Beat the hack last night. Overall, I think Drums of War is one of the top [complete] experiences out there, and I’m sure any additional updates will continue to make the experience stronger.
Since the hack finished so recently, I approached the game more as a playtest than as an experience to sit back and consume. I took some notes throughout and want to share my feedback + offer up some ideas for changes.
Below are a few areas specifically I want to address:
Economy
The defining gimmick of DoW is the boss recruits. I was pleasantly surprised at how many there were throughout, and ultimately former enemies became the backbone of the army. The tradeoff of “unit or cash” is interesting, especially since the game is just stingy enough with money to make me consider topping up gold versus getting a new unit.
That said, I ransomed ~2 bosses and was able to maintain enough gold throughout the whole game without issue. Maybe it’s because I was content to use cheaper weapons for longer than intended (slims are great), my units were blessed, or the game gave me just enough gold to get by, but I rarely felt like I missed out by taking the unit over cash. The only bosses I ransomed were ones I knew I wouldn’t use (Tiimo and Dzeneta). Otherwise, I sustained myself on selling weapons I wasn’t using and the few gems, statboosters, and excess master seals I had on hand. I ended up not needing like 5 master seals because the game gave me so many prepromote bosses that outclassed other units (more on this later), further nerfing value of the ransom.
I think you have an opportunity to tighten the economy more and make the tradeoff more visibly stark. I think nerfing the starting Lapis gem to half its value would go a long way in tightening the screws upfront, creating much more urgency for cash early. Alternatively, more expensive/interesting stuff to buy early would also help here.
Writing
I was excited to read Drums of War knowing its creator worked on Dream of Five and wrote Garath. The moment to moment writing was generally solid. While occasionally lengthy, the dialogue was generally quality. It took itself seriously enough to get me invested in the outcome. Connacht’s character writing was the clear highlight. His distinct style of speaking and actions made him a fast favorite. I also liked Renate and Gerhard a lot. While few of the characters were truly standout, none of the playables were grating. It’s a solid cast.
The overall plot was structured well. The shifting dynamics of power and the war were generally well-articulated. The weakest link in the overall storytelling were the villains.
Few were worthy of sympathy and many seemed needlessly mean to Roxie. Throughout the story, there seemed to be many opportunities for a long-term alliance or ceasfire to emerge, and constantly Roxie was betrayed. Wulfram in particular was the worst in this regard and I found his actions hard to justify, even for a self-conscious “king”. Most of the villains were pretty forgettable, but in general the vibe I got from everyone not in Roxie’s group was that they were a pompous shithead. Would’ve loved more sympathetic villains in general. Given how many alliances of convenience are temporarily struck throughout the plot, it would’ve been a nice juxtaposition to frame some inevitable encounters as more a clash of unfortunate circumstances (like Berenice near the end, but on a larger scale and without recruitment potential), where perhaps in easier times, Roxie and her adversary would’ve been pals. I generally felt little guilt or remorse against any foe, because they almost always instigated the player in some way.
The best villain was Micah. I like him as a foil to Roxie. Both are the last two powers standing, and both achieved this through their strength, guile, and loyalty to themselves. It’s an interesting mirror of how the selfish aim of survival can take different turns. Micah plots to gain power, while Roxie gains it through her will to survive and outlast. I would’ve liked to see this dynamic explored more since I think the two have interesting parallels given they are the most “formless” of the major forces in the plot. Both align to others where convenient and climb the power ladder accordingly, but in different ways.
Last detail on writing I’ll share is that every chapter had a lot going on. The start and end event runtimes could get lengthy, and given how much happens, it felt often like the characters served the needs of the plot and its steady march versus the plot serving the characters. I would’ve loved more time to breathe between major developments, since so much changed so quickly. While I’m sure some like no filler, I think it’s necessary to give time for the player to settle into this part of the story and get more familiar with characters. This would’ve added more weight to each change and shift in allegiance, too, and maybe given villains more opportunity to not just show up to be shitty to Roxie.
Favorite scene was Roxie’s dinner with Jurechka. I liked the end of act 1 dream sequence a lot too.
Gameplay
The gameplay was generally solid. Seldom did it feel unfair. I liked that there were gimmicks and twists on common objectives. Most of them landed well enough. When they didn’t, it was usually because something wasn’t clearly articulated (timers were a touch slow, especially E-2), escape points weren’t marked (this would be a nice change since it was unclear where I needed to escape from in a few maps), or enemies were too numerous at specific points in the map.
Most of my deaths came from “suffering from success” because of ORKOs on EP. I did need to savestate given the size of the maps and their density.
In general, most of the action happened on EP. Whenever things got dicey, the solution was almost always “slow down”. I’m not a huge fan of this, and there was little incentive to not just turtle out. The anti-turtles that existed were fairly lenient, and there were few instances where I really needed to rush. This meant I could generally roll up into a death ball and bait and switch as needed. Thankfully, a lot of the enemies move, so I was encouraged to strike first. However, there were situations where a huge formation or wave would crash into me, and the solution was to try and choke w/ heavy weapons so I wouldn’t die from killing them all w/ double attacks. Fewer, higher quality enemies would be the solution here, or adding more deploy slots (which felt needlessly arbitrary at times.)
