Good for Hell: Or why the boyscout civs should always pine for high AC

[citizenalex]

I've played games on both ends of the karma line and I've come to appreciate the ability good civs have to always keep their land in a pristine shape. For one thing, the AI is all too predictable in leaning towards the evil side and in most of the games I've played the Good to evil ratio is 1 to 5 or even 1 to 10. Many times I'm the only good guy left, even when I fix alignments ahead of time.

A quick run-down of all you lose when the hell terrain creeps in:

-All the grains (rice, wheat, corn) get turned to snake pillars
-All flood plains turn to burning sands
-You lose 2 meat animals by the merge of cow and horse to nightmare and pig & sheep to toad
-Sugar, silk, banana

-And lest we forget, the all important, all providing forests.


That last one is very crucial, because if Infernal Pact is researched before or shortly after most evil civs got engineering (to build workshops), the resulting shortfall in hammers will leave most of your rivals too anemic to fund a large war.

Also, in the longer term, the loss of the above mentionned ressources will make up for easy bartering. Even those that are the most uptight about your "goody good" ways will have to bargain with you at some point when you're the only one left with stuff to trade.

The loss of health ressources only aggravates the "First Plague" when the counter hits 30 for evil civs, so there's another great moment to start kicking. All in all, a high AC should be welcomed by those least affected by it... get Ragnarok and milk it!

 

[Korias]

Interesting. Using the AC as a way to shaft the evil players while you hold onto the things that they need. And then, you can double shaft them for trades because you have the rare resources of Sugar, Bannana, and Silk. THe only problem being that you would be on the defensive for a long period of time and would need to have the skill to pull off a lead that would make the combined forces of your enemies see attacking you as a bad idea.

 

[citizenalex]

Trade can also been seen as a foot in the door for defensive agreements and the such. Also, when AIs offer to trade stuff with you, correct me if I'm wrong, but it usually means the next 30-40 turns won't have any surprise attacks.

An insightful planning of your military expenditures is always recommended when the first signs of hell terrain creep in. I'm sure you've come to appreciate Hyperborem's arrival as a sort of wake up call to boost up your army's strengh, so it's not like you're caught with your pants down when you become the last guy eating bananas...

 

[Jules.lt]

There is is something wrong with good civs being better off than evil civs during the armagueddon.
Which is why the FF idea of making Sheaim and AV civs who do a certain ritual at peace with the demons makes a lot of sense.

 

[Korias]

I agree with Jules.It. With armageddon being a decidedly evil thing to do, and with good civs trying to lower the AC, having the AC be high would seem to be a bad thing. Perhaps a more powerful form of the Blight that hits at AC 25 for good civs might be neccessary as well as increased power to things that effect the Good Civs that fail to keep the AC in check.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

There is is something wrong with good civs being better off than evil civs during the armagueddon.
Which is why the FF idea of making Sheaim and AV civs who do a certain ritual at peace with the demons makes a lot of sense.

It isn't exactly an FF idea, it is an old Magister Modmod idea that they borrowed (and made work).

 

[algolly]

In theory, all of this is balanced by stigmata and flames, which benefit evil civs. Of course, it depends very much upon the kind of map you're on. How much ocean is there? Are there choke points or not?

 

[citizenalex]

As much as a stronger version of the blight might be needed to balance a few points, Going the way of Ashen Veil gives you huge boost on research that make evil worth it on its own. Even going Octo means having priests and hero units that are the envy of anyone stuck with the abilities of making tree grow and tigers (read:war kittens) obey your command.

The one thing the good have to their advantage is the land remaining as is. That perk should always stay, its the one thing that make Good playable without feeiling like some unicorn riding fairy boyscout; You get to laugh at all the AV civs once the counter starts picking up ...

 

[JonathanStrange]

Which way I fly is Hell ; myself am Hell ; And in the lowest depth, a lower deep, Still threat'ning to devour me, opens wide...

It is ironic but altogether fitting that the evil doers own machinations may work against them; I've no problem with that. Frequently, I find myself the sole civilization with grasslands and forests and cool refreshing waters while several evil civilizations allied with each other take turns attempting to take "my head and put it on a spear outside the city" as Sheelba so charmingly phrases it. We need all the help we can get!

The one thing the good have to their advantage is the land remaining as is. That perk should always stay, its the one thing that make Good playable without feeiling like some unicorn riding fairy boyscout; You get to laugh at all the AV civs once the counter starts picking up ...

