I keep this game on a USB flash drive just so I can play it on random computers when I'm bored.
a) This is unspeakably brilliant. I have taken steps to duplicate this, and so far it delights.
b) What the fuck am I doing? Is there a tutorial? I started a game on gimp level, and still got my ass handed to me by some Pixies and a lone barbarian swordsman razing my town. Also, a unit I put on Patrol is on patrol... forever? Please to be helping with character creation and first turn tips.
c) Make more post!
There's no tutorial to my knowledge, in those days, that's what the manual was for.
Sometimes you'll get stomped by raiders in the early game... with a random setup, it's just the way things are. Concentrate on getting a ranged unit and wooden walls in your town as soon as possible. Also remember not to neglect your spell research. A basic attack spell can usually polish off early bandits.
From what I remember "Patrol" is a toggle and doesn't prevent the unit from being given other orders.
There's no tutorial to my knowledge, in those days, that's what the manual was for.
Which reminds me that the manual was great for this game, as was the super-cool spell book. But even better was the official strategy guide, which was largely written by designers of the game who know everything, and went into incredible detail of the math involved in combat. Way cool, and I wish I still had my copy from back in the day.
It's rather depressing to see what strategy guides have turned into, compared to Ye Olde Dayes.
There's no tutorial to my knowledge, in those days, that's what the manual was for.
Which reminds me that the manual was great for this game, as was the super-cool spell book. But even better was the official strategy guide, which was largely written by designers of the game who know everything, and went into incredible detail of the math involved in combat. Way cool, and I wish I still had my copy from back in the day.
It's rather depressing to see what strategy guides have turned into, compared to Ye Olde Dayes.
I ordered a used copy off of Amazon, and am looking forward to it's 480 pages of goodness. Still, there is a certain self-defeating element to having a totally portable game like this in your pocket on a USB drive if you have to lug around a 2.4 pound book to play it.
Ranged attacker and wood walls. Got it. Any build queue tips? Should I get a second settlement ASAP, or wait? Any way to tell how strong the defenses are in a neutral town without attacking? What's a good character type for a beginner?
Ranged attacker and wood walls. Got it. Any build queue tips? Should I get a second settlement ASAP, or wait? Any way to tell how strong the defenses are in a neutral town without attacking? What's a good character type for a beginner?
Start with things that increase your population growth rate. That actually will help with your second question... Yes, crank out towns as your population allows, but make sure they're strategically located to take advantage of resources on the map. A town without good resources really isn't worth that much, but it's better than no towns at all.
I'd say that the best beginner setup would be White and Red magic. Healing and attack, the basics, really. Though Green is a little of both, so that's good too. May want to invest some points in the trait that buffs your units an experience level. That's always badass.
I seem to recall that there are spells that let you look at town defenses... also having a unit there and clicking on the town might work as well. It's been so long.
This thread had me playing some, it's still a lot of fun.... just for the general "check defenses" thing, you can right click a town when your men are near, and it'll show which units are stationed there.
I'd rank an expansion town's build list in the following priority:
1) +population/turn
2) wall
3) +gold/turn
4) unit production
I usually send a combat unit along with a settler so that the new outpost is defended off the bat and doesn't have to worry about making a barracks right away.
In fact, if you can get a town with mithril or adamantium deposits nearby, you should produce your combat units from that town as exclusively as possible.
The key to efficiency is to have each town do what its best at. So gold towns crank the commerce, and iron towns produce units.
Remember to build roads around and between your towns. Roads improve gold income and make your empire more defensible... there's a spell that allows instantanious transit of units over enchanted roads, and lets you cover vast numbers of cities with just one hardcore force.
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BroloBroseidonLord of the BroceanRegistered Userregular
edited September 2007
Does anyone know why all of my towns suddenly hate me? The previous turn I had unrest in maybe one or two cities, a couple of angry townsfolk rebelling. Then I ended my turn, my enemies took their turn, and when it comes back to me every single town has about 30% of its population angry at me. Gold production is down from +20 to -40, and I can't figure out what changed. Taxes are the same, no one's really attacked, everything seems to be the same as last turn except the unrest in every city.
