Game Option: Slower XP?

[dagorkan]

If any of you have tried it what impact does it have on the game?

I'm finding that the default settings gets tiring: seeing expensive, theoretically superior competent troops but who happen to have no experience getting thrashed by weaker troop types with a lot of experience.

I tend not to fight as much in the early game (I don't run away, I just tend to avoid the risk of early game wars) which means I'm at a gigantic disadvantage when I meet some other civ that is smaller but has been in wars even though it failed to to win them. Some of the buildings/civics help but even then not that much, when the average enemy is level 5+, you don't have much of a chance, and the effect is self-reinforcing, the initial survival rate (throwing your troops at the enemy) means you don't get the chance to get your own high level troops.

Doing well requires insane levels of unit specialization/promotion and army micromanagement in my opinion.

Would Slower XP help at all with that? How does it play more generally?

 

[Kjara]

With the new addition that higher level AI's get free exp, I think it somewhat depends on the difficulty you play at. If you are playing any of the last 3 or so, I think you will be seeing level 3-4 troops being built straight up by the AI, and slower xp will only make it tougher. Of course the converse is true(if you are playing where you have the ride of the kings or a high level altar, and are kicking out horses or disciple units at level 4, then slower exp will make the game easier against enemies that are only starting with <5 exp).

What you should really be doing to keep up with the exp even if you don't want to do an early war is to make sure you have enough guys out there hunting the animals and barbs(and that you have a map that either has barb world or enough open space so that there will still be barbs past when everyone builds their 3rd town).

A related question, how does slower exp effect arcane units? Does it also slow down the rate of free exp that they get?

 

[Kael]

A related question, how does slower exp effect arcane units? Does it also slow down the rate of free exp that they get?

Thats a good question. No it doesn't. It only effects xp granted through combat.

 

[dagorkan]

With the new addition that higher level AI's get free exp, I think it somewhat depends on the difficulty you play at. If you are playing any of the last 3 or so, I think you will be seeing level 3-4 troops being built straight up by the AI, and slower xp will only make it tougher. Of course the converse is true(if you are playing where you have the ride of the kings or a high level altar, and are kicking out horses or disciple units at level 4, then slower exp will make the game easier against enemies that are only starting with <5 exp).

Damn. Do you know what's the highest difficulty level before the AI starts getting free XP? I was playing at Emperor level with the normal XP rate and the odds were insane (Basium/Cassiel unexpectedly declared war on me playing Kuriotates, and cast stasis so I can't produce). The only way I could defeat them was luckily having built a few catapults and dozen Centaur Archers who all already had Flanking III (from Ride of Kings + civics)... slowly weakening individual units enough to finish them off with champions. I'd need all my catapults and centaurs to take out a stack of two or three Angels. Then a stack of about 8 Grigori champions/horsemen turned up and it cost half my military to defeat it.

And my military isn't even all that bad compared to previous games, decent sized and all my troops are up-to-date tech-wise and equipped with Iron weapons.

What you should really be doing to keep up with the exp even if you don't want to do an early war is to make sure you have enough guys out there hunting the animals and barbs(and that you have a map that either has barb world or enough open space so that there will still be barbs past when everyone builds their 3rd town).

That's the same micromanagement problem or even worse, if you have to go looking for barbs/animals.



Would it be complicated to edit the difficulty settings so that the AI doesn't get free XP? What file would they be stored in?

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

the AI starts getting XP at Prince IIRC. I'm pretty sure Prince is the one right after Noble ( it should go settler -> chieftain -> warlord -> noble -> prince -> monarch -> emperor -> immortal - deity )

 

[popejubal]

Sidar get cranky.

I don't know if that has an effect on the AI Sidar, though. I don't know how aggressive the AI Sidar are about putting their units in harm's way in order to generate Great People.

 

[marioflag]

Slower XP is one of my default option and i have to say it makes game a lot better, for various reasons.

