[Baalz]

I don't know, I think I'm in the very small minority that doesn't think MA Ulm is bottom of the barrel. Top tier? Certainly not. Unplayable? Far from it.

I'm not contending their weaknesses, a huge laundry list of them has been pointed out and they are mostly spot on. What I'd like to point out is some strengths that people tend to overlook.

1) Best forge bonus in the game and consequent diplomatic edge. The people calling "forge *****" need to work on their trading skills.

2) Their smiths are pretty cost effective in combat early on and just get better. Destruction + blade wind is pretty ugly. Legions of Steel & Strength of Giants grow into weapons of sharpness and marble warriors ending up at army of lead. Magma bolts is not terrible in a pinch, and magma eruption is one of the best mainline evo spells. Its not hard to forge a few blood stones and your combat mages should all have earth boots so you end up with pretty stout little casters once you throw in a summon earth power - on a 140 gold unit.

3) Gold cheap troops mean more castles, which mean more smiths. People complaining extra castles just gives you the ability to churn out more crap are not using the strengths of Ulm to their advantage. For the cost, you have a hard time having enough smiths, from forging cheap stuff for your thugs and forging goodwill for your neighbors, to researching and combat effectiveness, it's a very versatile unit for its cost. Have lots of smiths helps a bit with their magic diversity as you'll have S and A forgers as well as double F and triple E (real good combat mages).

4) Because of the excess gold, Ulm should have more castles than average, which lets you crap out loads of 30gp spies when you feel like taking a break from massing smiths. This should not be underrated, crapping out 10+ spies per turn mid game can be crippling. Spare gold also lets you bid well for mercenaries, which can help with your magic diversity.

5) The recruitable units are fairly good for indie expansion, and can hold their own against most other recruitable units until a bit of research is done. Once they start laying down poison, lighting, etc. you better damn well have your own research done and start hitting back with your own combat spells and cheap thugs outfitted to be immune to whatever they're throwing down. Screw lighthing, my favorite AN spell is destruction.

6) Ulm managing to get the FOTA up is just scary. Lightless lanterns, forgable by every one of your smiths cost just 1 fire gem apiece - crap 50 of them out the turn the forge goes up and you've made back your investment even if it's immediately dispelled. Manage to keep it up and fire brands, shields of beaten gold - 1f 1e. Amulet of Antimagic, luck pendants, rings of fire/lighting all one gem. Who cares if your black knights aren't invincible, at these prices they're expendable! Use that trade income you've got to crap out golems, use the quarter price blood stones your minting to crap out mechanical men and iron dragons playing linebacker for a hoard of phoenix rod wielding scouts and 5e righteous combat mages.