Does anyone know why all of my towns suddenly hate me? The previous turn I had unrest in maybe one or two cities, a couple of angry townsfolk rebelling. Then I ended my turn, my enemies took their turn, and when it comes back to me every single town has about 30% of its population angry at me. Gold production is down from +20 to -40, and I can't figure out what changed. Taxes are the same, no one's really attacked, everything seems to be the same as last turn except the unrest in every city.
Well, as your empire gets larger, there's a higher chance for unrest. Also racial differences can be tough... if they're captured towns, perhaps their citizens are finally getting their gumption back.
Are you producing enough food? Food shortages are a big one.
Do you have Shrines and other unrest-reducers?
There are spells that make townsfolk happy and some that make them unhappy. Has anyone corrupted the landscape around your villages?
Oh, and it also helps to station more units in the towns. You know, to keep the unrest down.
How could I forget the importance of martial law?
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Kane Red RobeMaster of MagicArcanusRegistered Userregular
edited September 2007
Did you just capture a Klackon city? I don't recall if their unrest penalty only applies to their cities or if it's universal. I raze Klackon settlements to the ground either way.
Kane Red Robe on
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Dusdais ashamed of this postSLC, UTRegistered Userregular
I'm really liking my MoM USB drive action. Is the game's pacing a little slow, though, even for the genre? I restarted as an all red mage on Easy and played for 3 hours before I was able to produce a unit better than a Swordsman.
I've explored my continent and have a five city network covering most of it except the little corner where I have the Klackons button-holed. I took out my first node, which was very exciting. And I melded a spirit with it, which produced all sorts of exciting lights. What do the exciting lights do, exactly? Also, can you not cast spells when attacking a node? I fizzled three spells in a row trying to take the node (a sorcery node, I think. The one that looks like a lake or a whirlpool.)
I did free a hero from the node, and he gives any units stacked with him flying which is pretty sweet. That should make attacking other continents a lot easier, I guess.
I've explored my continent and have a five city network covering most of it except the little corner where I have the Klackons button-holed. I took out my first node, which was very exciting. And I melded a spirit with it, which produced all sorts of exciting lights. What do the exciting lights do, exactly? Also, can you not cast spells when attacking a node? I fizzled three spells in a row trying to take the node (a sorcery node, I think. The one that looks like a lake or a whirlpool.)
The exciting lights give you more magic points, which increases your mana, casting points, or research rate; you can check the ratios on your magic screen.
Nodes interfere with magic that's not their own type. Also if you were fighting a Sky Drake, they're immune to magic entirely (and are a pain in the goddamn ass).
I did free a hero from the node, and he gives any units stacked with him flying which is pretty sweet. That should make attacking other continents a lot easier, I guess.
That's one of the best powers; mobility is one of the central keys to success in the game. Flying or Pathfinding are both golden.
I've explored my continent and have a five city network covering most of it except the little corner where I have the Klackons button-holed. I took out my first node, which was very exciting. And I melded a spirit with it, which produced all sorts of exciting lights. What do the exciting lights do, exactly? Also, can you not cast spells when attacking a node? I fizzled three spells in a row trying to take the node (a sorcery node, I think. The one that looks like a lake or a whirlpool.)
The exciting lights give you more magic points, which increases your mana, casting points, or research rate; you can check the ratios on your magic screen.
Nodes interfere with magic that's not their own type. Also if you were fighting a Sky Drake, they're immune to magic entirely (and are a pain in the goddamn ass).
Lovely. Thanks. Also, someone who may even have been you said to trade as much magic as possible with other players when you first meet them. I've met them, gotten their words of welcome or attempted intimidation, and then that's it. I found how to check their stats, but can't find any screen to initiate trading or other diplomacy with them. Do I need a particular building to be able to do that? Something else?
C'mon Amazon reseller -- Send me my MoM strategy guide!
