Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Not a complete noob when it comes to strategy games, yet every time I play I'm going along doing fine - then BAM its all over.

Just have the demo for now, waiting for a bud to check it out and we'll grab 2 copies.

With normal AI, 1v1 was too easy, 1v2 was ok, decided to try more.

Just played as the apes, with the 4-armed skelly god. Large map, me + 4 AI, mid starting position on a narrow strip of land between 2 landmasses (took it because tried 3 games and had an enemy within 3 spaces).

Expanded, didn't use the pretender till she was kitted out with 1st stage magic EQ, had everything for at least 2 provinces around the capital. Had found 2 enemies so far, no incoming activity.

Went after the top one, abysmia? Doing fine, then stopped cold. I'd have 7 commanders, pretender and 200 troops and I'd lose to 50 troops with 5 commanders... no commander loss, but lose 40-50 troops and kill 5-6 of theirs. WTF?
I was using the biggest monkey, slingers, and the 2nd smallest archers with some cav support (like 12 or so), tried it a couple of times as i had handy reinforcements, no luck.

Suddenly 2 other enemies start pounding on my back door, 1 popping a fort down. So, I hit the fort with 6 more commanders + 200 troops, similar config and stall at the door, no problem - i'll just swing down with the experienced guys.

Put the top battle on hold, beef up a bottleneck and go south where 2 other pretenders appear, a drake, and a few trog lords. Proceed to get my butt handed to me, massive losses, few kills and then my pretender gets horror marked, hunted and insta'd as she tosses her second buff.

So, if you've survived that I have a few questions after playing about 4 1/2 times:

Do the enemies duke it out? Or is it all v. 1?

Is there any diplomacy? Will sending bribes actually do anything?

I'm assuming magic is the game breaker for me, I went to level two in all schools vs. specializing - and never jacked up my casters (empowerment?)

Should the pretender be used for combat? melee or magic?

What is up with their heavy cav whooping me and mine seeming to just stall and get cut down, even using it to flank and take out rearmost doesn't do much.

Where are they getting their big mobs? summoning? is summoning a ritual? do they last till they die or 1 combat?

I'd rather not look at "stategies"... but without a save its pretty painful to spend 2 hours and suddenly have it go poof. So at this point, any advice is welcome or even pointing out places to read till I get a manual.

love the game (although bunch of micro on the troop side, especially with getting defeated), feel i've just scratched the surface which is how it should be.

Help?

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

I've been playing the game for a few weeks now, maybe a month. I am a newcomer to the Dominions series as well, so no prior knowledge. This is useful because I have very recently been in your shoes.

First off, the nature of a FFA vs many opponents is that sometimes you will just get screwed over. Not much you can do about it, it was just bad luck. If you end up in the middle of 2 or 3 comps and they need to go through you to get to anyone else, well, you are just plain in trouble.

The computers do fight eachother, yes. If you use scouts liberally you will see them fight.

There is no diplomacy as far as I know. The computer will often leave you alone until it feels it can beat you though and will send you a message letting you know it's about to open a can on you when it is ready.

Magic can definitely be a game breaker. However, you don't HAVE to be a heavy mage to win. This game has many strategies that can be quite potent if pulled off correctly.

This is a tough one. You need to design your pretender with a specific use in mind. Some are rainbow mages made mostly to find magic sites and cast a variety of spells, some you make with the idea of their bless being potent, some are for casting a specific high end spell or combo of spells, some are for combat, etc. The thing is, you have to know the race you are playing and the goal of your pretender and get them to work together, then design the pretender accordingly.

One thing that eventually just clicked with me is something akin to when building decks for Magic TCG finally clicks. At first you are just throwing together cards that look cool, but eventually you get to the point where you are building it with a specific purpose in mind and you cut out all the un-needed stuff. At first you are haphazardly building a pretender and tilting scales this way and that, but you don't really know what you are doing or what you are going for.

In your case with the monkeys, might I suggest taking a master lich (for his immortality, so you can use him in battle without worrying too much) with fire 3, air 2, astral 2, death 4, and nature 2. Give him a dominion of 8 (to spread his dominion quickly, since immortality does not work where you don't have dominion.) Put 2 into heat for your free points and 1 into magic to aid with research.

