The Things I Disliked about MoM

[ArcaneTourist]

I also agree MoM's UI is now very dated. I'd look to more recent 4X games for examples of what UIs worked.

One feature that hasn't been mentioned yet is historical graphs and other feedback about which players are doing better and in which areas. Lots of variation possible there. Some games have given periodic reports but not provided an on-demand menu. Some games show the current leaders in a few categories but don't provide historical graphs.

One feature that wasn't in MoM that is more common today is unit promotions. Personally, I hate them. Not sure why. Perhaps a feeling that I can never remember the tree and a feeling that promotions greatly increase the micromanagement by effectively multiplying the types of available units. (BTW, why do games display the tech tree when picking research but don't display the promotion tree when picking promotions?)

Another vote for customizable grand viziers and an ability to say which cities are managed by which vizier.

---------- Post added at 11:23 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:15 AM ----------

Of course the number one peeve for MoM is also the number one favorite feature! A seemingly unbalanced system with over the top awe and shock.

The point was that there were *multiple* killer strategies. My favorite was the invisible flying warships. Flight allowed them to leave the seas and venture onto land where they were unbalanced.

Over the top spells and units (or more likely a clever combination of them) are fun. As long as *all* of the players have some way of delivering awe and shock, the system can still be "fair". It's best if there's some sort of counter for everything though. The problem that MoM had was that the AI wasn't smart enough to make use of the killer combinations and the AI wasn't smart enough to be able to counter them.

---------- Post added at 11:56 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:23 AM ----------

Another thing to avoid in WoM (even if it's not something that was in MoM)...

Don't make things hard to understand or close off choices too soon. I recently looked at the master of mana mod for civ iv. Right on the first turn, I find that I can customize my city into one of three guilds. With no good documentation or feedback about the choices. Yuck. A better game design would be to push those building choices deeper into the city or research trees so that they player would have to be several turns into the game and probably have multiple cities before making important irrevocable choices. This helps keep the learning curve easier. A similar mechanic in Fallen Enchantress didn't feel ugly. But FE had a built-in delay before you made that choice the first time and made it very easy to understand the differences.

[Nicolbolas]

In my opinion, the highmen's paladins are the killers, any pair of spelled and experienced paladins would run over the entire map... finishing the game. When it comes to design a creature, it's very important to track this unbalanced situations.

[Mardagg]

i think its really problematic to talk about unbalanced or overpowered things for MoM because it never had multiplayer games.
I think lots of overpowered strats just worked because it was against a very limited AI.
For example,just a stack of buffed elite halfling slingers would make short work of 1 or 2 buffed Paladins.

[AlienPilgrim]

The things I disliked about MoM:
* The way Resistance worked made a lot of spells and powers (eg poison) useful only early in the game
* Magic Immunity was too strong (perhaps too binary) - it prevented not only all spell effects but special powers like breath attacks too
* The turn structure in combat meant that an army of ranged defenders and spells could severely damage your army before you had the chance to do anything (and they might flee before your turn)
* The arc of the game didn't quite work - the hardest part was usually near the beginning or midgame; if you didn't lose, the end was a walkover and all the powerful spells and items came too late to change the outcome
* Oh, and Crack's Call too - it was too strong and too all-or-nothing, and combined with Web could take down any corporeal unit in the game

[nDervish]

* The arc of the game didn't quite work - the hardest part was usually near the beginning or midgame; if you didn't lose, the end was a walkover and all the powerful spells and items came too late to change the outcome

I'm not sure I'd put that one on MoM, though. "If you can survive the beginning, the end will be a trivial mopping-up" seems endemic to the 4X genre as a whole. Which is kind of sad, because getting to play with the powerful units tends to be my favorite part of these games, but, by the time they become available, the game is already over, I've already won, and there's little reason to actually play out the final defeat of my opponents.

[Troy_Costisick]

I'm not sure I'd put that one on MoM, though. "If you can survive the beginning, the end will be a trivial mopping-up" seems endemic to the 4X genre as a whole. Which is kind of sad, because getting to play with the powerful units tends to be my favorite part of these games, but, by the time they become available, the game is already over, I've already won, and there's little reason to actually play out the final defeat of my opponents.

Yeah, that would be a hard bug to fix. Once you start winning battles, future battles get easier to win: your opponent has fewer resources. That's where heroes and champions should come in. They can tip the balance for a side that's losing in some cases. But like nDervish said, it's endemic to 4x games as a whole.

On further thought, MoM did have one catch-up mechanic: the Spell of Mastery. A guy could be getting crushed, but if you can manage to cast this, you can pull out a win from a losing position.

[Aldaron]

The unbalance in... EVERYTHING. Some books were better than others and specialization was WAY better than chosing different ones. Also, I never liked that you would get random spells from the books.

[Krakizbad]

The unbalance in... EVERYTHING. Some books were better than others and specialization was WAY better than chosing different ones. Also, I never liked that you would get random spells from the books.

Actually the randomization of spells was one of my favorite things about MoM.

[amcjkelly]

The biggest flaw in MOM is that the computer players didn't seem to take advantage of the magic items they had. Poor use of their heroes would be a close second.

[Happerry]

Actually the randomization of spells was one of my favorite things about MoM.

Agreed.

And Smarter AIs would fix alot of the mentioned issues I think..