Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

Baalz,

When I play MA-R - my bread and butter isn't meteorite guards and void summonings. Its the mind blasting illitids. Maxed out as much as I can, and as much chaff as I need to screen them. I don't even know that I've ever build a meteorite guard.

But yes, the critical mass is absolutely necesssary against R. And you do want the 400 chaff rather than the ichy's. Makes it tough to turn around tho against other opponents. Those chaff are aquatic only, and suffer high attrition.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

I mention the meteorite guards (and other tougher units) because they're the obvious counter to swarms of chaff. Chaff > snipers > elite units > chaff. So, against R'yleh I recommend you skip the elite units since they'll be using lots of snipers. Your (buffed) chaff > their (unbuffed) chaff, so you *in theory* you should have the upper hand so long as your own snipers can handle their elite units. Against real players...actual results may vary. :)

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

Meteorite Guards are excellent resource sinks, I can't imagine not building them with rlyeh unless you're maxing out your resources some other way, which shouldn't be happening once you get a couple of forts up.

Illithids, OTOH, are pretty much crap-on-a-stick for the price. The crab hybrids are much better in the water, and your mages are much better topside (once you get enough commander slots from underwater forts to make building enough of them possible). They'll get you through initial expansion since indies are dumb and static, but illithid troops get overwhelmed by numbers pretty quickly. They're not at all the centerpiece of a good rlyeh strat.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

Haha, of course nothing I say is going to help if Micah is playing R'yleh.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

God I hope if we meet in the water, you are playing MA R'lyeh. :p Illithids are bacon savers..... You can't even really effectively stop them with a single high HP/MR unit, like often works against Astral magic spam, as they always spread the love around a bit.

But I do agree wholeheartedly about Meteorites. Most UW castles can only put out a couple a turn anyways, and they're low gold cost, so may as well pile them up until the time is right to put them to good use.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

Illithids eat too much and are way too expensive for non sacred units.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

You can, you just need a passive attack. I defeated some Illithid+Troll invaders with a single Wraith Lord who cast Soul Vortex . He was paralyzed almost the whole battle, until the Illithids ran out of bullets. Then they charged forward and got killed too. I think I had something like a Frost Brand, Vine Shield, Starshine Cap, MR Ammy for gear.

I'm not sure if anything else would work as well as Soul Vortex, but you might get equivalent results with Fire Shield and enough Regen and Reinvig.

Like everything, if you just build Illithids (not that that's what Jim said at all), you're gonna be screwed. But it's worth throwing a few into your armies, and target fliers or large monsters or something else you'd like to disable in a battle.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

I want to elaborate on all of that, but getting way off topic, now. ;)

I tried a start similar to this one last night..... In this game, those Temple of the Deeps are in about 1/5 provinces, WHY have I never heard of them before? It's ridiculous. :p But, overall growth is just a bit slow. I'll try again, fiddle with it a little bit. But not until I start mass Transforming these Capricorns, I'm just too excited for it. I don't know why, but something with such an unknown random factor really makes things a lot more fun for me.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

Anything about Illithids is not off topic for a MA Oceania strategy thread. :)

Another thing I did fighting MA R'lyeh was to load up a couple Bane Lords with MR items, the works: Lead Shield, Ammy, Starshine Cap (okay, so I didn't bother with armor). Stick him at the front of your forces and watch as all the Illithids target him the entire fight and ignore the rest of your army. Unfortunately if you've got Sea Kings in your army then you need to use one of them as the decoy instead because they have higher HP.

Re: MA Oceana - OMG, I think I've done it
 

This is the Achilles' Heel of this strat, actually. I don't think that it can be downplayed, how useless the Capricorns are. In theory, it is really nice that you can remove their upkeep, and restore their paths, with Transformation. In practice, 90% of your new forms will have 5MR, and even just a random Mind Burn here or there will destroy them.

I think I may try again, but try to work it completely onto the summons angle. I mean, you are probably best off getting Capricorns for your aquatic conquest and early research - and then Transforming them when you get the chance - but seriously, 90% of them can't be committed to combat against a human opponent. So they become upkeep free researchers (that absolutely MUST be well protected from overland spells), and you will have to do all of your battlefield magics with your summons. It just seems..... like a bit of a stretch.

Oh and final tally for this last test, 21 water provinces, 4 Ancient Temples of the Deeps, 2 Kelp Fortresses.

Funny note, I was Transforming at a front line Lab without a castle. One of my Caps turned into a weird form of a Hydra, and I got attacked that turn before I even knew the results of the spell, and lost 2 mages to the poison cloud. :p Also got a bog beast, a Chimaera, 2 Ice Drakes (and a MOOSE)..... Had 0 deaths, and about a 16% rate of Feeblemind. Was using 3 Luck.