ntino

The game is too easy (challenging)

▼

The game is too easy (challenging)

from Elemental Forums

unlike most players, I think this game is too easy, or at least it seems to be easy to abuse the system, while the only way for the AI to overcome player abuse is by insane bonuses that might make the game frustrating on further difficulties.

I have not played any Beta.

I started my first game challenging/challenging because I read in a couple of games this was a difficult difficulty and the rest are even harder. No custom race -  Tarth was used, I think medium sized map and 4 opponents? I didn't know how to play at all so at first I didn't understand what was going on other than using heroes - I watched some u-tube video that explained resources in cities - I was set after that.

I realized that this race is considered overpowered by most - after reading some posts but at the same time its not as good as making a custom race which is what most power players will do.

The problem with the game stems from the fact that while making cities and developing them as well as building pioneers - the only use I found for them so far is ROADS - which are way overpowered! especially with Tarth. You can sneak in a pioneer somewhere and have an instant elevator into enemy territory!  I didn't realize how to build roads at first but having them pop automatically is just silly.

On to the problem - I was able to steamroll the AI easily without making a single unit, just from recruiting heroes, quests and taming a couple of beasts. There is just no balance between units you can recruit - already leveled up and units you can build and have to research many techs to build - I am on turn 88 and The AI while having built up its cities with everything available had very poor units that were no match for mine.

I never researched anything in the military tree and never recruited high level heroes - I only have 4 one out of which is a merchant sitting in my capitol. 

I dont think it makes sense to continue with this game - I only met 2 AIs one has a score of 22, other HAD a score of 60 - now 20 after losing their stuff to me.

I must say I did play with saves and reloads but did not abuse the system - simply because I did not know how strong units are etc.

Before I get flamed - I understand that I did not perhaps play on the right settings, but at the same time I really did not understand much about the game so I don't think I did well at all given the 88 turns  (first pioneer I built was just wondering around while I was desperately trying to understand why I cannot settle anything - among the 100s useless popups, couldnt they have one pop up when you build your first pioneer saying something like "you must look for new lands to settle, most cannot be settled, etc" 

On to the things that are just wrong:

*this game is totally not intuitive for a new player, could just be me though.

*Map is big but "empty" simply because all these lairs are "just another lair". Individual tiles dont matter  - if you have a game that allows stacking, you should make every tile in the game count! - I really dont see why make everything be 1-2-3-4-5 on one tile - that gives you either very poor or every overpowered cities - this could seem relatively minor but at the same time the game experience suffers from that - you just dont get that feeling "MY CITY IS BADDASS" because you know the AI always gets a 5-4-2 location(at least it did for its cities in my game) - you could take cities out, replace them with forts that can be enchanted and can purchase units for gold and do away with the city mess the way it is now, leave pioneers for outposts and improvements!

*if this is you vs environment type game then why the hell no one attacks your cities for the first 70 turns- AI understandably cant get to you, and once you clear out the NPCs(and you really want to do that since you need the xp, items,gold)

*Also, whats up with all the useless artifacts and why you never get gold as victory spoils? its totally useless having all those 100032 items non of which feels special - wolf/bear pelts to sell?! come on, why make it more complicated.

*Combat feels unbalanced simply because they are trying to balance it within a huge system of units having anywhere from 2 to 200HP. Why not make things a little more simple akin to civ or MOM? - you can have a lot of fun with unit design even if a unit is never more than 30hp - just make it more varied with abilities and perks not stupid meaningless numbers. 

I dont think combat is totally bad but rather than being focused, its all over the place - feels like 2-3 different people worked on this separately and then just meshed up their ideas.

*I almost did not use any magic even though I have magic casters - the balance of mana cost to easy of getting manage to spells to benefit in combat is just not right. You want to have spells in the system and you want people that play a mage use them every battle- just make the caster weaker in other ways - you simply cannot use spells that cost 15 mana every battle when your income of mana is 1-5 a turn.

*City buildings are very "stat-oriented" rather than flavor oriented - you just have 5 buildings all doing the same thing for one of the stats with different names to them !?

*I really like the fact that you have techs that unlock abilities - thats very good in a game like this BUT I feel some are not well balanced in the grand scheme of things.

*it is completely and utterly stupid that should you want to play a military faction or a magic oriented one you still need to research a lot of the civic techs right away simply to be able to research the other stuff - this is not CIV. There should be different research points for the different tech trees based on how you play - shard/mana based research for the spell stuff, civic based research for civics, military/civic for military.. That way you could play as a magic caster or warrior ignoring some of the other stuff.

