Liberty Bells and the REF

[snoopy369]

I like that one ... makes it sound like I can eat them for dinner

[Dale]

Originally posted by conmcb25
But whats better a few more FF's with a huge REF or a few less FF's, and a smaller REF?

There are some people who don't believe that's balanced. There are some people that want all the FF's and a small REF.

[bigcat55404]

Heh... to be fair, if you get a quarter of the FFs and still end up having to face 50 dragoons, 80 artillery, and 30 MoWs, I don't know that you could call it "balanced" exactly. I guess my point is that it's hard to play any other way because unless you purposely keep yourself from making LBs, you end up facing an unusually large REF. If the trade-offs are fair, then yes, it's balanced. If you can't really be reasonably expected to play any other way, that's a different story.

... But that's just my understanding based on what people are saying. I haven't actually made it to independence yet. *sheepish*

[snoopy369]

50 dragoons, 80 arty, and 30 MoWs is perfectly reasonable. If you can't beat that you're not playing very carefully The complaint that I consider reasonable is the difficulty level not scaling well; at the harder difficulty, you should be able to handle hundreds of REFs.

Remember, a quarter of the FFs is what you ought to get. If you get only that, you're generating an average level...

[gianni989]

Whats a FF and how do you get it?

[Impaler[WrG]]

I call this the "Rapid Revolt" strategy (keeping LB low until late game and ramping up very rapidly to get to 50% and start revolution). Its a bit boring to have have all those FF's (Founding Fathers) through the course of the game but it makes the final war easier.

Speaking of which that war requires radically different tactics from the standard Civ4 tactics, don't defend the cities, they are death traps. Abandon the cities, arm everyone regardless of their training and fight in the forests. Attack any time you can get a royal unit alone, defend only when on excellent terrain + terrain promotions. You will lose cities but if you've built inland you use Russian tactics and retreat using the land to your advantage. Alternatively some players use a "Atlantic Wall" strategy which seeks to drive the royals into the sea with decisive thrusts of your Panzers... I mean Dragoons. You need at least as many troops as the wave size of the royal forces (typically a quarter to a sixth of their total force). If you can annihilate them all on the turn they land and suffer no retaliation and heal up before the next wave its a breeze, but if your forces break your screwed.

[Vesayen]

I had no trouble getting FFs without making liberty bells. Each FF needs politics points and either more politics, or miliarty, trade or exploration. Trade and exploration come easy naturally, just devote 1 or 2 settlements just to build up miliarty or politics points.

[Dale]

I like to overload on dragoons, and concentrate on withdrawal promotions. That way you'll recover a lot more dragoons from battle to retreat to safety to heal while the rest finish off the damaged REF.

[Unimatrix11]

Impaler brings up an interesting point about the rev-war in the game. People complain, that the REF is like twice the size of the force they could possibly field. But they seem to tend to forget, that the king can only land with a fraction of that at once. If the complains are ligit, i cannot say yet, tho, cause i just ordered the game like an hour ago...

[Dale]

I find that you can face a 4 to 1 REF and it'll be 50:50 if you win. It seems that is the breakeven ratio.

People seem to see 500 units in REF and panic, when in fact a rebel army of 200 can clean them up.

[bigcat55404]

Fair enough... I am glad to defer to experience, here, and yes, I'm one of those people that sobs and clutches their blanket when a dozen REF dragoons come over the hill. I have a delicate constitution.

The crux of my point was still that having trade-offs don't automatically mean it's balanced... they need to be *fair* trade-offs for that. But if your sense is that players are not horribly screwing themselves by getting a few FFs (via LBs), I will trust your judgement. I'd even be curious to see if you could grab almost all the FFs and win the war thanks to so many bonuses!

[Supr49er]

Originally posted by gianni989
Whats a FF and how do you get it?

FF = Founding Father.
Accumulate points in five different areas to get a FF in each of those areas.

[Victor Galis]

Originally posted by Dale


There are some people who don't believe that's balanced. There are some people that want all the FF's and a small REF.

But right now the larger REF is too much of a penalty for acquiring some of the FF. The problem may just be that some of the FF aren't very good. I mean... whee! a free Frigate from a late game FF.

I'm thinking the REF should start bigger and increase in size slower. In the original Colonization building a vast, rebellious empire didn't lead to an overwhelming response from the homeland. It was larger, yes. Right now it seems like being successful in the early game is a liability.

[snoopy369]

LBs do a lot more than generate FFs. Indian land becomes yours with LBs, after all, and you get significant production bonuses.

In the harder levels, the REF is pretty much balanced now, I think ... it's only the easier levels where it's a problem.

[Asmodeous]

So snoopy, then would you say the perceived imbalance a lot of us have who aren't honestly fiendish enough to crank along on the highest difficulty levels is because the REF isn't scaling down properly to assume that we aren't butt-kickers like the rest of you?

Me.