Age of Wonders 4 News

We told you about the content of Ways of War, we showed it to you during the streams and dev journals—and now is finally the time to experience it yourself as both Ways of War and Tiger Update are out now!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2914280/Age_of_Wonders_4_Ways_of_War/?curator_clanid=43512488

Watch the release trailer:
[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]
[h2]Embrace prosperity, fight for righteousness, or wage total war![/h2]

Begin your journey to the realms of Paradise with the Age of Wonders 4: Ways of War content pack. This Content Pack is filled to the brim with the Simian & Ogrekin Forms, the Oathsworn Culture whose people follow one of three Oaths and 4 New Tomes to bring Balance. Learn more about neighboring Empires with the mysterious Intrigue Happenings, discover ancient creatures of Prosperity and Calamity and find yourself in lands of conflict where paradise is one choice away.

Your guide during your travels is the Tiger Update. This Free Update, available to all owners of Age of Wonders 4, revamps your Heroes with a completely reworked Skill Progression & Class System. Ambitions give your Heroes a new found Passion and a way to carve their place in this world. With new Hero Quests and Creation Options this Update is truly a Hero's Journey.

Check below for all the details on the Ways of War Content Pack and the Tiger Update.

Game Version: 1.009.001.99091





New Forms: Simians & Ogrekin
Two brand new forms inspired by East-Asian folklore. The Simian are quick, organized, and unbeatable in spirit. Their appearance is characterized by prominent ears and mouths, as well as a variety of skin patterns & decorations. The Ogrekin, on the other hand, would not be praised for their swiftness. They are big, brutish, and dominate with a fiery spirit. Their appearance is characterized by a multitude of horns and teeth; sharp & stabby was the memo.



New Culture: Oathsworn
The Oathsworn Culture is based around ethical codes which will provide unique advantages based on your Devotion. As an Oathsworn culture you get choose from 3 Oaths that determine the sort of ethical code you want your people to follow:

• Oath of Harmony: Focus on avoiding wars, while building a multicultural empire and making the world a safer place
  
• Oath of Righteousness: Focus on gathering “good” alignment points, and destroying evil forces
  
• Oath of Strife: Focus on waging war against worthy opponents; earn bonuses for attacking forces more powerful than your own
  

New Tomes
Channel your inner strength to cleanse units and empower attacks. Strike from the shadows, blind your foes and find weak points to deliver the perfect, fatal blow. Rain down calamity on the realm and burn your enemies in cold Ghostfire. Bring forth prosperity to your empire and grant your units healing Grace. Whether you walk in the light with the Order Tomes of Discipline & Prosperity or hide in the dark with the Shadow Tomes of Shades & Calamity, you can choose your own Path with these 4 Hybrid Tomes.



New Content: Intrigue Happenings
Intrigue Happenings are multi-stage story events that bring more of the character driven gameplay that is associated with Story Realms to normal skirmish maps. These events focus on other AI rulers and internal crises such as assassinations, coups and betrayals, and give you the chance to take part, thwart or exploit them as they wish.



New Realm: Paradise Divided
Once known as a realm of peace and paradise, its prosperity and order have since been threatened by calamity and strife. Get a taste of all that is new with this premium Challenge Realm. Sworn Rivalry introduces Three Empires that clash to rebuild paradise in their image. Unfolding Mysteries increases the chance of Intrigue Happenings occurring in the Empires of your enemies. Land of Conflict brings forth Accursed creatures and creatures of Prosperity that inhabit brand new locations on the World Map.

Even More Content
While we’re sure the above has you throwing your fists (in the air), there’s even more that you can enjoy. Further included in the Ways of War Content Pack are:

• 5 Achievements
  
• 3 New Music Tracks
  
• 5 New Premade Rulers
  
• Blessed Dragon & Graceful Judge Mounts
  
• New Ways of War Interface Skin & Banner Emblems
  

Hero Ambitions
Heroes now have their own Ambitions and Goals they desire to achieve. These Ambitions serve to add a sense of personality and investment to Heroes, further informing the things your Hero does in the world. As Heroes make progress towards their Goals they earn Renown. Renown is a measure of a hero’s fame and status and reflected in their Governance and Heroic Leadership.



Hero Skill Rework
Hero Skills have been completely reworked & redistributed. Rulers & Heroes have a set of Skill Trees from which they can pick their skills whenever they level up. The skill trees available to the hero will depend on 3 sources: Origin, Class and Signature Skills. Your Origin Skill Tree is determined by Godir Type, the Class Skill Trees are derived from your chosen Weapon Loadout during faction creation and your Signature Skill Tree is filled based on your Empire Affinity.

Thanks to the skill tree structure combined with the class system we can really up the power of your Heroes and specificity of hero skills. Where previously having a hero gain a barrage attack would have a whole host of problems, now it can be a unique choice that later skills can build upon to further empower it in unique ways!



Quality of Life and more
We always try to dedicate some time to improvements that make the game easier or more accessible to use. So what more can you expect from the Tiger Update that isn’t new Content, Balance Changes or Fixes?

The Faction Creation screens have received a visual upgrade, improving the usability and readability of various elements. Enjoy the ease of seeing what items look like before making the choice with the Snapshot Previews. With Improved Lighting and brand new Customization Items you’ll find yourself spending even more time creating your favorite Rulers.

We’ve updated the iconography used in the game to improve Accessibility. Enemy Combat Banners now have a more recognizable and obviously hostile style, Combat Hazard Icons have changed from generic Exclamation Points to clear Buff/Debuff icons and colors have been tweaked to have a stronger difference. Overall you’ll now require less clicking thanks to the handy “Repair All” button in the City Interface to quickly repair Province Improvements and a “Disenchant Equipment” button whenever you acquire new Equipment Rewards.

There’s still more to learn on your Journey with the Tiger Update. For the full list of change notes, please visit here.

