Ermor themes, too strong?

[Teraswaerto]

No upkeep, sure. But no way to recruit them either. Ermor is constantly short on death gems, so whether or not needing to/being able to to summon mages and priest is an advantage isn't so clear.

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
You've missed their major advantage, which is that they are still balanced for the Dominions 1 economy, whereas every other nation now has half the gold production available.

I don't happen to have Dominions 1, so I have no idea what you're talking about. Besides, it is irrelevant: Ermor will always have a more ridiculously huge number of troops than a living nation: Undoing Ermor's troops cannot be accomplished by hamhandedly throwing more troops at it, and if use the correct tools for the job, losing ANY troops in a clash of conventional armies is completely optional.

I believe that that statement is quite literally true. Ermor has absolutely no limitations on the maximum number of troops it can support

Incorrect: There is a maximum number of troops that Ermor (or any nation) is allowed to have, after which Ermor will not be able to receive any more troops, and any attempts to summon better troops risks failure due to this limit.

and pays no upkeep on its mages whatsoever.

This is certainly an advantage, but I don't see it as overwhelming: Other nations are perfectly capable of switching to summoned, no-upkeep mages as well.

quote:

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Don't let yourself be goaded into a rash campaign: Act with patience and prudence, not a knee-jerk reaction of "Ermor must die!".

I think that this is poor advice. Once ghost riders comes into play, which tends to be before turn 40, you basically have no chance against an Ermorian player. This spell makes building fortreses necessary in every province with a temple, which drains gold reserves incredibly quickly.

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Impulsive, poorly considered, knee-jerk attacks are invariably the cause of total army loss. An impulsive, badly planned rush with poor strategic support will leave you in a very awkward position if it fails horribly.

I see you've caught onto my remote temple burning strategy. Building fortresses in every province with a temple, this is basically necessary anyway: Ghost Riders is not the only remote-raiding spell, and fliers, or flying SCs, can easily maraud completely unchecked, leaving you to try to guess their next move in a giant, extremely aggravating, whack-a-mole, unless you build forts. Province defense can stop very lightweight attacks, but is generally worthless against a human player, and there is really no point to using it other than to run off scouts. Fortresses, no matter how lousy, however, do something that NO amount of PD can do: No matter HOW large the attacking army is, you will always buy yourself a minimum of one turn to respond. Furthermore, your attacker is unable to pillage the province, and the amount of savaging he can conduct merely by raising taxes to 200 is far more limited. Lastly, if your attacker is unable to breach the wall, he can't kill your army: Forts are particularly effective against lone SCs, because SCs tend to be exceedingly poor at sieging even the weakest forts, and will be forced to either bring or request backup, give up, or camp out in front of the gates until the defender can muster a suitable response and run him off.

It should also be noted that Ermor is not even the only nation capable of using remote summons, including Ghost Riders. I regularly employ the use of Ghost Riders for temple burnings as living nations as well. Forts are mandatory, and are by far a better long-term investment than troops that invariably die ineffectually, as I tend to see them do often: After all, if you can't defend your land and prevent the enemy from taking it, all you have really accomplished is clearing the indies out at your own expense so that your enemy can use the land. This is stupid: If you can't hold onto it, it's not yours, and you're just conquering it for the enemy.

Both population killing Ermorian themes should probably cost 200 points just to match the other reanimating themes that exist.

CW Pan is a zero-point reanimating theme. DT C'tis costs 200, an amount many believe is far overpriced, and only seems to warrant any cost at all because it (allegedly) lacks the killer dominion that will render your lands devoid of income, and thus permits the simultaneous use of living troops, removing the one-dimensional limitation of other reanimation themes.

[Yossar]

Originally posted by Norfleet:
CW Pan is a zero-point reanimating theme.

More like a 160 point theme. 200 point before the patch. Being forced to take growth in a death theme is pretty useless.

[ April 11, 2004, 08:02: Message edited by: Yossar ]

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Norfleet:
I don't happen to have Dominions 1, so I have no idea what you're talking about. Besides, it is irrelevant: Ermor will always have a more ridiculously huge number of troops than a living nation:

No, it really isn't irrelevant. In Dominions I, a living nation player had more than twice as much gold to throw around eac and every turn than they do now. That translates into a lot more units and especially a lot more mages and priests to handle the undead.

Incorrect: There is a maximum number of troops that Ermor (or any nation) is allowed to have, after which Ermor will not be able to receive any more troops, and any attempts to summon better troops risks failure due to this limit.

