Merry Christmas: Fall From Heaven Final to release 12/16

[Sky]

Started a new game as the dwarves yesterday, golems rock! Fireball-tossing golem workers!

It's funny after playing a couple games as the elves, now I'm used to all the bennies they get from the forests, and as the dwarves I'm clear-cutting my entire nation :)

[Ard]

So, y'all have gotten me curious enough to go find my civ 4 disks again, but I have a question about the requirements.  Do you need both expansions to run this, or just the second one?  I bought the game when it came out, and was unimpressed with it enough to not bother getting either.

[Sky]

Just BtS. I believe they also include the game changes from Warlords but not the units & leaders. Or maybe it's all of Warlords. Anyway, you only need BtS (which is actually a decent addition to vanilla civ based on the one vanilla game I played after buying it).

[Warskull]

Excellent mod, plays better than civ4.  I like how each race has a unique feel and the choices between religons and civics are more choices and not just one clearly outperforming the rest.

[Stormwaltz]

Now this is interesting.

Soren Johnson, the lead designer of Civ4, has published a massive three-part interview with Derek "Kael" Paxton, the lead designer of FFH.

A History of Fall from Heaven (Part I)

A History of Fall from Heaven (Part II)

A History of Fall from Heaven (Part III)

[Ard]

Okay, ended up picking up the expansion and got started on this tonight.  Played for a few hours, until the elves decided to chain rape me with a single fawn.  It didn't look like it should have been violating me as bad as I was (had multiple slingers, and a warrior in the city), but they didn't even dent it.  Am I missing something obvious?  Was playing as the dwarves, can't remember the name.

[rk47]

best to consult civilopedia.
I've no experience with this game but the in game wiki is good enough to explain basic concepts of spells and promotions.
Also: go play summoner and straight to Portal units. Nothing like summoning 3 spectres and 2 Fire Elems per turn.

[Stormwaltz]

Played for a few hours, until the elves decided to chain rape me with a single fawn.  It didn't look like it should have been violating me as bad as I was (had multiple slingers, and a warrior in the city), but they didn't even dent it.  Am I missing something obvious?

Fawns are fairly powerful units in the early game, and one reason to rush for Fellowship of Leaves. I've never played the dwarves, so I can't compare slingers. Warriors would be cold meat in a one-on-one contest.

My first question would be, did it have a lot of promotions? If your units have no experience, and they're up against a more-powerful unit with a lot of experience, it's a recipe for disaster.

[rk47]

oh just recalled a neat little trick i used last year. Whenever you're taking over towns during War, they always have that x number of turns before the citizens calm down a bit and operate normally right? Well, you can send a culture generator unit, something like an artisan to immediately END the uprising and expand the borders with 20 culture pop. I love using zealots like this, especially with my warp portal wonder in every town, I can settle my conquests quicker without wasting turns. Even better, drop a zealot first to quell the uprising then drop a cultist to build a temple. 20 culture & +2 culture gen/turn + 1 happy face = 

[Ard]

Fawns are fairly powerful units in the early game, and one reason to rush for Fellowship of Leaves. I've never played the dwarves, so I can't compare slingers. Warriors would be cold meat in a one-on-one contest.

My first question would be, did it have a lot of promotions? If your units have no experience, and they're up against a more-powerful unit with a lot of experience, it's a recipe for disaster.

The warriors had a bunch of promotions from barbarians.  The slingers didn't, since I was mass producing them for another war I got suckered into with someone else.  Slingers are basically the dwarf archer analog.  I'm just more annoyed that this one unit managed to scythe through all my cities like a knife through butter.  The fawn wasn't heavily promoted until it decided to decimate my cities, the initial one it sacked had 3 or 4 defending units in it, from the convoy chain down to my staging point.  None of them even seemed to damage it, even though it looked like they were getting hits in.

Suppose I'll go double check the encylopedia tonight to see if I missed something obvious.

[Merusk]

Walls and palisades are a must for defense and should be at least the 2nd thing built in cities when you have the capability to build them.  Without them you're throwing away about a 50% defensive bonus.

