The OP had basically said that the Khazad are no fun for him because their siege units dont compare with mages' fireballs. Big Deal. use another tactic. siege units aren't the only ways to weaken/take cities. As others have said, the khazad are going to get 3 units for every 1 the enemy gets(thanks to tremendous production) and those units are going to move faster in hills, defend cities better, and be just as strong as any other enemy unit. the point of each civ is to teach you to play differently than the last civ you played. Yes, some civs you will play similarly, but if you find that one civ doesn't have mages, use another strength. Hell, there have been a few threads on why the Khazad are too overpowered! It's all about play style, and it sounds like you are just upset because the Khazad can't get move 4 fireballs like you USED to.
Khazad are tough to play
- Thread starter Yarnosh
- Start date
readercolin
King
- Joined
- May 7, 2009
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- 604
Did you by any chance notice when the first post was made before you posted that? Heck, the original post and the proceeding thread ended up sharing much of the experience that lead to people figuring out how to play the Khazad well. If you look 1 page back, you'll see that about 5 posts from the bottom this thread was rezzed by someone having an issue playing them (notably against pyre zombies), and they didn't feel like making a brand new thread about it. I think that the original OP's post has been well answered since it was first made last 9 months ago...
-Colin
-Colin
First of all, Khazad have the benefits of RoK, which is one of the easiest religions to play, with all that gold coming in.
Second, Khazad with 500 gold per city in the vault have a massive production advantage and should get most of the end game wonders.
But they do need either catapults (but they build awesome ones) or a map with lots of ocean on it so that they can bombard cities. If you're going with the Cats, Bambur can repair them, which is nice. Collateral damage helps. Need to protect the cats against assassins.
The RoK Mines of Moria gives you both gems and iron -- gems allow you to build your priests and iron boosts the melee units and lets you build big ships.
It helps to conquer a neighbor early, either after you get Bambur or when you get melee units backed by iron ahead of everyone else.
Edit: Yes the Khazad are have a tough time against some specific attackers. Try to eliminate the Sheaim quickly if you see them. Would placing archers in the path of the stack of pyre zombies stop them? Would it be possible to go around the stack of doom and lure it back to its home by moving rapidly through the hills and retaking a city?
Arthendain now has destroy undead -- that should help a lot -- but don't let him end his turn adjacent to the doom stack.
Second, Khazad with 500 gold per city in the vault have a massive production advantage and should get most of the end game wonders.
But they do need either catapults (but they build awesome ones) or a map with lots of ocean on it so that they can bombard cities. If you're going with the Cats, Bambur can repair them, which is nice. Collateral damage helps. Need to protect the cats against assassins.
The RoK Mines of Moria gives you both gems and iron -- gems allow you to build your priests and iron boosts the melee units and lets you build big ships.
It helps to conquer a neighbor early, either after you get Bambur or when you get melee units backed by iron ahead of everyone else.
Edit: Yes the Khazad are have a tough time against some specific attackers. Try to eliminate the Sheaim quickly if you see them. Would placing archers in the path of the stack of pyre zombies stop them? Would it be possible to go around the stack of doom and lure it back to its home by moving rapidly through the hills and retaking a city?
Arthendain now has destroy undead -- that should help a lot -- but don't let him end his turn adjacent to the doom stack.
i got a good chuckle out of the above post, as in my most recent Khazad game, i did pretty much exactly what he's talking about. Monarch > Small > Pangea, Kandros. Started right by the Amurite capital, immediately made all nice and peaceful-like while building warriors. Built a second city and then sent my main stack down with a constant stream of warriors coming at them, wiped them out and took their two cities. This worked great since they were along the coastline to my east, and so i had a single expansion front, with no fear of anyone creeping up my backside.
I killed someone else too, rolled my warriors over from the Amurite campaign and started building Axemen, and curbstomped them. It was such a short war i don't even remember who they were. Unfortunately (as usual) that damn dragon popped up in a barb city to my southwest, blocking expansion in that direction (though really wasn't more than enough land for 2 or 3 cities anyway.) But it didn't really matter. By this point i had 9 cities (3 of my own, 2 Amurite, and 4 from the second dead civ), and was set to expand out again.
Ran into the Sheaim almost immediately after that, and then everybody else, while I was expanding. Got to about 12 cities and then dealt with the gold issues, but hey RoK holy city helped. Decided that Sheaim was the main problem, so traded resources and gold with Bannor and The Good Elves Whose Name I Can Never Spell.
By which times i had the Mines, which are pretty critical to the way I play Khazad in situations like this, since it allows me to divert off the metal line (since I got three Irons) and into economy to prevent myself from going broke from the REXing -- and to ensure the lovely production bonus.
By this time it was quite apparent that the Sheaim would be attacking me at any moment, after several poorly worded diplomatic requests. Really, do they think dwarves, DWARVES, respond well to THREATS?
I think not.
