Opinions on Caelum (MA and other)

[Kristoffer O]

> Well, I am playing MA Caelum in the same game Kristoffer's playing MA Mictlan (Armadillo), and I suppose my success may be partially behind why Kristoffer thinks MA Caelum needs a reduction in power.

Perhaps to some extent. Your success didn't refute the preconception I had on Caelum.

I've actually heard stuff on Caelum in general (it might have been EA), not MA in particular. I just assumed it was a general tendency, since Caelum was powerful in dom2.

---

If several people quickly argue against the home only stuff I will change it back. I made the change a bit out of a whim, when I checked what nations had access to higher lvl mages in the MA era. Atlanits, C'tis and Caelum struck me as the only ones with mages recruitable anywhere (there could be more), and I had the general pereconception that All caelums were strong. I was a bit uncertain (thematically) since Caelum is a magocracy, but decidet to go for it.

Since we're conservative I'm not too bothered with sticking to the previous way of things. But, since the patch is about to be launched on the beta (once JK's comp starts working again) , I would like quick feedback on this. I will not make any further changes in this patch, apart from this one.

[Meglobob]

Kristoffer O said:Atlanits, C'tis and Caelum struck me as the only ones with mages recruitable anywhere

It does not seem to make those 3 nations too stong, however. I think most people would agree those MA Nations are ok as is. Strengths/weaknesses seem to balance out.

[quantum_mechani]

Meglobob said:

It does not seem to make those 3 nations too stong, however. I think most people would agree those MA Nations are ok as is. Strengths/weaknesses seem to balance out.

Yes, I'd agree none of those nations are particularly strong ME.

[Kristoffer O]

> In the Armadillo game where I am playing MA Caelum I have been hugely lucky in everyway, none of my opponents I have faced have give me a major challenge. None tried to counter my powerful air magic by spending 5A gems making rings of tamed lightning or copper plate. Even MA Man who has powerful air magic himself. I have also been very lucky in magic sites I have found, giving me easy access to every shpere of magic. I would have been in serious trouble otherwise, MA Caelum only has Air/Water really. Finally I have benefited by having strong reliable allies who are happy to trade magic items with me.

Interesting. I consider my own career in that game luckier than anyone deserves.

My luck has been manyfold:
Strategical, weak/stong/entangled neighbours whose homes I could take easily.
Magical, access to all magic but blood, nice sites.
Random stuff, nice events, and other random effects. Bad events on my neighbors finishing them off or blocking them.

Wonder if C'tis and Pangaea feels the same. Did they get lucky, or did they get stong by themselves

[Kristoffer O]

> I'm depressed.

Why? Don't you want the high seraphs recruitable anywhere again?

[llamabeast]

Maybe it was an unrelated comment. He certainly didn't sound super chirpy.

[DrPraetorious]

FWIW, I'm not all that impressed by Eagle Kings.

Yes, they are an awesome unit, but the problem is the EA is the people who don't get crazy awesome units - not the people who do. If druids were twenty feet tall and breathed fire, this wouldn't be a game balance problem. My feeling is that every EA nation should show up and shout "grab your ankles!" to the whole world. I digress.

One time someone brought a nasty choir of raiding eagle kings against me - I successfully guessed where he was going, and intercepted with an army of shadow-blasting communion-heading hangadrotts, and killed or paralyzed all of them on the first turn. This was obviously a crazy late-game situation (I had iron order tower and amber-clan mages to make the rune smashers, eyes of the void and communion gear, respectively. And enough hangadrotts and death gems to make four such interceptor groups.) So don't nerf eagle kings, either.

Anyway, if you're going to rework MA Caelum, and part of the rework will put the high seraph as capital only, that's fine. As a standalone change it's a needless nerf.

Here's a suggestion: give Caelum some national unit buffs that only affect their own stuff - makes sense to me that air magic could be used to buff a flying unit in various ways. An only-vs-flying bit in the #spec field would have some other uses, as well, but I don't know if there are spare bits or not.

[Jazzepi]

Kristoffer O said:
> In the Armadillo game where I am playing MA Caelum I have been hugely lucky in everyway, none of my opponents I have faced have give me a major challenge. None tried to counter my powerful air magic by spending 5A gems making rings of tamed lightning or copper plate. Even MA Man who has powerful air magic himself. I have also been very lucky in magic sites I have found, giving me easy access to every shpere of magic. I would have been in serious trouble otherwise, MA Caelum only has Air/Water really. Finally I have benefited by having strong reliable allies who are happy to trade magic items with me.

Interesting. I consider my own career in that game luckier than anyone deserves.

My luck has been manyfold:
Strategical, weak/stong/entangled neighbours whose homes I could take easily.
Magical, access to all magic but blood, nice sites.
Random stuff, nice events, and other random effects. Bad events on my neighbors finishing them off or blocking them.

Wonder if C'tis and Pangaea feels the same. Did they get lucky, or did they get stong by themselves

I built an awful pretender in this game and it's really no surprise that Meglobob rolled me playing Man. Not everyone has played this game as much as he has. I find this comment silly...

"None tried to counter my powerful air magic by spending 5A gems making rings of tamed lightning or copper plate."

I know personally that those wouldn't have helped in the slightest. I got beat by fog warriors being cast in multiple instances, and by a set of three raiding parties working over my borders. So I fail to see how either of these items would have made any difference.

Jazzepi

[Xietor]

I think MA caelum is fine as is. Fix the elephant thing and they will not be in the top 5.

I am playing MA Ctis in the big game, and holding my own against players and races reputed to be among the best. But that is because MA Ctis has good research capabilities, and I took a strong d pretender and my best troops are all death summons.

MA Ctis recruitable units just do not hold a candle to lanka's. I basically have to use death summons. My castle bought troops are just impotent. While lanka is a different age, really the same holds true in the MA as well.

With the cold blooded disadvantage, I would like to see at least 1 good MA Ctis capital only bought troop. Even if it is expensive as hell, just 1 that can be relied upon to hold its own in a pinch against the elite units of other nations.

And MA Ctis pd is sad as well. If ermor gets a nether dart pd mage, I see no harm in giving ctis one that can spam a few skellies.

But MA Ctis is an average MA race. So I would rather see MA Ulm fixed 1st since they are broken.

[Meglobob]

Jazzepi said:I find this comment silly...

"None tried to counter my powerful air magic by spending 5A gems making rings of tamed lightning or copper plate."

I know personally that those wouldn't have helped in the slightest. I got beat by fog warriors being cast in multiple instances, and by a set of three raiding parties working over my borders. So I fail to see how either of these items would have made any difference.

Jazzepi

Come to think about it Jazzepi your probably right about this...

Silly Meglobob...