Kalin

You might not be able to normally, but you can fairly easily if you put in some time to make/edit the stamps and map types. However to say that there are only 3 type of maps? (stamps?) isn't right at all. Even among the "generic" tiles, if you look through them, you'll see many different combinations. Some with mountains, some don't, some with chasm, some don't, some only has fertile forests, etc... there are actually many different types. To generate Alaska or Hell, y

The problem with this is that it severely affects the AI's ability to fight one another, plus, it's just way too easy to choke the AI with an outpost. Think about it, pioneer spam with stealth, choke them... and then proceed to take the map for yourself (never mind Arcane Monolith >.>). If this is implemented, the AI's aggressiveness to their neighbors would have to be increased many folds... because if they can't just walk through your territory, they'll have to tak

Er... did you actually OPEN up the file? For example, inside Generic Small 03 tile, you'll see this: [code="xml"] S_Generic_Small_03 0 4 &nbsp

Ctrl+tab brings up the overlay, you can then see achievements from there, along with all the other features.

Look at the individual files in the "Core Stamps" folder. Most of them define what type of styles it is right at the top. Most has multiple styles. There's no 'just swamp' type.

There was such a list? Do I get a medal for being non-disgruntled? Sure, there were flaws, but I got tons of gameplay hours from it.

It's not really voodoo or mysterious... their map generator basically just fits together a bunch of "stamps", and then fill the cracks with water/plains. The type of maps dictate the type of stamps it uses to do that. All of the map types has "mountain" stamps. In order to get less mountains you want MORE of the other stamp types. There's actually 3 options for this: Swampy, Desert, or Broken. However, while Broken is not mountain, it still divide up the land, which isn't what you

It's there... most get it from monuments and one of the faction wonders and some quest rewards. Altar also gets it from doing quests (but they need it for their henchmens).

AI ganging up on weaker players seems like the right conclusion from my experience as well. People are just too focused on themselves to realize it. But the last 2 doesn't seem quite right. I will often out research the AI without much trouble on challenging (without inspiration - and I usually only build 1 conclave if any at all)... so I don't think they are getting any bonuses there. I wonder if it's possible that they are demanding techs from the other factions to keep

1. I don't think a popup is a good way to handle this, maybe generate a news event (on the right) when a city is asleep instead. This way, you can ignore the news if you don't care... Otherwise, if you turn this on, you'll be bombarded with popups when you have multiple sleeping towns. But what I would REALLY like for sleeping cities, is a toggle on the city to have the sleeping city not interfere with automatic turns. Basically, right now if a city is asleep but doesn't gener

Oh man... so many good stuff... looking forward to it. Hopefully tomorrow?

What ninja... I don't see any ninja. *winks* oh sna-

It looks to me from the graph that Altar got a great start and jumped out in front very quickly. The game has a built in steam roller that soon turns this into the situation that you saw in person. Veteran players counter this instinctively by smacking down the top score players first (because if you don't, they will bring it to you). This is a necessity because the game doesn't really have any real limitation on expansion. More is simply better. The dog piling

[quote who="Bellack" reply="52" id="3264837"] What? What is the point in playing a game if the AI is to easy? Of coarse you can and should judge a SINGLE PLAYER GAME (HELLO!!!!!!!!!) on how you easily roll the AI on the hard settings. And to wait until you play the other faction and design better units for them in order for that faction to be more of a challange later is kinda of riduculous. And I too perfer a game where I start out in a bad spot over starting

The problem with stealing designs from other factions is 2 folds: 1. Blood traits, some are just very good (different), and can alter the design by quite a bit (trogs)... 2. Unique Equipments... should be self explanatory. Better bows, axes, swords, no armor, etc... Community unit packs is a good idea. I do support this, but do keep in mind that the AI WILL roll people left and right with those design. If people are having a hard time with the game as it

Please don't judge the game on your ability to roll an AI... you're suppose to be able to (they want a certain viability to rushing if you like that kind of play style). Different AIs play differently, some focus more on building, and is vulnerable to rushes, some pumps troops and roll others... so beating one or two really doesn't mean much... especially on challenging. A smart player using some (rather obvious) tricks will easily destroy the AI on that difficulty. Just a single

[quote who="Tuidjy" reply="2" id="3264294"]If you are limited by swamps, drain them with "Raise Land". If you are limited by mountains, get rid of them with "Lower Land" Gilden usually has Earth magic coming out their ears. If your custom sovereign does not have it, look for a hero that does, or go make friends with Procipinee, buy a spellbok for a low level hero, and level him up. Be careful, while you can raise the bottom of ocean tiles, the beaches thus pr

The reason for archers over staves is because I spend most of my crystal on accessories (and mage robe). There's just not enough crystal to use accessories and a bunch of staves. The other thing about staves is they are affected by resists. If you fight a fire elemental your fire staves are useless, and the same for ice. If you're building one army to destroy everything, you don't want half your army being useless against certain enemies.

The reason for spears: 1. Safe and can never be countered. This allows them to charge in and attack almost anything without worry (only need to worry about fire aura). 2. Armor penetration. The AI tend to think armor is the best thing in the world (there isn't a sustained effort on dodge), and spears negates this big time. If you play against AI with bonuses, you need the armor penetration or you'll be clinking all the time. I don't even bother with Lightning Pikes

You might want to report that as a bug then. Every city starts with a militia (unarmored, not unarmed), you usually get 2 groups of militia and 1 group of archers in a typical city... and way more if it's a fortress.

I pretty much always use spear, Krax or not. I use a front line (3-4) of spear chargers (on wargs) and a backline of bowmens (also on warg - also chargers, but never move). I still haven't seen anything survive this set up. Hell, Vetrar died in one round. Heh.

My assassins are always in the middle of battle... but I never use sweep either. I take Assassin for crit and armor ignore.

I like to rush for Ironworks, so I pretty much can never run out of metal... but crystal costs tend to hurt. I usually have 2 designs of most troops, a "normal" version that minimizes crystal costs that I use in most places to save crystal... and a final "enchanted" version for my SoD, but even these never use champion armor (main crystal costs comes from accessories).

@OP, food simply determines maximum population. It determines what level your city can get, and thus determines the base bonuses of the city and what free improvements you can get. Improvements that + growth is for the city only, however there are improvements (usually wonders) that + prestige that effectively boosts overall faction growth (prestige/total cities). @Xia, I think the only way you'll see lv5 cities now is if you had multiple farms near a city and lots of towns in you

I think I tried this in a previous beta build (so it might no longer be accurate now), but while you definitely CAN get both life and death, you can't upgrade the path that you can't get naturally (due to Kingdom/Empire alignment). At least I wasn't able to get it to show up after some 30+ levels (it was when leveling was a lot easier). I suppose that might be an issue with randomized choices, but I was able to get to V on all the other magic paths and was running out of stuff to