How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

I'm confused.
With their stacking chill aura, they make any number of opposing troops useless in a matter of 1-2 rounds, so anything not immune to cold cannot even scratch them. In my test game 15 niefel giants killed 35 helhirdlings and 80 van infantry with no losses.
Somebody has managed to defeat Niefelheim? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif I'd like to hear your thoughts.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Area attack spells are, to my poor game insight, the only easy solution at the beginning of the game. You can also try to raise your attack level with a fire bless, even pushing to a nice flaming weapon, which will take them down amazingly fast due to their fire vulnerability. All in all : burn them with anything you've got !

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

There've been a couple of "how do I beat Niefelheim" threads. Here's one: http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/thr...=all&vc=1.

The short version is, if you're Helheim, you shouldn't be fighting Niefelheim head on. Raid the heck out of him -- your sacreds should be able to easily tear through anything that's NOT a Niefel Giant (including PD). Force him to defend his capital, lest you pillage the heck out of it and shut down Niefel recruitment. Then hit him elsewhere. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Same probably goes for Fomorians. They are a lot like Niefel in that respect, except Fomoria can be really goddamn scary. They have Divine Serpent as one of the pretender choices, and going for an imprisoned, with N3 and startdom 3 that allows for N10 blessing (20% regen, +2 berserk), Dominion 6 and seven positive scales to start with. Alternatively, you could tack on E4 blessing to get them reinvigoration. At a cost of 110 each, you can start going to town with them very early, even without tax 200 & patrol and they just will not die.

They lack the Niefel Giant's cold aura, but they have 50% cold immunity and can go underwater, so if you start on the coast, you can gain holdings that are safe from all but water nations for a good while.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Go for the nasty single target spells, Blindness, paralyze soulslay, rage etc.

Keep em busy with minor summons like ghost wolves.

Even better a small horde of undead with darkness works well.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Fighting niefelheim in the late stages of the game is no real issue. The problem is if they come gunning for you early, you simply cannot stop that.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

And now with Fomoria, even the water nations aren't safe from a regenerating giant rush.

Fomorian Giants have javelins, too... range 24 damage 27 javelins. Very nasty (although the long range and fomorians' 8 prec does lead to a lot of scatter, most humans won't survive even one hit).

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Do fomorian giants have chill 15 too?...
Regenerating giants arent a problem absolutely, stacking chill is. And then there are recruitable SCs, and goddamn scary ones too. With right mages to equip them.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

No, Fomorians don't have chill aura.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Then Fomorians arent half as bad. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Yes, I tried it once and my 2 paralyzed niefel jarls killed an army just thanks to chill (+ regeneration but it was hardly useful) (I had put them some more chill with the appropriate armor and spells). Just standing there paralysed, they killed a whole army which tried to come nearby.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

High chill effect is very nasty but so is high heat aura. It is interesting to watch Abysia and Niefelheim clash as they both give each other massive fatigue.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

How about killing the giants with fatigue damaging spells ? there is quite a few that cannot be resisted. And some summons damage fatigue (that elfshoot from the faeries, summonable via faerie court and another lower level spell).

Hold off the giants with chaff (preferably undead and even better ethereal undead) to get extra time and tire them up. Once over 100 fatigue they will die very quickly.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Skelly spam will defeat them unless the giants have a high earth bless. WRT. Evocations flame blot is probably the best choice and it is very low level.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Niefel Giants with a good bless are tough, but Niefelheim has an enormous weakness. It's PD isn't worth a pebble at a quarry. Attack on mulitple fronts and make his economy cry. And the stronger his bless, the more likely they sacrificed positive scales to achieve it.

As how to beat the giants with troops, I find Barbarians are a good unit to amass and charge with. They do high damage, which is key, and are ulimately disposable. Obviously, try to fight him in warmer provinces, as the chill bonuses to the N. G. can be quite effective.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

I have been playing the Fomorian giants.

