The FULL review official review follows which is by Dar:
Very fun and dramatic game to watch, it was one of those reviews where I didn't get bored once - there was always somewhere to look for activity, right from the start. Although - don't save replays as "Last Replay"!
Hero
Negatives
At the start, you only built one farm in your base - I imagine because you were intending to claim 3 external farms right away on this resource-rich map. I don't believe that on any map it's more efficient to build only one farm in base and go for extra settlements as Gondor: soldiers are just too slow. Isengard I think is the only race that can benefit from this. Certainly, on West Emnet (also plenty of close settlements) it's slower for Gondor to try to expand and only have one resource building at the start than it is to have two and expand when you can.
When Pippin was on no health, you could have run him into a nearby creep lair to die to creeps - that would have denied Prepare the Power Points and also got one of his orc units entangled in creeps.
Took some unnecessary risks with virtually-dead Knight units to trample orc hordes when you had healthy Knights who could have done the job just as easily.
Boromir. It was a hard choice as to whether to include Boromir as a positive or negative. He did do some work killing siege but his damage is so poor that he can only kill orcs, and levels only really slowly from them. It took a while to get the Horn of Gondor, and even then it didn't seem to drive too many Orc units away. For his cost you could have got Gandalf a little faster, or some more towers. When you got Boromir, you already had one summon (maybe the second ... ) and I don't think you were under the immediate threat that required him. Knights that could trample and move faster would have helped more I think. He got most of the way through level 4, and most of that experience was from being close to knights.
Power Point purchasing. Much like Boromir, this is a hard call - you could well have lost earlier than you did without purchasing power points as you did. Particularly I'm thinking of Elven Warriors here. Prepare wasn't going Monsters, so range attacks weren't as imperative as they would be otherwise. Rohirrim allies are better for dealing with catapults and rams which was what you were facing, and as at that point you were pretty much cooped up in your base anyway with the defence towers I think you could have got better use from Rohirrim Warriors earlier. As it is, the fact you got all the Tier 2 powers and then Daybreak denied you the Army of the Dead that could have won you the game - especially given you knew that his Darkness would be refreshed immediately. You've already said that Daybreak was a desparation tactic, but combined with the other wastes I think that it was a real crippler.
Positives
Pippin went on an orc labourer rampage that would have made Tolkein cry. Nice work.
On the whole, excellent management of Knights. You weren't scared to keep them out until the last minute and then return to the well to heal, meaning you cause a lot more damage to Prepare's initial economy than a more conservative player would. Apart from the Gandalf accident (which wasn't your fault), and one point where it was obvious that Faramir would die if he stopped running (and stopped anyway), your micro was excellent.
Tower management was superb. You destroyed them all for most of the game rather than letting Prepare do it ... it was only when it was a choice between tower or hero, later in the game, that he started to actually get killshots on base defences.
Prepare
Negatives
Right at the start, you took Eye of Sauron and used it - immediately giving Hero free usages of Elven Wood
Subsequently, when your orc suicides had already bought you Tainted Land, Hero cast Elven Wood and you didn't immediately overwrite.
Inactive orcs at a lot of points, either hanging around near your base or near Hero's settlements (early on) when they could have been destroying the settlements.
There were a lot of treasure chests on the ground you could have claimed with Gollum or nearby orcs ... not much money in the grand scheme of things but it's worth having.
Several times you had inactive Nazguls that could have creeped (keeping one Nazgul at the southern expansion just to guard it from knights ... this was pre-Gandalf).
Inactive rams right next to Gondor defences. Mordor units are tricky to micromanage and occasionally ignore all orders, so possibly that wasn't your fault.
Despite having vast amounts of money, you never built base defences against any form of assault. Might have been useful to guarantee a safe haven for your Nazgul when the eagles came.
Nazgul. Mostly the Nazgul usage was good, but there were several points (when the Witchking remained still as he was being shot, when the Nazgul kept attacking the citadel that they couldn't destroy and died in the process) that you could and should have avoided.
