Recovering from raids
 

Say you're in the middle of a major early war and you're getting raided in provinces you didn't even know you owned. Now, you've managed to counterattack and force the enemy forces from your borders. The downside is that unrest is through the roof in most of your provinces and if you send units to patrol, they won't be attacking your enemy. Conversely, your economy's on the floor and you won't be able to maintain a war machine without it.

This seems to be a recurring problem in my MP games. Are there any good ways to deal with this besides the mediocre one listed above?

Re: Recovering from raids
 

The best defense is a good offense. Raid his provinces and put taxes thru the roof. Solves your immediate income troubles and tank your enemies economy as well.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

At the point that you're describing the damage is already done so there's not too much you can do once you've already got unrest jacked up all over the place. Offense is a good option, but really what you want to do is stop the raiders. This can be easier said than done, but if your opponent is in a position to raid aggressively indefinitely it's going to make winning the war a very difficult prospect. Ambush his raiders, research anti-raiding spells (remote attack, teleportation, etc), send mages out to support your PD, and make it uneconomical for the raiding to continue on a large scale. The flip side, of course, is to raid him even more than his is doing to you. To a fairly significant degree managing raiding and counter-raiding is what wins most wars.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

And if you take the province back the turn after it's captured the unrest can't be spiked since pillage orders won't process and the tax rate will reset, so it should only take a turn or so of 0 taxes to get it back to 0 unrest.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Is it worth it to pillage a province you've raided with units that don't have the Pillage Bonus? How much more pillaging does a unit with the bonus do than one without?

The manual mentions fast and large units, and those with Fear (and the Pillage Bonus, of course), as being particularly effective at pillaging. Are there any other stats that affect the effectiveness of pillaging?

Re: Recovering from raids
 

The primary weakness of Niefleheim *is* raiding Cammorak.
I mean, they have to have *some* disadvantage.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

how is thugging Niefelheim's weakness? :o don't they have Skrattis(1 of the best thug chastises in the game) which can be both equipped with anti thug equipment(such as Axe of Hate+Dusk Dagger) or with penetration items for Frozen Heart spam...? and Skrattis are recruit everywhere and generally the most useful mage Niefelheim has, so they shouldn't be lacking in them...

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Thugging is not Neifel's weakness. Raiding is their weakness. Stopping raids. IOW, they have really lousy PD.

(And Frozen Heart doesn't need Penetration. It's not MR-resistable.)

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Oh, I know and accept that the big blue morons can't hold onto a province if their lives depended on it. Actually though, it's become more of a problem in other games outside of Countdown. Especially in a Caelum vs Helheim raiding war. That's just comedy gold. Especially since there's a nation between us and he has no idea what's going on.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

I will repeat, how is raiding a weakness when Skrattis are such strong anti thugs/SCs?

Re: Recovering from raids
 

I think because Skrattis cannot be everywhere at once. You can either spread out a large raiding force that takes a few turns to be destroyed by a large group of Skrattis. Or have a few of them all over the place, who are easily picked off. Skrattis are nice, but still killable with elite troops.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

not true. Skrattis are the best mage Niefelheim has access to, so he should have plenty of them lying around in his kingdom, researching, blood hunting, casting rituals, thugging, etc. so many uses for them and you can never really have enough... so if you get raided all you need is a single equipped skratti for each raider, not to mention that the Skrattis that are blood hunting outside of castles should be scripted with Frozen Heartx5 from the front lines or something like that, can also use the blood spells such as banish demon(if fighting demonic thugs/SCs), life for a life, claws of koklydos, etc. so basically every province that has a Skratti in it should not fall to a single thug, and those without should get a Skratti moving towards them(Wolf form, not Werewolf gives map move 3, so easy to mobilize).

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Well, Skratti can't teleport, aren't stealthy (without ditching gear in wolf form), so you have to send them out to wait for raiders, you can't respond effectively.

Since they have to be out waiting they can be Mind Hunted. Your PD is useless, so if you've spread Skratti out, they can be hit by teams designed to kill them.

Actually Neifel Jarls are probably better for anti-raider duty, since they can cloud trapeze.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

And niefel desperately needs any research they can get, so they will not spread skrattis around "just in case". Few key provinces could easily be defended, especially ones being bloodhunted or so, but with the size niefel tends to grow to, it's not easy or usually even possible to get a geared skratti werewolf into every prov.

