Strategy discussion

[Kenjister]

Ahh, normal speed... that would give a nice boost to the defenders too. I usually stick with the default epic since I'm more of the conquer by historical priority guy.

With the new addition of Unstoppable for free, I think it's actually becoming quite viable to promote cavalry down the flanking line... what are you guy's thoughts on this. A flanking promoted Ma Teng legion for example can kill the tough defenders with easy since you essentially get 2-3:1 odds. On the other hand, the legion's strength it usually in the actual unit's promotions, especially in late game, making the flanking legion much weaker when you aren't attacking strongpoints with a large stack of defenders.

 

[davidlallen]

Noble difficulty, 51x51 map, normal speed (not epic). I was attracted by Gongsun Zan's special ability, mounted units ignore city defense. I always hate building/transporting stacks of cats or trebs. I started the game without reading more. Ack! Yuan Shao shows up with 6 swordsmen, 6 cats and other stuff! Fail. Restart. Fail. I decided to approach the start position like a wargame puzzle, and found a solution. The key is to delay until you can get a pasture and a third swift rider in your capitol.

I actually gifted the small western city to Liu Bei, hoping he would be friendly enough to declare war on YS and divert his attention. This wouldn't have worked anyway because he's too far south. But this made YS focus on my middle city with 150 defense, and he bombarded it for a number of turns. Just before he attacked, I flank attacked with the three midlevel swift riders. I had built a couple of crossbowmen and stacked all the archers there, so I could then sally out and kill the stack.

The swift riders weren't badly damaged and they leveled, so I took the offensive. Most of YS's nearby cities had 1-2 archers, and a legion swift rider can take a city archer without too much trouble. So I quickly had all but two of YS's cities by about turn 30. This is already a kind of victory, I think, to survive the initial attack.

Phase 2 was to build an economy. As you can imagine my economy was poor since this region is mostly plains. Build workers, switch to Confucianism for the +50% improvement build speed, and keep turning out crossbows and eventually elite archers to protect all these cities. I had the two homeland cities building swift riders and my main hero had the Frontal Assault promotion, which does 25% collateral damage. Even better, now I really don't need crossbow/cat/treb stacks for city cracking. Swift riders are a little expensive but I can take 2-3 units from his legion and throw them at a city like you would normally throw a crossbow/cat stack to soften it up. I marched down the center part of the map and wound up at Cao Cao's western border.

I am in third place on points and I'm about to build my Forbidden Palace at YS' capitol, Ze. I'm going to have a little trouble with river crossings since all the cities in the north are carefully placed one square away from the river, so the opportunity to build galleys is very limited. I am pretty sure this position is winnable, but I have found that by even turn 150, the game gets to be a bit of a grind. Even with autobuild cities and rally points, there is a loop of build stack of doom, crack a city, wait a couple of turns for damaged units to heal and reinforcements to arrive, and repeat. I have eliminated about five players which only leaves about 20 more to go. And this is the smallest map available.

 

[AnotherPacifist]

If you play on Monarch or above, the many Jizhou Crossbows will probably make it impossible for your light cavalry to do their thing right outside your cities. What I usually do is try to take enough of Yuan Shao's cities early on until he's willing to make peace. If you stagnate and just defend, he'll eventually kill you.

 

[stmartin]

I am in third place on points and I'm about to build my Forbidden Palace at YS' capitol, Ze. I'm going to have a little trouble with river crossings since all the cities in the north are carefully placed one square away from the river, so the opportunity to build galleys is very limited. I am pretty sure this position is winnable, but I have found that by even turn 150, the game gets to be a bit of a grind. Even with autobuild cities and rally points, there is a loop of build stack of doom, crack a city, wait a couple of turns for damaged units to heal and reinforcements to arrive, and repeat. I have eliminated about five players which only leaves about 20 more to go. And this is the smallest map available.

This is a good description of the problem which we call 'late game stagnancy'. In BTS random map there are exploration then expansion then economy and military, but in scenarios of HoTK there are 'hold off the first wave of invasion' and then killing all your neighbors. So in HoTK scenarios the late game stagnancy comes earlier.

I have a couple of ideas about how to solve this problem, the guide line is to introduce more base-level game element into the middle and late game. In FFH there's the Armageddon count, RFC the stability and UHV, and other mods have other solutions. I think HoTK can learn from them and also invent something of its own.

 

[Kenjister]

I agree that something needs to be done to adress late-game stagnation. What to do is an interesting dilemma though. We can't have an Armageddon count, stability doesn't exactly speed up the late game as much as change the very dynamic of the whole thing, and UHV's are simply an alternative that you may or may not achieve.


