Stuck in holding pattern in Momus scenario

[magritte]

It's turn 229 and I don't seem to be making any headway in this scenario--wondering if I should restart and try again. I'm playing the default--can I change this?--(Lanun) at noble level. I'm an inexperienced FF2 player and an incompetent (partly due to sheer laziness) Civ 4 player. I have a suspicion I should have gone into total war mode from the start, but I tried to have a more balanced strategy since the first few wars declared were against opponents that were very far away.

I'm thinking the game may be salvageable simply because nobody's running way ahead of me despite my lack of gains. I have three cities, have room to build a fourth and should have done it a LONG time ago. I don't think anybody has more than four. One civ has been destroyed.

On the plus side, I survived the everybody vs me round without losing any cities. My demographics aren't terrible: 2nd in pop, 2nd in GNP, my score is rated a very close second (excluding the civ I don't have to defeat). Land area and manufacturing are fourth.

On the minus side, I haven't taken a single city from everybody, though I tried desperately to fight the Calabim. I'm also an alarming 7th in military--may partly reflect not building many workers or any ships if it calculates these things the same as civ3. I realize not building ships sounds ridiculous for the Lanun, but I just didn't see much need for them at this stage--I can see the whole world and everybody's accessible by land.

The Tech Situation
I've probably failed to commit myself sufficiently to a tech path. I have no clue about the magic system so I kind of ignored it other than picking up elementalism--I picked up that because I thought I would be able to build an air node, but maybe workers don't build them and I need mages. Fellowship of leaves spread into my land, so I got way of leaves and priesthood. I got trade and currency (maybe I shouldn't have bothered), iron working, feudalism. I'm currently working on bowyers, but maybe I would have been better off trying for mithril working? Is it worth going farther on the religious path? Or should I be trying to develop adepts and look at the magic? I've been mostly building swordsmen and catapults. Oh, and I've got a hero who's in progress...

The Civics
Since I have a small empire I went with Godking. I have foreign trade. I thought about conquest, but wasn't sure exactly how it worked--if building soldiers consume food does that mean my cities wouldn't grow? Not that they can grow much now, anyway. I'm...um...still in tribalism (I kind of forgot to change), probably should be in military state for this scenario? Nationhood and Godking--thought with such a small empire it would be best. Agrarianism doesn't appeal, since I'm getting my food mostly from the sea and focusing on mines & workshops on land. Is this a reasonable group of choices?

Anyway, what should I be doing and is it likely I can salvage this scenario or am I doomed?

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

my suggestion is to move north at the start, since the starting desert position sucks. then avoid OO like the plague since it will give troops to the infernal leader who is the biggest threat. then go empyrean, get Chalid and crush the world.

 

[magritte]

Yeah, it might be if I had settled further north I could have grabbed a city early when everyone declared war on the guy up there...I was afraid to waste too many turns early. And I actually tried to get OO myself then dropped it when it was discovered and accepted Fellowship of Leaves which spread to me from somewhere else. I haven't really played much with religions other than FoL and chose OO just because it seemed appropriate for a seafaring civ. Haven't tried Empyrean yet.

I was kind of hoping to be able to finish the game from my current spot with some good tech advice...does infernal get too strong to handle in the end game?

 

[Feyd Rautha]

The Momus is an interesting mod. If I had done it before I had a good grasp on things I probably would have been as lost as you seem to be. (no offense)

Basically things break down into three stages...

First you need to establish your two cities in chokepoint locations. One East (cutting off the Calabim) and one north (on the lake and giving some defense against the Amurites and Infernals). Be sure to put the eastern city as a port to the ocean on the south. That is the only body of water that is really useful (although you can get your city in a spot that will serve as a canal from the central lake which is a big help also).

Secondly you need to build up and research. There are good choke points to keep units from entering your lands in the east and west and you need to fortify a couple bowman on them quickly. After that get to iron weapons and slowly build up your cities while founding 1 or 2 more to fill out the land you have set aside. This is where you choose your religion. Some prefer Empryan, but I'm a fan of OO because it makes things easier on various levels. With Cultists and Stygian guards you can bombard from the sea and attack quite effectively.

Finally you need to go to war. First and foremost you have to take out the Infernals. Almost every unit you kill other than theirs strengthens their power because everyone is basically evil. You need to crush them before hitting anyone else and then the game is yours. Just remember... cultists will not start war in this scenario and so you can march right into their lands and tsunami their capitol into oblivion and then slowly wear down their remaining cities. Saverous with a stack of battle promoted stygians works well here. Just get a few catapults for those pesky cities and pump out stygians whenever you can get a break between buildings in your towns.

