[Spoilers] Biggus Decius and the Sucking Vampires (Bobchillingworth / Calabim)

[DaveV]

Hmm. I think I might continue on to vampires first for now since masonry -> construction -> sanitation is a pretty long detour (once I finish Carnivals... siiigh)

Masonry (140) + Construction (400) + Sanitation (640)

vs.

Horseback Riding (360) + Writing (360) + Trade (450) + Feudalism (1400)(!)

The first path is actually cheaper than shown, since you'll have two prerequisites for Sanitation (Construction and Bronze Working) and will get a discount. I don't see many happy resources in your screenshots, so the public baths could be really valuable, and the additional commerce and hammers from three extra population per city might mean you'd actually get to Feudalism faster than you would without the detour. The most important thing about going construction first, though, is it gives you access to a stack-killer unit *much* earlier. The only military unit that the Feudalism path opens up is Horsemen, who are pretty underwhelming. If you go Construction first, you get Chariots at Trade, which is a better mounted unit that can also use bronze weapons.

Feudalism is a really expensive tech, and you want to make sure your economy doesn't stall out when you're on the way there. You want to be working lots of aristofarms and commerce specials so you can keep teching while supporting your growing army.

Hey so another question... I want to capture that barbarian city to my east... should I attack with maybe 2 moroi and 4 bloodpets (moroi are 2-3 turns, bloodpets are 1 turn from my best production city), or just 6 bloodpets, or what? Moroi are pretty great offensive units thanks to burning blood, as long as you don't mind knowing that they're very likely not going to survive.

More like 9 bloodpets, since that would cost about the same in hammers as 2 moroi + 4 bloodpets. You'll lose some bloodpets, of course, but it sounds like you were planning on losing the moroi anyway. If the barb city is on a hill, you'll probably need catapults to take it without heavy losses.

[Bobchillingworth]

Heh, as always you might have a point about the tech path... but public baths are really expensive, and I'm going to have a lot of difficulty slotting in all these completing priority buildings / units.



I think nine bloodpets might be a wee bit excessive, given that the barb city should only have two 2/4 strength archers defending, and my bloodpets will have copper weapons.


Oh and I don't have horses nearby. I'll show a map overview when I do my turn 100 report.

[DaveV]

but public baths are really expensive

Just slightly more expensive than Granary/Smokehouse/Breeding Pit that you want to build . How much would you pay for a building that gives +6 commerce and +3 hammers?

the barb city should only have two 2/4 strength archers defending

Plus 0-3 warriors...

[Bobchillingworth]

Plus 0-3 warriors...

Well, the city always spawns with one melee unit who will beeline to attack the nearest civ- and I've already killed him. The barbs may build additional warriors, it's true, but I *think* that they won't ever use the AI_CITY_DEFENSE script and so are pretty likely to just suicide themselves against my oncoming stack.


I think I'll march with 6 or 7 bloodpets, and if there's too many barbs I can just camp outside their city until I add enough.



In other news, it looks like I'll be declaring on Sareln in a couple turns to capture his capital with a scout. Selrahc has somehow manged to find him, and since I have an NAP with Selrahc and have already settled Sareln his city in the south, it seems a waste to not take the 2X Cotton and Corn city for myself.



Uh, scouts can capture cities, right?

[DaveV]

Well, the city always spawns with one melee unit who will beeline to attack the nearest civ- and I've already killed him. The barbs may build additional warriors, it's true, but I *think* that they won't ever use the AI_CITY_DEFENSE script and so are pretty likely to just suicide themselves against my oncoming stack.


I think I'll march with 6 or 7 bloodpets, and if there's too many barbs I can just camp outside their city until I add enough.



In other news, it looks like I'll be declaring on Sareln in a couple turns to capture his capital with a scout. Selrahc has somehow manged to find him, and since I have an NAP with Selrahc and have already settled Sareln his city in the south, it seems a waste to not take the 2X Cotton and Corn city for myself.



Uh, scouts can capture cities, right?

I don't know why not, though I can't remember doing it.

Barb warriors will accumulate until there are 4 of them in a city, then they will go out as a stack to attack. I've never seen them attack out of the city.

