Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">Sorry to discourage you - but you're probably doomed http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif . There is no peace-loving Ashen Empire while your dominions is killing the world http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif .

You shouldn't attack Marignon. Rather, you should bribe him and lure him into a false sense of security, saying that he has nothing to fear from you - beacuse he's Marignon. Concentrate on Jotun or Abysia. But I suspect that he might not listen and would just join in the fun.

Marignon has powerful priests but versus Ermor Ashen Empire, there is nothing that can't be done by 10+ cheapo holy 2 priests. So, both Jotun or Abysia is equally deadly versus your force.

You only advantage is defensive. You land is hard to attack because of the lack of supply. So, you should go after Jotun or any one with decent access to nature magic, e.g. druids. Ghouls are your friends as they make your fortress virtually unbreachable. Use Bane Venome Charm and Black Servant. The charm can poison your attackers while it has no effect on the undeads. It's especially bad for seiging army as they have no where to dodge.

I don't think any diplomatic tricks would be too useful as they're not hard to see through. The only card on your hand is that you can drag any one of them down to dirt by pillaging, poison. Pick the one who initiated the alliance and make sure that he fears you in the next game. If you get lucky enough, the maneuver might be painful enough for him to back off and let you survive for a longer time.

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

Solid advice, Ywl. But then again it's the Jotuns that will be hurt the worst by Ashen Empire dominion considering the amount of supplies needed to keep the giants a threat. Abysia, with their resistance to the death scale, are more of a worry. Especially if they start bringing in bloodsummons to rip the frail ermorian commanders to shreds.

Too bad you're not running an AAR 1000yd Stare. Win or loose. It would be an interesting read. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon12.gif

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">True.

There are other tricks usable by Ermor but since Ermor usually has a slower research, I don't know how many can be used now without advance planning.

Turn 30 is probably just enough to get the research to level 6 in one of the paths... If there are enough death gems and Conjuration 6, cast "Spirit Mastery" and "Summon Ghost" (pretender need to have 7+ level in death for the latter to be effective). For earth income, "Clockwork Horror" or "Troll King" (expensive). For nature and access to druid, Vine creature. Winter Wolves are not bad if dominion is cold and plenty water gems. If you had Alteration 6, equipped the Dusk Elders, cast "Soul Vortex" and put them into melee combat.

Diversify.

The hundreds of soulless or longdeads are quite useless in a MP game. The only useful undeads are the Unholy knights, who are blessable and should have a lot of bonus from the pretender's magic. And the "Wailing Ladies" if there are enough gems. The ladies blessable, ethereal and their wailing is deadly. If there are spared Nature gems and the time, might as well give them "Gift of Reason". They're deadly with some armor and "Ring of Regeneration".

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

There are two spells that will turn a battle for Ermor, even if they are facing huge amounts of priests or anti-undead spells (Wither Bones, Dust to Dust).

Darkness and Rigor Mortis. Both of those spells affect anyone not undead (which are usually the ones trying to 'kill Ermor' because they are afraid). once you have those two spells in your arsenal, your attrition isn't quite as bad (with Darkness) and you can kill enemy mages by having backrow casters with Rigor Mortis they will eventually get to 200+ fatigue and die.

But even as there are those for Ermor there are other ones which will do masses of damage to them. But Darkness or Rigor Mortis is usually able to research one or the other by turn 20 to use in tough battles (as most players will mass one big force to handle 400+ armies).

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">My dad always said that . . .

I've never done well with Ashen Empire. Soul Gate, yes, because of the nifty ethereal units they get, but my undead hordes always get obliterated by the priests of my enemies. And I play SP. Of course, usually I used a low-commander strategy, because I was a n00b, so if a banishment or two hits your Mound Lord with a bajillion leadership points thanks to the nifty items you've been giving him, those bajillion undead units you have all die very quickly. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon9.gif

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

Well, after doing my turn, I must be doing something vastly different than what is being suggested here. I have, on turn 23, a total of 24 research points. No way in heck would I have been able to make it to conjuration 6 with my strategy of alternating dusk elder and archbishop purchases; instead I have covered most of the school's level 1 and 2 spells.
I think that I am concentrating more on the 'vast legions of chaff undead' than I should be.

Very illuminating discussion, much more than I expected.

As for an AAR, that is an intriguing thought, something I will put my mind to.

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

24 research on turn 23 ??? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif Man, in a MP game you'll be soon dead rather than undead http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/tongue.gif
IIRC in my current Pbem game, playing Ulm, I STARTED with 20 RP or so with a RB. On turn 20 approx. I was already lagging behind the leading nations with maybe 50 RPs http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/shock.gif ...

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

Are you using drain scale? If so, it'd be hard to compensate unless you push for Construction 4 and go with cheap mages (spectators come to mind, as they can forge their own skull mentors and summon the next spectator as well, and don't cost upkeep or supply) plus skull mentors.
Archbishops are expensive. Unless you're needing vast numbers of longdead horse, you probably could use the research and other summons more.

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It's actually normal and that's why I mentioned that Ermor usually has a slower research. The reason is because in the early game, you can at most summon one Dusk Elder every two turns. Each of them has only 6 research points. Most players choose a Drain scale, which make the situation even worse. You pretender has tons of research points but he needs to split his/her attention on site searching, fighting and research.

It's probably a bit late but there are several ways that could have alleviate the problem:
1) Use a Magic scale. The MR of your undeads will be decreased by one but who care about them.
2) Skull Mentor. Go for Construction 4 quick. It gave you Skull Mentor and the Bane Venome Charm. Both are necessary for your survival.
3) Summon the less fancy undeads like Spectator and Acolyte. Spectator has death 2, enough to cast a lot of spells. A Spectator & a Skull Mentor cost a total of 20 gems and has 13 research points. Acolyte is half the cost of an Archbishop. They're less powerful but if it's ghouls that you want, two can summon more than one Archbishop - at least in Dom 1.

Re: Help!! I\'m feeling oppressed
 

I would recommend ignoring the Jotun and concentrating on the other two. There is a good chance that the giants will get bored and wander off after a while.

A few points to add to this illuminating thread:

- This is one of our gaming group's first attempts at a multiplayer game. Of the players, most have played no more than two "real" MP games, and one of us (Abysia) has owned the game for all of a week.

- Marigon, Abysia and Jotun have taken out an AI player each, so they are actually weakened compared to Dr. Death, who has been content with gobbling up the ocean provinces (Desert Eye, BTW) and the indies.

I challenge 1K_yrd_stare to write up an AAR on his impending doom. I will do the same as I bring the aforementioned doom upon him. It's not too far in the game to recall why you expanded as you did and what your decision process was like when designing your dominion.

[ February 20, 2004, 15:20: Message edited by: Unwise ]