What’s your favourite nation FP duo?
… and why…
Clint (GM)
Gotta be Noldo/Harad… Superb characters and superb military backed up by a potential
killer economy… Ha, Corsiars and QA usually beats Harad… lol
Some random musings
Never played the NG/Dun but got some thoughts on what I’d like to do there.
Played the NM/Dw with Conjure mounts (dwarven mages) and that was actually a lot of fun and very competitive.
Eothriam/SG seem like a whole world of pain. Arth/Wood - that’s good fun as well - mid-game can be slightly boring but not too bad. Card/Sind is great fun - best combat I’ve found for the FP when it kicks off.
Nold/Hara - well a bit too much in the way of characters for me but it can be cute as well.
Clint (player)
Best Combo is probably Cardolan/Sinda. Great military in Cardolan and good characters with Sinda.
SG/Eothraim if played right could be fun, but not so much if the Dark Servants throw everything at you early and the Dwarves/Northmen don’t support you. To much dependancy on the other nations early.
Harad stinks, if free or dark.
I find the Dwarves boring as well.
Arthedain probably my favorite nation to play overall, so the Woodmen/Arthedain could be fun as well.
tim
I played Woo/SGo… now that was a great combination… both in very busy arenas… nice blend of massive armies and potential characters
not too keen on Woo/Art combo… sounds too boring…
and not sure if SGo/Eot is that great a combo… since SGo must recruit v heavily to support both Har and NGo, which leaves Eot alone with lots of enemies and little support
Just re-read your comments after writing mine… looks like we are completely opposed in our likes/dislikes as I also like the Dwa!!
Hi MichaelK,
I guess we should be teammates, as our nation preferences most likely would not overlap.
later
tim
I’m a relative newbie to Gunboat, but the number of negative comments about 3/7 in this thread is somewhat telling…
Seems like a heavy load in terms of responsibility (2 of the 3 major FP militaries), without a whole lot of opportunity for direct support. I guess the “idea” was that SG could bankroll EO… of course, DS agents are quite capable of draining SG’s treasury (and should do so!).
I really like the Eothraim, but this combo doesn’t do it for me.
I played the Eothraim (Ken Shannon played Southern Gondor) in gunboat 7. It was an immense amount of fun, but hey, I like tough positions. I don’t think that it’s a weak combination at all.
In game 7, Southern Gondor went south full-force (leaving Northern Gondor without direct military support at the Ithil Pass) to reinforce Harad and overwhelm the Corsairs. Great play by the Harad, by the way. The two of them together overran the Corsairs.
Eothraim burned 3822 (and captured 4025… then started burning LR camps), captured 3120, recaptured 3020, burned 3421, 3321, 3121 and 3022 and wiped out the Dog Lord starting army at 3221. This shattered the Dog Lord economic base early and sealed the northern gate of Mordor. (Northern Gondor took 3621, so I didn’t have to. Nice play by Northern Gondor in general).
Essentially the Eothraim bottled the darks up in mordor and diverted enough infantry forces to the Northmen that the Long Rider couldn’t break him, then torched Morrannon, Durthang, and Osgiliath with cavalry and war machines when the opportunity arose. Southern Gondor overran the Corsairs with the Harad.
In my opinion the Eothraim / SG combination is strong, but the trick is to not attempt to combine your military or character might against a single target. Rather, I’d send the two nations in two completely directions and support your allies with lots of military. Consider going to kill the Corsairs with Southern Gondor (or hit the QA, or go after the Fire King). With the Eothraim, I’d divert some troops to supporting the Northmen so that the LR can’t break him, and use the rest to keep Rhovannion in free hands and free of evil armies while burning as much as possible. In game 7 we didn’t attempt to “win the game” by breaking Mordor-- rather we tried to make the game “winnable” for the Free in general by keeping Mordor pinned down with the Eothraim while the Free won everywhere else (Rhun Sea, Angmar, Mirkwood, Umbar).
Sending a single huge army to torch Morrannon or Durthang (or even Dol Guldur) may be fun-- especially if it works-- but good play on the other side can prevent this every time (at least at Morannon and Durthang).
