[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by OmikronWarrior

I agree with most of this in theory, but in practice I still insist that misfortune (up to 2) is the cheapest place to pick up additional pretender points, especially if growth (or at least not death) and Order is taken. Turmoil+Death+Misfortune looks ugly pretty fast.

I've gotten lousy events in the first couple turns far too often to think taking misfortune is an 'easy' way to pick up points. I would far rather take temperature scales (where the effects are predictable), or drain scales (again, predictable - assumes nation can handle it) than misfortune scales in most cases. There are nations where death scales make more sense than misfortune. Every time I take misfortune I'm carefully weighing the likelihood of effectively losing the game before i even make contact with anyone else, and the amount of distraction independents attacking me will cause. For someone quibbling about 5% income below, you're awful cavalier about the possibility of suffering things like a 50+% income loss on turn 2 or 3. Ever had your fortress sieged by 100 barbarians turn 2? I have. (Thank god it was SP - i could quit right away).

I find myself rarely having the points for Growth scales, and taking order and growth to offset misfortune 2 is not a way to gain points - better off just taking less growth or order.

Don't get me wrong, there are times misfortune is the right choice. But those times are far from commonplace in my experience.

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This is completely wrong from my play experience. The math works out fine, but I don't think for a second seasonal shifts in the temp scale come close to being in effect "half the time." If you're like me, you probably have a dozen SP games floating around. Check any of them (which have reasonably sized empires with a good Dom spread). How many provinces deviate from the base temp scales? Not many, and those that do are most likely to be on the fringes or only recently fell under your dominion.

Though the mechanics of seasonal temp shifts are unknown to me, I believe they work like this. During certain seasons (summer and winter, obviously, but maybe fall and spring), provinces have a CHANCE to change temps in a certain direction. This chance is not certain, and I don't think even independent provinces under no dom will change temps with any regularity. Now, even those that do change, are now subject to shifts based on your dominion, the same shifts that change Order, luck, and magic. That drastically cuts down the effect of season on temperature. Meaning "half the time" is more like 1/6 the time.

Actually, i've watched my capitol temperature fluctuate up and down. Its a pretty regular occurrence.

Also, new provinces are another area where temperature extremes don't hurt as much. For some period of time you'll have incomplete scales in a province, especially far from your capitol, even in the presence of, say, your prophet or you pretender. Having played a game recently where temperature of contested provinces mattered a lot (Noobs vs. Vets, where I took Cold 3 as Shinuyama because it seemed the most likely to hurt the plausible nearby vets - and had Ashdod as my adjacent vet - so i was watching province temperature anywhere near Ashdod), I can tell you that even with my prophet right there I never saw a cold 3 border province (~5+ territories from my capitol) until the front had moved well past that point, with provinces near or on the border varying between 0-2 cold. And I had a Dom 9 pretender, so poor Dominion rating certainly wasn't an issue.

As I understand it, dominion spread doesn't guarantee scale spread, it just carries the possibility of spreading *a* scale, meaning the spreading of any given scale will be somewhat random. Larger maps relative to number of players will have more territories controlled by players far from their capitols, and thus less influenced for long periods of time by their scales.

Double check that again. Death and Sloth give you a 2% deduction outright, though pop loss might make temp losses more attractive in the long run, I don't think thats where you're going.

Like everyone else except apparently yourself participating in this thread, I'm assuming CBM. Do non-CBM games even happen? I haven't seen one start since I've started playing, so discussing non-CBM is *pointless*.

Let me provide a counter example. Take a nation that prefers Heat-1. Buy Heat-3. Congratulations, you just cost your nation 10% of its capital income for the critical expansion phase. No chance of that going down until winter, and the game starts in summer. Buy the time winter hits, your capital is likely to have a high dominion score, giving you a much reduced chance of going to Heat-2 for any extended length of time. Border provinces also suffer.

I'll admit, this sort of thinking does depend on the nation having a high dominion score, but since we are talking about the Virtue I'd say thats a safe assumption.

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I'd still take Heat 3. Even assuming you take the full penalty the first half of the year, the design points are usually more worthwhile than 5% of your cash.

And yes, 5% is the relevant metric because your heat 1 is going to go up to 2 by summer at the latest. Heat 3 is 40 free design points for that 'critical expansion' phase, because it can't go any higher than Heat 3.

Finally, Heat 3 is insurance against cold dominion spread against you, keeping your provinces comfortable for your units (who are resistant to the effects of heat, but not cold). The more heat you have, the more buffered you are - because every successful spreading of cold dominion into yours will reduce the heat by 1.