Most narrow nations
 

I know I risk being redundant, I hope you can see my point. It is debatable which nations are strong and which are weak. But I think it can be safely said which are the most narrow in choices they offer. And which allow widest choice of strategies.
I'm also trying to kill some time while waiting for my copy to arrive. As usual, I have problems choosing the right nation for my playing style, which is... I don't know. I'd hope this thread would help me decide. I don't like *too* narrow nations, but moderately limited one could be good start, because it isn't so overwhelming at first. Especially magic. I like to experiment a lot.
In some ways, nations too narrow/specialised can be considered worse, but that is not always the case.

I'll start. MA Ulm is probably one of most narrow nations, if it's anything like in Dom2. Heavily armored and armed infantry, some heavy knights, poor priests, mages specialised in earth, forging an (??)fire in lesser extent, if I remember correctly. No light infantry or even bows available mean MA Ulm is stuck with its heaviness unless it makes use of independents.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

Some people have trouble seeing the narrowness of the nations, and the same for wide-coverage of a nation.
What can be helpful is to try and think about how many strategies there are.
armored
horde
defensive
research
stealth
fly
summoning
forging
castling
dominion
harsh dominion
victory point

Hmmm I think there are others but thats an interesting list for now.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

I confess I like nations with somewhat 'narrow' magic. Sometimes the array of choices makes it too hard to decide on one effective strategy, and instead try to do a whole lot of things poorly.

Also, even the more narrow nations have broadened some in D3 compared to D2, for example MA Ulm's Smiths now have a 10% chance of getting FAES, in addition to the 1F2E they had before. But it's probably still the 'narrowest' nation.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

MA Ulm has stayed mostly the same. Slow heavy infantry, armored Arbalests, etc. Their Master Smiths have a 10% random now. FAES gives them access to Fire 2, or Phoenix Power and Augury; or Air/Earth combo items (which are pretty nice IMO) and few Lightning spells, perhaps Storm Bows; E3, 4 with Earth Boots, 5 with Earth Power, which is enough for all Earth combat spells... Astral gives them access to Gifts from the Sky, of course, also quite nice.

Not much less narrow, but MA Ulm COULD have a surprise up their sleeve now.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

Try Sauromatia, they can literally do every type of strategy. Pan as well.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

MA Abysia is pretty narrow IMO. Basically all you have is slow, heavy infantry for nationals. They only have 4 paths to choose from, Blood, Astral, Fire, and a small chance at Earth, so conjuration won't yield much for summons to supplement your infantry so you have to use Blood summons. Plus they're basically pigeonholed into taking Order, Prod, and Growth scales so you're pretender is going to be at least dormant.

They're strong, but they don't have a lot of playstyle options until much later in the game when, basically, everyone has those options at that time anyway.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

LA Ermor is (unsurprisingly) very narrow. Probably the most narrow in terms of pretender design even: you have to take several death magic points (anything below 4 is pretty suicidal) and an awake pretender, as a sleeping pretender *will* get you killed. fast. A strong dominion is also, while not absolutely necessary, still very important.
Also, for late age your national troops (read autosummons) plain suck. And getting priests with high magic to cast those whole-battlefield undead buffs is quite expensive, better summons are more economical. A bless will also be wasted on Ermor as you'll only get decent amounts of decent blessable troops quite late. (and good priests are still expensive)
Also, they lack several hundred coolness points because they're restricted to lame zombies and skeletons instead of the awesomeness of ghostly roman legions. :cry:

Tien Chi MA are very diverse. And you'll have to utilize that, as you get comparatively wek mages that have lots of different paths to make up for it. You also get a nice mix of national troops and summons.
Also unsurprising, since MA Tien Chi is basic Tien Chi from D2. Though a bit better imo.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

Tien Chi MA is very diverse?! They're practically pidgeon holed into a consort spam strategy backed by imperial xbows!

