The Grand Empress Schemes On The Open Beta! | Age Of Wonders 4 - Episode 6

[@Fableheim]

Hello everyone and welcome back to Age of Wonders 4! The Grand Empress has arrived on the Mystic 1.3 Beta to scheme and lament the loss of Legend Recruitment. If you'd like to skip my long tirade about the changes and possible Faithful implications, jump ahead to 5:00 to start the vibing. In terms of actual campaign progress, today was a lot of cleaning up within and without the Mantid territory, but Moira made history at 1:03:17 for being the first non-Advantaged AI to claim another life in one of my series. I'm proud of her. At 1:20:54, the path to Magic Victory is set, but there are a few faces that need slapping before Shek'zeer secures her Orderly Ascension -- thanks for watching!

[@AberrantSoldier]

Fable: "Give me Guided Projectiles!" Game: *Gives Guided Projectiles, then starts talking* Fable: *Waits with the patience of a saint as Werlac explains how he'll stop missing*

[@Undermine5]

1:46:15 Fableheim "Are the abductor the first mythical unit that don't have an imperium upkeep?" Primal culture summons "Are we a joke to you?" Fableheim "I think they are, I think they most certainly are."

[@Fableheim]

Technically, the Primal Summons don't have an effective Upkeep because they are summons, but I did 100% forget their existence.

[@Undermine5]

@@Fableheim Even if they had upkeep, they would have T2 upkeep which mean no imperium upkeep since imperium upkeep start at T4.

[@Erligan]

35:40 Abductor ate Skald Abductor: 'And that kids, is how I met your mom.' Skald: 'You had to take responsibility, considering, how you "Ate" me.' Abductor: 'Don't regret anything, I got myself a Wifu!'

[@Fableheim]

I've been waiting for that moment for quite some time.

[@Erligan]

Don't forget, High Culture gives Hero skill that gives chance for range attackers to Mark, so your Ranged Units can get beater as battle goes on. Imagine getting Reaver City in your empire, recruiting Magelocks and making them apply Mark and then do bonus damage.

[@SoulRuninFree]

I really need to play reavers after the mag lock rework.

[@AngryGerbils]

17:43 "Today we're gonna put an end to this obscuration bs. _Mark_ my words." Unintended accuracy pun.

[@Erligan]

health regen for Fabled Hunters makes sense, they are hunters, they can find food in the wilds and know how to heal miner wounds.

[@scanix100]

1:55:30 Attack the city with a scout to help Blint out of his "prison" ;)

[@Fableheim]

Can I attack it since he's breached it? I didn't think it worked that way but I'll give it a shot since the Scout is nearby!

[@scanix100]

@@Fableheim Yes, you can and he join the fight, it is practicly easy, then wouldI absorb the city and give it him as a gift ;)

[@sonadowfiend]

Oh my Godir! How have I overlooked the existence of Mighty Meek this whole time!? To me, my Sunderers! One last time into the breach, old friends! This time, we shall *purify* the world with Hellfire!

[@Fableheim]

It's easily overlooked, it is meek after all. (: Jokes aside, it should be pretty spicy these days.

[@sonadowfiend]

@@Fableheim Oh. I wasn't talking about doing it in "these days", I'm trying to squeeze out one more game with Legend Printing and actually giving Order a try

[@okonkwojones]

Mighty meek + mammoth or elephant mounts (and maybe supergrowth? Im unsure if that’s necessary) give industrious Arbalests a ton of extra HP, and make them only 2 models, and since they’re only tier 1, & overdraw crossbow does base 30 damage, and heroes count as a tier 6 or 7, they can oneshot basically most heroes. It’s nuts

[@Fableheim]

@@okonkwojones I approve!

[@Erligan]

You can create Ascended Sniper, there is trait, that gives +2 range on all abilities, could give Demon Slaying Bow, or Hunter's Crossbow, for Umbral Demon, Fiend/ Giant slaying, alternatively Reaver Champion with a GUN

[@Fableheim]

Is that an Ascension Trait? I really should look in to that list some day. XD

[@drowsyCoffee]

On the topic of accuracy, there *is* one very funny way to handle the accuracy problems of ranged units for these builds that stack ridiculous max range modifiers, though it is tied to a bronze wonder (The fae spring thingy). As it turns out, one of the fae (I think the Spring one) has a ludicrously good/underrated support ability, which gives essentially autohit to all units within a 1 hex radius, allowing your archers to 3 hit nuke people from the other side of the field, very fun in general. Also, the normally useless Accuracy Training (+10% hit chance to everyone in the army) support skill from heroes is another solution too

[@Fableheim]

Hmm, I might have to take back what I said about the Spring Fairy in this episode.