Perhaps you can implement a political will counter for each faction. This counter would be similar to war weariness, but you would want to keep this counter as high as possible. The counter would start at a base level (determined by your leaders "will") and would largely decrease for each unit lost. It would also increase for each unit you have (checked once every month or two), making it largely dependant on the size of your army.
For example let's say your faction has a count of 45. You lose a few troops defending the homeland, the counter goes down to 42. You then attempt a huge counterattack with your legions and fail miserably due to enemy reinforcements. They then take a city. Both those events would drop the count to 19. Next turn the monthly check is done and the count goes up by 10 for troop levels. If you're sill below a set number (in this case it could be 30) bad things would begin to happen to your country when enemies approach such as cities flat out surrendering. If the counter goes down by an insanely large amount and hits 0, then the faction flat out surrenders. The point of this whole thing would to model crushing defeats that totally breaks a faction's will to fight (in the late game) and cause the leader to surrender. Of course victory in your own land would be treated in a very positive manner and perhaps lead to bonus troops appearing in your cities. The famous rulers would have a very high base "will" and also a bonus to will increase everytime the check is done. I know it's really huge idea, and would be extremely hard to implement (not to mention, possibly very slow), but I was thinking that the game needed to reward quick decicive victories, and punish inept defence of the homeland. Of course for it to truely flow, there would have to be dynamic leader change, as to better model weak willed rulers taking control of the throne.
Just throwing the idea out here! feel free to criticize, I don't really this would ever make it in, but without ideas we'd be nowhere!

 

[AnotherPacifist]

Critical move is to found Pu Yang 1 SE of start (to get the copper). Then it's anti-cavalry battalion all around until you've killed everybody in Cao Cao's traditional lands. Still not quite enough for domination, but you can capture the emperor and vote yourself emperor.

 

[Kenjister]

Yep, Lu Bu is almost totally overpowered with early rushes due to his Tough trait... they don't stand a chance on the small map!

Speaking of Lu Bu, Flying General is the most powerful when paired with Crossbowmen. On the small map (with cities), Lu Bu paired with one of the crossbowmen has the ability to take out every single Cao Cao general in his mega stack in one turn unless they're attacked to Cavalry! It's possible to do with an axeman (I got really lucky once and took out Xiahou Dun without taking damage) but much easier when you have first strikes. I used to think Flying General would be useless unless Lu Bu was given Assault, but now after seeing Lu Bu take out 5 core troops in a row, I think I've changed my mind. Currently, I'm dominating in that game, since Lu Bu now has Quick and Attack IV, allowing him to attack twice in a turn meaning he can personally take out a 3-4 troops in a single turn if there's a general in the stack.

 

[AnotherPacifist]

1. Goal is to get more cities very quickly, even at the expense of low science rates. If you start out with 2 archers, buy a hero to lead them and conquer a smaller civ that has only warriors.
2. Use the cash to aim towards swordsmanship and know where your copper is.
3. Let your cities grow initially to at least size 2-4 before building any settlers.
4. Once you can build halberdiers, churn them out like mad and conquer the biggies (Cao Cao, Yuan Shao, Liu Bei, Liu Biao, Lu Bu). You will get their generals and cash from their cities.
5. You will hit a bottle neck once the number of your cities is around 10-12. Don't worry, just maintain barely even cash flow while researching towards Reformed Poetry and then calendar, and with a decent sized empire, even at 10% science and oligarchy you'll have enough science to be ahead.
6. Foment wars with the Emperor if possible, then declare on the one of the combatants closest to you when they are weakest. (E.g. As Liu Biao I asked Gongsun Zan to DOW on Yuan Shao, and after a while I DOW on the latter and got his cities). (You can capture the emperor if you're anywhere close to the central plains, and if not, just battle your way to him. It's doable even for Sun Ce)
7. Stay in Despotism, Corvee, hereditary, private school, Confucianism initially. If really in a crunch for science and culture, do it in 1 move with noble school and Mohism. After you have improved some happiness resources with calendar, during a GA (done with a great person saved for this purpose) change to the best civics for a large empire: oligarchy (science with specialists), state education (free specialist), agrarian colony (hammers with farms), legalism (less maintenance and more production), strong (more happiness and exp for new troops), meritocracy (quicker great people). Later on you want to switch to ranking classification and maybe Daoism for large productive cities.
8. Try not to get too big before you are able to get vassals with Laws of Wei. ("You have grown too powerful")
9. Roads sometimes are more important than useless cottages and mines you'll never use.
10. Micromanage gold so you don't lose any troops to strikes.

