Losing is Fun: Kandros Fir Dwarf Fortress [Khazad Spoiler Thread]

[Ichabod]

Oh, they definitely are. I couldn't wait for the conclusion to your cliffhanger!

And I'm still looking forward to see if/how you can deal with the Infernals.

Thanks, Mardoc.

Like I've said in the update, I'll make a post about the infernals later. I'm not very confident, though... My civ is definetely not made to defeat them and the map is perfect for them...



But, let's move on, anyway. The thread title is still the motto. And I can't say the dwarfs aren't evolving: better to be killed by powerful demons then by carps and elephants. We are masters of the elephants now! :

P.S.: I can't wait to read your thread in this game. It seems that you are the only one who kept a well updated thread and it'll probably be very amusing!

[Ravus Sol]

Well it certainly seems to be end-game territory for you. I heartily encourage grabbing the CoE religion you seem to need some late game goodies and that could be one of them. I will wait until I see your thoughts on "where to go from here" before commenting on anything else.

[Ichabod]

[SIZE="3"]Chronicle of a Death Foretold or Why I'll lose this game to the Infernals![/SIZE]

*sigh*

Yeah, I don't want to sound too pessimistic, but there's no way for me to beat the Infernals in this game. It was and still is a fun ride, but the end is nigh. "Why?" you ask. Well, let's see:

1. This map is perfect for the Infernals - That was my biggest mistake in this game. The one who made winning impossible. Well, to be fair, that was nothing much I could do apart from trying to compete with Selrahc to Corruption of Spirit (not likely that I'd have beaten the Lanun in such a direct beeline). But it makes me angry that I didn't see it coming... I was part naive and part dumb in believing Selrahc about the CoE beeline.

This map lacks food and lacks resources. This map made the tech rate very slow. What does this means? It means that the map is perfect for the infernals. They don't need food, nor resources and they can be very powerful with a straight beeline for Corruption of Spirit -> Infernal Pact and the one who will happen soon and will own me -> Malevolent Designs.

Yeah, people, Selrahc is most likely beelining Fanaticism planning on building the Infernal Grimoire to get Malevolent Designs. He already have priesthood, so he's very near Fanaticism. Malevolent Designs is one of the stupid big techs with almost no prerequisites that we have in the FfH tech tree. And it's perfect for the situation.

In the meantime, Selrahc is building 8 strenght diseased corpses that are promptly healed by Ritualists. They get the Iron from the Infernal palace and become powerful, cheap units. I, on the other hand, am very far from Iron Working, a very expensive tech that requires Smelting, another expensive tech. Then I'll be able to field soldiers of the exact same strenght as the diseased corpses, but that cost more hammers and need a training yard to build. Yeah, I need to tech way more things to get the same deal out of it...

Selrahc also has a very mobile form of Collateral, in the form of Ritualists. My collateral (trebs) is more expensive, way more slow and requires attacking to be effective.

So, right now we have a battle of Hyborem, Rosier, 8 strenght units and mobile collateral vs. Bambur, 5 strenght units and trebs. Pretty obvious who's going to win, huh? No? So consider the fact that Selrahc stack will be complemented by Eidolons (strenght 15) and Beasts of Agares (strenght 16) in a couple of turns.

It's frustrating to see how powerful the AV religion is. It beats the poor RoK (going for RoK was my second biggest mistake in this game) in pretty much everything.

The only thing holding up Selrahc before the inevitable attack against me is the time he needs to finish Malevolent Designs. My only hope is that the Lanun AI finishes it first, but I doubt they will...


I had to change civics to aristocracy and agrarianism to give me some economic power. I desperately need Iron Working, to have a minimal fighting chance. But I owned my production to do it, meaning I won't be able to keep churning out an army. Besides, I'll have to waste a lot of hammers on the Blight preparation project. There's almost no health resources in this map (cows, sheep, wheat, deer, reagents - that's it! - there's fish and crabs in the water, but why would I build a city there, it's just an iceball...) and food is very scarce... I'm considering cash rushing Herbalists in my cities, just so you can see how desperate I am about this... And it still won't do me much good...

Meanwhile, Selrahc sits at a big production power, with no fear of Blight... The big army of non-diseased corpses is coming to get me...


But... the game is not completely lost yet. I have some ideas and tricks that I can use. But the situation is very difficult. Seriously, I can't even be sure that I'm going to be able to kill Hyborem, since he has that damn feature of causing fear in the units...

Ok, I feel slightly more reliefed now after this rant. Now is time to start thinking about how to overcome these difficulties.

[Ravus Sol]

[SIZE="3"]Chronicle of a Death Foretold or Why I'll lose this game to the Infernals![/SIZE]

*sigh*

Yeah, I don't want to sound too pessimistic, but there's no way for me to beat the Infernals in this game. It was and still is a fun ride, but the end is nigh. "Why?" you ask. Well, let's see:

1. This map is perfect for the Infernals - That was my biggest mistake in this game. The one who made winning impossible. Well, to be fair, that was nothing much I could do apart from trying to compete with Selrahc to Corruption of Spirit (not likely that I'd have beaten the Lanun in such a direct beeline). But it makes me angry that I didn't see it coming... I was part naive and part dumb in believing Selrahc about the CoE beeline.

