Originally Posted By ghostryder (9 MAY 2012 10:02pm)

I picked up the game earlier tonight and have spent about 3 hours on it. I'm reasonably impressed and it looks like a winner if a few missing elements are added and some gameplay changes are made.

 

As per comments on what engine is used-it's clearly displayed on the game's startup- they used Autodesk's engine. Autodesk is the makers of 3d Studio Max-- which is better known for it's modeling- but it can be used for game creation as well. I'm a bit surprised a small dev picked it-it's rather a pricey piece of software. I have 3dMax7- several years old-as someone like myself can only afford a one time purchase when at a time I had some money to burn--regular upgrades to newer versions which seem to release about every 18 months or so are 5 grand plus- and a full version with what I concider the needed add-ons will run well over 9k. This is pretty pricey for a small dev concidering each member of the team must own a licienced copy. I use it only for modeling-and thankfully Unity imports 3d studio Max model files directly- (most low cost engines have their own formats and you must convert model files ((and their textures)) into that engine's format-something that can be very work extensive). The Witcher 1 BTW built their game levels in 3d studio Max and imported them into the Auroua engine. (Never Winter Night ) and though that engine was rather poor-the results of the Max levels were pretty stunning. Nothing in that engine ever looked good in the least until then.

 

Unlike Civ's Phython driven civIV or Civ V which has even a worse scripting language using LUA- the underlying scripting in Autodesk is pretty fast and powerful-hense the game is not nearly as sluggish as either civ title. Overall probably a very smart choice concidering the game can randomly generate huge maps with 6 levels and still run very well--wheras even one huge map in Civ 4 or Civ5 will suffer horrendous turn times with beasty machines. Multiple map levels wouldn't even be possible without tons of ram and it would take an eternity to process a LUA or Phython based turn. I've never understood why these crap languages are even concidered in Grand Strategy type games. HOI3, Civ IV and V all suffer because of the choice. Sure they are very easy for the dev to impliment--but that is the only benefit. It offers the players nothing. Hell, LUA isn't even a language intended for games-it's an assembly line industrial language. It's for configuration only really--so for example you want a custom GUI for a character in World of Warcraft-sure.. (it's actually used in WOW for that) but to code for a grand strategy game? It's insane--and is exactly one reason Fall to Heaven II Blows to even try a full game --other than the rediculous imbalances and exploits found in that mod.

 

Another smart move is to copy the GUI found in the Civ games. I don't have a problem with that at all. It ain't cheap- it's damn smart in my view. Why not use the best GUI ever for this type of game rather than something else just to be different that doesn't come close? I'm sick of screwy interfaces when there's tons of good ones one can look to for examples--use them.

 

The art is a little too Heroes of Might and Magic Bright for my tastes- I like darker types of fantasy art- Royo and the like - or the direction the first Diciples games took- but compared to Stardocks Elemental? Or even Fall to Heaven? This is tons better.

 

There's some odd gameplay choices I hope are changed:

1. There doesn't seem to be any compelling reason to explore the other plane levels. It's certainly not a required thing as was done with Master of Magic. The powerful monsters that roam them seem too much effort to defeat for the only benefit-some resources- none of which are limited to only those levels but can be found on the regular map as well. They are abundant , sure-but so is the foes you must defeat to aquire them. It may not be wise in fact to waste one's time here as victory conditions cannot be adjusted by the player-and the first order of buisness then must be to locate all your competing factions because if one casts Spell Mastery and you aren't there to stop it- they win and you lose.

 

2. As mentioned above no ability to set victory conditions. A huge map with multiple levels seems unplayable-an opponent will cast spell Mastery or meet other victory conditions long before you can explore even a couple of the levels. You really need the ability to turn off certain victory conditions and I am surprised this isn't in from the get go.

 

3. Buildings have upkeep but there's no intial build cost. Huh? Why?

 

4. Some missing commands that one would think standard. Skip turn, auto--whatever...be it move, explore...

 

5. There's spell research but no research for buildings--this isn't a big issue but a little depth can be added here none the same.

 

6. There's no civpedia-a missed oppurnity in my view.

 

7. There isn't any kind of the ledgers found in these types of games either-nor any progress reports at end game-who won, how and why-that sort of thing

 

just overall some basic functions one would expect-and may show up in patches but really should be there now.

 

8. I haven't played enough to see this but the forums report the enemy mage A.I. is rather passive-and doesn't attack--much like in civ V--but the random monsters seem to have pretty good A.I. from what I've seen.

