I know there are some guides for fomoria already but my approach is that much different that i decided to make my own guide thingie anyway
. I think that fomoria is one of the best EA nations if played well. There are some others that raise to the same level but none of them are better. I play vanilla version of the game but i think CBM dosen't change too many things to make this strategy fail. This strategy is better suited for bigger map than small ones. So lets get down to bisnes
Bless:
I want to have a bless that is usefull for sacreds to help with early expansion. I want a bless that is good for thugs when playing nation with recruitable thugs/SC's. And i want to have a usefull pretender. It's not easy to get all of those things so we need to make little compromises. The bless that i have found to be good is F4 E4 N6.
F4 is there to give our sacreds little more bang against the indies. Unmarkeds make 24 damage with hit. In EA not many units have protection over 14 so that 24 damage will usually oneshot most 10 hp opponents. With their long weapon they also benefit from the increased repel chanse from F bless.
EDIT. The following math section is completely irrelevnt to anything and should not be read by anyone. The things i spent 5 hours counting can be checked from wiki in 5 minutes
The text is like huge monument to my stypidity. The irony in it amuses me to no end so i don't really feel like removing it
For those of you who like math lets do some counting. Im not anykind of math wizard so if i make mistakes here feel free to correct me
. I play poker so i have kinda grown to like probabilities
. We dont want to get exact percents out of this. We just want numbers that are close enought to the real ones so we have somekind of math refrence when doing decisions on nation builds. Dominions counts the hits/misses by taking Attack value (ATT)plus Dominions Random Number (DRN = two six sided dices whit open ends) and comparing it with defence value (DEF) plus DRN. If attackers value is bigger its hit. When comparing ATT and DEF values close to each other the fact that those dices are open endet will deside most off the rolls that get the open end benefit. (the side whitout roll of 6 will get number from 2 to 10 and the side whit one 6 will get number from 8 to 16(and those numbers come from 2d6 so getting midle numbers is more likely)). So what do we learn from here? Firstly that DRN is lovely and secondly that those rolls that have 6 in them are ususally won by the side that has the 6. So when OE (open end) messes whit things attacker has 50% chanse to hit. So how often does that happen? Better guestion is how often that dosent happen
. Becouse that is much easier to count. We are rolling 4 dises and we dont want sixes to come. That happens 5/6 x 5/6 x 5/6 x 5/6 = 625/1296 of times. 625/1296 = 48,22% thats close enought of 50% for our needs. So the OE desides half of the close calls. The other half is desidet by rolling ATT + 2d5 against DEF + 2d5. There is 25 ways to roll 2d5. the ways include 1 way to roll 2. Two ways to roll 3. 3 rolls of 4. 4 of 5. 5 of 6. 4 of 7. 3 of 8. 2 of 9 and 1 of 10. The avarage roll is 6 so will we use it for defenders value. So how to count ATT 10 against DEF of 10? Attacker needs to roll 7 to hit against the defenders avarage score of 6. There is 10 ways to roll 7 or more whit 2d5. So the chance to hit whitout OE (for attacker or defender) is 10/25 = 40%. Whit OE the chanse is 12.5/50 (rolls whit OE) plus 10/50 (rolls whitout OE) 22.5/50 = 45%. This is the easiest way i know how to count the chanses to hit in dominions. (im not sure can the word easy be used when talking about it
). It wont give the real numbers but it will give numbers that are close enought to the real ones that they can be used to estimate some combat results. One reason for all of this math is that i really hate it when people give out percents and dont tell how they come up with them
For those who dont like math (or my crappy way to present it
). Im sorry for that brain ****. We just made little math mumbo jumbo to count hit percents that might (or might not) be pretty close to the real ones.
Results:
Chance for unmarked to hit def 11 unit = 55%. With F4 bless = 69%
Def 12 unit normal = 45% blessed = 63%. Def 13 normal = 37% blessed = 55%. Def 14 normal = 31% blessed = 45%. So the small increase in att will make guite big changes in the hit percents against opponent with 11-14 deff (which many indies have). And remember those hits will often be deadly.
The bless won't be so great for the kings but every bit counts.
Fire access will give you fire brands, golden/charcoal shields, lanterns, and fire resistance gear for thugs. It will give you the chanse to use flaming arrows in a emergency situations.
