[Baalz]

Sorry, my guides are all based on default settings, where noted (all the recent ones) using CBM. I'd also like to reiterate that I'd be a bit surprised and disappointed if people took what I wrote and tried to just apply it verbatim with no discovery of their own. People are always asking if its CBM or not, what the settings are, and pointing out that there's not enough points for the very specific thing I just laid out (because of a typo or an oversight on my part which doesn't really impact the idea). Thing is, each game (particularly MP!) is going to vary so much that a formulaic approach certainly won't work. I don't in any way attempt to give an exhaustive analysis of a nation and all the different ways it could be played with all the different settings in all the different scenarios you'll find yourself in. Obviously playing under hard research is going to impact some of the suggestions I make, sometimes it's just the luck of the draw and despite your best efforts you can't find the gems you need for what I suggest and instead have a pile of some other gem you'll have to decide how best to use. Sometimes, trying the same strategy you're going to blast through indies and pile up gold, sometimes you're going to be surrounded by heavy cavalry and dark vines and have a stunted growth, sometimes your capital is in high resource mountains, playing with indies at 9 will change stuff as well. Despite the fact that I often write from a perspective of "you'll do this then that" by necessity it's intended to really be suggesting fairly general patterns which are useful in different situations while illustrating some common situations through the usual span of a game. As is obvious from the response there are often dramatic different and effective angles on nations which didn't occur to me. Think of it, kind of like observing one specific game played by me with a running commentary of what thoughts were going through my head as I made my decisions - even I wouldn't be able to exactly duplicate that in another game.