Lok'tar ogar!!
This is a thread containing spoilers, so.......
This is a thread containing spoilers, so.......
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It's a Barb World Outside, Let's Keep It That Way: Jonas Endain of the Clan of Embers
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Ok, let's get this game rolling.
First, a brief introduction of myself. It's not related to the game in any way (sorry, but I'm not an orc in real life), but, well, what the hell. My name is Mozarth, I'm 21 years old, and I live in Brazil, in the southernmost state of Brazil actually (so, no samba, rainforest, paradisiac beaches and suntanned women for me... but we do have some things going for us, like chimarrão - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mate_(beverage) - seriously, impossible not to love this thing). I recently started working in a law firm, since I gratuated from law school (law school isn't a postgraduate like in USA, it's a normal college degree). As for my civ life, I've started playing the series in Civ III, but I only got hooked up with Civ IV. I played quite a bit vanilla and BTS, being able to beat deity (albeit BTS only) sometimes, but I never played any sort of competitive multiplayer, just cooperative games (btw, here's a link to an ongoing FfH SG that I've been playing in civfanatics, for those that may be interested - - we are playing with the high to low challenge thingy). I started playing FfH when I got tired of the BTS gameplay. FfH and Rhyes and Fall are my favorite mods, so I played them quite a bit. Hope it's enough to secure a win in this game :neenernee. Well, what gave me the idea to play a PBEM game was discovering the first FfH PBEM, specially pocketbeetle's thread. I had a lot of fun reading it, so I'm hoping for lots of fun playing a game like that too. So, enough about me. Next post, I'll coment on the leader picks from this game.
About the game:
When I discovered that another FfH PBEM was starting, I got very excited. I was hoping to play a game with normal settings, but only managed to get a spot in this one :neenernee. Well, what can you do... So, let's take a look at the settings: 1. Ancient start 2. Barb world 3. No settlers (But starting with two settlers) 4. Raging barbs 5. Wildlands 6. Unrestricted leaders snakepick 7. Living World 8. Acheron Pre-placed. 9. Human takeover of Mercurians + Infernals 10. Emperor difficulty 11. Kuriotates banned 12. Adaptive leaders have to choose the trait they're going to switch into with the first switch and never change it 13. Unrestricted leaders 14. Quick speed 15. No tech trading 16. No vassals Hmmm... quite a lot of stuff... FfH is not a mod that I would call properly balanced, but with this settings... OMG! Holy imbalances! Thinking about possible leader and civ choices, only one thing could get in my mind, when I saw unrestricted leaders: CHARISMATIC SIDAR, CHARISMATIC SIDAR, CHARISMATIC SIDAR... After some hazy dreams about hordes of buffed specialists filling my cities, reality kind of struck me. Even though it seems like magical stuff, this plan was kind of suicidal, like a lot of other apparently good combinations. The thing is, there's quite a lot of things to take into consideration when deciding the picks for this game. Let's take a look at them: 1. No settlers - well, this is a complete gamechanger. What does it mean? Without being able to expand, the production and research capabilities of the players will be severely harmed. We won't be able to field that many units and few cities might encourage early wars, since we will take a million years to tech to advanced units and war is one of the two possible ways to expand (the other being conquering barb cities). So, civilizations with good early units ore with some way to jump over the production gap get a bonus. Civs with slow starts and with nothing special going for them in the beggining (*cough* Sidar) would be the target of early rushers and probably get out of the game before they can make anything significant. So, which civs get points: Illians (priest of winter rush - 3 early units that can dominate the battlefield while not being that expensive to build), Grigori (free early game heroes that don't need to be build), Sheaim (pyre zombies -best bronze tier unit) and a little behind Clan of Embers (warrens pay 1, get 2). 2. Raging Barbs + emperor difficuly I haven't conducted any tests, but I'm imagining that the world will be swarming with barbs with this settings... Maybe barb world can help slowing the barbs down a bit. So, early defense it's very important. Early game risky strategies aren't going to work with the horde coming to get you. Points: the barbarian leaders + civs with good early defense. 