Any?

A pal of mine has been after me to try the free trial, which I did.

It's not bad.

Hail fellow emperors,

I stumbled over MOO when reading Sulla's and Sirian's websites. I cannot explain, why I did not play it back then, when it was hot and shiny. Too busy with civ1 I guess. :-)
Anyway, I tried it out and really like it. It somehow has that addictive thing to it like for example colonization, which I also play now and then.

I have a couple of questions:
1.) I read scout2 everywhere. Is this just the redesign of the original scout design and are we just making use of the reduced costs of "well established" technology? I can see that these extra 2BC matter in the early days. Or am I missing something else?

2.) I got hit by the rebellion event in my last game. I understand that I have to send troop transports to quell the riots. However, the rebellious planet was maxed out in pop points and I could not send troops/colonists over. Again am I missing something or is this a little flaw in the game?

3.) On a less important side, the game always exits when it should show the victory picture/animation. Any ideas? I am running it in that DOS modus under XP.

I will try to work my way up the difficulty level, so I might join a SG one day.

Cool game!

mh

The builds and PvP subs seem to be getting all the love lately, so I thought I'd spruce things up around here and add a variant I came up with a while back.

The rules are simple, you're only allowed to use your secondary profession. You can not use any skills, attributes, runes, insignias, or items associated with your primary profession. Like using ranger primary to spam attack skills from another profession thanks to expertise? Forget it. If you go ranger primary you can't use expertise, and the same goes for the other classes and their primary attributes.

You can upgrade your armor to the max defense possible for the class, but you're not allowed to use any primary profession runes (i.e. no stonefists if you're war primary). You are allowed to use generic runes and insignias (i.e. radiant/survivor insignias and runes of vigor/vitae/clarity).

Not sure there's much else to say. There aren't any restrictions on storage and merchants or any other NPCs, which is probably why this write-up is a lot shorter than the others. Aside from not having access to anything to do with your primary prof, it's a rather unrestricted and straightforward variant.

Seeing there is open access to FoW/UW this weekend (and the alliance is planning something for saturday)... I wanted to discuss a team build for a speedy full-clear of FoW. As in charging into most groups rather the slow and boring bonded-tank-pulls-aggro variety, so we have a chance on completing every quest in a timely fashion.

KingOfPain already tried this with Warblade? One of the keys was to bring a Minon Master, whose power is hailed in most PvE but aggro is feared in more difficult/sensitive places like FoW. Seems they nailed 7 of the 9 quests, so I'm curious what builds you guys were using, and where things went awry. Also curious to know which are the hard monsters to plan for as I've never seen about half of FoW.

If you *dont* post anything, you guys may have my own ideas inflicted upon you soon. Which are something like:

Orders/barbs on an MM
1-2 Paragons with GftE/Anthem of Flame, and maybe Crippling Anthem. Also Watch Yourself, Stand Your Ground. Add a few spear skills and agressive refrain.
1-2 Ranger(s), either utility with apply poison/broadhead, or the barrage variety with savage and maybe concussion shot. Bring pets for extra minion corpses if nothing else.
2-3 melee guys. Axe warriors with cyclone, moebius-blossom assassin, lyssa dervish, as long as it deals physical-type damage and a lot of it. Think offense, not stance-tanks.
2 Monk backline PvP-style heavy on the prot prayers, no bonders which just get thrashed by NR in the forest. Maybe a LoD and ZB combo. Need good hex removal to clean off spiteful spirit, possibly pre-veiling of melee, along with purge signet and a low-energy set for backup.

I know this sounds stupid, but how do you take screenshots (w/out using PrtSc and going on paint)

We had 2 different GvG sessions this weekend. The first was our regularly scheduled one on Friday and the second was an ad-hoc grouping on Sunday. Rather than make 2 topics, I'll just post about both of them here.

