Multiplayer mayhem newbie seeking advice

[Manuk]

Golems well equiped (with astral cap) can cast teleport to capture weakly defended provinces in any place of the map. You can actually teleport more than one.
tht way you can help your ally. use your spyes to spot where.

Golem's pros:

-Is a research bonus because you get it while you were searching for high level items (school contruction)
-Mindless: immune to fear and some mind affecting spells (doesn't rout?).
-Lifeless: Doesn't get encumbrance so doesn't get fatigue unless casting spells (just cast body ethereal).
-Big (lots of hit points).
-Astral magic (teleport) costs pearls so if you clam hoard you may get some of these.

Cons:
-Lifeless: Doesn't regenerate.
-Astral Magic: vulnerable to magic duel(or is it mind duel?).
-Low attack value: You must spend slots to get attack bounus (burning pearl?) or a weapon with attack bonus (fire sword?).

Maybe Im forgetting something.
reinvigoration items are unnessesary. Quickness items are good. a cumbersome armor is ok. maybe shield and weapon because it's low attack and not amidextrous.

[thejeff]

Also, make use of your forge bonus. If you can't support your ally militarily, offer to build items for him.

[Meglobob]

I have been in this position several times, made it to the end, reasonably powerful position and no idea whatsoever of how to close the game down. My end game sucks in MP.

Possibly your most potent weapon is diplomacy, try and get everyone to gang up on Marignon in 1st place, then if you finish him off, gang up on the 2nd place empire etc...

Your golem SC is probably your 2nd best weapon, get astral tempest, cast ritual of returning on them, try to give them defensive items such as awe, fear, protection, defense, then teleport them in and hurt large armies.

[Gandalf Parker]

Ulm generally tends to suck at magic but balances that with heavy armored troops. With castles, defense points put into important provinces, and temples.. you can still push damage in the physical and priestly world even while they are slinging their magics. Its true that the longer they get to research the worse off you are going to be but it might not be too late to put a strong foot forward.

[KissBlade]

Empower your mages and make boosters by either trading for them or getting them yourselves. As you feel your gold is getting less than important, use three scouts to blood hunt your 5-9K range population provinces for some blood slaves to empower into blood. Site search thoroughly EVERYTHING either with indie mages or mercenaries.

try to concentrate ESPECIALLY on grabbing the sorcery branches (astral, death, nature, blood) they tend to get incredibly strong late game.

Lastly diplomacy is definitely valid, make sure you're looking at the two most important graphs though when determining top nation (research and Gems)