AAR: Multi-Player After Action Report (Now Discussing Turns up to 13-16)

[Shardphoenix]

Originally Posted by LDiCesare

[i]Minotaur lords aren't really good fighters, but they have some hit points.

You seriously underestimate their berserk potential. Give him a flesheater axe (for +3 berserk and magic weapon), a lycanthropos amulet - and you`ve got some serious anti-thug force: high attack, VERY high damage, high HP, regen, some natural armor (from berserk) and gives enemy a chest wound. Oh, also immune to awe/fear/seduction. Caelian Eagle Kings aren`t going to like this.
I mean, look at this (additional HPs are from Gift of Health):

[LDiCesare]

Sure : For 10 gems or so, you have a MR 11 thug who dies to 1 thunderstrike. Against 1 mage + chaff, he's going to kill some of the chaff and then get paralysed/soul slain/mind controlled or otherwise magically fried.
The +3 berserk and magic weapon also matters little when you end up trampling most of your opponents, so the strength and attack boost become irrelevant unless you are facing opponents of the same size or bigger.
A fort-turn is better spent buying a dryad most of the time, or a Pan, unless there is no lab or temple in the fort.
Also, a sleeper will be less effective against thugs, but more so against human-sized troops, and comes with a magic weapon for 8 gems, along with having 4 more MR and better leadership, which make him actually suited to fight mages and lead magical troops and shoot arrows from whichever bow you prefer.
Also, lycanthropos amulets eventually turn your units into werewolves, so this build is efficient for a really short period of time and only against a limited set of opponents.
So, yes, what you describe is a very strong thug against size 3 thugs that don't have chaff shields and can't cast MR-negating or AN-damage spells. It is very situational, and I still doubt I would ever want one instead of a mage.

[Immaculate]

Arcosephalae
Turn Three: Every Breath You Take

As alluded to by Roland in the Helheim AAR, I did indeed get hit with a bad event on my capital, though not nearly as bad as his.



Ultimately it leads to a substantial decrease in my income for the turn and I am forced to reduce taxes to 50% to compensate. Oh well… at least I didn’t lose nearly as much as he did. And… I do have slight misfortune scales so this sort of stuff is bound to happen sometimes.



The battle against the barbarians goes much better. My ‘decoy’ scripting works nicely and I don’t lose a single unit. It doesn’t hurt that they fail their morale checks very early.

As a result, our capital has access to much more resources and I am able to expand the recruitment queue.



I also recruit a single barbarian commander from our new province. I’ll use him to help ferry chariots around very soon.



I also order an assault by our initial expansion party upon the province south of the one we just took.

There are many more barbarians here so I don’t believe we will do as well as we did with this turn’s battles. As it turns out, I will not be disappointed.

[Shardphoenix]

Originally Posted by LDiCesare

Sure : For 10 gems or so, you have a MR 11 thug who dies to 1 thunderstrike.

Show me 10n-gem thug who doesn`t die to 1 thunderstrike.
And Pan should roll in N gems.

Against 1 mage + chaff

Just like a bane. Only bane gets dust2dust instead of soulslain.

The +3 berserk and magic weapon also matters little when you end up trampling most of your opponents,

Most thugs are at least size 3. All ponymen nations, Caelum, giants, banelords...

A fort-turn is better spent buying a dryad most of the time, or a Pan, unless there is no lab or temple in the fort.

Yes, but not if Eagle Kings come knocking.

Also, a sleeper will be less effective against thugs, but more so against human-sized troops

Against common humans you have common minotaurs - just trample them into dust. Also centaur archers. And revelers.

Also, lycanthropos amulets eventually turn your units into werewolves

So what? Werewolf is weaker - but he also has his uses (assuming, your minotaur lives long enough to be turned into one - thug life expectancy is rather short)

So, yes, what you describe is a very strong thug against size 3 thugs that don't have chaff shields

Yes.

and can't cast MR-negating or AN-damage spells.

No. 29 HP is enough to live through couple AN spells, unless it`s soulslay-grade.

[Roland Jones]

Turn IV: Catching up



Okay, nothing happened (for me) this turn besides these two battles. This is it, let's see if I'm doomed already.




Heck yes, won both of them. Few casualties in the second one, but it was probably just some cheap human troops. Let's see how it went down.



