Novice First Game Questions

[A_Hamster]

Thanks to Ozbenno, I was finally able to download FfH II and am in the middle of my first game. This looks like it will be more addictive than Civ or even SMAC (which is my favorite Sid Meier game to date). There's so many options though, so I've a few questions.

1. I founded the Empyrean, but I've yet to see an Overcouncil election or proposal come up, and I've had the religion as my state religion for at least 150 turns now and been a member since I founded it. Is there something else I need to do?

2. To get the benefits from an Unique feature, how close do the cities need to be? I'd like to get a couple of cities around them. I started right next to the Dragon's Bones and have my capital and my fifth city within two spaces of it so they share the DB tile.

3. Penalty for military builds: what exactly is a military build? Cannons and Axemen obviously, but how about Disciples? Can you slip Golems under the wire?

4. Are city spells like Hope and Inspiration permanents? If not, how long do they last?

5. What do Druids do, and why are more experienced players so fond of them?

6. How to get Contagion? In the manual it says Death II, but the Civipedia for Death II says the effect of Death II is Summon Spectre.

7. How to get Meteor Swarm? Reading the AARs and sucession games, it is frequently mentioned, but I couldn't find an entry in the Civipedia.

Thank you for your assistance.

BTW, I'm playing as the Elohim and am gearing up for war. The west of the map has fallen to either the Ashen Veil or OO and even the neutrals are evil, and the Infernals are in the game too. The path of tolerance and peaceful conversion has not brought the desired results: it is time for the sword and the cleansing flame. The spawn of evil will be driven before us like chaff before the wind. First the Calabrim and their vassals the Sidar, then the Dark Elves and the Infernals. (In a previous war I vassalized the Sheaim: I'd have killed them, but I wanted the arcane techs that I had not researched.)

Oops, slipping into my RPG paladin mode ... probably should have founded Order instead.

 

[xienwolf]

1. Overcouncil is no longer tied to the Empyrean. It now is tied only to Honor (technology) and Overcouncil (Civic). Once 2 or more Civilizations have their Membership Civic set to Overcouncil elections should start.

2. Unique Features just provide better yield on that tile and some provide a resource as well. The resource is available to your entire trade network, just like any other resource. The yields are just like any Tile Yield and supply only the city which is working them with those benefits.

3. Everything is a military build except Hawks, Settlers & Workers.

4. Hope & Inspiration only remain while there is a caster capable of casting that spell in the City at the start of each turn.

5. Druids can get Nature 3: Vitalize and make all of your terrain Grasslands (or at least Plains if you stop short). Plus they have Nature Affinity, so can be made fairly strong. But mostly it is all about the Vitalize (without having to waste promotions on an Archmage for it)

6. Which manual are you using? The one in my sig is up to date, the one that is stickied is fairly old. Only Mary Mobus can cast Contagion now.

7. Meteor Swarm no longer exists. So I suspect you are on the old manual

 

[rusty217]

1. In order for overcouncil votes to come up at least two civs have to have the overcouncil civic, so check that you have it and then try and get another good or neutral to take it aswell.

2. Unique features are workable tiles so as long as they are in range to be worked like a normal tile, and if they give resources you will also need a road

4. The city spells last aslong as the caster stays in the city.

7. Metor Swarm is no longer in the game...

 

[MagisterCultuum]

1. The only link between the Empyrean and Overcouncil is they require the same tech, and the Empyrean hero will give you an extra vote on the council.

2. Depends what bonus you mean. If you mean the extra yeilds, they only apply if worked, so you need them in the fat cross (note the Kuriotates have fatter fat crosses than most civs, and that the City of a Thousand Slums wonder can let other civs boost their fat crosses by a 1 tile radius too). If you mean extra happiness, also in the fat cross, but it will apply if the feature is in the fat cross of multiple civs. If you mean the resource, you just need it in your territory and connected by a trade route. If you mean their spells (Pyre of the Seraphic allows you to sacrifice angels for fire elementals), or extra line of sight, then you just need a unit on the tile. For their ranged defense, you need a unit on the tile and the improvement not to be in rival borders.