And the werewolf form has mm3 too, at least in CBM.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

both of you point out at a mobility issue, which in my opinion can be solved by smart fort positioning which gives you a much faster reaction time. also even though Skrattis in Werewolf/Wolf form lose item slots you can use scouts to carry the items for them, and you should have plenty of scouts around if just to carry blood slaves from your labless blood hunting provinces into your labs... and having a handful of say Axes of Hate+Dusk Daggers in your lab preemptively in preparation for such raiding squads isn't such a bad idea, and if not raided will be used offensively later on so it isn't really wasted.

yes mind hunts can be a *****, but they are for many nations, nothing unique to Niefelheim... but Niefelheim has the Gygjas as well, and while not as useful as Skrattis they do have 52.5% to have S1 on them, less for S2 and even S3 very very rarely, so if you know there is an Astral power in the neighborhood, you might wanna get a few more Gygjas than usual.

so yes, obviously a very strong raiding blitz would be problematic to deal with, but that would go for anybody not just Niefelheim. I'm trying to say that Niefelheim isn't that more susceptible to raiders than other nations, and PD never really stops good thugs anyway...

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Expanding on the last comment:
Certainly skrattis can be equipped for anti-raiding duty. And they are generrally pretty good at it. But the fact remains that niefle's PD is porous, and subject to easy raiding.

Niefle makes the same numbers of commanders as other nations - which can be split among raid(antiraid), research, gem hunting, and forging, etc.

Equipping thugs (forging equipment) and then sending them out
on anti raid - are thugs that aren't being used to invade ME. And mages that aren't being used to research, or blood hunt.
And I'd much raither fight niefle on 'his' territory - than on mine.

IE., niefles armies are absolutely brutal - whether jarls, or popsicles. Dealing with one or two skrattis is a lot easier than dealing with 10 popsicles.. or 3-4 jarls.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

As I point out in my Niefel guide, lining up crystal coins is a huge win for Niefel, so much so it's worth considering at pretender creation. With crystal coins + caps you've got plenty of S3 Gygja which rather negates most of the concerns listed here. Mindhunts are suddenly not an option against you, and it's not all that high a bar to line up a dozen teleporting anti-raiders.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Yeah, I wouldn't even consider Mind-Hunting Neifel, unless I saw that he'd spread out unsupported Skratti into most of his provinces. Especially if they were in Wolf form for thug duty.

And Skratti moving out of forts are good for counter attacking to provinces back, but not for blocking the raids in the first place or for intercepting the raiders. Gygja and Neifel Jarls are the tools for intercepting.

I agree that PD never stops good thugs anyway, but giant PD doesn't stop lousy thugs, or even cheaper things. It lowers the opportunity cost of raiding, because you can do it so cheaply. Especially since PD is often left low because it's not worth investing in.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Well, I more or less agree on the principle but I think caps alone are sufficient. An 80% chance of getting feebleminded/killed with an s2 gygja is more than enough to persuade me to try soemthing else.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Isn't the best solution to raiding counter raiding? Preferebly cheaper than the raider is doing it?

Re: Recovering from raids
 

...
Well I do not have much xp in pvp mod of dominions...but what I learned form computers show to me the best way of deff for short time (after that u have to push an counterattack)...

When some one att u,make a solid deff in provinces (pull an line) 2-3 months from your borders,build some hard forts if possible (mountain) in provinces with no fort rais a lot of province def army (u know the thing that goes to 125) and rais or gather army with minimal 2xp in it...when enamy comes to the line start torture him with magic and then pull an counterattack (u can even wait untill he lose a lot of army on your deff line and then strike)
That works for me,almost every time...:D

How to recover...Have no good idea,I usually put low taxes for 3 months in taken provinces,and build tempels and prists that preach,that helps a lot...and then i strike again...
PS
Sorry for bad english,I hope u could understand me...

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Quite frankly, I was in a pretty poor position to be hit. I had gone light on mages in an effort for quick expansion and was caught with my pants down about one or two turns before I was going to consolidate my army.

So I think Neifel has fine counter-raiding potential with teleporting thugs and comparatively low opportunity-cost thug item construction. Making a smooth transition is critical to the success of this though, which is something I failed to do well.

It actually seems like luck scales are a reasonable boon for raided nations as well. Though they're all different scenarios, my limited game experience sees me responding much better when random events supplement my crippled income or provide extra gems/items for counters.

