"Got Blood?" -- BF Ulm AAR (Newbie)

[Daynarr]

Originally posted by SelfishGene:
I will be following this thread with interest as i find Black Forest Ulm to be a painfully weak and insipid theme.

From what ive gathered from other threads, most like Black Forest because of Vampire Counts and their ability to rout independents. Well, that must be all that Ulm has.

You could not be more wrong here. BF is possibly one of the most powerfull themes there if you know how to use their strengths. And it's actually even easier to use it for beginners then default Ulm. One of their best strengths are rangers. You can build masses of them just like man can build longbows, but rangers use armor piercing crossbows which are better at taking HI and HC which helps incredibly at early expansion. Heck, in MP you have a chance to take out 2 players out before real magic starts to kick in. You don't know how powerfull they are until you play against it in MP and you suddenly face large masses of rangers (who have high accuracy by the way) that start to effectively erase you troops backed up by a hard to penetrate wall of Ulm HI.
The really scary part is that BF can recruit those rangers really, really fast so you will probably face them much sooner then you can build effective defense.

BF also allows you to take Misfortune 3 and get away with it. Just build dozens of Fortunetellers and keep them in capitol. Chances for bad events are capitol based IIRC, and it will suppress most of bad events. Of course, that will mean that you don't get national heroes either, but you do get lots of nice design points.

You don't need to rush VC to play this theme effectively. And it DOES allow you to get Ice Devils later on, which normal Ulm wouldn't be able to, at least not easily.

Having only the generic priest available for duty means you cannot cast any morale support without your prophet. Having no sacred units means you can't ever build for bless effects. Virtually every unit has a mere 10 morale, which is downright terrible and makes Ulm the equal in morale weakness with the worst civs.

All this is true for normal Ulm as well, so this is not really weakness of BF but Ulm in general. As Graeme Dice said, there are workarounds to tackle these problems, but in the beginning your prophet is going to have to carry the burden of sustaining morale of your troops.

Having only 1 Blood, 160 gold, non-sacred mages means you HAVE to use scouts, meaning you have to blood hunt the whole country and spend dozens of turns building scouts.

That is why it's important to have a pretender with Blood magic to speed up the things (like VQ).

[Scott Hebert]

Personally, SelfishGene, I have to go with Daynarr here. BF Ulm, while not having a very good magical base (it IS Ulm, after all), or a very diverse troop base, has most everything you need to play.

First, the Rangers are quite powerful. As others have said, the ability to mass-produce them works very well. Second, you get excellent heavy infantry in the Morningstar Infantry of Ulm. Third, you get free, speedy, expendable flankers with the Wolfherd's wolves. They are excellent to shut down enemy archers and mages, crossbowmen especially.

Finally, you get access to slightly more diverse paths than base Ulm, and Communion. Something I've contemplated is this. Sabbath and Communion work with each other, right? So, if I enter my Vampire Queen or Blood Counts into a Sabbath while my other Mages go into Communion, and one of my Astral mages cast Astral Shield, my VQ/BCs will get the Shield without needing Astral Magic, correct? I might need this later, and thought to check now.

Also, I'm on turn 7 'in game', and I've gotten a Hero that I don't think anyone has commented on. Has anyone else seen Ulrich, the Ghoul Baron? If you want, I can post his stats when I write up his turn.

Anyway, on to the writing! Oh, and if you want to refer to me, it's "Tasogare" or "Taso" or "That incompetent supercilious idiot." My handle is written in Japanese style.

Bayushi Tasogare

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Bayushi Tasogare:
[QB]So, if I enter my Vampire Queen or Blood Counts into a Sabbath while my other Mages go into Communion, and one of my Astral mages cast Astral Shield, my VQ/BCs will get the Shield without needing Astral Magic, correct?[/QB

They will only get the astral shield if they are the slaves and a master casts the spell.

[Scott Hebert]

So... I can have my VQ/BCs absorbing the fatigue cost of my spells (and healing it through Life Drain attacks), and getting Astral Shield and whatnot?

Sounds good to me.

Bayushi Tasogare

[Scott Hebert]

Turn 2

Irma reclined on her throne made from the skulls of the Inquisition, and called for the report from Nan Bagor. Apparently, with the passing of the Malediction, the people of Cun Aral had reverted to barbarism, and 25 of them stood in the path of her armies. She dismissed him, and asked if the Fortuneteller she had requested had arrived or not.

Her chamberlain hesitated. "She... has arrived, Your Majesty. However..." He trailed off as she leaned forward intently.

"However..? Lord Chamberlain, I do not like my commands disobeyed. Where is sh..." Irma trailed off as a woman entered the throne room, looking somehow determinedly vacuous.

"Your majesty, may I introduce the Fortuneteller you requested?" The Chamberlain seemed eager to withdraw, and so Irma waved her hand dismissively.

"My dear, you must have been quite fatigued from the trip," Irma purred at the new arrival.

The Fortuneteller giggled, and replied, "The wolf does not know that the serpent hunts for it."

Starting to wonder at the girl's sanity, Irma continued, "What do you know that can help me in my mission to bring the Malediction to all?"

At that, the Fortuneteller laughed out loud. "A curse cannot be spread with a blessing," she said.

Irma's eyes narrowed in displeasure. "Are you having sport with me, woman? What is your name?"

The girl's eyes focused momentarily, and said hesitantly, "I do not remember. Once I started to See, I have been known as Coma."

Irma's anger changed abruptly to amusement. "You were well-named, child. Come, and help me in my studies."

And that is how Coma (2S) the Fortuneteller came into the service of Irma.

I got the Barbarians. Removing 3 Pikemen from Karl's formation (he started with 16), I put the 12 Rangers with him, put them off to the side, and along with Rexor's troops, have them go off into Fenatice. My reports had said that it had ~8000 pop, and so it would be a good province to Blood Hunt in. Also, I had seen bad Dominion to its NW, so I wanted to grab the province before someone else could. While Irma and Coma continue researching Alteration, Nan Bagor summons a couple of wolves. I pay 156 gold for another Fortuneteller, 3 Rangers, and 3 Morningstar Infantry (I greatly prefer these to Pikemen when using Rangers, because the shields help to cut down on friendly fire).

Summary:

Treasury: 8
Income: 180 (-2)
Upkeep: 29 (+13)
Gems: 2S6D2N
Gem Income: 1S3D1N
Research: Alteration 1 anticipated
Research Income: 25 of 25

As always, comments welcome.

Bayushi Tasogare

[Tuna-Fish]

Do post the stats of Ulrich.

Also, the communion/sabbath thing does not work, because the slaves will not do anyhting after becoming slaves. This is probably to save them from getting fatique, so giving astral shield to people who are essentially o0n "hold" orders is not very productive...

[Psitticine]

Hmm, I've just finished up a game with a lot of Communion magic going on. The Slaves cast spells quite freely after the first Communion Slave as long as I told them too. Maybe Sabbath Slaves are different. I haven't messed around with them.