Misty Shades of Grey [SPOILERS]

[Aurorarcher]

A spoiler thread, finally.

My picks were:

1. Tebryn of Sheaim
2. Shekinah of Sidar
3. Dain of Amurites
4. Arendal of Ljos 
5. Tasunke of Hippus  

Cairo got my top pick (but he is Averax) but that's fine. Playing with Sidar sounds like a cool trip too. I'm still debating a little whether I'd like to play magic game like before or go with recon game. Sidar is OK with magic route, y'know ARC etc. But I think I really want to focus on Recon line and play with their ability to cast Severed Soul spell with all my Recon units (once I get KotE), giving me a flying 2 move unit that can teleport my unit to the tile where the summon is standing. This gives me ability to move very quickly basically giving me two free moves anywhere. Besides it looks like at least two of my opponents are going for mages so my Assassins will be handy for that matter. Of course I will also play with adepts but no mages this time as high priority. If I want a religion FoL is high on the list.

Adepts can be used as shades if they ever get 17 xp (level 5, this used to be level 6) if nothing else. With ARC that's a lot faster, also never really played with CRE in MP (I think?) so time to test that as well. At least early city spot deciding will be a lot easier. So Sidar's specialty is that I can turn any level 5 unit to shade being able to settle them as Great Persons with some extra gold/beaker/hammer/culture depending on the GP I choose. Similarly with city specialists. That is a decent boost too. This is going to be the cornerstone of my economy, hopefully those barbs come in plenty early to get one shade ASAP. Usually later you don't want to turn your best units into Shades but earlier that doesn't feel so bad.

World spell, Into the Mist, can be useful. Turns all my units invisible for as long as I don't attack or cast a spell. Can be very powerful, especially if used before mages hit the stage. Or even then it's not still useless, but mages can hit my invisible units with spells like Maelstorm. Not even going to describe all the possible ways to abuse this spell but there are plenty. Always good to have a spell under my sleeve that can be scary to my opponents. Against Bob this won't be that useful... I think floating eyes (meta I, he starts with that mana) will reveal invisible units (I know it does show all other's so most likely shows invisibility from WS too?). If a lurker has better knowledge, please let me know. Otherwise, need to test that myself, I guess.

So the start (as you all know):



And when I got this I noticed one of the reasons why Sidar sucks. They start with Pacifism! -20% unit production, no thanks. So I had to revolt away right now. So why not just scout for first turn then?



I revealed some tiles, but not much. Then I settled on T2 back to where I started. All others went with SIP (obvious).

Just played T22, this is from T18 showing the land I know before Spider ate my Scout.



I met Cairo close to that Sugar but he hasn't found (?) my borders yet. I think his scout died like mine so maybe that's why.

Tech path: Agri -> Calendar -> Crafting -> Mining for start.

2nd city goes to that PH 1S of Ivory. Way to use CRE! I don't think anyone else will settle there. Commerce early is a very high priority, even higher that better food tiles (for example 2 x Sheep). The 2nd city will be settled T39 or T40 so not the earliest 2nd city. I could speed that with Exploration but I'll skip the tech for a bit. I get TRs with rivers anyway, and the first TRs with cap are the most important giving +2c immediately while the 3rd city only gives +1c. And I have Rice, Cotton and Reagents. Two riverside 4c. This city is going to be very strong in hammers with 9 hills. If I didn't have CRE I'd probably settle where I have "not x?". Can't ignore those commerce tiles even if they're not the best ones.

[shallow_thought]

Against Bob this won't be that useful... I think floating eyes (meta I, he starts with that mana) will reveal invisible units (I know it does show all other's so most likely shows invisibility from WS too?). If a lurker has better knowledge, please let me know.

My knowledge is limited to base FFH and is patchy in any case, but I recently found that I could see Sidar Misted units with both Floating Eyes and boring ordinary Hawks.

[Aurorarcher]

Thanks for the info, shallow! I don't think they've been changed in EitB so I will trust your knowledge Hawk's civilopedia reads as follows: "... reveal any hidden Shadows in the area". I am unlikely to see Hawks from many as the tech (Animal Handling 627 beakers in this game) is fairly useless otherwise unless you want any techs behind it. Especially before T100 which is around the time when first wars start.

[Mardoc]

But I think I really want to focus on Recon line and play with their ability to cast Severed Soul spell with all my Recon units (once I get KotE), giving me a flying 2 move unit that can teleport my unit to the tile where the summon is standing. This gives me ability to move very quickly basically giving me two free moves anywhere.

It's fun! You can pop across mountains and narrow seas, or use the severed soul as a free scout, or simply have a four move unit with 2 of those moves ignoring terrain.

World spell, Into the Mist, can be useful. Turns all my units invisible for as long as I don't attack or cast a spell. Can be very powerful, especially if used before mages hit the stage. Or even then it's not still useless, but mages can hit my invisible units with spells like Maelstorm. Not even going to describe all the possible ways to abuse this spell but there are plenty. Always good to have a spell under my sleeve that can be scary to my opponents. Against Bob this won't be that useful... I think floating eyes (meta I, he starts with that mana) will reveal invisible units (I know it does show all other's so most likely shows invisibility from WS too?). If a lurker has better knowledge, please let me know. Otherwise, need to test that myself, I guess.

