First, my thanks to the development team for getting the Vista fix pronto! Good job guys!
I noticed my first few turns had long delays while the AI moved or something happened. A little further into the game it is fine though.
A few things I saw that are carryovers from .42:
1. The main barb force is still coming way to early, especially at the slower speeds. In my epic speed game I had a ton of barbs on my doorstep on Turn 49! As I mentioned with .42, this doesn't work for two reasons:
a. I was prepared with 4 defenders. The AI never prepares and 6 of the 10 AI civs were wiped out before turn 75. At least the AI barbs don't seem to be targeting just one civ at a time as it is in FFH .34. However, I know it was talked about before, can anything be done to slow down the appearance of the barbs to avoid so many civs getting wiped out early?
b. The other thing is having all those barbs on the map so early really eliminates the exploration phase of the game. You simply cannot send lone exploring unit out to check out lairs/dungeons and/or capture animals. This IMO is one of the most fun elements of the game and is missing in FF. Again, give us a little more time to have fun with the exploration phase of the game instead of plopping down a load of barbs on the map so soon. Also, just about every lair/dungeon/goody hut gets a guard that is very difficult to take out with a Scout.
2. Does anyone think the Adventurer promotion really works when exploring dungeons/lairs? I have never seen better results from it. I think the success rate exploring these is abysmal with or without the promotion. Definitely, high risk, but it would be nice if that promotion actually did improve your chances of getting a good result.
3. I am not yet at Turn 150 in the epic speed game and have lost 2 99.9% battles. Just bad luck, eh? But, boy, it really sucks when your highly promoted Centeni loses a 99.9% battle to a freakin' Gorilla.
4. I always let the computer randomly choose the civ I get to play. My first .43 game I get the Scions of Patria. I was totally lost. There is some good flavor material on the civ, but precious little that I could find explaining how this civ works. Yes, I am figuring a lot out through trial and error, but what a unique, different civ!
And, why did two barb Goblins kill the Velite unit I had in my city when I had 4 strong Centeni units defending? Those were not Goblin Marksmen.
Anyway, thanks again for making this nice modmod available to us poor Vista users!
Possibly Flying as well would be appropriate.
