Looking for some general advice

[jokesonyou]

Hi folks,

first of all i'm new to the forum, but been playing more or less since 1.6.x . I want to start playing on the multiplayer server, but i don't think that i would be a decent opponent, since i only have played against the AI so far.

So it would be nice, if someone could check this replay and give me some advice/feedback how to polish up my play.

On this one i'm playing knalgans against rebels (both random) on Fallenstar lake. I made quite a few mistakes, but actually some were made because i know the ai has it flaws ....

[Zaroth]

Hello there and welcome to the forums!

First, some general advice (from another beginner, but one playing some multiplayer games ):

• in my opinion, it's not very instructive to play the AI. As you noticed, it has flaws and exploiting them generally doesn't help in multiplayer games. So if your goal is improving your 1v1 skills I recommend starting playing against humans ASAP. Not only your victories will be more rewarding, but your losses will teach you more as well. For finding opponents of similar skill and tracking your progress the ladder site is invaluable. At the beginning you should play with people of rank about 1300-1500 to play matches with at least some chances of winning. If you are afraid that you'll be losing - well, that's true, you will. A lot. You can look at my ladder page to get an estimate how much. Or even more. I jumped into the ladder just after one campaign (save & load method... sigh), reading JW's guide and watching some neki's commented replays - I was all like "yay, I know strategy, I can play!".
  But well, if you got a lot of stubbornness and the will to learn, you'll eventually start to climb up. If you are looking for inspiring example, look at plk2's rank graph. During his first ~30 games, he was well below 1500 rank, losing quite often. But he didn't give up and he is now a top ladder player. Take example and don't give up! (and don't think that as a "not decent player" you'll "waste time" of better players or something - it's just a game and some people actually enjoy winning, you know)
• If you played a multiplayer game and lost, always ask your opponent for advice on what he thinks gave him the biggest advantage! It doesn't hurt to ask and you may learn interesting insights this way. Or you can post your replays on the forum, like you did
• if you still haven't read JW's "How to play..." series (stickified), do it now. It may be a bit outdated, but a LOT of useful information for beginners is there. There are also some other really nice guides hanging around in this forum, you should find them easily. Only when browsing last ~6 pages of this forum I found about 10-20 guides, some specialized (certain match-up or faction), some general. Lurk moar! I'd also advise to play Wesnoth windowed and looking on the advice on the specific match-up from time to time during the match (mostly on opponent's turn, obviously), at least until you develop some intuition of "shoulds" and "shouldn'ts". Don't feel bad about it, even on go tournaments players are usually allowed to have a joseki dictionary (something like standard openings book).
• since Wesnoth is so situational, learning about behaviour in certain situations should be your next step. And this is best achieved by watching reviewed replays - if it's written, first try to formulate your own assessment of player's current situation and then read the commentary, it helps to see if you're improving
• keep playing random faction, it's the best way to master Wesnoth!

As for the actual game (my commentary won't treat it like it was a game vs AI, rather a multiplayer game):

Turn 1: You definitely shouldn't get an ulf in your first recruit. First, it needs to be covered from enemy fighters at all times, and at the beginning you don't have quite enough units to cover him and he becomes a burden. Money would be better spent on a dwarven fighter (always a solid Knalgan recruit), gryphon (this is a big map, you want gryphons) or just banked, so you can buy your units in the fort closer to the front. Second, if your opponent had done a grunt rush (or spearmen/skeleton/whatever quite strong melee), your ulf would have been next to useless. He's so expensive that you definitely don't want to exchange him for a grunt/spearman whatever cheap fighter.

Turn 2: Another ulf? That's expensive and very, very risky. See above.

Turns 3-6: no comment (although this dumb attacks with elf archer, mage and wose, well... everything remind me why I don't play with AI)

Turn 7: You completely abandoned southern flank. While in this situation it may not look so bad (especially since this elf archer later basically suicides on your thunderer), remember that on an abandoned flank a single scout can turn your life into hell if it starts pillaging your villages and the bonus money can help your opponent come out from a seemingly losing situation. My recommendation is to keep always at least one unit if there are few villages (2-3) on the flank (and prepare to give up a village if more than one serious enemy appears) or 2 otherwise (if you actually want some chances to defend this flank for a while).

Turn 8: Game is basically over.

As I said, not much can be said about AI matches, since AI is currently so dumb. If you want some more insightful review, post a multiplayer replay - and good luck with that!
And always remember, jokesonyou - it doesn't matter if you win or lose, as long as you learn something from it!

[jokesonyou]

Hi Zaroth,

i play games for fun and not really trying to be the best. Imho, it just makes more fun for the players when both got some skills

Anyway, it was a risky recruitment at the beginning, but just i wanted to try something diffrent with knalgans. That second ulf was actually a misclick but i didn't want to take the turn back.

I think i'll just jump in the cold water and start playing on the server.

Thank you for your advice/feedback. Its good to have feedback from other players.