EA Arco - uncle moneybags

[thejeff]

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

aaminoff is right in one thing. %reduction vs. %avoid should be really easy to tell. In particular, %reduction would show up small amounts of lightning damage every time you were in the AoE, but %avoid would show no damage most of the time and then *bam* lots of damage.

I just played around with this a little with Eagle Kings modded to 75% SR. They seemed to take more damage than I would expect with 75% resistance, but they also had fatigue most of the time. More importantly, I never saw one in the AoE not take some damage.

I'm sticking with the assumption that resistances are %reduction not %avoid.

[Verjigorm]

I've tried the standard SC's. The Cyclops is a weak choice for EA Arcoscephale. They already have significant earth power and Earth mages do not stand in as much need of an Earth blessing.

Cyclops' paths cost too much to make him useful in diversifying magic, and even if you still want the Earth blessing, you can take the Master Druid and get a dual bless with nature cheaper than you ever could with the Cyclops and he allows better magical diversity, even though you don't really need it for anything besides Death which you could do nicely using the Lord of Rebirth who, in CBM, will provide you with an excellent additional gem supply in exchange for the points and costs slightly less. In Vanilla, I doubt he's worth the 125 cost.

I prefer Immortals (especially Phoenix for early expansion), Rainbows (for site searches and easy access to all paths), and Big Astral--I found that a Sphinx with Death magic like this one (CBM) can make for interesting late game strategies.

Sphinx (Body 159, 500 hits)
Magic: Earth 6 Astral 10 Death 6
Dominion 5
Scales: Order 3 Sloth 2
Imprisoned

You want Thaum-8 or better by the time he escapes so he can teleport.

Stygian Paths to your enemies capitol and supply him with gems. He just casts a lot of Thaumaturgy spells:

Master Enslave
Undead Mastery
Soul Drain
Wither Bones
Burden of Time (if you plan to go with this strategy, of course, you'd want to take neutral or production scales, magic 1 or 3 and not get too many Philosophers, and I've never tried using BoT with Arco, but Orieads are relatively resistant to BoT)

You also get Charm on your Orieads which is one of the things they're great for, and access to the very useful Gale Gate, Imprint Souls, etc...

[Verjigorm]

Taking a step costs 15 death gems and 250 gold if you have to build a lab, but the Sphinx is definitely not easy to destroy especially in its own dominion.

Parking it inside a castle is a most excellent defense. Bing! 30 million tons of Astral Malevolence is now guarding your province... and no one can see it until they break down the doors and find their souls ripped out by a massive stone God.

There is one thing you should avoid, however...

The Sphinx cannot tear down a castle wall by itself, nor can it build a lab in a province with a castle. Therefore, if you teleport the Sphinx onto a castle, you need to be sure that the army that it brings along with it can tear down that castle AND storm it successfully as the Sphinx itself cannot do either of these things. Your best bet is to park the Sphinx in a province adjacent to the target castle and then use Gateway to transport in troops to siege and conquer the castle.

There are so many nifty things to do with the Sphinx in EA Arco.... I have played a bit, but haven't fully explored it's awesomeness. One thing is sure, though, I don't take the fountain anymore--The only immobile I select is the Sphinx. I have tried the Statue, and she's quite nice, but not as nice as interesting as Sphinxy. Teleporting the fountain into battle is very dangerous. It says the fountain is difficult to destroy in the description, but it's not that tough and it can't run away.

I've never encountered the "50-turn rout" problem with Sphinx... Not sure what happens, but I bet it's not good on the offense. Fortunately, his offensive movements are few and far between since he usually attacks opportunistically and then defends his landing spot from whatever might come there. If you can predict the path of your opponent's march (bridge provinces) you can set dastardly traps.

Sphinx is my favorite Late Game Astral pretender. Indestructible lovliness.

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

I have tried it - many times. Teach your mom to suck eggs =P.
There are a *lot* of indies that will gank a cyclops. Ichies, bandits, crossbows, cav, nightmares, awakened vines, air masters, mandragora.... to name a few.

Almost all of which you'll see coming. (The small numbers of crossbows or HC that occasionally avoid showing up in scout reports won't end you). And most of which are rare. Are there even crossbow indies in the EA? I mean, most awake SCs have things they can't handle, just don't attack those things.

And those air masters will end just about any standard expansion party or SC. So dying to them is kind of par for the course.

[chrispedersen]

Sure squirrel. But not only do you get awe with dom9, you get much better hitpoints -and therefore MUCH lower chance of a crippling affliction which ends your usage as an SC.

Anyway, we agree he isn't worth the points.

Verji, I don't think in MP play people are going to allow you to get away with an imprisoned pretender. Arco tends to get jumped...

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by chrispedersen

Verji, I don't think in MP play people are going to allow you to get away with an imprisoned pretender. Arco tends to get jumped...

I honestly don't understand this emphasis on pretenders to defend against rushes. I defend rushes with national mages and troops all the time. Now, my EA Arco experience is pretty limited, but you have earth magic and good research, it can't possibly be that bad.

You know, i think i feel a general strategy post coming on...

[Verjigorm]

I think they can take a rush provided you don't take the standard, Sloth-3 and can actually build a good group of troops. The Sphinx I suggested above still has Sloth, but that could be exchanged out especially since I took that extra gravy point of Astral magic and I didn't touch Misfortune. Mis-2 could be exchanged for the Sloth-2 for respectable troop production.

EA Arco has some very nice units. The only reason they are ever subpar in early game is because of the Sloth scale. 17-prot Myrmidons, Flying Cavalry, Trampling Chariots? Come on... They can defend themselves.

[rdonj]

Mm... myrmidons are a bit iffy. Their insane encumbrance value makes them tricky to use effectively other than as pure arrow catchers. The flying cavalry looks awesome on paper, but it is also tricky to use effectively, because of the way flyers seperate from each other and build up fatigue super fast. But I have only ever used them against the AI. Against a human, definitely they would be much better.

The archer chariots are pretty good though. And peltasts can be surprisingly effective.

[chrispedersen]

slingers for glamour
chariot archers for (almost)everything else.

You know, it seems to me, if you're flying you shouldn't' be trampled.

[Verjigorm]

Well, I tend to use a diversified army...

Icarids are excellent anti-archer and can be quite effective against infantry as well provided you outnumber them because in large numbers, they tend to flank opponents which, for a group of archers, results in a very, very quick death.

As for the flying cavalry, if you don't have a large number of them, for some odd reason the AI tends to spread them out and you get 1 vs. 27....