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Peroxis View Drop Down
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    Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 08:03
Hello, Ive been playing this game maybe 2 months now.  It has some nice elements but I definitely have a few issues which do put me off of playing quite a bit.
It mostly has to do with how limited I am in making decisions.

With city placement am sooo limited in where can place buildings, 7 food tiles only and can only place surrounded by plains.  Its hard to tell how much it has to do with the culture of the game to stay the same or if its the mechanics. Looking at the stats for different units it feels like a bit of both. 
In the real world every decision has advantages and disadvantages and this makes balance and I think this game easily could exist in  the same way.
Intuitively I would think being next to a building would give me a home ground advantage but nothing could be further from the truth.

These issues of city placement are exaggerated by the vast amount of lands full of forests and mountains that will never serve any purpose but extra delay in caravan travel.

I am new so I am hoping I am wrong about my assumptions.
Can the weapons etc that benefit from tiles (eg. 10% more damage on mountains) make large enough difference to counter the issues of having an inconvenient tile placement?

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Hyrdmoth View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Hyrdmoth Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 09:42
Can you tell me what proportion of towns are built on 7-food tiles surrounded by plains?
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Peroxis View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Peroxis Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 10:13
can only estimate, but seems about 40% of towns outside noob ring.
Above 85% have 7 food tiles.

So far everyone I have met has discouraged me from building anywhere else.
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Ruarc View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ruarc Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 10:44
7 food tiles were a choice at one point, but now that we're no longer capped to 10 cities it doesn't make sense to restrict yourself. Settle on 7 food tiles and then growing to 12 or so cities is easily done. You can always subsequently relocate those 12 cities to 5 or 6 food tiles if you want more military sovereignty but there's no longer any argument to settle on 5 or 6 food tiles when you're starting out. Just note that relocating to 5 or 6 food tiles means that you probably won't be able to support the population to resettle or recapture any lost cities.
 
In terms of city placement if you're sticking to a training / non-war alliance then there's really no reason why you should restrict your cities to be surrounded by plains. If you are in a military alliance, or want to experience the PvP side of things then you do kinda need to take heed of the mechanics and that does effectively mean settling so that you are adjacent to plains only, or a small hill or two at worst. If you want some variety you could try settling surrounded by forests. Infantry bonuses in forests, coupled with some easily obtained equipment, make it the second most viable terrain type. It's still more difficult and awkward than being surrounded by plains though, so you'd need to have some other compelling reason to do so (like joining DLords for instance).
 
The reality though is that there are some clearly superior choices when it comes to settlement in Illyriad, and it's just a question as to whether there are other factors at play and/or if you care enough about making the optimum choice.