3. Victory Conditions So, in my opinion, this game won't last that much. At least not with every player. And it will be very war oriented, without the ability to expand peacefully. Since FfH victory conditions, apart from domination and conquest require a lot of time and focus, players that trust them will probably get destroyed by the players that got a lot of land conquering other civs and barbs. Even with a tech lead and good defenses, they won't be able to stand the pressure of higher production capabilities. Points: conquest oriented civs. So... What do I choose? After a lot of thought, I finally decided. I was going to play with the Illians, using a spiritual leader. Why? Well, the illians are a very strong civ. They have the best world spell and an ability to overcome the production and teching difficulties of this game with the priest of winter rush. Early stasis + raging barbs at emperor means death for anyone stupid enough to try settling their second city early and for the ones who doesn't spam warriors at the beggining. I think we will be seing at least one player die to this strategy on this game. But the illians can't get religions. Well, think again. There are two civs that can't get religious things, the grigori and the illians. What sets them apart? While the grigori are a civ with the agnostic trait (which means that they won't be able to get religions with any leader) with a non-agnostic leader (which means that cassiel can get religions playing with other civs), the illians are a non-agnostic civ with an agnostic leaders, which means....    We can play the illians and still get religion, as long as Auric is not the leader... So, that settles it. i'm going to pick the illians, with a spiritual leader to make buffed priests of winter and conquer the world, and win the game, and be happy forever... *Takes a look at the planning thread* -Ravus Sol has picked the Illians. DAMN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Since we decided on doing a snakepick to choose our leaders, my plan died before it started. But let's not get disappointed. There are other ways to win the game... So, let's take a look at our opponents choices: OPPONENTS CHOICES: I'll give you the thoughts I had during the fases of the snakepick and offer a little conclusion after. I'd also comment on the players. Since I only recently became a RB member, I don't know this guys and their skills, apart from selrahc (from PBEM I), so, I'm judging them based on their choices. Here's the snakepick order: 1. Ravus Sol 2. Dantski 3. Sciz 4. Selrahc 5. Ichabod Picking last, I could go for some good combinations, since i'll be picking leader and civ one after the other. On the other hand, the guys who pick first might spoil my plans. 1st pick - Ravus Sol picks the illians Well, Ravus Sol seems to be a good player (since he thinks like me  ). Jokes aside, it was a very solid first pick, for the reasons stated above. Gotta take care with this guy.Rating: +++ 2nd pick - Dantski picks Cassiel I don't like this pick. Albeit Cassiel is a good leader and he'll be able to choose his second trait to combine with philosophical (he chose financial), picking leaders first is not a good idea. The civs are going to make much more difference than the leaders (all the other players picked civs first). Dantski lost his chance of picking a good civ, so it makes me a bit uncertain about his skills. I hope he doesn't badly surprise me later in the game :neenernee Rating: - 3rd pick - Sciz picks the Grigori It's a nice choice, but not overpowered like the illians. The free adventurers, free customizable heroes, are going to help, but maybe won't give him any kind of edge. Basing your army in just a few units is not a safe way to conduct war (priests of winter have summons at least), so Sciz will probably be afraid of losing them. Another thing is that you need to tech to get good units to upgrade your adventurers too. A warrior can't go far, even heavily promoted. So, his early game isn't going to be secured only with adventurers, specially with the Illian threat. The grigori worldspell is nice and can net you a nice victory combined with theocracy unlimited priests, going for the Altar of Luonnatar. But it would require a lot (and I mean, A LOT) of teching in a game that, like I said, will probably end up early. Not being able to get religion benefits is a big hinder for them, even though selrahc seems to be doing fine in FfH PBEM1. Rating: + 4th pick - selrahc picks the sheaim Nice choice. Pyre zombies are really, really good units. They stay useful for a long time and will be devastating in this game, based on the settings. Selrahc will probably rush for them and then go to the arcane line to add summons to the mix. He won't be able to get a lot of mana nodes due to the settings, though, so no >9000 specters will haunt us, I guess. Is he going to go AV? Don't know... It's a nice religion, with an early hero (to compensate for his lack of a hero... nobody gets to dragons), a relatively early collateral spell, a nice wonder... It's very nice to raise the AC, but selrahc won't play this game trusting on the AC (but I hope he does, since the AC summons are barbarians), I guess. Summoning the infernals is counterproductive, since they'll be competing for land and will likely steal one of your cities... Rating: ++ 5th and 6th pick - Ichabod picks Jonas Endain of the Clan of Embers Will talk abot my choices in the next post. 7th pick - selrahc picks Kandros Fir Kandros Fir is Agressive/Financial/Ingenuity. Very, very nice pick: agressive for buffed pyre zombies, financial to get them quickly and ingenuity to