Official Definitive Edition First Impressions Thread

[deleted_user]

Well, 11 hours since the streaming event began... what do you think?

Sweden is a well designed civ. Inca is a poorly designed civ. The age up politicians are all super awesome. Shift click sometimes bugs.

[fightinfrenchman]

Pissed about lack of Alt+D and no one seems to be playing treaty

[wardyb1]

Not sure I like that the only way to play "ranked" team is through qs (even though it looks bugged atm). I think that'll die very quickly. I kind of always liked that every game was ranked and that people playing unranked 1v1 is a bit of a scourge. But that's just from watching streams.

[forgrin]

Idk i'm still staring at a download bar. RIP.

[musketeer925]

Not sure I like that the only way to play "ranked" team is through qs (even though it looks bugged atm). I think that'll die very quickly. I kind of always liked that every game was ranked and that people playing unranked 1v1 is a bit of a scourge. But that's just from watching streams.

qs-only ranked is a good change. Ends noob bashing, selective opponent kicking, point trading, etc, all rampant on ESO (and the first two aren't really things you can ban people for).

I don't play any other competitive RTS games, but I imagine e.g., starcraft ranked is more like quicksearch?

[fightinfrenchman]

Not sure I like that the only way to play "ranked" team is through qs (even though it looks bugged atm). I think that'll die very quickly. I kind of always liked that every game was ranked and that people playing unranked 1v1 is a bit of a scourge. But that's just from watching streams.

qs-only ranked is a good change. Ends noob bashing, selective opponent kicking, point trading, etc.

I don't play any other competitive RTS games, but I imagine e.g., starcraft ranked is more like quicksearch?

Those are good things

[Squamiger]

Not sure I like that the only way to play "ranked" team is through qs (even though it looks bugged atm). I think that'll die very quickly. I kind of always liked that every game was ranked and that people playing unranked 1v1 is a bit of a scourge. But that's just from watching streams.

qs-only ranked is a good change. Ends noob bashing, selective opponent kicking, point trading, etc, all rampant on ESO (and the first two aren't really things you can ban people for).

I don't play any other competitive RTS games, but I imagine e.g., starcraft ranked is more like quicksearch?

wait but how do you figure out civ composition if ranked team games are all quick search?

[voigt1240]

Is it possible to turn off the new destroyed building animation?

[forgrin]

I think moving to only QS is in the right direction, but QS needs to be high quality for that to make sense.

IMO, moving to a system a little more like LoL, where you load into a lobby upon finding an opponent with a set map, and then you blind pick civs before greening up, would be an improvement. Could even blank out the opponent's name as well as civ if that helps stop people dodging.

[jap_jon]

I think moving to only QS is in the right direction, but QS needs to be high quality for that to make sense.

IMO, moving to a system a little more like LoL, where you load into a lobby upon finding an opponent with a set map, and then you blind pick civs before greening up, would be an improvement. Could even blank out the opponent's name as well as civ if that helps stop people dodging.

Do you mean "blind pick" as a team? That would make sense. Then you'd have an opportunity to discuss team roles/comps ahead of time.

[forgrin]

I think moving to only QS is in the right direction, but QS needs to be high quality for that to make sense.

IMO, moving to a system a little more like LoL, where you load into a lobby upon finding an opponent with a set map, and then you blind pick civs before greening up, would be an improvement. Could even blank out the opponent's name as well as civ if that helps stop people dodging.

Do you mean "blind pick" as a team? That would make sense. Then you'd have an opportunity to discuss team roles/comps ahead of time.

Yeah in team QS it would be blind picking as a team. I was thinking about 1v1s but it works for team as well.

[forgrin]

Not sure I like that the only way to play "ranked" team is through qs (even though it looks bugged atm). I think that'll die very quickly. I kind of always liked that every game was ranked and that people playing unranked 1v1 is a bit of a scourge. But that's just from watching streams.

qs-only ranked is a good change. Ends noob bashing, selective opponent kicking, point trading, etc, all rampant on ESO (and the first two aren't really things you can ban people for).

I don't play any other competitive RTS games, but I imagine e.g., starcraft ranked is more like quicksearch?

The original StarCraft had a lobby system, SC2 uses a ranked automated matchmaking system that inspired similar systems in LoL/DoTA. The automated matchmaking works well and it's a better experience than lobbies for ranked games IMO. However that's not to say that QS in AoE3 is really ready to be the primary ranked experience; I'd say the system is currently too primitive for healthy ranked games.

