This is both interesting and… strange design? I understand they wanted to make trade hands-off, indirectly controlled. I’ve found this explained in the manual:
But it’s not mentioned in a game itself I understand. Especially with the fact that out of range trade not being used as a bonus. I also assumed that when I’m told that something requires good outside of the trade range then this building won’t work at all.
I’m also happy that the resource is “infinite”, so if I have a good then as many states as possible can import it and I will still have it.
All this makes me wonder how Carthage campaign works. I guess you go round the Mediterranean and capture those tasty honey/silver/gems provinces and sell them to the world while your core lands manufacture everything, and you buy slaves, and I’m glad that game systems are simple yet allow for an obvious approaches like this.
Yeah, it’s mechanically interesting, but it feels a bit odd and artificial to me and thus was a little hard for me to learn without double-checking a number of times. My head-canon rationalizes it thusly:
A building is going to consume a lot of its needed good, so it must have a steady supply, and a solid trading partnership must exist to provide for it; this is worth looking abroad as needed. A bonus, however, good is something that is dusted on top and is used much more sparingly – thus it’s something that can be scrounged up if it’s local or brought in from immediately neighboring areas if it’s there, but it’s in volume that’s not of sufficient value to pay taxes on, nor to be worth setting up long-distance trade agreements.
Here is another nice to know thing: tier 2 buildings start to appear when you get 3 buildings of the same type; tier 3 appear when you have 6 buildings.
As buildings are randomized you’ll never notice that they appear after those specific points.
Aha! Thanks for that. I was actually trying to remember what that very rule was just last night and had made a note to go rooting around in the manual for it next time I sit down to play. You’ve saved me that time for actually conquering the Gauls!
It’s also helpful to know that wells (a level 2 ag project) lead to an irrigation project which leads to irrigation systems (also level 2 ag) which leads to irrigation canals (level 3 ag) which provide papyrus.
I’ve made it to turn 150 in my Dacae game, I’m now in 1st place in both legacy and legacy income. I -think- my position is pretty stable, but unless Rome starts to collapse I don’t think I’ll hit 3 times their score before time runs out. I wish I knew whether anything interesting will happen if I play it out.
I’ve been at war with Boii forever but I just can’t take that single region. They have a really good 2/2 general and and about 55 army strength. I have a 1/1 general and about 250 army strength with a good mix of legions, Italian foot, Alae, velites, light and heavy carvery. None of it matters. I can’t even put a dent in them. We will stalemate 3 of 4 battles on a turn and then they will finally win as my troops get tired and theirs don’t.
Anybody got any suggestions? I guess this one might be a good candidate to fight in FOGII and see if the result is different.
Can’t find any info on how healing works. I’m sure I saw units being in friendly territory on 2/3 HP for more than one turn and I’m puzzled at how it works. Does every region heal only specific number of HP every turn so you’d better spread out wounded? Does it depend on food or manpower?
I wonder if it will be better if you send two separate armies. No way you have more than half of your 250 strength army involved anyway. Or maybe use more ranged units to tire them.
I’ve tried sending two armies. They killed the leader of my first army (my best general) and routed them and then won the second battle as well. I think they may have lost 1 unit.
I’ve tried more ranged units but they never even engage in the battle. They just sit in the back and watch. The frontage is not very wide but not nearly as narrow as a battle I fought in the mountains against the Etruscans and I managed to win that one finally. The Boii are one tough nut to crack and I think most of it is because of their general. I need to deal with them because Carthage just declared on me and has already attacked Rome once with an army by sea. I need to turn my full might that way and not have to worry about the Boii at my back.
Honestly, this sounds like an interesting problem, a good kind of problem. You can probably make peace with them and eventually make them your client state. Or make peace and murder them later when you have veteran legions, maybe with some upgrades. Or when their ubergeneral is dead and you your own superstar general.
Yeah, I might try that. I also had thought of just waiting until his super general dies of old age. All my best generals died that way and now I’m left with crap in that regard, pretty much. It doesn’t help that the current leader of Rome is anti-war and has some penalties there that are not helping. His health is very poor so I suspect things will change there in a few turns with a new leader.
Depending on the makeup of their army, one solution is to simply leave them alone.
Bulk up the defenses in the bordering region(s) (Atesis and Aemilia?) including buildings and troops. Aemilia as a marsh might more vulnerable, and so especially needs buildings to make a siege very difficult. Your legions can probably make Atesis a tough nut for him to crack.
Chances are, though, that they will simply raid you, which is annoying, but hardly fatal. (And their great general cannot be everywhere. If he did lead an attack/siege, that would leave his own province vulnerable.)
My solution to annoying general in mountains is to simply wait until he leaves. Sooner or later he’ll come down into the plains where you can crush him with greater numbers/quality.
The combat value numbers do feel somewhat misleading at times.
That’s one of the things I’m really appreciating about this… you can’t just build stacks of doom and steamroll everything around you; actual thought has to be put into the terrain you will be fighting in and what the best composition of your army for that terrain might be.
Has anyone been able to find anywhere in the UI where you can see what the combat frontage of a region is before you go into battle? It shows it on the screen when the battle starts, but it’s hardly useful at that point, and I’m sure I’ll remember them all eventually, but it would be nice not to have to check the manual if you’re fighting in unfamiliar terrain.
Also, another wish for the UI: incorporate the notes about terrain types included in the table on page 45/46 of the manual into the game itself. Eg, little icons beside a terrain that is described as “Hill” to indicate that that also means that it is “rough”, “broken”, and “mountainous”. Again, things that can be cross-referenced in the manual and will probably become second nature eventually, but having a little UI space for it would sure be helpful.
I’m taking your advice on this. Their general is in his 60s so maybe he’ll die soon. I’ve moved south and am taking Sicily from Carthage while I wait. Up to turn 75 and so far so good.
I ran into the uber general issue in my second game. There was an enemy 2/2 general with some terrain and other bonuses leading a large stack of independent tribal soldiers. I threw stacks of armies at them; it was like throwing raw meat at a shark.
One of the thing that I noticed that made it even harder was that his troops piled up experience from all their victories, and I kept having to use fresh troops against them. So not only were they well led troops fighting in favorable terrain, but they also had a significant experience bonus.
I’m not sure how the “minimum” die rolls are generated in the tactical screen yet, but in the last battle I fought against him, I remember their minimum roll was a “6”, where mine was a “2”. I couldn’t touch them.
I thought this was kind of cool, from a gameplay standpoint. Well, other than the “you just knocked me out of the game” part of the whole experience.
