Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

In this past turn, I just got 200 gold from a trade boom, 1000 gold from a good tax collection, and 200 gold from a prospector. I did lose 80 gold and 3% of my population to hailstorms. Still, I get lots of lucky events and the unlucky ones (barbarian attacks) aren't too bad, even on the rare occasions when something bad happens in my capital on turn 2 or 3. So Misfortune-3 feels like free points.

-Max

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

The last time I played Misf3, at one point I lost 3 provinces in 2 turns to barbarian/knight attacks. My economy was already in bad shape (I can't figure out why :p), and losing a couple of temples really did me no kinds of good.

Some of my builds go Misf2, but even that can be a bit of a hassle, if you have crappy PD.

Wish I had your luck with Misfortune. :p

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Gold is just contemptible metal, but when you need to cast some important spells or equip someone with gems and items, and your lab burns — it's much worse than any gold you can have even from luck3.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Actually, the Luck/Misfortune scale is the one I tend to pay the most attention to depending on nation.

MA Ermor, for example, would seem like it would have problems with Misfortune, since you pretty much need a temple and lab with every fort for it to be useful, but I am usually happy to set Misfortune-3 on MA Ermor. The reason being, the most common bad events are population killers and attacks by independants; MA Ermor's PD is good enough to stop barbarians with 10 and has a reasonable chance of stopping knights with 14 and while gold is very handy stuff you'll usually have magic to fall back on by the end of the first year. Losing labs is certainly a problem, but you generally lay down more labs and temples than other nations, so losing one or two in a turn has less chance of crippling you, after the first year.

Yes, misfortune is a gamble, but it's not as clear as people make it out to be. High Misfortune and high Luck both call for strategic considerations on the part of the player to adapt their playstyle to the situation. Always taking Misfortune 3 is a common preference, but doing so makes you more vulnerable to players ready to exploit it, since you're probably putting less thought into how Misfortune changes your tactics.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Augh, I'd never take mist-3 for the simple reason I want an even minuscule chance of getting a hero :p But I often end up with Misf-2, often with the results JimMorrison said above :D

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Yep, I used mis-3 in almost every games to pay for order-3. More gold = better expansion, more mages in the long term. But recently I have somewhat changed my mind.

More provinces/more mages/more incomes also makes you like a common threat to others while luck+turmoil gives you more gems to diversify your magic.

Another fact: the barbarians attack will kill your population even if they are right defeated when they appear. Each attack seems to cause a population decrease of 15%.

Now I must consider it again before sleeping with mis3.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

The thing about misfortune, in my mind, is it's a constant push towards toppling you over. As long as you're on solid footing the bad events are easy enough to push back, but once you are in an earnest fight that steady push makes it a lot harder to keep your feet. Barbarian attacks aren't too bad when you can quickly retake the province, but they become a huge problem when all your troops are committed to fighting a war and you keep losing provinces you can't retake right now - just when you need them the most. A lab burning down is a moderate annoyance, until it happens when you needed forgings/rituals cast from there to support the war and now you're not only out the support, you're out the research, plus the gold for the new lab (which might very well be a huge portion of your available gold for the turn if your upkeep is high). And of course, it's all fun and games until something really bad happens to your capital early on.

Conversely, in a stalemated war several of the good events can get you the momentum to tip the balance. A couple thousand gold, an extra castle, a national hero, or a bunch of gems can be huge depending on the situation. Yes, obviously some of these can happen even with misfortune scales, but, well you could also have more income by taking turmoil scales and lucking into a bunch of high population provinces around your capital, or take sloth and hope you're surrounded by mountains.

