This is what you've been waiting for. This is the first map with ships. The map is fun, relatively easy and has plenty of ways to win with different strategies.
You start out with a viking close to your home base. If you assimilate him into your borders, you learn how to build a shipyard and haven. You'll need these because your main island has only coal. You'll need gold and iron if you want to win the game. Or not.
In fact, both enemies are allied. You can catapult them down, mow through them and into the gate. You could even build a haven next to red and go straight for the gate. It is within striking distance if you properly play your hand. This is a map you can enjoy several times.
The southern island has iron. The island directly south of the main island contains dinosaur bones. This will be a theme in the game telling you where the gold is to be found. Probably because gold comes from meteors and dinos were wiped out by meteors. Sounds entirely logical to me. This game sure has its own style.
Tuesday, April 8, 2014
Wednesday, April 2, 2014
I did it
I must have been about 7 years old when a friend first showed me the demo for Settlers 2. Last week I celebrated my 27th birthday. Yesterday I celebrated finishing Settlers 2 for the very first time.
Twenty years.
That's something to ponder.
In hindsight, the game wasn't particularly difficult, but I had to learn a few things here and there. Back when I started this blog, I lived in an apartment without internet. I quickly beat the first 6 missions but got stuck on the seventh. Soon after, a neighbor gave me his wifi pass and Guild Wars 2 released. That game occupied me for the majority of my gaming time for over a year, hence the delay on finishing this game.
To finish this game I had to learn two important things which I didn't know 20 years ago. Soldiers have to be upgraded in fortresses, catapults don't break peace.
To finish it today, I had to learn to sit back and sink a few hours into a game without being distracted by online games, videos and partners. This game is slow, the mechanics clunky. Moving your army around to optimize coin use can easily take 20 minutes.
I'm interested in speedrun times. Anything less than 10 hours for the full campaign would be very impressive.
Twenty years.
That's something to ponder.
In hindsight, the game wasn't particularly difficult, but I had to learn a few things here and there. Back when I started this blog, I lived in an apartment without internet. I quickly beat the first 6 missions but got stuck on the seventh. Soon after, a neighbor gave me his wifi pass and Guild Wars 2 released. That game occupied me for the majority of my gaming time for over a year, hence the delay on finishing this game.
To finish this game I had to learn two important things which I didn't know 20 years ago. Soldiers have to be upgraded in fortresses, catapults don't break peace.
To finish it today, I had to learn to sit back and sink a few hours into a game without being distracted by online games, videos and partners. This game is slow, the mechanics clunky. Moving your army around to optimize coin use can easily take 20 minutes.
I'm interested in speedrun times. Anything less than 10 hours for the full campaign would be very impressive.
Chapter 3 : The Pass
The name from the third map, The Pass, comes from a pass between two resource rich mountains. The terrain will force you north into gold deposits and then westwards through the titular pass. You'll stumble upon two enemies once you're through.
This map is easy and fast. I would even say it's unremarkable. Your enemies have almost no gold and will quickly run into productivity problems while you can expand at your leisure and train an extremely strong army.
After this map, the stakes will be raised considerably. Enjoy while you can.
This map is easy and fast. I would even say it's unremarkable. Your enemies have almost no gold and will quickly run into productivity problems while you can expand at your leisure and train an extremely strong army.
After this map, the stakes will be raised considerably. Enjoy while you can.
Monday, March 31, 2014
World Campaign : Europe
Conquering Europe, a lofty goal in any game, not so much in real life. I try to keep my imperialistic tendencies limited to video games and this map is one of the best to make me feel like a real Roman Emperor.
Initially, you have very limited space. Building a farm will be difficult. Build fisheries. You'll want a supply of food because you're racing for gold in this map.
In this map, speed is the key. Build barracks and expand northwards as fast as possible. You want to hit the mountain range and push through it before your opponent does. There's a small mountain pass that fits a single barracks. This pass controls the gold supply in this mountain. If you don't have it, you might as well start over. Your enemy is going to have a well trained army, you won't have a coin. I've been there, it's not fun.
This is where the trouble really starts though. You now have mountains full of gold and other ores and no room to place farms. You'll find large forests to the east and west, stay south of the alps and build lots of woodcutters. I personally try to keep my iron smelters, armory and mint in northern Italy while building farms to the east and west.
