Guide to Marverni
 

I've heard several people describe Marverni as the weakest EA nation of all. As with many of the perceived weak races though, they've got some serious strengths which, with proper cleverness, can transform this unsupposing nation into a juggernaut which will leave your confused opponents sorry they underestimated you.

Marverni's got a broad variety of decent troops to pick from, but nothing first class. This is a bit worrisome in the dual-bless heavy EA, and is compounded by the general impression that Marverni is easy pickings. Going with an awake combat pretender is the classical move in this situation, and indeed this will work as well for Marverni as anyone else, but I feel that this overlooks the strengths of Marverni and merely sets you up to lose more slowly as your opponent will likely have an awake pretender *AND* superior troops. If you're willing to use a bit of finesse though Marverni's got the tools to fight back most rushes without a pretender, and this frees you up to design Marverni to be a truly dominating mid-game player with an easy transition to a late game beast. Marverni really needs good scales to shine: needs production to crank out swarms of cheap troops, solid research is its lifeblood, and they need every piece of gold they can beg, borrow, or steal for it's awesome but ruinously expensive druids…who incidentally are often old so don’t overlook growth. My preference is to lean towards excellent scales over a tough pretender.

So, lets take a look at the tools in your arsenal and what you're gonna do when the wolves gather at your gate.

Barechests – several flavors, all of them cheap, and all of them fairly good for the price…except the lack of armor. This lack of armor coupled with the cheap price tag means these guys fit nicely into the disposable troops bucket and work very well against some kinds of enemies because of the numbers you'll be able to field them in. Against anybody who hits hard – dual blessed Lanka, Mictlan, Niefel – it doesn't really matter what your protection is so a press of cheap flesh is best, and the barechests have a pretty decent offense. Against high defense/glamoured troops or jaguar warriors javelins are quite effective in large numbers and even slings can do impressively en masse in the lower protection EA. Remember, the name of the game is critical mass. 20 barechests = why bother. 200 javelins & sling bolts focused on 15 glamoured raiders = why did they tell me Marverni was a pushover? Make sure you leverage your PD to get a lot of bodies on the ground when fighting defensively, a PD of 20 will get you 60 bodies so a supplemental army of merely 40 will get you the previously mentioned 200 shots over two rounds. More is better!

But what about the tougher sacreds and SC pretenders? They're gonna stomp right through mere spear chuckers! Enter the Carnute axe wielder. These guys are pretty much made for chopping up big trees. Decent strength? Check. High damage axe? Check. These guys would be decent at this job if it stopped there, but they've got a very respectable berserk bonus stacked on top of that. This means that when berserk they ignore awe & fear auras (important against any SC pretenders), have a pretty good attack and deal enough damage to punch through any armor you'll see in the early part of the game. And remember the Marverni mantra –strength in numbers. You should outnumber any super-elites drastically and can afford to take losses bringing them down while still winning on a gold for gold basis. If you're fighting the type of enemies that your berserk bonus makes a big difference, research up to berserkers and leverage those cheap nature mages to make sure you take advantage of it without needing to be hit first. Also, don’t overlook tangling vines, you’ll have lots of N1 mages in the beginning, your axe wielders should make short work of most anything that holds still for a second and from elephants to dual blessed guys you’re not going to see huge numbers of them in an early rush so 3 tangle vine spammers can make quite a difference (bonus: you’ll likely have a growth scale so it’s more effective).

Against archers and more conventional armies Marverni's got some pretty respectable medium infantry in various flavors. Slingers are often overlooked, but Marverni slingers have shields which make them ideal counters to other archers given their price and the fact that the enemy archers will not have shields or heavy armor. Given the number of lightly armored guys you’ll likely have running around, having a cheap and easy archer counter is a very nice thing indeed. For important fights use clumps of slingers in the front row set to fire (at enemy archers) and flee to really break up enemy formations. The Carnute noble is a very respectable all around guy, and what you'll probably want to use for the bulk of general purpose indy expansion. Note: Carnute nobles are tougher, but they're also more expensive gold wise as well as resource wise than the Carnute bare chests. Be aware that against super-elites it's often better to have extra bodies on the ground than extra protection and make your choice appropriately. If you’re going into a fight expecting to take some losses, consider mixing a few horn blowers into your troops. They’re relatively expensive and die pretty quick, but their standard will significantly improve your troop’s staying power for important fights.

