Hidden in Snow

[Zath]

Lazy_Perfectionist:

I would argue that LA Atlantis is better off with simple Claymen for troop summons if you're stuck with too many water gems, especially since the Angakoks can amass much large numbers of them with a couple of boosters. Claymen are about three times as efficient in terms of HP/gem, are easier to research, and they can at least go underwater for a nation that always starts on the coast. For better long term payback, you could also make 5 Bottles of Living Water that could be reused indefinitely while helping you both on land and in water.

Kristoffer O:

If I am not mistaken, Hidden in Snow is not accessible to MA Mictlan's national mages. This would indicate to me that you are likely casting Hidden in Snow with a pretender or a mage summoned by your pretender, and that this spell was only available to you after some diversification in magic was achieved. With that in mind, I think you would have been better off just sticking 2E on your pretender instead of going in a circle and risking vast amounts of water gems for access to earth magic.

PvK:

I am afraid that what you perceive as narrow is to me just getting to the point. Hidden in Snow is a poor spell for solely troop summons, and a poor spell for solely mage summons. Bundling two poor functions together in this case does not produce a good spell, because the effort put into this spell could be better spent in its specialized counterparts instead for greater overall gain.

Risk is a cost that must be accounted for in any investment of resources, and in the case of Hidden in Snow the risk of getting hosed by the random number generator outweighs its potential benefit. Hidden in Snow is certainly a nice flavor spell and could serve the purpose of wasting gems like the level 1 to 5 summons usually do (I don't mean that negatively since games in general need dud options for players to experiment with), but it is quite lacking in terms of giving water magic some punch. As this last function seems to be the intended purpose of Hidden in Snow, I think concerns over its power level are not entirely unfounded.

Sir_Dr_D:

Hidden in Snow could be useful if you needed troops in a hurry for a decisive battle, but I think 5 Bottles of Living Water would have done you more good if you have the oppurtunity to deploy them in a couple of battles. Water Elementals lack protection, but they have better attack and defense, and their four AP attacks can deal with both chaff and whatever blood summons Mictlan comes up with. You can also use them with Darkness since they are blind, and their higher defense will take better advantage of your opponent's lower attack too.

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Zath... What couple of boosters?

Oh... does Claymen scale up with levels in water? I hadn't noticed that before. Still, only a quarter of my Angakoks can do this - sometimes.

Regardless, the reason I cast Hidden in Snow as Atlants is three-fold. First, the chill aura. Second, the fact that it provides its own leadership. Third, curiosity, and the interest in finding a decisive battle for them to fight.

Winter wolves are better, from a pure chill perspective, but are also magical beings, and vulnerable to magical weapons. They have a place in my armies, but a limited one (though I think it would be interesting to mass them).

Not only are the Unfrozen neither magical or mindless, they come with their own commander, all the time. If one of my outposts are under considerable, but not overwhelming threat by my enemy, any Angakok can sail across the seas, summon the Unfrozen, and continue to do whatever I need him to do. Meanwhile, my Tungaliks and lesser armies will be trooping across the ocean floor. If I happen to get an Unfrozen mage, I round out the army with some Winter Wolves to harry the enemy. I also have the local Tungalik summon some dispossessed spirits to hold my flanks- even when you're lucky, there's room for more undead. Especially when every turn a unit is paralyzed is another fatigue penalty they're taking, in addition to being a target.

Unfortunately, the army I just described didn't have a chance to fight, since Ctis came under attack by Ermor, and withdrew from my anticipated clash.

The key factor about Hidden in Snow is that it's enchant six. Sure, there are better summons along the conjuration path - thats what its for, after all.

But look at what I get with the enchantments school.

Enchant 4:
Claymen (I'll have to take another look, but I'm worrying about cold fatigue)
Behemoth (cold resistantant trampler)
Pale Riders (can replace Winter Wolves as light cavalry)
Twiceborn (protect my favorite mages)

Enchant 5:
Winter Ward - You'll see
Undead Horde - Temporary measure, at best, but chaff can be very useful.
Send Tupilak - limited in use, but can be an useful, if overpriced assassin. Fear few mages or priests, thanks to your hitpoints and magic resistance, just be prepared to go down to bodyguards unless they succumb to friendly fire (happens more often than you'd think).