[harcha]

Overall there are far less bugs than previous betas, which is always great to see, and this makes me confident that this DE will be a success.

One small annoying thing is that I can no longer select neighboring idle villagers when pressing "find idle villager" + shift key, as only 1 villager is selected in this case. The music is still bugged but this is less relevant to gameplay.

[Mitoe]

Maybe it's just easier for me to see the things I don't like about it or something, Idk.

1) I think the graphics are pretty bad. They were clearly designed from a close-up perspective, and look positively atrocious from a zoomed-out top-down perspective like 99% of players play the game 99% of the time. The contrast between colours is really poor, so it's very hard to pick out specific details about units, especially at a glance, and they're frankly just hard to distinguish amongst the rest of the environment. When you zoom out past a certain point there's also this weird "fog" that seems to appear out of nowhere. There was also way way WAY too much attention given to foliage in the game, and it actually inhibits gameplay since your units appear BEHIND the foliage when you walk near it, rather than overtop of it, and there's no obscured unit alpha to help you see them. Disabling the foliage fixes the gameplay issue, but the ground textures look like absolute trash. Buildings look mostly fine, or even improved from the original, except the design for wooden walls seems to be just super ugly compared to the original game for no reason? Also don't like a lot of the dark brown buildings we get in the Colonial Age with most civilizations.

2) Sound design for guns and cannons is really disappointing to me. I've seen some people argue that they're more realistic, but I don't care about realism. The original game's combat sounds felt IMPACTFUL, sometimes even "EPIC" feeling. Listen to a falconet shoot in DE. It's pathetic. They evoke no fear in me. The sounds just seem really cheap to me and take away from the experience more than anything else. It sounds very similar to the Wars of Liberty mod, and while I like Wars of Liberty, I've never enjoyed the sounds and they have something of an unprofessional feel to them? (Edit: also, why do so many of the gun-wielding units have to have more than 1 sound, and why do they have to share those sounds with other units? What’s the point? I feel like I should be able to tell what unit is shooting based off of sound alone, and I don’t need my villager to sound like a musketeer, thanks.)

3) The deck builder is a straight up downgrade from the original game in every conceivable way. No flavour at all and very poor organization. You can't see the relationship between cards at all the way you can in the original game. Trying to figure out which upgrades affect which units for Sweden and Inca is a massive pain and a waste of time as a result of this. At least we have all cards unlocked from the get-go.

4) The new civs don't feel very polished to me. They're alright, and have some interesting ideas and definitely bring some new stuff to the game that's never been done before. But they seem so... gimmicky? Like just so many really weird design choices when it comes to unit mechanics and stuff. I really don't like having to switch my Caroleons between ranged and melee mode ALL THE TIME to feel like I'm playing the civilization optimally. You can argue there's some skill expression there, but that level of manual attention is mind-numbingly boring in my opinion, and I feel like it might put me off from playing the civ as soon as I lose a fight as a result of me not switching my reinforcing Caroleons into melee mode so that they arrive at the fight more quickly.


I mean, I'll probably get over this stuff eventually (as if I have much of a choice), but ultimately I think I am more disappointed than impressed. My only hope now is that it breathes some new life into the game and quick search actually functions--that's the thing I've missed the most about being a competitive AoE3 player over the last 4 years and something I will definitely be happy to get back. I suppose it'll also be interesting to see how some of the updates to the game's "dead content" like politicians, grenadiers, revolutions, etc. shake up the metagame and I look forward to experimenting in the future.

Edit: also since I hate the way the game looks at max-zoom so much I want to play at a closer zoom level, but the game's zoom options are bugged and don't do anything at all at the moment. Hopefully that gets fixed before release.

[Astaroth]

Yeah, the graphics are a bit weird. I feel like too many designers overlook the fact that better, more high res textures don't necessarily make for better looking units at an RTS zoom level. It's really more about fitting colors and clear contrasts.

What do people think about the Incas?