Though counter raiding is great, the danger is that you still have an enemy stomping around in your territory, so you have to develop your counter-raiding force and still create an answer.

I had a little success with indy archer supplementation, but I'm not sure if it's worth the price either.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

S3 means I've got a 50% chance I can get a teleport off before you get a mindhunt...so those Skratti targets that you know are tempting and I know are tempting are whole lot more dangerous to snipe when I'm expecting mind hunts.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Yes, that's a good way to lose. :)
While you are raising your great army and PD 125, you lose most of your provinces to raids. Or you've already won if you have such free resources and aren't get countered. :p
PD is helpful, of course - but it soon becomes cheaper to use your money for something more productive. And big army is precisely what is being prevented by many small raids.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Did you mean teleporting in? So that Gigja who wasn't present in the province will be here before mindhunter kills off a Scratti?

Re: Recovering from raids
 

He means having the teleport spell go off. The teleport spell has a 50% chance of resolving before mind hunt due to the way Dom3 handles orders.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Yes, I mean if I'm expecting a mindhunt and have a S3 mage I can teleport him in, giving a 50% chance to feeblemind anybody who targets that tempting low MR skratti who otherwise looks like a perfect target. Do that once or twice and you probably won't have to anymore as the mindhunts will likely stop. Most people can't afford to risk their rare and expensive S4 mages on iffy mindhunt targets.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Of just teleport two guys - one with low ID and another one with high. This will provide nearly 100% chance of feebleminding the mindhunter and is easily performed by any nation that gets at least steady S2 from recruitable mages.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Frankly speaking, all this id-oriented stuff is one of the things that make me strongly feel how the game is poorly implemented inside.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

It's a nice simple way of making things appear to be random in almost any case where it makes any difference. And most of the cases where it is abusable the cost of doing so is higher than it's worth.
But yes, it's a hack. Clever, but not really a good way to solve the problem.


And back on the issue at hand, teleporting S mages in to counter potential Mind Hunts works until your enemy realizes that's what you're doing and teleports/flies in anti-SC thugs to take out the original target and anti-mindhunters. Counter and counter-counter.

And going farther back in the original discussion, one of the reasons I like Jotunheim over the other 2: sneaking S1 Vaetti hags along with the Skratti thugs. No need for boosters to teleport. No need to expose the mind hunt counters to attack.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

I hope they enjoy their stay in kokytos.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Which is a potential counter for that and works well for the blood hunters, but not so well for raiders or against other attacks.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Not that it will work against 3 Magic-duelers teleporting in... :D

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Why not? First defensive round, spells go off. Bye bye.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Distance. :) And, unless you bring 3+ Kokitos-senders, you send one off, others kill you with Duel.
And in Kokitos these guys/gals are quite often scripted to cast Returning as a second/third spell. Learned this the hard way... :hurt:
Of course, this is among the counter-counters which could be countered themselves. But teleporting Gygjas should take in account this risk...

Re: Recovering from raids
 

I am amused by the level of counters and counter-counters that will be employed to kill or protect a single Skratti thug.
I mean, obviously you're going to back up every thug with teleporting Astral mages to block Mind Hunt and multiple (teleporting? If not how do they get there on demand?) Blood mages with enough slaves to send any anti-SC thugs to kokytos.
I thought the point was to make thugs cheap and disposable.

Sure, Blood-hunting provinces may be worth protecting and they'll have Skratti available for Claws anyway, but the original context here was using Skratti for anti-raiding duty. Now we're talking 1000gp in mages + ?? gems to stop raiding parties. Spread out like that and you're already losing.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

well, you're actually using the Skrattis to blood hunt, so they're not just there doing nothing... all you need is some anti thug items in your lab to deploy when needed... and the teleporting Gygjas is only if you're constantly mind hunted, which won't happen very often and most nations can't do it in the first place...

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Wait, are you using Skratti to blood hunt all your provinces? Doesn't that do a number on your income?

And if you've got Skratti in every province hunting and ready to counter raids, there's no need or point in teleporting Gygjas in, just have them there blood hunting too. Teleporting in to block Mind hunts only makes sense when you're talking about sending Skratti out as raiders/counter raiders.

Re: Recovering from raids
 

Yeah! :) Actually, I offered some counter-counter just in case someone will actually bring his costly and well-equipped Gygjas out into the open to protect thugs. ;) Then hunting such Gygjas will make a perfect sense.