mass upgrade them. Perfect setting for a pyre zombie rush. Although financial isn't going to help him as much as normally (less land = less cottages to spam), it's a solid pick nonetheless. Charismatic might be better than agressive in FfH, but there aren't many charismatic leaders. Rating: +++ 8th pick - Sciz picks Dain the Caswallan Dain is philosophical/arcane. I can understand why he would go for philosophical -> getting more and faster adventures early. But arcane is a strange second trait. It's unlikely that we'll get past mages in this game (if we manage to get mages, that is). And the grigori doesn't have anything special going for their mages... Well, this probably indicates that Sciz is going through the arcane line. If he doesn't detour first to get some defensive abilities, he won't last long in this game. Rating: + 9th pick - Dantski picks the svartalfar I really can't understand this pick. The starvaltar doesn't have any of the qualities that I listed as the ones you need for this game: 1. They don't have ways to overcome the productivity deficit from fewer cities. 2. They don't have good early war units. Their recon line is buffed, but recon line units are very bad as city attackers. He'll have a hard time taking cities with hunters, so he'll have to get BW early. 3. The elves start with 2 scouts. If the illians use their worldspell in the first turn of the game (or in the first 5 turns), there's a good chance that the elves are going to be killed by the barbs. Dantski must spam warriors early and wait for some time until settling his second city, since he won't be able to defend it if he doesn't do so. 4. He'll probably go for FoL early, maybe even beelining it. He'll be very vulnerable to a rush this way. Overall, a very, very bad pick. Rating: --- 10th pick - Ravus Sol picks Varn Gosam Varn Gosam is spiritual creative -> change to spiritual/financial. Spiritual for buffed priests of winter and faster temples of the hand. Creative will help he get the border pops when they are needed the most. Financial afterwards to help the economy (even though it won't help the rush, since it will come late). Even better -> no agnostic trait means religious Illians. Rating: +++ Picks + Scores Ravus Sol: Varn Gosam (spi/fin) of the Illians. Rating: ++++++ Dantski: Cassiel (phi/fin) of the Svartaltar. Rating: ---- Sciz: Dain the Caswallan (phi/arc) of the Grigori. Rating: ++ selrahc: Kandros Fir (agr/fin/ing) of the Sheaim. Rating: +++++ So, I have to keep a close watch at selrahc and Ravus Sol. I'm guessing that they'll be my hardest opponents in this game. Next post I'll explain why I picked what I picked. P.S.: As a non-english speaker and a bad datilographer, please forgive my mistakes. If you want to correct me, please go ahead. That way, I'll learn and hopefully won't do it again.
Picks Explanation:
So, I've picked Jonas Endain of the Clan of Embers. What's the reasoning behind it? Let's see... In the previous post, I've explained what I think will be necessary to have a chance in this game. 1st, a way to counter the no settlers option; 2nd, a way to counter the raging barbs option; 3rd, a way to win the game. So, how do the Clan of Embers get by this problem? Well, first thing to remember is that I'm not playing alone. That means that I have to make my choices taking in consideration the choices made by my opponents. When my time to pick came, there were already 3 civs chosen: Illians, Sheaim and Grigori. The Illians and the Sheaim are the biggest problem. They will rush other civs, with priests of winter and pyre zombies, no doubt about it. So, we need a civ with ways to counter their rushes. Countering Early Rushes: We can counter rushes with diplomacy and strenght. Strenght can be divided in offensive and defensive strenght. There's not very good choices avaiable to counter their rushes with offensive strenght, since they chose maybe the best early attackers in the game. So, that leaves defensive strenght civs, like the Elohim and the Ljosalfar (world spells). The problem is: how are you going to win the game with this guys? Culture, Altar, Tower? All this options take a very long time, specially with reduced number of cities. So, I won't be killed in the early game playing them, but I also won't win the game. The diplomacy solution is based around having an upper hand in a situation that you can use to conter the upper hand that this guys have when its their time to rush. The problem is, this upper hand has to come BEFORE their upper hand, since if it comes after, well... you won't have a chance to bargain at all. Why does the Clan has to do with it?? 1st, world spell -> I can probably counter or at least take out of the game a civ with my world spell, if I'm a little bit lucky. What it does is that it converts some barb units spread across the map to my civ, giving me an instant army (albeit spread across the map, that's where the luck comes into play). If I get just one strenght 4/6 archer goblin, there'll be a civ with no land improvements for a very long time. I'm hoping that this threat can give me a diplomatic upper hand against some of the players in this game. I'll talk more about the world spell strategies later. 