attempt for a mid-lategame strategic protection guide(domes). info needed :)

[Boron]

ok here what this guide should be about :
first methods to attack lategame without having a distance of only 3 or less provinces difference between you and your opponents capitol ( this difference you could fly ) .

lategame powerful overland spells become available . you need to protect somehow against this . if you spread your mages over several provinces , ok . but this way they are still vulnerable against e.g. seeking arrows .


i list possible forms of overland attacks , if i missed an important one plz name it and describe why . here we go :

early game :
- seeking arrows (very good RoI against pythium and other physical fragile but expensive mages , while almost worthless against jotunheim , pangenea and the like )
- call of the winds/wilds ( easy to protect against , most pd's of 5 defeat already call of the winds , most pd's of 15-20 call of the wilds ; a castle in the target province will give you enough time until moving in reinforcements normally )

midgame ( i only list additional methods , you still can attack with seeking arrow etc ) :

- fires from afar ( can be cast early game already but because it targets 10+ targets and needs 10 fire gems i think you get the best RoI out of that spell midgame )
- wind ride ( because of 10 air gems needed and 5A needed to cast and large beings + powerful earthmages have good odds that this spell does no damage to them very limited use . with good scouting in special circumstances though it should be devastating : from sunrays spell info :

Wind Ride : commanders with earth magic of 4 or more, size 6 or ethereal are not affected.

.
so catching an enemy rainbow pretender with this spell are probably your best invested 10 air gems ever
- teleporting spells : i list all because they are similiar :
cloud trapeze , teleport , astral travel (lategame) , faery trod (only forests) .
iirc you can get teleport via a unique artifact too .

they are very scary but as long as you still control all 5-6 provinces sourrounding you at least for the watchful ermor player it should be easy to defend midgame , for everyone else lategame : as ermor just send some hundred freespawns midgame and some legions freespawns lategame on patrol province . this way you should always reach the 50 turn battle limit . because of nowhere to retreat after 50 turns even the strongest sc will be dead hehe

- blood spells : send lesser horror / horde from hell . if i understand send lesser horror correct (have never used it myself) it should work like ghost riders . so a castle will do .
horde from hell though is like call of wild , if you win the battle , the remaining troops are under you control . per horde from hell you get 1 devil + 25 imps iirc .
given the imps poor morale even against 2-3 simultaneous hordes from hell when you are owner of a stronger pd ( jotun , ulm , abysia ) because of morale routing imps you have good odds to defend with something like 25 pd .

lategame :
-ghost riders
ghost riders are the king of this kind of spells with the highest RoI in this class .
33 longdead horsemen + 1 riding wraithlord are already enough to win against most pd's .
lategame they are very easy to masscast for everyone . ctis + ermor have a natural advantage here they should excel at this spell most .
-send horror
look at my description for send lesser horror in midgame section . simply replaces the lesser horror by a horror .
-earth attack
like an assasination attempt . by the time available it should be pretty unscary for sc's + pretenders . only weaker mages will still be in trouble . so some will still be in trouble but many will give the elemental a good fight , especially these with the ability to summon lots of fodder garbage like death mages . d4 mages can kill earth elementals pretty easy according to a post from norfleet by life drain .
-manifestation
an ashen angel makes an assasination attempt on an enemy leader chosen by himself . horror marked leaders are more likely to be chosen .
there is a chance that the ashen angel doesn't chose an enemy leader than the caster will be the assasination target ( never tried the spell myself , spell description vague , my description is what i think is done . if this is wrong please post and i will fix it then ).
like with the earth attack the ashen angel is no match for an enemy sc . if your caster of manifestation is horror marked he will be the target of the ashen angel very likely .
-phantasmal attack ( have never tested this spell myself)
but according to description it should work like ghost riders .
i assume that the 25+ phantasmal warriors have the same stats as those gained through the combat spell . so against pd with magical weapons ( abysia + caelum come to my mind ) they will surely do poor . a castle let's run the spell into the void .
-flames from the sky
i think this is the scariest overland spell of all . hard to defend against .

i think this are all strategic war spells .
perhaps i missed 1-2 .
in the next post i will try to cover protection strategies against the strategic war spells in general .

edit : included manifestation spell

[ July 31, 2004, 17:42: Message edited by: Boron ]

[Boron]

summary :
5 types of strategical attack spells :

type 1 : ghost rider type .

an independent army attacks the chosen province .
after the battle the independent warriors disappear no matter if you won or lost .

type 2 : troops under own command type .

your troops attack the chosen province . this can be either summons ( call of the wind etc. ) or your own troops ( teleport / astral travel ) .
if you win you are either sieging the province or you take over control when there is no castle . if you loose your whole army is annilihated if you don't have at least one direct neighbor province to your chosen attack province .

type 3 : damage spells type

you inflict damage on one or more randomly chosen targets in the chosen province via damage spells ( seeking arrow etc. ) .

