Bogarus Quick Guide

[DrPraetorious]

There has been much *****ing in respect to the power of Bogarus. Let's start with a breakdown of the mages:

* Starets. The Star, indeed, the raisin deeter of the entire nation. Much hash has been made over their low cost - they cost the same as an Augur elder, the Augur elder is quite excellent, and the Starets is better. I don't view this is a balance problem - you recruit one every turn, which is the same number you'd recruit if the cost 75gp more, and, by and large, you are going to end up spending the extra money on your dismal military.
While their low cost is not that big a deal, their high total research output (regardless of cost), *is* a big deal, and gives Bogarus the sharpest early research graph in the game, sharper even than EA Arco.
In the long run, you actually don't have a research advantage on cost anyway. These guys produce 12RP/17gp/turn, compare to an Archtheurg at 9RP/13gp/turn. Over the long haul, it's sacred researchers that really pay off.
But in the short run you've got a huge leg up, and you'll want to take advantage of it.

* Master of Names. By and large, you will recruit one of these in every non-capital fort, every turn. When you have all the science, they turn into serviceable communion slaves.

* Kalendologist. The argument can be made for these guys, but personally I'd rather have more science and take the bad events.

* Alchemist. Recruit 1 or 2 of these - they'll search for sites (only earth you get) and may perform alchemy if needed. Even at +50% alchemy is not a great idea most of the time.

* Astrapelagist. Another site searcher. The event prevention is not worth the loss of research, most of the time, BUT these guys are your best bet for cheap combat mages out of the many, many fortresses you will be building. If you're at war (and you probably are), you'll want groups of 8 who will form a communion and spam thunderstrike.

* Occultist. The final leg of your native site searchers. You can use these guys to blood hunt, or you can use five fold angels, it's probably about a wash.

Note that this gives you F1A2E1S1D1B1. Pick up a couple of trivals to find nature, and the only site you're missing is water.
This is one reason I recommend *against* aiming for the water summons. No income.

* Five fold angels. Use them as blood hunters (the unrest is bad, but the low upkeep and second point of blood magic are good), or stealth preachers, as you like it. Skopets are amusing but I wouldn't bother.

military:
Dateline: Stalingrad, 1943
* Scum, from the huts of scum. To conquer indie provinces, you will be recruiting peshti of one kind or another (I recommend the axes, so that you can kill some heavy infantry) and voi archers.
These units suck, and you don't care if they die doing their internationalist duty. When they can't conquer anything else useful, you bring them home to be patrollers. At least they're cheap.
You can give 1/3 of them axes if you really want to extend the red army joke.

* You can use the Voi infantry as skirmishers if you have the patience (scatter them around in front of your real army to soak spells and arrows), but your peshti are expendable enough that I wouldn't bother.

* The cavalry are decent and only moderately overpriced, especially the medium cav with composite bow and sword. Their great virtue is that they aren't strat move 1, so once your past the very early wars, use these guys, or tribal archers and light infantry, or something other than your SM 1 national troops.
Even these guys aren't much compared to a real army, so mainly you'll be wanting chaff who can die in droves while your communion drops thunderstrikes.

* Khlyst are stealthy. This means they are actually better than flagellants. Not worth a bless, though, imo.

Pretender Design:
You *need* a supercombatant God. If you don't have one, your opponents are not going to sit there and allow you to build up an insurmountable research lead.

This is my build, you can vary it somewhat:
Prince of Death, Awake, Domstr 10, Earth 4, Death 5, 3 Order, 3 Sloth, 3 Cold, 3 Growth, 2 Misfortune.
A few notes:
* The extra point of cold is probably going to be cancelled during summer of year 1 (when it really matters), and helps to bring the edges of your dominion to the desired cold 2 more quickly.
* Your dismal military really cries out for 3 Sloth.
* Your capital is a great city which changes the relative value of certain scales.

== Early Turns ==
1. Recruit a starets and a bunch of the archers. Send your PoD blind into the highest income-looking adjacent province (avoid forests, as dark vines can still kill him). Absolutely set him to attack - if he tries to use magic, that's bad.
Raise your TR to 150% and set your initial army to patrol. Your scout should be a prophet.
Alternately, raise your TR to 200% and have your scout sneak after your PoD, he'll build a fort on turn 2. Probably better to wait, though.

2-4. Build a starets every turn, and some scum if you like. Put all RP into construction. Keep your starting army in your capital until you have 1200 gp for a walled city, then lower your tax rate back down and build it in a nice-looking province. With a TR of 200% you can sometimes do this on the 2nd turn, but you miss out on a staret so it's not worth it.
Your POD should be wandering around killing stuff. Avoid enemy dominion, avoid amazons or undead provinces and dark vines. Avoid Hvy Cav unless dominion in the province is at least 3.
Once you have the money for a walled city, send your pile of archers and spearmen around conquering weak indies.

Turn 5 - Rerout your research to get const 2 and them thaumaturgy.

Turn 6 - You just got construction 2! Build the following:
Enchanted Sword, Pendant of Luck, your choice of:
Fire Plate, Fire Sword, Copper Plate (Fire Plate is usually what you want against an F9 bless enemy.) Have your God come home and get it.

If you have an opponent with weak dominion, your God can personally kick his *** now. More likely, your God is going to intercept your first neighbor to invade you (expect this next turn). Fighting inside your own (strong) dominion, he can stop pretty much anything at this point, and bite back against an enemy with anything other than a SC God of his own.
Early research priorities are Thaum 1 and Evocation 4, so that you can put together a communion of 8 Astrapalegists (4 masters, 4 slaves) to spam thunderstrike.
Then you probably want blood (for thug chassis as well as big piles of demon troops) and construction, or possibly enchantment (for flaming arrows) and alteration (for wind guide.)

Other Sundry:
1) Flaming Arrows + Wind Guide. You have enough fire and air to pull off both, so you probably should. Your national archers are an bang:buck ratio, but you'd probably rather have tribals for the improved strategic move.

2) PoD and risks. Your PoD is going to pick up a few afflictions. Try to avoid them but don't have kittens when it happens. Place him at the far rear of the battlefield (to avoid crossbow bolts) and set him to attack rear. This both minimizes his exposure to archery, and will hopefully inflict some morale damage on the front line infantry before they can turn around and get him.

Mostly they'll be pretty irrelevant (Chest Wound doesn't matter when you have no enc., Weakness and Never Healing Wound can almost be ignored, etc.) but there are a few that will end his career of conquest.
Use your research edge to beat everyone else to the chalice.

3) Stealth Communion Fun. See "stupid pet tricks". Make a master matrix, give it to a druid (or other stealthy nature mage.) Give him some nature gems. Send him along with four angels scripted to cast sabbath slave, and a bunch of Khlyst.

When they fight, he casts Mass Protection - tada, you get some kind of army!

Note that this is in-no-way worth a bless.