3. not sure, but I'd guess it is everything without a unitcombat (settlers, workers, workboats)

4. They remain so long as some unit capable of casting the spell remains in the city. It doesn't actually have to be the unit that cast the spell. I know this used to only be updated once per turn (so you could send the unit out and move it back without any trouble), but I think this was changed recently.

5. Druids have access to nature 1-3 (or earth 1-3 for dwarven druids), a unique spell (entangle for most druids, crush for the dwarven variety), affinity (+1 nature for most, +1 earth for dwarven druids), they start with subdue animal and they can heal and cure disease like priests. Now that religions carry over when units upgrade, they also have access to all the spells of their religion's high priests. High Priests will abandon you if you switch religions, but Druids never do.

6. Contagion used to be a death II sorcery spell (before sorcery and summoning were merged in .31), but now it is a unit specific spell for Mary Morbus, a hero that can only be gained through a random event which can only trigger n a city with an alchemy lab.

7. Meteor swarm used to be the Fire III Sorcery spell, but was also removed in .31 when sorcery and summoing were merged.


It might be a good idea to take on the Infernals first; they get free units (manes) when units of the evil religions (or with death or entropy promotions) die. They can upgrade these to almost any unit, can rush production, or can use them to increase their city size. Food does not effect this civ, and they have a UB that negates unhealthiness and unhappiness, so their cities can get obscenely large. If you wipe out other civil civs first, the Infernals will be much more of a threat. You might want to build the Mercurian Gate, so you can bring in Hybrem's nemesis, Basium. This would give you a permanent alliance with him, and give you the option of switching to him instead. He will force you into war with AV civs, and he gets angels from the deaths of good units, with their xp too. The Elohim are Pacifists, so if you're into role playing you may want to switch to the most militantly good civ in the game.

 

[A_Hamster]

1. Overcouncil is no longer tied to the Empyrean. It now is tied only to Honor (technology) and Overcouncil (Civic). Once 2 or more Civilizations have their Membership Civic set to Overcouncil elections should start.

Ah ha. That explains it. Everyone else (including Varn and Arendel Phaedra) are Honorless dogs. No one else can join. Guess I start gifting it and then when they are in, propose the crusade.

5. Druids can get Nature 3: Vitalize and make all of your terrain Grasslands (or at least Plains if you stop short). Plus they have Nature Affinity, so can be made fairly strong. But mostly it is all about the Vitalize (without having to waste promotions on an Archmage for it)

Okay, the Vitalize is worth it, and I have wasted a Vitalize promotion on an Archmage, but I can't spare him for the home front with a crusade coming.

6. Which manual are you using? The one in my sig is up to date, the one that is stickied is fairly old. Only Mary Mobus can cast Contagion now.

7. Meteor Swarm no longer exists. So I suspect you are on the old manual

*Heh* Probably. It also says the Illians are not yet a playable civ, which was obviously wrong. I'll download the new one.

MagisterCultuum The thrust of my question was about Happiness bonuses from unique features, but it is good to know about the rest of it.

As for crusading against the Infernals first, that makes excellent sense. Problem is that I don't know exactly where they are: my map doesn't extend that far west and south. Tebryn has given me what little knowledge of the west I now have (since the evil civs all had open borders for a long time), but even his map doesn't lift the fog from the south and southwest beyond Faeryl. It looks like there's a huge barbarian city to the east of her capital and the World Tree is just to the east of that. So I guess the Infernals are somewhere directly to her south. If you'd like to see the map, I can provide screenshots.

Based on the information I have, I'll have to carve my way through the Sidar and the Dark Elves, but that leaves my right flank exposed to Alexis, who will join in when I attack her vassal Sandalphon. Alexis is also in second place, so I might as well take her out anyway while securing my right flank. Another incentive is that she founded the Ashen Veil and has built the shrine.

Since I'm playing my first game on Warlord level, my troops have massive superiority in quality. I've four Archmagi and four Paladins, some highly experienced Devout, some mid-level Champions and Chariots, lots of Lvl 2 Monks, a fair number of level 2 Ratha and Radiant Guard, a moderate amount of L2-4 Vicars, two high level rangers (most Hunters became Devout), and now the first Cannon and Arquebuses are rolling off the line. At least with Alexis, I haven't seen anything better than a L3 Morai, and very few of those. They've got me on numbers. I can't maintain an offensive and garrison the captured cities. Should I just raze? After all, the Devouts can Sanctify the ruins, so I should break even AC-wise. Alternately, go as far as I can, then use my world spell to get time to get garrisons in place.