Edi is right the nation reminds me alot of Nielfelheim.

I managed to get a N9E9 bless on them with a imprisioned Great Mother, scales all 0, except drain 2. They are just as mighty as the Nielfelheim giants with that bless.

The advantages are you can recruit the unmarked early on and switch to the giants a little later when you have more money.

The Nielfelheim Jarls are directly comparable with the Fomorian Kings. Both cost 500 gps. The Fomorian Kings have at least A3 which means they are all cloud trapezing SC's. This is very cool for the late game.

My early impression is its about as powerful as Nielfelheim. You lose blood magic but gain powerful air magic. The Fomorian PD is better than Nielfelheims as well.

Anyway all the tactics vs Nielfelheim will probably work fine against the Fomorians. You don't after combat the chill factor now, but the Fomorians have not got the fire weakness.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Mind Elemental is right about dealing with them in the early game. It is near impossible to beat them, so you force them to chase you as you raid their provinces. I'm not saying there is not a nation or two that has the right assets to do significant damage, but most don't, and some may require just a few more turns to be effective.

It is difficult to realize and accept that you don't have to win every battle or combat mano a mano. Sometimes alternative plans will acomplish what you need to do, and deflecting Niefel giants is a better plan than taking them on in the early game. This buys time for research, gem accumulation and summoning that are not available at the moment.

Of course, this doesn't always work either. If this is the case, then the polite terminology is "You might get pregnant".

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Raiding him might work, yes. Or not if he just besieges your capitol fast and sends small parties to reclaim territories. But thats not the point...
Is it even right that recruitable troops are unbeatable by other nation's troops in any numbers? 'Any numbers' is the keyword here. If they arent killed in the first two rounds of combat, they arent killed at all. Its unsettling.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

There are a number of tactics... but like Helheim or MA Vanheim a all out bless rush is really hard to stop.

With Niefel you need to raid him wherever you can and avoid thier main forces unless you have the right troops/magic.
If you have astral casters go strait for the Soulslay, Enslave spells.
If you have fire go strait for Evoc fire AE spells.
If you have neighbors convince them they need to attack Niefel as well.

Really, the moment you find yourself next to niefel (or helheim or Vanheim) you need to immediately switch what you are researching to something that will work against them. Good combat magic is their weakness.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Might matter what bless one might have for those Helhirdings and Valkyries. If it's not a great melee bless, and it probably isn't if swarming Niefel Jarls isn't working, Dis + Valks make for ridiculously mobile raiding parties.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

IIRC, Ulm dual weilding troops easily win against Niefel Giants with equal Gold cost. Although they will cost more resources.

Basicailly you need cold resistant high damage troops. Sadly those are not in abundance.

Finally, WRT Fomorian giants, Giants without cold auras are not nearly as frightening. You can probably kill them with simple barbarians (which can also work, simetimes, with Niefels). The cloud trapeze is a very nice though. Air > Water.

One more time though: skelly spam > Giants.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

however, formorians can swim and throw javelins, making them rather dangerous. Especially when you cast spells like mistform or soulvortex or both.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

>> One more time though: skelly spam > Giants.

Tried that. Skelly spam costs too much fatique for a regular D3 or D4 mage; even with reinvigoration of about 6-7, 5 mages spamming skellies couldnt hold 5 niefel giants.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

What?!!? What temperature was the province?

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Well, N9E9 niefelheim is pretty hard. Nonetheless, unless your mages were in full plate armor, they should have taken zero aggregate fatigue damage with a reinvig of 7 and death 4. Zero.

BTW, neifel giants can be slaughtered by sauromatia using poison archers, hydras (though not cost-effectively at all).

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Or just Charm them. I've totally lost track of which nation this was originally posted for, but Pangaea can just send a bunch of Pans, and charm the whole freaking army, Jarls too.