[h2]Everything you need to know about Ways of War and Tiger Update: [/h2]

Dev Diaries:

• Oathsworn Culture
• Tomes and Wildlife
• Intrigue Happenings
• The Hero Rework
• The Art of Ways of War

Dev Streams:

• Ways of War First Look Dev Stream Pt 1
• Ways of War Pt 2: New Tomes!
  
• Ways of War Pt 3: Intrigue Happenings and a short king
  
• Ways of War Pt 4: Let’s see the dragons
  
• Ways of War Pt 5: The spookiest unit in the game?
  

Feature Highlights by IndridCasts:

• Simians, Ogrekin and Oathsworn Culture!
• New Tomes and Units of Ways of War
• Intrigue Happenings — New mechanic
• Free Update will change your Hero forever!

[h3]Get Ways of War Now: [/h3]
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2914280/Age_of_Wonders_4_Ways_of_War/?curator_clanid=43512488

Have a great day!


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Hi everyone! I’m Elle, 2D Artist at Triumph. “The Toms”© have allowed me to ramble on about everything art, so get a cup of coffee or tea (the latter would be more thematic) and join me on this grand showcase of The Art of ‘Ways of War’!

Image description: Ways of War teaser image, showing the Blossom node TC map in the foreground and an Oathsworn city in the background.



The Oathsworn culture was inspired by east asian mythology, fantasies, and theater. Since Age of Wonders 4 is a fantasy 4X, historical accuracy is not the priority. It was important for us to be respectful of the real-life cultures and history that inspired us, while focusing on creating a fantasy that fit into the existing AOW4 universe.

We started the Oathsworn culture exploration with sketches close to their real life inspirations:

Image description: Early thumbnail concepts for the Oathsworn Culture.

At this stage we place most importance on creating a diverse lineup that is easily distinguishable in tactical combat. In order to do so, we break the characters down to their most basic shapes (literally - peep the Minecraft looking breakdowns underneath the drawings). More explorations:

Image description: Early thumbnail concepts for the Oathsworn Culture.

If you’re wondering what the little numbers under the concepts mean in that image (I get it, I’m nosy too); those are counting how many unique tops, bottoms, and shoes the 3D character artists will need to make.

The Oathsworn culture introduces 8 new units, for which the workload would be immense if they all had entirely unique models. We’d rather spend our time on some really cool & standout pieces than 8 variations of shoes! With clever reuse, we can cut the work time down to about 5 days total per unit model: roughly 3 days to get the model in game and another 2 days to polish, tweak textures, adjust the skinning, and fitting the outfit to all the different forms and transformations (viva la modularity). :’D

We also did some exploration of the Oathsworn that went in the direction of intricate fabrics & segmented armor pieces:

Image description: More detailed concept explorations of 5 units.

But ultimately we decided that this direction was edging too close to the High culture aesthetics, which shares a lot of the visual language space we were exploring. Both are order cultures, but they have very different views on what constitutes ‘order’. We wanted the Oathsworn culture to look more conditioned for war, as ‘Ways of War’ might suggest ;)

So another concept pass was done (this one done by our art director Rich) and that’s where the culture really clicked for us. It felt different enough from what we already had in game, but perfectly fit in with the existing AOW4 universe. We brought this straight to our 3D character artist Geertje, who worked out the details with photo references and paintovers. See how the units changed between that last 2D concept pass and the final 3D:

Image description: Side by side comparisons of the concept art and 3D of Oathsworn culture units.

All of these units also needed new weapons, which were made by our 3D Artist Lara. Two of these are Free Patch pantheon unlock variations, let’s see if you can guess which are which!

Image description: Finished weapon models for Oathsworn Culture & Pantheon unlocks.

As we were exploring the new weapons, our animator Michiel started fighting ghosts in the office.

Image description: GIF of Michiel swinging a long wooden sword in the office.

I asked him if he was okay, and he responded:

"The new weapon types and fighting styles (punching!) require unique animations. Animating martial arts and historical fighting styles can get very complex. So it is important to film good reference material. Luckily we have a wooden sword lying around at the Triumph Studio office. It was the perfect prop to act out the Avenger’s Helmsplitter ability!”

Image description: GIF of the Avenger units’ Helmsplitter animation, a heavy downward swing of the sword.

And before I could bring my concerns about this sword-swinging to HR, he clarified: “Yes, sometimes I’m scared of hitting things (or coworkers!) when swinging the wooden sword around. But in those cases I’ll swing a pen instead of the wooden sword. Safety first!”

See the pen blade, uhm I mean Honor Blade, in action:

Image description: GIF side by side of Michiel’s reference footage and the Honor Blade’s Defensive Strike, a cross-legged jump with a stretched out sword strike.
​


No culture is complete without city assets! When researching east asian architecture we really fell in love with the roofs, so that was the primary element we wanted to highlight and exaggerate. The early concepts by Rich:

Image description: Early concept for the Oathsworn city + a subculture variation.

The city tiers were especially influenced by the beauty that is Thai temple roof tiers, where the more important a building is, the more roof tiers it’ll have. Fully an aesthetic choice rather than it being functional, and as artists we can’t get enough of useless aesthetic choices :D

You’ll see that exact concept in the city tiers, where an additional roof tier is added for each city tier. Here are the comparisons between the subcultures’ Tier I city and Tier IV city, modeled by our 3D environment artist Tom:

Image description: In-game screenshots of Level 1 and Level 4 Oathsworn city models.

There’s also a ton of work to be done for the Oathsworn city sieges, as we need unique wall and house visuals with destructible variants. Lara did all the work modeling these as well as creating unique textures, check out the cool sculpted dragon detail!

Image description: One of the new materials made for the siege map, its use in-game shown on the left.

Image description: Different house and tower model variations.

