[SPOILERS] Bobchillingworth is: Falamarrr- Sailor of the Swishy Seas

[Bobchillingworth]

Hell yeah, it’s time to kick bubblegum and chew ass as FFH’s resident Mary-Sue / Captain Jack Sparrow [strike]ripoff[/strike] homage , the Prancing Pirate, the Mincing Marauder, Falamar!



Really I think this picture about sums it up:

[Bobchillingworth]

Yeah, I’m going to kill everyone in a conquest victory. No peace for baby oil, so says Falamar. Cry “Havoc!” and let slip the Poodles of War. But I’ll get to that in a little bit! First I want to break with tradition and begin not with a description of my own civ, but my opponents. Now, by this point I think everyone is familiar with most of the FFH Civs, so I won’t go into much depth about them- you can find plenty of detailed descriptions of their UU and UB and unique mechanics elsewhere. Instead I'll share a few words about why I think their particular leaders have remained solidly in the dregs pile for eight PBEMs running, followed by a brief analysis of each of my esteemed opponents themselves.


Going by turn order, first up is Ichabod playing Alexis (Agg / Philo) of the sinister Calabim!





It’s fairly easy to see why Alexis has yet to be chosen- the alternative leaders for her civ are simply so much better. Flauros is the top dog of course, due to the incredible synergy from both of his traits with the vamps, but I think that even Decius is on-face obviously superior, with vamps & specters benefiting so much from Raiders. In comparison Alexis has Aggressive, always a solid trait, but then is stuck with Philo, which is a poor trait for her for a couple reasons. First, the Calabim don’t get elder councils, so she’s missing half her discounts from it. Second, Philo encourages you to work a lot of specialists- but the critical Feeding mechanic compels you to then eat them, mitigating much of the benefit. She’s not a bad leader by any means, but she’s best used in an unrestricted leaders game, leading someone like the Sheaim or Grigori.


So, what is she good at? Well, Calabim being the utter powerhouse that they are, she’s still perfectly deadly simply wielding vamps, even though Aggressive doesn’t matter as much for super-exp units, and having to pay full price on Manors sucks. But Alexis does shine with one unit which the other two leaders often ignore or under-utilitize- the Moroi. With Decius or Flauros they’re essentially just normal axes with an ability which makes them significantly better in a pinch, at the cost of likely losing the unit (eventually). Great for urgent empire defenses, not so great for carrying out an offensive due to the hammer investment required (as well as the tech diversion away from the critical artistofarms -> trade path needed to deploy them timely). But under Alexis they’re outright deadly as attacking units. Buring blood + free combat I + shock or cover with the exp from apprenticeship makes them seriously dangerous units, and Alexis can afford to stray from the vampire tech path for a bit due to Philo-fueled bulbs helping her catch up. Actually, she almost doesn’t need to ever even get to vampires, since Aggressive Moroi + ritualists form a deadly combo well into the late mid-game, especially if you can get Iron from the Mines or elsewhere.


Danger rating: Early game: **** Mid-game: ***** Late-game: ****


In all, I think she’s the most dangerous leader present in this game by a very wide margin.



As for the player,

[strike]Ichibound[/strike] [strike]Ichabund[/strike] [strike]Itchybrand[/strike] [strike]Echidnabond[/strike] Ichabod:


Not much to say here, I haven’t played with him before but I think that he knows his stuff. Will likely be one of the most dangerous opponents in this game, and probably starting favorite to win.



Next is Ellimist playing Charadon (Agg / Barb) of the wild Doviello!





Haha, does anyone really need an explanation for why Charadon utterly blows? He’s almost universally considered to be the weakest leader in the game. His most glaring flaw is that he barely even has one trait. Aggressive is good & well, but Barbarian is a very situational trait and Charadon is rarely in the situation where he needs, or even wants, it. Barbarian means that he can rush away without having to worry about getting his capital sacked by barbs. Except… that’s not much of a benefit. First of all, he’s playing against humans, so the real risk of losing your undefended capital doesn’t come from roving Orks but rather other players who don’t give a crap about your trait. Second, warriors (or in this case Beastmen) are already cheap, and with aggressive he really only needs one or at most two to be safe from most roving early barbarians anyway. In return he’s addled with a permanent -10% research penalty, the inability to pop lairs or capture barbarian cities, and no easy source for grinding exp. Sure he can fix those last couple of issues by declaring on them, but then he’s burdened with the research malus and doesn’t even have any sort of compensation for it.

