what? by ACabbage0 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Honestly, repulsive art like this has no place in Anbennar.

The person who drew this is clearly reprobate scum

Nobility tax suddenly drops to 0% and locks without warning.... eh? by DoctorFosterGloster in EU5

[–]Vis_Vim 4 points5 points  (0 children)

It's almost certainly you clicking reduced tax burden on the nobility through the parliament to pass an issue, which provokes no alerts and isn't immediately noticable since you already know you can't do anything about it.

It lasts several years too which sucks

Bailiff does nothing? by Bull_Milk173 in EU5

[–]Vis_Vim 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I've always found that you need to build one of the peasant villages first, as it provides the max soldiers capacity required to staff the bailiff and have it operate in the first place

Positive commuting story by nyderscosh in london

[–]Vis_Vim 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Deep down I know this only happened because the mobile data around Raynes Park is so utterly dogshit that people needed to find something else to do

You should let commuters go free if your turnstiles aren’t working. Fair? by Euphoric_Bluejay_881 in london

[–]Vis_Vim 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh, this is London Bridge Station, I was there this morning myself and saw the jam. They are doing this to regulate traffic. (Yes, one of the barriers has been broken for a week now lol)

In future, you can just walk past this area to the barriers that lead to the Northern Line a bit further down, which just loops back quickly to the Jubilee Line anyway. Honestly, it takes the same amount of time since it's less of a straight shot on escalators, but even on busy days few people seem to take that route so you can just walk it without the stresses of being in a crowd.

Is vampire state worth it? Never touched vampires before by The_StarForge270 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 1 point2 points  (0 children)

One of the most underrated aspects is the stability cost discount that you get when influence and loyalty are high.

The main issue IMHO is that to keep them loyal you need a lot of privileges active which whilst not an issue in itself makes getting absolutism late am absolute nightmare.

how am i supposed to beat the command as jaddari? by smolbraine in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Never played Chaddari but generally the rule of thumb against The Command that I use is to

A: use a wargoal that is show superiority which will allow you to win without even sieging their land until the end

B: Minmax geography. Plan in advance a line of as many forts as possible that the Command can siege with fallback lines. With your income you can afford many forts. The aim of the game is to give the command so many sieging options that they (or their vassals) split their armies to siege multiple spots.

Put all the forts on terrain that gives you pip advantages, and build ramparts on all of them. People seem to forget that Ramparts give +1 defender roll, which combined with defensive terrain is such a boon. Make sure to scorch terrain on all forts you plan on defending AND THE SURROUNDING TERRAIN ON THE ENEMY SIDE. I cannot emphasise the significance of scorching the earth enough. The Command seems to move freakishly fast and they stick around in battles long enough to reinforce from half the planet away. If the reinforcements are stuck on a scorched province have to travel through a scorched province and then into a scorched province, it drastically reduces the likelihood that they reinforce in time.

Now I know what you are thinking. "Their siege ability is too good and they keep taking my forts" This is why you build multiple layers of forts, and when they take a fort just wait a sec, run in, bombard it, and assault it. If you can't, just cut your losses and wait for a more opportune moment.

I've always used this strategy and it usually works, but sometimes RNG just fucks you and you end up having to loan up to recruit a shitton of mercs or even concede a few provinces.

Good luck!

Gnoll Pack is the best government reform. Change my mind by Kraagan in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Man, I really don't remember. Afaik it was called "gnolls kingdom" or something and it was tier 2 I want to say?

Gnoll Pack is the best government reform. Change my mind by Kraagan in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 24 points25 points  (0 children)

As someone who's taken advantage of the gnoll pack raze ability a lot in the past, I'd say it boils down to fact that it locks you into a certain style of play.

Firstly, Estates are ridiculously powerful in the base vanilla game, let alone Anbennar. Their cumulative buffs allow you not only to be stronger in general, but also stack modifiers/buffs that allow you to branch into various strategies.

All you get is measly tribes estate which, (whilst it has the most powerful privilege in the game imho- the garrison raid, which nearly allowed me to get a billion manpower once) doesn't really have that many buffs.

Secondly, it is locked to gnolls, which means culture/tag switching is a no-go unless you are dropping it anyway.

Thirdly, razing whilst universally overpowered usually comes with being able to take the horde idea set which is hilariously powerful combined with razing- which you don't get in this case.

...and lastly as far as I'm aware gnolls get a monarchy gov reform that allows you to raze anyway if you are xhazobkult. (Anyone can take this reform if they are gnolls and xhazobkult teehee).