This is a theme you'll find throughout the World Campaign. A lot of forests and stone will hinder your progress while being showered with gold and iron locations. Often, a metalworks can help by building a lot of axes.
To win this campaign, you just have to destroy all enemy headquarters. Easier said than done. Another problem you'll run into is vast swabs of land. Once you destroyed an enemy, burning some of conquered military buildings to free up soldiers can and will help, otherwise you'll find yourself without reinforcements on other fronts.
I've currently beaten Europe, Africa and South Asia. Europe was the most difficult map in my experience but also the most satisfying. If you like to conquer the world, I also recommend Rome: Total War and the Hearts of Iron series. Feel free to recommend me other games in the comments.
Initially, you have very limited space. Building a farm will be difficult. Build fisheries. You'll want a supply of food because you're racing for gold in this map.
In this map, speed is the key. Build barracks and expand northwards as fast as possible. You want to hit the mountain range and push through it before your opponent does. There's a small mountain pass that fits a single barracks. This pass controls the gold supply in this mountain. If you don't have it, you might as well start over. Your enemy is going to have a well trained army, you won't have a coin. I've been there, it's not fun.
This is where the trouble really starts though. You now have mountains full of gold and other ores and no room to place farms. You'll find large forests to the east and west, stay south of the alps and build lots of woodcutters. I personally try to keep my iron smelters, armory and mint in northern Italy while building farms to the east and west.
This is a theme you'll find throughout the World Campaign. A lot of forests and stone will hinder your progress while being showered with gold and iron locations. Often, a metalworks can help by building a lot of axes.
To win this campaign, you just have to destroy all enemy headquarters. Easier said than done. Another problem you'll run into is vast swabs of land. Once you destroyed an enemy, burning some of conquered military buildings to free up soldiers can and will help, otherwise you'll find yourself without reinforcements on other fronts.
I've currently beaten Europe, Africa and South Asia. Europe was the most difficult map in my experience but also the most satisfying. If you like to conquer the world, I also recommend Rome: Total War and the Hearts of Iron series. Feel free to recommend me other games in the comments.
The Stock (and farms)
This is the first in a series of articles on the main windows. You find these by clicking on the second icon from the left on the bottom of the screen.
First of, I'll start with the Stock since a lot of stuff in the other windows is self explaining. The stock, however, gives a good overall view on the performance of your economy. I've read a lot of rules of thumb on the internet on the amount of farms you need, between 1.5 to 3 per consuming building on different websites.
What I do is merely check the stock every so often. I want to see the amount of raw corn slowly rise with intermediate stuff like flour, beer and pigs being as close to zero as possible. Regardless of the amount of farms or their productivity, this shows a healthy economy.
The keyword is productivity. It is not always possible to have farms run on 100% . In some maps you'll have to make choices. A farm running at 50% is better than no farm at all. One could make a whole lot of calculations but the simplest solution is to check the stock.
Some other values to check are coal, iron and gold. Ideally, you'll want all of these to be as close to zero as possible. If one starts to rise over 100, just stop production by cutting food distribution or don't build mines. Gold and iron tend to climb fast on some maps. 100 gold ore is usually plenty to support the rest of the game, 100 iron translates into 50 soldiers. That's usually more than any map needs.
If you manage to keep all values low, this usually makes your road system far less cluttered, meaning your economy overall will run better. Your gold and stones will reach the front lines faster, ore and food can travel easily to their respective destinations and corn is transported to processing building. Cluttered roads is a sign of overproducing. The stock will help you determine the exact problem.
One exception is food and wheat early in the game. You'll want a bit of a surplus. This way you can support a young mining economy when room for extra farms is scarce. I usually start the game with a farm and a few fisheries should I have the room for it. After expanding a bit I can immediately support multiple mills and bakeries without building extra farms. I only have to start building farms when wheat drops under 100. I can forget about fisheries altogether after the beginning.
First of, I'll start with the Stock since a lot of stuff in the other windows is self explaining. The stock, however, gives a good overall view on the performance of your economy. I've read a lot of rules of thumb on the internet on the amount of farms you need, between 1.5 to 3 per consuming building on different websites.
