Conquest of Elysium 3 (CoE3) is a streamlined turn based fantasy strategy game with a touch of rogue-like and the complex undertones of Illwinter's Dominions series. While CoE3 appears to be a simple game with limited options at first glance, delving further into the game reveals a game of complex decision making and risky endeavors.
User reviews: Very Positive (150 reviews)
Release Date: Oct 24, 2012


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"Beneath its crude interface and simple graphic style is a robust, addicting, and deeply immersive turn-based fantasy strategy game! Check out my video"
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About This Game


The main focus in CoE3 is that each race plays differently. We're not talking about a unique building and unique unit, we're talking about completely differently, with different mechanics and different goals. Perhaps you're playing a druid, focused on amassing a vast forest and jungle empire from which to harvest ingredients to summon creatures of the woods with no practical need to conquer mines. Perhaps you're a dwarf, who's only concern are mines and produce units at a set rate every turn, focused almost entirely on upgrading those units to survive as long as possible since they are so difficult to replace. With 18 different factions that alone is enough to keep your play dynamic as you vie for control of the map to conquer Elysium. That isn't where it ends, however, there are 6 scenarios in which your game takes place that will help randomize the map. These scenarios range from a the early days of an agrarian world to a giant gleaming capital, which you can conquer, that spawns patrols of human guards, to a fallen empire filled with the living dead and scarred by battlefields and tombs. There's also random events to contend with, from merchants to pillage to the very gates of the underworld opening portals to your realm, your hands will be full before you even make contact with the enemy.

In each game the objective is to defeat your enemies by relying on the strengths of your chosen race. Combat in CoE3 is automatic to keep things streamlined, but that doesn't make it non-strategic. Each unit has a desired "location" it wants to be in the battlefield. Archers want to be in the rear, heavy infantry want to be in front. As you can imagine, putting together an army that has enough strength to protect the powerful archers and spell casters in the rear is vital. It goes beyond that though, as you must determine your enemy's strengths and hopefully be able to counter their strategy. An army of a mere 10 trolls is extremely dangerous, perhaps able to bring down a dragon, but they can only kill 10 creatures at once. An army of 50 small units will make short work of your trolls. However, an army with a wizard able to cast high level spell may completely destroy all 50 small units in one shot but would be unable to harm 10 trolls. Determining the strength and composition of an enemy army is a vital skill, and since hitting in combat, damage, and even the very spells that will be cast are randomized based on the abilities of each unit, every battle invites potential disaster and a change of plans.

Key Features:

  • 18 different classes that are unique, both in resources they need and the rituals or special abilities they have
  • Copious amounts of monsters and random events, good and bad
  • Random maps.
  • Spell system with 42 magic paths
  • Network or hotseat multiplayer
  • Team play, you can be 2 players against the AI for example.
  • Assassins that make an assassination attack before combat starts.
  • Catapults, Hill Giants and Rocs that can throw or drop boulders during sieges.
  • Immortal Liches and Vampires.
  • Regenerating trolls rise from the dead if they haven't been killed too badly or their side lost.
  • Large worms that can swallow smaller enemies whole. Swallowed units take a few points of damage from digestion each round until they are freed.
  • Shape changers that looks like something else when seen by the enemies.
  • And many many more monsters and abilites....

System Requirements

Mac OS X
    • OS:Windows XP/Vista/7
    • Processor:1 GHz
    • Memory:512 MB RAM
    • Graphics:OpenGL capabable graphics card
    • OS:10.4.11 and above
    • Processor:any PowerPC or Intel cpu
    • Memory:512 MB RAM
Helpful customer reviews
31 of 35 people (89%) found this review helpful
41.7 hrs on record
Posted: July 8
I highly, HIGHLY recommend this game for anyone interested in playing a Turn-Based Strategy game that hasn't been made overtly complex. Just good, simple fun that will have you going "just one more turn..." more times than you can count!
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23 of 25 people (92%) found this review helpful
242.7 hrs on record
Posted: September 6
It may not look like it, but this is one of the best turn-based strategy games ever...
once you get past the learning-curve (which is actually less steep than the Civ games).

