King's Bounty: Armored Princess Thread

Armored Princess is the follow up to the Strategy/RPG hybrid remake of the classic game.

The thread to the original can be found here.

Digital Download release date Nov 20, 2009 - US$39.99

No word on boxed copies still as of this date but there is definitely plans for one.

a highly playable demo is available

as well as several videos

Thanks for the new thread!

Does anyone know where to find info on new troops etc.? Is there already a unit guide or FAQ out there? I suppose if there were such a thing it would be in Russian, but I wouldn't know how to search for it. The official site has some info on races as well as - I assume - names of all unit types, but unfortunately nothing in-depth.

I hear the new Paladin unit is very useful, but it would mean going all humans for my warrior. In the demo I quite liked that big mother worm that couldn't move at all, just breed. Or should I go for the undead after all? Aaah, I need more info to decide!

The new achievements seem very cool. Unlike normal achievements from other games they are actually useful gameplay enhancing elements.

I only played a few minutes of the demo. I though it was a bit spoilerish the way they started you out with so many troops and abilities. I'd rather discover those things in the full game.

lucky day

The same thing happened with the first games Demo but maybe even more so JDR. I also think I've seen most of the spells after playing it twice - not a whole lot different from the first one.

I've not seen the big mother worm you speak of (tho I thought I finished it) but in the interest of not spoilerizing myself I'll just stop there.

Did they do that with the demo for KB: the Legend? I honestly don't remember. I thought that demo took place near the starting point of the full game, with a low level character.

Anyways, I never needed a demo to convince me to get Armored Princess. It's always been a sure buy for me since it was announced.

Wow ... $40? Didn't realize it was a full game, I assumed a $20 expansion, guess my attention has been thin on this. Sadly no time right now, so it will have to wait a bit ...

Anyone get an actual copy yet and not just the demo?

Lucky Day said:

Anyone get an actual copy yet and not just the demo?

Click to expand...

As much as I'm dying to play it, I'm going to wait for the retail box version to hit the stores. I'm not a big fan of digital distribution, especially for a title like this.

If anyone hears anything about the retail release, please let me know.

Anyone get an actual copy yet and not just the demo?

Yes, I got one. I'm playing a warrior and I'm about 60% through.
KBAP is much harder than KBTL. But it's great. They polished some of the minor
flaws. The paladin became improved, travelling is easier and faster, many more
items, some great new units.

After succumbing to that hot steam deal I've been at this non stop.

Since I did well in the first one I decided to play on Hard, which appears to be a scaler for cost cost and troop size?

Man, its tough that way..because getting troops is nigh difficult. I've found myself micromanaging troops even more so just to save a buck, loading up with peasants and devilfish on occasion and thanking God the boyfriend has the ability to train up pirates and robbers.

Also, I'm playing her as a paladin. If its better, its hard to say, because I keep wishing I played a mage.

It's even harder as a mage, Lucky. You have no rage, not all that much mana, and finding good spells can be difficult. I actually found more as a paladin.(I've got both builds going.) I'm playing on normal, and I can definitely feel the lack of cash. I almost never have enough for a full army.

They've done a lot of cool things with the units, though. But I'm about half way through and starting to think I need to be playing on 'Easy.'

I played as a mage on Normal difficulty, and found the first half (or maybe two thirds) of the game a bit of a challenge. I came very close to running out of money at one stage (but was able to maintain a full army). Hopefully this isn't too much of a spoiler, but the game does get easier... and it's largely a matter of getting access to level 5 troops and, particularly if you're a mage, big damage multi-target spells.

Although if anything I found the latter stages of the game disproportionately easy, overall I enjoyed it, because it had at times been difficult enough to make me sweat, but not lose my temper.

Ilmarian, you finish it then?

I've routinely found myself almost broke with no armies. One of the ways I managed to squirm back to play again was to sail to the higher level island and evade Pirate ships to pick up salvage.

I've also noticed that Royal Thorns and Cyclops are an incredible help. The Thorns are able to generate enough of their less powerful relations to distract your enemies. Cyclops don't take a lot of damage and can take on hundreds of enemies still standing while your pet dragon blasts the group thanks to its damage resistance and high hit points. No range penalties are able to let you hit the enemy hard before they get you.

Yes, I've finished it on Normal difficulty. I can well imagine the early stages of the game being quite difficult on Hard. Even on Normal, I found I had to evade enemies in the higher level islands to pick up gold/scrolls/runes/crystals just to keep me going. The game can be a bit demoralising at that stage, as you're trying to scrape together resources and struggle to find battles that you can win without losing too many troops.

