New
 

Hi I'm new to Dom2 I've been playing for a while and I've decided That my 5 fav nations are
1. Mictlan-blood magic and cheap troops
2. Caelum-Archers and fliers
3. Man-archers and semi strong magic
4. Abysia-'cool' people http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif
5. Machaka-spider riders

plz can peeps help me, and also offer advice on the game

Re: New
 

You probaly want to put this the general dominions 2 forums.
I am pretty nooby too but here is my opinions are your races.
Mictlan, blood and blessings
Caelum, fly, possibly the most powerful mages+magic
Man, archers rocks, magic research sucks so mages=decent
Abysia, blood magic
Machaka, ?

Re: New
 

This has been moved to the Dominions 2 general forum so you might have more of a response.

Re: New
 

If you want some sort of response, it would help if you asked specific questions. Otherwise, become comfortable with the search function on these boards - there are after all 152 pages of advice (among other things) already here http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: New
 

Well, one easy tip to give out is to use your starting spells. Not all nations have equally good starting spells, but Abysia can cast powerful Flare, Caelum has Wind Guide (IIRC), which is great help for archers. Machaka has Blindness, good spell but works best when used against few powerful enemies, so isn't really useful on expansion. If your enemy has few strong units without high mr(Black Knigths, Jotunheim's giants, Knights of the Chalice with flaming weapons and berserk), blind them!

Re: New
 

cheers for your help, but can you tell me who the best god is for machaka, for magic, dominion and strength,

cheers to all peeps who help me....

ps how do you gain ranks, I noticed sum peeps on this site that are genrals and majors how do you gain ranks?

Re: New
 

There is no best choice. Some pretenders are more effective at certain jobs. Machaka has lots of magical power, cheap archers and good melee units. If you want to use armies, you need resources, and to get them you need Productivity. To get your sacred Black Hunters or your best mages, you also need lots of money -> Order. Because Order lowers the chance of special events happening, you can usually take 1 or 2 points of Misfortune without anything too bad happening. Machaka also gets more points because they prefer warm lands (Heat 2), but they must take strong dominion so that their lands stay warm and they won't lose money. Because you are already taking high dominion (which is needed to recruit more sacred units) and you have good sacred units, you can easily take a pretender with high magic power which makes your sacred units better.

An example:
Lord of the Desert Sun:
starts with Fire 2 and Nature 1, Dominion 3
Take Fire 6, Nature 4. This gives your sacred units +3 attack and ability to go berserk. With this ability, after they are hit, Black Hunters get +1 to attack, strength and protection, -1 to defence and WON'T RUN AWAY. Very useful, but your priests are also affected. Try to keep them away from enemy arrows.
Take Heat 2, Dominion 6, as at least these are needed for Machaka. Then take Castle (80 points). You should have 205 points left. We'll take Order 3, Production 2 and Misfortune 1. You have enough points for 1 more scale. Because you have nature mages, you could take Death (scale) and get Magic(another scale). Magic scale helps all your mages research faster. As it is a small bonus to all mages, lots of cheap mages get more out of it than few expensive. You have cheap mages, although the cheapest, Witch Doctors, aren't good researchers.

You have good Fire and Nature magic, so now you've got Magic. Dominion and Scales are ok, although others would probably advise you to take less production and more Magic. Strength is also quite good: you have your normal national units (archers protected by hoplites), Black Hunters with very good attack and berserk, and your Pretender. Research Evocation 1 and make him cast Fire Darts. It gets more powerful with more Fire magic, and your Lord of the Desert Sun has plenty. Take him with your army, and his flames will be of great help. Then research Alteration 1 and add Eagle Eyes as his first spell.