2nd, Early hero -> I think I can get my hero in the field before the illians can field their priests, which will give another reason for them not to attack me. The sheaim will take it into consideration too. It won't save me all by itself, but it can help making them choose another player to attack. 3rd, Wolf riders -> If I'm lucky enough, maybe I can get a couple of wolf riders to help my early defense against opponents. If one of my goblin scout is victorius against a wolf, it becomes a goblin wolf rider (strenght 4, move 3, replaces horseman). I'm hoping that all this together + the fact that weaker civs like the grigori and the svartalfar are in the game will make my worst opponents knock in another guy door. Countering the No Settler Option: Two ways to do it: 1st conquering players; 2nd conquering barb cities. 1st. That's why we saw players going for early rush civs. The Clan has two advantages going for them in this departament, one early and one mid-game: Early-Game: World Spell. Will talk about it later. Mid-Game: Warrens. This building, avaiable at masonry, has a very nice special effect: every time I produce a unit in the city with it, I'll get two units instead (albeit the second one won't get initial xp) -> In a game where production is going to be the biggest bottleneck, this building is a blessing. Combine it with civic and religion cheese to get crazy good options (will talk about it in the religion section  )2nd. Conquering barb cities. Playing with a barbarian leader, i'm in peace with the barbs, meaning that I can't capture their cities by force without losing this advantage. That is, unless I'm playing the Clan. The Clan of Embers hero, Rantine, has a special ability that lets him convert barb cities to our civ, when he is standing inside them. Rantine is avaiable at Bronze Working. Seeing that it's very unlikely that someone will conquer barb cities before BW and axeman/swordsman (need to build training yard), I won't have that much of a disadvantage. But I have some advatanges: with my world spell, I'll probably get to know a lot of the map early. This way, I'll know where the barb cities are, so I can get there fast + know the good ones. Every barb city that I conquer, I don't have to worry about defendind against the barbs, only against other players, so I could run some thin garrissons for a while. And, when I use Rantine's special ability, I also get the option to disband the city. So, I can go across the map disbanding the barb cities near my opponents, that won't have cities to capture anymore. This is very risky, since I'll be taking Rantine very far away of my land (less defense) and he's still vulnerable to animals (since they are hidden nationality units), even though a highly promoted hero is tough to get killed. So, I'll probably make a scouting party to go barb city hunting together with Rantine. If Rantine dies, i'll have to declare war on the barbs to get more cities. That's not a big problem, since the early game is the best moment to be at peace with the barbs. Later in the game, they are not half as scary. Countering Raging Barbs + Emperor: Well, as a barbarian leader, I'm at peace with the barbs  It doesn't get any better than that. Since hidden nationality units (that will still attack me) won't enter the cities' borders, I don't have to fear getting pillaged by barbs or running thin garrissons in my cities. I will be safe for the duration of the Illian world spell. That's VERY IMPORTANT. If he uses it early, the raging barbs will be very tough to handle. I don't think that the other players realised this danger. Maybe the barb world option makes the barbs more peaceful, hadn't had time to test, but I wouldn't count on it. Winning the Game: Well, that's what I'm playing for. We need to have a shot at winning the game. I considered playing the Ljosalfar and gunning for a defensive/peaceful culture victory, but, like I said before, this game will be heavily war oriented and I'd end up being defeated by the guys who go with military strategies. So, I'll try to win a conquest victory, relying on my early game map exploration + barb city conquering abilities + unit spamming due to warrens. Taking all these factors into account, I decided to pick the Clan of Embers. If the Illians decide to go for me with the priests, i'm not sure if I'll be able to handle them, but I'll have a chance. Most of the other civ options wouldn't have the slighest... Why Jonas Endain? Since I chose to play as the barbs, I was obliged to choose a barbarian leader. There are 3 options: Jonas Endain (spiritual/expansive), Sheelba (agressive/organized) and Charadon (agressive). Well, the only two feasible choices were Sheelba and Jonas. Jonas' expansive trait is hindered by the fact that I can't build settlers. But I'm a big fan of the spiritual tech in BTS Civ and in FfH it gets even better. I'll be constantly switching civics (maybe even religions) based on what I'm doing in the game. Combine this with the imbaness of some of the FfH civics for maximum effect! Now that I justified my choices, I'll give a brief explanation on the Civ I chose and the strategies I'm planning to use in this game.
