How bad is starving?

[DonCorazon]

Hi, its the noob, DC here. So I am in my first MP game and just dawned on me I was looking at the resources number and not the supply number of the province where my massive army is poised to attack the foul smelling Shinuyamans (sorry, spacht). So now I am wondering how bad are the effects. The description of diseased sounds like you get afflictions every turn. How long can my force remain viable? Is having starving troops fight a bad idea or a way to cull the herd so there is more food to go around for the strong?

Also, if I get them to a province with enough supply, are they instantly back to healthy? By healthy, I don't mean cured of afflictions, as I know those are hard to get rid of, but I mean will they have that one turn cushion of being at the starving stage before the diseases kick in if they set out in low supply lands again?

Thanks, this is a great game, in spite of my stream of dumb mistakes leading to the needless deaths and suffering of many of Ulm's finest... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Starving is -4 morale instantly. Disease takes a while to kick in. When defending a fortress, starvation can be quite nasty. For both the attacker and defender. When raiding, especially with a disposable force, starvation isn't really a concern, even if its happening.

Starving troops will break and run very quickly. It's kind of hard to cull the herd in that case. But you won't be starving cause your army will be scattered around several provinces.

[Endoperez]

Diseased, living units never heal, and get 1 point of damager/turn. They'll also often get afflictions.

Starvation only kicks in after the unit suffers from it for the second turn. So moving in, starving, and moving out is perfectly safe.

Your own fortresses "radiate" supply lines to provinces near them, so having a fort nearby could save your troops. If you have researched Thaumaturgy 2, I suggest casting Gnome Lore on all provinces near the Shinuyama capital - you might get lucky and get a fortress from a site. Mountains and wastes have better chance of delivering, and searching empty provinces is better than ones which already have 3 of the 4 possible sites.

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Can recruit enough indie shamans, you can alleviate your starvation, as well. Not the best idea, but I'll throw it out there. As well, those indie shamans can often forge bags of endless wine for fifty supply.

[DonCorazon]

Thanks guys, very helpful. Btw, is there a hotkey to pickout starving troops, as there is for wounded troops?

[Rathar]

Nay

[Arralen]

Starvation is distributed randomly each turn ... therefore it wouldn't make much sense to pick out "starving" troops.

[DonCorazon]

I want to pick out the starving ones to send them back to a province with supplies and send the ones that are not starving on to fight. The non-starving ones won't have the morale penalty. The province they move into to fight has enough supplies for them. Not sure why that doesn't make sense?

Also, holding down 'S' does pick out the starving troops.

[Endoperez]

Wow, I never knew that! Cool!

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

I agree with Endoperez. But I have to add a
Smack to (my) forehead and say, why didn't I try that?! If w=wound, why wouldn't s=starve?!

[Jazzepi]

Arralen said:
Starvation is distributed randomly each turn ... therefore it wouldn't make much sense to pick out "starving" troops.



It makes a lot of sense. Starving troops, even if they have no afflictions take a -4 hit to morale which can be a huge swing in a squad morale check. It can be very useful to simply leave the low morale troops in the province that they're in before the army moves.

Jazzepi

[Rathar]

I am so pleased to be wrong! That is quite handy!

[vfb]

Yes, it's very useful. Thank you! If anyone is listening, a 'd' to filter out all diseased units would also be nice. Not that I'd do anything as evil as ship all my poor diseased troops to the closest front as cannon fodder, or failing that dump them in the nearest ocean.

[Edratman]

Add me to the list of players who were unaware of the "s" sort.

On the same topic, how does everyone else deal with supplying large armies if you don't have nature? I've taken to only playing nations with nature so I can forge summer sword, broth pot and wine bag. I have in the past empowered indy mages to 2N to forge the +1N flower mace, and gone from there, but I've had unlucky games without encountering an animal tribe or druid for way too long and finally quit playing nations without at least 1N on a recruitable mage. I know there are many commanders with a turkey leg (supply bonus) but I would rather make my commanders research, forge or command, not have 4 or 5 of them schlep around functioning as supply wagons. And supply commanders are a lot more vulnerable than a fully outfitted commander with 3 supply asset items.

The supply pigs of the Heims are great, but I'm now into playing (or trying) to play everyone else, but only if they have a N pick.

[Edi]

Even I didn't know about the 's' shortcut, which is going to come in right useful sooner or later. Thanks for the heads-up! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[NTJedi]

Edratman said:
Add me to the list of players who were unaware of the "s" sort.




I knew about the 's' sorting, there's also an 'e' sorting which will seperate units of more than 2 stars of experience from others. Usually I use the 'e' sorting for seperating archer types since most melee units have a shorter lifespan on the battlefield.

In the past I've also tried 'h' for horror-marking yet no luck and 'c' for cursed units yet no luck. Horror-marked guards can be useful for a commander/mage which has been horror-marked. Depending on the location of the magic site 'Infinite Vale of Horrors' it can be worthwhile horror marking specific types of units you own.

[duke_commando]

Edratman said:
Add me to the list of players who were unaware of the "s" sort.

On the same topic, how does everyone else deal with supplying large armies if you don't have nature? I've taken to only playing nations with nature so I can forge summer sword, broth pot and wine bag. I have in the past empowered indy mages to 2N to forge the +1N flower mace, and gone from there, but I've had unlucky games without encountering an animal tribe or druid for way too long and finally quit playing nations without at least 1N on a recruitable mage. I know there are many commanders with a turkey leg (supply bonus) but I would rather make my commanders research, forge or command, not have 4 or 5 of them schlep around functioning as supply wagons. And supply commanders are a lot more vulnerable than a fully outfitted commander with 3 supply asset items.

The supply pigs of the Heims are great, but I'm now into playing (or trying) to play everyone else, but only if they have a N pick.


Theres not a lot you can do without supply items that I know of, except split your army into parts and try to keep to high supply provinces.
Starving also comes after battles so you can attack an enemy in a low supply province and your guys will fight the battle without the starving debuff. Then you can move to a richer province next turn.

[Rasit]

[...]So now I am wondering how bad are the effects.[...]



I made the mistake of attacking a marsh with a supply lowering death site, to make matters worse I accidentally hit e instead of r, twice!

This (http://img66.imageshack.us/my.php?image=domlj2.jpg) was my small strike force before (they won this fight easily).

This (http://img114.imageshack.us/my.php?image=domdiseaseme0.jpg) was some turn later after the little swamp vacation, they were joined by the Inquisitor and the Angel after the previous battle.

Since everyone got a disease I was forced to get them in a battle every 4 turn, luckily I had a regeneration bless. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

[vfb]

Rasit said:
I made the mistake of attacking a marsh with a supply lowering death site,



Do you mean with a death-scale-increasing site? Which one? Are you sure it was not a disease-causing site?


to make matters worse I accidentally hit e instead of r, twice!



Do you mean 'e' instead of 'w'?


[...]Since everyone got a disease I was forced to get them in a battle every 4 turn, luckily I had a regeneration bless. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif



If you leave your army parked for 8 turns in a disease-causing site, there's a very good chance everyone will get sick. I'm not 100% sure, but I don't think your commanders will get diseased just because of supply problems. Army yes, commanders no.

[Wick]

No, he means he ended the turn while trying to recruit. It happens rarely but all too often.

[Edratman]

Wick said:
No, he means he ended the turn while trying to recruit. It happens rarely but all too often.



I agree that it happens too often. I take a lot of care to avoid the "end turn" in error, but once in a while I still make the mistake. I again maintain that I would not be offended by "are you too stupid to hit the right button?" popup, and one more mouse click added to hundred or so per turn would not significently harm me either.