I haven't faced a Sky Drake yet, but I did get cocky after taking the first node with no units lost and sidled over to a second node. Air Elemental, huh? Immune to weapons? Immune to Stoning? Magic doesn't work in the node? Well, I've got this Fire Giant, I guess he'll just take out this big whirlwind thing...
One round of melee later, and my Fire Giant has 1/3rd life while the Air Elemental is still all green with just a smidge lopped off his bar. Fortunately I was able to flee with no major damage done (to anything other than my pride.)
No, the diplomacy screen should be accessable as soon as you meet another wizard. I forget what the keyboard command is, but I assure you, you don't need a special building or whatnot. Tinker with it until you find the right screen. Should be a bunch of gems, some of which having portraits in them. Click on the portrait to engage in talks, is what I remember.
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Kane Red RobeMaster of MagicArcanusRegistered Userregular
I've explored my continent and have a five city network covering most of it except the little corner where I have the Klackons button-holed. I took out my first node, which was very exciting. And I melded a spirit with it, which produced all sorts of exciting lights. What do the exciting lights do, exactly? Also, can you not cast spells when attacking a node? I fizzled three spells in a row trying to take the node (a sorcery node, I think. The one that looks like a lake or a whirlpool.)
The exciting lights give you more magic points, which increases your mana, casting points, or research rate; you can check the ratios on your magic screen.
Nodes interfere with magic that's not their own type. Also if you were fighting a Sky Drake, they're immune to magic entirely (and are a pain in the goddamn ass).
Lovely. Thanks. Also, someone who may even have been you said to trade as much magic as possible with other players when you first meet them. I've met them, gotten their words of welcome or attempted intimidation, and then that's it. I found how to check their stats, but can't find any screen to initiate trading or other diplomacy with them. Do I need a particular building to be able to do that? Something else?
C'mon Amazon reseller -- Send me my MoM strategy guide!
I haven't faced a Sky Drake yet, but I did get cocky after taking the first node with no units lost and sidled over to a second node. Air Elemental, huh? Immune to weapons? Immune to Stoning? Magic doesn't work in the node? Well, I've got this Fire Giant, I guess he'll just take out this big whirlwind thing...
One round of melee later, and my Fire Giant has 1/3rd life while the Air Elemental is still all green with just a smidge lopped off his bar. Fortunately I was able to flee with no major damage done (to anything other than my pride.)
Left clicking on the portrait of the wizard on the Magic screen should bring up diplomacy.
my favorite thing to do was always summon the chosen one with that light magic spell, and buff him with every godly buffing spell in the game, and then use him to singlehandedly wipe out all opposition. one hero operating alone to wipe out entire armies was so win.
my favorite thing to do was always summon the chosen one with that light magic spell, and buff him with every godly buffing spell in the game, and then use him to singlehandedly wipe out all opposition. one hero operating alone to wipe out entire armies was so win.
Until he ran into the town with eight full units of buffed halfling slingers, and they kill him before he gets through the gate.
The lone gamefaqs faq on this game is surprisingly informative. I've learned a ton about the background mechanics of the game just by reading the first third or so of it (so far!).
The lone gamefaqs faq on this game is surprisingly informative. I've learned a ton about the background mechanics of the game just by reading the first third or so of it (so far!).
I was about to say that Dan Simpson is the man, but apprently he just updated the faq. I'm surprised he didn't write the damn thing himself.
Seriously, his Black Isle games faqs =
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AthenorBattle Hardened OptimistThe Skies of HiigaraRegistered Userregular
edited September 2007
Much of my childhood in Junior High was lost to this brilliant game.
I miss it, more than any games of that time.
Athenor, the Dragonrider in white, needs a character.
Work has taken over. The launch was Sunday and it went well, but things keep popping up and look like they will for a while, so I'm officially abandoning this.
HOWEVER.
If anyone's interested in taking over, I'll gladly email the save files across and finish the write-up to the point where the game is saved (I have a few pics still un-turned-into-story). I'll even bridge the gap between characters (as I presume someone will take over for Jim, to explain the differing writing styles).
I promise I'll do a badass LP at some point in the future, but I can't just now and it sucks keeping you guys waiting like this.