*if this game is supposed to be mostly player vs environment (this is what the game design/balance leans to it seems) then the game should take note from other great games such as HOMM and others with many monsters of different strength guarding various sites close and far - this is very different than the current situation of easy monsters close to player, bad ass monsters far away. It makes for no incentive to come back and even restock in your cities.

*if some of these are because I was playing Tarth - their bonus should be taken out of the game.

*FYI I did not lose a single unit in the game(I think, if I did I don't remember that) - there is no incentive in getting into fights that would make you lose units - this is bad. and of course the AI should present enough of a challenge and rewards to make you lose units - but as of right now you just gain useless cities that are unhappy and cannot produce anything that you couldn't before

To sum this up - it feels like this game suffers from bad design choices where there was no coherent vision of what the game was supposed to be. I think a lot can be changed with balancing though to make it a much better game.

I will try to start another game with a different race - I have no intention of finishing this game because while there are other quests(with dragons) and other AIs I dont feel that it will be very interesting to play on. - If that doesn't go well I will just consider this unplayable till mods/further balancing patches come out.

 

Please feel free to suggest more fun settings to play on, or suggest why my analysis might be wrong.

 

 

84,141 views 76 replies
Reply #26 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting ntino, reply 23



Sorry but I dont have time to sink 80 hours into this game while its not fun to play only to find out its so much more fun on the 21st replay?

I also dont think I have to play 20 games to be able to post on these forums.

Its not about being to my liking, its about the fact that the game is totally out of balance and no cohesive. The reason why it wasn't challenging on challenging is not because I know hot to play this game, but because its got some issues where half the game is essentially pointless. If i was to play on a higher difficulty I will do the same things - it might be more difficult to win but the same points are valid.

Most of my post was not about the fact that its easy - it was about the fact that being a total idiot in the game and not knowing research or city building mechanics (didnt even know how to build roads - not that the game helps you know btw) I was able to steamroll one AI and surely do the same with the others given the chance - the problem here is not that I was playing some "forbidden" race, the problem is that half the game mechanics dont even apply to win - thats a bit silly!

AND while the AI had built cities and clearly has all his cities with great resources fully built up (I dont know how he does that, but obviously cheating because it was so bad at actually playing), he totally sucked at everything else, no aggression, no army, bad heroes, etc. 

Gonna try a new game on expert, what race do I play?

 

Playing one game you miss a lot of the game. This isn't an FPS where you play through in 5 hours and see everything. You can't do that with this game. If you're a civ veteran you know a good 90% of the mechanics of the game, the things that are different is the heros, the magic, and the tactical battles (generally speaking that is, there is a good deal different but as far as metagame goes most 4x games play the same.) The races are vastly different and require different playstyles to achieve a win. Play a magic based race and you'll build a mage to drop some serious fireball nukes. Grab a shitty sov and then try to steam roll a game. the point is that 1 play through isn;t enough to judge this game. Yeah there are a lot of minor issues with the game that needs fixed but you stacked the odds in your favor. (By accident or on purpose is irrelevant)

Reply #27 from Elemental Forums Top

Please don't judge the game on your ability to roll an AI... you're suppose to be able to (they want a certain viability to rushing if you like that kind of play style). Different AIs play differently, some focus more on building, and is vulnerable to rushes, some pumps troops and roll others... so beating one or two really doesn't mean much... especially on challenging. A smart player using some (rather obvious) tricks will easily destroy the AI on that difficulty. Just a single tame will win me the game on that difficulty. You could call that "unbalancing" if you like, but the ability to do that makes it interesting. It's when you have to resort to those tricks to survive that it becomes fun. That's what the higher difficulty is for...

However, just to warn you... the AI is and will always be bad with their heroes, regardless of difficulty. They just don't understand the system enough to properly train, equip and synergize those with the proper traits. This is an unfortunate side effect of the complicated system that I pointed out way back in one of the early beta (and I hope to see improvements on in an expansion). Higher difficulty will see them better equipped, but they won't ever be "smart" in this department due to certain limitations in the system. If this is what you're looking for, then I'm afraid you won't find it.

Higher difficulty WILL have the AI pumping very well equipped troops to provide you with a challenge... but their design is generally subpar until you yourself play those faction and design better units for them. You don't HAVE to, but it does help them quite a bit. Once you do, they become quite dangerous... however their army make up is often still lacking... and thankfully so, because they would be pretty hard to beat otherwise. They also don't value their troops survival enough, and thus won't have veteran units like you do. This is one of the weaknesses that I don't see any good solution for, and that's why you need to give them some bonuses (play on higher difficulty) to make up for this.

