I favour at the moment my "alternative" blood strat slightly more by playing a good airnation which can clamhoard ( Caelum/Pythium ) . Then i clamhoard and try to get at least 1-2 of the airqueens .
Later in the game i can wish for blood then and wish 1-2 of the demon lords i need . They can then chainsummon e.g. storm demons and do everything else i need with blood .
This way i have the blood really only very late but as compensation i have clamhoarded , more goldincome from provinces and probably more gemincome from provinces too because Abysia is not the best sitesearchnation/clamhoarder but rather bad there while mictlan would be but mictlan is so fragile earlygame and has to waste significant amounts of blood for dominion .
And with Air i hopefully get the probably best Summonable SCs / Airqueens as compensation for the ice / arch devils .
For creatures/miniscs i can use Death until i can wish for blood .
Blood gives imo the best troops , good unique SCs and with Blood thorns/Hellswords the 2 best allround weapons .
But the costs are high :
- The goldloss
- The mageloss (they could research/forge/fight)
- The poploss
- The hidden goldloss : you need at least a lab but you should build a castle too otherwise a clever enemy will annoy you with call of the winds or similiar
Finally thnx to random events , ermor/pan cw presence , the good raiding tactics , spies and a few good populationkillspells ( plague ) normally your bloodincome will reach its peak midgame but drop then slowly but surely .
Lategame the clamhoarder who wishes for blood will probably overhaul you .
But my more severe concerns go to the following neighbors :
-Ermor . This is worst case they may corrupt a few of your provinces already early with their dominion . They can raid you very well early-midgame .
-Ulm , other nations with instill uprising units .
-Uberraiding nations like vanheim/caelum .
As Abysia/Mictlan earlygame your only good defense when you try to get the blood running is your SC and perhaps a few merchants while a Pythium that intends to clamhoard is normally a lot saver but lategame extremely strong too if he invested in clams + got airqueens .
You shouldn't play caelum , they are Banned in lots of games because they can abuse the false horror strat too well