Counters to Niefelheim

[HoneyBadger]

That's a good point. You can't play Niefelheim successfully or competitively, purely by creating Niefel giants.

As tough as they are, they're too expensive to use as a main army until late game, and you've got lots of other tough, useful troops.

Niefel giants are there to make a good army unbeatable, they're not there to provide that army, all by themselves.

To do so would be like building a navy that consisted only of battleships.

[Sandman]

A very effective tactic against Niefelhiem is ritual spells which cause unrest. Get unrest to over 100 in their capital and keep it there. Boom, no more Frost Giants. Rain of Toads, Raging Hearts, Plague of Locusts, Baleful Star, Blight and Hurricane are the spells you want.

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Foul Air may be nice... Incredibly slow, but nice. And not readily available to you.

How good are these giants at sieges? Can they be starved easily? I know I tend to take death scales as Agartha and I have a province as low as 86 food- and this is only two provinces distant from my capital. Size five, 30 Niefels, 120 food? You could probably starve them.

On the other hand, with a strength of 25, they'd have a siege strength of 6.25 x 30, or 187. It would be difficult (though not impossible) to hold off that force, but if your armies will be defeated in the field, than why not fort up? (other than losing the chance to counter-raid).

[Meglobob]

I had a 50 or so giant army of sacreds with a N8, E9 bless destroyed very easily by EA Ctis casting darkness and spamming raise skeletons.

Up till then the army had been virtually invincible.

EA Niefelheim is powerful but has many exploitable weaknesses. Many of which have been listed already.

EA Nielfelheim can recruit specific troops for sieging, the rock hurlers. They get a decent siege bonus.

[Micah]

Quite right Folket, I'd completely forgotten about magic duel for some reason. That'd pretty much gank their MR though.

I still stand by Flaming Arrows though, they cut through E9N4 giants without any trouble at all...maybe the extra regen at N9 changes things though, I haven't tried it. A couple of volleys and their whole army is on fire though, which helps negate some of the regen. Even if you're doing some other strat dropping a FA only takes a single mage, so why not add it on?

[Saint_Dude]

Of course, as Niefel, you are always concerned about Flaming Arrows and other instances of concentrated fire magic. Casting Rain on the first round of combat is a good idea for the Niefel player. With Rain and a nature bless, Niefel giants can hold up to large volleys of Flaming Arrows.

[Tuidjy]

When I play Niefel, I seldom, if ever, buy the Niefel giants. I stick to the
Jotun hirdmen. In the early game the big guys are too expensive. In the middle
game, buying Niefel jarls at the capital is so important that there is no money
to spend on Niefel giants. In the late game, the Niefel giants are irrelevant.
Nice to have, maybe, but if my opponent is worth anything, he is loaded for jarl,
and in that case the giants are just chafe. The Jotun hirdmen do most of what
Niefel giants do, at a fraction of the price.

[BigDisAwesome]

They were spamming disintegrate too Meglobob.

[Xietor]

I have often blamed KO for prejudice in favor of the cold races. There is a cheap spell that can be cast before battle to allow the battle to be in a cold climate, but no similar spell for heat?!

I would like to drag KO out of his cool climate and have him live here in New Orleans for a year. He would have a new appreciation for Swamps!

[Meglobob]

Xietor said:I would like to drag KO out of his cool climate and have him live here in New Orleans for a year. He would have a new appreciation for Swamps!

There is a spell that heats up the entire world to be fair, second sun.

BigDisAwesome said:
They were spamming disintegrate too Meglobob.

Oh, how did I miss that? Where any disintegrated? I thought your skele hordes hacked them to death.