 

[davidlallen]

I was discussing a few posts above about Gongsun Zan. He has an awful starting position on the historical map. I have been playing random pangaea maps lately. Now I am wondering if his ability is overpowered. The combination of ignoring building defense, plus frontal assault for collateral damage, means that a White Horse Cav army, with Gongsun at cavalry commander B can roll over most cities without trouble. You have to build cities near every purebred horse or regular horse, and make them your WHC factories. I have stacks of about 6-8 WHC, of which three are Gongsun's legion. Those three attack first for collateral; they may get damaged, but at strength 13 they are unlikely to be killed. Then attack with the other WHC and I can usually take a city in one turn.

Once you have Laws of Wei, you don't even have to leave behind any troops to guard cities; just abandon them and keep rolling. After 2-3 cities are crushed the civ will capitulate. You can gift back the cities to avoid maintenance.

Do most people play the historical maps, or are others also playing random maps? Are there some civs which seem over/underpowered for random maps?

 

[AnotherPacifist]

For random maps, historically tiny civs like Yan Baihu, Yang Feng (love his Incan UU equivalent), Gongsun Zan, Zhang Lu (quick pop growth) and Ma Teng are probably the best to play with.
I've played all of the historical maps, but I really like to start out with cities that I build (don't really like the placement of some cities), so I keep playing them. I tried a random map and it's just not as fun. E.g. As Liu Biao, building 1N makes a huge difference in terms of production with more hills and a horse.
I guess that's why I still play RFC from time to time since I know the map so well.

 

[AnotherPacifist]

I've always thought that the Emperor civic was a fad, only to be used by megalomaniac AI's who don't know what they are doing. Well, together with Legalism, it has the benefit of reducing your city maintenance by 80%! Which make early expansion a much less expensive proposition.
Of course the most important move is to found your capital 1 NW so you can get the copper, build lots of militia to take out the archers of Liu Bei, and once you have halberdiers, you can take on Lu Bu and the rest. Unfortunately Ji Yin died early for me, but I got lots of other generals.
This has to be the earliest win on monarch for the small map for me (for no cities/normal speed of course)

 

[AnotherPacifist]

1. Start with swordsmanship (no need for metal for building Heishan Bandits)
2. Found capital 1 SW of start (much more productive without mountains, more grassland/plains and same number of hills (2))
3. Let capital grow to size 2 (should have swordsmanship by then) and build a bandit.
4. Switch to Force (belief) and Mohism/Strong when it spreads to you.
5. Hire Zhang Yan and hit Zhang Yang (who still only has warriors) and get his worker/warrior camp.
6. Expand east and get Yuan Shao before too long.

 

[AnotherPacifist]

Li Jue can do pretty much the same thing as Liu Zhang, except that you don't even need copper for halberdiers. Armor halberdiers are good against melee but very weak against archery, so you need many more to kill them. Order of elimination: Zhang Lu, Liu Zhang (which opens up Yizhou for colonization until you meet Liu Biao going east), Yang Feng (bring the emperor back to Lin Jing/Chang An, Cao Cao (best technique is to war until you can't, get 2 of his cities and leave Chen Liu alone, make peace and wait until Lu Bu declares on him), Yuan Shao (who should have his hands full with Gongsun Zan), Gongsun Zan (can't wait until he gets cavalry), Zhang Yang (by now he should have several warrior camps to snatch), Liu Biao, the Prince of Chen, and finally Han Sui (capitulated). Zhang Xiu was a voluntary vassal, I didn't even touch Zhang Yan (he was completely surrounded by me) or Ma Teng. Lu Bu was stabbed in the back while he warred with Liu Bei. I got domination just growing cities in Yizhou and Jingzhou (I capitulated Liu Biao and founded cities south of him).

 

[AnotherPacifist]

...if he wasn't nerfed by his location. Yuan Shao has no chance against him without Jizhou crossbows. Order of elimination: Yuan Shao, Cao Cao, Yang Feng (want the emperor soon to move palace to a more central location, Chen Liu), Zhang Yang (send warrior camps to the purebred horse and sheep near Quan Zhou), Li Jue, Zhang Yan (to avoid backstabbing, even though he was happy with me), Yuan Shu, Liu Bei and then backwards for Lu Bu, the Prince of Chen (whose name always escapes me since I can't look him up in wikipedia), Liu Biao, Kong Rong, Zhang Lu, then Ma Teng was capitulated. Gongsun Du and Zhang Xiu I left well alone since they vassalized.