Edited by Ruarc - 23 Apr 2017 at 10:45
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Malek View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Malek Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 10:56
Hi Peroxis, 
There are lots of answers to your question. 
This game takes quite a long time to learn the mechanics. 
Plot for What?
There is a lot of amateurs in the game that immediately say 7 foods and not understanding why. 
Depending on the type of game you want to play will determine the type of food plot you put your town on. For specialised play for military, diplomatic and high production crafting (bows, beer etc) 5 foods are ideal. This enables you to have exceptionally high soverignty (read somewhere else about as I am not explaining it), as compared to the 7 food counterparts. 
5 Fooders
Military/ Diplo
For High sov military and diplo towns, I prefer to run 6 of one of WCIS. This is primarily based on using (for me its clay) the troop/diplo cost reduction buildings. I tend to put up 3 of them and run as close to 50% gold reduction as possible. Using 6 of one of these will leave you with 4 of another, I tend to leave it as stone as for my uses it is the least useful resource because wood, clay and iron are used in a lot of adv res production. If you are prestiging your basics, you can run quite easily 17 lvl 4 and 3 level 3 sov and only have to send yourself basics once a week or so to top you up. I have a post about it somewhere on the forum. 
There is another method of 5 fooders that others run, that is all 5's. This provides more flexibility in terms that you can switch up what you are doing in the town if you want and are not necessarily locked into one type of unit production. 
Where you can place your towns you can tenaril/terra form, and I will cover this soon. 
Crafting
I am not much of a crafter, but for some reason you want to make cows at a lightning clip of 330% sov or more, there are a few spots where you can get quite a few +3% sov for making them, all 5's is a good setup. No need to worry about the troop/diplo reduction building so smacking in an all 5 will do the job. 
As with everything in this game, its all about the trade off, so pursuing a 5 town strategy will not make you as much gold as a higher food plot town or make a higher pop town harder to maintain. 
6 Fooders
To me 6 fooders are a more balanced gameplay. A little more limited as the plot breakup is a bit more restrictive is what has a 4. I know you can make spears so that means a 4 stone, which is a small hill from memory. You can still do the crafting and the military, diplo, and also get a little more pop without being stuck with a 3 plot of something as you get with a 7 fooder. Its ok, it worked for me for a bit on the alt to help ease the gold burn, but thats about it. 
7 Fooders
One of the main reasons i dislike 7 fooders as there are way to many sheep in the game that automatically say 7 food without the comprehension of what a 7 food is about. They all say high pop, as if high pop is the be all and end all of illyriad, but let me give you the drum, its not. 
7 foods provide you with the ability to be able to churn out a significant amount of gold per hour, with proper placement and tweaking you can get from 70k per hour to 100k plus. This is perfect for traders if they want to do that, or for gold feeding alts to your specialised account. 
The other benefit of 7 fooders is the high pop that towns can get enabling you to get to in excess of 40 towns. Some people have done it, though what do you do when you get to 40 towns? If you convert those into gold towns, thats a pretty nest egg you will be sitting on. If you convert them to military towns, quite powerful till you start losing them, and maintaining that many military towns would be an absolute nightmare. I think traders go for the 7 fooders so they can get the pop to make gold so they can buy and sell. Miners, skinners, herbalists go for these as well as the guilds are all high pop so to be able to cram 350 plus of them, kinda need the pop. 

In a nutshell, depending on your gamestyle will determine what food plots you will go for. Explore the pros and cons before listening to the half wits. This game is all about trade offs. 

Terrain and surrounds. 
The terrain that your town actually sits on is to me, very important, it is your last line of defense. From my experience there are two perfect types of towns, Large mountain surrounded by plains and Forest surrounded by plains, look into it and discover why these are great. To get the correct setup that you want, you will either have to tenaril in, or get a terraformer to terraform it for you, this can be for the 5,6,7 food setup. 
If you are going to be quiet with this account and work in the background, you can have whatever you want as your surrounds. This could be for certain sov bonuses in your area. just know that if its not plains (or secondary small hill) around you, there is a possibility if you are in the wrong alliance you could get sieged. When you look at the terrain around you , you need to look at the terrain bonuses that are offered to various troop types if you are thinking about that. 

Send me an IGM if you have any questions , i have probably forgotten to add more detail, but this is a long post for me and i am losing interest in writing it,so best to contact me directly if you want more specific answers or post them here. 

He-Man



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Peroxis View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Peroxis Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 13:12
Its quite strange. Whenever I talk about this people seem to disagree with me and then confirm what I am saying.

Me: I wish I had variety in decisions available to me
Others: You obviously just don't understand the mechanics since you want to play differently, here are the reasons you should play like this

If I am just following an instruction manual I am not really playing, My brain means nothing if it has no space for decision making. I think it wouldnt take much to change this.
I dont expect changes since the game is entrenched in its ways by now, but ideally a town or an army should have to worry to a closer to equal degree about each surrounding tile. Everything ideally should have a counter, as it is there are no counters to units on a mountain or any other type of terrain.

At the moment I am still hopeful for a few ideas to go against the grain.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ruarc Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 13:35
Yeah, I don't agree with you at all He-Man - recommending a 5 food town to a new player seems unnecessarily restrictive and implies a decision has already been made about how they want to specialize. Speaking of prestiging basics to run sovereignty and so on... just much too much. There's also nothing that says settling on 7 food obliges you to go to 40 or more. There is a very real concern that your average player isn't going to reach beyond 9 cities if he settles predominantly on 5 food whereas he's almost certainly to reach 12 if he predominately settles on 7 food. There's a reason why 7 food is largely recommended, and it has nothing to do with folk being half-wits and everything to do with keeping options open for new players and not specializing too early before they fully understand the choices they're making. 