Now, you don't start with fire or air gem income, so this is a somewhat risky move, but your pretender will be a good site searcher and his immortality lets you move him around without worrying. If you don't get the gem income you need just alchemize them as you won't need many. The goal is to get to enchantment 4 quickly by recruiting a lot yogis when money is tight and guru's once you can afford it. While your white ones are researching away move your pretender to any squares you liberate to search for sites.

The monkeys have a plethora of ranged units and are one of the few early era races to get the longbow. This is a fact this pretender is built to capitalize on. Once you hit enchantment 4, give him some fire gems, put him in an army that has a lot of archers backing it up, and script him to cast flaming arrows first thing. Your archers should take care of the rest. Also, as soon as you hit enchantment 4 start researching alteration to level 4 for wind guide and script him to cast this as well. He'll need air gems for that one.

Once you have those two spells going on a mass of archers there isn't much they can't handle. The only things you'd have to be real careful of at this point would be caelum using flying units to get to your archers or abysia and their fire immunity. There are some magical spells that can render your archers useless, but the computer is unlikely to use those and a human player might not reallize what you are doing until it is too late.

After this you can always use your probably huge gem income to empower your pretender up a few more levels to cast some of your national summons if you like or just clean it up the ol' fashion way.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Diplomacy in the dominions series takes a bit of getting used to...
Basically, the AI will consider itself at peace with you at the start of the game. If you end up at war for any reason it will then attack you quite relentlessly, so all it takes is one battle to trigger a big war.

If the AI attacks you, you attack the AI, you use a non-anonymous province attack spell (e.g. call of the wilds), or (probably) you assasinate a commander of theirs (no 100% about this last one) then you're at war. If you both attack an independant province on the same turn and end up fighting you're not at war. Also, the AI will sometimes attack provinces you're sieging if they're at war with the guys in the fort.

The key is to choose your wars so you don't fight on each front. The way to stop the AI attacking you is to have a strong (especially numerically) force in every border province that they can attack. In the early game I'll build border PD to 20 and try to put a commander or two with troops in each such province to discourage attack. Later you'll need bigger armies and more PD.
This is only really possible if your borders are not large. Try planning your expansion so that you get to bottlenecks and then stop and fortify. Ideally put fortresses in the border provinces so that the AI will be slowed even if they do attack.
Once you have strong borders, choose one enemy - maybe someone you have too large a border with - and attack.
Sending bribes doesn't do anything - I think it's mainly there for multiplayer diplomacy

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Thanks guys!

Good analogy on the MTG as well, it does seem very similar especially with the multiple magic paths.

I obviously haven't been dealing with magic effectively yet, I'll end a game with a ton of gems, rarely alchemize them, never empower, never search. Being on the demo and limited to lvl 4 spells I thought I wouldn't need to...oops (especially while the AI doesn't seem to be limited http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Someone mentioned in another thread that a possible way to stave off multi thrashings is to stay on top of the army graph, even if its just with your cheapest units stockpiled.

Other than the greeks (ascepolis?) siege guys, are there specific strategies for breaking into forts? I can have an overwhelming # of troops, and still get stuck on the door forever.

How much does itemization (forging) play into everything? Is it generally better to rush research or initially get your main guys geared up then research? I'm assuming the construction path buffs your available forging recipes, is it worth hitting early?

Thanks again, i'll try the buffing of the archers approach. (I'm assuming longbow gives a better range/damage then shortbow/slings and thus more attacks before melee go at it.)

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

When storming a castle you should have some kind of elite troops charging the gate. A few elite defenders can hold the gate against huge hordes of inferior troops, at least until they collapse from fatigue, since the attackers come at them only a few at a time.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Other alternative is to hold back and let the defenders come out.

Since there's no way to order defenders to hold the gate, they'll charge out where you can surround them.

That and fliers to attack the rear.

Fliers also help with breaking down the gate in the first place.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

If you hold back, do you generally get pummeled with ranged?

How many holds do you generally script?

