[Valerius]

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

Grendelkin did not need to be nerfed. Without magic they aren't good for much beyond anti-thug/SC duty or army assistance. The rather high strength they started with (45) was the only thing that made them interesting at all - nerfing this has reduced any desire on my part to summon them.

I think combining high attack, damage and HP in one unit is a bad idea. The key nerf they received wasn't the strength drop but the 4 point drop in attack skill. I think that was crucial in order to give anti-SC thugs a chance against them.

I support the drop in strength as well, but really they still do a lot of damage. And I can't think of any SC with more HP. And since they don't have undead/demon/magic being tags you can't use damage multiplying weapons against them the way you can most SCs.

Sure, they aren't great operating solo since they have no built-in resistances or magic to buff with. But used in conjunction with an army, or just some mages to buff them, I think they can take out SCs and anti-SC thugs handily and handle troops fairly effectively as well.

OTOH, I wouldn't have a problem with giving them things like CR 50 or poor amphibian but, especially in the latter case, I don't think llamabeast likes the idea thematically.

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

No opinion on summons which require nature gems - N is too valuable to use for them for any nation i've used with EDM summons.

This has been my experience as well. I like treants but I'd rather use my N gems to forge gear for other SCs/thugs and fuel globals. Not sure what to do about that, though, other than lowering their cost.

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

Older cyclops version was much better (E4 + random), as it actually allows access to E5 rituals with boots, which gives you a real reason to summon them. The newer version is far less useful, and not really worth the 30e in most circumstances. If you can't get more E than a Troll King, its simply not worth it, since the King is so much easier to summon (path requirement wise).

I agree that the old cyclops was much better. I seem to recall there was some concern about them overshadowing the elemental royalty? Rather than downgrade them to match the elemental royalty I'd prefer to see their old paths return and boost the elemental royalty.

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

I don't remember when Asynja changed. The version that was used in CPF3 seemed perfectly useful.

I'm very interested to hear feedback on this change. The Asynja isn't a great SC chassis but with glamour she can pick and choose her fights.

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

None of these really reduce the demand for tarts, because tarts are still the best way to get magic diversity. Undoing the nerfs which stop the new summons from being useful for magic diversity is necessary, and even then tarts are still the best access to diverse magic. May need some other summons purely focused on providing magic diversity to actually compete.

I agree. It doesn't have to have the all-in-one magic diversity/SC potential of tarts but there does need to be a way to get that kind of late game magic diversity, other than through tarts.