good races for/against newbies.

[magnate]

Turin said:
If you are happy with that Jotunheim style, I´d use a e9n9 earth mother. Niefel giants with that bless are hard to counter if you aren´t familiar with the magic system.

Hmmm. I'd go with a W9N9 Son of Niefel, since most battles do not last long enough for the reinvigoration of the earth blessing to matter to troops (and Jotunheim has no sacred mages except the Neifel Jarl who's really a combat dude and is super expensive), and I'd take +4 def and double attacks over +4 prot any day.

I think this would be quite good if you're not bothered too much about magic, since the Son is a pretty decent fighter himself (and teamed with a Neifel Jarl prophet you have a pair of good army leaders). In fact, one of my opponents is playing exactly this setup in our current game.

It all depends *which* sneaky magic strategy your toughest opponent has gone for. I guess you'll find out ....

CC

[Turin]

magnate said:

Hmmm. I'd go with a W9N9 Son of Niefel, since most battles do not last long enough for the reinvigoration of the earth blessing to matter to troops (and Jotunheim has no sacred mages except the Neifel Jarl who's really a combat dude and is super expensive), and I'd take +4 def and double attacks over +4 prot any day.

You don´t get double attacks with the quickness blessing, it´s only 1,5 attacks. A dual9 son of niefel is 50 points more expensive.
Fatigue matters greatly for troops. If the battle lasts only 5 rounds, those niefels will have accumulated 20 fatigue, which means they get -2 to attack/defense and opponents have a chance to deal armorpiercing attacks.
And protection is far more important for niefels than defense. the ~ 20 protection/no fatigue they get with e9 means that they are practically immune to normal troops.

Just try both blessings and see which fares better vs lvl 7 indies.

[magnate]

Wow - I didn't know that fatigue lowered defence! I mean I did, but I thought it had to be over 50 or something. That makes earth blessing *much* better than I thought (oddly leaving air blessing as the only really crappy one).

I've seen posted elsewhere on this board that W9 blessing gets you only 50% extra tactical move but does in fact get you double attacks, not 3/2. I don't know how to test that though.

Anyway, thanks for the heads-up about fatigue. Blimey ...

CC

[quantum_mechani]

magnate said:
(oddly leaving air blessing as the only really crappy one).

Air 9 is not terribly useful, but lower blesses have there uses. Death's is almost as weak as air, and blood is on average the worst.

[magnate]

quantum_mechani said:
Air 9 is not terribly useful, but lower blesses have there uses. Death's is almost as weak as air, and blood is on average the worst.

Ooh I so disagree! +2 str is awesome for any mass-produced troops. Can change a miss into a hit and a hit into a kill. I've never used Blood 9, but I presume the Blood Vengeance works like the spell, ie any unit attacking the blessed unit has to make an MR check or take its own damage! That should be handy too. No, I like blood blessing on the whole.

I also like death blessing - ok so the fear effect has small radius, but its combined effect from lots of blessed troops results in *much* earlier routs than you get otherwise. Ok so it's not useful vs. mindless or undead, but then what's new. I can at least agree with you about the D9 Death Curse blessing, that really doesn't strike me as worth the cost (though I guess it might work for undead Ermor themes with masses of free sacred units - I've never tried).

By contrast the 20% air shield of A4 is imho the least useful of the level 4 blessings (now I'm told how important reinvigoration is). I'd much rather have Fear (-3) on all my units.

Anyway, back to Turin ... I checked some battles and I can't see any penalty to def (or anything else), even on an SC with over 70 fatigue after buffing. Are you sure there are penalties? Is there a table somewhere? There's nothing in the manual addenda. Is it supposed to be visible on the unit stats in combat? Is it just def which is reduced? Please tell me more ...

CC

[quantum_mechani]

magnate said:

Ooh I so disagree! +2 str is awesome for any mass-produced troops. Can change a miss into a hit and a hit into a kill. I've never used Blood 9, but I presume the Blood Vengeance works like the spell, ie any unit attacking the blessed unit has to make an MR check or take its own damage! That should be handy too. No, I like blood blessing on the whole.

I also like death blessing - ok so the fear effect has small radius, but its combined effect from lots of blessed troops results in *much* earlier routs than you get otherwise. Ok so it's not useful vs. mindless or undead, but then what's new. I can at least agree with you about the D9 Death Curse blessing, that really doesn't strike me as worth the cost (though I guess it might work for undead Ermor themes with masses of free sacred units - I've never tried).

By contrast the 20% air shield of A4 is imho the least useful of the level 4 blessings (now I'm told how important reinvigoration is). I'd much rather have Fear (-3) on all my units.

+2 strength is nice, but so is the air shield, it can save you a ton of casualties for low armour sacreds (or heavies vs. crossbows). Really, none of the level 4+ blesses suck, but there is wide variation in the power of level nines. And blood does not have the blood vengeance effect, it has the death curse you are associating with death. Death has a rarely useful level 9 effect that gives you a weak souless warrior when a a sacred unit dies.

[Turin]

magnate said:


Anyway, back to Turin ... I checked some battles and I can't see any penalty to def (or anything else), even on an SC with over 70 fatigue after buffing. Are you sure there are penalties? Is there a table somewhere? There's nothing in the manual addenda. Is it supposed to be visible on the unit stats in combat? Is it just def which is reduced? Please tell me more ...

Well I guesss it´s not in the manual addenda, because it´s in the manual on page 15. It lowers defense by 1 for every ten points and attack by one for every 20 points though, so it´s a bit less important for niefel giants.

[magnate]

Doh! Thanks Turin - it's not shown in the actual battles though, which is why I missed it. That probably makes E4 more useful than W4 for most troops.

QM - my mistake (again) - you're right that I got D9 and B9 confused. Neither is much use then, though B4 remains one of my favourites. I don't see how A4 protects many of your flagellants or other weak sacreds - 80% of the arrows still get though and mow them down ...

CC