His civ doesn’t help at all either, of course. The Doviello upgrade mechanics and no-prereq building UU are nice, but they’re just absolutely dead in the water when it comes to tech and the Doviello list of toys drops off rather alarmingly after the late-early / early-mid game, and doesn’t come back until well past the point where this match should be over. It doesn’t help that Battlemasters, the Doviello Champion replacement, are randomly and appallingly substantially worse than the units they replace.


So what option is left for our poor zombie barbarian beast-man Santa? Charadon simply lives and, more often than not, dies by the rush. You have the briefest glimmer of an advantage over your opponents in the early game, and you’d better exploit the hell out of it if you want to have even a prayer of lasting once your competitors get their econs going. With double land from an early conquest and an emphasis on religious units, the Doviello can remain competitive with the other players. He’s pretty doomed otherwise though, unless Mardoc gives him disgustingly fertile territory or something, and then screws over everyone else.


Danger rating: Early game: ***** Mid-game: *** Late-game: **


Starting next to him is the worst- if he can’t kill you outright, he’ll do his damnedest to at least cripple you. Once defenses are up to resist a T1 / T2 melee + worldspell wolves rush though he’s a lot less threatening.



As for the player,

Ellimist:


Again, another player which I know almost nothing about. Looks like this is going to be his first FFH PBEM game at RB, but I assume he has experience with the mod at least from SP. Did a quick post search, and all of his relating to FFH are either as a dedilurker for a thread I can’t read due to my own dedilurker status, or a single one he made in my PBEM V thread telling me that it was a good read. So he’s an unknown, but at least he has good taste



Our next contender is Sareln playing Arturus (Org / Ind / Ing) of the sturdy Khazad!





Probably the second-worst leader of the five after Charadon, Arturus is like Alexis in that he’s overshadowed by his civ’s alternative leader, but different in that he’s not even a good leader on his own. He’s simply inferior in almost every way to Kandros. The Khazad need lots of gold for their vaults; Kandros has that covered with Financial, Arturus gestures feebly at his cheaper civics and courthouses to universal cries of derision. The Khazad rely heavily on armies of power but slow-moving melee-line units; Kandros gives then a critical boost via Aggressive; Arturus murmurs something about “Command Posts” before ungracefully keeling over from terminal impotency.

His traits hardly even make any sense for his civ. Organized helps with rapid expansion, but that runs afoul of the (very) restrictive Khazad vaults mechanic. You could ignore the vaults of course, but then why are you even playing as them? Industrious helps him build all of those fantastic wonders which the Khazad get almost no use out of. Ride of the Nine Kings? Sure, you’ll have the most elite Boar Riders in town. Catacomb Librallus? Yeah, that’ll really help you pump out those adepts you can never upgrade. He gets the Mines and maybe the Bone Palace more quickly, and that’s about it.


What is he good at? Strangely, he’s a fantastic leader for the Tower of Mastery or the Altar, with him getting the maximum possible construction bonuses for either of them with Industrious, full Vaults, and maxed Dwarven Smithies, but good luck getting the nodes for the former or prophets for the latter. In the end, I think he’s best played by giving him up as a lost cause and simply trying to get to Basium as quickly as possible so that you can play a real leader. His presence was why I’m so confident that the angels will be making an appearance here- I know that I’d rush for them if I was Arturus, anyway. Oh, and he’s difficult to rush due to his palace giving an innate city defense bonus, so I guess there’s that too at least.


Danger rating: Early game: ** Mid-game: *** Late game: ***


He’s not particularly impressive in the early game. Early & later mid-game he can pull off a rather nasty but slow assault with Copper or Iron melee-line units and treb siege support, backed by enchantment adepts. Easily countered by Assassins, though. Has a couple neat toys in the end-game (Dwarven Shadows! Dwarven Druids! Hornguard!), but good luck getting to that point.



As for the player,

Sareln:


My buddy! I guess it’s not secret that I get along petty well with Sareln. He’s mostly honest and pretty good at FFH in general, although he tends to emphasize commerce to the occasional detriment of things like expanding or building workers. It’s mandatory at this point to note that he has terrible luck, having been rushed in no fewer than three games at RB now, plus another attempted rush in a private game he’s a part of with me. I dearly hope that he gets rushed here, too =)



The final player is Mist, in charge of Amelanchier (Rai / Def / Dex) of the smug Ljosfar!