To be sure, misfortune can be a viable choice, but it's far from free points in my mind.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Yay, I agree. Just had the proof of that in one of my recent MP games... Took Misf-2 with EA Agartha without really thinking.
The necessity of big, slow armies on the fronts (experimental strategy) and the poor PD made the rest. 4 barbarian attacks (one to the capitol, putting it on siege and stopping the recruitment for one turn) and the capitol lab burning, all in 2 crucial turns. My enemy was doing well, but I had still nice hopes (he was sending out far more units than me but I had won all the major battles till the moment). I could just go AI.
Definitively not free points, something to consider with attention.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Can only agree with Baalz.
And, as Lokean already said, it's a thing your strategy must take into account. Some nations can be just fine with Misfortune - generally it means they have strong & expensive troops, plus their national mages cover most of what's needed. If you need to diversify, though, Luck/Turmoil build is probably better. The same goes for strong national heroes. Probably cheap but high resources-intensive troops, too.
A question to MaxWilson - what nations you are playing most?

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

I have to say that I've been leaning much more towards the luck side of things lately.

Of course this must be nation specific, so I've been looking at nations where turmoil doesn't create too much of a hassle.

The scale I seem to always be looking at for free points is sloth. Hell I even take it with Niefel, though I don't think that's really such a good idea since if you don't get decent provinces around your cap you will seriously regret the choice when you can only pump out 2 Giants a turn (with a jarl of course). Then again, one can consider that as just another way of taking misfortune without actually taking it...

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Why I take Misf3 - it takes the sting out of Baleful Star. :doh:

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Keep in mind that luck does not affect ALL events. Events are tied into many things and luck can be part of an equation for that event, or not. If an event is tied ONLY to your magic scales, or terrain, or dominion strength then luck wont affect it whether its good or bad.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Order3 Misf2 is the most common choice for a reason. Misf3 can get a bit risky, as it unlocks some not cool events. But some nations with good early game can go with it.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Just to avoid confusion:
Luck scale does affect the chance of getting a good event or a bad event.

After the karma of the event has been determined, Misfortune won't prevent (most) good events from happening and Luck won't prevent (most) bad events from happening, just like Growth can bring immigrants or cause an Ancient Presence to destroy a province and kill most of its population, just as Death can cause a rich prince to die (and you to get his money) or cause a plague.

Furthermore, there are multiple versions of some events. I understand that out of the two otherwise identical plague events, one is Rare and has no scale requirements, other is Common and requires high Death scale. I hope that some of the better events are more common with high Luck.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

While I appreciate the long-term advantages of Order 3 / Misf 2 and have used it in a number of games, the main issue I have with Misf is it can be devastating right out of the gates. Events like lab burning down, temple destruction, or losing a chunk of capital population mean it is a gamble that can really slow you down or even wipe you out in the early game. It seems like a huge gamble with your nation that you might not take if you were a real-life leader in a true struggle for survival, but one that players in MP take all the time since they can just start over in another MP game if the one they are in goes poorly.

The flipside of the coin (most likely if you take Luck scales) is having a huge income event early on can be a positive game changer since you can build a new fort immediately, which can snowball into a nice lead in expansion and research. In CB games, I have found Order and Luck to be a viable and potent combination. While they do not synergize as well, the combination of steady income, with bonus income/gems/heroes is nice. Obviously its point intensive and involves some big tradeoffs.

One thing I think I have confirmed though is I will never play Turmoil/Luck again, even as Pan. Sucks to be poor.

Oh, and one other thing learned from KM, high luck can be useful to have a source of income not dependent on provinces. When you get mass surprise raided and have to hole up in forts, luck income can keep you going. Or when a world-breaker starts spamming armageddon, wiping out population, or utterdark, luck income is suddenly quite helpful to buy you time to deal with the offenders.

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

My current flavor is MA Ashdod. Other favorites are are LA Agartha, EA C'tis, EA Ermor, the old version of Helheim (pre-Svartalf nerf), and EA Marverni. (You can see that I'm strongly attracted to recruitable-anywhere mages, especially with Death magic.) MA Shinuyama would have been next but I'm not bored with Ashdod yet.

-Max

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Ironic addendum: this turn, random events included two knight attacks... on the same province.

-Max

Re: Why I Always Take Misfortune-3
 

Nevertheless, now your point of view gets quite understandable... ;)