This play guide document explains the new features of Age of Wonders III: Golden Realms more in-depth.
Golden Realms expands Age of Wonders III’s empire building mechanics and introduces bucket loads of new content. These new features are used in random maps, new scenarios and a new story campaign, where Halfling survivors settle in a distant land filled with danger and treasures never seen before. The expansion is set for a September 18th 2014 release.
New Content
The Halfling Race
The halfings are a diminutive and peaceful race. They lead a pastoral existence dedicated to farming, cooking and enjoying the good life. When called to battle, the halfings make use of whatever is available, giving their armies a ragtag, improvised appearance. Although they are physically weak, their endless sense of optimism gives them luck that borders on the supernatural. This is represented in game by the lucky ability, which by default gives the unit a 10% chance of ignoring any incoming attack, spell or offensive ability. As the halfing's morale rises, so does their luck. A halfing with Cheerful morale (the highest available) will avoid 25% of all incoming attacks, while a halfling with low morale (i.e. less than -200) will not having any luck at all. When fighting against halfings, it is vital to find ways of reducing their morale using magic, status effects or by forcing them to fight on terrain which they hate.
The most basic halfing unit is the adventurer, these young halflings can shoot their slings and act like makeshift archers. Though not as powerful as a proper archer, their Monster Slayer and Animal Slayer abilities make them very useful in the early game when clearing out independent forces.
The other halfing ranged unit is the Jester, who has a powerful single shot fireworks attack. The firework does fire and physical damage, but also has a chance to apply the "Dazzled" status effect to all nearby units. Dazzled units cannot retaliate if attacked, or use attacks of opportunity. The firework also has a small chance to panic animal type units caught in its area of effect, causing them to run away. Although powerful, this ability can do friendly fire, and must be used with care.
The 2 halfling footmen are the nightwatch and the farmer. The nightwatch is a sturdy infantryman, whose urban concealment ability allows him to hide in cities and other structures to confuse enemy invaders. The farmer uses his pitchfork as a makeshift pike and carries a chicken into battle. The chicken can be thrown at the farmer's enemies, doing physical damage and slowing them down.
Pony Riders make up the normal halfling cavalry, with Eagle Riders being the halfing elite unit. The eagle rider is much weaker than the elites from the other races, but also much faster. It also has a powerful wingbeat attack that allows it to strike at up to three enemies at once by knocking them down with a powerful gust of wind from its wings.
Golden Realms Campaign
In this three scenario campaign, you help the Halfling survivors of the Heartwood Massacre rebuild an empire in an exotic land and confront an ancient evil.
Family Feuds
With Ernest, Halfling Warlord, build up a Halfling empire for the first time. Make use of the new Flowers of Solace and the Cloverfields to keep your Halflings happy. Happy Halflings are Lucky, enabling them to dodge all kinds of attacks. As you make your way across the map encounter such new units as Dread Monkeys (watch out for the filth they fling!), Elephants (try to befriend one!), Feathered Serpents, Light Elementals, Nagas and more.
As you progress through the citybuilding phase, a sudden betrayal will force you to wage war to one of your fellow Halflings, so be sure to prepare some defenses as well (especially your Throne city!). As you keep founding or taking over cities you will discover more and more of this exotic new land. A certain party guest who is quite thoroughly lost brings some smiles and some nice and powerful units.
Win by defeating both Roger and Malzua (Malzua will surrender is Roger has been defeated and enough of her cities have been taken).
Into the Heart of Darkness
As Allie, the Halfling Sorcerer, set sail towards the mystical swamp and jungle of the Nagas. Discover ancient sites which provide new upgrades to your cities and rebuild the ruins of New Heartwood.
As you progress deeper along the river into the area, you will discover Jurwac and Karl, both of whom you must defeat. Bolmor, a local Dwarf, can be left alone. If you wish his resources and cities, you can attack and defeat him (if you find him!).
On this map players will get to own and build up a Naga Dwelling themselves, producing their powerful units and pitting them in battle against the enemy. Special mention goes to the Glutton, a powerful tier 4 monstrosity that can swallow entire units (if the Glutton is killed, the swallowed unit can be rescued from its bloated belly).
Defeat both Jurwac and Karl to proceed to the final map.
Seals of Power
Ham takes charge in this map. The Seals of Power have been activated: Leaders of all races and professions will seek to control these powerful Seals that, when broken, release tremendous energy: unlock their potential and rise above your peers to defeat them once and for all!