It’s super satisfying to see all these assets come together and get to enjoy them while my units get absolutely smashed into the ground because of my poor strategic planning and inability to make friends (not quite sure I’m still talking about the game).

Image description: GIF of in-game siege battle footage.

Lastly for the Oathsworn culture, I’d like to mention the crests that you see in the subculture icons:

Image description: Oath of Harmony, Righteousness, and Strife subculture icons.

The Oathsworn are so dedicated to their oaths that they also want everyone they meet to know what they are sworn to. Inspired by Japanese Kamon, we liked the idea of each subculture having a (family) crest they can wave in battle. These crests are available as banner icons, but also show up in an immense amount of places in-game. Initially they were just intended for use in the culture outfits, but when you play you’ll find traces of them everywhere!

Check out how Sara, our 3D environment artist, integrated them in the ‘School of {Subculture}’ special province improvements:

Image description: Concepts of the ‘School of {Subculture} SPI’s at the top, and screenshots of the in-game models at the bottom.

They also show up in spells and abilities, I imagine Ana might’ve gotten sick of looking at them…

Image description: The ‘pledge’ unit enchantments shown on a Goretusk Piglet, which grant the cultural devotion mechanic to non-cultural units.

Image description: The ‘seal’ link effects, inflicted by the Sealbearer unit.

And many more places, but I’ll leave the rest to you to discover in-game! As a hint, you might find them in the units and city assets too ;)



Luis has already given you the rundown on the 4 new tomes (technically 7) that come with Ways of War, but I wanted to cast an additional spotlight on the three ‘technically also tome books’; the culture tomes!

Image description: The finished tome art for all three subculture tomes, from left to right: Harmony, Righteousness, and Strife.

Every culture and subculture comes with a tome, and although not present in tome selection, you can still find these in the encyclopedia or your tome library! The art for them was made by our 2D and concept art intern Alex. Here’s the start to finish process:

Image description: Concepts for all three subculture tomes, starting with concepts on the left and with the finished tome on the right.

Alex played around with how we could incorporate those subculture crests that I talked about earlier without losing the feeling & themes of the tome. The Harmony tome was inspired by zen gardens, the Righteousness tome is a playful depiction of the Avenger units’ gear kit, and the Strife tome is all about the subculture’s affinity with fire and brute force.



You’ve seen glimpses of them already, but now formally introducing: The Simian and the Ogrekin, made by our 3D character art team Robin & Geertje as well as our intern Isa:

Image description: In-game visuals of the Simian and Ogrekin forms in the Physical Form selection menu. The Simian have slender bodies with prominent ears, mouths, and skin patterns. The Ogrekin have muscular bodies with prominent teeth and multiple horns.

To us, it seemed obvious which forms we needed for this expansion. You’ll recognize the inspiration we took from Journey to the West, and folklore such as the yōkai. These forms hope to fulfill two very unique fantasies as they inherently take such different approaches to war, diplomacy, and ruling their realms.

The Simian are quick, organized, and unbeatable in spirit. Their appearance is characterized by prominent ears and mouths, as well as a variety of skin patterns & decorations. The Simian come with the new free patch 1-point form trait Cheerful, which increases Morale gain. This trait came from wanting a form that was “cheerful” in personality and use, but would still allow players to make ruthless and bloodthirsty Simians in appearance.

Image description: Headshots of 10 different Simian Rulers, sampling some of the available customization options.

The Ogrekin, on the other hand, would not be praised for their swiftness. They are big, brutish, and dominate with a fiery spirit. The latter is entirely literal, as they come with the new free patch 2-point form trait Inner Fire, which increases their fire resistance and makes melee attackers sustain fire damage. Their appearance is characterized by a multitude of horns and teeth; sharp & stabby was the memo.

Image description: Headshots of 10 different Ogrekin Rulers, sampling some of the available customization options.

Inner Fire is not the only new free patch damage type specific form trait, we liked the concept of this so much that we added three of them ;)

Image description: Inner Fire, Inner Frost, and Inner Lightning form traits. All cost 2 trait points and give +3 Elemental Resistance and make the attackers sustain 3 Elemental Damage.

By the way, both the Simian and the Ogrekin come with tails, but as part of the free patch any forms with tails now have a tail slider that changes the length of the tail or removes it entirely. :)



The process of creating a unit is never linear. In theory the pipeline should be design -> concept art -> 3D -> animation -> VFX -> done. But in each step we get informed and inspired by each others’ decisions, and the Accursed Ogre (from Tome of Calamity) was a great example of this.

Image description: 5 progress pictures of the Accursed Ogre. 2D head concepts, full 2D concept, and then three versions of 3D & VFX with increasing polish.

The first iteration of the sculpt may have been closest to the concept, but we felt like it was missing something. There’s no need to go back to making new 2D concepts, we can simply paint over the 3D or try out changes directly in 3D. We found that adding tattoos to the upper body and hue shifting the red to a cooler tone really helped enhance the contrast around the unit’s face and pull attention to the new Ghostfire FX, made by Ana:

Image description: Accursed Ogre in the encyclopedia, showcasing the Ghostfire FX.

Whereas the troubleshooting happened mostly in 3D for the Accursed Ogre, our exploration for the Radiant Guardian (from Tome of Prosperity) was done mostly in 2D. We started off with a different idea entirely, thoroughly exploring feline and canine concepts inspired by Chinese guardian lion statues.

Image description: 2D concepts of the Radiant Guardian inspired by Chinese guardian lions, all four-legged with big teeth and golden decorative elements.

Although we loved this idea, there was something that we (and especially our concept artist Ollie) loved more. This other creature kept popping up in our research and rent free in our minds. “Turtles…, turtles..., turtles…”, the voices chanted. Louder and louder, until Ollie’s brain exploded and out came my personal favorite unit:

Image description: 2D concept front and back of the Radiant Guardian as a turtle, with a horned mask as shell.

