Newbie question: Best army buff paths/schools?

[MaxWilson]

People talk about high blesses becoming obsolete in mid-game, in part I think because battlefield spells provide similar bonuses on arbitrary (and cheaper) units. Right now I'm very pleased with how Strength of Giants (E3/Ench-3) and Legion of Steel (E3/Const-3) transform my weak little Helheim Hirdmen into lean, mean Abyssian-infantry-killing machines. E.g. the first time I met up with Abysian infantry this game, it was something like 24 F4E4W9S9-blessed Helhirdlings vs. 50 Abyssian battleaxe infantry in a Heat-2 province. I lost about 20 and killed about 20, which was scary since I'd cut through everything else like butter, so from then on I resolved to stay in Cold-2+ domains when fighting them. Now I send in one Svartalf with <Summon Earthpower, Legions of Steel, Strength of Giants> and 15 Hirdmen and easily defeat 30+ Abyssians. The big difference, of course, is that Abyssians have 16+ Protection and all my units do ~16 points of damage, so Strength of Giants effectively quintiples the damage I do against them.

I'm just wondering if I'm missing out on any other cool buff spells. I've tried Wind Guide and been generally unimpressed with the boost, especially since it costs air gems, but I've had some semi-nice results from mixing an S1 mage in with a crop of infantry or elephants scripted to cast Body Ethereal a couple of times.

-Max Wilson

[Wish]

air for fog warriors, wind guide, and arrow fend
astral for battle fortune
nature for mass protection and relief
earth for gold or lead warriors and weapons of sharpness

(fog warrior elephants are something fierce, I'll tell you)

[Micah]

You're much better off with destruction instead of either of those earth spells in that situation. You'll also want to force-cast fire fend to cut down the abysian's heat aura by burning a gem on phoenix power with a F1 Svartalf.

Considering 15 Helhirdings cost almost as much as 60 Abysians killing 30 isn't all that impressive...

[MaxWilson]

Gotta disagree about Destruction, in part because it only affects 5-6 squares and partly because Svartalf precision is... less than stellar. When the enemy is far away, you have a good chance of missing the main body (hitting maybe 3-6 troops) and when the enemy is close you have the potential to break your own guys' armor. At least, I haven't been impressed by Destruction in the past, even though it looks nice on paper. Note that I'm not saying I've only got 15 Hirdmen per army--I've got a few armies of 22 to 50--and Strength of Giants scales better with army size than Destruction.

-Max

[MaxWilson]

P.S. My point isn't so much that killing 30 Abyssians is impressive, it's that the spells in question helped my Hirdmen much more than a F4E4W9S9 bless helped my Helhirdlings. My kill ratio is an order of magnitude better than before.

[Micah]

Ah, my mistake, normal Hirdmen, not Helhirdings. That's much better, although he shouldn't be using battleaxe infantry regardless, flails or morningstars are the way to go against hige defense.

Destruction is amazingly good. You might need more than one guy casting it so it'll get good coverage, but it's a fantastic spell. It's about 5 times as effective as strength of giants in terms of extra damage done in your example, so even with only 50% coverage you're still way, way ahead. The friendly fire potential is annoying, true, but your troops are much less likely to get hit than your enemy's troops (and if your guys do take a hit, even with armor they still have a really high chance of dying from a battleaxe Abysian)

[MaxWilson]

Maybe I'll have to give Destruction another shot. I'm still only playing against the AI (and occasionally myself), trying to get a handle on tactics. Last time I tried Destruction it was as a possible counter to E9N9 Niefel Jarls, but I could never make my Svartalfs actually hit the Jarls so I went with Iron Bane instead, which worked pretty well. Still, the nice thing about buffs, as opposed to maluses like Destruction, is that it's really easy to cast them on your whole army with only a single caster. I might try Destruction + Strength of Giants, but I doubt I'd drop Strength of Giants out completely unless facing something much more heavily armored than Abyssians, like Wraith Lords or Niefel Jarls.

Fog Warriors sounds cool, although the A5 requirement is steep since Storm Power only works in a storm (requires gems). Summon Earthpower/Phoenix Power are great since they effectively boost your E/F power by 1 for everyone in your whole army, but Summor Storm Power/Water Power seem much more specialized. Do most people just get A/W boosts from items? And thanks for the pointers to the Nature buffs.

-Max