-each game plays out completely different
-The ancient/medieval-fantasy theme is well done
-Equip looted items to unit(s) of your choice
-Level up units
-plenty of personal style in how you play
-as complicated or simple as you want

Cons: (mods may very well exist to fix some of these)
-The music is good but does get repetitive (i can hear it in my head afterwards for days o.0)
-The neutral animals are a bit more aggressive than is realistic imo.
-I wish there was a way to convert/recruit neutral units into your army, particularly ones that are unique to your faction/class, instead of always being forced to fight/kill neutrals.
-graphics are ... simple
-ui interface could be easier to learn

8.5 / 10
Short description:
Unique turn-based fantasy army building & broad-strategy map domination. Game mechanics take a bit to get used to, but the elegantly balanced scaling-complexity, and replayability more than makes up for the sharper-than-average learning curve.
Longer description:
-Pick one of 6 different "societies" (time-periods which adjust the map generation parameters, making certain tiles more or less common).
-Choose one of 18 different "classes" (army factions), each with unique combinations of units (each has unique units but many have some common units as well) to battle against the other "players"
-(the ai has 10 difficulty levels!).
-At least 9 different types of resources make "money" handling slightly different based on which class/faction you play (it's simpler than it sounds)
-Build your armies, assign leaders to move them around; explore, conquer, and fight your way to victory.
-Almost every unit has room for a bunch of (magic) items, though items are sufficiently rare as to be extremely exciting when found and generally only equipped to your best units (leaders usually).
-Magic users have their own well-crafted system to them with many schools of magic and various spell ingredients/mana used to power them (see resources like sacrifices, herbs, fungus, and gems)
-Combat is automated which may seem crazy at first but is quite well done;
-unit capabilitiesstats are fairly easy to grasp and analyze.
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11 of 12 people (92%) found this review helpful
55.5 hrs on record
Posted: November 2
Excellent Rogue like 4x. Simple graphics and (sometimes a lot) different mechanics/playstyles for each of the 20 factions. Start up, on a normal map, select number of opponents (difficulty Jester is advised - has no resource advantage for AI; be warned larger advantages can very quickly steamroll u, as mid and lategame mobs are significantly stronger than startups) and let her rip.

startupswitches (steam - select properties --> Launchoptions)
are advised (yes with two -)
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10 of 11 people (91%) found this review helpful
43.2 hrs on record
Posted: October 21
It's a fast paced, turn based strategy game. Think Civilization 1, but much faster and scaled down. Instead of armies, you have individual troops that make up an army, and you march them around. There are tons of races, units, map types, and random events. Really fun stuff, different every time you play, it's a good game. Single player and Multi-player both are good.
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10 of 12 people (83%) found this review helpful
8.1 hrs on record
Posted: November 8
9/10. Easy to learn, hard to master.
I left my army on a frozen lake near the end of winter and they all drowned when spring came, then I went into a forest with fire elementals in the ranks and they burnt down all the trees.
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5 of 5 people (100%) found this review helpful
8.4 hrs on record
Posted: December 21
I assume you saw the screenshots, understand that gfx aren't gonna carry this one and are interested in fantasy turn-based strategy games. In lieu of a review, here's some very early impressions:

- ♥♥♥♥. Why did i buy this?
- I SO don't want to play this game.
- I don't even. All these stats... And the clunky menus.
- Allright lets get her holy high highnessness out there a-conquering. A cannibal camp... Oh well, gets me a ritual sacrifice bonus.
- Crap, you front line spearmen need to stay alive.
- Hahaha, suck on 3rd degree incineration spells hob.. er, half.. er. gn... whatever the hell you are, hahaha!
- Damn you and the planes you spawned on, and all other untis that show up to be recruited for 50 gold when i have 49! Still, with cheap summoning i get lots of fresh units. Mostly tiny rats and spiders. :\ Ooh o.O Giant Spider! That's more like it!
- Aw, crapdamn! Lost a town to 4 wolves. 4. Wolves. 4! C'mon town! Mmkay whatever, i'll just have this caster with leadership take a few archers and summoned monsters go and take it back. They can stop by the capital to pick up new recruits as well.
- Wait did my rookie summonamancer just blindly luck into summoning a demigod stronker than 3-4 of my combined armies???! Oooh, and he's a front row melee attacker, sweet!
- Damn these cheap summoning rituals, i'm up to my ascots in rats and scorpions. At least they soak damage really well.
- That... that giant moose is honestly too big. I heard of not seeing the forest from the trees but never a forest from a moose. Seriously.

