Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

A little birdie told me to say "MA Ermor."

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

MA Mictlan is still very much a top tier bless nation, vastly better than Man in every way. Honestly, Jags in the cap and eagles out is better than the other way around, since eagles are best mid and late game, and you still have all the jags you want early. It takes a bit more work for MA Mictlan to get to all those lovely sacred blood summons, but the nature jaguar summons are still quite a bit more decent than Cu Sidhe.

Vanheim and CBM Bandar Log are easily better bless nations than CBM Man. Sure, Ashdod no longer has good sacred troops, but their sacred commanders are still worth a high bless, same for Eriu.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

True. So the other bless nations might be:

Mictlan (while good is not EA or LA mictlan)
Bandar Log
Vanhiem
Ashdod
Eriu (commanders only)

Am I missing any? So is Man a better bless nation than these guys? None are as limited magically as Man so they don't have that handicap. I think it may be somewhat questionable to claim that man is a "better" bless nation than these guys.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

You are just plain wrong; CBM 1.92 wardens are better than jags and eagles in EVERY way.

They are harder to counter, have better attack and defence, better morale, better magic resistance, suffer less attrition and do more damage.

Mictlan may have wider path access, but it's even harder to get them up to usefull levels and blood with MA Mictlan without rods only works if your opponents are asleep or if you build a pretender to get you into blood; which means no bless.

Vans and Tiger Riders may seem to be comparable bless chassis to wardens, until you realise that your going to have at least twice as many wardens to work with.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Oh for God's sake, again, bless nations need a good sacred, but that's not all they need. Mictlan has low resource needs, free points from temp preference, wide magical diversity allowing for an imprisoned pretender at little cost, and recruitable flying H3s. In addition, it has tons of sacred summons that benefit from exactly the same blesses as its recruitables, and which can take over in the late game.

Bandar Log has as many problems as Man blessing its sacreds, but again, low resource requirements, and free points from temp. Its magical diversity isn't the greatest, but what it has is far more useful, with communions and mind hunt. And like Mictlan, it too has tons of sacred summons for the end game should it manage to bootstrap into blood.

Vanheim has sacred thuggable commanders for when its sacred troops stop being the greatest. Ashdod and Eriu don't actually have good sacred troops, but their commanders are thuggable very early with a good bless.

And wardens are harder to counter? How do you think sacreds are countered? Evocations murder wardens as well as it does anything else. Jags and Eagles on the other hand, are harder to deal with using evocations since the former has 2 lives and the latter has flight. The other nations listed all have thugs/SCs/high hp summons to lean on once evocations make human hp sacreds obsolescent. What does Man have?

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

It's worth noting that of those only Vanheim has definitively better access to magic; with both wider and higher paths than Man.

Only Ashdod has both astral and death...

Only Vanheim has usable blood...

So, I'd say of those the only nations with significantly better natural spell access are Ashdod and Vanheim.

The others all have their own diversity or scaling issues with magic.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

The slight points advantage doesn't even make up for the inferior choice of pretender chassis.

And you don't need flying H3's to run bless strategies, it just makes things a little easier if your lazy.

Those Couatl's that your relying on to bless by the way can and will be taken out by a decent player. Possibly before they get divine blessing off; you should be using priest kings.

Getting much mileage out of the Mictlan, Ashdod or Bandar Log summons without an awake blood pretender or clams in CBM is a pipe dream; your not going to get them in numbers or early enough.