Work has taken over. The launch was Sunday and it went well, but things keep popping up and look like they will for a while, so I'm officially abandoning this.
HOWEVER.
If anyone's interested in taking over, I'll gladly email the save files across and finish the write-up to the point where the game is saved (I have a few pics still un-turned-into-story). I'll even bridge the gap between characters (as I presume someone will take over for Jim, to explain the differing writing styles).
I promise I'll do a badass LP at some point in the future, but I can't just now and it sucks keeping you guys waiting like this.
Awwwww..... Crap.
Well, I can't take over. 1) My schedule poses similar impediments to regularly updating a LP right now, and 2) I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. I hope there's someone to step up, because this was a lot of fun to follow.
Dusdais ashamed of this postSLC, UTRegistered Userregular
edited September 2007
I'd rather you just go on hiatus for a while, and return to finish it later. That is, unless you can find someone with a similar writing style/sense of humor.
I'd rather you just go on hiatus for a while, and return to finish it later.
I agree.
On another note, I have never ever gotten sound to work in this game. I just fired it up in dosbox for the first time (glad I've kept my old files around for the last 10 years or so, from the first time I played it...the last time I played it was years ago on a win 98 machine), and sure enough, I still can't get the sound to work. I still have no idea what this game sounds like. Thankfully sound isn't important for it, but still.
So my copy of the MoM Strategy Guide arrived. Awesome book. When I saw Table 4.1, "Wizard Skills' Subjective Ranking by Author," with both aggregated and separate rankings of all wizard "retorts" it felt like coming home after a long journey...
The book references the instruction manual and spell book that came with the game, so I went on eBay to see if there were any copies. There's one good one with a couple of people bidding on it. I clicked through to the current winning bidder's recent purchases.
Of the first 25 results (ranging back to July 7), 6 are other copies of MoM! And 2 more are copies of the MoM Strategy Guide? Huh? Is this something people do that I didn't know about, buy up all available copies of a particular old game? He (presumably) had also purchased half a dozen copies of Star Trek: Birth of the Federation, both the game itself and the manuals. Is there enough demand for these games that he can resell them at a profit? Or is this some compulsive character rubbing himself with exotic oils and diving onto a big pile of old games?
Is there enough demand for these games that he can resell them at a profit? Or is this some compulsive character rubbing himself with exotic oils and diving onto a big pile of old games?
Uh, I WAS gonna pick up a copy of this strategy guide, but on the off chance that he's doing BOTH, then I think I'll pass.
Only the most detailed turn-based fantasy strategy game ever made..
Hardly. That prize goes for Fantasy General. But it doesn't change the fact that MoM is still awesome game.
I played that for a bit, and it didn't do much for me. I don't have anything against hexagons, but I guess I loved the open world feeling of MoM more.
LeumasWhite, don't remind me about the freaking Sky Drakes. Why are halfling slingers better against them than my cosmic powers?
Rolo, getting an unstoppable hero party rolling is fiendishly difficult on the higher difficulty levels. You're on the defensive from square one unless you are lucky enough to start on an island or in Myrror without competitors.
Not really. 5 Sorcery books, 2 other books of any two other colors, runemaster and artificer. A house-building race tends to make this easier.
You start with create item/create artifact. Start making objects and breaking them -- due to the stacking effects of runemaster and artificer, every MP you spend making an item you get returned 2 for 1.
With the 5 sorcery books, you can create a misc item with invisibility, magic immunity, guardian wind, and flight for 660 or so MP. That's an awful good get-out-of-dead free card for a newbie hero. Keep getting heroes (archers and casters are prefered to all but the most elite of melee fighters).
Turtle in the main city until you have a good marauding stack, and then start punching peoples lights out, or farming opposing towers for books and spells. Expansion's for suckers with such a strategy until you've got enough defense of your main city.
So my copy of the MoM Strategy Guide arrived. Awesome book. When I saw Table 4.1, "Wizard Skills' Subjective Ranking by Author," with both aggregated and separate rankings of all wizard "retorts" it felt like coming home after a long journey...