At this point i have 4 stacks of mixed melee/archers/casters stomping things, leveling up, collecting shiny swords and boots of flight, and generally spreading peace, love and understanding of the Cult of the mad blood god whose return shall end the world in pools of pizza sauce.

The game is relatively straightforwad even if it takes a bit of figuring out. Time wasting features are thrown right out and all that is left aims to streamline fantasy flavored, turn based conquering. Might sound featureless but the unit type and terrain diversity, not to mention hosts of spells and artifacts, season changes and random events all keep your campaign interesting. Plus even mooks get item slots, so you will find plenty of uses for shiny loot.

I can't accurately appraise this game. Not at this time. Ok maybe i can. It's a victory of substance over generic shinied sparkly baubleness. You might wonder why a prettier game wouldn't ever have decent, simple and honest fun mechanics, but the anwser is in the question. If you have a VERY shiny wrapper, then you'd be a fool to put anything better than a turd in it. Final Fantasy says hello.

"I stomped things!"
The menus are a teeny bit clunky and take a few minutes to figure out but the rest is:
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5 of 6 people (83%) found this review helpful
56.0 hrs on record
Posted: September 10
Buy it!

I wish I'd bought it sooner. It deserves your attention. It's a little gem, a modern Master of Magic, streamlined and simpler but with a richness that stems from the vast treasure-trove of creatures, spells and unique races already made by Illwinter. While you may be familiar with many creatures from playing Dominions, Conquest of Elysium builds on the familiar and adds twists that make it a very different experience. Dominions is for the grand strategy, long turns and slow pace with lots of planning even before the game begins. Elysium is fast, smooth, clean and streamlined. It has a lot of depth without ever overwhelming you with it. The creatures have a massive collection of traits (all with icons) that make them much more than cosmetically different. Your magical resources are only seen by those able to use them - so you're never overwhelmed by having to keep track of gems/herbs/weeds/hands of glory...etc. If you have someone who can use a new resource then you're able to see it on the map, if you don't then you can't see or claim it. It's one of the little things that helps new players. It's simple, elegant and eases you into the game gently.

Simple, yes. But that isn't to say the game is easy. It's easy to lose and tricky to win. Early mistakes can end the game, losing all your commanders and castles ends the game so there's always some risk from stealthy bandits and animals capturing your castle or some invulnerable creeping doom rolling over your army. At the end of the game, the streamlined options makes the AI smarter and stronger than I've come to expect from many 'modern' games. Even on the default 'jester' difficulty setting the AI can have large armies that are quite happy to attack your towns and castles and use all the magic they have available.

I've not played as every race yet, but I'm looking forward to doing so. I'm looking forward to team games, trying the different map sizes, the different ages of the world and to seeing what other hidden gems I'll find. I hope you get a chance to do all that too.
So... Buy It!
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3 of 3 people (100%) found this review helpful
14.7 hrs on record
Posted: September 30
This game has one of the worst UIs I have ever seen, the sound design is amuterish and the graphics are bad to middling at best and I think you should go play it. The thing is CoE 3 doesn't care about any of the stuff I just mentioned. Because the mechanics are rock solid it doesn't need flashy graphics to be a deep and engaing strategy game. It has a surprisingly large array of different armies all of which are asymetrical and distinct. If you're a fan of intellegent strategy games and miss the days when mechanics where front and center CoE 3 is for you.
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4 of 5 people (80%) found this review helpful
9.5 hrs on record
Posted: July 26
Maybe the most lo-fi modern strategy game there is, but surprisingly fun if you can get around the awkward interface.
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4 of 5 people (80%) found this review helpful
8.4 hrs on record
Posted: October 8
A decent strategy game with a lot of depth *if* you're willing to dig for it. It's fun to capture terrain and amass an empire. A casual approach to the game will leave it feeling dull.

