Gatherer / Crafter / Warrior start?

[andonsage]

With the next update nerfing the kids that come with the Crafter start, how do folks think about Crafter being best start?

[sikker]

It's alot closer if they all have the same amount of kids but I still think crafter start is the best, I'll repost my explanation from the other thread.

The most obvious reason is that they can craft equipment faster which is quite important throughout the whole game, at the start to get RP and at the end to get top tier equipment. The extra RP allows them to advance faster then a warrior or gatherer start.

But aside from this, they also have the best social and stealth skills. This allows them to beat most enemies in a sneak or social challenge and also gives them good first strike in fighting, which is one of the most important skills.
They also get a hunter which makes them good in hunting challenge. So these 3 challenges cover pretty much every type of enemy and they never have to risk a fight.

Gatherers also get a hunter so they are good in hunting challenges too but that's pretty much the only thing they're good at. They have terrible skills in a tactical hand in fighting challenges and their strength/health isn't very impressive either, so doing anything other then hunting is very risky for them.

Warriors are good in tactical challenges but they don't even get a hunter so they can only do tactics or fight. They are good at fighting ofcourse but they don't have first strike so even here they're not that impressive.

If you compare the 3, crafters clearly have the most options. Add the extra kids on top of that and there's no reason to ever take any other start.

[MTaur]

Gathering is a great skill to have in the wild. It takes a while to farm materials to build 6 or 8 sets of tools. You only get +1 or at most +3 from Straw. Cane isn't much better, and Whicker only goes up to +4 or +5, I think. And Whicker costs more advancement points. Sometimes you can't even settle for Straw because there isn't any nearby.

The good news about Gathering is that you can make Warriors later. At the very beginning, the easiest way to stall out is to not have enough materials to keep the crafters busy farming Research Points.

It's hard to deny that Crafters have a lot of utility in non-combat challenges. If I remember correctly, they tend to have ok HP and weight limits, too.

[Anastaziel]

Mokosh + gatherers is quite good as you can crank out 10 food types faster. Moreover gatheres are also good at social, intelligence, and hunter challenges.

[David]

On high difficulties:
Gatherer start is still terrible, because gathering itself sucks on insane/real. Further, they don't do any of the anti-undead challenges well, and those are the scary monsters that you want to alt-challenge in the scary part of the game (though maybe that changed today?).

Warrior start is okay now. You'll want to recruit mostly crafters to get all your crafting done in time, but the warriors themselves start strong and having a few extra high level confuses can be clutch in the early lategame.

Crafters is still the best. There comes a time when you need to craft like mad, and all those extra crafters are needed. Strong social challenge lets you do your god/tree quests early, and the crafters scale well with Stealth + more crafting power into the endgame.

On low difficulties:
Yoloswag 420 do anything. Gatherer start probably best to let you hyper-snowball out of control. P bad against giants tho.

[Lampros]

Originally posted by TreeHippo:

On high difficulties:
Gatherer start is still terrible, because gathering itself sucks on insane/real. Further, they don't do any of the anti-undead challenges well, and those are the scary monsters that you want to alt-challenge in the scary part of the game (though maybe that changed today?).

Warrior start is okay now. You'll want to recruit mostly crafters to get all your crafting done in time, but the warriors themselves start strong and having a few extra high level confuses can be clutch in the early lategame.

Crafters is still the best. There comes a time when you need to craft like mad, and all those extra crafters are needed. Strong social challenge lets you do your god/tree quests early, and the crafters scale well with Stealth + more crafting power into the endgame.

On low difficulties:
Yoloswag 420 do anything. Gatherer start probably best to let you hyper-snowball out of control. P bad against giants tho.

I am not quite understanding this "Craftsmen is best at highest difficulties" argument at all. I would think it'd be worst, since you need ingredients first before you can craft, no? And to get ingredients, you need to either harvest (Gatherers) or fight (Warriors).

[Kaerius]

Originally posted by Lampros:

I am not quite understanding this "Craftsmen is best at highest difficulties" argument at all. I would think it'd be worst, since you need ingredients first before you can craft, no? And to get ingredients, you need to either harvest (Gatherers) or fight (Warriors).

Crafter start don't fight much worse than warrior start(thanks to first attack stacking), and with realism on(which is when this really kicks in) having excess gatherers isn't so great anymore. I think gatherer start is preferable as long as realism is off.

[Lampros]

Originally posted by Kaerius:

Crafter start don't fight much worse than warrior start(thanks to first attack stacking), and with realism on(which is when this really kicks in) having excess gatherers isn't so great anymore. I think gatherer start is preferable as long as realism is off.

Even with Realism on, isn't the initial gathering edging considerable? I am currently experimenting with non-Warrior start for the first time, and the gathering boost is still considerable - though I benefit from it more, because I tend to re-load maps till I see Elven Wood or Gold within 3 hexes.

The biggest difference I see is that I cannot auto-resolve the easier fights any more, because I don't have a Medic.

[MTaur]

Realism can be fiddled with sometimes, but not always. If your gathering power is slightly larger than a divisor of the gathering cost, then the lost effort is minimal in some cases. Some early dives for Wicker or Nimblewood can be kind of like that. It can take longer to get a surplus of wood going at home, and a sustainable meat income for cooking is crippled by the one Manger (Stables?) limit.

I think they buffed Herbalist Hut, because I don't remember (in the past patches) being able to force Medic to be available. The building resources and one Advancement Point is still a significant cost to pay, but as a matter of game design, the expensiveness seems justified to me.