The book references the instruction manual and spell book that came with the game, so I went on eBay to see if there were any copies. There's one good one with a couple of people bidding on it. I clicked through to the current winning bidder's recent purchases.
Of the first 25 results (ranging back to July 7), 6 are other copies of MoM! And 2 more are copies of the MoM Strategy Guide? Huh? Is this something people do that I didn't know about, buy up all available copies of a particular old game? He (presumably) had also purchased half a dozen copies of Star Trek: Birth of the Federation, both the game itself and the manuals. Is there enough demand for these games that he can resell them at a profit? Or is this some compulsive character rubbing himself with exotic oils and diving onto a big pile of old games?
Alan Emrich's MoO and MoM strategy guides were, imho, the last two ever published worthy of such a title.
Turtle in the main city until you have a good marauding stack, and then start punching peoples lights out, or farming opposing towers for books and spells. Expansion's for suckers with such a strategy until you've got enough defense of your main city.
Afraid I can't endorse that tactic. In my experience, if you turtle up, you lose a lot of the ruins, caves, towers, etc that have retorts and spellbooks. The computer isn't shy about knocking over the world objectives, and sometimes I have to race to beat them to the punch.
You can keep expanding all you want if you can keep the enemy out of your home territory by distracting him. I like taking enemy cities and defending their walls with a couple range units. Invariably their main force loses enough taking the city back that they get conservative about attacking your lands.
Also strategic unit placement is handy... unless they have flight or water walking, you can defend for a long time by just protecting a pass.
More cities means more of everything... research, emergency unit production, mineral deposits, etc. There's very few points where one super buffed city will be better than a lot of moderate cities.
In honor of this thread, I played a game on Hard/4 wizards/Powerful magic the other day. I ended up finding a Great Wyrm spell in one of the caves (or nodes?) very early on, and once I actually had the mana to cast it, I started pumping them out and marching them all over the board, destroying everything everywhere I went. It was glorious. By the end of the game, I had probably 15 1-unit stacks of them just sitting around at various points on the board in case anything came up. I stationed a few of them outside my opponent's larger cities to keep an eye on them, stationed them on top of my captured nodes to protect them, stationed them in my newly captured cities to keep out invaders, etc. I kept all 4 of the other wizards banished simultaneously (any time one finished the spell of return, I'd have a wurm on his new city within a turn or two) and finished the game with the Spell of Mastery.
Turtle in the main city until you have a good marauding stack, and then start punching peoples lights out, or farming opposing towers for books and spells. Expansion's for suckers with such a strategy until you've got enough defense of your main city.
Afraid I can't endorse that tactic. In my experience, if you turtle up, you lose a lot of the ruins, caves, towers, etc that have retorts and spellbooks. The computer isn't shy about knocking over the world objectives, and sometimes I have to race to beat them to the punch.
You can keep expanding all you want if you can keep the enemy out of your home territory by distracting him. I like taking enemy cities and defending their walls with a couple range units. Invariably their main force loses enough taking the city back that they get conservative about attacking your lands.
Also strategic unit placement is handy... unless they have flight or water walking, you can defend for a long time by just protecting a pass.
More cities means more of everything... research, emergency unit production, mineral deposits, etc. There's very few points where one super buffed city will be better than a lot of moderate cities.
Well, that's on the higher difficulties at least.
I'm afraid I respectfully disagree. There are generally enough goodies in the nodes/ruins/etc on Myrror that I never worry about running out. Why bother arguing with Lo Pan over 4-point nodes when there are juicy 12-point nodes the computer can't manage to take? Further, I try to farm the computer; they've lots more books, and thus spells, and with the 1.3.1 patch, you get to take two spells that match your books every time you banish a wizard.
I tend to prefer to let the computer do all the hard, nasty work of expansion, and then take over their semi-built cities rather than try to expand early and go through the expense of time, money, and mana trying to be strong everywhere. That said, the high-men turtle strategy -- race to paladins -- means once you can take a city, you can generally hold it. I'll generally occupy any cities with houses, with the exception of barbs.
