help please with pretender SC's for early expansion

[Boron]

Originally posted by Endoperez:
I am not sure about what exactly is going on in here, but it seems that either even natural protections gained from multiple sources do not stack straight on or Earth lvl 9 bless effect is added as an armor protection, not as natural.

This is because if you calculate 10 (base prot of Tomb Wyrms) and 4 (Earth bless) together you will get 4+10 - ( 4*10 / 40) => 14-1 final protection value.

yep seems so . that makes it not very desireable for my tomb wyrms
but i am experimenting around now a bit more with blessings because they seem quite cool
now i have some more questions :

astral 9 : twist fate : protection from first hit
is this first hit / round of combat or only the first hit in the whole combat ?
is it only for melee or for ranged attacks too ?

water 9 : quickness (50%)
does this mean you get quickness every 2nd round of combat or do 50% of your blessed troops get quickness ?
if the latter can you get quickness then on almost every of your sacred units by multiple casting bless ?

what's a good blessing strat for vanheim ?

are other nations than man / vanheim / jotunheim / ctis / marignon worth blessing strats or is it especially attractive for them ?

since you get hordes of the knights of the unholy sepulchre as AE and have very many points to distribute did someone try a blessing strat with them ? something like fire 9 water 9 astral 9 looks quite nice to me

[Endoperez]

Originally posted by Boron:

quote:

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Originally posted by Endoperez:
This is because if you calculate 10 (base prot of Tomb Wyrms) and 4 (Earth bless) together you will get 4+10 - ( 4*10 / 40) => 14-1 final protection value.

yep seems so . that makes it not very desireable for my tomb wyrms

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1 prot less does not lower it too much. But as you won't have many sacred mages as Desert Tombs C'tis the lower levels of Earth won't do much, and it does seem to give too little for its price (for DT C'tis, that is).

astral 9 : twist fate : protection from first hit
is this first hit / round of combat or only the first hit in the whole combat ?
is it only for melee or for ranged attacks too ?

Just as the spell. That includes the first melee/ranged source of damage for sure, but I don't think that spells would get negated.

water 9 : quickness (50%)
does this mean you get quickness every 2nd round of combat or do 50% of your blessed troops get quickness ?

The first. I think it is not extra action every other round but 50% possibility of having it, every round. Not too big a difference, but don't count for it being in there the 1st/3rd round after being blessed...

what's a good blessing strat for vanheim ?

Vanir have mediocre armor and low-damage weapons (spears) with lowish strength, but awesome defence. They are somewhat vulnerable to missiles as defence won't help against those, their shields help somewhat but arrows are still dangerous. Their common mages are all sacred and have strong air and weak blood magic, their restricted ones have strong Earth but are weaker and not sacred.


Reasons to choose:
They could use Fire 9 for extra 8 ap damage, low-level Blood bless for extra strength, Air for air shield and lighting resistance to protect their expensive Vanir from friendly Orb lightnings, Water for defence that would be increased to awesome amounts and quickness on their mages, and finally, Earth for reinvigoration and protection.

Reasons to leave out:
Increased attack from Fire wouldn't do too much, but level 9 would increase shock value of Valkyries and give Vanheim magic they don't have easy access to.
Blood needs something else to be effective useful outside the bless. Blood 4/ Water 4 could be efficient 'light' bless and would give access to Ice Devils, and Heliophagii. Also, Blood 9 is weak, 8 expensive.
Air shield is nice early on, but Vanheim has easy access to Arrow Fend at Enchantment 6. On the other hand, Enchantment 5 and Thunder Ward would make Vanir 100% lighning-resistant as long as they were blessed. So good in both beginning and mid-to-late game.

Water is AWESOME! Especially your Vanir will be almost untoucheable as long as they won't have to fight versus multiple enemies, but Valkyries will be easily, negating defence, bonus or not. Especially the mages will benefit from Quickness, but it is useful in frontline too. All in all, very good, in both respects.

Earth gives mages reinvigoration. This will get more and more powerful when time goes on and better spells get researched/ the battles grow longer! Earth 9 gives increased protection. With Earth-niner and rushed Construction +4 from bless and +3 from Legions of Steel will give a nice boost.


In short, Water is very good if not best as it gives Vanir defence of over 20, Earth adds to your troops' survivability for when they are hit and helps your mages in long battles. Fire 9/ Blood 4 or 6 helps against high-protection troops. Air protects from missiles, the easiest counter to massed vanir, and lets you bLast with lightning without fear for your expensive Vanir.

