Guide to EA C'tis

[MaxWilson]

Excellent! That's more like it.

-Max

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Is there any fatigue difference between magic scales of one and three? Or is the discount capped at 10%?

[MaxWilson]

The manual says it's 10% per point of magic, and I'm 80% sure I've seen it in action. Keep in mind, though, that the fatigue from spellcasting includes encumbrance as well as spell fatigue; you can reduce the spell cost by magic scales, communion, or higher path skill, but you always take the basic encumbrance cost as well. So, 30% less fatigue doesn't automatically translate to 42% more spells.

-Max

[Crafty]

Newbie. Tried EA C'tis with rainbow pretender ,dormant great druid. with heat +3 and some negative luck scales. Tried using bless strategy, managed to win by beating the ryleah or something. Stupid sea thing was hard to beat, decided to defend only (i got more provinces anyway ha ha), until got thesis blessing or something...

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

A random SP game against Niefelheim, Sons of Winter, taught me something.

You might be able to manage, but I really don't recommend any dominion below five. You certainly have access to excellent priests, but if you run up against a cold nation, having a dominion strength of three will be brutal.

So... what's your opinions about workable dominion strengths with the C'tis?

[Shovah32]

Unless i was planning on not spreading my dominion(when i have completely destroyed my scales for example) i almost never take dominion strength below 5.

[MaxWilson]

I don't usually care all that much about Dominion strength, but since I almost invariably take a master lich it's easy to boost up to 4-6. Almost never do 7+. If I were using a Dragon or something I'd probably stick to 3-5 but not below that. Basically, I'll almost never sacrifice more than 1 magic path tick or 1 scale tick for Dominion.

Note that, contrary to what the manual says, building more temples does NOT appear to increase your temple check percentage. That is, your dominion push will scale linearly with your temple of numbers and not quadratically. If this is altered in a future patch to conform to the manual (and the in-game numbers from right clicking on a temple) I would probably alter my strategy, since -1 to Dominion could be offset by investing an extra 2000 gold in temples (five temples = +10% to checks), making Dominion strength pretty much irrelevant to large empires (since it can't go above 10).

-Max

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Blah blah: I just won a medium game versus Nefeilheim. I'm still not quite certain how I won after managing to lose over 20 commanders in one battle. However, maybe it had something to do with my stealthy raiding teams of ~8 shades led by a dark servant.

Tip: Want stealth raiding forces? It's not impossible, even with a complete absence of stealthy national troops. With your high death gem income, conjuration 2, and lesser magical items (construction 2), you can easily summon an army of Shades, led by a Dark Servant. A Rod of the Leper King will give your Dark Servant undead leadership +50, for a mere 5 gems. For 20 gems, you can get that Dark Servant, Rod, and eight shades. If you're taking on only PD, a Horror Helmet will help reduce your casualties.

If you also want to thug out that Black Servant, and limit yourself to equipment available early and cheap, the Barkskin amulet complements your zero protection nicely. While the Pendant of Luck might be better, its often hard to acquire the necessary astral gems early on.

If you've got the spare nature gems (and I always do) the Berserker Pelt will keep him from routing, and still be better protection. The Raw Hide Shield isn't much, either. But it will make your Black Servant even harder to hit, with a boost of four to your defense.

The Serpent Kryss is worth considering despite its low stats. It's length is zero, making it easy to dual wield, its got Death Poison (35 in Dom2, currently ??), which, combined with difficulty of hitting a Black Servant, just might actually have the time to work. Of course, putting anything in your hands eliminates the Life Drain affect.

For pure scouts, the Bane Venom Charm is interesting, and I'm curious whether there is any synergy between it and the Foul Air global.

If you're a noob like me, and outfitting your undead, remember, you don't have to worry about disease.

Later, if you wish to continue raiding, you can get a Spectral Mage with summon Spectre. Unlike the Black Servant, this leader is also partially amphibious. Also, the Harvester of Sorrows can bring you some much heavier stealth, with built in fear, ethereal, flying, and life drain. And is quite accessible with any Pretender, requiring only D4.

Also, while Shades, Shade Beasts, and Spirits, and Ghosts are not very impressive, there are a couple things worth explaining, aside from them all being stealthy and ethereal.

Shades have steal strength, handy against low MR units.
Shade Beasts have only weak poison, but are only size 1, fitting six to a square, easily outnumbering most forces. Larger races, such as Niefelheim, can suffer three times the posion damage of armies composed of the standard size two units.
Ghosts have both fear and chill, an interesting combination, if your opponent doesn't have any great morale options, especially considering the PD which doesn't have anywhere to flee, though do usually have +2 morale from dominion and home provinces.
The Spirits have paralyze, which is is tied to the target's size. They're also size one, but since Paralysis isn't cumulative... How does paralysis work, by the way? Is it against defense or MR? Anyways, Dispossessed Spirits aren't likely to kill anything, or survive a magical sneeze, but at 15 for 4 gems, make for an excellent way to tie up enemy units & break formations while your real warriors strike.

Edit: Also, starting units on patrol can handle 150% tax rate, but not 170%.