Post by ScytaleIRAx on Jul 30, 2008 21:02:28 GMT -5
This guide is here to help people who do not fully understand how to defend themselves as empires. This will have three parts, Locations, Defending, and Difficulty. This guide is intended for use with PvE games (humans vs kal, not humans vs humans).
1 Locations -=#=-[/size]
1.1 Definite Spawns -[/size]
1.1.1 Location -[/size]
There is a place in the ‘hard zone’ in the bottom of the map with a cave doodad. The area is guarded by fairly strong units which use the ogre magi model. This area is where what I will call Definite Spawns (DSpawns from now on) come from.
1.1.2 Contents -[/size]
These spawns will include whatever is typical of the current difficulty of the game, as well as specific heroes. These heroes are the dreadlord, deathknight, lich, and blademaster.
1.2 Random Spawns -[/size]
1.2.1 Location -[/size]
As is implied by the word ‘random’ these spawns can be found all over the map, but come in two flavors – creeps and camps.
1.2.2 Creeps -[/size]
These units spawn at specific locations around the map and are mostly what heroes kill for exp. They will not go out of their way to do anything, especially attack. They are relatively weak compared to the units which spawn under AI control, and never contain heroes or siege weapons.
1.2.3 Camps -[/size]
These Equipment Camps will spawn randomly at the same locations as the creep spawns, and are pingable through the spells on town halls and heroes. They grow over time by adding more buildings which increase production or towers that add to the defensive power of the camp. Camp spawns are rather powerful against empires because they can contain siege weapons, and will almost always have the far seer hero. For the rest of this guide, Camp Spawns will be referred to as CSpawns.
2 Defending -=#=-[/size]
2.1 DSpawns -[/size]
2.1.1 Enemy Heroes -[/size]
The most powerful enemy vs any empire is Duasq the lich. He calls down a meteor that does damage over time to whatever it hits. Focus him with everything you have if you see him. The blademaster has a form of sleep which can stop any helper hero you may have, the death knight has a strong nuke which may kill any helper hero you have, and the dreadlord has evasion AND curse, which will cause any helper hero to waste time on him. Bottom line: without the lich these guys are nothing special.
2.1.2 Towers Defense - [/size]
Combust towers and arrow/gun towers are best against these spawns. If they do get a siege weapon, it will not be nearly as powerful as Duasq, so just plan on being able to kill that hero fast. There is nothing particularly special that can be done to stop these attacks except having a strong defense for when they come.
2.1.3 Units Defense -[/size]
For people who prefer to use units over towers to defend, siege weapons are a must. Again, focus fire on the lich and you are fine.
2.2 CSpawns -[/size]
2.2.1 Enemy Hero -[/size]
The far seer hero can heal his friendly units with a chain heal. To mitigate the benefits of this heal, make sure to focus fire on one unit at a time. This hero does very little damage, so kill him last. If you are too lazy to micro your units’ fire they will have a hard time with these spawns because your men will spread their fire and then his heal will have an effect on multiple units instead of just one.
2.2.2 Towers Defense -[/size]
These spawns contain siege weapons. If you have only towers, you will probably have a hard time, so keep some archers/cavalry/aircraft ready to kill those siege weapons. No extra combust towers are needed here, just arrows/guns/cannons.
2.2.3 Units Defense -[/size]
No single type of unit is most effective against these spawns, but ranged ones are preferred. Ranged units are the easiest to use for focusing fire because they usually do not have to move to attack a new target. Splash damage is less effective because of the way that the heal works (see above).
2.2.4 The best defense is a good offense. -[/size]
Camps can be killed with 1 nuke, and obelisks die in 2. Once you can get nukes, get 3 so that you are ready for anything. Kill them before they become a problem.
2.3 Creeps -[/size]
There is no strategy to killing creeps because if they ever do attack you it will be just 3-4 enemies, and if they are able to beat you then the rebellions would have rolled over you anyway.
2.3.1 Air -[/size]
Dragons can spawn as creeps, and will sometimes fly over trees/cliffs to attack your empire if it is close to them. If you notice this happen simply place a tower or two near the affected area and upgrade it to a flak tower when you can. Dragons are not particularly strong, just annoying.
