Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

So I chose Lanka for an MP game because to my mind the only thing funnier than a nation of monkeys is a nation of demon monkeys... Now I have to think about strategy, and there's no guide on the forums (AFAIK) to kick me off.

I've looked at them a bit in SP and it strikes me that they have very nice sacreds, and lots available. So maybe some sort of Bless strategy is a good idea.

My rather fuzzy thoughts are:
Options for paths:
1: Get good blesses for the sacreds. Options I've considered here are E9 (might be a good one for survivability, especially for Kala-Mukha Warriors), F4W4 (the sacreds already have good Attack and Defence - adding even 2 should put them up with a lot of good summons), N6 or N8 (regen would stack with other blesses, but I'm not sure I want Berserk).

2: Go rainbow for the site searches in paths Lanka doesn't start with (Fire, Water, Earth, Astral). Going high enough in some of these could mesh with idea 1.

3: Go high in some of Lanka's national paths, to extract better value from summons they'd be using anyway. This doesn't give many good blesses though.

Secondly, Dominion. I have less ideas here.

A: It seems that a good Growth scale is beneficial for Blood nations, so G2 or G3 may be good.

B:I like Turmoil 3/Luck 3, and can see advantages in this for some Blood spells, but I suspect that Lanka will need all the income it can scrape together for their costly Sacreds. OTOH, Order 3/Misfortune 3 can be awkward with Lanka's poor PD not being much protection against the inevitable Barbarian invasions.

C: Productivity seems a better idea than Sloth, as Lanka's good units are demanding on Resources. Points have to come from somewhere though, and maybe Sloth is survivable...

Overall strategy I think has to involve lots of Blood, for the summons. I think, though, that one needs a good income at the same time for the Kala-Mukhas you can buy so many of.

Can anyone with experience of Lanka add anything to this, or resolve any of my dilemmas?

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I like to play Lanka with an e9s9 oracle. but no idea how the good players think about that http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

e9 is obviously good for lanka sacreds and the s9 increases mr which is good for demons.....

just my 2 cents

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Ok, here is the trick to playing Lanka(short version).

W9/N9 on your pretender. The quickness, regen and Berserk are are must haves to an unstopppable bless army. You seriously can take almost any indie province with 4 Palashankas if you do this. If you choose some other bless, they are basically just like normal(but good) units. Run a few test games if you like.

Get Growth, for the Blood hunting. Dump Productivity, as your resource heavy units are capital only and you capital takes in enough.

I like Magic 1 so that indie mages can research and even luck(0) because its not a hassle, but those are play-style choices.

Go Construction 4 ASAP for the Skull Mentors, then Blood 4 for the Rakshasa Warriors. Pick up the site searching spells as needed. Blood 8 has Mandahas and they are wicked awesome, and Blood 6 has a summonable national mage that is pretty awesome.

Your middle and late game will suck as your mages aren't powerful enough to power the good Death, Air, or Nature magics, so expect that you'll have to summon casters for that.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I'm rather worried about N9 blesses in the late game. Earthquakes or other mass-damage spells sending all your decent national mages berserking into the enemy just seems like an expensive way to lose a battle.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I tend to go with an s9w9 or s9e9 build with lanka. The added astral is good for demons and the speed and extra attack from water is good. Also you can get this build with better scales if you pick an imprissoned fountain.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Starting Lanka guide here:

http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/thr...art=1&vc=1

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I agree with K that the W9N9 bless rocks, especially since berserk stacks. Even the weak asura(?) 5 for 11 slaves, athame and berserk, kick with this bless.

The vast majority of your national summons are sacred, so a bless keeps on giving. Plus, both your cap only and your non-cap only tough sacreds are pretty tough.

The +1 research makes the little 3 research guys you get a lot of for 90g a bit more worth it, drain is obviously less so.

I personally like turmoil/luck (1 or 2 turmoil, 2 or 3 luck) for the extra cash and more importantly the extra gems.

Growth is great for longterm income and slave replacement although IMO its either growth 1 (minimal increase) or growth 3(max increase)...for some reason I never use growth 2.

I'm not sure if you can swing it (haven't tested), but if you can add a minor bless as well its nice.
F4 fixes the lack of fire magic, and allows empowerment in blood later for devils. +atk is always good
E4 is key imo - recup is always good, and means you may only have to empower one level on each blood stone maker. Father Illearth can help out a bunch here, 85 slaves for B4E4 methinks.
S4 - astral is always good, +MR vs banishment
D4 - even D3 is enough to easily bootstrap into a death mage path, revenent, mound(?), etc +affliction might be good with wrathful and such but minor

Even an A4 bless might help - 20% fend and you have someone to build your first air booster for all your 3A mages. The 20% fend might be nice for the demons with no shield.

just thoughts, i've got very little practical experience with Lanka in MP

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I tend to play Lanka with a E9N9 bless(Imprisoned cyclops, makes a nice SC when he breaks out) but I've also tried and enjoyed W9N9 and W9E9.
I stick with E9N9 because it helps all of your sacreds survive - you get extra protection from both earth and berserk, regeneration from the nature and reinvigoration from the earth.
The berserking mages can be annoying but you can always just keep them away from priests you have scripted to bless so that they don't go berserk at the start(when spells like earthquake/rain of stones ect are most likely to be cast).

The E9N9 is also great on the late game Mandahas and Davanas - units who rely more on their toughness than their defence.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Drain has the advantage of increasing your mr and protecting against battlefield spells- one of Lanka's main weaknesses. Your cheap mages will be blood hunters. Gold is vital for Lanka, I think, so definitely order.

Growth is vital. Especially since Lanka's blood and reanimation like population to be high.

E9 is nice for increasing protection and reinvigoration, and a nature bless is nice for regeneration. Water is obviously useful, though fire has its points as well.