First Balrog's fire breath didn't really achieve much - it injured two buildings instead of killing them.
Positives
Fast expansion, using orcs as cannon fodder and never letting up the pressure on Hero - Gondor doesn't even get a chance to think about raiding the Mordor base.
Mixed siege. It's refreshing to see someone who builds more than their 'favourite' siege unit. Perhaps a few less rams late game (with so many Knights) and a few more catapults might have done better, but the siege was nicely mixed forcing Hero to choose between taking damage to his base from the rams or his forces from the catapults.
Excellent building plan. Orc pits in the expansions furthest from Hero, and siege works in the ones closer. It was good to see you not go overboard with economy like some Mordors do.
The sneak attack from the north was excellent, leaving a big hole in the north wall that Hero had to pay attention to - even if you didn't manage to capitalise on it overmuch.
The dramatic three-Nazgul flyby as the Balrog destroys the stables in the Gondor base. Awesome. I wanted to screenshot this but after I changed to ultra-high resolution, I couldn't get the replay to load properly (normally I'm in custom, ultra-low graphics). I'm guessing that's due to an animation bug or something. A real shame, it looked very cinematic.
Summary
Overall, this was a very good game. Both players played exceptionally well, but due to the nature of the matchup there are fewer positives I can make about Hero's play (Gondor can't afford to mix units like other races, whereas Mordor with its excellent economy can do so easily) than Prepare's, but I thought both gave a very good performance despite their mistakes (no-one can play perfect, the game is too fast for that).
I think the most important thing about this though is that Prepare's strategy will work even better in 1.02 (although it's a strategy which - like most of Mordor - performs best on Fangorn Forest). I was tempted to make a list of why, but the strategy forum is a better place for that discussion. Link is here to the thread. Should be easy enough to piece together why I think Prepare's strategy will be more effective in 1.02.
This post has been edited by Darky: Apr 19 2005, 19:23 PM
Wow Darky i have never thought you play BFME and be a chairman at the same time. hehe i have watch this replay and im going to give you a Wub for how you played. Wubed
http://www.gamereplays.org/community/index...?showtopic=5646
The FULL review official review follows which is by Dar:
Very fun and dramatic game to watch, it was one of those reviews where I didn't get bored once - there was always somewhere to look for activity, right from the start. Although - don't save replays as "Last Replay"!
Hero
Negatives
- At the start, you only built one farm in your base - I imagine because you were intending to claim 3 external farms right away on this resource-rich map. I don't believe that on any map it's more efficient to build only one farm in base and go for extra settlements as Gondor: soldiers are just too slow. Isengard I think is the only race that can benefit from this. Certainly, on West Emnet (also plenty of close settlements) it's slower for Gondor to try to expand and only have one resource building at the start than it is to have two and expand when you can.
- When Pippin was on no health, you could have run him into a nearby creep lair to die to creeps - that would have denied Prepare the Power Points and also got one of his orc units entangled in creeps.
- Took some unnecessary risks with virtually-dead Knight units to trample orc hordes when you had healthy Knights who could have done the job just as easily.
- Boromir. It was a hard choice as to whether to include Boromir as a positive or negative. He did do some work killing siege but his damage is so poor that he can only kill orcs, and levels only really slowly from them. It took a while to get the Horn of Gondor, and even then it didn't seem to drive too many Orc units away. For his cost you could have got Gandalf a little faster, or some more towers. When you got Boromir, you already had one summon (maybe the second ... ) and I don't think you were under the immediate threat that required him. Knights that could trample and move faster would have helped more I think. He got most of the way through level 4, and most of that experience was from being close to knights.
- Power Point purchasing. Much like Boromir, this is a hard call - you could well have lost earlier than you did without purchasing power points as you did. Particularly I'm thinking of Elven Warriors here. Prepare wasn't going Monsters, so range attacks weren't as imperative as they would be otherwise. Rohirrim allies are better for dealing with catapults and rams which was what you were facing, and as at that point you were pretty much cooped up in your base anyway with the defence towers I think you could have got better use from Rohirrim Warriors earlier. As it is, the fact you got all the Tier 2 powers and then Daybreak denied you the Army of the Dead that could have won you the game - especially given you knew that his Darkness would be refreshed immediately. You've already said that Daybreak was a desparation tactic, but combined with the other wastes I think that it was a real crippler.
