Newbie question

[Xangaikid]

Hello,
I discovered this game a week ago, and i liked it so much. I want to know more about the multiplayer game. I got some questions:

1- Which era is most played, the default or Age of Heroes?
2- Is multiplayer factions balanced (default and AoH)?
3- Is there a popular add-on that almost everybody use?
4- Which settings is more common on competitive games, like tournaments etc? (era, add-on, maps)

Thanks in advance.

[Anonymus]

1- Which era is most played, the default or Age of Heroes

default


2- Is multiplayer factions balanced (default and AoH)?

dunno about Age of heroes, but default definitely is


3- Is there a popular add-on that almost everybody use?

There are several ones: Ageless Era (an era uncluding nearly every faction on the hole add-on server), Colosseum (survival with upgrading your units), Survival Xtreme SX (survival with upgrading)


4- Which settings is more common on competitive games, like tournaments etc? (era, add-on, maps)

The add-on is called RBY (rushed by Yetis). It's an add-on that randomly chooses a balanced 2P_Map using the default era and also randomly gives the factions to the players.

[cookie]

1- Which era is most played, the default or Age of Heroes?
Default
2- Is multiplayer factions balanced (default and AoH)?
Relatively close to as much as it can possibly be.
3- Is there a popular add-on that almost everybody use?
When you hit the download server, you can sort add-on's according to downloads. Answer is there.
Personally, default for everything.
4- Which settings is more common on competitive games, like tournaments etc? (era, add-on, maps)
Normal map setting with default era, though occasionally I may feel like spicing things up. So I add a 3 minute timer.

[TheEmptyLord]

1- Default between the two. The most used non-mainstream era is the Ageless era. It contains almost all of the user created factions as well as the default one.
2- Default is definitely. AoH may or may not be. AoH is certainly balanced for campaigns, allowing the AI to recruit powerful enemies for the right amount, but possibly not for players.
3- Ageless Era, 3p Survival Upgrade, World Conquest, various survivals are popular(things like SX, orocias, deep shrine), scrolling survival.
4- Usually default and mainline factions/maps. Depends on the specific case though.

[roidanton]

Age of Heroes is basically the same as Default, but you can recruit lvl 2 units. But you could also get the same units by leveling them. Same for Ageless Heroes.

Heroes make some survival games easier because you start with stronger units, but IMO it doesn't make much sense in normal 1v1 or 2v2 games, especially when you have twice the normal gold. For instance, if one player only recruits level 2 units and the other only recruits level 1 units, it can be be over very quickly - against someone with about twice the number of units, the heroes get surrounded and killed quickly.

[Dixie]

Well, it is not sure that lv2s and up's prices are balanced, so maybe age of Heroes is unbalanced. Anyway, aside from the occasionnal lv2 recruit with a useful ability (leadership?), you mostly want to recruit lv1s, as you'll be able to cover more ground and have more meat shields.

[TheEmptyLord]

Right roid, my only concern was that I'm not sure how much of AoH's pricing has been balanced to their costs in relation to their usefulness in MP play. I hardly ever use them, so I'm not an authority, but it seems they would be balanced for the AI's usage in campaigns to make a good challenge, but interspersed with normal units. Also, I hardly ever see discussions by developers or pro players about the balance of AoH so I assume they don't play it much, hence the chance of not being perfectly balanced.

[Temuchin Khan]

Is there a popular add-on that almost everybody use?

So far, the only people who have responded to this question have promoted Ageless Era. However, it is not currently being maintained. mnewton may get back to it someday, but for now he isn't working on it anymore, and no one else has stepped forward to take his place, or even wants to. So in many cases it is buggy and out of date. In my opinion, it is better to get the various individual eras themselves instead of this one.

I would recommend the Era of Myths and the Era of Magic.

I'm also partial to the Imperial Era and the Feudal Era, but I helped with those, so I might be a little biased. The current maintainer of IE and FE has also released an "Ageless II" era for Wesnoth 1.11, if you're using the development branch.

I hope that helps!

[roidanton]

I would recommend the Era of Myths and the Era of Magic.

Is there anything which combines both of these? I usually host games as Ageless because almost everyone has it installed and it allows people to choose a faction from either Era of Myths or Era of Magic.

[alluton]

You could combine them by yourself.

[TheEmptyLord]

The reason I suggested Ageless is the same as roid: Most people have it installed and its very hard to begin a game with any of the other eras.