You will encounter Seals and victory through Seals for the first time: if you control one, you accumulate charges. If you have enough, you win. But beware: the Seals have powerful guardians who will not stop to try and take it back! The enemies Yzzo and Groshak are strong too, and they have their eyes on the Seals as well!
As you progress through the map you may learn something about the Undead, who are strangely numerous in this area.
After your victory, you will discover more about the reason behind Karl’s behavior and about what horrors the Seals kept locked away from the world.
Exotic Map Locations
Capture the Naga Dwelling, home to serpentine queens and giant man-snakes, and discover new treasure sites such as the fabled Lost City to benefit your empire.
Flowers of Solace
Visiting units ignore negative morale penalties until the end of their next battle.
Eldritch Pit
Wild magic has infused this area, spawning fantastic monsters and animals.
Bountiful Melons
Restores 20% [hp] to visiting units.
Lucky Cloverfield
Visiting units become Lucky until the end of their next battle.
Lost City
Clear this ancient city for mystical treasures.
Item Rack
There is a powerful item here, waiting to be claimed.
Over twenty new units
Encounter new exotic units such as the filth throwing Dread Monkeys, alluring Mermaids and the fearsome Glutton who can swallow whole regiments in one bite.
The Naga Race
Nagas are an ancient and reclusive race of snake people who live in the southern islands. Their cities are filled with great twisting spires that tower over the surrounding jungles, and watched over by the fearsome Matriarchs who double as both queens and high priestesses of the massive Gluttons the Naga regard as their Gods. Naga are huge creatures, with 4 arms and long tails instead of legs. They heal at an astonishing rate; wounds that would kill a lesser being vanish within minutes of being inflicted. The wily Naga have learned to make the most of this by developing techniques to let them slip away from dangerous fights and regain health in safety nearby.
The majority of the Naga military is made up of Guardians and Slithers. The former wield huge tridents and dedicate their lives to protecting the Matriarchs, while the Slithers venture into the wilderness, relying on stealth to eliminate their enemies before they can discover the Nagas' secret homes.
In times of dire need the Matriarchs will also enter battle. Capable of wielding powerful magic, the Matriarch can control the minds of her enemies, making them flee the battlefield or fight amongst themselves. It is rumored that the most powerful of these beings can rend open the sky itself, and call down devastating lightning strikes.
The Glutton is the mightiest of the Nagas, though some might say that it cannot truly be named a Naga anymore. A horrifying monster of epic proportions, the glutton towers over the battlefield, smashing aside its foes with terrible strength. Although it has lost the Naga's fabled regenerative powers, it can regain its health by swallowing its enemies whole during battle.
Other encounters
Dread Monkey
This unit throws indescribable filth at targets, which will leave a disgusting stench! With a few of these moneys the whole battlefield starts to stink and enemy units suffer low morale and a resistance penalty. It’s best to keep them at bay with ranged attacks. The halfling Jester is great to counter Dread Monkeys.
Siren & Mermaids
Sirens can dominate enemies and they emit a deadly scream that deals physical damage to all units and objects caught in the attack range. Thus they are both strong against any unfortunate humanoids and boats.
Elephant
Great hard-hitter, but is vulnerable to befriend animal and ranged attacks.
And many more…
New Hero Items
The Golden Realms contain 50 new magical artifacts to discover and use. Wield the enigmatic Crystal Skull, or wear a stylish Witch Doctor’s Headdress to mix in with the locals.
A few of the new Items:
Wild Magic Specialization
Unleash wild magic. Cause spontaneous mutations, warp equipment and turn orderly battles into a pandemonium where the lines of battle are violently warped.
Warp Equipment (Combat Spell)
Warps the integrity of equipment at target location. Equipped Units and Machines within a 2 Hex radius around the target suffer -2 defense and -2 damage until end of combat.
Swap Locations (Combat Spell)
Target unit trades places with a random unit of the same tier owned by another player on the other side of the battle. Units climbing on walls cannot swap locations.
Spontaneous Mutation (Combat Spell)
Gives 2 mostly positive random mutations to every friendly living unit until the end of battle.
Mutations include Iron Skin, Swollen Muscles, Poison Glands, Spiked Hide, Leaden Bones, Bloated with Gas, Drenched with Sweat, Electrical Skin, Hormonal Imbalance and Chronic Halitosis (Gas Breath!).
