FfH Paring Questions

[Sareln]

perhaps tactical movement wise? Though with every recon unit getting the divided soul ability, they should be quite mobile now. In other news I finally got around to spamming the forum with some threads.

[darrelljs]

They have no early game advantage. That's why I think PHI is more important than faster wanes...wanes take forever, longer than golems even. And you have to give up an L6 unit? Ouch. They certainly could use something to boost the early game.

Darrell

[Bobchillingworth]

I guess suggestions for changes to the normal game still go here.



A few ideas for the Luchiurp-



First of all, their early power is way too expensive. Wood golems are good units, that's certainly true, but consider the following: Say you want to do a medium-sized attack / rush, around turn 100 and with about 8 wood golems, 2 enchantment adepts, and Barnaxus for at least the Empower I boost (assuming you're guaranteed to get 2 exp on him from Apprenticeship.


Even if you were to build all of that in only a single city, the costs are absolutely horrendous.

8 Wood Golem = 480 hammers

Barnaxus = 120 hammers

2 Adepts = 120 hammers

Sculptor's Studio = 60 hammers

Mage Guild = 80 hammers


Total: 860 hammers


For that price you could have 53 warriors, with a few hammers left over. Granted it's very difficult to pay for so many warriors, but that could easily translate to 25 swords instead, or 10 HA or Ritualists. In any of those scenarios, you'd have an unquestionably superior army than the WG force. Regular axes with bronze weapons aren't even that much worse at attacking cities, especially if the WG only have Empower I. WG should probably be reduced to 50 hammers for the Mod, at the very least 55.


Krill suggested to me an interesting idea in chat- allow level 4 Luchiurp warriors to found Sculptor's Studios. Maybe you could call the founding spell "retire" or something. I think that it would def. improve the Luchiurp but I worry that it might be too strong since Studios also give culture and a happy under nationhood (which you really need to be running pretty much all the time as them).


Barnaxus is massively overpriced. If he was too cheap he could be exploitable, constantly reviving him in the defense of a city, but that really only matters for very early rushes. He's a crappy city defender past the early game. Using him is a no-win scenario. If you build him early to take down barbs for those combat promotions, he's setting you back about the cost of a settler which would help you a whole lot more early on. If you want to rush somebody, he's the cost of two wood golems, who are much more useful if time of the essence. If you build him too late, when you can actually afford to throw 120 hammers on a unit who you can never risk in actual combat, then good luck getting enough exp on him for more than Empower II, unless you get another player to cheesily feed you scouts or whatever.


As Krill noted elsewhere, with the nerf to financial Philo is a much better trait for the Luchirup. Like, way better. Doesn't necessarily mean they have to have it, but it's worth pointing out.


One thing which I don't mind too much though are the Mud Golems. The first one takes forever to build, but I can easily produce them in two turns now in XI with what is a fairly average empire, and they're crazy efficient. Might be nice if they were 3 defense strength though- at present you'd still be mad to ever try defending in the open with them, and so you still have to retreat at the first sign of trouble. 3 defense would meant that they could at least keep mining of hill or chopping a forest if a goblin or scout appeared.

[Kuro]

And to throw my lot in for suggestions for the Luchiurp: What about a building like the Blasting Workshop/Pallens Engine/Adularia Chamber, but that instead gave a Mobility I promo? Golems are no longer slow.

[Ranamar]

And to throw my lot in for suggestions for the Luchiurp: What about a building like the Blasting Workshop/Pallens Engine/Adularia Chamber, but that instead gave a Mobility I promo? Golems are no longer slow.

You'd have to make it one of the Alteration manas of course, since the other sets all have it.

You start with enchantment mana, so that'd be kind of silly, IMO.

Body simultaneously makes the most sense and no sense at the same time.

Of course, power-wise, this is probably on par with a building that gives 5xp, I'd estimate, but the Blasting Chamber is, IMO, about as powerful.

[Bremen]

Body seems like it could work. Call it something like "Simulacrum Vita". Can't comment on it being overpowered or not, since I've never played Luchiurp.

[Krill]

I played a game as the Luichip the other night, and beside the AI settling in my face for my only food res and being in constant war from turn 20 with every civ in the game (and it wasn't AW!) these were the opinions I gained:

1. Mud Golems aren't as bad on quick as they are on normal (probably just individual bias on my part) but they do lose more time proprotionately moving onto hills and forests to road and improve, and from having to move away from barbs. But I can see how that gets put down to a quirk of the civ, but I don't see how making them 3 defence is really a bad thing, as it makes them credible rush defenders which is something the Luirchip need IMO.
   