Another question: it says razing the AV "Holy" city will lower the AC. Will using the inquisition ability do the same thing?

About the Mercurians, at some point I do intend to play them, but I like what I have going right now. When I do play them I'll read up about maximizing the position for the transfer. Same for the Infernals. Still, I do need allies ...

As for roleplaying, usually I'm more a gamer, and thus willing to trample flavor, but when I'm really getting into a game, I'll start roleplaying. Since I suspected this would happen, I decided to play the Elohim not as pure pacifists, but rather as a stern but loving parent. One tries to nurture your children, but now and then you have to punish them if they stray. Apparently sparing the rod does spoil the child, and now look what they are doing! Goes a little beyond shoplifting ...

Also when I do roleplay, I like playing against type, so twisting the stereotype is "in character" for me.

Again, thanks to all of you for your answers, and please excuse the lengthy reply: I'm just bubbling over with enthusiasm. Now, if you'll excuse me, in about 12-15 turns, it will time for the sword and the cleansing flame.

"Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of vampires?"

I don't know but I'll open up a few vampires and tell you what I find.

 

[Tssha]

The Civilopedia is correct, the Illians are not intended to be a playable Civ yet. So yes, you can switch to them with a custom game, but they're not really finished yet. They lack several features that will be included in Ice, the next phase in Fall from Heaven development.

Interestingly enough, the Svartalfar and the Sidar were unfinished Civs until Shadow came along. You could play them, but since invisibility and a few other race specific (or unit specific) changes were unimplemented at the time, they were lumped in with the Illians as "unplayable".

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Razing cities gives the Infernals more manes than killing evil units does. I don't think that Inquisition will effect AC, and it won't remove a religion from its holy city anyway. Razing normal AV cities does decrease the AC too, but since razing any city increases it you might not even break even on this.

Mercurian Cities have AV removed from them every turn, automatically. If you do summon Basium to your aid, but don't chose to switch, you can just gift all your conquests to him. If your rivals take the city back from him, it will automatically be purged of the evil religions so you may be able to convince them to convert to RoK, Empyrean, or Order more easily. His angels will spawn in random cites, so he may be better able to defend them than you could. When your units die, their xp will go both to your other units (assuming you have lots of reliquaries) and to his new angels. If you have a spare great engineer, it might be a good idea to start the war and then rush build the gate in a newly conquered city away from your core empire, in the direction you plan to be advancing.


When playing as the Elohim, being surrounded by evil civs that won't give you open borders is no excuse for a limited world map: Devouts can move through rival territory without open borders. You could use them to find the Infernals and better plan an early attack against them, and to sanctify your enemies lands before the war, to deprive them of hell's strategic resources and to take away the defensive bonus for their demonic units.


Keep in mind your world spell, and the unique spell of your hero, Corindale. Sanctuary makes all your territory un-enterable for 30 turns, and Peace halves the AC and forces everyone into a peace treaty. This can't be broken for 10 turns (well, you could use a spell to break it if you want, but the AI doesn't know this. You don't have to be as careful about defending against overwhelming numbers if you can be invulnerable for 40 turns. You might be able to make peace with the civs that stand between you and the Infernals pretty easily once your troops move through.



Tssha isn't entirely correct; before Shadow, playability was based on leaders instead of civs, and being unplayable actually meant you couldn't play as that civ (without a very minor xml change). Currently, you cannot select the Illians unless you have already selected Auric Ulvin.

 

[A_Hamster]

Razing cities gives the Infernals more manes than killing evil units does. I don't think that Inquisition will effect AC, and it won't remove a religion from its holy city anyway. Razing normal AV cities does decrease the AC too, but since razing any city increases it you might not even break even on this.

I'll let you know. I'll test it, record results, and then reload.

Mercurian Cities have AV removed from them every turn, automatically. If you do summon Basium to your aid, but don't chose to switch, you can just gift all your conquests to him.
[Snip]
If you have a spare great engineer, it might be a good idea to start the war and then rush build the gate in a newly conquered city away from your core empire, in the direction you plan to be advancing.