What I do is merely check the stock every so often. I want to see the amount of raw corn slowly rise with intermediate stuff like flour, beer and pigs being as close to zero as possible. Regardless of the amount of farms or their productivity, this shows a healthy economy.
The keyword is productivity. It is not always possible to have farms run on 100% . In some maps you'll have to make choices. A farm running at 50% is better than no farm at all. One could make a whole lot of calculations but the simplest solution is to check the stock.
Some other values to check are coal, iron and gold. Ideally, you'll want all of these to be as close to zero as possible. If one starts to rise over 100, just stop production by cutting food distribution or don't build mines. Gold and iron tend to climb fast on some maps. 100 gold ore is usually plenty to support the rest of the game, 100 iron translates into 50 soldiers. That's usually more than any map needs.
If you manage to keep all values low, this usually makes your road system far less cluttered, meaning your economy overall will run better. Your gold and stones will reach the front lines faster, ore and food can travel easily to their respective destinations and corn is transported to processing building. Cluttered roads is a sign of overproducing. The stock will help you determine the exact problem.
One exception is food and wheat early in the game. You'll want a bit of a surplus. This way you can support a young mining economy when room for extra farms is scarce. I usually start the game with a farm and a few fisheries should I have the room for it. After expanding a bit I can immediately support multiple mills and bakeries without building extra farms. I only have to start building farms when wheat drops under 100. I can forget about fisheries altogether after the beginning.
Mission 2 : Initial Contact
First thing you'll notice is your Headquarters. After the first mission, the tent has now been upgraded to a Capitol Building. Rome may not have been built overnight, your Headquarters just needed a single mission. According to the ship log, about 1 year.
After expanding a bit into the north you'll find a tent. That's not another civilization of stranded settlers. It's just a single of your own settlers, stranded on another island. How fortunate to find him. How fortunate he happens to be a brewer. Life on any island sure gets dull without women or booze. This guy gives you the latter.
Beer is a necessary component in breeding soldiers. Fill them up with a fine lager and they'll happily sign up for the army. As for the brewer, he brews a lot of beer. I always managed to upkeep the draft with a single brewer throughout any mission, despite building 4 armories and iron smelters.
Once you start expanding, you'll soon find ruined buildings: a guardhouse, watchtower and fortress. The watchtower is nestled defensively into granite rocks, the others are out in the open. By having your builders analyze these, you'll learn to build them yourself. After experimenting with those buildings, you'll run into another civilization. They are friendly but the portal is an object of worship. To claim it, you'll have to wipe them out. Just as easily said as done since they pose little threat.
A bit further you'll run into their catapult. Burn it to the ground and you'll learn how to build it yourself. Apparently the ashes of a catapult produce blueprints much like the ruins of the fortress you found earler. This building will prove to be very valuable in the missions ahead.
Overall this is another easy tutorial mission. An easy ride with some unique scenery.
Wednesday, March 21, 2012
Mission 1: Off we go.
After enjoying the intro movie (more on that later) we find ourself in the start screen, from which we can access the first 2 missions. This is deliberate as the first mission is a tutorial. Actually the first 4 missions are tutorials in a sense, so in the Good Old Games version the first 4 are already unlocked.
The first mission tries to introduce you to the game, and does a pretty good job to boot. This mission you start out with a tent. Sending explorers to the south will find you your shipwrecked galleon.
Build up your game and keep going. The first time, back in the time, this took me several hours. I didn't even realize I completed it at some point. Today this mission can be done in about 20 minutes or so, no idea. Fast anyways. It is a nice island however, one I know by heart. There isn't much room for farms but frankly, you don't really need them. Just experiment and move on to mission 2.
The first mission tries to introduce you to the game, and does a pretty good job to boot. This mission you start out with a tent. Sending explorers to the south will find you your shipwrecked galleon.
Build up your game and keep going. The first time, back in the time, this took me several hours. I didn't even realize I completed it at some point. Today this mission can be done in about 20 minutes or so, no idea. Fast anyways. It is a nice island however, one I know by heart. There isn't much room for farms but frankly, you don't really need them. Just experiment and move on to mission 2.
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