   
   
2. After discussing with Bob exactly what the state of a Luirchip rush looks like, it's basically a complete no go. They are slow to expand to new city sites (no cheaper workers, settlers, and not BARB), FIN got nerfed into the ground so they can't tech well, to what they need (Construction, KotE), and everything they want to build comes at one tech, so they basically have nothing to do until Construction, then have to build everything in one go with no real options.
   
   
   
3. Wood Golems basically suck without repair adepts and an E5 Barny, to the extent that they cost significantly more than axes, they take longer to heal so you can fight less battles per number of turns, and they aren't strong enough to take down forted C1 warriors (without Bronze) in flat land cities without losing regularly. I don't think you can compare them to axes either because of all the downsides, they are just weaker as combat units because they aren't a huge threat in the early game if you have numbers with Apprenticeship and/or copper weapons, and part of the problem is Barny.
   
   
   
4. As cool and as fun as Barny can be to play with in SP, he is basically a lottery ticket in that you have to hope that there are a shit load of barb warriors and goblins in a small 5x5 or 7x7 square just outside your empire for you to farm. If there are a few barbs, but they are all around you empire, it doesn't help you because Barny is slow and can't kill all of them. If they are strong barbs (bears, scorpions) then you are going to take forever to heal to fight the next battle (and yeah, even one bit of bad look and it is back to the drawing board, as SL found out numerous times). I think Barny should stick around, but the benefits he gives to golems should not be solely along the empower line - without those promotions, golems are inferior to the units they replace.
   
   I agree with Bob that he is too expensive, and I do think he comes at the wrong part of the tech tree. I think he needs to be made cheaper (60 hammers), put at Mining or Masonry (BW is too far up, but you could make him need both techs) and he needs a a fail safe way to get to Empower 5. I dislike the Hero promotion, maybe he could be made an disciple unit and given Channeling 2 and 3 (or just one of them), but not given the divine promotion? That would mean he could get to 26XP. This would mean you can work on him earlier on in the game, when you aren't building studios or siege workshops, he isn't overpriced, and has a method to get to 26XP without you getting screwed over by barbs. Also, he might be S5, but he wouldn't be getting copper weapons for a while.
   
   
   
5. Philo is just better than FIN - I know Bob said that he thought moving the hammers to 1 city was exploitative, but that's the only good usage of that world spell. I think it should be re-coded so that you can drop the hammers in 1 city without having to delete the unit. In my game I managed to bulb my way to IW after triggering the WS with 2 cities...then I realised that I had to kill 2 civs before I could even get iron. I basically can't figure out a single decent usage of that world spell that doesn't involve bulbing, and that's after you find out that you're screwed on resources.
   
   
   
6. Warriors forcing Sculptors studios. This was basically just an idea to lessen the cost of a rush. Warriors are worthless to the Luirchip because if you get any good ones, they can't be upgraded, so you keep them around as MP in backline cities, and you actively don't use them for barb farming because you want to get as much XP onto Barny. This at least gives you a reason to barb farm (it's not like you ever want to build FotT, is it?) I don't think it's going to be absolutely huge, because getting a warrior to 10XP isn't impossible for the first few, but it's not like you can force SC into every city, and Construction comes late enough that it's not like it's the third tech on the path. I think it might be possible to code it so that a warrior only adds X amount of hammers to a sculptors studio though, if you were worried about it being over powering, but tbh at 20 hammers more than a monument...I think it'd be OK.
   
   
   
7. I still think that there needs to be a way to get Golems to 2MP, and I suppose getting Spell Extension on Barny putting mobility onto the golems is out of the question?

That said, I don't think Golems are over powered once they get rolling - they are hard countered by summons, they won't even get XP...can you imagine a Luirchip v Balseraph battle? An unstoppable force meeting an immovable object?

[Krill]

Also, Feral Bond does nothing in game - it either should have some content given to it or deleted from the tech tree, and the beaker cost folded into something else.

Almost the same story for Mithril Weapons. 6K beakers for the chance to build the Mithril Golem?

[Sareln]

Also, Feral Bond does nothing in game - it either should have some content given to it or deleted from the tech tree, and the beaker cost folded into something else.

Almost the same story for Mithril Weapons. 6K beakers for the chance to build the Mithril Golem?

Feral bond is where Rangers normally are. Animal Mastery has Beast Masters and Baron.

Mithril Weapons is rather bleak right now, it's true.

[Krill]

Ah. Dwarves can't build rangers, right? That would be why it looks blank in my game.