For Friday, our team was:
Wyrm - Hammer War
Fox - Ranger
Hawk - Para
Vort - Rit
Moo - Axe War
Jude (DA guest) - Monk
Aravis (KKoP guest) - Ele
Dirk (KKoP guest) - Sin

There's not much to say about the individual matches. We had 3 guests with very little GvG experience and a build that was less than optimal for the situation (we didn't really run the build either since we had to make several skill substitutions). In truth, I consider these matches my first major failure as the GvG leader. I still think the build is capable of working, with a few minor alterations (i.e. LoD flagger) and people with a bit more experience. Anyways, lesson learned, let's move on.

---

For the ad-hoc meeting on Sunday we decided to try the build I copied from [Vibe] and, as it turned out, things went much more smoothly once we figured stuff out. It took us forever to get off the ground, but once we did we were able to keep going for quite a while. The team this time was:

Wyrm - Cruel Spear Para
Moo - Crippling Anthem Para
Veraxis - Axe War
Merlona Meercat (DA guest) - Sword War
Fox - Ranger
Derezer (AB guest) - Mes
SF - Monk
Vort - Monk

Xyn (once Moo left) - Crippling Anthem Para
This Is A (HRK guest, once Merlona left) - Sword War
Seijin (once Derezer left) - Mes

Our setup wasn't ideal. Veraxis only has Prophecies so he had to run the axe war, which is really where I should be for leading. He also had very little experience, and as such wasn't really contributing to spikes. For the first match, we didn't really have a hold on the build (at all) so we were kinda running around like chickens with our heads cut off. We lost, to say the least.

After the second match, Moo left and Xyn stepped in as the other para. The next few matches were fairly easily, we fought a couple teams with ratings below 980, which we thought were smurfs, but aparently weren't.

The fourth match against Resurrection Of The Almighty [RIP] was really our best effort. Even though Derezer has connectivity issues, we were able to keep it a fairly close match, though we had problems with the whole 2 flag stands thing. At the start of VoD we had the Bodyguard, both Knights, and 3 archers left alive while they had all of their NPCs. We were able to keep control of the upper stand around 21-22min, which helped us finish off their NPCs and then we got the lower stand and were able to get a morale boost while they stood and waited for the GLs to come out at 25 min. Once the lords came out we still had the upper stand so that helped. They weren't healing their lord for whatever reason so we killed him shortly after 26 min.

After that match, Derezer had too many connection issues to continue and Merlona had to sign off, so we hung out and watched the 4th match on observer again to see how we managed to pull it off. Seijin signed on and took over the mes, and a HRK guy who was going to join us earlier but D/Ced was back and took over the sword warrior. By this time we were starting to get a handle on the build and our spikes were better timed.

All in all, I enjoyed the build and I think we should use it for a while. We might need to make a few alterations depending on preferences, but it served us well.

Also, after the GvG our HRK guest took us over to HA for a few runs there. He actually knew what he was doing, so he led. After making a few alterations to the build we went in and did better than pretty much all of our other previous entries. I know this isn't GvG, but I know that personally, I learned a lot, not just about HA, but also about leading. It was definitely worth it for us to stay around all that time to get things going.

Since we've already failed this mission once, I think we need to find a strategy to go with as opposed to trying to wing it.

The basics of the mission: Using this map for reference, the mission starts to the west at Hinon and proceeds east. There are 3 regular harbingers up the initial stairs and corridor marked by red Xs. There are a bunch of margonites lying in wait throughout the garden itself. On either side of the ravine in the center are two more harbingers makred by X. Across the ravine, there is the harbinger of nightfall marked by a yellow X. Up the two staircases on either side are harbingers to be killed for the masters level, marked by blue Xs. Every two minutes a patrol of margonites will spawn at the harbinger of nightfall's location, randomly run around either the left or right of the ravine, and head west towards the beginning, attacking any players or spirits they find on the way, and eventually killing Hinon which ends the mission.

Each harbinger is immune to damage and can only be killed by a light of sebhorin. One light spawns at the start of the mission by Hinon, and he will spawn another one every two minutes. (Not that we want to wait for that) When you drop a light next to a harbinger, the harbinger dies, a spirit of sebhorin is summoned, and a new light of sebhorin appears. When you use that light, the spirit that created it will make a new light at it's location. If the spirit linked to a light dies (to a margonite patrol), then the light disappears as well. You need 3 lights to kill the harbinger, so going back to pick up extra lights from the spirits is necessary at that point.