Vanheim and Eriu thugs scale into mid game a bit better, at the cost of gems, but the wardens catch back up when battlefield enchantments come in.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Against Mictlan? Indy slingers will do the job.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Why do you say that coutal's are easier to take out than priest kings? Large size? But you can summon jade serpents (good hitpoints, so well suited to this purpose) or monster toads as decoys. Magic being? Opposition and Control are only range 20, and the coutals are hanging out in the back dropping buffs and evocations. Other than that, I don't see why they would be more vulnerable than priest kings.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Since when did glamour, mistform and air shield start costing gems? BTW, Sidhe Lord with barkskin tops Lord Warden in protection.
What enchantments? Arrow Fend, Fog Warriors and Growing Fury? Of all those only Fog Warriors is universally useful. You can`t have Army of Lead without either empowering+forging+summoning with E1 crone for 90 E gems total, or being lucky with super-rare E2 Crone AND still spending 60 E gems for forging+summoning. Add 50 E for every Weapons of Sharpness caster.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

You would need a LOT of indy slingers to get anywhere against mictlan, especially assuming there's remotely competent archer decoying going on.

Magic duel.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

That's true, I hadn't thought of that. But they aren't SO vulnerable that Mictlan shouldn't use them; they are its best mages, after all.

On a related note, does Magic Duel always target the strongest astral mage?

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

They are cold-blooded, right? Cold scales (from Wolven Winter or cold dominion) should seriously hurt them.
Single-target spells usually target biggest/highest HP suitable target.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Magic duel is completely random in its targeting I believe. Unlike other single target spells. Or atleast it did not target the golems when I used it in another game. It targeted the normal mages. And Mictlan have plenty of turkey duelers.

Ehh, give me a moment and I will test this....

Edit: Yep, completely random. This is why people send things like turkey mages and other cheap astral mages along to protect important astral casters.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Completely - or by unit`s ID?

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Hmm. Thats hard to test. But anyway, how is MA Man or all nations supposed to magic duel the turkey nations anyway?

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

We are comparing them not in duel against each other, but how well do they fare in game overall.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Couatls are H2. It's the High Priest of the Sky that's flying H3. And having access to H3s is hardly just something for lazy players. Look at Man, only priest is H1 nonmage. It needs to recruit indy priests just to start up a second expansion party if it's leaning heavily on Wardens. Admittedly, Bandar Log has the same problem.

And what inferior bless chasis? The only thing Man has that Mictlan might want is a good Water bless chasis.

Ashdod has recruitable SCs and thugs. It doesn't begin to need its summons to leverage its bless.

Mictlan can get into blood pretty easily without a blood pretender. Those cheap recruit anywhere turkey mages have a 2.5% chance of blood, and 2 out of 4 heros have blood. The big advantage though, is a B2 summon that can summon itself. CBM has significantly nerfed it, but still, all it takes is a single B2 caster and 35 slaves to get the ball rolling. Even without luck in randoms or heros, that's achieveable with scouts reasonably early.

Bandar Log admittedly is much harder to get into blood with the massive nerf of Dakini, but they're still good enough to invest in. You do have to make a solid commitment with pretender design to summon one, but once you do, they can summon themselves and blood hunt. That's a late game thing, but it's a late game option that Man doesn't have.

That's a pretty nutty claim right there. Barring rare randoms or empowerment, Man has up to A3/W1/E1/N4 in cap, and A2/N3 everywhere. Notice how hard it is to get battlemagic out of its recruit anywheres. It can naturally only forge 2 boosters, W+1/N+1 out of the 9 total in its 4 paths.

Bandar Log is pretty bad diversity wise, but compare it to Man. Also only 4 paths, up to W1/E1/S4/N3 in cap, S2/N1 everywhere. Its natural booster access gives W+1/S+2/N+2, and all that S means communions. So better than Man.

Ashdod has F3/S3 in cap, and F2/E3/S2/D4 everywhere, and it can boost F+2/E+2/S+2/D+2. How is that not better in both breadth and depth than Man?

