EA Oceania - Knight of the deep too good?

konming · #1 December 8th, 2007, 04:14 AM

How do you fight EA Oceania as the other two underwater nations - Atlantis and R'lyeh?

With W9S9 bless, it seems those knights of the deep is just unbeatable.

I have seen EA R'lyeh throwing 500+ troops including over 100 mind blasters against less than 100 KotDs. Those 500+ troops managed to kill less than 20 KotDs. Even 20 KotDs easily defeated an ancient kraken combat SC.

Being Atlantis, there is no better luck either. No troop in their arsenal can touch (literally) those knights.

KotD is only 85 gold, recruits everywhere, and easily blessed with bishop fishes, and kills any and everything twice, three times, or five time the cost.

Summons? Low level summons are no good at all. Even level 9 abominations get killed easily. Attack spell? There seem to be no good attack spells underwater, against W9S9 KotDs anyway.

So how do you combat EA oceanias and their nicely blessed KotDs?

Jazzepi · #2 December 8th, 2007, 04:17 AM

Are they aquatic only? If so, then combating a good bless for them is probably not something you have to worry about. If you're playing that nation, and you spend a whole lot of resources setting up a double bless for units that you can only use underwater, you're shooting yourself in the foot for the mid-late game when you'll be completely unable to get onto land. Your scales will be middling/poor, and your sacreds will only be usable in the water.

Basically if those units are aquatic, as I think they are, nobody is going to use the double bless strat.

Jazzepi

konming · #3 December 8th, 2007, 04:40 AM

Well, that mid-late game weakness is no help for the other two EA aqua nations. I do not see a way how either can survive for more than a few turns against those knights. Even by some miracle, those two nations survived to mid game, I still cannot find any reasonable counter to those knights.

In any case, EA oceania poses little threat to land nations until late game, but kills aqua nation really fast.

Is there anyway an EA aqua nation may survive against EA oceania?

Digress · #4 December 8th, 2007, 07:23 AM

I agree with Jazzepi.

When you are playing Oceania your focus has to be on getting out of the water and then building up armies on land. Basing your strategy on double blessed Knights seems a little foolish.

Its very easy to find yourself stuck in the ocean for too long and find yourself in a position where you don't have much influence on the outcome of the larger game (most of which is decided above the waves).

This is a game that provides no rewards for coming second.

Sombre · #5 December 8th, 2007, 07:27 AM

It's a pretty well known issue that in EA a competent Oceania will beat a competent Rlyeh, a competent Rlyeh will beat a competent Atlantis and Atlantis will,.. uh,.. die horribly unless it's the only aquatic nation.

EA Oceania is supposed to be the shizzle underwater. Thus their UW only sacreds are among the best in the game and well worth a strong bless to get a really strong start, killing off indies and other UW nations with relative ease.

Of course an expert Rlyeh player can beat a newbie Oceania player in EA.

Zeldor · #6 December 8th, 2007, 10:18 AM

But those Knights can go on land with items, yep?

llamabeast · #7 December 8th, 2007, 10:22 AM

Nope. There aren't actually any items which allow aquatic creatures onto land, surprisingly.

B0rsuk · #8 December 8th, 2007, 10:24 AM

One thing : strong early game often translates into strong middle, or even late game. In fact, if you know in advance that you're going to face both R'lyeh and Atlantis, it may be worth it to use even double bless. You're going to conquer two 30 000 population provinces and two strong magic sites, 6-5 gems/month each depending on era.

Salamander8 · #9 December 13th, 2007, 05:52 PM

I was EA R'Lyeh in Evermore next to Atul's EA Oceania, and it was far uglier than I would have guessed (I still have not done many MP games as of yet).

I'm not naysaying you here Sombre, I am instead agreeing with you, but why is it like this?:

Quote:

EA Oceania is supposed to be the shizzle underwater.

A game as complex and variable as D3 can't expect balance in all things, but having 1 of 3 water nations clearly better then the other 2 (and having 1 of those clearly better than the other) seems off. EA R'Lyeh is one of my personal favorite nations to play, but the sound thrashing that EA Oceania gave me, and this was after I pulled almost every mobile caster off research and hurled all my 2ndry force and home units at the multi-blessed knights, was terrible. My main force was way out west when he attacked, but I had at least 1 or 2 Mind Lords and several Aboleths with freespawns and other built melee troops to hold a line and it was quite one-sided. Those knights just screamed across the battlefield and none (or almost none) of my mind blasts or enslaves, or even my water-gem equipped shark summoners helped.

Having the aquatic only sacreds may not help in the mid-late game, but it sure as heck is rough for the other water folks early. I had a very similiar land experience vs DR P's multi-blessed giants in sophistry as Arco. Even with several casters and lots of national troops, it was a slaughter (of Arco by Niefelheim).

Baalz said:

Quote:

Don't like to think how things would have played out if I'd started next to you....

Oh, it wasn't pretty. We (EA R'Lyeh) started really close to Atul's EA Oceania and even with an awake (if immobile) pretender to manufacture freespawn and give myself a research boost, it went badly. I'm still pretty green, but man was that ugly.