Yes, and we all know that every other nation can afford to have 32767 troops plus several dozen mages sitting around.

This is certainly an advantage, but I don't see it as overwhelming: Other nations are perfectly capable of switching to summoned, no-upkeep mages as well.

So what, they're supposed to squander their death gems (if they can even find them affordably with their mages) empowering a mage, then summoning spectres?

[quote]I see you've caught onto my remote temple burning strategy. Building fortresses in every province with a temple, this is basically necessary anyway: Ghost Riders is not the only remote-raiding spell, and fliers, or flying SCs, can easily maraud completely unchecked, leaving you to try to guess their next move in a giant, extremely aggravating, whack-a-mole, unless you build forts.[quote]

Ghost riders is the _only_ remote attack spell that comes anywhere near its power level. Army of the dead doesn't supply you with a wraith lord.

Province defense can stop very lightweight attacks, but is generally worthless against a human player, and there is really no point to using it other than to run off scouts.

Province defense of 10 can stop just about any remote attack spell other than ghost riders cold.

Fortresses, no matter how lousy, however, do something that NO amount of PD can do: No matter HOW large the attacking army is, you will always buy yourself a minimum of one turn to respond.

And the typical fort costs 300-450 gold, which is far too expensive to build in every province other than if you plan to bore your opponents to death.

It should also be noted that Ermor is not even the only nation capable of using remote summons, including Ghost Riders. I regularly employ the use of Ghost Riders for temple burnings as living nations as well.

The only other nation that has cheap access to Ghost Riders is C'Tis.

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
No, it really isn't irrelevant. In Dominions I, a living nation player had more than twice as much gold to throw around eac and every turn than they do now. That translates into a lot more units and especially a lot more mages and priests to handle the undead.

If you really feel it's such a problem, you can always choose to play on Rich world: That would give you your Dominions I balance back. Me, I think you're just spoiled by too much gold.

Yes, and we all know that every other nation can afford to have 32767 troops plus several dozen mages sitting around.

This from the guy who claimed to have several hundred mystics and astrologers camping out in his capitol?

So what, they're supposed to squander their death gems (if they can even find them affordably with their mages) empowering a mage, then summoning spectres?

If you don't HAVE any death mages, it's a little hard to do anything else with your death gems. It's not that hard to find and equip a death-1 or 2 mage with equipment needed to forge more +death items.

Province defense of 10 can stop just about any remote attack spell other than ghost riders cold.

I've overrun PD 10 with Arouse Hunger, Imprint Souls, Hordes from Hell....PD is simply unable to cope. If you can't beat it with just one casting, use two or three. What are you, the AI? Do you not care if you succeed or fail? Anything worth doing is worth doing with excessive force.

[quote]And the typical fort costs 300-450 gold, which is far too expensive to build in every province other than if you plan to bore your opponents to death.[/QUOTE
When you consider how much it would cost you to maintain a standing army or PD capable of stopping the attacks that forts can, forts are a bargain! It is difficult or impossible for a typical standing army to fight off, say, 10 casting of Ghost Riders. A single fort, even the lowly 0-point watchtower, can ward off an infinite number of Ghost Riders. Even a PD of 125 cannot stop a rampaging ice devil: A single watch tower stops it cold. A fort can stop or delay enemies that no army you can muster at any reasonable, or even unreasonable, cost can.

The only other nation that has cheap access to Ghost Riders is C'Tis.

It's not all that difficult to get access to death-4 mages, Graeme. Once you have a D2 mage, he can forge a skullstaff and skullface, and voila, D4 mage. After all, if you have no other sources of death mages, what ELSE would you do with death gems? You need death mages to even use death gems, and nearly any nation can afford to get death gems, given that Dark Knowledge requires only a single rank of death magic, which most nations will surely roll on a random sooner or later.

[Taqwus]

Anybody that can summon Lamia Queens has a decent chance of getting a Death-3 or even Death-4 queen without expending vast amounts of death gems, too.

[GavinWheeler]

Originally posted by Norfleet:
In short, it is absolutely NOT necessary to form a massive coalition and turn the game into a gigantic anti-undead crusade: It is perfectly possible for most nations to take on an Ermor of relatively equal size unassisted...

Soooo... a self-confessed Ermor fan is effectively saying "no need to gang up and squash Ermor before it gets rolling, just give me twenty turns or so then all come at me one by one"?