[Bobchillingworth]

Okay, Turn 100 Report time!


I'll start with a picture of my current empire:




Three cities, with two being added in the next couple turns- One at the marked spot between Acaia and Nubia, and the other being Sareln's current capital. I've also founded Sareln's frozen new homeland in the south, and it's a good thing I didn't delay- as I posted previously, Selrahc has managed to find Sarlen's capital, and so I have to capture it for myself before he razes it.


Next is all of the territory I've revealed thus far:








The lack of Mana is pretty disappointing, especially since I was hoping there would be a free one for Sareln to grab so that he could build a sun node & begin thawing out the south. I still haven't scouted very far to my West- I have a bloodpet exploring the Southwest currently and I'm recalling my Southeast scout to help him out. I have a fairly secure source of horses in the Southeast, but it's distant and not a priority. Otherwise my land is borderline excellent- lots of rivers, a nice mix of health and happiness resources, and three gold.


Here's an image & overview for each of my cities:


Acaia




My most recent city, the terrain makes for a nice hybrid production / commerce / feasting town. (Tentative) build order is a worker starting at size 4, followed by 2X bloodpets, and then likely another worker or two before I start infrastructure builds.


Prespur




My capital. Prespur is right now a straight commerce / future feasting city. Build order is worker -> worker -> possible training yard for +1 happy -> settlers, workers, and a market for the foreseeable future. I'll eventually want to get the same semi-mandatory infra in this city as everywhere else (breeding pit, smokehouse, granary, market, carnival) but right now the priority is for civ development units.


Nubia




My main production city. Also has a fair amount of commerce, thanks to the gold, river, and reagents. Build order is for 2X bloodpets (all bloodpets are one-turn builds) to defend Sareln's soon-to-be former capital, then 6-7 bloodpets to capture the barb city, with reinforcements if necessary. After that probably a carnival so that I can work an additional hill mine, and a market. Most of my garrisons will originate from Nubia, at least for the time being.




Finally, a diplomatic overview:


Cull: I haven't spoken to Cull much except for when I offered him some tactical advice, which I'm not sure he bothered to follow. His war with Selrahc and poor civ development (no roads, seriously?) have left him backwards. I also don't like the idea of sharing Sareln's loyalty with him. I think that Cull is probably one of the weaker players in this game, and I think that his civ is a great target for Raider's pillaging, so he's pretty high on my hit list. I don't have any plans to mess with him before I have several high-level vampires, though.


pocketbeetle: I still haven't "officially" met him, and my scout who I sent in his direction will be eaten by a bear next turn, so we haven't really had much diplomatic contact. As he popped his worldspell after he only had 3 cities, he may be / have been unaware that with a large-size map he can actually have 4 mega cities.

He's confirmed to be going for a culture victory, and appears to be spamming religions to that end. The Kuriotates are fantastic at accumulating culture in their great cities, but it's very hard to defend your land when you can at most only build four units per turn. Excellent pillaging target for specter-equipped vampires.


Iskender: Ugh, this dude. I'm still upset that he explored that lair, and I'm worried that I may have to declare on him if he tries it again (he's had a scout & warrior pair in the area). Other than telling him not to open the lair, I haven't had much communication with him.

I'm hoping he doesn't try to rush me, and I'm grateful that he has the weaker Hippus leader. He's my top target for right now- he's the closest, and I won't feel secure as long as he's around. Still, I have other priorities besides war at the moment.


Selrahc: I can never spell his name correctly... Anyway, the current leader in the game and probably most experienced / skilled player. I still have an NAP with him, although I should do a better job of keeping track of many many turns are left- I think between 20 to 15. He's willing to take risks in combat and launch punative expeditions, so I'll have to be very careful how I handle my diplomacy with him, especially as relates to my protection of Sareln.

Personally I hope that he'll simply drop his war with the Svarts once Sareln's current capital is gone- there's literally nothing that he could get out of the war anymore, and I doubt he wants to keep paying upkeep for his priests in the wilderness. Since I'm adopting a tech path to construction at Dave's suggestion, I should be able to handle him if he decides he wants to fight once the NAP wears off.