I lost so many Jarls to Carlosib in Ludus by this method, that he ended up having more Niefel Jarls than I did. And I paid for and equipped them all.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Instead of spamming skeletons, could you spam ethereal troops?

Giants are few in number and thus have few attacks - I think it's 75% chance of avoiding a hit for ethereal troops. A giant will kill a basic unit almost as easily as a 1HP phantasm, but they'd have a boatload of misses. Could this be better to hold them than skeletons?

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Reinvig of 7 and death four? 0 aggregate fatigue?
Raise Skeletons has fatigue 40.
Animate Skeleton has fatigue 30. I can see how negation takes place with this spell...

but raise skeletons has fatigue of 40, path 2. At D4, the cost would be 40 / (excess levels+1) or 13.

If they didn't have that high MR, you could drain life to recover fatigue- but as they do... No.

If you have the time and the mages, Darkness can help. Even if your army consists of regular troops, it affects elites more, working to your advantage. Plus it will significantly help with the survival of your skelies/ghosts.

For the record, you can spam ethereal troops. Niefel Giants do not have a magical weapon and the area-affect weapons they do get at con 4 are cold and death damage. So dispossessed spirits may get hit by a magical weapon, but only one at a time.

Now how effective any of this is? I'll probably be finding out, starting next to Niefelheim in Doom Chicken. None of the above is a tested strategy yet.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

It would be great if you reported any successful strategies from this game.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Drain life is not resistable. But not fast nor easy enough to mass.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

The problem with Doom Chicken is that I can't afford my Dai Oni... I'm a dirt poor Yomi...

Oh, Drain Life isn't resistable? Than script it amongst all the Raise Skeletons. It's not about the damage as much as the fatigue relief. Though I'll have to check out the damage and see whether its at all economical.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

If you do it via standard of the damned, combined with boots of quickness, you get 2 drain lifes per combat round for only 10 fatigue.

Thats a real killer for both giants and SC's or in indeed anything else that is big, has lots of hps.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Wait... raise dead is fatigue 40? I thought it was 20!
Much is explained....

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

I'm not sure that is correct. The costs were raised in CB, check if you are playing with a mod.

Raise Dead costs less fatigue that Raise Sekeletons, at any rate. 40 sounds about right for Raise Skeletons, not Raise Dead.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

I play usually C'tis of various ages and I admit these giants can be slightly stressful to face on early game.

My advice is very limited, it ties to the side that they do rely on cold. If not directly they cannot make sizeable lasting armies if you can spread hot dominion outwards. The supply of giants will be so penalized they succumb to diseases and starving.

Thus, my strategy is often based on just decent point defence supported with additional forces and simply wear them down, by spreading hot dominion against them. Considering they do not have great defense values or immensly good shields, missile troops probably would be good to use against them aswell. With C'tis that is not something to even bother.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

From the game itself.
Fatigues
Animate Skeleton (1): -30
Animate Dead (1): -20
Raise Skeletons (5): -40
Raise Dead (10): -40

Javelins? Nah. With a protection of 14 and no access to Armor of Achilles... If they've got an earth bless you're out of luck. For missiles, defense doesn't matter. Just the shield's parry and fatigue.

If you've got a race that combines hot and death dominions, its rather easy to starve them out- just be aware of the catches. 4 food apiece. One shaman forged bag of endless wine can support 12. But you'll be able to identify that problem after they steamroll any outer 1 point PD.

If you're going to war with them, it may pay to raise taxes in _your_ nearby provinces, so as to raise unrest and prevent them from gaining funds there or being effective patrollers.