type 4 : assasination attempt spells

only 2 such spells come to my mind , manifestation and earth attack . they are for many nations not main research priority so by the time you get these 2 spells 1/3 - 1/2 of the possible targets will already be sc's / strong battle mages with guards . against these your assasinators have bad odds .
the other 2/3 - 1/2 of possible targets are priests or researchers which are kinda cheap (50-150 gold class ) .
so in general these spells have a very bad RoI .
but no rule without exemption :
if you know that there is only one leader in the province on which you want to send the assasinator ( e.g. a sc ) you can perhaps send several earth attacks on that province .
hp are only restored after all battles .
so perhaps 2 earth attacks are just enough to kill the target .
but in general teleporting in your own sc or attacking with ghost riders gives you higher better results for less gems .

type 5 : the various kill population / increase unrest / create misfortune / create gold loss rituals

examples are blight , tidal wave and the like .
all in all under this type fall about 10-15 battle spells . some are available early game , some midgame and some lategame .
all have in common that they "only" do damage on the province , but not on the units in the province .
for blood hunters they can be a real problem though .
i mentioned them only for the sake of completeness but they are no important part of my guide .

[Boron]

part 3 shall cover protection strategies against the mentioned spells / tactics .

here i need some information first though :
3 main questions :

number 1 :
-afaik you can stack several ghost rider attacks . they are all resolved in one battle together . is this correct ?

-if you mix different spells from the same type are they still resolved as one battle ?
example :
sending 2 ghost riders + 1 send horror in the same province .
how many battles are the result of this example ?

-if you mix several different summon spells where you are the leader of the troops :
e.g. 2 hordes from hell + 2 call of the wilds .
how many battles are the result of this example ?

-if you mix several summon spells like horde from hell with indep summon spells like ghostriders .
how many battles are there the result ?

-if you mix ghost riders with horde from hell with teleported in sc ?
how many battles are here the result ?

if more than 1 battle is the result of my above mentioned questions then please write the order of the battles too in your answers .


main question number 2 :

how do domes work exactly ?

- can you have several domes of the same kind on 1 province ?
like 5 domes of solid air on your capitol

if answer is no then i will continue with further questions concerning domes .
if the answer is yes to this question then this is surprisingly simple . but i strongly doubt the answer is yes .

- main question number 3 :
which spells can target underwater provinces ?
focus on the damage spells like flames from the sky . if you have time then list all type 1-4 spells i mentioned in my part 1 of the guide which can be targeted on underwater provinces too .

thank you for your help in advance . hopefully i will finish my guide tomorrow then if no riddles are left .

edit : added main question number 3

[ July 31, 2004, 17:41: Message edited by: Boron ]

[Taqwus]

Independent summons ("Special Monsters") will cheerfully attack and slaughter any non-special-monsters that you teleport or summon into an enemy province. If memory serves, they may then disappear and not actually attack the province owners, but it's been a while. All Special Monsters will work together, IIRC, while same-side summons and teleports will work together.

Domes can be stacked, although IIRC the developers have stated that only one dome of each type is checked per incoming spell, so the stacking is just for insurance.

Versus underwater: check the spell manual. The usual cheapies Fires from Afar and Seeking Arrow will not work. Horrors, Ghost Riders, Earth elementals, Imprint Souls, however, will.

[Boron]

Originally posted by Taqwus:
Independent summons ("Special Monsters") will cheerfully attack and slaughter any non-special-monsters that you teleport or summon into an enemy province. If memory serves, they may then disappear and not actually attack the province owners, but it's been a while. All Special Monsters will work together, IIRC, while same-side summons and teleports will work together.

Domes can be stacked, although IIRC the developers have stated that only one dome of each type is checked per incoming spell, so the stacking is just for insurance.

Versus underwater: check the spell manual. The usual cheapies Fires from Afar and Seeking Arrow will not work. Horrors, Ghost Riders, Earth elementals, Imprint Souls, however, will.

thnx taquus . that's almost all information needed to make the Last part of my guide .

only 4 small futher clarifications :
1. the send (lesser) horror spells :
this means a (lesser) horror just targets the pd or ?
2.you left out flames from the sky .
i assume this can't target underwater too .
3.can any of the spells which work underwater too attack more than 1 mage protected via castle ?
4.which dome is checked first ?
percentages do not stack right ?

example : 2 domes .
1 air dome
1 nature dome

the air dome has 80% stopping chance
the nature dome 30% stopping chance

which one is checked first ?
they do not stack that would be nonsense right ?

finally can they block every spell from otherwise ?
what is when someone teleports into a dome protected province ?
does it block ghost riders and so on too ?
what is the result for the caster of e.g. ghost riders against a dome province ?
does he lose the gems and gets a message and no result ?
is he informed if he passed through a dome ?

and is a good dome destroying strat casting lots of cheap spells like seeking arrows and then after that the killer spells like flames from the sky ?

if i have clear answers on these questions and no new ones come to my mind then i will finish my protection guide

[archaeolept]

1.a lesser horror would still attack the PD, if that's all there was there outside of a castle.

2.really don't think flames fromt he sky will target underwater.

3.murdering winter could, i believe, but is not very effective against castles.

4.I believe domes are checked in the order in which they were cast. and, yes, a dome will interfere w/ your own teleport attempts into the province, though not out of.

