Some hints on MA R'yleh?

[Taqwus]

Aside from the cost, I seem to recall illithid soldiers having only mapmove 1 instead of the 2 that normal illithids have -- a fair disadvantage on landmasses with good terrain -- and have a slightly worse mindblast weapon.

With the Void Gate... use priestly starspawn, or perhaps Cthgul once he arrives -- he's supposed to have bonuses there (in D2, he had a reduced chance of going mad, for instance). As soon as you can, give pearls and a 'Returning' script to your summoner. Be aware that once a summoner's skill gets to be fairly high (15?), the chance to get a Vastness (consider GoR...) is actually cut; you'll get more Othernesses et al.

Oh, and get a source of Storms or Darkness. Storms and darkness don't inhibit your mindblasters at all; it's still precision-100.

[KissBlade]

Order3/Mis 1 (or 2 depending on how you need the points) is standard for all builds in base except for very few exceptions. Sloth3/Cold3 is also fairly standard practice for Ryleh. Growth 3 should also be considered for the vast lobo/illithid armies you'll probably be using. Try to splash earth/air onto your pretender since you won't generally have access to those. Some good picks are dormant Ghost Kings/Void Lord or awakened Wyrm/Kraken. (note if you're using kraken you must take air + water) You also want a decently high dom as Ryleh tends to have dom problems.

Lastly, your army should consist of meteorite guards/lobos/non armored illithids + starspawn mages. Be sure to make a bunch of underwater fort + labs as your uber mages are not cap only.

[Sandman]

Personally, I'd never take misfortune as R'lyeh. Their heroes are outstanding.

[Teraswaerto]

The heroes are great, but not that great. I would always take order as R'lyeh, they need the money too bad not to.

[KissBlade]

Sandman said:
Personally, I'd never take misfortune as R'lyeh. Their heroes are outstanding.

Ryleh and Tien Chi I do tend to be wary about taking misfortune. They do have some very nice heroes.

[moderation]

Which heros does R'yleh get? I recall only the one unit that have move 10.

[Amhazair]

LA gets a strong Aboleth mage (W4S4 iirc) I suppose MA does too, since he's an EA survivor. That's the only one I got in my game with them.

[Darkwind]

I think R'lyeh also gets a powerful Basalt King or something, if I remember correctly he's W4-5. They also get Cthugul, a hero Starspawn, who starts with Void Summoning 3 (1 more than your priest Starspawn), and maybe slightly better magic paths than the normal Starspawn mage. I'm fairly sure MA and LA share the same heros, too, but they might not.

[Saxon]

I am not sure, the map we used would have made it possible to do land travel, even if starting and ending in water. I got it once in SP, but don't recall.

It is supposed to be a visitor from some other plane, so it might avoid the water restriction, it would be thematic.

No progression to vastness.

[chrispedersen]

If Ermor is in the game, go Heat 3.
Use as little chaff as possible. As another poster noted, use the unarmored version of the illithid.

I don't use a bless strategy, and I usually don't rely on star gate much. once he gets up to +10 or +11 I switch him out.

I personally don't remember - but does luck influence the void gate? If so reconsider misfortune.. you dont need scales much at all.

Blood Vengeance rock!