I know this is very generic, but overall if you get what I'm pointing term wise you should have the base you need to use the strat effectively. Good luck!

 

[Bill Bisco]

I put my cities up north, my capital nearby the infernals so it wouldn't be cultured to death, and my other city to the right of it on a hill. As Feyd Rautha said, your true enemy is Duke Sallos, he starts out with Iron Axemen and soon Iron Diseased Corpses, combined with the fact that all OO and Ashen veil deaths cause his cities to grow makes him eventually a nigh-unbeatable powerhouse. The key to winning is to take out Duke Sallos early and hard. That's why I settled next to him in the very beginning. The first war Perpentach declared was against him, and I sent 2 swordsmen and 2 archers to take one of his cities. So near the beginning i had 3 cities while the Duke had only 1.

The key to winning is Swordsmen and Catapaults. I have 1 swordsmen city, 1 catapault city. The third city is catapaults too. If I get a 4th city, it becomes swordsmen, and so forth.

Only capture cities that are adjacent to your current city. You can take your catapaults and swordsmen to attack faraway places if that's what perpentach allows. However, raze all of those cities. And be aware, that whenever you raze other cities while keeping your own, you are likely to be targeted by perpentach.

Always be ready to attack the Duke and take him out. You can research Ashen Veil and get ritualists if Duke Sallos is killed, but that's only an if.

I am currently playing a Marathon Deity game of Momus, and finally I haver defeated the Duke and the Amurites. And now, my main threat is the hippus, but I'm not too worried.

Edit: And my beginning stategy was building lots of archers and lots of workers. I made sure that I had 3-4 archers per city and a ridiculous number of workers to make my cities top notch.

 

[Elyssaen]

I'm at a similar level to you, magritte.

I've tried one game of The Momus. I almost immediately died at the beginning when I thought I could go on the offensive when Perpentach immediately set everyone on each other. I took one city, lost it, then lost another two cities (including my capital) and was pushed back to one before I fought them off.

I've never needed to spam swordsmen and/or archers to the exclusion of everything else quite so much.

I quickly found that everyone not Duke Sallis was actually quite weak, and spent a while enjoying going after Perpentach's victims and destroying them.

I didn't think, at the time, that for the most part I was just empowering the Duke.

Fighting him was a nightmare. He has more soldiers than you, they're stronger than you (Diseased Corpses, Iron and casters who will spam Ring of Flames like it's going out of fashion), and worst yet: he'll culture push you when you take and hold his cities. I even lost Cevedes to his culture. That's when I quit.

I'm going to give it another go later. The Duke is the real enemy, so my plan is to defend and build up my forces until I can fight him. Then I'm hoping to take his capital and immediately raze it, followed by any other cities I can take. I can't seem to hold his cities so it's for the best.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

The big key is chokepoints. Set your initial cities on the chokepoint to the east and the isthmus in the northeast or at least put a defensive unit there. If you give your starting cities some breathing room you should be able to progress fast enough. Don't get involved in the wars with anyone with the Duke before you have about 3-4 defensive units on the chokepoints and then build up on the isthmus and strike hard.

When you get an iron boarding parties, saverous, and catapults SOD together go forth and raze his cities. After that you can have cultists, frigates, and stygian guards clean up the remaining opponents coastal cities as your SOD slowly progresses east towards the Hippus.

Also remember, coasts are your bread and butter so quickly go to OO and kill the kraken in the central lake so you can reap the rewards of the pirate coves.

 

[hbar]

Keep in mind, few people beat this scenario before the turn counter shows up. I beat it with 15 turns left. I used OO and cultists, but Sallos has some inland cities that are really tough to crack. Sallos is the only real enemy - everyone else can be kept at bay with typical defenses.

Also, raze any cities you don't need. You don't want to have to worry about defending them later.

 

[Landmonitor]

... I haven't even cracked the scenarios in this game yet! So many iterations... so little time...

 

[Elyssaen]

Just won.

Early survival is as others have said. I founded Order, and used Crusaders instead of Boarding Parties.

Bless is very handy. You also won't feed the Duke's army with Order. Later you can cure the disease some of your soldiers will get and have Sphener use Heal.

For breaking Sallis, wait 'til you have a stack of doom with catapults, and Valin with a few crusaders.

Lay siege to Dis. Take the west route after taking Cevedes. Don't attack. Have Valin's team raze the other two cities when the Duke reinforces Dis.

Game over for him.