Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

MA Mictlan Priests are great without a lab, just 60 gold for 3RP (neutral scales). Of course, you need some nice mountains to put up your fort in, so random maps are out. You want a temple anyway for more eagle warriors.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Well, I have long had a soft spot for the Vaetti Hag as a useful mage recruitable without a lab. 3-4 rp for 55 gold without a lab. Not quite as useful as the Ammi, but much cheaper and they can handle all your S, D & N(with a booster) site searching spells and blood hunt.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Not to forget that Ashdod and Gath can do it too.

Ashdod does it (arguably) better than Hinnom.

Gath's option is extremely cheap - but requires a temple which costs 800 gold form them.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Hmm.. we're hijaaking a thread. But I like the idea of a national remote summon mage spell, for a slow moving weak nation, in order to allow them to build a lab....

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

EA Arco's philosophers?

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Technically, but they're capital only so it doesn't really matter.
And technically they're not mages...

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Hinnom won't be a research lead, as the IIRC 125gp is not that good a price for 4/5RP even without a lab.

About Gath, the best option for research IMO is the S1N1 Sybil for 80gp, not sacred so won't need 80gp temples, and have 5% Fortune telling to offset Misfortune scales somewhat. The 50gp sages are a bargain, but S1N1 just offers more combat potential late game, spamming S2/S3/N2 spells by the dozen (Rev. communion, LotNS), and if you were not recruiting Sybils you won't have the numbers.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Fomoria has the worst battle mages IMO.
Sure, the Kings are great, but you don't risk them that much in battle with their insane cost of 500 and the very limited numbers.
You save them for SC usage but again risky since they have one vital flaw.
And your common mages are just crap. Fomorian druids suck badly!!! A1 WDNA 1 random. The only half usable ones are A2.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

What? Fomoria has awesome mages. Fomorian Kings are one of the strongest units in the game, whether for SC duty of casting. Fomorian druids don't have much magic but are still good for so much. Can't get no respect :hurt:

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Hey this is all fascinating. Sorry for being so new, mind if I ask? I havent played Hinnom more than 3 turns in SP (just started now to see what it's like), what I cant figure out is
- where does it say that population dies because of the units? I cant see that tag on any of the units. Just the gluttony. But I thought that is only for supplies?
- Baalz writes that they have all paths but water, and can site search all but water. I just clicked through all commanders to make sure, and I cant find Death. Am I missing something?
Looks fun, if a bit overpowered in MP, I will try some giant fun in SP!
Thank you for your help

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Yes the Kings are good. But you'll only be using them for heavy lifting due to very limited numbers. And their SC usage is limited too due to morale.

I'm talking about the druids here, their mage majority. They are crap.
A1D1 gives you nothin'
A1W1 gives you nothin'
A1N1 gives you... guess...

A2 is useful, but you still need storm to make use of them.

I don't like Fomoria generally. I feel you have to rely on luck too much to get the magic schools you want.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Those little cave man dudes have D1, forget their name.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

A1D1 gets you...half a fomorian king. A1W1 gets you lightning or frozen heart damage for versatility via storm power/lightning bolt, orb lightning, or frozen heart, or half a formorian king. A1N1 gets you half a fomorian king...every pair of druids you set to researching covers the RP you lose by sending out a king to do the heavy lifting, and given that you should be getting a king every turn after you can afford it there's plenty of room for your poorly-pathed druids to pick up the research slack. And of course with a storm power buff all of the druids can spam lightning bolts all day long, especially if you have the sense to give them an E bless.

The only time morale really comes into play is if you're facing stacked fear units, which is a fairly uncommon situation...if it does come up you can always throw a berserker item on them if you need to.

Yes, they're not the most stellar battle mages, but when all they have to do is compensate your research so your killer flying SCs can go break some heads they hardly need to be.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Plus (not sure if this is what Micah meant by half a Formorian King) A1 + an air gem = mist form. Assuming you've got an E/N bless druids can make very decent thugs if you can manage vine or golden shields.

A2 = mistform without a gems, cloud trapeze
W = breath of winter, quicken self - I'm thinking used in small groups, devastating in the right circumstances with that 21 strength and stacking chill aura. Also, can you say 150 gold niefel slayer?
N = resist elements, resist poison, resist lightning combine with frost brand & dragon helm for 100% resistance to whatever it is you're fighting.
D = Not so much a thug, but with a skull staff can drop winds of death & wailing winds which are two very underrated spells IMO. Can also summon Morrigans, which are some of the best things D gems can go to.

Doesn't sound like a useless unit to me...

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Baalz - I just meant that sticking 2 druids on research duty covered the RP you lost by sending out a king, so you can actually stick the majority of your kings out in the field once you transition your research onto the backs of your druids instead, and since the kings can teleport it doesn't become a logistical challenge catching them up with your current war front.

