acluewithout
Deity
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2017
- Messages
- 3,470
Does Apocalypse Mode have any impact on the game either strategically or tactically?
To be clear, I’m not trying to beat up on the last DLC or anything. Just trying to understand how to get the most of it.
Strategically, nothing much seems to change except that Climate Change is accelerated (so avoiding Global Warming is either harder to avoid or easier to deliberately trigger, depending on your view point), you generally have more yields because of increased flooding etc, and you have a hard deadline to finish the game before the Apocalypse starts. I don’t really think any of those things change the game in material way - you’re doing the same stuff but faster.
Carl on the Live-stream suggested Apocalypse Mode encouraged settling off water to avoid floods and being more careful settling low coastal tiles. From what little I’ve played, I haven’t found that, but perhaps others have changed their play style to avoid disasters.
Tactically, there’s really only the Soothsayer, and I’m not sure the Soothsayer adds much. The base version seems a poor offensive unit - it can’t take cities, it’s vulnerable because it’s a support unit, it’s attacks get its adjacent friendly units killed, don’t really weaken City defences materially and just pillage tiles without giving you any yields (and indeed, potentially giving the other player better yields long term). Basically, the Soothsayer is a pillage unit, but that is slow, vulnerable, doesn’t give you any yields and potentially buffs your opponent. I think I’d rather pillage with Horsemen and Knights.
Promotions don’t add much. The Seige promotion is the most interesting, but you can siege with a warrior and a scout so not a big deal usually. Combat bonus for adjacent units is also interesting, but there are easier ways to get combat bonuses.
Soothsayer does have some niche uses - triggering disasters on your land and sometimes being able to cause pillage to an enemy without declaring war because you can trigger disasters outside their territory.
Perhaps AM has more relevance in multiplayer, where the game is faster (online speed), so the ticking time bomb of the Apocalypse has more relevance. AM also has some “fun” factor, just in that it adds some wacky stuff (YMMV). But for SP, so far I’m not seeing any material change to game meta or meaningful increase to difficulty other than more stuff goes wrong / more RNG.
To be clear, I’m not trying to beat up on the last DLC or anything. Just trying to understand how to get the most of it.
Strategically, nothing much seems to change except that Climate Change is accelerated (so avoiding Global Warming is either harder to avoid or easier to deliberately trigger, depending on your view point), you generally have more yields because of increased flooding etc, and you have a hard deadline to finish the game before the Apocalypse starts. I don’t really think any of those things change the game in material way - you’re doing the same stuff but faster.
Carl on the Live-stream suggested Apocalypse Mode encouraged settling off water to avoid floods and being more careful settling low coastal tiles. From what little I’ve played, I haven’t found that, but perhaps others have changed their play style to avoid disasters.
Tactically, there’s really only the Soothsayer, and I’m not sure the Soothsayer adds much. The base version seems a poor offensive unit - it can’t take cities, it’s vulnerable because it’s a support unit, it’s attacks get its adjacent friendly units killed, don’t really weaken City defences materially and just pillage tiles without giving you any yields (and indeed, potentially giving the other player better yields long term). Basically, the Soothsayer is a pillage unit, but that is slow, vulnerable, doesn’t give you any yields and potentially buffs your opponent. I think I’d rather pillage with Horsemen and Knights.
Promotions don’t add much. The Seige promotion is the most interesting, but you can siege with a warrior and a scout so not a big deal usually. Combat bonus for adjacent units is also interesting, but there are easier ways to get combat bonuses.
Soothsayer does have some niche uses - triggering disasters on your land and sometimes being able to cause pillage to an enemy without declaring war because you can trigger disasters outside their territory.
Perhaps AM has more relevance in multiplayer, where the game is faster (online speed), so the ticking time bomb of the Apocalypse has more relevance. AM also has some “fun” factor, just in that it adds some wacky stuff (YMMV). But for SP, so far I’m not seeing any material change to game meta or meaningful increase to difficulty other than more stuff goes wrong / more RNG.
