[Tuna-Fish]

Originally posted by En Forcer:
Hmm...I wonder about Tuna's strategy. All those mages while great at research will soak you on upkeep.

To answer your question, I shoot for 10 dedicated researchers equiped with lanterns and quills by turn 30 or so.

Originally posted by Teraswaerto:
With certain nations, like C'tis and Caelum, I try to recruit a mage every turn in every fort.
Some nations & strategies are just better equipped for researching than others.

This seems to be the point here. I use pretty much all the gold on mages and their upkeep because I think there is not really all that much other stuff that is worth more than them. I quess we all agree that 90 or 100 gold spent on Seithkorna or Seraph gives you more overall combat power than spending that in troops. After getting eagle eyes and nether darts, the Seithkorna can wipe out 9-10 normal troops with impunity even on the second round of combat, making it hugely more powerful.

Thus I believe that gold spent on troops gives you just some combat power, while gold spent on mages gives you some (less) immediate combat power, but also research, which gives huge amounts of potential combat power.

Now, with the Jotun utgard as an example: 1st case, I spend all my gold on troops, from turn one until I make contact. I get some decent expansion speed for the start, but next to no research. 2nd case: I get one seithkorna a turn, use excess gold on troops. With the starting troops and my pretender, I can take perhaps one indie province a turn, and also I'm racking up some research. When i meet th jotuns in the first example, I have gotten nether bolt and eagle eyes. When we meet, I use troops as a meat shield and do the combat with my mages, they get decimated. I meet the second opponent, who by now has a huge empire, but because my research increases by 8 every turn (magic scale is obviously integral to my strategy), I'll have nether darts and the second opponent will feel massive pain. With the huge research I have it'll be easy to pick important other spells like relief.

IMHO, the only thing you should care about early game is research and survival, because when you have enough research it guarantees your survival.

And, so that my jotun example isn't the only example, some other importnant research goals:

C'tis and Conj-9 (well of misery, ghost riders, legion of wights, get pretender with lots of death)
Caelum, Evo-6, Const-4, Ench-4 (Wrathful skies, staff of storms, cloud trapeze)
Pythium, Thau 4, alt 2, conj-4 (paralyse, quickness, light of the northern star)

All those stuff can be protected against with some research and/or effort, but the point is getting them so fast and hitting the enemy so early they simpy have no time for getting some protection.