Guide to Marverni

[Ming]

Capng,

Thanks. Didn't know one can hunt for slaves without blood path. Useful to know.

[Ming]

Baalz,

Thanks. BTW, congrats for an excellent guide. I have learnt much from it.

You may wish to update it incorporate the cheap conj5 national summon - size5 sacred trampler, which would be a nice supplement to the Druids. I was toying with the idea of an W9 bless before I saw your guide, but unfortunately A4W9 is probably too expensive for keeping good scales. Not sure if W9 is a viable alternative to a F4A4 Phoenix.

[Sombre]

It's also worth noting that the iron pigs spell grants Iron Boars for marverni which are sacred super high prot high morale tramplers.

In CBM it's pretty crazy, but in basegame it probably still isn't worth it iirc.

[Baalz]

Sombre said:
It's also worth noting that the iron pigs spell grants Iron Boars for marverni which are sacred super high prot high morale tramplers.

I love all the easter eggs in this game.

At any rate, the great boar I don't find cost effective at all. Just get some indie elephants and save your gems for equipping druids - you'll always have very good uses for gems.

[Ming]

Baalz,

With due respect, I do beg to differ with you on this (the cost effectiveness of the Great Boar of Canute). It costs only 7N, no upkeep, is a sacred leader, has forest survival and much higher morale and magic resistance than elephants, and auto-summons one great boar per turn! Are you sure you are not mixing it up with the size3 trampling great boar (conj3, 20 for 20N) - which I agree is not cost effective except that you get one per turn for free with the Great Boar of Canute?

[Baalz]

When I tested it out it seems like it autosummoned much less than one per round of the smaller boars, small enough numbers that it was not worthwhile as anything other than a small bonus. It's size 5 so less effective than elephants at trampling, is a leader but with only two misc slots there's not much worthwhile to put on them, they've got low protection so you need many of them to have a chance of survival, and being sacred doesn't help much as you're unlikely to have a good bless. 7N doesn't sound too bad, but when you're talking about summoning 10 of them in order to be effective those gems start adding up fast (smaller numbers than that are going to struggle against even strong PD). I'd rather have 4-5 equipped druids almost any time.

That's just my opinion though, you're perfectly free to hold your own and prove me wrong.

[MaxWilson]

If you happen to have an E9 bless (maybe because of your druids?) you could put Bracers of Protection on the Great Boar for a net +5 or +6 to Prot.

-Max

[Ming]

MaxWilson,

E9 bless would not help the boars as they have no armour but W9 bless would as the boars would then travel twice as far and so trample twice as many enemies (The extra defense is secondary). The smaller boars would trample size2 enemies and occupies the attention of others and so improve the survival rate of the Canute boars. Most opposition would break and flee before they can take down the Canute boars.

Furthermore, the Canute boars should be used in addition to the Druids, not to replace them. In the middle game summoning 10 Canute boars is certainly far easier than getting an EXTRA 4-5 equipped druids, so it is hardly a fair comparison (I would prefer to have 4-5 extra equipped Druids too ) The boars are more effective in combined arms than on their own and when used as such can be quite effective. They are also very effective defending castles.

[JimMorrison]

Ming said:
MaxWilson,

E9 bless would not help the boars as they have no armour ...

I think he was actually saying that for 5E gems you can put on Bracers, which are a piece of armor, and gain the bless bonus. The thing being that while Water bless is probably outright more effective - if you are running a boar focused strat - it does nothing for the casters, while the Earth bless gives reinvig, and the armor.

[Ming]

JimMorrison,

Thanks for the clarification. I actually forgot that bracers count as armour and stand corrected on my previous comments on the E9 bless.

However, I am not sure if an E9 bless provide that much help to the druids. So if one were to invest the points for a lvl9 bless, W9 might be better to give Marverni an extra threat in addition to their druids. The trade-off is not so much W9 boars vs druids, but W9 boars vs a wind guide/fire arrow casting Pretender plus some eye of aiming (mass produced if one gets lucky with indies). Unless one gets lucky with finding indie air mages, it is not clear to me that W9 is inferior - and if one gets so lucky, air mages can be found with W9 through mercs and then air sites too!

At any rate, I think the Canute boars are cost effective even without a W9 bless.