Once we saw this concept there was no going back! Having plenty of canine and feline wildlife units already but not a single turtle (the shame!), it was an easy call to make. We also got the opportunity to add some fun animations such as a unique defense mode:

Image description: GIF of the Radiant Guardian’s defense mode animation, where it jumps into its shell.

And butterfly FX added by Ana, because that is exactly what it was missing:

Image description: Radiant Guardian in the encyclopedia, showcasing small butterflies flying around the unit.



I have spent entirely too much time talking but there’s still art left to show so I’ll just quickfire some last DLC content highlights for your enjoyment!

A new blossom node + tactical combat map made by Tom with an accompanying event image (which also has some cool falling leaf FX by Ana):

Image description: GIF of Blossom Node TC map in-game.

Image description: Blossom Node ‘surrender’ event image + how it looks in context in-game.


A new wooden UI Skin made by Alex:

Image description: Ways of War UI Skin elements, carved wood adorned with rope & coins.


And finally finishing off the DLC showcase with the inspiring designer words, “we need another icon”:

Image description: Varying icons made for Ways of War.



You might notice some visual updates in the free patch as well, of which a lot have come from suggestions that you, the players, have made. If you ever have any art-related feedback or suggestions, please continue sharing them in the forums! We are watching you (ominous tone) and value your feedback! Here are some of the free patch visual update highlights:

Robin, our lead 3D artist, updated the lighting in the front-end. We agreed with you that it was sometimes really hard to see your ruler and units with how dark this screen was.

Image description: Before (left) and after (right) of the front-end faction selection screen.

New faction customization interface, because we were just as sick of the sliders as you! Sliders work well when options are on a sliding scale (such as ‘Head Size’ or ‘Tail Length’, seen in the image below), but not so much for helmet or outfit options. In those cases, we’ve now replaced the sliders with icon previews.

Image description: In-game screenshot of the customization item icons being used in the place of sliders.

In early AOW4 development, we’d considered making 2D icons for all the customization options. But the workload of this would be huge, and it’d limit the amount of options we could add in the future as we’d always have to reserve extra time for making 2D icons. Our principal 3D tech artist Allert was instead able to set up 3D item previews so they’re grabbed automatically, and won’t give us additional work when adding content in the future. This system should also work for mods.

Next, the weapon enchantment visuals were updated by Ana. The old enchantments were visually overwhelming, especially when combined with other enchantments and transformations. The new enchantments should allow you to better maintain the visuals you intended for your ruler, while also just looking better overall!

Image description: Before (top) and after (bottom) of the ‘Lightning Blades’ enchantment visual.


Image description: Before (top) and after (bottom) of the ‘Flameburst Weapons’ enchantment visual.

We also did some much needed accessibility updates for the color blind. There were some particularly egregious places where we used red and green to distinguish between important elements, which obviously makes the difference impossible to see for those with red-green colorblindness. You’ll find visual updates in the enemy combat banners, tactical hazard icons, and the battle prediction colors.

Image description: Added visual distinction in the form of spikes to the TC unit banners, which previously could only be distinguished by color.

Image description: Added visual distinction to the TC hazards, which now use up/down arrows for positive/negative warnings respectively.

Image description: Tweaked colors on the battle prediction bar for better visual contrast.


And as a last highlight, the much requested option to disable the angelic transformation glow!
Image description: ‘Angelic Transformation’ major transformation with visuals enabled (left) and disabled (right).

Just like that, I’m all out of images! I hope you enjoyed this behind-the-scenes look at what the art team has been up to, and most of all I hope you enjoy playing with the new content. :)

The wait is almost over, as the Ways of War content pack and Tiger Update free patch release on the 5th of November!

[h3]Get Expansion Pass 2:[/h3]

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Spooktacular Rulers!

"Trick or treat?" says the Arcane Trickster, as if there was a choice. Join us this Halloween for a spooky livestream!

Set your reminders for Tomorrow, 31 October at 2pm CET! Note that if you are from outside Europe, the stream will begin one hour later than usual due to Summer Time ending here.

[h2]Watch Here on our YouTube channel![/h2]

[h3]What time is the stream for me?[/h3]

• PDT: 6am
  
• MDT: 7am
  
• CDT: 8am
  
• EDT: 9am
  
• GMT: 1pm
  
• GMT+7: 8pm
  
• GMT+8: 9pm
  
• GMT+9: 10pm
  
• GMT+11: 12am (next day)
  

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Hi all!

Today we’re going to be trying something new, by putting the whole of the upcoming Tiger Update into an Open Beta! This means that if you have the game on Steam, you will be able to play on that update by opting into the Tiger Beta (see instructions below).

This Update changes an awful lot of things, including the massive Hero Skill Rework and Ambitions System, so we’re setting out to achieve two things.

• We’re keen to start collecting your Feedback early about how the system works and if (or in all likelihood - how quickly) the balance of it can be completely broken to make unkillable god heroes who single handedly kill 18 strong armies of tier 5 units.
  
• We also want to give the Modding Community a headstart in updating their content to match the new update. We’ve done some testing to verify initial compatibility but there’s a vast variety of mods and mod combinations out there.

After updating to the Tiger Beta your in-game version will read 1.009.001.99114.



If you want to take part in the beta there are a few important things you need to know!

• This Beta is only available on Steam, owners on Console, Epic or GOG will receive the full Tiger Update alongside the Ways of War Content Pack on November 5th.
  
• If a save has been made in Open Beta, there’s no going back! You will not be able to open that save in the game outside of the beta until the beta ends on November 7th!
  
• Only use this in multiplayer if all participants agree. Make sure you do not use the beta in multiplayer without checking with the other players first, once a multiplayer game session has been updated to use the open beta, you cannot go back to previous versions!
  
