Help with Age of Ice

[cfkane]

Or Fall from Heaven, whatever it's called.

From the start you're in an area surrounded by mountains, and since there are only two entries into your are it's pretty easy to defend it: just build two cities by the entrance and train archers to defend them.

The problem I keep coming into is that I get so holed up in that area that I can barely venture out and, you know, beat the game.

My main problem is that I can't find a source of iron anywhere. There isn't any near your starting area and I keep procrastinating in venturing out that the barbarians and whatnot snatch up all of the land before I can scout/claim it.

Where should I start looking for iron?

 

[Hawe Hawe]

Face it: You won't have iron, even copper is extremely difficult, because both ressources are near or in the Doviello areas. So Caradon and Mulcarn have much stronger units than you! You can't beat them in the beginning.
You will need a totally different playstyle, because the expansion for ressources outside your mountain-fortress is very dangerous. You can't defend those cities well, everything will be pillaged, the terrain is awful and maintainance cost will kill your research.
So i had good experiences with turtling in. You can build two good cities in addition to your capital in your area. Not much but it is enough. Then you will have to defend yourself at the two only chokepoints. This works well with bows or crossbows.
You can claim horses if you try, but the spot and the units are not worth it in my opinion.
But what to do instead? Key Units are:
-the bow units for the defence of the hill chokepoints
-your hero (they will lead to very different games, i have won a game with C...( the hunter) and lost one with Epona(?) the mage with a wrong strategy, didn't try the swordmen-hero yet)
- advanced scout-units: hunters and ?? (don't know how they are called in english). explore and promote them. Key promotion is the animal domination promotion. You will get free bears and spiders, who are very strong in the beginning. Later when your hunters have grown up, try and defeat a mammut (the hairy elefants). Bring that mammut to your homeland and build the Mammut camp ressource(?) with it in your city radius.
- catapults: They are essential for defence and offense, because of their high withdrawal rate. Very different to BTS, but also to Warlords/Vanilla.
- Mammut riders: the ultimate weapon, now it is time for revenge. But you will need that tamed Mammut for it, because you don't have the ressource either and your enemies do.
I love this scenario, it is really more adventure or roleplay than a traditional civ game. And the whole story and atmosphere is brilliant like the big Fall from heaven Mod in general.

 

[Sultan Al-Malik]

It was a very difficult scenario, I just finished it yesterday. They key here is to defend and soften up units through archers and longbowmens and then attack them through other units. I claimed horse resource and thus made out a couple of horsemen. Gradually these units can be upgraded with experience points to make them uber elite units. The children of kylorin also sometimes help with existing abilites, they can be upgraded to other units to make them effective combatants.

 

[Pandemonis]

There's a lot of different strategies you can adapt to exploit the weak spots of your opponents.

Rather than kill the fun and detail some, just remember it's a cross between Strategy and Role-playing, so you really need to emphasize on managing specialized units, heroes, Children of Kyorlin and specific matters rather than empire-wise issues.

 

[Nikis-Knight]

DOn't forget you can pillage the Doviello metals to bring them down to your level if you don't have metals. Horsemen with move 4 should be able to move, pillage, and retreat. And you can't pillage mammoth camps, but you can pillage the roads leading to them.

If you choose the swordsman hero, you may be able to rush the Doviello and get the copper city fairly soon.

 

[Pandemonis]

DOn't forget you can pillage the Doviello metals to bring them down to your level if you don't have metals. Horsemen with move 4 should be able to move, pillage, and retreat. And you can't pillage mammoth camps, but you can pillage the roads leading to them.

If you choose the swordsman hero, you may be able to rush the Doviello and get the copper city fairly soon.

I didnt know that... Barbarians can pillage yours but you cant pillage the others ? Why, may I ask ?

 

[Nikis-Knight]

Well, I may be mistaken, but I think all mammoth camps cannot be destroyed? Because they require a mammoth to build. Even if I'm wrong, it should be easy enough to get your mammoth into a position where it won't be pillaged.

 

[hexagonian]

You can get by without copper for awhile, but it means the following...

The two entry points in your valley are great choke points. As been pointed out, your valley can hold 3-4 cities.

If possible...Do not let the Doviello get too strong. This may mean early game opportunistic hit-and-run/pillage and razing their cities (if you do not have the units to maintain a sufficient defense when you take those cities). You keep them weaker, and you build up some XPs.

Once they get strong, then you have a three-prong enemy (Mulcarn/Doviello/Barbarians) who will combine forces against you. And they will not let up either. You end up locked in a long stalemate before you can break out.

