KevinC
1828
Yes, a one-hex radius. You’ll see the radius when you use the skill. You can hold down ALT to target the ground near an enemy as well, which is useful when you want to place it so it hits multiple enemies.
Anyone figured out how to increase success chances on espionage operations?
Going to the trouble to research them, burn energy prepping them for use, only to then discover I can’t actually use them because the success rate is deemed too low is troubling if I don’t have a counter.
My guess is there are counters and I don’t know what they are, little help here por favor!!
What pushed me over the top just now was that I researched infiltrate operations center because it reads like it’s supposed to lower the other guys defense for actions. Imagine my reaction when I research and prime this operation only to find it’s gated behind the same bullshit success, so the very damn thing I researched in order to address this too low success is itself also gated by the same thing.
Mark_L
1830
Some of the techs raise your offensive and defensive op strength, I think the ones that give more strategy points. Also you can use the infiltrate strat op to raise overall chances.
I’ll try and pay more attention to the research on this I guess, I’ve been trying to push on it in what I choose.
I guess where I’m still confused is how if infiltrate also lists too low chances how do you ever do anything about too low success chances if that’s supposedly the very tool you’re supposed to research in order to address it and it doesn’t work?!
Still feels like I’m missing something on this.
KevinC
1832
The espionage system just doesn’t seem to be that fleshed out or interesting at the moment. Which, to be fair, pretty much describes nearly every espionage system I’ve engaged with in strategy games.
What drew me into looking at it was the fact I had an AI constantly screwing with me, and getting energy drained in particular was getting annoying.
So I was working my way towards dealing with it and encountered the problem I described above.
If I had the fire power I’d brute force the solution and take them out, trouble is they took out two other NPCs and are now quite strong…
We are at the moment in a three way stalemate in the 2nd planet Amazon story where I"m tasked with taking out the other Amazon, and so far we’re all just trading blows.
Started a new random scenario, I do like these so much better than the campaign. Just the freedom to do what you want is so satisfying.
The one tweak I’d suggest Triumph make, I’d make it so the fish and paragon ask the player for something twice every turn instead of just every turn. I mean if bugging me about taking on some magically appearing army or burning research for them, or giving them energy is non-stop fun popping up every turn then surely doing it twice every turn would be twice as much fun, right?
Spock
1835
I still struggle with how fast to expand. I’ve read that one should go as “wide” as possible, but when I do this, enemies grab my fringe territories, as I can’t defend everything.
I wonder if I should play a 1 vs 1 game vs Very Easy AI to grok this game better? Would that be helpful, do you think?
I’ve certainly not grok’d this one yet myself. So I’ve taken the same approach I found success with playing AOW3, I play teams. That way I’ve got a teammate who if nothing else denies territory thru their expansion to the enemy teams. You do need to make sure and expand out towards your teammate initially to block them from overtaking space you’ll need for your own expansion as they have a habit of starting fairly near you.
With this 2x2 or 3x3 arrangement I get some help, even if the AI doesn’t tend to go on the offensive against the enemy, they at least deny territory and provide alternative targets for the enemy to focus on other than me.
I think if I played 1x1 it would turn into a straight up expansion race that I tend to lose to the AI and as a result they have more scale than I do so that when we do meet I’m not in a position to adequately deal with them. They however usually can’t put together enough to take me out so I counterpunch to a stalemate.
On another note, in my current campaign I’ve left all the victory conditions on, and I think points might be the way it’s won, conceivably by the AI before I can take them out because I’ve not sorted what produces points. Last turn I also got an alert saying I was 50% of the way to some kind of territory grab victory, no doubt based off my AI teammates penchant for expansion, yet I’ve no idea which victory condition this is or whether it’s possibly a subset of the points victory condition because I don’t recall one I could tick on or off for territory/province victory.
Sorry for long response.
jpinard
1837
How do you decide whether to build a new outpost/city vs. just absorbing the territory?
I could be totally off base on this, and would love to hear if I am, but if I want to really hang on to stuff in an area I build a city so that the expansion off it that pulls in sections of the map around it creates the economic basis for building an army to defend it.
I mean I can wander around the map spending 20 diplo points claiming sections of the map, but it’s insanely simple for the AI to just go capture it and it seems like they often do, so I suppose you could use it as a distraction, but in terms of controlling map it doesn’t really do much.
Question: does the enemy AI know where you are at all times?
Example: I’ve found the capital of one of the enemy AI’s I’m facing, if I plan to some recon in force am I automatically known to the enemy even if I managed to avoid running into any of their units?
In other words, does the AI know by default where all units are on the map? Or do they have to do the same thing I do and recruit scouts to reveal the map and units like I do?
jpinard
1840
I feel bad saying this, but I’m having a hard time connecting. When the game becomes less abstract, does it really click and make you want to sink all your time into it? My feelings thus far are a bit the opposite of when I hit AoW 3 where I was instantly mesmerized, and never wanted to come up for air. Note I’m only half way through second campaign mission.
Dumb question - does anything carry over between campaign missions? I haven’t gotten far enough to see if there’s any link if they’re totally independent scenarios.
JoshoB
1841
They’re independent scenarios, as far as I can tell. Nothing carries over.
Strato
1842
Commander gear does carry over… I think. I’m doubting myself now.
Enidigm
1843
I think my problem with it is that it takes sooo long.
Otherwise it feels like an improvement over AoW. I really hated how there were just so many similar terrain features in AoW 3, and it feels like they did the work rebalancing the map to be more impactful, where it felt like i was just swimming in special sites in 3.
But i’m not sure i’ll ever finish a full random game on a medium sized map.
In order -
Yes, units operate at 100% efficiency until the moment they drop. It’s one of my least favorite aspects of the Age series in general.
The rewards screen is showing you the stuff you could get, or if you Sell you will just get energy. So sometimes you might see that the reward is 52 energy and a incinerator cannon or something, next to that will be the sell button which will say X energy, where X is the 52 energy you would have gotten + the additional energy value from selling the cannon. If you are clicking these and nothing is happening, something weird is going on.
In the campaign? No idea, played 10 minutes of it, thought it was awful, went to sandbox.
Yes.
Spock
1847
I’m no expert, but I think upthread someone said “yes, basically, with some exceptions.” It’s why the AI is so annoyingly good at sniping the one area I left under-garrisoned.
