Niefelheim - Who’s afraid of the big bad wolf?

[AreaOfEffect]

I just don't understand. Its hard to say an idea has been stolen when the concept applied is amazingly simple. Nobody needs to read anybody else's work to understand that a Skratti thug is worth investigating. All you need to do is play Jotunheim or Utgard once. That's all it took for me. The same applies to a dominion push strategy. The instant you realize they can push cold scales past their dominion it becomes an important consideration for anyone.

I would say that this is the first time I've read up on Neifelheim at all and I'm not overwhelmed with many ideas that I haven't already had myself. There are all sorts of mini-strats one can apply. Pieces to a puzzle. The question isn't identifying them, its figuring out how many of them you can apply before you overextend yourself. Which ones are synergistic and could be kept and which ones you need to forego for the sake of the rest.

[Juffos]

You people are arguing on who is copying who? By writing these guides and by helping other people out, we all are urinating into the same big pool of piss. It is collective.

[thejeff]

Inspired by this guide, I've been playing around with Skratti thugs in Jotunheim. MA doesn't have the skinshifters and the regular troops are resource intensive and unimpressive. This means it's hard to expand with the lousy scales Neifelheim can use: sloth3 particularly.

I was trying to see what was the minimum Skratti needed to be able to clear indies with some efficiency. In EA, they did well with Quicken Self and a pair of ice swords. In MA, you don't have the starting water income and my trials with other weapons ended in early death.
Anyone have thoughts on how to get quickly get them up and taking at least the weaker indies? I'd rather not wait for Const 4 & blood income.

Once you're using Baalz's Skratti build, how do they handle archers? It seems the lack of a shield would leave them vulnerable. I've used them before with Frost Brand and whatever shield I could afford and that was brutal.

[Baalz]

Originally Posted by thejeff

Inspired by this guide, I've been playing around with Skratti thugs in Jotunheim. MA doesn't have the skinshifters and the regular troops are resource intensive and unimpressive. This means it's hard to expand with the lousy scales Neifelheim can use: sloth3 particularly.

I was trying to see what was the minimum Skratti needed to be able to clear indies with some efficiency. In EA, they did well with Quicken Self and a pair of ice swords. In MA, you don't have the starting water income and my trials with other weapons ended in early death.
Anyone have thoughts on how to get quickly get them up and taking at least the weaker indies? I'd rather not wait for Const 4 & blood income.

Once you're using Baalz's Skratti build, how do they handle archers? It seems the lack of a shield would leave them vulnerable. I've used them before with Frost Brand and whatever shield I could afford and that was brutal.

You're gonna have a hard time fielding them effectively before const-4, really most of your options before that aren't much better than just using their default claws and as you say arrows/javelins are going to eat you alive if you're planning on attacking without support. Even at const-4 you've got a relatively fragile offense machine who's certainly not going to be soloing anything significant - the build I suggest at this point with no armor very much assumes no concentrated attack - Niefels are great for drawing fire and tanking it out, but you've still got some good well shielded hitpoint sinks in MA. For initial expansion you might try using a handful of hirdmen to draw the attacks while a quickened skratti does the damage from the flank...but that's going to be dicey. Once you've got some research leeway you're definitely going to want to tweak some of my default suggestions according to what you're expecting to face. Using shields trips up the very low gem usage target as you're looking at adding 50%-100% to the gems you need for each guy (not counting blood slaves), but obviously is the way to go anyway in some situations. One option to consider is that amulet which gives air shield, with a 20 protection and regen you're very resistant to occasional arrow hits. Nothing really beats a good shield though if you're expecting very heavy archer fire.

[AreaOfEffect]

I've played extensively with Utgard in this respect. I find that taking two Skratti casting Quicken and one size 2 astral mage casting body ethereal twice works very effectively. Unfortunately this is best with Utgard as they have cheep mages with reliable access to astral. You could try your luck with Vaetti hags as one in four are astral. You'd have better luck with the Gygjas though. Use a few militia set to body guard and placed up front to screen arrow fire.

As for gear, I wouldn't ignore two-handed items for the purpose of expansion. Even the thorn staff can be useful as it allows you to parry most attacks and raises your defense by 5. There isn't many appealing choices against missile fire aside from the body ethereal.

[Endoperez]

I'm with HoneyBadger. His point was that Baalz's ideas aren't new.

Not that someone else had written a similar guide. Not that HoneyBadger himself had mentioned these things before. His point was that experienced players already knew Niefelheim has more tricks than just the blue giants, and indeed many experienced players commented something along the lines of "I knew most of this, but I liked this one idea you had" or "I never used axes with the skratti before, that's nice".

HoneyBadger's example isn't meant to be identical, but similar.
He recommends using non-Niefel commanders and goes into detail about using Skratti as thugs, and he recommends similar scales (Luck 3 most notably), and worries about dominion death (which Baalz solved differently). Focus on the similarities. Alansmithee's post above is good, even though it focuses on the differences.