E4 gives ur thugs and sacreds little reinvig. This will take the melee encumbarance from 6 to 4 for unmarkeds and from 5 to 3 giants. More math. NO, no more... Please?
(i think im slowly losing my sanity here
)
The earth access will give some nice gear for kings. U will forge guite much stuff for the kings so having the chanse to make your own hammers is good too.
N6 makes our sacreds much harder to take down. It is also very good for the kings. Unmarked will heal for 4 hitpoints per turn and king for 7. The reduced affliction chance is very good thing too.
Pretender with nature will give you faster access to nature items. Including thistle mace, treelords staff, boots of messenger, regen ring, vine shield and many others. He can also cast gift of health.
Scales:
So lets talk about the scales for a bit. And no math this time
I will mark the scale for my example build in the beginning.
Order 1
Order is usually good choise for any nation for the cash. When playing fomoria i usually dont need so much cash that some other nations do. Im bying sacreds for the early expansion and i wont byu too many mages from other castles than capital. So order 1 should be enought.
Production 3
Fomoria has very good capital only troops. I want as many of those as i can get. Production 3 gives me more of what i want. I will talk more about the troops later.
Cold 2
I need to get points from somewhere and heat scale is good place for it. Its pretty much up to personal preference if u want to go towards heat or cold. Cold gives problems for coldbloodet dudes so i usually go for cold. Cold also feels more right for fomoria for some reason
Death 2
Fomoria is a cursed land that must use death scale. Well not really but there is not many reasons not to take death for fomoria. Fomoria dont have any problems whit old age and blood huntting or overtaxing are not so often used when playing fomoria. In long game u will loose some income but thats ok. I still dont like taking death 3 if i really dont have to. Some of the events it unlock are too nasty.
Luck 0
Taking misfortune with death is not nice and taking luck with order seems wastefull. I would still like to take luck. I would also like to get new ferrari. If i only could afford those
Magic 1
In my opinion there is no point not taking magic 1. Its so cheap for what u get. Other choise would be to go for drain 2 for the 120 points. Fomoria is one of the few nations which can afford the drain. But that would reguire an awake pretender to get hammers fast. With fire pretender fomoria has access to all research boosters. This example is with dormant pretender so no drain.
Pretender:
My choise for this example was dormant master druid. He gives me the bless that i want cheaply so i can afford my nice scales. For dominions score i went with the low minimum of 6. Less is way too risky and more is too expencive. 6 is low so you really need to keep an eye on those candles when playing. I will explain this choise bit more when talking about troops.
For other paths i took S 2 and D 1. That S gives us antimagic amulets, lucky pendant, crystal stuffs, skullcaps and other usefull thingies. That D gives flaming skulls which can turn indie F1 mages into something usfull. And the list goes on with lantern shields, hidden in sand, ether gate ( in my wet dreams where i have enought astral pearls to cast it and wish for blood who... ehmm slaves
)
All of those magics and scales leaves us whit 0 points. The first sign of well balanced build
. Only problem whit this pretender is that i will want him to do too many things. Too many things and too litle time. Good thing that gods wont suffer from burnouts. Other option and one that would be better for smaller maps is to take that pretender awake and take most of the points for it by going drain 2. If u go with drain use owl guills.
So now we have this build up and running so what do we do with it? Lets talk about the troops first.
Troops:
Firbolgs are guite good standard human troops in EA. Nothing too spesial but they can be good for some tasks. Slingers are not really that hot for anything but they can be massed easily so they have some rare uses. Axe warriors are not that hot either. They hit bit harder than the ones with javelins but have worse stats. The javelin ones start to be better. I like javelins. I usually buy group or two of them when i got the second fort up. With their high deff and javelins they can take barbarians and lizards supraisingly well.
Goatheads... Fomorian militia is the first one on that list. I would ratherly buy markatas then those. I would ratherly shoot my self in the kneecap before bying markatas
Goathead javelinist is actually guite good troop type. If i would have made this game i would have added the word expendaple in the end of their description. (if i would have made this game it would have so many typos that any teacher playing it would make suecide in ten seconds). They are like goblins or gnoblars only bigger. They do 23 damage with those javelins. They cost 20 gold per dude and they are actyally guite hard to beat on money to money basis with any normal troops whitout big shields. They are good against most sacreds too. They can be dangerous to thugs too. That awe/fear or vine shield wont do you no good against those javelins. After they have thrown the sticks they are pretty much useless. Fire and flee is one of the options. When they die dont be sad remember they are like goblins only... They have low prec and guite long range for thrown weapon so it is better to get them close to enemy before throwing. Wind guide can help too if u can find free air 2 druid for it. The other non sacred goathheads are nothing to be too excited about.
