Iron Dragons=Uber Unit ??

[Hawkmoon]

I have been playing almost non-stop with the occasional break for work, sleep, family and food but me and my friends have a gentleman's agreement to not use Iron Dragons. Are these units insanely powerful? I mean for the measely price of 25 Earth Gems you get a nearly unstoppable killing machine...what am I missing? Is there a chink that I'm not exploiting here? Are they easily killable with a few item combos? Help us out so we can add this untit back into our games please....

[Nerfix]

Their magic resistance suX0Rs rear-end. Never ever neglet the power of magic resistance... or lack of it. A 3-Astral mage can kill an ID, or even worse, make it change sides. A lucky punk with 1-Death magic can give ID a death sentence.

[Hawkmoon]

What spells are you specifically talking about ? I apologize for the newbishness here but we need help...what spells kill ID or allow you to take control ?

[Pocus]

you should not ban a creature, at least try to comes with a solution, there is always at least one

For example against iron dragon, check all spells wich ask for a MR save. An example : If you play Jotunheim, have your mages cast disintegrate, with a spell focus for further MR breaching. If you compare what you must invest compared to what cost a dragon (20 gems ok, but researching to level 9 in construction too), then you will see that it is not as desequilibrated at you might think.

Check also spells which hamper move, like the various vine, entangle and bond spells (nature, fire, air, ...). They will stop in their track a creature for one round. In the meantime, some units can hammer at them.
There is also blindness, which will reduce the attack and defence too zero. Ok attack wont be important, because they trample (so I dont think the stat is used), but having a defence of 0 will mean that your troops will be able to kill them rather easily.

Just some ideas, but there is more.

[Sammual]

Other than Vine Ogres Iron Dragons give the best 'bang for the buck'. The only thing they don't have is a very high Magic Resistance.

Control is your best bet. I gem per cast and it has almost a 50% chance to take over an ID.

Arcane Domination seems to take control of about 25% of attacking Iron Dragons per cast.

Casting a spell that will kill off all the attacking mages causes the Iron Draons to fall apart (Bone Grinding, Fire Storm, Acid Storm, Rain of Stones, Astral Tempest, Heat from Hell, Grip of Winter).


Unraveling destroys almost half of the Iron Dragons per cast.

Master Enslave gets you about 25% of attacking Iron Dragons per cast (Plus most of the units with low MR) but does enough fatigue to kill most mages.

Personally I try to have more IDs than whoever I am fighting, If I don't I just cast Control a lot.
These suggestions only help if you know that you will be facing the IDs.

Sammual

[NTJedi]

Iron Dragons????

They're only good and banning them from a game is way overboard.

There are other spells just as powerful if not more powerful !
examples:
Ghost Riders = Army of Longdead Horsemen for 5 death gems
THUS 25 gems same price as your Iron Dragon... you have 5 of those armies which could easily do TONZ MORE damage then any one iron dragon !!

Wild Hunt = Global Enchantment which sends one enemy priests by himself every turn to fight a powerful nature assassin plus army of strong wolves. Much better assassin then any Iron Dragon could even wish to be.


these are just two examples !

[ December 23, 2003, 22:05: Message edited by: NTJedi ]