Summon Lesser Elemental (Strategic Spell)
A lesser elemental is summoned to the target location.
Lesser Elementals can evolve into full grown elemental of its type.
Warp Domain (Strategic Spell)
Randomly changes terrain tiles in target city domain into blight, volcanic, arctic and tropical terrain. This spell also destroys all roads and bridges in that city's domain.
If you just want to hurt your opponent, this is spell to use!
Degenerate (Combat Spell)
Infects the target with a magical disease that weakens the creature at the fundamental level. The unit gains 60% weakness to all damage types until the end of battle.
Great spell to counter strong units or Leaders.
Unstable Transformation (Combat Spell)
The target friendly unit is saturated with powerful magic and transforms into a new random unit of equal or greater power. The new unit is inherently unstable and will die at the end of battle. Units destroyed with this spell cannot resurge.
One of most fun spells found in the game. You can transform your tier 1 unit into a Dragon. If you’re lucky, this is possible!
Pandemonium (Combat Spell)
All units get displaced, up to 4 hexes from their original position, and all enemies get a random 100% weakness (Frost, Fire, Shock, Blight, Spirit or Physical)
This is a spell to get the odds back in to your favor. Also works wonders during sieges as it may pull defenders down from the walls.
Where to find Wild Magic? You can create a new custom leader with the Wild Magic specializations or select the Halfling Leader Allie. Allie is also featured in the second Golden Realms campaign map.
Partisan Specialization
Use new skills for guerrilla warfare. Create concealed hide-outs and develop ambushing skills.
Partisan Army (Empire Upgrade)
Your units gain the Partisan ability. Units with Partisan gain Wetlands, Mountain, and Forest concealment when they are the only unit in the army.
Folk Hero (Empire Upgrade)
Units at Inns are 25% cheaper, Independent cities are 10% cheaper.
Guerrilla Tactics (Empire Upgrade)
Your Irregular and Infantry units gain the Guerrilla ability, which prevents movement loss when retreating from battle. In addition, when retreating from combat you don't incur the morale penalty of losing.
War Anthem (Combat Spell)
All enemy units must resist a spirit check or suffer -500 morale.
This spell is a great counter against the Luck Mechanic. Halfling Leaders should be very weary of this spell!
Hide Out (Strategic Spell)
All friendly units in the target city's domain are Invisible.
Where to find Partisan Specialization? You can create a new custom leader with the Partisan specialization or select the Halfling Leader Ernest. Ernest is the leader you play in the first Golden Realms campaign map.
Two hand crafted scenarios
Playable single and multi-player these new stand-alone scenarios are built around the new features of the Golden Realms expansion, including the Seals of Power.
Valley of the Lost Seals
After the opening of the Prime Seals, lesser Seals were revealed all over Athla. As an adventurer seeking great power, venture out to the Valley of the Lost Seals, a lush area filled with magical treasures and mysterious Seals of Power.
Free For All or 2 vs 2, 4 Player, Seal Victory, Battle Map
On Top of the World
The frigid White Mountains are known for their ice-cold climate. For the first time in nearly twenty years, the ice has started to thaw again, revealing magical Seals of Power. Six cold-blooded lords now seek to settle on these harsh mountains to open the Seals of Power and claim these lands.
Free For All or 3 vs 3, 6 Player, Seal Victory, Empire Building
New Features
All the new content and features mentioned in this document are integrated into the updated Random Map Generator.
Mystical City Upgrades
Arcane treasure sites located in your domain unlock new unique upgrades for your cities, making the location and specialization of your cities more important than ever. You can see what upgrades a structure will unlock by clicking on it:
Clicking on the name of the upgrade will take you to the Tome of Wonders page for the upgrade, so you can see an explanation of what it does.
To make the upgrade you need to have a city with that structure within its domain, and you need to have cleared the structure of any defenders or inhabitants. The upgrade will then become available in the city’s build menu. Once built, the upgrade will function automatically, and upgrade the appropriate units as the city builds them.
Empire Quests
Achieve empire building goals before your rivals to unlock unique rewards for your realm. This introduces a new type of indirect competition between players. Examples are the Eternal City: be the first to build a metropolis and get an awe-inspiring Monument. There are also rewards for Prime Good and Evil, where the first player to achieve full good or full evil alignment receives a party of champions of the respective alignment at no cost.
