Starting conditions
Each player starts with 1000 gold, 500 mana and 4500 RP (to pick on the ground) as well as 4 medal stashes (to level up units). The Leader starts (and is capped) at level 13.
Starting conditions in the Arena
Engagement rules
Before players choose their army, it is recommended that they randomly select a terrain (overlay + climate) and decide who will launch the attack (= attacker). The other player (= defenders) must position all his units on the chosen terrain, then the attacker chooses how to engage the fight, with all his units on the same terrain.
On round 1 of the battle, only movements are allowed. The use of abilities or spells and attacks are all banned. This aims to make the battle fair for both players and avoid advantaging the attacker or the defender. In the future, this rule should be integrated directly by in-game mechanics (abilities will start on cooldown and a battle enchantment will prevent spellcasting and damage-dealing).
Only movements are allowed during the first turn, usually the armies move away from each other, but not always!
Banned skills
All skills that have no impact on tactical battles have been removed (e.g. Domain of Winter, Terraforming, etc.). In addition:
- Rite of Malediction is banned
- Disintegrate: cannot target Leaders
Disintegrate has been modified and can't target Leaders. Many more balance changes will come in future versions
Evolve and Racial Governance
Evolve is removed from all units and skills. Racial Governance should not be used (the current version still has RG but it should not be used; in the future, it will be entirely removed).
Known issues
If you start playing the Arena, don't be surprised by these issues, they will be fixed in future versions:
- buildings can be sold: they should not!
- some high-level skills (tier VI and above) do not appear as much as we'd like in the research book (Disintigrate, Mass Statis, ...)
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Where to play?
The heart of the Arena game mode is on the Battlefield, the community website for AoW3. All news, latest releases, guides, meta statistics and commentaries, etc. will be centralized there. The best places to look for players a re the Arena Pool where you can use the in-site tool to share your availabilities and find who will be available at the same time, and the chat (which does not require registration). Come say hello at any of these places and you`ll find people to play with.
How to use the chat as a guest (without registering)
Two videos of AbedNego vs Nemesis_Zero in the first showcase matches of the Arena:
Future evolutions
Many improvements are planned in the coming months!
The biggest is going to be the move from 5 to only 1 mod, which will considerably simplify life for users. This new version will also fix remaining issues (RG still usable, etc.) and bring a big wave of balance changes for the Arena. It should also include in-game restrictions on actions on turn 1 to prevent players from forgetting they can only move and are not allowed to do anything else during the first round of any battle.
Pre-made armies might get prepared and provided in specific maps so that players can skip the preparation phase and go straight into combat. The armies will probably use the most popular builds played during tournaments, and will include armies of independents to facilitate play in single player in PvE.
An Arena ranking will be added to the Battlefield community website. At first, this ranking will probably be reset every few months as the Arena matures and gets more and more balanced. Once it reaches maturity, the ranking should be integrated into the General ranking.
An army building tool might get added on the Battlefield, both to simulate armies and see what they cost (gold, mana, RP, Leader`s upgrade points) and to facilitate matches, especially for tournaments: both opponents would be able to input their army in advance, without being able to change them, so that they can then exchange the save game to prepare the match without worrying their opponent might see their army, etc.
Meta-statistics about the most used units, skills and abilities might be added on top of the army building tools.
Current meta-statistics from live MP and PBEM matches reported on the Battlefield
Tournaments will be organized. The current idea for tournaments is to let each player choose 3 armies for each tourney round. A player will then have to beat the 3 armies (each with a value of 1000 gold, 500 mana and 4500 RP) of his opponent to win the round, leading to between three (3-0) and five (3-2) actual battles each round. Such a system should ensure rounds are not lost to impossible match-ups on one single battle.
Finally, a specific Wikia should be set up to list the stats of all the units, skills and Leader`s upgrades including the specific Arena balance changes.
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Key videos of competitive AoW3 play and new video library
2017 has seen a big increase in the number of high-level videos and players looking to learn intermediate to advanced strategies and tactics now have many choices of tutorials and matches to watch! From casual single players to veteran multiplayers, these videos, published by the AoW3 competitive community (PBEM and live multiplayer) offer both entertainment and valuable advice and examples. Basically all the classes and races and all the sites (for site clearing tactics) have been covered by the videos published by Marcuspers, Hiliadan, DreadReapr, Fluksen, Nemesis Zero, gabthegab, Techno, Tussel and others!
2018-01-19 17:36:11| Écrit par Hiliadan
A first article had been published about videos from the 2015 PBEM Duel Tournament in July 2016. Then one post on the official forum and one post on the Steam forum had been listing the latest videos of competitive play.