Finn's rematch first. Starts the same way as the last battle, except this time I had accidentally scripted the Helhirding to "Hold and attack" rather than "Guard Commander", so he rushed ahead before Finn was done casting. Wound up not getting him killed or anything though, so it's fine.



He did take a few hits for his stupidity, but he deserved that. Anyway, Finn and his minion clean up the rest of the jerks who drove them away last time with no real trouble.

Let's check out the other battle now.



Okay, this one's set up a bit more dynamically. Sir Slicer, the *******, is set up in the back, to bless himself and... Well, he has Death magic rather than Air, so he doesn't have much to do, for himself or his soldiers. Meanwhile, the serf warriors are set up in the front, where they will hold for a few turns before moving in, while the huskarlar are set to the side and a ways back, but will move in to attack immediately.

There's actually several reasons for this setup. The serfs are generally weaker, but they have shields at least, so they can block some arrows, and since they're in the front, the enemies will target them first; since the enemy AI doesn't change targets for its shooting unless engaged in melee or the target routs/dies, they will keep shooting at these guys even as the more valuable and huskarlar get closer and ready to murder them. The huskarlar, being set to the side and further back, meanwhile, will hit the enemy in the side, theoretically, and will actually reach the enemy at about the same time as the serfs, who start further ahead but don't move at first, resulting in my entire army hitting them at once without the more valuable units having taken damage yet. Sr Slicer, meanwhile, is on a horse, and therefore moves a lot faster than the little men walking around, so he'll get there at about the same time too.



Here's the enemy, meanwhile. Mounted archers. They can attack in melee, but they won't unless engaged directly, since they're primarily archers. I was expecting a melee portion to this battle, since I wasn't that familiar with the Horse Tribe and didn't know I'd meet an entirely ranged regiment here, but fortunately my plan holds up regardless.



And here we see my plan working. The archers are firing at the serfs even as the huskarlar come in for them. Meanwhile, Sir Slicer cast a low-level Death spell after blessing himself; Frighten lowers the morale of a few enemy troops. Nothing big, but it could help a little, and it's one more turn he's busy instead of rushing forward on his horse; if he were the first person to meet the enemy, he might be in trouble, and the commander dying means the army automatically routs.



Anyway, my positioning and scripting worked out mostly well here; huskarlar and serfs hit the Horse Tribe at almost the same time, and while Sir Slicer wound up behind some other units and unable to attack at first, he also reached the battle at the same time at least. In melee, the Horse Tribe has trouble striking my glamoured troops, while the huskarlar stab at them and their horses with impunity.



Unfortunately for the serfs, they are not protected by glamour, and barely protected by their crappy armor, so they take some casualties and damage from the tribe's weapons.



After several of them take various wounds, they break, leaving Sir Slicer and the huskarlar to fight. By this point, their running makes little difference in this battle, but unfortunately if they retreat they'll move to other provinces, meaning they won't be with this army for the same strategy this turn. My arrow fodder is running away.



As said, their absence makes no difference; the huskarlar and their Helkarl finish off most of the remaining Horse Tribe with ease, and the rest flee. Rather quickly, at that; they get off the battlefield before the serfs do, meaning that, while they ran away, the serfs end up staying with the army anyway. Score.



Aw yeah, look at that. Not one, but two provinces in a turn. I'm now making enough money to... Pay upkeep for my army. Yeah, with my capitol still at zero percent tax to get rid of the unrest, I really am not making much money. Had enough to get two more Helhirdings, at least, which are what Finn is moving back to the capitol for; he only has one minion at the moment, and it got a chest wound from the failed battle. Meanwhile, Sir Slicer and his army are still moving forward; as the serfs didn't flee, I can use the same strategy for the next battle, and the province they're moving to is full of Ichtyids, fishmen who are rather weak; I could have probably taken this province with only the Huskarlar and Sir Slicer, really. Serfs being there to take the focus off of the real units basically dooms the poor fishmen.

Sir Slicer has also made the Hall of Fame, but the ability he got isn't nearly as nice; he merely got Heroic Precision, which makes him more likely to hit things. Not detrimental, but compared to Finn becoming the Energizer Bunny it's kind of a letdown. Oh well.

Something really nice, in addition to getting land, is that both of them had magic sites on them. While most sites that you can see without searching aren't very good, they can be useful.



