Test games played

[Arnuz]

What difficulty? Seems a decent enough combination - although gnolls is not for the long game they should give me some early conquests. Master?

[Nelphine]

I'd say expert. Depends on the death book. If you get ghouls quickly, you could do well. If you don't get ghouls.. I don't know how the new sorcery changes will work out. But I'd say it would be tough before the changes.

[Seravy]

Sorcery is still hard to play in the early game compared to, say, Life or Death, it's just more playable than before. I'd say expert as well. (and knowing my recent results I'd probably lose with it.)

[Arnuz]

Expert. I've gotten ghouls and focus magic on the book (I hadn't selected it). The game must know me by now :D
Explored around a little, I have 2 neighbours. I wait that the halfling N/D starts with the settling, then strike. I bring 2 full stacks of nagas and swordsmen, 2 of which with heroism, against 3 bears 3 sprites 2 swordsmen 1 spearmen - 1 bears and 2 swordsmen with wraithform. I lose it all but there's only a summoned centaur left! Luckily I had a wolf raider coming along and he arrives to conquer, stealing the glory of his fallen comrades. I find wraith form and summon zombie. Next turn I'll research ghouls, then it'll go more or less as usual I guess, there are some good lairs around me.
The sprites attacked my nagas once they were out of shots, while they wouldn't attack the swordsmen on the attack before. Is it normal? They could have just waited it out and the fortress would have saved them... I had skill enough for 2 aether sparks, and with a bit of bad luck it would have taken more than 2 attacks.

All the neutral cities come from the fallen Merlin:

[Arnuz]

It's july 03.

[Arnuz]

Expert. I've gotten ghouls and focus magic on the book (I hadn't selected it). The game must know me by now :D
Explored around a little, I have 2 neighbours. I wait that the halfling N/D starts with the settling, then strike. I bring 2 full stacks of nagas and swordsmen, 2 of which with heroism, against 3 bears 3 sprites 2 swordsmen 1 spearmen - 1 bears and 2 swordsmen with wraithform. I lose it all but there's only a summoned centaur left! Luckily I had a wolf raider coming along and he arrives to conquer, stealing the glory of his fallen comrades. I find wraith form and summon zombie. Next turn I'll research ghouls, then it'll go more or less as usual I guess, there are some good lairs around me.
The sprites attacked my nagas once they were out of shots, while they wouldn't attack the swordsmen on the attack before. Is it normal? They could have just waited it out and the fortress would have saved them... I had skill enough for 2 aether sparks, and with a bit of bad luck it would have taken more than 2 attacks.

All the neutral cities come from the fallen Merlin:

I've banished the second AI, and befriended the third. The game is basically over. The banished AI still makes 500 mana per turn with 4-5 cities and 2 nodes, I'd consider this the level of cheating of master - if not lunatic - rather than expert.

Edit: water elementals seem to be way too common in nodes now. Could be anecdotal, but I've found them in almost all the sorc nodes on the map.

[Nelphine]

Whats the retorts of the banished ai?

4-5 cities - assuming fairly developed cities, and high elf with population 12, that could be 30 per city. So 150. Plus 2 nodes, average 8 on arcanus, 0.5 per tile due to weak, that's another 8. 158. 60 population at 2.5 tax rate is 150 gold - another 75 mana.

So without cheating spells or retorts, they could be getting 230 mana per turn. With retorts and spells, you could easily double that. So cheating doesn't need to be terribly high to get 500 assuming there are any retorts or spells helping out.

[Seravy]

Previously completed random game for difficulty testing (Advanced) : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GsYOGgRY...e=youtu.be

[Arnuz]

I was going by memory and sorely mistaken Nelphine, the AI I banished has 23 cities lol, all with holy light, here's an older save that I found - it's before the fortress strike. I found the game quite challenging, the impression was as master, and without fortress strike I don't think I'd stand a chance. 1 test is probably not enough but keep in mind that I lucked out and found ghouls and focus magic!

In any case early aggression is made better the more the AI cheats... It's not just about getting the buildings in the conquered cities: it's always better to let the AI settle and then conquer its cities than to settle yourself, given the disparity in resources. The same goes with fortress strikes. I'm beginning to doubt that this can be even solved... Maybe it's not a bug but a feature? Facing overwhelming odds and surpassing them anyways surely gives satisfaction.

On the other hand, reducing the cheating might make more strategies available. Then we could nerf further the early aggression ones, perhaps then there could be an equal value in development strategies.

[Seravy]

I think that's a different save file, as you are yellow in that one but blue on the screenshot.