The cavalry I find a bit lackluster without a lance, but they’re not that expensive as cavalry goes and can be useful as flanking archer killers. Boar warriors are pretty decent, and might even be worth designing a bless strategy around if they weren't capital only. As it is, consider taking advantage of them if you end up with an incidental decent bless, just mix them in with your Carnute nobles. Even without a bless they might be worthwhile to use if you think those extra couple points of berserk will make a difference for whatever you’re fighting. Some people like the Boar Warriors, and you can make a pretty impressive initial expansion if you take a dual bless, but I dislike pursuing a strategy that other nations pull off better, and lets face it in the sacred units category EA is brutally competitive. Plus, the blessings which most help the Boar Warrior do absolutely noting for your magic diversity. Besides, even without Boar Warriors your initial expansion should be relatively quick as your Carnute nobles fare pretty well against most indies, and slingers fare surprisingly well against the almost non-existent protection of many indies in EA (while your nobles ignore the friendly fire).

Aim to get a second (and third) castle up fairly fast, Marverni has a whole lot of options for 800 gold forts – this is a national advantage you should be mindful of as this can be translated into a leading position in research. Forego druids at first as 2 druids = a fort costwise! With a positive magic scales though, your cheaper mages are decent researchers so use your good scales and quick expansion to set up a couple recruitment centers ASAP, with the added benefit that this will put you in a much stronger position if a rush does materialize. I’d recommend starting with the Gutuaters as they’ll give you several good low research things to throw at a rush: tangling vines (vs high defense guys like Vans), berserkers (vs awe, fear, high protection), curse (vs SC enemy pretenders, giants), sleep (vs elephants). Remember, if you’re being pressed by an aggressive rush don’t hesitate for a second to pass out gems to, for instance, cast sleep if you don’t happen to have the guy with the right randoms available (or enough of them). As you start building up in research though it’s good to switch to Stargazers and begin building up a base of communion slaves while stockpiling gold for more fortresses and eventually druids.

Now I want to digress for a second here to mention one aspect of pretender choice. You've got a couple reasonable choices, but I really feel adding air to this nation greatly enhances their effectiveness for a couple reasons. I'll discuss more in the following sections, but I wanted to point out how having a reasonably strong (level 4+) air mage could be immensely useful for the tactics outlined above. Wind guide – multiplies the effectiveness of all those javelins/slings by a considerable amount. If you throw in fire to round out your magic diversity adding flaming arrows to the mix will turn your PD into a very formidable force which your air/fire pretender can cloud trapeze in to buff in the path of any invader. Arrow Fend & Storm – neuters the obvious counter to swarms of lightly armored guys. Fog Warriors & Mass Flight are just made for swarms of cheap dudes with good weapons – oh lets go ahead and toss in strength of giants and weapons of sharpness for a force that'll kill almost anything while costing pennies. I like a Phoenix because of the ability to leverage your immortality with a scary dominion push (discussed below), but obviously there are a couple reasonable choices.

Ok, so you've employed the above tactics to fend off the hungry dual blessed wolves, but this doesn't sound like the type of strategy that leads to world domination. I promised a juggernaut! Enter the druid. This guy seems good at first, but it's not obvious *how* good until you really think about it. One of your early research targets should be ench-3 for Strength of Giants, this greatly enhances the damage output of not only your swords & axes, but also your javelins. With Strength of Giants those hundreds of javelins are dealing 17 damage apiece and start hitting the range of dealing enough damage to punch through shield blocks. As your guys generally have axes or broad swords and above average strength, stacking strength of giants puts them up into the fairly heavy damage dealer territory for melee if the javelins alone weren’t enough – berserk Carnute nobles are hitting for 25 damage which will fell some might big Niefel trees.

Your next research target is going to depend on what you think you'll be facing, and how urgently you think you'll need it. If you're not sorely pressed it's a good idea to pick up conj-3 for summon earth power, but if you are in a pinch you can skip it and make up the difference by passing out earth gems. It's also always nice to pick up the schools for site searching spells, but the next real crown jewels are in the evocation tree. Blade wind is hideously effective in the lightly armored EA, and just one step above that you gain access to Gifts from Heaven and with Earthpower (or gems) every one of your recruit everywhere druids can cast both. Ah, Gifts from Heaven, that spell that seems kind cool, but also seems kinda a crap shoot because of its precision coupled with long range. Ah, but what's this? Druids have a fairly decent chance of getting a nature random and can thus self buff eagle eyes. What's this again? You've got access to air magic through your pretender (and hopefully some indie mages he's been able to site search) and start cranking out eyes of aiming as fast as you can. With the consequent 22+ precession those cute flaming balls of unresistable death will be falling with deadly regularity just where you want them to and those clouds of blades will fall in devastatingly tight groupings from across the field. A single druid can lay down enough hurt to rout a medium sized army, and most PD…oh, and did I mention they all (some with the help of a booster) can teleport?

