Is High culture weak, or am I just a noob?

[Janthis]

I really like the concept of them, but they seem to be focused mostly on cooperation, with healing and support units and not enough heavy hitters. I just got demolished by an orc AI with horde tactics, and it seemed like there was nothing I could do. Despite similar numbers, it felt like all of its units were twice as effective as mine at everything. Is there something I'm missing? Has anyone been successful with the faith/zeal trees or should I just spec into something else?

[aclyte]

It's the only culture i haven't played yet, but looks like their focus is on support (awakening) and archers (+1 range on awakening rocks)

[yuzhonglu]

They're meh until tier 3 when they get those tier 3 awakeners.

[Janthis]

I should also mention this AI leader had an army twice the size of mine despite having fewer cities and land, but that's something I've gotten used to already.

[Mithrals]

I find it very strong.
Their t3 unit is a powerhouse.
The extra dmg they get + awakening buff feels like a 2 for 1, and if you go full evil you don't even have to worry about it as you start with it already active.

All cultures have their appeal tho, but I do not think high is worse than others by any means.

You culd try to pick up some archers from either tome of wind or tome of the glades, and buff them with awaken and seeker arrows + all the crit you can find, altough it seems most ppl just use the tier 1 archers. I find using t1 archers a bit boring, but who am I to judge what ppl find fun in a game.

[アンジェル]

Originally posted by Johnny_B_80:

Is High culture weak, or am I just a noob?
I really like the concept of them, but they seem to be focused mostly on cooperation, with healing and support units and not enough heavy hitters. I just got demolished by an orc AI with horde tactics, and it seemed like there was nothing I could do. Despite similar numbers, it felt like all of its units were twice as effective as mine at everything. Is there something I'm missing? Has anyone been successful with the faith/zeal trees or should I just spec into something else?

It is pretty strong, as long as you focus on its strengths and do not try to play it like the other more aggressive cultures. As it has been mentioned before by others, their power lies mainly in making good use of the awakening feature and the dormant enchantments. Once you reached higher tier tomes it works like exponential modifiers with the right buffs. And God Emperor can be an incredible enemy to fight against, which I consider even deadlier than necromancy.

[Багряный]

Yes, it is the weakest culture, due to the fact that its bonuses are useless and because the AI of the vassal does not work

[Janthis]

Originally posted by Mithrals:

I find it very strong.
Their t3 unit is a powerhouse.
The extra dmg they get + awakening buff feels like a 2 for 1, and if you go full evil you don't even have to worry about it as you start with it already active.

You mean the inquisitor? Yeah, I was just about to start training those when the AI attacked me with 3+ stacks of archers and berserkers plus fully equipped heroes and just spammed me to death. Meanwhile I could only do holy damage and half my army was weak healers/support units that barely did anything. I dunno, maybe I just need to get more familiar with this playstyle.

[Mithrals]

Originally posted by Johnny_B_80:

Originally posted by Mithrals:

I find it very strong.
Their t3 unit is a powerhouse.
The extra dmg they get + awakening buff feels like a 2 for 1, and if you go full evil you don't even have to worry about it as you start with it already active.

You mean the inquisitor? Yeah, I was just about to start training those when the AI attacked me with 3+ stacks of archers and berserkers plus fully equipped heroes and just spammed me to death. Meanwhile I could only do holy damage and half my army was weak healers/support units that barely did anything. I dunno, maybe I just need to get more familiar with this playstyle.

The inquisitor is from a tome, the awakener is the t3 battlemage unit of the high culture, altough the inquisior is a really fun unit also.

The awakener has a free action to awaken 2 units and an aoe blast that also shreds defences, great unit.

And yeah I don't really build support units unless theres something very specific I am trying to do, and the only support ive found to actually make my army stronger is the skald from tome of revelry.

Altough i can see the nymph also being useful for certain builds.

That is why the awakener is so great since it lets you awaken units on a free action while still being a very competent nuker with high damage and great range. Thus you do not have to bring weak supports that bogs down your army to play into the high culture mechanic.

[Gundalf]

Originally posted by Johnny_B_80:

I should also mention this AI leader had an army twice the size of mine despite having fewer cities and land, but that's something I've gotten used to already.

You should avoid being outnumbered in fights, as it can easily scale thanks to Lanchester's square law. And past the early game walk around with atleast three full stacks since thats the max you bring to battle.

High culture is just a bit odd in that they advocate order affinity with rally of lieges and units from other sources but at the same time have a pretty exclusive Culture mechanic, which pretty much forces you to run Sun priests and awakeners in every army.

Army wise i would recommend 3 daylightspears or some other shield or spear units + 1 sun pirest + 2 awakeners. Heroes as available and late game Shrine of Smiting if you go for order tomes.

[Seswatha]

Is easily one of the top cultures.

Some fallacies in this thread:

1. High = Order
Seen in every other culture discussion. You can go high with 0 Order tomes. That been said Order is also a very strong affinity depending on the map. On maps with a lot of free cities it's easily one of the top competitors.

2. You need Awakeners for High to be good. Nope. You have AoE Awaken spell, Twin Awaken on heroes, eventually you can even go full evil. You'll be making great use of Awakening pretty much from the start. Note: Any support in high gets Awaken, as long as you get the culture enchantment, so even your Wildspeakers can have it for exapmple.

