YARG2 , 24 players EA RAND game [7/24 players left]

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by PriestyMan

i'm really hoping that you are joking here

(1) CBM cavalry for them is amazing
(2) TS rush/spam is trivially accomplished.

The only weak thing about them is infantry, and no one compels you to hire them. They have incredible research tempo out of the gates, which should give them an early research lead *without* an awake pretender. Combine that with some of the better mages in LA and if you can't turn that into something awesome then you're just bad.

[don_Pablo]

Eden was won by AdmiralZhao with EA Agartha.
And he left competitors far behind almost at the very beginning of the game, if my memory serves me right.

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by don_Pablo

Eden was won by AdmiralZhao with EA Agartha.
And he left competitors far behind almost at the very beginning of the game, if my memory serves me right.

Ok, there are like 2 notable players in that game beside Admiral Zhao, so basically he beat up on n00bs and bad players. Go him. Admiral Zhao is a top notch player, and Baalz has also handicapped himself with Pangaea.

I'll also note that said game is not a RAND game, which makes a huge difference for weaker nations. Its pretty obvious from the thread that he was making ample use of diplomacy as well, since he apparently had NAPs with most of his neighbors.

The rich settings may also make Agartha more viable, but I'm not sure.

Basically, you can't point to that game as an example of anything, much less a RAND game.

[TheConway]

Bogarus has an amazing early game? First I've heard, from ANYONE.

[WingedDog]

What's wrong with EA Agartha? I'm not joking or mocking, I just never played them and I'm not much into theory.

Squirrelloid
You could really provide us your AAR, Caelum and C'tis already did. I doubt your story would affect the game at this stage. I wonder what was your build and what you were planning to do in the game.

WraithLord
My vote is for difficult research in further YARG games. I play the second game and I really enjoy this setting.

[WraithLord]

Yes Squirrelloid, you could share your build + AAR with us and we could do a theoretic exercise in seeing if it could have been better optimized for this game.
Also, what is "TS" for Bogarus.
I disagree that they have amazing early game. They have good research yes and nice cavalry but an early rush from a bless nation can kill Bogarus. I'm not just being theoretic here, I'm talking from personal experience both as Bogarus player and neighbor to Bogarus. In a RAND type game I wouldn't recommend taking it w/o awake SC pretender - well unless you have a death wish that is.

WingedDog, I feel the same. I'm glad you like the settings. So far we have:
Hard research: 2
Normal research: 1

Another advantage of this settings is that it helps push further in the direction that CBM is leading: i.e. get more mileage out of earlier spells/items/summons.
Did previous YARG game end with tartrians all over the place?- Lo and behold - It certainly did not! and that with an earlier CBM. The more I think about this the more I like the setting.

[WraithLord]

Yes Squirrelloid, you could share your build + AAR with us and we could do a theoretic exercise in seeing if it could have been better optimized for this game.
Also, what is "TS" for Bogarus.
Edit, Oh Thunderstrike - it's nice but if that's your one trick pony then a good opponent will make you pay dearly.

I disagree that they have amazing early game. They have good research yes and nice cavalry but an early rush from a bless nation can kill Bogarus. I'm not just being theoretic here, I'm talking from personal experience both as Bogarus player and neighbor to Bogarus. In a RAND type game I wouldn't recommend taking it w/o awake SC pretender - well unless you have a death wish that is.

WingedDog, I feel the same. I'm glad you like the settings. So far we have:
Hard research: 2
Normal research: 1

Another advantage of this settings is that it helps push further in the direction that CBM is leading: i.e. get more mileage out of earlier spells/items/summons.
Did previous YARG game end with tartrians all over the place?- Lo and behold - It certainly did not! and that with an earlier CBM. The more I think about this the more I like the setting.

[Calahan]

Originally Posted by WraithLord

Did previous YARG game end with tartrians all over the place?- Lo and behold - It certainly did not! and that with an earlier CBM.

Just a quickie to say that IIRC, YARG1 was originally going to be CBM, but was then changed to vanilla during sign-ups for Ano, as he wouldn't play if it was CBM. I found this switch a little annoying personally, and this was compounded when Ano left the game just a dozen turns in, while marking his goodbye by inadvertently (due to llamaserver logs) revealing both his nation (unavoidable after he posted to say he was leaving) and also stupidly naming the player who was replacing him at the same time. Which gave everyone else the one thing they should never have in a RAND game, which is a confirmed matching nation+player ID for an active nation.

General FYI - Subs in RAND games on the llamaserver MUST remain anonymous from everyone but the admin, and anyone wishing to leave a llamaserver RAND game must do so only through the admin, and must certainly never post in the thread about leaving the game. (although as long as players don't know who is replacing those subbing-out, they only get one piece of the player+nation ID. But even that is one piece too many IMO)

Maybe this is obvious in hindsight, but Ano is certainly an intelligent enough person (from what I know of him) to not need telling any of this. This was my first ever game with Ano, after hearing many good things, but must say it didn't leave he with a good impression of him at all.


Anyway, enough mini-ranting. Despite my poor showing in this game (poor by my own standards), and my struggle in YARG1, I still think hard research is a good setting for this game. Only thing I might suggest is that for YARG 3 it could be worth using Burns's mod that reduces the research level of some useful early spells, which he made to assist weak nation survive early rushes in games with hard/v.hard research settings.

Not sure this mod has ever been used in a MP game yet (or at least none that I know of), but in theory giving weak nations quicker access to essential survival spells should be a good thing. I know my demise against Hinnom in this game might have gone differently had I been able to research certain spells while I still had a feasible position to back them up with. But as it was the spells only arrived in time to help defend by capital, rather than any realistic chance of turning the war around. (although in my case, other factors played a bigger part than the research level, but the hard research setting was a factor none-the-less)

[WingedDog]

WraithLord
I don't know, my personal choice for Bogarus is a great sage. With early research boost and proper magic schools they can deflect any rush, or even rush someone themselves. Then total arcane domination in the midgame, as noone even close to their research level.

[WraithLord]

Originally Posted by WingedDog

WraithLord
I don't know, my personal choice for Bogarus is a great sage. With early research boost and proper magic schools they can deflect any rush, or even rush someone themselves. Then total arcane domination in the midgame, as noone even close to their research level.

Sounds good in theory. When preparing for first YARG I had tested a similar build but, as you well know , opted for awake Wyrm. I'm really interested in concrete evidence how this great sage build for Bogarus works in MP games. As it stands I'm a bit wary of it.