[ July 31, 2004, 20:09: Message edited by: archaeolept ]

[Sheap]

1. the send (lesser) horror spells :
this means a (lesser) horror just targets the pd or ?

It attacks just as any other army would. The only difference is that it completes its attack right after the rituals phase, and disappears before movement.

2.you left out flames from the sky.
i assume this can't target underwater too.

Correct. Most spells like this can neither target nor be launched from underwater.

3.can any of the spells which work underwater too attack more than 1 mage protected via castle ?

No.

percentages do not stack right ?

By stack you mean:
Percentages add, i.e. Dome of Air + Forest Dome results in 110%. But by "stack" what everyone else usually means is: Each dome is checked in turn.

Domes of different types stack according to the common description. Domes of the same type don't, but I heard a rumor that they still could if cast by different mages. You can have more than one dome of the same type in a province and the extras will be there as insurance in case the first one breaks.

4.which dome is checked first ?

I would like an answer to this myself. The best would to check the "boobytrap" domes (i.e. Dome of Flaming Death) first, THEN check the "protection" domes. But I don't know if it is in the order they are cast, some random or at least nonobvious order, or what.

[Boron]

thnx sheap and archaeolept .

only a few questions now left :

i myself forgot that murdering winter . given the casting cost of 30 water gems murdering winter is probably even stronger than flames from the sky (only 20 fire gems) .

i want to figure out how to protect my researchers/forgers best .

the spell description of murdering winter / flames from the sky says it targets 50% of the enemy army in the province .
if you have in lategame 30 researchers/forgers in a province in a castle does this mean that 15 of them are attacked ?

i couldn't test that out unfortunately and sandboxing that will take too much time
but i think at least norfleet has tried this out in praxis already :
if you cast 4-5 murdering winters or flames from the sky in one turn on the main forging province of the enemy with no domes there :
because damage only heals once per turn and each of the spells targets about 50% of the units in the target province i think if you have 80 researchers / forgers in your capitol and they get hit by my suggested 4-5 murdering winters or flames from the sky at least 75 of the 80 will be dead .

can anyone please share their praxis expierience on that ?
lategame with either 200 astral income via clams or especially as machaka 50-100 firegem income via fever fetishes 4-5 flames from the sky / murdering winters should be an easy task .


other main question :
can every dome be cast everywhere ? above and underwater ?

then some domes according to the description only Last for a short while .
e.g. the dome of arcane warding .
it says if you put more gems in it the longer it will Last .
what is the exact effect of each extra astral pearl invested in it ?

finally is there a way to figure out how many domes are currently protecting your own province ? you get a pentagrammsymbol for provinces with domes in it but any further info ?

is there a earth/death dome spell ?

what happens if you want to teleport into an enemy province which is protected via dome(s) ?
do you lose the gems for teleport or even lose the sc you wanted to teleport in ?


finally i put up a small model for discuss :
lets assume you cast :
1.a dome of solid air (80%)
2.a dome of arcane warding (50%)
3.a frost dome (30%)
then repeat.

so now only 7% of the spells should come through that wall .
furthermore if .e.g the dome of solid air gets destroyed because you have repeated the process then the next spell will again have to come through the above listed 3 domes or `? just which dome is first can change .

you could further decrease the success probability by casting a forest dome to 4,9% .

the problem though :
a seeking arrow needs 3 air gems the cheapest spell overland spell which comes to my mind at the moment. the only domes with good values are the blood + air dome . the blood dome results according to the description in horror attacks so a most likely too heavy price paid .
so in average i think a dome of air only Lasts 3-4 turns before penetrated .

this makes things difficult . do you get info by spies if a dome is protecting a province ?

if you only cast 10 arcane domes every 3-4th spell will come through . so you are still vulnerable to flames from the sky fire .
if you cast in addition my above mentioned pattern you will reduce the total penetration odds to 7% or 4,9% but pay not 20 air gems but about 50-60 gems in total.

so while you made yourself quite save from flames from the sky / murdering winter only bombing the clever attacker should be able to destroy your domes much cheaper with seeking arrows and other cheap similiar spells .
he still can include 2-3 flames from the sky / murdering winter in the end of his penetration strat .

your answers are crucial

especially when my dome model is quite correct AND 4-5 murdering winters kill surely 90-95% of e.g. 80 researching/forging mages e.g. gathered in your ryleh underwater capitol with castle (and 90-95% of normal hp troops with 10-30 hps ) then i will come to the conclusion that you can't protect yourself by stocking 90% your mages for forging/researching/summoning in one underwater province with several domes lategame .

[Boron]

small addenda :

caelum is 100% cold immune .

so if caelum would stock all their researchers/forgers underwater in one province what would then be ?

cold immune means immune to any spell from the water school . because murdering winter seems to be the only mass unit kill spell which can be cast underwater should the caelum mages then suffer no damage by murdering winter because they are 100% cold immune ?

[Sheap]

I think what happens (based on reading forums not experience) is that all the spells which target "half the army" will all hit the same half of the army. So you can lose at most half your mages per turn.