Eriu is the easiest, since it has exactly the same paths as Man. With the exception that it naturally gets A4, W2, and E2.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Man is in competition for having some of the worst mages of the game, one should however not underestimate having excellent spies.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

You`ve missed something really important. :) Notice this S4. S4+Starshine cap gives you RoS, and then RoW. And those two rings open up big E, big N, big W...
Also, E1S1 means crystal shields for combat mages, and couple Gifts from Heaven can really ruin your opponent`s day... Especially when one of them hits his fully-kitted titan-sized pretender while he is outside of his own dominion. And Gifts, unlike Thunderstrikes, can`t be countered by simple ring.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Sooo... You count your pretender as a national caster? Or? Because there is no way for MA Mans mages to cast GfH with native mages.

Keep in mind that every magic path you put on your pretender have a opportunity cost in the form of what you could have spent the points on otherwise.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

I`m talking about Bandars.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

I'm about 95% sure Magic Duel always targets the strongest astral mage. Highest path, not biggest or most hp.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

I agree that it would make sense, but it doesn't seem to be true. After I made that post, I tested a bunch of S1 magic duelers against a few coutal and turkey mages, and turkeys were targeted too, so Im thinking it's either random, or based on some other variable. Perhaps the deliciousness of the target?

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Yeah this is wrong. Magic duel seems to hit very random targets. As in, size 6 s4 mages can be decoyed by size 2 s1 mages levels of random. When the s4 mages are closer to the enemy. So don't rely on it hitting one thing or another, it will pick and choose itself.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

So, to sum it up - Wardens are so good because they are meant to be used with only a minor bless, for taking a major bless for them means you`ve just shot yourself in the leg.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

So I'm not sure that sums it up at all. Refer back to my earlier post.

Most of the discussion since then has been about the relative strength of Man vs. the other bless nations like bandar, miclan, van etc. Theses guys are stronger than man PERIOD. Bless or no bless. They have more options, better diversity, better summons, better mages, better thugs, etc. With players of equal skill and equal luck man is probably going to loose whether it has a rainbow or whether it has a bless.

But the question you're asking is a completely different one. Your asking the question of what version of man is better, the one with a bless or the one without. Just because both are weaker than these other nations doesn't necessarily mean the bless version of man is weaker than the version of man with a rainbow pretender. Once again go back to my earlier post, what are you really trading off between the bless version of man and the rainbow version of man?

-------------------------------------------------------------------
So what do you really give up going for a bless strat rather than a rainbow?

Not mitigated by indi's
60 Gem Empowerment for Air mother - assuming you don't get an A4 random

Potentially mitigated by indi's
30 Gem Empowerment for an E mother to get earth rolling. Once again assuming you don't get an E2 random.
Guaranteed Astral Access
Guaranteed Death Access
Guaranteed Fire Access

The bottom line is that you're going to find at least a couple of the last category on indi's, especially if you expand fast. So the question really comes down to whether or not you think a strong bless on the wardens is worth 60 air gems and missing a couple of the 2nd category. It's true that if you don't find any indi mages then you're somewhat screwed. But if you do happen on some wizards, or metal orders, or moon mages, or even just some lizard men and some raptors you'll be much better off.
------------------------------------------------------------------

I don't think its necessarily clear at all which one is a stronger bet. I think, as I said, that its more about variance. Find some good magic diversity on indies from some rapid expansion fueled by blessed wardens and you'll do very well. Don't find any and you're going to loose and loose very badly. If instead you go with a rainbow pretender, man will preform somewhat below average almost all the time, but you'll be guaranteed at least a decent showing before being eliminated. Since man is a weak nation to begin with going with the high variance strategy at least gives you some probability of wining. Going with the rainbow ensures that you'll preform at a middling level in almost every game.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

And how big is a chance for you to get those without a rainbow pretender sitesearching? Remember, without a pretender you can reliably search only for full N, full A, 1W (full W after you hit const6) and 1E. Poison glades (D access), Tower of the Silver Order (Air version), Tower of the Iron Order (Earth version and only with manual sitesearch) - but that`s about it, I think.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

That's the thing though, Man doesn't have trouble expanding or fighting early game. Man has superb regular troops, and always did, even before CBM made the knights and avalon knights useable. Wardens don't inherently change the dynamic, especially as they are just as resource intensive as Man's regulars. Unlike, say, Eagle Warriors, or Ashdod/Eriu's sacred thugs/SCs, Wardens start petering out in the midgame same as most sacreds. Earlier actually, since trying to bless a large Warden army other than the one with your prophet is horrible, and you can forget complex scripting.