 

9. There is no penalty for entering and attacking in enemy terratory or your own. Huh? Unlike Civ games there's no need for open borders and you can surround and attack--and so can they (if they did) at any time.

 

All in all impressive and certainly fun-and if the above is addressed this would rise to a great game--but until the player can adjust victory conditions long games seem foolish-as your be chasing the land to locate wizards in order to  keep an eye on them if they go for victory- and until an A.I. is included that can actually conquest it boils down to a time race to find/block their other abilities to win and just slowly mow through them.

 

I never cared for the Majesty Games but this one certainly is to my liking. Elven Lecacy was so so but basically just move/fight kind of stuff and missed the very elements this game has--

 

Had the above missing elements been here I could see a $49.95 title---at $20 it's well worth it. I'd had paid $39.95 and felt okay about it in fact--but it's a title I probably won't fully explore until huge 6 level worlds can be enjoyed because that's the type of epic games I like--so a better A.I.  and victory conditions are a must-- the other options a plus but no game killer. They need to offer more reasons to enter the other worlds. Quests? Needed artifacts for certain buildings? Something. Otherwise why not just skip them?

 

Out of 8 knocks the title for lack of innovation. I disagree. 4x games have certain elements that make them fun-and those elements need to be in each title--most titles omit them to be different and they basically suck because of it. No title approaches MOO because elements are left out. Innovation? A screwy GUI with missing elements in a 3d confusing nightmare did not make SOTS any better. No way points nor tactical battles hurt-and did not help Gal Civ II---sure it's standard fair--a very much needed standard fair for this type of game and I would award points for the inclusion and not take away because of it. It's a mistake for a dev to say, "if we include this it'll be like...." when the title they are thinking about is a top 10 all time great. Use the stuff-add to it- make it better....that's smart and that makes a good game. We needed a civ type game that didn't run like molasses with MOM type multiple levels and huge maps in a fantasy setting. Not one dev has yet done that. Stardock blew it. Hell Civ V basically blew it.-and here we have it and it's not new enough for you? It needs A.I. tweaks, some added features-knock it for that-but don't knock it for doing everything found right in other titles and using them smartly because frankly it's the best damn way to build such a game.

 

Let the innovation come from the lore chosen or the units and their types-the world it created- not from screwy GUI options ALA HOI3 that makes the game a damn job to play , or much needed missing elements (which includes a game that runs fast enough)- this title certainly has a basic generic lore but it's still better than Elemental- and there's a lot of things that could be added that would make it more innovative- but the interface is about as good as it gets for this type of game--thank god it's not Forge of Freedom or Illwinter's Dominions III--which in their own right garner higher marks --- basically for depth and not certainly innovation-- nor good GUIs -

 

a mod make over for this game--with a darker lore-and more unigue units would be very possible for anyone owning a copy of 3d studio Max for example- there's a lot to be exited about here.

 

Innovation is great IF it leads to a better way to do things--when it doesn't-which is often the case-you don't reward points for it-you ask "WTF were they thinking?"

 

Lol this is one of those games like Vic's Cryptic Comet games....how much do you DEMAND for $20 or less??

Yes, human nature is to demand everything we want for $40 already, but, now for $20 you want MORE? lol

Originally Posted By Wolverine101 (10 MAY 2012 7:39am)

 

 

Lol this is one of those games like Vic's Cryptic Comet games....how much do you DEMAND for $20 or less??

 

Yes, human nature is to demand everything we want for $40 already, but, now for $20 you want MORE? lol

 

Not necessarily.  I can tell that the AI in Warlock is capable, on average.

The only big complaint I have being that it's not aggressive in attacking the player's cities.  It does so in AI vs AI wars, however, so it just needs a tweak or two.  In comparison, the last Cryptic game's AI was just terrible, though.  I don't think it could've been redeemed without a lot of work.  Even for $20, I'd hope for some challenge.

Originally Posted By Wolverine101 (10 MAY 2012 7:39am)

Originally Posted By ghostryder (9 MAY 2012 10:02pm)

Had the above missing elements been here I could see a $49.95 title---at $20 it's well worth it. I'd had paid $39.95 and felt okay about it in fact

 

Lol this is one of those games like Vic's Cryptic Comet games....how much do you DEMAND for $20 or less??

 

Yes, human nature is to demand everything we want for $40 already, but, now for $20 you want MORE? lol

 

No, actually he said "at $20 it's well worth it", and even felt okay about paying $40 for it.

