[EitB LVIII] Und wenn sie nicht gestorben sind - Xist Fairy Tales

[Qgqqqqq]

Ah whoops, forgot the WS nerf! Seems a bit hard tbh...

Yeah, I've no idea what improvements you've made, was just musing about economies.

[xist10]

In T54, I immediately switch to God King with Anarchy - and now also to Apprenticeship.
Barbarian battles are slowly increasing. Thanks to AGG, I win the first fights and with Combat2 or even 3, the rest are no problem either.

Nubia prepares a settler for the corn spot, a settler from Prespur goes to the coast for the horse.
The coastal city is too early right now.

Research goes to Code of Law. It's on the way to vampires and my 2nd UB is unlocked - as are the courthouses.




My scout has made contact with Bing in the east - the border is still visible.
Otherwise, another barb battle has been survived and I'm just trying to get the scout home.
There are too many animals here for me to heal and upgrading the scout to a hunter seems to be a good idea.




Unfortunately, a bear ate both warriors at the corn spot just as the settler was finishing.
No matter, there are 2 city guards in Nubia and I can settle in a short time.




With 7 cities, I am broke in T69 and research goes to cartography after all.

Research still exists somewhat thanks to the Elder Councils (+2 ).
PHI helps enormously here, as I can only build them (quickly) with PHI.

Otherwise I would have spread out here too quickly.

The scout also came home safe and sound.




In T71 I invest the in the upgrade to a hunter.

[xist10]

My finances recover with the first National Wonder.
The wonder gives beer (+1 ) and +30% for Prespur.




Two turns later, the hunter also has his first hunting success.
With the Animal Taming promotion, defeated animals are taken over.
Most animals are “usable”, i.e. not just additional troops.

The scorpion here has the Nature2 spell, effectively +1 for my hunter.




Here you can see my 2nd UB in effect.
+1 , but +10 .




I then change my civics again. City states reduce the city maintenance by a lot.




My current costs for city maintenance fall by 50%.
However, this is mostly negated by the lost bonus from God King. - I have not enough cities.

In the end, a positive exchange, but not as good as hoped.

The courthouses I started are also all cancelled, with 2 upkeep it's no longer worth it.

[xist10]

With colonisation I also unlocked the option to swap maps.
DaveV was found as my western neighbour thanks to San'taron.
Too bad, I had hoped to have a coast there.
"Only" 5 cities, but bigger ones.
But I currently have 9 more. - 43 for me, 34 for DaveV.

But I'm behind in terms of technology.




coldrain also has 7 cities and more than me.
49 for coldrain.




6 cities for Bing and 42 .


In terms of resources, the whole thing is relatively balanced so far. In terms of other terrain points, I feel to be a bit behind ?
I do feel Bing and coldrain have better terrain without jungle.

Auroarcher didn't want to swap cards with me, Brian is still unknown to me.




In T80 I lose a worker to a spider in this area and forget about it.
Furthermore, the 3rd religion is founded and Brian finishes the 1st project.
3 Priests of the White Hand for Brian.




2 turns later, coldrain builds Barnaxus and destroys it on purpose.
I don't know why, but Barnaxus can be rebuilt immediately.
And coldrain conquers a barb city.

I have finished Bronze Working, can finally tackle the jungle blocking my expedition to the north and have access to another 5 units.

[xist10]

I do think this should be know to most people here, but I still can write about it.

Armageddon

A concept to make the endgame in FFH2 a bit more exciting, there are some actions that increase the Armageddon counter.
Demolish cities, for example. Conversely, you can also lower the Armageddon counter again.
This is more or less the only benefit of the Life1 spell. - Okay, Life1 is the only way to combat hell terrain.

The maximum Armageddon counter depends on the map, but the percentage is displayed directly - on which all consequences also depend.

There are 2-4 things you have to consider when using the Armageddon counter.

1 "hell terrain" - there is an "evil" variant for grassland, desert and plain.
Initially no difference to the original, there is a combat bonus for demons on hell terrain.
What's special about Hell terrain? Many resources are transformed. This is actually rather positive at first.
The new resources are actually of equal value and there are new bonuses.

It only becomes difficult when all resource deposits are transformed, as 2-3 normal resources only become 1 hell resource.

Hell terrain expands automatically, but the Armageddon counter limits its expansion.
As long as no player follows the Ashen Veil, Hellterrain should not be a problem.
With massive use of Life1 adepts I think it is possible to remove Hellterrain completely.

However, the mean thing is that hell terrain is not displayed for tundra, ice and water (as well as mountains), but this tiles still "transform" and can be a source of expansion.

2. there are a number of events that occur once and are linked to the Armageddon counter.
The first event was shown in the last post.
At 10% there is a warning - and I think the barbarian hero Orthos.
Orthos is disabled by default in the PBEM.

Later events spawn the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse - all strong units, the weakest of the 4 horsemen has 24 .
There are also strong effects on living units in addition to the appearance of the horsemen.

The apocalypse occurs at 100%. The in all cities is halved and every living unit has a 50% chance of being killed.

3. there are a few units (and projects) that require a high Armageddon counter to build.
This also indirectly includes the Sheiam, whose "UU" cannot be built directly and appear more frequently with a higher Armageddon counter.

4. the higher the Armageddon counter, the greater the relationship mali between different alignments.

So who is interested in increasing the Armageddon counter?
2 groups.
Firstly, the Sheiam, whose (endgame) unit production is partly dependent on the Armageddon counter.

