Shambler Thralls?
 

I was wondering what other people thought of these guys. I'm currently in a very long and drawn-out SP game as EA R'leyh and due to the Mind Lord's lack of magic item slots (2 misc, and 1 of these has to be an Amulet of the Fish to pursue my land opponents) and inherent command abilities (10 normal and 165 magical), I tend to fill them up with quite a few of these guys. I use less of them in Dom2 as R'Leyh and as MA R'Leyh thanks in part to the Void Gate summons, but I still used some of them to 'bulk up' my infantry blocks. They don't rout and are fairly large and trample, but they still seem to die a lot. The lack of protection is a large factor here I know, but what are other peoples' opinions on these guys?

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

Well, I wouldn't use them much against the CPU.

Against computer players you just want to avoid taking losses.

Otherwise, the shambler thrall is more fragile (per $) than Elephants, but does pretty much the same thing.

Against a human opponent it's a whole different situation - elephants are rather cowardly, and killing another player's army without losses is generally not an option (barring an extreme edge in luck, position, skill, etc.) So against another player, shambler thralls are excellent.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

I do tend to lose less than the AIs. This is important considering the enormous armies they love to build. But some nations I tend to get chewed up more than others. I can usually minimize my losses, but sometimes these battles are real meatgrinders. EA R'leyh, with it's lack of solid amphibious troops, has me rely a lot more on independent troops than I normally prefer. MA R'Leyh has the lovely Illithids to Mind Blast the heck out of my enemies, but for EA R'Leyh, Gibodais and Giboleths have to remain underwater which hamstrings land conquest in comparison to MA R'Leyh.

I try to pair Slave Princes with Mind Lords to allow me to use more normal troops, and especially archers, when on the attack above the waves. In my current SP game I also have some Firbolgs leading large forces running around.

I still consider myself a beginner, and not the best mirco-manager so here is a fairly typical example of what I mean:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...er8/Armies.jpg

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

I would definatley try and mix in some of those shamblers with the elephants to increase the morale of the elephants.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

I could be wrong but i think i remember hearing that mindless/berserk/undead units dont boost to morale of regular guys in their squad.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

Im pretty sure you are correct here shovah.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

But the idea is right - you want to take some high (but not 50)morale troops and put them in the same squad as the elephants.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

Yea. Dosnt rlyeh have some armoured, very slow(and unlikely to reach battle) elite troops that have high(but not mindless) morale? I seem to recall them having them but could be wrong.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

well they do have meteorite guards (morale 12), but since sloth 3 is almost always used for R'lyeh you might not be able to build many of those (30 resources)

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

O well. I guess regular 10/10 troops with average morale would work ok too.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

I'm at work so can't confirm for sure, but I don't remember having the meteorite guards available as EA R'Leyh, although I have used them as MA R'Leyh. The standard atlantian and merman slave troops for EA are morale 8 if I can remember correctly.

I did in fact merge the elephants with the shamblers later on and it's been one nasty trample machine. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

I've never tried taking sloth as R'Leyh as of yet, but as I said I'm still pretty green. I could see it for MA R'Leyh, since I prefer the unarmored, and therefore less resource intensive, ilithids for the strat move of 2 over the 1 of the armored ones, but for EA R'Leyh I have been heavily reliant on indy troops (and summons) for ground pounders.

One advantage of the Shambler Thralls is only needing 1 resource, which would lend itself to some sloth. I'll have to try that sometime.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

I'd suggest cranking out Shambler Princes, once you're in mid-game, and giving them morale-boosting equippage (like that summer sword or herald's lance) if you feel you must have elephants. You might also consider using Behemoths, since they're mindless, undead elephants. I believe meteor-guards are MA or LA R'lyeh, and that Salamander8 is playing EA though.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

you are right about the meteorite guards....missed the fact we were discussing EA r'lyeh here http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

I would really recommend sloth 3 for r'lyeh (all ages), basically most of the national troops you are going to build cost only 1 resource (they are a very gold hungry nation, therefore you want order 3 with them aswell).

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

Behemoth are not mindless, they're Mor 30.

Which makes *them* an excellent unit to mix in with Elephants, for morale boostage.

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

I actually made elephants only because I conquered a pre-fab fort province that had them available. I prefer to build archers for the 10 normal troops the mind lords can lead, but the route to the front passed through the elephant province, allowing them to scoop up the elephants on their way.

The Firbolg's standard ability has been nice for the elephants and all the slave troops as well (I made my pretender with many paths and have empowered her on top of that, and have the +1 to all magic paths ring on her as well). I like Behemoths but I have a summoning bottle-neck as only my pretender has inherent death magic, beyond summoned casters, and I've only recently been pushing them out the door.

Thanks for all the advice! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

oh, my mistake-even better!

Re: Shambler Thralls?
 

Arent they undead which works the same way as mindless with squad morale?