Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Tip #1: The Dai-Oni enters every battle with three wolves. They don't do much, but they do draw arrows and are nice to have in arena deathmatches. It seems like the Oni General gets the same benefit.

Tip #2: Blessing may be precision 100, but can miss even if you're soloing a province (thanks to the wolves, I suppose). Consider scripting redundant blesses if you happen to have a nice one. A low level regeneration bless can reduce the number of afflictions you get in addition to the hitpoint bonuses.

Tip #3: Oni generals and Dai-Onis show 20 protection, but wear no helmet. A right click reveals a basic protection of 7 and 10, respectively. Not horrible, but if you want to make the best of an Oni thug, don't forget the headgear. Or, if you have a random earth magic on your general, cast iron skin.

Tip #4: If your Oni does get a head wound, don't despair. Muted, they're still a decent thug. Battle Fright may bring their morale back down to 13, but a basic bless (no magic paths) will boost it back to 15.

Now to the real truth of the matter... Got any advice for me? I'm just starting out with them.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Alteration is your best friend ever, as far as paths. For Dai Oni especially.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Consider an A9 bless. It will couteract Iron skin buff. And if you get into war with a major air user (caelum) it will help. Your pretender will be able to actually do something with those air gems you get. And the air shield is nice vs bows of botulf and allows you to use 2handed weapons without fear of flaming arrows.
The nature 4 bless is also very nice.

order3/sloth 3 seems to be a no-brainer with the low production cost of the Oni's.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Tip #5: Dai Oni can reanimate dead. Specifically, Ghouls and Soulless. If you've got a crippled Dai Oni, he can spend time bringing you some spare troops to flush out the ranks of your undead leadership - especially since it's difficult to afford many of the oni.

Your Demon Priests cannot reanimate, but your Oni Generals and Hannya can if you make them your prophets. If you make them (or Dai Onis) prophets (H3), you can reanimate more of the above and longdead warriors.

Soulless require corpses, Ghouls consume population, and longdead neither.

Tip #6: Twice born will not work on Hannya or Oni, since they're demonic. As of 3.08, it is not worth casting Twice Born on a diseased Sorcerer as they will be reborn with one hitpoint. But, if you want to save a particular demon general or sorcerer... just be aware that twice born keeps magic and experience, but loses all abilities other than heroic ones, in favor of the wight mage's chassis. Generally not worth casting with yomi, though there are specific applications for undead mages, you'll just be vulnerable to banishment.

Tip #7:
Ritual of Rebirth does not work on lifeless or undead, but does work on demons (just tested). Use this on a former prophet to get multiple level three/four priests for reanimation purposes.
http://www.freewebs.com/dominions2/dom3spells.html
Edit: Also, a reborn oni loses the research penalty, and their sacred status, though they retain their priest magics.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

I really don't recommend the A9 bless in any case, but for Yomi it seems a particularly poor choice. I have yet to ever have a Dai Oni die or be crippled from an arrow, and if lighting is a big issue for your SCs, you are much better off trading for lightning res items or switching tactics than paying the ungodly amount of points for A9. Actually, about the only Yomi blesses I think I'd consider very seriously are earth and perhaps nature 4.

Tips that come to mind:

*Don't underestimate Hannyas, they are extremely potent and versatile mages for 200 gold. Early on on use skelly spam or eagle eyes + fireball, later add phionix power, falling fires and shadow blast to your options.

*Be sure to abuse your stealthy 8 gold shortbows to the max, including of course flaming arrows. Don't even think about the other bakemono in 99% of cases.

*Careful buying demon troops, in general error on the side of buying better mages, fewer demons.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Agree.

Note that Yomi's paths cover forging lots of the elemental resistance items for your Dai Onis: copper plate replaces your too-heavy samurai armor and gives you 100% SR. Hannya's can forge Brimstone Boots to boost your PR to 100% and give you 50% CR (plus fatigue recovery). Charcoal shield or fire helmet or burning pearl boost you to 100% FR.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

I like to use armies of the little cold/numbness guys. They're pretty cheap, and with their stats, cold damage, and second forms, they make an excellent core of foot-soldiers, much better than heavy infantry, for example. Once I've got a good core of them, Yomi has plenty to suppliment them-and you'll definitely want to-but I think a good core is essential for Yomi. With the numbness caused by their clubs, they not only break up formation, they'll also slow units long enough for your smallest demons to flank them, and your largest demons to either missle them to death, or tear them apart with SCs.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Hannyas are powerful mages but never forget they're cold blooded. Using Hannyas as battle mages in cold provinces can lead to painful results for them :hurt:

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Yeah, I'd go for high Heat with Yomi-if Niefelheim attacks, it nerfs them, and if you get attacked by Abyssia, you can spam those little cold guys I mentioned. Which gives me an idea...suppose (Muspelheim) Surt became a new hero for Abyssia, now that we've got 6 hero-slots? It kinda-sorta makes a little bit of sense...