Fatigue... yet another thing I need to get a handle on http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

My bud took too long to check it out, I ordered it today http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Well, the answers to your questions is, of course, it depends! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Troops with shields fare a lot better against arrows, some fortresses have no arrow towers, some have a bunch. Is your enemy using archers or mages, if so how many, how powerful? Do you have stronger ranged troops than your enemy? Do you have any resistances you can throw down, like for instance fire resistance if you're expecting fire mages pummeling you? Do you have a small number of tough guys who you can buff, or a huge army of chaff? Do you expect them to send a never ending wave of undead out the front gate? Do you/they have cavalry or flyers? Etc, etc, etc. This game has very deep strategy, you can't really give a one size fits all answer to questions like that.

As far as fatigue goes, you'll start getting a handle on that when you get more powerful in magic and start summoning big bad dudes who are basically invincible...until they pass out from exhaustion. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif It's not usually a big deal with your swarms of regular units. Just one more dimension you have to ballance.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Just pull the troops back to the rear of the field and put them on hold and attack.

It depends on what troops you have and what you expect them to have.

I've been playing Man lately, so I'm likely to have serious missile superiority. I'm fighting Jotuns so I'm not likely to break through the gate easily. Solution: let them come out, swarm them with smaller troops and pound them with arrows. If you've got better artillery mages, the same strategy can work.

If you've got better troops who can break through the gate defenders and get inside, do that.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Im not sure if this has been mentioned(not enough time to read everything) but the reason your being crushes by abysian troops is their heat aura, above average stats and great prot(they are even better in EA incase your playing there)

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Should probably not cast flame arrows against Abysia...

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

You shouldnt cast flame anything with them. I had that problem in a death match. My witch hunter was to cast flame elementals to aid himself but those creatures have not any physical attack but flames so some abysian dude couldnt be harmed, darn.

About getting the defenders in the open i think it will work ok.
getting lots of archers works ok.
flyers work ok.
You can put some fast cavalry ahead in the center so they get through before they reach the gate and they will distract their troops long enough to get some more men behind them and that's all you need.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

yeah, that's the part that interests me -- what should he do against Abyssia??

I'm a hopeless Agartha/Jotun fan at this point, so monkey strats are utterly beyond me -- i tried them once in the demo and failed HORRIBLY -- markatas somehow just don't handle melee quite like my triple-blessed Ancient Ones do... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif

Antpile's strat looked really good in general, but it's primary weakness is the specific nation that the OP was having trouble with.

For Abyssia specifically, you'll probably want to look to your mages -- Yakshas Earth paths should be good for spamming some nice anti-armor spells (is Destruction available in demo? mmmm destruction http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif ) which will make all your arrows MUCH more effective against the heavily armored abyssians. Yakshinis should be able to deal out some frosty hurtness with all their water power. Rain and Frostfall come to mind, but again i dunno if they are available in the demo. Chill effects will also slow down advancing troops a bit, which is good for you.

Position your guys way at the back, to keep the baddies at range as long as possible. I don't have any idea at all what your best strat to delay the incoming infantry would be... if noone with a clue chimes in, I'd try experimenting with various levels of province defense, and/or defensively equipped thugs. Check out some of the supercombatant threads for ideas here -- you will want staying power over offence, as your prime goal is just to keep the infantry off your archers as long as possible. Fire resist+etherial+shield(does it help to equip 2 shields??)+luck+reinvig+??? equipped commander types might be just the thing...

I imagine there's a bit of a balancing act on provice defense -- too much and you'll rout your "real" army when the chaff routs -- too little and the poor lil buggers won't even be a speed bump to the incoming baddies.

anyhoo, hopefully there's something in there you'll find useful. I'm pretty much a complete noob as well, so don't be too suprised if my advice turns out to be worth exactly what you paid for it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

g/l with them wee monkie kritters!
danm

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

For the monkeys iron cudgel bandars mixed with makartas to take hits should work fairly well vrs abysia as would some previously mentioned battle magic.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Magic is a huge part of the game. Even magic up to only level 4 is very powerful.