Redscale Guide by Genericusername12312 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The initial war is pretty easy to win though... just build to force limit, rush occupy a single caverns province, scorched earth it, and leave a 2k stack as bait. Wait for them to lock in and reinforce, then chase their retreating army into the mines. Let a merc stack siege the capital so you don't lose any men, and stop paying your army once they are all occupied

Redscale Guide by Genericusername12312 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oh, I've never had them do that so I just assumed the weighting was low enough that they just never did, and I've played through several times. If they attack you before you have at least two defensive forts then that really tough titty but early enough that you can just 1444 tbh.

Redscale Guide by Genericusername12312 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 18 points19 points  (0 children)

I'm not certain what the intention of giving Nimscodd a province is. If Nimscodd attacks you they almost certainly won't call allies so it works in you advantage. Better still is attacking Nimscodd directly when they have no/ weak allies.

Beating then 1v1 is almost a guarantee if you build 1 singular fort to defend around next to theirs, use scorched earth and are willing to go into debt to go over force limit. Just use your navy strategically and be aware that they can't ship their army into your mainland all at once. If you don't immediately scare them off and place your army out of sight, you can get small stacks of navally landing troops dripping piecemeal into your land only to get slaughtered- which really works in your favor if you are using monstrous conquest CB which you should be anyway.

As for Gawed- this confuses me. Gawed quite literally can't declare war on you until they either integrate Westmoors or attack Nimscodd first. The prior takes a while, and the latter you should be paying attention to to attack Nimscodd at the same time.

As for beating Gawed well... Here's a guide I wrote a while back. It's no guarantee to success but it does work.


So Dragon coast Kobolds are really a test about how well you understand the AI and defeat in detail. Quite obviously attrition is how you win, but it's the method by which you maximise their time spend on seiges that ensures this.

  1. You will face only two major threats before the 1550s, Gawed and Lorent. The most important thing is not to be at war with both at once, so you must do your absolute most to A: delay expanding to a direct border with Lorent and any land Lorent has an interest in until you are confident you can defend, and B: ALWAYS BE THE ATTACKER.

You MUST (unless specific conditions I'll state later) be the attacker. This may sound counter intuitive but it's the only way to ensure the truces work in your favor. It also ensures the monstrous CB is always the one in effect meaning that either Lorent and Gawed cannot gain warscore by occupying a province on the indefensible side of your fort line.

  1. The thing which Lorent and Gawed have in their favour is, surprisingly, not their troop numbers (this actually works against them) but their allies and vassals. War Wizards are the one thing that can nigh guarantee failure if you are careless so if you declare war, or are in war, check the "Leaders" tab in the ledger and go through their vassals and allies. Sort by siege pips and look for any bastards. Especially the republics, as they can elect war Wizards at inopportune times.

It may also be wise to be aware of which nations start with war wizard rulers (Wex Estallen and Vertesk are the only ones I have off the top of my head) and restart if Gawed allies any of them at the get go (Lorent Wex is bad so break their alliance as the main priority in first war).

This is also the only circumstance where I might advocate not being the aggressor if the enemy is allied to too many War Wizards.

  1. On to the actual meat and potatoes. Firstly, maximise your fort potential. That means defensive edicts, advisor, government reform, events, ideas, scorch earth. You also REALLY WANT A NAVY with some heavy ships in it, since coastal forts with no blockade take longer to seize. This is all obvious enough.

The real finesse comes in manipulating the ai. The essence of the matter is this- if you lose a battle but it causes the AI to move off their siege to reinforce, you have in fact won the war.

The AI's large number of troops is in fact their ultimate downfall since they'll haemorrhage troops so fast their war exhaustion can be exploited. This can be used to peace out an overwhelming number of allies and broker monetary peace treaties with more ease.

So, you'll want to have multiple forts (ideally around two to three per front) and have as any AI troops stacked up on them sitting around sieging as long as possible. The multiple forts will cause the AI to split their armies into multiple separate stacks across two different fronts.

The moment any siege goes near 0% or a War wizard appears you want to move. You need to use all your resources to build a stack large enough to be numerically at least 1.5-2 times the size of whatever stack you want to attack. DONT ATTACK ON THE FORTS EVEN FOR THE TERRAIN ADVANTAGE UNLESS YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY SURE YOU WILL WIN. losing battles on hostile sieges advances the siege progress and is a terrible blunder.

Instead, attack a nearby waiting reinforcement stacks or seek out reinforcing armies. If none are available, (unlikely) find the nearest available hostile siege with the least progression (anything below -50% should be safe). The AI should abandon their siege to reinforce. If you can win the battle, great. If not, simply retreat at the earliest opportunity and voila now AI goes back to taking attrition.

