Dominion

[Knai]

Originally Posted by Ferrosol

Arco is awesome at least in EA and MA anyway.

They have a lot going for them in EA, but it doesn't all pan out well. There is a reason they were in the first Cripple Fight, despite the easy access to powerful nature globals due to the Oreid, the power of the skeptic, and the communion capabilities of the Mystic. But troop wise, at least in vanilla, they suck. The slinger is near useless, while Cardaces and Peltasts are easy to mass, they aren't very good, Chariots are just too resource heavy to mass easily, though doable (Cash isn't a huge issue, EA Arco should have a lot), and they have near worthless flying units because they are too expensive. Furthermore, Death access isn't, and EA Arco has trouble getting decent astral.

Now, MA Arco has some real staying power, not the least of which is the ease of a mass priestess mass astrologer Mind Hunt spam, and relatively early, which can do some real damage, and counter late game SC strategies if you keep it up to power.

[GrudgeBringer]

Guess it depends on how you play them.

I am in 2 games turns in the 80's and 90's and right in the hunt and we just finished one from exhaustion that was in the ninties that had another 50 turns to get to a winner.

What you say is basically true about troops, but sometimes the parts can become bigger than the whole if you know how to use your strengths.

Anyway, I have always played Arco and have had good success in games and have enjoyed this nation immensly.

Wanna have a good time....try playing with some of the best players and play against Helheim, Sauro, Caelem, Niefl etc and out last a lot of them.

It doesn't matter if you win the game, just being there at the end is good enough with a nation like Arco for me.

[chrispedersen]

I rate EA arco as somewhere around the 5th strongest nation in EA, and a lot of fun to play.

[Verjigorm]

I always enjoy Arco as well. They're my favorite nation, but EA is my least favorite version as they have neither astrologers nor heart companions. The Astral/Nature combo Sibyl with her Fortunetelling (15) ability is also a unit I'm quite fond of, though not as much as the Astrologers as 1/4 astrologers can Mind Hunt without a booster whereas Sibyls are 1/4 can hunt with one booster.

I have run many strategy variations with Arco, and they are relatively robust all around. I always find that people playing arco tend to overlook the Myrmidon for some reason. They're incredibly resource intensive (and Arco has very little resources), but Myrmidons are a nasty little swarm of units. They have 12HP, 11 Strength, and 17 protection. The last item being the best part about them. They have an extremely low gold cost which makes them more "cost effective" if you take a less-than-rich arco. Lots of people tend to take arco rich which isn't strictly necessary--granted, it is useful since Orieads and Mystics are not the cheapest mages around (in fact quite the opposite).

It's also not impossible to recruit Wind Riders, either. Wind Riders are very nice troops and I love hiring them and Icarids quite frequently--not because they are necessarily a superior individual unit mind you, but Icarids are VERY fast on the map and in battle. This speed and their low resource cost allows them to swarm archers and back line units easily and their large numbers usually allows for good flanking which tears apart lightly-armored units early on.

I think people give Arcoscephale's units too little credit.

Heart Companion is still my favorite even though they're cap-only. I usually give them either Twist Fate or Flaming Weapons, but don't go for a double/triple bless since they're cap only. Now in LA, I was thinking that, since Sibyl's are sacred, an E9 would be quite appropriate bless for them since the rejuv makes up for the Sibyl's lack of Earth magic relative to the Oriead (even though I would never presume to say that a Sibyl could ever compare to an Oriead), but then again, E4S9 might still be better... and you could still get away with a bit more E like E6 maybe... so many possibilities. I hate to limit myself to just one "standard" build... so boring.

On another note, I've also taken Arco builds that don't incorporate Sloth which reduces the attractiveness of the Philosopher (since Production scales give research penalties) and increases the attractiveness of the Mage Engineer as an early researcher and item forger. You will only end up with just a handful of Mage Engineers since your income should be good enough to get Orieads every turn a bit more quickly for non-sloth arco. It also opens up swarms of Myrmidons, Chariots, and Wind Rider cavalry. This, of course, was an SP game, though I wouldn't be above trying it in MP sometime given the opportunity.

Taking Sloth-1 Magic-1 can also free up production quite a bit and doesn't do too bad on research--though you'll switch to Oriead production asap. Sloth-3 Magic-1 I think is quite common.

[Knai]

EA Arco is my favorite nation personally, even if they aren't hugely powerful. They lack some of the fun parts that MA and LA can pull of easily, but there are some advantages, and some ways to have a lot of fun. Oreid assassination is always entertaining, particularly once you have high Thaum research and just Charm the guy, which works very well against SCs that aren't yet outfitted with all the MR they will be getting later but still good enough to hurt people.

As for Arco builds, I've used no Sloth builds before, some of which work well. The hysapsist is a nice little unit to mass, and in EA there is fun to be had with the Myrmidon, and a high production build might actually be able to use Wind Riders, and they can be useful, though they are overpriced.

[Calahan]

Originally Posted by Knai

They have a lot going for them in EA, but it doesn't all pan out well. There is a reason they were in the first Cripple Fight, despite the easy access to powerful nature globals due to the Oreid, the power of the skeptic, and the communion capabilities of the Mystic.

It was LA Arco that was in the Cripple Fight game, not EA Arco. As EA Arco has a few wins under its belt.