Seiging a fort is a simple matter of (to make a long story short) more men seiging than the enemy has defending. As for how to Storm a for - thats a different matter. There are tons of strategies for it, but at its most basic level it is this: How will you counter the defensive advantage of the wall? Some of the common ways to do this are: archers, magic spells, flying, trampling, or an ultra elite vanguard to take the gate.

Yes, staying on top fo the army graph (or close to it) will make the AI less likely to attack you. It is an important factor in SP gamees.

Forging Items plays a pretty big role in the full game. There, you will often forge "booster" items which increase your power in a magic path so you can cast the mega spells. Or equip an SC (super combatant) with all kinds of fancy equipment to go and destroy all your enemies.

Oh, and as for Abysia specific attack strategies, magic is probably the easiest is magic. Look for the high precision, armor negating spells like Lightning Bolt, Soul Slay, etc.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Thanks a ton guys, I've learned more with this post than i have playing for 2 days.

Tried again, this time vs. 4 comp opponents EA, got an edge keep with expansion room up top, and 1 good chokepoint, 2 2 province chokes... right outside of which are the greeks and ulm i think, leaving me with about 12-14 provinces I can hold. 2 of which declared war on me before I even found them, even while I was at the top of the army board.

Fire arrows work FANTASTIC! significantly cut down on my losses.

Been going with a 2 prong approach, group of melee on the left with ranged behind, same on the right, if I have cav i go flank/rear.

Established my borders, playing defensively and advancing slowly. Slowly building up my big army as I make my way to the first enemy stronghold, hopefully connecting 2 chokes so i reduce my exposure. No clue where the other baddies are, but they have to be behind somewhere.

This game SERIOUSLY needs a waypoint system (build a unit, tell it where to go...in x turns it arrives, if the province is taken, oh well). Half my time is spent shuttling guys back and forth to the front, cleaning up after partial routs, etc.

So, questions:

Does encumberence/fatigue matter with the undead?

Should I have spent more time searching before jumping in with defense/expansion? I only hit like 2 areas, found some sites... but now have a 3path doing searches..slowly.

Is it worth empowering your peons? Should I wait till i have a hefty gem pile or go for it right when i get enough?

I'm only a few turns away from my first siege, so I'll try the tips.

Can't wait till the full version gets here.

Edit: Oh yeah, any insight on Blessing? i.e. triple bless? I'm assuming that a higher path conveys the static bonuses (i.e. +1 MP 4S)? And that having 3 paths with 3 bonuses all stack? I hear it mentioned a lot, is it significantly powerful or just another viable strat with the right races?

Thanks again!

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Most undead have 0enc so unless you have some undead mages burning themselves out with spells it shouldnt matter. Afaik in an undead unit has enc above 0 he should fatigue as normal.

Triple blesses, while not ALL nations can use them are deadly for those who can. A f9w9s9 mictlan has cheap, fast, high defence units who can all take 1 hit with no damage, have good mr and are extremely deadly. A f9w9(e9/n4/s9/d9) vanheim/helheim has extremely tough, fast, deadly sacreds with glamour who are deadly and almost impossible to kill without magic. A w9e9n4(although most people wouldnt go so far) niefelheim has immensely tough sacred units(above average defence, good prot and regen) and can make AMAZING thugs/SCs with its jarls(they can buff, have full slots, great stats and that bless).

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Just watch the friendly fire.

It should be noted that some nations have units which are reasonably capable of both missile and melee combat; Late Era Man's Defenders are an example. Modify your deployment respectively.

Against humans, archer placement may take some care due to the possibility of flyers set to 'target archers'. If you can't shut down such fliers, you may wish to hold back forces to protect the archers.



*snip*

Depends on the nation and your recruitment habits. With Late Era Ermor or R'lyeh, this is unavoidable -- hordes of freespawns. If you're in the late game with a nation with strong summons or powerful + expensive + rare troops, you may be relying much less on moving troops around.


2xENC is still felt for casting purposes, so armor enc matters. They do not gain fatigue when attacking normally, but whatever fatigue they accumulate from other methods (casting, or certain fatigue-causing things like being hit with Magebane) still applies.


Expansion tends to be more important; hiring mages to run around searching is expensive in terms of maintenance, and opportunity cost (not researching, for instance, or not helping you take provinces while he's stopping to search).