Now, what you REALLY need to watch out for is the fucking priests of leaves.   Goddamned elves had stacked 9-10 in each of their cities, then cast "Summon tiger" and proceeded to wipe my advancing 10-stack army of level 5 and 6 Champions, mages, Archmage, 2 crossbowmen and both heroes off the planet.  Yeah, big army of big guys, but nobody can withstand 20-30 attacks in one round (I was within 2 turns distance of 3 of his cities) Wtf.   

[Ard]

Yeah, I put up the palisades first, didn't have the research done for walls at that point, was futzing around with other things.

I guess the part that bothers me, is that I hadn't seen any other units in the game yet that'd given my army any problems, other than a solitary barbarian tiger that as promoted through the roof.  Then this fawn appears, and a literal "I'm in ur base killin ur doodz" happens.  I'm used to getting raped when I don't know the tech tree and whatnot in civ games, but I was higher score and with a bigger army, at the time, than the AI that did this, and it wasn't more than like 150 turns into the game, on like the second easiest AI setting.  Just made me feel like a tard.

[Sky]

Don't forget tile bonuses for defense, too. Early FfH2 is pretty brutal, I usually build palisades /first/ and also locate on a wooded hill if possible. Don't fight elves in the forest, if you border with them start clearcutting the border now, burn out a nice strip so they don't get bonuses coming into your territory. Elves are nasty, I had the whole priest summoning tigers things going in my last game and it's devastating when you've got a few leveled-up priests running around.

Still, it's odd. The slingers defend at 5 and a fawn is attack 4. Hmm.

[Ard]

Still, it's odd. The slingers defend at 5 and a fawn is attack 4. Hmm.

It's possible I missed something obvious.  I haven't played Civ4 since it was initially released. 

[rk47]

so at what difficulty does the enemy start to get tricky?
i think i put mine on prince, and wasn't really challenged so far with Clan of Ember double military production bonus (Build 1 get 1 Free) mid game with iron weapons.

I blame the random climate I guess. It's quite strange why the random map Erendil generator decides to put impassable mountain range with 1-3 tiles of choke point, making it really easy for me to plan expansions and grabbing resources. Then place me in semi jungle area that made grabbing Jungle clear tech priority, but the plantations are a boon for research. But the neighboring civs seem to fail to grasp that concept. I keep seeing Dark Elves in below 5 pop cities still mired in jungles. Then there's the dwarves being made to start in TUNDRA? Wth. I'd love a challenge but the map seems too 'Hard' for the AI to play in.

[Sky]

I don't know that the AI ever knows how to properly build and improve terrain, modded or not.

But I won't go on my usual AI rant, since apparently nobody gives a fuck about improving AI.

[Tebonas]

There is an option for the AI not the be restricted by building requirements for their advanced units.

[Murgos]

But I won't go on my usual AI rant, since apparently nobody gives a fuck about improving AI.

For what it's worth, I think you are entirely wrong.

[Merusk]

Still, it's odd. The slingers defend at 5 and a fawn is attack 4. Hmm.

It's possible I missed something obvious.  I haven't played Civ4 since it was initially released. 

I'm beginning to wonder if it was a bug of some sort or if, like Sky mentioned, you were on woods.  That gives fawns some big combat bonuses, IIRC.   OB question, you did have the slingers Fortified and not just in sentry mode, right?  If so, I can't see a reason the fawn should have ever won. 

[Ard]

Now, what you REALLY need to watch out for is the fucking priests of leaves.   Goddamned elves had stacked 9-10 in each of their cities, then cast "Summon tiger" and proceeded to wipe my advancing 10-stack army of level 5 and 6 Champions, mages, Archmage, 2 crossbowmen and both heroes off the planet.  Yeah, big army of big guys, but nobody can withstand 20-30 attacks in one round (I was within 2 turns distance of 3 of his cities) Wtf.   

Fuck, and this happened to me last night too now, right outside my capital.  I'm the one that stupidly picked the fight this time, but I was having a good run until I did that.

I'm beginning to wonder if it was a bug of some sort or if, like Sky mentioned, you were on woods.  That gives fawns some big combat bonuses, IIRC.   OB question, you did have the slingers Fortified and not just in sentry mode, right?  If so, I can't see a reason the fawn should have ever won. 

It's very likely the city was built on a forest, I hadn't had time to clear the surrounding areas in that game.  And yes, I fortified the archers, and they'd been there for like 20+ turns, so they had the full bonus.  I'm just going to chalk that one up as a "I'm a retard", and just slash and burn any woods near me if there are elves around.

