Install Steam
login
|
language
简体中文 (Simplified Chinese)
繁體中文 (Traditional Chinese)
日本語 (Japanese)
한국어 (Korean)
ไทย (Thai)
Български (Bulgarian)
Čeština (Czech)
Dansk (Danish)
Deutsch (German)
Español - España (Spanish - Spain)
Español - Latinoamérica (Spanish - Latin America)
Ελληνικά (Greek)
Français (French)
Italiano (Italian)
Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian)
Magyar (Hungarian)
Nederlands (Dutch)
Norsk (Norwegian)
Polski (Polish)
Português (Portuguese - Portugal)
Português - Brasil (Portuguese - Brazil)
Română (Romanian)
Русский (Russian)
Suomi (Finnish)
Svenska (Swedish)
Türkçe (Turkish)
Tiếng Việt (Vietnamese)
Українська (Ukrainian)
Report a translation problem
Discussions Rules and Guidelines
Report this post
Given that most of the UG maps are Take & Hold/Defensive style maps, Volta generally is the easiest Underlord to play. Just plaster any and all important locations with bombards and storm vortexes (and place garrisons where you can).
>Should I lower the gameplay speed
It certainly would not hurt. The main advantage of the AI is that it is much better than a human player when it comes to micro-management (i.e., the Master AI constantly keeps its workers slapped to make them work faster), but you can declaw it to a degree by decreasing the game speed.
>Which spells should I buy first
Depends on your Underlord. For Volta, you definetely want the 'Forge' spell. 'Shockwave' also can be useful if there are enemy melee units clogging up your defenses. As far as other aspects are concerned, you want to unlock the Storm Vortex as quickly as possible (given that it will be your main tool), as well as the Foundry Upgrade and the garrison. Bombards are useful to scare away enemy workers, but will generally be destroyed quickly if the AI drops its entire army on them as it usually does.
My initial order tends to be: spawn max workers; unlock mana vault, annex and conduit; build 2-3 mana vault and spawn more workers; use annex to b-line to gold veins / gateways; use conduit near gold veins to speed up mining; use worker rally flags on important areas (ie. gold veins; claiming tiles).
With map2, it seems the enemy never goes for the democrons and iirc, they are alphas (really strong), however you need to detonate the brimstone before you can build a outpost. Also, the AI doesn't seem to claim land with outposts (ie. artefacts behind base; etc).
I had this funny strategy which might work with masters on map2. You build an outpost on the little piece of land behind their base, then complete the construct ritual. Then build a bombard and drop some flying units. Then send them over the gap but within range of the bombards. The enemy sends everyone at you allowing you to attack the objectives (just drop a new bafu/occulus whenever you want to distract them again). lolWut.
Regarding the above question, I have completed UG with all underlords. I tend to play very aggressively though and aim to take out the AI as soon as I am able to. Any of the underlords can be won with decent enough gameplay. Lamash currently has an easy win condition on UG1 with the empowered banshee spell, for instance. Shale is all about amassing an army of screechers/terrors. Volta is largely about storm vortex. Shale and Volta can use thunderlings which also help. Shale has ember demons too.
I usually start off with a 3x3 beast den and archive and the prophecy spell (since I do not know the maps that well). I personally did not explore much, I focussed on the objectives. For UG1 and UG2 you just want to beeline the shrines. If brimstone is in the way then get an underminer (I cannot remember if UG1 has brimstone blocking the path, I think that it does on at least one map though).
I personally advise against training cultists on these maps, it is often just a waste of time in my eyes. The point of maximum workers is good though: unless you are using the mana elsewhere, you may as well spawn as many as possible, especially in the early game.
Regarding the above strategy of pre-placing defences...the AI very often suicides its units this way. Throw in a garrison or use the aureate monoltih (depending on underlord choice) to turn this into a farming strategy. The outpost/construction tactic can be used to gain underhills very easily, but if you are fast enough then you can beat the AI to it, especially with the use of annex.
It is also worth emphasising here that good gameplay is what gets players the furthest. This means no early lairs/slaughterpens/taverns, build them when they are required. Build up your unit army as much as possible: this means enlarging the beast den, building more props, using potions and rituals if appropriate, and constantly using the mana pool. Disable units which are of little benefit by clicking on the gateway. I usually disable gnarlings and beastmasters, for instance.
In both maps I rushed for two of the three rooms. You do not necessarily need to build up your dungeon. As soon the defense is set in level three, you can use mana to keep them intact. Sometimes the enemy tries to break through, but with Voltas strom vortexes you do not need to send minions into the fight.
For spells I always took the revelation to scout the map early, foundry and lightning tower. That's the starting 3 and after that take assembly to manually build 2-3 towers at the desired location.
btw, don;t bother building rooms etc. early, just rush the shard piece or that important location/chokepoint and build up 2-3 lightning towers there to hold the enemy. You might need a try ot two but after that it's smooth sailing to victory.
Ultimately the winning strat was attacking from the side with a level ~5 army with storm vortexes turtling.
Leason learned: unless it is king of the underhill, the ghost shrines do jack all. Just build an high level army and destroy the core/heart yourself.
Also, the AI really needs to claim all their tiles and use bridges to those tiles. This map had the mana shrine at the back that had a small alcove with an artefact in it. At the 30min mark, I prophecied all those artefacts and built outposts + construction ritual. Then I took their mana shrines and built 4 storm vortexes + barricades on each. Thus I ended up with 4 mana shrines = 75% reduction in spells cast. I could quickly build defenses by casting 60mana forge spells on them. It is a cheap tactic but fun to try, lol.
Bonechillers do literally nothing and i cannot sit on the front lines 24/7 to keep activating them for a root that is too short to make a difference. Embers have this leap/charge thing and close distance far too fast.
Freeze potion insta-kills embers.
Against opponents who employ embers, you risk losing your ground very quickly if you will try to claim key areas with weak traps. Speed is very essential in this case.
As for doing this with every other underlord on Master - It's doable but certainly not easy. You can lower the speed if you like, it will help you dig your dungeon, however it won't stop AI from doing the same. Each underlord has different exposure window - you will need to wait some time before all viable options are available to you. Unfortunately UG2 and UG3 force you to act quickly so on Master difficulty, you may find yourself in trouble with Kasita/Volta and much more trouble as Lamash. The best advice here is - try to do everything even faster. If needed, memorize the shortest path to objectives and try to capture them sooner. This will certainly help you win even if you will lose some of them after some time. Also observe AI behavior - learn how quickly it does reach those areas itself.
Since I was cut off, I had to built outposts on the dirt near the lava in the center of the map, do construct rituals and build stone bridges just so I could put storm vortexes near the objective and claim some tiles for myself to expand on. UGGGHHH.
Really wish you could build defenses on allied tiles for this map and a way to tell the AI to focus on an area (like a ping in SC2).
It's funny because I had the exact opposite happen in my game of Volta. Mira claimed her hill and the central hill and held it for most of the game. I couldn't push Shale hard enough to reach my hill so I just held at the Moongate and let her dump minions on my turrets while occasionally air-dropping creatures to reinforce Mira's hills. Mira dumped on Korvek so hard at the beginning that he couldn't claw himself back into the game.
I absolutely agree with the AI land-blocking you, but it'd be impossible to teach them how to appropriately use Unclaim.
---
Your name breaks the damn quote tags.
Wow, how interesting! I seem to recall reading that the AI chooses from a number of strategies for their personality. So in your game, Mira played agressively, while in mine she played passively.