I’m actually not quite certain why Amelanchier hasn’t been picked yet. I think he was my third choice leader for FFH PBEM I and my second for FFH PBEM V. I suppose that this is yet another case of a leader simply being overshadowed by their fellow civ-mates. Thessa helps make up for the Ljo’s inability to use siege engines by getting Air II mages more quickly, and Expansive pairs well with the Ljo’s forest-boosted production. Arendal is probably the overall best Ljo leader, with Spiritual allowing quick access to ritualists and other goodies, and creative saving you some precious early hammers and allowing greater freedom with city placements. In comparison with the two lovely ladies of the Ljo, Amelanchier sort of feels like he’s missing a third (well, technically fourth) trait. He actually has okay synergy with Defender, since he can use the discount to produce Dextrous archers more quickly, but it’s still the weakest trait in the game by a long margin. Raiders is excellent, but the Ljo aren’t really built to exploit it as well as most of the other civs with a Raiders leader.


What can he do? The Ljo would honestly be a good civ even with a completely trait-less leader, so he can still benefit from the always-welcome Elven economy. As the nominal war leader for the Ljo, Alemanchier can pull off a decent early rush with archers, his hero, and possibly some Priests of the Leaves if he’s got a great commerce start. Later he has the option of Frydwell stacks, which do well with exploiting Raiders. Taking heavily-defended later game cities is a serious obstacle for him though, due to having few quick or handy options for collateral damage. He’s very difficult to rush, at least.



Danger rating: Early game: **** Mid-game: *** Late game: ***


Early game has the risk of an archery rush, nothing to sneer at. Mid-game bring stacks of his HA UU and Priests of the Leaves, but also requires him to either take a diversion to the Veil or an even longer one to the Empyrean or slowly build up some mages if he wants to get decent odds vs. entrenched city defenders. Late game sees some neat toys like Flurries and Iron-wielding LB, but many of those are expensive units from expensive techs.



As for the player,

Mist:


Mist has certainly seemed confident in his abilities in past games, but he has also made some questionable decisions. His rush against the Luchiurp in FFH PBEM II did nothing but take them both out of contention, an outcome he was constantly warned about but apparently failed to seriously consider. I think he knows his stuff though when it comes down to it, so he’s just as dangerous as the rest.

[Bobchillingworth]

Alright, now for the good stuff






I’d be remiss if I didn’t briefly first address why Falamar hasn’t been picked for a game yet. Debates have gone on about whether he’s truly worse than Hannah, but I personally don’t see how anyone could seriously argue otherwise. Hannah has financial, the best trait in the game, which has absolutely wonderful synergy with those coastal tiles the Lanun love, and honestly need, to work. Raiders gives her an actual edge in combat, and allows her to make use of Lanun HA as a dangerous attacking force.

Falamar in contrast has Expansive, which gives him some health and a hefty settler production bonus, and Charismatic for +1 happy and quicker promos. They aren’t bad traits necessarily, but they just aren’t right for the Lanun. Falamar would be a fantastic Calabim or Sidar leader, but as the Lanun his trait bonuses are largely wasted. Settlers don’t produce any more quickly with Expansive when your best tiles are all coastal. Charismatic is best paired with special units who can make use of it, or the Arcane or Spiritual traits, or Org for exploiting the Command Post bonus exp, but Falamar can’t do any of that. His increased health / happy caps are nice, but surely the far more immediate benefit of financial outweighs them. In the end, he’s yet another leader who is okay on their own but is best reserved for unrestricted leaders games.



I won’t talk too much about the Lanun as a civ- they are presently being used already in FFH PBEMs II, III, and VI, so head to one (or better yet, all three) of those for a lurk if you want to read all about their various goodies. As my thread title & introduction should make clear, I am less than thrilled about Falamar’s survivability. The Lanun are going to be by far the softest target in a game full of confirmed or potential rushers. No early archery hero or cheap defenses. No trait to help with early combat. No extra city defense from the palace. He has the advantage that, assuming I have coast in reach, I’m going to build a great many warriors before I bother with a worker due to being able to live off my Pirate Ports and sea resources for a while. So I’ve got no excuse to not have early rush defenses up. But he’s in real trouble should someone come calling early, with force. Or come calling late, or really any time. Such are the perils of having a terrible T3 melee UU and T4 mounted UU, and vanilla grunts everywhere else. But I said earlier that I’m going to win by conquest, right? Well, see, I’m not too worried about the rushers because I have a Plan.