• The changes we make during the Open Beta will not be integrated into the main game on the 5th! They will be integrated when the beta ends. This means that, if you step out the beta before it ends (on the 7th) you will be going to an earlier version of the game!

That being said, to access the beta you will need to do the following:

To switch to a custom branch in the Steam client, right-click on the game from the library page and select "Properties".



Among the available tabs will be the "BETAS" tab.



The Tiger Beta should be listed in the dropdown menu under "Select the beta you would like to opt into:" A restart of your Steam Client may be needed if the Branch isn’t visible.

[h2]Leaving Feedback[/h2]

The most effective way to provide us with feedback is by making a Discussion Thread in the Open Beta Discussions. There’s a couple different types of Feedback that we can process during this Beta period.

• Balance
  
  • Balance changes that focus on adjusting values such as Damage, Cooldowns, AP Costs etc. are easy to implement. If there’s any extreme imbalances that need to be tackled asap, would need to be tweaked as such.
    
  • Balance changes that require us to change text are not feasible for the November 7th date. Any Balance changes that involve us reworking abilities/functionality can be provided as feedback but cannot be done until a later point in time.
    
• Stability
  
  • Crashes reported with the Crash Tool will automatically show up in our back end, so when you experience a crash please make sure to Upload those.
    
  • If you have a Blocker i.e. a Crash or Hang that will not allow you to continue your game, please make a report and include your Crash Report Name - given after upload - so we can tackle it.
    
  • Any general Bugs reported are welcome but not the main focus of this period, we’ll try to address those in a timely manner depending on our available resources.
    
• Modding
  
  • If you experience issues and suspect that it might be related to one of the mods you have installed, then please verify which mod it may be by disabling your mods. If you’ve determined which Mod is causing your issue try to contact the Mod Developer first.
    
  • If you experience crashes with your mods, then please make a thread as stated above. While outdated mods can cause issues, we do try to ensure that they do not crash.

Starting on November 5th we’ll be busy with the official launch of Ways of War and the Tiger Update so after that goes live, our availability to respond here will vastly decrease. This also means any feedback after November 5th may not make it into the November 7th version, so be aware.



Check out the full list of changes included in the Tiger Update here.

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Greetings Godir and Mortal alike, I am Thomas Schuiten, Designer at Triumph, and today i finally get to show you the greatest post-release rework Triumph has ever done; The Hero Rework!

With the upcoming release of Ways of War on November 5th, we are as always including a free update, Tiger Update, which will strengthen the base game, this time focusing on Heroes, Governance and Ambition!

Likewise this too, is a story of Heroes, (attempted) Governance and certainly a lot of Ambition, so grab your astral dew, get your reading glasses out and join me as I attempt to explain it all!

Behold, the behemoth.

This board is where I compiled all the skills and designed the classes, origins, affinity skills etc. You will see the relevant places more up close further down, rest assured there is (some) order in this chaos!



Heroes as they were at release were functional, adaptable and easy to expand upon. The open selection system has served Age of Wonders well in the past, but some of the need for that adaptability was lessened with the introduction of the Item Forge and with Tiger Patch a much smarter item reward system. However, much more importantly for our story today, it brought with it several problems, problems that could not easily be solved.

To start off the rework i collected feedback and combined it with our own observations to make a list of the problems we would seek to tackle with the new design, i have added in italics a quick summary of what part of the new design ended up addressing that point:

• Homogenization of heroes
  
  • All heroes have access to the same set of skills and can swap weapons at any time, contributing to a lack of identity.
• Skill category balance
  
  • Battle mage is considered weak compared to Warfare, and Support is very concentrated in a select few powerful effects.
• Signature skills
  
  • Randomization makes it hard to build character with these
    
  • Small pool makes builds quite homogenous in terms of signature skills
    
  • Internal balance is off and causes certain signatures to never be taken
    
  • Often chosen based on the affinity reward on rulers
    
• Hero Stacking
  
  • Heroes are meant as army leaders but are often easily specialized into being powerful combat units instead leading to them having less identity than hoped.
• Flavor / Storytelling themes
  
  • Heroes’ Identity is entirely carried by the background trait, which simply does not do enough on its own.

No single change could cover all of the outlined problems in one go, but we could be efficient with the design and cover multiple bases with each change. Here I will give a basic outline of the changes before going into depth in their own sections.

The major changes can be broken down into the following areas: Hero Advancement, Governance and Narrative.

[h2]Hero Advancement[/h2]
Heroes will gain a set of Skill Trees from which they can pick their skills whenever they level up. The skill trees available to the hero will depend on 3 sources: Origin, Class and Signature Skills.
Each source adds a tree of options to that the hero may choose their skills from as they gain levels.

Origin would express the hero’s well… origin, it is what they are. This is meant to separate a Mortal Champion from a Dragon Lord. This meant that Wizard Kings and Mortal Champions would finally have their own unique skill set available only to them.

Class will express a heroes’ talents, each has a general direction but allow for further specialization towards particular roles within it. A Defender for example is hardy and dependable, but can lean into the role of an Infantry polearm hero or a shield that defends those around them!

Signature Skills are a big change from the past, these will now instead generally express the influence of the Empire’s Affinity upon the hero, rather than being randomized and for rulers doing the opposite. The hero will choose signature skills from options based on the empire’s affinity, each granting a boost to the army they lead and giving new hero skill options that fit that affinity!

Thanks to the skill tree structure combined with the class system we can really up the power level and specificity of hero skills, where previously having a hero gain a barrage attack would have a whole host of problems such as them not wielding the correct weapon, the ability not scaling as the game progresses and it being yet another ability on a hero that can get too many already, now it can be a unique choice that later skills can build upon to further empower it in unique ways and let it remain a valid choice for use in combat!

