BPrado wrote:




ps: what´s with the blue ruins?

The Endless Day quest that unlocks the Haunts hero.

Played some to test the "new" theory (play mostly like any other faction going to war) and it seems to be right.



I could not have been more wrong about Proliferators. I´ve been looking at Endless as if it was Impossible. You can afford to pump your city up before researching them on Impossible, so that when they´re available, you can spam them on three turns. Endless doesn´t leave room for that, you need to take 6, 7, 8 turns to get one by turn 40~50 at most. First because there will hardly be any Villages left after that, unless you barely hunt; and perhaps more importantly - because they allow you to keep leeching your enemy military. Every stupid army that crosses your border means that many more cannon fodder.



Their role is obivous, of course, but I had the timing wrong. They are early. You´re supposed to go for them first, like you went for Necrodrone when you were a baby faction.



I wasn´t taking screenshot because, honestly, I kinda forgot. There were interesting situations. I´m starting one right now.



"Just do it!"

-Shia



I gotta say for the record that, when playing necrofages, yes - you need full strategic designs even offline.



ps: oh, and you need them before turn ~60, because apparently FDTR is a thing after that

I tweaked my strategy after a massive tall Drakken rush on turn 30, and now I think it´s how I should have started the thread in the first place.



This Military Overview here shows clearly how much stronger I am now in comparison to any other previous game. Looking at the pictures of what was supposed to be my heavy infantry by the mid of the game made me realize I was way too late even in comparison to what I was used to before pausing EL for a while, not to mention in comparison to Endless.



The way it works right now, since the AI seems to fail at efficient designs, a strictly military game becomes a matter of offsetting their superiority in unit Levels (from tech superiority) and Quantity using the quality of strategics. If you go for the discounts really soon, it´s possible to have your intial army + a couple of choice units in full design and wreck havoc on the AI early on.



Something important to note about the other games is how much larger the gap always got between my armies and the strongest AI´s throughout time. Even investing huge amounts of industry on a large amounts reasonable units, my units would only be reasonable in practice if they were always a couple of levels higher. I was trying to beat the AI in its own game.



I still believe, although with no real evidence, that cannon fodder tactics can work in MP. They always have. I should try MP at some point. They work on Impossible anyway.



To the game!



Turn 1 - Great start for Necrophage, except I would totally trade some science for dust. Tech tree - A military approach dictates I need, above anything, availability of choices, which means having things to do and being able to do them. That means science and industry. Usually, the tricky part is that they are both dependent on population, thus food and approval. But necros don´t really need buildings for that. I tend to choose buildings for approval, but food ones are my last priority.



Turn 2 - Lots of good terrain to fight



Turn 4 - Either Vaulters or Wild Walkers are easy prey right at the beginning



Turn 5 - Micromanaging to stay on two pop while producing as fast as possible



Turn 7 - Capital. Winter prediction was long enough, so I decided to make the most out of the little tiles I´ll have for a while. When winter is upon me, then I´ll go for mint to replace the yielding.



Turn 9 - Technically, aren´t we all necrophages? I mean, they´re not monsters because they preffer not to eat things still breathing, right? bzz



Turn 11 - Finding the region with the luxury you need for Ka-Riss can sometimes be a pain when you keep a tight, isolated approach with no scouts. Last game I was on an awesome Tundra Rocks start (Tundra Rocks rocks) with plenty of cash so I bought a drone and it was wonderful, totally worth it. So much sight, so much movement, so much potential.



Turn 13 - From now on, since my Dust is short and can go negative at any moment because of winter, I´ll be spending only on retrofits and Ka-Riss. During the initial 10 turns it´s useful to rush one turn of foundry here, one turn of Geomics there in order to micromanage each building´s effect to what you need the most in x number of turns.



Turn 16 - Capital. Influence during settler to make sure I have a little to spare for this and the next Empire Plan.



Turn 17 - Three sisters of mercy, but one of them will be my little farm for proliferators for a while. Tech tree - with a little of luck and effort, even Necro can into Empire Plan level 2.



Turn 20 - Rushing emeralds for Ka-Riss. Empire Plan - going to make sure I have a backup plan in case money goes short.



Turn 21 - Hunting for food eco-friendly style.



Turn 23 - A bug has to eat.



Turn 27 - This should probably do for the first war, on whoever that might be. Remember Will of the Hive - more attack for declared war.



Turn 28 - A well placed ambush could be the first step to owning all of that orange there. It would have to be later, for a good reason.



Turn 30 - This dude will give me plenty of good reasons to wait a little.



Turn 32 - "I´ll just leave this here!" =D - Military Overview - when the game says you have about the same power, you´re already on overkill. That´s good, I like overkill.



Turn 33 - I´d probably be entering Era 2 around now on a regular Empire Building approach.



Turn 34 - Mints right now, seed storages after winter is gone. Tech tree - might change after Cannon Fodder.



Turn 36 - So fun.



Turn 37 - Around now I was being hit in the head by 120 damage Wyverns last game. Drakken is freaking insane. But then again, they are freaking dragons.



Turn 40 - BzzBzztbzzbzbzz Empire Plan - did I mention overkill? Just kidding, I´m positevely expecting the orange there to some huge problem. Another Necro would be very very annoying. Speaking of overkill, when you´re overwhelming an army and you have proliferators, never auto-resolve (in fact - never auto resolve.) or you´ll end up not creating potential cannon fodder.



Turn 41 - Warning!



Turn 42 - The orange being Vaulters makes things positevely easier. Military Overview



Turn 43 - Her marine. Used well, it could be trouble.



Turn 44 - No! Not like this.



That´s a nice addition, now I´ll probably just sit there for a while with a bunch of cannon fodder and bring the main army back. Even though she was the one who attacked me, they don´t take kindly to bumswhooping. I should declare war myself, very soon.



Comments? Please feel free

Going on, meeting new people.



I was so tired yesterday I said something wrong. My armies only have rings, they don´t have weapons yet. I´m putting them on in this cycle.



Turn 44 - Sieging. Gave up on sending Feeds back home, the xp is nice.



Turn 48 - Money is fine, I can sell battleborns, so I decide to hire Lakapassar as a future general.



