Continuing this Miasma discussion I'm wondering what some vets think of a set up like this...
Order +3 Sloth +3 Heat +2 Growth 0 Misfortune +3 Magic +1
Resoning being that you need many resources for Miasma if you use serpents. You'll have enough to field enough Swamp Gaurds and Poison Slingers anyway. You can still use the LI as screeners and their javalin is nice en masse. You do benefit from a decent income though, and with order +3 you might as well take misfortune +3. I didn't see any reason to go for growth or death, though for more points death +1 is doable I think. Magic +1 is to help your Shamen research. I'm thinking you could also go to Heat +3 as the income loss isn't that bad and supply shouldn't be an issue with all the marshmasters and undead you will probably field.
That nets 160 extra points, less 50 for miasma is 110... I think the Dark Citadel is a good choice as it's hard to seige and cheap, though it is expensive and takes 4 turns.
As to the pretender... well you have some choices, even if you limit yourself to undead, nagas, and the lizard king (or whatever he calls himself...) Domain is important though, so taking a pretender with a higher domain is cost effective, I'd not use less than 6 and probably try for 7. Then it's about magic. I'm having a difficult time deciding what good bless effects are for the Serpets. Nature is good at some level for at least the 'zerking, though with 22hp regeneration isn't all that great (though it could be for your pretender, the Naga would use it well). Death 9 is also somewhat lacking since the serpents don't benefit from the life after death, though the fear aura could be useful (but maybe you don't need 9 in death to get some benefit from that). Earth seems popular, but fatigue isn't an issue and it's hard to get earth 9 and anything else since none of the miasma immune pretenders start with earth. Also the serpents have a low protection to begin with, adding 4 to a low number isn't as useful as adding 4 to a high number, unless you can couple in regeneration, which is really costly.
Taking high astral might be interesting though...
The research track comes next... I'd imagine that conjuration should be a priority so you can get your undead army churning, and construction is always useful. If you luck into some early blood marshmasters you could even try to set up some blood (or if you take a blood pretender). Otherwise I don't know, what schools offer the best auxilary spells for nature and death? Oh you can go for quickness too since all the MMs have water...
Heh, that's getting a bit long... oh well, if you read it give me some comments or your thoughts/experiences
