Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

This includes summoned units, of course!

Any ideas? I just started playing, and Eater of the Dead looks pretty powerful... what happens when it gets too powerful?! The game finished before I could see...

Anyway, any input on what the most powerful unit is would be welcome!

Thanks!

J

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Dollar for dollar

I would have to say I would have to say Wolf Tribe Warriors.

They have heart. They will have that elephant sliced up and cooking on the grill before the rest of the army even gets to move. They know how to party.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Apart from maybe some specially built pretenders, it's hard to beat the power per unit of a well equipped tartarian or seraph. It really comes down more to the equipment and magic than the base stats though.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

militia. You can recruit them anywhere, and they are really good at packing a lot of meat into a very small spot as a constant pool of reinvigoration for your soul vortexed liches.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Seraph. Only real drawbacks are less than 100 HP and vulnerability to magic duels. And expense, of course.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Bog beast. Whenever I tech for Wish I always start summoning and GoRing these badboys. Two misc slots baby.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

how does one get a Seraph?
a Bog Beast?

=?

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Unique conjuration spell for pythium/marignon.

Bog beast was a joke, get them in a mid level conj summon with nature/water.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

You can wish for units as well, though they require a gift of reason to be a commander.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

gift of reason?!

Man this game is complicated.
What's Gift of Reason? =(

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Most spells, esp. most summons, are described in your manual.

The 'Slave to Unreason' is quite an interesting character.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Good catch, I totally forgot about doom horrors since they are so impractical to employ in MP. My personal favorite is the maker of ruins.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I think the best unit in the game has to be a mage who casts buffs on an army and globals. Pick your choice of magic paths, though a high level death mage with Utterdark, Burden of Time and some fun combat spells looks tasty to me. They have more potential to win a game than even a great SC.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Devourer of Souls of course

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I found that this is like a paper/rock/scissors game. Whenever I think I've found the best unit, it usually gets chopped up at some point by a counter strategy that I was oblivious to.

So how can you truly judge a unit? Some are merely good by themselves, but really trick up well with buffing.

Personally I love the rare, but strong independent mages that cover magic paths that I don't have. That may because you cannot tuly buy or make them, you have to get lucky and stumble upon them.

But think the correct way to answer your question would categorize the units as:
1. Very strong
2. Good
3. poor
4. Too expensive for what you get
Even with this, units change relative strength from early to late game. A prime example of this are mages. Without much magic research, most of them do not contribute much early and what they can do requires mundane troops to keep them out of melee. However, by the late game 4 or 5 of the right mages and the right spells can devestate a 500+ army.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Heavily equipped seraphs and doom horrors(equipped or unequipped) are probably some of the best. Specially built pretenders could over-take seraphs and maybe some of the doom horrors.
Gift of reason is a spell that turns regular units into commanders(even wishing for a commander gives you it as a unit) and so is required if you wish for a seraph.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I like my GoR-ed Tarrasque, empowered to S4 so she can Gateway her buddies in Team Tarrasque all over the map. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

The original question is a bit off, though. As Edratman wrote, it's really hard to pin down the "best" unit in a game this complex. Best at what? Best thug? Best mage? Best support unit? And even if you manage to narrow down your terms, you'll find that someone has a counter-tactic that will leave your uber-unit crying for mercy.

So, yeah, there is no "best" unit in Dom3. Certainly, any of the unique summons are very powerful. For example, the King of Banefires makes a fantastic supercombatant. Air Queens can use the Cloud Trapeeze - Staff of Storms - Wrathful Skies trick to wreck entire armies. Arch Devils can lead a powerful raiding force behind enemy lines. Etcetera....

In a different line of reasoning, I also like units that are reasonably powerful, versatile, and easily available. According to that standard, I like the Barbarian Heavy Horseman from Late-Age TC. Those guys are great! You can buy them in any fort, they have a strategic move of 2 (yay, horses!), and they'll grind up nearly any mundane army into dust. Just set them to "Hold & Attack (whatever)": they'll send three volleys of composite-bow arrows at the closest enemy, which will then be followed by a devastating charge. They have good defense and adequate armor, so they're reasonably survivable. Yeah, I'm a cavalry fanatic. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

A big group of them set to hold and attack closest(with a small screen of tower shield infantry to catch stray arrows) with two flanking groups of W9N4 ancestor vessels has always served me well(with the ancestor vessels being costly and less easily availiable but having more punch) but could be similarly effective with just the barbarian cavalry. The barbarian horsemen(and ancestor vessels) are pretty much what make LA Tien Chi a viable nation as they are very versatile and powerful.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Best for what? I tend to think of best supporting units but
Standalone fighter I am guessing. IN that case Terrasque would seem to have been put in the game to be that altho eater of the dead is also a good choice

Inst there also an eater of heroes and eater of gods?

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

There's a Hunter of Heroes.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Theres a hunter of heroes, an eater of gods, a maker of ruin and a slave to unreason.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

the three nasties from The Kindly Ones.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

If you include blessable unit in your pool of units to choose from, then I'd say blessable non-capitol only units are the best.
Being non capitol only they can be recruited in large numbers, and being blessable they can be made much much powerful than regular units. Sure, one tarrasque will eat one blessable unit for breakfast. But armies of units can be easily raised, and they will mop the floor with the tarrasque (or any very very strong expensive unit)

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Not quite, SCs can be built that will mop the floor with most unsupported sacred troops.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I'll put Team Tarrasque against nearly any blessable units. Have you looked at a Tarrasque's stats lately? They're significantly obnoxious. Poison cloud, regen, recuperation, high protection + HP, and bile breath. Think Uber-Hydra. Anything that isn't poison-immune will be in for a rough time....