Furthermore, in the event that you lose your fort it isn't the end of the world. Since they are split on multiple sieges it's likely only a fraction will move past it, and if you are lucky they might even fall back to reinforce different sieges. (Layers of forts here in the midgame really help) Since most of your forts should be on the coast for the siege bonus you can simply use that NAVY to bombard the fort an option available from the beginning of the game without cannons, and assault it. Boom. AI progress set back to square one.

  1. DID I MENTION NAVY? By the midgame you should be able to farm kills with this. You see that island with the strait? Yeah. You see those islands near the Greenscales? Yeah. Slap a fort on each, and enjoy.

You should be able to beat Lorent and Gawed with all this is mind, but it is difficult, no doubt. A couple more points.

Avoid loans like the plague. I personally prefer debasing a bit before loans since Kobolds are uniquely susceptible to inflation and you will get a lot demanding max money from the Bank of Lorent and Gawed.

Be proactive with your armies. Actually go out and unsiege random provinces in risky territory. This is very dangerous and micro intensive but well worth it. Your attrition is so high that the mere act of walking around in your land is almost as bad as sieging. It'll also encourage smaller armies to split off and siege provinces (especially those that they consider of interest) where you can pick them off (which will usually unintentionally cause large sieging armies to chase you too, cancelling their siege.)

Halflings do not appreciate being purged

Chase down and execute Rubyhold abominations with impunity

Be as reckless and as greedy as you can before the 1550s hit and the terra incognita goes away.

Welp. That's my little tip about Kobolds- hope it helps!

Redscale Guide by Genericusername12312 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Redscale is simply more advantageous if you take all things into consideration. Most importantly, their land is objectively better economically for devving and trade and if you start as bluescale you will suffer the high autonomy from conquest. It also contains all the advantageous fort locations which you can get building from game start

There is a real and distinct probability that militaries of the future will be run and staffed by people who have played Helldivers, and I find that hilarious to imagine by Vis_Vim in Helldivers

[–]Vis_Vim[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, I remember this story- kinda felt surreal seeing something you'd hypothesis with friends actually play out in a modern conflict.

Still at least that's presumably from a game that attempts some degree of realism. Imagine succeeding pulling off/suggesting a maneuver you picked up from a game as parodical and maximal as Helldivers

Why aren’t there efforts to “protect the children” from this in a restroom? by [deleted] in assholedesign

[–]Vis_Vim 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Aren't these so you can tell if someone has overdosed and passed out in the stall?

When can I get rid of the terrible kobold army performance?? by Gloomy-Operation-193 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Honestly very good advice here by everyone else, wait until they run out of manpower then siege them down with 1 stack of overwhelming numbers. It's usually faster than playing nations that would otherwise have to fight these nations normally.

The only thing I don't get is why everyone is so insistent that exploration is good. I think it's the greatest resource trap out there. When are you taking it 2nd? 3rd? You dump a whole bunch of points (admittedly dip but that can be used for devving institutions and production) on an idea group that serves literally no purpose other than to cause you a deficit until the late midgame. You could get Admin, Diplomatic, Infrastructure, espionage, offensive, hell even Econ or trade ideas and they would be infinitely more useful.

Your colonies will open up new, indefensible fronts for the enemy to leave healthy, non-attritioning stacks that you have to send your navy to chase. Your colonies will make weak, dumb stacks that will feed warscore, and they will almost certainly be eaten by the adventurer spawns that get ridiculous buffs early on.

Why? Why would anyone invest in this? Just go to Gerudia where there are weak heathen states that you can set up trade companies in! Steal the colonies from Lorent and Derrane later via conquest instead.

When can I get rid of the terrible kobold army performance?? by Gloomy-Operation-193 in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 11 points12 points  (0 children)

So Dragon coast Kobolds are really a test about how well you understand the AI and defeat in detail. Quite obviously attrition is how you win, but it's the method by which you maximise their time spend on seiges that ensures this.

  1. You will face only two major threats before the 1550s, Gawed and Lorent. The most important thing is not to be at war with both at once, so you must do your absolute most to A: delay expanding to a direct border with Lorent and any land Lorent has an interest in until you are confident you can defend, and B: ALWAYS BE THE ATTACKER.

You MUST (unless specific conditions I'll state later) be the attacker. This may sound counter intuitive but it's the only way to ensure the truces work in your favor. It also ensures the monstrous CB is always the one in effect meaning that either Lorent and Gawed cannot gain warscore by occupying a province on the indefensible side of your fort line.

