[Scott Hebert]

Originally posted by PvK:
So by the time you have two conquering armies, you already have about 14-16 mages casting site searching spells every turn, using about 30 gems/slaves consisting of all types per turn? I'm impressed...

Not exactly. When I do this, I would have 3-4 mages casting the searching spells that my national mages can cast. This doesn't search as well as a Rainbow, true, but I'm also guaranteed to be able to make full use of most if not all of the gems I _do_ find.

So you use the Great Mother as a stay-at-home rainbow mage, because of her improved ability to resist assassination?

Survivability is an issue, but besides that, she's cheaper, which is the entire problem. The difference in cost between an E4/S3/N4 Great Mother and an E4/S3/N4 Human Pretender is not significant enough for me to take the Human Pretender, when you consider that the Human Pretender has a 2 lower _base_ Dominion. The balance point is Dominion 5, where the difference in cost is only 7 points. Anything higher helps the Great Mother, who is _also_ the person who gains the most benefits from that Dominion. I see this as a balance issue.

Another interesting case is that of the Daughter of the Land, who makes perhaps the best 'giant rainbow', because she generates her own Clams and she has a higher base Dominion.