By the way, all the magic paths except Holy have a remote-search spell requiring no more than level 3 in the relevant path. Astral has a rather expensive one which locates -all- magic sites, including holy, in the province that you pick (provided that you own it at casting time). Once you have a gem income that can sustain casting these spells, it should boost your efficiency as you don't need to have them spend half their time moving.

Usually not, unless it's the cheapest way to get something that you could really use. Forging booster items tends to be more efficient *if* you can forge them (some are hard; air, for instance, has no boosters available with just A3 if memory serves). Summons and other rituals may be more useful.

For instance, if you have easy access to Earth-1 mages, but not Earth-2 -- taking *one* to Earth 2 might be useful as he can now build Earth Boots which will bring him to Earth 3 (which allows the Dwarven Hammer, which in turn makes forging cheaper) and the other E1 mages to E2.

If you're looking to bootstrap the Death machine and have a done a lot of research, but all you have are D1 mages -- getting a D1 mage to D2 lets you get a Skull Staff for +1D; the resulting D2+1 can then summon a Mound Fiend which is D3 native; D3 + Skull Staff = D4 which lets him forge a +1D skull helmet for D5 total, which if memory serves is enough to forge the +D3 unique Sceptre for D7 net (has to lose the staff, so net +D2) which easily allows summoning D4-native Demiliches, or for that matter Tartarians. Yeah, it's bizarre and quite a bit of forging and research, but if you want Tartarians and you have are D1s... and it's cheaper than empowering all or even most of the way.


It might also be useful if you have a particularly bad-*** monster commander and would like him to be able to cast a useful buffing spell.

Depends on the availability of sacred troops, how large the map is, and so forth. If it's a monster game with several hundred provinces, for instance, and the sacred troops you have in mind are capital-only and have a resource cost, they might give you a decent head start during expansion, but by the late game the lousy scales you've taken to afford your blessings will be hurting your entire empire (unless you're minimizing your own dominion...) and you won't be cranking out that many sacreds.

Blessings do stack. Hence, the F9W9 combo -- the +4 attack and flaming weapons of F9 works well with +50% Quickness and +4 defense of W9.

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

nice, thanks.

Game just suddenly stopped saying "you have reached the end of the demo", so i'll just wait for delivery I guess. Got a bit of reading to catch up on http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Are the Dom2 forums useful? Or have there been enough changes since that a lot of it doesn't apply?

Re: Q: New to game, need advice - getting wrecked
 

Sunray's page
Arryn's page
Gandalf's and Nerfix's page

There you can read some stuff alright.

Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

Some of the strategy-affecting differences...

Dom 2:
- No Eras.
- Base Nation + Theme option; themes generally cost design points.
Most themeless nations resemble Middle Era D3 nations.
Themes may be similar to other eras.
A couple of themes have turned into global enchantments.
- You bought one fortress design with design points, and used it on all terrain; hence, one could go for 'mad castling' with a cheap fortress.
- And forts were cheaper, too.
- It was much easier to access all magical paths; randoms were either FAWE, SDNB, or FAWESDNB. Sages were common and had a FAWESDNB random. Spectres had two.
- Far fewer national spells.
- Half the income and supply of D3. Combine with cheaper forts and there's more emphasis on mages and SCs than large armies.
- Lifedrain weapons not restricted in how much they could drain...

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

Cool

Initially thought sea going races would suck.. but its kind of nice to be a bit more undisturbed.

Completely dif stats though I'm figuring. Ran up against the Ry'leh(sp?) and by the time i'd knocked them out of their keep others had conquered huge swaths of land with huge armies so I was way behind as i butted heads right off the bat (again!).

What's up with random map placement? Tried the Farthing map, 76 land 25 sea.. end up 3 provinces away from the only other sea nation. I was mid left, he was top left. Seems like every map i try there's an enemy within 3 or 4.