You could also take different approach. As an example, Fire 9 would give the sacred spiders attack +4 and flaming weapons... Or take Phoenix and high dominion. If Phoenix dies in positive dominion, he won't die but is reborn on your home province, and with good Fire or Air magic he can kill dozens of units before being sent back to capital to recover, every turn until he gets Feeble Minded or something. Then it takes few turns to go offensive again, as Immortal units recover from such wounds. Or you could take Oracle, get Astral 4-6, very good scales and fortress, and win with your national mages and armies. Your Oracle would give you access to different magic, and be able to forge powerful items like Ring of Sorcery or Ring of Wizardry that would help your normal mages.


re:ranks
It must be post count. They don't matter much: I have 1000+ posts, Zen 430, but he has done lots more to the community. There is 27-page-thread about his mods! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

Re: New
 

cheers for your help on Machaka,
I have decided that they are my fave and I hope that it will help me, If it doesn't there is summit wrong...
http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif
cheers

Re: New
 

Machaka was my favorite for a long time. They have some major weaknesses.
First their province defense is terrible... seriously I've seen tennis balls kill them.
Second is they have only one very expensive blessed unit. If you don't get a good source of gold income you'll have very few units to bless.
Third their archers are very weak... pray you find a province to recruit some decent archers.

I know they have some good points... but the list above are the bad points I remember.

Re: New
 

I think Machaka has great archers -- they are so cheap. I think they have decent precision as well. Or do you mean you want to find indy crossbows?

Machaka hoplites are great troops, if you have the resources for them.

Re: New
 

Their archers do die very easily to most spells, but they are cheap enough for that not to bother me. And if you are afraid of flyers and want to keep them alive, buy few Spider Riders to their sides. They are expensive, but should be able to at least slow down fliers and even knights.

Re: New
 

I looked in the dictionary, and I see no meaning for "peeps." I assume you mean people, but I'm not sure http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif

Re: New
 

Odd that you didn't find peep in the dictionary: the usual meaning is "to peek, to have a brief look". The word "peepshow" is fairly popular in France, describing specifically a place where pornographic or erotic material is displayed (most often in front of the eyes of the customer, rather than as a film). Peep may have other meanings: it can be an appearance (especially from hiding), or the sound of a bird.

In slang, peeps means people indeed (I believe the word was first used in rap, but I am not sure).

Re: New
 

I saw the word "peep", but "people" was not one of it's meanings.

Re: New
 

hi, cheers for your comments,
by peeps I mean people.
thanks for the help,

ps can u tell me how I can can get the best out on Machaka and destroy my enemies

Re: New
 

hi just a quick question how u add polls

Re: New
 

In the beginning of the game buy hoplites... they're good for the price. Focus on research and getting some death summons. If you have good gold income get the big spider hunters. For bottle neck areas I recommend having 4 assassins to take out any approaching armies. Also summon vine ogres for whatever mages can reach 3 nature via items.

Re: New
 

what are u losing too?

Re: New
 

People have already commented on how to pick a pretender for Machaka so I thought I would just say a little bit about the nation in general. I agree with some of the people here that Machakan archers are one of its strengths. They are so cheap its great! And if you feel like it, you can easily cast Flaming Arrows which *really* leverages thier cheapness in a major way. Machaka hoplites are really an excellent troop too, having both high prot AND above average defense. I never got around to using the sacred spiders much since they were so expensive.

In terms of magic I found Machaka really well suited to earth and death summons. They have the really really cheap witch doctor to do your site searching. And then the sorcerer is pretty easy to get 3N which in turn gives you Lamias and 3-4D, which in turn gives you all your Bane Lord SCs and whatnot. Also... I think the witch doctors or sorcerers are perfect for summoning Banefire Archers, which are loads of fun. Mech Men too, I believe.

Your PD is just complete trash tho. Don't buy more than like 3-5 points. Conventional wisdom is to only buy 1PD in any province (10 PD if you want to catch scouts). But you can't buy just 1 Machaka PD cause it is so terrible. I would not be surprised if scouts or... like any stealth leader could kill them alone.

Edit: Oh and I forgot to mention that Machaka is also built to cast Blight, which I feel is an often overlooked spell. If you are fighting an early-middle war where fluctuations in income are meaningful, a couple of Blights can really cripple your enemy at a key time.

Re: New
 

Sent a long PM to you, but received some weird error message. If you didn't get it, PM me back and I'll resend it.

Re: New
 

Do Fever Fetishes still work on undead? If that wasn't fixed, it's one way for Machaka to boost its fire gem supply -- put them on cheap Mound Kings.

