prepping for beginning expansion
 

Ok, I have a tough enough time expanding early in the game with indeps at 3.

I read that ppl using indeps at 6+ are up to 8-12 provinces by turn 10.


HOW????? I am not sure how, any strat tips would be appreciated.

Thus speaks Lekiro the Arch Mage, the Mountain Lord, Prince of Tremors, the Armorer http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon10.gif

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I always play at indep 9. Never attack anything for the first two rounds. Just build up your forces and research the first level of spells that'll help your mages.

Then pick your targets. Never attack anything that says "Heavy Cavalry" in it. Never attack in an indep province were you do not hold dominion. You need a bit more strength to punch trough those lances. Indep archers always fire at the closest unit so put your heavy infantery up front and your own archers on fire archers.

Flanking is a good way to end a battle quickly since indep commanders tend to stay in the back with their archers. Hold and attack archers is better than hold and attack rearmost.

Indeps have no way to increase morale so all you need to do is to rout them. Fearsome units can turn a battle quickly as do quick massive losses of units. Use your own heavy cavalry or simply massed archers/crossbows/javelineers. Keep a spare commander around to ferry new troops to your army each turn.

If you have a tough pretender then it can serve as the spearhead of each attack and collect enemy troops around it in a nice target range for your archers.

My own preference however is to use assassins. At indep 9 there's usually four commanders to deal with. It's very easy to create assassins that no regular indep commander has a chance to fight. Just give them a cheap magic object and they will usually develop a good heroic ability since you're still so early into the game. This is especially true for C'Tis who's assassins need very little spellresearch to be effectively unstoppable by indeps.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Depends on how many humans are in the game but most mercenaries are also very good for their price during early and mid game for capturing provinces. Orion is probably the best overall for the price he offers.

Second try different battle formations... I won't mention any of my strategies but this is important. Perhaps dominions_3 will provide a battle field in an octagon shape where armies in different territories will be approaching from different directions where more strategies could be developed.

Using assassins on the commanders is a good idea too... if done right you can attack the territory and independents will retreat.

Last I recommend getting lots of archers... this works great on most indepedent territories. Definitely stay away from any cavalary type territories until you are ready.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

There are a few ways to do this. One of the easiest is having a SC Pretender ready for Indy Whacking on turn 2-3 and take a province a turn with him in that time.

Even without a SC Pretender you can take Territories with the right configuration of units.

The most common and easily usable is the Archer with Melee support.

Usually you will need from 15-20 Archer/Xbows. Your initial melee troops. Set one (1) melee troop in the front of your block of archers with Hold and Attack Orders, and your Archers on Fire Closest.

The rest of your Melee troops held at the very back in a block in hold and attack (in order to keep morale). That one single melee troop has a bomb strapped to his head and is screaming "Praise Allah" after 2 turns, but your Archers will mow down most of the approaching force (Only use Xbows for HInfantry, if you have normal archers or not very many Longbowmen, stay away from Cav provinces) and they will rout.

The reason you need the other melee troops in the back is so you can restock your "Target" for Indy missile fire and melee giving your Archers time to shoot holes in the opponents. You can usually take anywhere from 4-6 provinces on that kind of initial force before needing to resupply.

Another way to kill indies using their morale against them is to put a highly survivable unit in front (Think Van, or Knight) with the main body of your forces on a flank with attack rear orders. You probably have a 50/50 chance that your survivable unit will survive enough for your main forces to hammer into the archer/commanders in the back and cause the entire host to rout.

Last but not least, Cause Fear and Fear Spells are ways to insta-rout most indy provinces. Things with high Fear Auras (PoD is a classic Example) or using spells like Panic, Terror or troops with Lesser Fear auras.

With a fear or spell on units they will make morale check every time they are *hit*. So having at least 1 square of an entire squad in your aura of fear will make the entire squad make a morale check. Such spells as Fire Flies, Shards, or archer/javalins cause alot of morale checks before actually engaging you and causing most fodder (LI) to rout without touching you and 1 to 2 rounds of HI. Then cleaning up the Archers is cake.

Edit: You can also use the AI to split it's forces (especially if you are running a higher end of Indep 7-9). By placing a single melee/missile unit slightly forward on one flank (say the north) and the bulk of your units on the southern flank with specific orders (Again, Attack Archers/Rearmost is good) they will hammer into archers and most likely cause a rout after 1-3 rounds. This works particularly well with commanders so you can have them hold 1 or 2 rounds then begin to retreat stringing out the enemy melee forces letting you have more squares to attack.

[ June 08, 2004, 20:26: Message edited by: Zen ]

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Welp, if we weren't on the FBI watch list before, we definitely are now: You've probably managed to nail most of the buzzwords with that one.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I certainly hope so. Free Publicity. You'd better start sandbagging your windows Norfleet.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

If Shrapnel were to send a free publicity copy to the Rev. Jerry Falwell or his ilk, and some literature emphasizing the prospect of blood sacrifice, that might work too.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Heh.

Before the thread started to devolve (but a humorous devolvement), there's some really nice information in it.

I currently play on Indep5 most of the time. I don't think I could go back to Indep3... they'd seem like such pushovers.

Basically, the best way to learn how to expand is probably to play on an Indep setting 2 or 3 higher than what you actually intend to play on. Once you get your expansion rate to the point you want it on the higher setting, you shouldn't have any trouble achieving that expansion rate on the lower setting.

Scott

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I dont know why Indep 3 is the default. I guess because it matches AI-easy.

I think that hurts the game. Indep 5 is more human-setting. The setting of 3 is more in favor of the AI than human players. It leads new people to think they arent doing well because the AI swarms into them early in the game. Im continually telling new players to turn indepts up until they learn the game better.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I play consistantly on Indep 6. Just gard enough that it takes skill and effort to expand, but just easy enough so that a Combat Pretender can be of use with or without an army if you desire.

I would admonish all Newbies to play on at least AI 5+ in order to better learn how the AI functions in the Battlefield.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Actually, higher settings benefits the AI as well, as the AI shows up with bigger armies that they need to accumulate to conquer indies at 6+. This also means more national troops, and less mad rushes with militia armies who are either insufficient to conquer indie provinces, or get killed in the process. If by "benefit" you meant that they get more provinces more quickly, that's true, but they get to use them better and more thoroughly (as well as their home province) on higher settings. In my experience, in its current state the AI plays best (as in - provides the best opposition) with indies at 6-7, rich world and sites at 50.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Wel actually I usually word it the other way. That higher indept settings benefit a human player more than the AI. A human usually does better at avoiding the hard ones and prepping for the others.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I've found that the AI benefits as much, if not more, than the benefits the human reaps for high indies: High independent settings force the AIs to build up more before making attempts, so when they encounter you, they'll be better armed. However, higher indies also tend to slaughter the AI's entire army at times.....as a result, some of the AIs won't survive this phase and will be culled from the herd: The herd, as a whole, however, is stronger for it, as the AIs are then less crowded in and do not cripple themselves on fruitless internecine warfare.

On the flipside, the human benefits from a reduced risk of an early-game AI dogpile. If the human player is wielding an super-SC pretender, the AI's dogpile will be stomped into the ground anyway, but a higher independent setting gives more viability to noncombatant pretenders: It also tends to make it more likely that the human player survives....and faces a smaller number of tougher AI nations.

So, overall, a higher independent setting benefits an individual human more than an individual AI players, but higher independent settings, collectively, benefit the AI players more.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

To give you specific advice, cpbeller, I think we need to know more about the problems you are having. What do you typically do with your starting army and/or 1st turn builds? Can you take out one or two indie provinces but then you're left with too weak of an army for more? Or are you having trouble right out of the gate? Is there some sort of pattern to how your battles, particularly your losses, go?

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

the game i am playing at the moment, it is turn 19, i have control of 5 or 6 provinces. Indeps at 5.

I had a very bloody battle and lost 37 troops about 4 turns ago taking a high income province (no knoghts, but heavy cav). I won that battle only because of my Wind Riders taking out their 2 commanders, forcing the indy army to route (thank God for that, my army was getting slaughtered).

I have secured the provinces surrounding my capital, but have now come in contact with C'tis on the south-eastern border (they are still 2-3 provinces away from me, but my dominion has spread enough so i can see them). Also, R'lyeh is on my north-western border, right next to a key province of mine (connects one land mass to another). R'Lyeh only has 50 troops right now (Lobo Guards, Slave Troopers, Crab Hybrids & an Illithid Lord).

I guess, I have trouble with all of it. I personally think my early expansion hasn't been so bad until that large battle, losing 37 guys. What I have a lot of trouble in though is formations (for one thing).

Also, building a good army with such low resources. With the resources my capital can use (71 resources), I can only build 2 elite troops per turn, and that doesn't include commanders.

I am currently nearly right in the middle of the map, with water directly north (bordering me), and open land to the south, and especially to the east (C'tis).