The Ichtysatyr Village is a site that, despite seeming to do a lot, is rather simple, really. I get a Nature gem from it every turn, which is nice, and it lets me recruit some units I normally couldn't; Merman Captains are amphibious commanders, meaning that they can lead troops under water or above it, while Ichtysatyrs are weird shapeshifting fishmen (as as in, they have mermaid-like lower bodies underwater, not that they're fishlike humanoids like the Ichytids up there) who take the form of satyrs on land, are stealthy underwater, and recuperate from injuries. Kind of neat, but ultimately not that useful for me; as much as I'd like to get into the ocean, R'lyeh can kill these guys without any trouble, although if I claimed an ocean province before his pretender or army arrived, I could possibly demand that he leave it to me or effectively declare war on me, giving me an excuse to punt his scaly butt back into the ocean wherever I find it on land. I'll consider it.

This site also produces a small amount of resources a turn, which isn't too great here since there isn't much I want from this place; however, since it's adjacent to my capitol, and forts draw income and resources from the surrounding provinces, it helps make my capitol more productive. Not bad.



The Shambler Reef is a recruitment province like the village, but it's far less interesting. No gems or resources, just allows me to recruit Shamblers from this province. Shamblers are large Atlantians who wear no armor, and aren't really that great. Could be useful for taking an ocean province, but in the long run I'm not getting much from having them.

Anyway, I know what you all really want to see: Graphs. Let's look at graphs.



Province graph, heck yes. I am back in the game. Fomoria and Abysia also gained two provinces this turn, tying them with R'lyeh who's gained one since the start, but this puts me equal with Arcoscephale, Marverni, and Pangaea, and ahead of Caelum.



Income is... Less exciting. I'm making money again, but hardly any. I'm still behind even Arcoscephale after whatever the heck crashed their economy there. I really need to get my capitol up and running again.



Army size, meanwhile. I'm at the bottom, but that doesn't matter at all since I rely on a few elite units rather than massed militia. Abysia seems to have suffered a huge loss here, but this is actually them gaining and then losing that mercenary band of sixty militia, i.e. some of the worst units in the game; checking the mercenary screen confirms this, as those guys aren't listed there anymore. For those players who didn't know, mercenaries also show up in your army graph; this is also why Marverni is just behind Pangaea in units despite all the freespawn Pan gets.

Other than that, there isn't much of interest here. R'lyeh got a huge boost but they have access to Lobo Guards, some of the cheapest units in the game, so he probably bought a lot of them. More interesting is Caelum; they've had a steady boost there, one that's increasing by the exact same amount each turn. Since my first turn, I only got three units, and the slope there is greater than that of Caelum's line... He's only recruiting one unit a turn? Maybe; since he also expanded, but kept his research going, either he expanded with his starting army and didn't lose any units (unlikely, Caelian military is some of the worst in the game, which is unfortunate for people like me, who like Caelum), or he switched from researching with his god to researching with whatever he hired first turn while the god took a province and the starting army continued patrolling his capitol so he could afford the singular unit he's recruiting: Eagle Kings. These guys are 400 gold each, which is quite a bit of money. They're definitely worth it, but recruiting them from the start is a painfully expensive strategy, and as we can see, one that limits your ability to expand quite a bit.

Anyway, that's turn four. Catching up to everyone else and horribly abusing the graphs even more; while I love using them, I think anyone who argues against them can, instead of formulating an argument for why they're bad, simply point to my posts here and say, "Because they let you do that". And I'm just starting here.

Next turn: Stomping on fishmen.

-------

Bonus: Scales analysis.

So, you may have heard some of us talking about "scales". You may be wondering what the heck the big deal is. Well, scales are the effects your pretender's dominion has on the surrounding environment; they're called scales because, well, that's how they're represented in pretender creation, a set of scales that can be weighed one way or the other.



Here's a sample set of scales, what's on my capitol this turn. You can also see what scales an individual province has by looking in the upper-left corner of the screen while on the map; the more of an individual icon there is, the stronger the effect of that scale there. The side that is weighted down is the dominant scale in this case, with the left side being the good one in all but one case (where both sides are bad and balance is good), and the right one being pretty bad for you. So, as you have probably gathered, my scales are downright toxic. Let's look at them in more detail, top to bottom.