Great uses for the druids, but I don't see Fomoria having to resort to using them since they should be fielding a steady supply of kings that would put most of that gear to slightly better use than the druids, but I'm kind of a princess for using the best available units I can get my hands on and not dwelling much on lower-level thugs. =)

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Also, AD wielding a skull staff can also cast Wailing Winds in CBM, with 2D gems. Before you get to summoning Morrigans, an AD plus a lightning rod can summon 4 Corpse Men monthly from very early on in the game, which are pretty decent in CBM.

AN = Rainbow Armor forger, and in battle with an N gem can Summon Sprites, which are good against SCs. Ranged 100 AN stun damage! 12 Sprites per cast, 20 shots per sprite, to defeat high MR.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Hehe, but I think you can make very cost effective thugs with pretty cheap equipment assuming you already sprang for a nice blessing so they make sense if you're running short of kings to equip. I think golden shield + fire plate + horned helm should give you a pretty serviceable thug for 12 gems which can erupt in numbers out of any of your castles. They might even make sense *instead* of Kings in some circumstances as you can field 3+ for the cost of each king, so they'd be a better bet for a broad blitz expecting to encounter mostly PD in dozens of provinces.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

A1D1 lets you pull off the same Mirror Image/Mistform/Soul Vortex combo as a Rakshraja. The downside is that 1.) You need gear + gems to do it (1 air gem, 1 death gem, skull staff) and 2.) Fomorian Kings do it better with less gear.

Pathboost gems and SCs actually go together really well, since SCs typically don't have enough paths to blow all their gems uselessly on the first couple of spells like battlemages do, so there's less need for the logistic hassle of a separate gem carrier/scout. Plus, gems stack with path boosters, and they also don't take up any slots.

-Max

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

I'm talking about Fomorian Druids as battle mages.
There just isn't a whole lot they can do on their own. The enemy is just gonna kick your *** if you don't have any Kings to support your mages since the enemy will have better battle mages most of the time.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

I don't know, I think there's actually a pretty decent range of things you can do if you're thinking boosters and gems. Sure you don't have the obvious goto spells some nations have and some nations will be fielding more directly effective mages, but then again you're fielding giant troops with Morrigan support so your mages don't have to be as directly effective. Sure, you're gonna want Kings where you can, but for smaller raiding/skirmish parties a druid or two can be just perfect. They can also take care of support spells for bigger fights leaving the kings free to be SCs or cast the real big spells (darkness, wrathful skies, etc).

A2 - storm power (or gems) & thunderstrike obviously, also they're tough enough to drop mistform then blast orb lightning from among the front line or even lightning resistance and shock wave.

W - with a water bracelet (or W gems) you can drop freezing mist, which is very, very good in combination with undead troops, skellispam, etc. or even just leveraging your much higher hitpoints and regen. Can also drop quickness & quickening which is iffy for your encumb-5 giants, but very, very nice for Morrigans. If you're in the water (which you should be) you can drop shark attack, friendly currents & grip of winter.

D - With a skull staff already mentioned wailing winds & winds of death. Also, terror, shadow blast, disintegrate, and skellispam (which tends to be a good counter to giant-slaying things).

N - healing mists works well with your giants and VBF mentioned fairies. Swarm is a staple spell, and panic stacks well if you're dropping terror with wailing winds along with something having a fear aura....like Morrigans. With a couple bigger boosters you're looking at mass regeneration and relief - both great spells for your giants.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Nah you don't need a lot of equipment to make druids effective.
Just storms and storm power.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

not pedantic, but not especially relevant. The guide was for pre-nerf Hinnom. I'd take claims of their being vastly over-powered more seriously if those complaining had actually won games with them (against reasonably good opponents). The nerf hit them hard, making them only over-powered. They are certainly not as excessive as Ashdod, and probably no more dangerous in EA than a standard Niefl bless.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

In Darkparadise I not only won, I completely dominated to the point that in year three I annihilated the second place power (Sauromatia) over two turns before simultaneously declaring war on all remaining players including (all viable positions) Micltlan, Neifelheim, TC, and Lanka (played by K). That, BTW, included posting this guide around year two so everyone in the game knew exactly the strategy I was pursuing. To be fair that was pre-nerf, but I don't see anything in the nerf that negates the fact that Hinnom is strong or very strong in every aspect of the game leading to a cumulative effect of being more than very strong because a lot of it is a multiplicative effect.