Also keep in mind that sometimes you start out in good spots and sometimes you won't. I usually find it more fun when I don't...

Offworld Trading Company
Reply #28 from Stardock Forums Top

Yeah I think you should always take what you are given and roll with it.  Restarting until you get a good starting position or reloading everytime something doesn't go your way is just cheapening the game. 

 

Reply #29 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Kalin, reply 27
their design is generally subpar until you yourself play those faction and design better units for them. You don't HAVE to, but it does help them quite a bit. Once you do, they become quite dangerous...

You are not kidding. I started making sure that my custom races do NOT get included in my ridiculous games.  Add the difficulty production bonuses and extra traits to my handcrafted 'Elusive' and 'Heavy' lines, and the game became impossible. 

Heavies use iron, elusives use crystal, the AI ended up with a mix of both, and I had NOTHING against them unless I was playing a fire mage.

I did defeat three of my customs once though.  But I played a super evoker for that purpose, and I luckied by having Nochd as my first hero.

Reply #30 from Elemental Forums Top

The game has never been balanced IMO - the faction perks, sovereign perks, and spells have been all over the place. People did highlight these things in the beta process but unfortunately they're still around. I think it's going to take someone modding the changes before things are set right, Derek and Brad are making tweaks here and there but I think more is needed.

As for AI difficulty I find expert is the best level to play on because on this setting you see much better performance from the AI - it builds up forces and generally behaves more intelligently. Ridiculous is a massive step up in difficulty and it's not much fun seeing the AI attack you with a massive force around turn 70 so I tend not to bother with that setting as I don't use custom sovs or factions.

Reply #31 from Elemental Forums Top

I am just starting another game.

Is Master Scout considered overpowered as well?

Reply #32 from Elemental Forums Top

I don't think anyone will gripe about master scouts - it's stealth that's seen as the cheesy one. But whatever man, choose whatever perks you want.

 

Reply #33 from Elemental Forums Top

I was just wondering about the default sov with master scouts.

btw master scouts is ALOT better than the average perk.

I didn't go with that, chose what I think is an average sov. I am having a much better start than last time but the monsters are also a bit stronger so its good

Reply #34 from Elemental Forums Top

Yeah master scouts is good but I wouldn't consider it OP or broken - the other traits should be boosted so that they are on par IMO

 

Reply #35 from Elemental Forums Top

Not sure if anybody has answered your question "which faction should I play next?"  and the answer is ... wait for it ... well, it depends.

For people that say the game is too easy, we say play Pariden or Resoln.  Unfortunately, those factions take a lot of micromanagement and careful strategery to be successful so you'll probably think they're boring and weak.

Tarth (monster avoidance / movement), Kraxis (wealth), Yithril (juggernauts), and Altar (henchman) are much too powerful if you think the game is easy.

So that leaves Gilden or Magnar.  Magnar is fun, but totally different.  You might not like them.  So the final answer is Gilden.  Good luck!

 

Reply #36 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting DGB246, reply 33
I don't think anyone will gripe about master scouts - it's stealth that's seen as the cheesy one. But whatever man, choose whatever perks you want.

Wait what? ^_^ (I don't really agree, but each man to his own).

Thank you Ntino for putting your thoughts here, while put out slightly rough I do think most of them have a solid ground to stand on.

I can recommend trying Sean's balance mod, or Heavenfall's mod... They do have really big changes included in both mods, and atleast one of them have tried to rebalance the game (I can't play 2 mods at once you know ;))

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #37 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting DGB246, reply 35
Yeah master scouts is good but I wouldn't consider it OP or broken - the other traits should be boosted so that they are on par IMO
 

Master scout, enchanters, binding, defensive, lucky, heroic, slave lord, wanderlust are the top tier race traits. 

Reply #38 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting xarilius, reply 26
While I agree that most of you probably know the game better than I do as you have much more games under your belt, this whole attitude of "go play 20 games then come and comment on what needs work" is silly.  You do realize that the majority of the people buying a game like this may never get past the 5-10 game mark, let alone 20? The value of a criticism from someone that's played 2 games is as valuable as someone that has played 20 games for a game developer, at least for one that is interested in growing their fan base.  You can get a good enough grasp of the game after a few games to what can be improved in the game. 

