Helheim - lets burn some rubber

[Baalz]

Originally Posted by Loren

I've been trying to play with this and the strategy makes no sense. I have yet to get a start where I have the resources needed to produce the indicated troops early on.

Originally Posted by Baalz

With this blessing you’re going to be able to expand against moderate to weak indies using just a single Helkarl with a single Helhirding and a half dozen huskarls.....After the first two turns you’re going to switch to fielding an expansion party every other turn, alternating with recruiting a dwarf.

Hmmm, the troops I list here cost a total of 84 resources if you recruit everything from scratch, so you should be able to field one every other turn with your capital only resources...but you start out with enough infantry for two of these squads so you shouldn't really have trouble fielding exactly what I suggest. Also, everything I suggest is of necessity a rough suggestion that you'll have to modify in light of how a particular game is going - it's not the end of the world if you have to skip a turn sending out an expansion party. You are going to have to skip the tougher ones, combine expansion parties to attack the slightly tougher oens and you're going to take some total losses. That's Ok, this isn't a recipe for an uber fast expansion, just a decent one. In a theoretic best case scenario with each of those expansion parties conquering one province per turn you're looking at over 50 provinces by the end of year one. Don't aim that high, you'll never make it! Be more modest in your targets, skipping some, pulling some of your armies together, don't worry if you lose a couple, etc. and you should be able to maintain a respectable if not blistering initial expansion until you're ready to start burning rubber.

Also, perhaps I didn't make it clear, but literally going straight for constr-8 then conj-9 is kind of a perfect ideal that you aim for and can hope for if all the stars line up, but realistically it's seldom going to play out perfectly. After constr-4 when your research starts really ramping up it's a pretty quick sidetrack to pick up alt-3, which in combination with constr-4 and the suggested bless (of which 1 point of regen is a critical feature) gives you thugs easily able to handle the harder indies you skipped over initially. If you're then pressed into an early war (or decide to pursue one yourself) I'd also recommend swinging over and picking up cloud trapeze before the full court press to Tartarians. Constr-4 + alt-3 + ench-4 should give you the muscle to fight it out through mid game, those blessed, buffed & equipped vanjarls are pretty tough. If you're really getting pressed by somebody who is laying down solid thug counters you'll obviously have to reroute your research to more urgent goals, but just a touch more alt research and you're throwing down destruction, you've got strength of giants, legions of steel then weapons of sharpness in your planned research path so your glamoured infantry starts being a pretty darned tough more standard army, and your Helhirdlings start looking like some *serious* 0 enc heavy cavalry.