Here is the game info:

- using Golden Age Arco, Arch Mage (4 Fire/4 Air/4 Water/4 Earth/1 Death).

- the Forgotten Realms map (huge map, over 400 provinces)

- Indeps set to 5

- magic sites set to 50 (I think)


I think that is pretty much it....the thing i really have a difficult time is the formations, and building units (what kind exactly, and getting the most out of my resources).

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Well cpbeller, I think you have already learned the lesson that independent's with heavy cav can be a tough fight. I generally avoid those guys early in the game.

I've never played Golden Age Arco but I have looked at it some and I do seem to remember it needing a goodly amount of resources. Which is unfrotunate, because it does sound like you have low resources in your capital. Part of your difficulties this game may be bad luck in your starting location. But I am also guessing that you took a fort with a low admin value and/or scale settings that diminished your resources, neither of which sounds like a good idea with Golden Age Arco.

So what I am saying is: With a different nation and/or more congenial settings, you would probably be having an easier time of it with the Independents.

As for how to arrange your battle formations, that depends entirely on what you're bringing to the table and what you expect to be fighting. The best general advice I can think of right now is:

Put cheap, expendable, units in front of your best troops to soak up early arrow fire, lances, and nasty stuff like that.

All other things being equal, large Groups of units are less likely to rout than small units. Also, if you have powerful units with not-so-good morale (chariots?), you can put one of the chariots in a group with higher morale units to make the chariot less likely to run away than if it was in an all-chariot group.

Hold and Attack Rear is often a good order to use with flying troops like Wind Riders.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Golden Age Arco does seem a bit rough. If memory serves, Sloth is mandatory (not unreasonable for a philosopher-dominated society http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif ), but your myrmidon heavy infantry, while very nicely equipped, require substantial resources; and your icarids are fairly expensive for their fragility.

With that sort of setup, a few things come to mind. Bear in mind the caveat that I haven't poked at this theme much at all...

Hire mercenaries. This would might be less cost-effective in an MP game if there's a bidding war. Your initial bottleneck for getting an early army is resources, not gold, so this seems like a good choice. Heavy horsemen, heavy infantry (including the Ship Wreckers), the pike formations (God's Justice, perhaps others) come to mind. You have no archers, if memory serves, just slingers, so Farstrikers would fill a gap but you would still need some infantry as a screen. Farstrikers can be useful against lightly-armored folks like barbarians, but likely won't do much against heavy cav. Chariots can also work well against lightly-armored.

Consider aiming for Riches from Beneath. It's an Earth enchantment that will significantly boost your resource production and thus troop production if you have the gold to match. Later on you'll probably be able to supplement your human troops with living statues and mechanical men, and a couple of your heroes make superb heavy infantry (Pathos the Son of Titans comes to mind as somebody that shine with good equipment, and the Asterios Monster in the Maze is another candidate for better gear).

If you go heavy inf/chariots, I'd probably put the heavy infantry pretty far back and center, on hold/attack, and chariots massed on one flank and even further back, on hold/attack archers or rear. Any light infantry should be put closer to the front to attract missile fire. And don't forget to bring along Priestesses for the after-battle healing. Later on mystics may provide good fire support, but you may not have researched enough yet. *shrug*

The one pain I remember from my Last go with it was the irritation that, according to Acashic Record, my highest magical income was in Death, and Arco/GE is weak in death and blood magic until you boost a Priestess and start summoning Lamia Queens.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I always thought that you are supposed to have sceptics in your resource-rich provinces to get rid of the sloth... Somewhat risky, but helps atleast a little. but as you would have to have them in the neightboring provinces too, and you couldn't turn them of, it would need quite a lot of micromanagement.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I like the idea of using Skeptics to reduce the Sloth in your own provinces, but that requires you to zero the Dominion, right? Not a very good idea, to me.

From my own experience with GE Arco, there are a couple of ways to go about playing them, at least early game.

One is to focus on Wind Riders. They ARE a good Sacred unit. The reasoning behind it is that you are only able to hire 3 or so Myrmidons a turn at the beginning, and you can hire 2 or 3 Wind Riders a turn, if you do it right.

Another is to try to mitigate the damage done by the Sloth scale. I normally play on Rich (no matter who I play), which certainly mitigates the problem. The other idea is, as others have said, pick a high-admin castle. Let me give you my 'standard' Pretender for Arco, standard or Golden Era.