*Nod* The building of the Gate was going be away from the core regardless, placed to act as a buffer state and so the Mercurians could get easy access to the evil civs. After all, there are former Sheaim cities that I could use now, but they aren't that well situated. There is a decently placed Sidar city that would do. The great engineer I don't have. Guess I can start it normally, then rush build.

Regarding the Reliquiaries, yes, all primary unit production centers have them, but my oldest, most experienced units were built before I had the tech. My Adept units all have Spirit Guides though, as do the heroes.

When playing as the Elohim, being surrounded by evil civs that won't give you open borders is no excuse for a limited world map: Devouts can move through rival territory without open borders. You could use them to find the Infernals and better plan an early attack against them, and to sanctify your enemies lands before the war, to deprive them of hell's strategic resources and to take away the defensive bonus for their demonic units.

This is just poor play on my part. It didn't click: I'd been thinking more about Hidden Nationality units and missed the implications of the Devout. However, I'm a few turns off from Omniscience, although Chalid and an Archmage have prepped a LRRP unit of four Devout anyway, and the LRRP team is sailing southwest. There are three Calabrim cities there that block entry, but if I had twigged to the Devouts abilities earlier, I could have scouted, built up in Sidar lands, then launched from there, and just fought a holding action in the north while going after the Infernals, but it is too late.

In my earlier force assessment I left out Chalid, Corindale, and Baron Duin. However, the window of opportunity has closed. Alexis is gearing up to attack me. Now her closest city has a large stack of Lvl3 Morai, and many L3 Bloodpets and Diseased Corpses. My stack is still comparable in size and is still overall higher quality, and there are now a few garrison units ready, but it doesn't look like I can go through her like a hot knife through butter anymore.

Keep in mind your world spell, and the unique spell of your hero, Corindale. Sanctuary makes all your territory un-enterable for 30 turns, and Peace halves the AC and forces everyone into a peace treaty. [Snip] You don't have to be as careful about defending against overwhelming numbers if you can be invulnerable for 40 turns. You might be able to make peace with the civs that stand between you and the Infernals pretty easily once your troops move through.

Yes, this is a great aid and comfort. Also, being able to attack and then dodge the retaliation (to some extent) amuses me. "Here, let me take your capital. Want it back? HA! Can't touch this! "

By the way, Alexis just popped a Great Sage with your user name in the AV "Holy" city. Are you part of the FfH development team or did you just get your user name from the mod?

 

[xienwolf]

Neither actually. He is just such a Lore buff that Kael honored him with using his forum Nickname as a possibility for the Great Sages.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

No, I'm not on the team. No, I did not take my name from the mod. It is Latin for "Master (in the since of one with delegated authority, often a teacher or foreman, not a slave owner or despot) of Civilizations"

Kael PMed me a couple weeks before the release of .31 and said that he was so impressed with my knowledge of FfH lore that i deserve the title of great sage.

Actually though, the Sage's name is mispelled. Its Magistar Cultuum instead of I'm MagisterCultuum. Maybe that has some meaning in Patrian, but not in Latin.

 

[xienwolf]

They fixed the misspelling. Are you playing the latest Patch MC? (and you meant to use sense, not since... )

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Oh. I have the latest patch, but haven't actually had time to play lately (not will I for the rest of the month). (I actually did play a couple quick Broader Alignments games, but I really shouldn't have wasted that time.) I haven't seen "myself" pop up lately, and since Kael didn't consider it important enough to mention in a changelog I assumed it hadn't been changed. I know it was still wrong last time I saw it, so this must have been in the latest patch.

 

[Tssha]

Well, frankly, disabling them on a 'select civs' basis is probably a fast way of keeping your average user from taking an uncompleted civ. When you click Play Now and select your civ, you're selecting from a list of civs (Amurites, Elohim, then pick your leader). In custom games, you're picking them on a leader basis (since when you pick a leader it automatically selects the civ they belong to and selecting the civ in custom game doesn't automatically select their sole leader or narrow your choices). Still, you're picking nits here...

 

[A_Hamster]

Some questions about the Immortal promotion. Can a unit have it, use it, then get it back through other means? Specifically, I'm a turn away from completing Blood of the Phoenix, but have no Melee units of high enough level to upgrade to Immortals (those that were are now Paladins). If the Phalanxes that are being produced now earn enough exp to earn Immortal through upgrade, can they become Immortal again?