Order versus Turmoil: The first scale, represented on the map screen as a dove and crossed swords, respectively. Order increases the amount of income in a province and decreases the number of random events there, while Turmoil makes the province less profitable and causes more things, good and bad, to occur. Order also unlocks a number of positive events, while Turmoil has a mix of good and bad ones it enables. (The scales of a province determine what events can happen there; you won't have an event where snowfall impedes trade in a province with Heat scales, for example.)

Production versus Sloth: Represented on the map screen by a hammer and a sawing log (ooh, a visual joke). Production increases the income of a province slightly and really increases the resources there (resources are a non-monetary aspect to unit creation, generally used in units that need heavy armor and weapons; resources aren't saved from turn to turn and are specific to their province, instead of shared across your kingdom like gold, so a low-resource province will never be able to make a ton of heavily-armored knights), while Sloth decreases both. Interestingly, this is the only scale that doesn't affect events at all; it only changes income and resources.

Tangent, CBM (the mod we're using) adjusts the Order and Production scales a bit, decreasing the income from the former and increasing it on the latter, making them more equal since, in the vanilla game, Sloth 3 was taken by almost every nation that didn't have really heavy units. This is, in my opinion, a really terrible change, as it ends up making Order barely more profitable than Production when it's supposed to be the scale about money, and enables a formerly-risky strategy of combining Turmoil and Luck scales, hoping to get a lot of good events to make up for the income loss, because now you're not losing that much income, especially if you take Production as well. Some people have said "well Order also brings good events", which is true, but it also makes events less likely, and it doesn't affect whether the events that happen are positive or negative, just that there are more positive ones if you're lucky in the 50:50 chance the event will be good. Personally, I like how a mod from SA handles it: The income from both scales is the same as vanilla Dom3, but Production and Sloth affect how many resources you get a lot more; Sloth 2 in it decreases your available resources by more than vanilla Sloth 3. If you take full Sloth scales in this mod, then unless all your units have a resource cost of 1 you will have trouble massing anything for an army. Instead of devaluing Order, it increases the value of Production and makes Sloth 3, the strategy CBM is trying to battle and that I took anyway, a lot harsher to do.

Anyway, tangent over. Back to scales analysis.

Heat versus Cold: Represented by a sun and a snowflake, this scale is actually negative both ways; a balanced temperature is best for most nations, although some prefer more extreme climates. The further you are from your preferred temperature, in either direction, the less income and supplies you get; a nation that prefers Heat 2 and is in a Cold 1 province would get the same penalty as a nation that prefers neutral temperatures in Heat or Cold 3. This scale can also fluctuate based on the season, so many people take it at one past their preferred scale for extra points without a huge impact on their income. Helheim prefers Cold 1, by the way. Another interesting thing about this scale is that, when a province has three levels of it either way, all units in it take more fatigue in battle unless they're resistant to the appropriate element (so fire for Heat and frost for Cold).

Growth versus Death: Represented by a shaft of wheat and a skull. The former slightly increases income, greatly increases supplies (basically what keeps units in that province fed; if they don't have enough they will starve, then get diseased, which is bad), and slowly increases the population of that province over time, which makes it more profitable. Death, meanwhile, it a very dangerous scale that decreases all those things, slowly killing your population and unlocking a lot of bad events (and one good one, strangely enough; Growth meanwhile is mostly good but has a few bad events, including one that is almost game-endingly nasty depending on where it happens). So, of course, I took Death 3.

Luck versus Misfortune: Represented by a four-leaf clover and a wilted clover. Both of these scales make events more likely, in the same way Turmoil does. However, Luck increases the base chance of the event that happens being good, while Misfortune makes bad events more likely; normally it's an even chance either way when an event happens. They also, predictably, open up a lot of new events, with all the Luck ones being good, and the Misfortune ones being some of the worst events in the game, especially when combined with Death or Drain. After taking Misfortune 2 in my first multiplayer game, I vowed to never touch it again; my Luck scales are neutral here.

Magic versus Drain: Represented by a purple sphere and a gray one. Magic increases the effectiveness of researching, while Drain decreases it; notably, since it affects it by .5 per scale, which is then rounded up, people who want the research bonus can just take Magic 1, while those in need of points may as well take Drain 2 since it doesn't affect your research more than 1 does. They also affect the difficulty of casting battlemagic in their province; in Magic scales, casting uses less fatigue and affects targets more easily, while in Drain it's harder to cast and people are more resistant to its effects.

