Idea for the Kuriotates

[Imuratep]

I really like that the change that Kuriotates got Airships as a new unit. That gives them new, very interesting strategies. But how about expanding the theme of flying units? Kuriotates are supposed to have a link to ancient Greek Mythology, but nevertheless Centaurs are the only ones showing up. So how about allowing them to upgrade your caught Griffins to a new created flying attack unit (like the humans in Warcraft)? Griffins are not the only possibility offered by Greek Mythology. You could give them Pegasus Riders and as a late game possibility sphinxes (with Mind III, Spirit III or Life III, which can be regained by upgrading the unit. In their case the Unit should also lose Spirit III to be able to regain it, so you can cast trust multiple times).
For other Civilizations harpys and the Gorgons seek a home , because they are too evil to fit the Kuriotates - they always get excluded .

 

[Fenboy]

For other Civilizations harpys and the Gorgons seek a home , because they are too evil to fit the Kuriotates - they always get excluded .

Not the harpies, they appear in Capria's entry in the 'pedia as a type of demon, but they'd make a very interesting Unique Unit for the Sheaim or Infernals.

 

[Demus]

the kurio's are powerful enough as it is, try playing them as empyrean, using a stack with a high priest, chalid, 4-6 catapults (just incase) and about a dozen champions, piled in 3-4 air transports. Take down a city in 1 turn, then eighter move back to a mountain or the coast, or unload all units to defend the stack (you don't require movement for this, even 0 movement units can load and unload!). In my last game, i managed to add eurebates with orthus axe, a lvl 17 champion with the gela and an attached commander, and brigit freed by the champion to the stack. I took down a 2500 points calabim decius in little over 6 turns.

 

[rusty217]

the kurio's are powerful enough as it is, try playing them as empyrean, using a stack with a high priest, chalid, 4-6 catapults (just incase) and about a dozen champions, piled in 3-4 air transports. Take down a city in 1 turn, then eighter move back to a mountain or the coast, or unload all units to defend the stack (you don't require movement for this, even 0 movement units can load and unload!). In my last game, i managed to add eurebates with orthus axe, a lvl 17 champion with the gela and an attached commander, and brigit freed by the champion to the stack. I took down a 2500 points calabim decius in little over 6 turns.

But any civ is overpowered with Chalid...

 

[Demus]

he just speeded the expedition up a bit, the catapults and empyrean high priests had exactly the same effect (as would a couple of air 2 mages if i would have bothered with em). The point is: such a stack would normally be unbeatable enough, but the airships allow you to move even faster through the enemy terrain than a raider stack would (assuming champions as your main force)

 

[Kjara]

Just played a game with the Kuriotates. I have to agree that airships while not making the force much stronger, speeds up the rate at which a stack can take towns. I was cleaning up a few people late game; was using killer stack with ~5 cannons (to reduce fort), 4 of each of the two late unique mounted units (both knight and war chariot replacements), and a few other scattered troops like champs. The airships basically let you use the cannons against a different town each turn, as you can load them back into the airships to move to the next town after bombarding.

 

[Imuratep]

My concern is not power but flavor. I know airships are powerful, I used them by myself, but I wished there were more such cool units as the airships for the Kuriotates. They should have some late game powerhouse by their own to have something to research, what you really like. Chalid and Empyrean Priests anyone can discover, but what do the Kurios get Centaurs, Centaurs and look more Centaurs. The airships apealed me not because of their power, but because of their style.
And that's why I'm saying give the Kurios more cool units like the airships. Flying units could be a unique factor for the Kurios.

Griffin Riders could for example be build with animal handling with a strength of 7-8 and a movement of basic 4, but you need a caught griffin, wouldn't be too powerful, but cool. You could give them the same with rhoks with a lower strength, but buildable without a caught unit. I think of all the fantastic RPGs, where you were riding on a giant bird.

A sphinx could come with strength of will or with omniscience - I don't which fits it better - and should have a low attacking power and a high toughness. Spirit III, Life III and Soul III regainable I already suggested. A new idea, that occured to me, was, that it could sacrifice itself to build a unique building "Wisdom of the Sphinx" (that is a Sphinx that has settled down) which gives you a great research bonus and GP-bonus in all of your cities or something like that. Note that the myth of sphinx is egyptian AND greek, so it would fit the Kurios, which have a link to greek mythology

Another possibility would be to make the Sphinx a unique feature on the map, which anyone could visit. The original myth of the Sphinx says that she gave you a riddle and if you can't solve it you will be choked to death. In FFH it could be implemented like this, that she gives you a task and if you perform it during a certain time (let's say 20 turns) you will get a golden age or some kind of permanent bonus, otherwise you get punished (For example 5 turns anarchy - compared with Ilian Worldspell quite fair ).