It's true; we get a bad rap, tell someone you're an Elf player and... well, you have to remind them that "No, we don't ride unicorns" [It's deer and there's a lot of skill involved] or "No, I don't dance with flowers in my hair in a clearing in the woods at the full moon." [Those are Smurfs. Perhaps you're thinking of the Festival of Flowers in which the High Priestess dances]

 

[MagisterCultuum]

The way I've been playing recently, alignment doesn't protect anyone from the spread hell. Hell retreats from Good lands faster, but can spread anywhere regardless of AC or Alignment, albeit more slowly at first. (The code increasing plot counters only runs if a random number generated that turn is greater than the AC.) For the most part, it is spread by the corruption of having Demons and AV priests in your land. (A PyPerTurn effect of Demon and Unholy Taint increases the counter by AC/10, rounded down.) An evil army advancing in Good lands will leave a trail of corruption, which if not stopped opens up a path for the greater demons (Balors and Hyborem himself) who cannot enter untainted lands on account of the Compact.

 

[Thunder_Gr]

The way I've been playing recently, alignment doesn't protect anyone from the spread hell. Hell retreats from Good lands faster, but can spread anywhere regardless of AC or Alignment, albeit more slowly at first. (The code increasing plot counters only runs if a random number generated that turn is greater than the AC.) For the most part, it is spread by the corruption of having Demons and AV priests in your land. (A PyPerTurn effect of Demon and Unholy Taint increases the counter by AC/10, rounded down.) An evil army advancing in Good lands will leave a trail of corruption, which if not stopped opens up a path for the greater demons (Balors and Hyborem himself) who cannot enter untainted lands on account of the Compact.

No wonder why a great sage is named after you. These ideas are pretty neat.

 

[civ_king]

Stop dissing boy scouts or I'm going to get a shotgun blast you in the face and then cut your heart out with my BSA knife (J/K but seriously stop dissing scouts)

 

[PekkaR]

-All flood plains turn to burning sands

All deserts turn into Burning Sands actually, which means they start burning shortly afterwards. This can be difficult because only Demon, Orcish or fire resistance through other means allows your troops to move in flames! I haven't gotten trapped in my own cities yet, but I did watch a dwarf ally try to invade the Infernal lands... She had to stop at the border and wait for an Adept that could cast Spring to keep the fire away long enough for her army to move past.

The notion about forests (or workshops) being important for production seemed a little odd to me at first because I can usually have enough mines on hills. I'll assume it was more of an issue when playing with elves.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I'm pretty sure that Burning Sands no longer create Flames if they have another improvement. However, as Flood Planes don't have Burning Sands as a valid terrain, they are removed as soon as the terrain changes. In my version, I made Flood Plains and Ovsidian Plains both have both Deserts and Burning sands as valid terrains, and made cf.doHell(self) switch them back and forth the same way it changes resources. This often means there is a 1 turn delay in them changing, but it works.

Edit: looking back at the code, I don't see any real reason why burning sands wouldn't make flames on tiles that already have features. I should probably change that.

 

[Lone Wolf]

That doesn't really make much logical sense, does it? Althrough there are advantages to Hell terrain also (Nightmares), and the Sheaim planar gates benefit from high AC, and upping the Armageddon counter has risks - the Horsemen guys may appear next to you, so it's not that simple.

And there are many ways to play Good civs without being fairy boyscouts - using Death/Entropy mana, backstabbing your allies, razing cities...

 

[Lone Wolf]

For one thing, the AI is all too predictable in leaning towards the evil side and in most of the games I've played the Good to evil ratio is 1 to 5 or even 1 to 10.

The AI has a tendency to neutrality if anything. RoK is an early religion, and it switches Evil to Neutral, while FoL cements all the aligments.

But there is something wrong with Good civs commiting atrocities along with the Evil guys, in order to make only Evil suffer. Personally I think that the Good immunity should stay at least 'till AC 90, but Evil AV guys should benefit from it more.

And upping the AC as Good civ with a strong Sheaim in your game may have its disadvantages.

Which is why the FF idea of making Sheaim and AV civs who do a certain ritual at peace with the demons makes a lot of sense.

I like that idea. Unfortunately, some other FF features are not appealing to me.

Any other ideas to make the high AC count bad for Good civs without them losing the Hell imunity at least to a certain moment?

 

[WarKirby]

The main thing about how it's done in FF, that ritual makes a LOT more difference. FF spawns demons in hell terrain constantly as the AC rises. AT the moment, I feel they're a bit overpowered, because they tend to start with 4-6 free levels, in addition to generally being high strength. The demonic horde is an unstoppable onslaught, and if you're AV, it's like a personal army that you don't pay maintenance for (or control, admittedly). One Sheiam game, I was able to sit back and build economy while the barbarian demons wiped out my neighbors, then moved settlers into the now vacant lands.

Stop dissing boy scouts or I'm going to get a shotgun blast you in the face and then beat you to death with my aluminum bat

Fixed !

kudos if you get the reference.

 

[thadian]

I in my FFH newbness have learned to love the AC.

here are my thoughts for what (little) they may mean to you.

For good: actually, its great. you should allow it to get high and use it as a means to gauge your defensive needs. yes - the horsemen are a tad of a problem, but your the ones most fitted to deal with them. you hopefully have hero units, magery, and siege on your side. anything that removes fear is a big plus. but don't attack the horseman until you can kill it! it sucks when you sac 12 units on it hoping to kill it next turn, just to have it run away and someone else gets its special weapon.

Balance: Yes, something could be done. good could suffer a lot more plague - think RFC and stability for a second. the plague should be cumulative to a civs overall size, health and biggest factor of all - geddon counter. it should affect good people more than evil people, because their pious, ignorant minds are more prone to corruption. but i can also see many people moving to the good lands to live in times of high geddon counter. i often wonder why citizens choose to suffer in hell instead of moving to greener pastures weather to good lands or barbarian lands.


Neutral: Fence sitters, hop off! i don't know how many of them can gain benefits from hell terrain but they will go evil unless they can't deal with fire damage/hell terrain. if so, they need to get good real quick. no excuses.


Evil: i started as the sheaim - changed to the infernals and omg... it was fun. the angels didnt even show up until it was too late to matter, only 2 good civ's - and one was vassaled to the other. finally, mercurians show up and get fragged immediately. thats what you get for spawning in a border city next to the person your at war with .

but i had a terrible mishap, and 3 of the horseman + the avatar of wrath came in and used a cheese grater on my rectum. there was no way to survive. i tried my best, and i took 2 of the horseman down but when the third (fourth horseman, the second horseman went the other way) came i was only halfway done killing the horseman at my capital. and i had ALMOST gotten them weaned down to dark red. but then the avatar spawned on me - it was bad. all i had built... erm, destroyed had truly come to destroy me.

however its sad that there is no selfish, evil race who has intentions to avoid the apocalypse. think this logic: "God is good, and darkness is evil you say? God is the one who planted the seed of death within your birth, and God is the one who chose to interfere despite his promise. how good is his word on anything with his violation of his own words? We are not evil. We seek to prevent the armageddon. Our world does not need gods or demons - only masters, and those masters are us."

 

[Emptiness]

however its sad that there is no selfish, evil race who has intentions to avoid the apocalypse.

The Svartalfar are evil but should probably be trying to avoid apocalypse, since hell terrain will spread to their lands at a relatively low AC. They stand to lose more than most from hell terrain, since it will obliterate any forests not on tundra or ice as well as all ancient forests. Their potential is much lower when the ability to improve forest/AF tiles is effectively removed.

Personally, I want to avoid the apocalypse no matter what civ I play. Even as the Sheaim or the Infernals, who in theory should want to bring about apocalypse, the benefit of deliberately increasing the AC is dubious. Inevitably I seem to always take the brunt of the damage caused by AC-related events - much like the Illians being killed by frostlings spawned from their own Samhain ritual. As the AC gets higher I'm typically in first place and have the largest empire, so I lose more population to blight and the odds of the horsemen spawning in my area is greater. The Sheaim get more free units, and their worldspell can do some serious damage, but by the time those matter I've already gotten my civ to the point that victory is assured without those factors. Powerful barbarian heroes spawning behind my lines makes my victory harder, rather than being a natural path to it. Even as the Infernals, at peace with the barbarians, the damage done to my opponents is minor and unfocused - plus, if I become powerful enough to threaten victory then the barbarians turn on me. It is simpler to just keep the AC low and win an uncomplicated game.

 

[Lone Wolf]

however its sad that there is no selfish, evil race who has intentions to avoid the apocalypse.

Most Evil races in FfH don't have the Apocalypse as their goal at all. They may not mind dealing with demons as a way to increase their own power, through.