Enchant six:
Hidden in Snow
Frost Dome (nice, but easily circumvented)
Rigor Mortis (Keep away from living armies, but if you've got a nice undead death or twiceborn wight mage...)
Ziz (got fear? attack rear!)
Grip of Winter (the star)

All that list above? Can be ignored. Isn't that important, though does provide strategic variety. IMO, the real reason to cast Hidden in Snow is Grip of Winter.

If you have cold scales already, the chill aura and effect of Grip of Winter is increased, and does a nice job of knocking out enemy mages. If you don't have the cold scales, you'll have to resort to Wolven Winter. Once you get up to 3, you start seeing every normal nation take an encumbrance penalty. If you're facing a coldblooded nation, this is incredibly effective, allowing your Tungaliks and Angakoks to focus solely on undead slaying.

[Sir_Dr_D]

Lazy_perfectionist. Very well said. Hidden in Snow does work well with certain strategies. And you also gave all the reasons why I researched in the enchamnet school.


Are people on here arguing that the spell is bad because it is random, and there is a chance of a bad casting? OR are they arguing that even at its max it is sub par. I am biased towards it because I had good luck in its casting.

[PvK]

Zath said:
...PvK:

I am afraid that what you perceive as narrow is to me just getting to the point. Hidden in Snow is a poor spell for solely troop summons, and a poor spell for solely mage summons. Bundling two poor functions together in this case does not produce a good spell, because the effort put into this spell could be better spent in its specialized counterparts instead for greater overall gain.
...

To reduce a spell like Hidden in Snow to one point (as in "just getting to the point") is what I mean by a narrow perspective. I'm not saying it would be wrong to choose that perspective, but I see others that seem equally valid, and are more compelling to me.

I don't see how "the effort put into this spell could be better spent in its specialized counterparts instead for greater overall gain", unless you choose to weigh the pessimistic result more than the optimistic result. Either perspective is valid, but it's a choice, not an absolute value.

So Hidden in Snow casts 55 Water gems and requires W3D1, and gives 0-2 mages with W0-3, D0-3, E0-3, and some number of unique pretty good undead warriors and often a commander/thug.

Your suggestion if I understand it is instead of casting Streams from Hades a few times (possibly once, average twice, _if_ your goal is to get E2+:

Cast Streams From Hades for 40 Water gems with a W_4_D1 mage, to get exactly one W3D3 mage.
Somehow, as a nation without Earth magic, get 80 Earth gems to empower someone to E2.

And to get the same effect, also:
Cast other spells to get something you consider better than the unfrozen warriors and commanders.
Cast other spells or hire other mages to get more mages to match the ones that didn't have E2 that you would likely have got from casting Streams From Hades.

So versus an average of 110 water gems by a W3D1 mage for a bunch of troops, commanders, and mages with mixed WDE magic, you spend 40 water gems, 80 earth gems (that you probably don't have), and whatever other mage-time and gems it takes to get whatever makes up for the other undead and mages you won't get.

Seems to me you are spending considerably more because you focus on the pessimistic possibility that you'll not get the mages you think you want. Which is a valid perspective, but not necessarily more valid than the optimistic perspective that you could get several likely multi-path mages plus troops and commanders for less investment, D3 rather than D2, that even extra D2 mages are nothing to sneeze at, etc.

PvK

[Wyatt Hebert]

Zath: I, also, believe you are looking at it narrowly. Without the extra experience of the others, I will restrict my comments to things I know I'm working with.

First of all, sticking 2E on KO's pretender is not always the optimal choice. If it's a rainbow pretender, it would be fine, but if Earth magic was that critical to your gameplan, you should have put that on in the first place. Also, working on that plan, if it's a combat pretender, you have to tie up your pretender to use it for non-combat work.

Second of all, your statistics, while accurate as stated, can be considered misleading. The possible results of the spell, assuming even probabilities, using your focus, are as follows:

33% No mage.
33% 1 Mage (12.5% 0E, 37.5% 1E, 37.5% 2E, 12.5% 3E)
33% 2 Mages (Each at probabilities above).

So, what are the chances per cast of getting a 2E+ mage. Well, it would be 33.3%+16.7%, or 50%, as stated.* Very good. Now, the question: What's this mean? You have a 50% chance, per casting, of getting a 2E+ mage. However, simply stated that way, you ignore the other point. The other option is simply not getting a 2E+ mage, NOT getting no mage or a useless mage.