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

very cool ideas there Imuratep, I especially like the idea of a Griffin Rider... but it should be buildable even without having captured griffons, otherwise it will see very little use. this thread http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=265423 had a lot of suggestions about the kurios btw

 

[Skitters]

The thing is, if you take the aerial route with the Kurios, you also have to consider that the other civs would need someway to counter them otherwise you hand a massive tactical advantage to one civ with limited means to combat.

 

[rezaf]

The thing is, if you take the aerial route with the Kurios, you also have to consider that the other civs would need someway to counter them otherwise you hand a massive tactical advantage to one civ with limited means to combat.

QFT

Also, in the Armored Cavalry thread somebody remarked about how Cavalry had low priority in his research, but he'd pick it over the Archery techs any time.
Might be a good and somewhat fitting job for the archers: They could automatically open fire on an airship that moved next to the city.
This would make them worth picking "just in case" and it would put a halt to the "Flying Catalpult Service" tactics.
Of course, that tactics could also be prevented by making Airship transports being only available to units that have not yet acted that turn.
_____
rezaf

 

[orangelex44]

Honestly, having Archers be a counter to one single unit only available to one civ wouldn't really make much more useful.

 

[Ajidica]

If archers were given barage like in AoI, it would be quite realistic. Not nesisarily as a counter for Airships, but for small stacks of powerful units. EG: At Agincourt and Crecy, the french were slaughtered by English Longbows and at Carahe Rome was overwhelmingly defeated by Persian Horse Archers. As far as I can tell, the AI knows how to use barrage (in DCM, they use it against me all the time) and it would also help reduce the 'Sphener, 3 paladins, and a few champions go and destroy an entire empire' effect.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I like the barrage idea..

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I like letting archers have ranged attacks too (the normal xml-only ranged attacks ability works better than a spell would), but Kael doesn't; he thinks that is the role for Magic and that letting ordinary units like archers have the ability detracts from magic users, and mitigates an intentional dwarven disadvantage too much. You're welcome to try to convince him to change his mind, or you could just stick to FF or, eventually, my modmod.

 

[Ajidica]

I dont think that it would detract from mages to much. Only archers, longbows (are they still even in the mod), barrages (have they been merged/removed? I have never really gone down the archery tree.) would have it. Also, the theme is different. To have a large mage army, you need substantial infrastructure while for archers, it is 2-3 techs to tack them onto an army. Also, the human player will diferentiate between archers and mages. It may just be me, but I never view archers as being an entire army, while mages I can view as being part of a large army.

Magister, I have been lurking on these forums since Shadow, and you have been talking about your modmod since then. No offense intended at all, but are you ever going to release your modmod? (Once again, no offense intended, I am just wondering)

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I keep planning to, but I keep getting way too busy with school. I'm thinking that I won't have much time to work on it until winter break. I'll probably have something ready to release in January, and then will be too busy to work on it until next summer.


I'm pretty sure that the most current version technically is still shadow. Ice doesn't officially begin until the scenarios become playable.

 

[cyther]

I'm pretty sure that the most current version technically is still shadow. Ice doesn't officially begin until the scenarios become playable.

Maybe, but the Illians are playable...

 

[Verily]

Maybe, but the Illians are playable...

Ice will begin with 0.40. Until 0.40, all versions are Shadow, which began with 0.30. Fire was 0.20 and Light was 0.10.

 

[Imuratep]

You're right you need some kind of counterpart for the flying units, because every city has some sort of unpassable terrain, to which no nonflying unit can move so the flying units can hide there. I would propose to give the Archer +25% against flying units and to allow workers to build a defense tower on a nearby impassable terrain, so flying units would have to destroy this first, before being able to retreat without being harmed. You can still attack from nearby cities and retreat to them but that should be a legit strategy.

 

[onedreamer]

I would have rather given the Kurios abilities to better exploit sea tiles than a flying transport. A faster and unattackable transport creates quite some balance issues, plus this doesn't solve in any way the two main sea-based drawbacks Kurios suffer:
1- the AI will still build coastal cities
2- Kurios will still be unable to grab sea resources.