Does an immortal hero work just the same as any other immortal unit?

I'm assuming immortal doesn't work if you sacrifice the hero (i.e. Corindale's Peace Spell).

Also, does Spirit Guide still work when an Immortal dies the first time and get reborn in the Capitol? (Colorwise, it should not, but I don't know how the game engine handles the situation.)

Incidentally, how much force do I need against Acheron the dragon? Courage is not a problem, but the dragon's high strength and Stoneskin(?) is a problem.

Anyway, the crusade has been much delayed. I'm deliberately holding off on completing Blood of the Phoenix until I complete the Knights and Phalanxes, which means no war for the time being. Also there are other reasons.

Following MagisterCultuum's advice, I started scouting the area looking for alternate routes. As confirmed by completing Omniscience, there's no route which does not go through the Calabrim. However, there was a side benefit: the LRRP team captured the Barbarian city of Sludgehome (now renamed Dies Irae for what will issue from there eventually). This city is right on the front with the Infernals and just to the east-southeast of Ahpetr, where Acheron the Dragon dwells. Through gates, I'm slowly building up a task force to capture Ahpetr, and plan to build the Mercurian gate there since it borders the Infernals and the Dark Elves.

Currently the AC is at 24-26, with two of my cities running the Hallowing continuously. The Sidar have been trying to scout my lands since we still have open borders, but my hidden nationality units have been killing them whenever they try. I still have two of the three Hill Giants from Pact of the Nilhorn, and Curly is Lvl 10 now: Sandalphon's Savants haven't a chance against that.

Arendel has declared war against Faeryl, which means she is at war with Alexis and Sandalphon, since Faeryl and Sandalphon are vassals of Alexis. She has even used March of the Trees, which is a pointless waste since she doesn't have the sealift capacity to get to Faeryl. Meanwhile, my Privateers are picking off the stray Caravel or Drown that tries to get to Arendel by sea. I just need 12-15 more turns to complete the Knights and Phalanxes, and to complete my Dragonkillers task force. Then I can go to war (finally). When that happens the whole world will be at war except for Varn, since Tasuke and Tebryn are my vassals (not that they are worth much). Varn could be useful, but he's too far away and doesn't have the ships.

 

[rusty217]

The Immortal unit doesn't use the immortal promotion it just is immortal, so yes if you get it now you could still upgrade to an Immortal.

Phalanxes can't ever upgrade to Immortals though, so they would not be able to get it again...

 

[xienwolf]

I think I covered Immortality fairly well in the manual, please let me know if it wasn't clear enough (So I can re-write it and make it better ). But for the moment: Immortal units are immortal by means other than the promotion. They simply ARE immortal, it can never be taken away from them. Other units can only possibly get Immortal through Blood of the Phoenix, with the exception of Hyborem, who starts with it, and Losha Valas, who can continue to get it over and over. No unit is restricted from getting Immortal multiple times, with the caveat that you cannot have 2 copies of it at once. Thus if you HAD Immortal promotion, "died" and used it (thus now do not have it), then something happens to grant it to you, there is no problem and you are allowed to have it.

Now, if you promote someone with the Immortal Promotion to be an Immortal (unit), then they still have the promotion, and don't need it at all since they will automatically be Immortal. Sadly they will lose the promotion the first time that the die though.


As for the others: When you have the Immortal promotion, you never ACTUALLY die. You escape from combat the moment before the death blow, then you teleport to the capitol. Thus no "On Unit Death" effects will occur.



As for Immortality triggereing by death in means other than Combat, right now it doesn't (even if killed by a spell, like the effects of Pestilence). Kael is supposedly changing how that will work in .32 IIRC. We shall have to see how he changes things to know if it will trigger Immortality after you sacrifice a unit for Research or something along those lines. Ideally you shouldn't be allowed to sacrifice your Immortal Promoted units, nor your Immortal class units.


