Buffing

[ComTrav]

Simple noob question:

How do you make sure your mages buff, more or less, what they're supposed to buff? I'm sure I'm not the only player who has accidentally stacked scads of protection buffs on archers.

Usually putting the mage next to what I want buffed works for me. In an SP game as Pan, though, I can never get my mages to cast Wooden/Iron warriors on Maenads (who desperately need it for prot more than 0) instead of my Centaur Archers.

I would note that Legions of Steel seems to work differently (targeting a squad), but the Maenads get no benefit from it anyway. (Which is funny, as this is the only buff that seems to get cast on them.)

[Aezeal]

don't you need to have armor for legions of steel?

[capnq]

Aezeal said: don't you need to have armor for legions of steel?

Yes, Legions of Steel only affects troops that are wearing armor.

[ComTrav]

Kas: What I really need intel on right now is Marignon Harbringers =).

Yes, you're all right about Legions of Steel only working on armoured units, which is why it's so strange that the Pan set it cast it casts it on the Maenads but Wooden Warriors and Iron Warriors get cast on my Centaur Archers.

[kasnavada]

Hehe, good !

I can't help though for Marignon. For the matter of legion of steel and other spells being casted seemingly at random, it's true that it's strange. In one of my games, the pans actually casted legion of steel in on themselves when there was no units around them...

What are your armies made of ? Only centaurs archers and maenads ? Or also other kind of units ? It's very possible that since they cost (a lot more) the AI decides that the maenads are not worth protecting. In that case, using minotaurs and centaur "melee" units could make those protection spells target them instead. It's not a "fix" but it would help not wasting them. Another idea would be to use the centaur archers as melee units. It can work quite well in some situation, as I've learned when I scripted them on attack rather than fire, but centaur warriors would probably do a better job.

[thejeff]

Legions of Steel targeting unarmored troops is on the buglist. I thought it had been fixed, but there's nothing on the progress page, so I must have misremembered.

Not much that can be done about it at the moment. You can try to play with positioning, but it's fairly long range.

[kasnavada]

Gathering intel for a possible war comtrav ? Please do, it will make the game more interesting.

I actually have more or less the same problems, and solved them by not casting those spells at all. Using the few attack spells (usually 2N or 3E needed, like blade wind, wine arrow, sermon of courage, breath of the dragon, panic, sleep cloud...) seems to work better for me, and I wait for battlefield-wide spells to protect the armies I control. That means, alteration is your priority if you want to rely on maenads to attack anything : mass protection, then army of lead and gold.

Protection magic, in my opinion, is better used for making thugs. Like invunerability : making your pans thugs just means giving them items that increase their defense, regen, and reinvigorisation, cast invulnerability on turn one, and you're faced with a defense 25+, protection 30+, regenerating thug. You can also make him berserk for added morale.

Before that, Maenads are your protection. You don't need spells to defend them, you need them to prevent your real offensive units from dying. Your units could be anything : centaurs, carrions, satyrs, minotaurs... it doesn't matter.

Also note that getting one or more air spellcasters to use "anti-arrow" spells increases the life expectancy of your maenads armies by a lot, since arrows are one of their biggest weakness. And you've got one right in your paths : fairy court. Which also makes pretty good free summonable "archers" of their own.

All of this sounds like pretty much middle-game strategies though. The gorgon, good diplomacy (difficult to achieve in a SP game I know) or plain luck will help a lot.

PS : Legion of steel works only on armored units if my memory is correct, and maenads, being naked, of course, can't use it.