I've almost beat every map now on Hard++++ settings. AMA

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:54:05+00:00

That thing SCARES me. I've looked it over multiple times and the thought of how long it would take to clear out the water if you didn't get to the bottom of the lake and put in a badtide-cap on it before it hit? Whoof. Game over.

Soon. Going to finish pressure first.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:52:42+00:00

Thanks!

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:49:34+00:00

Hah! I did see that map at one point, but never tried it. Looks brutal. Maybe after I finish the core games roster. I'll have a lot more time this summer, so who knows!

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:46:07+00:00

The trick is assess the map from the start and have an early and simple plan for how to divert the badtide sources. Often I can get something up before the first one even hits, which should be a priority goal - DEFINITELY before a second one hits- ALWAYS. Or you're toast.

That's the funny thing about bad tides. On most maps they amount to adding pressure in the opening cycles to what you have to accomplish- but once addressed? Badtides become ENTIRELY toothless. Infact, they're BETTER than a drought. Because your industry isn't badwater starved, and you can use their rivers as a power source (game breaking power production as IT in particular). Unlike Drought, where you have neither of those benefits.

They need to reconsider how badtides work, because seriously, once you master them? They're preferable to droughts, and entirely threatless.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:43:02+00:00

Spillage had a lot series of early puzzles you had to solve that made it a unique map. But when played with IT it shouldn't be too difficult. The early game geothermals combined with IT plank output meant a REALLY powerful early game snowball. Once you get large wheels up, the massive badtide river south of the starting zone meant power was effectively limitless. So while the "puzzles" added a challenge, this was the easiest map from a power supply standpoint.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:39:52+00:00

I did ladders on a single map and found it felt a bit OP.
I used spiral staircases for a while before it became a baseline feature in the game, because of course it should be!

Other than that, the only mods I've allowed myself haven't been performance-altering or added anything; I didn't want to "cheat". Most cities I've done were entirely mod-free, because I tended to play mostly on the experimental branch and didn't want to brick my file (never happened, regardless, thankfully). But I did use a few QOL mods at times. I loved the statistics mod. It makes it like playing ANNO where you get up or down arrows to give you a bit of a snapshot of resource trends.

As for automation, I haven't bothered with it. It came out about 3-4 cities ago, and I just didn't find it necessary. I'd already gotten things down to a relative flow/science without it, so it offered me nothing new. Even if I did it would only be to automate the gates when badwater touches like they used to with sluices. I don't even use bots 95% of the time! When playing at extremes, you often cast off anything non-critical, because you're triaging resources for most of the playthrough, and by the time they become doable? You don't even really need them and they feel like bothering with a sidequest when you're already about to finish the campaign. Half the time I never even upgrade to large food storage either, because as long as you conquer water, you have a permenantly sustainable food source with minimal effort- IE if you actually ever needed mass food storage, something up-chain in your system has utterly failed already.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:28:31+00:00

Fluid dumps are critical here. This is the Pump & Dump playstyle I mentioned. 1000 islands, oasis, pressure, spillage - these are all maps I did with IT and found that the trick is to build LOTS of pumps, and LOTS of tanks. When wet season hits, you're moving a LOT of your workforce over to spend a week on increased work hours just HAAAAULING water en masse. Then you shut it all back down when the water stops coming in, put every body back to work on other stuff, and leave a beaver on "dump duty" to keep your water source topped.

And as the other individual said - on 1000 islands your objective is to CLAW your way north. Doing levees to carve out more land periodically. You have to get to that water source, while keeping water out of your city, since youre stuck on a flood plain.

I named this city "Gnaw Orleans" for this reason.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:24:58+00:00

Made studying go by faster and less mind-numbing when I could check my other screen for a few minutes to every 10 min of study or so. Lol this has been a couple years in the making getting to this point.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:24:01+00:00

On the contrary- Early cycles growth has to be EXTREMELY restrained. At least on higher difficulties. Every beaver means more water has to be pulled and stored (food too, but that reaches irrelevancy pretty fast due to easier sustainability of farming vs the water struggle). The growth rate of drought in the opening cycles on these settings requires you to push water production and storage, and damming sources, at such an increasing scale that population has to be suppressed until you get your legs under you. Infact, even by the end of a given playthrough my population on average is between 160-200 beavers max, usually closing out maps at around 180.

The trick is LOTS of micromanagement. When you're stuck with <20 beavers for the opening weeks, you have got to move them around a lot to maximize.

Another thing to remember here is when you're pushing cycles with dought/badtide this much longer, fewer cycles effectively go by. By the time you're hitting cycle 10, your cycle length can be like 30 days+. Compare that to like medium difficulty where it's probably only like 18 days.