In December 2017, a new video library was launched on the AoW3 Wikia. This library aims to gather videos that can help players improve their skills, both in terms of strategy (what to build and research, and when? how to move troops wisely? what are good strategies against certain classes/races? etc.) and of tactics (tactical battles). All readers of this article are strongly advised to have a look at this library, and consider it as an extension to this article, listing all the good videos to learn and improve at AoW3.
So the video library lists all the good videos but what about the best videos? Which ones should be watched if one has limited time? Here are some of the key videos of 2017 in my opinion:
Fluksen (Halfling Dreadnought) vs Techno (Draconian Arch Druid) - Live MP
Constantly harassed by hordes of animals from Techno's Arch Druid, the jolly Halflings of Fluksen desperately try to develop Party Golems and other funky machines. At one point, Techno takes the Throne of Fluksen and the Halfling player makes a bad move, sending his Leader to take back a city alone, giving the opportunity to Techno to pounce on him with a Panther and a Gryphon. Guess what? Fluksen gets out alive thanks to a Critical on the Panther and a well-timed Lucky!
Fluksen did a great job editing a 6 hour match into an entertaining 1 hours 20 min of video that he commented post-match.
Exalted Martyr rush
Theocrat's Martyrs may look like nice but weak units that are barely good enough to Absorb Pain on your front line units? Well, you may be missing a key strategy involving them! Marcuspers guides us on how to realize the full potential of Martyrs. The tech Exalted Martyrs allows your little Martyrs to evolve into vigorous Exalted, that in addition to Flying, have the Resurgence ability. Exalted Martyrs can be obtained early and Exalted who evolve from Martyrs keep the Absorb Pain ability (as well as any Mystical City Upgrade they may possess, like Mercenary from Trading Posts), which works wonder combined with Resurgence!
Through a series of commented videos, Marcus shows how to quickly build enough Martyrs, research Exalted Martyrs and then evolve the believers into Exalted! By turn 18, he has almost a full stack of Elite Exalted (this video and a similar performance by DarkRider in a tournament game led to nerfs for this strategy in the PBEM & Single Player balance mod).
Hiliadan (Tigran Warlord) vs El Lobo (Human Necromancer) - Heptatopia and Monoculture in a duel
This series of videos of a 2017 PBEM Duel Tournament match shows that it's possible to get Heptatopia and Monoculture even on a small map ("Tournament size" to be precise; that's an additional map size provided by the PBEM & Single Player balance mod). The comments on the video associated to each turn are not focused solely on Heptatopia and Monoculture (unlike the videos on the Exalted Martyr rush) but strategic considerations related to these two Empire Quests are nonetheless regularly mentioned.
The full strategic breakdown of the constructions required and the turns when each Racial Governance upgrades are obtained is detailed on the AoW3 Strategy and Tactical Guide from Academy Games on the Battlefield.com
Hiliadan (Dwarf Dreadnought) & rickyroo222 (Frostling Theocrat) vs rrrrookie (Frostling Arch Druid) & Jonny Thunder (Halfling Rogue) - Epic game!
This epic struggle is part of the 2016 PBEM 2vs2 Team Tournament. After a catastrophic start, Hiliadan tried to get back to steam but his team faced waves after waves of attacks from rrrrookie and his team-mate. Combined with big mistakes on Phoenix Rising (Hiliadan + rickyroo)'s side, this led to some difficult times! Highlights:
– rush of rrrrookie on turn 19 and how Phoenix Rising responded to it, check out the turns 19 to 23
-> 2nd wave of attack from rrrrookie from turn 28 to 32
-> 3rd wave attack from Jonny Thunder on team Phoenix Rising, killing rickyroo (and illustrating why your Leader always have to be together with strong stacks): turn 35 to 37
-> 4th wave attack immediately after the 3rd wave, also from Jonny Thunder: turn 38 and 39
-> 5th wave attack, led by rrrrookie: turn 47 and 48
-> final wave of attack by Jonny Thunder and tentative of sneaky attack with a single Tireless Life Drain hero by Hiliadan: turn 54 to 56 (check out videos from turn 52 and 53 to see how the hero, Mira, got her gears, succeeding the might Tara to lead the sneaky attack vs rrrrookie)
How to use blocking, splitting and positioning? Guide to tactical combat - Example with a Trading Post
This video, which is actually the recap of turn 5 of the 2vs2 game mentioned above (Hiliadan & rickyroo vs Jonny & rrrrookie), shows in details a tactical battle at a Trading Post. It illustrates several concepts defined in the AoW3 Strategy and Tactical Guide from Academy Games on the Battlefield.com and can be considered a video "to watch" for all those who want to get the basic tactics to beat the AI defending sites in difficult settings.
How to clear a Lost City before turn 10?