Especially since, in the meantime, i had completed Form of the Titan in my capital, Heroic Epic and National Epic in my second city -- and both those cities were production powerhouses, plus I had full coffers, so hey
Sheaim sent a stack of doom against my frontier city closest to them, which was pretty much what i expected. Which is why it was built on a hill, and i had bought Walls. At that point I didn't have much of a stack myself, due to consolidating former gains and concentrating on economy for a while, but i had 2 slingers, 5 axemen, and bambur in there, so i felt kinda safe. Not after i saw their stack though -- at least 15-20 pyre zombies and a bunch of hunters, at which point i resolved myself to losing that city. As soon as i saw that stack coming, i set science to 0%, switched to conquest, every building that could be rushed, was, and all cities switched to full military production.
Needless to say, i lost that frontier city. They also lost more than half their stack attacking it, and within a few turns i had a retribution stack with bambur at its head, an anti-zombie force composed of mobility-upgraded axemen, and fresh garrisons in every city. Also had Nilhorn, so used the giants to bombard since my catapults weren't really ready yet and slow as hell.
Took back my city 2 turns after i lost it, and wiped out the last Sheaim heretics maybe 10 turns later. The zombies were a pain but attrition is the best friend of the Khazad, and with the insane production that a fully mobilized dwarf empire can generate, especially with iron (before anyone else), experience upgrades from Aggressive, Form of the Titan, etc -- not only is the force huge, but they start off much better than pretty much anyone else's troops. At one point I was pumping out 4-5 Mobility + Shock Axemen a turn, then alternating Shock + Cover Axemen, all with Iron weapons, in addition to multiple Shock warriors and city defense Slingers. Then I started building Boar Riders just to pillage all their improvements, it was kinda ridiculous.
Rest of the game was just mopping up, look out Doviello, beelined to Druids, killed Lanun, then Basium (who the elves had brought in), then fought off the #2 and #3 empires (Bannor and Elves) who had gone to war as soon as I nailed Basium, then after that just casually wiped out Kurotates for a nice conquest victory.
So yeah, against Sheaim, generally rely on attrition and fast, decisive strikes. Pyre zombies are great and all, but if they throw them en masse against a decently defended city, let 'em, and then hit them when they're weakened. Sow the land with salt and let the streets run red with the blood of the unbelievers!
I killed someone else too, rolled my warriors over from the Amurite campaign and started building Axemen, and curbstomped them. It was such a short war i don't even remember who they were. Unfortunately (as usual) that damn dragon popped up in a barb city to my southwest, blocking expansion in that direction (though really wasn't more than enough land for 2 or 3 cities anyway.) But it didn't really matter. By this point i had 9 cities (3 of my own, 2 Amurite, and 4 from the second dead civ), and was set to expand out again.
Ran into the Sheaim almost immediately after that, and then everybody else, while I was expanding. Got to about 12 cities and then dealt with the gold issues, but hey RoK holy city helped. Decided that Sheaim was the main problem, so traded resources and gold with Bannor and The Good Elves Whose Name I Can Never Spell.
By which times i had the Mines, which are pretty critical to the way I play Khazad in situations like this, since it allows me to divert off the metal line (since I got three Irons) and into economy to prevent myself from going broke from the REXing -- and to ensure the lovely production bonus.
By this time it was quite apparent that the Sheaim would be attacking me at any moment, after several poorly worded diplomatic requests. Really, do they think dwarves, DWARVES, respond well to THREATS?
I think not.
Especially since, in the meantime, i had completed Form of the Titan in my capital, Heroic Epic and National Epic in my second city -- and both those cities were production powerhouses, plus I had full coffers, so hey
Sheaim sent a stack of doom against my frontier city closest to them, which was pretty much what i expected. Which is why it was built on a hill, and i had bought Walls. At that point I didn't have much of a stack myself, due to consolidating former gains and concentrating on economy for a while, but i had 2 slingers, 5 axemen, and bambur in there, so i felt kinda safe. Not after i saw their stack though -- at least 15-20 pyre zombies and a bunch of hunters, at which point i resolved myself to losing that city. As soon as i saw that stack coming, i set science to 0%, switched to conquest, every building that could be rushed, was, and all cities switched to full military production.
Needless to say, i lost that frontier city. They also lost more than half their stack attacking it, and within a few turns i had a retribution stack with bambur at its head, an anti-zombie force composed of mobility-upgraded axemen, and fresh garrisons in every city. Also had Nilhorn, so used the giants to bombard since my catapults weren't really ready yet and slow as hell.
Took back my city 2 turns after i lost it, and wiped out the last Sheaim heretics maybe 10 turns later. The zombies were a pain but attrition is the best friend of the Khazad, and with the insane production that a fully mobilized dwarf empire can generate, especially with iron (before anyone else), experience upgrades from Aggressive, Form of the Titan, etc -- not only is the force huge, but they start off much better than pretty much anyone else's troops. At one point I was pumping out 4-5 Mobility + Shock Axemen a turn, then alternating Shock + Cover Axemen, all with Iron weapons, in addition to multiple Shock warriors and city defense Slingers. Then I started building Boar Riders just to pillage all their improvements, it was kinda ridiculous.