2.3.2 Stopping the spawn -[/size]
This is one of the most useful parts of being an empire. If you build within sight of a creep spawn, none will ever appear there. Ever. This can be used/abused to your advantage by putting campfires on top of those spawns, even if it is pretty far away from your base. This allows you to push your walls out to the smallest place which is the cheapest/easiest to defend. I will sometimes put campfires across ¼ of the map just to get to a good choke point. Just remember that as long as you have vision of everything within your walls you are safe.
3 Difficulty -=#=-[/size]
An important concept of this section is that difficulty steadily increases with time.
3.1 Obelisks and Cargo Wagons -[/size]
3.1.1 Obelisks -[/size]
These buildings pop up just like CSpawn camps do, and in the same places too! After 10 minutes of existence an obelisk will go away and the game will get harder by an amount equal to 30 minutes of game time.
3.1.2 Cargo Wagons -[/size]
These are spawned at one trading-camp (where heroes go) and walk slowly to the other camp. They are only spawned by quests that are started by heroes, and this particular quest can only start from a camp (never a randomly appearing quest giver). It is random which camp the wagon starts at. If the wagon dies the quest is failed and the game gets 10 minutes harder.
3.2 Location -[/size]
Location indirectly affects difficulty, as will be explained below
3.2.1 Hard Zone -[/size]
The most obvious way that location impacts difficulty is that the desert-like area in the bottom left of the map is much harder than the rest of the map. Never build there unless you are doing so to attack kal.
3.2.2 Allies -[/size]
If you are friendly towards another empire, connect your defenses. Use the mentioned campfire method of expanding borders until you reduce the number of entrances to your combined base. Some parts of the map are better than others for this.
3.2.3 DSpawns and CSpawns -[/size]
These spawns will attack the nearest empire. Remember that computer players are 1337 h4xx0r and do not need to ever see you before they will attack, so be ready from the start to defend yourself.
3.2.3.1 DSpawns -[/size]
Avoid building in the center or bottom right areas of the map as they are closest to the DSPawn start location, and will be under constant attack from them.
3.2.3.2 CSpawns -[/size]
These will attack the person closest to them, so let other players worry about camps across the map, but make sure you take out the ones that spawn close to you. Once you can nuke them, go ahead and just keep the whole map clear of camps and obelisks.
3.2.3.3 Base Entries -[/size]
Because enemies will look for the potentially fastest way into your base, it can be useful to wall off the rear entries to your base but leave the ‘front door’ open (either not complete the wall or leave a gate open). This will cause the AI to *generally* try to pass through your front gate more than the back sides. I cannot be much more descriptive than that because of how many different areas there are.
3.3 Game Settings -[/size]
3.3.1 Difficulty -[/size]
The command –difficulty shows this value.
3.3.1.1 How it is decided -[/size]
The difficulty is the average of all of the entered votes from the whole game. So if you start at the lowest difficulty and call it ‘0’ and the highest ‘10’ (I might be wrong about there being 11 settings… probably less), then add all of what everyone voted and divide by the number of voting players(afk’ers do not reduce the difficulty by counting as 0). That number is then rounded and whatever number ends up is the difficulty.
3.3.1.2 What it does -[/size]
Because so many games are played at weak and average, people do not often realize what effects there are from difficulty settings. The difficulty setting tweaks the enemy stats to add a multiplier to their hp and attack speed. The raw damage and armor values do not change. This means a few important things…
3.3.1.2.1 Caster heroes have a harder time dealing with enemies on higher difficulty. -[/size]
Because hp increases and armor does not, it is harder for everyone to kill the enemy. For melee classes this just means it takes longer, and for rangers (or anyone with bow skill) it means you will take damage, but for casters it means using more spells which reduces mana (which is also hp for them because of mana shield).
3.3.1.2.2 Empires have an advantage. -[/size]
If an empire can stay ahead of the competing spawns by enough to never lose their defenses, then they will keep getting stronger. Because heroes get stronger by killing enemies, and enemies are harder to kill in higher difficulties, it becomes much harder for them to keep progressing without being hired.
