Nations under CBM 1.6

[Quitti]

Yes, forge bonus is one redeeming factor. And the black knights are awesome, but cost a ton. Full chain mail troops are not bad either, but require lots of resources per gold spent (though they do get resource bonus in forts, so it's not THAT bad). They are def 5 though, so not evading anything, and that's with prot17. Plate ones are def 4 with body prot of 21 and one more enc, and both plate and chain troops are map move 1. Their "crossbowmen" have arbalests, which while do good damage, fire only once per three turns. Sappers cost 1½x the gold and same resources, but are more viable to use due having normal crossbows and a very good siege bonus. Still, the lack of diversity in national mages is even worse than of EA/MA vanheim. One 3.3% s1 chance on your main researcher. Weak priests (h2 cap only that eats the recruitment time from other useful stuff). No blood, no death, unreliably (10%) access up to e3 from only useful mages is rather weak. Iron angels are good, but require either e+s random smith (0.33% chance to get to begin with) with RoW/Robe of Magi/similar to summon, or pretender designed to do that.

And LA Ulm does not need their pretender to stay and summon counts, one is enough as it can continue the process with boosters or summon up one vampire lord and it needs less boosters to do the trick. Of course this requires construction research and so on. And LA gets s2b1 mages right out of the box, which is quite awesome (for communions, against sc's and so on), and the troops are good even if a bit expensive resourcewise for expansion - but the trick is to just spam those delicious rangers and keep some guys tieing the other troops down. And certainly this again has a counter, like pretty much everything in dom3. Still, I would rank LA Ulm well better off than MA, due the access to blood and death and astral in reliable quantities (provided that you go towards the vampire counts).

[Fantomen]

I would personally rank LA ulm as one of the strongest nations in the game.

LA Caelum I think is potentially awesome as well.

[Mardagg]

yeah,LA Ulm is a pretty strong nation,imo.
In addition to those great rangers,2S1B everywhere mages,sacred priests researching+inquisitor bonus+ spamming iron blizzard and a good shot at blood,dont forget the ghoul guardians.Sure,they are cap only,but if you happen to have good resource provinces surrounding your cap+prod scale(an option with Ulm)+the resource bonus of ulm,you can easily build like 12+ ghoul guardians per turn.Guardians and Rangers backed by priests spamming tempering the will and iron blizzard are a very strong force until you make it deep into blood.

Also,i say that LA Ulm profits a lot from no gem gens.

Concercing EA Agartha i dont agree,too.
People fail to see,how big an advantage they got in the sea.And they are even able to build castles and PD there.
Depending on the map you play,this can be a huuge plus with them.
E.g. Agartha has no problem at all to smash R`leyh .All their troops got good to high MR+those Oracles make great Casters in the sea,backed up by cheap summonable Earth Elementals which trample those lobo guards.
For more,Umbrals make good Sc chassis if you GoR them and they come cheap,v cheap.Plus those magma childs become pretty nasty if backed up by some Armor increasing spells,which are easily castable by most of Ag`s mages.
Also the risen Oracle,which fits well into EA Agarthas strat,is a huge immortal SC if you take the right magic path`s...even after the cost nerf in CBM...since EA Ag imo fits v well for turmoil 3,Sloth 3,Heat 3,Luck 3 scales,which leave the points for the risen oracle.

I consider EA Agartha much stronger than MA Agartha,it plays a lot different bc of the water advantages and the relative environment,i.e. vs EA nations instead of MA nations.

[Mardagg]

Btw,saying that Machaka got a huge hit in CBM 1.6 ,makes things a bit too easy,dont you think?

Sure,they cant forge fever fetishes anymore,but other nations cant forge clams and/or blood stones anymore...

I actually think Machaka is stronger now bc of this.
Still not a top nation,but playable imo.
Just spam fire drakes with your fire random dragon mastered sorcerers and you got some good use for your fire/nature gems again.
And Hunter Spiders are cheaper now.

[Jarkko]

Originally Posted by Mardagg

I actually think Machaka is stronger now bc of this.
Still not a top nation,but playable imo.
Just spam fire drakes with your fire random dragon mastered sorcerers and you got some good use for your fire/nature gems again.
And Hunter Spiders are cheaper now.

