What Game Should I Play Next?

[Thrasher]

Me too. Check out this resource for items, and what can be used to repair them. Just type in the item name in the search window, return, and voila!

http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Chinese_stealth_armor_(Operation:_Anchorage)

 

[Heronblade]

Generally ended up being a sniper more often than not. Given half a chance to set up, I could drop almost anything before it got within striking distance. OF course, that made getting ambushed... interesting.

 

[Thrasher]

Being a sniper works fine against one swamp folk. Against more than one, you're gonna get wacked since your stealth and sneak attack is lost after the first shot. If you have tons of stealth boys then you can restealth.

 

[Thrasher]

Finished Might and Magic World of Xeen last weekend! Wow, now this is what call an epic story and world design. Unification of the lightside and darkside included. For me, the exploration aspect was just about the best I've played. Seriously. Even with the low res aspects (or perhaps because of them) the diversity was astounding.

The game seemed amazingly well balanced from low to epic levels. I was very impressed that my ending chars with buffed levels of [152, 167] still found a few challenges at the end (e.g. the Mega Dragon). But here is a strange thing, there seemed to be enough XP available to reach much higher levels, but I couldn't afford to train everyone. To afford training my Cleric and Sorcerer 10 levels, I had to add nearly 20 years to the age of my characters so I could gain interest in the bank while they effectively waited (while working). How one could afford to train to the 255 level cap is beyond me (or perhaps I don't have the patience for needlessly mindless grind activities like mining).

I also very much liked the puzzles in this game. There were riddles, anagrams, visual clues (some only appeared on your mini map, very cool), regular word puzzles, math word problems, arithmetic and algebraic problems - all great fun. I also like mazes, and sure got my fill of them.

I'm back to playing HoMM V now - this time the Hammers of Fate expansion. It's a blast. The most fun is figuring out the best tactics for different kinds of enemies given your own units and hero abilities/spells. There are some new units, but after the 1st two scenarios in the single player campaign, it seems very little is different from the original. I hope it gets more diverse.

 

[HiddenX]

The Might & Magic series (parts II,III, IV,V,VI,VII) is pure fun!

 

[JDR13]

I'm very much looking forward to when I finally have the time to really dive into the M&M series, as well as HoMM. I'd love to do a marathon where I play all the HoMM games and M&M VI, VII, & VIII over a period of months.

 

[Thrasher]

The Might & Magic series (parts II,III, IV,V,VI,VII) is pure fun!

The next M&M I think I'll play is VI, assuming the story continues. If not, which one is the best remaining, do you think?

I also have to play DMoMM.

 

[dteowner]

7 is the best, but 6 is well worth playing. Plan on doing both. See you in about 6 months. Although it's not really mandatory, I'd play them in order.

 

[Thrasher]

Thanks for that, DTE!

JDR, I couldn't imagine playing all those back to back unless I knew them well enough to do a speed run, but then I would have played them already. And I don't enjoy speed runs. There's so much to explore, it would take years, I'd think!

 

[JDR13]

Have you been to the M&M Wiki site? It gives a nice overview of most of the games in the series.

 

[Thrasher]

TY! One for the bookmarks.

 

[Thrasher]

Last weekend ….in between taxes, I hate TurboTax, BTW, they didn't implement all the latest IRS community property and income laws new for this year per IRS publication 555, so now I have to get an extension for my Fed taxes until they get their act together, they should pay me interest on my missing fed refund or at least refund the cost of TurboTax since they failed their guarantee.

/rant off

I almost got through the first Hammers of Fate campaign. The last map is a doosey! It's HUGE (even Donald Trump would say so)! And the enemy heroes come back every turn to harass you even after you kill them. That put a serious dent in my need to fully explore the map. I built up large enough armies to scare them into staying penned inside their area with secondary heroes. Then I could have fun.

Almost done, then on to the Dwarf campaign. I hope it offers more variety and new units to figure out.

 

[Thrasher]

OK, I finished the Haven campaign. Huge map was fun, but I totally squished the final set of boss enemies and garrisons with armies of over 500 marskman, 50 angels, etc... Even by taking my time to fully explore there wasn't enough XP to max out the secondary hero. So I suppose there was a limit to the uberness.

Doing the dwarf campaign now. The Runemage hero fells less overpowered than the Haven hero at the start of the campaign. We'll see about later. I'm building him as a caster, ignoring the leadership skill and going for sorcery, light magic, destruction magic, and enlightenment. The rune magic is a nice touch, and a fun new dimension to combat tactics and resource management. This one seems like it's going to take more finesse from beginning. Thank god! Until I stumble upon some uber OP tactics, if possible.

 

[Thrasher]

Yep, the dwarf campaign was much more fun than the Haven campaign for the reasons described above.