The scales I took, by the way, are Order 3, Sloth 3, Cold 3, Death 3, and Drain 2. These are very bad scales. My dominion is a place where the life and energy is drained out of everything and almost nothing happens. Sounds like a land of the dead, alright. Why would I take such bad scales? Well, as I said, when creating your god, you have a certain number of points, which can be spent on increasing the strength of its dominion, its magical ability, and your scales, with good scales costing points (except in the case of temperature, where, again, moving either way counts as "bad", even if it takes you to your preferred temperature; this is pretty cool for nations like Abysia and Caelum, who like extreme temperatures) and bad scales getting you points. As you may have guessed, I got a lot of points from taking these scales. This allowed me to make a pretty powerful god, although at a big cost. Of course, Helheim's a pretty powerful nation, so I can overcome these (mostly self-imposed) difficulties. Hopefully.

[Bluemage142]

This Sunday, a Marverni double feature. Turns 3 and 4, in one post!

Try and hold the applause. Yes, all two of you.

Turn 3:



Here's what I see when I start my turn. Another Prophet (probably a recruited commander- maybe a priest, to try for Holy 4), a random event, a battle, and a message that makes me grin. See, if I got a magic item, that probably means I won the battle, which means things aren't yet failing on my usual scale.



The event was actually good, too! 200 gold isn't much- there are 1500 and 3000-gold events, if memory serves me right- but for somebody with Misfortune 1? Nice.



Look at that ratio. 53 troops and 3 commanders down, for eight of my (expendable) troops? I'll take that any/every day of the week. More on the battle in a bit.




This is the magic item I found, and it's a bit of a mixed bag. It's cursed, so my prophet is really easy to permanently cripple- and I can't take it off. On the other hand, it's a weapon that boosts my defense, curses guys it hits, ignores armor, and counts as magic (so it can hit ethereal enemies, which normal attacks miss 75% of the time). To top it off, it's on a guy I'm not trying to get into melee. On the whole, I'll call it a slight gain.



Here's the battle. On the left, my guys. That's my group of BCs up front, javelins behind and above them, and amazons behind and below. Behind that are two commanders. My prophet is the guy in the middle of the javelineers- look for the red shield.
On the other side, some bog-standard undead. The brownish ones are ghouls, and the green ones are soulless- basically zombies. The soulless can't have their morale broken, and the ghouls are really darn motivated (morale 18, to my 10-13), so the only way I'd win this is to kill them before they rout me.



Strength buff goes off as planned, and the amazons kill a handful of ghouls in one volley. They have 11 HP, for reference. You can see that each arrow is either crippling or outright killing a ghoul, which I like.



Volley of javelins at close range. More damage, but less accurate.



We've closed to melee now, and things are inconclusive- a few hits here and there. One of my Carnutes went berserk, which you can't see right now, because I was too focused on the effects of Banishment. Those are a lot of damage numbers!
Figure that that hit at least nine zombies, all of them taking 25-75% of their life in damage. VERY effective.



Another round, and you can see what a javelin barrage and melee attack did to the ghouls. Also, note the Carnute BC with the 12 over him, a row back from the front line. That's a one-hit kill from friendly fire, there. If it had hit anybody IMPORTANT, I'd be sad, but this is Marverni. None of my melee combatants are important.

The rest of the undead die in a few boring rounds of melee.



See that? That is R'lyeh's pretender god. Unescorted. Last turn, I guessed that he'd taken a Kraken, and here it is. An easy call to make, since most underwater units are total suck, but it's always nice to be right. Now, to my plans!



No new mercs, and Abysia recruited the militia I saw last turn. Were they hungry? Low on charcoal? Who knows?



Another Gutuater, a pile of BCs, and some slingers to round out my purchases. This is more than I got last turn- my new province at work- but a FRACTION of what I'll be recruiting ten turns from now.



My first Gut goes into the lab, and I set him researching Thaumaturgy. Usually I go for Alteration or evocation right off, but this is Marverni. Thaum gives me two things I want- most of the site-searching spells, and the ability to force my Carnutes to go berserk. Thaum1 will give me a limited amount of it, and Thaum2 gives me an area berserk and the search spells, so I can get to what I need quickly, before moving over to Alt or Evo. Four turns to Thaum1, and two more to Thaum2.

