|
In EA and MA I've personally found the bandar archers to be easily massed and useful for early expansion. They're cheap enough that losses are easily replaced unless you have poo poo scales, you can flood the battlefield with arrows that tear through lightly armoured indies, most enemy nations you might accidentally bump usually don't have heavy armor unless they're EA Abysia or MA Ulm, and if something survives the arrows they pack a decent punch with their maces in melee. Also I was virtuous Abysia in this one.  Generally people seem to agree that EA Abysia isn't too great, and it certainly isn't when I'm behind the wheel.
|
#
¿
Nov 27, 2020 08:59
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 9, 2024 14:21 |
|
|
FilthIncarnate posted:So unlike a lot of other people in the community, who get involved in multiple games at once (sometimes, like, up to twenty, which is insane to think about, to me), I have a strict "One-Game Policy", i.e. I only ever play one game at a time. The more games you're in, the more games you can theoretically win, though. So far it's potentially possibly working out for me. I mean, I've won three whole times. Plus it helps make people aware of my personal "brand" as a very cool and awesome gamer that they should ally with and bribe in every game they possibly can. It even works, sometimes. FilthIncarnate posted:Anyway I've never done another SSLP and I probably never will; I don't really like gloating postmortems etc (it seems in poor taste to mock your friends, especially after beating them), but I figured that this one would be at the very least mechanically interesting, so this project is sort of here to give a more comprehensive record of my thinking than I usually display. I also wouldn't worry about it coming off as gloating or mocking, in my opinion, it's a game and I feel like the community as a whole is good at treating it as such. I don't get the feeling that any wins or losses tend to engender hard feelings of any kind, and we're usually capable of taking a decent ribbing. Personally I take every loss as a chance to learn what my opponent did that was smarter than what I did.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 28, 2020 00:34
|
|
|
Personally I've had terrible luck with the Great Archon when I've brought him out, not sure if it's just been that, luck, but it feels like he's underperformed as an expander every time. Maybe I just needed a better bless.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 28, 2020 01:02
|
|
|
Does the hard skin even still do anything once you've got that much prot from the Earth magic? I remember it has some diminishing returns going on.
|
|
#
¿
Nov 30, 2020 21:27
|
|
|
Speleothing posted:Imprisoned is 36 turns. That's halfway through the game. You're not getting your ball rolling until everyone else is mostly down the hill. A lot of nations don't need their PG to expand, research or give them needed path variety, however, so once year 3 rolls around all they need is those fat paths to bring up some globals or cast some big rituals which they likely won't have researched until then anyway. And in those three years, having order 3, prod 3, growth 3, magic 1, luck 1 will, even if they're a province or two behind, have given them a rocking economy compared to everyone else, so if they've made it that far, they probably have the chunkiest armies and the most mages and might well have already taken out a less lucky competitor. And if they rely on sacreds, you can easily cobble together a better FSR and some nice generic boosts(a lot of sacreds already become quite efficiently killy with just a +2 strength, +2 attack skill, blood surge, or something simple along those lines) without needing to invest in any incarnate stuff.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 1, 2020 14:34
|
|
|
I feel like the Ship Wreckers are the only consistently good mercs in the game, maybe also Durand's boys. All the rest largely just exist to die miserably to soften up some barbs or ping a throne. Oh and the architect is good if you can hold on to him for enough turns to upgrade your poo poo. Though, as an important question, if he starts on an upgrade that requires the Architect trait, can someone without the trait finish it?
|
|
#
¿
Dec 3, 2020 09:01
|
|
|
Luck scales are always vindicated, I don't get people who choose misf scales.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 4, 2020 02:12
|
|
|
Arcvasti posted:Propheting a Demon General in JBBM gives me the Mason ability, so I can upgrade palisades into real fortresses. Which is pretty nice. JBBM Yomi's starting army is disgustingly strong and Yomi has no sacreds to speak of, so I didn't lose out on much by waiting this long for a prophet. I always found it was a tough choice, on the one hand having proper fortresses is nice, on the other hand, some of the other choices let you get more/better freespawn out of your prophet.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 4, 2020 12:18
|
|
|
Meanwhile I'm busy learning why you don't take D3 Abysia to afford your bless, because if you do, you can get an event that halves your cap pop meaning your resources for recruiting your beefy-rear end sacred dudes that you took most of the bless for in the first place are totally hosed. 