Finally, this video is part of the "Advanced Tutorials" and is probably the most impressive in terms of timing: the clearing of a Lost City happens on turn 8. It shows how to abuse the weakness of AI's behaviours and maximize the use of Necromancer's spells and Cadavers' abilities. Similarly to the video above, it's part of a tournament match, Hiliadan vs DarkRider on round 2 of the 2017 PBEM Duel Tournament. Despite this impressive early game clearing, I (Hiliadan) lost that game in the end: very early clearing of high level sites is not sufficient to win games fortunately!
If you're still hungry for more videos after watching these key videos of 2017, the best is probably to subscribe to the channels of these three players (click on their name to reach their channel):
Hiliadan: a veteran AoW3 PBEM player, currently ranked #4 in the general ranking and #9 in the PBEM ranking. I play only PBEM (and Arena mode now!) and I record short and concentrated commented summaries at the end of each of my turn for high-stakes games. No small-talk, relatively short, commented, videos focused on advanced PBEM tactics and strategies, with all classes and races.
Marcuspers: a veteran AoW3 player but experienced both with PBEM (ranked #6) and live MP. He is currently ranked #5 in the general ranking. Marcus also does commented summaries of his PBEM turns, compared to Hiliadan's videos, his are usually relatively longer and show more tactical battles. He also published several strategic guides (rushes for Exalted, Shadow Stalkers, and Eldritch Horrors). His videos are commented summaries of PBEM turns and video guides for advanced strategies.
DreadReapr: one of the best live MP players but an impatient PBEM players who dislikes manual tactical combats vs the AI, his #33 ranking does not make justice to his skills (very few live MP games are reported so it's mainly PBEM that lowered his ranking). DreadReapr is very good at optimizing his building and research on the strategic map and can get T4 and strong armies very early, especially when playing Tigran Warlord (beware of the Manticores raining on you!). His videos are full recording of his live MP matches and are not commented.
There have been many more videos published by the competitive community, too many to list them all here! You can find them back in the video library on the AoW3 Wikia. In addition to videos from Hiliadan, Marcuspers, DreadReapr and Fluksen (live MP, cut and commented), you'll also find videos from Nemesis Zero (live MP, not commented), gabthegab (PBEM, full turn, not commented), Techno (live MP, not commented) and Tussel (PBEM, full game, not commented).
These few bullet points provide an overview of what is on the library:
- Intermediate level tutorials:
- A gathering of videos providing advanced tips for AoW3 players. The topics covered include:
- clearing of low and intermediary sites (up to Epic)
- general tips on how to play on the strategic map - Advanced level tutorials:
- A gathering of videos providing advanced tips for AoW3 players. The topics covered include:
- advanced strategies: Theocrat's Exalted Martyr rush, Rogue's Shadow Stalker rush, Sorcerer's Eldritch Horror rush, and example of Monoculture & Heptatopia rush.
- advanced tactics like clearing of high-level sites (Legendary and Mystical) with relatively low level units in early turns - Full matches
You can search videos by sites cleared, by class, by race and the best videos are tagged ("Good example" and "To watch!").
The library will be regularly updated to include the latest videos. You can follow it if you have a Fandom account ("Follow" link at the bottom left if you're logged in) to get alerted by the latest updates. New videos will be flagged to be easily identifiable, and will always be at the top of each table.
Feel free to propose videos to add to the library (through comments here or on the forum).
If you're looking for more videos, you can also check the PBEM & Single Player Balance Mod presentation video and the videos from the July 2017 Live Chat Event that presented the Shadow Realm Community Expansion, the Arena mode and a lot of other great content from the community.
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PBEM and Single Player Balance Mod v1.23 released: a small but impactful update
Released on its beta branch only 1 month after v1.22, the balance's mod v1.23 contains only 10 main changes but its impact on heroes' and Leaders' builds should still be significant. This small updates focuses on making rarely used heroes and Leaders' abilities more useful, brings light adjustments to Necro and a few other small fixes/changes.
2017-12-20 23:07:51| Écrit par Hiliadan
Breaking the slow pace of release that had characterised v1.22 (first release on the beta branch in July 2017, 3 months after the finalization of v1.21, and then more than 3 months elapsing before the "official" release on the main branch in early November), v1.23 is a small update that re-establish the previous rhythm of one release every 2-3 months. The objective is both to be more responsive to emerging and unplanned balanced concerns, and to accelerate the pace of development of the mod, to be able to deal with all the major concerns that were expressed by the community during the consultation about the main balance issues (its results are displayed in this article). Balance is a never ending issue but it should be possible to deal with all major imbalances in a reasonable time frame, and leave only minor issues unattended.
v1.23 is already available on the beta branch of the balance mod and will be released on the main branch around 20 February.
