Ai-Mo/Strategy

* Strategies
* Tribes
* Units
* Perfection
* Domination
 * Tribes
* **Ai-Mo**
* Bardur
* Cymanti
* ∑∫ỹriȱŋ
* Kickoo
* Polaris
* Xin-xi
* Yădakk
* Zebasi

Ai-Mo is a tribe that may seem useless at first: a tribe with a lot of mountains and a starting tech that builds mountain temples, but can't even climb. However, as was proven in the 2019 tribe duels, Ai-Mo has several hidden strengths that can be used to take down titans like Bardur and Kickoo.

There seem to be two main strategies: one that is hard to mess up but isn't very strong (philosophy rush), and one that is very powerful but requires careful early game turns (giant rush).

## Basics

* Income: Getting a good economy in the early game is key to long term success. For example, upgrading a level 2 city with a workshop instead of an explorer or when upgrading a level 3 city, choosing 5 Stars instead of Walls
* Researching tech before taking a village: Tech becomes more expensive after you take a new village. Therefore, consider researching useful tech just before taking a new village
* Keep your options open: Whether it is waiting to buy a tech until you need it or waiting to build a port until you have a unit read to use it, don’t spend your stars until you need to. Another example, never partially upgrade a city.
* Plan ahead: Look at the map and the resources available. Chose tech and units that will support future turns. When you explore during the first few turns, always explore towards the center as early as possible (in a 1v1).

Make sure to read Gerenuk's guide for more general tips!

### Giant Rush

This was the most common advice given by PewQ and Skrealder during round two of the discord tribal duels, which was Ai-mo vs Yadakk on medium map glory. It was proven to work just as well against Bardur and Kickoo in the following rounds.

Essentially, the goal is to get a giant as soon as possible because that’s what Yadakk and many other tribes have a hard time with. Although ai-mo’s giant potential isn’t as great as tribes like Bardur or Luxidoor, Ai-mo does get a free monument, the Altar of Peace, that can be used to boost a city to level 5. A skilled player can reliably produce a giant by turn 5, 6, or 7.

First, we analyze why level 5 is such a great level. From level 3 (which is also a great level to be at) to level 5, it costs 6 population, gives you +2 stp, a giant worth roughly 10 stars, and a monument the first time you get to level 5.

As for an opening, there is no standard moveset like there was with pre-nerf Bardur. In fact, the question of whether to get a second warrior on turn 0 is disagreed upon. I will list a few pros and a few cons of buying a second warrior. Of course it depends on your spawn, but it can also depend on whether you hosted or not.

* Pros: Almost doubles your exploration during the first few turns, and allows you to grab contested cities before your opponent does. Early cities means more money. If there are two ruins in opposite directions, it will always pay off to get two warriors and send one for each ruin.
* Cons: Essentially costs 4 stars because it delays your +2 upgrade by a turn. That means it also delays your giant by a turn, and the whole point of this strategy is to rush a giant. You don’t necessarily need new cities, in fact it is acceptable to delay a capture in order to get a tech for cheaper, just make sure you do the math. Most ai-mo players did not get a turn 0 warrior during rounds 3 and 4, and the majority of ai-mo players won.

After turn 0, you will explore with your warrior(s) and save up for either hunting, organization, or fishing to upgrade your capital. Wait until you have 9 stars before buying a tech, so that you can make the most informed choice between the three. If you can’t decide which tech to use to level up your city, take forests and potential whales into consideration, and don’t go organization if hunting or fishing are just as good, because there will be almost 0 farms in Ai-moyan terrain.

Some more things to consider: which city are you going to get your first giant in? You will need to get 11 population somehow, but 3 will be taken care of by the monument. Your giant city doesn’t have to be your capital, but it is easier to get it in the capital because you can get population from a ruins (more on that later) and extra population potential from connections. You might find that your capital can easily get a giant without the monument, so you might consider placing the monument in another city to 2 giants. Leave your options open and plan ahead.

On the note of ruins: don’t ignore them! Whether it’s better to go for ruins first or villages first is up for debate, but they can give you stars, tech, or population to boost you to level 5, or if it’s after turn 5, they can give you a giant. Just a tip: if it’s in the corner or in a spot where an explorer would be useless, make sure to clear all the clouds around it so that an explorer won’t spawn. Getting population on turn 2 is great. Keep in mind that the second player, who spawns as far away as possible from the first player (meaning, in the corner) is more likely to have nearby ruins than the first player (because ruins have higher concentration towards the edge of the map, unless they are water ruins). Host still always has the advantage, but don't be discouraged by corner spawns.

These early turns are crucial. If you do it right, you can get a giant as early as turn 5 or 6, then another one in a few turns with the park of fortune.

If the game turns out to be a land game, you've basically won. Advance the giant and don't make mistakes. Use the general strategies described in the Gerenuk's or other people's guides, such as rider+roads, archery, or catapults.

If the game turns out to be a naval game, use your giant to get a giant battleship. Giant battleships are very hard to kill and can do a lot of damage. It will last you a long time while you build up custom houses (rare) or what ever else you need (like defender boat spam.) Again, use the general guides.

#### Example game

This game was played by Espark during the tribal duels (against Yadakk, med, glory)

#### More Example games

These are two animated gifs of Pewq’s AI-Mo games. There is no commentary.

Ai-mo vs Yadakk example 2

Ai-mo vs Yadakk example 3

### Ai-mo opening with philosophy (the easy way)

In other situations, philosophy lets Ai-Mo be pretty flexible. Obviously it depends on the map size, player count, glory/domination etc. This opening may not be the best but it’s reliably good enough. If you end up going down the wrong tech branch, for example buying knights when you really needed swordsmen, it won't hurt as much.

On turn 0, buy another warrior. You will be  saving up for philosophy and other techs, and a second warrior doubles exploration during those turns.

It doesn't matter on which turn exactly you buy philosophy. It doesn't even have to be your first tech; if you get resources from a ruins, or you somehow are able to obtain fishing/organization/hunting, level up your capital, and have 7 stars before your first village, then by all means go for it.

The key thing is this: you must buy philosophy before you capture your first village. Otherwise your tech prices will snowball faster than your economy can grow. If you are lucky, you will have your first village on turn 3 and your second on turn 4.

After you buy philosophy, you need to decide if you will go hunting, fishing, or organization. You can count the number of fish/llamos/peppers in your territory, but if you have to choose between organization or fishing/hunting, you should not go with organization. Forestry, mathematics, whaling, and sailing are all useful techs. On the other hand, farming is useless because aimo has --farmland, and shields aren't useful until later.

It is also possible to use mines and forges to build your economy, but this doesn't work as often as it does for Xin xi, and it's always risky because you can't see how much or where your metal is.

On turn 5, you obviously place the Altar of Peace monument. Place it in a city that you will be able to get a giant the easiest (read the section from the other strategy).

It is not hard to last the first 5 turns peacefully. Even if you are on a tiny/crowded map and run into other tribes within the first 5 turns, warrior spam will be able to protect you for a few turns. Defenders are not necessary.

If you are on a large or medium map 1v1, the rest of the game will probably play out like any other tribe. If you are on a tiny or crowded map, you will be the only tribe that can use mind benders practically.

Here is a screenshot of an economy built off hunting/forestry/mathematics, and another built off mining/forges, both with philosophy. Even if philosophy is not optimal, it usually isn’t that bad and is harder to mess up.

#### Glory mode

First, make sure to reference scores when you play glory mode. There are several ways to earn points: temples, vision, monuments, cities (population, parks, borders),  tech, and units.

Glory mode should start out exactly like might mode does. Don’t build temples like in perfection, or else your economy will be so far behind that your opponent will be able to destroy you. The only difference is that when you reach around 8,000+ points, which can be as early as turn 15 on a large map, (but may take longer if you have to spend stars on military) you should start looking for ways to “sprint” the rest of the way to 10,000. Usually, you’ll be able to reach 10,000 in one or two turns. It is not uncommon to reach 10k by turn 18 or earlier, even on a medium map.

Therefore, there any temple you build probably won’t level up, so a temple only gives you 5 points per star. Temples are NEVER worth it in glory mode.

Next, you can use vision (exploring tiles). If for some reason you have a level 1 city, an explorer will give you a solid amount of points. Just make sure you have sailing and navigation if it’s a coastal city. But of course, you probably won’t have a level 0 city lying around that just happens to be next to a bunch of clouds.

As for monuments, you should probably already have Park of Fortune, and Ai-mo would definitely already have the Altar of Peace (for other tribes, 5 turns is too long for such a sprint). Emperor’s tomb is not impossible if you are making 50+ stp, but at that point you probably don’t need it. Eye of god is almost impossible to get. Tower of wisdom is pretty hard to get as well, but buying tech in general is a good option (more on that later). That leaves Grand Bazaar and Gate of power, which you can go for if you don’t already have them.

Finally, cities and tech should give you the bulk of your points. Your cities should already be at least at level 3. Unless you are certain your city is about to get captured (not just seiged) next turn or the turn after, choose parks when you level up. (However, parks are only good during the sprint because your giants usually will not have time to reach the front lines anyways. But mid-game, before 7000 points, giants are usually better.) Buying techs for points is usually a pretty good option, and is even better if you have philosophy. Third tier techs give you the highest points/stars ratio. But even with philosophy, techs can get pretty expensive (if you didn’t already know, without philosophy: first tier techs cost n+4 stars, second tier techs cost 2n+4 stars, and third tier techs cost 3n+4 stars, where n is the number of cities you have.) Third tier techs always have the best points per star rates. If you do the math, parks are usually more cost efficient than techs, but you might not always have the resources to reach high levels.

If you have leftover stars (don’t forget to clear forests, but don’t disband unless you are super close to getting a tech/monument/park, because you lose points from disbanding) and need less than 50 or less points, you might be able to make it the rest of the way by buying units, which give you 5 points for every star. But a 5/1 points/star ratio is pretty bad, so units won’t be the bulk of your points.

### Example sprint

Context: this game was a practice game for the upcoming tribal duels. Medium map, and although it was technically might by accident, we were playing as if it were glory mode just for practice. On the left is the end of turn 23 (score: 8,855), on the right is the beginning of turn 24 (you can see the score went down because some units died). My navy and economy were much weaker than Yadakk’s, but I was ahead in points because I had been buying techs like Mathematics, shields, and mining.

Starting a few turns back, I began producing catapults because it was cheaper defence than a navy (although I was also spamming defender boats, which you should always do in naval battles).

On turn 24, I had 54 stars and needed a little less than 1,300 points. Although many of my catapults were killed or crippled by Yadakk, the survivors killed enough of Yadakk’s navy that I managed to get Gate of Power. With a few extra stars I used it to get a park, which in total brought me about 700 points. I then bought a second tier tech for 13 stars and two third tier techs for 18 stars each (didn’t matter which techs). I made it over 10,000 with points and stars to spare. This was not the best example, but it’s better than just a bunch of paragraphs.

### Do I need philosophy?

Philosophy is nice on large maps because it sets you up for buying a lot of techs. This is useful if you are fighting multiple players or your opponent changes strategy. Philosophy is also nice on small maps because it gives you another option of mindbenders if you choose to use them. However, philosophy severely hurts your early economy and takes a while to recover from. Therefore, if you are playing on a tiny map against a tribe that is hard to mindbend (Yadakk, Oumaji, Hoodrick, Polaris, etc) or a medium map, philosophy is probably not worth it.

During the tribe duels (for the last 3 rounds at least) very few ai-mo players rushed philosophy, and Ai-mo ended up winning. However, every player who got philosophy from a ruin won their game, and philosophy was very useful at the end, right before sprinting to 10k.

