Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

Sorry, I may have misunderstood you. If by "expansion", you mean "expanding against your neighbors who already ate up all the indies", then it's not a problem.

If you're talking about expanding against indies, which is what I usually take "expansion" to mean, then waiting for a Const-4 item or spending all your 1st year money on forts is just going to get you killed.

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

But of course! I forgot about the mindless, I knew he wouldn't autorout. I was mistaken on the Berserker Pelt.

Spiders are amazing, but that game was a lot fun. In reality he wasn't much more than an inexpensive, funny accessory that let me take good scales and have a blistering expansion.

I just couldn't get this image out of my head of a gigantic wooden statue rolling with the slope of the land in a roughly westwards direction, squashing all the pathetic local militias that tried to stop him, causing the inhabitants to pledge their allegiance. :)

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

Well, I knew that, but he can mind hunt (I think I even named him Bastardo). I though Astral would give him use past the expansion phase. I was not thinking of how that might cause him to absentmindedly kill himself with gifts from heaven.

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

That is not at all what I am saying. With a N9 bless, 3-4 spiders take any indy. And with the blessing I proposed you can easily afford

O3, r1, h2-3, g3, magic 3, luck x.

Each turn you can build an expansion team of 3-4 spiders and a bless monkey.

In fact, since you start with a priest and you can make a prophet you have a leg up. The spider commander prophetized will solo most provinces.

Use the starting troops to patrol, and set the tax rate at 120.
Your income most of the time will be roughly 600 or so.

If you go light on your initial expansion teams (3 spiders) your cost is less than 300.

This means that on turn 3-4 you easily have enough money to build your first fort.

I may be misremembering, however, my remembrance says that sorceresses are 190 for 7 rp. Regardless, you need the second fort to make the eyes of the lord (unit with patrol bonus?). Churn them out to lead troops, and to patrol.

Machaka units (other than spiders) are all resource intensive, and fairly uniformly, crap. However, your spiders are pretty darn good against thugs and SC's.

If you push forts, (while not interfering with your regular expansion) you ameliorate the glaring weakness of machaka pd.

Like I said v, I've got no problem hitting 15 with this strategy, with a 2nd fort built and third on the way in the first year.

What strategy are you promulgating? (and sorry I came across snippy).

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

I don't believe this is correct.

I *believe* that berserk units are given another 25 turns before autodeath.

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

Yeah, according to past discussions we've had about this on the forums, 75 is the hard limit on turns.

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

You are paying far too much for too little gain. With the scales you have there, you should be able to hit 15+ provinces, as well as a couple of castles, the first year without any bless whatsoever.

I think Black Hunters are generally underestimated here on the boards - probably because past incarnations of CBM made the price discrepancy between them and ordinary spiders so large - but their strength lies mainly in the opening game. Machaka really has no problem there, so investing in a N9 bless that gives you little afterwards is not the best idea.

About 6 Black Hunters without any bless can take practically any indy, pretty much the same as your 3-4 N9 expansion parties. Add in a minor N4 and possibly E4 (the latter helps against largish numbers and might be something you want anyway) and you can shave off a couple of hunters.

Do not get me wrong, you will of course get a better expansion rate with N9 than without, but once the indies are gone, the benefit of the bless will be greatly reduced. Human oponents really do not find it much harder to deal with N9 hunters than unblessed ones.


Also, Machakan troops are certainly not resource intensive. Apart from the hoplite, the regular troops are all very resource cheap. The combination of very cheap archers and good ability to cast Flame Arrows is excellent. Since Machaka has access to both the nature and earth protection spells as well as Iron Bane, cheap troops without armour has an occasional use. Combine with Curse of Stones for more fun.

Lastly Sorceresses have f1e1d1 + 10%fedn and cost 110gp, so 110 for 5rp is more accurate.

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

I'm using a dormant rainbow S4N4E4B4A?W???, whose minor paths I can't remember because he's currently dead (as the result of a failed experiment). 2 or 3 or something.

@ ChrisP: I agree that black hunters are good for expansion against indies. Rings of Regen, not so much. That was the point I was trying to make.

@ BigDaddy: Mindless units with S can *cast* Mind Hunt just fine. I'm saying a Collosal Fetish can't be targeted by it.

@ Amorphous: I think the Black Hunters are underestimated because outside of CBM they have MR 5 in spider form, and are more expensive to boot.

I don't think that putting a berserker pelt on a Collosal Fetish is a good idea. It's kind of broken: his morale will remain at 50, but he'll gain fatigue from the beserk and won't be able to self-buff. A morale-50 unit is not going to retreat ever anyway. The only exception is if you order him to retreat, which is actually a terrible idea, because he'll have some sort of positronic meltdown and just die.

I'm pretty sure mindless units dissolve on turn 50 whether they are berserk or not.

I don't like to hire the sorceresses because the (also) cap-only sorcerers are so much better.

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

You are probably right in part, but I doubt that is the whole of it. MR really does not matter during indy expansion and though some may stare themselves blind on the price tag of the hunters, I doubt that most fail to compare the cost to what else Machaka has available.

In vanilla, Black Hunter expansion parties are cheaper in gold but more expensive in resources than parties of Spider Riders. In past versions of CBM the cost of the riders were significantly lessened while hunters had a cost the same as in vanilla, which made the rider parties cheaper in gold and resources - outside of a some ridiculously expensive bless. The hunter cost decrease in the latest CBM version changes the situation to one similar to vanilla.

Re: Can someone tell me about Machaka?
 

Aren't the Black Spiders still 100 gold each? 10 Spider riders (ie an investment of 300 gold) can take most indy provinces, but can 3 Black Spiders do that too? The usual upkeep advantage sacreds have is not relevant with spiders (riderless spiders are free from upkeep), so just the basic investment matters. I've been under the impresion one needs 5 or 6 black spiders to do the job of 10 brown ones, but I haven't tested this out in a loooong time.

I think I have to try this out :) If 3 Black spiders, even with a bless (build a temple in a province, and build indy priests to cast Bless ad nauseautum, and you can still recruit mages from the fort(s)), can act as an expansion party, then that has to be done for the shere coolness factor. Black Spiders *are* cool, there is no question about that (I think), but just being cool has not been good enough for the steep price (except to eat elephants and giants, but those are not common enough usually).