PvK's point is that there are some people who have no problems taking risks. Also, some of the alternatives provided take more time. Claymen may well be more effective, in general. However, they either take (1) more mage time, or (2) a rather high level caster in Water (which typically means a lot of investment or your pretender). Also note that there is better than a 50% chance, I believe, of getting a mage who can cast Claymen. Possibly the best use of it is when you are sieged, and gambling on getting enough help to not lose the castle. Lack of time can do that.

Wyatt Hebert

* I believe the probability is slightly lower than 50%, actually. Probability of getting at least one mage of 2E+ is 0% (No mage generated)+ 33% (One mage generated) * 50% (getting 2E+)+33% (two mages generated)*75% (at least one of the two mages has 2E+)=41.667%, or less than 50%.

[Kristoffer O]

> If I am not mistaken, Hidden in Snow is not accessible to MA Mictlan's national mages. This would indicate to me that you are likely casting Hidden in Snow with a pretender or a mage summoned by your pretender, and that this spell was only available to you after some diversification in magic was achieved. With that in mind, I think you would have been better off just sticking 2E on your pretender instead of going in a circle and risking vast amounts of water gems for access to earth magic.

55 is not vast amounts. A lot cheaper than empowering a mage from scratch. I think I tend to empower a lot though.

My pretender had neither earth nor water. I decided to use death gems to empower an ordinary rain priest after I got a magical plague event that gave me a boost in death gems. Now I have greater access to both earth and death than before.

I did not plan to cast the spell when I made my pretender, but as the game has turned out it is quite useful. I have not researched that high on conj, so ench is a nice way to spend gems not used on items or empowerment.

[mr_Logic]

never tried it, but such extreme variation in pay off makes this spell a gamble, and everyone knows you should gamble with funds you cant afford to miss.

if you have water gems to spare, but are in need of earth/death magic however...

(oops, forgot how old this thread was)

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

An admittedly rare situation...

In Veturi, there's only three players remaining. Currently,
Ermor was duking it out with Tien Chi whilst I cast Maelstrom, Sea of Ice, Well of Misery, and Riches from Beneath. Obviously, I wasn't going to be able to remain neutral for much longer. So in one of my border provinces and one turn...

5 Castings of Hidden in Snow got me 12 commanders, including mages. I averaged about 4 to 7 Unfrozen Warriors, maybe 14 to 17 Unfrozen per cast.

I spent maybe 275 water gems, plus a water bracelet for each mage. 320 something... Not a small expense- certainly not economical.

Admittedly, it was a surprise attack, this squad faced off against 153 undead and lost 19 (of 107) in return. They were scripted to cleansing water but I probably could have done better. I got a few 2,2,2, but nothing better. Since this is late game, I should have given one earth boots, and scripted, perhaps, Earthpower -> Army of Lead. Though I wasn't there quite yet, I could have been if I focused my research which is near 600 a turn. That alteration path would have also opened up quickening, which I would have been able to cast.

More practically aiming, Strength of Giants is on the Enchantment path, though there isn't much reason to bring that into play against Ermor. I can cast that with just two gems, even with a E1 mage. I could have pulled out some skelly spam of my own to even the odds. I could have cast Legions of Steel (construction 3), to buff my squads protection. Alteration really doesn't have much to offer me for a low research investment.

So, my first real fight was hardly a fair test of their value, but it did get me thinking how I'd make the most use of them, instead of using the mages to cast spells capable of friendly fire.

If I were to adjust the spell itself, I'd do one of two things...
Make it less expensive at 30 gems, making it summon five Unfrozen Warriors, 10 Unfrozen, 1 Unfrozen Lord, and 1 Unfrozen Mage with 1W1D1E 100%, with a 50% shot each at one additional level of water, death, and earth.
This would make it a) more consistent b). guarantee the ability to cast earth buffs, though I would need boosters/gems, along with other spells, and c). make it something I can dream of casting twice early on. If there was still some random factor, this would allow me to compensate for a bad roll.

Make it more expensive, say, 70 or 80 gems. As well, I'd get a minimum of 20 or 30 unfrozen, possibly as much as 60.
This way, instead of five castings getting me 105 unfrozen, I'd get that amount in four casting or less. I'm not going to hammer out exact numbers, but I'm thinking making the per gem roughly the same or somewhat better, but making an individual casting cost maybe 50% more, and be 50% more effective, plus somewhat reliable.