Force against Acheron: It varies. Just like taking on Orthus. Sometimes you get incredibly lucky and smack him on accident, other times he gets incredibly lucky and takes down your entire army. But in general it shouldn't be so difficult to tackle him with Courage, Blur and a couple of Mounted units.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

As for Immortality triggereing by death in means other than Combat, right now it doesn't (even if killed by a spell, like the effects of Pestilence). Kael is supposedly changing how that will work in .32 IIRC. We shall have to see how he changes things to know if it will trigger Immortality after you sacrifice a unit for Research or something along those lines. Ideally you shouldn't be allowed to sacrifice your Immortal Promoted units, nor your Immortal class units.
.

79. Immortality will now save units that die from spell damage and such.

Actually, Immortality was changed for the release of .31

 

[A_Hamster]

The Immortal unit doesn't use the immortal promotion it just is immortal, so yes if you get it now you could still upgrade to an Immortal.

Phalanxes can't ever upgrade to Immortals though, so they would not be able to get it again...

Okay, thanks.

I think I covered Immortality fairly well in the manual, please let me know if it wasn't clear enough (So I can re-write it and make it better ).

Ah, I forgot to check the new one. My bad. But will comply.

As for the others: When you have the Immortal promotion, you never ACTUALLY die. You escape from combat the moment before the death blow, then you teleport to the capitol. Thus no "On Unit Death" effects will occur.

Good. When I was still playing Magic:the Gathering, there was some card combo that got exploited for guarenteed life points every turn, and then you recycled the sacrificed creature and set things up to do it again next turn. They had to rewrite the rules on sacrificing to stop that. So I wouldn't want that to happen here. While I'm not usually clever enough to find those kind of exploits, others are and then they break the game with them until the exploits are fixed. Of course in SP, it doesn't matter, but MP is a different story.

 

[A_Hamster]

Razing cities gives the Infernals more manes than killing evil units does. I don't think that Inquisition will effect AC, and it won't remove a religion from its holy city anyway. Razing normal AV cities does decrease the AC too, but since razing any city increases it you might not even break even on this.

In destroying the Infernals, I've gathered some data regarding the above.

1. The Inquisition ability does not effect the AC.
2. Razing an AV city does not always effect the AC counter negatively.

When I razed a size 3 city it resulted in the creation of two Manes and the counter held still. When I reloaded and kept it, the counter also remained at 14.
One turn later, I razed a size 2 AV city but no Manes were created and the counter stayed put. I forgot to raze Dis (size 11) to see how many manes would be created and what would happen to the AC, but Faeryl is next (which will start wars with the Sidar and Calabrim) so more data can be gathered.

And three more questions.

1. According to the manual and the civilopedia, Spirit Guide is supposed to grant 50% of the exp to a random unit on the same tile. In the two times it has activated, the spirit fled to an unit in one of my cities instead. Is this how it supposed to work?

2. Since I was running the Hallowing continuously, I built the Celestial Compass. When checking the progress of my rituals, I did not see the usual build modifiers during mouseover. There was +45% for the forge and machine shop, but I did not see +50% for Celestial Compass. Is this wonder working properly?

3. Some of my units have their religion listed. While the state religion is Empyrean, FoL and RoK are also present. Most units are Empyrean, but some others are FoL or RoK and a few are apparently atheists since they've no religion at all. My guess this is important for Angel/Manes generation. How does the game engine figure this out? (I actually think this is a nifty game mechanic since it makes it seem like the units have chosen their own religion based on personal preference.)

 

[MagisterCultuum]

1. Yeah, it actually gives the xp to a random unit of the same civ. This was changed quite a while back, but the Civilopedia is rarely updated quickly.

2. I think I remember reading someone mention this a a bug before, but I don't really know what's up.

3. Religious UUs all start with their respective religion. When a unit is built and doesn't have a religion associated with its unit type, there is a chance for the game to assign it any religion present in the city building it. I haven't actually been able to figure out where this is handled though.

Order, Empyrean, and Runes of Kilmorph units, plus any living unit owned by the Mercurians, have a chance of becoming Mercurian Angels, compete with the xp (but not promotions or levels, jut the xp to purchase new promos). All AV, OO, and CoE units, plus all units with Death 1 or Entropy 1, have a chance to provide two Infernal Manes (with no promotions, levels, or xp)

Some spells (Priest spells and Esus Recon unit spells) also depend on the unit's religion too.