Positives- Pippin went on an orc labourer rampage that would have made Tolkein cry. Nice work.
- On the whole, excellent management of Knights. You weren't scared to keep them out until the last minute and then return to the well to heal, meaning you cause a lot more damage to Prepare's initial economy than a more conservative player would. Apart from the Gandalf accident (which wasn't your fault), and one point where it was obvious that Faramir would die if he stopped running (and stopped anyway), your micro was excellent.
- Tower management was superb. You destroyed them all for most of the game rather than letting Prepare do it ... it was only when it was a choice between tower or hero, later in the game, that he started to actually get killshots on base defences.
PrepareNegatives
- Right at the start, you took Eye of Sauron and used it - immediately giving Hero free usages of Elven Wood
- Subsequently, when your orc suicides had already bought you Tainted Land, Hero cast Elven Wood and you didn't immediately overwrite.
- Inactive orcs at a lot of points, either hanging around near your base or near Hero's settlements (early on) when they could have been destroying the settlements.
- There were a lot of treasure chests on the ground you could have claimed with Gollum or nearby orcs ... not much money in the grand scheme of things but it's worth having.
- Several times you had inactive Nazguls that could have creeped (keeping one Nazgul at the southern expansion just to guard it from knights ... this was pre-Gandalf).
- Inactive rams right next to Gondor defences. Mordor units are tricky to micromanage and occasionally ignore all orders, so possibly that wasn't your fault.
- Despite having vast amounts of money, you never built base defences against any form of assault. Might have been useful to guarantee a safe haven for your Nazgul when the eagles came.
- Nazgul. Mostly the Nazgul usage was good, but there were several points (when the Witchking remained still as he was being shot, when the Nazgul kept attacking the citadel that they couldn't destroy and died in the process) that you could and should have avoided.
- First Balrog's fire breath didn't really achieve much - it injured two buildings instead of killing them.
Positives- Fast expansion, using orcs as cannon fodder and never letting up the pressure on Hero - Gondor doesn't even get a chance to think about raiding the Mordor base.
- Mixed siege. It's refreshing to see someone who builds more than their 'favourite' siege unit. Perhaps a few less rams late game (with so many Knights) and a few more catapults might have done better, but the siege was nicely mixed forcing Hero to choose between taking damage to his base from the rams or his forces from the catapults.
- Excellent building plan. Orc pits in the expansions furthest from Hero, and siege works in the ones closer. It was good to see you not go overboard with economy like some Mordors do.
- The sneak attack from the north was excellent, leaving a big hole in the north wall that Hero had to pay attention to - even if you didn't manage to capitalise on it overmuch.
- The dramatic three-Nazgul flyby as the Balrog destroys the stables in the Gondor base. Awesome. I wanted to screenshot this but after I changed to ultra-high resolution, I couldn't get the replay to load properly (normally I'm in custom, ultra-low graphics). I'm guessing that's due to an animation bug or something. A real shame, it looked very cinematic.
SummaryOverall, this was a very good game. Both players played exceptionally well, but due to the nature of the matchup there are fewer positives I can make about Hero's play (Gondor can't afford to mix units like other races, whereas Mordor with its excellent economy can do so easily) than Prepare's, but I thought both gave a very good performance despite their mistakes (no-one can play perfect, the game is too fast for that).
I think the most important thing about this though is that Prepare's strategy will work even better in 1.02 (although it's a strategy which - like most of Mordor - performs best on Fangorn Forest). I was tempted to make a list of why, but the strategy forum is a better place for that discussion. Link is here to the thread. Should be easy enough to piece together why I think Prepare's strategy will be more effective in 1.02.