Poor bad guys

[Ambassador]

What it is that all the evil civs are always the weakest civs in my games ... I already choose aggressive AI ... Seems as if everyone is at peace with everyone, and especially the Clan is always tiny and not warlike.

Couldnt they be made a little stronger? With more incentive to go to war early or better chances to build cities early on?

 

[smusebaer]

Turn on raging barbarians and great landmasses. Last game only the barbarian Empires survifed the first 100 turns.
I only survied, because I cast the Elohim worldspell.
As soon, i managed the barbarians, a very big clan declared war on me, and a also very bid doviello joined him against me...
That was fun... and i lost.

 

[Bad Player]

IMO evil civs should inherently be a bit more powerful (on their own), but good civs should make better friends so that it balances out like that.

 

[reverend oats]

Well, the Balseraphs, Illians, Svalts, and Sheim always seem to be at the top of the scoreboard in my games, so maybe it's just luck that they do badly in yours.

 

[Pyr0mancer]

The evil civs seem to do fine to me. Elves (either flavor), Clan*, Doviello*, and Balseraphs almost always do fairly well in my games, unless they go to war with me, in which case they lose their momentum and experienced units and get out-teched in the mid-game. Calabim often do pretty well too if they don't get penned in too badly. I play Emperor/Epic, usually Pangaea, Standard.

* Doviello and Clan seem to depend heavily on having a successful initial rush to build up an early advantage. The few games where they've picked me for their first target, if I fend off their rush then they tend to stagnate, but if they go after another AI they often become a continent-spanning powerhouse that throws stacks of 40 units at me every few turns.

 

[orangelex44]

There are a few civs that seem to always be at the bottom of the strength scale for me, but alignment doesn't seem to be much of a deciding factor....

The Illians, Bannor and Khazad almost always seem to be in the bottom two or three. Clan and Doviello are very hit-or-miss, they need to beat on a couple other civs to become strong. The Calabim always seem to be at the top - they'll start slow, but after casting River of Blood they go crazy (damn you, Decius!).

Are you playing Creation maptypes? Creation has a "flavored" civ start, meaning that civs generally tend to start in terrain that represents them. For Clan, that's jungle, and Doviello, tundra... neither of which is good for empire-building. That may be why they're doing so bad in your games.

Of course, that doesn't explain the other Evil civs. Maybe just a run of bad luck? How many games are we talking about, here?

 

[Ambassador]

Thanks to all.

@orangelex: I was talking about my last 4 games... yes, then maybe just bad luck in these cases.

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I'm playing Erebus with FF+SOP and flavourmod enabled. the Ljolsafar, Calabim and Keelyn are always doing very good. while Bannor, Kuriotates, both dwarves, sheaim and malakim are always doing bad. same for illians and doviello that start in ice/tundra.

 

[KillerClowns]

The Balseraphs are usually my biggest worries. Perpentach is eerily brilliant; I suspect it is because the AI adapts effortlessly to his shifting traits. And while it doesn't use Keelyn's Summoner trait and puppets as ruthlessly as a human, I find that for some bizarre reason, she's usually the best at intercontinental warfare.

 

[Sarisin]

Here's a thought: why don't you play an Evil civ, Ambassador?

Then, you could cultivate alliances with the other Evil civs on the map and help them stay around and be more powerful by going after the Good Guys.

I have to agree with your point to the extent that I almost always play a Good or Neutral civ (or convert to a religion that makes me one), so I am pounding on the Bad Guys and helping the Good Guys.

However, there is always at least one Evil civ, and I agree that it is often the Balseraphs, that is up there. My last game I was constantly fighting a very powerful Hyborem who had expanded allover the huge map.

In other games, I have seen many civs convert to AV and go bad creating problems for the lone Good or Neutral civs.

 

[zup]

RoK and FoL spread too much, OO too but not that bad. I'd much rather see massive AV vs Order games. But even then you need extremely high ac to make the "Lets all be friends!" bots go after each other.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I don't think the problem is that RoK and FoL spread to much, as much as it is that Elves and Dwarves are forced to beeline straight for their founding techs (bypassing much wiser tech choices), so they are founded early.

 

[Jean Elcard]

The Dwarves did pretty goood in th last games I remember, but it's always sad to see, that Dovilello, Illians and Malakim often aren't doing that good in there prefered kind of terrain. Maybe some future FFH patches are going to change this but I'm not really counting on it. Or should I? At least I'm remembering a thread discussion trying to improve the Malakim style of life.

 

[Sarisin]

I don't think the problem is that RoK and FoL spread to much, as much as it is that Elves and Dwarves are forced to beeline straight for their founding techs (bypassing much wiser tech choices), so they are founded early.

I absolutely agree with this!

I've been saying since the first version of FFH that it is almost impossible to found FOL or ROK if you are not playing the elves or dwarves in your game and they are there.

In my last game ROK was founded BEFORE Turn 100 - in an Epic Speed game. That just isn't right. In addition to the beelining I am still convince somehow, someway (I think and Adept might have something to do with it ) they also get some help with their goody huts. The elves always send both their Scouts out and leave their capital undefended (I beeline for the Elves capital if they are anywhere near me because it takes awhile to build that first defender at epic speed), but I cannot understand how the dwarves (one has two Warriors to start) does it.

By allowing them to beeline these religions and found them so early, it really does impact the way your games go. ROK and FOL are spread around quite a bit before the other religions are founded.

Although, I must say that AV getting beelined (it would appear so anyway) has the same effect with the early spread of that religion and the introduction of Hyborem to the game.

Suggestion: stop the beelining of the founding of ALL religions. Give the players an even playing field with all getting a chance to found the religions. An alternate suggestion, I have mentioned before, would be to give the dwarves and elves Way of the Earthmother and Ways of the Forest as starting techs and just get it over with!

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

I think AI beelining for religions is gonna be toned down a bit in 0.34, actually. right now, some civs don't even have a choice, they just HAVE TO get that tech asap. which led to a bug where if a religion was not available (i.e. disabled via custom option) , those civs would just sit there doing nothing. Kael acknowledged that so it's gonna be fixed, which means that in the process the AI logic about beelining religions could get a tweak or two

 

[loffenx]

I think the beelining should be modified so that the player has the option of getting the religion if he/she beelines himself, ie. tone it down so that the elves and dwarves get their respective religion in most cases, unless the player really rushes towards the religion.

The wiseness of the choice waries though, sometimes the elves have won a religious victory before I've even met them, though I play on very small maps.