[h2]Governance[/h2]
Heroes will each gain a Governance Trait, this determines the effects they have on their Governed City. This replaces the old hero affinity based income bonus with a more clear and noticeable effect.
These Governance traits would scale as the game progresses and the hero gains Renown.

[h2]Narrative[/h2]
Heroes will now each have Ambitions, goals they seek to achieve, granting them Renown that improves their Governance effects. These Ambitions give a narrative expression of what the Hero personally wants, and give a unique hero skill when the major ambition is completed.



As an overview, a Hero in the new system is made up of 3 factors:

• Their Class, which grants access to the largest “main” skill tree, the class of rulers is determined by their loadout choice.
  
  • Defender, defensive, melee only, supportive and hard to kill.
    
  • Warrior, offensive, melee only, high damage and fast.
    
  • Mage, magic damage at range, area of effect and control through status effects.
    
  • Ritualist, (magical) support, buffing allies, healing and summoning.
    
  • Ranger, pure offensive, ranged damage, skirmishing, disruptive.
    
• Their Origin, which grants them a small skill tree with unique options.
  
  • Mortal Champion
    
    • Specialized in Army leadership
  • Wizard King
    
    • Specialized in Spellcasting
  • Dragon Lord (Dragon Dawn)
    
    • Specialized in unique Combat skills
  • Eldritch Sovereign (Eldritch Realms)
    
    • Specialized in strategic rituals and control
• Their Signature Skills, chosen at milestone levels (4, 8, 12, 16)
  
  • For Champions and Wizard Kings these became Affinity Dedications
    • Heroes can pick affinity dedications that their empire has the correct affinity for.
      
      • They do not, themselves, grant Affinity.
  • Each Affinity Dedication gives an Army Leadership bonus
    
  • Each Affinity Dedication grants 2 skill options that can be used to support tome builds of that affinity.
• For Dragon Lords (Dragon Dawn) they gained unique Signature skill choices for the levels where they lacked them.
  
  • Dragon Lord heroes still gain access to the 2 affinity skill options, similar to Champions and Wizard Kings.
    
  • Dragon Lord Signature skills do not have affinity requirements.
• For Eldritch Sovereigns (Eldritch Realms) they retained their Signature skills as they were, though they also no longer grant affinity.
  
  • Eldritch Sovereign Signature skills do not have affinity requirements

There is a lot of detail to go into here so I will go step by step, starting with the largest component of a Hero: Classes.


When I began exploring the class concept I set a ground rule that each class should be able to be built to fill roughly two different “Roles”, this would help ensure the system isn't too restrictive and allow for creative builds within it.

The first step was identifying player fantasies for their heroes, what did players want their heroes to be? What could already be done and how? And what could not be done yet, and why not?

Having created what is effectively a pile of dorky fantasies, I grouped them based on the rough role they would have in our combat system. A knight would for example be a Shock Unit in combat, so whichever class was going to contain the Shock unit role would have to support Knight as a fantasy, while also accounting for the charging barbarian with a greataxe.

I will go over each class, what fantasies they were meant to embody, how they try to do so and maybe some interesting tidbits here and there too!

[h2]Defender[/h2]



Expected Role(s): Polearm, Shield
Strengths: High defenses, high health, strong options for Retaliations and defending others.
Weaknesses: No Ranged attacks, low damage output
Weapons: Polearm, One Handed Melee (and shield)

The Defender was the first class I designed the content for, for the first iteration we tried to simply re-use existing skills for this. I knew from the initial design this would be unlikely to hold up all the way until release but it gave us a good guideline for what may work and let us test the system in its simplest form.

Like most Class skill trees I divided it roughly into 3 sections, a center section with generalist skills where most stat increases can be found, and the two sides, each hosting skills more suited to a particular specialization the class is capable of. In the Defender’s case these were “Infantry” and “Shield”.

The Infantry side specializes in retaliations and is more individual, leaning into the polearm role. While the Shield side specializes in the use of defense mode and holding formation with allies.

First iteration of the Defender skill tree, note the central column contains primarily stat improvements while the sides had all the juicy stuff in this version.

This design worked as intended and proved the concept could work, but it lacked the opportunity for creativity I wanted and feedback from testing showed it was definitely noticeable. Additionally it was simply too passive and lacked particularly exciting abilities that set the hero apart.

The creativity issue is visible in the “columns” formed in this design, it meant that often picking 1 skill just locked you in to picking the ones below it, which reduces the number of variants you could make within the tree significantly.

So after we got the other classes functional I had another go at the Defender with the aim to improve build options within it and allow for much more creative use of the skills. I also added more active abilities since the original version lacked these quite severely.

Current (final) version of Defender, Note that there is much more crossover between the sections and several new skills to help fill out the roster.

And here it is in game, as demonstrated on my Dragon Lord who is going hard into their Shield Defense!

There we go, that is a nice web of chaos! In the final iteration I allowed for much more connectivity between the branches which should allow for more unconventional builds. I also added three active abilities, one for each “type” of Defender;

A Pushing attack for defenders focused on damage, with specialization options to make it more defensive for those who want to use it while stuck in, or more aggressive for initiating combat or shifting the frontline!

Taunt is an obvious classic that was simply lacking in the first version, and Stunning bash fills the role of a shield bash, letting the hero contribute directly to the battle while still entering their empowered defense mode.

[h2]Warrior[/h2]



Expected Role(s): Shock, Fighter (Damage)
Strengths: High damage, High mobility, individual unit power
Weaknesses: No Ranged attacks, low defense and resistance, no support ability
Weapons: Great Weapons, Polearms, One Handed Melee (and shield).

Warrior covers a lot of separate themes, the noble knight and the unstoppable barbarian both should be formed out of its components. It focuses a lot on the power of the hero themselves, eschewing any and all support abilities. They can be surprisingly hard to truly take down thanks to their access to health and self healing in combat. They always risk being focused down on their own however, lacking the access to Defense and Resistance that the Defender has.

