[chrispedersen]

.... is no (major) bless at all.

It took me quite a *long* time to get *the* strategy for Arcosephale. And, that being said, I don't believe it to be competitive in MP - but I do believe its what the designers intended.

Lets look at the clues:

Arco has one of the best stealthy mages in the game, with the Oreliad.

It has an AWESOME unit in the Wind Rider - highly mobile, great defense, lances - but ridiculously expensive, and capitol only.

It has icarid - a moderate flying unit.

It has excellent commanders - sceptics and philosophers(cap only) and one of the best mages in the game (especially if you are playing unpatched) - the mystic. And finally, engineers and mage engineers.

And finally, we have the canonical history of where the inspiration for arco was drawn - the greek city states.

And all the rest of its units, if you'll pardon the expression - are crap.

What do all of these point to?

Arco is not supposed to win large scale pitched battles. Point of fact - arco can not mass comabat effective troops, should be trying to *avoid* pitched battles - and should be trying to force its enemies to do the same.

How?

Again - the units give clues to the tactics. In point of fact, arco should be one of the *raiding* nations.

Icarids and Wind Riders. The icarids can be built at any fort, and have a smaller map move - and are far more of a harrying force.

The wind riders - pound for pound are a great unit - and can pack a huge punch with just 7-10 riders.

And if raiding is the left jab - dominion kill is the right hook.

Arcosephale raids in order to prevent PD or patrolling from discovering its skeptics.

Aka.. after arco raids a place - move the sceptics in. The sceptics don't have to execute an order in order to kill dominion - they just have to exist *in* a province.

So raiding should be one continous string of apparrently random movement- followed by a trail of sceptics.

Now, you are probably saying, this is easily counterable - and to some extent - you are right.

But a lot of nations - Lanka, Niefle etc are built around the idea of fighting a military confrontation. If you do that as arco you will lose... so the idea is to prevent youropponents from credibly developing that strategy.

What are other shreads of evidence to support this?
Well, first, arco, of all the nations in the game, is the only nation I recall of the top of my head - that has discounted labs.
Arco - more than almost any other nation except LA MAN needs forts and labs to crank out - not military - but commanders.
Discounted labs helps arco to crank out sceptics.

So, if you follow this strategy of no massed armies - and just constant raiding - what do you do about enemy forts? And lo and behold - arco has a ready answer for that.

Engineers - with a *huge* siege bonus. On top of that, wind riders - which are flying and hence count double for sieging.

The third bit of evidence: Suppose that you have been successful in raidng the bejeesus out of your opponent - and your opponent has responded the way you want - ie., by dispersing troops, and commanders to counter your raiding.

So he has a *lot* of units, and a lot of commanders tied down to garrison duty..... where they are *easily* seduced or assassinated by your orelieads.

Fourthly. You have the *best* healer in the game - and you heal within your dominion, spontaneously. What does this point to?
Death Dominion - with healers.

So, I've given you a few of the clues- so this is how I believe Arco sephale is meant to be played:

A: Pretender - Awake. You need the dominion spread, caused by your pretender. Magic Paths.. up to you. Personally, I think death is mandatory, and a rainbow is useful.

As for Scales... the only thing I feel strongly about is Death 3.
Personally, I feel that Turmoil hurts your opponents more than it hurts you, and it benefits your philsophers.

Magic +1-+3 is useful as it will benefit your researchers and make easier your job of fort defense via communion.

*IF* you take turmoil, you will probably need to max out luck and production, and keep an even temp scale, in order to remain financially viable.

B: Fort construction. As fast as you can. Except for capitol, you don't care about unit production, only commanders - so resources are not that important. When possible, build near your enemies (or future enemies). You really don't want skeptics traversing *your* territory.
Swamps are fastest to build.

C: Taxation: Raise em. National troops are good only for patrolling.

D: Province defense: yeah - a point or two to prevent scouts from walking over your teritories is fine. If you took luck +3, you don't need to worry about random events trouncing your territories - and if the ENEMY is raiding your territories rejoice for he is playing *your* game. Save PD for your forts.

You don't care about lands - what you want to engage in is a series of small battles where you can attrit your enemy. Any place you *do* care about strongly needs a fort ... ASAP.

Think about it - the greek city states were just that - bunches of city states with dry dusty wilderness between.

E. So, I've told you how important forts are.. So fort defense is critical. And you have two layers to do so.

First, you should confine your raiding so that a bunch of your raiders can collapse back on your forts, to defend.

Secondly: Communions. Every single Mystic is communion bait.
Plan on building Crystal Matrixes/ Slave Matrixes so your Oreo's can get in on the action.

A few last thoughts, not because there isn't more to say, but because I'm tired of typing....

Funnily, played in this fashion, Pan is your natural ally. Both of you have a strong interest in projecting turmoil. Both of you are raiding nations.

Arco is not a brute force nation - it is a thinking mans nation.

A few things to watch out for: Armageddon.
A comment on Formoria: Charm, or communioned charm.
CBM: Confusion.
Oreos: did you know lightning bolts made great tools for assassination? Add in an aim, an orb of aiming, or natures eyes which they can self buff. And lightning bolts *cant* be blocked by shields.

Now, if I had only figured this out *BEFORE* I started this MP game...