#503 - The Choosing 2nd Beta

[unclemike]

DW  Cannot find special dwarf 599 order in 3rd cycle order entry tool. expected to see it near the 600 order.

It's located under the Kingdom menu in the Special Abilities category (usually listed after normal orders but before miscellaneous actions). Nearly every menu tab has a Special Abilities subcategory but they will only show up if your kingdom has any special actions.

Ancient Ones and Demonic Princes should see a Special Abilities section in their Political menu, Underworld has a special section under Covert, Dragons (and a few others) have one under Kingdom to create their dragon's lair, and the Dwarf has one under Kingdom (for order 599). You may want to refresh your browser after you select the Kingdom menu tab if it doesn't show up.

[HeadHoncho]

As of right now, over two turns (with the ring staying put), the Ring of Spells has appeared to increase its wearer's level by one each turn.

[VballMichael]

As of right now, over two turns (with the ring staying put), the Ring of Spells has appeared to increase its wearer's level by one each turn.

Wow, I will take THAT ring.

[Ry Vor]

As of right now, over two turns (with the ring staying put), the Ring of Spells has appeared to increase its wearer's level by one each turn.

Thanks for reporting - everyone else, please report unusual results, the beta is to get The Choosing ready for commercial release, of course.

Also would like to hear from the players whose kingdoms have already controlled a region.  To what do you attribute that?  Luck, skill, happenstance?  Are regions too easy to take in what is to be a slower game?  Was your city census unusually high?

[VballMichael]

May be an issue with the Red Bats.
4TY has 1 brigade of Warg Riders and has the Great Red Bats of the Lost Caves.
Later, under the artifacts, the description says to use order 727, group ID in A, destination in B (up to 7 squares with division or smaller).
I did all that but my group stayed at its location. This is huge because the group is not at my capital for reinforcements.
The text says: Our 4th Tyrant does not consist entirely of flying brigades to execute this order.

I know we are not generally fixing things in-game as this is test, but missing the reinforcements affects the whole battle for the region to check balance.
And the system is treating the group as a flying group as it did give me a recon of the square in which I am still sitting.

[The Gray Mouser]

(Illusionist)  Once again, I enjoyed the choices I faced in completing my turn, but was not among those gaining control of a region.  Still, feeling slightly embarrassed at being the Illusionist and not seeing clearly where the population centers are.  Found a few foreign owned, not wanting to cause a raucous just yet. 

Feeling the pain of gaining cities but not gaining villages.  After the NO (I think it was) took a village, food has been short.  

Wanting to use some of the new spells, like Project Image, but everybody's been busy.  Was a little surprised how maybe 6 kingdoms have gained regions after turn 4.

[unclemike]

As of right now, over two turns (with the ring staying put), the Ring of Spells has appeared to increase its wearer's level by one each turn.

Fixed now.

[unclemike]

May be an issue with the Red Bats.
4TY has 1 brigade of Warg Riders and has the Great Red Bats of the Lost Caves.
Later, under the artifacts, the description says to use order 727, group ID in A, destination in B (up to 7 squares with division or smaller).
I did all that but my group stayed at its location. This is huge because the group is not at my capital for reinforcements.
The text says: Our 4th Tyrant does not consist entirely of flying brigades to execute this order.

I know we are not generally fixing things in-game as this is test, but missing the reinforcements affects the whole battle for the region to check balance.
And the system is treating the group as a flying group as it did give me a recon of the square in which I am still sitting.

Fixed now and your 4TY is at your capital to receive turn 5 reinforcements.

[VballMichael]

TY

The tyrant is challenging. Dispersed, it is difficult to fight for a region early on (like the RD in 2nd cycle). Resources are scarcer in 3rd cycle, so owning pieces of a region don't quite add up to enough to develop well.
So, I did a little diplomacy to avoid conflict in one region, then went stronger in a different region. Taking a while to consolidate my forces there, which gives the opponent some edge. We shall see how the strategy works.

In the meantime, the mechanics are working great (other than the few hiccups we have raised and UM has fixed).

The kingdom is definitely cool, just tying to get enough resources together to do some recruiting and try to get some troops bloodied. Starting with lots of pop centers is awesome, but with orders limited, it is difficult to get value out of all 6 available groups. Maybe later in the game with more resources and more influence, that will make a difference.

[Jumpingfist]

NE

I went about getting my region differently. Took the city and traded for a town and village in my region. I used a total of three emmies. Two on the city so I could get the production sooner and the other to take the village. The other town I moved my 1NE and summoned a skeleton brigade to put me at 7k vs PC with my 1NE. My 2NE was to far away to help. So I also got a boost from issuing 240 order as part of my trades. This made for a lot of income in the early turn that allowed me to do things like build temples and hire /promote 2 HPs for use on turn 4 and at the same time raise wizards and production of my PCs as knowing I was close to taking the region I raise food at my city which is now paying dividends in the winter months also raised gold at my capital and maybe some other places along with raising a p2 to p3, p1 to p3 and a p1 to p2 and 1 right of magi. I had so many extra orders since my groups were staying home and not splitting/combining to search for PCs. Also not using a lot of gold moving and taking PCs with Emmies. I was hoping for a T2 region then a T3 but got the region on T4 but did not feel the economic crunch I normally do. Now t4 going to t5 I am making a modest 44k gold in winter, knowing there are still 2 human PCs in my region but also have a p4,2p3, p2, p1 to help supplement my income if needed as I raise my wizards up. Getting create gold at level 1 has helped. Issuing the early 600 orders to help gain more census are already starting to return a larger long term investment.

Overall in the few games I have tested I have found getting the region to be easier than 2nd cycle but also more luck based due to random chances to find more distributed PCs and large random swings in census levels of PCs. Also I have found the game does go slower due to less resources in each region. I think this is a good kind of slower because it also forces players to be hungry for more resources as one region will not supply enough resources as the influence and armies build up.