As Ctis, I had some effectiveness against Abysia with Black Servant, Summon Shadesx2, Rod of the Leper King- though I didn't go far enough. I wasted gems on Wights and Bane Venom Charms, rather than going in wholly with one strategy. It may be worth trying against Neifelheim. Their province defense has poor attack and protection even for 20+ points (pg 114) and is pretty skimpy in quantity. Some support can ruin this tactic, but its a pretty expensive option for Jotunheim.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

I agree. Fomorian giants are not in the same galaxy in terms of battle effectiveness as their Niefelheim counterparts. The cold aura changes the equation dramatically.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

hellhirdlings and van infantry aren't the way to go.

send in some valkyries and a commander(there are a few elidgable choices) with a fire bless, split you're valkyries into several squads(maybe two or 3), script for each squad to attack at a different time so as to give the giants some time to clear some space adjacent to them so the next squad can hit them strraight away instead of waiting behind their buddies in the giants cold aura getting over fatigued.

the fire bless is what will give you're valkiries what they need to pack the punch to take the giants down and you should have you're commander casting buffs on the squads holding with him before they go out to kill giants, or just have you're commander casting evocation spells .

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

usually though you will want to just raid his undefended provinces with valkiries, they can fly and have glamour making them the perfect raiders, they are also pretty good fighters so can be used if you need to attack via the above strategy.


Edit: oops clicked quote instead of edit.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Concur that helhirdings isn't the way to go against Neifel, even if they're blessed, except maybe unless you have an F9 bless. The cold aura is the killer, so go for Iron Bane (Niefel Giants drop to Prot 5) + skelly spam augmented by serf warriors (set to Guard Commander). Use Destruction if you can't get Iron Bane. Other options, depending upon your gem income and/or research, are Drain Life via the Standard, Ghosts or other summoned creatures with a Fear aura, Rods of the Phoenix (I think--is that an F2 item? if so, Svartalfs can forge them w/ Skull of Fire), Longdead Horsemen + Clockwork horrors (plus Iron Bane of course), and thugged-out Hangadrottir w/ traded-for rings of Frost. I haven't tried all of these, because so far in my experience Iron Bane + cheap troops + skelly spam has been sufficient.

-Max

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

fear won't work most of the time, nature bless gives beserk.

iron bane sounds a good idea and it should counter an earth bless, life drain would have it's work cut out especially with a nature bless though, i think a barbarian spam + iron bane would be a good idea, also how about sleep cloud beat em at their own game of fatigue, just make sure you have some chaff to hold em back - markatas and hoburgs anyone?

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

If they're N9 berserkers they're taking extra fatigue and are no longer 0-enc w/ an E9 bless. (Plus, Niefel Jarls will have to wait till they're done buffing to bless, or else you can just hit them with a flyer to berserk them.) The high regen makes Drain Life less viable against them without large numbers of casters, but the increased fatigue (2 per turn) makes them more vulnerable to skelly spam/mechanical men.

So, as Helheim, I suspect you'd be raiding behind his lines (cranking up taxes) to weaken his economy, and if he heads for your capital you'd empty the library and smash his E9N9 Niefel Giants with your researchers. You don't have to win *every* pitched battle, you just need to be able to stop him from walking all over you. Sounds like a fun game.

-Max

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

sometimes desperation attacks work

http://i37.tinypic.com/fymmiw.jpg

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Niefel Jarls? You Petrify them. Simple as that. Takes a while to get to Petrify though, and not everyone can do it.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Which gives a fine reason for Niefelheim to recruit elephants :)

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Petrify isn't actually fool proof. Couple of Niefles with hp in the 240 range - even if you petrify em, they regen faster than you can damage em.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Umm, excuse me? If you petrify them, they turn into stone... ergo, they don't regen anymore... they are dead.

Had it done to me in an MP game. Very nasty.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

you guys should try a game with niefel fomoria abysia hinnom pangaea sauromatia agartha tir na og and caelum I have one goin on right now and it is a mess even in single player.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Sorry! Read petrify, thought paralyze.

Petrify could work on anyone - but niefles generally have a solid MR.

Re: How do you fight the Niefel giants?
 

Umm. I'm tired, and this post is tough. Just send about six Petrify mages with gems against Niefel. It's sad for Niefel.