Hello. I am Roland and I am the godking of two nations-
Okay, yeah, not really. I'm Roland Jones, one of the Something Awful players in this game. Unrelated to Bluemage's god. Probably.
Anyway, I figure that I should introduce myself, and also my nation. I am a moderately-experienced player; I don't claim to be an expert, but I am not terrible, apart from my habit of taking inefficient pretenders because it fits the nation better/I think it's funny. A good example of this is my pretender for this game, who is so inefficient it's funny; I knew full-well how to get the same effect for far fewer points, I just thought that it was boring and instead... Well, you'll see.
Meanwhile, the nation I am playing is Helheim. Normally I play nations that can sit around and research a lot and don't necessarily have to get into an early war, like non-LA Caelum and MA R'lyeh when it has the ocean to itself (although it'll likely win an ocean war anyway). Helheim, on the other hand, is a highly-aggressive nation that wants to expand, expand, and expand some more, crushing everyone in its path. It's one of the three Norse-themed nations in the game; while Vanheim/Midgard is generic Norse myth and Niefelheim/Jotunheim/Utgard is Norse giants, Helheim, as you may have guessed from the name, is based on the Norse afterlife.
(The following this is a
long summary of the nation and its units, so if you're not interested in that stuff, you can stop reading now.)
Helheim, like Vanheim and Tir na n'Org (nation based upon the Tuatha and Sidhe), is a "ponyman" nation, to use the Dom3 slang. What this means is that it is a nation that fields a lot of sacred, glamour-shrouded units, who happen to be mounted on horses, and blesses them so that they are absurdly strong and capable of taking on a lot of enemies on their own or with little backup, and are generally very dangerous early and mid-game but lose steam in the late game when people start to catch up to their might. They can also blood sacrifice, which creates a lot more dominion for them and can suffocate enemies as you stamp out all belief in their gods. In other words, if I do well, this is going to be a short Let's Play.
Above is a picture of a typical Helheim recruitment screen. See those guys on the top? We don't care about any of them except the last two. While all of them (except the first, being a pathetic, ordinary human) possess both stealth and glamour, two very useful traits, the Valkyrie and the Helhirding are where it's at.
This is a valkyrie. As you can see, she is a warrior who flies. Her stats are all above-average (10 is average for a human, except encumbrance, which is how much fatigue you take from actions, and move, the first number of which is how many provinces the unit can move in a turn), which is nice, but the really important bits are those icons below all the numbers. From left to right:
The candelabra means that she is a sacred unit. Sacred units can be blessed, gaining various combat bonuses depending on the magic paths of your pretender god, and also cost less upkeep, which is a nice bonus.
The wings indicate that the unit can fly. Out of combat, this basically means that it isn't affected by terrain and thus can always move up to its maximum move amount, and that they can attack non-adjacent provinces, something grounded units cannot do. In battle, flying units can move right to what they are attacking, instead of having to run across the battlefield, which can really mess up enemy plans, but since Dom3 AI is kind of screwy sometimes backfires horribly.
The cloak and dagger means that the unit is stealthy; stealthy units can move through enemy territory undetected, and can't be found unless the enemy happens to be patrolling the province they're in, which, depending on how stealthy the unit in question is, may require a lot of manpower. Stealthy commanders usually take a penalty if they're leading troops while sneaking, unless the units are also stealthy, like this valkyrie.
Lastly, the weird illusion-man indicates that this unit possesses glamour. Out of battle, this means that the units cannot be detected in their own territory (so, an enemy looking into my land could think that a province is empty, but I could have an army of units with glamour there), and are almost impossible to patrol out in enemy territory. In-battle, this gives them the effects of the spell Mirror Image, making duplicates of them that cut the chance of them being hit to a fraction of what it normally would be. For units without Air magic, it's just one extra image, but those with Air magic get two images per level, which can result in some ridiculously hard to hit units. Glamour fades after the first successful hit, though, so a lucky shot can ruin things for you.
This, meanwhile, is a Helhirding. He is about equal to or stronger than the valkyrie in everything, and, as he is on a horse, has a lot more AP (action points, the second number in move, determines how much you can move and attack and such in a round) than her. However, he cannot fly. Despite this, I will be using these guys more than the valkyries as their increased combat ability makes them generally better for my particular expansion strategy. These guys are pretty awesome.
The rest of the units in the top row, who I didn't cover, aren't particularly interesting. While all of them (except the first one, who is again an ordinary human) possess stealth and glamour, making them far better than the average unit, they are not sacred, and since my strategy here is based on blessed troops, they don't help me much. There are, however, some situations where they may see use; if they come up, I'll include their stats and such in the post. As the Valkyrie and Helhirding can only be recruited at Helheim's capital, I may have to settle for lesser units when recruiting them elsewhere.
