LA Ermor Questions

[incognito]

Been playing late age Ermor in an MP game, and while I am doing well in the early going, I have tons of questions that will instruct me for the late(r) game.

1) How good are wailing ladies? They seem like expensive summons, and as of yet, I have not gotten any. Is the death attack and AoE; what is the range?

2) Has anyone tried soul gate? What types of troops do you get and how many of them? I start with the assumption that it's a bit like the Ry'leh void gate in terms of randomness of output.

3) What are generally considered the better summons? I see lictors as OK, perhaps very nice if combined with the item that lets you get two additional lictor summons with the 'revive lictor' summon. Wraith senator seems to trump arch bishops for the additional 2 death gems once you get high enough conjuration. Dusk elders and spectators are staples for me, although summoning slows down as you find indy sites (minimal for me so far), plus have other uses for death gems. Any really good commanders of forces (high undead leadership and good MR/etherealness)?

4) Battle magic - there are some obvious choices e.g. darkness, rigor mortis, but what other options have people found to be effective? What are specific tactics for leader composition to minimize weaknesses (mindless troops) and maximize strengths?

5) Tactics for effectively managing army gathering??

Thanks in advance for some good replies.

[Nick_K]

1) Not sure how good wailing ladies are as I play sp only and the game is pretty much over by the time they make their appearance. I believe that the attack is Aoe1 Mr resists, although I'm not sure. As for 'range'... I seem to recall that their death attack is melee, unlike the basilisk and catoblepas.

2) If you've played Doms2 you'll know what to expect. You get various ethereal undead. I believe it's dispossessed spirits, shadows, shades and apparitions. The latter have a disease aura. These appear as part of the freespawn you get, although I'm not sure how their numbers are determined. Definitely not as many as the corporeal ones.
I should note that what you get is much more predictable than R'lyeh. You'll get a very similar mix of troops in each province.

3) In SP it really doesn't matter what leaders you use so I'm not a good advisor here. You should get freespawn mound kings. Not sure what the best undead leadership/cost is but maybe censors. The undead clerics have high leadership and can also reanimate and cast useful battlefield spells, so I like to have some in each army.

[calmon]

1) I played LA ermor in a MP game but didn't use the wailing lady (beside some out of the soulgate). They can do some damage but they die fast. For me wailing ladies aren't worth the gems, they don't help against anti-undead armies and you don't really need them against others. In general i don't like the LA ermor national summons, only the research 0 are usefull.

2) Souldgate IS really powerfull. I think you double your undead combat strength you get each turn.

Soulgate free spawns are:
Shadow Tribunes, commander, holy 1
Dispossessed Spirit (much)
Spectral Legionnaire (much)
Spectral Standard (sometimes)
Spectral Velite (sometimes)
Shade (sometimes)
Shadow (sometimes)
Ghost (sometimes)
Shade Beast (rare)
Apparition (rare, spread disease)
Wailing Lady (very rare)
Generally provinces with temples give you the better ones.

3) I only used Dusk Elders and spectators + indies and free summons. I cast a wraith senator to make him a good prophet. Manual says they are holy 3 but they are only holy 2 so take care! I wrote that in the bug threat some time ago.

4) Wailing Winds! This Fear +0 attack every turn rocks! Priests and other nasty things will start to retreat after you bring up this spell. Your dusk elders have a chance to get air magic.

5) Well, i was very happy after my opponents surrendered. It was a 24 hour qickhost and that micromanagment was really stressful. No really good hint here.

[Shovah32]

4)Wailing winds, drain life, shadow blast, cloud of death ect

[PvK]

1) Wailing Ladies' best trick is their Fear effect. For that, they are perhaps worth their cost. You don't want them to try to engage in combat - you want them hanging out just behind the front lines to break the enemies' morale.

3) Tartarians are one of the best summons in the game, especially considering their cost. There are lots of other very good death summons, too.

4) Be sure to try to have priest support available for Power and Protection of the Unholy Sepulchre, etc. Raise Skeletons is good to spam.

5) Build forts so you get better freespawns. Freespawn mound kings are great for troop-zooming if you have enough. If you group the faster undead by type under fast leaders, then they can move er, faster.

[Shovah32]

Basically i agree with PvK. Spectators are great skele-spammers, tartarians are AMAZING for their cost, protection of the sepulchre(and power with a holy4 priest) is very useful, forts are good for the superior troops and wailing ladies are nice although i personally only use them when i reach the highest level, most cost effective way to summon them.

[LoloMo]

Do you normally set taxes to 200% for ermor? It seems like there is no disadvantage to doing so, and if you patrol you get troops faster?

[PvK]

Personally, I tend to use normal taxation until my dominion arrives. Once my lethal dominion arrives, then I go to 200%.

[incognito]

I'm surprised to hear that. I would have thought that, even with population dying, 100 taxes and no unrest is the money optimizing solution here. While there are no purchaseable national units, having castles, temples, and high PD in every province really helps.

What's the logic to 200 taxes, and presumably a quick choking off of future revenue?

[MaxWilson]

Presumably PvK patrols with freespawn to keep unrest down.

-Max