This map lacks food and lacks resources. This map made the tech rate very slow. What does this means? It means that the map is perfect for the infernals. They don't need food, nor resources and they can be very powerful with a straight beeline for Corruption of Spirit -> Infernal Pact and the one who will happen soon and will own me -> Malevolent Designs.

Yeah, people, Selrahc is most likely beelining Fanaticism planning on building the Infernal Grimoire to get Malevolent Designs. He already have priesthood, so he's very near Fanaticism. Malevolent Designs is one of the stupid big techs with almost no prerequisites that we have in the FfH tech tree. And it's perfect for the situation.

In the meantime, Selrahc is building 8 strenght diseased corpses that are promptly healed by Ritualists. They get the Iron from the Infernal palace and become powerful, cheap units. I, on the other hand, am very far from Iron Working, a very expensive tech that requires Smelting, another expensive tech. Then I'll be able to field soldiers of the exact same strenght as the diseased corpses, but that cost more hammers and need a training yard to build. Yeah, I need to tech way more things to get the same deal out of it...

Selrahc also has a very mobile form of Collateral, in the form of Ritualists. My collateral (trebs) is more expensive, way more slow and requires attacking to be effective.

So, right now we have a battle of Hyborem, Rosier, 8 strenght units and mobile collateral vs. Bambur, 5 strenght units and trebs. Pretty obvious who's going to win, huh? No? So consider the fact that Selrahc stack will be complemented by Eidolons (strenght 15) and Beasts of Agares (strenght 16) in a couple of turns.

It's frustrating to see how powerful the AV religion is. It beats the poor RoK (going for RoK was my second biggest mistake in this game) in pretty much everything.

The only thing holding up Selrahc before the inevitable attack against me is the time he needs to finish Malevolent Designs. My only hope is that the Lanun AI finishes it first, but I doubt they will...


I had to change civics to aristocracy and agrarianism to give me some economic power. I desperately need Iron Working, to have a minimal fighting chance. But I owned my production to do it, meaning I won't be able to keep churning out an army. Besides, I'll have to waste a lot of hammers on the Blight preparation project. There's almost no health resources in this map (cows, sheep, wheat, deer, reagents - that's it! - there's fish and crabs in the water, but why would I build a city there, it's just an iceball...) and food is very scarce... I'm considering cash rushing Herbalists in my cities, just so you can see how desperate I am about this... And it still won't do me much good...

Meanwhile, Selrahc sits at a big production power, with no fear of Blight... The big army of non-diseased corpses is coming to get me...


But... the game is not completely lost yet. I have some ideas and tricks that I can use. But the situation is very difficult. Seriously, I can't even be sure that I'm going to be able to kill Hyborem, since he has that damn feature of causing fear in the units...

Ok, I feel slightly more reliefed now after this rant. Now is time to start thinking about how to overcome these difficulties.

You arn't even mentioning the burning sands that will spread across the world from AC25 onwards. But yeah this map is tailor made for a Demon Ascension.

CoE will be a goodie to help. On defence. Not so much on attack. Can you win on defence? Do you have any exit strategies? Domination might be your best bet. Demons arn't made for expansion. If you have CoE on the defence as well you could try to grab enough land to win without fighting. But on a map as barren as this you could wreck your economy.

Now might be the time to hit up the Elohim for an alliance but i'm not sure on your history with them. Maybe a subtle hint warning them about possible infernal aggression?

If you shut down all teching what eventual bonus would you gain from the vaults?

How long do assassins take? You allready have hunting after all. Assassins can be very good on the CoE defence...

Perhaps the Nine mercenary wonder? That trades in gold for units? Has that been built anywhere?

The Infernals might have more teching power and better toys but you might be able to spam more units if necessary.

[Ichabod]

Blight will hit at the end of the turn, so I'll wait to update to show the damage done.

[Ichabod]

Blight will hit at the end of the turn, so I'll wait to update to show the damage done.

Sorry about losing my head in this comment. I've been pretty stressed in the last couple fo days due to work and life things in general and I tend to let it out on games and things like that.

[Ichabod]

just read in teh EitB bug thread that Reagents require KotE to count as a resource in base FfH... Damn, I didn't know that! I'll need to tech KotE really quick (I think I can get it in two turns) to get a boost against blight. At least when they are online, I'll get 2 health in my most important cities...

Still waiting to see the blight consequences. I think I'll be able to get a crab trade with the Lanun AI. I'm probably looking at losing some population in my core cities, though...

[Mardoc]

just read in teh EitB bug thread that Reagents require KotE to count as a resource in base FfH... Damn, I didn't know that! I'll need to tech KotE really quick (I think I can get it in two turns) to get a boost against blight. At least when they are online, I'll get 2 health in my most important cities...

I'm pretty sure that reagents aren't a health resource, they're a strategic one.

[Mist]

They give +1 health with a herbalist, but yeah, on their own, they don't give any boost.

[Mardoc]

You'll kill me soon enough!

Is this your true expectation right now? How are things in boatmurdered?