The Anteroom - community discussion thread

**Nightbringer** · 07-07-2011, 05:45

yep, I feel like the balance in 6.4 is really in the sweet spot. Cav feels powerful but not indestructible.

As for A Song of Ice and Fire, I would definitely recommend it if you were looking to read some more fantasy. It can be pretty graphic and is definitely "dark" fantasy. It is also quite an investment of time, with 4 books currently with ~800 pages each. And a new one coming out soon. The first book is "A Game of Thrones." There is an HBO series of it right now but I haven't seen any of it so I can't speak to the quality of that. There is also an RTS being made based on it, I think that is still a long way off though.

**phonicsmonkey** · 07-07-2011, 05:50

Ah it's Game of Thrones. You are officially the third person to recommend that to me. The TV series is for Sean Bean fans as far as I can tell

Speaking of TV, I can't get enough of Spartacus...I just rewatched Blood and Sand after seeing Gods of the Arena. Love it. The acting and dialogue is terrible on the whole but the plot is pretty good and it's full of sex and violence, which is what the monkey likes...

**Nightbringer** · 07-07-2011, 05:59

well, there is lots of sex and violence in those books. As for spartacus, I tried and episode and the history major in me had to shut it off. I might enjoy it as entertainment if I gave it more of a chance though.

**phonicsmonkey** · 07-07-2011, 06:02

That is the only way to enjoy it. History it is not. My wife calls it gladiator-p0rn and she has it about right. It will be interesting to see whether they attempt to be historically accurate at all about the much-better documented events that follow his escape from the Ludus...

**Zim** · 07-07-2011, 07:44

Make that 4 people, it's a great series. My father's reading the books right now. I'll have to ask him how the show compares.

Aside from exposure to the Sharpe series through my father I hadn't really seen much fo Sean Bean before, but I was pleasantly surprised to see Aiden Gillen (from The Wire) in the show.

Originally Posted by phonicsmonkey

Ah it's Game of Thrones. You are officially the third person to recommend that to me. The TV series is for Sean Bean fans as far as I can tell

Speaking of TV, I can't get enough of Spartacus...I just rewatched Blood and Sand after seeing Gods of the Arena. Love it. The acting and dialogue is terrible on the whole but the plot is pretty good and it's full of sex and violence, which is what the monkey likes...

**Myth** · 07-07-2011, 15:29

1. ASOIAF is one of the greatest fantasy series ever! It's in my top 4 with LOTR, WoT and the Chronicles of Amber. Definitely read it. READ IT. NOW!
2. Watch the TV series after you have read the book. GRRM has done his best with the scripts and advising the HBO staff, but there is only so much stuff one can fit in 10 episodes per season. Books first, TV after.
3. SS is great. Definitely play with Gracul's AI, the other AIs are too passive and it's too easy to have unbreakable 200 turn alliances. Gracul is the way to go if you want a challenge. Try BGR4 if you have tons of time to read and learn the rules. It's somewhat of a chore though, so i've abandoned it for now. BTW in an Early campaign in SS Genral's Bodyguards still rule the battle map. Wherever there is only one enemy cav unit (or better yet-none) you can win with a GB alone. I've taken every rebel settlement on the British Isles in SP with just a unit of GB and a unit of Miles cav. I siege, the AI sallies and I kill them. This doesn't work in hotseat however, as when the Rebel turn comes the AI just autocalcs the sally battle and you lose horribly.

Monkey I'd also advise you to play with Real Rercruitment on in SP - it makes it harder to blitz the AI since you lack quality troops and the AI can always out-spearmilita you with it's massive gold and unit boosts. As England I eliminated the moors but had to fight around 6-7 full stacks to do so! And they had a bunch more but I eliminated them before they could use them!

Oh TATW is great value for a mod. It shows superb effort has been put in the making of it. What I also don't quite enjoy about it is that he map is huge but kind of bland - a settlement every 500 miles or so, not like the clusterfark that is Western and Central Europe in regular M2TW :D

BTW there is a Weseteros mod in the making (hosted on the .net) I've downloaded the alpha and it's nice, but the full version looks so much better.. *drool*. Go and check it out if you want.

**Visor** · 07-07-2011, 23:36

I've won a few hotseats. I like a lot of the mods released, BC, TATW, SS, KGCM. (KGCM is good for SP IMO). (Just not the HS patch version.)

I've killed the Mongols turn 2 as Khwarez on LE before.... ;)

I've seen the Turks do well once in a hotseat game, SS6.3. But they would've lost against me (Cumans, love my Cumans) and the Romans.

**phonicsmonkey** · 07-08-2011, 01:50

Originally Posted by Visorslash

I've killed the Mongols turn 2 as Khwarez on LE before.... ;)

They don't believe you over at TWC

**Visor** · 07-08-2011, 02:02

Cause they are heretics. :P I'll post some pics.

**LooseCannon1** · 07-08-2011, 13:49

Originally Posted by phonicsmonkey

They don't believe you over at TWC

That was me. And now that he's finally posted the screen shots

In case no one realizes it. I was chief beta-tester for 6.2 and this strategy never crossed our minds. I've got to Pm gracul and remind him to put "horde" mode back into the mongols for the next update .

That'll teach you.

**Kogitsune** · 07-08-2011, 17:16

Originally Posted by Myth

1. ASOIAF is one of the greatest fantasy series ever! It's in my top 4 with LOTR, WoT and the Chronicles of Amber. Definitely read it. READ IT. NOW!
2. Watch the TV series after you have read the book. GRRM has done his best with the scripts and advising the HBO staff, but there is only so much stuff one can fit in 10 episodes per season. Books first, TV after.

can't agree more with 1.WOT 2.ASOIAF 3.LOTR

Just checked my amazon account.. i've pre-ordered book 5 of ASOIAF abt 2 years ago, and it notified me today that it would ship next week ... finally!
As for the HBO show of ASOIAF: very enjoyable (as usual with HBO) and very true to the books, however not deep enough to fully appreciate the story if you haven't already read the books, you miss a lot of stuff I feel one shouldn't be missing :)

**Zim** · 07-08-2011, 18:45

I've been wondering about that. I hadn't read the books yet because I was afraid they'd spoil the show more than the show would spoil the books (figuring the first book would have far more detail, plus maybe some story lines that the show might not have been able to include).

Originally Posted by Kogitsune

As for the HBO show of ASOIAF: very enjoyable (as usual with HBO) and very true to the books, however not deep enough to fully appreciate the story if you haven't already read the books, you miss a lot of stuff I feel one shouldn't be missing :)

**Kogitsune** · 07-08-2011, 21:16

The show wont spoil the books, because the books contain a vast amount of details the show doesnt. Plus, the books are so superbly written, that even though i did like the dialogues in the show, the books still come out far on top.
besides, it's only book 1 which as been filmed, you can still breeze through it and enjoy the next 4 :)

I assure you, if you dig fantasy, ASOIAF is a must read