(Useful, but berserking requires one more component- Nature gems. Not something that'll be an 'I win' button for every battle.)

Scout moving to the next province over, army moving over to where the scout was (20 militia/heavy infantry? Slaughter), mage researching. Fairly obvious.

I also sent a message to R'lyeh, basically saying that I wasn't going to attack him, and asking him to stick to the seas for now. R'lyeh needs time to consolidate before it pushes up onto land, so I suspect jotwebe will agree for the time being. Sadly, I forgot to screenshot the message, so he'll have to show you all.



This is interesting. Notice the bright green line, and how it went flat? That's Pangaea's research. This, combined with grabbing two provinces this turn, tells me he has an awake combat pretender with magic. Turn 1, he had it researching, and then he sent it out to fight on Turn 2, once he knew what the neightbor provinces looked like.



Income tells us a lot, too. Helheim isn't doing well, at all- no new provinces and no more income (no income at all- 103 unrest shuts you down cold). I'm steady, R'lyeh gained a bit from his new province, and everybody else made a classic move. That spike-and-drop their incomes did tells me that they all increased their tax rates on Turn 1, so they could get a bit more gold on Turn 2. The cost of that is unrest, which either forces lower taxes, or forces you to use your units to patrol the province and restore order.

You can see that Abysia and Fomoria dropped back down to my level this turn- I suspect that they used patrollers. Arcoscephale... didn't. That, or they got hit with an event, too.

(Also, notice how my graph barely moved. A cookie if you can see the problem with that.)

The other reason why I won't be buying many commanders from my forts, by the way, is that I can just get them from my provinces! They aren't as good, but think of it this way: I'm trading a bit of inconvenience for another mage every time I buy independent commanders instead of Marverni ones. Mages win the mid- and late-game. It's an investment.

On to Turn 4!

Turn 4:



Three messages, all possibly good or bad. Let's look at them.



So R'lyeh wants me to know he has a kraken near me. He's also a bit dramatic. That's fine with me. Next!



More free money! I'll take that!



Kill ratios are still nice. Let's take a look at that.



You know what? No. Let's not take a look at that. We're fighting Militia and Heavy Infantry.




These guys. This is basically five decent soldiers, three commanders, and a bunch of javelin decoys. Nothing more to see here, though I am running low on BCs. Let's fix that.



See what I mean about volume? That's 40 barechests, and I'm not NEARLY at full production yet! I'll be able to turn out over 100 a turn, just from this fort alone- think of what you could do with that many attacks!



Rehiring my archers, because they've been awesome. Mercenaries only stay with you for three turns; you have to renew your contract, if you want to keep them. Thing is, each pound of gold you offer is worth twice as much when rehiring mercs, so 50 gold from me is equal to the 100 gold other people would have to put in. I, of course, will be paying a good bit more than that.



Province graph. Helheim is recovering- two provinces a turn is good work. Caelum has been lacking in success, R'lyeh is leading because of its first-turn attack, and Pan hit a wall. Maybe he's stocking up on Maenads.

I haven't gained much income, but Arco and Helheim are rebounding. Caelum seems to be in a bit of a slump. Wonder why?



That funny-colored line there is Pan, Abysia, and Helheim all finding magic sites that give gems. They're probably coming across the low-level sites- level 0 sites can be found by any commander. Nothing to worry about yet.

Caelum is still research-happy, Arco, Fomoria, and I are all building up, and Pan has totally stopped research. Pans are expensive, so this suggests he's putting gold into other things- a fort, maybe, or temples. Maybe just building combat commanders.

Pan is getting ridiculous dominion, as is R'lyeh. I'd say that the temple idea is fairly possible, given that. R'lyeh is just expanding into the water and the beach provinces- well, that and his pretender probably has maxed-out dominion. A classic move.

Pan's cheap troops and freespawn are SLIGHTLY more numerous than my cheap troops. R'lyeh is probably getting some freespawn, but most of that is cheap underwater guys.



Sending my guys back for BC reinforcements. You can't see that I just bought two independent commanders in my non-capital provinces; these guys will be my second expansion party. The kraken left, and my scout is heading west, where my first party is headed.

[Corinthian]

Excellent updates from both Marverni and Helheim. Just a few small notes about graphs and other things.

