HoM&M V Vs. King's Bounty Vs. HoM&M V: Tribes of the East

[CyberGuy]

I recently finished playing the game King's Bounty: The Legend and I loved it. I was not very fond of turn-based strategy game before but now I am hooked on it.
I have to wait a few more months for the translation of Armored Princess so in the mean time I am looking around for similar games and came across the other 2 similar turn-based games called:

Heroes of Might & Magic V and the stand-alone expansion called Heroes of Might & Magic V: Tribes of the East.

Which of the 3 games is the best? I assumed that since this is the King's Bounty forum that it will be biased toward this game.

Should I start playing Heroes of Might & Magic V and Heroes of Might & Magic V: Tribes of the East before the Armored Princess come out in English?

[Elwin]

As already someone stated today, both have their strong points. As single player King's Bounty wins definetly.U have nice campaign you can play it several times, but it will get boring after that. HOMM V is good for multiplayer and u have campaign and many maps ( actualy not itsleves but many maps made by other players) so you can play it for a long time.

[jake21]

I never played homm V (or tribes) but mostly because I played the demo and hated it. I did play homm II and homm III which I liked. I played king bounty demo and loved it so much I purchased the game the day it became availalbe (usa) and loved the game though after 3 plays (mage, warrior and paladin all on hard) it has become a bit old (mostly not enough unique items so I think I now seen them all). I hope the expansion comes to USA soon (but will play demo first).

Another game I really enjoyed was space rangers ii reboot (I did not play space rangers or space rangers ii). The game starts out very hard (well hard if you get into combat) but at the end becomes too easy. I hate the rts portion of this game but it is optional. I love the text quests but there are only 20 or so and I understand that is all as they are not making a sprace ranger iii or furth er expnasion.

I'm now playing a game that is not much fun but since I paid for it will finish it (nwn2 storm of something - the first two were much better).
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If you want a fun turn base game look for age of wonders shadow magic - much better than heros V (though the graphics are around the time of heroes III). Another fun turn base game is civ 4 or colonization - they have modern graphics but are not fantasy based like heroes or king bounty. Stardock is working on a game that will come out in 6 or 9 months that might be worth watching. Not sure of the name but it is turn base and fantasy oriented. I mention them because like 1c they have a reputation of producing good games and being consumer friendly. Unrelated but 1c and Nike have provided very good support - the best I've seen in a long time and I truely hope they are making a good profit for their efforts.

[fld88]

I really like Kings’s Bounty and I’m looking forward to the expansion but HOMM has been my favourite game series of all time. HOMM has a much longer shelf life than because of all the maps, campaigns and scenario editor. Tribes of the East is the best but I would only start with that one if you were sure you were not going to play the previous two versions of HOMM V.

I too avoided HOMM V for quite a while because of not liking the demo but later I took a risk and bought the game and now I would say HOMM V is my favourite for single player while HOMM is tops for multiplayer.

[master.jimmy]

king's bounty 1990
Heroes of might and magic 1994

hoM&M comes later... i always wanna say this

I ve played both. No match about it. Music, design, combact/strategy, arts. KB is so much better.
The only disadvantage is "no multiplayer game".
Heroes is a "stage/episode" game, KB has an history and it's 1 story. A Strategic game/rpg (with strategic battle)
In HOMM EVERY episode, u should "build",find resource, clear buildings to hire troops... very boring.
No match for me.
KB > all

[jake21]

Well steam had a special on HOMM V (v+ expansions for 13.00). I've played a few hours and so far hate it as much as the demo but I will play a bit more before deciding conclusively. This isn't to say it is a bad game - but so far the campaign is dull as can be. Then again you noted that you like the multi-player - can't comment on that aspect (yet) but to date for TB games AOW-SM has been my favorite (though the graphics are now a bit dated). Would love to see 1C do a new version of AOW-SM or space rangers iii

Originally Posted by fld88

I really like Kings’s Bounty and I’m looking forward to the expansion but HOMM has been my favourite game series of all time. HOMM has a much longer shelf life than because of all the maps, campaigns and scenario editor. Tribes of the East is the best but I would only start with that one if you were sure you were not going to play the previous two versions of HOMM V.

I too avoided HOMM V for quite a while because of not liking the demo but later I took a risk and bought the game and now I would say HOMM V is my favourite for single player while HOMM is tops for multiplayer.