Astral bless isn't very appealing, if only because twist fate seems useless for a nation whose sacred troops can take on thugs.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Yomi? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Yogini possibly?

Btw, why spend 90g on the 1B Raktapata as a researcher when you can get a Yogini for 110 with twice the RP?

Looks like my early idea of a F4W4N6 awake pretender isn't quite up there.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Yogini's aren't sacred, so upkeep piles up a bit quicker.

As you move from a primarily gold to a primarily blood economy, each gold piece counts a bit more.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Clearly.

:-p

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Thats true, but since you don't get recruitable H3 casters until Mandahas(Blood 8), you'll be using Bless more often than Divine Blessing so you'll be able to keep mages unblessed if you like.

Also, in the late game you need to have your good mages (which are high hp) heavily armored and immune to bunch of things anyway because spells like Frozen Heart and Drain Life will preferentially target high HP units anyway, so worrying about battlefield attacks is a little redundant.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Look at w9, f4, n4. with the high str almost anything your blessed troups hit die in one hit so with quickness your blessed troups will shred anything. The f4 helps make sure they hit and the n4 keeps them from getting afflictions and with their high hit points helps keep them alive.

I personally hate the n9 bless as mage after mage goes berzerk at the wrong times. There really should be a toggle to allow blessed units to go berzerk...

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Thinking about it, if the only advantage to Berzerk is the +2 attack, then W9N8F4 is a little more expensive for a better result (no penalty to Defence).

And if 10% regen is an acceptable alternative to 15%, then W9N6F4 gives you rather better scales (or a sleeping rather than imprisoned Pretender, which seems like a good thing for early research).

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Actually berserk is more than just an attack bonus. It also boosts their strength(good for taking down tough targets) and protection and makes them unroutable.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

The sacreds are pretty hard to rout anyway, with the +2 off Bless making 17 morale. And I'm not sure the +2 strength is much additional bonus with their existing Str of 18-odd and falchions. Most hits Lanka sacreds make are already blasting through all normal armour.

The protection boost is interesting though. What I'd like to know is whether it's worth the drop of 2 points defence (16 with W9 bless going down to 14, and Prot rising from 12 to 14). I'm relatively new to Dominions, but in most combat systems I'm familiar with it's better to avoid damage than absorb it.

As I read the numbers here, 12 and 14 prot are both the strong end of the mid-range, but going from 14 to 16 defence takes it from fairly good to exceptional (off the top end of the normal infantry scale).

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Well defence doesn't help against a ranged weapon, and your sacreds are nice enough in combat to not really need the extra defence.
I tend to take E9N9 rather than a bless involving water or fire so their survivability gets quite a big boost with +2 protection from berserk, +4 protection from earth bless, 4 reinvigoration and good regeneration. All of their sacreds are fairly strong offensively(recruitables and summons) and have very good survivability(Palankashas have 60 health per square) so I like to boost their survivability from good to great.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

The problem is that you aren't fielding a lot of sacreds, and when a unit gets under five things in it it checks to route every turn.

But, if even one person in a unit is Berserk, then the whole unit is unroutable. The N9 is essential to Lanka's strategy of fielding low numbers of very strong guys.

The Water 9 bless also makes your demons wicked fast, meaning fewer enemies escape battles and the demons spend less time taking ranged fire before they get into melee and that ranged fire starts to get your enemies as well.

It takes only a few minutes to test out a W9N9 bless vs other ones. Try it.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

After testing, I concluded that W9 N9 is NOT the best bless. W9 N9 E9 is.

Yes, K, you seem to be correct.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

What's the best double bless?

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I don't think that one berserker makes a whole unit unroutable. I'm pretty sure I've seen a squad route while berserkers in it keep attacking.

That said I don't know how it plays in to group morale. Or the other special morale cases, either.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I think that thejeff is right, though I'm not certain either.

I'd agree on W9N9 being awesome, but I havn't tested every option.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I'm with thejeff here, based on observations from a recent MP game.

Having done a bit of testing (albeit with sub-optimal strategies, and on a small scale), there's only a small difference between say F4W9N6 and W9N9. Both seem to fall over when hugely outnumbered by barbarians and sometimes cavalry.

Has anyone tried a strategy using Blood as a secondary economy and using hordes of Kala-Mukhas generated using multiple castles? It'd need a huge income though.

Also, I have worries about reliance on the demon troops against other players. Falling Fires could really ruin your day.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

The triple bless is suicide in MP.

That being said, the E9 is a perfect addition because your demons fatigue out pretty quickly with the Quickness bless, but as Lanka you get the potential for Relief and Wooden Warriors, which is almost as good.

I've been experimenting with adding a E4, but I'm not 100% sure if its worth the investment.

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If you see units with Berserks running, its because your commanders have been killed or left the field.

The actual Berserkers will fight even without commanders, which can sometimes win you a battle with no commanders at the end.

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High damage armies will kill your sacreds, so you need to use basic tactics like:

A. Barbarians require archers.

B. Calvary requires chaff to absorb the lance hits.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

I am aware that triple bless (or, more accurately, the scales needed to take triple bless) would kill you in MP, although the initial rush might be pretty fun to play

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

A triple bless would not be suicide, as long you manage your dominion spread and keep it from polluting too many provinces. Right? Re-assure me, I just started a triple bless Mictlan in a MP game.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

Zhao, you'll make yourself friends by two ways :
Annoying them with your horrid dominion
Smashing them with your WFE bless (did I guess rigth ?)
It's no more suicidal than annything else with Mictlan... Annyway, your playing a faction that requires a strong bless to survive.

Re: Lanka pretender design/strategy
 

The lack of normal dominion spread with Mictlan makes it safer than with most nations.
F9W9S9 seems to be the most common Mictlan triple bless.