Turn 49 - Fighting Vaulters early is much easier. I´m going for the orange, but if no one bothers the blue, they´ll grow really strong really soon.



Turn 50 - The city is mine, time to scout and get ruins before moving west to start actually getting territory. I´m not settling those regions for a while.



Turn 51 - I´m so stupid, they can´t be infected. I should totally have killed the village after realizing it, but I took some time to do it for whatever reason.



Turn 54 - I´ve actually retrofitted already, I´m missing some details here, I should make notes during the game =p



Turn 56 - Heading out with the last army



Turn 57 - Tech tree for now



Turn 60 - Warning! - This here will be the Empire Plan for a while.



Turn 61 - War



Turn 63 - This seriously pisses me off, great job designers, no sarcasm here



Turn 64 - Winter



Turn 66 - Heading in



Turn 69 - Meeting the Roving Clans, I´ll let him grow that city for me, don´t want many enemies while trying to deal with the light blue



Begin of Turn 70 - She moves to engage me, so I move just a little to allow her to perform the attack, which she does - Phase 1 - Phase 2 - Phase 3 - Phase 4 - Phase 5 - Phase 6 - Result. End of turn 70 - now I actually have good weapons.



Turn 71 - With my science climbing, now I´m planning to get my influence to a level which allows me level 4 military ministry when it´s available.



Turn 72 - Sieging for a while



Turn 76 - Getting that adamantian to complete FDTR. That means anything I´ll use early will be palladian, which means food and attack.



Turn 80 - Good proposition, I set the empire plan the same way as it was, take her city and then take the deal. I should totally not be able to do it, the decision about the deal has to lock everything else, since its value changes throughout the turn. Military Overview - ok, I´m a little worried now, but I´ll just assume that´s because she has some guardians and a lot of fortified people.



Now I want to connect the two main parts of my empire for roads and all the income. I need to stop making buildings soon and go back to building elite forces. I´ve only been producing garrison City Swarms for now because of my lack of strategics. I´m seriously considering hiring a Broken Lord governor soon.



Hope this helps anyone

Lots of free time for the good of the hive. Too bad for the Roving Clans.



Turn 81 - Damn this is nice. Hiring Wayra Sigo.



Turn 82 - Tech tree. Science going nicely as expected.



Turn 83 - The Roving Clans make my decision between settling and going to war rather easy.



Turn 87 - Tech tree. army army army bzzzz



Turn 88 - Last thing you want is to declare war on someone and in 5 turns discover your attack or approval are going down significantly.



Turn 89 - Also (i´ve done this) moving pop one side to the other to get just enough Influence and then forget everything about it and conquer a city. Don´t do it.



Turn 92 - Using Ka-Riss food bonus to grow my capital a little while Wayra Sigo boosts my forest rich city and gets level enough for building cost reduction.



Turn 93 - Retrofitting to face the incoming threat. Do the same on Feed´s army.



Turn 94 - Bad move. One tile up, and I wouldn´t be able to engage that army to the south without bringing the other army into the battle. This makes things easier.



Turn 95 - And to complete the mess, it attacks me even having the information that I have a freaking swarm around. This would be a short battle, so I didn´t use everyone, even going for the overkill. - Phase 1 - Phase 2 - Phase 3 - Phase 4



Turn 97 - Letting him settle that, I might even settle for a good peace deal to have another war later.



Turn 99 - Broken Lords out.



Turn 100 - New Empire Plan



Turn 101 - Another winter comes

Ok, learnt something else from this game. I probably took too many small cities from the Vaulters. This eventually meant I did not get a level 4 minitry like I had to in order to fight the blue vaulters.



On turn 122 she had Serum of Iteru, and started attacking me. I had just completed From Dust to Rust about 10 turns ago and had most my main armies equipped on adamantian and paladian level 1, dust health rings. It was not use. This prediction was more accurate than usual, although she had a bigger advantage in the end.



This is not fun anymore. I´m going to win like 3 games and come back with something more solid.



I´m not saying it´s bad mechanics or that it should be changed or anything, but From Dust to Rust is incredibly annoying on Endless.

It´s the same thing over and over.



Necros don´t have the means to rush on turn 20, that means I´ll have to fight a reasonable neighbor by turn 40, conquer them by turn 60, and then From Dust to Rust activates, and I can no longer build efficient armies. I build t3 iron and dust instead, in order to just upgrade when FDTR goes off. Then: either these armies are crushed by endless waves of attacking level 7-9 enemies, or by the time I complete FDTR, the people I really have to kill already have Serum of Iteru.



My current game is going well enough, I conquered a broken lords, have plenty of resources, reasonable amount of armies left after the war. I simple cannot make the jump in the military in order to catch up with everyone.



This is my second city. I have all 5 techs of glassteel/titanium equipment, and they´re not fully on level 3 stuff. Look what happens when I build one army. This is an army that would handle my current opposition. I already have +20% defense from tech. I´m about to go level 4 military ministry and hope this one army can conquer the entire red there here. I seriously don´t think it´s going to work.



If that´s the case, that´s it, I have no idea how to play necrophages and shouldn´t be trying to guide anyone =p





ps: yeah, I give up, I´ve had the most awesome starts, the luckiest games, I´ve gotten proliferators running around by turn 32, I´ve gotten all strategic techs before turn 40, all extractors before turn 10. I can´t find a solution for the middle of the game. Either I lack the science to get everything on time, or the gold to upgrade anyone, or the production to retrain anything I lose. Battleborns are just garrison. If at least they were born at the level of the unit that generated them, it would be easier to do something.



Also, I´ve tried looking around youtube for someone doing it. Can´t seem to find it, can anyone send me a link? Thanks



if anyone wants me tro try a different faction, just say it

Jojo_Fr wrote:
- Why some people seem to love Demanding Gods ? It's an advanced technology, there are others excellent technology for hapiness (as the Market) at this era, and it's only give +30 in happiness, for one population point, for a limited time.



- The sewer system, level 1 tech, cost nearly nothing, and give +20 happiness.