On higher difficulty settings, I've been having an AI mage sending raids (oversea even!) of a couple units at a time.  Obviously it holds most of it's strength for defense still but it's now doing something.

I suspect the extra production bonuses given to the AI opponents, on higher difficulties, is allowing it to pump out more units than it's programming says it needs for defending home territory.  So it's sending some out here & there. 

I was pretty alarmed about a couple massive bonuses the AI got, in the leap from Normal to Challenging.  First is that all the AIs tend to keep making resource demands w/ the threat of declaring war.  So the player will end up at war with multiple AI factions pretty quickly.  The other is that when I was attacking one enemy AI's capital city (and it still had an extra one, too), it would build a unit every friggin' turn plus summon one.  I expected it to run out of mana & money pretty quickly, especially since it was building units in one turn that regularly took two or three turns on the normal setting.  But nope.. it kept going & going.  Took forever to take that sucker, and lost a couple units in the process.  I liked the challenge but at the same time the AI bonuses seem to be at least double, and probably more, over what it is just one step down on normal difficulty.  So perhaps the leap between the two is a bit more broad than it should be.  Then again, Challenging may be a pushover for me now that I'm learning the game, so perhaps it has to be that way.

Incidentally, Ghosty, do you have the new patch yet? It's supposed to make the AI more aggressive, but I'm unsure whether that includes AI leaders (much less whether it works.)

Originally Posted By ghostryder (9 MAY 2012 10:02pm)
We needed a civ type game that didn't run like molasses with MOM type multiple levels and huge maps in a fantasy setting. Not one dev has yet done that. Stardock blew it. Hell Civ V basically blew it.

I think we've disagreed before on the relative merits of Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic vs. Master of Magic (I was willing to agree that for subtle balance reasons, involving income and spell design/implementation, AoW doesn't flow quite as well as MoM), but fair is fair:

AOWSM was a Civ-type game (unless you mean more specifically like Civ than MoM was), which provided MoM style multiple levels, and huge randomized maps (huger than MoM anyway), in a fantasy setting, and didn't run like molasses. A developer did make a very respectable MoM heir; and (subtle balance issues) aside AOWSM not only had significantly more content than MoM but the few things it technically lacked (a spell of mastery gamewinning option; multi-soldier squads in the tac battles; replacing some factions with other factions) didn't make a significant difference to the quality of gameplay.

Originally Posted By JasonPratt (11 MAY 2012 11:55am)

Incidentally, Ghosty, do you have the new patch yet? It's supposed to make the AI more aggressive, but I'm unsure whether that includes AI leaders (much less whether it works.)

 

Where did you get the patch, JP???

Got any linkage???

As an aside, GoatRyder loves AoW: SM better than MoM...especially with the LotR's mod.....!

Your spiritual counselor,

Nick

Originally Posted By Azzurri (11 MAY 2012 1:19pm)
As an aside, GoatRyder loves AoW: SM better than MoM...especially with the LotR's mod.....!

Oh? Okay, I must have been thinking of someone else. Sorry, Ghosty!

As to the patch, argh where did I see that? I remember it being a day 1 patch... Let me poke around here....

Okay, the main Warlock homepage says patches are automatically applied through Steam. (...yay?)

LongBlade (a Wargamer admin who started his own wargamer forum, GrogHeads), says that the following are the release notes for the first patch. I don't know where he's getting this from exactly:

Interactive and aggressive AI. Lots of tweaks and improvements including but not limited such as: AI do not afraid to wage war on two fronts; AI faction can now declare non-aggression pacts and alliances; AI pays attention on units in its territory and units gathering near borders of its territory.
Tactical AI – improved unit selection for battle tasks (e.g. for capturing a city).
Tactical AI – improved the usage of transport ships. Now AI tries to get its units on a shore as fast as it is needed.
Temple units were improved – unique perks for all temple units was added that give more flavour  of correspondent gods (e.g. Krolm gives to his followers a perk that makes them immune to curses and increases protection from elemental magic).
Summoned units were re-balanced: fixed the exploit that makes summoned imps more powerful than many damage spells.
Fixes in economics for patch 1.1: e.g. the population income in “alien” cities was lowered, unit spawn in neutral cities was decreased.
New global news types: Another faction has started to cast Unity spell; enemy Great mage has counter your spell; a temple was build; a portal to other world was found.
New sounds: Voice of Adviser for news and voices of Great Mages, generic news sounds.
Regeneration aura was made: Totem of Koatles now heals nearby friendly units each turn.
Bugfix: AI won’t attack naval units by land melee units.
Bugfix: Rare bug with units resting.
Bugfix: hint will now work correctly during scrolling of a list by mouse wheel.
Fixed the bug that causes AI to research spell too fast on high difficulty levels.