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

The only tactic that I've found to be effective is using Flaming Arrows in every combat and keeping a few Fever Fetishes with your army.

Every other possible tactic tends to end in failure for this nation. They seem designed for SCing, but even when you finally get them casting Soul Vortex they tend to not last that long.

Their low armor on all their troops tends to mean that you either race to Wooden Warriors and just live with the fact that you can't fight without mages or you end up dead very fast. Unlike other nations with low armor, you don't have Bless troops that can be juiced up help you survive until WW/MP or one of the "Army of" spells..

On the plus side, Hannya are recruitable anywhere and with Phoenix Power they can spam Falling Fires.

I also tend to do a lot of item crafting with them for things like those Incinerate rods, the banners that cast Drain Life, and standards(since you don't have a good morale solution without H2s or beserkers). Low research on your Oni and being a death power means that you are required to make Skull Mentors.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Dai-Oni make outstanding battle mages, able to cast all the heavy hitting spells from Fire, Earth, and Death, once you deal with their horrible encumbrance. Get them out of their armor (the lighter the better, but anything, even Steel Plate, is better than their heavy samurai armor), give them some reinvigoration items, and maybe even think about a light Earth bless. Oh, and casting Summon Earth Power at the beginning of battle is a good idea too (all of them can do it).

It helps to think of them as four different units, depending on the random. If you get one with F3, well, Phoenix Power will get you to F4, good enough for Falling Fires spam, etc. Give him a Skull of Fire, and now he can cast every Fire magic spell in the book, including BE spells like Heat from Hell, Fire Storm, etc.. Give him a Flame Helmet too, and well, he'll hand it right back saying he doesn't even need it ;) Oh, and Warriors of Muspelheim will make all your 50% FR Oni 100% FR.

If you get the guy with the A1 random, think Aim plus anything. I like it with Bane Fire, a very nasty spell if it can be cast with any accuracy! Late in the game, with a Death booster, the niche yet powerful spells Wailing Winds and Wind of Death become available. Oh, I almost forgot, with Earth Power or a booster, they can also cast Rain of Stones, a cheap, brutal spell for Yomi to use with its robust demon units (keep the Bakemono and Sorcerers at home for this one).

The E3 guys? Boots get you to E4, Earth Power to E5. And now you can cast every Earth spell too! All those cool buffs - for starters though, think End of Weakness, and your Oni soldiers now have, well, average protection, but still with only an Encumbrance of 1. Blade Wind is nice, but Magma Eruption is better. Petrify, Weapons of Sharpness, and finally, the Army spells.

Oh, and finally, the guys with D4. That's right, Yomi has access to natural D4 mages, so D6 with Staff and Helmet (or if you're super lucky, you just might get a D5 10% random that will get you to D7 without Artifacts or empowerment - I got two of those in my last MP game, used 'em as cheap Tartarian factories!). Darkness is a given (even Bakemono have 50% Darkvision). Judicious use of Shadow Blast can be powerful. Drain Life and Disintegrate for enemy Thugs/SCs. Fear/Terror, Cloud of Death, Plague, etc. etc..

Oh, your E3 Dai-Oni can forge Dwarven Hammers immediately. You should eventually have a lot of them floating around. Site search like mad, get those gems flowing in, and forge away!

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

I have to say, this is the first post that's imparted any real confidence in Yomi to me. So thank you for doing that for one of my favorite nations :)

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Yomi is, as far as I can tell, a proof of concept that with awesome magery you don't need real troops.

And they do that in spades. Toss down Darkness and your bakemono actually have 50% darkvision so they tend to come out even with real troops who don't. Toss down Army of Lead and you have the Protection to compete. Toss down army destroying spells and spells with high collateral damage like Falling Foo because your units are cheap when other people's are not. Boost the Str on your fire breathing units with Strength of Giants and Bloodlust and increase Precision with Wind Guide and you've got super-powerful AP fire attacks.

Heck, send in a Dai Oni with Soul Vortex and Fire Shield and Invulnerability and it doesn't even matter if he hits things....things just die.

The key problem is getting that Research. Your best mages are crap researchers, so there is a big loss of turn advantage in the beginning of the game.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Yomi does have ok troops, though. If they had any sacred recruits at all, they'd *be* awesome, so I've never had as much of a problem with them as with EA R'lyeh, which is-apparently-supposed to be proof of the same concept, and lays it out even better than Yomi.

