Blood Nation Woes

[Meglobob]

Thanks Baalz and everyone else for the advice, I am going to aim for that 100+ blood slave income per turn, that sounds really, really good.

[Baalz]

Oh, another thing I also mentioned in another thread but I'll repeat for the benefit of anybody reading this one. There are several blood magic sites which give you a significant (40-60%) reduction in cost to rituals. I think a lot of people neglect searching for blood sites because they are a lot less common but just think about the impact of having a 60% discount while pulling in 100+ blood slaves per turn. It's worth some effort to look for.

[K]

Some things to add:

-Blood items: Blood Stones are one of the best non-artifact items in the game, so having some earth on a god and Empowering him in Blood is a good route to building a huge Earth income (which you can turn into something good like Living Statues).

Sanguine rods are required for blood hunting. Period.

Soul Contracts are designed for astral casters. Let the Horrors attack you as you sit and research in your capital and free spawn Devils, as you'll be gone on turn 1 of battle with Returning before the Horror can even attack you.

Protection Contracts are cheap, and in battle they send imps off to do one of the most important battle functions, which is to divert enemy fire. Put them guys you don't mind dying(like scouts), and send them with your armies. Don't underestimate the power of five Protection Contracts in a single battle, especially one heavy in archers or evokers.

-One thing to remember in a blood economy is that the troops and leaders you get are free of upkeep, fill new roles in your armies, and generally are quite good if you invest properly in them. Blessed summonables can easy be super troops, so turning 5-6 provinces into blood provinces to produce summonable Blessed in a sure route to victory. Blessed troops are usually produced in small amounts from a temple/castle combo because they are crazy good with a proper Bless, so by using blood you can not invest in temples and castles and summon up a bunch in a hurry.

Tha being said, use Blood Leaders to fill new roles in your army. For example, if you only have Death on your god, then summoning some Vampires can get you into death casting. Use Archdevils for Fire, Ice Devils for Water, and Demon Princes for everything.

-A note on vampires. Most people try to use them as regular leaders, which is a mistake. Don't give them equipment, but do give them gems, and throw them into defensive battles in your dominion. It doesn't matter if they live or die, because they are immortal and if they kill any troops before they die then you are golden. They also really want Growing Fury and Mass Protection/Armies of "..." cast on them, so a mimimum investment in Nature and Earth Magic and a Sabbath can be a killer tactic. The fact that they fly means that every turn that they are killed and return to your capital they can be immediately be sent back out.

-Don't be afraid to Empower Leaders in Blood to get that killer app you need. Blood slaves come in much greater amounts than gems (3 or 2 to 1, in my book), so Empowering is much less of a big deal.

-Experiment with Hell Power. Thats all I'll say on that subject.

-Sabbaths are exactly like Communions, so experiment with Commununions in general.

-A note on Lanka. The national summons you get are in many cases better than your capital troops, so its worth it to summon Rakshase Warriors for most fights and the red girls for battles that you have Mass protection or other armor spells for.

Mandaha's are not Supercombatants, and anyone that tells you this is not your friend. They cast Darkness at the beginning of every battle, and that means that your demons will not be affected by it and your enemies probably will, meaning that every Mandaha is "one free winning battle per turn" if you play your cards right. Fly them out when your armies look like they are going to get crushed, and don't put them in situations where they die needlessly (like the front line).

--A note on Globals. Given the amount of blood slaves you can produce with a mimimum of effort, you can toss down an Astral Corruption so big nobody will ever be able to drop it. The Utterdark also has no effect on demons in batle and no economic effect on armies of summonables.

Just think about that.

[Hellboy]

Wow, great thread!

Baalz said:
Oh, in answer to your other question I almost always go to con-4 first with Mictlan, though of course there are different ways to play it. The main reason is because up until around that point your mages are more useful researching than blood hunting. You don't need any blood summons immediately because your holy troops are tough enough to deal with whatever they need to initially, and you're capitol's naturual income is enough to keep you blood sacrificing at first. The nice thing about using all those Mictlan priests to research is that the very turn that you finish researching construction-4 they can all forge themselves sanguine rods.

So, after getting construction-4, and then researching blood for a while, does construction-6 ever kick in as a priority? With non-blood nations I love those lightless lanterns, and I like to make them sooner rather than later, but is that important to Mictlan?

Also, one of the biggest problems I'm having with my Mictlan setup is that I'm reluctant to put earth on my pretender, and I'm not seeing any good way to get over to earth, except for maybe hoping to find an indy, or maybe summoning spectres. Do Mictlan players always put earth on the pretender, or simply live without, or am I missing some possibility here?

[Baalz]

Heh, this is morphing into another Mictlan thread. I'm going to try to put together a guide to Mictlan like FrankTrollman's guide to T'ien Ch'i.

Anyway, yes con-6 does offer some really nice stuff for Mictlan, but its usually a good idea to try and get some demons into your armies before you head there. Jaguar warriors will only carry you so far, you need to have an answer ready when your opponent starts countering them. About the time you get to the nice SC bases (Ice/Arch devils) I usually switch back to construction. Lightless lanterns are the only research booster you can forge with recruitable mages, and water bracelets, astral caps, and blood thorns are gonna give you a lot more versatility. Not to mention all the nastiness you're gonna want to slap on those nice fresh ice devils.

Yeah, earth is a tough one for Mictlan to crack. I usually can't justify putting it on my pretender because it just doesn't have a good synergy with the rest of Mictlan. I usually just keep an eye open for the chance to snag an earth mage (succbi, hell bind heart, indie mages) and consider it a bonus if I get it- I plan my strategy without any earth magic. Even if you take earth on your pretender it's going to be pretty hard unless you plan to have your pretender spend a good portion of his time site searching and forging blood stones. I have had decent luck snagging earth mages with succubi as long as you don't mind losing a few in the process (what's a couple hundred blood slaves between friends?)

[Hellboy]

Baalz said:
Heh, this is morphing into another Mictlan thread. I'm going to try to put together a guide to Mictlan like FrankTrollman's guide to T'ien Ch'i.

By all means do! Near as I can tell you're certainly well qualified to do so.

Anyhow, I certainly appreciate the comments on research and earth magic. That fills in two key gaps in my knowledge of Mictlan, and will speed me along towards my first MP game!