The Bogarus Problem

Malarkey · #1 August 1st, 2008, 08:39 PM

Recently, I've been trying out the cool, cool nation of Bogarus. Thematically, they are great, but choosing the right Pretender design is pretty tricky. Initially, I went with a Rainbow build in order to take cover all of Bog's summons. I ended up trying out all of those national summons and I'm not that impressed with any of the ones that I have to go out of my way to cast. None of the National Water summons are that good and the Leshy is a pretty good thug only in a forest.

Bogarus' military is generally horrible, so another inclination of mine was to go Sloth 3, but I actually think their heavy cavalry is pretty good and if I did that, I'd have no military whatsoever.

I'd definitely go Cold 3 and Growth 3.

Much of my newest round of strategy involves finding all of my high income provinces, setting them to 200% tax, then patrolling in them with the Simargl, which are pretty good patrollers. Also finding all of my higher pop provinces and blood hunting in them while patrolling them as well. I guess I'll god Blood on my Pretender because of this.

What are everyone's thoughts on Chassis/Magicks? I might still go for Nature 4 or 5 for the Leshy. Probably go Blood a little bit. Any suggestions?

Edit: Oh and I'd been going Dormant or Imprisoned, but I've heard most Bogs dont do that for lack of a strong army. Thoughts?

K · #2 August 1st, 2008, 08:51 PM

Bogarus is the greatest magic nation in the game. In terms of pure research, they can bust out research faster than anyone. Ever.

That being said, the cav is indeed their only good unit. I found that my initial "province taker" armies actually consisted of two smiters and some Cav.

In general, I'd go Forge Lord with W4/F4 so he can make super cheap Elemental staves and fire items, good scales, and then focus on powerful magery (imprisoned, dom8,Ord3,Prod3,Cold3,Gr3,Mis2,Mag1).

Ming · #3 August 2nd, 2008, 02:26 AM

Malarkay,

Many people are of the opinion that Bogarus need an awake god to help early expansion. PoD is not a bad choice.

Add A1 for air shield since high damage missiles are common in LA.

Bogarus has excellent site searchers and so should have high gem income but only E1 available in its recruitable mages. So E2 for your pretender is worthy of consideration to get dwarven hammer through earth boots. This should leave enough design points for a high dominion and good scales.

Don't rely too much on Bogarus' national troops as they are generally inferior to those of other nations. Use your awake pretender to hold off any early invasion and research battle magic quickly.

Renojustin · #4 August 2nd, 2008, 02:44 AM

Not only do you need an awake pretender for expansion, but Bogarus is also on the shortlist of Nations To Rush. I just took them out pretty quickly; would have had their capital at turn 7 if I didn't make a mistake, but had it at turn 9 anyway.

An awake pretender is necessary for Bogarus's survival in the early game so that you actually have a chance to use their awesome magic powers later. Otherwise, they simply have nothing - NOTHING that can stop an early rush by any dunce with a dual bless.

K · #5 August 2nd, 2008, 04:10 PM

Quote:

Renojustin said:
Not only do you need an awake pretender for expansion, but Bogarus is also on the shortlist of Nations To Rush. I just took them out pretty quickly; would have had their capital at turn 7 if I didn't make a mistake, but had it at turn 9 anyway.

An awake pretender is necessary for Bogarus's survival in the early game so that you actually have a chance to use their awesome magic powers later. Otherwise, they simply have nothing - NOTHING that can stop an early rush by any dunce with a dual bless.

There aren't many nations that can survive a turn 6 Dual Bless rush even with an awake god. I wouldn't be married to that strategy.

JimMorrison · #6 August 2nd, 2008, 04:29 PM

One might almost say "there aren't many awake gods that can survive a turn 6 dual-bless rush".

I don't think really the point is to insure you can always "handily defeat" your most likely rushers. But rather, to have a strategy and setup that will hopefully hurt them and slow them down enough, to deter them from screwing their entire game by hitting the speed-bump of your nation.

Renojustin · #7 August 2nd, 2008, 04:48 PM

Yeah man, at least give yourself a chance. You KNOW that someone is going to come after you... imo you're really going to have to prepare for that somehow and an awake pretender is the only way.

cleveland · #8 August 4th, 2008, 02:15 PM

Starets have a 2.5% chance at F3. After recruiting them for 20 turns, you've got a solid 40% chance of landing one...about the same time you're accessing Flaming Arrows. Voi archers are 8g...

DonCorazon · #9 August 4th, 2008, 02:26 PM

Relying on archer strategies is dangerous though as about the time you pull off flaming arrows and the F3 mage your foes might also be getting arrow fend, mist, staff of storms / storm, darkness...

But it is something to consider depending on who you're fighting. Just seems like archers have a large number of counters as opposed to something like darkness, for example, which is pretty tricky to deal with.

cleveland · #10 August 4th, 2008, 02:55 PM

Agreed, particularly in LA. I personally wouldn't bother recruiting a single Voi archer until an F3 shows up. But when it did, I'd immediately puke out as many Voi as possible and rant/rave about my devastating ability to rain down fiery death. At worst, it'd force my opponents to develop Arrow Fend, Mist, Staff of Storms, Storm, Darkness, instead of something they'd rather be researching...at the cost of, what, $500 gold? Certainly better spent than on the rest of the crap they've got.