[Sky]

That's one of the things I love about FfH2, the way it does stuff Will Wright would kill to do, create goals and narrative out of the gameplay elements. Secret is having good elements, I guess.

I think it's a great fantasy element, elves show up....GET OUT THE AXES, BOYS! Treehugger? More like Stumphugger, bitches!

[rk47]

Yeah it's funny, it felt like a classic RPG mixed with empire building. Sometimes I can't help but just end the game right there when I'm satisfied with the state of my empire. Letting a bunch of Dwarves living in Tundra (with closed borders and culture blocked their only exit  , turning another civ into my vassals while having a pet Angel Civilization under my command. It felt complete.

[Raguel]

 Archmages are the only way for Ljosofar (the good elves) to take cities

 (Actually their endgame I-Won units are probably Druids, which have a huge Nature mana affinity - in other words for each Nature mana node you have they gain combat strength, and if you founded Fellowship of Leaves you probably have at least 3 nature nodes)

True story: I hadn't played the elves in awhile, but after seeing the Balseraph spam a bunch of  tigers and reading this thread, I figured what the hey. There's a hard limit on the number of tigers you can summon. I didn't do the math, but it's enough that I didn't need fire mana until late game. 

One thing I dislike about druids is that they get a poison ability that doesn't work on neutral units. Umm, only neutral civs can build druids :/


Btw, from what I can tell, druids are cool if you just build them, but if you upgrade them from Priests, they can also summon treants. I didn't think it was possible to take cities faster than I did as Malakim (with all the goodies like cannons, mages, and oh yea Chalid) but Treants + tigerzerg = 

[Merusk]

That's one of the things I love about FfH2, the way it does stuff Will Wright would kill to do, create goals and narrative out of the gameplay elements. Secret is having good elements, I guess.

I think it's a great fantasy element, elves show up....GET OUT THE AXES, BOYS! Treehugger? More like Stumphugger, bitches!

Part of the problem is vanilla Civs is constrained by being politically correct.  Take religions as the best example. There is nothing in Civ IV to make you take one religion over another other than the fact that you founded it.  When you read the background info Sid talks about not wanting to promote a "Best" religion for a style of gamplay as it could be interpreted as a commentary on that religion.   It's damn stupid and ties the hands of the designers to the point that a possibly stellar feature (As shown in FFH2) is now just fluff in vanilla.

[Sky]

Btw, from what I can tell, druids are cool if you just build them, but if you upgrade them from Priests, they can also summon treants. I didn't think it was possible to take cities faster than I did as Malakim (with all the goodies like cannons, mages, and oh yea Chalid) but Treants + tigerzerg = 

Always upgrade if you can, rather than building fresh units. I try to make my non-sacrificial units after I get Apprenticeship and Conquest, which are fairly early civics. +4 xp per unit, plus any building bonuses, is pretty nifty. I was talking earlier about terraforming with Druids, because in one game I had two druids I had upgraded and one I had built. The one I had built lacked one of the terraforming abilities the upgraded units had.

The Treant hero unit is pretty badass, too.

[Lum]

Even better, drop a zealot first to quell the uprising then drop a cultist to build a temple. 20 culture & +2 culture gen/turn + 1 happy face = 

You can just drop the cultist for the same effect. Force-building a temple will quell unrest. I usually send cultists (or the equivalent) behind my conquering hordes for that reason.

[Lum]

Btw, from what I can tell, druids are cool if you just build them, but if you upgrade them from Priests, they can also summon treants.

A lot of higher level units are like this - Eidolons (the golems for evil religions) especially. Never build an Eidolon, always upgrade it. I usually upgrade it from a cultist/ritualist so they get passive health bonuses and a conversion chance. Plus, hey, evil high priest robots.

[Ard]

Always upgrade if you can, rather than building fresh units.

This is actually a pretty key thing that'll get beaten into you if you play the Balseraphs.  You pretty much always want to build a Freak first for mutations, and then upgrade it into another unit type.

That said, it's a great idea for that race, but shitty in implementation since the race is built around cultural takeover, not military.