The guiding principles of v1.23:
- Making rarely used heroes' abilities more interesting: the changes are mostly guided by the poll on how to balance heroes;
- Continuing to tweak the balance for Necro (Ghouling Strike, Energy Drain), with further tweaks to come in future updates of the mod;
- Starting to make rarely used units more interesting: the first change implementing this priority for balance (see poll) facilitates access to produced Succubus, but (much) more will come in v1.24;
- Fixing recently discovered issues and bringing adjustments: Combat Healing's cooldown, Public Bath, over-powerful heroes from Cosmic Events (who could be mind-controlled, harming end-game power balance), and the possibility to reach Sage (Empire Quest) very early with luck and Storm Magic + Planetary Alignment.
On a related note, Der Mentat announced on the Steam Workshop's page of his compatibility mod for the Empire Building mod and the balance mod that he would probably update it in December, to take into account v1.22 (and then compatibility for v1.23 probably in 2018?).
As mentioned in the previous paragraphs, in the future, v1.24 should bring many more changes to make rarely used units (e.g. racial Pikemen and built Dwelling units) more interesting to build. Future versions should also start tackling one key aspect of the game, Racial Governance, but also non-summon strategic spells, many of which are uncompetitive compared to summon spells and a few very good strategic spells (e.g. Death March, Mana Fuel Cell, Iron Grip, etc.).
Full changelog of v1.23 (also available on the official changelog of the balance mod)
General
- Combat Healing starts with an initial 3 turns cooldown (was 4 turns) .
- Spell upgrades for heroes cost 4 (was 5), except:
Chaos Rift (stay at 5)
Chain Lightning (stay at 5)
Last Stand (stay at 5)
Slayer’s Doubt (stay at 5)
Stiffen Limbs (stay at 5)
Repair Fortification: costs 3
- Dirty Half Dozen costs 3 upgrade points (UP) (was 4)
Infiltration Squad gives Improved Wall Climbing (was Wall Climbing)
Chaplain costs 4 UP (was 3)
Pest Control Squad costs 4 UP (was 5)
Charge Command costs 4 UP (was 5)
Fleet Command gives Fast Embark and Mariner (was Mariner)
Holy Champion costs 4 UP (was 5)
Nature`s Resistance costs 4 UP (was 3)
Fleet Command's interest has been raised by giving Fast Embark to units benefiting from it
- Heroes appearing in Cosmic Events have Mind Control Immunity
- Energy Drain has a physical strength 10 (was spirit strength 10)
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Alpha tests launched, and custom campaign announced for the Shadow Realm Expansion!
Some months have passed since the last news from the Shadow Realm Community Expansion but the team of volunteers designing it has not been idle! The Community Expansion reached a new stage at the beginning of November 2017 with the launch of the alpha phase of tests. Single players will also be pleased to learn that a custom campaign (it will be the first complete custom campaign for AoW3 when it is released!) has been added to the content of the expansion!
2017-11-05 15:04:30| Écrit par Hiliadan
The preliminary design of almost all the content of the Shadow Realm Community Expansion has been completed: the Archon and Dark Elf Dwellings, the Shadow Elf Race, the new structures for the new Shadow Realm layer, the Shadow Demon roaming independents (check out the last article entirely dedicated to the expansion, which introduced the first video of the Shadow Elves and the article about the July 2017 live chat with the team developing the expansion) -> And most of it has also been modded into the game. That has allowed a first stage of testing to begin, the alpha phase. Despite the progress in 2017, many things are still missing (in particular icons!), many others are buggy and much needs to be balanced. The details of all the units, abilities, etc. are thus likely to change significantly during the alpha test, and many bugs will be hammered out.
Official launch of the alpha tests on 1st November!
To conduct the first tests, a small team started a PBEM game with 4 humans (Marcuspers, Markymark, Refineus and Hiliadan) and 4 AI. This game is probably going to be restarted after a few turns, when an updated version of the expansion is released, as things are being fixed and added rapidly.
Shadow Elves require a different way to play in tactical combat but have a very strong (maybe too strong?) potential with Life Stealing Cavalry and Shadow Shifting Irregulars
These PBEM games will also help to spot balance issues with the Shadow Elves (SE).
Their extra +2 resistance makes them good against elemental damage and the Shadow Shift grants Frost Weapons to Touched, making them quite effective against Phantasm Warriors
A new member has been welcomed in the Shadow Realm development team, Refineus! He oversees the development of the custom campaign for the expansion. The campaign will start where the story of the Eternal Lords DLC stopped, and let the player investigate what lies beyond the Shadow Gates. Characters from AoW2 and AoW3 will be met again and their story and ambitions explored further, while the player will have to face the threat originating from the Shadow Realm.
Ready to go back to Athla and to the Shadow Realm in the new campaign?
More will be shared about the campaign as work on it progresses. Additional articles about the new structures, the Archons, the Shadow Demons and the Dark Elves, will also be drafted (as promised in previous articles about the expansion).
