Blessings balance?

[Endoperez]

BigJMoney said:
That's wonderful. Combine the increased affliction chance with the increased damage, and you have guerilla tactics that death nations can use. They can send smaller, expendable armies of undead and priests earlier in the game to attack enemies, dealing a lot of damage and afflictions before they die, ruining the larger defending armies.

Cheap sacreds like flagellants might also be good for something like this.

I don't think it makes a good raider force. They aren't good at pillaging, or even much better at conquering provinces, but they can make enemy armies less powerful. That's rarely useful against national units, but against Jotunheim, or thugs or SCs, it can be worth it. And the 100%, or doubled afflictions, are just for Death 4. Every pick after 4 increases it by further 50 percent. At Death 9, we're talking of +350% afflictions.

[DominionsFan]

Daynarr said:
Death magic 9 gives Death weapon to sacred troops. Death weapons have a CHANCE to do additional death damage to the target. Not the same thing as fire weapons. Both are magical though.

100% affilction chance is basically double chance to cause affliction to the target.

Devs can correct me if I misremembered.

Awesome...especially because Ermor is my favourite nation.

[BigJMoney]

I dunno, I think it could be good against units that are hard to crack but small in number, like ulmish infantry and cavalry. A lot of hits don't go through the armor, and those that do usually only deal minimal damage that will be healed afterward. I can also see it being good against creatures with Regen because at +350% affliction giving bonuses, even regenerating creatures that live through a battle will probably pick up a few afflictions. In my personal experience playing Ulm, I've had armies that I overestimated because I didn't realize how badly wounded they had become over time.

One good use of flagellants, I think, would simply be to use them as light infantry. The usual role of wearing out the enemy would be supplemented by their ability to deliver hampering afflictions. They'd be a walking affliction bomb.

=$=

[Graeme Dice]

JaydedOne said:
Personally, I agree that the Nature 9 berserk bless is suboptimal compared to, say, fire weapons and don't think I'd buy up to 9 with the vast majority of strategies I might use.

I'd agree that Fire 9 was the most generally useful of the blesses in Dominions II. Nature 9 was only useful for those troops that have enough hitpoints to survive enemy attacks, and both high enough protection, and low enough defense that the protection bonus and defense penalty works out in favour of protection. Pangaean white centaurs and Jotunheim sacred troops are probably better off with N9 than F9, but I'd usually pick F9 for most other nations.

[DominionsFan]

Graeme Dice said:

I'd agree that Fire 9 was the most generally useful of the blesses in Dominions II. Nature 9 was only useful for those troops that have enough hitpoints to survive enemy attacks, and both high enough protection, and low enough defense that the protection bonus and defense penalty works out in favour of protection. Pangaean white centaurs and Jotunheim sacred troops are probably better off with N9 than F9, but I'd usually pick F9 for most other nations.

Yes, N9 blessing for Jotun is a must have. F9 was the "best" blessing in Doms 2. However the new D9 blessing looks very powerul in Dominions 3. Well we will be more clever, after we've tried the game.

[alexti]

JaydedOne said:
Personally, I agree that the Nature 9 berserk bless is suboptimal compared to, say, fire weapons and don't think I'd buy up to 9 with the vast majority of strategies I might use.

I'm not sure I agree. Fire-9 is a good bless when you have cheap and weak sacred troops (which incidentally tend to imply that you need high dominion as well thus increasing the cost of the strategy). Nature-9 gives you pretty nice combo of regeneration, lower affliction chances and berserk. Very good for nations with strong sacred troops (like Jotunheim or Machaka). Because those only need dominion of 5 and 6 it makes the strategy cheaper, allowing an option of taking second bless (perhaps water, or fire). So in my view fire, water and nature are the best blesses, but what is optimal depends on the nation.