Try something like this: druid + black steel tower shield + robe of missile protection + boots of the messenger + eye of aiming (+ starshine skull cap if necessary for teleporting). Set in the back row and script summon earth power ( + eagle eyes if he has a nature pick), gifts from heaven/blade wind X4. Singlehandedly this guy can take out everything from some types of PD to tartarian raiders so long as he steers clear of flyers or cavalry (which he can mostly handle if he's defending supported by light PD). He's essentially immune to arrow fire, has the paths, strength, and reinvigoration to cast for many rounds (if you're raiding PD) or to take 3 shots and then cast returning if you're dropping in to ruin a SC or elite army's day. Use them in pairs (or more) for heavier opposition and there's not much immune to their raiding.

Once your enemy starts deploying flyers or other counters to the nightmare of druids dropping out of the sky all over the place its time to leverage a heavier tank. From most flyers to most spells a properly outfitted golem will be immune to the things your opponent will be bringing to counter the druid terror. Golems have their own counters, to be sure, but in general these are diametrically different than the counters for Gift of Heaven spamming druids and with the luxury of your teleporting you get to pick who fights in each fight. For example, a fire and lightning immune, mindless, lifeless golem can drop in and happily stomp over the flyers and mages set to counter your druids. The next turn your opponent teleports/moves a response to the golem in only to find your golem casts returning and the three gift of heaven spamming druids who teleported in get to act first as defenders from behind the swarm of PD you've purchased, skipping the summon earth power (using earth boots/gems) to drop precision boosted meteors/blade wind on them first turn (blade wind is important to consider as a standard counter to golems is to teleport in some guys to cast magic duel – this will really ruin their day). Ah, but the fun's not over yet, after squishing his response you now gateway in a whole slew of troops to the lab that the golem built and buffed with strength of giants and weapons of sharpness (conveniently unlocked when you researched golems) they make a very discouraging wall of linebackers who chop up whatever cleverness your opponent thought was going to counter both druids and golems (that 25 Carnute damage is now AP...youch!).

But wait, there's more! Each of those teleporting druids is also a level 2 priest…and can blood sacrifice….and Marverni's temples are only 200 gold. Just think about that for a second and you should see the awesome potential for dominion killing an opponent with a weak dominion if you can scrape together a tiny blood economy to fuel your blood sacrificing. Teleport in a half dozen druids to take out PD in the territories surrounding your opponent's capital, each one plops down a temple and recruits their own PD blockers, then proceeds to blood sacrifice. Equipped with a jade dagger each temple + druid sacrificing will function as 5 temples and each druid himself will provide a very capable deterrent to your opponent counter-raiding your temples, stuck behind some PD blockers as he is. So, for 1200 gold worth of temples plus whatever you spend on the PD you get the effect of 30 temples concentrated in a small area, each of them defended by a formidable force (who conveniently won't use your blood slaves fighting off attackers). Throw this out of the clear blue sky at somebody with a weak dominion and there will be no way that he'll be able to recover in time. Oh, did I mention this is a completely feasible to do to somebody clear across the map since you're teleporting everything in? Scan that score graph for the guy who thought design points in dominion were a waste.

Ok, ok, I know what you're thinking – enough about the druids. But…but...but wait, there's more! These guys may just be my all time favorite mage. You'll get plenty of S3 and S4 druids, as they're recruitable everywhere you've got the potential to mind hunt or enslave mind as readily as R'yleh as you can easily forge crystal coins as well as starshine caps. All those great earth and astral alterations, from Army of Lead to Will of the Fates are at your fingertips easier than perhaps any other nation because of the ease of forging boosters and the slew of S1 communion slave fodder available. As you'll be cranking out druids from several castles you won't have much trouble netting a N2 and W2 one, with easy to forge boosters these guys will be level 4, and with power of the spheres/crystal shield (easily forgable) that bumps them to level 5 – before you even consider a communion there aren't many spells that one of your druids can't cast from the paths of Earth, Astral, Water, and Nature. Assuming you've picked a pretender as I suggested with good Fire and Air paths this leaves just Death and Blood as the only thing you don't have *strong* (level 5+ in combat) access to without tapping your communions – all of it teleport/cloud trapeze capable. Death is perhaps the easiest path to bootstrap into, and blood should probably be ignored (aside from blood sacrificing).