[Elias_Maluco]

Kings Bounty is a RPG game with a turn-based tactical battle system; HOMM is an strategy game with some RPG elements. Their combat system is similar and both have "heroes", but apart from this, they are very different games. HOMM is about strategy and city building and tactical combat and hero development; KB is about questing and exploring and tactical combat and hero development.

Personally, I like then both. KB single player is very good. But once you are done, you can only replay the same game with a different hero, using different troops, etc. HOMM is way more open-ended, you have several campaigns, 8 different factions, several single maps, hundreds of user-created maps (and some campaigns), a random map generator, and, of course, multi-player.

[Vilk]

I quickly look at the fan guide to get an overview and homm5 seems a lot about management, how to manage heroes, troops and cities to build more powerful armies.

My grin when looking at the rules is they made a confusion with the number of rules and game quality, no no this isn't linked.

The complexity remind me how complex had become AD&D classes, at the end it's more confusion than more cool features.

For the battles I noticed different things:

• For all snapshots I saw, no obstacles or pointless in battle fields. Obstacles add a lot to battles finesses.
• And I could not found spells like target, time back, slow, invisibility, sleep, skills of cannon fooder summon, walls, field armor like the glot armor, some complexity like damages linked to movements like for Leena Ball or Horsemen, enemy teleporting and so on. Ie all the fun is missing.
• Units seems not have so many special talents and most if not all are purely based on fire power long range or close range. The only exception is perhaps some stuff linked with necromancy.

I haven't played yet homm5 but my feeling is that there are many strategy elements from resources, improvements, heroes choices, managing armies and movements and so on. But on the battlefield it seems a bit too much like brutal encounters.

I'll still try the game but I think that it's from strategical elements that I'll take the fun not from tactics in battle field like in KBTL.

[McSwan]

"And I could not found spells like target, time back, slow, invisibility, sleep, skills of cannon fooder summon, walls, field armor like the glot armor, some complexity like damages linked to movements like for Leena Ball or Horsemen, enemy teleporting and so on. Ie all the fun is missing."

Homm does have most of these.

Spells like time back, mass sleep etc. don't exist because they're hard to balance in multi-player.

[Vilk]

I understand the problem of multiplayer but that's also my grin, make a game for both always lowdown the gameplay quality for standard play.

About the spells there's in homm5, be less vague, what spell in homm5 for those:

• So I'm not wrong, no Time Back, no Target, no mass sleep.
• But there's invisibility? What homm5 spell?
• There's walls to put obstacles like wall or ice thorns? I only saw fire wall and that's totally different.
• There's slow? I saw haste but not slow. Some spell effect can freeze and at highest level that's a 100% chance but still that's not slow you use for a pure tactical meaning with a low mana cost.
• There's free mass cannon fooder summon with zero mana cost? Sure the game allows summon, any game does, but for no mana cost, that makes all the difference and there's that in homm5?
• There's field armor that disable any movements? Pure field armor is just another protection spell.
• Leena ball is a very special thing, most player don't use it and don't know use it. But once you learn that's rather interesting. I won't even ask I know there's no stuff like that in homm5.
• Is there magic spring? That's a rather complicate way to restore some mana during a battle but that's what make it fun. I haven't quote any stuff like that in homm5.
• Is there mass Magic Shackles that block magic talents of enemy troops? Well units seems not have many stuff like talent but also I didn't quote any spell like that in homm5.
• Enemy teleporting isn't teleporting, is really homm5 has that? In KBTL it's only through the use of Archmage skill but that's still huge and very interesting in a tactical point of view.
• Is homm5 units has choices for attacking or using a non attacking talent? That adds a lot to finesses of battles and homm5 seems not have that.
• Gift, can you in homm5 have units get back all its special talents?
• Fit of Energy, is in homm5 you can make a unit attack a second time during same round?

Now I have played a bit homm5, finished the first campaign, start the second... and for now battles are rather pathetic in comparison with first areas of KBTL. Not that the game isn't fun, i have been catch but by the strategy aspects, in second campaign.

Mmm and for the quote I have seen some battles video of homm5 and they only confirm my feeling.

EDIT: And obstacles, no battle of homm5 seems have obstacle like in many of kbtl battles, and what make battles more subtle, obstacles obviously. If really battles design of homm5 had take profit of the same focus and quality than in kbtl, battle fields of homm5 would have much more obstacles.