I didn't really notice Illwinter much except for one Giant attack, but they don't stick around so its easy for a single commander to move in and grab the province back. More of an annoyance really. Although the cold scales definitely hurt my 2-Heat loving populace.
Looming Hell (is that the right name?) was certainly more effective as I penetrated the Neifelheim dominion. Luckily I had stocked up with lots of Bells of Cleansing during my wars with Lanka and Yomi, so all my weaker commanders and lots of my semi-tough ones had Bells that would banish the attacking Devils. Even still I lost a couple commanders while Preaching the Neifelheim dominion away.
Astral Corruption certainly had a big effect on my strategy. I had to blow a bunch of Astral pearls in order to enable Astral ability on my powerful summoning/forging mages. This was of course to enable them to cast Ritual of Returning. So in effect my powerful summoners/forgers were taken out of play half the time while they traveled back to a non-capitol laboratory so the Returning would work next time they summoned/forged.
The game was certainly fun, I was definitely looking forward to hitting Agartha hard
I had several powerful Mages (including three Air Queens and several Devalas) geared up with Astral Travel and Air Trapezes with lots of elite support troops available to enter the Astral gateways.
If I had known that Pangea was about to take his last VP, I would have brought in a rather formidable force, although a battle against 1,000 Pangeans would have been a hard fight indeed.
Anyway, great game with wonderful opponents/allies and I'm looking forward to playing with/against you all again!
--Kydorias