Putting a heavy bless on Man basically exaggerates Man's existing strong early, weak later characteristics. Especially the W9 bless. At least E9 is good for the sacred mages later. And I'm not convinced an army of high blessed Wardens supported by regulars (and Wardens still need regular support even with high bless) is all that much stronger than an army of regulars supported by rainbow blessed Wardens.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

The thing is, if you are not going with a strong bless you might as well expand with knights, because then you can use the limited commander recruitment slot in the capitol to recruit mages instead of priests. Knights can be commanded by indy commanders after all.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Well, from personal experience I can tell that Wardens with E9 N4 bless accumulate stars fast, with archer support eat Machaka/Bandar sacreds for breakfast and generally have very low attrition rate.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

I'm pretty sure that even with a strong bless, expanding with Knights of Avalon for all but the first expansion party with your prophet is at least as efficient as doing so with Wardens. As you say, they can be led by indy commanders and don't require you spend 400 gold like turn 3 to get indy priests for additional expansion parties, or waste capital recruitment on nonmages.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Knights of A are great But its not just initial expansion, its also the first couple wars you find yourself in. Blessed wardens coming out of 3 or 4 castles can steamroll in a few early wars, especially if you make full used of their stealth, leaving you very well off coming into the mid and late game. You'll just never have enough knights for them to be more than niche plus they're still fairly expensive.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

It's nice that you took the time to confirm the original point I was making, that all of those are limited to 4 paths.

As for battlemagic from recruit everywheres, they have the some of the best early-mid game evos, the lightning spells, and one of the best late game evos, storm of thorns. They can also self buff precision. Exactly how much more do you want them to be able to do.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

The whole point of a bless strategy is to win or generate a large lead quickly.

You don't do that by just taking indies.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

What's with this ridiculous backpedaling? This is what you claimed before:

Mictlan and Vanheim have greater breadth in magic. Indeed, Mictlan has access to every path except earth, with death and blood available on semi-dependable randoms from turkeys, heros, and all else failing, its national Tlaloque summon.

Those nations noted all have greater depth in their 4 paths. Again, Man can natively forge only 2 out of 9 boosters in its 4 paths, and no astral rings. None of the others are that limited. Bandar's not even really limited to 4 paths, with its wide range of national summons that provide access to paths outside those needed to summon them. Ashdod can forge all the boosters in its paths plus the astral rings, and again, Eriu is just Man, but better.

What in the world are you talking about? Only 1/4 Mothers can cast lighning bolt. For more serious evocations, Man has to wait for Evo 5 and getting orb lightning. For better than piddling range, it needs to cast storm with a slow, fragile, and ridiculously old crone, and simultaneously render useless its excellent archers, so the 1/4 A2 Mothers can cast thunderstrike.

Bandar Log has massive communion potential, and so does Mictlan. Vanheim and Eriu can seriously pull off lightning evocations. Ashdod post CBM nerf is the only one with worse battlemagic than Man...but at least it still has early SCs.

Due to lack of blessers, Man can't even translate a high bless into notably faster indy expansion the way Mictlan can, unless it wastes half its year 1 capital recruitment on otherwise worthless priests. And the point of a bless strategy is to gain a lead quickly, and use that to translate into a victory. With excellent troops bless or no bless, it's that second part that Man has a problem at.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Since you have trouble comprehending English I'll highlight it for you.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Only if your incredibly bad...

