Noob questions galore

[morchuflex]

Hello.

I am discovering this great mod, and have basic questions. Perhaps you can help me:

1. Is there any way to use the BUG mod in combination with FFH? I have been using it for years in regular Civ, and now playing without it feels like wandering in the street blind-folded.

2. Some techs appear in red, including seafaring. Why?

3. Can I disable this "hissing" or "fireball" sound that I hear almost every turn (I guess it means someone explored a shipwreck or a lair)?

4. For my first game, I picked a good civ. Everyone else (huge map, 11 rivals) is evil or neutral. Is this random?

5. First game, Monarch level, good but not exceptional territory, and on turn 350 I have 150% of my best rival's score. Am I that good, or is the AI dumb ? In regular Civ, I struggle on Emperor.

6. What is crime? Some buildings "increase" or "reduce" the "crime rate", but I see no effect in game.

Thanks for reading.

 

[iamdanthemansta]

I don't know the answer to all of them but here's some:

2) The techs that appear red are ones you can not research. Seafaring provides specific bonuses and is only available to the Lanun. Others civ can't research certain technologies, ie some can't get religious ones. Most civs can research everything but seafaring I believe.

4) I'm not 100% sure but I think it's random. I've had lots of different combinations of alignment in my games.

5) How good the AI is depends somewhat on which patch you are using. As a general rule the AI is pretty good but not with Heroes who can really make or break a game. FFH is much more warfare focused than normal civ so if you're really good at that it might be easier once you understand the mechanics.

 

[Morlark]

1. http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=331029, although it only seems to be compatible with patch i.

2. Most of the red techs require you to have a certain state religion before you can research them. As dan said, Seafaring is a special perk available only to the Lanun.

5. In patch g and earlier, most people reckoned that, compared to difficulty levels in BTS, FFH was quite a bit easier. Patch h and beyond has revamped the AI, so they should be much better economically, although the unit AI is still being worked on, I think. Although now they sometimes spam so many units that it cripples their economy anyway, so if you're playing on the more recent patches then maybe that's why you're finding it easy.

 

[morchuflex]

FFH is much more warfare focused than normal civ so if you're really good at that it might be easier once you understand the mechanics.

Actually, it's quite the opposite: I never wage war in Civ-like games.

Here in FFH, I did what I mostly do in Civ: chose archipelago map, made all cities coastal, built GLH + Inn + LH + Harbor in every city, research Astronomy, open borders with everyone (they hated me on first sight, but by offering great deals for them, I immediately gained +4) and reach 1000 gold / beakers per turn by turn 300.

 

[iamdanthemansta]

Actually, it's quite the opposite: I never wage war in Civ-like games.

Here in FFH, I did what I mostly do in Civ: chose archipelago map, made all cities coastal, built GLH + Inn + LH + Harbor in every city, research Astronomy, open borders with everyone (they hated me on first sight, but by offering great deals for them, I immediately gained +4) and reach 1000 gold / beakers per turn by turn 300.

That's probably part of it in FFH the AI is even worse than in normal civ at dealing with water. Try a land based map for more of a challenge.

 

[readercolin]

1. The link that was posted is one way, another is to play Wild Mana. Fall Further and Orbis (and of course, Fall Further Plus - Now Rise from Erebus) incorporated some versions of BUG, but not all.

2. Red techs you cannot research, either because they are civ limited, because you are not following the right religion, or a few other reasons (most of the other reasons are only applicable in modmods). Unless you are playing an agnostic civ (illians or grigori), you can unlock some of the red techs by following the applicable religion. For example, to research Arete, you must first follow Runes of Kilmorph.

3. No idea. I usually play with sound off...

4. There are 21 civs total, with approximately 1/3 being good, 1/3 being neutral, and 1/3 being evil. So getting 11 neutral or evil civs is random, though unlikely. If you want a slightly more balanced feeling game, you can select civs to be random good/random neutral/random evil.

5. Be glad you're playing the latest patches. In previous ones, on monarch, I was usually twice the score by turn 100. Now sometimes they even have a higher score than me. I will go more into this later.

6. Crime is an added little thing that was added in FFH. The only thing that it affects is the event system - have a higher crime rate, and you'll be more likely to have crime related events take place in that city.

Now, as to your play style. Fall from Heaven at the moment sucks horribly at naval stuff. As in in previous versions you MIGHT, if you were lucky, see a 1 boat naval invasion around turn 400, normal speed. Naval AI got even worse with the later patchs - now the AI rarely builds ships. If you want to get the most out of FFH, choose a land based, or mostly land based map. If you want to still have navy in the game, I would recommend doing something like Hemispheres. But if you want to see the most out of the AI (as in, actually have the game be a challenge) then you'll need to move to more landcentric maps. This may change later on, but for now, we have to live with it.

-Colin

 

[phizuol]

3) Wipe out the Balseraphs. Problem solved. I think that's something that should be in the front of your mind the moment you see them in your game, "Here's a civ that needs to die ASAP."

Now that I think about it they're alive in my current game. I should put them out of their misery. I guess I don't think about it as much because Loki has already died.

 

[morchuflex]

Thanks EVERYONE for the kind input.

I tried the BUG merge described in the link, but it only works partially (some features work, others don't). Maybe I'll try these modmods...

As for the AI and water maps, it's too bad, because I really love naval warfare and exploration. But since I still want a challenge, I guess I'll have to adapt and play Pangeae...

Thanks again!

 

[readercolin]

You don't have to play Pangea. There is also lakes, hemispheres, erebus, etc - pretty much every map other than archipelago and islands. Just remember that if there is more than 1 continent, the civs on the other continent probably won't get in contact with the other civs.

-Colin

 

[Onionsoilder]

5. In patch g and earlier, most people reckoned that, compared to difficulty levels in BTS, FFH was quite a bit easier. Patch h and beyond has revamped the AI, so they should be much better economically, although the unit AI is still being worked on, I think. Although now they sometimes spam so many units that it cripples their economy anyway, so if you're playing on the more recent patches then maybe that's why you're finding it easy.

I disagree. I have found the AI to be much easier with patch J than it was with patch H, before the changes. with H, I was struggling on Immortal. Now I can completely dominate every single Deity game, to the point were it isn't even close to a challenge anymore. The AI does slightly better early on, but they crash their economy later. They also don't have a clue how to use their units anymore.

 

[Zongo]

You don't have to play Pangea. There is also lakes, hemispheres, erebus, etc - pretty much every map other than archipelago and islands. Just remember that if there is more than 1 continent, the civs on the other continent probably won't get in contact with the other civs.

-Colin

Personally the best random maps for FfH2 are the ones generated by the script ErebusContinent, which you can find here.

 

[morchuflex]

Thanks, I'll try it.

 

[WCH]

A lot of people also hate the Erebus mapscript. Read this thread: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=339162