- In my opinion the Demanding God bonus is not enough high and should be at least +40 happiness. Or maybe just +30, but reduce the expansion disapproval of District of 75 % (it would be cool if Necrophages could build enormous city, with tentecularous district forms, without respect for the sacro-saint "triangle").

Demanding Gods is powerfull, but it needs a global strategy consistent with its constraints, otherwise it is better to go the classical path (Sewer system and so on). It's difficult to estimate, but I think that under 8 pop happiness building are more efficient, whereas above 10+ pop it is the reverse. I think one big advantage to consider when following a 'Demanding Gods' strategy is that you can totally ignore happiness tech unlocking, which emphasis quite well a mid-range military strategy.



That being said, a slight buff to +40 happiness would be welcome, it would make this tech more flexible and easy to exploit, for sure.

Hi.



I had in my heart to finish this once, so I´m giving it a try. I hope these AARs (as I´ve just discovered they´re called ^^ ) are of any use.



I´m on turn 2 yet, but I already have something interesting I´d like to put some emphasis on - both in order to report it in case it´s unknown and unintended, and to spread the information in case this is either mechanics or unavoiadable.



Settings



First, about the faction. As necro, I´m in general looking for a start with the less amount of food from tiles possible. This will usually guide my first scouting forager when I´m able to see what the regions next to me look like - whenever I´m near deserts and ice regions, that´s what I would ideally preffer to settle.



Moving with them can be a good choice for several reasons, like being closer to a potential military target, making better use of Slavery, Cull the Herd and reinforcements against minors, and the fact that a target region can never be much worst than your starting one regarding these things (since you necessarily start in a region with one village). Placing your capital in a region with too many food-based tiles means you´re wasting yields, while I´m pretty sure regions with a reduced average of food tiles tend to have food anomalies to compensate the average yields in potential empire spawn points.



When it comes to fighting, in case you move to a region with many villages, it´s a win-win regardless of the difficulty of the units you´re up against. When they´re easy, they´re fast-food and when they´re tough, you can often use reinforcements for at least part of them and quickly get access to cheap strong minor faction units.



When ideal placement is not possible, rivers and water in general then become very attractive for the amount of extra yields they can generate at a relatively low cost in the short term. By Tier 2 youre adding a couple of dust and food to every one of them. Forests are also basically the same safe bet as they are with anyone else, since their things was never about the food. Forest + water is the second best thing to a start with anomalies.





Ideal placement is really sweet though, right? So, when you´re looking for a place to settle with your Settler unit using tht function that shows you the FIDSI, I´m sure everyone already noticed you´re shown the value of a couple of tiles that are still hidden.



Well, the game also allows you to move from the last tile you can see to the first hidden one next to it while still calculating the FIDSI. That´s an insane amount of extra information.



Turn 1 - I get this meh start so I move the forager towards the desert. I find good terrain and ... then I find out it´s actually amazing terrain. That would come to be a Mineral Rich.



I´m going back there now, just wanted to point this out.



ps: what´s with the blue ruins?

Nope, not this time again, sorry. I think I have to go expanding much earlier to prevent people from getting this size. With max Military Ministry I could probably take them on before the Serum.



I think I have to find a way to reach era 4 earlier, with more productive power.



I realise now that I should probably have boomed my capital the way I did with Osdarcha.



Well, there´s always another game.





edit: Well, looking again, I might have missed opportunities at few elite forces there. That´s what I´m trying next time, then, I´m giving up on my theory about building cannon fodder, I´ll let that job exclusively for proliferators. As a consequence, I´m going to try and push my science almost to a Science Victory level at the start, in order to reach era 2 with room and momentum to get proliferators+meritocratic promotion+cannon fodder and try war with my economy almost in danger, Civ style. Bad placed winter, bad matchup, bad region start, there are so many things that can spoil this. Let´s see.

Very nice posts and deep discussion! I've also caught the bug of fighting with Necrophages on Endless and have struggled as well. It's great to join the forums and follow your efforts! Thanks and keep it up!

Thanks both of you guys.



So here it goes. I decided to use swarms this time, since the AI is a little better now. Makes things easy peasy.



Turn 2 - Very important to scout efficiently in search of strategics and -luxuries- because of the Ka-Riss quest. I would be lucky and get the Dyes I already have as requirement. - Tech Tree



Turn 4 - I also find two glassteel deposits to the east, so that´s where I´m settling.



Turn 5 - Now I need to regroup to go daemon-hunting



Turn 7 - bzzzz



Turn 8 - The earlier the better for strats and military factions.



Turn 9 - Tech Tree - I bought out the Empire Mint and used a Food Boost in the capital, so this here is me growing while training a settler



Turn 10 - On my way to settler. - Capital - Empire Plan



Turn 11 - Second city FIDSI



Turn 12 - Hunting orcs now



Turn 14 - Sewer Systems, or should I say Popular Housing Program, amIrite?



Turn 16 - Scores - Tech Tree



Turn 18 - Hunting Caecatores.



Turn 19 - Winter



Turn 20 - Empire Plan



Turn 21 - Using discount to get productive



Turn 22 - Winter gone



Turn 24 - I never even bothered starting Industrial Megapole, but I was really close to the initiative deed. I would eventually get the Free Counter one, and that´s it.



Turn 25 - Tech Tree



Turn 26 - Going for those Industry buildings instead.



Turn 28 - Blue had been coming in and out of my screen, my bug senses are tingling - better put myself in a position to be able to declare war before he does in order to make full use of Will of the Hive.



Turn 29 - Getting Ka-Riss. - Ka-Riss governing - Second City



Turn 30 - Running back home. Empire Plan



Turn 31 - Industry!



Turn 34 - Ok, I can´t take this, this is clearly an invasion and a violation of my sovereignty, this means WAR! ;]



Turn 35 - mwahahaha im so smart justifying my wars. (on a serious note: legitmacy of wars could be a thing in future games, affecting diplomacy with other factions civ-style : )



Turn 36 - Siege



Turn 38 - Waiting for empire plan



Turn 39 - Thrifty trait for swarm



Turn 40 - Cool. Cool, cool, cool. - Empire Plan



Turn 42 - Heal marching - Tech Tree



Turn 43 - Setting me up to build Dust Transmutter.



