c'tis themes

[WraithLord]

Did anyone try out the desert tombs and miasma themes?
I would like to know the details of those themes.
Are they stronger/weaker then the default?
Is the desert tombs the equivalent of DOM-I ermor?
if so, Are there more nations thet get this kind of theme?

TIA

[johan osterman]

Originally posted by izaqyos:
Did anyone try out the desert tombs and miasma themes?
I would like to know the details of those themes.
Are they stronger/weaker then the default?
Is the desert tombs the equivalent of DOM-I ermor?
if so, Are there more nations thet get this kind of theme?

TIA

I'll leave the weaker/stronger question for someone else to answer.

Desert tombs is not equivalent to dom 1 ermor, it is somewhat similar in that it has summonable units that can reanimate undeads, but it doesn't have the destructive dominion and it has a set of units recruitable for gold that is similar to ordinary C'tis.

In the full game the Carrion woods theme for Pangaea will be more similar to the old dom 1 emror. Carrion Woods Pangaea does have a destructive dominion, and it's dominion causes some undeads to appear for free. Carrion Woods is a little special in that it both has units recruitable for gold and a destructive dominion.

[licker]

While its true that DTombs doesn't 'require' a destructive domain, it is so fricken expensive (200 points) that if you want to do anything with magic on your pretender you almost have to take a destructive domain, or at least a domain with negatives.

Though in fairness, DTombs can handle alot of negative scales fairly well...

Miasma is interesting, though maybe a poor selection for MP since your domain effect is going to tick off your neighbors, probably worse than Ermor ever did. I've been fooling around with it for fun though, havn't quite figured it out very well yet though

[WraithLord]

Though in fairness, DTombs can handle alot of negative scales fairly well...

Can you elaborate on that?
Can they handle death -3? order -3? etc.

In DOM-I I could take ermor with -3 on all scales (+3 cold) and get tons of free points.

[licker]

Originally posted by izaqyos:

quote:

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Though in fairness, DTombs can handle alot of negative scales fairly well...

Can you elaborate on that?
Can they handle death -3? order -3? etc.

In DOM-I I could take ermor with -3 on all scales (+3 cold) and get tons of free points.

---

Well like I said, I'm not an expert on Tombs, but it seems that you don't need productivity or order that badly, death also can be knocked up a bit. You don't have as much flexibility as Ermor had in Dom1, but you do have more flexibility than standard C'tis or Miasma. I'm sure there are others out there who have crunched the numbers on the scales already who can give you a concrete answer, but my 'gut' feeling is that if you are going to rely on summons and revived the productiviity and order scales are mostly unneeded. Anyway, the effects are not as bad as in Dom1, so you have more time to get your Death based economy off the ground. You could also probably add blood to the mix fairly easilly.

[apoger]

My thoughts;

Desert Tombs:
Costs 200
Requires minimum heat +2 and death +2
The heat +2 puts C'tis at -%5 as it is not their prefered temerature.
No Swamp guards available.
Start with one unholy priest.
Have the ability to convert death gems into more unholy priests.
Unholy priests can generate undead for free.

The undead generation of the priests must be compared to C'tis's ordinary ability to generate undead via reanimation. It takes the priests approximately 7 turns to generate more undead than their "reanimation" cost in death gems. Thus gaining advantage in undead summons takes a bit of time. However with time it can get very impressive. The question is, will your enemies let you sit around and slowely crank up an undead generation machine. Plus by the time it really is pumping, will undead be meaningfull?

It's hard to tell. I'd say that Desert Tombs is fun, but questionable for multi-player situations.


Miasma:
Costs 50
Requires minimum heat +2
The heat +2 puts C'tis at -%5 as it is not their prefered temerature.
Sauromancer replaced by Marshmaster (-1 death, +1 water, +40 gold cost).
Raises taxes by 1% per level of dominion, but requires at least dominion 6 to start seeing benefits due to the extra heat.
Miasma requires a high dominion strength to be effective, and as such has the hidden cost of that extra dominion.

I've done some testing for the "disease" function of Miasma. I ran a few armies of enemy troop back and forth over a Miasma C'tis. Results were approximately a 5% chance of each troop getting diseased every turn they were in the Miasma dominion. Keep in mind that this is an aproximation from a small sampling. Extensive tests may get more precise results. While this is unpleasant, I don't think this will stop enemies from attacking. Particularly if the Miasma dominion is seeping into their area.

