Ohhhhh Eva Peron!

[GeneralZIft]

I watched the Spiffing Brit... And I thought he said Eva Braun. You know, the wife of the Hitler? I was thinking this game had some crazy roster.

Speaking of... Good game? Balanced? Fun?
I hear the combat is not too good. Is that true?

 

[Galacticat42]

Saw that video as well. It's definitely fun, but has been getting pretty big patches after launch to tune it and get it where it needs to be.
As for combat, it's not bad, but different. It's very in-depth, but happens in the background when 2 warring units enter the same space, or are sieging a city or bombarding from a distance. Units can be individual pieces, or entire battalions. Knowing your enemy's forces is paramount as you build units to counter them. Catapults and siege weapons are paramount for taking walled cities, etc.

 

[KayAU]

Speaking of... Good game? Balanced? Fun?
I hear the combat is not too good. Is that true?

Yes. No. Yes. No, I don't think it is true

Honestly, the game has it's issues, and his criticisms are mostly fair. He misses the mark on some points, though, and he fails to mention some of the things which makes the game stand out in a positive way. For example, the variety between playthroughs is much greater than he portrays it to be, and warfare can be of great benefit. My current England game, for example, is playing out very differently from my previous Thailand game. I had increased the difficulty, map size, number of opponents, and water levels before starting, and was put into a very different situation, with different resources and constraints. Because I started out on a peninsula with limited space and was fenced in by neighbors, I went to war early, to get some more space, and because there were not many forests, I moved quickly towards the tech to cross oceans, allowing me to settle an island to the north which is now my main source of lumber. I'm about halfway, and it's been an interesting game so far.

Of the main features he failed to mention, I would highlight three:

• The culling system. There are three acts, and at each transition, the nations with the lowest score are "lost to history". It may not seem like a huge deal, but I think it is brilliant. For one thing, it creates some pressure to get those prestige points in order to survive if you are struggling. For another, it shakes things up a bit, as the lands and resources left behind by those nations are up for grabs.
• Simultaneous turns and up to 36 nations on the map. This is just a different scale compared to Civ, and thanks to the simultaneous turn system, starting a game with 36 players still plays very well.
• Irregularly shaped regions with a variable number of zones. This game doesn't have neither squares nor hexes, and I feel like it's a major change which doesn't get enough attention. Regions are shaped by natural features and boundaries, and having different numbers of zones and bordering regions just adds to the strategy.

I think Ara is already great, but it is being rapidly improved, and the first major content update is due this month, and is looking very promising.

 

[MrRadar]

Speaking of... Good game?

Oh, yeah, you can say that.

Balanced?

Hahahahaaaa

Fun?

By Grabthar's hammer... YES!
When you finally know what you're doing, that is... I mean, when you finally know what you're to be producing and buying in by trade

I hear the combat is not too good. Is that true?

You assemble and then send in troops formations, and then watch how they're doing, that's it. If things start going south, pray you have prepared more formations to send in promptly to increase the numbers. Don't neglect troop training into the reserves, si vis pacem, para bellum, all that.

Diplomacy and war system is rather a hysterical one, absolutely insane, but that's a nowadays gaming for you, nobody bothers with them anymore for the release date.

In short, when somebody declares war on somebody, any war, doesn't matter just, unjust, whatever, it damages relationships across the board, even if you were friendly with the attacker and would have attacked the victim yourself.

Then the wars have limited duration and goals, and if the goal is reached, war ends automatically on the spot, and then there's enforced peace for a time. So if you see neutral powers in your neighbourhood with zero armies, it does not mean that next turn one of them will not declare a war of expansion on you and muster quite a few reserves. Surprise, mfer! Pray that you have something in reserve to muster as well, or else... oh look, we've burned down your city, what a shame! And you can do jack s**t in return, because now we have achieved our declared war goal and must have 20 turns of peace, you see. Yes, mandatory, enforced without flaw, unbreakable vow as in Harry Potter. Tough luck, Muggle.

Then when you, swallowing tears of pride, put into the build queues the military effort for a retaliation war and make plans for a sizeable area of salted earth, another neighbour comes knocking, burns down another city of your's, like in two turns, and casually shoves into your face a peace declaration that's already been signed on your behalf. Marvelous, it's just something expensive flies out of the window.