Turn 45 - After that money starts flowing in, I can finish the game.



Turn 47 - Sieging till empire plan



Turn 48 - Tech Tree



Turn 50 - Army Harvester (glassteel 2 axe) - Empire Plan



Turn 52 - Marching



Turn 53 - Army Necrofighter (glassteel 2 claws)



Turn 54 - Winter and looking for capitals.



Turn 56 - I lost count of the amount of decrease population actions the AI took against me.



Turn 57 - Swarming



Turn 58 - War* - Daemons



*I´d like to call attention here to the health of my first proliferator and my last Necrodrone, between turn 57 and 58. I am Necro, I probably had one level on Ka-Riss of the factional trait for health regen and I did use the Watchtower, but even still - that´s way too much healing, and it can still get much larger. Sure, everyone can get most of the same bonuses - but my point here is not that Necro are particularly strong because of that, just that this mechanic enables warfare in a very extreme way and it is a huge part of the reason why peaceful victories are hardly worth it or even possible in high level play.



Turn 60 - Empire Plan - Military Overview



Turn 61 -



Turn 63 - Tech Tree - Necrofighter - Necrodrone - Regarding the difference between Dust 1 and Glassteel 2 weapons: the increase in damage from Dust weapons do not make them, in my opinion, essentially better. It just makes them different.



It doesn´t matter if you have 18 units with the maximum amount of damage you could possibly get, if when you need them to fight only 10 make it into the battlefield because your reinforcement flags were overwhelmed. Having units equipped with the most damage doesn´t necessarily mean you have the strongest army. However little tactics might be involved in the battle system, it still has rules well-structured enough to provide Endless Legend with a good level of realism when it comes to the efficiency of complex armies.



Turn 65 - Siege till turn 60.



Turn 66 - That siege damage.



Turn 67 - Army Daemons



Turn 69 - Winter



Turn 70 - Going to capture Idyna for the strategic access. - Empire Plan



Turn 71 - 10k health B)



Turn 72 - Tech Tree



Turn 73 - Headed to plant a spy



Turn 74 - Military Overview



Turn 75 - Good position



Turn 76 - Gios



Turn 77 - Siege



Turn 78 -



Turn 80 - Someone killed the Cult for me. - Empire Plan



Turn 81 - Last War



Turn 83 -



Turn 84 -



Turn 86 - Last Winter



Turn 88 - ta da



GG

Impressive! Really well done!



It would be interesting to see this done again. Is Fast better or worse for Necrophages compared to Normal speed?



I currently am playing an Endless Necro game on the vanilla game (only the free mods on Steam, no guardians) with Normal speed and since I have just started the game, the awakening quest popped up and I have found the hero in the first 5 turns or so. That boosted my start considerably, the luxury reward was good too. More importantly I lured the hero to my capital and it provided lots of militia corpses for several turns before joining my ranks... not sure if it will be a win yet, but it's looking good.



I should probably try to beat the game without this seasonal boon. :P



Thank you for sharing!

Thanks danrelle, and welcome to the forums!

danrelle wrote:
It would be interesting to see this done again. Is Fast better or worse for Necrophages compared to Normal speed?

If you have the patience for manual battles, I would say Normal speed is slightly easier for the fact that there´s more "smaller" battles. The more you manual against the AI, the larger your advantage will be over it since it can´t resolve battles manually for shit. In case you don´t like to manual, then I´d say that the proportion between the AI´s advantages and how much you can offset it every turn makes Normal speed slightly harder. I used to manual everything when I first got the game, but now I don´t manual a single battle so I personally preffer fast speed.



I could play another Necro game no problem, but I could also make a different thread for a different faction. Whichever people preffer.



ps: Getting a free Eslek Tarosh with necro must be really sweet.

BPrado wrote:




ps: Getting a free Eslek Tarosh with necro must be really sweet.

Gives me a chance to bully the Endless AI for a change. ^_^



I manual battles... I think auto would be a much bigger challenge. If I can win regularly, I will try to win with auto-battles.



I guess playing multiplayer you lose the habit to manual, but I haven't tried multiplayer yet.



For me, I'm always interested to see a Necro game, since no diplomacy makes Endless gameplay more Endless. But you might be tired of them, so perhaps you'd have more fun sharing a game from a different race. I think playing something different, but not using/abusing diplomacy would be cool!

danrelle wrote:
Gives me a chance to bully the Endless AI for a change. ^_^



I manual battles... I think auto would be a much bigger challenge. If I can win regularly, I will try to win with auto-battles.



I guess playing multiplayer you lose the habit to manual, but I haven't tried multiplayer yet.



For me, I'm always interested to see a Necro game, since no diplomacy makes Endless gameplay more Endless. But you might be tired of them, so perhaps you'd have more fun sharing a game from a different race. I think playing something different, but not using/abusing diplomacy would be cool!

People manual a lot on multiplayer too (I just enjoy being annoying about it), you don´t have to worry, and you should totally try it if you take on Endless AI. It´s really a lot more fun.





Regarding Diplomacy "abuse" - to be fair I do it, in a certain level, 100% of games against Endless AI. The simple fact all those factions I steamroll will make peace with me right after I get their capital could be considered an abuse (and it´s certainly diplomacy, even with necro).



I will not stop doing it, though, because it´s only an abuse if you assume the player is supposed to keep fighting an uphill battle in the name of honor or something like that - and I don´t think that´s true. Even on multiplayer, I consider it totally acceptable for a player to simply recognize defeat. It makes things easier for the conqueror, yes - but so what? If you have no more chances of winning, why should you put effort in simply balancing the game for someone else to win and not the guy who beat you? I´m all for balance of power between relevant leviathans ^^



It also makes little sense to not use diplomacy playing peacefully, since the game benefits war so much. I began making these threads trying to show unconventional wins, that´s why I started with Roving Clans and diplo Ardent Mages. I tried my best to get an economic victory with forgotten but simply couldn´t. Then I started just killing everyone like it´s so much easier to do.



I´ll play random next time and whatever I get I´ll play military again and post it.

You make some interesting points. I had assumed military victories are the hardest to get on Endless... I don't have enough experience to know what victory types are more challenging.



