Caelum pretender design

[Arryn]

I'm curious as to what sort of pretender design -- excluding the Vampire Queen -- the experienced players of (base) Caelum out there are using. Do you go for an SC chassis, or a research chassis? Do you give the pretender the same magic paths as the national mages, or something completely different?

[archaeolept]

you mean caelum is allowed to take a pretender other than the VQ?



;P

I haven't played caelum, but it certainly has the points for a massive SC, and little reason not to go for one.

[Truper]

The Caelum design currently living on my machine is a Ghost King - 3A 2W 3E 3D. Standard research alteration and stomp indies tactics. Later on his earth and death will be useful for forging/summons.

I also like using a Son of Neifel with, say, 3W 4B. This is if I want to turn Caelum into a blood nation, and get the ice devils.

Both these pretenders attempt to leverage Caelum's cold - ghosts, winter wolves and ice devils love it.

Neither of them is maxed out - I'm more fond of good scales and strong dominion than many players.

[Kel]

Hehe, I wasn't going to say anything as I don't necessarily think I am experienced with Caelum but that GK is the exact same one I have been using lately

- Kel

[Arryn]

It's interesting that you should pick a GK with 3A2W3E3D, as I've had good success with a very similar one (3A3W3E2D). Why do you prefer 2W3D over 3W2D? For the summons later on?

Does anyone play with a Sage (or other human) pretender?

How would you design a Nat? And does anyone prefer the Nat over the GK (and why)?

[archaeolept]

3D for soul vortex

i love GK's, but here we see another indication that they really are a bit underpriced. even upping initial path costs to 30 would work, I think.

Nat's have fatigue problems, so you need to use a slot to give them cold resistance right away.

[Maltrease]

The Caelum build that I have had very good success with.

Oracle with Astral 4
Dominion 6 or 7
Cermonial Faith (take advantage of steathly preachers)
Order 3
Productivity 3
Cold 3
Growth 3
Magic 3

Castle - Castle.

Caelium's mages and begining troops are very capable of taking provenences by themselves. Usually from turn 2 on with this build. You get a ton of money (to buy all those cheap mages). And your income continues to improve as the game goes on thanks to growth.

The oracle can be used for Archiac record with the astrals you get from clamming your water gems. Later the oracle can forge sorcery rings so your arch seraphs can get to death 2, nature 2, where they can forge addional path boosters.

The oracle with equipment also has a good chance of catching a couple SC's with a mind hunt and forcing them to counter with higher MR items.

I have tried this build with Sloth 3 (for the extra 240 points). While Sloth would not be a problem in the late game it really slows the early expansion down, plus makes a significant dent in your income.

My current build (untested in MP) is to also take Misfortune 2 (and 1 less dominion I think). And give my oracle Astral 5, Earth 3. This allows the creation of golems, hammers, and crystal coins. It also give easier access to wish in the late game by using a sorc ring, wiz ring, crystal coin, and tome of high power.

[Boron]

Arryn said:
I'm curious as to what sort of pretender design -- excluding the Vampire Queen -- the experienced players of (base) Caelum out there are using. Do you go for an SC chassis, or a research chassis? Do you give the pretender the same magic paths as the national mages, or something completely different?

i am not experienced but i saw in a brief overlook not mentioned one pretender :

the nataraja .

since caelum has quite a few points from cold 3 you can make a really cool nataraja .

if she gets wounded she is a bit screwed but lategame you can get fairy queens to heal her .

[archaeolept]

1. natarajas are male.
2. they suffer cold fatigue from caelum's dominion
3. due to their usual function as brawlers w/out massive paths, they tend to accumulate afflictions - hence their popularity w/ Arcos.

[Boron]

archaeolept said:
1. natarajas are male.
2. they suffer cold fatigue from caelum's dominion
3. due to their usual function as brawlers w/out massive paths, they tend to accumulate afflictions - hence their popularity w/ Arcos.

1. correct . the name sounds feminine though
so i continue saying her
2. sure . i never said though that i use her as an earlygame sc
nataraja is 0 points +3 dominion so giving her a bit fire + air magic ( for travel ) and a bit earth for forging + invulnerability since caelum lacks earth is not too expensive .
2 death is an almost must to summon spectres finally .

but thats all in all not so expensive so i can go quite good scales

when i use her lategame i fight often outside my own dominin anyways so until i have an undead pretender i will always suffer some fatigue against either heat or cold opponents anyway .

3. i use her only fully equipped as mid-lategame sc .
if i get afflictions then it should be not too difficult with my astral income which is quite nice as caelum if needed to summon first a coatl and then a fairy queen with coatl + treelords staff .
cause 1 of my spectres should be able to summon a coatl sooner or later


so nataraja is relative useless earlygame ( but a good sitesearcher ) but mid-lategame she is better than a ghostking or a vq as sc and she is cheaper than a vq and about as expensive as a ghostking .