Dominions Nations Evaluations ;)

[MaxWilson]

quantum_mechani said:
The problem is, your ratings seem to be largely based on the strength of Ea Ulm/Marverni/C'tis regular troops, when that tends to not be all that relevant when in an EA early game fight. You can have troops far better for the price as similar indies (ulm archers and c'tis elite warriors come to mind), but they can still be shredded by a few properly blessed helhirdlings or niefel giants. If you remove mages from the equation, these nations have almost no chance in such a situation.

I also strongly disagree about Ulm's forge bonus wearing down with time. The late game revolves around thugs and SCs for the most part, and while there is little worthwhile to forge early, you are pouring maybe even the majority of your gems into it by the late game.

That's why Helheim and Niefelheim are 5s in the early game. There really aren't many normal troops that can stand up to them at all--you NEED mages to fight them. Edit: I've revised my early-game rating of EA Ermor to reflect this. Their troops are solid but can't compete with Helheim and Niefelheim.

Ulm's forge bonus is like a 50% boost in gem production relative to just hammers. That's non-negligible, but considering how little their mages can actually forge it seems more a midgame issue to me than a true lategame strategy. By the time people are throwing around Tartarians and Seraphs, how much does it really matter that Ulm can forge Earth Boots for 5 gems instead of 7? The lack of high-level mages and poor Astral/Death, unmitigated by access to good thug chassises, seems to me a serious weakness.

Not that that has to stop Ulm. As noted several times elsewhere (including by yourself), the endgame ratings are iffy anyway because there's a good chance you can leverage a strong beginning into a good ending, and you can diversify your magic with indies or your pretender.

-Max