Sareln: My vassal/buddy. I've had more diplo contact with him then every other player combined, and have been largely treating him has a team member. I don't really see any reason not to; he's soon going to be limited to my back-lines, owes me his for his continued existence in this game, and I could easily wipe him out at any time if I chose to do so. I'd really like to see him get his feet back into the game though, and so I'll do whatever I can to support him.

Main issue is where he can expand to- obviously his current lands suck (especially without Sun I or FoL), but I don't want him taking any of my nicer land, or critical resources like my sole mana node. I need to keep exploring it, but I think I'll end up ceding him most of what lies to my West, while I claim the fertile land to my north and east for myself. There are more forests to my west than east anyway, and it puts him closer to Iskender in case I need him to reinforce me against a Hippus invasion.




As always, questions / comments are welcome!

[DaveV]

cities ... being added ... at the marked spot between Acaia and Nubia

Why here? All it gives you that you don't already have is desert incense, which is a good commerce tile, but not as good as gold. Your marked wines city would give you more happiness, which would let you work some more tiles and get more governor's manor hammers.

Looks like you're behind on worker stuff - no road on the copper, no farms on Acaia's floodplains. Keep building workers!

That's all I have time for now, more later. Can you post some demographic or graph screenshots?

[Bobchillingworth]

Why here? All it gives you that you don't already have is desert incense, which is a good commerce tile, but not as good as gold. Your marked wines city would give you more happiness, which would let you work some more tiles and get more governor's manor hammers.

Looks like you're behind on worker stuff - no road on the copper, no farms on Acaia's floodplains. Keep building workers!

Aha, that question I can answer easily =)


Reason 1: I need more straight production spots, and that city (founded on a plains hill) is a great choice. I'll probably build most of my catapults there. Also lets me work the cows.

Reason 2: There's also decent commerce, from the incense and two FP squares.

Reason 3: It's really close by, so won't cost much to maintain and it's easy to reinforce if necessary.

Reason 4: I couldn't even claim those wine if I wanted to right now- check out the resource icon shading, the barb city controls the one closest to me.



As for workers, I do have three guys on the copper at present, so I'll finish the road shortly, assuming that lizardman doesn't cause any problems (which he probably will). I have four workers for three cities, but yeah I'll need more soon. Thus all the worker builds in my proposed construction ques

[Bobchillingworth]

Appros of nothing, I thought I'd share with whoever is reading this some interesting stuff from a recent SP game I played...


One neat thing about FFH is that the mod comes packed with several scenarios, which together form a non-linear campaign. The gameplay is usually enjoyable (although a handful are on excessively large maps), the storyline is interesting, and wherever they ripped the fantasy artwork from does lovely stuff =)


Over the last couple days I've been gradually whacking away at the Lord of the Balors scenario, where you play as one of four factions to invade Hell and eliminate the seven demon lords. Combat obviously plays a major roll.


Screenshot the First:






This is why the Mecurian faction is awesome Your incredibly elite hero unit (in this case Valin) dies at 99.99 % odds? No problem, he's reincarnated as a super-angel, who you can upgrade to any Tier IV unit! I ended up upgrading this angel to a Ophanim (War-Chariot replacement UU) who got over 1,000 exp before I won.


Screenshot the Second:





Not the most impressive kill totals ever, I know, but considering that the vast majority of them came from a handful of incredibly experienced super-units single-handedly wiping out dozens or hundreds of demons each, the scenario certainly had an appropriately epic feel for invading Hell itself.


So, uh, in summary if you haven't tried the FFH scenarios yet, you really ought to give them a look =)

[Sciz]

I started playing them yesterday myself actually. Completed two pretty boring ones (Menagerie and the Dain test thing), but then I did the Decius one against Falun which was pretty fun, though short, and now i'm on the second Falamar scenario (the one after the Menagerie) where Perpentach decides the wars. I was doing great until Perpentach made everyone declare war on me and i had infernals to the north of me with a stack of like 80 guys and then three balseraph nations invading from the east. I lost three cities in my east but destroyed the infernal's entire stack, and was going to kill him when the wars changed again. Managed to retake my three cities pretty easily, and then killed off another civ, so I'm pretty close to winning now. Only really annoying civ are the infernals because they have so extremely many troops, even though most of them are weak.