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Originally Posted by chrispedersen
I couldn't really disagree with you more. I'd really have to say.. *try it*.
I don't get the n9 blessing for the 14 regen. I don't get it for the additional protection.
I get it for the 99 morale. Machakan morale is not great. Berserk spiders will take, about 1 time in 4 provinces that non berserk units will not.
With small units ... losing even one unit will put you in the circumstance where you are taking morale checks or quit the field.
I get it - so you can expand with groups of 2-4 spiders - instead of 4-8. Which lets you send out an expansion party a turn instead of 2 in the first 4 turns.
So I view the N9 as critical especially if you wish to expand with units of 2-3 spiders.
The N9 bless is not what the opponent will have a problem dealing with. The issue is that you are sending out one expansion party a turn, *and not taking any losses*.
Whereas most non giant races will take attrition losses. This will mean on average that you will have about 25% more troops than an average nation, more experience as well as more provinces when you finally meet.
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First, I want to make two things clear, so that we understand each other.
1. I have tried it. I would not be making the claims I do, if I had not.
2. I assume that the game parameters are normal, e.g. indy strength is 5.
That said, I certainly cannot get N9 to work as well as you advertise. An expansion party of 2 spiders does not work very well at all. Even keeping to what seems to be easier indies, you will lose a spider more often than not. Essentially, such parties can capture one province. 4 N4 spiders perform a lot better. 4 spiders without any bless also perform better than the 2 N9 spiders as long as you keep to easier indies.
3 N9 spiders can take pretty much the same provinces as 4 N4. Thanks to the berserk the N9 spiders will take some provinces that the N4 ones would lose, but these are the same provinces where you lose a spider. I also have a slightly higher attrition rate among the N9 spiders, but it is slight enough that I am willing to write it off as natural variance. The N9 party performs a bit better than the N4 party.
4 N9 spiders can, with very few exceptions, take the same provinces as 6 N4, but with a significantly higher attrition rate, so the latter group clearly performs better.
8 Black Hunters without any bless whatsoever perform better across the board than 4 N9 do.
You will definitely lose spiders - even with N9 - if you keep sending them out in groups of 2-4. Same goes if you just send out groups of 4. If you want to go without losses (apart from really bad luck, of course), you are going to have to send out groups of 5-6. If you go with N4 you need 7-8.
If you have some special trick that allows you better performance than this, I can try it out, but the above is what I can manage consistently.
Again, I want to make clear that the N9 bless certainly makes the Black Hunters perform better than without it. The investment is, however, not worth the cost in my opinion. The difference between N4 and N9 is at least 160 points. You could spend 80 of those on production and thereby get an extra spider or two per turn, which makes your expansion very close to N9, and you still have 80 points left to spend.