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

Like many commenting here, I'm very new to the game, having played it (fairly constantly) for only about a month, and only in SP. Here's my perspective:

Just Surviving: If you're just looking to play through a huge game to see what is possible and want to avoid losing at all costs, play LA Rl'yeh. They are the only nation of that era to start underwater, and if you aren't facing Atlantis then you have no serious competition for the oceans. You will likely be frustrated by micromanagement (which is compounded by insanity domain effects), esp. given your above comments, but this will give you a sense of the value of F1. Lessons you can learn from Rl'yeh: Clam-spamming (N enabled Slave Mage -> Contact Naiad -> Clam of Pearls), controlling hordes, shifting from recruited to summoned commanders to save cash, raiding, and later a great experimental lab through Wish.

Bless: I tend to play large, long games. In these, bless is generally less useful than in small games, since many nations (but by no means all of them) have capitol-only sacreds. Even so, bless approaches far cheaper than a triple 9 bless can still yield great dividends without totally wrecking your economy. For example, Mictlan can run F9N4E4B4D2 with an imprisoned Smoking Mirror and still have enough points to runs a strong chaos economy (Turmoil/Sloth/Luck/Growth 3 and their freebie Heat 1) and taking dominion 5. While their many sacred troops won't be quite as nasty as they can possibly be, they'll still hit with brutal power (+4 attack, +2 strength, flaming weapons), regenerate, and reinvigorate (great for their many sacred spellcasters, both recruited and summoned) while being able to catch a lot of lucky breaks, generate compound population interest, and groom smaller provinces for bloodhunting/ recuperate bloodhunting losses.

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

Thanks for the reply.

I think I'm starting to get a hang of the terminology, but just want to clarify some stuff.

chaos economy works? lots of events, trying for positives for gem and cash flow? seems counter-intuitive, but I'm assuming it works since i've seen it mentioned a bit.

Haven't noticed the mirror yet, but randomly: why do folks pick a non-moving god? Don't you lose a lot of potential that way? Are they generally cheaper or that much more protected?

I'll have lots to play with once the full version comes in, definitely looking forward to it.

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

Non moving gods are generally cheaper for what you get(better dom, good start magic, decent new path cost) and chaos economy is good partly because it can get you extra points(order3misfortune2 is 40 points more than turmoil3luck3. You should avoid misfortune3 due to some very bad events)

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

Well, above caveats about experience repeated:

Different races and map sizes require different layouts. I love Turmoil/Luck for Mictlan in part because a blood economy, even if located in your less affluent provinces, will still significantly cut into your income. The chaos economy provides opportunities for income for each province which are unrelated to taxation (200 gold pickups or mines /guilds worth +40 or 60/round are pretty common, with drops of 1000 and 3000 + magic items being more rare but happening maybe one round out of four). The extra gems are excellent for a nation which has access to so many different kinds of mages (blood/fire/nature/astral/water, national summons with death) and earth and fire can be alchemized for gold if need be. Given that your opponent doesn't benefit from the postive aspects of your scales (or so I've been told), turmoil/sloth/luck 3 is also pretty hostile environment to spread into enemy areas - little gold or resources and lots of random events without the positive spin makes invasion hazardous. Finally, Luck 3 + Improved Crossbreeding is one of my biggest joys in the game - it only takes a couple Basilisks, Chimera, or Dracolions to have me giggling on the floor.

I should also say that, while a 42% difference in income seems overwhelming and impossible to overcome, even with Order 3 misfortune 1 I've had some really nasty events (thief stealing a big chunk of magical gems I had been hording for empowerment, serious money losses, large exodus of population, etc). So you have to balance the guaranteed increase in gold income with the fact that you're likely to lose a chunk of it (and magical gems as well, which are often harder to come by) to misfortune.

Do they balance out? No clue. I've been told by people who seem to know what they are talking about that chaos is better in the long run/big maps and order better in the short run / small maps. Whether this is a side effect of the fact that chaos is often accompanied by growth (due to the fact that order 3 costs the same as turmoil/luck/growth 3) is unknown to me. You also gotta look at where you want to go with your nation - don't stint Yomi on gold, but EA/LA Mictlan / LA Ermor / LA Rl'yeh thrive in chaos. Between these two extremes there's a lot of guesswork.

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

I've tried it twice so far (been playing a big too much http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

First with Atlantis - had a terrible time with luck 3... still seemed to get hit with invasions/gold loss every time i turned around.

