But do you really like SC in dominions2 ?

[Graeme Dice]

Saber Cherry said:
Quite the opposite. SCs are cheap and easily replacable (Bane Lord, Tartarian, etc) if you have the magic levels to create them.

A bane lord has to have extremely expensive equipment that at least triples his cost in order to make him able to stand up to elite national troops. He'll need a luck pendant, antimagic amulet, starshine skull cap, wraith sword, flying boots, and a jade armour at the very least. Even then, a lucky set of 50 barbarians or so can take them out from time to time.

As for rushing - of course you have to rush, to get the best (unique or limited) SCs, and double-rush if you want to make them invincible with unique artifacts too.

Very few of the artifacts are worth using on SCs. The weapons are only worthwhile if you also have a blood thorn or can cast soul vortex and have a regeneration source. The armours are too heavy for anything that isn't undead and very beefy. The shields are very good.

Otherwise you're left summoning weak fallen angels because all of the ice devils and arch devils are taken.

The devil commanders from hordes from hell would almost certainly be a better use of your blood slaves.

I like to play single player because AIs don't use SCs, and the game is more fun and strategically + tactically interesting if I have to use real armies instead of just moving my SCs around without even bothering to check what's in the target provinces, because the outcome is assured.

Well, that's to be expected if you're playing against the AI. You simply cannot send SCs into a battle unsupported after a certain point in the game, as they will be taken down by an appropriately constructed army or ghostriders.

If making each SC took resources similar to a huge national army, that would be OK.

Should the battlefield affecting spells also take similar amounts of resources then? Wrathful skies is far more effective at destroying a huge national army than even the most expensively equipped bane lord ever would be.

But they simply don't, and have huge advantages in mobility, supply usage, and upkeep on top of that.

Armies have their own advantages, they can be far more numerous in number than the amount of SCs that your opponent can put out. If you have a dozen armies, he needs more than a dozen bane lords, and that gets extremely expensive.