Rest of the game was just mopping up, look out Doviello, beelined to Druids, killed Lanun, then Basium (who the elves had brought in), then fought off the #2 and #3 empires (Bannor and Elves) who had gone to war as soon as I nailed Basium, then after that just casually wiped out Kurotates for a nice conquest victory.
So yeah, against Sheaim, generally rely on attrition and fast, decisive strikes. Pyre zombies are great and all, but if they throw them en masse against a decently defended city, let 'em, and then hit them when they're weakened. Sow the land with salt and let the streets run red with the blood of the unbelievers!
I play Khazad rather a lot - always with Kandros Fir.
My civics are relatively static and I always run Religion, Arete and Conquest. My Government civic is the exception to this rule for which I run God King which I pick up en route to RoK, this is eventually changed for Aristocracy as I expand (mostly for the -40% maintenance and Royal Guards (which I love).
Finally I may change to city states if my empire becomes immense but I don't like to lose my Royal Guards or receive the penalty to culture that comes with it.
Early defence is made up of a combination of Slingers and SoK's giving me a semi active defence, usually I will throw in some catapults and trebuchets to deal with doom stacks.
Early attacks are made up of axemen headed up by Bambur and catapults (later to become trebuchets).
As mid game comes around Maros and Arthendain are available for boosting my defensive capabilities greatly, offensively at this point I tend to be at my weakest but by no means powerless. Mid game is a great time to consolidate and try to build up some gold and research - the two effective defensive heroes compliment this point in the game very well.
Late game is another shining moment for the Khazad, Trebuchets are no longer required in an offensive capacity as the Druids with crush obliterate all opposition, combined with a legion of Champions and if all has gone well Myconids (Spore is useful for halting counter attacks on your stack of doom).
In defence my (very) outdated slingers are replaced with Arquebus (sadly not by way of upgrade) but I tend to keep my SoK's on board for active defence and flexablility (i.e if some demons turn up I can make good use of ingenuity to turn them into Paramanders). Also my defensive trebuchets are replaced with Cannon.
A quick note on Runekeepers - I tend to keep all four in border cities with my Royal Guards to quash outbreaks of heathen religions and maintain the powerful Medic III ability in cities most likely to be attacked.
My civics are relatively static and I always run Religion, Arete and Conquest. My Government civic is the exception to this rule for which I run God King which I pick up en route to RoK, this is eventually changed for Aristocracy as I expand (mostly for the -40% maintenance and Royal Guards (which I love).
Finally I may change to city states if my empire becomes immense but I don't like to lose my Royal Guards or receive the penalty to culture that comes with it.
Early defence is made up of a combination of Slingers and SoK's giving me a semi active defence, usually I will throw in some catapults and trebuchets to deal with doom stacks.
Early attacks are made up of axemen headed up by Bambur and catapults (later to become trebuchets).
As mid game comes around Maros and Arthendain are available for boosting my defensive capabilities greatly, offensively at this point I tend to be at my weakest but by no means powerless. Mid game is a great time to consolidate and try to build up some gold and research - the two effective defensive heroes compliment this point in the game very well.
Late game is another shining moment for the Khazad, Trebuchets are no longer required in an offensive capacity as the Druids with crush obliterate all opposition, combined with a legion of Champions and if all has gone well Myconids (Spore is useful for halting counter attacks on your stack of doom).
In defence my (very) outdated slingers are replaced with Arquebus (sadly not by way of upgrade) but I tend to keep my SoK's on board for active defence and flexablility (i.e if some demons turn up I can make good use of ingenuity to turn them into Paramanders). Also my defensive trebuchets are replaced with Cannon.
A quick note on Runekeepers - I tend to keep all four in border cities with my Royal Guards to quash outbreaks of heathen religions and maintain the powerful Medic III ability in cities most likely to be attacked.
Monkeyfinger
Deity
- Joined
- Oct 24, 2006
- Messages
- 2,002
Why does this thread keep coming back
The best way to deal with invading pyre zombies as the khazad is put put a few axemen or slingers in their path and let em die. The zombies who scored the kills will be hurt and left a tile behind the rest of the zombies. Attack these stragglers with chariots or hasted axemen, and their explosions will fry the rest of the invading army.
The best way to deal with invading pyre zombies as the khazad is put put a few axemen or slingers in their path and let em die. The zombies who scored the kills will be hurt and left a tile behind the rest of the zombies. Attack these stragglers with chariots or hasted axemen, and their explosions will fry the rest of the invading army.
biggest problem i usually see with khazad, luchiurp or even other civs like doviello is the poor selection of starting terrain. I am sure this is just because i usually play Erebus maps, but a lot of the time i end up with a crappy valley of plains hills. well what kind of cities will i get out of this, super production is great and all but not when i cant work most of the tiles and my city is size 4.
usually if i play these terrain-centric civs I will just regen the map just so I am not gimped out the door. as long as some green or flatlands are nearby I will be happy even if i have to roll someone to get it.
usually if i play these terrain-centric civs I will just regen the map just so I am not gimped out the door. as long as some green or flatlands are nearby I will be happy even if i have to roll someone to get it.
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