Later in the thread however, there are various people (LB included) complaining that the AI is still turtling too much.

Incidentally, LB confirmed with Paradox yesterday that the multiplayer patch will be a free DLC later this summer.

Steam just updated my game to 1.1.26.  Haven't seen/found any info/changelog about what got patched yet....

Yes AOW:SM is probably the closest your get to MOM. It could have up to 3 levels on a map-the second being basically draven and the 3rd the shadow demons. The base game however makes a critical mistake--if your wizard dies it's game over. It's other shortoming is the tactical A.I. ---however the strategic A.I. is pretty aggressive-and as Azz mentioned the LOTR mod really shines in this game. It ups mines and such to $500- which allows massive stacks--and the A.I. will use them--but it is somewhat predictable as it always goes for weakly defended cities and will never challenge a well defended one no matter how critical it's strategically sitting or how many enemy stacks are nearby that realistcally could take it.. A couple years ago i did a long AAR of it here in this section if anyone wants to search for it.There's an unofficial 1.4 patch that adds bunches of new tile art-units, spells and such--but you won't see any of the new stuff ingame outside of the 4 scenerios included with the patch. They are good but no LOTR contender-

Getting back on track - I'm really liking this game. It's pretty tough. unlike civ 5-which puts me to sleep even more than watching Golf- where you have untold turns without challenge- this game pretty much puts you in thje fray from the getgo and it's tough going just to get a decent foothold. Some of the quests seem a bit messy-I've been spamed several times to "build a harbor" when I really don't need one in every city and would rather save that hex for something else-and turning it down only to see it again repeatedly.The other anoyance is the dude that repeatedly tells you "you just researched a spell."---would be less anoying if that was some sexy chick voice (like was used at the beginning of LOTR) but seems out of place as that popup is no different than "you just built a unit" -and it's unvoiced. Kill the old guy and put in Mistress- in fact include a different one for each seperate wizard you can play.

The game has a good flow though- it's always challenging you on some front. Aside from a few adjustments and the added options I mentioned I think the game is basically a winner-and should really shine as the issues are addressed.

Really good game-the patch/update seems to have ramped up the A.I. on "challenging" setting.

Getting my arse handed to me, right now!

Best $20 bucks I have spent in awhile! 

Dammit. I folded, grabbing this game. I had a blast playing the demo last night, and I grabbed the Lords DLC with some blue coin.

Originally Posted By ghostryder (11 MAY 2012 4:51pm)
The base game [of AoW:SM?] however makes a critical mistake--if your wizard dies it's game over.

I don't know whether this happened in the official or unofficial patch or not, but AoWSM does allow the possibility of game continuance, very much like MoM (although I recall this can be tweaked during the pregame setup). If your wizard dies, so long as you have the right buildings in another city you can resurrect him or her there eventually. But you have to have the correct buildings first to even have that opportunity. (It's something basic like the wizard tower or a normal upgrade to it.) If the wiz dies before then, game over.

I've always found AoWSM's tactical AI to be decent enough, although I agree its strategic AI is better. The tac AI will maneuver into position for charges and ranged attacks, and will throw overland spells that make sense, and its city assaults make a basic amount of sense given the situation: doors are the weak spot so swarm the doors on as many sides of the city as possible, while sniping defenders (and/or weakening walls or doors) from long distance with seige weapons and other archery things. Any units that can climb over walls, assault as far from the doors as possible.

Maybe that only comes with the final patches, but I seem to recall it working out about the same in AoW2, the previous game.

This serves to remind me I've never tried the LotR mod yet, of course. {g}

Originally Posted By ghostryder (11 MAY 2012 4:51pm)
The other anoyance is the dude that repeatedly tells you "you just researched a spell."---would be less anoying if that was some sexy chick voice (like was used at the beginning of LOTR) but seems out of place as that popup is no different than "you just built a unit" -and it's unvoiced. Kill the old guy and put in Mistress- in fact include a different one for each seperate wizard you can play.

