Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

I am playing a game as MA agartha and I've gotten KinBreaker as a hero. So, I saw that he had already big HP and big defense, so I put on him a blacksteel full plate and boots of the behemot, and just sent him around to trounce independents and chaff.

And it just occured to me that the crusher has similarily high defense, and even more HP. Doesn't that make him a good thug chassis, even if it cant self-buff?

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

If he was a commander, probably yes, but paying 20 nature + equipment for a thug that can retreat by no means is not wise at all.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

(15 nature in CBM)

(in fact, cheaper than the Agarthan marble oracle: 35 earth gems vs 8 earth gems + 15 nature gems.
To this add the cost of 5 earth gems for boots of the behemoth (must have), and possibly other stuff (some decent armor, shields, a weapon for the rare enemy that is larger than you...)

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

maybe JUST the boots is OK... he's got natural 24 prot, right? If you're using him for basic raiding you may not need much else.

also, not being able to retreat is often an advantage. there are many times you would have one if your soldiers had just stuck around. I often give the cheaper undead commander summons an amulet of Lycanthrope and some low level thug equipment and utilize them as light raiders or even skirmishers.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

It is not an advantage because you are short of maneuver. If the enemy decides to attack you in magic phase you may do nothing other than accept the fight. And be killed in most cases.
You can't script retreat for a mindless commander and that is the biggest problem.

Also, I'm not a fan of marble oracles because they have the same problem though they are quite tough and hard to kill. But still I once killed 3 or 4 with a Djinn and they could do absolutely nothing. A huge waste of gems.
But marble oracle has 16 MR while Crusher and Gargoyle have 12 which means they are very vulnerable to something like opposition and, again, you can't do anything with that.
It's up to you, of course, but a good player will beat it easily.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

Actually you can script retreat orders for mindless commanders, they just have to be able to get off the battlefield in 1 turn. A quirk of the engine makes it take a turn before they "realize" they're routing and go into evaporate mode.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

Really? Nice bug. I'll test it.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

BTW: on this line: MA Ermor just apostathized my Kin-Breaker thug.So add to the gored crushers the advantage of not being holy.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

It may be worth trying for MA Agartha and their boosts. But not being able to rout from battles is a huge problem that should not really exist. It is really stupid to see someone die just because it is turn50 of the battle.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

oh... I didn't realize. Do mindless things die on turn 50? whereas something that is, say, berserk will fight until the turn 75 (or is it 100) mark when everything else is forced to flee?

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

I had the same though some time ago but iirc

Crushers have no body slot, never heal and have low MR so there's not much point in goring them.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

Yeah, mindless stuff automatically dies at turn limit, so 50 on attack. Normal attackers autodie on turn 75 if for some strange reason they don't route [had enemy 300HP prophetized tartarian do that, no idea why he was stopping to fight troops chasing him, but he did it for 25 turns and was just 1 turn from routing and then poof, he was dead].

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

What happens to berserk mindless troops? Or do mindless not go berserk?

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

:(
Curse that infernal Djinn

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

According to the spell name, one should expect "Gift of Reason" to remove the "Mindless" tag. :)

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

They do heal in a lab.

Lack of body slot kind of kills a good chunk of the idea, though. I wanted to put on them a blacksteel full plate to make their defense soar to above 30 (and basically use them as elephants in assistance to my regular armies, or other thugs)

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

IMHO there's not all that much difference between e.g. Prot 26 and Prot 33. Either way you're more likely to die from the same causes: fatigue critical hits (with or without Stellar Cascades), AP weapons (Weapons of Sharpness or crossbows), MR-resisted attacks (Soul Slay, Disintegrate), AP or AN spells (Incinerate), ritual spells (Vengeance of the Dead, Mind Hunt). Doesn't hurt to slap on the Black Steel Plate, but it's probably not worth GoRing him just for that.

Morale 50 units don't automatically die at turn 50, they just have a 50% chance of disintegrating each turn after that. So sometimes you get lucky.

I wonder but have never tested: if you prophetize a Morale 50 unit, does it become Morale 30 (never fails morale check but routs as usual at autorout limit)? My gut says no, both because 50 is a higher number, and because the Colossal Fetish pretender has Morale 50 instead of regular pretender Morale 30.

-Max

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

Crushers have 0 encumbrance. No fatigue. Sure, it can still be destroyed by spells (then again, few things cant be destroyed like that), but in my experience with the armored onyx oracle it worked rather well. Specially at independent smashing. Of course, I was factoring in MA agartha's dominion, as well, which gives a hp bonus to your golems and stuff.


On this same line: are banelords all that better as thugs than regular banes? They cost three times as much, and dont have twice the hitpoints (and the other stats are almost identical).

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

It doesn't change the underlying morale of the unit, and morale 50 automatically adds the mindless tag.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

It just makes an unit a commander. There is such a thing as mindless commanders, so no real contradiction.

Re: Uhm, stupid question: GoRing crushers?
 

No fatigue from melee, that is. "With or without Stellar Cascades" was my feeble attempt at acknowledging that some thugs are 0-enc, with the caveat that they can still rack up the fatigue and die from critical hits if they have elemental attacks, Stellar Cascades spam, ice elementals, etc. You're not likely to face any of these things vs. PD, but the real point is that high Prot has diminishing returns--IME a Prot 24 unit and a Prot 30 unit have about the same change of dying[1], so I personally wouldn't consider raising Prot to 30 to be worth the gems for GoR. YMMV.

-Max

[1] For example vs. PD, the biggest threat is "Ooops, it isn't just PD any more after all."