I'm still not seeing the problem. War weariness has never been an issue for me, for any civ, and I play on Emperor/Immortal difficulties. If I'm going to play a warmongering game Elohim are still going to be one of the absolute last I choose. I'd much rather have a civ which starts with warlike traits/units/bonuses, instead of having to trust my luck on finding a neighboring civ and overwhelming them.
Good for you.
But perhaps other people have different experiences? (Important note: Gamespeed, Playstyle, Maptype, Mode (singleplayer / multiplayer) all factor into that hugely. i can't even verify you having any point here with that post since i completely lack the perspective of how / what you play.)
What civ you are playing usually? Do you usually play Elhoim! on Emperor / Immortal? (emphasis on Elhoim not on the difficulty.) Or do you usually play other civs and Elhoim only on occasion?
Chances are you never had a problem with war weariness because you regularly played civs with a reduction instead of a whopping +40% increase (which is about double as bad as even a civ with only a 20% reduction) or you did play the Elhoim civ non-warmonger-like when you did play them (which is exactly how they were! intended to be played pre 0.33. Where it was subpar to engage into armed conflicts with them as civ-pic save those winnable in a few turns anyways.).
Now thats subpar play for Elhoim (and there are so many combat related civs in FFH2 that its unlikely you don't run into such a civ at least every second game, likely much more often + you can fully adjust your strategy without problem if you don't since its the very start of the game. Likely before even researching your first or second tech (which for most players is agriculture / edu or mysticism anyways so its not a big thing even after that.).
And in such a case you have the advantage of having friendly neighbors usually which is not a bad thing for a peacemongering strategy / civ if you are "forced" into that one.
In fact not everyone choses the "type" of game / style he wants to play before the game has even started. Full adaptability for any situation is a huge advantage.)
+ the Elhoim have an Emphasis on civics which further inflate WW. At least at the start.
Now subpar play doesn't mean outright bad or that you can't win Emperor / Immortal with such a strategy. Unless of course you dominate the AI so badly that it doesn't matter anyways (in which case you should try deity and have a look if its still a nonissue for you in 0.32.
).
In fact you can still play rather good and still subpar. But not everyone does roleplay / deliberately goes for another option than the best (especially in a case so blatantly obvious as above stated.).
Up until now WW was! a problem for Elhoim (and about the only civ where you could call that a big one. All other "peacemongers" only have a minor adjustment. At worst.). That was the whole point. Like Dwarves nonability to use magic beyond Tier 1. For balance and flavor. Throwing that out of the window is like giving the Lanun focused strength on land. Or giving warriors / other nonflying units flying. At least a bit of flavor, background and coherence is not soo bad.
And it didn't even remotely need to be like that to make the trait work as designed (i do doubt it does, and that part is utterly deliberate btw. But only the team can comment on that.)
But if its not an issue for you anyways i guess you whouldn't have a problem with a change of the palace-buildings to exclude WW then?
(Like its a problem for balance, flavor and common sense. And i don't mean the trait itself which i have no problem with, just that "small" aspect of palaces governing WW instead of the civ war/peace-likeness be put somewhere else.)
Very important edit regarding the WW issue:
+ its not all about you / the player / Elhoim AI alone in question.
Beeing engaged in a long-drawn and casualty-heavy conflict without suffering much WW (or none WW at all in case of pnfernal palace or with a warlike civs palace + the right civics.) might not downright help you much directly in comparison to not beeing in such a conflict but it hinders your opponent. Big time (especially civs without a reduction.).
This can become a game-changing factor against a peacmonger / insane tech-trader like Cardith or the Luchirp (not only does their pop turn unhappy but also their expenses skyrocket, they pick military civs and focus their resources on military which taken together kills their economy and tech.). And that one works up to Deity (even if beeing at war with many AI at that difficulty can create its own problems...
Just hope your walls are thick enough or try a game of survival challenge to get the feeling.
).
The less WW you have to endure the more civs you can drag into such an economic deadlock. (without any drawbacks of the usual extreme warmongers for teching / civs and nonabilities.)
Just go and slaughter as much of their units in your territory as you can + capture a few of their cities if possible. Don't mind your own losses as long as you don't loose due to them.
@ Marioflag: How does the! weakest civ militarily at the start of the game (read: the time you can build warriors / scouts and nothing else or at the latest the time you get copper if its near) mix with a combat promotion (homeland)?