The graphs work slightly different than what people looking at them might think. Mainly the dominion graph and the army graph. You actually get 5 points on the graph for every province with your dominion in it + 1 point per candle. This means that nations with awake expansion pretenders that touch close to many provinces looks like they have bigger dominion than they really do. This is especially true if you are a octopus circling the world.

The second strange graph is the army graph witch gives you size-1*unit(?) points. This means that a giant (size4) count as 3 size 2 humans on the graphs. A big fomorian giant (size6) count as 5 humans. Size 1 units gives 1/2 points I think.

Also, I hate undead provinces. Because they never have much population in them. I think they have base type *0.4 pop. So you never get much of any gold from them. They are reasonably easy to beat if you bring a prophet, but you are usually better of attacking another more useful province.

[LDiCesare]

Originally Posted by Shardphoenix

Show me 10n-gem thug who doesn`t die to 1 thunderstrike.
And Pan should roll in N gems.

5 N + 5 blood slaves in your example. So with 2 magic paths, any A thug is lightning immune.

Just like a bane. Only bane gets dust2dust instead of soulslain.

NO. Bane: MR = 15. Minotaur: MR = 11. That's four point difference, and this is huge. Banes are much more survivable than this. Andd what size are they, btw?

Most thugs are at least size 3. All ponymen nations, Caelum, giants, banelords...

Not banes, though. And jaguar warriors, warriors of the 5 elements, mechanical men... are all size 2 and slaughter the aforementioned minotaur easily.

Yes, but not if Eagle Kings come knocking.

Eagle Kings = Thunder strike, so your minotaur is fried in this case.

No. 29 HP is enough to live through couple AN spells, unless it`s soulslay-grade.

Thunder strike? 26+, AN, usually cast by caelian high kings who are Air 4. Check. And it's Evo 4, so same level as the Cons 4 items required for this build.

The build you describe may have its uses, namely sending it solo against a solo thug who is not a Caelian High King (who would fry it in 1 or 2 of the thunderstrikes he is scripted to cast anyway).

By the way, since you gave the example of a Bane, a (4 gems + 1 turn of summoning) bane beats this (5 gems + 5 slaves + 40 gold + upkeep + 2 turns of forging + 1 turn of recruiting + 1 turn blood hunting) minotaur.
So, it certainly is very situational and probably not worth mentioning unless you face someone sending in solo thugs (it could be a good counter to Helheim for instance, but there are others).

[jotwebe]

R'lyeh - Turn 4

Turn 4 starts with good news (some earth gems in R'lyeh) and bad news (brigands in the Sea of Carassos increase unrest). The Sea of Carassos is the province Yöt-Webbogoth conquered last turn.



Yöt-Webbogoth continues on its rampage and subdues the northern sea of Baptizer. Barely pausing, it continues east, now accompanied by the pudgy prophet Nyarlathothep.

They're going up against a province with shark knights next. I don't want one of those bypassing the big guy and skewering the prophet. So I'm having him sneak -- the kraken does not need the smite support. The extra temple check is more important.

In addition the good and the bad news, there's also great news:



Auluudh crawls out of whatever repulsive lair he had kept himself secluded. He has slightly more magic picks than my regular mind lords and twice as many "enslave mind" attacks. Oh, and he gets fear, which the regular version doesn't have.

Note from the future/present: it's a bit strange, but more recently I've looked at him, and he had only one enslave mind attack instead of the normal two or the four he used to have. He's also properly amphibious instead of both amphibious and aquatic at once. Here's a picture of him from the future/present:



So the best way to use him is on the front. He immediately is drafted and marches (well, slithers) off to the south-east of R'lyeh at the front of the several lumbering slave trolls, a score of downtrodden atlanteans and tritons, the same number of imbecile lobo guard and almost a dozen mindblasting giboleths and gibodais. Their target: Moon Sea, a province held by one of the powerful Amber Clans.

In other news:



Maverni sends greetings. They're located on the north coast, off the Sea of Carassos. I send a reply which the aboleths have censored for some reason. Maybe Bluemage142 will leak it...

Note from the future/present: looks like he did. Excellent. Although I can't see it -- is imgur not working for you guys, too?

So far the gameplay. Instead of graph analysis, for those who like, another little story. Feel free to skip.

