Starting the game with DLC

[ashi]

I want to play this game, but not sure if it's a good idea for a newbie to start with dlc or just the base game. Does the dlc just make the beginning of the game too confusing and "too much"? Can the dlc be disabled from a menu and turned on once I'm comfortable with the mechanics of the game? Thanks!

[ValhallasAshes]

Yes the DLC can be individually enabled and disabled. But I don't think you can disable a DLC once it's been enabled in a game session. You can enable a DLC in an existing session, but can't disable it. You will have to restart a new session or load an earlier save before it was enabled to make the choice of enabling again. I prefer the game with the DLC and I do think the game does a decent job of breaking you into the game. But admittedly, it can be daunting.

I've done a list of my must haves in another thread if you want more information on the various DLCs. Here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/916440/discussions/0/3784750482951474461/

[ashi]

Originally posted by ValhallasAshes:

Yes the DLC can be individually enabled and disabled. But I don't think you can disable a DLC once it's been enabled in a game session. You can enable a DLC in an existing session, but can't disable it. You will have to restart a new session or load an earlier save before it was enabled to make the choice of enabling again. I prefer the game with the DLC and I do think the game does a decent job of breaking you into the game. But admittedly, it can be daunting.

I've done a list of my must haves in another thread if you want more information on the various DLCs. Here: https://steamcommunity.com/app/916440/discussions/0/3784750482951474461/

Thank you for a very useful answer!

[Hundinger]

Careful! You can NOT enable a DLC later when you disabled it in the beginning. You can enable new DLCs when you load your save, but if you say no thanks, that's it.

Just start with all DLCs enabled and know this: you don't have to do them all at once. Just because the game tells you can go to the arctic now (for example) you don't have to do it. Make sure everything is fine where you are before you go somewhere else. Concentrate on one session at a time. If you do that it won't be stressful. But if you do everything at once, settle the new world, the arctic and enbesa at the same time and constantly jump between those sessions it will be very stressful and overwhelming. So don't do that, find your own pace.

If you only pick one star AI they won't go anywhere before you do, so there is no pressure to unlock a region.

[ValhallasAshes]

My mistake. Sorry about that. I've always ran the game with all the DLC enabled and my experience with DLC enabling in the middle of a session is because I rarely start a new game session after buying new DLC. Just enabling it in the game session I'm already playing. But I do remember seeing the game asking me which DLCs I want enabled during the game creation settings process.

One thing I can definitely confirm is when Hundinger says to just take your time and don't go into an area until you're ready to exploit it. This is very much true. While the game is very much a competitive match with the AI, the AI will never enter an area until "after" you've discovered it. So you don't ever have worry about any of your AI competitors already being in an area (apart from storyline AIs which never claim islands) when you first discover them. You will always get first dibs. So just try not to discover a new area until you're ready to claim/exploit it, because if you discover but not claim, the AI will eventually expand into the newly discovered regions. But you realize pretty quickly that it's really easy to control the flow of the game by just intentionally not triggering new areas until you're ready. And even if you do accidentally, autosaves are plenty and regular enough that its really easy to just load an earlier save without losing much or any real work.

Anno can feel like it throws it a lot at you, but it's generally really easy to control the flow of your own game.

[Hundinger]

Originally posted by ValhallasAshes:

While the game is very much a competitive match with the AI, the AI will never enter an area until "after" you've discovered it. So you don't ever have worry about any of your AI competitors already being in an area (apart from storyline AIs which never claim islands) when you first discover them.

As much as I know 2 and 3 stars AI do go to other places before you do, if you are slow. The exception being the arctic. I only play with one stars, so I can't speak of experience, but I'm pretty sure that's true.

[Squirrelfoot]

I am playing with all the DLC enabled with two of the one star AI competitors. I have not been to the Arctic yet and just reached the Engineers in my city. However, I noticed that my competitors are starting to fly around in the blimps dropping leaflets. Any idea on how they got them if they can't go there before I do?

[Hundinger]

The blimps can be produced in the new world if you have the empire of skies DLC. And the leaflet mechanic is part of that DLC. Pretty annoying mechancic, if you ask me.

[ValhallasAshes]

Originally posted by Hundinger:

Originally posted by ValhallasAshes:

While the game is very much a competitive match with the AI, the AI will never enter an area until "after" you've discovered it. So you don't ever have worry about any of your AI competitors already being in an area (apart from storyline AIs which never claim islands) when you first discover them.

As much as I know 2 and 3 stars AI do go to other places before you do, if you are slow. The exception being the arctic. I only play with one stars, so I can't speak of experience, but I'm pretty sure that's true.

Wow, I did not know that. I've played 2 and 3 star AI a couple times, but to be honest, they didn't survive long enough for that to happen in my game. But I mostly play to relax, so I "mostly" play with lower difficulty AI's so I can kill them off quickly because I prefer a more relaxed game to focus on building and optimizing to build as big of a city as possible. The competitive AI's tend to get in the way of that. Even in my current game, I killed off the AI competitors long ago. So I guess I assumed they followed the same regional rules as the lower ranked AI's. If what you say is true of the higher ranked AI's, I never knew about it, nor observed it. Just goes to show, I have hundreds of hours in this game and I still learn new things all the time. In which case, for your first game, I would recommend limiting your AI opponents to 1 star opponents.

[Someone]

Originally posted by Squirrelfoot:

I am playing with all the DLC enabled with two of the one star AI competitors. I have not been to the Arctic yet and just reached the Engineers in my city. However, I noticed that my competitors are starting to fly around in the blimps dropping leaflets. Any idea on how they got them if they can't go there before I do?

That is probably one of the reasons why I wouldn't recommend starting out with all the DLCs. You might not visit the new worlds but your opponents will, and they might take all the good islands with the best resources while you are not there.

The base world alone takes a while to get used too, so I would honestly recommend to start without any DLC and to then turn them on one by one once you feel comfortable with the base game

[Hundinger]

Originally posted by Someone:

Originally posted by Squirrelfoot:

I am playing with all the DLC enabled with two of the one star AI competitors. I have not been to the Arctic yet and just reached the Engineers in my city. However, I noticed that my competitors are starting to fly around in the blimps dropping leaflets. Any idea on how they got them if they can't go there before I do?

That is probably one of the reasons why I wouldn't recommend starting out with all the DLCs. You might not visit the new worlds but your opponents will, and they might take all the good islands with the best resources while you are not there.

The base world alone takes a while to get used too, so I would honestly recommend to start without any DLC and to then turn them on one by one once you feel comfortable with the base game

Playing with one star AI makes this a non issue. And you cannot turn them on one by one. The decision that you make at the start is final.