[HoneyBadger]

Rytek, the reason I rewrote this was because people-including you, obviously-aren't getting that you have to actually use your brain to deal with things you encounter in the course of the game. Sombre figured that out right away, without having his nose rubbed in it, which I thanked him for.

If you can't use your brain, then no, you're not going to do well with this guide. Or any other guide. Agartha has *plenty* of ways to deal with cold nations though. If your Ancient Lords are having trouble with fatigue, certainly reinvigoration is going to help-and if you can beat cold Nations with just a ring of cold resistance, then you just go and do that. The bless I suggest will still help you there, and without Air, it's not an overly expensive Bless, anyway.

Not every single Ancient Lord has to be built identically, because-guess what?-every game is different!

Against cold:

you can Dominion Push, which means you don't have to fight them in the cold. No cold Nation has your priests, so this is a real option--and you're more likely to be fighting them in weather that Agarthans find comfortable, with Heat 3.

you can use your summons, because you won't be blindly throwing every single gem into equipment, if it's not working for you. Umbrals and Magma Children both are great against cold enemies.

you can use Ancient Lords with only a little bit of equipment (ring of cold resistance), while you use better equipped Ancient Lords in other places, against other enemies. That's one reason I favor a strong bless, because your sacreds are still very good without extra equipment. Their bless will certainly help them deal with cold fatigue.

You also are allowed-I give you permission-to forge cold weather gear, if that's what you need.

The point isn't that you have to follow this guide exactly to win the game with Agartha. The point is that EA Agartha has tons of gems, and easy access to all the right Forges to make cheap, excellent SCs-and compared to other SCs, yes they are cheap-extremely cheap compared to Late Game SCs, and yes they are excellent.

They're not the best SCs the game has to offer ofcourse, and you're going to want to use your Oracles, and maybe GoR some Umbrals, but Ancient Lords are extremely good for the price. They also aren't going to be SCs forever-eventually, you'll have to organize them into units, with Oracle support, to get very far.

Agartha's probably the best EA forging Nation outside of Ulm, considering that they have site searching right out of the gate, and access to all the right paths. They have ridiculous amounts of gems, and they get them sooner than other Nations, because they can find them faster. And Ulm lacks any good recruitable chassis, so Agartha actually has better synergy with forging than Ulm does.

And the builds I've suggested go perfectly well with Agartha's summons. Burning Pearl is probably the best thing you can do for an Ancient Lord, because it improves his lousy attack, and gives 50% Fire Resistance-which, combined with Magma Children, gives you a mixed force that's hard to beat.

You just have to be able to think for yourself when you're playing the game, this guide-like any other guide-is just there to help you, and offer advice, not to play the game for you. If you were expecting that, then I'm sorry, but I'm offering some tips, and a basic strategy, not offering to hold your hand, or to come up with a solution to every single problem you might encounter in any given game. That's something you need to be able to do for yourself, anyway, if you're going to have any success in MP.

Poopsi-if you get lucky with Oracles, that's great, go with that!-I'd still suggest you consider building some Ancient Lords for melee purposes, though, to keep your numbers up, since once you've got more fortresses going, you can build them alongside Oracles, and that way, you can get the most out of your bless.

And you're right-you're not meant to equip every last Ancient Lord to the hilt. That's something else that people are missing. These guys aren't Sidhe Lords, where every last bit of stuff has to be put on the unit to make them fully effective. You can send Ancient Lords out with no gear, some gear, or a complete suit of gear, and they'll still be a decent unit. They're generic melee giants, and as such, they're very flexible.

Some, you can equip with Gate Cleaver (yet another cheap item for Agartha), to destroy castles and to dismantle SCs. Some-as mentioned-you'll want to put cold weather gear on. Some will be heroes-meaning that you can allow their heroic abilities to define them-I've used 2 weapons and a horned helmet on ambidextrous Ancient Lords. Obese Ancient Lords, you may want to switch Bracers for a Ring of Regeneration. Heroic Leaders, you might want to equip with Herald's Lance and Shield of Gleaming Gold.

Fit the gear to the situation, and you'll do much better with this guide.

You can make them well-nigh-invulnerable with the *right* gear-all of which you'll have access to at low levels and low cost, but it's not necessary, or even a goal, to fill every slot on every last Ancient Lord.

Having a dozen that *are* almost invulnerable-and have several stars of experience-for every 1 Tartarian or Seraph or whatever, that another Nation has finally managed to summon up, has to have it's benefits, though.

And relying on Luck is a viable solution, Rytek, because Agartha has the ability to negate bad events. Luck 3 + Turmoil 3 - Bad events = a decent income, when you're not relying on huge armies.