I like the idea of +5% taxes with a 10 dominion.
I don't like the Marshmaster, or the attention that the dominion will draw in multiplayer. It's a close call, but I'll probably pass on Misama.

[Nagot Gick Fel]

Originally posted by izaqyos:
Did anyone try out the desert tombs and miasma themes?

Miasma seems actually very interesting with a strong dominion. Now the interesting question is: does the diseasing effect also apply to your non-cold blooded pretender?

[licker]

Originally posted by Nagot Gick Fel:

quote:

---

Originally posted by izaqyos:
Did anyone try out the desert tombs and miasma themes?

Miasma seems actually very interesting with a strong dominion. Now the interesting question is: does the diseasing effect also apply to your non-cold blooded pretender?

---

I wondered this myself, but I've only used undead or CBed pretenders... Its annoying as well that indie priests and mages are a bit more of a risk, though there must be ways to protect them from disease.

I'm not sure about this, but I think with seasons the effects of the extra heat scale arn't as bad as they would be otherwise, though it depends on how much the seasons are effecting the temperature scales. My point is that though you have a +1 default difference from prefered, during certain seasons you will be at prefered, while other nations would be 1 off of their prefered... Of course what matters is how many seasons, and how far off of prefered Miasma is compared to other nations, but remember a swing of -2 is only an effect of -1 for miasma, there is no swing of +2 (which would be -3...)

Also miasma decreases taxes outside of your boarders by a decent amount (if I remember correctly) where you have domain, and the fact that you will take heat 2 and death 2 means that you will further complicate enemies taxes where you can get a domain advantage, if you are able to do it right you will really create problems for your neighbors, which of course will create problems for you in MP... I dunno, it will be interesting to see how it works in practicality.

Also you can seemingly use sloth at a high level since you don't have alot of resource hungry units (if you go with serpents and summons) so you can further crud up border provinces... seems Miasma is could be very effective for domain pushing since it adds more negatives to your neighbors.

[Chris Byler]

Originally posted by licker:
While its true that DTombs doesn't 'require' a destructive domain, it is so fricken expensive (200 points) that if you want to do anything with magic on your pretender you almost have to take a destructive domain, or at least a domain with negatives.

Though in fairness, DTombs can handle alot of negative scales fairly well...

Miasma is interesting, though maybe a poor selection for MP since your domain effect is going to tick off your neighbors, probably worse than Ermor ever did. I've been fooling around with it for fun though, havn't quite figured it out very well yet though

I think what he meant by "destructive domain" is the way Dom I Ermorian dominion kills people really really fast. Like thousands of deaths per turn. No amount of death scale can match the killer dominion.

Desert Tombs does not have this kind of killer dominion, however, it does require heat 2 (which is 1 more than C'tis's preferred heat) and death 2 (which nobody likes, although C'tis can tolerate it better than most).

Scales with Desert Tombs:

Order - you can get some commanders by summoning, although it is expensive. A lot of troops are undead and cost no maintenance. Desert Tombs C'tis probably needs gold less than most nations (although that isn't saying much).

Productivity - you don't need it. Default C'tis can get away with some sloth (IMO) and Desert Tombs even more so. A substantial part of your forces come from summons or unholy priest reanimation, and a lot of the rest are low-resource anyway.

Heat - at least 2 heat is required. If you have a strong fire-using pretender you might want to take 3 to boost your fire summons, but C'tis (even DT) gets no fire mages. I would have liked to see an undead sauromancer with (say) death-3 fire-2; low versatility and they lose the nature magic, but it would give them a use for their fire gem income, and potential Banefire/Reanimate Archers/King of Banefires access. Oh well, I guess you can still do this through the right pretender.

Growth - at least 2 death is required. You might be able to get away with 3, but 2 is already cutting into your income and supplies for your living troops (you get most of C'tis's normal troops in addition to the unholy undeads) - in addition to your heat penalty.

Fortune - what you should do in fortune depends on what you are doing in order and magic. Misfortune synergizes really nastily with lots of other scales (not only negative ones) - you can already get a lot of droughts and plagues, if you have magic you get to be overrun by vinemen and other magic beings too.