I'm sorry but this just isn't true. Someone who has only played 2 games can give valid opinions on many things, like the user interface, new player accessibility, learning curve, graphics, things along those lines - but balance or game difficulty is not one of them. This game is meant to be complex, you cannot learn the game in one or two play throughs, you are not qualified to say what is or is not balanced. How the hell can you give real criticism on game balance when you have played only one faction, for less than 100 turns, you haven't explored the vast majority of the tech tree, haven't experienced most of the spells in the game, haven't experimented AT ALL with the warfare technologies, and you don't even understand what the basic resources (crystal, metal) in the game are used for? Sorry, but no your comments on balance should NEVER, EVER be taken seriously until you at least understand the basic mechanics of the game. Many people find the game impossible to beat on even the easiest difficulty settings, so the game is obviously not too easy on challenging. As many people have already pointed out, this poster used one of the strongest default factions (intention to do so is not relevant here), and for all we know he got a great starting position and the AI's all got pushover personalities which would further invalidate his opinion based off a single game of 88 turns.

Reply #39 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Tuidjy, reply 38
Master scout, enchanters, binding, defensive, lucky, heroic, slave lord, wanderlust are the top tier race traits.

Hm seriously? Some of those I find rather dull...
Arh well, tastes differs, and I might be biased to what race traits that are powerful.
With enchanters, are you thinking about the faction trait that unlocks a whopping 2 items, or "The Decalon" which unlocks magical books and scrying pools?

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #40 from Elemental Forums Top

metal and crystal are useful for armies/ trained units.

Metal can give you armor and metal weapons (for armies), while crystal can give you magical weapons (for armies).

 

granted none of this helps your Champion(s), as they *have* to buy their gear with gold, unless they find it while travelling. (personally I think its silly that we can't just spend around 15-20 metal on equipping our champion with good armor .... but NO we need around 500 gold instead.

I guess the "good news" about that is that if you are focusing on champions then don't worry about resources ... just spam High-food settlements and -unrest buildings for high taxes/ lots o gold.

Also, high essence (the blue thing that sometimes appears below food and materials) is a MUST for any good conclave city. Relatively early your conclave cities will be able to give you +1 mana for each essence in a conclave.

For me, any spot 2-3 essence or higher goes conclave (my only experience is with 2 essence and 3 essence spots).

 

If you are trying to go mage-lord (instead of melee focus) it can generally be a good idea to have your first city go conclave (as long as its a decent spot for essence= at least 2)

Reply #41 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Tuidjy, reply 38

Quoting DGB246, reply 35Yeah master scouts is good but I wouldn't consider it OP or broken - the other traits should be boosted so that they are on par IMO
 

Master scout, enchanters, binding, defensive, lucky, heroic, slave lord, wanderlust are the top tier race traits. 

 

Defensive and lucky, certainly. They are quite flexible and cost only 1 point. Easily top tier.

Slave lord doesn't allow creation of slaves ... it just adds population from battles, and is 2 points. Ick.

Quendar racial (+50% fire resist -50% cold resist) is TIED to the ability to make slaves. So if you want slaves just go Quendar.

Binding and Enchanters sound really awesome (Demon Armies and Scrying Pools) but I just haven't gotten the chance to use them yet.

Heroic and Wanderlust, when COMBINED are pretty awesome. I tried to make a custom Altar race ... but Altar are already pretty badass at what they do. Might take uneducated and Lucky as a bit of a min/maxer, but that's about it. (or X + enchanters if I wanted the extra essence)

 

As far as Master Scout, I've no idea. But I'll go with the benefit of the doubt on that one. Isn't stealthy slightly better though?

Reply #42 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Tasunke, reply 42
Slave lord doesn't allow creation of slaves ... it just adds population from battles, and is 2 points. Ick.

I think its rubbish too ;)

Quoting Tasunke, reply 42
Binding and Enchanters sound really awesome (Demon Armies and Scrying Pools) but I just haven't gotten the chance to use them yet.

Enchanters, still wrong trait, but I understand ;)
Binding is only good for empires since it doesn't work for life altars for some reason (I hate those kind of things personally). and is a fantastic source of free units, some of them are particularly decent (Like those from the air nodes).

Quoting Tasunke, reply 42
As far as Master Scout, I've no idea. But I'll go with the benefit of the doubt on that one. Isn't stealthy slightly better though?