Originally posted by Peroxis Peroxis wrote:

...but ideally a town or an army should have to worry to a closer to equal degree about each surrounding tile. Everything ideally should have a counter, as it is there are no counters to units on a mountain or any other type of terrain.

At the moment I am still hopeful for a few ideas to go against the grain.
 
Every town does have to worry about each surrounding tile. That's why plains are preferred, because it's easier for cavalry to clear an enemy army on that terrain type.
 
There are alternatives but the mechanics are what they are: if you want to be placed to most easily defend yourself then you want to be surrounded by plains. The only viable alternative I've seen is forest settlements with an infantry focus, ideally at an alliance level and focused on Dwarfs plus equipment (like DLords). You can go for early 5 and 6 food tiles too, like He-Man suggested, but like the forest/Dwarf placement it's not a mainstream suggestion and requires a particular focus to be used effectively.
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Malek Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 14:28
Ruarc, 
Maybe you should read a little closer to what I was saying, I did not say he should do 5 fooders or anything like that I pointed out pros and cons of each type of sq and plot and what they can be used for, now if you can point out where i said he should go for the 5 food early on, please do so, otherwise I guess I can add you to the half wit pile. 

I have explored the mechanics of this game for years and I know them inside and out and I have seen many half wits in this game say the only option is 7 food without explaining what else you can do, which it looks like you have done, how i find out about their options and what they want to do early on, i normally just ask them seems to work most of the time. Telling them to move straight away onto 7 fooders is not keeping their options opened, because if they say i want to play a lot of military or diplo, and are on 7 foods, they then have to exo and rebuild them. Ask and help build their account around their play style instead of stating go for the 7 food as its what all the sheep do. 

Tell me what is concerning if a player does not reach more than 9 cities? Where does this concern stem from and is this concern systemic in illy? What is the handicap of having 8 cities instead of 9 or 12? Does that make them average in your view? 


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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Ruarc Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 15:40
You're presenting it as an option to consider. It's also pretty clear, given your comments, of your own preferences. Surely you can spot how that might come across as a recommendation?
 
The crux of the matter is whether you prioritize troop build times or total growth. If you settle primarily on 5 food you are going to have a more difficult time reaching 9 cities or more. If you settle primarily on 7 food you are going to have a more difficult time recruiting troops. Given how relatively rare warfare is in Illy building cities will be of more use for the vast majority of players. Furthermore, 7 food cities allow you a higher sustainable standing army than a 5 food city. While not optimal it's not anywhere near as damaging as having settled 5 food tiles everywhere and subsequently deciding to prioritize growth, especially if they desire more than 12 cities.

You could ask new people what the wanted to do, sure. But do you reckon they have sufficient knowledge of the mechanics to make an informed choice having been exposed to the game for, what, a few months? What if they change their mind as they learn more about the game? Settling 5, or even 6, food cities compared to 7 is not something to recommend lightly. It's also why Peroxis is receiving the advice to settle on 7 food tiles. It's the safe choice that keeps a new player's options open. If you want to add a caveat you could say that it keeps them open to a greater extent than settling on 5 food tiles does.
 
Do we really need to do the math on the pros and cons of 8/9 cities compared to 12 or more?
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Malek Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 23 Apr 2017 at 23:05
Given how you are saying that only 7 foods are the answer, and this is the problem I have with half wits, you dont consider the alternatives its 7 food or nothing. 
When I ask people they tend to know what they want to do they have played enough games to know they want to make craft, trade, fight or steal(diplo). It looks like it may take you longer so you can get them to do it your way. You have also demonstrated that you also do not have sufficient knowledge of the mechanics to help people make any form of informed decisions after being here for 18 months or so. 

Im done with this forum thread, looks like the halfwits have a new champion. Keep building on 7 fooders, I like nice easy targets. 
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