It will expand faster than Mictan, without any attrition, and you should only need 2 lord wardens from the capital before your second fort takes over... Less if your a little lucky and get an indy priest province.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

You won't want to use the priests - get the lord wardens. That's who you'll want leading your raiding parties later, possibly with a magic weapon to add some punch. It's also worth noting knight commanders can also bless your troops and could make nice mini-thugs.

Thinking it over, I think it's certainly viable to play Man with a strong bless (not necessarily optimal long term - but viable). Personally I'd prefer E9N4 - net 0 encumbrance on your wardens and 4 points of reinvig for your sacred mages. When you consider the total package of reasonable cost, recruit everywhere, tough in a battle but with stealth as an option I think it's fair to say that Man's sacred troops can be considered among the best in MA.

I think Torgon is right that your build depends on your tolerance for risk. Nothing is going to change the fact that you've got no native S/D/B access. Are you willing to take a risk that you'll find some indies to help you out or do you want to make sure your pretender can break you into those paths ASAP? Personally, I'd be willing roll the dice and go with an ENS pretender and see what happens.

But, as I mentioned earlier, if you don't like leaving things to chance I think wardens are perfectly usable with a light bless (EN first, FW are also nice).

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

I think that E4D9N4 is interesting, opens up all death, Lamia Queens and HiS. And you still have positive scales at Dom 8.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

So you were just making up your own nonsensical definition of "better magic"? All those nations have either more paths and equal levels, or the same number of paths at higher (thanks to better booster access) levels. Their paths also synergise better, but lets ignore that, and stick to your definition. And you're still wrong, Mictlan and Bandar Log.

Do learn to read, preferably without making up your own definitions. There will be indy priests in your cap circle pretty much guaranteed. That's not the problem. The problem is Knights of Avalon expand just as well as an equal resource value of high bless Wardens, and it's equal gold value too once you factor in the early temple and indy priests. Somewhat better actually, since Knights can handle crossbows and elephants better than Wardens.

That's why you don't expand any faster with high bless than without. Unlike Mictlan, resources limit how fast you can put out secondary expansion parties.

That's not really the issue. Yes, having a pretender that can break you into S/D is great depending on your luck with indies. But it's just as important to have a storm stave in the mid-game so you can do battle magic without needing to use a super vulnerable and slow crone, or bust out flaming arrows to compliment your excellent archers or various other assorted battle magics that your national mages can't do by themselves.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Nightfall, go to irc.gamesurge.net #dominions. And stick around for a while. Some people that are banned here had some disagreements with your ideas about bless nations.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Some?!? Think you left out an 'a' and two 'l's there Soy.


But it's funny to see newbs and patzers playing theory Dominions. They make me laugh. If Matrix was here, he'd laugh too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gki8DgcWCs0

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Considering getting minor E/S, there are also Mercs to consider.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

I'm happy to admit that I'm still mostly a newb Calahan, but I also have some direct multiplayer experience with both major bless MA Man and MA Mictlan in CBM 1.92, how many of the people dismissing me out of hand can say the same.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Not only did you, once again, leave out an important word, but your lack of comprehension is not my problem.

I'll just fix that quote for you so the outright lie is more obvious.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Stay calm chaps.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

Yes, everyone is entitled to their opinion, regardless on how strongly you feel they are wrong.

I love CBM, for me it makes the game 1000% more enjoyable, if you don't like it feel free to say so (politely) and enjoy playing vanilla. I am just using that as an example.

That is the beauty of playing wargames, people have their own and varying opinions on strategies and nations. Otherwise we would be stuck playing chess.

Express your opinion by all means, questions others opinions by all means, but do it nicely.

Remember strongly word posts usually come across MORE strongly than they were intended and can cause friction.

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

D9? For a nation with magic weapon on troops? BUT WHY?

Re: Man: A Bless nation in CBM 1.92?
 

So...no actual response to points made. I've noticed you like doing that, just ignoring anything you can't respond to, but this is the first time you've ignored everything. I guess we're done here.