-I always had the feeling that combat experience and stronger promotions were not balanced, so this option makes FfH2 a bit more like combat experience in Vanilla or AoI, which i like more

-Barbarian attacks are more troubling to fend off.Without this option with a few fights and your unit had enough experience to get lot of combat with 99% chance of success.So at least for me it gives a better feeling of survival

-Choosing promotion is a bit more strategic because they are harder to get


Among the negative effects:

-Before 0.34 i noticed AI just performed worst in the games with Slower XP and died more often due to barbarians.With experience given for level of difficulty in 0.34 it doesn't seem to happen anymore

-Hero promotion is more powerful.Though there is the positive effect that an hero in the hands of a human player is not so overpowered as before because you need to fight more to get the same number of promotion

-Marathon remains not balanced with Slower XP.Combat experience remains a lot more powerful at this speed with Slower XP than Normal Speed without Slower XP.

 

[dagorkan]

So what would you recommend as challenging settings without giving the AI too much of a free ride? Slower XP, Normal speed and Prince (+1 free experience level according to gecko_xp)?

 

[marioflag]

So what would you recommend as challenging settings without giving the AI too much of a free ride? Slower XP, Normal speed and Prince (+1 free experience level according to gecko_xp)?

Well it depends how much you think is important also gameplay. I find for example that giving AI some free riding make games a bit more fair and gameplay more interesting. For example AI No building requirements and AI no minimum levels makes game more "fair" because AI is able to use your same units. Personally i would drop one level of difficulty and enable these 2 options for better gameplay.

About Game speed Normal is the best balanced, Slower XP will give you a more challenging start of a game and i find a more balanced combat experience.... but it's just my taste.About the level of difficulty try the best fit for your abilities

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

yeah, AI no minimum levels and AI no building requirements are STRONGLY suggested if you want to have fun. they really make the game a lot better.

 

[Blackmantle]

@ popejubal: Sadly AI Sidar don't shade at all currently i belive (even if i have written a possible way how to make the AI do it sensibly in the AI-issues thread after Kael stated that they don't do so to prevent the AI from screwing itself...).

At highest difficulties the no-AI building requirements are not that much needed anymore (it still helps a bit but i regularly see upgraded units fastly after AI getting the tech now.
Hence me having it unchecked by default again now without that much impedement to AI-power anymore.
At immortal/deity the AI is rather competent about building-priorities now. For Emperor and below or if you wan't a really really challenging game its still very much recommendable though.).
But no AI-minimum Levels is very much required to not hose the AI and really improves the AI alot (especially at the highest levels...). Thanks Xienwolf (i belive he has coded it) for that feature/workaround.

@ Topic: The option is very much needed for marathon and perhaps here and there for epic. Its not recommendable on normal and quick. That detracts from the feel of FFH2 (imo.)

 

[dagorkan]

I've been playing with both options since my second game..

Just a bit disappointed to either be able to steamroll everyone or having my expensive unique national units steamrolled by an army of high level axemen (with bronze axes) because the AI spent the early game chopping up waves of goblins while I was busy researching tech (OK a bit of an exaggeration, but only slightly in the case of my last game - I was surrounded early on so I never had to deal with barbarians after destroying the lair in my starting valley).

 

[dagorkan]

yeah, AI no minimum levels and AI no building requirements are STRONGLY suggested if you want to have fun. they really make the game a lot better.

Does no building reqs mean that the AI will never bother to build archery ranges, mage guilds, stables etc? That must save them quite a bit of money.

 

[Blackmantle]

Yep thats about what it does. (i don't know if they never do/cant.
But they don't need! to to get those buildings to be able to build archers /adepts / mounted in the first place.).

As said though that option (unlike the no-level-requirements-option) is around for a long time and the highest-levels AI does a good job of getting those buildings up rather fast in my experience.

 

[dagorkan]

I suppose they might still build them for the XP bonus... IIRC archery range give new units +2xp unless that's only in Age of Ice

 

[Blackmantle]

Thats a Boyer building (in main FFH2) not an archery range. And i also think that at times they do build buildings with another function beyond being a pure unit-enabler...

 

[Keeper_GFA]

I've captured AI cities with unit buildings in them, so it must still build them sometimes.

 

[dagorkan]

Playing on Prince with Slower XP and no building reqs, no level reqs, so far feels a lot more realistic.

Gave myself more natural enemies to make up for the lesser difficulty.

 

[onedreamer]

Marioflag summed it up very precisely in post #7. Can't explain it any better