Ulm vs New Era

[PrinzMegaherz]

From the first looks, NE is quite superior to Ulm.

Lets do a quick comparison:
Battle:
Grove Guards are very strong against Ulm. Trampling makes ulmish steel worthless and allows the Grove Guard to kill multiple enemies in one battle turn, while Ulm's HI will have a hard time wounding a grove guard. Arbalestes do damage, but trampling often brings the grove guards in the middle of the enemy, so the arbalestes will hit friend and foe alike. Grove Guards are strong enough (str 17, damage 9 axe) to hurt the ulmish knights.

Magic:
Ulm is better in research due to their smiths immunity against drain scale. You can build 2 smiths for one pan. However, NE has higher paths available, and the pans are capable of producing the items needed to boost those (earth boots, thistle mace). Ulm has no means to boost its fire magic. In addition, nature magic seems to be more helpfull for a nation that uses huge amounts of troops than fire.

Forging:
While Smiths have a forge bonus, the range of things they can actually forge is quite small. In addition, Ulm lacks commanders worth equipping. On the other hand, NE has everything to make their Grove Guards excellent fighters: Ring of regeneration, Black Steel Armor, Midget Smasher, Boots of the messenger and the cauldron. Especially regeneration is usefull for those high hp grove guards.

Stealth:
NE has some stealthy troops, although they are inferior tho those of other stealth nations.

Holy:
Both nations suck.

Scales:
Order 3 Productivity 3 is recommendet for both nations. Ulm has some more points to spend because of the drain 3.

What did I miss? Maybe the more experienced players could point out a few things in Ulm's favour.

[ August 05, 2004, 23:16: Message edited by: PrinzMegaherz ]