Guide for MA Ulm

[lch]

Also check Dedas' posts for quality advice on MA Ulm.

[Velusion]

Good to see more guides!

[Endoperez]

It's also good to remember that the Arbalests are actually pretty decent infantry. Good hp and protection for archers, and shortsword is a good weapon. They lack shields, of course, but their arbalests work quite well against enemy archers... As such, they have less need for meat shield.

[Meglobob]

MA Ulm has 3 units each with a different weapon, which weapon should I use against what type of foe?

Is it morningstars vs shields for example? Anyone give a little bit more detail on this? I am not very good at small tactical detail like this and when playing MA Ulm it seems you should pay alot of attention to such details.

Examples would be appreciated...ie morningstars vs Abysia...would that be good?

[lch]

Meglobob said:
Is it morningstars vs shields for example?

AFAIK morningstars ignore shields, yes. You might want to use Flails against weakly protected foes for their two attacks, and mauls or battleaxes against high prot or high HP enemies like the Jotun giants - they're going to hit them harder, and when a Jotun hits them then it's game over anyway. Pikes with their extremely long length are perfect for fighting low morale troops with their repel effect.

[Endoperez]

Besides having long weapons, pikeneers also have higher morale. 11 still isn't good, but it's a bit of a bonus. Their weapon also deals a bit more damage than flails or morningstars, while still having attack 1 instead of attack 0.

Morningstars used to ignore shields, but with the different shield system in Dom3 their bonus changed to +2 attack against units with shields. In effect, they'll be able to strike past the parry value more often than other troops of the same skill. Both morningstars and flails have this bonus, and an attack rating of 1 to boot. And as multiple attacks lower defence, flails are even better against units with extreme defense or very good shields.


You WILL get Smiths with randoms, so be sure you can use them for the best possible effect. Earth 2 Fire 2 isn't any better for Magma spells, but together with Phoenix Power you get access to many nice Fire spells. Not many items, though. With access to boosters, spamming Rods of the Phoenix could quickly become nasty... Wands of Wild Fire aren't bad, either.

Astral 1 is a bit harder to use: it's mainly Arcane Probing until you can empower one to Astral 2. After that you can start mass-producing Crystal Coins and Starshine Skullcaps and Crystal Shields. Crystal Shields are good for your other randoms as well. There are other good and/or interesting items as well: Crystal Heart, Stone Idol, Stone Sphere, Eye of the Void, and the thug items Faithful/Lucky Coin/Pendant of Luck, Amulet of Antimagic, Elf Bane...

Earth 2 Fire 1 Air 1 is hardest to boost. Sure, you can forge Owl Quills, but you can't remote-search unless you empower, and the first booster is from Air 4. There are some nice low-level items, though - Shield of Valor, Piercer (armor-negating Attack Rear, but still worse than Vision's Foe), Silver Hauberk, Chain Mail of Displacement... It might be worth it to take Air 4 with your pretender just for Air boosters. There's also the Earth/Air Staff of Elemental Mastery to consider...

Earth 3 Fire 1 is the simplest. Combine with Earth Boots and Earth Power, and blast away.

Of the paths you can't get even with randoms, Death is perhaps the most beneficial. Death gives Black Bows of Botulf (good against all SCs without Air Shield, or to force the enemy SCs to use Air Shield instead of something more offensive) and Flaming Skulls (for Fire oomph! Phoenix Power and thus Fire 3 for all your Smiths!) and Bane weapons, as well as site-searching spell. If you manage to get Death 2, you can summon revenants to do the sitesearching, and do Skull Staves and Shadow Brands and Skull Mentors, perhaps even those annoying Vision's Foes and Lantern Shields. And if you're good with spies, as you should be, you might consider Bane Venom Charms...

Nature gets you nice items, but you need Nature 2 to really benefit from it. You'd get Nature 3 for the same price then, thanks to Thistle Maces, but supplies aren't enough, and it'll be hard to get something tougher that'd really benefit from Rings of Regeneration, and Charcoal Shield is better than Vine Shield in most cases. There's little Earth/Nature synergy in items, and Fire/Nature doesn't have much besides Fever Fetishes.
Water gets you a booster at first level and has some nice items (Quickness from boots or jade armor, demon bane, bottle of living water, and breather items and Wave Breaker for getting underwater), but not much otherwise. Voice of Tiamat and Voice of Apsu aren't bad, either, but Death is still better.
Even one Blood mage can potentially kickstart a blood economy, and you'll eventually be able to get lots of nice items (lifedrain, contracts, boots of youth, armor of souls which also doubles as a blood booster...), but as far as summons go it'd probably be too little, too late, and it'd be tedious to collect all those slaves.

[Stryke11]

Excellent posts by all. I've always been a fan of MA Ulm (or standard Ulm in Dom2) and am excited they're getting some love.

[Sandman]

One of the best non-sacred calvary in the game. They can crush enemy infantry and take very little damage in the process due to their high protection.

They die like flies to astral mages and level-3 priests, though.