I think what irritates HB most is the fact that Baalz never mentions that these aren't all new ideas, and wrote a shocking introduction that made the reader expect something revolutionary.

"Let me introduce you to the other Niefelheim, the one geared to win the game rather than scare the crap out of everyone for only the first couple years. "
"Blasphemy, I know. Now I admit, Niefel giants make great indie stompers, but my goodness don’t you realize you’re paying retail!?!?."

It isn't revolutionary for players who have used most of these tricks before. For players who haven't, it might seem like it's all Baalz's idea.

HoneyBadger didn't say that Baalz copied, mind you. His point was to know what Baalz came up with and what he didn't, so that you respect him for the stuff he did come up with and not the stuff all veterans already know. Baalz is the guy who kills huge armies with his teleporting Marverni mages, not a guy who uses Skratti thugs.

[vfb]

Originally Posted by Endoperez

...I think what irritates HB most is the fact that Baalz never mentions that these aren't all new ideas, and wrote a shocking introduction that made the reader expect something revolutionary.

"Let me introduce you to the other Niefelheim, the one geared to win the game rather than scare the crap out of everyone for only the first couple years. "
"Blasphemy, I know. Now I admit, Niefel giants make great indie stompers, but my goodness don’t you realize you’re paying retail!?!?."
...

Oh no, it sounds like you're trying to revoke Baalz's poetic license! C'mon, it's flavorful and good for you too. His next guide could look like this:

"Part 1 of the treatise on Niefelheim in which it is described in some detail the various strategies that may be employed in which to obtain an enhanced level of capabilities in the later stages, creating a favorable environment for elimination of other potential prospects for the position of Pankreator, as opposed to a strong early game which though can possibly result in the rapid acquisition of neighboring territory does not provide the synergies necessary for an extended campaign..."

That's not gonna make me want to jump up and start a new game with Nief, that's going to put me to sleep.

[KissBlade]

I agree with HB & Endo's sentiment that this guide really isn't giving most people anything new but there's not exactly a whole lot of depth to Niefel really. Bless your Jotun's, abuse skinshifters => win. If not win => use skratti's as thug chassis + death/astral/blood => win.

[Sombre]

Alansmithee, that was good stuff. I'd rather this didn't all turn sour, but HB deserved that.

'lept speaks the truth as usual.

Endo: I have to wonder if you even read what HB posted. He might try to weasel out of it, but he's pretty clearly saying that Baalz is plagiarising other peoples ideas and that he had already come up with them and written a guide about them and OH BY THE WAY LOOK AT MY GUIDE LOOK AT MY GUIDE.

[Endoperez]

Originally Posted by KissBlade

I agree with HB & Endo's sentiment that this guide really isn't giving most people anything new

I didn't say that. It's not giving new stuff to veterans. I'm not a veteran, just a regular, and learned a lot reading this guide.

Originally Posted by vfb

Oh no, it sounds like you're trying to revoke Baalz's poetic license! C'mon, it's flavorful and good for you too. His next guide could look like this:

I've enjoyed Baalz's over-the-top writing before and hope to enjoy it in the future. However, flavorful can come off wrong. My comment on this guide (first reply in the first page) is an example of that. I meant to say that Niefelheim played according to this guide would be wicked to play against and wicked fun to play as, but it didn't come out that way.

Originally Posted by Sombre

Endo: I have to wonder if you even read what HB posted. He might try to weasel out of it, but he's pretty clearly saying that Baalz is plagiarising other peoples ideas and that he had already come up with them

HB said he had come up with SOME OF the ideas Baalz used.

If he'd just linked to his post instead of quoting the whole of it, the tone of his post wouldn't have seemed nearly bad as it did. Here are some chosen quotes from the other parts of that message:

"...most of what's suggested here is a retread of things that have already been suggested, often more than once. Not all of it, but a lot. Just to give one example, here's a copy of a post I made in September 30 of last year..."

"I'm not trying to grab credit for Baalz' work-and this *is* a nice, concise guide-but it's a little insulting to other people who originally came up with these ideas and aren't recieving any credit for them, and it's insulting to Baalz for people to say that it's some of his best work, since he really *has* come up with some fantastic, innovative guides. ... There's just not a lot that's original here. It's either old ideas gathered together, or Baalz' standard tactics applied generically to yet another Nation."

Here's the part where HB suggests that Baalz borrowed ideas, with a clause for the chance that Baalz came up with it independently.

"I don't mind anyone using my ideas, but I like to recieve credit for them, and I'm sure I'm not alone in this. It's not so terribly difficult to do a little research and see if your "great new idea" has ever been thought of before."

Even a single sentence about experienced players already being familiar with some of the stuff mentioned in the guide would have been enough to keep HoneyBadger from posting. It wouldn't have taken that much to keep what HB posted sounding less hostile. It probably got worse in further posts, but fire tends to spread and there's little to do about that.