Not really, the 50% movement bonus from master scouts is the one I want. (50% more xp for your heroes for example)

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

Reply #43 from Elemental Forums Top

For people that say the game is too easy, we say play Pariden or Resoln.  Unfortunately, those factions take a lot of micromanagement and careful strategery to be successful so you'll probably think they're boring and weak.

So true. I still try to win a game with Resoln on challenging. (I´m far from beeing a good player.) But boring? Now way. This is what makes FE so much fun. Try, fail, adapt my strategy and try again. 

@OP

You really can´t say after one game, if it is too easy or not. I had games (not with resoln) where i steamrolled the AI with no probs. Good starting position, good loot, good champs and so on on. But in other games (same faction, same custom sov., same difficulty) i was chrushed bei AI without any chance. 

Again...this is what makes FE so fantatsic and interesting. (And this is what don´t see all the reviewers) Every game, even if all preconditions are the same, will be different.

Reply #44 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting ntino, reply 7



Quoting rvgr,
reply 3

quoting post
Please feel free to suggest more fun settings to play on, or suggest why my analysis might be wrong.


Fun settings? Sure. Large landmass, 10+ opponents. Difficulty level -- Ridiculous, both for the World and the competition.

Race? Doesn't matter. 

This should be fun.

Now if you're not looking for fun, but rather to gimp your gameplay, then I suggest the following:

Insane Difiiculty for both the World and the opponents. Never settle more than one city, do not recruit any heroes and do not cast any spells. Oh, and play as the Kingdom of Paridan.

I guess my point is that the game is what you make of it. It won't force you to have fun if you don't intend to have fun.


 

Sorry I disagree - a game should be fun on basic settings - if its not then these should not be the basic/default settings. If these are the default settings then by default this is what the developer thinks should be fun.

A game such as this should be fun on simple settings such 1x1 vs the AI - if its not then something is wrong.

I see some people are playing vs 10 or 18 opponents - do you ever finish your games?! erratic diplomacy would mess everything up - then you would really need to start reloading and saving your games if the AI is any challenge.

Yes I finish games all the time with max opponents on the largest map. In fact I only play 4x games that way (FE, AOW:SM, ALL CIV's, All Total Wars etc.) I hate playing on smaller maps with less opponets, it is just not fun for me

Why would you need to reload?  If the AI posed a challange then you would either adapt or die no reload cheat is necessary.  And yes reloading because your getting your ass handed to you is cheating.

I do agree the game should be fun on basic setting.

Reply #45 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Lantros, reply 44

For people that say the game is too easy, we say play Pariden or Resoln.  Unfortunately, those factions take a lot of micromanagement and careful strategery to be successful so you'll probably think they're boring and weak.

So true. I still try to win a game with Resoln on challenging. (I´m far from beeing a good player.) But boring? Now way. This is what makes FE so much fun. Try, fail, adapt my strategy and try again. 

@OP

You really can´t say after one game, if it is too easy or not. I had games (not with resoln) where i steamrolled the AI with no probs. Good starting position, good loot, good champs and so on on. But in other games (same faction, same custom sov., same difficulty) i was chrushed bei AI without any chance. 

Again...this is what makes FE so fantatsic and interesting. (And this is what don´t see all the reviewers) Every game, even if all preconditions are the same, will be different.

How is this a good thing if you sometimes completely steamroll the AI and sometimes lose?! When I play a game I want there to be challenge from the AI every game, to where I lose(not so much the map - in other words, I dont want the map to destroy me unless we are playing Majesty).

I am not a veteran Civ player so I would play on Emperor and win far more than lose play on immortal and it was very hard to win without saves/reloads - but that really doesnt help that much on a game like civ - you would sometimes get unlucky with barbs on immortal and that could really kill you early on.

Reply #46 from Elemental Forums Top

It's all about what you want from a game.

 

To me, FE is RPG/Strategy mix. I create my own faction and my own custom sovereign and never play the "one super party all-hero no-city (or one city) steamrolling stack" because it doesn't fit my idea of this game.

I don't care if it's possible to play that way and win by turn 50 or whatever and just steamroll over everyone. It's not my cup of tea. I play to explore, settle few cities and when the wars start the AI usually has a big advantage in tech and army strength. That way, for me the game is challenging and fun, and from time to time I tend to lose, especially if I play against some of my previous custom factions :-).

My settings are on Challenging/Challenging. I reload very rarely, usually if I make a clicking mistake and sometimes not even then.

Of course, some things like big monsters destroying my cities in the early game are annoying, but that's all a part of the game.