The only strategic terrain I every worry about holding is towers -- I consider Myrror my property, and the other wizards are not welcome.
And it works on impossible, too. The completely farked diplomacy model means being an inoffensive little churchmouse means, in general, that the computer will leave you the heck alone until you're ready to give him what for.
Oh man, I knew Age of Wonders was 'inspired' by this game, but I never knew it was that blatant. They copied the combat system, the map, the interaction with other rulers, the hero system, the spell research system, even the overpowered summoned creatures as the post by Marty suggests. The only real difference at first sight seems to be the graphixx and the story of course. Still makes it a good game though, I heard they are both great.
Oh man, I knew Age of Wonders was 'inspired' by this game, but I never knew it was that blatant. They copied the combat system, the map, the interaction with other rulers, the hero system, the spell research system, even the overpowered summoned creatures as the post by Marty suggests. The only real difference at first sight seems to be the graphixx and the story of course. Still makes it a good game though, I heard they are both great.
There's actually a significant mechanical difference in the combat, because MoM uses a multiple-figure unit system, where each soldier in a unit gets their own attack roll and damage and the like, while AoW just has 1 figure per unit. This can make a difference when taking into account buffing spells, and makes attack rolls less all-or-nothing.
In fact, until Shadow Magic, MoM was superior in every category except structured missions, as you couldn't even make your own magic items.
Posts
There's no tutorial to my knowledge, in those days, that's what the manual was for.
Sometimes you'll get stomped by raiders in the early game... with a random setup, it's just the way things are. Concentrate on getting a ranged unit and wooden walls in your town as soon as possible. Also remember not to neglect your spell research. A basic attack spell can usually polish off early bandits.
From what I remember "Patrol" is a toggle and doesn't prevent the unit from being given other orders.
Which reminds me that the manual was great for this game, as was the super-cool spell book. But even better was the official strategy guide, which was largely written by designers of the game who know everything, and went into incredible detail of the math involved in combat. Way cool, and I wish I still had my copy from back in the day.
It's rather depressing to see what strategy guides have turned into, compared to Ye Olde Dayes.
IOS Game Center ID: Isotope-X
I ordered a used copy off of Amazon, and am looking forward to it's 480 pages of goodness. Still, there is a certain self-defeating element to having a totally portable game like this in your pocket on a USB drive if you have to lug around a 2.4 pound book to play it.
Ranged attacker and wood walls. Got it. Any build queue tips? Should I get a second settlement ASAP, or wait? Any way to tell how strong the defenses are in a neutral town without attacking? What's a good character type for a beginner?
Steam profile.
Getting started with BATTLETECH: Part 1 / Part 2
Start with things that increase your population growth rate. That actually will help with your second question... Yes, crank out towns as your population allows, but make sure they're strategically located to take advantage of resources on the map. A town without good resources really isn't worth that much, but it's better than no towns at all.
I'd say that the best beginner setup would be White and Red magic. Healing and attack, the basics, really. Though Green is a little of both, so that's good too. May want to invest some points in the trait that buffs your units an experience level. That's always badass.
I seem to recall that there are spells that let you look at town defenses... also having a unit there and clicking on the town might work as well. It's been so long.
Plus the fact that I've come down with something... LAMEN.
I'd rank an expansion town's build list in the following priority:
1) +population/turn
2) wall
3) +gold/turn
4) unit production
I usually send a combat unit along with a settler so that the new outpost is defended off the bat and doesn't have to worry about making a barracks right away.
In fact, if you can get a town with mithril or adamantium deposits nearby, you should produce your combat units from that town as exclusively as possible.
The key to efficiency is to have each town do what its best at. So gold towns crank the commerce, and iron towns produce units.
Remember to build roads around and between your towns. Roads improve gold income and make your empire more defensible... there's a spell that allows instantanious transit of units over enchanted roads, and lets you cover vast numbers of cities with just one hardcore force.