Can't get that equation. (In fact any leader without a significant combat-promotion/trait (which whould be raiders, agressive and charismatic and defensive?) or warrior UU is by default! weaker militarily than the elhoim at the very start of the game.)
In fact even some of the warlike civs (with a reduction of WW from palace) have leaders which are weaker for warrior rush than both leaders of the elhoim (namely Rohanna, Os Gabella, Tebryn, Arthus Throne (a bit because movement is an issue early so thats not a clear thing), Varn Gosam, Kyleen, Capria, Flauros from top of my head. More possible.)
But i have to add, as so often, that above is very dependent on game speed. The faster gamespeed you play is the lesser above holds true (so more or less a non-issue at quick. At normal its not a problem to do above mentioned strategy and at epic its virtually impossible for even deity AI some space away from you to reach something above warriors if you intend to Warrior-Rush. So there it always works. Marathon is broken / borderline unfun anyways so i won't comment the obvious. FFH2 is mainly balanced for normal right now so thats my take on it.)
+ Elhoim have very good (good-aligned. Are Elhoim devouts upgradable to Emyprean priests now? Seems that has been overlooked. But im sure it will indeed be added.) priests (their priests can chose promotions of the recon-line which is nice especially for mobility 2 + have acess to Life 1?/2/3 depending on Tier (which is rather nice now. Especially Life 3 + Corlindale or if Life 2 fighting undead/ demons?) and posess Spirit Guide (+ defensive promotion if you are really lucky).) so they do have one whole branch where they are the best and those they might want to build themselves. And Divine Units are not all that bad. Especially the later Tiers (With Druids in the recon line as the best, which is the way to reach above outlined priests anyways. Religious heroes excluded.)
On the other points overall i agree more or less.
(Will see if i change that opinion to call the trait to powerful WW excluded after intensive tests but i doubt it.)
@ Ksi: Warrior Rushing works regardless of nearly all settings (save starting at classical era or with advanced start which breaks the game even more since its a big advantage to a player at higher difficulties. So actually turning ON "newbie" settings and drastically decrease the number of civs on a given mapsize might make the elhoim worse warmongers and "disadvantage" them to a certain extent unlike what you said.) sometimes even works on quick gamespeed (just not as effectively and against more than one or at best 2 civs.) and you just have to kill bloodpets to get vampires (no, Elhoim Vampires can't feast on pop. Should only be able to tap into bloodpets. Only Calabim Vampires can feast on pop.) or warriors / scouts / goblins to get Hippus Horsemen / Ogres and Adventurers. Not all that hard.
+ For added meanness you can force AI into peace with corlindale (which is easiely resurectable with Life 3 which you have easy acess to long before Archmages.) or seal your territory with sanctuary and sue for peace afterwards (which is completely inpenetratable for even the best warmongers.
) so you just need to grab an exposed / scarcely defended city later on and you are set. (if you liberate 2 or 3 cities afterwards even your relations won't be hit all that badly. For the "you attacked my friend" penalty play a game of Somnium with them + win to make them "forget".
Thanks Sto.
)
You can even do that to 3 or 4 civs at once with corlindale. (With powerful UUs / build-options of 5 or 6 different civs + homeland promotion you should indeed be a force to be reckoned with.)
Also losing their palace is not a drawback but an advantage since you get something better in most cases + their Mana is rather crappy for the start of the game.
And on top of all that, they know where the unique features are. So you can grab a serious economic / military advantage at times if you are near one. Woe to those civs near you if you start near Ygdrasil or the Remnants of Patria.
Another situational benefit but a very serious one if it occurs.
But i can't really see what makes them bad militarily (Save WW which is a nonissue with the buggy status available now.).
So i disagree (at least until the palace-issue is fixed. Then i might reasess.).
But we will soon enough see whom of us is right after some intensive tests.
Still very setting dependent. And not all of those settings are "newbie" by default. (otherwise survival challenge settings whould be "newbie" because its easy / borderline overpowering to live under those with the Sidar)
I don't like that use of words since its a very misleading catch all-phrase, and anything could be subsummed under it. (The civs are so different that any tweaking of the settings help some civ and hinders another... So base settings + the most common variants should be the rule if anything.)
I guess we can agree on that its somewhat situational to have them be good warmongers though can we?
(only that those situations where they are not they have other advantages from it most of the time...)
