Looking for help with SC pretenders

[Cainehill]

Several of the best are nation specific - Allfather, Carrion Dragon, Niefel Jarl, maybe the Medusa. Others include the cyclops, several of the titan-esque pretenders, even the earth momma (albeit she is, imo, _crippled_ because of the way trampling works - same with the Dagon).

[Cainehill]

Yossar said:
Carrion Dragon is really good because of recuperation and sleep vines but suffers late game (like all dragons) from a lack of equipment slots.

No it doesn't. Unlike the elemental dragons, the CD is still pretty beefy in its humanish form - 53 base hit points or so, and full equipment slots. The only real weakness is a relatively low attack / defense in carrion lord form. Helping to make up for that is the 6 carrion sleep vine attacks in addition to whatever weapon is equipped. In dragon form, it has much higher offense, and great HPs - base 200, easily getting close to 500 in favorable dominion.

[Vynd]

It's always seemed to me that the most crucial spells for your early expansion, indy-killing, SC are Mistform and Mirror Image. Ironskin/Invulnerability are next on my list. I've experimented with many of the chassis that people have mentioned (Ghost King, Wyrm, etc.) with some air and earth magic but none of this "1 point of fire for fire shield, 2 points of water for quickness and breath of winter." And they've mostly done just fine against all but the toughest indies. And this frees up quite a few more points to use on some non-SC related magic paths, or on better scales.

Have other people found that quickness, BoW, or fire shield, really make a big difference? I haven't been seeing it but I know there are plenty of folks with more experience than I have.

On a different note, one thing I have noticed is very helpful in cleaning out indies is a powerful Fear aura. When I tried a Carrion Dragon chasis with 7 Death magic on top of his naturally very high Fear, he would often rout high morale units with just a single kill. Regular morale units often ran without even getting close enough to fight. He had no air or earth magic at all but still had no trouble with indies, not even knights. A Prince of Death could probably do something similar, although I haven't tried it.

[Kel]

Vynd said:
Have other people found that quickness, BoW, or fire shield, really make a big difference? I haven't been seeing it but I know there are plenty of folks with more experience than I have.

I pretty well always build in quickness for an early indie clearer. I start with quickness, ironskin, mistform, mirror image. All the others you listed (+ a few others like Soul Vortex) can help later, against other players, but for non flying indies, that usually does the trick with pretty much any pretender.

Vynd said:
A Prince of Death could probably do something similar, although I haven't tried it.

The PoD is great for routing indies with fear. The only thing I run into with him is that if I don't give him the aforementioned spells, I occasionally lose him to some group that got lucky with their morale roles. I still use him but only when I really want the death magic anyway (as it should be). He is also one of my favorite choices for Miasma Ctis.

- Kel

[JJ_Colorado]

Cainehill,

What do you mean that the Earth Mother is crippled by the way that trampling works? It seems really effective (trampling) in my experience.

Thanks,
John

[The_Tauren13]

I assume he is refering to the fact that giving her a hell sword or blood thorn is useless because she will trample rather than use it.

[The Panther]

Having played Dagon in my first MP game, I can say that trample fails miserably against SCs. He was fine clearing the level 9 indies, but was completely hopeless against the VQ. The VQ with the quickness and mistform never got run over. It always squirted away. Every single time. So the VQ just kept growing in HP as Dagon slowly died. Totally one-sided.

I am sure it is the same against any other SC who has quickness/flying/mistform. Trample has a pathetically low probability against these buffs. And it will never use the normal sword attack when up against a smaller opponent. Even against indies, dagon was always getting heavily fatigued while trampling. A reinvigoration artifact is an absolute must.

You simply cannot make a true SC who has the busted ability trample. Now, if there was a way to turn it off before a battle, than I would modify my opinion. Or maybe even if it was smart enough to actually do an attack rather than trying a completely hopeless trample a dozen times or more. But as it stands, trample loses to pretty much ANY other SC who is smaller in size.

[Nagot Gick Fel]

The Panther said:
I am sure it is the same against any other SC who has quickness/flying/mistform. Trample has a pathetically low probability against these buffs.

Nope, the big decider here is etherealness (although if the trampled has a lifedraining attack it's even worse). For the record, I saw an AI Dagon lose an arena dearhmatch to a Black Servant once.

Myself I learned the effectiveness of etherealness vs trampling the hard way in my first MP a few years ago, when I lost THREE Iron Dragons to a Dusk Elder and an etherealized Ghoul!

I still think trampling is great, it's just not great vs everything, so pick your targets accordingly. A trampling pretender should equip as many reinvigoration items as possible. Buying a few levels of death magic for Soul Vortex is also a good idea.

[Kel]

Tramplers don't swing their life draining weapons. Someone needs to invent life draining boots for them.

- Kel

[Cainehill]

JJ_Colorado said:
Cainehill,

What do you mean that the Earth Mother is crippled by the way that trampling works? It seems really effective (trampling) in my experience.

As others have mentioned, trample is ... less than effective against a number of opponents - ethereal for instance, and I believe it's not only against ethereal opponents.

And the real problem is that you can't do _anything_ about it. A unit that can trample, will trample, against anything less than its own size. So - as others mentioned, the nice Hellsword, or Bloodthorn does nothing for you, and it's not only the life-stealing weapons that are thus useless. Ember - nope, not going to get the 1-hex area of effect fire and cold attack. Ditto for other weapons.

Thus, a large trampling commander is screwed - it's okay for dealing with ... peasants, but, in my experience, loses to any halfway decently magicked combatant commander, simply because the trample doesn't work.

(For example: my scout watched _two_ very well equipped golems lose to one VQ. In fact - the VQ was unconscious, and the tramplers _STILL_ couldn't do anything to her - they'd trample, the VQ would shift about the battlefield in her sleep, and the golems kept losing fatigue until the VQ woke up and finished things. This, despite the fact that the golems had good weapons.)