When you wrote that, I flashed back to the Dark Chick (whoever she was) on Team Ceyah during Kohan 2: Kings of War. "What DOES my MASter reQUIRE...?" {g}

Warlock is a Paradox game, right? Seems like it should be very moddable.

(Huh, wonder why I didn't log in as my normal ID? Let's try that again...)

(Right, there we go. I was logged in as "Sabreman", the first ID I created on the forum years ago but which I never used. Sorry.)

Originally Posted By JasonPratt (12 MAY 2012 9:44am)

(Huh, wonder why I didn't log in as my normal ID? Let's try that again...)

 

(Right, there we go. I was logged in as "Sabreman", the first ID I created on the forum years ago but which I never used. Sorry.)

lol...I was wondering about that.

The constant AI diplo demands for resources (or War! otherwise) is getting annoying on the higher difficulty levels.

While the AI is a bit more aggressive in the latest update, I still haven't had it send a large cohesive force after any of my cities.  I've had as much trouble (or more) with the roaming monsters that had built up outside a couple planar gates (damn yous fire elementals!). So despite being at war with two or three at a time (last game I put in 4 AIs) - they only send a couple units to raid regularly.

I'll give Challenging mode another fresh go since the biggest problem seems to be the AI can't seem to pump out enough units to keep pace with me.  I'm pretty sure it doesn't start pumping out the "freebie" units until I actually invade their territory, during war, so I have doubts about how well it builds an army when that's not the case.

I've always found AoWSM's tactical AI to be decent enough, although I agree its strategic AI is better. The tac AI will maneuver into position for charges and ranged attacks, and will throw overland spells that make sense, and its city assaults make a basic amount of sense given the situation: doors are the weak spot so swarm the doors on as many sides of the city as possible, while sniping defenders (and/or weakening walls or doors) from long distance with seige weapons and other archery things. Any units that can climb over walls, assault as far from the doors as possible.

Where AOWSM is weak tactically is basically defending--say you knock the castle door down (two on each side) and it fails to move units to defend the hole. On attack it suffers the same thing. Once it knocks a door down on one side other units will walk all the way around your castle on the outside towards that one door allowing your archers a turkey shoot even though with one or two more hits the door they were working on would have fallen. It seems to handle spells all right but generally it's so poor tactically you can defend any city with about 4 melee units and 2 stacks of archers or dwarven cannons. If it had a brain it should be able to easily steamroll over such a weak garrison.

Which brings me to it's other fault- it fails to properly defend cities with enough troops.

The LOTR mod addresses a lot of that by reworking the resources and scripting regular enemy spawns by key enemy castles- and also by map design-- where the enemy is pretty much forced to attack key strategic points. I recommend anyone give that mod a try

Curses to all of you who talked about AoWSM! I had bought the complete collection a while back and after reading through this thread (while playing Warlock) I was tempted to give AoWSM a try. Well, now I think I like it better than Warlock: Master of the Arcane! Yeah, I'm still playing that but I find myself firing up AoWSM more often. It seems way more engaging and fun. And I love the number of setup options and the fact that there is diplomacy. How did I miss this game before? 

So again, curses to all of you who talked about AoWSM! 

I found some swamps that allowed you to train Koatl.  They were extremely strong for their cost, and their bowmen & shaman were equally more formidable than regular troops.

Giant turtle?  I'm all over it.

WE LOVE YOU, GAMERA!

Originally Posted By steve58 (23 MAY 2012 6:53am)

a new DLC (Power of the Serpent) is available for pre-order ($3) on GG (available 5/29)

http://www.gamersgate.com/DD-WLMAPSDLC2/warlock-master-of-the-arcane-power-of-the-serpent-dlc

Play as the all new Great Mage, Malixalxochi, Wizard Queen of a powerful race of reptilian warriors known as the Koatl. Renowned for her cruelty and ferocity, she is a formidable foe to anyone in Ardania who dares oppose her.

The new Mage brings two new perks to the battlefield: Lord of Koatls and Koatl Training. As Lord of her race she can hire fierce reptile Spears, Hunters, Warlocks and of course the powerful Giant Turtle. Then instruct any of your units with Koatl training for increased protection from ranged an Melee attacks.

Crush your enemies with the Power of the Serpent!

Features
◦The Great Mage Malinalxochi, the Queen of Serpents.
◦New perks for Great Mages:
◦Koatl Training – Increased protection from melee and ranged attacks for all of your Great Mage's units.
◦Lord of Koatls – Ensures the appearance of a Koatl village near the capitol of a Great Mage.
◦The Koatl village is a local resource that allows for the construction of buildings that enable the player to hire Koatl Hunters, Koatl Spears, Koatl Warlocks, and a powerful Giant Turtle.

