But do you really like SC in dominions2 ?

[Graeme Dice]

Saber Cherry said:
Got it; I misunderstood you. When I think "National Army" I think:

All of your listed armies are simply asking to be hit by murdering winter or wrathful skies, since they have no protection from spells, and are far too resource intensive. They all also suffer from Zerg syndrome, as at 200 troops the battlefield is getting very crowded.

Your "national armies" are much cheaper, much smaller, and much more mage-centric.

They are also much more effective, since they are less likely to be instantly wiped out by any of a dozen different tactics that all cost less than the cost of the hordes.

Still, it seems to me that a party with 5-10 fighting units would rout too fast to do anything, e.g. if one of the units took a single arrow from a defender,

That's why each of his groups are set up so that battlefield summons prevent routing and cause the most damage. 15 Ctissian city guards spread out through two or three groups are unlikely to rout before the sauromancers can provide many skleletons to support them. If they do, you only lost a small amount of resources.

Once two units are killed, they'll all leave for sure, even if the mages could win singlehandedly.

Not if you've taken your units and split them up into five groups per commander. Then they all have to be killed before the army routs.

[alexti]

Saber Cherry said:

Got it; I misunderstood you. When I think "National Army" I think:

200 Ulm Infantry + 8 Smiths + 20 Black Knights
or
200 Mictlan Slaves + 200 Warriors + 25 Eagle/Sun Warriors + 10 mages and 50 blood slaves
or
30 Hydras with several poison-immune-item mages to cast body ethereal
or
30 Valkyries / Vans with 200 Hirdmen + 200 medium indy archers + 3 Vanadrotts + 5 Smiths

Those are also "national armies". By "national army" I mean any army you can buy for gold at any time and which costs you 0 gems. Your examples I'd qualify as "large national armies", which are quite a big investment, thus worth fortifying them with all available means.

Saber Cherry said:
... and so forth. These numbers don't include various arrow-target units or bodyguards for the mages. Your "national armies" are much cheaper, much smaller, and much more mage-centric. Obviously they are effective for you, so I'll have to try them... but I would consider them "raiding parties"

One doesn't exclude another, "national army" describes content and "raiding party" describes the purpose.

Saber Cherry said:
Still, it seems to me that a party with 5-10 fighting units would rout too fast to do anything, e.g. if one of the units took a single arrow from a defender, Dominions II gives the entire army about a 50% percent chance of routing. Once two units are killed, they'll all leave for sure, even if the mages could win singlehandedly.

I don't think so. I haven't observed concept of routing for the army as a whole. Each squad seems to route independently. I often observed some squads routing and other keep fighting. So, when a unit is killed it may only cause the remaining half of the squad to route (assuming 2 units per squad). And for some of those armies, there's enough commanders to use 1 unit squads.

Saber Cherry said:In other words, it seems like they'd have trouble attacking province defense of around 20 (especially backed by a mage or a few archers) let alone taking castles, conquering indies (at settings of 6+), or really doing anything useful except invading provinces where the opponent forgot to hire any province defense...

It depends. Caelum's or C'tis squads should have little problems with 20pd, unless PD is flying. With Jotunheim armies it's a bit a matter of luck. Pan's army should do fine if their several units are Centaur Warriors. If you add few (like 5-10) archers, it won't change results much, if you add a mage, that depends on the mage, with good mage (like sauromancer or seraph) PD is likely to win. But people rarely buy 20 PD (because it's like paying gold to give the enemy army free experience), so those armies work well until they meet some more serious army.

Of course, you're not likely to storm any forts with those armies, but you can always gather them together when needed, moving supporting summons and SC at the same time, so that you instantly getting a strong army in the required spot.

[alexti]

Graeme Dice said:
That's why each of his groups are set up so that battlefield summons prevent routing and cause the most damage. 15 Ctissian city guards spread out through two or three groups are unlikely to rout before the sauromancers can provide many skleletons to support them. If they do, you only lost a small amount of resources.

Right, and if you use many small national armies, they're likely to route into the province another army has moved in, so they can be quickly enlisted into that army

[Tuidjy]

> Got it; I misunderstood you. When I think "National Army" I think:
>
> 200 Ulm Infantry + 8 Smiths + 20 Black Knights
> or
> 200 Mictlan Slaves + 200 Warriors + 25 Eagle/Sun Warriors + 10 mages and 50 blood slaves
> or
> 30 Hydras with several poison-immune-item mages to cast body ethereal
> or
> 30 Valkyries / Vans with 200 Hirdmen + 200 medium indy archers + 3 Vanadrotts + 5 Smiths

If we are talking about Dominions II, there is a word for the above: 'free xpt'.
There are so many, different ways of utterly defeating any of these with 50gems
and 1000g worth of resources, that making such combinations viable would require
changing Dominions II beyond recognition.

Against a good player, each of the above will win one fight, and survive an
additional turn while the enemy puts together a reaction force. The next time
it shows its nose outside of a castle, it will be obliterated.

Obviously you dislike this. I don't.

[PvK]

Boron said:

If you have tartarians why should you ever use any other kind of mages ?

Because other mages don't cost astral gems to summon.

If you have wish why shouldn't you wish each turn for 1-2 AQs or similiar SCs each turn ?

Because the game was over before you clamhoarded that much astral income, or because you're playing a mod that nerfs clams.

There are 2-3 troops / mages / Scs / weapons / spells that are so uber that you use them almost exclusively once you have them .

I think you meant to write "I" where you wrote "you". I don't do those things. Nevertheless, I agree that I would rather see some of the "obvious super deals" cost more like what they are worth.

PvK