How to beat Late Age Ermor?

[Jazzepi]

MP or SP?

Jazzepi

[Lingchih]

They are pretty easy to beat in the late game, if you can last that long. They are a one-trick pony. Early-mid game, they can run you ragged.

[Kuritza]

I was under impression that in the late game, when they send small raiding parties of 1000+ units, they become unstoppable.

[Ironhawk]

Aldrenas: can you go into more detail about what thugs you are using? I have not fought LA ermor myself (due to objections over thier dominion) but from what I understand the conventional way to fight them is with massed banishments. And the way to use thugs vs them is pretty much any chasis plus a fire shield and regen.

Kuritza, ermor relies on masses of cheap undead to win. But in the late game, masses of troops no longer matter. Access to the high level spells and SCs makes them obsolete.

[Alderanas]

o sry i haven't tried to play mp yet so i am referring to sp. Well last time i played against them I played Bogarus. I started out ok trying to mass produce the elite horsemen bodyguards. I took over a dozen territories quickly then ran into groups of ermor ranging from 100- 900. I had lots of priests and different types of mages mixed into my forces balancing out holy and regular magic. The biggest army i was able to amass on the field was over 350 of those elite horsemen near the middle of the game. I also had armies of the swordsmen ranging out behind that army supporting it. I took alot of territory but somehow ermor just kept pumping out legions of dead that were very overwhelming. While i fielded an army of 350 they were slamming me with armies of 2000-3000. I was slowly overwhelmed. near the end the gath started to attack me too. In the end I got desperate so I wished for horrors. lots of my astral mages were killed but i did get some horrors. but by that point ermor had enveloped me and was besieging my capitol with over 10000 soldiers which was quite ridiculous.

[Alderanas]

I used those heroes that show up on horses for Bogarus. The first one of those hero horsemen that are sacred and have priest ability unit i tried giving him the sword of justice, Wraith crown, elemental armor, ring of regeneration, and nethgul. The second one i gave ember, unquenched sword, horror helmet, hydra skin armor, krupp's bracers, and the ark.

[Alderanas]

course ermor also did get some nasty spells active while i was busy using my astral gems elsewhere. They managed to get utterdark and burden of time up for about 10 turns before i could dispel them.

[Kuritza]

Ironhawk said:
Kuritza, ermor relies on masses of cheap undead to win. But in the late game, masses of troops no longer matter. Access to the high level spells and SCs makes them obsolete.

Really? In the endgame, mages become invulnerable and no longer need a meat shield to absorb hits?
Sorry, quite the opposite. In the endgame, quality of the troops doesnt matter as much, and quantity is where Ermor rules supreme. Not to mention that Ermor can also use SCs (death gems, right?), counter your SCs with lifedrain and desintegrate and support his masses of undead with Darkness.
Just look at the statistics - LA Ermor owns.

[Twan]

LA Ermor has two moments of vulnerability :

- very early game against rush nations with mages-priests (so even the researchers they recruited before seing Ermor can bannish) and cheap/numerous sacreds with a correct bless (ideally water 9) ; Atlantis, Mictlan, etc... have no difficulty to erase Ermor if they start close

- beginning of late game against nations having the edge in research and able to use anti-undead or anti-chaff spells (wither bones, solar brillance, or even mass elemental/mundane dammages...) and communions to boost priests ; but once Ermor has hordes of tartarians etc... it's not sufficient

[sector24]

If you don't mind exploiting a bug, forge a crystal matrix for a holy priest (with no other paths, only holy). Group him with at least 2 astral mages scripted to cast communion slave. The priest will banish 3 times per round instead of 1. This is very easy for Bogarus, and the more slaves, the bigger the banish.

In a more general sense, you can't beat Ermor with troops. You have to use magic, either large amounts of conventional mages with troops as blockers, small communions to cast battlefield wide spells like Solar Brilliance with expendable chaff to block, or a global like Purgatory with lots temples and dominion spread. (Is it Purgatory that blasts undead in your dominion? I don't remember). Fighting Ermor with troops is always a losing endeavor for two reasons:

1) Their troops are free
2) Their mages spam raise dead in the backfield, so you're actually fighting an army about 50% larger than the listed number.