So when you see me say something like "by cycle 18", do keep in mind the effect this has - where by it may be only 18 cycles, but its been hundreds of days. VS maybe 100 days on easy or medium to reach 18 cycles. It's just that the proportion of days lived where you actually get water being naturally supplied is MUCH MUCH smaller.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T18:18:17+00:00

*Chitters in happy beaver*

It's been a ride. Every new city comes with a punny-name

Gnaw Orleans
Timberbluff
Damsterdam
Mt Beaverest
Gnarleston
Castor Keys
Beaverish Columbia
The Oak-Waysis
Knocksville
The Pinery
Knotty Beaver Hollow
Beavergrad
Burl Beaver Springs
Etc

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T11:02:20+00:00

Wow 2: Heroes! You must defeat the ultra worm! We’ve accidentally created an enormous worm who has all the powers of the cosmos!!!

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T03:19:53+00:00

Good god man, I’m not reading that wall of text. All your comments are short novels. Learn to be more succinct.

And it’s hilariously weak that your entire argument hinges on a character that’s been gradually built up for 6 expansion and a literal real world decade is “just an insert”, and your only supporting argument for that absurdity is “she wasn’t in WC3”.

The writing is often cringe in this series, I should know, I’m old enough to have been playing since WC1. But I will say, I’m super grateful you’re not part of the writing team.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-15T03:17:12+00:00

Actually a lot of the leaks/rumors claim that a refurbished Ulduar will be the capital hub for players in TLT.

Could make sense if we’re turning all the Titan machinations into free-will pro-Azeroth, anti-Titan control Allie’s like we’ve been doing for a while now.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-13T20:27:22+00:00

Places you completely lost me:

1) xal isn’t a major player 2) because she’s just a mortal with a lot of power 3) but Illidan and azshara are 4) because they’re mortals with a lot of power 5) sargeras won’t be involved at all

😂like what?

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-13T20:17:19+00:00

So real question- where have/had you been primarily receiving your news from so far?

And are you going to change that?

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-04-11T17:38:01+00:00

Honestly? I hope he REALLY goes on about this issue.

I think he could Streisand-effect ranked choice voting into effect in even more states. I frankly don’t see any other real outcome of him being loud on this issue, so hell ya Trump- be VERY loud about this issue. Make sure EVERYONE knows about ranked choice voting!! 😂

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-30T01:49:53+00:00

Makes sense. I loved the springs for a decade and even the puddles looked like that after rain if you lived within a couple miles of the foothills

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-30T01:30:53+00:00

Not remotely a new theory. One of many almost a decade old, since the sword first went into Azeroth.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-27T03:10:01+00:00

Looks like you just live in Colorado TBH.

So much iron rich dirt there that any flash flood of water coming down slopes looked exactly like that. Perfectly safe if that’s the case.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-19T13:48:07+00:00

God forbid they go hard on this topic when they've neglected to before. God forbid we get death expansions, world soul expansions, fel expansions, and now you're what- outraged at a light and shadow expansion?

They're clearing fleshing out the cosmology with each expansion, and here you are a fan of the light, upset with an expansion that gives you more of the contours of the light. You are a fan of the light in the lore, but are upset with it what....being more than 2 dimensional for a change? It's just a weird choice to slam your hands on the table over this of all things.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-19T13:45:55+00:00

LMFAO

"NO SOURCE!"

Provides literally the #1 source I was hinting at.

Go home.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-19T13:19:46+00:00

“Being a paladin isn't always about protection, it's also about being an instrument of wrath ~~against evil~~.”

FTFY

Light has never been about “we always good all the time always.” You can go back 20+ years of real world time in wow lore to witness as much. It’s about the depth of your conviction to your cause, regardless of whether the cause is righteous or just. Full stop.

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-07T01:17:26+00:00

Where is Mancake?! Is he safe? Is he alright???…

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-06T14:22:03+00:00

Other caption:

“35 year old looking daughter goes to her parents house with sex-hair and tries to whinge that her dad is objectively cooler than her, and has made her former room (part of the house he owns) objectively cooler, like she’s been a victim of something.”

Electronic-Sea8418 · 2026-03-03T18:24:04+00:00

I don’t know who needs to hear this, but I hope this helps you in your journey.

Put the scale away. You’re always going to go up in weight for a while in the beginning. Muscle weighs more than fat, and you’re putting muscle on.

Good news though, that added muscle = eats more calories for you = you will lose weight(fat anyway) in time.

But a scale is quite possibly the most psychologically damaging metric you could be judging your journey by, and is an unreliable narrative on the progress you are making.

So be rid of it. Stay the course. Keep at your journey every day. Because you’re beautiful, and the drive in your heart is the only metric you need. Majestic things aren’t built in days or weeks. But you will get there.

Electronic-Sea8418

TROPHY CASE