As it is, you may cast Hidden in Snow, and get around ten units- hardly enough to use as part of a fighting force, especially considering their weaknesses compared to wights. If you know you're getting at least 25, or so, you've got an additional strike force you can summon up in a pinch. They're not elites, but with some buff spells, their hardly a laughing matter, and could carve through unprepared armies. And you at least get greater numbers to differentiate them from a legion of wights. I've always thought from an unreasoning standpoint that a tribe should be forty units. I mean, I hardly see less when fighting independent wolf tribes. And while I don't see a reason for this, some banefire bows might be interesting.

[Burnsaber]

I'm very dissapointed in this spell. I have casted it 5 times (in MP nonetheless!) and hit no mages. It's simply not fun. I had Enchnament bonus site, but still those could have been spend elsewhere.

A bit of randomness is cool, but I just don't think that Hidden In Snow is anyway near it's appropiate gem cost, if it can backfire this much.

[Lingchih]

Lazy_Perfectionist said:
An admittedly rare situation...

In Veturi, there's only three players remaining. Currently,
Ermor was duking it out with Tien Chi whilst I cast Maelstrom, Sea of Ice, Well of Misery, and Riches from Beneath. Obviously, I wasn't going to be able to remain neutral for much longer. So in one of my border provinces and one turn...

5 Castings of Hidden in Snow got me 12 commanders, including mages. I averaged about 4 to 7 Unfrozen Warriors, maybe 14 to 17 Unfrozen per cast.

I spent maybe 275 water gems, plus a water bracelet for each mage. 320 something... Not a small expense- certainly not economical.

Admittedly, it was a surprise attack, this squad faced off against 153 undead and lost 19 (of 107) in return. They were scripted to cleansing water but I probably could have done better. I got a few 2,2,2, but nothing better. Since this is late game, I should have given one earth boots, and scripted, perhaps, Earthpower -> Army of Lead. Though I wasn't there quite yet, I could have been if I focused my research which is near 600 a turn. That alteration path would have also opened up quickening, which I would have been able to cast.

More practically aiming, Strength of Giants is on the Enchantment path, though there isn't much reason to bring that into play against Ermor. I can cast that with just two gems, even with a E1 mage. I could have pulled out some skelly spam of my own to even the odds. I could have cast Legions of Steel (construction 3), to buff my squads protection. Alteration really doesn't have much to offer me for a low research investment.

So, my first real fight was hardly a fair test of their value, but it did get me thinking how I'd make the most use of them, instead of using the mages to cast spells capable of friendly fire.

If I were to adjust the spell itself, I'd do one of two things...
Make it less expensive at 30 gems, making it summon five Unfrozen Warriors, 10 Unfrozen, 1 Unfrozen Lord, and 1 Unfrozen Mage with 1W1D1E 100%, with a 50% shot each at one additional level of water, death, and earth.
This would make it a) more consistent b). guarantee the ability to cast earth buffs, though I would need boosters/gems, along with other spells, and c). make it something I can dream of casting twice early on. If there was still some random factor, this would allow me to compensate for a bad roll.

Make it more expensive, say, 70 or 80 gems. As well, I'd get a minimum of 20 or 30 unfrozen, possibly as much as 60.
This way, instead of five castings getting me 105 unfrozen, I'd get that amount in four casting or less. I'm not going to hammer out exact numbers, but I'm thinking making the per gem roughly the same or somewhat better, but making an individual casting cost maybe 50% more, and be 50% more effective, plus somewhat reliable.

As it is, you may cast Hidden in Snow, and get around ten units- hardly enough to use as part of a fighting force, especially considering their weaknesses compared to wights. If you know you're getting at least 25, or so, you've got an additional strike force you can summon up in a pinch. They're not elites, but with some buff spells, their hardly a laughing matter, and could carve through unprepared armies. And you at least get greater numbers to differentiate them from a legion of wights. I've always thought from an unreasoning standpoint that a tribe should be forty units. I mean, I hardly see less when fighting independent wolf tribes. And while I don't see a reason for this, some banefire bows might be interesting.

Nice. I've never spammed Hidden in Snow, but it sounds effective. I assume that would give you a fairly nice undead attack force, with fairly high HP, along with quite a few mages. I'm not sure I could ever replicate that in a real game, but it sounds interesting.