Spoiler :

 

[Kenjister]

Well, he does get a horrible starting location for a reason
You've really been busy with those no city maps haven't you? I personally get really irritated for some reason when the dates don't match with the events (ei Cao Cao's rise begins in 202 AD) so I never can bring myself to play a complete game on them. Perhaps I'll try soon though.

 

[AnotherPacifist]

I'm trying to prove that it's possible to win on the small map with no cities, in monarch mode, with every civ (some of them might have to be cultural like Liu Yao, Zhang Yan and Shanyue). I'm right now doing Zhang Yang and I've already eliminated Yuan Shao, Cao Cao, Gongsun Zan, Li Jue and on my way to getting Gongsun Du (who had the temerity to found a city outside his peninsula, right where I wanted my 3 excess warrior camps).
Xianbei horsemen are really strong, and can travel blocks even in forests! (Too bad you can't combine that with Gongsun Zan's ability)
Just a thought: wouldn't it be nice if you have Cao Cao (the hero) and wherever he is, that city gets his abilities (philosophical, agriculture, talented), or if you have Gongsun Zan and he's on a horse, he can ignore city walls? Imagine getting Liu Bei and be able to get his abilities!

 

[Kenjister]

That seems like a pretty cool idea... perhaps it will be implemented in a future version. I'm thinking maybe when Advisors are started?

 

[AnotherPacifist]

Zhang Yang's Xianbei Horsemen are equally overpowered. 1 of them (spawned early combined with Zhang Yang) can kill an entire army of levy crossbows and conscript archers, even against Lu Bu's anticavs. The only problem I had was with Huang Zhong behind 125% walls, and I actually had to depend on a very lucky strike in a second war against Liu Biao which killed him before I could take him down. Sun Ce capitulated, Yan Baihu dead and I was about to kill Wang Lang when I won a diplo win. Even killed Gongsun Du which is usual for me, because he dared to build a city west of Quan Zhou.

I had so many warrior camps that all of northern China's pastures had warrior camps. From then on it was just free Xianbei horsemen every 3-5 turns.

A horrible thing for Chinese culture if the Xianbei took over China before the 16 Kingdoms period.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xianbei

 

[AnotherPacifist]

It is possible to found 3 of the important religions even with your crappy starting location. Buy a workboat and work the fish and 1NW even if you can't grow quickly initially. You have to basically be lucky and hope nobody founds Pure Force with the Way of Peace (Zhang Lu shoots straight for Religion which is impossible for you to take, and in 1 out of 3 you'll miss Pure Force). Then just aim for Reformed Poetry and the relatively cheap Eight Diagrams, and with the money from the free shrines you should be OK with tech. Liu Biao or Yuan Shao will most likely get Ancient Dictionary before your GP pops but it should be possible if you try really hard (I didn't).

The TONS of barbs from the south and west are a major nuisance to expansion, and make sure you don't piss Sun Ce off (just switch to his religion which will most likely be Unification, and DOW on whoever he likes to DOW on, either Shanyue or Wang Lang). Steal techs and gold from Sun Ce (I already got Drainage Cellar and Calendar) and later Liu Biao when you expand westwards. The only war was against Yan Baihu.

In the end, Sun Ce's Shu flipped to me with the Imperial Jade Seal intact. So I had 5 religions and their shrines.

Spoiler :

 

[AnotherPacifist]

Why does Liu Chong do so badly when played by the AI? It's not because he has one of the best, if not THE best, early units--there really is no counter to a doubly promoted Chen's crossbow, and if you chose either 25% against melee or archers you'll chew up anything in the Central Plains easily. The only tech he needs is high-rise structures (about 18 turns) and no need for iron/copper--just a good big city that can reach out in each direction.
He's the Prince of Chen, which is a really crappy place early on. What is needed is a migration that takes 3 turns to Qiao, and using your initial warrior to steal 2 workers from Cao Cao (the AI likes to work the pig right around that time) and let your capital grow to 3 which can then churn out 1 crossbow in 3-4 moves. Order of elimination is Cao Cao, Lu Bu (he never had a chance to build any ACBs), Liu Bei (just a fountain of good generals wasted), then Zhang Xiu/Kong Rong/Yang Feng at the same time, and then finally Liu Biao before he gets those nasty swift bowmen. From then on it's just a matter of mopping up while getting the economy in gear.

Oh, and the best promotion is bravery (even 1 strength above 5 gives your crossbows a much better chance against defenders) and the must-get hero is Huang Zhong (use him to bombard with archers).