Starting setup for LA Ulm

[Aleph]

So I've had a bug in my ear around LA Ulm since Frank Trollman mentioned them as an excellent LA bloodhunting nation in a post of mine. I've tried a couple different starting builds for them but am always frustrated by their high resource costs + the need for an awake/dormant pretender (since you need a blood/death 3 pretender to kick off your vampire count chain), + my own need to have growth for a blood hunting nation. Their bless troops don't mass well, their mages are awful... and yet I keep wanting to give them one more shot. Any advice?

I've had the best luck playing dormant crone with great scales (order 3/growth 2/production3/magic 1/misfortune 2) and b4/d4/e4. What do people who have a clue what they are doing use?

[PvK]

At the _very_ first, just to get started, recruit many of the reasource-cheapest units for earliest expansion (maybe mainly just for the provinces adjacent the capital). IIRC it is the Ranger Crossbowmen who can be recruited so quickly it doesn't matter if they die. Then start to work up to the higher-resource units with longer life expectancy. Secure the provinces adjacent the home province ASAP to get the resources for the better-equipped troops.

PvK

[Shovah32]

For your army mass rangers, use a few indies for meatshield and when you get a good flow of resources into your capitol make a mix of rangers and the guys with greatswords(dont make me spell their name )

[Aleph]

1. Zweihanders over the heavy infantry with tower shields? I'd think the latter has much more survivability in most cases - are the Zweihanders there as super meatshields or to actually do damage?

2. Uses of pikemen? I've seen people talking about them as a counter to giants.

3. Uses of villains besides archer screen for rangers? They are definitely your cheapest unit, but are they worth using?

4. Is my pretender design fairly normal for LA Ulm? I can't really justify the expense of a Vampire Queen given the number of vamps I'll be hoping to throwing around, and I want a mobile pretender just so I can bloodhunt somewhere besides my capital. E4 is for forge (minimizing your need to empower your S2B1 mages in order to get sorc/wiz rings, as well as opening up Thistle Mace production for N enabled Fortune Tellers) and getting someone to kick off boot production for your capital-only priests (since their pitiful E skill is as good a battlemage as you get, I'm looking to boot->earthpower my way into some legions of steel and bladewinds).

5. Finally and here's an issue I've been pondering for a while - is there any consensus at all on what a good blood/gold conversion rate is? For some reason, I've been thinking about MA Abysia's Demonbreds vs. Vampire Counts - which is a better deal for their cost, and which one is actually cheaper? Obviously, Vampire Counts cost more if you're playing Order, as lost revenues from bloodhunting are greater, but I'm still not sure about the basic conversion.

[Meglobob]

I recently played LA Ulm in a MP and I agree that this nation is excellent, it is potentially very, very powerful. Sadly I started on a island with Patala, who rushed and crushed me with elephants by turn 13, so I will probably never find out.

I am of the opinion, that its too hard to have a high bless strategy with this nation. The black templars are just too damn expensive and the other sacred is undead and therefore too easily destroyed. So forget a bless strategy.

I think your design points should be concentrated in good scales and your pretender.

What really got me excited was the astral magic wielding spy who has +20 stealth. This one unit, recruitable from any castle can virtually single handly win you the end game if used correctly and you have the economy to churn loads out.

The other excellent unit, sadly capital only, is the wolf trainer, who only costs 50 gp and can summon 2 free wolves a turn. Unlimited free chaff, excellent for patrolling your provinces well you blood hunt, add bulk to your armies and later on you can buff them up to make them more dangerous in battle.

Then the whole vampire, limitless blood magic going on as well, with immortal vampire SC's to give you one of the best late game defense ever...well wow...really WOW, this is the most powerful Ulm ever...

[Aleph]

Didn't get my pretender right last time, quoting from memory - hag was e2 n2 for boots/mace. Thinking about massing wolfherds instead of earth priests, now am trying

Master Lich
Dormant
Dominion 5
Order Production 3 Growth 2 Magic 1 Misfortune 2
Blood 3 Death 5 (IIRC?)

He's not much more expensive than the Hag if you're going for decent dominion, and his immortality/immunity to afflictions and x3 misc slots will give him some good options in the late game. He's not as good a blood hunter as I would have liked him to be, but he won't be doing that for long.

[Shovah32]

That actually sounds like a nice build but theres one big problem: you have almost no magic versatility other than spectres/rare non-feeble minded tartarian commanders. Without those undead mages all you really have is death, blood and minor astral.

edit: indies are also possibilities but are generally weak or rare.


One thing ive noticed during my tests is the power or rangers. They are great just in a regular army-base precision 12, crossbow adds 2 and with all precision over 10 being doubled they are basically firing precision 18 crossbows. They can also defend themselves against melee troops with low defence(armour isnt too dangerous to them as they have their crossbows, strength 11 and axes) and can be used as raiders commanded by wolfherds and illuminated ones.

[Meglobob]

Aleph said:
He's not as good a blood hunter as I would have liked him to be, but he won't be doing that for long.

You shouldn't really be using your pretender for blood hunting. There are far better things for a pretender to do.

I seem to remember doing my bloodhunting with mages who got blood 1 or so every now and again.

With the wolfherders, I wait till you get 40 wolves then give them all to a indie commander who goes to where your blood hunting and patrols. You quickly amass loads of those armies, a useful reserve in case of trouble and when you are getting hordes of them, just start chucking them in combat as fast as possible. A enemy will kill loads but 10 wolfherders can summon 20 a turn, 20 wolfherders 40 a turn etc...

[PvK]

I think Death magic can get him Spectral Mages (who have some random magic skills) which can (eventually with luck and forged boosters, maybe via Streams from Hades?) get him Unfrozen mages and maybe an Ether Lord.

Zweihanders vs. heavy shield infantry - the shield infantry are the sturdier block, but Zweihanders can do higher damage to penetrate with. I tend to use a few Zweihanders starting behind the main body of shielded troops.

Pikemen are faster to recruit and good for staving off lower-morale troops, so yes they might be a reasonable choice against giants. Better than the shielded heavy infantry, anyway.

Villains? Faster to recruit than the crossbowmen, and usable for light stealthy raiders. Their low morale and protection are major weaknesses though.

[Shovah32]

Villians are inferior to rangers against almost every late era unit(due to shortbows sucking vrs armour). They are also less survivable and worse in close combat.