Otherwise civs that use a large number of non-living units. Extra points if these are demons. - this category doesn't include the Sheaim by default.
These are above all the Infernals under Hyborem.

The next civs are followers of the Ashen Veil or the Octopus Overlords, who have demons as religious units.

Interestingly, this also applies to Hyborem's opponent, Basium with the Mercurians. The Angels are just as immune.

Furthermore, the Lurchirp, whose golems are immune to the worst effects of the Armageddon counter, also have a certain interest in increasing the Armageddon counter.

However, it will be a while before they reach 30% and the first relevant event.

[xist10]

Besides the city conquest of coldrain, I forgot to show that I haven't learnt anything and lose a 2nd worker to the spider here.
But this time I have a hunter ready and take over the spider.




In the meantime, I've also received a GS, which I use for Knowledge of the Ether.
I'm not sure if that was the best use, but I do want to have a few adepts ready to use Burning blood with my Moroi and maybe build a few mana nodes later.


And now the jump to the current status.




The capital is due to train a few adepts soon. I also want to breed another GS here.
Otherwise you can currently see 3 tamed animals here.
The scorpion can reinforce my explorers - which is also one of the reasons why nature is rather weak as a palace mana, by the way. You can get the only useful spell from a (rare) animal.
Wolf and Spider are currently not "usable", I would need certain techs.




Nubia is training troops.
I need a few more settlers, but for now I need a few Moroi.




Acai prepares for the vampires.
, , . 15 and then directly 4 promotions for the vampire ?




Morr'ta'nar was possibly a mistake.
I'm still missing fishing, plus in the swamp and jungle ?
Growing slowly and needed a few techs at the time of the founding.




Adonis is in a slightly better position.
Unfortunately no river nearby and only 2 plainscows.
Should grow to 8 and work 2 more mines.
There is also no way to bring farms with irrigation spread here.




San'ta'ron at least has a grassland corn.
Irrigation spread won't be easy here either, but at least there's the option.
Even if I then have to farm the marble.
But the tech for the quarry and irrigation spread is still missing.




Pavu'nar was also a mistake.
I found the city under false assumptions.
In contrast to BtS, the 2 resources do not give .
One tile further south and the option of river farms and the city would be good.
The lower 3 tile are currently being modernised, the CE was 2 turns ago.
This city will be better.




Krinera was founded a few turns ago.
Just like Morr'ta'nar in the jungle, but this time only founded when I could chop it.
Caught a religion from Auro somewhat surprisingly.




Itos was also founded recently.
Also a jungle city, I'm bordering Bing here.
Let's see how that situation develops.




Last turn, Nininsnal, a barbarian city between me and DaveV, was conquered.
Save the settlers, I also wanted to found a city here for the cotton.




A 2nd barbarian city in the north is being eyed.
I'm happy to take this city with the tomb, but with the 2 units next to the 2 archers it's more heavily guarded than Nininsnal.




In the south-west I now actually farm the bear den.
+1 and +3 I'm happy to use it..




With the conquest, I also have my first level 6 unit. I could built the Titan (or what was the wonder name ?), If I research the tech.
I want to use it to tame the elephant at Itos next and then use this unit in the Tomb city.




Demo is no good outside of .
My cities are too small.
I blame a lot on the terrain.
I had few usable rivers before expensive bronze working, which was needed to made the jungle usable.
And I had bad terrain to create a network of farms using irrigation spread.
Grassland is also a bit rare in general.




The weak value is also reflected in the research.
I'm currently going for trade - via riding.
Pretechs for vampires, but also +1 in all cities.

Otherwise I'm thinking about the Great Menagerie.
This requires 5 animal cages.
I have 3 animals ready - including the rare gorilla.
I hope to get tigers in the barb city. - Otherwise a quick raid on Auroarcher ?
A lion could still be roaming the wilderness in the east.




The spider would need animal handling to become useful.




After Trade comes Feudalism and finally Vampires. But it still takes almost 50 turns ?




In terms of magic, I want to add Necromancy in the medium term.
My hero is on the Religious Path with Fanaticism and therefore quite far away.
I haven't progressed at all on the Religious Path, which also prevents me from adopting a religion.
I can't use any of the advantages, so I remain without a religion.

[RefSteel]

Good luck with your plans going forward - I hope the terrain isn't too great an obstacle (i.e. that it at least isn't hopelessly bad) - regardless of your position now, I suspect there's a lot that can still happen in a six-player game with a map of this size!

(I'll note as far as I know, the appearance of Orthus (and Acheron the Red Dragon) don't depend on the Armageddon Counter; in fact, they should appear even if the option to turn the AC off entirely is selected. That doesn't matter in this game though, as you noted: Both of them have been turned off anyway!)

[xist10]

The game is just a bit boring for me.
I sneak up to feudalism and are slowly building my military.




Auro is apparently also interested in Barbstadt.




I move my elite hunter north to have a chance to crack the city.
Still, 70% are not that good.
Otherwise Auro has withdrawn from here ?




I also have the first adept.
With loyalty I can give my Moroi another 20% without any problems. - I would also have to test how exactly the interaction is.
Do both spell overwrite themselves ?




So I should be able to raise the chances of my "standard" Moroi to 50% for here with Burning Blood.




And there is another Barbstadt in the south.

[Jabah]

yes the 2 'spells' should cancel each other (i would cast loyauty after, just in case)

[xist10]

The question was more, if I can cast burning blood again if I have a loyal moroi.