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Tourney won by Player Castaneda !!
A great tourney eventually found his earned end!
2017-10-11 12:09:29| Écrit par myl_supporter
A tourney ended successfully:
Thanks to all those who participated in this tourney !!
Congrats to the winner(s)! And a big thanks to the organizer myl_supporter!
The following matches were played:
Round 1: Game#1 spockimpossible beat rickyroo222
Round 1: Game#2 Castaneda beat Wintermute
Round 1: Game#3 Lck beat DreadReapr
Round 1: Game#4 Fluksen beat Techno
Round 2: Game#5 Castaneda beat spockimpossible
Round 2: Game#6 Lck beat Fluksen
Round 3: Game#7 Castaneda beat Lck
And the winner was Castaneda.
He will get an extra place in our Hall of Fame!
Good luck and have fun in the next tourneys!
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Invitation to our 2on2 Tournament
Play exciting Live Multiplayer Games
2017-09-09 18:18:37| Écrit par myl_supporter
We invite all AOW3 Players to our 2on2 Tournament, post in this thread when you have interest and when you search a player, then we will help you!
We will Play with 8 Teams (16 Players) and we will try to use the BF Scheduler to find availabities to the games, so it shall be possible to organisate!
Important Links
Rules
Overview
Join BF with one click
Join the tournament when you have a player
Participants
Discord Chats (find others live Mp players)
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PBEM and Single Player Balance Mod v1.22 released and available in 3 languages!
v1.22 was released on 25 July on the beta branch of the PBEM & Single Player balance mod! This new version significantly improve the ease of play/comfort improvement for all players with many unclear or incorrect descriptions of units or abilities clarified! It also brings improvements to XP counters, correct some remaining issues with Necro, boost Dreadnought and AD, nerf Divine Justicar and Lesser Mighty Meek, fix 1 exploit and bring a few other improvements. v1.22 is thus one more step into the continuous and progressive improvements of the game initiated with the balance mod more than 15 months ago! After the addition of Russian in v1.21, a new language is added with this update: Polish! Changes associated to units currently rarely used and heroes and their abilities were pushed back to later versions to refine them.
2017-08-12 10:21:19| Écrit par Hiliadan
The balance mod has been improving the AoW3 experience for Single Players and PBEM Players for more than 15 months. It has included the Racial Watchtower and Racial Unit Reskin mods and has been available in Russian since its v1.21 (see article on v1.21). With its latest release, it becomes available in Polish and in addition to the improved visuals it was already providing, it now provides more ease of use with reworked ability's descriptions. With all this excellent content (learn more about why you should use it), maybe the balance mod will improve its ranking next time a poll is run to rate the best mods of AoW3? (it ranked #4 in the last poll)
A 25min video was released with v1.21 but can still be useful to learn more about the balance mod if you're new to it (turn the English subtitles on as additional content is provided through them):
In June 2017, Der Mentat, the author of the great Empire Building Mod (also #4 in the same ranking of best mods) released a compatibility mod for the balance mod. This solves issues with several concurrent changes to the same units/abilities/etc made by the two mods, and improve the experience for players using both mods. In order to benefit from the advantage of the compatibility mod, you need to play with the 3 mods enabled: the balance mod, the Empire Building Mod and the compatibility mod. Many thanks to Der Mentat for his effort!
Please note that the compatibility mod only works with the main branch of the balance mod and, as of September 2017, is thus limited to v1.21.
The main changes brought by v1.22 have been guided by the poll about the directions the balance mod should take in the near future:
1/ It increases ease of play with over 30 improvements to in-game descriptions
Before and after v1.22 update: Blinded is a subtle ability and its official description does not make it justice. The updated description clarifies the significant impact of Blinded on melee units who lose most opportunity for attacks of opportunity and can get severely flanked
2/ Experience farming is further contained through a minor tweak to XP counters
3/ The overhaul of Necro started in previous releases of the mod is completed: Ghouled units get the +25% upkeep that other mind-controled units had already been suffering since v1.21, the Necromancy I-VII economic boosts (introduced in early versions of the mod) are removed and Whispers of the Fallen is nerfed. Based on a poll on difficulties when playing Necro which revealed most players had no issue with Necro, but those who had struggled only with its economy, new economic boosts are introduced, linked to buildings.
4/ The first phase of the boost to heroes and their abilities is implemented with new abilities for Dreadnought.
5/ A strategy that had appeared recently in PBEM Tournaments and which threatened the balance of the game is nerfed: Exalted Martyr rush (see videos of Marcuspers on how to get 6 Elite Exalted Martyrs by turn 20).
v1.22 was released on the beta branch of the balance mod and should be released on the main branch around the end of October.
v1.23 and further versions will continue to build on the poll on directions for the balance mod and the latest poll on the types of changes people wish for heroes.
