Early Game, Mid Game, and End Game... What's the goal of each?

[PhilD]

Originally posted by Spacepain:

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Originally posted by Norfleet:
Like in life, the objective of Dominions II is to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women.

Sounds like somebody has been playing TOO much dom2...

Well, the tricky part is one can only be beaten by the easy AI so many time before one is slightly discouraged... I've taken an estudious approach to becoming rather good at many other game and been met with considerable success, so why not apply that to this game? Whilst, I certainly don't plan on becoming a pro by being simply book smart, I do hope to figure out the general outline behind a "good way" to play dom2.

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Learn which independent provinces you can take easily and early. These are not the same for all nations. After a few games (preferably with the same nation), you should be able to take the first provinces with very few losses.

Hint: Barbarians hit pretty hard, but they have little protection; they're perfect targets for archer nations, but will inevitably cause losses to melee troops (even with good protection). Knights and Longbowmen are tempting as they're good to recruit, but they're hard to kill early; avoid them until you can swamp them quickly.

What constitutes the early/mid/end game will depend a LOT on the map size and number of AIs. With large maps or few AIs, you'll probably have to fight a single AI instead of a multi-war; what this will look like will depend a lot on which nation this is (although AIs tend to not use their national forces enough, with the exception of Dead Ermor).

Try to build Fortresses. If you're like me, you're not building enough. Yes, they're expensive, but for most nations, your national troops should be most of what you buy, so this means building fortresses. Don't build them next to each other, still, as this gets counter-productive.

Oh, and send scouts around. Even if you hear that the AI is predictable. Shield your armies and borders with scouts; that way, you'll know if an enemy army is likely to reinforce the province you're planning on attacking, and you'll see the enemy moving to attack you.