Talk about this God....

[MythicalMino]

Abysia (default theme)

Moloch (Fire-9, Air-1, Blood-4)

Turmoil - 3
Productivity - 3
Heat - 3
Fortune - 2
Dominion Str. 3

With the Fire and Blood bless effects, my sacred units get:

1. Flaming Weapoons
2. Attack Skill +2 (or, is this actually more since I have Fire-9 ???)
3. My Moloch will be able to cast Aim (since he has a level in Air Magic), helping my **early** fire mages' Precision.
4. Strength +2 due to the Blood-4.

So, I wanted Abysia to be an up close and personal bring it to ya and layeth the smackdown type of Nation. So, with Flaming Weapons, Attack Skill up 2+, and strength up +2....they should be able to stand up and fight. And, with my mages (eventually at any rate) being able to utilize Aim, they can offer great magic support.

So, what do you guys think? With all this talk about race design and all, well, I wanted to get in on this too. So, this is actually my first Pretender design really focusing on the different things.

Please feel free to dissect this design, and tell me what you would choose and why, and why you wouldn't choose the things I did....only way to learn really

[ November 26, 2003, 22:15: Message edited by: cpbeller ]

Fire 9 gives +4 Attack, Flaming Weapons.

Blood 4 is alright but you would be better off with Nature unless you are trying to do something with demons.

Only your pretender can cast Aim. If you want something you can use on all your mages you may want to look into something that gives precision that you can forge, or just hope for 1 nature (Eagle Eyes) or 1 Air (Aim) on your Warlocks.

If you are going 3 paths you might not want to pick a Moloch.

You can also only make 3 Lava Warriors per turn intitially until you pump your domain. Though this may not matter with having such a low gold income but high production.

Edit: Take a look at the Lord of the Desert Sun for a good Nature/Fire combination. He is the easiest to get to 9/9.

[ November 26, 2003, 22:23: Message edited by: Zen ]

[MythicalMino]

what about dropping the Blood path, and just focusing on Fire and Air?

[MythicalMino]

also, would probably add more to the Dominion Str. also....but why Nature? For Eagle Eyes?

well, it probably would be better to take just Fire & Air magic. then put the rest into Dominion probably....maybe even be able to add more into Luck and possibly (??)

[MythicalMino]

ok, what about would be better? 9 in Fire? or, 9 in Nature? Using Lord of the Desert Sun with Abysia...

Why are you picking Air? Just for Aim? Or other reasons.

[MythicalMino]

For Aim....since Abysia's mages have bad Precision....

[SurvivalistMerc]

He may have meant that his pretender would hope for air sites and forge eyes of aiming for his magi. That is how I interpreted it.

Those eyes of aiming make a huge difference (or at least seem to to me). The problem is that you have to hope to find air gems, which you aren't guaranteed with air 1.

I'm a little worried about his turmoil and fortune scales. But I've never played with scales like that. Some of the Abyssian units that I love to use such as the Dragon and Anathament warlock are very expensive. The dragon, fortunately, is sacred.

If I recall correctly, Abyssian troops are both expensive and resource-intensive. So I think both order and production would benefit the nation, especially since most provinces will already have their income negatively impacted by the heat 3 scale that your troops prefer.

-21% income from turmoil 3
-15% income from heat 3 (but I don't think this affects your starting province...just my supposition) (Also not -30% supplies which I might consider countering with a bit of growth for this race, though it isn't light infantry intensive and can probably stand the decrease in supplies. Nature would also be a nice alternative since you could forge items that would make the supplies unnecessary.)

+6% income from productivity 3
Overall: -30% income compared to base. I hope you strike it rich in terms of luck events. Because although I'm a newb I don't think I could make it work easily with this much of an income hit.

Would change around those dominion effects, but there may be something I as a newb am missing here.

I would consider something like going nature 9 on the pretender for regeneration and poison resistance on the troops (something you don't have...and those abyssians would certainly scare me more if they were to regenerate. Also regeneration would protect your commanders which are quite expensive from battle afflictions). I totally understand the blood 4, which you can probably empower up even more, because abyssia has wonderful access to blood slaves.

I might let one of my warlocks be the air mage and go for only two paths. That savings might let you concentrate more on your dominion effects since new paths are expensive to open for Moloch.

I'm writing this more for criticism of my criticism than anything else. I've never played abyssia past about turn 40 on the demo. (Hope this doesn't appear hypercritical)

[MythicalMino]

oh, no...this is the kind of info i was asking for....there really is an infinite amount of combinations you can put together...something counters something else, while that improves something else, ect, ect...

I am enjoying reading about how things work in this game...

I was thinking if i could pull it off somehow....go Earth 9, Nature 9.....but I am not sure how to get both paths up to 9....Regen plus a higher armor rating sounds good (ok, makes me drool)....but again, not sure that is really what would happen as I am not too sure about all the bless effects.

Thinking about going Archmage or Great Sage for the Earth 9/Nature 9....but, there might be another way to get there

[ November 26, 2003, 23:43: Message edited by: cpbeller ]

Well if you are taking Air for Aim/Eyes of Aiming you may want to go with a Phoenix. They start with the 2 paths you want (Air/Fire) and you can more affordably raise your Fire/Air if you want more than 1 in Air.

If you are going Air for Eyes of Aiming (which is my suggestion) you would be better off to get 3 or 4 in Air to find sites to create them.

Nature gives you Berserk (which stacks with the Lava Warriors Berserk for additional) that gives you +Prot, +Att, +Str, +Morale, -Defense. Plus Regeneration and poison resistance, whereas Fire gives you +4 Att, and Flaming weapons to hit Ethereal beings.

Taking Turmoil is going to hurt your gold income and you are going to have to be able to compensate somehow. Air also gives you quick access to Patrollers via Call of the Wind. For better blood hunting.

All in all; it's how you play the game. Though personally I wouldn't focus on bless effects before I knew how to play the race without using bless effects.

My suggestion to you would be to play Abysian with a low power pretender and high scales and see how to compose the quickest most viable armies and what those armies weaknesses are. Then you can make your pretender to fill in those gaps.