Beginner's Guide

In-depth tactical discussion on how to lose the least

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Yonder
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Beginner's Guide

Postby Yonder » Tue Oct 03, 2006 2:28 am

Beginner’s Guide

Alright, so you just got the game and are a little confused. That’s ok! We all were, let’s see if we can help you out.

To Do List:
1. Watch a Rolling Demo. It’s a nice 1v1v1 CPU game, enough players to be interesting, but you can still wrap your mind around what is happening. Don’t pay attention to details yet, just let it wash over you. It’s beautiful isn’t it, nice music too huh. It seems like the computers are pretty brutal too each other doesn’t it? Well they are, but in a little while you’ll be better! Which brings us to:

2. Play the Tutorials! Now that the demo has hyped you up you need to know what you are doing, the AI presents a steep learning curve and you are going to need to know the basics if you want to have a chance.

3. The tutorials are going to culminate with a game against the CPU, you will most likely lose, that’s ok! The first 6 tutorials inflated your confidence too much, now that you have a realistic feel of your current abilities you can concentrate on getting better.

4. Play another game against one computer opponent. Put some distance between you so that you have some time to get set up and think. You may win this one, and that’s great, but if you lose again don’t worry. The reason you are playing this second time is to get a better feel for why you are losing, since the first time everything probably happened so quickly that you didn’t really know what was going on.

5. Watch another Rolling Demo (or set up a 1v1v1 manually, whatever), this time you will be able to see some of the strategy behind the CPUs actions, you will be able to see the other side of the tactics used against you.

6. Watch another Rolling Demo, the CPU will probably do something different (1 of them anyways) and even if it doesn’t you will still pick up something new.

7. Play another 1v1 to put some of these new ideas into practice. I think you will win this time, if you don’t, come to the forums and get some help.

8. Play with more territories turned on, and develop strategies for specific scenarios, both by trying things out and spectating CPU and human games. Here are some of the situations I am talking about:

a. Enemy is far away: It will take some time to get your naval forces into position, it will take longer for land based bombers to get to the enemy, enemy will be far enough away that the differences the east/west distance will be small.
b. Enemy is close by: You will be able to attack each other quickly, and also interfere with each other. Anti air will reach into each others territory, radar sites will give you many of your structures right away.
c. Alliances are locked: You do not have to worry as much about defense as you have less enemies, you can be more aggressive and not have to worry about your vulnerability making you a bigger target (to backstabbers) You can place your structures to take advantage of the fact that you have an ally covering you.
d. Alliances are flexible: You need to keep in mind when placing defensive structures that your allies may not be friendly for very long, so you still need to defend yourself from otherwise “safe” directions. You should always keep enough nukes to retaliate in the event of a backstab, this will deter your allies from doing so. You need to be more defense oriented as you have more potential enemies and your allies will (if radar sharing is on) be able to see your defenses and will know if you are weak. You will have to allocate units to stay close enough to your allies that you can retaliate should they attack, but you don’t want to detract too much from the war against the “real” enemies, and you don’t want to unnerve an ally so much that he attacks you when he wouldn’t unprovoked (actually you might want that)
e. Your territories latitude: If you are a northern country you will have a more direct attack towards other territories due to the northward missile arcs, this makes your ICBMs less likely to be shot down. Southern Countries have to get through their northern neighbors, making it much harder for your missiles to hit targets that are far away, however you also have protection from the North, since most ICBMs targeting you have to get through him. Obviously Alliances can affect this issue greatly.


Alright, I think this is enough for now, I will post some specific tips a little later. If anyone has any tips or new to-do list items (or things they think should be changed) let me know and I’d be happy to put them in.
Yonder
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Postby Yonder » Tue Oct 03, 2006 11:13 pm

Does anyone have any comments about this whatsoever?
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VANGUARD
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Postby VANGUARD » Tue Oct 03, 2006 11:23 pm

I posted one down below but mines less tactical =p

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