Thanks to Badok for the Polish translation!
Full changelog of v1.22 (also available on the official changelog of the balance mod)
Bug fixes
- Siren’s Musical Box is Epic (was Strong, despite its change of status in v1.2)
- Tigran Necromancer’s economic RG are correctly displayed (was: the descriptions are blank)
General
- Maximum XP interactions (XP counters) for each tier are 6/8/9/10 for tier 1, tier 2, tier 3, tier 4 respectively (was 6/8/10/12)
- Units acquired through Ghouling Strike and Inflict Ghoul Curse have an upkeep increased by +25% gold/turn
- Earth Elemental cannot be obtained as a reward any more in the Forbidden Sanctum
- Effigy of the Lich King gives Healing Undead and Undying (was Healing Undead and Necromantic Aura)
- Spiders spawned by the battle enchantment of Shrine to the Queen of Spiders (Arachnide Hordes) do not provide XP when hit or killed
- Over 30 abilities see their text updated to correct imprecise or incorrect descriptions (full list): True Sight for heroes and leaders, Giant, Toughness, Thunderstorm…
Before and after v1.22 update: the invalid targets of mind-control abilities like Convert, Dominate and Charm are explained explicitly, meaning no more bad surprises when you discover that nasty Animal cannot be converted during a tough fight! (note: as of 7 September 2017, the description of Convert is incorrect in the "beta branch": it does not mention Animals are also incorrect targets, the description will be updated for the release on the "main branch")
Before and after v1.22 update: the meaning of "strength" for Mighty Meek is clarified to state it applies to melee and ranged and to all channels
Arch Druid
- Baby Spiders and Baby Serpents get the abilities of their evolved state (Spider Queens and Mature Serpent) on Elite, namely:
Dread Spider Baby: Inflict Severely Poisoned
Hunter Spider Baby: Inflict Enfeebling Fever
Vampire Spider Baby: Inflict Exhausting Fatigue
Baby Reed Serpent and Baby Shock Serpent get +4 MP
Dreadnought
- Musketeers do 11 melee damage (was 10) and gets +1 melee damage at Veteran and Elite
- Dreadnought heroes can choose Lava Walking for 4 points at level 9, it also gives them 100% Fire Protection
Lava Walking in action: Firak now walks on lava while he casts Temperate Empire, a spell also boosted by v1.22 (see below)
- Dreadnought heroes can choose Inject Mana Fuel at level 11 for 5 points, a self-buff active ability costing 0 AP which gives them Wall Crushing, Demolisher, Tireless, Reinforced, 40% shock weakness (and add blue particle effects to represent the mana injected in the veins of the units)
Necromancer
- Dead cities do not have economic bonus linked to Necromancy skills any more (was gain +5% to all types of income for every level of Necromancy skill)
Embalmers Guild gives +5 gold and Cathedral of Bones gives +10% to all the incomes of the city. The Bone Furnace (new building) can be built in Ghoul city, requiring Cathedral of Bones, it costs 150 gold and 100 mana and gives +15% to all the incomes of the city.
Cathedral of Bones costs 100 gold and 100 mana (was 150 gold and 100 mana).
You won't be able to say Necro has no tool to boost its economy during late game!
- Whispers of the Fallen provide 2 RP per unit tier for each unit killed in combat. Fallen Heroes provide 10 RP (was 3 RP per unit tier and 15 RP)
Theocrat
- Divine Justicars costs 12 points (was 10)
- The description of the tech Exalted Martyr is corrected: it does not provide any XP bonus to Martyrs (was saying it gave +50% but was actually not). When Exalted Martyrs is researched, Martyrs evolve into Awaken Martyrs at Elite (was evolve into Exalted (Martyr)). Awaken Martyrs have the stats of an Elite Martyr and have Evolve into Exalted at Elite. They don’t get any bonus on medals (not even HP or defense, damage).
Warlord
- Researching Death March allows to cast Death March for 60 CP and Scout Death March for 20 CP, which has a similar effect. Scout Death March affect only T1 Irregulars in target stack (and units can only be targetted once by Death March or Scout Death March).
Halfling
- Halfling T1’s Lesser Mighty Meek gives +1 physical damage by tier level difference with the unit attacking them (was +1 strength on all channels per tier difference with the unit they attack)
- Brew Brothers cost 75 gold and 20 mana (was 70 gold and 20 mana)
- Halfling Shaman get Nourishing Meal on gold instead of Healing.
Fire
- Tropical Empire gives Inflict Immolation to allied units in your domain.
Creation
- Temperate Empire gives +1 defense and +1 resistance to allied units in your domain.
