Dev Thinking on Balance?

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Huzurdaddi:

quote:

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Many pretenders can use these spells to conquer independent provinces. Being able to conquer an independent province a turn with your pretender is commonplace.

Really? Please list.

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Okay, so let's assume an average, commonly favored independent setting of 6. I think 6 is a fair benchmark, because it seems to be the prevalent setting of most MP games.

Pretenders that I have found can do the job against common independents, not including Tritons and other rare flier-infested provinces, but including provinces that may contain knights) with nothing higher than L3 research, a sum, under normal research conditions, of 120 RPs, assuming that the designer of the pretender has specifically tweaked his chassis for battle, and is attempting to operate solo, or with only very limited support (no army, at most maybe an attending mage or priest who will may search or build in the province after battle):

Allfather
Carrion Dragon
Colossal Head
Ghost King
Lord of the Wild
Monolith
Mother of Tuathas
Nataraja(Arco)
Vampire Queen

These pretenders are either unlikely to suffer from afflictions, can recover from any afflictions taken, or are not greatly affected by many of the afflictions (limping Monolith).

Other pretenders that can attempt the job, as long as excessive knights are avoided, with slightly higher levels of research or items, or with more accompanying chaff, afflictions are willing to be risked, or occasional failure acceptable:

Green Dragon
Medusa
Prince of Death
Phoenix
Titan(male)
Virtue

So between first-class and second-class choices, you have a fair number of pretenders to choose from. Note that all of these assume that you have tweaked for BATTLE as a primary objective, and filling national magic gaps or attaining a useful blessing as secondary. Air blessings and nature blessings are, however, synergistic with combat prowess.