How do you feel about goody huts? I kinda wish their was a
'no techs from goody huts, but everything else is alright (minus stuff that you don't get for difficulty)' option.
I'm not sure on them yet. Recent discussion on them has me wondering why I didn't notice their effects
. Of course, part of that is I only recently moved to immortal, so I've not been at a difficulty where they'd *for sure* give the AI more benefit until recently.
My gut feeling after thinking about it is that they don't distort the game as much as barbs though (but I may play with them off). Keep in mind, too, that I frequently play with barbs on...just not in HoF
. It's random events I absolutely, positively can't stand
. Part of that is because of reason #4...but that's not the only event that can really hurt. My personal favorite is chained forest-fire events really early in the game where you don't have money, accruing 2 or in one instance 3 whip anger arbitrarily, while you still only have one city.
I'm pretty sure I broke a mirror or somebody hexed me when it comes to random events though...they seem to bother other people a lot less. I lose 2-3 forges sometimes, or have 3 mining accidents in the BCs on my copper. Unlike barbs, which one can at least plan for (they're semi-consistent in spawn rate and power given a difficulty), random events force you to either 1) play suboptimally in anticipation of an event that never comes or 2) risk taking considerable early or mid game damage from them.
I've already hijacked this thread like 12509872340987 times too much though.
Paradigm, I apologize. Obviously your games, both here and in HoF, can be played in any way you deem best for yourself (well, provided it's within the rules in HoF, that is
). I'll take my complaints elsewhere now.
You definitely need to love Cathy. Cathy can never get enough love or treaties in pockets. I personally feel you could wreck @ emperor, you're a solid player (unless there's enough alcohol involved perhaps
), but that's your choice too. Sometimes it's more fun to be on drunken binges!
As for barbs, high level barbs are much more dangerous. I tried that deity Mao game by ABCF and ugh. Learned a thing or two. Snaaty's guide about getting archery early after either bronze or AH (but not both) really helps. If you move to emp you may want to keep that in mind, although again since you're playing normal it should feel much, much easier even at emperor than G major 40 did.