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Videos from the live chat event about the Shadow Realm Community Expansion
In June, a live chat event was organized to present progress on the Shadow Realm Community Expansion, discuss its content and also share some of the best content produced by the AoW3 community since the launch of the game. A few dozens people watched the event live and many more watched the 5 video replays of the event on YouTube. The replays present the Shadow Elves, Dark Elves, living Archons, the Shadow Realm layer, the top 20 mods for AoW3, the Wiki, some useful AoW3 YouTube channels, and 2 player vs player battles in the new "Arena" playing mode.
2017-07-24 19:13:08| Écrit par Hiliadan
The Shadow Realm Community Expansion & Community Content live chat event was organized as a big event to promote the many excellent content existing for the game (mods, maps, videos, guides, you name it) and let everyone discover the pearls that can significantly boost one's AoW3 experience (for a quick overview, check the trailer of the event). The main attraction of the event was the presentation of the AoW3 Shadow Realm Community Expansion that has been under development for more than a year (see latest article about the expansion) by a team of dedicated volunteers. It was held on June, 24th on the chat of the Battlefield.
3 videos edited and cut to about 30min each makes it possible to watch what was presented even if you missed the live chat. Here is their content:
DISCLAIMER: at the time of the video, the expansion is still in very early stage and not even in alpha stage. Many content will change and be improved.
1st part:
– the leader creation
– the Shadow Realm layer
– the Shadow Elf racial units
– the (living) Archon units
– other great content from Decodence
2nd part:
– 3 new sites: Raven’s Home, Sword of the Ashen Rose, Flame of Grauth
– the Archon units in tactical battle
– the Dark Elf Dwelling
3rd part:
– The Arena Battle Mode, a new mode to play AoW3, focusing on tactical battles
– The 4 mods of the Shadow Realm Community Expansion (or even more)
– Advanced strategies and tactics video: Marcuspers and Hiliadan’s channels, the advanced tutorial playlist
– The Wiki and the excellent guides it contains about the campaigns and tactics and strategies
– Best mods for AoW3
One developer of Triumph Studios was there during the live chat, SikBok, and we had the pleasure to chat a bit with him! About 20 people were watching the stream at some point (and up to 40 people joined in in total according to YouTube's statistics).
The work on the Shadow Realm expansion continues (what was presented was really early stage and many things will change and be improved)! An alpha phase is planned in the coming months.
A big thank goes to the team working on the expansion (see the credits in the 3 videos' descriptions), especially to Charlatan for the huge work he did on Decodence, the foundation of all the expansion, as well as many other elements (like the Dark Elves).
Big thank to Marcuspers too, who helped a lot with the organization and was one of the commentator, for the PvP battles.
Two more videos from the event showcase the new Arena playing mode, but more will come on that in a future article.
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The AoW3 community more active than ever! Tournaments, AoW3 Veterans, polls
More than 2 years after the release of the last DLC, some might think AoW3 is dead... Far from it! There are never been so many tournaments at the same time, so many Veteran players (in terms of ranking points) and the amazing content produced by the community (including a new Race created this year and a full expansion in progress!) makes the game fresh again, even for people who played hundreds of hours!
2017-07-13 17:48:44| Écrit par Hiliadan
There is a lot of activity recently on the Battlefield, our beloved community website for AoW3!
3 tournaments are currently ongoing, involving about 70 competitors in total (though many play in several tournaments in parallel). Two are PBEM tournaments: the 2017 PBEM Duel Tournament (stats of the class and races played and roster with links to the match reports) started in January and currently in its third round, and the PBEM 2vs2 Team Tournament (stats of the class and races played and roster with links to the match reports) started in October 2016 and finishing its fourth round with 8 teams left. The third tournament is a live MP one which started very recently. A fourth tournament ended recently and was won by DarkRider: it was also a live MP tournament. Videos of these tournaments are available on YouTube and another article will list the most recent ones in a few weeks. You can check out the article from last year which listed some good competitive play videos as well as the post on the official forum referencing all competitive play videos.
In recent weeks, ranked play has reached a new high for AoW3 with the accession of a third player to the rank of AoW3's Master!! 
This mechanically comes from the accession of a 30th player to the rank of Veteran (see the explanations of the ranks and ranking: the top 10% of Veterans are Masters and you need to reach 1000 points to become Veteran).
As of July 13rd, our 3 Masters are: gabthegab, Jean de Metz and Ezekiel! Congratulations to them! AlXStormrage also held the rank of Master for some days, before Ezekiel took it from him.