To see a list of available empire quests you need to click the overview button in the top left corner, and then switch to the empire quests tab:
This dialogue will also open when you select the “Empire Quests” hint that pops up when the game starts. You can see a description of what you need to do to complete the empire quest, as well as a description of the reward by clicking on it.
When a player completes an empire quest, all players in the game are informed of it. This is intended to both pressurize other players, by warning them that you are ahead of them in a particular area, and also to warn other players that you might be attempting to rush for a particular strategy.
Note that empire quests can be switched on and off in the advanced game setup menu. They are on by default in randomly generated maps, while disabled by default in premade scenarios and campaigns.
Seals of Power
A new King of the Hill style victory condition where players must capture and hold the dangerous Seals of Power structures in order to achieve victory. Don’t sit and hold back as broken seals attract extra-dimensional beings wanting to take the Seal back.
Where do I find this? You can find the Seals of Power in the third Golden Realms Campaign map, the Random Map Generator and the two new custom scenarios Valley of the Lost Seals and On Top of the World.
Defensive City Upgrades
Each race has a unique city defense to build. The Draconian’s Firestorm Pillar sets ablaze those who dare attack their city. The Bell Tower for the Humans rallies the citizenry to shoot volleys at oncoming enemies.
Defensive structures are unlocked by building the Siege Workshop in your cities. If you wish to build one:
Builder’s Hall -> Siege Workshop -> Bell Tower (or racial equivalent).
Once built, the defensive upgrade will fire once per round in tactical combat when the city is attacked. The defenses themselves are out of the player’s reach, and cannot be stopped by the attacking player.
A refresher on the new features:
New Content Includes
- The Halfling Race: The little folk are back, with new units, heroes and leaders. The jesters shoots fireworks which dazzle the enemy and the cleaver flinging brew brothers keep the Halfling armies fed while on the road. Halflings can be used with all classes and introduce the new Luck mechanic which allows them to dodge incoming attack while they’re in good spirits.
- Golden Realms Campaign: In this three scenario campaign, you help the Halfling survivors of the Heartwood Massacre rebuild an empire in an exotic land and confront an ancient evil.
- Exotic Map Locations: Capture the Naga Dwelling, home to serpentine queens and giant man-snakes, and discover new treasure sites such as the fabled Lost City to benefit your empire.
- Over twenty new units: Encounter new exotic units such as the filth throwing Dread Monkeys, alluring Mermaids and the fearsome Glutton who can swallow whole regiments in one bite.
- New Hero Items: The Golden Realms contain 50 new magical artifacts to discover and use. Wield the enigmatic Crystal Skull, or wear a stylish Witch Doctor’s Headdress to mix in with the locals.
- Wild Magic Specialization: Unleash wild magic. Cause spontaneous mutations, warp equipment and turn orderly battles into a pandemonium where the lines of battle are violently warped.
- Partisan Specialization: Use new skills for guerrilla warfare. Create concealed hide-outs and develop ambushing skills.
- Two hand crafted scenarios: Playable single and multi-player these new stand-alone scenarios are built around the new features of the Golden Realms expansion.
Features
- Mystical City Upgrades: Arcane treasure sites located in your domain unlock new unique upgrades for your cities, making the location and specialization of your cities more important than ever. Building a city near a Crystal Tree unlocks the Enchanted Armory which reinforcing your armored units.
- Empire Quests: Achieve empire building goals before your rivals to unlock unique rewards for your realm. This introduces a new type of indirect competition between players. Examples are the Eternal City: be the first to build a metropolis and get an awe-inspiring Monument of Prime Good and Evil, where the first player to achieve full good or full evil alignment has a party of champions the respective alignment join at no cost.
- Seals of Power: A new King of the Hill style victory condition where players must capture and hold the dangerous Seals of Power structures in order to achieve victory. Don’t sit and hold back as broken seals attract extra-dimensional beings wanting to take the Seal back.
- Defensive City Upgrades: Each race has a unique city defense to build. The Draconian’s Firestorm Pillar sets ablaze those who dare attack their city. Or the Bell Tower for the Humans which rallies the citizenry to shoot volleys at oncoming enemies.
- All the new content and features mentioned above are integrated into the updated Random Map Generator.
Age of Wonders III: Golden Realms incorporates feedback from the community and coincides with a free update adding updated AI, balance, a new Spell Disjunction System, Steam Workshop and Cloud Saves for Steam Users. Golden Realms is set for a September 18th 2014 release and available via online stores such as Steam and GoG.
