Pillaging the dead and my beloved Tuatha

[Minrhael]

Couple things:

1) Would it be possible to have a chance of taking gems from slain enemy commanders carrying them? It always irks me when I kill an enemy commander that had a gem pouch filled with 30 gems and I can't ever get any of them. Making it so we have a, let's say 20% chance of getting each gem the enemy was carrying at battle's end, this would only result in about a half dozen gems from a full pouch which wouldn't seem outrageous, the rest can get lost in the melee of battle. It just seems silly that I never find any of them.

2) My beloved Tuatha: I find that the Sidhe Lord (2A 1N 3H 280g or 290g forget which) in between the Sidhe Champion (1A 1N 2H 140g) and the Tuatha (3A 2N 1? 3H 390g) is virtually useless. If you're going to spend 280, you may as well wait for the extra 110 gold and get an extra air, nature, and random spell level, especially with that random pick being the only way Tuatha are ever getting outside A/N except their pretender and lucky independent finds. How about cutting a level of air off it, and increasing the holy level to 4, perhaps making it unmounted.

Since the Tuatha have virtually no access to Power of the Spheres, or a Communion, or Crystal Shields there's really no chance of them ever getting priests above level 3 except for one via the (IIRC) Unique Sword of Justice and their one prophet, and they have to make that prophet out of a very expensive commander if they want Holy 4. If the Sidhe Lord was made 1A 1N 4H, it would finally have some use, and I could see recruiting one now and again as it would at least have a specific purpose, though I still wouldn't use them very often, with the much more useful Tuatha just 100 gold more. And if it was made unmounted, the loss of 3 strategic move and without the 2A to Cloud Trapeze around it would be much less mobile which should make up for any overpowering that access to lvl 4 Holy would give. It just irks me that a theme which is so clearly intended to use bless effects is hampered by the inability to cast divine blessing, it's not like the theme is overpowered.

Also, how about letting us recruit Cu Sidhe at all castles? Probably not I suppose, as limiting all the sacreds to the starting province makes sense to me thematically, but at least then they'd be a bit more useful, as it is I never recruit them until very end game when I have the ability to recruit 10 or 12 sacred troops and don't have the resources to recruit that many Daoine Sidhe.

[ May 03, 2004, 09:45: Message edited by: Minrhael ]

[PhilD]

Well, the Tuatha theme may be poor in high-level Priests, but it has an excellent small level priest in the Monk - Stealthy and very cheap. OK, that's the same as the basic Man theme, but I like it a lot - it's cheaper than Scouts in the long run, thanks to the Sacred bit.

Man not having powerful (natural level 4) priests seems reasonable to me; but I agree that the intermediate Sidhe commander is next to useless; being mounted is actually more of a hindrance than an asset, as it prevents him from wearing boots, and there is no mounted Daoine Sidhe Version (now THAT would be a nice thing).

I also make very little use of the Cu Sidhe, but was wondering if I should give them a try. But I'm not a Blessing freak, and high Blessings in Tuatha are horribly expensive...

[sergex]

Only use I see for sidhe lord is if you need the ability to cast lightning bolt early on. They are cheaper than the 390gp one if you are just using them in the back to cast direct damage. Honestly though, they are pretty weak but then again most nations have one or two pretty useless commanders.

I suppose you could use a strategy of building a Sidhe Lord every turn early on while researching Evocation up to lightning bolt and then swarm the neutrals with them. Doesn't really work against heavy cavalry but it would route infantry quickly.

Oh, and the best use I found for the doggies is as patrollers. One game I was being harrassed by Tien Chi concubines in my capital but a dozen of the dogs caught them right away and tore em up good I wouldn't rely on them in combat but as patrollers they fit the role perfectly. If you have a choke point on the map just set them to patrol there and no scouts will get through.

[ May 03, 2004, 10:46: Message edited by: sergex ]

[Minrhael]

Yep, I like the Cu as patrollers as well, and they actually do more damage than the Daoine (str 14 + 2dmg bite vs str 12 + 3 dmg spear), assuming they don't get repelled. Incidentally, do flaming weapons work on bite (or other 0 length attacks)? I assume not, as flaming teeth would seem more than a bit silly, but who knows, I don't think I've ever tried them with fire 9.

But since they have only 5 prot, and 10 def, they have no survivability whatsoever even with the 18 hp in a 16 gold unit (which is pretty nice). Basically, if I have Arrow Fend researched, and a Water blessing, I find them to be useful in combat as flankers. Also, they are a 3 move forest survival unit, so they do work well as your quick response unit, which is what I'm starting to use them as now that I've gotten over my PD purchasing phase.

So, all in all, I don't think they're a bad unit, just not worth recruiting because you have to get every Daoine you can, really, and I rarely have extra gold with the rather expensive mages and poor scales thanks to high blessings and required luck.

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Minrhael:
Incidentally, do flaming weapons work on bite (or other 0 length attacks)?

Of course it does.

[st.patrik]

The Sidhe Lord is a great early game choice, or late game when you have multiple smaller forces in addition to your main force/s. Basically he has just enough magic to cast Wind Guide so he's ideally suited to leading a cadre of longbows, whether that be early conquest of indies, patrolling in late game, or as a territory-grabbing auxiliary force.

The Cu Sidhe definitely seem to me to be the extra troop to recruit when you max out your resources. If you have lots of income and a high dominion then you have the possibility to make quite a few Cu Sidhe each turn, in addition to the Daoine Sidhe. I happen to think they're very useful too...

[Jasper]

I find I use both Lords and Tuatha. Lords have just enough magic to cast Cloud Trapeze, Mistform, Lightning, and Shockwave, and are often basically as effect as a Tuatha -- for 3/4 the price. Tuatha aren't as efficient, but their better magic has obvious advantages.

With an excellent _30_ gold stealthy priest Man has zero problems getting it's troops blessed, especially considering every Sidhe leader can also bless. Plus, while you don't get alot of mileage out of Holy 4 on an expensive commander, the stat bonuses are nice on a commander that kicks *** in battle.

As far as Cu Sidhe go, what's the point? I always max out on the far more usefull Doaine Sidhe, and so can't recruit Cu. Early in the game I can't quite do this, but then I'd still rather save my gold for more Sidhe.