3.3.1.2.3 Ending the game becomes ridiculous. -[/size]
These changes to hp and attack speed affect Kal, which is big news because even at weak he has multishot, nuts damage, decent armor, and a LOT of hp. This is where empires excel – they can keep the pressure on kal until he dies by building a camp outside his base and pumping a steady flow of units at him. This allows heroes to teleport in right away if they die.
3.3.2 Empire ‘class’ -[/size]
These change what play style you should use unit-wise. Mostly up to the player’s preference.
3.3.2.1 Defenses -[/size]
Increases your defenses’ hp and attack speed (do not remember percent). Makes tesla coils even more ridiculous, and makes turtle-ing your base out with towers a reasonable strategy for attacking hard zone (to eventually make an outpost and attack Kal). A novelty because towers are already very strong and you cannot build in kal’s castle.
3.3.2.2 Infantry -[/size]
Increases your infantry units’ hp 50%, regeneration a lot, and attack speed 50%. Very good for having a mobile defense early on, and the regeneration helps considerably. Statistically the worst benefit to choose, but if you like endgame infantry then use this.
3.3.2.3 Tanks -[/size]
Increases tank units’ hp 50% and attack speed 100%. Arguably the best choice because of the immense power of the endgame tank tech artillery unit, which actually does more damage per hit than Kal. Tied with resources for my favorite.
3.3.2.4 Airplanes -[/size]
Increases air units’ hp 50% and attack speed 150% (!). Statistically the biggest benefit of any of the unit upgrading choices, this is not for the faint of heart. If you are afraid of getting far enough in the game to use air units then this is not the choice for you. Stealth wraiths are quite powerful because of their maneuverability. A fleet of them can move in and attack Kal without suffering any casualties on the way, which might happen if you chose infantry.
3.3.2.5 Resource Collector -[/size]
Possibly the best choice for someone who is uncertain of what they want, and definitely the best bet for someone who wants to end the game fast, this gives 20% more income of *almost everything*. It affects food, tax, commerce, and industry. It has no bearing on wood cutting, but when the values get large for endgame resources woodcutting is irrelevant. Having the extra 20% food means you can probably raise rations enough to get another ‘point’ of tax out of your citizens, so this class gets more than 20% more gold income which can be put towards faster research and faster progression through ages. I often choose this because I like to be consistently stronger than the heroes in the game, and that is easily done by staying on top of research.
Fin.
1 Locations -=#=-[/size]
1.1 Definite Spawns -[/size]
1.1.1 Location -[/size]
There is a place in the ‘hard zone’ in the bottom of the map with a cave doodad. The area is guarded by fairly strong units which use the ogre magi model. This area is where what I will call Definite Spawns (DSpawns from now on) come from.
1.1.2 Contents -[/size]
These spawns will include whatever is typical of the current difficulty of the game, as well as specific heroes. These heroes are the dreadlord, deathknight, lich, and blademaster.
1.2 Random Spawns -[/size]
1.2.1 Location -[/size]
As is implied by the word ‘random’ these spawns can be found all over the map, but come in two flavors – creeps and camps.
1.2.2 Creeps -[/size]
These units spawn at specific locations around the map and are mostly what heroes kill for exp. They will not go out of their way to do anything, especially attack. They are relatively weak compared to the units which spawn under AI control, and never contain heroes or siege weapons.
1.2.3 Camps -[/size]
These Equipment Camps will spawn randomly at the same locations as the creep spawns, and are pingable through the spells on town halls and heroes. They grow over time by adding more buildings which increase production or towers that add to the defensive power of the camp. Camp spawns are rather powerful against empires because they can contain siege weapons, and will almost always have the far seer hero. For the rest of this guide, Camp Spawns will be referred to as CSpawns.
2 Defending -=#=-[/size]
2.1 DSpawns -[/size]
2.1.1 Enemy Heroes -[/size]
The most powerful enemy vs any empire is Duasq the lich. He calls down a meteor that does damage over time to whatever it hits. Focus him with everything you have if you see him. The blademaster has a form of sleep which can stop any helper hero you may have, the death knight has a strong nuke which may kill any helper hero you have, and the dreadlord has evasion AND curse, which will cause any helper hero to waste time on him. Bottom line: without the lich these guys are nothing special.