Re: New
 

I think so, but I'm not sure. I had though recent patch removed that, but it wasn't listed in changes in recent versions.

Fever Fetishes give the one wearing them Disease (no healing, 1 hp of damage every turn, more afflictions), but produce 1 fire gem per turn. They aren't of much use, except when you give them to undead units. Undead aren't affected by disease, but Fetishes still produce the gems. By giving cheap undead, like Mound King from Revive King, you can get free fire gem income. Machaka is one of the few nations who can forge Fever Fetishes with cheap mages.

Re: New
 

hi I just want to say thanks for all the support you guys have given me,
and I would like to ask the question who is your fave nation?
plz tell me thier name and reason.

Re: New
 

As you all probably know my fave nation is machaka,
as you have told me, they have strongish pretenders, cheap archers, strong heavy infantry and cavalry,
but the number of combo's you can do with them,
Ivy crown and summon vine ogre,
death summons,
eagle eyes and ranged spells like fire darts and flare
they have a wide range of skills and powers with a few magic items items, even and chief can command hundreds of men, and even better,
for every fire point you have they get to command more men, so 9+ fire for a high command troop and soe other command boosting items can give him 300+ men and more magical beasts.
this is a very cool thing to have command over, a strong mage with protection and power, spells and phisical might coupled with 100's of archers and a few spiders with a dense formation of hoplites can take down gods, powerful mages and thousands of units, you can win with odds of 2-1
remember Machaka and Naresh are a force to be reconed with.

Re: New
 

Naresh, you have a lot of comments here about commanding lots of men, magic creatures, etc. Which is great and loads of fun I will admit. But be careful with large armies as the game progresses. There are many spells which will decimate large armies either from afar (Murdering Winter, Flames from the Sky, Beckoning) or in battle (Wrathful Skies, Rain of Stones, etc). As the game progresses, most players will move to smaller armies, shifting thier military weight more onto mages and SCs.

Re: New
 

Weak archers ?? What's the problem, they have a bow, that's all that matter... Any bowman group is doomed if any melee troops comes to contact, having poor morale is rather an advantage as they run quickier - and faster as they're unarmored.
And being very cheap allows for large numbers, very interesting for Flame arrows.
As for PD, half of the nations have also terrible PDs (Man, Arco..), that's not specific to Machaka.
Agreed on the limited blessed units. But it's also like Arco in fact : pretty good mages and troops (although Machaka's mages are more "straightforward" and less varied), but not many blessed units.

Re: New
 

Pangaea: I love stealth. I dont play well enough to win but with Pangaea (or Man, Ulm Blackforest, Oceania) I can stay in the game long enough to be imprtant as an ally, or in making sure someone else DOESNT win.

Gandalf Parker
--
Some play to win or lose,
others to stay in the game

Re: New
 

Poor morale is never an advantage... the sooner they run the sooner they stop supporting other troops on the field such as a SC or slow tank troops. Also the sooner they run the more likely your army will lose during close battles.
I only buy the Machaka archers during the beginning of a game or if I'm desperate.


Yes... but that hopefully Dominions3 will have better/stronger province defense for the races.

Re: New
 

IIRC Illwinter didn't change it for DomII because they thought it might lead to defence being stronger that offense, and to boring games.

Re: New
 

thanks to every one who has written in here are the rsults so far
Abysia 0
atlantis 0
all others 0
apart from Machaka 1
pangea 1

Re: New
 

I love pangea carrion woods theme, no idea why. I've still got difficulty getting a good strategy with carrion woods, but I'll figure it out.

Re: New
 

results sdo far
Pangea: 2
Machaka:1
keep them coming

Re: New
 

PD also wasnt changed because Dom is a game of rock-paper-scissors at a race level. Its a game where SOME races are supposed to have great PD which can be used in their strategies, while other races have other levels of PD which they must work into theirs.

For a great PD race, choose Jotunheim giants. Altho that comes with the "too expensive to travel as an army"

Re: New
 

Naresh, you will probably be interested in this thread:

Dominions 2 Power Rankings

Re: New
 

cheers all
thaks for the advice the thread helps alot.
I am starting my first game over the net,
I am playing machaka my opponent who is 100 times better is playing ulm. there are also some comps but I am not to worried about them.
please can you help me! thanks

Re: New
 

Many ulm units have low MR, so your blindness spell should be helpful there.