Unmarked are the best troops that u have. You want to build 6 of this dudes every turn. 6 of them make nice expancion party. U need priest to lead them. I usually use unmarked champpion scripted to bless x 3 and then fire closest. After throwing the sticks he will join the fight. The best way to use those expansion partys is to put them somewhere in the middle of ur placement area. Let the enemy come to u. The indies will get to strike first but thats ok. The only way to loose unmarkeds to normal indies is if they get singled out and surroundet. When they stand as united wall they can take a lot of punishment. The indies u should avoid with those parties are barbarians, lizards and cavemans. They can take down pretty much anything else whitout losses. Heavy calvaries go down very easily too.
Fomorian giants are not so good. Only reasons to ever buy them is that poor amfibian tag and the cold resistance 50. They are capable of going underwater but they are suprisingly crappy when fighting there.
The last ones are the nemedians. Those poor bastards still living under the goatheaded shadow of fomoria. Nemedians are very good troops. Seriosly if any of the middle age nations could buy them they would not even look at the other recruits. There vould be whole strategies build around their awesomeness
But in fomoria everything gets combared tho those sacred goatheaded ****ers
Nemedians are the reasons for takin that prod 3 and only 6 dominion. We will buy them with all resources left after those 6 unmarkeds. That should be 5-8 nemedians every turn. Nemedians will be used as sneaking raiders. Their magic golden spears are very good to have in many situations. For example if the opponent has etherial troops or thugs that relay on mistform. Nemedians are somewhat vulnerable to archers. They have good shields and enought prot not to die on first hit but the arrow hit will cancel the mirror image and after that is gone thy are much more vulnerable to other attacks.
Commanders:
I have nothing to say about most of the commanders. Unmarked cahmpions are good. They can bless and lead your armies. They are tough enought to fight with the other unmarkeds. If u can spare them some gear they can serve as thugs. Armed with just frost brand they can be suprisingly big help for your armies. Druids are not so special. The ones whit A 2 are good and the others kind of suck. Water ones will forge brands. U want lots of brands. Its not bad to forge brands whit all water gems. Water druids can alsou site search water after researching construction 6. Spamming frozen heart is one use for them. U can forge thistlemaces for one of the nature random druids to get nature site search going fast. Death druids can site search death and summon morrigans with boosters. With some nations u want to buy maximum number of weak mages from everywhere. Fomoria is not one of those... Druids are not good enought for that kind of strategies.
Kings are the best thing u can buy... So buy them
Research:
First thing to research is construction 4. It will give us researtch boosters and gear for thugs. Next goal is alteration 3 for mistform. Next enchantment 4 for cloud trapeze. It will also give us raise sekeletons for some skelly spammin fun.
Those are the ones we need for the early/early mid game strategy. After those we want many things and the order depends on what we need. Here is list for other important stuff. All of the remote site seaching spells. some more costruction for more gear. More enchantment for gift of health, hidden in sand, domes, and other stuff. More alteration for wind guide, darkness, fogwarriors, soul vortex and many others. Conjuration for morrigans, lamia gueens, troll kings... ... tartarians. Evocation for some lightning fun and shadow blasts. Thaumaturgy for wither bones and undead control spells.
Strategy:
At the beginning of the game i buy one druid and make him the prophet. I dont like to make the scout prophet and i need the normal commander to patroll on the first turn. Using the druid saves some resources for more unmarkeds. On the second turn i send the starting army to take easiest looking independents. The firbolg champions are bit too brave warriors so its good idea to script him hold x 5. In my test games i have lost some attacks becouse the dude gets himself killed. The starting army is good enought to take 1-3 indies. On the early turns buy only 6 unmarkeds and one unmarked champion to lead them. Dont take the provinces around capital too soon. It saves time if u have provinses that new groups can take right away. As soon as u can start to make second castle. Its ok to skip one expancion party for it. You can buy temple to get indie priests to bless the unmarkeds. When u have money for it start to build nemedians with the resources that are left after unmarkeds. Buy one nemedian champion to lead the nemedians.