On to late game.

Much of the mid game strategies above will work verbatim into late game as well. Precision boosted Gifts from Heaven are one of the best SC killers, and you'll upgrade from wooden warriors and strength of giants to army of lead and mass regeneration but you'll maintain those keys to late game success – mobility and flexibility. Use that air pretender to forge a couple staffs of storms and drop in groups of druids for hit and run fun against large enemy armies. Use cheap battlefield summons like swarm to tie up cavalry for the couple rounds you need, then either go with the good old gifts from heaven or: summon earth power, invulnerability, earthquake, earthquake, vortex of returning (imagine that with 3+ mages). Mix in Doom if you feel like being particularly mean. If you can manage to get the Forge of the Ancients up (easily castable by a national mages), I'm sure you can think of some nasty, nasty implications combined with the recruit anywhere nature of druids and each one's effectiveness when kitted. Those S4 druids are S6 with cap and coin, S7 with light of the northern star, S8 with a crystal shield. Hmmm, to me that sounds like a first round Master Enslave pulled off with a non-empowered national mage and fairly cheap items, with slots for a rune smasher and eye of the void (have a supporting mage holding a banner of the northern star cast vortex of returning for an army snatch that your opponent gets no chance at all to respond to if you're defending). Think having 4 or 5 of these pairs teleporting around might pose a problem for your opponents? There are almost no army effecting buffs you can't easily cast, and you've got ideal units to cast them on (cheap, good offense).

Is that juggernaut enough for you?

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Gulp... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Great guide by the way!
Thanks.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Yes! Again another great guide from Baalz! Makes me want to try it! Marverni is one of those factions which I have only barely played too.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Yep, teleporting in golems, returning them back, teleporiting in meteor-launching druids, just to bring a whole army of mass buffed carnutes was what i was thinking when i saw marverni first time. Ok, i did not. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Bravo! I just love good scales strategies!

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Great guide Baalz.

One small comment, early game, Tahum 1, farstrike. I've played a certain MP game with CBM (in which its set to prec. 100) and this was a major killer early game. In vanilla game, it may still be worthwhile esp. on N1 druids (buffed with eagle eyes). Also, its on the way for communion master/slave, mind burn, soul slay so its practically free.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Excellent guide as usual.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

IIRC, missiles never punch through shields.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

yrw. They can, given sufficient damage. The higher the "protection" value of a shield, the harder it is to punch through,

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Some people concluded otherwise in another thread.

I think shield protection is not used in range combat. If it fails to hit the unit then damage is not calculated. The shield just seems to negate missles by providing a large boost to the target's defense roll via shield parry.

It would be better if it used the shield protection when the 2x shield parry bonus actually causes the arrow to miss.

I'm not show how this affects missiles from spells like fire bolts. It seems strange that an armour negating bolt might be useless against a unit with a shield.

This is the boulder's vs shields issue that people some time talk about.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Shield protection is not used in ranged combat. You either parry or you don't. Even AN missile weapons (provided they /are/ counted as missile weapons) can be parried.

Shield protection is used in melee though.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Baalz, great write up.

On most I have to agree and are part of the setup in my current game, in a slightly different way, though. Although I mess it up quite a lot of times, like not having a skullcap in a lab when I need one right now ...

You seem to completely ignore the ambitate nobles, though. I think they are the best general purpose unit Marverni has. They have better att/def then the carnutes and do only marginally less damage. Their morale is decent, also, and they are cheaper, goldwise.

One thing I haven't concluded yet is whether to rely on gutuator's 1/4 for communion or go for stargazers.
You pay more upkeep for 1 less in research and they are mapmove 1.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

To my experience, the PD runs quite early, especially if in enemy dominion. Wouldn't that mean an autorout problem when you have just a druid/golem there?

I at least suffered that several times when the battle was virtually won.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Well, golems don't rout, ever. They're rather unique in that.

