Blood Red FIGHT ON!)

[Jarkko]

If you accept non-mod nations, then I could join with Eriu to test this cunning plan I have come up with

[Ferrosol]

I will take the Skaven.

[Baalz]

Alright, I'll call it closed at 10 nations. Anybody want to nominate a map? Thanks for putting it all together Pyg!

[Trumanator]

Urraparand, Sharivar, Parganos, and Rim of Darkness come to mind as possible candidates. RoD might need some balancing though, and I haven't actually played Urraparand in an MP game.

[Aethyr]

I've played Urraparand in MP a few times, and I like the map a great deal. However, you absolutely HAVE to have fixed starts...or its bound to be a short game for someone.

[Baalz]

Originally Posted by Aethyr

I've played Urraparand in MP a few times, and I like the map a great deal. However, you absolutely HAVE to have fixed starts...or its bound to be a short game for someone.

I've no objections if you want to put in the changes.

[Sombre]

I will watch this game with interest.

[Baalz]

Hmmm, watching them in action I've got some stronger concerns about Themiskyra being balanced against other nations. Masses of strong sacreds are very tough, and combine their great defense with good protection, good offense and their sacreds are not only recruit anywhere, but also pretty affordable. Compare to some of the other really good recruit anywhere sacreds. There are really only a few and they're well known for being powerhouses.

Mictlan Jaguar warriors. Low defense & protection means there are lots of decent counters.

Lanka Kalu-mukha. 60% more expensive than jade maidens. Only 1 attack. Lower protection. Vastly lower defense.

Hmmm, I can't think of any other top notch recruit anywhere sacreds off the top of my head. You can't really compare cap only or indie recruits because of how powerful critical mass is - 20+ high defense sacreds are all but invincible in melee as they've got friends to their left and right. When you can have several (all of your) armies like that its a bit out of line with other nations. When you add on the strategic flexibility of having a bunch of very different top notch sacreds available so you can fly, sneak, overwhelm with fear or go with the cheap guys (you can get 2 jade maidens and some change for the price of a Van)... it just seems quite a bit too much.

What do other people playing think? I'm willing to allow it if I'm the only one who thinks this.

[Alpine Joe]

Looking at Themiskra, I agree that their sacreds seem a little ridiculous. However the other mod nations in this game all have some pretty effective strategies as well. i say leave them as is, but everyone be aware of how strong they can be.

[Burnsaber]

Originally Posted by Alpine Joe

Looking at Themiskra, I agree that their sacreds seem a little ridiculous. However the other mod nations in this game all have some pretty effective strategies as well. i say leave them as is, but everyone be aware of how strong they can be.

Since I'm the author of two of these mod nations that have "effective stragedies", I've decided to level the playground and help the players in this game by telling something about them.

You see, both of my nations (Dwarfs and Alugra) are pretty oddball and play out a lot different than most dom3 nations. If you try to use "conventional" tricks against them, you might be suprised.

Dwarfs

This is the nations second MP game, so there might be some balance issues. However, my feedback in the thread has mostly been about improving them somehow, so I'm quite confident that they are fine (if they are not, gangbang always works) . Dwarf military is likely best in the game, but cost a lot of gold and resources. All of their castles also cost 1200gold and take 4 turns to build. It is in essence, a slow nation to get rolling and is likely to play defensively, especially considering their good PD.

They have mages with forgebonus (gee, what a shocker), but only medicore diversity and only really strong magic in earth. Also, their most powerful mages have casting encumberance of 13!, limiting the magic support they can give to their troops. This is not a nation that throws fireballs around in the battlefield. You should note though that they have very heavy artilley unit at enchantment 7, "Anvil of Doom" that can do all sorts of crazy stuff. Be prepared to counter it if you think that the dwarfs have access to it!

If you face dwarfs, you should use shielded chaff troops to negate the effectiveness of their excellent crossbow archers (and ranger throwing axes!) and kill the melee forces with appropiate selection of magic. Anything that does AN/AP damage will do fine (poison, combustion, star fire/stellar cascades, numbness, gifts from heaven, fireball, lightning spells), try to avoid mr-negates effects due to their high mr and drain dominion. Be careful when using thugs or big sized troops against them, since they excellent counter to those in the form of slayers (who are weak to archery, try fire largest to target them since they have some extra hp when compared to other infantry).

In conclusion: To fight against dwarfs you need to switch gears to deal with a low number of extremely elite troops, instead of the chaff with mage support most nations wield.

Alugra

Alugra is another oddball. At the moment, it has gone through 3 MP games, facing slight nerfs after each one. IMO it is balanced at the moment. It has sucky national mages, but it has 7 different types of cap-only "gifted" troops who come with magic picks. The nation also comes with a national GoR spell that costs 7 astral gems.

Their regular non-cap forces are pretty meh, but the afromentioned gifted troops are superb and fill many roles, allowing Alugra to wield a wild smorgasbord of battlefield tactics. GoR'red gifted are also good thug chassises and this fact is only improved by their good selection of national self buffing spells.

If you face Alugra, you should be prepared to deal with gifted thugs and troops. Note that gifted are magical beings ("Control", "Moonblade" and "Opposition" ring any bells?). Also, being human(oid?), they have low hitpoints considering their big gold costs so AP/AN stuff works well. Scouting is also very important when fighting Alugra, learning their troop composition allows you to abuse the weak points of many gifted troops (poison with watchmen, lightining for Smiths, mr-stuff vs workers).

One of the oddest stragedies that Alugra can wiled is something called "Thug Communion". Alugra's single non-cap mage, "Manifest", is a guarantied S1 and has pretty good stats and equipment. Sometimes they are communioned en masse with leaders casting self-buffs and finishing the deal with "Use the Leylines". It is a national spell that clears 100 fatigue and blinks the caster. If casted by a leader, it affects all slaves too.

It's nasty.

You have been warned