The strength of Machaka was always in my opinion the strong mid-game. They struggle early on in the game, and they quite simply suck late in the game. If Machaka is to do good, to win if you so want to say, they have to steamroll the field in the midgame (after havng survived the early phases somehow).

The Machaka PD is a joke, even with the slight boost seen in CBM 1.6. Thus Machaka is very weak against an early rush (before you have been able to summon fire-drakes to bolster the frontline and crafted enough boosters for your mages to make a difference on the battlefield). Machakan PD is famous for rushing forwards and then be killed by their own missiles... Try it in SP if you want to see the hilariosity.

The midgame is where Machaka can shine. Flaming arrows (althjugh Flaming Arros is tougher to get to in CBM), firedrakes at front, spiders on flanks, evocations. Of course you need lots of firegems to succeed in all that. Firegems which are not available in CBM1.6 anymore.

Late game for Machaka does not exist. The game is over once the SC's enter the field. No endgame for Machaka in vanilla, not in earlier versions of CBM, and not in 1.6. The do or die time for Machaka is the mid-game, and in 1.6 there is no "do" left in that.

@Squirrel: If you honestly think LA Ulm rangers, ghoul guards and x-bowmen are not enough to take you through the early game, then you do need to learn to play the game called Dominions 3

[Mardagg]

Originally Posted by Jarkko

The strength of Machaka was always in my opinion the strong mid-game. They struggle early on in the game, and they quite simply suck late in the game. If Machaka is to do good, to win if you so want to say, they have to steamroll the field in the midgame (after havng survived the early phases somehow).

The Machaka PD is a joke, even with the slight boost seen in CBM 1.6. Thus Machaka is very weak against an early rush (before you have been able to summon fire-drakes to bolster the frontline and crafted enough boosters for your mages to make a difference on the battlefield). Machakan PD is famous for rushing forwards and then be killed by their own missiles... Try it in SP if you want to see the hilariosity.

The midgame is where Machaka can shine. Flaming arrows (althjugh Flaming Arros is tougher to get to in CBM), firedrakes at front, spiders on flanks, evocations. Of course you need lots of firegems to succeed in all that. Firegems which are not available in CBM1.6 anymore.

Late game for Machaka does not exist. The game is over once the SC's enter the field. No endgame for Machaka in vanilla, not in earlier versions of CBM, and not in 1.6. The do or die time for Machaka is the mid-game, and in 1.6 there is no "do" left in that.

Yeah,the PD is hilarious bad.
That should and probably will be adressed in future CBM upgrades,QM already said this.
In general,i dont mind certain nations being bad at Early game and/or Midgame and/or Late game.Part of the way and style the nation is intended to play.
Adds diversity.
If you prefer having a strong endgame ,just take a nation that got it.
I for my part like playig "fast" nations from time to time, with a bad endgame,thus being forced to get a significant advantage early on.
A bad late game sure is not advisable on huge maps,other than that u just cant turtle,which is good imo,it adds more action.
If i compare my current MP games with my history of games on Dom2,where a lot of nations were considered to have very bad Late and/or early game btw,simply too much turtling and racing for research is going on these days.If you want to turtle take a nation with good endgame,if you want to be ruthless take those giants,rushing your neigbours.

Concerning Machaka,i still do have a different opinion.
It looks to me,that those Hunter spider sacreds are now very much affordable.They make sick good,and i mean really sick good, expansion parties for the early game.In my last SP game tests,i was able to field 3-5 expansion parties by the end of year 1,taking 0 losses most of the time.4-6 spiders and only some archers are steamrolling most indies.Map move 2 and forest survival adds a lot of flexibilty there ,too.Of course,you have to take a pretty good bless for this,which is easily affordable with Machaka though,thanks to Heat 3.
I also think that keeping the spider after losing the rider shouldnt be underestimated in power,especially with a low to medium Nature bless.