For the PD issue with druids, it depends on what you're facing. The druids spew a ridiculous amount of damage real fast, so the biggest threat to making the PD rout before the druids can lay the smack down is archers - anything else needs to spend a couple rounds closing and a couple rounds killing which is all the time the druids need. If your opponent is fielding significant archers just skip the PD completely as the druids are basically immune to it. A combination of archers and cavalry/flyers is the hardest thing for the druids to handle (pay no attention anyone in my current game), but small numbers can be handled by throwing in a summon earth elemental or swarm before starting in with the evocations. If you're talking about large amounts of cavalry *and* archers...well that sounds like where the golems need to go. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Well, you could (and have) make an argument for the Ambitate nobles, but I tend to prefer the extra toughness and damage of the Carnutes. I suppose it depends on what specifically you're fighting, but for me the bereserk bonus is what really puts the Carnutes into the top spot for me. When berserk they have a better attack than the Ambitates, much more damage, never rout, ignore fear/awe and have much more protection.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Great guide Baalz! Now I just HAVE to try out those strategies!

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

How do you get blood slaves for Marveni (not counting Pretenders with blood path)?

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

A commander doesn't have to have a blood path to hunt for slaves; having a blood path just makes him much more efficient at it.

I'm not sure your nation even has to have the ability to do sacrifices. I can imagine a "slave trader" nation hunting to supply its allies in a multiplayer game.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Also, one of the national multi-heroes is a blood druid. If you end up taking luck you're likely to land one or two.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Capng,

Thanks. Didn't know one can hunt for slaves without blood path. Useful to know.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Baalz,

Thanks. BTW, congrats for an excellent guide. I have learnt much from it.

You may wish to update it incorporate the cheap conj5 national summon - size5 sacred trampler, which would be a nice supplement to the Druids. I was toying with the idea of an W9 bless before I saw your guide, but unfortunately A4W9 is probably too expensive for keeping good scales. Not sure if W9 is a viable alternative to a F4A4 Phoenix.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

It's also worth noting that the iron pigs spell grants Iron Boars for marverni which are sacred super high prot high morale tramplers.

In CBM it's pretty crazy, but in basegame it probably still isn't worth it iirc.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

I love all the easter eggs in this game.

At any rate, the great boar I don't find cost effective at all. Just get some indie elephants and save your gems for equipping druids - you'll always have very good uses for gems.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Baalz,

With due respect, I do beg to differ with you on this (the cost effectiveness of the Great Boar of Canute). It costs only 7N, no upkeep, is a sacred leader, has forest survival and much higher morale and magic resistance than elephants, and auto-summons one great boar per turn! Are you sure you are not mixing it up with the size3 trampling great boar (conj3, 20 for 20N) - which I agree is not cost effective except that you get one per turn for free with the Great Boar of Canute?

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

When I tested it out it seems like it autosummoned much less than one per round of the smaller boars, small enough numbers that it was not worthwhile as anything other than a small bonus. It's size 5 so less effective than elephants at trampling, is a leader but with only two misc slots there's not much worthwhile to put on them, they've got low protection so you need many of them to have a chance of survival, and being sacred doesn't help much as you're unlikely to have a good bless. 7N doesn't sound too bad, but when you're talking about summoning 10 of them in order to be effective those gems start adding up fast (smaller numbers than that are going to struggle against even strong PD). I'd rather have 4-5 equipped druids almost any time.

That's just my opinion though, you're perfectly free to hold your own and prove me wrong.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

If you happen to have an E9 bless (maybe because of your druids?) you could put Bracers of Protection on the Great Boar for a net +5 or +6 to Prot.

-Max

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

MaxWilson,

E9 bless would not help the boars as they have no armour but W9 bless would as the boars would then travel twice as far and so trample twice as many enemies (The extra defense is secondary). The smaller boars would trample size2 enemies and occupies the attention of others and so improve the survival rate of the Canute boars. Most opposition would break and flee before they can take down the Canute boars.

Furthermore, the Canute boars should be used in addition to the Druids, not to replace them. In the middle game summoning 10 Canute boars is certainly far easier than getting an EXTRA 4-5 equipped druids, so it is hardly a fair comparison (I would prefer to have 4-5 extra equipped Druids too http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif) The boars are more effective in combined arms than on their own and when used as such can be quite effective. They are also very effective defending castles.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

I think he was actually saying that for 5E gems you can put on Bracers, which are a piece of armor, and gain the bless bonus. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif The thing being that while Water bless is probably outright more effective - if you are running a boar focused strat - it does nothing for the casters, while the Earth bless gives reinvig, and the armor.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

JimMorrison,

Thanks for the clarification. I actually forgot that bracers count as armour and stand corrected on my previous comments on the E9 bless.

