Eador: Masters of the Broken World Review
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Strategy Gameplay The gameplay of Eador: MotBW is effectively split up into three different modes. The first is the Astral Plane itself, which takes the form of your mission hub. Here, you can examine the details of your empire (including which Shards you have captured), talk to the other Masters that you have met in your adventure (some of whom will refuse to speak to you based on your karma), and selecting which Shards to stage your assault on next, which start out very small but grow larger and involve more Masters simultaneously as the game goes on.
Part of claiming victory comes down to preparation, and the Astral Plane also allows you to pass turns to gain Energy, which can be spent on giving yourself starting bonuses when you invade a Shard - but as other Masters can take a Shard for every turn you spend on the Astral Plane, often it's wise not to waste time unless you really need the boost. As you conquer new Shards you will gain access to new structures and units to use, so you always have something new to look forward to.
The second level of gameplay is the strategic map view you get when you invade a Shard. Every Shard has a different type, and some even have special properties - a World of Sand is entirely covered in desert, for instance, and thus there are bigger stamina penalties on your units, while a World of Rust will make your heroes' weapons and armor corrode and break quickly, so properly choosing a strategy for the specifics of each Shard is very important.
Each Shard is arranged into a large hex grid, with each hex on the grid called a Province. A Province consists of a terrain type (swamp, desert, hills, etc.), a population of inhabitants (humans, barbarians, elves, etc.), possibly a special resource (iron, wood, etc.), and finally, any number of locations to visit, ranging from dungeons where enemies dwell, to NPC-run shops selling magical items, to special encounters that will affect the Province permanently.
You start each Shard with a Stronghold, which is your main base of operations. Unlike the Heroes series, you don't find new towns to conquer - what you start with is what you get, but if you capture an enemy's Stronghold it will become a powerful high-value Province. In your Stronghold, you build structures, recruit heroes and units, and can repair or purchase your hero's equipment. Interestingly, the Stronghold can only hold so many buildings in each district, so you'll need to plan ahead what you want to build rather than just build everything available to you. Every turn that passes, you'll gain an income in gold and gems - "normal" and "magic" currencies respectively - but depending on your expenses you could actually find yourself losing that income if you don't take steps to keep your economy balanced, which helps prevent players from growing too quickly.
To make progress on the Shard, you'll need to effectively capture a line of Provinces leading to your enemy Strongholds, and lay a siege to knock them back into the Astral Plane. However, things are rarely so clear-cut - many Provinces have those special resources that you'll want to pick up depending on the units you build. What's more, many of them will be populated by very high-level inhabitants, making it a challenge just to capture and hold even a neutral Province.