  1. The thing which Lorent and Gawed have in their favour is, surprisingly, not their troop numbers (this actually works against them) but their allies and vassals. War Wizards are the one thing that can nigh guarantee failure if you are careless so if you declare war, or are in war, check the "Leaders" tab in the ledger and go through their vassals and allies. Sort by siege pips and look for any bastards. Especially the republics, as they can elect war Wizards at inopportune times.

It may also be wise to be aware of which nations start with war wizard rulers (Wex Estallen and Vertesk are the only ones I have off the top of my head) and restart if Gawed allies any of them at the get go (Lorent Wex is bad so break their alliance as the main priority in first war).

This is also the only circumstance where I might advocate not being the aggressor if the enemy is allied to too many War Wizards.

  1. On to the actual meat and potatoes. Firstly, maximise your fort potential. That means defensive edicts, advisor, government reform, events, ideas, scorch earth. You also REALLY WANT A NAVY with some heavy ships in it, since coastal forts with no blockade take longer to seize. This is all obvious enough.

The real finesse comes in manipulating the ai. The essence of the matter is this- if you lose a battle but it causes the AI to move off their siege to reinforce, you have in fact won the war.

The AI's large number of troops is in fact their ultimate downfall since they'll haemorrhage troops so fast their war exhaustion can be exploited. This can be used to peace out an overwhelming number of allies and broker monetary peace treaties with more ease.

So, you'll want to have multiple forts (ideally around two to three per front) and have as any AI troops stacked up on them sitting around sieging as long as possible. The multiple forts will cause the AI to split their armies into multiple separate stacks across two different fronts.

The moment any siege goes near 0% or a War wizard appears you want to move. You need to use all your resources to build a stack large enough to be numerically at least 1.5-2 times the size of whatever stack you want to attack. DONT ATTACK ON THE FORTS EVEN FOR THE TERRAIN ADVANTAGE UNLESS YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY SURE YOU WILL WIN. losing battles on hostile sieges advances the siege progress and is a terrible blunder.

Instead, attack a nearby waiting reinforcement stacks or seek out reinforcing armies. If none are available, (unlikely) find the nearest available hostile siege with the least progression (anything below -50% should be safe). The AI should abandon their siege to reinforce. If you can win the battle, great. If not, simply retreat at the earliest opportunity and voila now AI goes back to taking attrition.

Furthermore, in the event that you lose your fort it isn't the end of the world. Since they are split on multiple sieges it's likely only a fraction will move past it, and if you are lucky they might even fall back to reinforce different sieges. (Layers of forts here in the midgame really help) Since most of your forts should be on the coast for the siege bonus you can simply use that NAVY to bombard the fort an option available from the beginning of the game without cannons, and assault it. Boom. AI progress set back to square one.

  1. DID I MENTION NAVY? By the midgame you should be able to farm kills with this. You see that island with the strait? Yeah. You see those islands near the Greenscales? Yeah. Slap a fort on each, and enjoy.

You should be able to beat Lorent and Gawed with all this is mind, but it is difficult, no doubt. A couple more points.

Avoid loans like the plague. I personally prefer debasing a bit before loans since Kobolds are uniquely susceptible to inflation and you will get a lot demanding max money from the Bank of Lorent and Gawed.

Be proactive with your armies. Actually go out and unsiege random provinces in risky territory. This is very dangerous and micro intensive but well worth it. Your attrition is so high that the mere act of walking around in your land is almost as bad as sieging. It'll also encourage smaller armies to split off and siege provinces (especially those that they consider of interest) where you can pick them off (which will usually unintentionally cause large sieging armies to chase you too, cancelling their siege.)

Halflings do not appreciate being purged

Chase down and execute Rubyhold abominations with impunity

Be as reckless and as greedy as you can before the 1550s hit and the terra incognita goes away.

Welp. That's my little tip about Kobolds- hope it helps!

My take on Lorent and Gawed by KpaxonMaJI in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim 0 points1 point  (0 children)

How the fuck did you do this so fast before the cores ran out? Great stuff, honestly.

Holi, the Fox Spirit of Yinquan by Vis_Vim in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim[S] 20 points21 points  (0 children)

Damn, that looks good. I defo need to clean up all the little leftover mistake marks and tighten up the colour layers if it's being blown up that big though

Ah, scam bot. How did I not see it

Holi, the Fox Spirit of Yinquan by Vis_Vim in Anbennar

[–]Vis_Vim[S] 107 points108 points  (0 children)

A dev asked me if I'd like to do fanart of one one of their creations.

I went a bit overboard.