When you're among the leaders in province count because of your initial expansion it stacks with your strong scale income and broad ability to site search leading you to likely be leading in gold, gems & research. Your strong giant troops leave you no need for short term magic research goals, start immediately for your optimal medium/long term goals. You've got a strong blood economy and immediate access to massive blood stone forgings and good national summons. You've got top notch SCs along with standard troops & PD strong enough to fight all but the best elites with no support...but then again you've got 2x as many mages as anybody else so then there's no reason they have to.

Yeah, early game Hinnom is comparable to Neifelhiem, the difference is Neifelhiem fades in power as the game progresses and people manage to field counters, while Hinnom starts at the top of the power distribution and steadily gets more powerful (blood stone forging since year one, blood economy, strong research with diverse mages, strong gold & gem income, arguably the best end game summons available to anybody)

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

It might be useful to list exactly what got changed in the 'nerfing patch' so that people can compare Hinnom before and after. I'll have a stab here now, but I may need some help with this as I never really looked at Hinnom pre-nerf, and don't currently have any pre-nerf patchs close at hand to check them out.

The Bold Text is taken from the patch history notes....

- Hinnom PD reduced
My quick test shows you currently get.
upto 20PD...
An Avvite Commander
1.5 Avvite Light Infantry for every 2 points of PD
1 Avvite Swordsman for every 2 points of PD

...above 20PD...
A Kohen
1 Avvite Heavy Archer for every 2 points of PD

What was it before the patch?

- Hinnom start army reduced
You currently get...
6 Avvite Light Infantry
6 Avvite Swordsman

What was it before the patch?

- Hinnom Popkillers give some unrest

- Avvite Chariot -> 5
This guide says they used to be size 6.

- Dawn Guard -> 45gp
This guide hints at them being 40gp before.

- Melqart Blood -> 3
??? Guessing it was 4?

- Ba'al Blood -> 2
?? Guessing it was 3?

- Ba'al eat Melqart event reversed.


Please feel free to comment on, or correct, anything I have listed above. And please forgive my blindness if any of the missing info is somewhere in the guide.

If we can nail down exactly what got changed, then we can work out exactly what change is supposed to have turned this super nation into merely an overpowered one.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

W - Frozen Heart is very good for a W1 spell.

D - Skelly spam from a D2 mage isn't really worth doing--too much fatigue--especially if you need to blow 7 D gems on a skull staff for it. You'd get a better skelly density out of a regular old skull talisman on an indy commander.

Note: I don't mean that casting "Raise Skeletons" once or twice might not be worth doing, but in my book it's not "spam" unless you're actually able to spam it... 30+ skeletons every turn is skelly spam, 5 skeletons every 8-9 turns is not, and 5 every 8 is what you get from a Fomorian Druid w/ skull staff.

-Max

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Frozen heart is a great spell, although you probably couldn't script too much of it's due to short range, and I don't know if the AI would cast it on it's own.

I'm looking at my old game with Hinnom,
I think Hinnom had 8 - 8 starting army before the patch,
Baal had blood 3 and random 4.
Actually I think Melqart had an increase in blood by 1.

The funniest part was the fact that you could use unequiped Hinnom scouts to take out 1PD of many nations, still can. :)

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Druids are great for casting frozen heart because they can safely be put up front. With 30hp and a E/N bless they're not easy to kill.

Hinnom still has probably the best starting army in the game. I took the starting army + first turn recruitment and expanded forever without losses.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Gluttony is just for supplies. Popeating does not have an icon, but they do eat population, as per description text. It is one of those special abilities that doesn't have an icon, just like increased chance to escape from Inferno, Kokytos or the Void, stormflying, and a number of others.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

popeating also bring unrest I presume? Or are they different factors?

Unruly human slaves, why don't you stay obedient and let me eat your babies?!

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Yes, popeating causes unrest. I can't remember if it was always that way or was added as part of the Hinnom balance patch.

-Max

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

I think it always caused it. In any case, popeating and causing unrest are separate attributes of a unit. I.e. having the popeating ability itself does not cause unrest but the units that have it also have the other ability.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Hello again, one more newbie question from me here -- those Melquart individuals. They are certainly bad right out of the box. I am just curious as to one thing: What do you do with their Blood Magic? I mean, you don't use those guys for blood hunting, sacrificing, or summoning, but for killing stuff on the battlefield. Right? So what's the magic for -- can you do anything with blood magic? And how do you keep a giant out on or behind the front lines supplied with virgins to do it if you do?

And one last question: Trampling. Is there any risk to it? Do you trample OR use your normal attack, or both?
Those Melquarts already have armor and a magical attack out of the box, I was wondering if giving them Boots of the Behemoth are a good idea or not. (As opposed to say boots of reinvigoration or strength or something else.)

Thank you

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

The usual method of keeping front line mages supplied with blood mages is scouts that are loaded with blood, travel with the army, and sneak so they are not involved in the combat.