In general, I felt most of the maps were too large. I would’ve broken some of these up into multiple chapters with fewer bosses, but in absence of that, reducing the total enemy count and reducing the map size would help. I also ran an army that was majority 5 move units, so this may also be coloring my perception of size.
Deployment was throttled more than necessary, and given the flow of units, there were a lot of units I never got to see in battle. Deployment was generally too low (especially later on) for the amount you’re asked to do. When deploy was low, it encouraged me to try to juggernaut with Roxie or Gerhard as much as possible since I simply didn’t have enough to work with to play maps normally. E-1 being 7 deploy and the Valentrix chapter being sub-10 also felt needlessly restrictive given how many units I had, and these 2, along w/ a few other lower count maps, led to a power gulf between units that I wasn’t keen on. By the end, the lion’s share fell to only a few units, while the rest either healed or did the occasional chip or stray kill. Given how fast I was able to promote, I usually found myself gaining hardly any experience for fighting, so I felt inclined to try to blitz maps to save resources instead.
In general, I think you could improve things quickly mostly by 1) reducing total enemy count, 2) increasing deploy, 3) boosting enemy speed, 4) tweaking a few turn-based timers, and 5) shrinking down a few maps to make them less intensive. If you only did the first 3 items here, the game would be stronger for it immediately IMO.
Highlights for me were Ch3, Ch4, Ch5, and Ch11. Lowlights were E-1, E-2, Ch12, and Ch13. I didn’t truly dislike any of them. The highlight chapters generally were mostly my speed – challenging, good volume of enemies per turn, and a reason to move. Lowlights usually cut deployment, had awkward timers, or suffered from some of the other things I highlighted.
Final Thoughts
Drums of War is easily a top 10 all-time [complete] hack on the strength of its moment to moment writing, visuals, and mix of gameplay objectives (I love escorting villagers).
Where it stumbles are areas I am generally most prickly about, but it never got to a point where I wanted to drop the hack. No chapter was a bottleneck to progress, albeit seeing large map after large map encouraged me to take more breaks. The game is oozing with stuff despite clocking in at a more modest ~18 chapters.
I end up dropping most [complete] hacks I play and getting through this in a week is a testament to its quality and consistency throughout.
I look forward to seeing future tweaks and rebalancing! Nice work. Happy to chat through any specifics if it’s helpful
And of course, the team
Roxie’s good. I think she was blessed. Had some speed issues until late where she picked it up. She got all the best swords and benefited from it. Solid lord, arguably too strong for my taste since she ended up steamrolling most of the late game w/ Calista support.
If you’re going to do a refresher, having them immediately like Calista is nice. Not much to say, surprised we didn’t get dragon Calista gotoh for endgame, but many would argue dancer is better.
Gerhard got some good levels early and beat out Jaro for deploy towards midgame. I kept calling him ‘axe Storch’ in my head because of the palette lol.
I love hackrom soldiers. I knew I had to use him, and wasn’t disappointed. Not too tough to train. Impractical, yes, but certainly fun. Harpoon is excellent. Love the mug.
Used more for combat than heals. Magic growth was slow and shifted more towards utility by the end, but still solid.
First promo. I probably underused her since she had such good combat, but was frail enough that she didn’t end up doing as much as she should’ve. Can see a smarter player finding ways to break the game with her.
With the heavy flow of enemies, Renate and Petras were invaluable. They were super economical too, able to contribute meaningfully with irons for most of the game. Excellent portrait.
Same as above. He was a bit stronger by the end, but Renate dealt with mages better.
Immediately pooped on Radu. 3 range is good.
Outclassed Vivica hard. Mostly used for utility. Never bought a dark tome. Deadeye support.
His strength and access to 3-range kept him around through the end. Faced low % crit a lot. Excellent mug, favorite character in hack.
Mostly filler for bigger deploys. Probably strong if you invest more, but rarely was worthy of the best weapons to make it happen (Gerhard and Roxie took the good recurves and swords).
Bow armor! 3 range was too good to pass up. Bulk and weapon access was also nice.
In a game where I was concerned w/ money, Estrelle’s prf was nice. Reminds me of Stefan FE9 but better.
Like the portrait. The only S light user I had besides Sanne. Put in some work near the end with it.
Sanne is super well-designed. Immediately fills a gap for the player on any tome they don’t have a user for. Got deployed w/ S dark and S anima.
Ramond was solid for a bit, but eventually I benched him. Was nails vs. mages, but otherwise unremarkable.
Helje was useful for a while. Flying utility was nice early and then became less relevant. She peaked at the swamp map and then retired since her damage output tapered off. Excellent early though.
Influences?
I did notice a few influences throughout. The biggest notes for me were Dream of Five (in a good way!), Cerulean Coast, Requiem, Sword of Heaven and Earth, and Death or Glory. Curious if I got any right.