What's strong about High? Well, ranged damage dealers are very good in the current state, and High gives all of them +1 range and +20% accuracy along with +4 flat damage as long as you Awaken them. This is by far the strongest combat bonus of any culture.

Neutral Agenda + high stability = big prod and food boost in every city, trumping Feudal and not requiring a skill. You have to figure out how to get this high stability, but is well worth it, especially with Tome of Faith & Convent synergies making you an eco powerhouse.

Best unit is Dusk Hunter which is a good contender for the title of the most cost effective unit in the game in general.

Best stack (not the strongest possible, but the most efficient) is 2 heroes with Twin Awaken and 4 Dusk Hunters tbh. You can replace 1 hero with an Awakener if you don't have money for more hereos.

[Janthis]

Originally posted by Seswatha:

Is easily one of the top cultures.

Some fallacies in this thread:

1. High = Order
Seen in every other culture discussion. You can go high with 0 Order tomes. That been said Order is also a very strong affinity depending on the map. On maps with a lot of free cities it's easily one of the top competitors.

2. You need Awakeners for High to be good. Nope. You have AoE Awaken spell, Twin Awaken on heroes, eventually you can even go full evil. You'll be making great use of Awakening pretty much from the start.

What's strong about High? Well, ranged damage dealers are very good in the current state, and High gives all of them +1 range and +20% accuracy along with +4 flat damage as long as you Awaken them. This is by far the strongest combat bonus of any culture.

Neutral Agenda + high stability = big prod and food boost in every city, trumping Feudal and not requiring a skill. You have to figure out how to get this high stability, but is well worth it, especially with Tome of Faith & Convent synergies making you an eco powerhouse.

Best unit is Dusk Hunter which is a good contender for the title of the most cost effective unit in the game in general.

So what would be a good army composition? I generally went with sun priest (later awakener), a couple of sun spears / shields, and 2 dusk hunters. Yet the barbarian AI just spammed archers and fighters and took me out before I could kill more than half of its troops. Mine just felt weak by comparison.

[Jaeger]

I'd say their heavy-hitting damage comes from their ranged attacks, especially if you stack on enchantments for archers or battlemages. Awakening always gives some extra spirit damage, but on your archers and Awakeners, they also get +1 range and + 20% chance. That's a lot more time shooting with that damage buff rather than relocating to get in range or get a workable hit-percentage.

Awakened sunpriests also get to apply Distracted on their attacks, which is some nice extra damage, but there's the matter of opportunity costs there and it's "only" a 60% chance, so not the most reliable.

Awakened High spearmen get an extra retaliation attack. I don't think that compares to what your ranged units can do damage-wise, but it's not nothing when you add on the Awaken damage boost and are using them to slug it out with the enemy while the sword and shields support.

[Seswatha]

Originally posted by Johnny_B_80:

Originally posted by Seswatha:

Is easily one of the top cultures.

Some fallacies in this thread:

1. High = Order
Seen in every other culture discussion. You can go high with 0 Order tomes. That been said Order is also a very strong affinity depending on the map. On maps with a lot of free cities it's easily one of the top competitors.

2. You need Awakeners for High to be good. Nope. You have AoE Awaken spell, Twin Awaken on heroes, eventually you can even go full evil. You'll be making great use of Awakening pretty much from the start.

What's strong about High? Well, ranged damage dealers are very good in the current state, and High gives all of them +1 range and +20% accuracy along with +4 flat damage as long as you Awaken them. This is by far the strongest combat bonus of any culture.

Neutral Agenda + high stability = big prod and food boost in every city, trumping Feudal and not requiring a skill. You have to figure out how to get this high stability, but is well worth it, especially with Tome of Faith & Convent synergies making you an eco powerhouse.

Best unit is Dusk Hunter which is a good contender for the title of the most cost effective unit in the game in general.

So what would be a good army composition? I generally went with sun priest (later awakener), a couple of sun spears / shields, and 2 dusk hunters. Yet the barbarian AI just spammed archers and fighters and took me out before I could kill more than half of its troops. Mine just felt weak by comparison.

As I edited in my post, go heroes with Twin Awaken + Dusk Hunters. 2 heroes / 4 hunters is good for a full stack. Mid/Late game you might want to start replacing Dusk Hunters with Zephyr archers. You can have 7 range archers as High, stack crit chance on them to bypass accuracy. If you don't have money for enough heroes mix in some Awakeners, they're pretty good too, but I wouldn't take more than 2 per stack.

[Azunai]

That's odd. I always found high culture with full order or (or some dips into other affinities for some additional enchants) very strong. Guess it must be a matter of playstyle.

Their sun priest is weak. You're better off using a chaplain imo. The other units are good. Make sure you grab twin awaken asap on all your heroes (respec new heroes to include it right away).

The battlemage is awesome, their pikes and shields are decent their archer is easily the best t1 archer in the game.

Going pure evil with high culture is a strong choice (makes your armies start battles already awakened). And of course much easier than going pure good.

[parent child bowl]

6 range archers are absolutely broken. I don't even bother with Awakeners since I generally go pure evil asap.