|
|
#
¿
Dec 8, 2020 01:49
|
|
|
Kobal2 posted:Taking Death in general has always felt somewhat nuts to me. A hellbless might win you an early war or two but soon enough your sacreds will be getting mulched by whatever magic the next guy over has been cooking ; and you can't sit pretty on your conquests or focus on zooming up research either since they're slowly depleting from under you (both naturally and through poo poo events) while the scale boys you could not kill fast enough are all busy growing. Actually what I'm finding to be the WORST thing about taking a Death bless is the damage it does to supply scores in your dominion. I had so much trouble with starving troops this time around, it suuuuuuucked.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 8, 2020 12:19
|
|
|
Lord Koth posted:Out of idle curiosity, was the half-pop event an Abysia-unique one, one purely Death scale related, or a Death/Misfortune event? It was a generic event, pure Death, I don't gently caress with misfortune any longer after loving Newbad 2.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 8, 2020 22:32
|
|
|
my dad posted:I won a game with turmoil 3, death 3, and misfortune 3, and did well with these scales in another game. Just accept that poo poo's gonna happen. It doesn't matter if you lose a bunch of money and population if you storm and take someone's cap on turn 12. If you've got a nation with a shitload of fortune tellers, that can also negate a lot of the sting of misfortune.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 9, 2020 10:39
|
|
|
At this point I'm busy being boxed in to the north by Agartha and the west by TC. Agartha, so I expanded mostly east, and everywhere I expanded, Agartha was to the north of me. I never had the time to get a good, full view of Agartha but I consistently had an impression of them as the biggest, scariest nation in the game.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 12, 2020 09:21
|
|
|
Huh, this war on Ubar is part of the stuff I didn't witness or even realize was going on in the early game as I was just busy getting settled in, eventually running up against TC to my west.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 13, 2020 09:28
|
|
|
Looks like this is going suspiciously well for you, where's all the dramatic tension?
|
|
#
¿
Dec 21, 2020 12:22
|
|
|
Dr. Kyle Farnsworth posted:luck scales seem really good? i think this is the first LP I've seen em in and you keep getting good events? is there a reason everyone usually tanks them (i think)? Part of it is also that some of the worst misfortune events only trigger at misf 3 and with stuff like hefty death scales, so you can usually go misf 1 or 2 with high Order and not really feel any too bad consequences. Usually. It gets even more ameliorated if you have a lot of casters with fortuneteller on them, so any fort is likely to be clogged with dudes sneaking out and dismantling barbarian invasions and troglodyte attacks so you never really feel the worst of it.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 21, 2020 17:03
|
|
|
I confess when I last played Yomi I didn't focus much on a bless, worked pretty well for me until two nations came for me at once(after surviving the FIRST time two nations came for me at once and I beat one so hard he gave up on the game) with some ownage on their minds.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 21, 2020 22:40
|
|
|
Finally the protagonist of the game arrives on the stage. I was a bit surprised since I thought I'd grabbed the Throne of Air long before this. But I guess in some games the turns just fly by.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 22, 2020 22:58
|
|
|
FilthIncarnate posted:my notes say: What a strange trick. Personally I always try to attract everyone's attention, the game is more fun that way. Then if I don't get enough attention I engage in comical warfare for the hell of it.