I made the stupid mistake at one point (early on in the game) of leveling up one of my dragon's key abilities, then not having enough max rage to use it, and it was awhile before I got my rage up (being a mage) high enough. Ranged troops and summoned, throw-away troops are probably the order of the day early on (although ranged troops do get picked on). I don't know if the scrolls that you get are randomly determined, but I found magic to be of little use in the first half of the game, so I think it's really a case of choosing the right troops and making the best possible use of them (and your dragon).

I think irrespective of which class I chose, I would gravitate towards Paladins and Resurrection (and maybe Inquisitors) every time... the savings in troop costs are very significant. However, I'd be interested to hear of other approaches, e.g. focusing on specific races and their equipment sets. I found it difficult to see how one could be expected to adopt certain focuses (like elf or lizard), given that the necessary troops/items only become available in sufficient quantity in the latter part of the game, and people generally don't like switching troop sets and strategies that they've become comfortable with. If they should ever make another KB game, I'd like to see more choice initially (i.e. low to mid level troops of all races), with more specialisation being required in the later stages of the game.

KBAP is much harder, especially in the beginning, as Ilmarin said. Also, mages are now the hardest class, not the easiest. Basically, in the first part you were nuking with your spells, but now the mage role is more of a summoner - once I realized that, things started going more smoothly. I haven't finished the game yet, but I do feel it's getting easier after around Verona. Also note that you'll get leadership as a mage, so eventually all the fights will be "Lethal" to you, even if you've already killed everything you can. My warrior playthrough feels much easier (haven't yet reached Verona, but it's definitely easier so far).

Anyway, on strategy: gold for troops shouldn't ever be a problem, simply because you aren't supposed to lose any troops in battle. That's basically the core game principle here, and now there's even an explicit reward for pulling it off (more leadership via the medal). Of course, to do that, you'll probably want to have some means of ressurecting troops - Paladins or Inquisitors, and a means of getting fodder (Royal Griffons, Royal Thorns...). After that, it's just a matter of picking your battles carefully; also, be sure to "kite" (draw out the enemy troop and then run around it to get the goodies) whatever treasure you can, particulary leadership flags.

A lot of the game is random: enemy troop composition, troops and artifacts available in shops, shrines and some treasure. Of course, this is great for replayability, but you can also get pretty screwed if you don't get good units/equipment for your chosen class. Finally, if I had to pick one thing to change, I'd like it very much if I could recruit my chosen troops without going back to the shop, after the first time. After a while, it becomes very annoying to run back to previous islands to "fill up". In fact, that's what always turns me away from the game after a while - I haven't actually finished a single playthrough, in both KB games, precisely because this gets too tedious after a while.

Interesting points, VPeric and Ilmarin. One of the reasons I've been so often without money is that I also try to avoid going back to the shops—finding it as tedious as mentioned—so end up overbuying troops to hold in reserve, then end up being stuck with them when I should be using a higher level unit. I stopped doing that, and it helped. Now I just buy one extra stack at a time. Also, while I've found very few good spells, I have been able to get demonologists and royal griffins, so the summoning aspect is also cutting down troop expense.

But mostly I've just had to pay more attention in battles and stop wasting troops. I'm to Verona now, and things are manageable, but still very different from KB:TL, where I had so much cash I could actually buy artifacts on Hard.

Like Ilmarin, the most aggravating thing I did was not get the warrior skill for increasing rage when I had the might runes for it—now I'm stuck with a max of 15 rage and only 2 skills that cost under that. And there just aren't any might runes laying around. Not even a $#@! roasted rat.

Only playing on normal, but have ridiculously excessive levels of cash. I found that the first husband you get encouraged me to use marauders for a long while, and with their two looting the dead actions + 2 treasure searches for each combat I got stacks of cash very early on.

Paladin seems pretty easy anyway, not entirely sure I'm so keen on some of the medals. The one of avoiding troop losses is good as it forces some good tactical play, but the spell casting ones are most annoying. 450 uses of heal / resurrection etc in the first 10 rounds of combat to get lvl 3 medals is way too much, 50 and 150 were fairly achievable but I've been dragging fights out for half a dozen turns more than necessary for about the last 6 hours odd of gameplay time and still haven't hit 450 (after which I'll have to do the same with stoneskin . . .)

Bit of a bugger finding full sets of stuff though

Yeah, that training skill comes in handy--missed it on my first start and never took advantage of the cheap troops. Plus the looting skill is very helpful indeed--you can get an extra thousand or two per combat easy. The medals are okay, but it's kind of hard to hit the casting numbers when half the spells aren't in the game.

I've got the elf-husband that wears a dress now and he's pretty cool for restoring mana and scribing the very occasional wanderer's spell. Plus he's pretty in pink.

I love kings bounty? should I get that game? is it harder than/or equal to the original? what do people think?

GothicGothicness said:

I love kings bounty? should I get that game? is it harder than/or equal to the original? what do people think?

Click to expand...

Yes?

(keeping it short here )