Guide: LA R'lyeh or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Dreamlands

[Illuminated One]

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

Sure, rp/$ is way lower. Until you realize that *only* the starspawn mages are immune to insanity. So eventually your starspawn priests go insane and start losing research turns. Eventually they become so insane you never get to give them an order again. So their average rp/$ is actually worse than the starspawn mages. And that's just considering their value for research.

That's not true, starspawn priests can go insane yes, but they will never from your dominion - at least I've yet to see it.

[WraithLord]

So Illuminated One, how would the starspawn priests go insane if not from the insanity dominion?
And what are you basing that claim on, manual, tests?
Do you make that claim only for the priests or also for some of the other commanders as well, like the starchilds?

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by Illuminated One

That's not true, starspawn priests can go insane yes, but they will never from your dominion - at least I've yet to see it.

I've seen a starspawn priest go insane. Ok, I don't know for certain it was from dominion, but what else would it be from?

[Natpy]

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

I've seen a starspawn priest go insane. Ok, I don't know for certain it was from dominion, but what else would it be from?

Starspawn priests can go insane from the summoning void beings, or from "lost in time and space" event.

[Squirrelloid]

So, even accepting that Starspawn priests are immune to dominion-based insanity, I still feel you want to be pumping out mages. You need to start generating different path combinations early and often, and those mages will be far more useful at a variety of tasks, not just researching. Effectively, you need your workforce to be capable of multi-tasking, and need to have the necessary magical capabilities already lined up before you actually need them.

It does suggest that once you have what you consider enough magical might (imho, somewhere in the 30-50 mage department is probably sufficient for awhile) you should purchase the priests for research duty (which will help free up some of those mage assets for other tasks even when those tasks aren't critical).

[Illuminated One]

Sorry for not being clear, it's as Napty says, but they don't get insane just for hanging out in your Dom, only based on having a good bunch of illithid priests for 40+ turns.
Everything else (Starchild, Freespawn) goes insane.

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

It does suggest that once you have what you consider enough magical might (imho, somewhere in the 30-50 mage department is probably sufficient for awhile) you should purchase the priests for research duty (which will help free up some of those mage assets for other tasks even when those tasks aren't critical).

I'd go the other way round, I'd first build a research base from the cheap mages you have around and then start building some combat mages.

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by Illuminated One

I'd go the other way round, I'd first build a research base from the cheap mages you have around and then start building some combat mages.

Here's the problem I have with that theory: you won't get the starspawn mages you need reliably, and that's a problem. There are a lot of possible combinations, and only a few of them are really desirable (many of the others are pretty interchangeable). W3S3, W1E2S3, W1S3D2, and W1S5 are your preferred combinations for most purposes, and to get those in any numbers you need to buy a lot of mages.

Further, starspawn mages are more efficient turn-wise with research, and are more efficient capability-wise as well. I'll pay the extra upkeep/purchase price for that versatility alone. That they are better than the priest starspawn at any activity isn't something to be looked down at. Only after my versatility needs are met would I start to think about specialist researchers. (If you could purchase the exact paths you wanted when you bought a mage my opinion might be different, but the random element means I want to have those mages before i need them so i do have them when i need them and don't need to spend 4+ turns buying mages to try and get the one(s) i need).

Its not like you need to buy troops. You're trading gold efficiency for other kinds of efficiency, and advantages like research tempo and crafting tempo.

Edit: Want efficient cheap research? Craft skull mentors.

[Squirrelloid]

Hmm... edit period expired. Consider this an addendum to the previous post.

On specific mage path demands: When you get construction 2 the items you most want are dwarven hammers, clams, and crystal shields. This requires you have a W3S3 mage ready to be empowered to N1 (preferable way to get clams), and a W1E2S3 mage ready to be empowered to E3 for the hammer (also minimal mage to make the shields before empowerment, so you may want more than one). The odds of getting both picks in the same school is 1/16, but with a 10% chance of +1WESD getting either of those is more like 1/15. That's an expectation you'll have to buy 15 mages to see the one you want. Don't wait to start buying.

Assuming no 3rd random pick, distribution of mage paths are as follows. Especially desirable combinations are marked with an asterix.

W3S3* : 1/16
W2S4 : 1/8
W1S5* : 1/16
W1E1S4 : 1/8
W1E2S3* : 1/16
W2E1S3 : 1/8
W1S4D1 : 1/8
W1S3D2* : 1/16
W2S3D1 : 1/8
W1E1S3D1 : 1/8