The Clan of Embers, a little introduction:
So, let's talk about my choice of Civilization. The Clan of Embers are the orc civilization of FfH. Orcs, Lizardmen and Goblins wotking together to rule the world. Sounds nice. Green skinned beasts for the win (at least I hope so). Since our units are orcs and lizardmen, they start with special racial promotions: Orcs and Goblins: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0002.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0002.jpg) Lizardmen: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0032.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0032.jpg) Since our workers are orcs, they take a little longer to improve things. At least the barbs won't pillage their work... Clan of Embers Palace: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0033.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0033.jpg) -40% war weariness is nice. We can enter war and stay on it! -Nature, Fire and Body Mana -> It's a nice mana combination. We don't get any kind of passive bonus, but we could get some nice spells (haste, regeneration, vitalize, fire ball -> I can post pictures if you guys want to see the effects). Unfortunately, I'll probably won't be heading down the arcane line, so it'll go to waste. Units: What's special about the Clan of Embers units? 1. The recon line units are lizardmen (except for the scout, which is a goblin). But, except for the special lizardman promotion, they aren't different from the regular recon line, as far as I know. 2. The mounted line stops at horseman (the first mounted unit avaiable), or better said, the wolf rider, it's replacement. What's special about it is that if one of my goblin scouts defeats a wolf in combat, he becomes one of this wolf riders: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0034.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0034.jpg) Yup, we have a nerfed mounted line. Fortunately, with a nerf, comes a buff at another place. So... 3. We have a stronger melee line. Unfortunately, the benefits only start in the iron stage of the melee line (warrior (start) -> axeman (bronze) -> champion (iron), it's the normal progression), which is a bit longer down the tech tree. It can help us, but it'll take a long time to do so... Here's the Ogre, our champion replacement: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0005.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0005.jpg) Notice the 8 strenght compared to the champion's 6. And they can use weapons too! Hero Our hero is called Rantine. I already talked about his ability to convert barb cities to the clan's cause, but I didn't talk about the hero itself. Rantine is avaiable at Bronze Working, kind of an early tech (very early compared to the techs that usually unlock heroes). He's a 4 strenght unit, with an innate 25% against melee bonus and the hero promotion. The hero promotion gives 1 XP every turn, for a maximum of 100XP. That's 9 promotions without having to enter a combat. Another thing about the hero promotion is that it gives acess to the heroic strenght I and II and the heroic defense I and II promotions, which gives 1 attack or defense point each. So, we are talking about a potentially 6 strenght unit, with ability to use weapons, probably having the combat 5 promotion. It's nice, especially coming early, but not gamebreaking at all. Here's our tough guy: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0000.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0000.jpg) Special Building: Warrens It's our main advantage in this game. Like I said before, the warrens are a building avaiable at masonry (another kind of early tech), that makes the city produce another unit every time it produces one. Like, if I build an axeman, when the unit completes, I'll get 2 axeman. Pretty nice, huh? Of course, it has some limitations. First, it doesn't work with siege weapons, heroes, national or naval units. And the second unit doesn't receive any xp bonus from civics, buildings, etc. But it's still a very nice building, potentially halving a lot of units cost. Here's the necessary pic: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0006.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0006.jpg) Next post, i'll talk about the world spell!
