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Alliances |
This is going to be a bit long but bear with me. When it comes to individual strategies it's close to perfected, but team play isn't so it's there i think the biggest possibilities for improvement lies.
Getting your alliance to become a good one consist of 3 parts as i see it
They are
1. Good individual skill
2. Good cooperation
3. Good diplomacy/intelligence
Good indidual skill I won't address here, you will find clues all over the forum. Good diplomacy/intelligence I won't talk about either, I have never been good at that, you should rather ask hardworking AL's like Guderian, Lithical, Naskovland, The Scum and MMUK about that.
What i do know is how you can make your alliance cooperation better. Often things can work out when people do their own things, but it's when people cooperate to use each others strengths to a maximum that an alliance really get an edge. It is not often discussed on how you could increase your cooperation efficiency, but believe me, it does make a big difference. STILL; THIS SHOULD BE CONSIDERED AS ADVANCED GAMING. IF PEOPLE CAN'T THE BASICS; ATTEMPT'S OF COMPLICATED COOPERATION IS BOUND TO BACKFIRE.
It's also important to cooperate in the right way. Usually people help each other out, but it's usually done in a very ad hoc manner. I believe there should be more of a thought behind the alliance cooperation. Alliance member should have good idea of how to use their resources, armies and research for the best of the alliance. Sometimes the highest player should drain his resources to get his other members up there, but sometimes it's better that the alliances give him the backup so he can stay in his position. Timing of mage runs are also very important in an alliance, often you see players saving up turns to go for effective mage runs, but the consequences becomes that the alliance loose the upper hand to enemies who chooses to spends it's turns attacking instead.
Nevertheless the best way to improve your alliance is to define and specialize the members so that they can cooperate and use each other advantages. Maybe you don't contribute the most by trying to get as good army as possible but rather by supplying rare resources and being the smallest member in the alliance. This is how i think players should think of their roll in an alliance.
Economic rolls
Smith: This is the players that should mostly provide the alliance with weapons. Most civs spend a enormous amount of resources on weapons, you'll really notice who much resources you can free up when a player with great discount on weapon making produce the weapons for you. The ideal player for this roll is a tool-Mongol, if not any such is available any Mongol will do. If you do not have a smith and rely on swords and bows or even maces, you will really have a disadvantage to other alliances.
Bank: This is the player that produce the most gold, a bank should be player that is online a lot and is ready to bail other members out and help them set up effective mage runs The best way for bank to provide members with gold is to buy goods that he knows belong the member he is helping out from the public market. If necessary he will even aid goods then buy it back to supply gold. Preferable banks are mine-Byz or tool-Mongols.
Resource maker: Some civs can do a roll in alliance by providing horses, iron, wood, wine or food. It's not as important as having a bank or smith, but it frees some resources from those who don't have to provide those resources themselves. Resources makers can also sell their resources and won't become dependant on alliance members to do everything.
Free rider: For some members, it might be better to fully focus on their military abilities and rely on their alliance members to provide them with recourses, It really gives them an edge but if the providers don't come through fore them free riders will be stalled by having to provide themselves, diverting lots of recourses, thus making them a lot less efficient. If you are going to have free riders, make sure they get there recourses automatically without having to beg and whine all the time, and they will really do the difference in the alliance.
Military rolls
Leech: This players has one roll in the alliance, to take big chunks of land from the opponents. He wont have a mega attack , but when he wins he really hurt the opponent.
Breaker: The breaker is the player whit a lot of attack points. If opponents doesn't have sufficient defence he just runs them over, else he chews some wine or let his friends nag on the opponent before he leads the breaking attacks. Having a breaker also deteriates the defensive will of the opponents, so they neglect their defence feeling that no defence is good enough.
Bombarder Sometimes the best way to win battles is to break their army before the attack, having a player with lots of catapults and thief's. Good defences are often high-quality defences who suffers greatly from having being taken out with cat/thieves. So with a few bombarders in your alliance not even the best defense will be enough. The best way to use bombarders is if they cooperate so try to have bombarders that are usually online on the same time. Since bombarders don't take as much land as breakers/leaches they need good defences so they also loose less land.
Blocker: Some player jare specialized on other things then grabbing land but they can still have roll in the alliance. Instead of getting a so so army or being a half good bombarder they should focus on their defensive qualities and be last player of the alliance. Breaking these guys should be a major pain in the as, usually it should feel like it's not even worthwhile to try it. This means you get a player in the alliance that can focus on his economic roll and just finish of players who have got their army taken out.
Starting rolls
Booster This guy try to run away in the start and aiding goods for smaller members saving those a lot of turns
Dominator Tries to get to the top of score list and having a strong army when he reaches about 2 million land. This way he can take out the worst enemies closing in and establish a domination of the game.
Sleeper If you know you are a lousy explorer you will try to move without causing any fear to any opponent, so you lay as close to max turns as you can, and get aids by larger members to improve your exploring. Then at a certain point when you think the score list looks good you move up all sleepers to join the bigger members and fortify your domination.
An example of a cooperated alliance start
At the reset of the previous game an AL reads the doc of test game and recruits members for the next game. He recruits 8 players leaving 2 spots open for any opening if any old friends appears the next game
Considering the players request and skills the members agrees on the following civs
1 Frank
1 Inca
2 Mongol
1 Byz
2 Chinese
1 Viking
and the get the following roll
Frank: resource maker (horse/food), blocker, booster
Inca: free rider, leach/bombarder, sleeper
Mongol 1: smith/bank, leach, sleeper
Mongol 2: smith/bank, breaker, dominator
Byz: bank, bombarder, dominator
Chinese 1 free rider, leach, sleeper
Chinese 2 free rider, bombardiers, sleeper
Viking , Resource maker (food, iron, wood), blocker, dominator
The idea:
The Chinese and Inca are going to do 150 turns quickly then start sending food to un started bys, Viking and frank every 4 hours. The Viking and frank are do turns until they no longer have population problems. All others are going to save turns only spending them so they don't loose any. Whenever possible aid should be sent to the smallest allowed player to gain time. The Viking and frank should start by researching food, the Byz mine, the Mongols tools, the Chinese fort space and the Inca conquered land.
Then the frank should run away and start producing horses for the dominators, who shouldn't have to produce any own horses until they reach 800k land. In this way the frank allows the byz, the Mongol, and the Viking to get a good start. The Mongol should also have produced some weapons and have put on the public market. The byz will by these for maximum prize. This will give the Mongol enough gold to produce weapon for the rest of the alliance. He aids out these goods, everyone builds their armies and the sleepers catches up while taking out their biggest threats.
Then hopefully the alliance have got a head start. Then they are just going to capitalize from it by cooperating doing safe mageruns when the domination is accomplished and taking in 2 players to fill out the alliance. |
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By: Turkles
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Hits: 939
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Last Updated: 17/4/07
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