|
|
#
¿
Dec 30, 2020 01:21
|
|
|
greatsword of sharpness or great sword of sharpness, a question for the ages.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 3, 2021 00:18
|
|
|
Drakyn posted:Are there any generally accepted playerbase ideas on how to fix those structural problems with water nations beyond just 'delete them'? I've got a soft spot for waterborne and underwater nonsense in games in general - I still miss RTSes having naval units - and I'm always interested in hearing new reasons why they don't work or could be made to work or both. I know Arcvasti's working on/off on a mod that rebalances water nations while also giving them amphibious options, which goes some way towards solving the issue by letting water nations participate on land.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 5, 2021 00:34
|
|
|
Arcvasti posted:Putting Ys as a coastal nation actually totally bypasses the need to give merrow druids a workable magic path, because then you start off with their kernou druids who have the perfectly serviceable E1S1 crosspath. They're still overpriced for their paths, but they're a lot more usable then merrow druids. Hell basically anything that has S1 in the mix is a good option because even if it can't cast something by itself, something else can use it as a battery or it can communion up with others of its kind to cast cool poo poo.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 5, 2021 01:43
|
|
|
Wow nice job ignoring the VERY VALUABLE Abysian contribution to the war against TC by stealing a fat chunk of his core lands while everyone else is busy doing the hard work, and then cautiously sitting in a corner picking his nose until he's sure everyone else has taken the risks.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 15, 2021 02:37
|
|
|
Donkringel posted:At this point in the game who were you most actively plotting against? At this point I'm still weighing my options. After taking a few TC forts on the border, I wait until he's gone AI and then start sprinting for his cap, trying to reach it before Ermor does. I believe that around this time, various nations have also started trying to paint Ermor as a big threat that I should absolutely be excited to get into a fight with, with rumblings of a coalition occurring. And while I do love a big dogpile, everyone being busy fighting an existential threat is also a great time to attack them. My main excuse for dithering is "oh noooooo, Agartha's got such great big stacks hanging around my border, oh nooooo," even though everyone keeps telling me he's a newbie who's badly bungled his game so far and no real threat, mostly because I want to make sure everyone else has taken the risks before I chip in.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 19, 2021 11:32
|
|
|
FilthIncarnate posted:
The cap-only sacreds and cap-only mages greatly benefit from being Larger, but it also makes them eat more, which goes poorly with a Death dominion, as I learned the hard way. Also the air shield part of the bless is from the Throne of Air that I took. I probably could have gotten away with overblessing my sacreds less and giving myself better scales, but lesson learned! The rest of it was intended to boost my casters since Liquid Flames is a muy bueno spell, that sadly only the Anointed really have the paths to cast, if I remember right. But they have the extra Fire when casting it that it just completely fucks dudes up. Blasts a huge area for tons of AP damage and then leaves a damaging fire field behind that your own guys will just casually walk through while it erases chunks of enemy stacks. FilthIncarnate posted:[6:02 PM] PurpleXVI: Thanks, Turtle, I look forward to the many comical ways in which we shall dunk on other players. It's generally my policy to go along with plans presented to me since they tend to be entertaining and usually profitable.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 21, 2021 11:25
|
|
|
Loremasters are such extremely good stuff, even if you just get access to a couple more paths, searching-wise, that can be a real gamechanger. Also a couple of 2-path loremasters can also help you break into some booster types you normally wouldn't be able to make.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 22, 2021 00:44
|
|
|
FilthIncarnate posted:*****purple might get cold feet at some point, let's just be careful**** I mean, that's not why you should be careful.
