Bless nation recommendation, please

[sansanjuan]

Originally Posted by ebenweb

Hi all,

I'm a NOOB and am having a hard time finding a nation to play with what the forum members consider units worthy of a bless strategy.

I thought Pythium would be alright--I figured a good Water bless would make their sacred units very difficult to hit and counterbalance their lack of armour--but have read guides that say they're not good enough to be focused on. I was playing with C'tis using a high water bless on their sacred serpents and that seemed pretty effective early-game, but again read conflicting strategy guides.

Can someone give some examples of GOOD bless strategies? I'd like to play a nation that doesn't use blook magic as I want to keep things simple, and I like the idea of a pretender who is mobile but am happy to make them dormant.

Cheers,

Eben

Eb,
Perhaps a bit of topic...
A good thing to remember is that blesses become less of a tilt late game. Many blesses become redundant and even superseded by mass battlefield spells (army of lead/gold, fog warriors, mass regeneration, will of fates, reinvig spells, etc.). You are trading that bless off for an early pretender and/or good scales. That's not to say bless strategies are worse than scales/research/rainbow strategies only that you'd better take advantage early with that edge you've purchased so dearly. I remember I had W9/N9 Jotuns which carved most everything till about turn 20ish. However my research sucked and by mid game my armies of blessed Jotuns were flaming pincushions and heat fatigued into oblivion. Lesson is to avoid being a one trick pony. The gold that comes with scales buys forts and researchers and all the later game options. Heavy blesses are fun and viable but have a mid game plan "B".
My $0.02
-ssj

[Aleph]

I do think E9W9 Lanka is pretty forgiving... research to construction 4 for skull mentors and then up to Blood 6 while mashing faces with your excellent sacred heavy infantry. The Dakini can Cloud Trapeze, are fantastic thugs with snake bladder sticks and vine shields and a few air buffs, and aren't pricey for the damage they cause.

Probably one of the best-rounded nations in the game is MA Ermor. You can learn so much about the game... the power and weaknesses of huge hordes of undead, the strength of communions with lots of holy spells from slaves, and how to move steadily up the Death magic ladder. They also bless nicely with S9... as cap-only troops Shadow Vestals are probably not a good choice for a heavy bless, but Ethereal + Twist Fate will really help your starting expansion, without the need for an SC pretender which can be nerve-wracking for newer players (and me, whenever said pretender is not immortal).

[ebenweb]

Originally Posted by sansanjuan

Eb,
Perhaps a bit of topic...
A good thing to remember is that blesses become less of a tilt late game. Many blesses become redundant and even superseded by mass battlefield spells (army of lead/gold, fog warriors, mass regeneration, will of fates, reinvig spells, etc.). You are trading that bless off for an early pretender and/or good scales. That's not to say bless strategies are worse than scales/research/rainbow strategies only that you'd better take advantage early with that edge you've purchased so dearly. I remember I had W9/N9 Jotuns which carved most everything till about turn 20ish. However my research sucked and by mid game my armies of blessed Jotuns were flaming pincushions and heat fatigued into oblivion. Lesson is to avoid being a one trick pony. The gold that comes with scales buys forts and researchers and all the later game options. Heavy blesses are fun and viable but have a mid game plan "B".
My $0.02
-ssj

Cheers, mate. In the end I went with Pythium MA and played my first "real" game. Took an E9/F5 forge lord and have waded through the enemy pretty easily on normal difficulty. Stacking up communicants with Theurgs and pumping out Thunder Strikes is lots of fun, although in hindsight I think the Earth bless may be redundant with Communicant Slave/Master spells--I haven't really done the math.