However, I am not sure if an E9 bless provide that much help to the druids. So if one were to invest the points for a lvl9 bless, W9 might be better to give Marverni an extra threat in addition to their druids. The trade-off is not so much W9 boars vs druids, but W9 boars vs a wind guide/fire arrow casting Pretender plus some eye of aiming (mass produced if one gets lucky with indies). Unless one gets lucky with finding indie air mages, it is not clear to me that W9 is inferior - and if one gets so lucky, air mages can be found with W9 through mercs and then air sites too!

At any rate, I think the Canute boars are cost effective even without a W9 bless. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

MaxWilson,

On second thought, E9 might be more viable than I initially thought as it also gives Boar Warriors 20 prot when beserk, which is invaluable in the early game.

I wonder if any other player has thoughts on interesting variations on Baalz's excellent guide to play Marverni.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

I'd still like to know Baalz exact proposition for the pretender and scales so I can use that as a starting point for my pretender.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

For what it's worth, I can tell you my build for the newb game I won as Marverni, so far my favorite nation. Much of it is along the lines of what Baalz says, although the game started before his thread.

Marverni needs gold and more gold.
Marverni needs gems.
Marverni lacks thugs (except golems).
Marverni has good synergy with blood.

That led me to the following build:

Fountain of Blood
B4D3F2
O3L3H1M1G1
Dom 8
I think I set it to sleeping

The luck+order give lots of gold and gems. Also keep the bloodhenge druid save! They forge the jade knives and blood stones you will want to build en masse!
Gutuators with wn and two boosters will forge clams.

The magic is good to get started into death and blood, forge the fire booster, forge the devil summon (soul contract?) item, etc.

Cheap temples + sacrifice = dominion kill

The growth is to mitigate a little the effect of blood hunting the capital.

Now you just need to expand fast (don't overlook standards! regroup and prepare carefully for each battle!) , build three fortresses the first year and research as hell.

Make friends early when you are most vulnerable. Time is playing into your hands. Make sure to diversify!

I hope that helps.


ad Boars: I like the great boar, but it is too late in research and summons only 10% / candle iron boars. That is not too impressive. But the greatest weakness is two misc slots only. I wish it had a head slot at least, but that idea got stamped in another thread ...

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

It doesn't summon iron boars, it summons regular sacred boars of marverni.

Iron pigs summons sacred iron boars and in cbm is a superb spell for marverni.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

I think this was supposed to read Order 3, Luck 3, Heat 1, Magic 1, Growth 1
What Bloodhenge Druids? You mean the indies? You mean to charm them, or what? Just because I know of no other way for Marverni to get them normally.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Maybe the bloodhenge druids showed up because of the worthy heroes mod.

Anyways, you should empower a druid with nature to blood 1 if you don't get a druid hero with blood. Jade knives and blood stones are really too nice to miss.


>> I think this was supposed to read Order 3, luck 3, Heat 1, Magic 1, Growth 1

correct.

sorry about iron boars, I meant the regular boars, of course.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

No, they're not worthy heroes, they're Marverni non-unique national heroes which I guess Lch is unfamiliar with. They're B/N (don't remember the strength, but it's more than 1), and singlehandedly worth considering luck scales for as just one or two of these will open up a whole new vector for you. From blood sacrificing to boots of youth for your expensive mages, a little blood goes a long way.


As I've said elsewhere, specific pretender selection is a matter of personal taste, and there's enough leeway in what I lay out to give you room for variety. I've no doubt a blood fountain could be competitive, but personally I prefer to have my pretender doing things other than bloodhunting. Plus, Marverni is vulnerable to an early rush and needs a pretender to either be a SC or a force multiplier via flaming arrows, etc. People tend to discount the combat effectiveness of non-SC pretenders early on, but having access to a few crucial spells can certainly be much more effective than a poorly equipped SC in many situations.

Order - absolutely necessary
Luck - a good idea
Production - could be worse uses for design points, but not strictly necessary
Growth - a good idea - expensive, old mages.
Magic - a good idea
Temp - neutral, you need the gold and supplies

Basically you want everything, so you're gonna have to balance what you want to give up. There are several different competitive choices you could make, but as I mentioned originally I think it's a good idea to have your pretender get you into A/F.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

I chose the fountain for two rreasons:
first, I didn't know of the blood druids.
second, the fountain is cheap and let me chose the other things that are more important, like good scales and access to other paths.
fourth, I disagree that Marverni cannot do without the pretender helping against the rush. With level 3-4 research + 3 fortresses in year one, which they should pursue anyways, they can make a miserable day for the rusher (probably for themselves as well, though). It really depends whether fatigue, poison, mind burns or blade wind are needed.

