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Originally Posted by Calahan
It was a few months ago that I tested the White Bull, and all I can really remember was that when the Bull was trampling it was all good and he killed things. When he wasn't trampling he just got his head smashed in. And buffing was out as he couldn't bring his fatigue back down without items (which made him useless as an early expander).
Thinking now though, maybe I was testing it without awe, as I'm sure at the time I was just looking for the cheapest N4 SC expander I could find. Might have been for my tests as EA Ermor actually (when I think about what nations I've tested since coming back)
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I did a White Bull build for my EA Arco guide, and found the critical factor was having a little earth magic. Just an extra +4 protection makes a very large difference against spear wielding humans. As long as you stick to the (very common in EA) lower damage indies I found no problem at all expanding very reliably.
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Originally Posted by Baalz
Now, the bull doesn’t need awe, but he does really need some earth magic. Taking the great white bull I can afford 4E 4N, a dominion of 5 and Order-3, Sloth-3, cold-1, death-1, luck-3, and magic-1. The earth component is critical for a couple of reasons. Right off the bat it gives him +4 protection, bringing his berserk protection up to 16. Against spear wielding humans the difference between a 12 protection and 16 is *huge* it’s going to reduce the amount of damage you take by an order of magnitude. A 12 protection is kind of iffy for initial expansion, 16 you’ve got no problem against most of the stuff you’ll see in inides. Stay away from barbarians, lizards, wolf tribe & heavy cavalry and you’ve really got nothing to worry about with all those hitpoints.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Calahan
Still hard to imagine the White Bull having much use long-term though.
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This also came up in the Arco thread, and I think people discount him too much. Obviously he's not one of the titans who nicely equipped can jump in and singlehandedly kill an army, but properly deployed he's an extremely useful asset *far* from "not having much use". Equip with a ring of regen & amulet of MR, self buff earth power, invulnerability, resist elements & personal regen attack rearmost. Have support mages cast quickness, haste, body ethereal, luck, & iron will. Assuming you're in dominion your berserk protection is 30, MR is 28, you're regenerating close to 100 hitpoints per turn on top of being lucky & ethereal and front load way more damage against most troops than a typical SC swatting one tile per round with a frostbrand. Even if you run into a large enough force that you pass out before routing them, most troops can't damage you fast enough to kill you even when you're passed out. Even critical hits are going against a 15 protection + ethereal + luck and you're regenning at about a hundred. Even most SC counters are going to struggle with that. Meanwhile your mages switched to evocations after buffing him so life is most decidedly unpleasant for the bad guys piling up around him.
Double plus bonus - it's not really that big a deal if you die if you have a bunch of mage priests (like Marverni). Outsource iron warriors and regeneration to your support mages and call your god back immediately every time he dies to do a pretty good impression of an immortal badass which your opponent *really* wishes you didn't have.