[IndyPendant]

I played MA Tien-Chi in this game.

First of all, I would like to apologize for the...snarkiness in my earlier posts (in this thread)--particularly to Caelum. I was annoyed with myself much more than anything else, and that annoyance bled through into my writing. It should not have.

This was my first MP game (note: not my first MP Dominions game; this was my first computer game ever played against other players, period!) I made an embarrassingly large number of mistakes, almost too many to count, although a lot of them were mentioned in my earlier posts. Still, I also learned a *lot* in the short time I was in the game.

Agartha did very well to defend against my 'surprise' attacks. Caelum defeated me fairly--if, uh, frustratingly handily. ; ) And I learned that although MA Tien-Chi remains one of my favourite nations to play in SP, I probably will never play them again in MP. I did not play well this game, but here's what I think of the nation itself:

MA Tien-Chi is a one-trick pony. They shoot, they shoot, they shoot, and oh, by the way...they shoot. Their archers are awesome, arguably the best in the age--but their other forces are sub-par. All of them. Their mages were also pretty weak--particularly in midgame, which is where I drowned under hordes of winged mages and seeking arrows. They have low levels in all their magic, and need the late-game magic boosters/communions to truly shine. They suffer from low hit points and/or old age, so are easily assassinated with spells and creatures. They don't have a good recruitable thug chassis to take advantage of their multiple magic paths with crafting. Mid-game, MA Tien-Chi is easily neutered via Arrow Fend and/or Staff of Storms. One single spell or item reduces their effectiveness dramatically.

I was playing in in version 3.9, and 3.10 has helped MA Tien-Chi's mages significantly, so that I like playing them even more in SP--but the patch has done absolutely nothing for their armies, leaving Tien-Chi with largely the same old problems. Agartha stopped my offensive dead with high-prot summoned statues, which Tien-Chi really could not deal with adequately at all, without high-level magic. Caelum defeated me with Seeking Arrow, Storm, Summon Air Power, and their (much much MUCH) better mages.

Basically, shooting is pretty much all MA Tien-Chi is good for.

I would recommend MA Tien-Chi to anyone for SP games. I would recommend it to absolutely no one for MP games.