Forge of Ulm

[Executor]

Assassination spells require a huge amount of investment. Take mind hunt for example;
Crystal Coin + Astral Cap + Eye of Void + Rune Smasher = 55 gems.
Besides, assassination spells usually only work the first turn around. After that you'll be sure to protect your good mages and if the enemy keeps attacking your lesser mages all the better.
Most province attack spells are easily dealable, with the exception of GR, which usually takes a lich and two boosters which total 65 gems. So nobodys gonna have too many of those.
Fast travel spells are unreliable and cost a heck of a lot of gems to organize. And time too. You usually need to take a province, farsummon a fort, build a lab and gateway in troops which is immensely expensive. Don't get me wrong, I love doing it but it's a very risky form of attack.

Of course you'll get killed in the end if everyone joins up but I still think you'd have a very good shot of defending against even 4 nations with the forge up.

Not sure what my point was anyway... Forge is OP for level 0?

[Knai]

Originally Posted by Executor

Assassination spells require a huge amount of investment. Take mind hunt for example;
Crystal Coin + Astral Cap + Eye of Void + Rune Smasher = 55 gems.
Besides, assassination spells usually only work the first turn around. After that you'll be sure to protect your good mages and if the enemy keeps attacking your lesser mages all the better.

I see that you assumed a 2S mage, and no higher. The nations that are actually likely to use Mind Hunt probably have a 3S mage, and furthermore, given that, can probably work decently without an Eye of the Void and Rune Smasher. Moreover, others are much cheaper (e.g Manifestation, Earth Attack) for the nations good at them, and Forge of the Ancients is the sort of thing that warrants spending lots of gems as a countermeasure anyways. Plus, if you do invest in an assassination strategy as a counter, you will still have most of the investment after it.