Congratulations also to all our 31 Veterans of AoW3 (including the 3 Masters), who have played a great deal of AoW3's matches and have learnt many aspects of this very rich and deep game (by alphabetical order):
AlXStormrage
Azazir
bbqsauceomgwtf
BLACKCAT
cbower
DarkRider
DreadReapr
EarL1893
Evgendil
Fistandantilus
HellBrick
Hiliadan
gladis
JONNY THUNDER
LIGHTFORM
marcuspers
MARKYMARK
mauvebutterfly
Melciar
Olop
rrrrookie
$eeR
Skuns453Lirik902
Tasslehoff
Techno
Tussell
Warlord Keldon
xlnt
A new feature has been introduced on the Battlefield recently: an estimation of the probability of victory of each player in each match. This is based on the ranking points of each player and the Elo formula used to calculate ranking points themselves (which means it is of course not really accurate for new players who haven't yet reached their "true ranking"). The idea behind this new feature is to prepare the ground for potential betting features (for fun), which may or may not be introduced in the future, time will tell. The probabilities are displayed only on games with an "Open" status (so not for Ongoing games).
Since the last article reporting the results of polls run on the Battlefield, 4 polls have been run! It is time to present and discuss their results!
First, What direction should the Balance Mod take in the coming months?
That poll was launched to help get a feeling of what priorities the community had and therefore on which topics the PBEM & Single Player balance mod should focus.
The table below shows the % of voters that are Battlefield (BF)'s registered users (who are more involved in competitive PBEM) who voted for each option, the ranking among BF users (#1 has the most votes, #17 the least), the % of general voters (BF users or not), the ranking among general voters, and then the final ranking that was made based on these results. It means that the priorities for the near future for the balance mod will be: 1/ Make all heroes and their abilities more interesting (e.g. boost Dreadnought’s late game abilities) - great progress on this was already made (see associated post on the official forum), 2/ Make currently rarely used units more useful (e.g. non-cavalry units produced at War Halls) - discussion started on the official forum too (Dwellings and other units), and then 3/ Balance Racial Governance (make all choices interesting and races more equal).
Some explanations for those interested: the steering of the balance mod works by consensus: anyone can propose a change and if at least a few other players believe the change is worth it, it is listed in a big table of proposed changes, then a core group of discussion assesses the proposed changes and if it gets a net support of 3 members (e.g. 4 "for" and 1 "against"), it moves on as a "Priority change" and is submitted to further debates through an extended group. Proposed changes that get a net support of 5 players get confirmed. It means changes which belong to one of the priority expressed in the poll are much more likely to succeed because they'll get large support.
Second, Do you think the mod that removes rapids (blocked water) from the Random Map Generator should be used for tournament games to help classes/races that cannot cross these rapids?
This poll was run specifically for a tournament and the result was not to use the mod to remove rapids as the majority was too slim to change the status quo.
The third and fourth polls were designed to help with the balancing effort, just like the first one: What are your difficulties when playing Necromancer? and How best to balance all heroes and their abilities and also make them more interesting?
The poll regarding Necro tried to investigate the difficulties of new and experienced players playing Necro, as the class was reportedly difficult. The results seem to show that most people actually do fine with Necro and the main area of concern are the economics of the class (the lack of happiness-related income bonus translates into lower income than other classes, especially in late game). As a consequence, specific attention has been paid to the economics of the class when modifying one element that made Necro relatively overpowered: the economic bonus associated to Necromancy I-VII (in the balance mod) were transferred to Necro's economic buildings and a new economic building has been designed: the Bone Furnace (see changelog of v1.22).
The fourth poll focused on one answer of the previous poll on balance's directions (the 1st poll, see above): how to balance heroes and their abilities? Discussions on changes proposed had indeed shown a lack of consensus on the topic among the community and it was necessary to "measure the temperature" and see what most people preferred.
The results indicate the options that will be pushed forward: 1/ Boost existing lackluster abilities, 2/ Create new top (and intermediate) abilities for classes lacking them, and 3/ Rework the starting items to provide equal XP opportunities for all classes and limit the interest to kill starting heroes for their weapon. Other options received less support but still got more than 40% of votes so will also be considered: 4/ Introduce sub-classes for each class (it will be a long and significant work!), 5/ Reduce the upgrade points needed to choose spells to 4 CP except for very strong spells and 6/ Reduce the upgrade points needed to choose Casting Points.
Before concluding this article, two initiatives from the community are worth mentioning, to highlight the activity of a "core community" still quite active (even if of course the total number of AoW3 players has declined significantly since the release of Eternal Lords): a full new race has been released by Eomolch, the living Archons, and a Community Expansion is under work (see link below) and will contain 1 new layer, 1 new Race, 2 new Dwellings, several new sites, new independent units and many new abilities!
To conclude this article, a few reminders in case you missed the information!
- The four players qualified for the final phase of the 2015 PBEM Duel Tournament answered questions and provided some very good insights on AoW3 and their matches, check them out:
- Published in May, the last article about the Shadow Realm Community Expansion reveals the 1st trailer of the expansion with some Shadow Elf gameplay!
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