Endless Legend - The Fantasy 4X spin off of the Endless Space

What mechanics are those, their pain magic and pillars?

Yes. It's like a metagame you'd find in competitive multiplayer stuff.

I wouldn't describe their 'units get stronger the more damage they take' as a unique mechanic... at least not on the level of their pillars.

So, random meta-gaming question.

With the empire-unique buildings, like the cryogrenics laboratory, and such: things that get bonuses for having anomalies around. Would you build the lab on your highest science city the moment it's available to get the best warning for winters, or would you wait for the perfect terrain to exploit that (land with a whole bunch of rivers, oceans, and anomalies so that science boosts stack up ridiculously high)?

I'm probably going to play on easy difficulties, and enjoy supersizing my empire. I'm not learning how to play properly, but having massive, world-spanning empires without much challenge just really appeals to me.

The AI is already pretty easy; I would just set it to normal, and play something good at expansion. As for the empire-specific ones, I tend to build in in the best place when I have the right materials/time to build it.

I'm actually trying out the Ardent Mages with a science victory... boxed in on two sides by Drakken and Broken Lords AI with much bigger empires. Jokes on them, I've already reached the tier VI researches. My queue is still in Era IV, but no matter.

The Shadows expansion was released today! I'm pretty terrible at it, as I predicted. The Forgotten are very interesting, though, and I love their faction quest.

I haven't played EL since before Guardians, but I saw the update notification and got curious. What's the Forgotten's deal? And why'd they wait for now to crawl out of the shadows?

Same reason every other faction started; the big cataclysm. More specifically, the playable forgotten are a more traditional sect than other Forgotten. Their 'deal' is that they excel at espionage and stealth; however, they cannot use Science at all. They instead either purchase researches (it becomes very expensive very fast) or, better, steal it from other factions. You'll want a decent amount of heroes to infiltrate cities, and a good Influence machine to fuel them. In combat, the units are rather squishy, but have exceptionally high DPR due to most units dual-wielding. The only unit that doesn't, the Mysts, can actually lay out huge damage to clumps of enemies, since their entire damage chains with no drop off. Also they're all invisible. There is new camouflage items that make units invisible in forest terrain, I'm sure Wild Walkers will love that. With the new Pillage function, cold war actually feels like cold war; stuff like friendly villages and extractors and the like. I'm not sure if it actually steals stuff, though, just gives you loot and shuts down the benefit for a few turns.

Really, I think Cultists would be a blast with the new stuff. They only have to worry about one city, and their minor faction units can scout for new cities to infiltrate.

Oh god, they're the Lord's Believers mixed with the Data Angels. Have to admit, that's pretty neat. I'll take a look at the xpac when things clear up for me.

The problem being that a spy can tear down the otherwise massive walls of your one city and instantly lose you the game.

Which is why your security will be super-high; get a good governor and maintain happiness and it will be fine; just be wary about letting other empires get vision on your city, and run the occasional round-up. And, with the new systems, if anyone comes near your city its taken as a sign of aggression.

Part of the reason I would like one city; you don't actually have to deal with more than one city.

I will keep my eye on this one. I'm not quite ready to buy anything more just yet, but adding in espionage says good things for the series.

Eventually they're going to have to do an Endless Space 2 and incorporate the new stuff into it.

They're actually doing an Endless Space 2, though.

Yeah, they announced that already.

Espionage is a bit weird compared to what I'm used to, since other than the Forgotten's special tech stealing, very little of the spy really helps you (unless you plan to invade soon), they just hurt the opponent. While admittedly that helps you win in the long run, it makes it harder for me to judge the value of it, especially since it takes up a hero.

edited 4th Sep '15 12:06:25 AM by Clarste

Uh? Nice. More ways for me to accidentially waste entire nights on plotting to take over the galaxy.

Oh, right. Good. I will have to look for that. I remember it, just forgot for a while.

Played that game of Cultists with Shadows on, and I have to say it was quite fun. Though the AI handing me a Supremacy victory probably helped with that...

I've been playing a lot of Vaulter runs lately. Gotta say, they feel a lot like the Brotherhood of Steel Midwest Chapter invading the Well World.

It's a blast.

Happy Endless Day everybody!

I got the game in the last Steam sale, and have a hard time putting it down over the last couple weeks.

Anyways, Amplitude just did a quick stream on Twitch, and previewed some artwork and music for a new faction coming in the next few months.

Well, I got this off a bundle (a base game with some extra Mezari thrown in) and it is kinda fun so far.

Picked Easy to get started, planning to go for a Quest Victory first as the Big Ear Elves. There's plenty to learn compared to Civilization V - which is the other 4X that I've played a lot - but I'm definitely enjoying the experience so far.

Yeah, this game is a fairly unique experience to other Civ games cuz of all the different factions and whatnot. Just wish I could completely finish a game XD But I just getbored and annoyed with the winter mechanic.

Go into the faction editor, pick the custom trait that gives you dust enhancement in the winter.

Laugh all over every ones face as winter becomes your ally not your enemy.

Its something like +2 movent, and a bunch of other bonuses in the winter, I forgot the name of it, but it really does turn winter into something you look foward too rather then a penelty.

edited 15th Nov '17 2:44:34 PM by Imca

Granted, if you have the Shifters expansion, you can proceed to break the game (regardless of faction) by setting up a combo of techs and improvements that make winter boost your food and industry production by 50% or more in any coastal city. (This gets even more broken if you are playing the Morgrawr, as you might imagine.)

edited 15th Nov '17 4:06:33 PM by TotemicHero

.... Imagine pairing that, Morgrawr.... and the trait I mentiomed. ._.;

I wanna try.

Well, then again, the Morgrawr break the game as is, so it's not like you need to go making a custom race if you want to see how ridiculous it can get.