The Warrior is subdivided into “Shock Trooper” on the left which specializes in enhancing charge attacks and the “Berserker” on the right side which excels in sustained combat and repeating attacks.

The old Warrior skill tree, very similar in setup to that of the first Defender.

Being designed second, this initial design had similar issues to the Defender’s first version, but had an even more extreme issue of segmentation, where players would pick columns instead of individual skills, which led to much less build variety than was acceptable or intended. This tree too, got a big pass once the others were completed, adding more active skills and rearranging it significantly.

Ah, now we are cooking, cooking spaghetti that is, but the tasty, enjoyable kind! Much more interconnectivity between the skills to explore, letting the hero be built in much more varied ways than before.

And here it is in game, this particular warrior is aiming for a build around an aggressive charge, quickly slaying their opponent with one swift strike before using second wind to recover and reposition!

The warrior, just like the defender, lacked active skills in their first iteration which was addressed here, giving them a bit more flash.



Second wind in particular is worth highlighting, as it is part of the “Streamlining” I have tried to do with hero abilities to address the ability bloat. Second Wind is a mashup of the old Sprint ability and Bloodlust (Barbarian culture), the effect of sprint was lessened a bit to move it out of the territory of the Skirmishers and make it a more versatile tool for warriors, the extra movement and slippery lets the hero lash out at a nearby enemy while the healing effect gain lets them stay in the fight longer.

The attempt to tackle hero ability bloat is more clearly exemplified in the next class, the Mage.

[h2]Mage[/h2]

Expected Role(s): Battlemage
Strengths: Magic damage, Area of effect, Range, afflictions
Weaknesses: No melee, low Defense and Health
Weapons: Orbs, Staves

Final version of the Mage Skill Tree

Mage came third, and is a much more “specific” concept, spellcasting as a unit role existed before the hero rework, but they were one-off abilities that scale poorly as the game progressed. I wanted to strengthen the feel of a hero being a “Mage” by giving the unit abilities that they can then modify through their skill choices.

Mage is roughly divided into “Devastator” and “Warlock”, with the devastator side granting AoE magic abilities and focusing on damage dealing while the warlock side specializes in status effects and control.

The designer spaghett version

The Mage Skill tree is roughly built around 2 defining skills, the Evocation and the Curse, with specialization building upon those skills.

Evocations were in the game before, as separate abilities that did not scale well as the game progressed. Now the hero can choose to specialize in a Fire Area of Effect Evocation or a chain targeting Lightning Evocation. Each can then be further specialized, letting them focus on damage, disruption or even spreading like wildfire!

The curse ability is at its base a single target debuff that deals frost damage, it can be built to be even more powerful as a frost cure or as a plague inflicting AoE.

[h2]Ritualist[/h2]



Expected Role(s): Support
Strengths: Support, Summons, Healing
Weaknesses: No melee, weak defenses, low damage
Weapons: Staves, Orbs

The final in-game version of the Ritualist skill tree, this particular hero focusing on area of effect and a druidic theme.

Ritualist is a particularly unique class, having to cover a wide set of themes and mechanics. At its most basic level it is divided into a Healing/support and summoning. But each of these has many flavors to cover.

Ritualist is the most ability heavy of all the classes, which leads to a rather unique setup compared to the other classes.

The Restore skill is at the core of the class, unifying the many heal abilities into a single powerful ability that can be built to be single target and extremely potent (and even revive!), area of effect or even quick to cast but weaker.

Additionally this class can lean into themes such as Druidry through the Conjure Wildgrowth skills, summoning through the Spirit Summoning skills and Necromancy through the raise undead skills!

There is much ground to cover in this class, but the skills were picked based on mechanical variance. Of course one would want summons for any specific unit type they happen to be building for but this is handled through other sources instead, such as hero items and the Affinity hero skills gained through dedicating the hero to the Nature affinity.


The ritualist skill tree design, note it is more segmented than others due to the many active abilities contained in the class.

[h2]Ranger[/h2]



Expected Role(s): Ranged, Skirmisher
Strengths: High (ranged) Damage, Critical strikes, versatile
Weaknesses: Weaker defenses, lacking Resistance
Weapons: Ranged Weapons, Dual (skirmisher) weapons

In-game final version of the Ranger skill tree, this hero is functioning as a skirmisher, using Snapshot as an opener before diving into melee where they can finish the target off.

Ranger was a pain in the butt to design, Age of Wonders 4 did not feature many hero skills that actually fit with the ranged role appropriately, and for skirmishing there was even less. Thus the Ranger class had from its first iteration, the most new skills out of them all. Having practically all of it made anew to begin with.

The Ranger has, similar to the Mage, a choice of defining ability on the left side of its tree. Scatter shot gives an area of effect option to the usually single target focused role of ranged attackers, while True shot lets one make a true “sniper”. Snapshot lets the hero be built as a much more mobile unit, either for rangers who want to have a backup when forced to move, or rangers who want to add extra utility to their skirmishing!

The Ranger tree, a maze of delirium that nearly drove Tom Bird to madness… well, more of it anyway.

New item forge options!

To support the skirmishing role now being an option for heroes, we added additional skirmisher weapons to the item forge and as starting options for the Feudal, Dark and High cultures. Not everyone wants to be slinging magelock pistols after all!



Origins would be the second component that grants a hero more identity, this primarily affects rulers since heroes are usually mortals, unless they join from the Pantheon!

Each Origin has its own “niche” for which it provides skills the hero can choose to specialize further in. They are relatively small, intended to supplement the hero's role as provided by their class rather than supplant it.

[h2]Mortal Champions[/h2]



Champions have suffered a bit as we expanded on AoW4 and added more ruler types to the game. They did not have too much to set them apart from those ruler types. So with the rework we gave them an identity of their own: Commanders.