Magic - really helps. Desert Tombs keeps the Shaman who is a cheap sacred researcher - they benefit a lot from a magic scale. Also, the fatigue reduction benefits Sauromancers and Shaman on the battlefield (there are death evocations now, in addition to the lesser undead summons and, if you're reckless enough, Lammashtas). On the other hand there is the magic resistance thing (and of course point cost - it may be easier to get a good blessing if you're not putting points in scales).

I like magic scales in general because they let me stay competitive in magic while sending a good number of mages out to search (and thus get a higher gem income). C'tis gets a powerful mage at a good price, and Death magic may be better on the battlefield in Dom II, so they are well placed to benefit from an emphasis on magic. But if you just have tons of gold (literally - Dom II's monetary unit is the pound of gold), you can recruit enough mages that it doesn't matter whether you take magic or drain.


On the whole - I like Desert Tombs for the ability to get both holy 4 and unholy 4 priests (not counting prophets - btw, making a DT unholy priest your prophet makes him a stronger unholy priest). They get a nice unholy undead, although it's a one per turn reanimate on a commander that costs 23 death gems. C'tis can normally get into the water without too much trouble but the increased emphasis on undead makes it even easier (although the unpriests don't have inherent amphibian or poor amphibian, so you may want a water pretender to forge them some items if you expect entering water to be important to you).

Unlike Dom I Ermor, they don't have a bootstrap problem (need a Dusk Elder to summon a Dusk Elder) because a Sauromancer can be recruited for gold and cast all their special summons.

On the other hand: it costs 200 points (pretty steep) and requires some significant negative scales. Your bless effects will probably be rather limited because of the high point cost of the theme itself (which in turn somewhat limits the usefulness of the tomb wyrms). No nature gems in the capitol (although you still have Nature-1s to search with, and maybe a Nature-2 if you buy enough Sauromancers - this will get you onto the booster forging track for Nature, without empowering). Hard to find an effective use for your base fire gem income unless you get a fire Sauromancer early or have a fire skilled pretender (which is therefore recommended - heat 2 works nicely with this too). I don't think losing the Swamp Guards is a big factor but some may disagree.


I haven't played Miasma yet, but unlike Dom I Ermor, its effects stop when you lose dominion, so I would expect it to be both less potent and less irritating to neighbors. On the other hand its defensive benefit can't be countered by supply items, but only by undead or constructs. I really wouldn't want to try seiging and storming a Citadel or Hill Fortress (let alone a Mountain Citadel - this seems made for Miasma, since it has to be sieged for a long long time and then has lots of poison sling missile towers when they try to storm) in a Miasma dominion.

[Nagot Gick Fel]

Originally posted by apoger:
My thoughts;

Miasma:
Costs 50

Costs 10.

Requires minimum heat +2
The heat +2 puts C'tis at -%5 as it is not their prefered temerature.

4% actually (you start with a dominion of 1). Recruit a LK in turn 1, have him preach immediately. Once your dominion strength reaches 5, you're even. After that, it's free bonus. You can of course do the same in every rich province you control once heat reaches +2, if your dominion is low there.

And remember you're not alone in this game, and most other players will have a preferred heat/cold scale which is neutral or opposite to yours. These influences will work against you, therefore heat+2 might actually be better than heat+1 for your econ.

Sauromancer replaced by Marshmaster (-1 death, +1 water, +40 gold cost).

You forgot +1 nature. 6 magic levels instead of 5. You wanted that for free? Similar in cost to a Crone or a Norna, at least as good as them, and recruitable everywhere.

Raises taxes by 1% per level of dominion, but requires at least dominion 6 to start seeing benefits due to the extra heat.

Might be an issue for the first 2-3 turns.

Miasma requires a high dominion strength to be effective, and as such has the hidden cost of that extra dominion.

It's even effective with a low dominion.

I like the idea of +5% taxes with a 10 dominion.
I don't like the Marshmaster, or the attention that the dominion will draw in multiplayer. It's a close call, but I'll probably pass on Misama.

I like the Marshmaster, I doubt the dominion will draw that much attention in MP (unless you play your dominion very aggressively), and I wouldn't pass on Miasma. Its only drawback in my view (and you made no mention of it) is it will make the recruiting of independent troops, and especially independent mages, an hazardous affair.