What’s the plan?


I’m going to ask them to kill me.


After I’ve summoned Hyborem, of course


Yes, unless my start firmly plants me in the most isolated, safe corner of the Land of Milk and Honey and Seafood Resources, I have already decided that playing as Falamar in this environment is an entirely untenable proposition. Everyone knows that I’m the easy civ to kill, and I’m going to be stuck with that appellation for the fair majority of the game, bar someone else getting crippled or something. So my plan is to beeline Hyborem. Along the way, if (when) I discover that I’ve got a rusher living near me, and it’s clear that they want to kill me, I’ll propose a deal for them. Let me live, indeed protect me, until I can reach Hyborem. Let me pump out an army of weak savants for you to slaughter. And then, once I’m ready to make the switch, I’ll promise to leave my civ wide open for destruction, as long as they kill as many Veil units as they can while taking it. Sorry in advance Ravus, I know that you wanted to play Hyborem, but unless someone else manages to beat me to the Pact you’re going to get the sold-out shell of the Lanun instead. This was my plan from the beginning if I got Falamar when Mardoc randomly assigned leaders, and it’s why I voted to only allow the AI to take over for him or the civ that gets left behind.



I’ll have more to say about Hyborem himself once the game actually starts and I get closer to day of The Great Bait & Switch. Suffice it so say that I intend to kill everyone with him

[Commodore]

I am...disappoint. :-( The dregs game was supposed to showcase the unloved. You're not even planning on giving poor Anime Boy Pirate a fair shake?

[Nicolae Carpathia]

No one agrees with me that Falamar can compete with Hannah Maybe it's because all the starts I've ever rolled with him were hammer heavy, and I'm not well versed in all the cool little toys unique to different civs in FFH.

[Bobchillingworth]

I am...disappoint. :-( The dregs game was supposed to showcase the unloved. You're not even planning on giving poor Anime Boy Pirate a fair shake?

Sorry, bud. In a game where I'm going to be investing months of my own time, if I have to choose between being an "educational" resource and playing to win I'm going to go with the latter every time. I simply do not believe that Falamar can win against the likes of the Calabim or Ljo, and I think that my odds of surviving dedicated early-game rushes without a "suicide pact" involving Hyborem are about none.


Of course my start could be totally ideal, and in that situation as I said earlier I might indeed consider just sticking with Falamar. But if you want to see the Lanun in action, except all-around better, see one of the other FFH PBEM games :P


But hey, I'll have to stick with the guy for a while anyway just to get to the point of summoning Hyborem! And then maybe Ravus can show you allll about what Falamar can really do And to be fair, Hyborem hasn't really gotten a fair shake in any game here yet either, having always been summoned when the game is in an advanced stage and the map is rapidly running out of free land.

[Selrahc]

You should be nice and leave the Lanun in a somewhat playable state, in case whoever takes over actually wants to show off Falamar.

[Bobchillingworth]

Eh, maybe. Kind of hard to make a case for rushers though that they should leave me alone in the short term if they're going to have to plough through a top-shape Lanun empire once I abandon it rather than one populated entirely by un-promoted savants or whatever. I could of course outright lie to them and leave them with a tough fight on their hands, but then I'm just going to be a different kind of jerk


Anyway without even having played a single turn yet this is all merely academic. Who knows, I might even end up sticking with Falamar through choice or by necessity. But because he lacks any sort of exploitable combat advantage outside of Charismatic benefiting spellcasters and having faster boats, and because this game is quite obviously destined to end via bloodbath given the leaders / civs involved, trying to actually win this match as him seems like an exercise in masochism. Besides, I'm never going to use the actual Lanun military no matter what happens in this game. Boarding Parties, War Tortoises, haha never. If I'm not Hyborem, my military is going to be ratha and maybe Veil stuff, and we've seen all that before. So like I said earlier, if you want a game which is actually about the Lanun doing Lanun stuff, this ain't it

[Mardoc]

Your start:

[Nicolae Carpathia]

That's some nice land, good for Lanun thanks to the windy coast and good for others because of how green it is. Main problem is it's pretty production starved, I don't see any 1/2 tiles to help get our workboats out faster. There's room for a cove in the northern lake, and room for another cove in northeast lake (though it may be tricky getting a workboat up there).

I think SIP, going fishing > crafting > mining is a decent idea. What say you bob?