But then, when you reinstall the game on your more modern and a very fresh rig, you already know what's what and can start using the system the other way around. Oh, AI planted an inconvenient city next to my borders, what a shame, they better call the ambulance... but not for me! I can choose the duration of my war. I can put something into the reserves and calculate the assault just so that the AI has no time to react. And then there's 20 turns of peace when they can do nothing, rinse, repeat. There will have to be some changes here, definitely.

In the meanwhile, a big patch is coming this month, something that was rather widely requested in the QoL arena, and something, I gather, a lot of what they planned to implement anyway, but did not quite make it to the release deadline. Modern gaming for you. But this one can turn really good, it definitely has something of that je ne sais quoi

 

[Shirotora Kenshin]

Simultaneous turns and up to 36 nations on the map. This is just a different scale compared to Civ, and thanks to the simultaneous turn system, starting a game with 36 players still plays very well.

Oh, i‘m curious to see next year how this feature will feel when playing. I believe it was you (correct me if i‘m wrong) who made a post in the Humankind forum about that you didn‘t like that in HK… does it work better in Ara than in HK or have your point of view changed since then?

 

[KayAU]

Oh, i‘m curious to see next year how this feature will feel when playing. I believe it was you (correct me if i‘m wrong) who made a post in the Humankind forum about that you didn‘t like that in HK… does it work better in Ara than in HK or have your point of view changed since then?

That may have been me, yes, I think I made a post complaining about how their particular implementation of simultaneous turns introduced a "twitch reflex" aspect to a narratively focused turn based game. I still think that aspect of Humankind is really silly, but it doesn't work like that in Ara. You don't move your units around, and suddenly, an AI unit is revealed and starts moving. Instead, what you do is issue orders, and when you hit end turn, all orders for all players are resolved. You can also cancel and change orders before ending your turn, which negates the need for an Old World-style Undo-button.

To be honest, I think there are pros and cons to simultaneous turns as opposed to sequential turns like you have in Civ. Movement, and in particular exploration, feels better to me when I see my units move immediately. Simultaneous turns is in a sense fairer though, and it speeds things up a great deal in games with lots of players. For a 36-player game, I think sequential turns are simply not feasible.

 

[KayAU]

Here, I'll show you:

As you can see, I have some forces which are involved in combat with an invading Venezuelan army. I have ordered my Square and Catapults forces to join the battle, and you can see both in the orders list and on the map that they will need two turns to get there. I can also cancel and change the orders if I wish. Once I hit Next Turn, my troops will start moving. They could also, in theory, be intercepted. I don't think Venezuela have any forces at hand which can do that, but this is one of the interesting aspects of how simultaneous turns work in Ara.

Here are a few more screenshots of the situation, including a couple from the combat viewer:

Spoiler :

The combat viewer is one of the features which is going to be improved upon in the content update which is due this month.

 

[Shirotora Kenshin]

You don't move your units around, and suddenly, an AI unit is revealed and starts moving. Instead, what you do is issue orders, and when you hit end turn, all orders for all players are resolved.

I think this is the key take away for me. Now it makes sense to me why you don‘t like the feature in HK but like it in Ara. It’s clear that the system in Ara is working much better in practice. Thanks for the explanation
Can‘t wait to get my hands on the game. Just hoping the crafting doesn‘t feel too much like in Anno.

 

[fjaoaoaoao]

SpiffingBrit's video is bad from an informational standpoint.

But if it gets some people somewhat interested (while turning off others who may have been on the fence), then kudos to those people.

I think this is the key take away for me. Now it makes sense to me why you don‘t like the feature in HK but like it in Ara. It’s clear that the system in Ara is working much better in practice. Thanks for the explanation
Can‘t wait to get my hands on the game. Just hoping the crafting doesn‘t feel too much like in Anno.

The crafting is more flexible than in Anno. One thing that is a double-edged sword for me in Anno is that your whole chain can collapse. The realism is nice but sometimes it becomes too overwhelming and repetitive after a while. You don't really have that issue in Ara.

 

[Shirotora Kenshin]

The crafting is more flexible than in Anno. One thing that is a double-edged sword for me in Anno is that your whole chain can collapse. The realism is nice but sometimes it becomes too overwhelming and repetitive after a while. You don't really have that issue in Ara.

Exactly, and that Ara doesn‘t have that issue sounds great! So then Ara is the number one game i will buy and play on my new pc, sometime next year.