For me the challenge to balance military and economy and to be ready for a fight at every point in the game seems the hardest. I can imagine that racing for an unconventional victory condition can be tougher though.



I would love to see more military, or other types of close call victories! ^_^

"Your presence is welcome. May you grow prosperous and fat."



I laughed for minutes when I first got this greeting. This is freaking genius. If you understand the implications of their traits, these sentences describe perfectly how a Necrofage player should face the game: anything that can be killed is cattle.



Frankly, I feel a little akward using the word "Guide". I´m not particularly good as the Necrofages, and this might be a disaster. I´ve only beaten endless once with vanilla them. But they are fun as hell, even when you lose. Also, I got an awesome start that allowed me not to feel like a dirty cheater and still make the thread. I might play again with a modest start even if I win.



There are several reasons why a Necrofage player should preffer to expand through warfare than peacefully. Agriculturally Challenged makes settlers be particularly expensive; the complete lack of opportunity of pacifying villages and the high benefits from rebuilding them forces you into spending industry on that instead of units or other basic buildings; since you´re geared towards military domination, every city you found peacefully will be that much more of a burden when you have a huge empire in terms of building maintenance, luxuries and empire plans costs.



At the same time, past Era 1, it´s usual for me to find myself with a reasonable amount of still necessary techs for my military and a sheer lack of available really useful buildings. Science is important, but it´s not necessarily vital - after all, you are bugs. Spending a larger time on a certain technology tier than usual means that you will be dealing with cheaper and weaker armies than usual, which couples with their lore.



Although the relation between Food and Science is not as straightforward in EL as in, say, Civ, it´s still there and it´s very important. Out of the three main sources of Science - tiles, population and buildings - two are directly related to your food output and the latter is arguably dependent on population itself. So it´s not a surprise that a faction with penalties to the natural generation of food will tend to be left behind technologically. That means your army is basically composed by Cannon Fodder.



Having specific unit designs help the Necros a lot because of that. When your army is composed by a large number of weak units, it´s important to focus some of them on damage and the rest on threat-interception. When you keep an uniform mass of weak units there´s an incomparably larger amount of metas against you.



Necro units are, above anything, defensive; that´s what claws are for. I believe that´s the main difference from a Cult military gameplay, for example. While both are supposed to be very tall very fast and spit out entire armies of damage dealing units, the Cult benefits faster (because of the distribution of units stats) from an offensive approach with little infantry and lots of mobility and ranged units. Since the Necros lack the huge city defenses, losing entire stacks can result in instant defeat. So an infantry based approach, with few mobile high damage flying units than can go in and out, confusing the enemy, is the best in my opinion.



What they lack in weapons of choice, they make up in stats. Don´t be fooled by feeling that it´s "too average". There´s no such thing. Every stat distribution is supposed to define the function of each unit. Average-stats units usually have a moderate initiative that might go unnoticed before their lack of damage or health or defense. But moderate initiative can very easily become high initiative. And when initiave is just high enough, it´s able to single handedly render huge attacks and defenses and damages and healths completely useless.



I like to have 4 types of Foragers - ranged slayers with improved movement, ranged slayers with improved initiative, ranged slayers with improved damage and claw-wearing with improved initiative. That usually presents me with a range of initiative and movement that allows me to block cavalry, to reach Dekari rangers before dying pathetically on the way and to escape Warlock blitz, as examples.



I think I´ve said enough for now, and I ran out of time. I´ll post the sequence of turns as soon as I´m free again, but they´re already on steam. I´ll upload a save too.



[spoiler] I got the Industrial Megapole [/spoiler]

The game goes on, and although I felt I was doing ok, now I´m afraid the challenge of taking on the Roving Clans will be a bit too difficult. I´ll probably need all the help I can get from Empire Plans and Proliferators.



Turn 80 - Empire Plan. She closed her borders, so war it is.



Turn 81 - Totally letting her settle.



Turn 82 - go on



Turn 84 - Winter is gone



Turn 89 - War is gone. This treaty will help wonders with my military. The Palladian goes to FDTR.



Turn 93 - An early midgame Necrodrone. And here there´s an enemy Dervish. I´m taking suggestions on how to fight that.



Turn 96 - Finding the Vaulters. I´ll let her build up that city real nice.



Turn 100 - Empire Plan



Turn 102 - Going for roads for extra money, science, mobility and health regen.



Turn 108 - Winter again



Turn 110 - Settling for a Masargaka.



Turn 112 - This little fellow will be huge soon, watch it.



Turn 117 - B) . These here will hopefully be my meta against dervishes. I should later design a heavier anti-infantry one.



Turn 119 - Osdarcha is ready.



Turn 120 - Empire Plan. The next one I should probably go Max. Military and take on the west. The extra health will hopefully help fight their...:sigh: Serum of Iteru. Yeah, they got it. This will probably not end well.



Turn 121 - Completing FDTR. Now I´m hoping to lower the costs of palladian and adamantian to upgrade what I have. I need to save cash. Dust equip will be available next turn, but I have to consider carefully how to manage that since I don´t really make money. Health rings would be awesome though.



In any case, these are midgame designs of my infantry. Especially the weakest ones will very soon be upgraded to dust, and proliferators will be upgraded immediately.

• Forager
• Scavenger
• Harvester - palladian armor
• Gatherer - adamantian helmet
  
  

Any advices, suggestions, comments? please, I welcome them like a forager welcomes prey ^^

Turn 44 - Back to gathering food. I want to stock enough units for homeland defense, but on a high level of quality. After this wave of expensive units, which will be retrofit into something even better (lvl2 rings), I´ll the fill the garrisons with City Swarms, the another wave of expensive units. Getting this and that building in the meanwhile of course. And districts.



Turn 45 - Cold regions with no food tend to have plenty of science tiles. Never underestimate Geomics Labs.



Turn 48 - So much to bite



Turn 50 - Cool faction idea - winter bugs



Turn 55 - I know the Cult, but I slacked there and didn´t check the Military I guess. Anyway, I´m usually a little terrified of these people, so I pass the offer. Surely soon, but maybe not soon enough. Maybe. bzzzt



Turn 56 - =[nowthatitwascoolfightingthem.Anyway, excellent news.



