Guide: MA Oceania - OMG, I think I've done it

[thejeff]

On the other hand, if wind ride does only move units 1 province, it's still a good assassination spell on air-breathers on the coast.

[cleveland]

Awesome stuff, as usual.

I just finished subbing for an MA Oceania position which shared the water with R'lyeh. I completely agree with everything you've said - if R'lyeh doesn't exist. But since it happens, here are a few comments to complement your extraordinary guide:

If R'lyeh is in the game, buckle up. After turn 25, they will dominate you, so kill them immediately.

Picture this: your Grand Army is swimming to meet the Alien Army. But just before the confrontation, 6 of your 10 commanders get zapfried by mindhunts, including the stealty S1 Spectre that was protecting them. So you arrive at the battlefield at half strength, across from a huge hoard of mindless chaff...

Turn 1: a half dozen ichtycentaurs get their minds enslaved, 2 dozen first strikes are spent killing them, as are a few errant numbness-es. Turn 2: repeat, only now the chaff have engaged you.........Eventually your exhausted ichtycentaurs break and retreat into enemy territory, since Imprint Souls can target underwater provinces.

I recommend:
(A) Surge out the the water looking with the singular goal of finding indy astral mage provinces. Forge swim trunks and institute the buddy system.
(B) Beg/Borrow/Steal all the Starshine Skullcaps you can. Put them on A and start every party with Antimagic.
(C) Beg/Borrow/Steal all the Amulets of Antimagic you can. Use 16+4=20MR Bishop Fish to lead your underwater armies, lest you arrive at the field without any troops. Make Lead Shields if necessary.
(D) Get Foul Vapors immediately...I know Alteration is awesome for Oceania, but you MUST get this spell before R'lyeh gets Enslave Mind. Unintuitively, Foul Vapors is castable underwater, and you can cast Poison Ward to mitigate the damage to your troops, he can't. Splurge those Earth gems on some un-mind-burnable, regenerating, poison-immune, zero-encumberance claymen to bolster your frontline.
(E) You need Bloodstones badly, as your Mermages can't wear Earth Boots underwater. Make it a priority, as you can then use Summon Earthpower and get Strength of Giants/Legions of Steel/Weapons of Sharpness underwater. Plus you can then summon Troll Kings.
(F) 20 PD in each retreat route.
(G) Don't cast Shark Attack in round 1. Script your Sirens for (Summon Water Power)(hold)(hold)(hold)(Shark Attack) so that the Enslave Minders are too exhausted for sustained enslavment of your sharks.

One last thought: Sailor's Death (W3, AOE=1, 14+ AN damage) works underwater against troops that are there by unnatural means (i.e. Sea King's Goblet, Wave Breaker, etc)...Summon Waterpower makes every mage you have W3, and most get Eagle Eyes...exploit this.

Again, great stuff.

[chrispedersen]

Originally Posted by cleveland

Awesome stuff, as usual.

I just finished subbing for an MA Oceania position which shared the water with R'lyeh. I completely agree with everything you've said - if R'lyeh doesn't exist. But since it happens, here are a few comments to complement your extraordinary guide:

If R'lyeh is in the game, buckle up. After turn 25, they will dominate you, so kill them immediately.

Picture this: your Grand Army is swimming to meet the Alien Army. But just before the confrontation, 6 of your 10 commanders get zapfried by mindhunts, including the stealty S1 Spectre that was protecting them. So you arrive at the battlefield at half strength, across from a huge hoard of mindless chaff...

Turn 1: a half dozen ichtycentaurs get their minds enslaved, 2 dozen first strikes are spent killing them, as are a few errant numbness-es. Turn 2: repeat, only now the chaff have engaged you.........Eventually your exhausted ichtycentaurs break and retreat into enemy territory, since Imprint Souls can target underwater provinces.

I recommend:
(A) Surge out the the water looking with the singular goal of finding indy astral mage provinces. Forge swim trunks and institute the buddy system.
(B) Beg/Borrow/Steal all the Starshine Skullcaps you can. Put them on A and start every party with Antimagic.
(C) Beg/Borrow/Steal all the Amulets of Antimagic you can. Use 16+4=20MR Bishop Fish to lead your underwater armies, lest you arrive at the field without any troops. Make Lead Shields if necessary.
(D) Get Foul Vapors immediately...I know Alteration is awesome for Oceania, but you MUST get this spell before R'lyeh gets Enslave Mind. Unintuitively, Foul Vapors is castable underwater, and you can cast Poison Ward to mitigate the damage to your troops, he can't. Splurge those Earth gems on some un-mind-burnable, regenerating, poison-immune, zero-encumberance claymen to bolster your frontline.
(E) You need Bloodstones badly, as your Mermages can't wear Earth Boots underwater. Make it a priority, as you can then use Summon Earthpower and get Strength of Giants/Legions of Steel/Weapons of Sharpness underwater. Plus you can then summon Troll Kings.
(F) 20 PD in each retreat route.
(G) Don't cast Shark Attack in round 1. Script your Sirens for (Summon Water Power)(hold)(hold)(hold)(Shark Attack) so that the Enslave Minders are too exhausted for sustained enslavment of your sharks.

One last thought: Sailor's Death (W3, AOE=1, 14+ AN damage) works underwater against troops that are there by unnatural means (i.e. Sea King's Goblet, Wave Breaker, etc)...Summon Waterpower makes every mage you have W3, and most get Eagle Eyes...exploit this.

Again, great stuff.