[@HjalleCalibursChannel]

Perfect, i needed something like this. Thank you fable

[@drowsyCoffee]

19:20 On this topic, originally also crit chances (If i remember right) worked as a weird sort secondary accuracy. So, lets say you had 50% chance of hitting, and 20% of critting, instead of rolling first a 50/50 to see if you hit, and then rolling a 20/80 to see if that hit was a crit, you rolled the 50/50 accuracy check, then regardless of result the 20/80 and if it hit a crit you would land the hit with additional damage (Even if you would have otherwise missed) (I am not sure on the specific order of these operations, i only remember Crit chance working as an autohit roll pretty much). This (Even though some of the crit chance mechanics like Fortune were directly negated by Misfortune) *heavily* biased all hit calculations towards hitting, and through all the passive crit chance mods (Like Flameburst or Artisan) made it really hard to use the debuff mechanics meant to fuck with accurace (Blind and Misfortune). So, a lot of the buffs to Misfortune arent only in the sence of making the debuff and fumbling better in general, but also in terms of a more welcoming metagame/mechanical context

[@Fableheim]

This was how it worked, but they changed it up in one of the patches. I think critting is still an auto-hit, but you cannot have more crit chance than you have accuracy on a target. Multi-hits will also rolls their crit chance each attack, instead of just making the check on the first one.

[@cier5158]

The vermin shall inherit the realm 😈👌 Huh…that sounded kinda Skaven tbh 🤔

[@AngryGerbils]

44:19 "Daniel Prideborn has crossed me... SHE is not to be trusted."

[@Fableheim]

If I had a nickel for every customization that went awry in this series, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it happened twice.

[@okonkwojones]

4:13 I think not allowing insta-Champion recruitment is for the players to have to at least work for that really transformative medal: like, isn’t it sprint for skirmishers, exalted defense for shields, +1 range for archers, etc? Those are really powerful abilities to just roll off the assembly line with: it puts some cost into losing those champ units besides just replacing them.

[@Fableheim]

Yeah, the Champion Medals are pretty insane, so it makes sense that they don't particularly want you mass producing them. I think the only thing you can pump out at Champion at the moment is the Copper Golem with the proper Tome setup.

[@Erligan]

If turning Mind Controlled into Warbreeds doesn't work, could try Transforming Zealot Kamikaze, those can be summoned to your Hero, or city, as long as there are no Jammers, then you transform them, while mana costly, could save in a pickle, regular Summoned/Recruited Tier 4 would be stronger in the long run, but, those are costly to keep, unlike Zealots.

[@Fableheim]

I knew Zealots would be a useful cannon fodder summon. :D

[@AngryGerbils]

25:23 Sounds like an overarching problem.

[@Fableheim]

Ba dun tssss~

[@Logan0503]

1:24:08 Instead of using the final submission thing couldn’t you use the Eldritch Sovereign mind control ability to get the Umbral Tyrant with Polymorph. IIRC you took the upgrade that lets you have the option to keep the mind controlled creature after the battle.

[@Fableheim]

That should work in theory! Unfortunately, I believe it's the Puppeteer that has the Dominate upgrade, and Shek'zeer is the Enthraller.

[@Logan0503]

@@Fableheim I believe that they both actually upgrade Eldritch Mind Control. Enthraller allows Eldritch Truth to fully dominate the target, and enable you to retain control post battle (it might also change the name to enrapturing truth). Puppeteer makes Eldritch Truth more likely to work and last longer, but does still eventually wear off. I believe it also changes the ability name to Puppeteer’s domination.

[@Fableheim]

@@Logan0503 The only change to Eldritch Mind-Control from Enthraller is that it will target another nearby enemy thanks to the Manipulator passive, and Enrapturing Truth inflicts Madness (Insanity + Damage taken at the end of the turn) not Domination.

[@Logan0503]

@@Fableheim Huh, must have misread something in my playthrough then. Most of what I know of Eldritch Sovereigns is from just a couple games though, so I’m not as confident in my knowledge as usual. Sorry for the misinfo!

[@Fableheim]

@@Logan0503 I just finished recording the last episode, and you were absolutely correct about Enrapturing Truth applying Domination. Going back to your first comment, yes, Enrapturing Truth could have been used in place of Final Ultimatum if I had access to a Polymorph. I was definitely wrong about not having a Domination, sorry! (I double checked, and it is indeed Puppeteer whose Eldritch Mind-Control evolves in to Puppeteer's Domination.)

[@SoulRuninFree]

Man this had a whole lot to do with nerfing starting ranks however it dose not seem to be that bad, and the ability to have faithful on stuff other than order is stupid useful. That and I still need to play reavers so what affinity should I pair with them. I’m kinda leaning towards nature.

[@Fableheim]

In the grand scheme of things, I don't think it's bad, but it feels extra bad because we got to play with unlimited Legends. XD Reavers are weird in that the only Affinity that they truly feel at home with is Materium, but Nature can work decently well in providing them some extra tricks and/or animals to frontline for them.

[@SoulRuninFree]

@@Fableheim thanks for the tip

[@scanix100]

Why don't you send a summon or any unit to help Blint, it worked every time when AI glitched out.

[@Fableheim]

Does Blint *really* deserve to be free of his eternal torment? On a series note, I didn't know that I could attack something he was sieging. I thought it locked him in to being the attacker. 😅

[@scanix100]

@@Fableheim He does, it is an Under-hero Blint, almost the same as Uber- :)

[@equinox1975]

I always cringe when I see empty item slots on your heroes, I don't understand why you don't give them any item, even if they are "trash" in your opinion? Some items in your inventory will surely bring useful stats to your heroes!

[@Fableheim]

I've always been a lazy hoarder about using my items, but it got way worse when they added the stat randomizer. I die a little bit every time I look at a Breastplate of the Champion that has +1 Blight Resistance. XD