 

Reply #47 from Elemental Forums Top

How is this a good thing if you sometimes completely steamroll the AI and sometimes lose?! When I play a game I want there to be challenge from the AI every game, to where I lose(not so much the map - in other words, I dont want the map to destroy me unless we are playing Majesty).

I think this is a matter of taste. Because of the randomness (map, AI personality, starting position etc.) its always interesting. Some like that, some not. I don´t have a problem with loosing in one game and i don´t have the problem with dominating the world in another game.

I don´t think its not possible the have this randomness and provide always the same challenge. But i´m not a game designer/AI programmer or anything. This is just a guess

 

It's all about what you want from a game.

To me, FE is RPG/Strategy mix. I create my own faction and my own custom sovereign and never play the "one super party all-hero no-city (or one city) steamrolling stack" because it doesn't fit my idea of this game.

I don't care if it's possible to play that way and win by turn 50 or whatever and just steamroll over everyone. It's not my cup of tea. I play to explore, settle few cities and when the wars start the AI usually has a big advantage in tech and army strength. That way, for me the game is challenging and fun, and from time to time I tend to lose, especially if I play against some of my previous custom factions :) .

My settings are on Challenging/Challenging. I reload very rarely, usually if I make a clicking mistake and sometimes not even then.

Of course, some things like big monsters destroying my cities in the early game are annoying, but that's all a part of the game.

I would sign this. :)

 

 

Reply #48 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting rvgr, reply 13



Quoting ntino,
reply 11

Well, because if the AI is good, and the game is well designed then at the appropriate difficulty level you should have a hard time beating 1 or 2 AIs, therefore you should stand no chance against 5 ais at war with you. I just read one of Tuidjys posts according to which the AI gangs up on the player on higher difficulties, therefor if you are able to still win the game is not balanced well. Either that or they dont gang up - I'm just assuming they do.


You have played one game, where you picked a faction that you knew to be unbalanced, picked a very favorable favorable setting for that faction (reduced landmass and the number of opponents), ignored the bulk of what makes this game interesting (taming the wildlands, questing, etc), didn't even finish the game, and now you're posting here about how the game is too easy. How about you win the game first? Post your ridiculously high score and ridiculously low number of turns it took you to beat the game, then let's talk about how easy it is.

The point is that no faction should be that easy.  And if by game design playing that faction makes you ignore "bulk of what makes this game interesting" then something is wrong with the game (or at least that Faction Trait needs to be changed.) 

Stealth should not work 100% of the time.  There should be some sort of spot roll that creatures should have to roll to see if it spots the stealth unit. And these rols should be based on level and abilities, Spells etc. Base should be 50% and can go up or down.

Also the trait that gives Cerese (I think) the ability to hire Hero's for free is way over the top. That ability should give a large hiring cost reduction (50%) instead of hiring Heros for free.

Reply #49 from Elemental Forums Top

Quoting Bellack, reply 49

Also the trait that gives Cerese (I think) the ability to hire Hero's for free is way over the top. That ability should give a large hiring cost reduction (50%) instead of hiring Heros for free.

You're probably talking about Relias. The truth is that Karavox, not Relias is a champ-stacking machine: starting with 800 Gildar and the ability to recruit both Kingdom and Empire champs, he can load up on them faster than anyone else.

Reply #50 from Elemental Forums Top

If people think the game is easy, I recommend trying a few things:

one is: Randomize the map settings, this will help due to you cannot build a certain strategy over "I just need to get that iron deposit before turn 50" since sometimes resources will be low, and there will be a mile between each iron deposit, same goes with spellcasters and whatnot, with randomized map settings you have to adapt to how the map decided to look.

two: Try new factions, if you look at a faction and think "That faction looks like its rubbish"... try to play it ;), I would say play the "Random Faction" if that part was actually implemented.

Three: Try saving and reloading as little as possible, this makes each choice more important, and sometimes you are screwed by random generators, that said feel free to do like me and reload when a bug ruins the game (your sovereign is permastunned for example). I recommend putting autosaves to save each turn, and then never really saving, I am not sure if they fixed the autosave bug though
(don't worry, it just gives a very slight penalty to gildar research and production when reloading the autosave).

Half the game is set up so you can choose settings that make the game easier for your playstyle in specific, this doesn't help the AI and will therefore be a sort of "handicap".
Another thing is trying to play as each faction, and creating custom units for each faction, these will help the AI as they use all the custom units you designed when they play the same faction.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej