Armageddon Counter

The Armageddon Counter - commonly referred to as the AC - is visible in the lower right area of the main game screen. It is a percent value; it begins the game at 0 and raises all the way to 100, which is when the Apocalypse will occur. If you hover the mouse on the number it will give details on Armageddon Count. An example is a display of 30 in the lower area may be 60 AC / 200 (which is the maximum) means an AC of 30.

Bad events - such as a city being razed, the Ashen Veil being founded, Ashen Veil spreading or the Compact being broken raises the AC. Good events - such as sanctifying city ruins, the Elohim ritual (Hallowing of the Elohim) being completed or the Ashen Veil being removed from a city lowers the AC. Certain Wonders such as the Pillar of Chains, The Necronomicon, Stigmata of the Unborn will increase the AC.

Infernals and Sheaim gain an advantage for high AC. At higher AC values, Everyone will suffer from Hell Terrain. Ashen Veil followers, so eager to push Armageddon, will be the first to have hell terrain on their lands. Good player are well suited to endure Armageddon; no hell terrain will spawn in their borders, and they gain bonuses against demons.

While the Apocalypse approaches it becomes increasingly difficult to remain indifferent. Antagonism between good and evil leaders are exasperated. Ashen Veil is hated as the prime cause of evil. A bias toward Good vs Evil permeates diplomacy.

Just a suggestion: try sometimes to go all the way to AC 100 and trigger Apocalypse. You may ride the AC as the Infernals, or set option Last Days to double AC effect, and try to fight it as the good guy.

Influencing the AC

• Razing a city will rise AC by 1.
• Sanctifying a city ruin will lower the AC by 1. If you or your allies are fond of razing cities, you may consider to bring along a Life I adept to keep AC under control.
• Every time Ashen Veil spreads to a city, AC rises by 1.
• Building Stigmata of the Unborn in AV holy city raises counter by 5.
• When someone researches Infernal Pact, Hyborem will enter the world and will do anything to raise the AC. Defeating him is a good mean to stop the rising tide.
• Prophecy of Ragnarok wonder will raise the counter by 1 everytime you build unit in the city. Prophecy of Ragnarok is the most powerful mean to influence AC: you can use it to indefinitely build very cheap units like warriors, to be upgraded later or also leaven on stand-by. Or you may build it just to negate it other players and never build a unit in that city.

Note that the Armageddon mechanic is balanced so to favor the Armageddon: it an intended bias, as declared by the mods creator, Kael.

AC count

The Armageddon Count is visible when one mouses over the Armageddon Counter. It is displayed as one number divided by another, higher number. i.e. 0/200 The 0 is what the Armageddon Count is currently at, and the 200 is the maximum Armageddon Count possible. If an event raises the AC by 10 - such as the completion of the Draw - then the Armageddon Count is now at 10/200, and the Armageddon Counter will display 5.

Influence of AC

The Armageddon Counter influences many aspects of Erebus. As it grows higher, civilizations will be more prone to warfare, fires will spread more easily, Hell Terrain will begin to creep across the land, and terrible harbingers of destruction will begin to appear.

Most events happen the first turn when the AC ht the prerequisite AC and are one-time in game, so may not trigger again if AC goes up and down while you fight to prevent Apocalypse. Only Hell Terrain and Hellfire continue to spawn forever.

Gameplay strategic vantage of high AC

Hyborem

Hyborem lives to see Erebus converted to Hell. Strategic advantage of high AC is evident for him.

Sheut Stone

The spreading of Hell Terrain is a problem to everyone, but to get hell on your cows for +1 death strength to all your new forces is tempting. Of course, if you're on Hyborem's side, he might trade some of his sheut stone to you.

Sheaim

The Armageddon Counter influences the frequency that units will appear at the Sheaim's Planar Gates.

• Under 50: 1 unit of each type per Planar Gate with 6% chance to spawn
• 50-74: 2 units of each per Planar Gate with 9% chance to spawn
• 75-99: 3 units of each per Planar Gate with 12% chance to spawn
• 100: 4 units of each per Planar Gate with 15% chance to spawn

Stigmata Promotion and Stigmata on the Unborn

The Stigmata Promotion gives a combat bonus of (AC/2)%. This promotion is available to Demons and Undeads with combat 5, and free for all units created in the City with the Stigmata on the Unborn (the Ashen Veil Shrine). To have an example, at AC100 a simple Champion get 6+50%=9 strenght, and a promoted combat V Eidolon: 11+4death+20%x5 +(AC/2)%=(11+140%)+4death=26+4death

Leaders with Barbarian Trait

Clan of Embers, Doviello and Hyborem have the Barbarian Trait: while the AC raises, they may watch the barbs destroy everyone else. The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and barbarians spawning from Hellfire will not attack Barbarian Trait leader.

Pillar of Chains

The Necronomicon

Luchuirp

Luchuirp actually have some particular synergies with high AC. Stephanos can't convert golems and golems are never feared away. Yersinia will find that golems are immune to disease and plague. Ars Moriendi will learn that Golems are unaffected by death damage, have no experience to be enervated and cannot become wraiths. Wrath will harass other precious high level units, while your adepts and golems are easily replaced. And finally, at the Apocolypse, half of your enemy units are down, while all of your golems are still around. They have to make sure to reach a developed state before going through all this, and they have to remain good.

Take the Prize of the Four Horsemen

The equipment of each Horeman is very valuable: it may be useful to summon them just to rob them.

Diplomacy

The AC effects diplomacy. The Diplomatic penalties (but not the bonuses) between the different alignments scales based on the AC, and civs become more aggressive. Also, the largest contributor to the AC gets a significant diplomatic penalty with all civs without the Ashen Veil State religion and the same size bonus to those with it.

If you dedicate yourself lowering the AC you start getting relationship bonus from others like you.

Infernal landscape

See also Hell terrain.

When the lands begins breaking and Hell appears on Earth, the landscape became barren. See terraforming for more information on the metamorphosis of terrain. Basically all changes are reversible, minus the degrading of flood plains in simple plains. The passage of any Horseman of the Apocalypse(or the war machine) turns floodplains to bare desert. Forests quickly die: any forested tile became burned forest, and after some turns also the burned forest disappears. If you are Elven and your economy revolves on ancient forest, this may be a huge hit: it is advisable to have a Sanctify adept at hand to quickly revert terrain and prevent the forest form dying completely. Anyhow you will need to plant new forest, wait for them to grow to forest, and then to become Ancient Forest, and if you have abandoned FoL you will have to revert to the old faith to obtain this. A long, long way.

Hell terrain need a Life I adept with sanctify spell, while hellfire (a localized feature that spam barbarians) need only a normal unit enter the tile to disappear.

Burning sands will slowly cover the world. The flames that cover the once-desert damage the units present, and prevent any unit to enter the area. Daemons and units having any amount of fire-resistance will be able to cross the burning sands. Otherwise, you can use the spring spell to extinguish the fire for a turn, or the sanctify spell to revert terrain back to regular desert.

If you play the Infernal and you happen to find large area covered with flames, you will have to deal with the graphical impact on the used machine: slow computer may drop FPS and lag considerably. Most players have also some complain on the visual fatigue of seeing large, moving, bright flames all over the screen for all the time. While the graphic appeal is perfect for isolated phenomena, to play a long game in such condition is hell. Literally.

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse are terrific demons. They are mounted on undead horses. They have ability to fly. They are barbarian Heroes and all of them cause fear and are immune to magic.

1. Stephanos. He equips the Crown of Command (30% capture of defeated living units).
2. Buboes has Blitz and can cast Rage. He equips the sword called War (+3 unholy strength and +1 to the AC for every living unit killed).
3. Yersinia automatically razes Cities when he finish a turn inside. He equip the dagger Athame (+3 poison strength and spreads plague).
4. Ars Moriendi All living units he defeats are turned to barbarian Wraiths, like the Death III summon but with unlimited duration. Has an ability called Vile Touch.

At AC 40 the Horsemen start appearing in random location on the map, madly attacking any unit or city they find. They are extremely mobile, flying units, and may simply cross oceans and mountains. An advanced civilization with tier 4 units and the high mobility of Passing Trought the Ether will quickly dispose of them and will enjoy the rich prizes they present as equipment (Crown of Command, War and Athame). But if the Armageddon come early, they will pose a serious threat to weak civilization. If left unchecked for a while they may gain a small Barbarian army of defeated units of Wraiths, or spread the Black Death, or raze dawn several Capitals.

After the Horsemen, at AC 90, the Avatar of Wrath appears in the world. Evrey living unit he defeats join the barbarian state. When he appears every living unit will have a 50% chance of becoming Enraged. He is a powerful caster able to use Fireballs and to summon the fearful Ira. The avalanche effect of Ira is notable: if left undisturbed to kill, the Ira will gain strenght, +1 after each combat, to a maximum of 32, growing powerful like Dragons.

Note - in previous version of the game, the Death of the Horesemn caused a Mana to spawn: Spirit for Buboes, Body for Yersinia, Death for Ars Moriendi, Mind for Stephanos.

Apocalypse

At AC 100 the Apocalypse occurs, and half the living units in the world, including the population of the cities, instantaneously dies. Only Hyborem is immune (thank to his Fallow traitt) and will prosper. But life goes on.The Armageddon is not the end of the world, after all. All events one time only, the worst is passed, the cities will recover, the units will be rebuilt. Main problems are the lost heroes and the cities left with no defenders, to be coverd quickly against barbarian units and daemons. AC may be pushed down to limit spawning of hell terrain, or it may be advisable to switch to good alignement to keep hell terrain away. It suffices to temorarly adopt Order religion, that happens to be more suited to fight daemons, anyway.

Guide to management of AC:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/handling-armageddon-counter.222919/

Armageddon Events

AC 0

• Even if the armageddon counter is on zero, the Hell Terrain will spread through any Ashen Veil civilization's cultural borders.

AC 10

• First of the Apocalyptic Warnings.

AC 25

• Hell Terrain will spread through unowned land. At this time it will not spread through any other civilization's lands unless they have the Ashen Veil as their state religion.

AC 30 - Blight

• Part one of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• The Blight will hit all civilization's cities, causing severe Unhealthiness. This may cause large problems in big cities. The blight will ravage the land for 10-20 turns and slowly recede. When the blight first hits, it will cause death energy damage to all living units. However, this heals as fast as any other damage and is a relatively minor nuisance unless it strikes in the midst of a war.
• Note: in older versions, the effects were more severe: "Destroys all pastures, plantations, farms, camps, and winery improvements in the world; 25% chance to destroy each source of the wheat, corn, rice, deer, cow, pigs, sheep, sugar, and wine; 50% chance to remove each ice feature; 25% chance for each plains tile to turn to desert."

AC 40 - Stephanos

• Part two of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• Stephanos, the first Horseman of the Apocalypse, will appear in the World. All Horsemen are powerful Demonic Flying Mounted Barbarian Heroes. He causes fear, and is immune to magic. He has the Crown of Command and Command promotions, and thus is likely to convert any defeated living units to his side.

AC 50 - Buboes

• Part three of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• Buboes, the second Horseman of the Apocalypse, will arrive. Stronger than Stephanos. He can attack multiple times in a turn and can cast Rage, which enrages all nearby living units. Enraged units are uncontrollable, will move to attack random targets, and have a small chance every turn to become a Barbarian unit. Has the sword War, which will raise the AC for every living unit he kills.
• Hell Terrain will now spread through all Evil civilization's cultural borders.

AC 60 - Yersina

• Part four of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• Yersinia, the third Horseman of the Apocalypse, will arrive. Can spread the Plague to all nearby living units.

AC 70 - Ars Moriendi

• Part five of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• Ars Moriendi, the final Horseman of the Apocalypse, will arrive. All living units he defeats are turned into barbarian Wraiths, these units are similar to the Death III summon but are permanent rather than a temporary summon.

AC 75

• Hell Terrain will now spread through Neutral civilization's cultural borders.

AC 80 - Hellfire

• Part six of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• Hellfire will spawn on random tiles of the map, spawning Infernal or Barbarian Champions. Hellfires can be destroyed by moving a unit onto it.
  • If the Infernals have entered Erebus they can become significantly stronger, as they may control most of the Champions that spawn.

AC 90 - Avatar of Wrath

• The seventh part of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• The Avatar of Wrath will appear in the world. The Avatar has 33 base strength, can walk on water, and can summon Ira, which are powerful permanently summoned demonic units than grow stronger with every unit they kill, can walk on water, and are healed after every combat.
• Every living unit will have a 50% chance of becoming Enraged. Like with Bubuoes, enraged units are uncontrollable, will move to attack random targets, and have a small chance every turn to become a Barbarian unit.

AC 100 - Apocalypse

• The final part of the speech, The End, will appear to all civilizations.
• Apocalypse will strike, halving the population of all non-Infernal cities on the map.
• Each living unit has a 50% chance to die. This is an independent chance per unit, so more or less than 50% of your units may die.
  • Living units are units that are not Undead, Demons, Angels, Elementals, Golems, or Siege Weapons. Some special units are not considered alive. A unit's tooltip will tell you if it is Not Alive.
• Note that Hell Terrain will never spread through Good civilization's cultural borders.