### Should I buy climbing?

Climbing is useful but not necessary. Because first tier tech prices rise slowly, it is ok to wait until later to buy it. But in a crowded free for all, that’s a different story (ask PRA for advice or watch his video here)

### Should I use mind benders?

As you know, mind benders have two abilities: convert and heal. Keep reading if you would like to see effective converting traps in action. As for heal, I find that it is not very useful, because most experienced players are used to doing “kill not wound.” There is a possible tactic that can be used with the heal function. This is to use mind benders in tandem with riders; the rider(s) hit and return, and the mind bender heals them up to full or almost full health so they can be used immediately next turn. However, I have yet to see this used against a human player, and I doubt it is practical enough to be used competitively.

## Part 2: Mind bender example setups

As I said before: mind benders rarely work. You can use these traps against bots or inexperienced players, but it is hard to get a trap so solid that a skilled player could not get out of. However, I will present a few examples here so that you can use mind benders when the situation arises.

When should you not attempt a mind bender trap? When your opponent has  (or you predict they will soon have) knights, catapults, or battleships; mind benders will be useless. Even riders and archers will make mind bender traps very difficult to pull off. For this reason, you must use your mind benders early (as a rule of thumb, turn 15 is too late to do an offensive trap, unless you have a lot of support).

When should you attempt a mind bender trap? When your opponent has giant(s), mind bending or forcing them to disband is usually worth the risk, assuming you already have philosophy (otherwise catapults are more effective). Mind bending swordsmen is also pretty good (but again, catapults are better). Many players think that swordsmen can one shot mind benders, but forget that with the meditation bonus or if the swordsman is 11 health, the mind bender will survive.

The perfect opportunity is when you see an enemy giant approaching alone or with few units. When you see this, buy a mind bender in the nearest city that is not in immediate danger. Buying two is even better.

The other condition you need for a successful trap is some support units (warriors are fine, riders are better) or a nice choke point formed by water or mountains. The more constricted the land, the less support you need.

Mind benders can be used defensively or offensively. I'll start with a defensive example because it's easier. (Note: All of the following setups were against real players, not bots. The top of the screens might be cut off to remove the waiting message and keep the opponents anonymous)

### Defensive mind benders

Context: It's turn 7. This was a ranked PolyChamps game (and I risked mind benders? Unthinkable!). It was a crowded 4v4 in which imp was my ally, and zebasi was not. I had a knight there because I got a ruin (gave 10 stars) and a whale, but the knight is not important right now.

The most basic way to use a defensive mind bender is to place it behind your city, so that just in case an enemy unit is able to occupy it, you can convert it.

In this situation, zebasi will need (assuming they don't have catapults or knights yet, their score was lower than mine) 5 riders/warriors in order to secure a capture: 3 to kill the warrior and 2 to kill the mindbender. They would also need climbing, probably, and would have to have knowledge of the mindbender's presence.

Result: His warrior became a veteran when he tried to capture my city, and I stole the veteran. My city was safe.

###

### Stealing giants

An obvious way to use mindbenders is to steal giants (or force them to disband). Here is one example. It is turn 10. If zebasi didn't know of the mindbender's presence, he may be tempted to kill the rider or warrior, and then the mindbender would steal him. And even if he was aware of the mindbender, his only good move is to stand on the park of fortune, but then he would get caught by a double mindbender trap, which would force the giant to retreat until reinforcements kill the mindbenders

Result: I didn't get the giant but I got the city and won.

The double mindbenders are shown here (this is the same game from the first screenshot, so imperius is my ally and Hoodrick is not). If the hoodrick giant killed the mindbender next to it, the other mindbender would steal the giant. If the giant did nothing, it would still get mindbent.

Result: the giant disbanded. My team won.

I do realize that turn 19 is pretty late, and the trap would have failed if hoodrick had catapults in the clouds or if the ship became a battleship. However, since the mindbenders were still around from the early game, I would have lost nothing if the trap had failed. There was nothing to lose by trying.

###

### Stealing a swordsman.

It's turn 9. This swordsman was at 11 health because it hit my warrior last turn. Obviously, if he tried to finish it off he would get mind bent, or he could try to kill the mind bender and occupy the city. A lot of players know that swordsmen can usually one shot a mind bender, but don’t realize that if the swordsman is at 11 health or lower, or the mind bender has the meditation bonus, the mind bender survives. So again, experienced players might not fall for it, but it’s always worth a try. Result: he tried to hit my mind bender, and it survived. Make sure to use the Polytopia battle calculator.

###

### Bait

One more example: you can use cities to bait giants, a bit like the defensive mindbender setups. This example game was played by The Snooper in round 3 of the tribal duels. Just to note: Snooper got philosophy from a ruin.

## Offensive mind benders

Mind benders can also be used offensively to capture cities, although this is much more difficult. The basic idea is to place a mind bender next to an enemy city and convert a unit if it were to spawn in that city. However, the most common response to this is to leave the city empty next turn. Because of this, you need to have another unit (warrior, usually) next to the city as well to enter the empty city, because the mindbender itself is unable to enter enemy cities (Seriously, Midjiwan? Aren’t they useless enough?).

Here is an example of what an attempt might look like.

It's turn 8. As I said before, it is very difficult to create a trap that is impossible to escape. If my warrior on the mountain moved southwest one tile, it would have been inescapable (assuming no catapults, ships or knights, obviously,because xin xi’s score was lower than mine) unless xinxi had a bunch of riders.

Notice the elements of a trap in this screenshot: The mindbender is there, the support warriors make it impossible to kill the mindbender (if they had been placed a bit better), and they are there in case the city was left empty.  Result: Xin xi left a warrior in the city and I captured it.

Here is an example of a failed attempt against a very good player. The screenshots are a bit confusing so let me explain: The one on the left is taken before turn 8. During turn 8, I moved the mindbender forward, kept the southern warrior where it was, and  advanced the other two warriors. The end of turn 8 is shown through the score screen. Quetzali left the city open. The picture on the right is taken after turn 9, when I moved the warrior into the city and the mindbender over to try to get the defender. Unfortunately, Quetzali had enough riders to kill both my occupying warrior and the mindbender. Result: I lost the game. Learn from my mistakes.

### The Element of Surprise

Another thing to keep in mind when using mindbenders: because mindbenders rely on the element of surprise, you must be able to predict what your opponents can or can not see. You’ll have to remember where their units have been, and need to see if they have bought explorers. Here is an example:

I forgot to take a screenshot of what I saw, but my opponent sent me a screenshot of what they saw after they fell for the trap.

Context: my opponent (Yadakk) had just captured one of my cities with a giant from a ship. Because that giant was the only unit that had landed and it wasn’t from a battleship, I knew that the city he had just captured was all he could see. As soon as the lone giant stepped ashore, I trained a mindbender in the nearest city. I predicted that my opponent would move the giant south to explore my land, so I placed the mindbender just outside the border. Result: I stole the giant and won the game.

That’s about it for my serious examples. Thank you for reading, and please leave a comment if you have any thoughts.

## Part 3: Fun and Games

The rest of this “guide” is all fun and games.

### How to mind bend a navalon :

This was a game with some of my real life friends. Mind bending a navalon is usually not worth the trouble, it’s better to kill it with catapults or battleships. But since it was clear I was going to win this game, I made it a goal to mindbend a navalon, like trophy hunting.

This is what my setup looked like: I had my emperor’s tomb and a farm ready in that city to spawn in a giant. I used a string of weakened boats to lure the navalon into occupying my city. I had 2 mindbenders: one next to the bait city (the one with a temple), and one in the next city over. I also had catapults nearby just in case something went wrong.

Here’s what would have happened: the navalon swam in, killed the eastern mindbender, and crippled the veteran rider. Then I would push it out with a giant. The navalon would be pushed into the city’s north eastern port, and I would move my backup mindbender onto the custom house. The next turn, the navalon would not be able to move because it had just been pushed, and the mindbender would capture it. (I have now realized that this wouldn’t have worked because pushed units can still attack after being pushed. However, mindbending a navalon is still possible, you would just have to have a mindbender next to the spot the navalon got pushed into)

Here’s what actually happened: the navalon entered the city and tried to kill the rider before killing the mindbender. I stole it without using my emperor’s tomb.

Jebaited.jpg

And here’s an example of how not to use mindbenders:

Thanks for reading, hope you learned something. Please comment if you have any thoughts.