Just finished one (well premature ending of demo) as agartha, worked like a charm. 3 turmoil, 2 sloth, 1 growth, 3 luck, 2 heat with a mini-bless - 4F4A4W3A4D4G0B I think with the sage (37 research to start!). Just purchased the big sacreds and big mages... good quality, low quantity... and equipped my trogs, rushed up to blade wind and started rolling. Good map too, adventurien.. started on the top coast, about 4 from the nearest enemy.

edit: F4A3W4E4A4D4N4 with 3Turmoil, 3 sloth, 2 heat, 1 death, 3 luck

I'm curious what the "end of demo" is... when you take out your first enemy god/starting loc? 4 years? Sometimes it seems to end at the end of 3 years, some at the end of 4 years... but usually just as i have someone on the ropes or just decimated their country.

I haven't found much about Agartha, but with 3H3E 400g priests (divine blessing + blade wind) and big sacreds the bless thingy worked pretty well. Didn't bother jacking 9 in something as I was limited to 4th lvl spells anyway.

Fun, fun... seems i'll try the chaos bit out more, not a huge fan of focusing on bless - although i'm guessing it very much has to do with the race/nationals/capital limiteds.

I've found I like a combat pretender the best, big bull (good hp, trample, regen, lack of slots), dagon (big, trample, good slots) for atlantis, etc.. but it really sucks with no save function if they croak. More fun though http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Question: Site finding - water seems easy with voice of tiamat, is there an equivalent for surface? Seems wastful to cast 3 or 4 spells on one province, doesnt that take forever? I had a great finder (lots of 4's), but wanted him researching.. what's an efficient way to search?

Question: What are the different eras about? Stuck on early for now, do the units change? Do more units become available? Do funky things like prices/site types, etc change? Any rule changes between eras?

Also really wish there was a pdf version of the manual online http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

There's acashic record which searches for everything (unlike tiamat which is only elemental) but is cost inefficient for 25 astral unless you're already dominating. I believe certain land types have higher percentages of magic sites (wastelands, and starred provinces on certain maps) which might make them a useful target for akashic, but otherwise it's not a good idea.

In the current iteration of the game, you can have 1 spellcaster at a time doing monthly (SHIFT-M) search spells/spell and it will target okay - so 1 guy doing dark knowledge, 1 guy doing voice of apsu, etc. It tends to target newly acquired provinces 1st and will sometimes turn off for no reason or target capitals, but in general its a decent low management solution if you have low ranked mages of several stripes to spare.

There's no pdf manual to prevent piracy.

Bless is 100% nation specific, as are pretty much all strats in the game - you want strong non-capital only sacred troops, or absolutely amazing capital only sacred. Mictlan, one of my favorite nations, has good non-capital sacred troops and a ton of sacred unique summons. Playing them with the same scales you would play with Yomi is a roadmap for frustration.

While the nation names stay the same between eras (at least, for the most part, as there are some nations which are not present in all era), the units tend to change pretty dramatically from era to era. Agartha, for example, loses most of its Pale Ones as the eras progress and ends up a heavily armed and armored human nation with pretty strong death/fire/earth battlemages and some kickin' national summons. The most dramatic change award goes to Ermor, which starts out pseudo-roman with a little death and ends up 100% undead, with no national units able to be purchased with gold, the best magical income in the game to fuel a large variety of unique national summons, and a hostile domain which decimates population and reanimates freespawns everywhere it reaches. Mictlan changes a ton from Early to Mid (similar troops but losing its defining magical competency) and then goes back very similar to early in late.

Re: Some things similar, some have changed a lot
 

Awesome, didn't know about shift-M, it was such a hassle that i'd rarely search.

gah, so much to try! bloody post is taking forever, guess i should have sprung for the quick delivery

I'm almost tempted to get a cracked version just so i can finish a freakin game. Unfortunately the only cheats I use are no-cd cracks for convenience.

being limited to only 5 nations is good, eases you into the huge quantity.

btw, nilheim giants - SUCK! i guess i let him get to big, cuz once i was ready to rumble so was he, and he wiped me. Trample chariots - core of my army - completely useless http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Love it!