***

The city was in ruins, motionless under glittering schools of cod. The kelp had not yet claimed the broken buildings and tumbled towers. Nithü the Slave Mage drifted with the current, dispassionate as his eyes roamed over the destruction.

Scavenging crabs scuttled away as he passed them. A small shark circled him at a distance, just out of sight in the murky green waters of the northern seas. But Nithü had senses other than sight to guide him. There... one tower still stood.

With a measured kick of his tail, the merman propelled himself closer. It was strange, coming home like this.

Like all triton towers, the court mage's tower had its entrance at the top. Nithü let himself sink down to the flagstones. The door had been warded with certain sigils of the aquatic school. Their power had bled away with time, Nithü knew. A week ago the tower would have been hidden by the strange currents the sigils conjured.

He knew who would wait within.

The merman thumped the iron-shod tip of his staff against the door. Shod with the iron of R'lyeh, not with the mage-crafted amber he would once have carried.

"Lagash!" he called. "The kraken is long gone. It is safe to come out."

For time, Nithü waited and followed the shark's distant circles with his mind.

"Lagash!" he called again. "What are you waiting for?"

His new powers told him of a presence just behind the door. Just as he pulled back his staff for another strike, it opened a crack.

"Nithü?" a querulous voice asked. "Nithü! It is you! It is a miracle."

The slave mage studied his former teacher critically. Lagash, the court mage of the Northern Kingdom, now little resembled the well-groomed figure he had once been. His hair and beard were still green, but hung lank and bedraggled, and the wrinkled robe was in a state the triton mage would once have never accepted. He blinked in the comparative brightness.

"Nithü. When you were lost, we thought you were gone forever. Did you escape? Did the kraken attack the aboleths, too? If so, we must travel to the Southern Kingdom at once! Old grievances must drift away, we have the opportunity--"

"We have nothing," Nithü cut him off. "The Northern Kingdom lies in ruins around you, old man. The Southern Kingdom is about to fall as we speak: R'lyeh was not destroyed, but awoken. And I, I did not escape. No, Lagash, I now serve the God of Near and Close. The things I know now... you triton mages are like children. I have more power as a slave in R'lyeh than I would ever have had here in the Northern Kingdom."

"But you would have been free!" the triton quavered.

"I would have been a merman, and never the equal of you noble tritons with your precious royal lineage. Now I know the true shape of things... now... why am I even talking to you? You are an irrelevance. Leave the tower, swear fealty to the Kraken God, and you may have a future. You can run, but the sea is a circle, and R'lyeh lies at the beginning and the end."

"Run? Swear fealty? I have had enough of hiding!" Suddenly the ancient mage's eyes blaze fierce and wild. He throws wide his arms, robe swirling in the water, and shouts a word of power. A shockwave of water strikes the younger mage and whirls him against the tower's breastwork.

Nithü brandishes his own staff to answer in kind, but before he can complete the gesture, another strike flattens him against the flagstones. Blood billows from his smashed nose. As he tries to rise, the water strikes a third time.

The old triton glides up to his former student. "Now you will die like the traitor you are, merman scum! And then we will see about your masters." He pulls back his staff of hardened amber for the coup de grace. Behind him a shape appears out of the green murk, and is gone just as quickly, leaving behind a cloud of blood.

Lagash stares at the stump of his arm. The shark strikes again, taking a leg this time. Two more passes, and the triton is no more.

Nithü gets up slowly, using his iron-tipped staff to keep his balance. He knows the shark will come again, and turns to face the beast. Now it is Nithü's turn to shout a word in the language of shark-kind, which is to say it is not truly a sound. But the shark slows, passes the merman by. Its empty black eye seems to glare.

The shark turns in a lazy circle and makes for the merman again. Now the mage calls the abyss between the stars into his eyes and locks his gaze with the predator. Shark-kind has lived a long time, unchanged, not least because it knows which is prey and which is not. It knows the mark of R'lyeh, and knows better than to tresspass.

After a moment Nithü swam over to where his teacher's amber staff had come to rest. He picked it up: it would have some value to his new masters. Then he decided differently, and with a silent spell broke the staff in two. He tossed the pieces over the breastwork, where they would rest among the tumbled stones at the tower's base.

Then he sent a thought along the astral ley lines, informing the aboleth council of a new source of water gems in the Sea Untamed.

[Immaculate]

I like "the sea is a circle with r'leyh at the beginning and the end" very poetic.