[Squirrelloid]

Hmmm... weakest 10 land nations in approximate order of weakness

1. MA Agartha
2. EA Agartha

The non-LA Agartha's are by far the weakest nations in the game, with or without CBM. Note that EA Agartha is probably worse than its MA version relative to its era, but when you're playing with other cripples EA is probably better...

3. (MA) Machaka

Loss of fetishes hurt, a lot. They're still better off than the above Agarthas, but not by much.

4. (MA) Eriu

Eriu has issues. Its research sucks. It has no endgame (at all). It needs early research. It needs a bless. It has no astral, precious little earth, and no death magic. The only thing it has going for it is arguably the best raiding thug in the game. This only gets it so far. By mid-game Eriu has generally moved from 'threat' to 'annoyance'.

5. LA Ulm

If you can survive long enough to get a blood economy going, you're probably ok. Surviving that long is *really hard*. Your national units are all typically overpriced in either gold, resources, or both. And most of them come with crippling encumbrance that makes them all but useless after a couple rounds of melee. And then your national mages top out at 3 total paths, making you the winner of the 'worst mages in the game' award.

6. MA Man

Similar problems to Eriu, except the research isn't quite as bad, your pretender isn't overworked, and you have good standard armies instead of good thugs. Good standard armies + a good buffing path (nature) means you make it to the end of midgame fine. (Then you hit lategame and realize you have none).

7. EA Abysia

Don't get me wrong, they have a recruitable thug/almost SC in their capital and excellent sacreds. The problem is that they only really do one thing well. Once someone counters your fire you're done. Since you also *predictably* do just one thing well, expect that to happen pretty fast.

---------

Those 7 are pretty indisputable, even if some of them miraculously didn't qualify for cripple fight. These are my picks for the next 3 in order.

8. (EA) TNN

Hire anywhere Bean Sidhes, A2 assassins, and better sacreds plus a good non-sacred option make TNN leaps and bounds better than Eriu. But its still not very good.

9. LA Caelum

For a nation with troops as bad as its are, LA Caelum finally rips the heart out of the nation by saddling it with crappy mages. Sure, your death magic improved, so your endgame might be really good. But how do you expect to get there? I suppose if you're playing against a bunch of n00bs that can't figure out how to counter mammoths you might do ok, but otherwise you're just hosed.

10. LA Atlantis

Sure, you've got great sacreds and decent cap-only mages. But your recruit-anywhere mages are pretty awful, and your UW recruit mages are really expensive for what they do. And while you have death and some astral (UW fortresses), your other magic paths are either uninspiring (water, oh yay) or too short to be useful (E,A,F only on randoms). And good cap-only sacreds only get you so far.

That said, there's a big difference between LA Atlantis and the other nations listed above.

------

The following are often considered weak, although I have to imagine this is because many players can't figure out how to defend a rush with them. In no way would I consider them weak.

MA BL
Lots of astral power, earth via Rishi and national summons, great recruit-anywhere mages for communioning, and all its mages are sacred meaning really efficient research.

EA Marveni
No nation with a recruit anywhere E2S2H2 +210% EWSN mage can actually be that weak. Did i mention it can blood sacrifice as well?

EA Ermor
Similarly, F2S1D2 +110% FASD recruit anywhere mage is also pretty awesome, and they've even got good troops and respectable sacreds on top of that.

-----------------

The following is generally considered weak, although I think its probably underrated. But it arguably could replace LA Atlantis in the 10th slot:

LA Jomon - read the last few pages of the CBM thread already.