Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

Answering the last two posts here...
Saber: you mean the "have an ally splash a GR onto your Charm Offensive province where your Nature mages mind-control the attackers" stunt? ( http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/evil.gif ooo how nasty my mind gets these days!)
Huzur: Very good point on the requirement to cast. Any Lamia Queen can forge items to boost herself to D4 (and if that's as far as she can go, she can instead either get to N5 or is eligible for a Ring of Sorcery.. and can now forge her way to D5). Only one in 16 can quickly get to D6 (but with the right timing, she could ring up the Scepter of Dark Regency and hel-llloooo D8!)
And hasn't this discussion gotten off the original point? Although if the reason no-one takes the other castle types is because of GR and nothing else, then maybe it hasn't....
Hoping the Watch Tower isn't the supply crawler of the Alpha Centauri series-- the "use it or you lose" item-- because an otherwise so balanced game shouldn't have a thing that, if the other guy's using it and you're not, you've already lost. (Unless you destroy him before he gets to the easy killer sequence...)

Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

Shhh!

Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

Except that it does not work. You cannot capture (Enslave, Charm, Hellbind)
special monsters and province defense. Standard indies and player troops are
fair game. It can be done with other summons (Angelic host, Call of the W-)
but it takes quite the ally to go for something like this.

This is where you guys (do I get points for using 'guys' instead of an insult?)
go wrong. Ghost riders is only one of the many, many ways of laying waste to
an undefended province. Speaking for myself, it is my least favorite one,
together with the other 'annonymous' raiders. Yes, I do use it, but only when
I cannot send a squad that will actually TAKE the province, or when I have a
scout nearby AND gems to invest in an instant castle. As for anyone even
suggesting that Ghost Riders have an use against anything but undefended
provinces, I have one word: 'Play people with a clue, you may learn something'.
The last time Ghost riders have damaged any squad of mine was in the first game
I saw them. I was playing Ulm in that game, so you should be able to figure
out how long ago that was :-)

And yes, I am aware of the trick of making the opponent waste gems by casting
ghost riders. There are three ways of countering that (that I know of) and
one of them is pretty much part of my SOP.

In my opinion, not even close. The crawler had no disadvantages and one had to
be mad not to use it (especially since you are able to produce it at a minor
base and then reassign it to a major one, airshipped/maglifted both ways)

The watchtower has a few major disadvantages, but the people who whine about them
have never tried to play with one. Low income, extremely hard to produce a
conquering army, let alone a second, no supplies to speak of and low defense
that does matter in the early game. The reason I take a watchtower as
opposed to a castle is not the construction cost or build time. It is the
eighty design points. But the time I start fortifying non-essensial provinces,
money is meaningless.

Of course, a well-balanced game does not have ONE thing like that. A well
balanced game has a dozen things like that. I have posted this challenge
before, I it is still standing. I am ready to play 1x1 with any whinner, and
he gets to forbid me from using one additional 'exploit' every game. The
idea is to see how many games it would take him to win.

My point is that if you fail to expand early, search for sites, research quickly,
develop highly mobile defenses, hoard at least one ressource, fortify every
important province, build a strong domain, avoid an early all-against-you
alliance, secure a few good globals, or at least prevent the enemy from doing
so... you are unlikely to win. In a smaller game, you can get away with only
a few of these, but if you plan to win a 150+ province game, you have to do
most of the above.

And what may that be? How comes I have never encountered anything that comes
close to being an 'easy killer'? Hell, I learned my latest new trick from
a game I was not even in. I fully intend to smurf a game and tailor my
development towards chain casting Armaggeddon after making sure that my
important units can take it. But even that is far from being an 'easy killer'.

Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

I'm really fond of the Wizard Tower. At 120 pts., it's nothing like cheap, but an admin of 30 on a castle that springs up in 2 turns is no joke.

Also, the Mausoleum is really good. Only 40 design pts. and you get an Admin of 20. That's not bad.

In general, I think the Watchtower is one of the weaker options. Both of the other 300 gold/2t castles are better. You pay for that, and you don't always have the points to spend. But if you do, those castles are rather obviously worth it.

-Frank

Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

the wizard tower is too expensive. For 120 points you can pick order 3 which nets you +21% taxes. The 20 more admin, which you get from the wizard tower is only 10%.
Sure there is the resource bonus and higher def, but those two aren´t that important.

Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

Right. But you can't have 3 more Order, can you? You could have Production 3, but that's only 9% taxes. Once you've already made the choice as to whether you are an order/misfortune nation or a turmoil/luck nation, the Wizard's Tower is the biggest chunk of economy you can buy.

Of course, the Mausoleum is even better in that regard - it only costs 40, so it stacks up quite well to picking a point of Productivity o Growth.

-Frank

Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

I prefer castles, with 450g / 3 turn build and 40 admin @ 80 points to Wizard Towers. IIRC, as normal races, I've never taken anything other than Castle, Fortified City (on very small maps when I don't expect to build a second castle), or guard tower. Though if you need to fortify all provinces or lose them, nothing above 300g will be a very good idea.

Pumping points into your pretender's fire magic (to enable fire-site searching) can boost your economy nicely, though... I'd rather give a pretender 80 or 120 points of fire / earth searching ability (for non fire / earth nations) than spend the points on Wizard Towers. Alchemizing the gems should make up the difference, and Ironskin / Fire Shield are great on combat pretenders.

Re: Cost/Benefit for Castle types
 

I´d still pick growth 3 over a wizardtower. That´s 4% less taxes at the beginning, but you soon gain more because of the increased growth, especially in conjunction with order 3. Now if you can take order 3 growth3, magic 3, design your pretender and you still have 120 points left, then the wizardtower is a good choice.

I don´t like the mausoleum, because the defense is so low. One single casting of hordes from hell breaches the castle walls immediately.