Water magic
 

What are good ways to use it on land? Quickness spells seem good in principle but hard to make use of.

Re: Water magic
 

Well, the staples of midgame combat are Falling Frost and Frozen Heart which the first killing large numbers of foes and the latter killing SCs, thugs, and high hp units. Spells like Grip of Winter are perfect for attacking whole armies, and depending on your nation and foes Wolven Winter can be crippling.

Quickness is one of those things that is nice to get, but hard to use. It is far better to use the various direct attack Water spells.

Basically, Water is a midgame magic. Unlike Fire that peaks in early and mid or Astral that is mid to late, Water gets all its most generally useful and nice things right in the middle of the research paths.

Re: Water magic
 

Cold spells are very nice too, and there's lots of water summons that can be used on land.

Re: Water magic
 

While you're waiting for those goodies, you might want to try out:

Slime - slows armies down

Numbness - I'm pretty sure this is a (5AN+cold scale) no-MR stun attack, CR defends

Curse of the Desert - Nice area 2d8 stun attack, CR does not defend, MR defends. If initial MR check fails, continues to do 2d8 stun damage until more difficult MR check made.

Wolven Winter - You can also cast this on someone's capital to reduce their income immediately by 15% (best on heat-loving nations, not good on cold-loving ones) and permanently (via the 5% pop kill). The pop kill does not sound like much, but 6 casts and you've cut his best province income by a third.

In the mid-game, you can also make bottles of living water, it's really gem-efficient.

Re: Water magic
 

I agree with you, there are a number of good mid level damage spells. I'm wondering though, how effective are niefel flames? Is having a few niefel flame casters an effective late game strategy?

Re: Water magic
 

Neifle Flames is nice for that high quality AN damage, but it suffers from the problem that not only is chaff and Cold Resistance easy to come by in the late game, but Undead Cold resistant chaff is extremely easy to come by.

Re: Water magic
 

grip of winter + falling frost spam murders everything not cold resistant, no questions asked, just make sure you have something to protect you're mages (a wall of chaff to stop melee troops, some way to protect from mage counters such as rain of stones) as long as you're mages can hold out for like 10 turns everything not cold resistant the enemy has is more than likely to die, even if not killed in those 10 turns they would be over fatigued and are made useless (i find this particularly effective vs hydra rushes, funny seeing those blessed serpents die of fatigue) .

falling frost also causes damage (but not the chill effect) to cold resistant troops but can be evaded with a high defence/parry skill making it perfect for even cold resistant chaff.

Re: Water magic
 

Don't forget Sailor's Death. I think its something like 3W, area 1, 10 AN damage or something around there. Its Thaum, though I don't recall what lvl.

Re: Water magic
 

sailors death isn't too effective for me.

you're better of hording all you're mages back to research till you research some of the nicer evocation spells before casting frozen death on you're enemies in the battlefield. Unless ofcourse you're a neifel jarl or a formorian king, then send em out straight away with like five of they're resepective sacred units as henchmen then splash a nice bless and take out any indie province or early game army with the greatest of ease.

Re: Water magic
 

Has anyone used Prison of Sedna to good effect?

Re: Water magic
 

Prison of sedna can only be used in water can't it?

it's the one that freezes the water around the enemies i think, haven't used that in ages but can be usefull to hold back tramplers (shambler thralls come to mind) apart from that i think SCs and the larger water summons would break out after a few turns quite easily mind you i don't think the extra protection would do much for an SC so it does make one slightly more vulnerable for the time it is trapped in ice.

Re: Water magic
 

Maelstrom is good, as it gives you a lot of gems, including 5s a turn.

Bottles of water are really good. if you are defending against a lot of earth attacks and assassination spells, this helps a ton.

Rime hauberk is really good. At times i use it on seraphs when mr is not crucial to prevent the frozen heart attacks, and also to allow the seraph to fight units(typically undead) that have a chill aura).

frost brand-hard to beat for the price

boots of quickness-for me a must for all thugs and sc's that do not have water magic.

Water trolls-not a bad deal for 1 water gem a piece. Though it would be nice to see them get some sort of weapon like their earth counterparts. Maybe KO can hold a contest to think up the best weapon to give them. :)

Sea Turtles-i like them. Expensive at 15 w gems each. but decent mr and morale. and 5 of them can trample smaller thugs easily.

As far as spells frozen heart is the hallmark. Breath of winter can be a very effective situational buff. And of course quicken self is a standard must have buff.

Wolven winter is great to use against Ctis, and other cold blooded races/units. Especially before a big battle. It makes a difference if those Marshmasters are trying to skelly spam in a cold 3 province.

Wolven winter is also good to cast before a big battle if your troops are cold aura troops and you are in enemy dominion(heat).

I am always careful about killing enemy capital population. Especially if it is a capital i border. Since I know I am going to be owning that capital, in a sense I am killing my own future income.:)

Re: Water magic
 

Nobody likes Ice Strike? I found it to be fairly effective in a recent SP game when I was playing LA Atlantis....

Re: Water magic
 

I could be wrong, but wouldn't that mean that Niefel Flames targetting would automatically bypass any undead chaff? Sounds quite useful.

Re: Water magic
 

I think cold blast is very underestimated because of it's short range. But several water mages , properly positioned spamming cold blasts on enemies whom you allowed to come closer instead of wasting all your fatigue on cold bolts or sailor's deaths, feel quite safe and are very devastating. And you get this spell very, very early. Just put your mages not behind archers, but between archers and heavy protected guys.
I use sailor's death only when the enemy has more ranged power, and i attack. In this case you just can't use blast. Theoretically sailor's death should be effective against high-protected units. it is, at least better then clot bolts. But still worse then cold blasts, even with heavy protected ones. If you can win the placement game, of course. And some risk is always involved.

Re: Water magic
 

nice necro.

Re: Water magic
 

But it's a decent comment. Militarist: Check out the wiki page on water path and add your comments to the discussion.

Re: Water magic
 

Added to Wiki. It was a good idea,Maerlande.

Re: Water magic
 

No problem. I'm not always a dickhead. And I promise to update the page asap.