I myself liked the W9/E9 Cyclops. Quickness and reinvigoration are NICE combination, and he gets extra-many Claymen. I lost that game to AI, though...

are other nations than man / vanheim / jotunheim / ctis / marignon worth blessing strats or is it especially attractive for them ?

Might not be for 9/9, or even 9/4, but single 9 might be. Bless effects should not, however, be the only reason to choose a spesific pretender/magic, and you should plan for using both your blessed units and your pretender's expensive magic if you are going to MP with it.

since you get hordes of the knights of the unholy sepulchre as AE and have very many points to distribute did someone try a blessing strat with them ? something like fire 9 water 9 astral 9 looks quite nice to me

It does. Remember that Death will give undead even higher Fear rating, and you need to have atleast some of it anyway. But Dust to Dust/ Wither Bones kills KotUS fast, and they spawn slowly.

Sorry for posting this long a post, it just kept growing!

[CayseP]

The Moloch is very good at initial expansion also - just make sure you give have some extra troops standing in the back to prevent routing when the wimpy but _effective_ imps rout (in spite of their low morale they have fighting skills far surpassing those of e.g. militia). His ambidexterity, good attack/defence, hp, prot and cause fear combined with a low enc. makes him capable of shredding what he has not yet burninated!

Just wanted to mention this awesome pretender in this start game SC context :-)

[Boron]

Originally posted by Endoperez:


Sorry for posting this long a post, it just kept growing!

no need to apology and thnx it was great

i tried a w9/f9 blessing in a testspgame with vanheim the vans were impressive
problem was i chose the goldnaga and still achieving f9/w9 was damn hard
i got very lousy scales through this
another prob with vanheim they have only lvl 3 priests so i only get one lvl 4 through prophet for the whole battlefield affecting blessing .

[Boron]

Originally posted by CayseP:
The Moloch is very good at initial expansion also - just make sure you give have some extra troops standing in the back to prevent routing when the wimpy but _effective_ imps rout (in spite of their low morale they have fighting skills far surpassing those of e.g. militia). His ambidexterity, good attack/defence, hp, prot and cause fear combined with a low enc. makes him capable of shredding what he has not yet burninated!

Just wanted to mention this awesome pretender in this start game SC context :-)

guess i check him for abysia
there i have though expensive natural lvl 4 priests and some additional points via heat 3 compared to vanheims cold 1
or perhaps i can make a vq with them with some lower blessings

[Endoperez]

Originally posted by Boron:

quote:

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Originally posted by Endoperez:


Sorry for posting this long a post, it just kept growing!

no need to apology and thnx it was great

i tried a w9/f9 blessing in a testspgame with vanheim the vans were impressive
problem was i chose the goldnaga and still achieving f9/w9 was damn hard
i got very lousy scales through this
another prob with vanheim they have only lvl 3 priests so i only get one lvl 4 through prophet for the whole battlefield affecting blessing .

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I think the Last level make Moloch better choice than Golden Naga. There is a 60-point difference in the price of paths, but Moloch will get the Last path for cheaper (not sure about the strict amount) and is better early game fighter.

[Boron]

Originally posted by Endoperez:
I think the Last level make Moloch better choice than Golden Naga. There is a 60-point difference in the price of paths, but Moloch will get the Last path for cheaper (not sure about the strict amount) and is better early game fighter.

you are right
moloch saves 31 points + has a 2 higher dominion which are additional points

so i guess he is a very good choice for any F9 / something else 9 blessing .

possible concurrents are the divine glyph / the baphomet but both are immobile and not available for vanheim .

perhaps he is even the best choice for every F9 / something else 9 blessing since he is a acceptable sc too .

perhaps i should try mictlan with him since i can summon 1-2 FoD's then early which will prevent him from routing and so i can make full use of his flight ability when indep smashing

edit : if i play mictlan with a moloch = any non mictlan only pretender he still spreads dominion like he would do with any other nation right ?

if i control e.g. 50 provinces how many blood slaves do i have to sacrifice each turn in average in order to keep my dominion at a reasonable level ?

[ July 04, 2004, 21:40: Message edited by: Boron ]

[tinkthank]

It would be helpful also if you mentioned the nation you want to play. (This contextualizes your question both in terms of what troops might be backing your SC up, what starting spells s/he may have access to, and what magic paths may make sense as well as what pretenders are available at all.)

Immortality is always a nice attribute to have very early (turns 1-10), since your SC will likely be nearly naked but need not care within its own dominion. For this reason, a Phoenix could be good for you if you mention Abysia (starting spell: flare), even though it cant melee its way around.