Really really great stuff. Makes me excited to try it.

[Dedas]

Great stuff yourself Cleveland! Have a beer!

[Baalz]

A couple good points there Cleveland, particularly about Shark attack and Sailor's death which I didn't know. I will say though that I don't think R'yleh will quite dominate you if you play this right and make the appropriate preparations for a mid/late game fight with the squids. To be sure, R'yleh is one of the more powerful nations in the game and will seldom be a pushover for any nation to fight, but you do have some powerful tools at your disposal using this setup I outlined.

1) Fighting R'yleh you don't want to use ichtycentaurs, use the Oceanian Triton supported by mindless/high MR summons (yeah leviathans!). Those enslave minds/soul slay/mind blasts are now targeting your 12 MR, 10 gold troops who are *very* tough chaff when buffed with mass protection and possibly fog warriors. Using ice pebble staffs and support mages (frozen heart, bone melter, drain life, etc.) you should be able to easily handle the small numbers of elite units R'yleh fields (meteor guards, void summons). Enslave mind is a lot less scary when instead of 100 centaurs you're fielding 400 tritons who have a nice unbuffed 12 MR (ok, probably 11 in a magic-1 environment), flanked by swarms of bone fiends, and remember you're countering with powerful spells of your own. If he's dropping mind hunt and enslave mind (evocation & thuaum), you should be matching with polymorphs & shark attack (alteration & conj)

2) You've got a stealthy astral pretender from turn 1 and if you've got a S1 specter you damn sure better slap two boosters on him. The thing about having *stealthy* astral mages is they work as a wonderful mind hunt deterrent far above the actual number of territories they're in. Think about it, if you're playing R'yleh and you know I've got some unknown number of astral mages hiding in my territory (because you've been feebleminded a couple times targeting apparently "safe" targets) are you likely to drop 10 mind hunts on the high value army that I'm very interested in protecting? Even if I *don't* have a mage there you're likely to assume I do. Remember, your opponent has *no idea* how many stealthy astral mages you've got covering you or where they are, only that that number is greater than 0 and he's got no way to recover from feeblemind. And of course you're not just bluffing, you should stick a specter/your pretender sneaking around with the grand army you really don't want mind hunted.

3) Indie astral mages are certainly a boon, but one of the tenants of this guide is that astral mages are too vital to count on finding indies. Your pretender gives you astral from turn 1. Specters are an early focus for your death economy, and you're also optionally funneling water gems into Unfrozen - you should have a handful of astral mages to work with even if you can't find any indie ones. I certainly don't disagree that you should keep your eyes peeled for indies, but they're not critical. You should be able to forge as many amulets of antimagic as you want, drop anti-magic, and stop mind hunts dead without counting on luck. If you don't have enough astral mages for what you need, well you now know what the top priority is for all your death and water gems.

Yes, I do believe I described blood stones as unlocking the second holy grail for MA Oceana. Couldn't agree more. If you need the extra level of earth that you lose from not being able to wear earth boots underwater use one of your E/S specters to forge a crystal shield.

Foul vapors I don't know if I agree with. Certainly it can be made to be effective, but I don't see it as being a top priority target. It works too slow, requires combos to work well, and still probably will result in friendly casualties until you start getting the real powerful combos (large numbers of poison immune troops, mass regeneration, etc). Certainly it's something you'll want to pick up at some point, but I wouldn't personally drop some of the other stuff I suggest to get it.

[chrispedersen]

Baalz,

When I play MA-R - my bread and butter isn't meteorite guards and void summonings. Its the mind blasting illitids. Maxed out as much as I can, and as much chaff as I need to screen them. I don't even know that I've ever build a meteorite guard.

But yes, the critical mass is absolutely necesssary against R. And you do want the 400 chaff rather than the ichy's. Makes it tough to turn around tho against other opponents. Those chaff are aquatic only, and suffer high attrition.

[Baalz]

I mention the meteorite guards (and other tougher units) because they're the obvious counter to swarms of chaff. Chaff > snipers > elite units > chaff. So, against R'yleh I recommend you skip the elite units since they'll be using lots of snipers. Your (buffed) chaff > their (unbuffed) chaff, so you *in theory* you should have the upper hand so long as your own snipers can handle their elite units. Against real players...actual results may vary.

[Micah]

Meteorite Guards are excellent resource sinks, I can't imagine not building them with rlyeh unless you're maxing out your resources some other way, which shouldn't be happening once you get a couple of forts up.

Illithids, OTOH, are pretty much crap-on-a-stick for the price. The crab hybrids are much better in the water, and your mages are much better topside (once you get enough commander slots from underwater forts to make building enough of them possible). They'll get you through initial expansion since indies are dumb and static, but illithid troops get overwhelmed by numbers pretty quickly. They're not at all the centerpiece of a good rlyeh strat.

[JimMorrison]

Originally Posted by Micah

Illithids, OTOH, are pretty much crap-on-a-stick for the price. The crab hybrids are much better in the water, and your mages are much better topside

God I hope if we meet in the water, you are playing MA R'lyeh. Illithids are bacon savers..... You can't even really effectively stop them with a single high HP/MR unit, like often works against Astral magic spam, as they always spread the love around a bit.

But I do agree wholeheartedly about Meteorites. Most UW castles can only put out a couple a turn anyways, and they're low gold cost, so may as well pile them up until the time is right to put them to good use.

[Baalz]

Haha, of course nothing I say is going to help if Micah is playing R'yleh.