Dumb QUESTIONS

[deccan]

Originally posted by Sheap:
In the single player game, if you attack the computer players' home province, it will draw their fleets like a magnet, saving the annoying "whack a mole" syndrome.

I assume you mean his capitol. That won't work for me. In my game, I'm fighting the Caelum AI and they're far and away the most powerful nation on the map. They've taken down the Jotuns, Pythium and Machaka and now only me and Abyssia are left. This means that his capitol is a long, long way away from where I am.

I think Caelum's troops are crap compared to mine, since I get huge kill ratios in my favor all the time whenever I can catch one of their armies, but like I said, I can't field enough armies to hold a frontline against them, so they're all over the place.

What I'm doing right now is summoning an angelic host every 3 or 4 turns and having them raid behind enemy lines destroying temples. Caelum seems to have a temple in every province they control.

Note: Abyssia shares a border with me but don't seem to be attacking me. Is the AI smart enough to realize that it should ally with another nation to beat off a more powerful enemy even though there's no diplomacy in the game?

[Atrocities]

Just finished my third game. Man this game is addictive. The micro-Managment though can become a bit tiring though.

Another question, how do you attact water cities? There was a peach of one just off my coast and I could not figure out how to attack them.

Also are there naval units? What other units are available in the full Version of the game? Air, additional ground, etc???

[Arryn]

Originally posted by deccan:
Note: Abyssia shares a border with me but don't seem to be attacking me. Is the AI smart enough to realize that it should ally with another nation to beat off a more powerful enemy even though there's no diplomacy in the game?

The AIs will preferentially tend to go after the biggest perceived threat, which as you describe is Caelum. The AI (at least for most of the nations) also tends to build temples in every province.

While Angelic Hosts are one of my favorite summons, because they can act as "fire brigades" just like you're using them for, the normal angels of the host are somewhat fragile (especially compared to the archangel leader). You might want to step back for a bit and switch to building SCs capable of taking and holding the provinces you're presently raiding into. Especially if you have death magic and good death gem income, which is excellent for such purposes.

[Cainehill]

Originally posted by Gandalf Parker:
If you own the province you can click on scales, and on taxes, and on defence. Defence gives free troops if you are attacked. Local militia which differs with each nation. It can be very helpful for not losing provinces too much. I tend to use defence numbers like 1, 6, 11, 21

Why 6, 11, 21? I tend to go 2 ( because a scout _might_ get lucky against PD 1 ), 5, or 10, and only very very rarely pay the expense of going to 15 or 20, if I think I'm going to immediately be on the defensive with my army there also.

( For the inexperienced players : A benefit of jacking the PD up in a contested province that also has your army in it : The PD acts as chaff, soaking up a lot of casualties that your army, and quality troops, might otherwise take. And then, as long as you managed to hold the province, the PD regenerates, even if it was _all_ killed. )

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Atrocities:
Another question, how do you attact water cities?

With water-breathing troops and commanders. Besides spells and magic items that impart such ability, every mage that has water magic can have 1 troop per level of water magic enter the water along with the mage (the troops must be in the same "stack" as the mage; that is, under the mage's command).

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Cainehill:
Why 6, 11, 21?

Because empirical testing hints that when enemy AIs look at what provinces are strong or weak, a PD value of 11 or 21 gets interpreted as 20 or 30 (respectively), and thus that extra +1 gets rounded up to the next "breakpoint" of 10 when the AI decides if it has enough strength to take on the defenses. I've tested this a bit. I had the AI attacking a province with PD of 20. I reloaded the game, upped the PD to 21, and then ran the turn again and the AI chose somewhere else to attack. Consistently over more than a dozen repetitions of 20 vs. 21, and ditto for 10 vs. 11, etc. Other people have observed similar behavior. Either that's the way the game is coded, or we're having a mass delusion.

[Saxon]

Also, I think you get an extra commander at 11 and 21. Small thing, but sometimes having a second commander can prevent a rout.

[Karacan]

You get one commander at 1, and another at 21. There's no such thing as a commander at 11.

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Karacan:
You get one commander at 1, and another at 21.

You get the second commander at 20, not 21.

[tinkthank]

Atrocities, how did you get nearly 8000 Posts?

Originally posted by Cainehill:

quote:

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Originally posted by Gandalf Parker:
If you own the province you can click on scales, and on taxes, and on defence. Defence gives free troops if you are attacked. Local militia which differs with each nation. It can be very helpful for not losing provinces too much. I tend to use defence numbers like 1, 6, 11, 21

Why 6, 11, 21? I tend to go 2 ( because a scout _might_ get lucky against PD 1 ), 5, or 10, and only very very rarely pay the expense of going to 15 or 20, if I think I'm going to immediately be on the defensive with my army there also.

( For the inexperienced players : A benefit of jacking the PD up in a contested province that also has your army in it : The PD acts as chaff, soaking up a lot of casualties that your army, and quality troops, might otherwise take. And then, as long as you managed to hold the province, the PD regenerates, even if it was _all_ killed. )

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It also might really depend on what nation you are playing and what stage of the game you are in. Sometimes I will invest in higher PD if I have a nation with good PD and have some extra cash but no acute provincial goals and do not wish to purchase additional troops to keep my upkeep down; I like to get troops right before a big battle. Also, higher PD may help if you are getting hit by many Calls of the Wild or similar spells if you play a nation with good PD. PD is upkeep free. PD is also regenerating, which is good if you use a lot of poison or diseasing or other self-damaging AoE spells -- your PD may be crippled beyond belief, but they'll be fresh next turn.
Sometimes PD is truly dangerous, like if you have commanders getting ready to launch a Wrathful Skies attack but before they move, the province is hit with a Call of the Wilds or whatever; if in a province with PD, the PD may actually cause your commanders to rout because you killed your PD with wrathful skies.