Now, that second row of people. Those are commanders. The top row, which we've covered, is of units. Units make up most of your army, but have to be lead by a commander. They also have more limited scripting options. Commanders, meanwhile, lead units, and also do other things like cast spells and stuff. They're more interesting generally, but most need troop support or they'll be overrun by the enemy army in battle. There are, of course, some exceptions. They can also use equipment; in the following images you'll see a row of hand, head, chest, and so on images below the unit stats. This is where equipment is shown when, well, equipped. Equipment can do a lot of things, so I'm just telling you the basics there.
This is a scout. Pretty much every nation gets a scout (except a few, like Jomon, who get ninjas, basically scouts that can assassinate people), although most don't get scouts with glamour. Useful for reconnaissance, although since
all of my commanders, except one, are stealthy and glamour'd, I don't have much reason to recruit these guys over them. He is, however, objectively better than the scouts of pretty much every other nation in this game, so I'm showing him off anyway. Eat it *****es.
Here is the Vanherse. See the above about stealth, glamour, horses, and so on. However, you may notice the little row of symbols below his equipment row. The little cloud with a lightning bolt represents Air magic, which this guy has one level of. As you may expect, it allows him to cast Air magic; it also, as stated above, improves his glamour, so he's even harder to hit. The tiny candelabra, meanwhile, is Holy magic. Most nations only get Holy magic on their priests, although this doesn't affect them too much. Holy magic is mainly for banishing demons and undead, and for improving unit morale. However, it is also for blessing sacred units. So, basically, these guys have better glamour, good combat stats, can cast Air Shield (a spell that makes most arrows miss, which is useful as projectiles aren't affected by glamour), and can bless themselves and their underlings before charging in to murder people. They're awesome. These guys will be my main early-game commanders.
(The little stack of books, meanwhile, is their research ability. Research is # of spell levels + experience +- bonus/penalty +2. Research is needed for discovering new spells and such. These guys won't be spending much time in a lab, though.)
This is a Vanjarl. He's basically a better Vanherse, and the only thing that keeps me from using them over the latter in every case is that they cost more. He has two levels of Air magic instead of one, giving him even more mirror images from glamour, and allowing him to cast Mistform (a spell that dramatically lowers the amount of damage he takes) in addition to Air Shield, plus extra Holy, which won't do much really, although it allows him to sacrifice twice as many blood slaves a turn as an H1 commander, should I decide to do that stuff. He also has a level of Blood magic, indicated by that red pool after the Air. There are some useful Blood spells, but these guys probably won't be making much use of them, at least for their early battles. The question mark, meanwhile, indicates that this guy has a random chance of getting more magic; in this case, a 50% of another level of Blood. As these guys are basically better Vanherses, who are awesome, Vanjarls are even more awesome.
This is a Helkarl. Basically a Vanherse, except with Death magic instead of Air, and better stats. While Death is an awesome path, at level 1 it can't do much, so I won't be using these guys as much as the Vans. They're still awesome, though. Just less so.
Here is the first of Helheim's capital-only commanders, the Dis. She and the following commanders can only be recruited at Helheim's capital, due to the unique magic sites there; the other commanders can be recruited at any Helheim fort, meanwhile. The Dis possesses Air, Death, and Holy magic, and can also fly. This makes her ideal for leading Valkyries, as her description suggests. A Dis and Valkyrie attack squad makes for an awesome raiding party. Like every other Helheim commander, she is awesome.
This is a Hangadrott, a Hanged King. One of the rulers of Helheim, this guy is a badass. Great stats, awesome magic (in addition to what you see there, he also has a 100% chance of getting another level of either Air, Earth, Death, or Blood magic,
and a separate 10% chance of another level, same paths). It is really unfortunate that these guys are so expensive and capital-only, because they are possibly the most awesome of all of Helheim's awesome commanders. Which, as you've seen, is saying something.
The last commander of Helheim, these guys are a bit different. The Svartalf are dwarves, and therefore lack the glamour of their Van allies. However, they are far from useless; in addition to good Earth and Death magic (they also have a 100% chance of getting another path, either in Fire, Air, Earth, or Death, making them Helheim's only native access to Fire magic), they have a rather useful ability in CBM, the mod we're using. The mountain goat is Mountain Survival (lets them move through mountains without a penalty and they sufferr less from low supplies there) and the eye is Darkvision (they can see somewhat in situations where other units would be blind), but neither of these are what we care about. The hammer there is a forging bonus of 25, meaning that, when these guys forge magic items, they use 25% fewer gems, rounded favorably. So, forging a 10 gem item would only use 7, as an example. As CBM makes Dwarven Hammers (a piece of equipment that provides such a bonus) into artifacts, meaning that only one person can get it and not until late into the game, this bonus is a godsend for some of the things I'll have these guys doing. They'll never see combat unless things go
horribly wrong for me, but they are excellent guys nonetheless. Also, as you might have gathered, they're awesome.
So, there's Helheim and all the units that will matter for the early game. If you read all that, well, good job. Anyway, that's it from me for now, at least until we get twenty turns or so into this game. See you then.