2.1.2 Towers Defense - [/size]
Combust towers and arrow/gun towers are best against these spawns. If they do get a siege weapon, it will not be nearly as powerful as Duasq, so just plan on being able to kill that hero fast. There is nothing particularly special that can be done to stop these attacks except having a strong defense for when they come.
2.1.3 Units Defense -[/size]
For people who prefer to use units over towers to defend, siege weapons are a must. Again, focus fire on the lich and you are fine.
2.2 CSpawns -[/size]
2.2.1 Enemy Hero -[/size]
The far seer hero can heal his friendly units with a chain heal. To mitigate the benefits of this heal, make sure to focus fire on one unit at a time. This hero does very little damage, so kill him last. If you are too lazy to micro your units’ fire they will have a hard time with these spawns because your men will spread their fire and then his heal will have an effect on multiple units instead of just one.
2.2.2 Towers Defense -[/size]
These spawns contain siege weapons. If you have only towers, you will probably have a hard time, so keep some archers/cavalry/aircraft ready to kill those siege weapons. No extra combust towers are needed here, just arrows/guns/cannons.
2.2.3 Units Defense -[/size]
No single type of unit is most effective against these spawns, but ranged ones are preferred. Ranged units are the easiest to use for focusing fire because they usually do not have to move to attack a new target. Splash damage is less effective because of the way that the heal works (see above).
2.2.4 The best defense is a good offense. -[/size]
Camps can be killed with 1 nuke, and obelisks die in 2. Once you can get nukes, get 3 so that you are ready for anything. Kill them before they become a problem.
2.3 Creeps -[/size]
There is no strategy to killing creeps because if they ever do attack you it will be just 3-4 enemies, and if they are able to beat you then the rebellions would have rolled over you anyway.
2.3.1 Air -[/size]
Dragons can spawn as creeps, and will sometimes fly over trees/cliffs to attack your empire if it is close to them. If you notice this happen simply place a tower or two near the affected area and upgrade it to a flak tower when you can. Dragons are not particularly strong, just annoying.
2.3.2 Stopping the spawn -[/size]
This is one of the most useful parts of being an empire. If you build within sight of a creep spawn, none will ever appear there. Ever. This can be used/abused to your advantage by putting campfires on top of those spawns, even if it is pretty far away from your base. This allows you to push your walls out to the smallest place which is the cheapest/easiest to defend. I will sometimes put campfires across ¼ of the map just to get to a good choke point. Just remember that as long as you have vision of everything within your walls you are safe.
3 Difficulty -=#=-[/size]
An important concept of this section is that difficulty steadily increases with time.
3.1 Obelisks and Cargo Wagons -[/size]
3.1.1 Obelisks -[/size]
These buildings pop up just like CSpawn camps do, and in the same places too! After 10 minutes of existence an obelisk will go away and the game will get harder by an amount equal to 30 minutes of game time.
3.1.2 Cargo Wagons -[/size]
These are spawned at one trading-camp (where heroes go) and walk slowly to the other camp. They are only spawned by quests that are started by heroes, and this particular quest can only start from a camp (never a randomly appearing quest giver). It is random which camp the wagon starts at. If the wagon dies the quest is failed and the game gets 10 minutes harder.
3.2 Location -[/size]
Location indirectly affects difficulty, as will be explained below
3.2.1 Hard Zone -[/size]
The most obvious way that location impacts difficulty is that the desert-like area in the bottom left of the map is much harder than the rest of the map. Never build there unless you are doing so to attack kal.
3.2.2 Allies -[/size]
If you are friendly towards another empire, connect your defenses. Use the mentioned campfire method of expanding borders until you reduce the number of entrances to your combined base. Some parts of the map are better than others for this.
3.2.3 DSpawns and CSpawns -[/size]
These spawns will attack the nearest empire. Remember that computer players are 1337 h4xx0r and do not need to ever see you before they will attack, so be ready from the start to defend yourself.
3.2.3.1 DSpawns -[/size]
Avoid building in the center or bottom right areas of the map as they are closest to the DSPawn start location, and will be under constant attack from them.
3.2.3.2 CSpawns -[/size]
These will attack the person closest to them, so let other players worry about camps across the map, but make sure you take out the ones that spawn close to you. Once you can nuke them, go ahead and just keep the whole map clear of camps and obelisks.