Re: Most narrow nations
 

They have access to many paths. They might not be able to use them well, but they have access to many paths. In a game where every player could expect, say, 15 turns before contact with another player, Tien Chi's diverse magic could pay off. It won't pay off in a blitz, perhaps even in most games... but they still have access to many paths.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

They don't really have that much access to that many more paths than other nations. Only five if I recall, which there are quite a few number of nations can boast in terms of magic versatility of equal if not greater level.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

I noted that Tien Chi has 3 or 4 pretenders that boost luck? All titans. And they have some decent magics. Possibly a bless strategy. They only have one blessable unit? But many blessable leaders and many of them mages.

If I remember Jade Emperor I got up to air 4, water 4, astral 9. That gives air shield 20%, Defense Skill +2, Magic Resistance +3, and Twist of Fate. Pretty good for a battle field full of mages. I only got 5 dominion but for purchasing mostly blessable leaders that isnt too much of a problem. Plus the luck bonuses, the research boost, the high astral. Someone should be able to make that a decent strategy shouldnt they?

Re: Most narrow nations
 

Well the problem is, the mages once on battle field can't do anything! Also in ME, astral nations are very rampant making your capital only mages all too easily counterable. Sure they have a decent strategy, xbows + consorts. XD

Re: Most narrow nations
 

Almost every nation is extremely limited. You basically get to choose between some combination of regular troops, summoned troops and battle magic. Then you have to advance toward one of the limited victory conditions.

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Most narrow nations
 

This may be compensation for being able to take unlikely bad scales...
Pale Ones are cold-blooded (meaning they suffer from a local Cold scale, think C'tis), so a Heat 1 or even 2 scale is a ... half-brainer. They don't eat either (but Trogs do), so there's /less of/ a penalty even for a Death scale (but I wouldn't take one). You get points there, so you expect some weaknesses.

Re: Most narrow nations
 

EE Agartha seems narrow, too. It's about clumsy giants, no ranged weapons, no cavalry. Specialised mages (lots of earth; site searching is annoyingly time consuming without rainbow pretender; oracles are far from being cost-effective site searchers)

Re: Most narrow nations
 

I don't know. You can go for underwater conquest or focues on land. You can pick if you want to focus on Fire, Water or Death along with Earth. Death is obviously a good choice. :p

Do you want to focus heavily on Evocation and the callsic Bladewind and Magma spells, or perhaps toss in some Alteration, or perhaps Enchament or Conjuration. Conjuration is Good for Agartha, or rather Agartha gets very nice spells as a byproduct of Conj 3 which is needed for Earthpower.

Do you want to use Claymen or Living States or will you shoot for those high level Alteration spells?

Do you want to kit thugs out of Troglo Lords and Ancient Lords (who seem to get curiously low attack and high def when you give them items o_o) or do you just want to kit mages?

What sort of bless you want for Agartha, which of the weaknesses of the Agarthans you want to try to nullify with blesses or do you just want reinvigoration for those mages? Or perhaps regeneration. Dragons or Earth Mother, Cyclops or Titan, Olm or Monolith? Or maybe a snazzy Risen Oracle.

And so on. I don't think it's that restricted. Less rectricted than MA Ulm certainly. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: Most narrow nations
 

I find Aboleths to be very narrow, atleast in terms of troops. They have heavy hitters in the form of Mind Lords, and lots and lots (and lots) of weak, free, polyp troops, but you can't do much in the way of forging for Mind Lords, or anybody except slave princes, because all they have are misc slots. Polypal Mothers can't move and have no magic, so they're only good for guarding the provinces you already have. And, while Aboleth-kind offers excellent units, the remaining units aren't much better than independents. I can really do without enslaved atlantians and tritons and mermen and what have you. They're redundant and, while perhaps necessary for the theme of an enslaving, alien race, detract from the uniqueness of what, in my opinion, should be one of the most (if not the most) unique and weird nations. There are probably quite a few ways to play Aboleths, but clearly the nation is geared to swarming your enemies. I wish Aboleths offered more varied troops, as well as access to the Void Gate that both other R'lyeth ages get. Atleast some bizarre and powerful national summons?