Well, as your empire gets larger, there's a higher chance for unrest. Also racial differences can be tough... if they're captured towns, perhaps their citizens are finally getting their gumption back.
Are you producing enough food? Food shortages are a big one.
Do you have Shrines and other unrest-reducers?
There are spells that make townsfolk happy and some that make them unhappy. Has anyone corrupted the landscape around your villages?
If all else fails, reduce your taxes.
How could I forget the importance of martial law?
I'm really liking my MoM USB drive action. Is the game's pacing a little slow, though, even for the genre? I restarted as an all red mage on Easy and played for 3 hours before I was able to produce a unit better than a Swordsman.
I've explored my continent and have a five city network covering most of it except the little corner where I have the Klackons button-holed. I took out my first node, which was very exciting. And I melded a spirit with it, which produced all sorts of exciting lights. What do the exciting lights do, exactly? Also, can you not cast spells when attacking a node? I fizzled three spells in a row trying to take the node (a sorcery node, I think. The one that looks like a lake or a whirlpool.)
I did free a hero from the node, and he gives any units stacked with him flying which is pretty sweet. That should make attacking other continents a lot easier, I guess.
Steam profile.
Getting started with BATTLETECH: Part 1 / Part 2
The exciting lights give you more magic points, which increases your mana, casting points, or research rate; you can check the ratios on your magic screen.
Nodes interfere with magic that's not their own type. Also if you were fighting a Sky Drake, they're immune to magic entirely (and are a pain in the goddamn ass).
That's one of the best powers; mobility is one of the central keys to success in the game. Flying or Pathfinding are both golden.
Lovely. Thanks. Also, someone who may even have been you said to trade as much magic as possible with other players when you first meet them. I've met them, gotten their words of welcome or attempted intimidation, and then that's it. I found how to check their stats, but can't find any screen to initiate trading or other diplomacy with them. Do I need a particular building to be able to do that? Something else?
C'mon Amazon reseller -- Send me my MoM strategy guide!
I haven't faced a Sky Drake yet, but I did get cocky after taking the first node with no units lost and sidled over to a second node. Air Elemental, huh? Immune to weapons? Immune to Stoning? Magic doesn't work in the node? Well, I've got this Fire Giant, I guess he'll just take out this big whirlwind thing...
One round of melee later, and my Fire Giant has 1/3rd life while the Air Elemental is still all green with just a smidge lopped off his bar. Fortunately I was able to flee with no major damage done (to anything other than my pride.)
Steam profile.
Getting started with BATTLETECH: Part 1 / Part 2
Left clicking on the portrait of the wizard on the Magic screen should bring up diplomacy.
my favorite thing to do was always summon the chosen one with that light magic spell, and buff him with every godly buffing spell in the game, and then use him to singlehandedly wipe out all opposition. one hero operating alone to wipe out entire armies was so win.
Until he ran into the town with eight full units of buffed halfling slingers, and they kill him before he gets through the gate.
Seriously, his Black Isle games faqs =
I miss it, more than any games of that time.
Athenor, the Dragonrider in white, needs a character.
Work has taken over. The launch was Sunday and it went well, but things keep popping up and look like they will for a while, so I'm officially abandoning this.
HOWEVER.
If anyone's interested in taking over, I'll gladly email the save files across and finish the write-up to the point where the game is saved (I have a few pics still un-turned-into-story). I'll even bridge the gap between characters (as I presume someone will take over for Jim, to explain the differing writing styles).
I promise I'll do a badass LP at some point in the future, but I can't just now and it sucks keeping you guys waiting like this.
Awwwww..... Crap.
Well, I can't take over. 1) My schedule poses similar impediments to regularly updating a LP right now, and 2) I don't know what the fuck I'm doing. I hope there's someone to step up, because this was a lot of fun to follow.
Steam profile.
Getting started with BATTLETECH: Part 1 / Part 2
IOS Game Center ID: Isotope-X
I agree.
On another note, I have never ever gotten sound to work in this game. I just fired it up in dosbox for the first time (glad I've kept my old files around for the last 10 years or so, from the first time I played it...the last time I played it was years ago on a win 98 machine), and sure enough, I still can't get the sound to work. I still have no idea what this game sounds like. Thankfully sound isn't important for it, but still.