But it could well be that I underestimate the early game vulnerability.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Well, the problem (in my mind) is that in EA there are several things you need to worry about towards the end of year one. Double/triple blessed - jaguar warriors, palashankas, niefels, helherdlings, vans, etc, and you better believe that any of these guys sitting on a strong bless and seeing Marverni on their border is coming for blood. In this time frame (end of year one) you're gonna have a very hard time putting up 3 fortress, labs, temples, and affording the very expensive druids while also funding troops for indie expansion, which is when it really helps to have a powerful "free" mage to complement the paths of the few mages you do afford.

To be sure, you won't be rushed most of the time and in a worst case scenario you're pretty much screwed anyway, but I don't think its generally a good idea to not expect trouble until you've comfortably lined up enough guys to spam blade wind.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Remember, there's a bug where units which are adding adding protection via items - bracers, and hmm I forget - there are two other items... but anyway - they get double the benefit they are otherwise entitled to from an E9 bless.

Some might consider it an exploit, so be advised.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

It's because of the way it's coded - to insure that the blessed get boosted on both Body and Head protection (or only one or the other, if applicable).

This leads me to believe that anything that has a Prot or Def rating (that's not a weapon or shield) would get it - Krupp's Bracer, Cat Charm, and even Stone Bird, Flying Trident, and Gift of Kurgi.

I haven't tested all of those, but since the Cat Charm is purported to give the bonus, and only lists Defense.....

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

It's not a bug, it is WAD. You just don't expect misc items to add an armor like shields, helmets and body slot armors do. These are, exactly, Bracers of Protection (221), Cat Charm (224), Krupp's Bracers (278) and The Gift of Kurgi (296). The Dancing Trident (230), Astral Serpent (250) and Stone Bird (262) all give an additional weapon and thus are unaffected by an earth bless, but they might be affected by other blesses like Fire, Water, Death.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

There are bug reports about stone birds and fire blesses... so yes, I'd say fire blesses affect ...

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Just a detail, but I think the Great Boar can make a great thug.
Equip him a Ring of Regeneration and bring along a Stargazer to cast Body Ethereal and Luck, and you will have a regenerating size 5 trampler that will only hit by 1/8 of hits from mundane weapons. That's not even counting a bless. If you add in a Nature bless you get about 20% regen + berserk (for example).

I think that counts as a pretty decent thug.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

I almost don't know that I like trampling thugs. They can do a lot of damage quickly but it's much easier to bring them down because they're good at getting surrounded. Granted, being lucky and ethereal helps quite a bit with that.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Fatigue is also a big problem with trampling thugs or SCs.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

You can always give him a Amulet of Resilience or Girdle of Might (both of which are easy for Marverni to make) if fatigue becomes a problem. Thankfully the Great Boar's encumbrance is low (2).

I find that a strong regen balances out the few hits you do get (through the ethereal & luck). The nature bless is nice for this, and for the berserk. Of course if you are fighting troops with magic weapons they become drastically less effective.

The positive side to trampling thugs is that they can kill or damage quite a few opponents in a single turn.

The only annoying thing about using Great Boars this way is that you need a support mage to cast Body Ethereal (and possibly Blessing).

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

Wouldn't he just be soul slay, paralyse etc bait?

What's the mr on the boar?

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

MR is 14 IIRC. However, this can be boosted (maybe instead of reinvig, which I haven't had too much trouble with) with an Amulet of Antimagic.

Of course if someone is serious about killing these things they will be able to do it.

Re: Guide to Marverni
 

The boar could be really great under at least several of the following conditions:

a) it had at least a head slot. Now you cannot give it MR, prot, regen at the same time.
b) you have a nature bless
c) you could summon it before evocations are easily available (i.e. conj. 3)
d) summons more boars to really get a critical mass

At the moment you don't have it available at the stage of the game where you would want it and it dies way too easy without proper support.

I started a SP game with a E9N9 bless some time ago, I think with bracers of protection and lycanthrope's amulet it could be nice. But unfortunately it cannot bless/buff itself.

I really like it though, I guess I have to mod some of the above. Especially the slot and the research level.