[Lampros]

Originally posted by MTaur:

Realism can be fiddled with sometimes, but not always. If your gathering power is slightly larger than a divisor of the gathering cost, then the lost effort is minimal in some cases. Some early dives for Wicker or Nimblewood can be kind of like that. It can take longer to get a surplus of wood going at home, and a sustainable meat income for cooking is crippled by the one Manger (Stables?) limit.

I think they buffed Herbalist Hut, because I don't remember (in the past patches) being able to force Medic to be available. The building resources and one Advancement Point is still a significant cost to pay, but as a matter of game design, the expensiveness seems justified to me.

It's a separate issue, but I think the building requirement should not fall into the Realism mode. There is no reason why you can have, say, more Pastures to increase food production, because you are still talking about finite land space (10 building max).

[alan]

Just don't get the benefit of a crafter start, forget the kids that was taken out a while ago, I only play a map as it comes to see how long it takes to get to a win (normally cosmic) so no restarts if I don't land in paradise. Warriors/garterers/crafters all can fight and win the appropriate challenges so no real preference there, but only gatherers alow you to get the materials you need to get going.
So any game with gatherers can get the village up & running with wood & food and send out a self sustaining expedition which if you can get to 6/7/8 moves will cover ground pick up events and find that key resources to win (Db&AW) often without having to push water uphill finding something to make baskets with to turn the deadweight into useful guys. RPs from crafting isn't an issue with a few crafters all you need is a couple of gys to produce silk shirts and food and life is good.
just don't see the case for crafters in the early game.

[Lampros]

Originally posted by alan:

just don't see the case for crafters in the early game.

Yeah, that's what I am saying!

But I want to test on Perun tier 5 with a good map on all 3 starts just to see the difference at 300-plus.

I won't go for Cosmic Victory though - frankly, I feel that's too easy, too fast, and all around boring and anti-climactic. I prefer longer games.

[Poynt]

There are 9 types of challenges - fight, hex, hunting, intellect, physical, sickness, sneaking, social, and tactical. Each challenge type uses different skills for offense, defense, shielding, and the various tactical board abilities.

Crafters have the offensive stats for 5 of these challenge types, whereas fighters and gatherers only have the offensive stats used in two or three. A crafter start would typically send most (or all) of the crafters out with the expeditionary party, from turn 1 onward, to seek out and handle these types of challenges.

In higher difficulties, you don't want to actually seek out fight challenges in the early game (because losing hitpoints risks death if other enemies then attack after your turn is complete), so one of the warrior's strengths is effectively reserved for defensive purposes. With only 7 villagers, you would also want to bring out as many people as possible with your expeditionary group, to be able to more safely handle challenges. Thus, most (or all) of the crafters won't actually be crafting until after you've already gathered materials and/or dissassembled loot from exploration events.

[aegis3d]

I generally go with a gatherer start, even at higher levels, as gathering out in the field is still one of the most efficient ways of gaining power quickly. Even if you cheese the start to get a good location and some good resources, you'll still quickly get more and better goods by walking around. You can make a fairly effective fighting force (though certainly not the best), and if you're smart with your moves, and sacrifice that last movement point, you can build up a lot of very good materials for the crafters to start working on. I'm not sure the crafter start can really get going that quickly, though they are good at challenges. The only comparable way to get much more powerful items quickly are the herbalism/spider queen fights, which the warrior start has an advantage on because of the medic. But that's not quite as predictable. My crafter starts will win challenges and get materials, but they're almost always lower-end materials.

[alan]

Those that go for crafter start: What settings & god are you using?
'cos I just don't get it. I don't get much else other than frustration when I can't make my first half decent wepon before turn 100, it just seems to make the start so slooooow, I can't even put together a self sustaining expedition much before turn 50, if then, and you have to get half decent baskets before the deadweight can do much, so what am I doing that's diferent?

[mk11]

I usually play at 350% difficulty with a fully levelled god and play a crafter start.

Normally, leave a 4 point gatherer (not the hunter) in the village to gather wood and send the other 6 on expedition (make sure they have the best gear, 2 points of wood and a days worth of food, also send the children with them). For the first day they wander around and can take on any 1-skull ruin and any 1-skull lair or wandering party (using an alternative challenge). They can also take on some 2-skull parties or lairs using an alternative challenge appropriate to their god's bonuses.

You can use sneak on skeleton parties to get some gear and hunting on spiders for silk or bees for amber.

During the first night, take all the characters in an expedition that wanders around 1-hex from the village and ends each turn disbanded in the village to do some gathering and crafting. Mostly, concentrate on crafting food to get at least the bonus for 5 food stuffs. If there is excess craft a few basic clothes (using amber if you have some), craft a set of crafting tools if you can get at least +3.

During second day leave your best crafter at the village and send everyone else on expedition. There may be some minor quests to complete or more ruins or lairs to take out. Also should be able to use last movement point to sometimes stop and gather wood or a basic food. End up back at the village for the night.

Keep research points back until you have the materials and time you need to craft/construct the new stuff.

Particularly good events to get are the Herbs and spider event (usually get a lot of wicker), the boars (for enchanted bones) - party will have needed to get some gear before that. The ruined tower (if you get trapped use the physical option). Crows nest is good but risky until you have improved the party. Dragon bones is good but run away from some of the options until the party is stronger.

If you get hold of some wicker, make one set of gathering tools but keep the rest back to make jewelry (monster bone rings for strength and divination for hex challenges) - unless you have coal at the village. If you get some enchanted bone keep it and make 2 shields - opens up hex challenges.

Priority of things to do are: Make 10 food stuffs, build a smithy (3-point ideally, e.g. granite and monster bone), get 2 spectral shields, make a few strength rings.