Turn 58 - I had half said "screw it". Should totally have done it.



Turn 60 - Settling the third, after the Empire Plan. Here´s the queue.



Turn 61 - Capital, Second City and Military Overview.



Turn 63 - The rules in the jungle are pretty clear - it´s big, you don´t try to kill it. Not yet. bzzzzzzzzzzzz



Turn 64 - In between running from dervishes and yirmaks, I kinda could have completed three lust for loots there



Turn 66 - Hiring "The Dude" Unwin Weybridge



Turn 67 - Still running, although I supose if they really wanted to fight, they woud´ve gotten me already. I´m still running nonetheless.



Turn 70 - What´s that smell? Is that food? bzzz



Turn 73 - "Here´s hoping they will pacify those for me in time", damn typos



Turn 74 - The beauty of retrofitting. Thanks picoli! And this is my infantry with my General.



Turn 75 - lol . I think it´s a valid question whether to let them settle or not. It´s free population. Here´s the Men....I mean Military Overview. I´d say she´s running away from someone.

Here we go again.



I´ve been too fixated on districts, on the contrary of what I believed. Since instead of a sheer bonus to something, the Necro(ok)phages have a defficiency, expanding too soon is not worth it unless your initial district contains a couple of anomalies or great terrain with no food (which means more yielding).



The Necrophages relation with food is funny. In a way, if you have to choose between "meh food meh rest" and "no food ok rest", I think you should always go for the latter (in opposition to everyone else). Trying to settle food means throwing yields away.



At least while you don´t increase the productivity of your tiles, Necrophages shouldn´t really expand much faster than anyone else - if not actually slower in cases when you (luckly) move your capital to a region with three villages.



If you have clear indications that you´re adjacent to a production/science-rich region with 2-3 easy villages, I say at least offline it pays to try and go there. You´ll usually be losing little (if you even considered moving, you must not be in a great place) and simply having two villages in the capital instead of one is already absurdly better. If you do get three villages, it´s completely reasonable to try a one city approach until your first conquering expansion. You can grow to absurd heights even using Feeds only occasionally.



Well, to the game.



Turn 1 - No food, so I´ll be going for Monument(buying partly) - Seed Storage(buying partly)



Turn 3 - Sometimes the game helps



Turn 6 - Finding out what I need for Ka-Riss already



Turn 7 - Completing deed for Wine, all from quest.



Turn 9 - Their peculiar way to get food makes them more sensible to good micromanaging, a little like Broken Lords.



Turn 10 - Finding the rest of my domains



Turn 12 - Rushing other sides of the Necroes.



Turn 13 - Only drones can deal with those



Turn 15 - Avoiding trouble. I probably could kill one of these, but I would be going around outside my territory with low health in a moment they could be spawning. Retreating means I would be less able to explore, so it´s better to just stay away.



Turn 16 - Bzzz



Turn 17 - Settler real quick in the background.



Turn 19 - Once I can tame them, all these Haunts are actually very good news.



Turn 20 - Empire Plan. Much less influence, but I don´t really have any plans of building more units for a while.



Turn 22 - Nice place. Second city´s queue.



Turn 24 - I used to think this increase in damage was a horrible thing for Necrophages. In a way, however, it does stop you from killing off every single village in sight, which sometimes will alow more roaming units and more farming.



Turn 25 - Well, fighting it is then.



Turn 28 - I can take on some Dredgers



Turn 29 - Especially upgraded



Units - I got shots of my designs, in case anyone´s interested.

• Forager - Basic cheap cannon fodder, usually very light on strategics, it´s meant to be killed when someone will have to die anyway. They´re awesome during attrition warfare because you freaking eat them back into your economy.
• Scavenger - Light infantry, made to rush strategic positions and to be exposed at flanks, from where it can retreat when SweepStrikeback isn´t useful.
• Harvester - Shield-wall infantry, made to stand strategic positions from where Drones and Fighters can go out and back in, delay engagement and chase Ranged and Support units (improved movement later)
• Gatherer - Shield-wall infantry, made to impose attrition to lines threatening Proliferators and pick-up kills left behind by more mobile units.
• Necrodrone - Shock Glasscannon, you go in, you hope you don´t die, you go out and people die chasing you.
• Necrofighter - Attrition Glasscannon, for when things are going grim and it´s better to just stay in your corner opening a new champagne for every sweep strikeback
• City Swarm - You know in cartoons how beehives are always full of angry well coordinated and incredibly annoying drones that won´t leave you ever alone again, like, ever. Yep.
  
  

Turn 30 - Dwarf hunting



Turn 31 - I wish I could cut all the minor faction suffering, I´m such a great guy



Turn 32 - nope



Turn 34 - time for a unit, the others only after empire plan



Turn 35 - Keep the Bzziness going smoothly



Turn 37 - bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzziness



Turn 38 - Nice, he´ll be a governor, Fast Healer is more useful than xp imo



Turn 39 - Soon



Turn 40 - Empire Plan



Turn 41 - The question now is: do I invest these food packs that I´ll get now on my capital or on a third city? I usually go for the city, but I think I´ll try something taller now.



Hope this goes well. comments are welcome!

Hehe



Can someone guide me? I´m using these settings, two continents but with 70% landmass. I made it larger every time I got my..."abdomen" handed to me. Still no use.



My main issue: when I´m finally ready to start spamming reasonably strong units, and that has been around turn 60 so far without the Megapole, From Dust to Rust kicks in and I have to choose between investing the industry anyway and removing part of the strategic design (or "spam" 3 units and wait 15 turns), or delay the military, build up and focus my entire second third of the game on somehow completing FDTR.



The further I´ve gotten was turn ~125 and there was 1 contribution from the AI. By this point, I had taken a neighbor, but still couldn´t get units out fast in more than two of my cities, and I fell for the next invader.



I´ve been unlocking Ka-Riss aroun 30-40, taking Kruos´ advice, and building raw units then upgrading them at the start like Abmpicoli said it´s best. I´m still not sure if I should get two ministries on turn 20 and delay settling a bit, or if I should get the second city ASAP. I´m also not sure how worth buildings are in comparison to districts, maybe I build to many buildings.

