Dev Diary #44 - Archon Prophecy: The Architects (Part 2)

[Triumph Jordi]

How does the Dominant Affinity apply for Empires with equally split affinities (e.g. 3 Order 3 Materium)? Does it just preference one, does it get a diminished effect of both like how the Crystal Dwelling artifacts work, or does the culture penalize you for not committing?

The Affinity that first reaches the number is the Dominant Affinity.

 

[Triumph Jordi]

The affinity mechanics sound really interesting! But not going to lie, I'm a little skeptical about this double support units thing...

This isn't the first Culture with double Support. The Mystic Summoners also have double supports with their T2 and T3.

The aesthetics of the architect units are quite underwhelming and look like a less interesting cross between High and Primal. The architects are inspired by Greco-Roman culture, so there was so much source material to draw from to create distinct and colourful costumes:

The Architects are based on Greeks, leaning towards Babylonian and Assuryian and less Roman. For Units what matters is recognizability, the visuals in your images don't hold up when your playing the game zoomed out and at a distance where you cannot see or define that detail.

 

[Triumph Jordi]

That's fair. My initial impression is that this will be a battle of attrition type culture since you've given them multiple support units and lower damage shield unit. It seems like you expect the battle strategy to be buff and heal the shield units and let them defeat enemies via retaliation attacks. This might work on AI, but it seems very easy to disrupt as a human player. But we'll see, maybe I've got it all wrong.

Selfishly, I do wish you had gone for (potentially) non-astral battle mages, though.... battle mages need more love...

For every Unit a lot of the power and potential comes from the Affinity Incarnate. Increased Damage, Resistance Reductions, Extra HP, that's what all these units are build around.

Battle Mages got a huge pass and power boost with the last update.