AAR - EA bless (Helheim) owerpowered on med+ map ?
 

Hello,

there has been some discussion about EA bless strategies and possible counters. I think people were mainly in agreement, that some nations with possible bless/rush strategies are fairly overpowered on small (edit: had large here first - but finding out about that is the main purpose of this AAR http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif ) maps and hard to counter (if it is possible at all).

It has been mentioned, that this might not be that much of a problem on a larger map due to the worse scales. But on the other hand the early game advantage could transform into a strong mid/late game, too.

This is what I will try to write this "AAR" about. The main focus will be on how strong Helheim is vs. 10 impossible AIs

http://homes.highspeed3.de/CharonJr/...el_players.jpg

on a medium map

http://homes.highspeed3.de/CharonJr/dom3/hel_map.jpg

with Atlantis being the only underwater nation. At least one nation should be fairly safe at the beginning and able to grow to some power http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

I went with a Father of Winters as a pretender (9F/9W, Dom7) and due to having 29 points left I am fairly sure that there are better scales out there http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

http://homes.highspeed3.de/CharonJr/dom3/hel_dom.jpg

BTW, when judging the merits of heavy bless on a medium map please keep in mind that this is my 3rd dom3 game with about 12 dom2 games under my belt. I consider myself still very green, so I dare to say that the good players out there could do much better http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

CharonJr

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

You're Helheim, Sloth is free points.

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Hmm, there goes the noob http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Thank you, since I have not played Helheim before I was unaware that I could get away with Sloth with them. Or do you refer to the bug that Helheim can recruit its blessable/glamor cav outside its home-province ?

If this is the case I plan to avoid using this bug.

CharonJr

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Nope, though I'm aware of the bug and would abuse it liberally as well. Helheim's sacreds are woefully underpriced in terms of resources and you can easily get away with sloth 3. Taking just one neighboring mountain/forest province will let you have enough resources to field max sacreds.

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Oh yeah I like Magic 1 instead of drain 2, Helheim's battlemagic is so uber ...

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Drop down to sloth 3, misfortune 2(would suggest 3 but its a big map so..) and with your 160 free'd up points go with kissblades magic 1 (bladewind rocks, air magic is nice aswell) and then either go to either cold 1 or misfortune 1 again.

I was going to say you can expect a bit of trouble with abysia (fire resistant and high prot) but remembering your very high defence and great air magic you should be fine (try to keep in your own dominion though, if your lands get hot then his troops get better)

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Thank you again, will drop Prod to Sloth 3. And yup, I like magic, because of that I went with Drain 2 instead of 3 and took Cold 2 instead of 1 http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

I will NOT use the bug.

Since I am no great writer this should be more of an educational than an entertaining AAR - due to this using a bug would be wrong http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

CharonJr

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Not using the bug is fine, even before any temple spammage you can still produce over 500 golds worth of sacreds per turn NOT including the commanders needed to lead them (also note that 5-7 helhirdlings is enough to take most indies...)

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Scales updated http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

And I tried to take nations for the AI which could give me the most trouble (form the limited knowledge I have with Dom3).

CharonJr

Re: noob taking a closer look at EA bless, medium
 

Mictlan is brutal when handled with humans but tends to implode with AI.