Lady of Fortune
Water-4, Nature-4
Order-3, (Sloth-1 for GE), Growth 1, Magic 1
Castle Fortification
6 Dominion

(Note that you have 40 extra points in GE to play around with.)

This gives access to the Nature rituals (Gift of Health, etc.), good events in whatever province the Lady is in (which makes it more palatable for her to site-search), and actually a credible SC later in the game. If used to site-search, she's finding all of the Nature and Water sites, which are both useful. Nature gives you gems that you'll need for the Nature rituals, and Water gives you gems for Clams.

You also gives you a plausibly decent Bless effect. Taken together (and assuming you Berserk), you get a +1 to ATT/DEF/PROT/STR. While you can have the unfortunate problem of berserking Priestesses, that problem is minimal, IMO.

Anyway, just some ideas I had. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

Scott

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

It seems to me that GE Arco is designed to not be able to have many quality troops. My first impulse when playing a nation is to get the best troops in the largest quantities and buff them so that they are a force to be reckoned with - but I think this approach is fundamentally the wrong one with GE. It seems to me that the way to go is with strong elemental attacks - multiple mages casting direct-damage elemental attacks, while protected by a small bodyguard of myrmidons. Of course this isn't an early game strategy, but with the philosophers and a magic scale you can get to mid levels of evocation fairly quickly.

later game it should be possible to get some tough-guy summons (kings and queens of the elements come to mind) to bolster your offense.

The other thing that strikes me about GE is that it lends itself to multiple castles in a big way - firstly to get as many myrmidons as possible, and second, because your defense does not lie in standing armies, but in castle walls - with your engineers you can hold an enemy army at bay.

So I'm thinking for GE a cheap castle, but with a decent admin and defence value, and a strong magic scale to get research done quickly and decrease opponents MR, and a pretender who can forge path-enhancing items for your mages.

Note that I haven't actually tried this out yet, but I think something like this would maximize GE's strengths.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

All good stuff here. I have a question, however.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I dont have much success with assassins, although I never really gave Ctis much of a shot. What "cheap items" are you talking about, Wauthan? I cant think of a single trinket that would save my assassins, although I guess Ctis could get a Skull Talisman fairly quick. (But how do you use those assassins anyhow, set to "fire closest"? I dont understand Empoisoners very well -- any tips?) I only feel safe with assassins once they can equip summoning items (bottle of water, lifelong protection, etc.) or really good gear, otherwise they die on me to everything but priests. Tips?

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Just retried Ctis -- cant get it to work.
Anyone have tips on Assassins early game (without auto-summon help from items)? General early-game assassin equipment help?
merci!

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I don't know if this 'helps', but I do remember vividly thinking at one point that Empoisoners weren't 'all that'... and when I finally used them, they cast Decay and that was that.

I don't know much about C'tis, but I do know that Desert Tombs is an absolute bLast now. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif One small request I would make of the designers is to give Unholy-5 priests a 'unique' Reanimation ability. I believe that for BE/AE Ermor they are Lictors (already). Soul Gate could get Ghosts. As for Desert Tombs, the most thematic I think would be Banefire Archers. Just an idea.

Scott

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

I have found the Enchantment level 1 spell "Animate skeleton" or preferably "Animate dead", if there are corpses available in the province, to be quite neat with empoisoners. Just set him in a far back corner with orders to summon skellies, and he can beat most commanders. Swarm is also nice, but you need a gem for that.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Luck charms, barkskin amulets aren't too expensive and can help (well, the barkskin won't help as much as on a human assuming that Empoisoners, as lizardmen, have some base prot; can't remember what it is 'tho). For somebody with decent prot (perhaps from Boots of Stone, say), the etherealness from a Robe of Shadows can be a big help.

If you think there's a decent chance the assassin will die, a weapon with powerful poison or a decay effect might be in order.

But the auto summoners are very useful (wraith crown in particular; but that's very expensive; against many non-flying non-lightning-immune opponents, a spirit helm might be the better buy, although harder for C'tis).

Later on, the Drain Life banner is just vicious... always-hits, affects even lifeless enemies, decent range, good armor-negating hp/fatigue damage, restores health/fatigue on assassin, and not blocked by any immunities.

Re: prepping for beginning expansion
 

Let me rephrase: I have lots of success with assassins in mid- to late game, it's early game (turns 1-20) with eliminating indy commanders with access only to magic trinkets or maximal construction 2 items.
Barkskin amulet: ok, I'll try that. Other than that, I feel there is no real good gear to give assassins pre-construction-4 that can help in expanding early, and my assassins always die sooner or later when naked.