Aeon221
Lord of the Cheese Helmet
Why don't you just make 10 stronger and make 10 be the strength and make that a little stronger?
Because I am XD
Why don't you just make 10 stronger and make 10 be the strength and make that a little stronger?
So, the other day, I went back and played a game of vanilla Civ, with raging barbarians on (as they are when I play FfH). Imagine my surprise when beating the barbs turned out to be more difficult in vanilla Civ than in FfH! Given that this world is meant to be a dangerous one where Civs can be swallowed up in the blink of an eye, I think this should be looked in to. The following are the causes that I've identified for the easier barbarian difficulty of FfH.
1) Promotions! In FfH, you get twice as much experience per battle, and you get to buy promotions that are worth twice as much as their vanilla counterparts. Combine that with early +xp civics, and you're seeing 80, 90% odds battles where in vanilla Civ you'd be fighting straight 50's and 60's. Then, combine that with specific anti-orcish promotions that you can get after combat I, and it really stops being a challenge.
2) Upgrades! In vanilla Civ, each player needed about 10 to 15 turns to research to get the second tier unit. This means that axemen show up much, much earlier. You need to invest in military infrastructure early, or you're going to get swarmed. Not so in FfH. I've gone whole games without seeing a single barbarian axeman.
3) Expansion! The easier the barbs are, the easier it is to expand. The easier it is to expand, the easier the barbs are. I'll admit that FfH animals can limit expansion quite a bit, but hunters render them obsolete. This should clear itself up somewhat if the above two points are addressed, but it still should be considered.
You know, it strikes me that a bigger barb challenge would be very easy to add in one simple step anyone can do with the editor.
Orc Promotion gives +20% str.
CoE would get a bit of a boost too, but I could live with that.
IT wouldn't matter what the defenders promoted; the orcs will still have +20% str. If that doesn't matter, you can make it 25 or 30.But then you'd just promote up AntiMelee I first, then its back to 'checkers'. It wouldn't work against all Barb, but it would against the units that matter in the early early going: Orc Spearmen.
I believe Unser thought that you were referring to the anti-orc promotion (switching it from 40% to 20%), not a +20% promotion given to the orcs themselves.
Hm... you know how experience in FfH is roughly doubled? Maybe experience gotten from fights with barbarians shouldn't be doubled. This would mean that you wouldn't get experience for 100% battles anymore, which I have no problem with.
i wouldnt say the barbs are easier, its just once you shift your game style to heavy military it becomes easier, though you still have to actively deal with them.
vanilla is much easier, there you don't even have to make military most of the time, just a token unit for the garrison happiness.
Is the problem that the barbarians are easy? Or perhaps people need to notch up the difficulty level a bit if they want a challenge? Barbarians have never been a major problem for me- when the Sailor's Dirge does not pop up on my doorstep that is- in any games. But in my current game, I bumped the difficulty level up (maybe prince?? don't remember) and had to really change tactics to protect my territory from the increased numbers and quality of barbs attacking me.
1. Sailor's Dirge - I really don't have any experience with that.
2. Orthus - easy to kill, especially if he visits you first, as long as you have a couple of Warriors with promotions. It is great to get the Axe ASAP.
3. Acheron, the Red Dragon - this has been a bit more problematic for me in my last few games. As Acheron appears rather early, it is very difficult to take him down. If he sets up shop in a city close to you, you will have problems as it is difficult for you to expand in that direction and also it seems like you get beaucoup barbs visiting your territory. My strategy is to quickly take out any barb cities that pop up near my CIV if I can (if I am not being swarmed), because IMO if a barb city appears just outside your boundaries in the early game there is a 100% chance Acheron will soon appear. To validate this, I went out and took down three barb cities close to my civ. No Acheron. However, sure as shootin' when I couldn't get to one city to destroy it in time, Acheron showed up!
4. Having 2 or more AI civs with the BAR trait. One is not a problem as you can let that civ exceed the 50% rule and the barbs will take him out. However, with two you have a problem as they will tend to stay close to each other in score - the 50% rule will not go into effect, even if you are far back in third place from these two in total points. So, you have to venture out and conquer one of these civs at least. Easier said than done as you need to have defenders from the barbs too. I am in a game now that has Hyborem and Jonas and they are within 50 pts of each other and 150 pts ahead of me. No 50% rule possibility.
1. I have had it show up on me in 3 games. One str 3 skeleton would do some damage, but 3 can't be overcome that early.
2. my current game he appeared who knows where- just not near me. I saw the event his axe changed hands at least 8 times, then while roaming around randomly my Curly squashed a barb goblin and I got the axe
3. Bambur with 100 exp or Baron with 80ish wins every time for me. My problem is usually there is a stack of AI troops camped out somewhere nearby so I have to be able to take out the dragon and the 7 or 8 orcs in one turn to get the city or an AI will steal it.
4. I have the opposite experience, Hyborem and the barbarians on one map ended up being the weakest militarily because none of their troops had battled to level up. So my smaller, veteran stack walked through both of their civs. I finally declared peace with Hyborem when he had one city left- on an island and me with no ships...