|
|
#
¿
Jan 22, 2021 13:12
|
|
|
I'm being very trusting by letting the monkeys keep track of how many lanterns I've sent them, in another game, RealBadDumb, I played as Ulm and managed to score the Steel Ovens and became the world's lantern supplier and because I just kept sending out X number of lanterns per turn, several people ended up getting more they paid for, because the cost in fire gems to me was so resultingly trivial.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 1, 2021 04:43
|
|
|
Clearly Ermor will tolerate the ancient law of "I got there first, nyah nyah nyah neener neener neener" and not do anything aggressive about me taking TC's cap right in front of him. lol
|
|
#
¿
Feb 2, 2021 00:22
|
|
|
GrayDorian posted:I'm a fan of the diplochat, but get lost when it's multiple people talking without showing the civ name Just stick to only reading the parts with me, they're the coolest and funniest.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 3, 2021 11:17
|
|
|
Rule #1 of Dogpile Club is never be the first person to join Dogpile Club. The ideal point is two to three turns after the other person goes. Firstly, it means you won't be on the target's borders when the attacking on the other front begins, so they'll feel free to redirect everything towards that fight. This means that when you do come in, you'll be hitting a depopulated front while everyone else has already begun to suffer casualties. Don't forget that most likely whoever's helping you with your dogpile will be your enemy sooner or later, so it's absolutely to your benefit if they have as many costly, painful fights with the dogpile target as possible. It's also important not to get in too late, of course, so you'll miss out on the better spoils. But the best thing is if you can talk to the dogpile target, and convince them to give you some things in exchange for you not going whole-hog. After all, the only thing better than fighting for something is getting it for free, and if that gives the dogpile target enough breathing room to turn the tables on whoever you were dogpiling with... well that's just more free real estate when you then betray that person, isn't it? Or maybe you've just gotten two opponents mired in an interminable hellwar that will leave them permanently behind and less threatening.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 4, 2021 00:49
|
|
|
Donkringel posted:Is there ever a reason not to put a flying thug in the far back, buff, then attack rear? Assuming you aren't hitting any counter thug mages or cav you're separating the main army from the commanders and then your thug has much less to deal with. The enemy might have fliers that don't need buffs before doing their attack rear who might land on your thug before they can go flying. So if you're expecting anything like that, might be worth it to sandwich them nearer the middle of your formation instead.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 4, 2021 17:59
|
|
|
my dad posted:Unironically the most important lesson of good thug use is knowing when not to use them. i.e. never. Always thug. ALWAYS THUG.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 4, 2021 23:49
|
|
|
Agartha was great for giving me an excuse to not fight Ermor so that Ermor could, instead, bribe me with large amounts of gold to not get involved.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 8, 2021 04:10
|
|
|
At this point I've talked with Ermor and have no idea what the apes are up to, so I'm just puttering around and planning to steal Ubar while everyone else is busy with Ermor. I figure there's still plenty of time to the big reckoning.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 9, 2021 23:14
|
|
|
Arcvasti posted:Mounds Kings also have pierce resistance so their hp stretches farther then you might think, since arrows(seeking or otherwise) are a pretty common way for commanders to die ignominiously. Plus they have pretty high defense so they're above average versus earthquake. They're good bony boys. I wonder what the general distribution on pierce/blunt/slashing damage among units is. I want to feel like piercing is the most common, since it's almost every ranged weapon and almost every polearm, with slashing second and blunt at a distant third because you don't really see hammers and clubs all that often.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 10, 2021 23:57
|
|
|
Tulip posted:Goon honor is very pedantic and legalistic, and AFAICT Purple hasn't actually done anything that violates the boundaries of that honor. If anything, they're a good player to make deals with because they're actually quite predictable. I will predictably do what seems funniest to me at any given point in time, yes(i.e. casting Wild Hunt, making boondoggle thugs, helping someone else with a boondoggle thug project). I also try not to be a dick about betrayals, like, it if it feels like the betrayal would seem mean-spirited and upset someone, or otherwise ruin their fun, I wouldn't have the heart for it.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 12, 2021 20:56
|
|
|
Thanks for the LP! I think the only thing I could say is if you do another, downsize your screenshots a bit.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 13, 2021 21:21
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 9, 2024 14:21 |
|
|
FilthIncarnate posted:but ironically it turns out to be much better if everyone else fights each other while you quietly pursue your goals I've won two and one third games, and I can agree with this, though it largely depends on your initial expansion. If you can secure access to three or better yet four thrones before initial vs-indies expansion settles down, you're usually in a good space to turtle for a bit. Otherwise, one early war to expand your throne contact and economic base, and then for the rest of it I was largely just teching up. In one case assaulting people as they went AI for unrelated reasons and eating up more real estate than I had the right to. On the other I just had superb throne contact and managed to get, like Filth, some good earth attack access that make me real hard to contend with. And in the one-third(because we were a three-man disciple team) we ate up one other disciple trio early on before settling down to mass-produce tartarians and other end-phase war machines to secure our win once things got spicy.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 14, 2021 21:32
|
|