Also, patch 'o' is out now, just came out in the last day or so.  Was patch 'n' when I installed Sunday.

edit:  finally found some notes, it's mostly cosmetic changes

It will not break save games and makes the following changes:
1. New Amurite Palace by C.Roland (old Amurite palace model moved to the tower of complacency).
2. New Bannor cityset art by C.Roland.
3. New Bannor Palace by C.Roland.
4. New Dwarven Settler model graphics by seZereth.
5. Fixed a CtD that could happen if Koun split from a barbarian trait leader.
6. Updated German translation (thanks to Kontrollator and the German translation team).
7. Tech recosting (in general early techs become a bit cheaper and later techs become a bit more expensive, but the major effect awas to smooth out a lot of the weird tech cost jumps).
8. New Dwarven Druid model by seZereth.
9. New Dwarven Slinger model by seZereth.
10. New Dwarven Warrior model by seZereth.

[Raguel]

Btw, from what I can tell, druids are cool if you just build them, but if you upgrade them from Priests, they can also summon treants.

A lot of higher level units are like this - Eidolons (the golems for evil religions) especially. Never build an Eidolon, always upgrade it. I usually upgrade it from a cultist/ritualist so they get passive health bonuses and a conversion chance. Plus, hey, evil high priest robots.

Yeah I nornally play a good civ, so I always upgrade to paladins using a priest or radiant guard for the lulz. They must have changed something recently, because I don't remember being able to upgrade rathas to knights.

I was just surprised by the druids, since the base priests couldn't summon treants.  This makes me think it's a bug, but not one I'm inclined to report. 

[Lum]

Complete FfH changelog: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=302590

[Raguel]

Calabim don't get elder councils?  That puts a serious tamper on how I tech. Do you go straight to writing ASAP or am I missing something?

[rk47]

Calabim don't get elder councils?  That puts a serious tamper on how I tech. Do you go straight to writing ASAP or am I missing something?

Hmm, yeah something like that. That civ is quite hard to play with, I suspect the key here is to tech rush to unlock Vamps and achieve high food production on your cities.. I'm more comfortable with early power civs like Sheaim's summoning & fireballs and Hippus Raider horsemen.

Oh and the AI seems to be more aggressive in Monarch difficulty. I was having hard time surviving in a middle of 3 way battle as Hippus, but man it's fun being the founding Ashen Veil while being sandwiched by 3 Order Civs. Ring of Fire is the awesome stack killers.

[Raging Turtle]

Calabim don't get elder councils?  That puts a serious tamper on how I tech. Do you go straight to writing ASAP or am I missing something?

Education and cottage spam works very well. 

If the Erebus map isn't giving you a challenge, try Pangaea.  The AI isn't bad at all if it doesn't need to worry about navies or getting over mountains. 

Sky, I think your Druid could summon Treants because it suddenly had access to Channeling III, along with FoL.  Priests can only cast Channeling II (divine) spells. So if you take a fresh FoL druid and teach it Nature I, II, and III, it should be able to cast Vitalize as well as make treants. 

And I was pretty sure that building a city destroyed any forest that was previously on the spot?  Therefore no defensive bonuses or pluses for attackers?  If the fawn just got extremely lucky on its first attack, then it would get a big exp bonus as a result - the worse the odds, the more exp you get from a battle.  And then he pwned you with his new promotions over the next few turns. 

[Lum]

Calabim don't get elder councils?  That puts a serious tamper on how I tech.

Calabim gain a very cheap extra pop-increasing granary to counteract, and their courthouse (vampire governor) grants production bonuses for unhappy citizens. Teching as Calabim = huge teeming cities with lots of improvements. Calabim are one of the easiest civs to win with, actually - vampirism is broken in general and vampire lords are game-winning units.

[Ard]

And I was pretty sure that building a city destroyed any forest that was previously on the spot?  Therefore no defensive bonuses or pluses for attackers?  If the fawn just got extremely lucky on its first attack, then it would get a big exp bonus as a result - the worse the odds, the more exp you get from a battle.  And then he pwned you with his new promotions over the next few turns. 

Pretty sure it does as well.  My point was, there was forest all around that city, and all the way up and around all my cities at that point in the game.  There's no way I could have preemptively stopped it if I'd tried, and apparently nothing in my cities could stop it either.