T'ien Ch'i, and how they rule!

Crystal Shields ... Sigh. They are expensive, even if you do get a good searcher for Earth. My main searcher is either a Celestial Master with a Earth and Death or a Lot5E with a Death. Also Nature is good since so many sites are Nature 1. The trick is getting him up to Earth 2, Astral 3 (for the shields) they are not that glamourous. Cost something like 20 Astral 20 Earth gems to forge and are heavy thus netting you less spells because most of the time you can only script what you want first off (Quickness etc.) then under computer control it chooses the most fatiguing spells instead of chaincasting ones that they can repeatedly do.

I hold onto my Astral (outside of Power of the Spheres, which I always have scout runners ready to supply for) unless I need to Alchemy for making summons, since they are such a big part of S&A and a Pack of Summer Lions or Fall Bears can make a big difference in it's army strength. Otherwise I save them for an Angelic Host. A good % of the time I find a pretty healthy death income and keep on the Spirit Mastery and Revive Mound King to carry them around with the main army.

Where I seem to be falling, is really penetrating those heavy troops of the enemy. I wish that S&A had access to X-bows, that would at least give them a half-decent way to deal with them. That and the fact if I don't build my pretender exactly right; I have a gem income I can't use and armies with vast holes in them (Because of summons and the fact that Celestial Masters suck at summoning anything other than Demon of's).

If the Random 2 slot would both be to 1 path that would be best, it would at least give you a shot at not having to make your pretender do all the work.

Edit: I wish that Luck 3 would upgrade the vanilla luck events. Like instead of 30 Militia (nearly useless with S&A since most of what you can recruit is on par with militia, and they eat a ton) upgrade it to 20 Heavy Infantry if you get that same event in a Luck 3 enviroment. Instead of 20 Flaggelants, upgrade it to 10 Knights.

[ December 04, 2003, 05:36: Message edited by: Zen ]

[Saber Cherry]

What's up with the love of Crystal Shields? They're terrible! Way too much encumbrance. I prefer shields of valor, or lucky coins. Am I missing something? Or are these just used to enable a specific spell that would normally be uncastable? Or do people always use them with reinvig items?

On a Celestial Master it's like a free Power of the Spheres during battle. Which is very nice unless you like casting Geyser or Acid Bolt his entire career.

A Power of the Spheres and a Crystal Shield on a Master makes him able to cast nifty spells like Falling Fires, Falling Frost, Orb Lightning (effectively), and when he gets low on fatigue, Smite a billion times.

Unfortunately, the Computer doesn't say "Look we're at 99 Fatigue, I am only going to cast Holy spells" it says "Lets cast the most fatiguing spell I have"

[Saber Cherry]

Originally posted by Zen:
A Power of the Spheres and a Crystal Shield on a Master makes him able to cast nifty spells like Falling Fires, Falling Frost, Orb Lightning (effectively), and when he gets low on fatigue, Smite a billion times.

Ah! There we go=) I didn't know it raised divine as well. Hmmm... time to give one to my prophet=)

[Saber Cherry]

Originally posted by Keir Maxwell:
The one thing I do get is lots of astral gems from all those temples.

Huh? Is this some special I don't know about? Or do you mean holy sites that give astral gems?

I was thinking a bit about a lack of xbows being a weakness for Tien Chi themes. But... indy xbows are pretty common, and I like them better... cheaper, lower resources. Assuming you find indy xbows (a good assumption) the TC non-default themes shouldn't be hindered.

Well every X-bow out there except the Hoburg is pricy in resources; thus you must build a Castle on it to be useful; while your main castles are left to build either Glaive, Spear/Shield Infantry, Compositebowmen, or Horsemen (bleh).

The Glaives are okay; but they get mowed down quite fast. I wish they would strap on a little more armor to them. An added bonus is they get torn up by your own missle fire; so once someone routs, your Glaive squad(s) are mincemeat.

I think the main fault is not having a cavalry to speak of. If they had more than a mediocre cavalry (like Barbarian Kings) they would at least have a shot at throwing back a heavy wave, or tearing up an enemy xbow core.

I think that is the main problem, because even the summons you get from using a Celestial Master (Wyverns) that you would use for Cavalry purposes get chewed up by your forced use of arrowfire.

Arrow Fend is out of reach of most Celestial Masters or Mot5E, but with a Power of the Spheres and a Shield they can do it. But I don't feel using 1 spell is the answer to a race/theme. At least unless they start with it .

I'm probably just playing them wrong ;/ I do have a fast start for S&A though, not as fast as a true quick race, but enough I wouldn't feel crippled. It's the midgame that really is cruel on S&A, with not enough Demons to make a heavy core, and no units to bolster those that you have.

[Keir Maxwell]

Originally posted by Saber Cherry:

quote:

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Originally posted by Keir Maxwell:
The one thing I do get is lots of astral gems from all those temples.

Huh? Is this some special I don't know about? Or do you mean holy sites that give astral gems?

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Thats the one - sorry for the confusion.