Wiki lists several strategies that are worth reading over. What they all have in common is that they try to avoid killing at least one harbringer. While the patrol frequency is always two minutes, the size and composition of the patrol group increases for each harbinger you kill.


I would suggest the "tactical advance" strategy as being the easiest.At the start, kill the first patrol, run past the first two harbingers, kill the third one at the top of the stairs and work on from there up the left side. Kill the harbinger to the left of the ravine by pulling him and his margonites towards the center of the ravine (to watch for patrols). Then go around the left of the ravine and move through the center and clear out as many margonites as possible without aggroing the harbinger of nightfall. (Since the patrols come from the center we won't be missing them) Once that is done we can kill the harbinger to the right of the ravine from behind, or we can attempt the bonus first. Then send a runner (or two) back to kill the first two harbingers while the group waits across the ravine to catch patrols, then have those runner(s) ferry 3 lights up to our group, then use that to finish off the harbinger of nightfall.

As wyrm pointed out, once a patrol group is finished you have to immediately start working on one of the static groups, so you have the best chance at killing them before the patrol group shows up. No waiting to catch your breath like we often did. We need to use something other than rebirth for hard res (ressurect/renew life/death pact signet/signet of return) so we don't have that additional downtime of rebirth. And not too many hard rezes since each harbinger gives a morale boost, and we'll probably fail anyway if we are dying that often. This also means we can't engage the static margonites constantly, and need to anticipate when to wait for the next patrol to come around.

While our skill choices as LoL are tight, we need at least one runner to ferry light of sebhorin around, and also in bad situations to catch aggro from a stray patrol. When going for the bonus, you ideally want to first lure the margonites on a staircase down to the bottom and fight them there, then send a runner by themselves up the staircase to kill the harbinger with a light, while the group stays below to watch for patrols.

Better coordination is also vital for this mission. This means everyone including our KKoP friends on vent, and a single leader who calls the shots for when to engage, when to back up, when to wait. If we wanted to be real precise, a stopwatch could give us a feel for when the next patrol is due, otherwise we need to watch and communicate for that patrol.

I have been a member here for over two years now, and I have managed to rack up a grand total of 28 posts. Not really that many.

So I would like to take this chance to reintroduce my self.

I have been playing Civilization since 2001. That was the year that I bought Civilization III. At the time, I didn't really have the ability to fully comprehend what a classic I had. I on-and-off played it for a couple years, and I purchased the Play The World expansion pack. I just finished rereading Sulla's "Conquest Review: The Last Word" and "Ten Reasons Why Conquests Went Wrong" (the main subject matter of those two was conquests, but they also referred to PTW). Reading those, I now realize what a waste of money PTW was, and I barely ever played it.
I only really got into playing Civ III hardcore after I bought Conquests. I got to many different fan sites, the first of which was Sirian's Great Library.
I read every single report he ever posted there (and for a good while was under the impression that he was a she). I also read all of Sulla's epic reports, of which my favorite was Epic 21. Using all of these sites as learning tools, I got better and better at the game. I eventually beat four emperor level games.
And I guess that brings me to the release of Civ IV. In October of '05, I did buy Civ IV. My current opinion on it? It's decent. Not nearly as much of a classic as Civ III, but it is decent.

I am still playing Civ III, stimulating my interest with scenarios and mixing and matching terrain graphics. But I need something more. I need Civ IV.

So that is why I am here now. I need to put Civ III behind me for the most part, and move on. It has been six years. It had a good run.
I think what Sulla said at the end of his Picture Farewell best matches where I should be with Civ III:

"...I think it's time to put this very fun but deeply flawed game to rest for good."

I put a note up on the main page, but in case you guys don't check there so often , Sullla has volunteered to be a second Organizer for our tournament. He's sponsored the current Adventure, plus he's got a few other ideas up his sleeve. He's also the person to contact if you have a great idea for a scenario.

I also wanted to thank everyone who has contacted me recently with ideas or offers to keep the tournament going. We hope you stick around and enjoy the upcoming offerings.

That's right, folks, we're open for business. Now remember, meat is murder!