Eriu guide

[Sombre]

They do have one of the few sacreds that actually benefits from a blood bless, though that isn't something anyone should give them given that they're slow, cap only and generally pretty weak.

[LDiCesare]

ComTrav said:
Superficially, Eriu has a lot in common with Vanheim (air magic, glamour, recruitable thugs)

I don't think so. Glamour for Vanheim is more widely available than for Eriu, where it's limited to commanders and capital only troops.
I certainly don't play Eriu well, but their having to rely on indeps to do any kind of research certainly takes most fun out of them for me. They are really bad at research, even when you try to give them owl quills, which is the only thing they can forge to help research.
As for Fir bolgs, it should be noted they cost 13 gold, which is still a bit expensive for what they are worth. With the cost of Tuathas, fielding an army of any size is quite hard imo, and research is poor.

I believe a surprise attack with sneaky leaders can be nice, particularly if you coordinate a lot of attacks at once, but I can't see how you can build enough units and research to get it to work without being attacked by someone first. You certainly need to be good/lucky in diplomacy to be able to pull this out.

[Baalz]

Vanheim and Eriu have a lot of the same notes, but the melody is very different. The strength of Vanheim is in it's troops, the strength of Eriu is in it's commanders. Dual blessed Vanheim sacreds are among the very best units in the game, while none of Eriu's troops are better than passable. On the flip side Vanheim's commanders lack nature magic which is a critical component. Without nature you lose
barkskin - your protection is now 14 instead of 21. BIG difference as now your average spear wielder has a good chance of causing damage.
resist elements/poison - many, many counters now open up

Also, the E/N bless required for commander blessing is completely different from the classic W/F bless which most benefits the sacred units.

Eriu and Vanheim play completely differently, there is no way one can carry out the strategies of the other.

[Baalz]

LDiCesare said:
As for Fir bolgs, it should be noted they cost 13 gold, which is still a bit expensive for what they are worth. With the cost of Tuathas, fielding an army of any size is quite hard imo, and research is poor.

I believe a surprise attack with sneaky leaders can be nice, particularly if you coordinate a lot of attacks at once, but I can't see how you can build enough units and research to get it to work without being attacked by someone first. You certainly need to be good/lucky in diplomacy to be able to pull this out.

I find that the best way to counter a very early rush is to merely expand at a reasonable rate. Rushers are generally going to pick an easier target first, if you're expanding relatively rapidly they'll often pick on somebody else. At any rate rushing in the first year is obviously going to be a bit weak out of necessity and I think such fears are largely overblown - I think in all my MP games I've been attacked in the first year maybe once. At any rate I urge you to give Fir Bolgs a try, I also didn't appreciate them just looking at their stats, but the slight edge in defense, attack, and strength really does make them fairly effective at indie expansion. Besides, with nothing but alt-3 researched you've got your blessing, barkskin and mistform - you should be able to counter-raid even the most aggressive rush.

As to needing good luck and diplomacy, while this is always true I don't think you're appreciating how much this is a rush tactic. I can give you a concrete example of how it played out in the Epic Heroes II game I'm in. I don't remember the exact turn numbers, but right around the time all the indies were claimed and everyone really started sizing up their neighbors I started infiltrating one of my neighbors - Man who was ever so slightly larger than me. 3 or 4 turns later, between my stealth troops and cloud trapeze I hit 7 or 8 provinces and took every one. After turn 2 of the war the only thing Man held were two sieged castles. 3 turns later, while my Fir Bolg armies (very shortly supported by thunder strike) descended to crack Man's castles my Sidhe Lords had infiltrated Man's neighbor Abyssia (slightly smaller than me now that I had eaten man), and fresh thugs cloud trapezed in so I hit 10 or so my first turn. 3 turns later the only things Abyssia held were sieged castles and the province containing his SC pretender. This all happened in year 2.

FWIW I made several strategic mistakes in that game and am currently on the ropes, but the rush was rock solid.

[Torin]

Cloud trapeze is even enough if you fit the guy with the right items. No one can defend every province at once.
Like Endo I would like to get rid of unnesesary blessing if I can. I dont know if thats possible.

[Tichy]

Baalz: As the T'ien Ch'i in question, you were usually facing PD 11-15. I just didn't have the money to put up more than that, and I didn't expect it would do much good without mage support.

There were a few instances where PD alone would take out a Sidhe Lord. Usually if he wasn't wielding the vine shield, but very occasionally in a lucky shot if he was, especially if a previous encounter had given him an affliction.

[Baalz]

All I know is it was a lot of arrows. Yeah, I'll do several things differently if I do this one again. My assertion was really about unafflicted and fully equipped Sidhe Lords, I figured out pretty quick that the lack of a vine shield greatly reduced their survivability because the hits rack up faster than the regen can balance. So much so that I stopped sending them out without them despite the fact I was sitting on a bunch of frost brands and unused Sidhe Lords (well, they were pitifully researching). As I said, I found that this build has exactly what it needs and no more. Remove vine shield, they die. Remove regen, they die. Remove frost brand (or some other AOE weapon) they'll often end up retreating. Remove mistform, they die. Remove barkskin, they die against some PDs- though this can be necessary if you need 100% FR. Put it all together though while stealthily dancing around the real defenders and you'll cause much teeth gnashing while only being out a couple hundred gold and a handful of gems when you miscalculate.

[sansanjuan]

Nice guide. I did have one issue. I attacked a province and drove off the PD as advertised with a Sidhe Lord equipped. I decided to try to hold the province by cranking up the PD and dropping another in and scripting windguide on the new paratrooper. When the prince of death moved in to attack I though ok, this will be interesting but my two Lords retreated (and died) after casting their spells. Did the routing of the PD even though they were not under their direct command cause the others to retreat?
-SSJ

[Zeldor]

Yes, retreting PD can force whole army to retreat.

[sansanjuan]

That sucks oh so tremendously. Lesson learned.

Thanks for the reply Z.
-SSJ