When u have solved the problem of blessing your sacreds (u really should always bless them) it is time to start buying mages. First u should buy 4-6 nemedian sorcerers. U will need some mages for researts, site seacrhing and forging. Those should be nemedians. If u buy 5 nemedians instead of kings u will save 1150 g cash. In early game that is huge pile of cash. Send two nemedians with water or nature randoms to site search early. Site search with druids too. Buy those druids from our second castle.
In the end of yer one u should have one of the biggest land areas nice income some gems and sucky researts but that will change soon. U should also have about 60 unmarkeds with some afflictions and some stars.
If u are not yet in war with some other player its time to choose some nice looking land area and prepare for attack. You want to have the original reseach plan completed. Sneak some nemedians on the lands of the opponent. Cloud trapeze 5 - 6 fomorian kings To the opponents land. Give the kings frost brands and script them to bless and cast mistform. Use the nemedians to take the capitol on the same turn. Tax 200% every where and take more land. Buy one defence in every land. Buy big chunk of pd to some lands. Keep the opponent guessing which provinces you give back whitout fight. Keep thugs, PD or nemedians in others. Laught when the opponent goes AI
If u are alredy figting war complete ur research asap and then execute the thug land grap. Play time and try to dance around any too big enemy armys. Bleed out the big armies. Use fomorian javelinists to weaken the enemy. If the enemy cannot keep their land they will loose. It just might take some time for the opponent to undestant that
If u read about the history of the fomorians u will learn that they never fight fairly. If they are loosing they will plague the lands and use other dirty tricks. Its up to you to keep up that tradition
There are 4 ways that i know how to raid enemys inland provinces. First is teleporting/trapezing thugs. You can do that with kings. Second is sneak attacks. Have i talked you about nemedians yet? Third is flying armies. Flying boots and morrigans. Last is sailing past the opponent well defendet provinces and hitting them in the back. Kings can sail. So there is no reason why you should not be raiding the opponent like there is no tomorrow.
Scouting is very important for fomoria. You should do anything u can to get most of the opponents areas scouted. If u cant find indie scouts then u should buy them from ur non capital castles. If u have problems getting enought scouts then black servants can help.
If your scouts happen to find site searchers you can send them some arrows. The seeking kind
When going against human players you should always mix some other troops with ur goats. There are tree options for this. First is to use some high deff troops to reduce the damage ur goats will take. Firbolgs are good for this. Second is to mix in some high damage troops like barbarians. Let ur goats take the first damage and then let the barbarians fill the caps. Works good against calvary and high protection targets. Third and the best option is to mix in nemedians. They have very high defence with mirror image and their magic weapons will help against many opponents. Blessed unmarkeds mixed with nemedians make for suprisingly good battle force.
I usually buy an army of independent archers when i have the cash and resorces for it. Archers work guite well against many of the stuff that those sacreds have problems whit. Archers are also very difrent from what is usually expected from fomoria. Archers mix well with unmarkeds but not so good with nemedians. Wind guide is ofcourse good with this strategy. In vanilla dom that enchantment 4 we have gives the option to cast flaming arrows. That can save the day sometimes.
Fomoria has many cheap castles and i like to build many of those. Build temples in every castle. Helps with that low dom score. Keep an eye out for indie mages. Many of those can help lot with diversity. Your pretender can forge most of the boosters so even the low level indie mages are usefull.
Gift of healt is very good for fomoria and works well with those trapezing and regenerating thugs. Its very good for the sacreds too. If u have the gems for it when u hit enchantment 4 u should go straight for it. Usually i dont have the gems for it that early
Fogwarriors is very good for nemedians who start to go down bit too easily when the game hits mid game. Nemedians also have darkvision 50 which can be handy with those high death mages around.
Fomorian kings are effective thugs with minimal equipment but it can be good idea to give them more gear. With the nice bless they dont need too much gear to be effective even if mistform fails. They are not some weak *** vans who go puff as soon as mistform fails. Even just the chainmail of displeicment and frost brand can be enough for guite big fight. Any extra gear will help. Soul vortex is ofcourse good for kings. It can be cast whit death 2 kings if u give them one gem for it.
Hmm i was supposed to write small guide for my way to play fomoria but it seems like i accidentally wrote the second bible
Im sorry for boring u all to death and im sorry for all the headache my bad english causes to people
I hope that this text can atleast offer some ideas to some readers. And i atleast got some masochistic pleasure from writing it
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