Going Underwater

[PhilD]

Originally posted by Tough Guy:
I have items that let me breathe underwater but I cannot bring troops with me. What else do I need?

My mages have no water magic at all.

I'm not an expert, but I believe the main ways into the sea are:

* Water magic; some water summons are amphibious, notably the Sea Trolls (Conj 6)

* Air magic and construction.

* Death summons: most undead are poor amphibians.

If you have access to none of the above, you'll have a hard time conquering anything underwater.

[Endoperez]

Originally posted by Tough Guy:

* Water magic; some water summons are amphibious, notably the Sea Trolls (Conj 6)

* Air magic and construction.

* Death summons: most undead are poor amphibians.

Also, a SC capable of going underwater. He propably won't be able to cast spells, though, as tritons fly. But you need water for most items letting you breath underwater.

Then there are the few units that can be recruited on land and can go underwater. Tritons and whatever the fishmen are called. But that was mentioned already.

[ April 03, 2004, 19:37: Message edited by: Endoperez ]

[Psitticine]

One particular spell, Thetis' Blessing, lets everybody into the pool. It's a good thing, unless you are Atlantis or R'lyeh, that is.

[PhilD]

Originally posted by Psitticine:
One particular spell, Thetis' Blessing, lets everybody into the pool. It's a good thing, unless you are Atlantis or R'lyeh, that is.

Yeah, nice try, but this one requires a high Water magic (5), and is Enchantment 9 (from the Online Grimoire). Not exactly a quick way into the water... plus, if you've got the Water mage for it, you should be able to conjure a few Sea Kings, who are quite good (with their many friends) at conquering indie underwater provinces.

[Psitticine]

Oops, forgot about the requirements of this particular problem! No water magic and fast . . . sorry about that!

Continuing the brief digression, however , there are (to me, at least) advantages to being able to take everybody, including all the armies you've already cleaned up the land with, into the water when you take the plunge. Summons are great, no question there, but I like to bring all the lads into the game.

A lot of that is just my play style, really. I tend to keep the aquatic nations at the bottom of my list of targets until I've solidly locked up the land under my control. I find two-front wars are hard enough without making one front above and one front below the water! I also don't bother with indie underwater provinces when playing as a land race because I can't defend them the way I'd like.

[Saxon]

Linked to the underwater question, does anyone have any good hints on how to take out tritons and keep going? Between their flying and the poison, I find that they deal a lot of damage to my troops and occasionally rout them if they get to the commanders. If I run into two or three provinces in a row, it is tough to go through. To me, they are some of the toughest independents. Ok, the dark vines are a pain and so are knights, but the tritons seem more common.

[Scott Hebert]

What I've found is that Tritons are a 2-edged sword. They're _very_ good at routing enemy troops (because of flying and generally high casualty counts), but they're susceptible to the same problems. Generally, when I'm going into a Triton province, I have my commanders in the middle of my troops, and try to bring in a good number more than the report says are in the province. Tritons have very little protection, so it's normally a bloodbath on all sides. Your major task is to break them without breaking yourself. To do that, anything that lowers their morale (Fear) and anything that raises yours (Priests, Standards) are useful.

Just some basic stuff, but generally useful.