Agreed there, I rarely ever get it.



I always wonder if there´s something I´m doing terribly wrong about the size of my cities/approval. I can see it being useful when conquering very tall cities, in order to avoid bringing the general approval down for some turns. But at least this application seems a little marginal.



I just got owned again by huge eneqa wings, not even worth posting about it. I think I never learned to play these guys properly.

- Why some people seem to love Demanding Gods ? It's an advanced technology, there are others excellent technology for hapiness (as the Market) at this era, and it's only give +30 in happiness, for one population point, for a limited time.



- The sewer system, level 1 tech, cost nearly nothing, and give +20 happiness.



- In my opinion the Demanding God bonus is not enough high and should be at least +40 happiness. Or maybe just +30, but reduce the expansion disapproval of District of 75 % (it would be cool if Necrophages could build enormous city, with tentecularous district forms, without respect for the sacro-saint "triangle").

I was swept by Broken Lords no amount of early foragers would have saved me



The static green to the east turned out to be an Ardent Mages. Sometimes I see them playing really tall builds, which is cool, but they usually lose to some brute like these Broken Lords.



I´ll try again! Perhaps pink is not the right color. or perhaps I need more districts.

Ok, so Amplitude managed to tease me. Let´s try this again. I just noticed I actually didn´t share the previous game (which I won´t continue because Megapole gameplay is peculiar), so here it goes. Dropbox as always.



Furude could perhaps stop showing off and help us get a better understanding of this beautiful disgusting faction.



So I started this new game. Pink Necrofages for the win.



Turn 1 - Another desert. The plan here will be starving for a while to rush the very meh district to the west, get pop while building a foundry, then use it to get a settler, while spending money on science and more money. I´m going for a more literate type of invertebrate here, which will clearly slow me down militarily at first. With this approach, I completely kill any possibility of a situational early rush on a different faction, so that means I´ll assume an isolation stance for a long while. There will come a moment when I´ll be more than happy to watch my units die, but for the beginning here with low production, I need to make the best not to lose any of the initial ones and get them to level instead.



Turn 3 - Getting whatever ruins I can in the first ~10 turns, while uncovering all my region and looking for foreign borders.



Turn 5 - Spending the ruin dust on the Memorial this time, less security but more science and food. I´ll expect I´ll keep the pattern throughout the game, basing it more on a high dust output than a high industry one.



Turn 7 - Militia tastes just like chicken



Turn 15 - I´ll hold the food package and send Feeds to govern with the food capacity. My plan is to settle the region I´m pacifying, but there´s the Geldirus from my own region in the way, I cannot handle them, and they might just force me into settling the desert to the east. It´s a terrible region (with Gold), so if I´m stuck there without a boost, things can start getting out of hand.



Turn 18 - I was delaying the settler until it had an escort. I thought it would take longer, but I took a chance there (i would never have taken online ) and managed to slip past some Arpuja, who are now following me. They do fly which is annoying. Two turns of Clicker Heroes.



Turn 20 - Just in time, if I was actually trying to lure them I´m sure i would´ve failed. Here´s the Empire Plan. I want at least enough science to get me Cannon Fodder before turn 50. I also need Apprentice´s Registry for my second city, so that´s a lot of research.



Turn 24 - Placement of the second city. Using wine before settling and sending the food to the capital. And here´s after it´s settled.



Turn 25 - Capital after the food boost. Now I can send a drone to unlock Ka-Riss when I have the dust.



Turn 26 - The Ice Wargs I´m afraid of.



Turn 29 - Almost there.



Turn 30 - Now I can use the units to finish the villages in my regions, get more districts in my cities, and consider an expansion. Those green to the east are suspiciously not settling in my direction whatsoever, so they might be cultists. If that´s the case, I´ll need another city.



Turn 31 - Winter comes



Turn 32 - Capital and Second City.



Turn 33 - My science is certainly better than the Megapole game, let´s see how it goes in the long term.





Comments and suggestions are always welcome. If I should be building more districts, please let me know.

To be honest, I don´t like Proliferators. ^^ They´re terribly useful, fit the cannon fodder strategy perfectly, and I´m sure they´re needed on MP. I just don´t like suddenly having a river of battleborns when I don´t really need them.



They´d be more useful offline, the way I see it, if they were weaker and earlier, so that you have another option in terms of how to compete against AI´s extra industry. Necrodrones are way too good compared to Foragers, they might increase the latter´s opportunity cost a little too much.

Hehe nice pic Furude, this is a nice bunch of bug you have here. ^^



Regarding the Battleborns I do the same, I fill all my garnisons with them, and actually they slowly replace my Foragers. Actually, even if Foragers are gearable and can be specialized for some specific role, I tend to not see any use of that.



Once at mid game my armies are generally composed like this :

- Proliferator armies : composed of Proliferators geared for damage essentially (2 at least) and Foragers/Battleborns geared for initiative. No heroes.

- Shock armies : only composed of Necrodrones geared for damage essentially, with a hero geared for initiative.



With this composition I do not see the added value of the Foragers (versus the Battleborn) or a specific thing that would make them interesting to build. Necrodrones or Proliferators are more interesting to build once at mid game, because the meat bag role is now filled by the Battleborn.

Hey there. Thanks for the comments.

I would say that this the key of this Necrophages strategy : expand to late and you take the risk to let some opponents become powerfull, expand to early and you take the risk to struggle a little for empire management (moral and armies volume).

Very true.



About Battleborns - I use them as garrison usually, or to fill the spot of some dead Forager until I can replace it. I don´t like walking around with a bunch of Battleborns.



I´ve stopped EL for a while, it was a nightmare trying to keep this game fluid with all the "join army->move" bugs. When I forget about it again, or the game gets fixed, I´ll be back to finish it.



The Vaulters kept banging their head against the bee hive, I think whenever I come back to this thread, I might try a different game without the Megapole, to be more of a guide.

Beat this - http://screenshooter.net/100256023/tqpcemw

Regarding armies composition, I have a question BPrado about how you manage your Foragers once the Battleborn are in the place. They tend to have very similar roles in my book, I wonder if our well loved little Foragers are not a little useless once in the middle game.