A couple of caveats:
(1) The darks will send agents to drain the Eothraim treasury, but the Darks can’t eliminate the Eothraim if the Eothraim have a strong enough economy and Southern Gondor funnels gold as needed to cover the deficit (and order that occur before order 690) in each turn. Just keep a very close eye on your economy and deficit each turn! You will need lots and lots of troops.
In game 7, I had the following deficits: (-22,723 deficit turn 5) (-20,413 deficit turn 10)(-14743 deficit turn 15)(-917 deficit turn 20). The deficit dropped as I reduced the number of troops I was fielding following the destruction of Morrannon and Durthang.
(2) I had very good allies in Harad and Northern Gondor, and a very determined Northmen who didn’t give up even though the Long Rider was camped outside his capital. That helps immensely. A less determined Northmen would have fallen.
Interesting. This reinforces a lot of my thoughts about this position, as you essentially didn’t play it as a “combination”, rather as two separate nations with economic support going from SG -> EO. The fact you had two players splitting the pair probably encouraged that approach.
I’d very much like to comment on my present situation, which is in some ways the polar opposite of what you’ve described, but that will have to wait until the war is ended…
[QUOTE=Diehard;34770]Interesting. This reinforces a lot of my thoughts about this position, as you essentially didn’t play it as a “combination”, rather as two separate nations with economic support going from SG -> EO. The fact you had two players splitting the pair probably encouraged that approach.
I just finished my first GB as SG/Eo and the positions offered about everything I had hoped for. As far as economic support, I simply gave Eo some towns so he could hold his own. I used the combined strength of both militaries and enjoyed great success moving about Mordor. I also chose to name many agents for Eo and all of a sudden it was not so easy to pick off those comms. I think some players underestimate the use of agents w/military nations and against an opponent that uses their agents effectively, you can quickly have several comms captured. SG’s main focus was taking out the Corsairs navy and I was able to do that fairly early which allowed Harad to enjoy success in his planning and execution down south while allowing SG to pick his fights. While this duo is built for battle, a good plan is equally as important.
Dan
GB54
I think the absolute power of NG/Duns is amazing. Of course no-one will be surprised to hear that they’re my favorite GB FP combo. If I ever get time, I’m going to write up an article for Bree on why they’re so awesome in GB. But the quick summary is this:
They have everything that you need in GB in one nation pair:
- huge economies
- military might and the ability to continually refresh it
- intelligence gathering capability to the max (palantirs are your friends!)
- enemies right next door so that military might gets used efficiently (i.e. the maintenance cost expended building military prior to the use of military power is about as good as you can find in the game)
- agent / scouting
- freedom / time to build up emmies & agents to help the mid/end-game
I agree with Dan above that in GB, the FP simply can’t ignore agents & emmies in favor of being all-military all-the-time. That’s a bad recipe for the case where the DS survive into the mid game…
Dave
Probably why I thought you were Northern Gondor/Duns last gunboat game Dave.
I agree about the agent with the free side. I named an agent turn one last game with Southern Gondor and an agent on turn 5 with the Eothraim. Both made huge impacts on the game.
Tim
While I consider Arthedain having the most potentail of the FP’s teaming them up with WM presents inetresting challnges…
But for the Buck I really like EO/SG becuase it most fit’s my style of play and everything I need to spell doom for DS. So my choice is this one…
I can play militray powerhouse in EO and support with SG massive resources… Us Naval power at will… Do all my own mage work including artifact lore… Make a killer agent immediately… and Mass HC!! all the stuff that makes the game fun.
The most fun one is without doubt NG/Dun, limited weaknesses, that for most part gets solved by the other nation (NG lack of agents, fer instance).
Most challenging would be Harad/Noldo, trying to get a lot of artifacts, and keep Harad allive, if the Corsair/QA/LR/CL are competent players…
Arth/Woodmen can be rough, if Card and Arth doesn’t read each others moves. Woodmen is allways rough, especially if Sinda doesn’t help enough.