Brainstorming Nation Strategies

[BesucherXia]

EA Pangaea

-living maenads+buff=awesome
-dead maenads+Air=death gems
-sleeping maenads=great castle defenders
-Blood stone
-Pan+vine shield+snake bladder+earth power+iron skin+resistant poison+stregnth of gaia+regen=thug
-Pan+leech/life4life=hunter of sc-raiders
-Pan+penetration items=deadly forests
-Rush:Call of the wild
-Raid:Bless+Sacred centaurs
-Intelligence & gem transporters:Harpy
-mother oak+gift of health+any other nature GEs if slots still available.

[WraithLord]

my comments:

MA Man:
-> Take rainbow mage if you want any chance for end game. Take E4F4D4S4 at the least. It makes for a nice bless and opens up lots of options in end game.
-> Rush to Air Queens

EA mictlan:
-> I say don't trash your scales. Take single major bless and maybe a couple of minors. F9E4S4 can work quite well.

Sauromatia:
-> I tried lot's of variations on blessed WS thugs. I agree E9 helps them considerably but IMO they are still not worth the investment.
I found they were too brittle and had higher than acceptable attrition rate.
It works, but not worth the investment IMO. E6 is good enough for your sacred mages.

MA C'tis:
-> Rush to tartarians (nobrainner)
-> Take E4 and above bless for your communions (helps greatly in cold dominion)
-> Set your assassins to use swarm against light weight targets (not SCs).
-> Cast Life after death (or whatever the name is) and kill your own priests to get free reanimators (thank you ano for reminding me of this old trick)

[WraithLord]

Some more comments:
MA Abysia:
-> Another nations with lots to gain from a rainbow pretender
-> Do take the D3 but don't trash Order

EA Pangaea:
-> What's that about?
"-dead maenads+Air=death gems
-sleeping maenads=great castle defenders
"
-> Gorgon SC
-> Pan+MR penet. => charm traps 4 SCs.
-> Strategy: raid your enemy and never meet his armies on his terms. feign weakness and then bring a ton of unexpected stealthy help.
Don't go for glorious battles. If he is weaker than you swallow him. If he is stronger than you - bleed him to death.


I really like this thread
I'll do Pyth, Patala, Jotun & Caelum if no one beats me to them

[Jarkko]

Originally Posted by WraithLord

-> What's that about?
"-dead maenads+Air=death gems
-sleeping maenads=great castle defenders
"

Dead Maenads:
Get a two indy commanders and pack them full with maenads (110 if they have a star). Position the commanders at back rank. Send in the maenads, preferably against lots of archers. Repeat a few times. Cast raven feast (or what ever it was called again) to the province -> loads of death gems. Works best with an ally who can provide the archers against whome your maenads rush.

Sleeping Maenads:
Have a few pans with a few hundred maenads inside a castle. Will take *ages* for the fort to fall when under siege, and when it is about to fall, sneak the pans out.

[WraithLord]

Originally Posted by Jarkko

Sleeping Maenads:
Have a few pans with a few hundred maenads inside a castle. Will take *ages* for the fort to fall when under siege, and when it is about to fall, sneak the pans out.

: that's one nasty trick.
Watch out for firestorm and all the bad evoc. nasties.

[WraithLord]

Pythium (my favorite ):
-> Comminions! Read Baalz's guide.
-> Don't waste your A. theurgs time. They should forge, cast artillery and summon....
-> Angels. All the types you get have their uses and are *awesome*. You should probably slap 4S4F on your pretender for easy access to the choir.
-> Your regular troops are great. You should choose great scales and make lot's of armies. Principes, Emerald guards are ridiculously good.
Use hydras for plan B and for stopping them tramplers.
-> Astral Fires, paralyze, soul slay, enslave, falling frost, fog warriors, thunder strike etc
-> N4 on pretender and growth scales for old mages.
-> BE troops. Later anti-magic, WotF, Master Enslave.

[WraithLord]

Patala:
-> Take a sleeping semi rainbow/semi SC pretender. Some four armed E4F4D4B4 pretender for example.
He gets an unexpected forge bonus what with those four arms. He'll make an awesome SC, will complement your magic paths and will allow you good scales.
E4 (and above) is for your all around sacred mages.
-> Blood hunt and get into blood ASAP. Get them blood stones early on.
-> Your Nagarishis are awesome battle mages. They can cast Aog, AoL, GftH, falling frost and much more.
-> They are also great summoners. Build squads of them for EA batches. Cast 10-15 EAs on enemy armies and later laugh all you can.
-> The stealthy nagasomething are good raiding thugs. Some of them come with S1 so can't be MHed.
-> Markatas make good chaff. They have nice def and are small. With some buffs they can hold the enemy long enough for your evocers to present a stream og gifts from the heavens.
-> Bandar warriors are your workhorse. They don't die easily to remote evoc. spells.
-> With Nagas and access to W you can be an UW force
-> Clams (duh)
-> Early rush with elephants. Switch quickly to normal armies once the other nations do some research. Normally you have enough time to choke the life out of one neighbor.

[BesucherXia]

Originally Posted by WraithLord

Some more comments:
MA Abysia:
-> Another nations with lots to gain from a rainbow pretender
-> Do take the D3 but don't trash Order

EA Pangaea:
-> What's that about?
"-dead maenads+Air=death gems
-sleeping maenads=great castle defenders
"
-> Gorgon SC
-> Pan+MR penet. => charm traps 4 SCs.
-> Strategy: raid your enemy and never meet his armies on his terms. feign weakness and then bring a ton of unexpected stealthy help.
Don't go for glorious battles. If he is weaker than you swallow him. If he is stronger than you - bleed him to death.


I really like this thread
I'll do Pyth, Patala, Jotun & Caelum if no one beats me to them

Raiding SCs tend to have very high MR(25+), so charm is not so effecive against them, sometimes even a bad idea because you have to run risk of losing your items. I prefer to use groups of pans using Leech / Life for Life to hunt them down - Blood magic are so good against single target, almost a guaranteed death for him. Charming thugs seem to be an attractive idea anyway.

[Jarkko]

Originally Posted by WraithLord

Watch out for firestorm and all the bad evoc. nasties.

That is the whole point with sleeping maenads. It will take a damn long time to break the castle defences with all the naked women repairing the fort, and when you finally break it, there is nothing worthwhile left in there anymore (and with any luck the enemy kills a few own troops with battlefield spells like Fire Storm ).

[chrispedersen]

Originally Posted by WraithLord

: that's one nasty trick.
Watch out for firestorm and all the bad evoc. nasties.

doesn't really matter. Pans spawn every turn. I love it if you firestorm.. you're wasting gems better off spent elsewhere.