What do you think?

Interesting, I tend to adopt a similar strategy when playing the Necrophages.



In my games generally I have better results when developping Feeds' as a general, it allows more corpse and a more secure early game on overall, which is the weakness of the Necrophages. Well pexed and geared, Feeds' alone can farm villages and wandering units very efficiently also.



Regarding Ka-Riss, I would say that a T40 unlock is a good one, and after T50 is a little late, I use it as an indicator of how well my developpement is going. Ka-Riss means more corpse, which in turn means more fat cities, which is important for the incoming 'Demanding Gods' to be efficient. So, the sooner the better.



I build only one Settler, which I settle very early, around T12-16 generally, on the fattest spot I can found at that time (food&prod&villages). The plan is to developp only two cities and to reach 10 pop the sooner possible. At that point, I generally switch heavily on prod to recruit my proliferators. Why 10 pop? Because I think it is the sweet spot to use sacrifices -a key necrophages tool, every ten turn, allowing cities to be happy and continue to grow at the same time. Combined with some luxuaries it is very powerfull, your empire quickly become 'Fervent' while you keep expand from conquered cities to conquered cities, well used sacrifice is a very powerfull lever.



Once Ka-Riss is up with severall 6 units armies, and my two fat cities are using sacrifices efficiently, I generally switch in conquest mode, identifying the weakest neighbourg and quickly grabbing 2-3 cities to start the expansion. More battles mean more corpses and more foods, which is good, but also more moral penalties, this is why it is important to not switch in conquest mode too early, to handle the moral well.



I would say that this the key of this Necrophages strategy : expand to late and you take the risk to let some opponents become powerfull, expand to early and you take the risk to struggle a little for empire management (moral and armies volume).

Turn 2 - This over here is the kind of start that can be a trap. It seems good for all the yielding and approval, but it takes me farther from the other anomalies in the region. Also, settling on top of that titanium will instantly connect it, allowing me the opportunity at equipments. It will be a poor location for science, even after I annex the life tree to the west, but what can you do right? It could be worse, and its not like teaching bugs to read is going to make them that much better at what they do. Districts will provide some science in any case.



Looking for ruins before settling your capital can be extremely helpful. Every now and then you´ll get the quest to settle the own region you started at, and every now and then you´re bound to get some luxuries. Activating them will only cost 5 which means you can activate it twice in case the deed for 150x something requires it. It´s good to remember that food boosts from killing units counts as a luxury.



Turn 4 - When battling near your cities, make sure you use your Militia to its full potential - easy convenient food. Isolate them, hold Foragers back, force them into AoE attacks and defenses, expose them to disease, anything counts as long as they die. That´s how disgusting you are now. (: They´ll be back the next turn, so - working as intended.



Turn 5 - Luck helps a lot.



Turn 10 - I have little explanation for sometimes buying out these early units, instead of rushing memorials and foundries and libraries. Except that I preffer to have a low chance of losing my entire army while on a casual stroll through some ruins and ruining my game than to have a high one.



Turn 11 - These will help me finish the first food pack, and complete the deed.



Turn 12 - I´m often not able to kill both cavalry units of an army in the early game - those dead militia now add up to complete the boost a turn before I would.



Turn 13 - When the quest is to clear a region, that faction will attack your city, and there they are. Unfortunately it will take a couple of turns to get back there, but the healing will be useful.



Turn 15 - I kill the driders and then send Feeds to govern. I´m already considering the Megapole at this point, but I simply cannot make do without the wine region to the southeast.



Turn 18 - You need resources, approval, population, a mill foundry and start it before turn 20 - with whatever faction that is, you´ll have a high chance of getting the Megapole. Luck plays the larger part nonetheless.



Turn 21 - Second city, need to pacify those villages asap, I´m really looking forward to assimilate these.



Turn 25 - It might not show, but I have 20% more science. =[



Turn 29 - Finishing the ruins hunting, avoiding hard villages, now I´m able so I want to eat again.



Turn 31 - Cull the Herd, even without the Slavery trait from Necro governors, is an awesome trait. A big region with lots of villages will multiply its population really fast if you put some effort into it.



Turn 35 - See



Turn 39 - Winter happens for everyone, during the same period of time.



Turn 40 - Empire Plan



Turn 44 - Only advancing tiers now for the lack of libraries. I hope that the excess titanium and conquering the Vaulters to the east will eventually even that out.



Turn 45 - Reeeeeally should get some units instead, dumby me.



Turn 47 - Now I feel bad about it and retrofit the ones I have instead.



Turn 49 - Then I get scared again. Also, headed to open Ka-Riss.



Turn 50 - Damn yeah. My capital, and second city. War should come anytime now. It took them longer than usual; if I had to guess I´d say it´s because of the stink, or the disgusting homicidal and cannibal behavior my armies tend to display. But it could be forgiving AI. Drakken would surely be knocking on my door way earlier if they were my neighbor, to the point I would never have chosen to try the Megapole in the first place.



Turn 58 - Finally. I´m really not feeling like using the influence.



Turn 59 - So, I have this friend on steam, and he´s constantly playing a random game I have never heard about or seen, but it´s called Clicker Heroes so I assume it must very close to this.



Turn 60 - I already got a level of region healing on Feeds, so right now I want to lure a couple more of their armies into the nest. The first one panicked at the sight of my mighty horde and attacked the fortified city. It´s very useful to remember that, as much as EL really does lack defensive dynamics for tall builds, fortifications already present the AI with a huge difficulty on their choices. A player would, or should, never attack this city in this situation, and that prediction can only possibly be not considering the 100hp for every one of my units.



Let me make it clearer - if an enemy attacks a city that has reinforcements in range, the reinforcements will be effectively fighting inside the city, and thus will receive all of its fortification bonuses. Even if their Health bar during the fight doesn´t show the "grey amount"; whereas if the enemy engages an army out in the field and I choose to use the garrisons as reinforcements, they will not have any fortification because they´re fighting outside.



This here was the empire plan for turn 60.



Turn 61 - Military Overview - If I manage to kill more of those fast, she´s as good as cooked.