MP Game - Newbie Game (by Aku) - Page 13

PashaDawg · #**121** July 31st, 2004, 06:50 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by The Panther:
So, what does everyone think? Should I try to eliminate him or not? I still have plenty of neutrals to take so I have lots to do if even I do not attack his capital. Since he lost his god, I probably have about an 80% chance to kill him. The chance of losing is a big risk for me, though.

Show mercy... why take a big risk? This could give you an opportunity to expand in the other direction safely.

Pickles · #**122** July 31st, 2004, 07:00 PM

"The chance of losing is a big risk for me, though."

I would say it is about no risk of you losing but you may be able to expand slightly faster against neutrals and it may take longer than you expect.

"Show mercy... "

It is supposed to be a newb game & you will both learn more by not fighting (each other now).

Pickles

Aku · #**123** July 31st, 2004, 07:50 PM

Also part of mp is about diplomacy. It is up to alexi and panther to negotiate war or peace.

In the other mp we are doing I got into a war early like around 10 or so and it took me over 25 turns to finally win. Even if you have a superior army a lot of ping ponging of provinces can happen if both armies never meet. Also spies are important because that is the only way to know what your enemy has and their troop movements. Alexi lost his god and may be weak but also may not be. It can result in two things, alexi dies fast, or doesnt die fast like you expect and you guys get locked in a long war. But that is part of mp and up to you panther to make that decision.

Lex · #**124** July 31st, 2004, 09:30 PM

"You know I'm just tryin to yank your chain."

i know.. and i'm just playin along

"Alexi lost his god and may be weak but also may not be."

well, i'll be honest, i didn't have much experience with Vans before starting this game. But I've since discovered a bunch of successful strategies in SP for Vans, and with those the painful realization that my current scales+pretender made an extremely poor combination. I don't expect to survive long without my pretender's magic since i was relying on Blade Winds and Thunder Strike early on, and then after turn 10 it was Destruction+Blade Winds. This allowed me to take out most independents with very few troops + my pretender, which was required since all my gold went towards buying mages for research to get those spells. (which also means I don't have priests to call my god back..)

The reason why my scales where wrong for this early game strategy is because I took Sloth3, which makes it really tough to recruit armies. Vanheim has terrific troops, and ignoring them was stupid of me when I built my pretender. Their mages are good, but useless in battle until mid game or later. Plus I took the Midgard theme, which limits my troop selection to Skin Shifters and Einhere (which are both excellent in combat) but without high resources, I can't recruit them fast enough to build armies. Plus, with that theme you lose access to the best Van commanders outside your capital. So I would have been crippled by mid game anyways without the capacity to make armies and I would have had to use mostly Galdermans, which require equipment or alot of luck to get the right magics. I'd be interested in hearing about any other strategies for Midguard. My intuition is that Midguard is all about killer Skin Shifters+Einhere armies supported by a few Galdermans.

With this in mind, Panther is welcome try to take me, but my grieving nation is not gonna go down without a fight.

The Panther · #**125** July 31st, 2004, 09:40 PM

Alexi, I decided to not attack you for the following reasons:

1. Even if you have practically no troops right now, you can recruit some in this turn and next.
2. You could likely bump up the PD maybe to 30 since your upkeep is low right now.
3. Even though I could easily be seiging your capital in two turns, I have no idea how long it will take to bust down the walls, especially with no seige specialists in my army.
4. I will be fighting in your domain, thus reducing my pretender's HP and my troops morale.
5. The arrows from the towers have a nasty habit of moving down slow, armored infantry, which I have in my army right now.
6. I could take several neutral provinces in the time it would take to siege and take the fortress.
7. R'lyeh could sneak onto shore near me if I am too far away from my own capital.
8. Your Vanheim capital will be a buffer from attacks, and I will not have to worry about being attacked from your direction for quite a while.

So, adding it all up means I will be playing it safe for now.

Cheers, and here's hoping you recover quickly, alexi.

The Panther

Aku · #**126** July 31st, 2004, 09:49 PM

Also with early battles it is small armies so you couldnt just overwhelm his troops so you would be suffering casualties. Also it would be disastrous if he was building his castle walls faster than you could take it down. Would of been an interesting war but you made a lot of interesting points to not war. I did something similar against Abysia(nation I had early war with). He attacked my capital but did not suspect me to have moved their with troops on move then patrol so he got my army and my pd all at once. Also I had started putting spies in all his provinces and then worked my way back taking over his land until I got to his capital.

Lex · #**127** July 31st, 2004, 10:04 PM

"Cheers, and here's hoping you recover quickly, alexi."

thanks!

Edit: i just thought of some useful ways of using the units available to the Midgard theme even with low resources and no pretender... necessity is the mother of invention right? maybe playing handicapped isn't so bad after all

[ July 31, 2004, 21:18: Message edited by: alexi ]

Aku · #**128** July 31st, 2004, 10:25 PM

Well one thing you will learn to play better at least. Like for me the early war for me helped me learn a lot. SP is way different than MP and there is still a lot to learn because players are so different than the AI. Like against the AI I could predict what province they would attack but I kept failing to predict Abysia's movement paths. But back to what I was saying is that under bad conditions you are going to think more and make the best of your situation so when things are under good conditions you will be much better.

Boron · #**129** August 1st, 2004, 01:07 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by alexi:
well, i'll be honest, i didn't have much experience with Vans before starting this game. But I've since discovered a bunch of successful strategies in SP for Vans, and with those the painful realization that my current scales+pretender made an extremely poor combination. I don't expect to survive long without my pretender's magic since i was relying on Blade Winds and Thunder Strike early on, and then after turn 10 it was Destruction+Blade Winds. This allowed me to take out most independents with very few troops + my pretender, which was required since all my gold went towards buying mages for research to get those spells. (which also means I don't have priests to call my god back..)

The reason why my scales where wrong for this early game strategy is because I took Sloth3, which makes it really tough to recruit armies. Vanheim has terrific troops, and ignoring them was stupid of me when I built my pretender. Their mages are good, but useless in battle until mid game or later. Plus I took the Midgard theme, which limits my troop selection to Skin Shifters and Einhere (which are both excellent in combat) but without high resources, I can't recruit them fast enough to build armies. Plus, with that theme you lose access to the best Van commanders outside your capital. So I would have been crippled by mid game anyways without the capacity to make armies and I would have had to use mostly Galdermans, which require equipment or alot of luck to get the right magics. I'd be interested in hearing about any other strategies for Midguard. My intuition is that Midguard is all about killer Skin Shifters+Einhere armies supported by a few Galdermans.

With this in mind, Panther is welcome try to take me, but my grieving nation is not gonna go down without a fight.

hm i have not much xp with vanheim but started a pbem (currently at turn 2 ) game where i play standard vanheim .

i see nothing that speaks against sloth 3 . your most expensive unit only costs 20 resources , a van only 16 and a skin shifter only 7 .

i think a f9 bless van + skin shifter army is really scary early - midgame .

vanheim has ihmo damn good national troops at least top 5 .

i myself like the "normal no theme vanheim" best though . no need to worry about supplies even against ermor because of the fay swines

and blessed valkieries + vans are great

Lex · #**130** August 1st, 2004, 02:02 AM

yeah.. i figured standard vanheim was better. and sloth3 prevents you from building a bunch of 20 unit squads of skin shifters within a few turns.

but today i started playing around with the Midguard theme, and it kicks ***!! much better then standard theme. Cos in midguard you get cheaper researchers with astral2. This didn't strike me as more usefull then the other magic unit which has A2 and 2random. But imagine the sight of a squad of 25-30 skinshifters that are all ethereal and lucky, making them almost impossible to hit, and if you do hit them, they go into beast form and regenerate!! And then you have 6-10 Stellar Cascades stunning your entire army so that even your best units are unconscious, just waiting for my impossible-to-hit-regenerating-beasts to rip them to shreds.. its extremely effective.

All that WITHOUT a pretender! No bless, no rainbow, no supercombatant.

Anyways, I'm sure you could adapt this strategy for any race that has cheap S2 mages. And it would be even more powerfull with sacred units and a F9 or W9 bless.