I have blue coins with GG and never have the option to use them in a purchase - am I missing something that needs to be done?

I think you must be able to pay the total amount with blue coins.  I guess you can't combine 2 payment methods.

Originally Posted By The Fox (24 MAY 2012 6:06am)

I think you must be able to pay the total amount with blue coins.  I guess you can't combine 2 payment methods.

Not necessarily correct.

You can purchase Blue Coins with cash, in $5 increments, to supplement what you currently have - and then purchase whatever it is you're wanting.  So you can mix the two, but not to the exact amount.  It just takes an extra purchase (of the blue coins).

When it asks you the payment method, check the box that says Blue Coins.  Quite easy.

If something comes out, and I've had more than $5 of blue coins sitting around for awhile, I'll just buy blue coins to round off the purchase price and use those - saves me five or ten bucks sometimes.  You don't need to save them up until something goes on sale at that price or less.

I've just about finished my first campaign on Normal.  I have to say the AI is pretty braindead but I'm getting a bit of entertainment nonetheless.   I've studied the unity spell (which took 14 turns) and am in the process of casting it which takes 20 turns.

In my first campaign as one of the Human mages, the first things I did was capture two neighboring independant cities which added undead and goblins to my arsenal right away.  I made a couple more settlements and then captured another independant city which had dwarves.   From that point on there really was no stopping me.  I learned rather late that there's absolutely no penalty to spamming cities as long as you are careful of the buildings you place so now I have 20ish cities (on a large map).

The AI would make pacts but then they would be broken inexplicably.  They declare war on me but then never do much of anything though I did have a couple hexes on me that I didn't notice for awhile (it would be nice if it was obvious on the main screen).   The only real challenge are the monsters which never stop spawning unless you wipe out their spawnpoint so some of the distant part of the continent I'm on only recently got cleaned out.

 I moved on to one of the alternate realms and there were so many monsters they could barely move! OK, slight exaggeration but not much.  Needless to say, after dispatching about a dozen red dragons, another dozen two-headed dragon thingies, more elementals and other beasts than I can count, I'm only just making headway and plopped my first city down there.  I see a clutch of red dragon eggs as a resource which I want to get soon but don't know if I will get to it before I finish casting my unity spell.  One thing that has helped is researching the vampiric weapon enchantment.  I literally get more health from monster attacks than hurt on those units with it except for the ones with ranged weapons.

On the main world, I have literally conquered one of my opponents with two units, a dwarf and a beastmaster.  I recently upgraded the dwarf and now he's a one man wrecking crew.  He hits a city for 100-150 pts a turn so by himself even the capital only takes 4-5 turns to conquer.   I could conquer two opponents rather quickly but I don't think I'll get to it before the unity spell finishes.  

So, I like the variety of the game.  Even starting as humans i have representatives of all the main troops types, goblins, trolls, rats, skeletons, zombies, ghosts, donkey riders (lol), magistars and a lot of special units, dwarves, elves, minotaurs.  I like all the special resources from iron, silver, nefril and adamantium.  As I mentioned before I saw a dragon clutch resource on the other plane so want to try to colonize near it to see what I might get.  I like the god aspect of the game and how they give you different perks.  I like how you can at best appease two gods at once so you can't get everything.

What I don't like is the absolute passivity of the AI mages.  They do declare war but unless you are right next to them already, you may not even see them ever attack you.  Even if connected by land, I have had 2 mages declare war on me and my two man (now 1 man) wrecking crew easily went through their empire.  Some of the spells (like the vampire enchantment) may be a bit overpowered especially when layering on with other enchantments.  I have a veteran who even before the vampiric enchantment was only taking 2-3 damage and my dwarven overseers now completely shrug of arrows and take maybe 1 hit per turn.  The AI could cast a simple dispel but I've never seen it do that.

So, time permitting may try this on challenging mode but it sounds like all it will do is slow the game down unless the mages get smarter.  We'll see!

If you have any experience at all with 4x games I recommend playing on at least the challenging difficulty level. I have had the AI pressure me at the challenging level and sometimes the terrain can make it difficult to take some of his cities. Normal is really pretty easy. Also, once you get going you are hard to stop so I have preferred playing on a normal map. That does limit how advanced you can get though so it has its drawbacks.