On Kailasa
 

Kailasa has to be my favorite new nation so far, what with the last of a fading race of divine creatures and just-civilised ape people. It seems really interesting to me. However they seem to be rather limited. I tried a bless strategy only to find that they have just two priests with only a single level. And they are capital only http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif

Any good strategies on these guys? The one in the manual was interesting but brief. So far I've been using mass waves of Markata and Atavi archers in front of a few Bandar Warriors. Should I push Evocation for the Yakshas or should I go the conjuration route?

Re: On Kailasa
 

They are excellent on very small maps. Create a cheap pretender thats dormant, crank your scales all the way up, and swarm the enemy with archers.

Lots of national fodder is pretty much the only strategy with them. Both their magic and priestly ability is poor.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Their magic abilities are not poor.

The yakshas have E3N, a 100% and a 10% WESN random.

Every yaksha can do summon EP, eagle eyes, bladewind x3.
That is excellent.

Your astral yakshas can do summon EP, eagle eyes, gifts from heaven x3.

Also the yakshas and the yakshinis with buffs + some equipment might be decent thugs.

Your gurus are very useful too on large maps. There you could use a few yogi as communion slaves and the gurus then for soul slay spam.
They can also nicely counter SCs in the early game with horror mark.

Re: On Kailasa
 

How is horror mark a counter against SCs? In Dominions 2 at least horror attacks were really rare even if you were marked.

Re: On Kailasa
 

They stack now in Dom3. And you might also be attacked by some of the unique horrors.

Within 10 turns if decently horror marked the enemy pretender should at least be once attacked by a horror.

It is not 100% reliable of course, but usually it works imho well enough.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Didn't know that. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/shock.gif Cool.

Re: On Kailasa
 

What's a "decent" amount of Horror Mark? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: On Kailasa
 

Yep, that is what happened to my friend's first SC yesterday. He was rather unhappy. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif
This is definitely a good thing, that horror marks can be stacked now.

Re: On Kailasa
 

That is the problem, i do not have yet have the manual and i have no info how it exactly works.

But in blitz with QM we each other horror marked our pretenders, iirc we both used only 1 astral mage for that who casted 5x horror mark, and within 5 game turns after that both our pretenders got killed by the slayer of gods horror http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.
And in the turn i called my god back he got again killed by the slayer of gods.

But that was with Dom version 2.8x iirc, so it might have changed.
Are there details in the manual?

Horror mark is an incredible fun SC counter, but you need luck http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.
It is very possible that within the next 3 turns the horror marked enemy SC gets killed by a unique horror, but it can also happen that he only gets one lesser horror attack in the next 20 turns which doesn't kill him.

But given how little research it needs it is surely a good spell to suicide 1 of your astral mages for horror marking the enemy SC pretender http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif.

Re: On Kailasa
 

If you think a bit more about this, you'll find it isn't fun, it sucks!

Basically, a spell that can spell sure doom on a pretender should only be castable by mages which have been 'power-upped' and equipped with all the nicest gear possible, or by other pretenders.

Either that, or magic resistance should easily negate... as it does with lots of other spells which are much weaker and more costly.

Re: On Kailasa
 

I thought Horror Mark from the spell wasn't the killer, but the Horror Mark from the Horrors' Astral Hooks. After one Horror attack, the pretender will get attacked more and more often.

Re: On Kailasa
 

It sounds to me like there has got to be a way to remove horror marks (other wise that 1 astral mage amid the chaff could bring down any SC).

Re: On Kailasa
 

There isn't for curse, even though it will also bring down a commander that keeps fighting. It could be interesting if the Horror Mark would slowly weaken, given time, and the commander wouldn't run as big a chance of horror attacks if he stayed clear of magic and mayhem. Perhaps items or abilities would also help. Regeneration helps against afflictions, for instance.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Another option would be allowing astral mages to slowly remove the horror mark (getting faster with each level) but, while they are doing this the horror marked commander has a higher chance of being attacked (using astral magic on some-one horror marked is sure to attract horros).

Re: On Kailasa
 

Sounds like a sure-fire way to get horror marked yourself.
(Translation: It would be cool if that astral mage also ran a risk of getting horror marked himself.
Maybe even make a spell that moves horror marks from one commander to another.
And a blood spell that transfers the horror mark to a blood slave :O )

Re: On Kailasa
 

That's a cool concept, but it ought to have drawbacks...perhaps a risk of a Horror attack, Insanity, or even both?

Re: On Kailasa
 

Somebody wrote an AAR involving these guys which presents one strategy, centering around bless effects for the sacred Yavana warriors. This seemed to work pretty well, partly because some of the national summons are powerful priests.

Re: On Kailasa
 

I really like the idea of transfering horror marks, Agrajag. I can just see a god asking some poor general to stand over there for just a moment... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: On Kailasa
 

That i would like to see (too bad it wouldnt work since blood slaves only appear as units during battle). Or how about sacrifice 10 or so slaves to free a horror marked commander and transfer the mark to some random fuzzy animal *imagines a rabbit being attacked by that god slaying doom horror*

Re: On Kailasa
 

10 is too little, unless it's a funky ritual at best.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Maybe make it require b4-5, 15 slaves, 75% chance of working and have a big chance the caster will be attacked by a horror during the ritual (only a small chance of it being a big horror though)? Losing a b4-5 mage is a nasty blow (losing either an expensive mage or booster items)and, even if he survived an attack from the horror the spell may not even have worked.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Well, that sounds better.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Horror mark seems silly now, from the sounds of wat Boron is saying, it really seems waayyy too effective for such a cheapie. Plus it makes deathmatch even MORE pointless. "Oh look, I'll send my astral one an horrormark x3 for script"

Re: On Kailasa
 

Its very effective vrs lone SC's or in duels but in most cases its no-where near as effective. I agree its too strong (dosnt it require astral 2 though?) since there is no way to remove it but how could you make it weaker? Increasing fatigue/limiting range is all i can think of because if it costed gems imo it would be pathetic.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Move it one or two up in Thaumaturgy or then make the current Horror Mark MR-resistable AND add a new spell that Horror Marks without chance to resist it to higher levels in Thaumaturgy.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Astral Geyser is in Evocation. It's an Evocation spell with a Horror Mark effect.

How many of you nerfers have actually tested this, though? I haven't noticed Horror Mark being that deadly, or even tested it that much.

Re: On Kailasa
 

Maybe we should have a MP game where we volunteer our pretenders for Horror Mark use and then see how it goes...

I would send my Olm to it. Endo, are you up for a game of Horror Marking some fat olm-troll-giants? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: On Kailasa
 

Depends. Would you let me be Agartha? If not, would you let me be Mictlan and speed the Horror process a bit via the Blood spells for calling and later sending horrors?

Re: On Kailasa
 

You can be whatever you want to be, I just want to see how the Horror Mark works nowadays.

Re: On Kailasa
 

I haven't tried the new horror mark yet, but if the risks grow steeply with the number of marks, one simple solution could be to add a chance of failure when adding a horror mark which is dependant on how many you have already. So creating the first one should always work, but after you have N trying to add a N+1th one should succeed 1/N of the time or somesuch curve, or you save at MR+N after you have one. That way you can still add more, but piling on a very high number requires real effort or bad luck, not just a couple of scripted cheap S1 mages and no way to avoid it except not playing.

Sill