Paths of Blood

[Shovah32]

Arent demon lords B9?

[vfb]

Blood 9 research, need a B8 caster to summon.

[Aleph]

Haven't been here in quite a while.

LA Ulm mixes decent blood magic, freespawn thralls, freespawn wolves, and incredibly potent spies to shut down enemy economies. They aren't anywhere near the blood nation that Mictlan is, insofar as they just aren't a heavy magic nation period, but the Counts are pretty decent all rounders who, as a previous poster noted, aren't so expensive that they shouldn't hunt. They also give you a credible bootstrap into death magic, since they (unlike Tlahuelpuchi) start out being able to forge skull staves.

One small magical edge that LA Ulm has over Mictlan is access to Earth magic, albeit at low levels. With some selective empowering of capital only priests (really easy with blood) you can kick off a nice Blood Stone economy.

Also, I forget who taught me this, but Vampire Counts casting Summon Lamashtas are incredible defensive troops in your own domain. You're immortal... who cares if they turn on you?

[jutetrea]

Agree with Baalz and Velusion, I'll almost always try to get a small blood income going...even if its only a few slaves/turn. Make a few rods and have 1 or 2 sites going for a 5-20 slave income every turn. If its not part of the main strategy it adds up pretty quick.

Then it allows you to forge some really great items, blood stone being the primary. If you get a head start to const 8 you can nab some of the great artifacts as well.

I usually have blood spells as low priority, but bowl, toads and occasionally crossbreeding for chaff work well. If you've got the extra research, getting up to blood 6(?) gets you infernal disease (good assassin spell) and 5 gates (28 slaves for 5 demons in one cast). None of which are huge cost and potentially useful.

For moderate loss in income (and a bit more micro) you can get some pretty nifty benefits late mid-late game.

[Shovah32]

Aleph said:
Haven't been here in quite a while.

LA Ulm mixes decent blood magic, freespawn thralls, freespawn wolves, and incredibly potent spies to shut down enemy economies. They aren't anywhere near the blood nation that Mictlan is, insofar as they just aren't a heavy magic nation period, but the Counts are pretty decent all rounders who, as a previous poster noted, aren't so expensive that they shouldn't hunt. They also give you a credible bootstrap into death magic, since they (unlike Tlahuelpuchi) start out being able to forge skull staves.

One small magical edge that LA Ulm has over Mictlan is access to Earth magic, albeit at low levels. With some selective empowering of capital only priests (really easy with blood) you can kick off a nice Blood Stone economy.

Also, I forget who taught me this, but Vampire Counts casting Summon Lamashtas are incredible defensive troops in your own domain. You're immortal... who cares if they turn on you?

I absolutely love counts. Throw lifelong protection on them and have them spam raise skeletons(swapping to summon lammashta's when you want to do damage/are near your capitol) and you can get an endless horde of chaff to wear down the enemy.

[Sombre]

I think Hell Power would work the same way too. You get a boost and if nasties turn up, who cares? You're immortal.

[Shovah32]

LA Ulm with high dominion has some funny potential strategies avaliable and is alot of fun, atleast in single player.

[SlipperyJim]

I'm another one who will always add a little Blood to any game I play. Even if it's thematically inappropriate ... Ulm Reborn, for example. A little bit of Blood can open up a lot of possibilities.

Succubus.
Infernal Disease.
And my favorite global, The Looming Hell.

Blood forging (as others have said) is probably the best way to get some mileage out of a little bit of Blood, because it doesn't require you to spend any research effort on Blood magic. All you have to research is Construction -- which you're going to research anyway -- and you can get some very nice possibilities:

• Lifelong Protection
• Soul Contract
• Armour of Souls
• Blood Thorn
• Blood Stone
• Boots of Youth
• assorted artifacts!

A little bit of Blood can go a long way. I think it's well worth the marginal effort required.

[JaghataiKhan]

By the way, why can't I transfer blood slavs immediately to the laboratory? My hands ache from sheer amount of clicking.

This sucks. I also need Blood Sacrifices directly from labs when available. I hate microing Mictlan.

[Meglobob]

JaghataiKhan said:
By the way, why can't I transfer blood slavs immediately to the laboratory? My hands ache from sheer amount of clicking.

You can just click pool in your lab.