As for Boots of the Behemoth....You probably could make it work.. but why? You already have size 5 trampling troops, that don't take up a commander slot.

As for trample / attack.... you attack something your size or greater. you trample those smaller.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Thank you!

[/quote]

As for Boots of the Behemoth....You probably could make it work.. but why? [/quote]

Won't I get to kill more stuff per turn that way? Don't I get to trample a smaller enemy as long as I have MP left over? With a sword, I can only make one attack per turn, but with boots, don't I get to trample a bunch of little guys and then smash them with my sword? I mean: for very little investment (boots), won't I be gaining a large array of choices -- turning a very robust individual which would normally do well against a small number of large or robust troops but would be relatively ineffective vs. a large number of small, cheap troops into a unit which could do well vs. both?
In other words: To your question "why?", I ask: "Why not?" What is the drawback to trample, what do I lose?
thank you!

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Yes you'll be able to kill more troops per battle turn with trample, but you'll build up fatigue too much too fast, hit over 100, fall unconscious and get yourself killed that way, and that's not very effective.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

As for Boots of the Behemoth....You probably could make it work.. but why? [/quote]

Won't I get to kill more stuff per turn that way? Don't I get to trample a smaller enemy as long as I have MP left over? With a sword, I can only make one attack per turn, but with boots, don't I get to trample a bunch of little guys and then smash them with my sword? I mean: for very little investment (boots), won't I be gaining a large array of choices -- turning a very robust individual which would normally do well against a small number of large or robust troops but would be relatively ineffective vs. a large number of small, cheap troops into a unit which could do well vs. both?
In other words: To your question "why?", I ask: "Why not?" What is the drawback to trample, what do I lose?
thank you![/quote]

Well, Executor's answer is pretty succinct, but I'll try to give a gentler version of it.

MP: you have to make pretty close to optimum choices. The level of competition is much stiffer than SP.

Yes, you can use BOB boots. Unfortunately to make it really work you then need at the minimum an amulet of resilience and probably an earth bless.

So thats 15 gems, and two commander actions and two slots on your melqart.

In the end, the games are usually decided by mages and SC's not armies. So the ability to kill lots of army men is less important than having a MR in the 28's, and a protection in the 25+s.

So the long answer is - yes you can. But then you'll have to take extra actions to equipment him for the late game.

So if you are taking non optimum actions while your opponents are not - you're at a disadvantage.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

I see. Thank you. I didnt realize that with the fatigue, guess I am not sure how trample works. Good that there is a downside too. Thank you all.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Basically you multiple your base encumbrance by the number of squares the commander runs over, the more action point you have the more squares you'll run over, but, the more squares you run over the faster you'll accumulate you fatigue.
Example, your enc. is 5 (the base enc. of a Melqart), and your run over 5 squares of troops, that's 5*5=25 fatigue for just one turn. So reinvigoration doesn't help much here, as you'd need a lot!
Defense also matters a lot with trample, so does protection. You have it described in the manual how it works.


The Behemot boots are best used on low encumbrance and high AP units.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

The best thing for an SC to do with blood magic is Blood Vengeance.

-Max

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Don't forget zero-encumbrance units. One of the "quirks" of Dom3 is that units with ZERO encumbrance will never gain fatigue from combat. Casting spells will still cause fatigue, but they can fight all day log without getting tired. And it doesn't make any difference if you load them up with heavy armor and shield, either! As long as the critter has a base encumbrance of ZERO, it will never gain fatigue from combat.

The vets all know this fact (I think it's part of why Tartarians are so popular), but newcomers might miss it.

Zero encumbrance + Boots of the Behemoth = fatigue-free trampling goodness :D

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

But it says that armor adds encumberance to combat in the description? Has that been changed?

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

As he said, a "quirk".

No change though. It's worked this way at least back to Dom2.

Armor adds to combat encumbrance for anyone with a base encumbrance above 0. It adds to spell casting encumbrance for everyone, so don't load your self-buffing Tartarian down too heavily.

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

And it also decreases AP, so if you throw the Monolith Armor on a Wraith Lord just because he's 0-enc don't expect him to move very fast.

(I believe the reason almost everybody knows about 0-enc units not being affected by armor enc is because it's one of the between-turn "Helpful tips.")

-Max

Re: HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING
 

Great guide. Reading through the initial posting, Baals get described as "top-flight" SC's, but I really wonder. Primary issue is encumbrance, but I suppose you could overcome that with reinvig spells or items. Morale, on the other hand, seems like a real issue at a measley 16. Seems like they'll break more often than not if they're not ultra-quick in taking out the small armies they're facing... What do people find? Never played them post-nerf, so can't rightly say.