This is probably the one and only Steam game that will run on your Raspberry Pi. That's right, it includes a Raspi binary! I ran a dedicated CoE3 server this way for awhile.
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2 of 2 people (100%) found this review helpful
52.9 hrs on record
Posted: December 13
Simple little addictive game. Decent replay if you like beating challenges with multiple races (over 10 available with unique abilities and weaknesses).
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2 of 2 people (100%) found this review helpful
6.9 hrs on record
Posted: December 27
Conquest of Elysium 3 is the latest in the CoE series made by Illwinter, who are also the designers of the Dominions series. In simple terms the game is about raising armies to defeat your opponenets. At the start of each game you select a class to play which determines how you go about raising your armies or what your fighting style is. An example is the enchanter class, at the start most of your army is composed of generic soldiers until you get resources to summon powerful constructs and golems in the mid to late game.

-There are 18 different classes to pick from each having cool special abilities and playstyles unique to them.
-There are many cool units and magic spells to mess with.
-Games play quickly and end faster than most strategy games.
-Random generated maps allow for endless play.

-The graphics are rather lacking.
-The unit animations are also rather lacking.
-Lots of unit stats to sift through.
-Some matches are doomed from the start due to bad spawn areas.

Bottom Line:
If you enjoy a strategy game where everytime you play you learn something new this game is for you. If you are short on time a lot but you love to play complex strategy games this is for you as well. If you are a person who cares about graphics do not pick this up, likewise if you are not willing to (possibly) read a manual sometimes then do not pick this up either. Illwinter has made many improvements from Conquest of Elysium 2 and at the cheap price of ten dollars it could be argued that this game beats many modern strategy games in terms of features and replayability.
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7 of 12 people (58%) found this review helpful
6.5 hrs on record
Posted: September 24
A quicker, smaller, and less robust version of Dominions 3. While this may sound fun, the game resembles a battle simulator with little of the strategic thought or depths found in Dominions 3. Unless you want a stripped down version of Dominions 3, avoid Conquest of Elysium 3.
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2 of 3 people (67%) found this review helpful
39.5 hrs on record
Posted: September 29
nice fun turn-based strategy game. can loose time playing this. it draws you in and keeps you involved and intersted for hours on end. start playing in the morning and before you know it it's after midnight.
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2 of 3 people (67%) found this review helpful
5.8 hrs on record
Posted: November 29
In this game you lose.
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1 of 2 people (50%) found this review helpful
21.3 hrs on record
Posted: October 8
Bought it, Playd it for 12 hours straight, was up until 4 in the morning, Worth it. This game is very unique due to the face that when you go into a battle you dont actualy control what ANY of your monster/people/demons/ghosts... Etc do. and some of the abilites are extreamly entertain, And the monster are Freaky and extreamly cool too just by the way that they look and how they attack. So if your interested in games like this then it is DEFFINETLY worth checking out it was honestly worth the $9.99 even tho the graphics arnt the BEST the game is still AMAZING so i would give it a 9/10. But yeah its definetly worth checking out.
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3 of 6 people (50%) found this review helpful
34.2 hrs on record
Posted: September 5
Amazing Game 10/10 fun to play with friends
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2 of 4 people (50%) found this review helpful
27.7 hrs on record
Posted: October 1
really awesome game for 10 bucks can't beat it.
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84 of 95 people (88%) found this review helpful
461.3 hrs on record
Posted: December 29, 2013
This is one of my favourite games, I would value it at $60+ so it is an absolute bargain. All 17, yes 17, factions play in their own unque way and I have had fun playing every faction. This game is a must if your a Civilization fan or enjoy turn based strategy games in general. I found it very helpful to watch some lets plays on youtube by Das24680 I highly recomend watching these he explains all the controls and other basics very well.
I recommend the troll race for your first game as the troll king is a one man army at the beginning and is very forgiving of newbie errors.

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44 of 48 people (92%) found this review helpful
24.3 hrs on record
Posted: January 21
Game is great.

-Variety of classes
-Variety of units
-Variety of playstyles
-Extreme replayability
-Excellent multiplayer
-Feels very roguelike-ish
-Tons of spells/items
-Super random

-Sound (god awful)
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