Aboleths have *no* decent troops, and their mages, while great, still have their limitations-and they lack *any* national summons, sacred or otherwise. So as a fan of both nations, I don't complain so much about Yomi as I do about Aboleths.

We really need to ask Kristoffer to play Aboleths in a MP game :) Yomi too...but it's not as urgent.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Remember, Yomi has the paths and gem income to forge all three research boosters (and at a discount with Hammers). That should help out greatly with long term research.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

One thing that I think would be very effective for Yomi is some destruction spam. It would level the playing field protwise and the Oni have higher hitpoints and a big whackin' club coupled with high strength.
Personally my favorite thing to do against the AI is to just spam Aka-Onis and watch them fill the sky with fire. Probably wouldn't work in MP though. :(

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

One nasty thing with Yomi is IMHO that the awake SC pretender you need for expanding early (unbuffed recruitables are pretty much pityful), must be used with incredible care as you can't recall him easily - none of your researchers (the critical mass for the Call God usually) are priests and that's a very bad sinergy.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

KO was Yomi in Kingmaker, IIRC. He got eaten by LA Pan pretty early on.

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Hmmm... Oni. One of my favorites, second after Marignon
First - Oni don`t need supplies, so you can set supplies to 50 (looks like cheat. but may be very useful against non-nature players)
Second - Brutal magic. Forging and magic rush with SC mages. Right, they`re ecu is poor, but some light armor and artefacts would help. I usually boost main (highest) magic skill with artefacts and at the end of game forge Rings of Sorcery
Third - Mighty magic of Oni is an easy way to my favorite style: creating large summoned armies. Oni with high D-skills can summon Tartarans and Legions of Wights. High E-skills leads to Iron Dragons, the deadliest unit in game. High F-skills give no powerful units, but Fires from Afar is rather deadly spell. Sure, for such overmagic game you need powerful astral mages (for total Acasic Record) and large/huge map with over 150 provs under control and 300+ all (I play 300+ vs Players and 450+ vs AI)
===
Gregstrom, to prevent Pangaean "Minotaur Rush" Oni can recruit as many troops as possible and pillage provinces to continue expensive upkeep. It`s possible, but too hard. They`re not rushers :( But in game with 300x300x50 they have a chance

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

Well actually only the demonic troops of Oni don't need supplies, the others do and they are seriously put in danger of starving by the demons' gluttony. Relying on demons' only doesn't look like a good strategy until you have some way to boost the not exceptional MR - having your army of Onis banished by a handful of cheap priests and some blockers looks like a painful experience.
Dai Oni SCs are of course a great opportunity but not until you have some buffs and gear...

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

"Other troops" are weak bandits, they`re quite useless. Banishment...yes, it`s bad - but not deadly, one priest can banish 3-4 demons before they kill him (If you use army of 70-100 demons in early game and 300-400 in mid-stage such casualties is not a problem)
Dai Oni also can use some buffs and gear - and with their magic skills it`s easier to do. Research is just problem of Oni - you must pick Magic for your dominion or search for Sages/Loremasters
=little grammar fix=

Re: Tips for Yomi, Oni Kings
 

You can gamble, and go without an awake SC pretender in exchange for excellent scales (you certainly don't need much of a bless, or much help with magic paths).

In this case, Kuro-Oni can make excellent early expansion troops, in conjunction with other forces. Very expensive, yes (hence the need for good scales), but they have MR 15, comparable to other elite recruitables, and thus wont be bothered much by indy priests. They've got ranged fire and poison attacks (both magic attacks, by the way), an Attack score of 14 (with their awesome weapon), Strength 16 and a weapon that does 8 damage (awesome again), and 24 HP - in their first life (their 2nd life is ethereal)! Meaning, they've got staying power, despite their meager 6 Protection and lack of shield, plus the offensive power to hack through the heaviest armor similar to giants.

Yes, they're very vulnerable to missile weapons, so use decoys. Anything will do, but indy infantry with shields are best (meaning, they'll last longest). Place them front and center, with 'hold' orders. Put the Oni on the flank - they'll throw fire and poison as the enemy advances, and then close. Back them up with a pack of cheap bakemono archers to suppress enemy archers. Works against most indy types, and you can mix it around for outliers like barbarians and cavalry.

One downside? You can't lead them with an indy commander, you'll need a Demon General, hurting your early research. But you can make up for it later with your ability to forge all research boosters, and hopefully with building other castles quickly.

Another downside, depending on your foe, is that you may have trouble with an early war (I said it was a gamble). But with luck and good diplomacy, you can still expand fairly rapidly in the early game, and have the good scales to power you into the mid and late game.