Break the Doviello, and you have a lot more breathing room, as well as more time.

(Just finished tonight) Early game spoilers posted in the ffh2 AoI subforum

 

[jefmart1]

I got lucky...I had the scout Hero unit and he captured Fialcra of the North early on! Having a 11 str flying unit was exceedingly useful. After I beat back the guys next to you and secured copper, I had it fly around killing barbs for mega experience.

If you haven't used that hero yet to capture animals I highly suggest you do. Wolves give +1 happy with a kennel in your cities. Mammoths can create camps that provide ivory and allow mammoth riders.

 

[justkilled]

I used a totally different strategy to win (monarch I think). I didn't use the subdue animal ability at all (well I didn't even thought about it... too much randomness involved maybe ).

Klick at the spoiler or find it out yourself

Spoiler :

I picked Ehlona and yeah her fireball is really great. It can do some damage (str 4) lots of colateral damage AND it is the only way for a long time to reduce city defenses. Even later its the most effecient way, since the ball can move 2 squares before using his ability.

Well that said I just planted a second city at the southern gate of the valley and moved soe scouts out. With archery I made the step to the horse site. Dont belive what was posted earlyer Horseman are great. They have +100% vs archery and mcan retreat. Since the Doviellos use lot of javelin throwers who are archery units + retreat is good to soften up city defenders, so you have a strong attack unit.
I conquered the doviellos + the barbarian lakecity with the combo of horseman + archers (for barrage) and Ehlonas fireball. Just remember to bring enough troops

Since they already have mammoth at their capital the rest of the game shouldn't be that difficult.

 

[kolpo]

To the north north west of your starting place is their a relative good spot to found at least 2 cities. Near those big rivers with some grassland Remmeber to escort your setlers with the best archer units you have(those must also defend your new city later), archers with both anti melee and city defense promotion are the best. Only build cities in that region on hills.

In that region shall you get sometimes attacked by ice giants, so try to get either longbowmen or archers with very good promotions.

I got lucky in my game, in the mine near my capital was iron discovered. This allowed me to build pikemen. On itself are pikemen a rather weak unit, but they have one gigantic advantage: you can let 2 form one new unit and you can keep adding as many pikemen to that unit as you like. What is so great about that? If you merge a pikemen with +80% vs melee, with one with +80% vs horse, with one with +80% vs archer with one with combat 2 with one with +40% city attack, then shall you get a unit that is good against everything and weak against nothing! Combine a few of those with many archers(so you can use their special ability to weaken the city defenders) and a few catapuls and you can even take cities on mountains without a single casuality!

 

[cabert]

I got lucky...I had the scout Hero unit and he captured Fialcra of the North early on! Having a 11 str flying unit was exceedingly useful. After I beat back the guys next to you and secured copper, I had it fly around killing barbs for mega experience.

If you haven't used that hero yet to capture animals I highly suggest you do. Wolves give +1 happy with a kennel in your cities. Mammoths can create camps that provide ivory and allow mammoth riders.

I captured the eagle too. But a lot later, with a ranger .
The captured animals are great, but I found that my swordsman hero is a bit lonely as strong unit, even with the eagle unit. Mulcarn's followers have a huge pile of archers, basically killing my units before I can fight. I had to retreat and got killed while doing so .
In the meantime, I DLed FfH2 and am playing on the evil side .

 

[Ecofarm]

I find it difficult to decide: tech cottages or tech pasture.

I send a warrior and scout SW, to kill the 2 wolves and frostling den. I try to hit the wolves with the scout to get him 4xp. The warrior gets 5xp from the den. If the warrior dies, the scout gets his 4xp for sure (is ready to hit den on warrior death). Scout promotes C1 and waits for animal husbandry to promote subdue and wander north of the home valley. Warrior promotes healer (if I chose swordsman hero) or city raider (if I chose mage hero). The other scout grabs the hut NE of the starting valley, and then gets deleted since the ice melts (or he runs to get the hut N of barb city and ether). I think the water freezes again later, but I always forget to get the hut later. 1st warrior I build goes west into the forest, and I am never attacked from that choke. My hero conquers the barb city after killing nearby dens (perhaps a bit of milking the barb city). I build a city 3n of the cap (to work the deer); those tiles turn to grassland around turn 35. And I keep the barb city. I build a city at the SW choke late in the game and it seems pointless, working the wheat, silver, and a couple cottages.

CR3 sorc and warriors ftw; follow the roads and burn baby burn
+ archers if you wanna get fancy

Actually, keep blue capital, for mammoths and copper.