Many ulm units have high protection so your machaka archers won't hurt them much, unless you do something like flaming arrows.

Ulm is usually strong in the beginning but if you can last you will out-magic them.

If they are playing Black Forest theme for ulm, then that is a different story...

Re: New
 

thanks I will use some of these tactics thanks again
Naresh

Re: New
 

Okay, I'll try to stay away from this thread then. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: New
 

lol
I think u should

Re: New
 

Blindness is good, but only really valuable vs small numbers of high value troops, like Black Knights (assuming Base Ulm or Iron Faith).

Actually even flaming arrows wont really hurt Ulm much. They are just 8ap, I believe? So will only reliably penetrate armor up to prot 16. Most Ulm units are prot 18-20, arent they? Banefire Archers are easy for Machaka tho and would be exceptionally valuable vs Ulm. 10AP to make the hit and then a Decay strike to make sure it dies? Nice.

Yeah magic is definitely the way to go. Off the cuff I would think that using those cheap Sorceresses for Magma Bolts (to penetrate the think ulmish armor) would be good. As might other fire spells. Air is really best vs Ulm, but you dont have that. Blade Winds, which is what I normally use Black Sorcerors for wont be effective vs Ulm. Tho beware the reverse! The Ulm Master Smiths will Blade Wind your armies back into the stone age!! Particularly vs the poorly armored Machaka units!

Nothing is coming to me in terms of long term magic tho. You should probably steal the Mother Oak tho, early. Is that in the same school as Banefire Archers? If so thats a good dynamic.

Re: New
 

Blindness seems about good as magma bolts (they are a little hard to compare), except that your witch doctors (or sorceresses) can cast it with zero research, right?

Nature has some ok armor avoiding spells - Breath of the Dragon (poison) and Sleep cloud, for example. But neither of those are fantastic.

Machaka hoplites and spider knights shouldn't be too badly hurt by blade wind but machaka archers will be slaughtered by it.

I see a lot of people pumping out vine orges in early/mid games with machaka. Flaming Arrows (and wind guide if your pretender has air) is another common trick early on.

If you didn't know, don't waste your money on the spider mouted archer.

Re: New
 

thanks for the help.
keep it coming

Re: New
 

Hmmm, I think the Machaka 55 gold spider knights might be of some use... I'm not sure though if the spider's attack are strong enough to hit the ulmish units.

Re: New
 

thanks for the help,
we are playing on the britan map and i am heavily out numbered on all sides. I have archers and mages on all of my borders...
I have about 40 archers and 20 hoplites and 5 mages in each province. they cast blindess and flaming arrows but they only just win.
ulm usually sends a heavy wave of sappers one turn then a small burst of about 20 black knights. the on the same tun the attack from another province with a large number of crossbowmen, and plenty of infantry.
then on the other side I am being attacked by C'tis saurumancers and serpent dancers... the have a very high dominion and I have 3 high priests battling it out for dominion...
but then I have Caelum attacking me from the sea!!! they have a few high level water mages and pump out water rings and barrels of ir like mad... the give these to commanders and send archers across the sea. then to top it off they cast wind guide and the commanders have bows of acuracy and war! please help I am deperate
But then on a high note I am casting L/R spells every tun and I am hassleing the C'tis and Caelum capitols and they keep most(I say most) of the enemies busy but then I cannot cast enough spells to keep the researchers and wizards busy... I can cast about 6 call to wilds a turn. 3 fires from afar and 2 seeking arrows!!!!!!!!!!!!!! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...s/confused.gif life is hell http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/evil.gif
but do you like my writing underneath this?is did it myself. good innit?

Re: New
 

please hurry with the help please I'm desperate!

Re: game
 

pleasee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Re: game
 

Try saving up for some real powerfull spells.
Summoning some powerfull warriors and equiping them. AI does bad against properly equiped strong warriors.
Make peace with one of your neighbours.

Re: game
 

yo people the game is going well

Re: game
 

hi i think u can win !!! dont let others tell u other wise