World Spell: For the Horde
For the horde, the Clan of embers world spell, gives a 50% chance of converting a barb unit in the map, making it your own. It checks all barb units currently on the game when I use it, and I have a 50% chance of each one of the units converting. So, when I use it, I get some units (a lot, using settings like the ones in this game), all spreaded across the map (because I get them in the place they used to stand before converted). Normally, the units will be barb warriors (3 strenght), goblin scouts (2 strenght + 1 poison strenght) and goblin archers (3/5 strenght + 1 poison sometimes). With the settings we're going to play, there's also the barb archers that protect cities (2/4 strenght, unfortunately). I don't know if there's another units that I can get. I don't recall converting lizardman, skeletons and such... And I think they fixed the conversion of the Acheron special units... Can I get some help from the lurkers about this??  Positive Sides: Scouting: When I use it, i'll reveal a lot of the map and probably will meet all my opponents. Powerful units to harass: A 4/6 goblin archer in early agem is a potential civ killer. Of course, I won't be able to conquer someone's capital with it, but I can pillage him to death, while his strenght 3 warriors won't be able to kill me. Of course, I have to use this wisely... Maybe try to make a deal with the Illians: "I'll keep the guy underdeveloped for you to kill and in exchange you don't kill me..." Negative Sides: Unprotected barb cities: If I end up converting all units that were garissoning a barb city, I'll leave it open for one of my enemies to conquer (I can't gift the units back to the barbs, unfortunately). Maintenance Costs: They'll go sky high when I use it, thanks to unit cost and unit supply. So, my already bad teching will defenitely sink.... Unless.... Unless there's an Illian player in the game. Why? Because of stasis. During the turns of stasis, there's no production and commerce for me, but there's also no maintenance. So, I have at least 10 turns (don't know how many on quick speed) of scouting and potential conquest or harass with a lot of units. I've been looking in the other FFH PBEMs and the players seem to be very, very loose about their defense in the early game. They go worker first, explore with both initial units, explore lairs near their undefended capitals... i'm surprised there's no early eliminations going on... But, everything has its time and place Especially with raging barbs, stasis ans my world spell. Hell, if the Illians use stasis at turn one, the elves are going to have only two scouts defending their capital. If I find them early with one of my converted units, there's a really nice chance for me to eliminate them... Or so I hope :neenernee
A Little Bit of Thought into Religion:
So, it's still pretty early to be making definite teching plans, specially about something with so many options like the religon choices. But, well, brainstorming is fun and at least I give something to the lurkers while they wait for the game. I'm thinking about going for Runes of Kilmorph as my state religion. Why? Let's give some reasons. 1st. Timing and Research Costs RoK is the first religion avaiable in FfH, or the one who needs the least beakers to reach. Since research is not the strong point of the Clan of mebers, that's quite an advantage. Of course, getting Chalid, for example, would be great, but I won't reach him, realistically speaking. We are fighting against the Sheaim, the Illians, the Grigori and the Svartalfar. The Scarts will go for FoL, i'm almost sure about it. The grigori can't get religion. The sheaim and the illians could benefit from RoK, even though the Sheaim may want to raise the AC counter and go for AV and the Illians will try to reach the Priests of Winter first. So, I don't think i'll have a lot of competition going. But I don't really care if i'm not the one who founds it. The main benefit I can get from the religion doesn't require me to be the first. And, like I've said many times before, this game won't last that long, if my prediction are right. So, advantages early >>>> advantages that I won't be able to use. 2nd. Soldiers of Kilmorph These cute little dwarves are the main reason for me to want RoK. They are strenght 4 units, able to use weapons and cost 90 hammers. Yes, It's a lot for a strenght 4 unit. Axemen are way cheaper. But they have a special ability called "hurry production". When you use it in a city, the Soldier dies and you add 45 hammers to the current building being constructed, just like a Great Engineer would do. Let's take a look at these guys: ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0036.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0036.jpg) With any other civilization, you only get half your hammers back doing this. But, if I build one of these in a city with warrens, I can potentially build, for example, a wonder with the production of two cities. I'll get 2 SoKs and will be able to rush 90 hammers. That for itself is already very good. But, if you add the military state civic + nationhood + the conquest civic (don't forget I'm spiritual), I'll be building SoKs with a 25% bonus using the overflow food as production (same way as settlers). Yup, it has the potential to be a very, very good ability. I can get a lot of wonders if I manage to get all the tech required for warrens, SoKs and the civics. 3rd. Mines of Gal-Dur The Mines of Gal-Dur are a special wonder enabled by the Arete tech (the second tech in the RoK religion line). What it does is give 3 iron resources to the player who builds it. ![[Image: Civ4ScreenShot0035.jpg]](http://i1044.photobucket.com/albums/b450/MozarthSpier/FFH%20PBEM%20IV/Civ4ScreenShot0035.jpg) The iron resource adds +2 strenght to the military units that can use weapons (normally the melee line). You need the smelting tech to see iron in the map and Iron working to use it as weapons. Both are pretty expensive techs (no player in FFH II PBEM I reached them, for instance), not something easy to achieve for a civ like mine. But Arete, the tech that enables the mines is way cheaper than the cost for those two techs. And if I build the mines, I get the same effect. So, not only it'll make my units stronger, the other 2 irons can be used as diplomatic trade fodder. Not that I'm keen on giving my enemies free military power, but you never now what can happen in this game. It's good to have options! |