If you dont take a good bless,you probably are forced to take an awake SC pretender to help with expansion,thats right.
But if i want to play Machaka,i want to play it aggressive,that fits for the theme.
Mid game is pretty good,like you said.Those Fire and Nature mages are perfect for fire drake spamming.
Late game is not the best,but at least you got early access to death and nature.Actually machaka can have a very good nature gem income pretty fast.That looks to me like a shot for GoH and Tartarians.
If you manage to get very mighty in the early and midgame,but werent able to win,you should have a decisive gem advantage at least to keep the GoH up,i would think.
Additionally,it sure comes down on having some kind of astral access.
Astral is heavily nerved bc of no gem gens,everyone is in need of those pearls.
Thats why its probably enough,if you got only some shamans arcane probing with alchemized fire gems as early as possible,so that you can at least forge some items at the end game.
Some earth sites also offer pretty good astral mages.

Needs to be tested,for sure.I will soon start a MP game playing Machaka,i am pretty curious.
They have been my favorite nation,besides Abysia,in Dom2 and even back there,Machaka was considered to be pretty weak(where i considered them pretty strong actually).

[WraithLord]

Squirrelloid, I totally agree with your list, at least until 9.

It's actually quite sad that CBM didn't see fit to address Agartha and Machaka. Some small touches could make a big difference in making them interesting and competitive.

like for example, give all Machaka sorcerers/es +1 E/D/F pick. They are supposed to me a mage centric nation right?- That one additional pick can make the difference between lame and decent.

[Squirrelloid]

Originally Posted by WraithLord

Squirrelloid, I totally agree with your list, at least until 9.

It's actually quite sad that CBM didn't see fit to address Agartha and Machaka. Some small touches could make a big difference in making them interesting and competitive.

like for example, give all Machaka sorcerers/es +1 E/D/F pick. They are supposed to me a mage centric nation right?- That one additional pick can make the difference between lame and decent.

I wasn't totally happy with LA Atlantis on that list, since its so much better than everything else there. But if I had to pick a 10th... LA Atlantis at least has a shot at winning a game without riding the coattails of other nations.

Being reminded how much MA Ulm sucks helped a lot. (ie, amend list so MA Ulm is #6, and adjust accordingly)

[Squirrelloid]

LA Ulm is by no means strong. They are very weak early, and their troops are bad and overpriced. Lasting long enough to summon a vampire count is hard, much less lasting long enough to do anything with said vampire count. And their blood access is bad and expensive for their performance as blood hunters - you don't get the good blood summons, they're already all gone because you're competing with LA Abysia, LA Mictlan, etc... And have we mentioned the bad research? - you get to midgame after everyone else even in the research-poor LA, as a nation whose early game sucks. You think Marveni has a hard time surviving the early game? At least Marveni gets to start with a good mage and troops that don't fatigue out at the drop of a hat.

Agartha:
...
First of all, EA Rlyeh isn't even *that* strong, and EA Agartha still has no chance against them. Good MR doesn't help when your troops have the military power of tissue paper. Oh yeah, and invading Rlyeh with their guaranteed C3 dominion... let me know how that turns out for you. I'd take indie tritons over agarthan troops. No, not equal cash, equal numbers.

[Mardagg]

Originally Posted by Squirrelloid

Agartha:
...
First of all, EA Rlyeh isn't even *that* strong, and EA Agartha still has no chance against them. Good MR doesn't help when your troops have the military power of tissue paper. Oh yeah, and invading Rlyeh with their guaranteed C3 dominion... let me know how that turns out for you. I'd take indie tritons over agarthan troops. No, not equal cash, equal numbers.

ok,my friend.I must say that i already hate your arrogance at this point,after only reading half a dozen posts from you.
I just won an MP war with Agartha vs an EA Rlyeh ,that did know what he was doing.
He had no chance,bc my Pale infantry did a good job resisting quite a lot of mind blasts,while my Earth elementals via barathus pact where stomping his Lobos.He then proceeded to target my oracles in further battles,which had starting MR of 18,some did cast iron will for MR 22 before being targeted...in that fight he did not manage to kill a single of my Orcale mages,bc you know,they got pretty good HP,too.
My teleporting Risen oracle did a good job there,too,since,you know,he is amphibous.I took a start dom of 10 so actually wasnt a big problem to face his cold 3,since EA Ryleh always has dom problems.
I say EA Agartha is the top nation for battling EA Squids.
And,you know,that was just an example by me.
You didnt adress any of my other points.


Did YOU ever play EA Agartha?