3.2.3.3 Base Entries -[/size]
Because enemies will look for the potentially fastest way into your base, it can be useful to wall off the rear entries to your base but leave the ‘front door’ open (either not complete the wall or leave a gate open). This will cause the AI to *generally* try to pass through your front gate more than the back sides. I cannot be much more descriptive than that because of how many different areas there are.
3.3 Game Settings -[/size]
3.3.1 Difficulty -[/size]
The command –difficulty shows this value.
3.3.1.1 How it is decided -[/size]
The difficulty is the average of all of the entered votes from the whole game. So if you start at the lowest difficulty and call it ‘0’ and the highest ‘10’ (I might be wrong about there being 11 settings… probably less), then add all of what everyone voted and divide by the number of voting players(afk’ers do not reduce the difficulty by counting as 0). That number is then rounded and whatever number ends up is the difficulty.
3.3.1.2 What it does -[/size]
Because so many games are played at weak and average, people do not often realize what effects there are from difficulty settings. The difficulty setting tweaks the enemy stats to add a multiplier to their hp and attack speed. The raw damage and armor values do not change. This means a few important things…
3.3.1.2.1 Caster heroes have a harder time dealing with enemies on higher difficulty. -[/size]
Because hp increases and armor does not, it is harder for everyone to kill the enemy. For melee classes this just means it takes longer, and for rangers (or anyone with bow skill) it means you will take damage, but for casters it means using more spells which reduces mana (which is also hp for them because of mana shield).
3.3.1.2.2 Empires have an advantage. -[/size]
If an empire can stay ahead of the competing spawns by enough to never lose their defenses, then they will keep getting stronger. Because heroes get stronger by killing enemies, and enemies are harder to kill in higher difficulties, it becomes much harder for them to keep progressing without being hired.
3.3.1.2.3 Ending the game becomes ridiculous. -[/size]
These changes to hp and attack speed affect Kal, which is big news because even at weak he has multishot, nuts damage, decent armor, and a LOT of hp. This is where empires excel – they can keep the pressure on kal until he dies by building a camp outside his base and pumping a steady flow of units at him. This allows heroes to teleport in right away if they die.
3.3.2 Empire ‘class’ -[/size]
These change what play style you should use unit-wise. Mostly up to the player’s preference.
3.3.2.1 Defenses -[/size]
Increases your defenses’ hp and attack speed (do not remember percent). Makes tesla coils even more ridiculous, and makes turtle-ing your base out with towers a reasonable strategy for attacking hard zone (to eventually make an outpost and attack Kal). A novelty because towers are already very strong and you cannot build in kal’s castle.
3.3.2.2 Infantry -[/size]
Increases your infantry units’ hp 50%, regeneration a lot, and attack speed 50%. Very good for having a mobile defense early on, and the regeneration helps considerably. Statistically the worst benefit to choose, but if you like endgame infantry then use this.
3.3.2.3 Tanks -[/size]
Increases tank units’ hp 50% and attack speed 100%. Arguably the best choice because of the immense power of the endgame tank tech artillery unit, which actually does more damage per hit than Kal. Tied with resources for my favorite.
3.3.2.4 Airplanes -[/size]
Increases air units’ hp 50% and attack speed 150% (!). Statistically the biggest benefit of any of the unit upgrading choices, this is not for the faint of heart. If you are afraid of getting far enough in the game to use air units then this is not the choice for you. Stealth wraiths are quite powerful because of their maneuverability. A fleet of them can move in and attack Kal without suffering any casualties on the way, which might happen if you chose infantry.
3.3.2.5 Resource Collector -[/size]
Possibly the best choice for someone who is uncertain of what they want, and definitely the best bet for someone who wants to end the game fast, this gives 20% more income of *almost everything*. It affects food, tax, commerce, and industry. It has no bearing on wood cutting, but when the values get large for endgame resources woodcutting is irrelevant. Having the extra 20% food means you can probably raise rations enough to get another ‘point’ of tax out of your citizens, so this class gets more than 20% more gold income which can be put towards faster research and faster progression through ages. I often choose this because I like to be consistently stronger than the heroes in the game, and that is easily done by staying on top of research.
Fin.
maybe someone else will give this game the update that it needs