[harcha]

@Mitoe
1) I agree that the graphics make it harder to play. I think game readability is the issue here. Old graphics were easier to read either by design or simply by the fact that they were more jarring. I haven't noticed unit alpha issues tho, maybe that is because I've played with foliage on medium since the start (due to lag on my 1080p monitor with a 1080ti LOL).
2) I honestly think this is more about taste than anything, and having arguments about taste is kind of pointless. Maybe there is another game readability argument here, but so far I have not encountered problems understanding what sound means what. There are some bugs in sounds/music still.
3) Agree, but not sure how significant this is, certainly doesn't make the game unplayable.
4) Agree, there is some lack of polish. But I expect this is a question of time.
Perhaps caroleans could get an auto switch in volley mode/stance depending on distance from waypoint, kinda like how a marching army switches from vertical/longitudinal column to horizontal/abreast formation when nearing the waypoint.

Honestly at this point I don't really understand how grenadiers are countered... Is it just kiting with skirm?? It feels like you really need to go for a 3 unit composition even in colonial/commerce now - musk/hus/gren.

[Mitoe]

Pretty sure you can’t get good grens until Fortress.

Also, @harcha for #3 I think it’s actually very very important for new players and is being very heavily overlooked/dismissed by MS.

[howlingwolfpaw]

I haven't seen how bad grens are for countering, but how do you counter macemen? 4.8 speed and 760 Hp 102 attack with area? I have seen armies of them wipe out armies clean and then destroy towns. THey are like a jag knight mixed with a skull knight with that high of a base attack.


I like the addition of many more infinite cards

[Kynesie]

What do people think about the Incas?

They looks bad
No 3v hurt them a lot , you can be agressive with the double bh travois, but it looks a weaker version of aztecks, with 3v down, expensive units, less xp.
You can boom , and it s a bit a weaker version of brit (135w for 0.5f ) and still down from 3v on wood.
The priestess boom is such a pain ( no starting priestess and only a 2priestess card age 2 ).
Water boom isn t great , not enought vill early on to gather the needed wood, and the 2 warship lose 0-2 versus caravels , because they lack special attack.
The warchief aura buff natives (if it s the same as last betas ) , you can get some good rush with it , but overall it s a lot weaker than other warchiefs aura.

Positive points are the late colonial when 2tcs + 13houses makes your eco great.
Stronghold gives me fun ! it really op sometimes but just die uselessly agaisnt canons with more range.
Chimu runner can be invisible and keep their speed, that s too much lame for me

[deleted_user]

Play-ability issues:

1) shift-click seems to "bug" for me more often than on Legacy (not used to different latency?)
2) quick clicks not registering on shipments and building icons
3) just kind of like a worse UI across the board

I like/don't mind pretty much everything else except for Inca's abusability but gotta admit Mitoe has some good points but I also gotta admit those things aren't ruining the game for me and the new stuff is more engaging than the things that weren't done perfectly are disengaging.

[WickedCossack]

Maybe it's just easier for me to see the things I don't like about it or something, Idk.

Probably quite a normal take for those that have been with the game a certain length of time. The improvements seem common sense to us and because of that it's often too easy to not give enough credit where it's due, and we should do so e.g to name a few:

1. Competitve maps in QS
2. Unlocked cards
3. New content - civs & maps
4. Server side hosted games

The graphics as you mention in your first point do however give me pause for thought. I would agree in their current state they don't justify the upgrade in hardware that people may have to make to run this. The clarity at the zoomed out level is poor. However it has been a long time since I played so a lot of my impressions are from the current streams, I wonder if a streamer can confirm how the ingame images compare to what's presented across the stream? It could be the blur is introduced more prominently over stream, idk.

As a second point can I make a petition to bring back aoe3 ranks e.g Captain, Brigadier and so on .. or maybe when the elo settles they can categorise groups of 100 by the traditional names. I fudging love these.

[[Armag] diarouga]

It s worse than EP, not even close.
The playability is awful because of the new UI and graphisms.

That's sad because we've told them countless times what the issues are but they either didn't really care or didn't have the skill to fix it.

[xxsix9xx]

Pissed about lack of Alt+D and no one seems to be playing treaty

Where is it for? Did you put the hotkeys in the hotkeymenu on legacy? I got alt-D to look at dock, but that's my own assignment.

[Challenger_Marco]

I like everything except UI ,map visibility ,unit visibility.I can't differentiate between treasure guardians and herds.I thought it was a herd and lost like 3 vills lol.
Indian monk name and the default names are very wrong ,inaccurate, they need to be changed.

[Snuden]

Not overly impressed.