Of course, hordes of undead will probably wear them down, especially if those undead have chill auras. A swarm of ghosts would ruin the Team's day for sure. But that fact just reinforces the previous statement about how there is no "best" unit in Dom 3. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Yeah, Team Tarrasque may beat most sacreds. Though, what about the summoned sacred some nations get now?

It will lose to a dozen or so S1 mages casting Magic Duel.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

And again here we have the good old 'unit X will beat super unit Y and will lose to unit X counter unit Z' ect.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Hmmm ... I'm not familiar enough with the summoned sacreds. Did you have a specific example?

Team Tarrasque might suffer some pain from a bunch of E9N9 Niefel giants, especially if the giants had a caster along to make them poison-immune.

And I know about the Magic Duel vulnerability. Fortunately, I'm playing against the AI, who rarely uses Magic Duel. Otherwise, I suppose I'd just keep pumping Astral Pearls into Empowerment until my commanding Tarrasque is S6 or better. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

(I never said it was efficient, just fun.)

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

On the subject of barbarian horsemen and tarrasques, i've seen the AI kill five tarrasques in one battle with nothing but T'ien Ch'i cavalry of various sorts.

I submit that the best unit in the game is a sprite. Those elf shots are evil.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Best unit in the game? I'd say any cheap, piece of crap unit you can throw Army of Gold/Lead on. That horde of Vine-men ain't so funny now, is it? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Haunted forest + dragonflies.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Sages

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

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

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Could you please give me an example or two of this? With non pretender scenarios

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Flame storm hits 40 squares(which would hold 120 human units) with a strength 15+AP fire attack. Shimmering Fields hits 50 squares with 10+AN shock damage. Rain of Stones hits the entire battlefield with 14 mundane damage and earthquake does the same with 8AP damage. Wrathful Skies(in a storm) hits a certain %(might be 10%) of the squares on the battlefield every turn with a powerful shock attack. Fire storm and astral tempest are both powerful battlefield enchantments. Master Enslave, when cast by a powerful mage with penetration items, can enslave a large portion of the enemy army in a single casting and as an odd example bloodletting, a spell requiring only 4 blood magic and 4 slaves, does 1AN damage(MR negates) over the whole battlefield and adds damage done to the mages life force which means a few mages casting it at a very large army could keep going until it was decimated.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I am particularly fond of illusionists myself, also Caelums A2W1 flying mages.

The best units are not your end game mega stuff but ones that you use the majority of the game to get you there.

So the very best units are useful in the early, midgame and endgame.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

My favorite unit in the game is Cthulhu.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Argh! Stop with the misleading statements HB!

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Its not Cthulhu, its Hastur. The cthulhu rules say if you speak his name 3 times he comes and destroys the town.

-- The DM hands you a piece of paper which says that you see carved into the tabletop of the bar...
"For a good time call Hastur".
What do you do?

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Yes, I could tell you're new with the game when you mentioned Eater of the Dead being powerful. Based on the cost of gems and what it does in battle... it's one of the worst deals in the game. It's a strong unit yet way way over priced and never worth considering in a multiplayer game.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

> It's a strong unit yet way way over priced and never worth considering in a multiplayer game.

Of course he is! He grows like a sponge! Cover the world in sponges and you will rule th galaxy http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Edit: DOn't forget to feed him http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Even after being fully stuffed with corpses he has multiple weaknesses for costing 50 astral ! First only one can exist on the map so any opponent wanting to destroy all your hard work just has to summon one of them. Second this creature will go beserk and leave you... possibly return to attack you. For a few more astral gems I can summon a army of ether warriors and an ether lord commander which could slice and dice three eater of the deads in battle.
It's a strong unit, but if you check the multiplayer games... it's never casted.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

> First only one can exist on the map

Not after he has broken free.

Of course it is not casted! People like control over things http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Well it's more with the cost of the spell... 50 astral gems is a very high price for a single unit which comes from a high research level.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Its actually a combination of the high cost, rather low survivability (low defense+low protection) and the fact you lose control over it.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

>50 astral gems is a very high price for a single unit

Actually it's a low price for freeing the fettered one and unleash him upon the world. The fact that his physical powers are limited by time, space and the newly dead doesn't make the powers of his fetters less strong.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

A eater of the dead should spawn more eaters of the dead once it grows to a certain size. Attack of the blobs

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

Agartha can get a 300+ hitpoint commander, by prophetizing a Marble Oracle which you must admit, is somewhat insane, considering thats more than most pretenders.

I'm hoping to figure out a working astral pretender build, so I can try a Juggernaut with the Golem Cult bonus.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I had an eater of the dead show up on one of my chaoticised maps. I loved it. As Pangaea I would rush a couple of Pans over there to follow it around. Every time it cleared a province, my hidden pan would toss a couple of maenads and take ownership. Since the pans stayed hidden they were not in danger from the eater.

Re: Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?
 

I have a 500+ hp prophet at the momement, I prophetized a tartarian! 50hp/turn regeneration... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/stupid.gif

Him and my destroyer of worlds pretender, only 200+ hps make a cool duo... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif