Let's review advantages/disadvantages
of Nationalists faction:
- 20% increase in supply ranges of
settlements
- 1 additional component slot
- 25% more expensive upgrade cost
- Elite Guards
Because of the additional component slot, most of your settlements will
stay at village level. With 2 component slots you can have a bank and
iron export boosting your economy. However, the disadvantage of this is
that you only get +1 company per village. So, even with 3 villages you
will be limited to only 3 companies. If you wish to play Nats well, you
will need to expand, expand, expand.
There is no one RIGHT way to play with
Nats but here is how I usually play.
In my first village I build bank + iron export. You don't want to
upgrade your first village to town because it will cost you 200 gold. It
is more efficient to build 2 new villages then upgrade.
So, in my second village i will usually build another bank and iron
export (unless I know the enemy is near and need some units fast). In my
third village I will build a woodmill and a group of 6 scouts and start
exploring.
Skipping ahead. Lets say you found 3
wood mines near your settlements then you should quickly get yourself a
group of engineers going and pump out some wood units (footmen or
archers). If you find lots of iron, then get some infantry/grenadiers or
dragoons. There are endless possibilities, just adjust to your map.
Because you don't want to upgrade to
town too early, your company limit will be always be lower then your
opponents' or even allies'. So, what do you do? Keep expanding even in
mid-to-late game or take over indies and enemy cities. If you are one of
those people who likes to raze enemy towns (I do) then you will need to
expand.
Nats have one of the most powerful support
units in the game, zealots. They do area damage (25-30 dmg in a 3 square
area, I think). So, if your opponent clumps 25 units all together, you
will do (25 to 30 dmg)*25 units which is roughly 625 - 750 dmg. Of
course this situation will not always happen but even if you are faced
with 2 groups of infantry then you will do 25*12=300dmg. In my opinion,
zealots are better then mages but their (zealot's) damage is spread out
unlike mage's direct damage. So, each unit has its pro's and con's.
To get zealots, you will need to spend a lots of gold though. Building a
temple + upgrade will cost you 220 gold unless you use a carpentry guild
which will reduce that cost to 170 gold but will add 88 gold cost for
the carpentry guild. So, it is best to use that carpentry guild in your
town (I'll explain later).
Zealots are a great unit which you can use at any point in the game. You
can put couple of zealots with footmen, or infantry, or grenadiers, or
elites. So, if you have some spare cash, use them!
Next step in my build-up is getting
more advanced units. Nats will usually have 1, maybe 2 towns and the
rest will be villages. This is both good and bad. Because you will have
lots of villages, you will be spread out more so then your opponents
which will leave your vulnerable. However, because you do have so many
villages even if you lose one, your economy will not suffer as much as
it would if you only had 3 major towns/cities. As a comparison, I
usually settle 7-10 villages/towns in every game on top of whatever
towns I capture from my enemy. However, you don't want to lose your main
town because it can halt your units production. So, choose wisely when
you upgrade that one village to a town. Personally, I like to upgrade a
village that is located more or less in the center of my settlements.
Why? Because your enemy will have to go through your other towns before
he will get to this one, giving your sufficient time to build up defenses.
But, on large maps this means that your main city will most likely be
far away from battles. So, as you can see, everything has its up/down
sides.
A good player will try to have a
mixture of troops. So, if you can afford it, get yourself some archers
with infantry troops and have a couple groups of dragoons (with rangers)
for flanking as well as protecting your support units. I like to mix 1
group of elite guards with at least 2 groups of regular grenadiers and
back them up with archers if I can afford it. However, to get all of the
units above you will need 5 component slots and you will only have 4.
Elite guard requires a blacksmith +
barracks + temple + library.
Dragoons require a blacksmith + barrack
Rangers require a woodmill + library.
when you upgrade to town you should
have 2 slots taken by a bank and iron export. Build a carpentry guild
(88 gold). Then build barracks (save 40 gold). Sell
bank (i think for 72 gold) and build Library (save 50 gold) in its
place. You should have iron export, barracks, carpentry guild and
library. With this setup, pump out 2 groups of 4 dragoons and 2 rangers.
Sell iron export (99 gold). Build temple (save 50 gold), sell carpentry
guild (not sure how much it sells for) and build blacksmith. Now you can
pump out elite guards with mage, cleric, zealots (you need to upgrade
temple of course), and other units from this one town. The only units
you will not be able to build here is rangers and archers or any other
units that require a woodmill. That is why you want to build at least 2
groups of dragoons in the mid process. If you wish to build more
dragoons/rangers groups you will need to upgrade another village (or
sell temple and build woodmill in your main town). However, 4 dragoons
and 2 rangers should never be destroyed. Rangers will let your group
quickly retreat to a save position even in the middle of the forest. I
like to use 2 rangers because if one of them dies, I still have another
one to offer trailblazing ability.
Whew, this is a damn long post. Sorry
for that. But I think it has some good tips on how to improve your play
as Nats. Remember, you can have zealots early in the game by building
nightbringer in any of your villages. If you have blacksmith +
nightbringer you can pump out infantry with zealot and cleric support.
In another village you can build blacksmith + library for infantry +
mages support. It is a mixed blessing to have this "bonus"
slot. It lets you build nice groups early in the game and fast but you
can mix and match. One village will be for zealots production and
another for mages but not both (unless you upgrade to town).
I would like to hear any other
strategies people use for playing Nats. Any comments, flames,
suggestions, donations are welcome.