The book references the instruction manual and spell book that came with the game, so I went on eBay to see if there were any copies. There's one good one with a couple of people bidding on it. I clicked through to the current winning bidder's recent purchases.
Of the first 25 results (ranging back to July 7), 6 are other copies of MoM! And 2 more are copies of the MoM Strategy Guide? Huh? Is this something people do that I didn't know about, buy up all available copies of a particular old game? He (presumably) had also purchased half a dozen copies of Star Trek: Birth of the Federation, both the game itself and the manuals. Is there enough demand for these games that he can resell them at a profit? Or is this some compulsive character rubbing himself with exotic oils and diving onto a big pile of old games?
Steam profile.
Getting started with BATTLETECH: Part 1 / Part 2
Uh, I WAS gonna pick up a copy of this strategy guide, but on the off chance that he's doing BOTH, then I think I'll pass.
Not really. 5 Sorcery books, 2 other books of any two other colors, runemaster and artificer. A house-building race tends to make this easier.
You start with create item/create artifact. Start making objects and breaking them -- due to the stacking effects of runemaster and artificer, every MP you spend making an item you get returned 2 for 1.
With the 5 sorcery books, you can create a misc item with invisibility, magic immunity, guardian wind, and flight for 660 or so MP. That's an awful good get-out-of-dead free card for a newbie hero. Keep getting heroes (archers and casters are prefered to all but the most elite of melee fighters).
Turtle in the main city until you have a good marauding stack, and then start punching peoples lights out, or farming opposing towers for books and spells. Expansion's for suckers with such a strategy until you've got enough defense of your main city.
Alan Emrich's MoO and MoM strategy guides were, imho, the last two ever published worthy of such a title.
Afraid I can't endorse that tactic. In my experience, if you turtle up, you lose a lot of the ruins, caves, towers, etc that have retorts and spellbooks. The computer isn't shy about knocking over the world objectives, and sometimes I have to race to beat them to the punch.
You can keep expanding all you want if you can keep the enemy out of your home territory by distracting him. I like taking enemy cities and defending their walls with a couple range units. Invariably their main force loses enough taking the city back that they get conservative about attacking your lands.
Also strategic unit placement is handy... unless they have flight or water walking, you can defend for a long time by just protecting a pass.
More cities means more of everything... research, emergency unit production, mineral deposits, etc. There's very few points where one super buffed city will be better than a lot of moderate cities.
Well, that's on the higher difficulties at least.
I've actually never heard of someone winning like that, precisely. Well done.
I'm afraid I respectfully disagree. There are generally enough goodies in the nodes/ruins/etc on Myrror that I never worry about running out. Why bother arguing with Lo Pan over 4-point nodes when there are juicy 12-point nodes the computer can't manage to take? Further, I try to farm the computer; they've lots more books, and thus spells, and with the 1.3.1 patch, you get to take two spells that match your books every time you banish a wizard.
I tend to prefer to let the computer do all the hard, nasty work of expansion, and then take over their semi-built cities rather than try to expand early and go through the expense of time, money, and mana trying to be strong everywhere. That said, the high-men turtle strategy -- race to paladins -- means once you can take a city, you can generally hold it. I'll generally occupy any cities with houses, with the exception of barbs.
The only strategic terrain I every worry about holding is towers -- I consider Myrror my property, and the other wizards are not welcome.
And it works on impossible, too. The completely farked diplomacy model means being an inoffensive little churchmouse means, in general, that the computer will leave you the heck alone until you're ready to give him what for.
There's actually a significant mechanical difference in the combat, because MoM uses a multiple-figure unit system, where each soldier in a unit gets their own attack roll and damage and the like, while AoW just has 1 figure per unit. This can make a difference when taking into account buffing spells, and makes attack rolls less all-or-nothing.
In fact, until Shadow Magic, MoM was superior in every category except structured missions, as you couldn't even make your own magic items.