I'm sure that Floating Eye reveals them. I think but am not sure that Hawks do too. And then several Empyrean units.

[Aurorarcher]

Yeah, fun and something new for me so there are exciting times to come! You played them in at least one EitB game before where we all started with adepts, I was playing Amurites and jalepeno won with Lanun. Did you play around with severed soul in that game much? From that game I do remember how invisibility is not meaning much against Cultists in the sea... Good thing those guys are banned in this game.

EDIT: I had forgotten Empyrean. Rathas and Radiant Guards can see magically hidden units at least.

[Aurorarcher]

World spell, Into the Mist, can be useful. Turns all my units invisible for as long as I don't attack or cast a spell. Can be very powerful, especially if used before mages hit the stage. Or even then it's not still useless, but mages can hit my invisible units with spells like Maelstorm. Not even going to describe all the possible ways to abuse this spell but there are plenty. Always good to have a spell under my sleeve that can be scary to my opponents. Against Bob this won't be that useful... I think floating eyes (meta I, he starts with that mana) will reveal invisible units (I know it does show all other's so most likely shows invisibility from WS too?). If a lurker has better knowledge, please let me know. Otherwise, need to test that myself, I guess.

I'm sure that Floating Eye reveals them.  I think but am not sure that Hawks do too.  And then several Empyrean units.

Made a quick WB test, turns out Floating Eye reveals them (we all agreed on that). Hawks on the other hand don't.

[Mardoc]

Yeah, fun and something new for me so there are exciting times to come! You played them in at least one EitB game before where we all started with adepts, I was playing Amurites and jalepeno won with Lanun. Did you play around with severed soul in that game much? From that game I do remember how invisibility is not meaning much against Cultists in the sea... Good thing those guys are banned in this game.

I don't think I really played that game well enough to enjoy Severed Soul. Where I did use it was in the No settlers - raging barbs game. That one was fun as the Sidar! Even though I think Bob managed to win in the end - I made several tactical errors around elf forest-walking that cost me a lot of military.

[Aurorarcher]

Ah, I forgot that game! I read about that game a long time ago (before I even registered!). At the time the pics were still there so it was easy to follow the game. Definitely going to go back and check if I can learn any tricks from your thread... I think I do remember that Sidar was consider OP in that game and people wanted to push waning back to level-6 units. I guess that was more due to setup (No settlers + raging barbs) than Sidar though.

Now that I think of it if I really play just for recon line, then I guess Sandalphon (PHI/IND) could've been a better pick. Oh, well, no time to regret that now, gotta play with the leader I chose! At least none has ever (?) played with Shekinah before in MP.

[Aurorarcher]

So what's going on?

Nothing much, waiting for my Settler to pop out. Hopefully that polar bear moves away once my settler gets there. It shows in the cap 4 turns left. But that'll be 3 turns once I get the 3rd farm done next turn and can use it. That'll be T37 when I will put 3 warriors and settler on the tile.



What have other players been doing? You can see the different scores.

Mack got a 3rd tech one turn before others on T29 (2 turns on me, but I had to waste the 1st turn so yeah). He might've just gotten an event to get Crafting earlier. I don't see him picking other techs. He is also sitting at size 4 cap. Not sure why, yeah, I know you will only work 3 foodhammers for your 5th pop which will eat 2 foodhammers so the 5th pop only gives you one hammer for like 7 turns until you can farm more.

Dave has played pretty similar to me. Grow to 5, and got Crafting 1t before me. I'd expect to see him settle his 2nd city around the same time as me.

Cairo has been sitting at size 4 cap, been a bit behind in tech due to BAR, has had high MFG which makes sense with EXP. He had 9 MFG at once. Obviously will settle his 2nd city first, but hasn't done so yet. He has 3 techs but he didn't pick Crafting. Instead he went Exploration to road his way to 2nd city.

Bob has played a bit of odd start, he has grown to size 5 but still hasn't finished his 3rd tech. So he must be trying to pick a more expensive tech. The one I can think of is AH or Mysticism... others don't make sense at all.

Demos.



28 GNP... Hmm, that's got to be mack but how? He has built his unique building, a reliquary (monu replacement but only 30h, and he is CRE too). Not sure when but he is getting some early GP points towards popping a Prophet. He'll likely get the 1st religion if he really wants.

[Aurorarcher]

Warrior survived polar bear, earned 2 xp.



Settled my 2nd city as planned. Mack settled his on T36. And he grabbed 8 land tiles with it (while cairo only got 4 land tiles with his 2nd), he might've settled the same spot that I did! Way to go CRE guys :.

I figured out the map.

"THIS SPOT" = "IS THIS SPOT". Capitals are 16 tiles away from each other.