I've moved on to the Dungeon campaign and it's even more of a chllenge. It's been most fun at the beginning when you had to be tricky with positioning your mini-troop of blood furies/maidens to strike and return without getting hit and suffering losses. Judicious use of spell casting witches was important too.

Now at the 3rd mission most of that strategy seems to pretty much go out the window. It's all about maxing spellpower and mana for my hero - blasting huge armies away while meatshields soak up the damage, hopefully dishing out spell + defensive retaliation attack damage faster than receiving it.

But, and it is a big but, the damn game isn't giving me the skills I want. Hero is at level 20 and she still only has basic destructive magic. WTF! That's what she started with. Attack, Luck, and Sorcery skills are maxed but the PRIME Warlock skill for beating the baddies is stuck at the lowest level - this means no 3rd and fourth level spells. I'm afraid she'll be seriously gimped in the final missions, because she won't be able to learn the spells she needs. I was hoping to have light magic maxed by now too, so I could ressurect to zero losses, but no dice. This mission is perfect for learning spells because you take over 5 towns. Luckily her spellpower is astronomic. We'll see… There is a little more XP to be had, but I doubt enough for 5 levels before the next mission, assuming all the skills offered are the ones I want and in the right order…

While the randomized skill offering of HoMM and KB adds spice, to me, it irritates me too much. I like planning my chars and building to plan, rather than hoping.

 

[Thrasher]

Finished Hammers of Fate over the weekend.

Even though my warlock never got Light Magic she did very well.

It was almost ruined by the last mission being bugged. A first in HoMM V for me. What should have been a big payoff at the end, was mangled by repeated cutscenes replacing missing cutscenes for the finale.

Also the last mission was rather screwy. If you rushed your strong hero and starter army to the sieged town for the first objective, an incredible large demonic army and hero would snatch the sieged town, and kill all of your potential allied heros. If you break the siege and meet the objective afterword, the cutscenes would play about their joining you, but the heros never appeared. So, after retrying that a few times, I had to suicidally lure the uber enemy to the rather weak starting army for the haven hero. This approach wouldn't work with my warlock since his army scared away the enemy, if it was divided down enough for him to attack, my warlock would inevitably lose. I must have retried it 5 times…

The haven army with a few dungeon army units could JUST barely beat the demon army while successfully luring it. The resurrection spell was key. But it was VERY hard. Again, it took many tries.

After that, the mission was fairly easy except for a garrison that had over 10K troops guarding the approach the other haven town! I delayed the siege rescue objective until I captured all the other towns and cleared all other areas, leveling up my starting heros in the process, and giving them all the attribute boosts and uber items that could be found. Once that was done, I had more than enough gold to hire and upgrade all the troops in the haven and dungeon towns / buildings. And could fairly easily take the last town with a haven army and the haven hero received after breaking the siege, who cast mass haste, mass deflect arrows, and LOT of resurrections. I didn't use any of the starter heros for the finale. A lot of wasted effort trying to build them up.

I still have to play the second "expansion" of HoMM V, "Tribes of the East".

In the meantime, I am thinking hard about a party for NWN 2, Storm of Zehir. Trying to devise a good set up for allocating skills to get all the teamwork feats and other bonuses, and having sufficient crafting skills/feats to craft anything.

Can anyone recommend a particular party?

I'm thinking…

Leader
Human Rogue x / Ranger 3
- rogue skills, craft traps, bluff, hide, move silently, survival, appraisal?, dual-wielding
Gold Dwarf Fighter x / Weapon Master ?
- intimidate, taunt
Aasimar Cleric
- diplomacy, heal, listen, spot
Sun Elf Wizard x / Arcane Scholar of Candlekeep 5?
- main crafter, craft armor, craft weapons, spellcraft, search, lore

 

[Thrasher]

I am hearing the crickets, maybe it's time for this thread to die...

 

[dteowner]

Nah, just the cycle of things. Others will weigh in eventually.

 

[JDR13]

Try posting that question in the NWN2 forum.

Sounds like Hammers of Fate was pretty disappointing..

 

[Thrasher]

I liked it, but it certainly was far from excellant. Probably the most fun was the 2nd Runemage scenario set of missions.

 

[movwills]

lot's of games i can suggest you to play...
Super Mario World
Team Fortress 2
Super Mario Galaxy 2
Ratchet & Clank Series
Super Smash Bros. Melee
New Super Mario Bros. Wii
Donkey Kong Country(GBC Port)
Donkey Kong Country Returns
Fire Emblem(GBA)
Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon
Robopon
Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Gunstar Heroes
Shinobi III: Return of the Ninja Master
Call of duty MW 2
NHL '94
Revenge of Shinobi
Pulseman
Beyond Oasis
Golden Axe II
Ecco the Dolphin