The Champion was quite unfocused before, their ruler benefits have been simplified to be less economy focused and lean into the trope of the mortal hero.

Champion rulers now start with the command ability (veterans may remember this as “Spur to Action”), this ability lets them order another unit to move again at the expense of their own movement and can be upgraded as well.

The Mortal Champion Origin skill tree, notice it is quite wide rather than deep, this is the general norm for Origin skill trees as they are intended to be more supplemental than the Class tree.

Besides the command ability, champion origin rulers have access to other skills which boost their army both tactically and strategically. Though investing in these skills may mean forgoing potential personal power in their class or through the affinity hero skills!


Champions as heroes
All heroes found in the game that do not come from the pantheon, are Mortal Champions. With this rework we have set them apart a little from their ruler counterparts, heroes have their own version of the champion origin tree, one notably lacking access to the Command skill. Regardless they can still specialize between army leadership and their class just the same!

[h2]Wizard Kings[/h2]



Just as the champion looked less and less appealing as the game grew, the wizard king similarly had some trouble truly standing apart from their mortal counterpart. Overchannel was an iconic ability, but had all of its power condensed into it from the start. To bring the Wizard king more in line with the other ruler types and allow for more build variety in their theme, the Overchannel ability was reworked into Channeling Ritual.



Channeling ritual, like Command for the mortal champions, is a starting ability, one that can be specialized into a quickened (but only useable once per combat) version, or a more defensive ritual, which heals the user and lets them enter defense mode, a potential combo with the Defender or Ritualist classes!

The Wizard King Origin tree in-game.

Furthermore the Wizard King’s skill tree features skills that grant more casting points, replacing the automatic casting point gain of wizard kings with a more intentional investment on the hero’s part to gain that power.

And lastly a set of skills which let the Wizard King gain strength as spells are cast and add an overcharge effect to particular spells whenever Channeling Ritual is used!

[h2]Dragon Lords[/h2]

Big, stompy and terrifying. That is what dragons were meant to be when we introduced them in Dragon Dawn, yet in practice they were found to be easy to focus down, lacking the defense to withstand the damage their larger form attracted. In the end they were often relegated to something more akin to an artillery unit than a monstrous beast of war.



I decided that during a personal development day I would redesign the Dragon lord signatures, being a bit of a dragon nerd myself, I wanted to address their lacking survivability, the forced transformation and build variety.

Survivability I would address by having each of the dragon’s signature skills grant a stat boost, roughly equivalent to being 1 unit tier higher each time. This means that dragons can now keep up with the survivability of other heroes gaining equipment, without having to invest skill points into merely keeping up.

Dragon Lords have always had unique signature skills, divided into 2 levels, at level 4 they would choose their lesser transformation, and at level 12 they would gain a major transformation that modified their breath weapon. But at level 8 and 16 they shared the same pool as all other heroes did.

Behold the whole line-up of designs for the Dragon Signature skills.

In order to support the Affinity hero skills and open up build options I aimed to “fill in the gaps” and add 2 more signature skill sets, so that each signature skill choice now had unique options, these are grouped as the following:

Aspect selection at level 4.

Aspects (level 4 Signature skills) - a powerful stat boost accompanied by a passive effect that reinforces the affinity’s expected role. Order grants adjacent allies resistance, while shadow inflicts weakened for example.

Transformations (level 8 Signature skills) - These once more include the stat boost, but more importantly here the unit type changes are found. If you want to become a Fey dragon, choose the Nature Transformation and grow the wilds on the battlefield as you move!
This is where the major visual variation is now added, so in addition to the 6 affinity transformations there is a 7th option, Primal Transformation, this option grants a hefty stat bonus and Natural Regeneration. But more importantly does not change the Dragon lord’s visuals, letting them be a “pure” dragon. This transformation grants affinity skills just as the others do, though its affinity is based on what affinity the dragon started with.

Breath (level 12 Signature skills) - yet again the hero gains more hit points, but much more importantly this modifies their breath attack. These are streamlined to give a much clearer use case to each breath attack, Purebreath (order) grants the breath attack a heal and cleanse on friendly units, while Rustbreath (Materium) weakens and sunders defenses while cleansing the enemy’s positive effects instead!

Elder (level 16 Signature Skills) - an even bigger stat bonus than the other levels, keeping the dragon lord up to par with heroes who will have gained their armor by now. But more interestingly each affinity option here grants the dragon lord a unique effect, the Elder of Astral skill grants Wind barrier and a unique ability to remove pesky melee units from your dragon’s presence, while the Elder of Chaos grants a damage bonus that grows throughout the battle each time the hero slays an enemy!

Dragon Claws
Dragons have always had their own unique melee weapon in the dragon claws, but now that they can have class roles there were some options lacking. Which provides the perfect opportunity to add some new options here!

The new Dragon Claw options in the item forge.

There are now three variations of claw weapon:
Dragon Claws for sustained repeating damage, Armored Claws for more defense and a powerful defense mode and Warclaws for charging in and crushing your enemies!

[h2]Eldritch Sovereign[/h2]

The sovereigns were largely untouched, having been a recent addition in Eldritch Realms. A distinguishing feature of theirs is that they have unique extremely powerful abilities gained through their signatures and Origin skill tree. But they do not have the same ties to affinities that the other Origins have, and thus do not gain Affinity hero skill options from their Signatures.

Additionally it is notable that Sovereigns can only be Mages or Ritualists, both leaning into their strengths as magic users.

Still as manipulative and controlling as ever… do not trust them.

It was at this point we realized we had hit the Steam word count and were only at 30 out of 45 pages. We still haven't covered Signature Skills or the new and improved UI yet, so...



[h3]Get Expansion Pass 2:[/h3]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/3181480/Age_of_Wonders_4_Expansion_Pass_2/


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