common high end sc protection/defense values ? possible defeat with common troops ?

[Boron]

ok as promised my first attempt to provide a cheap sc kill idea :

my initial idea was a cheap fire 10 bless with vanheim . but because strength is not added to the 8 ap fire attack a protection of 20+ will be enough to decrease damage suffered by fire bless attack hits to mere 1.29 avg damage at protection 20 and ridiculous 0.321 avg damage for a protection of 30 .

so next attempt :
take pangenea or vanheim or ulm . rush to con 7 .
i describe the tactic for pangenea in the following . it is really simple :

when you reach con 7 you should have gotten 1 lucky pan with an earth random pick meanwhile + found at least 1 site with earth gem income .

hopefully you can forge him earth boots .
so he has earth 4 then .

you should have dozens - hundreds of maenads then . mix a few minotaurs or centaurs in them .
a mintaur has strenght 16 + battle axe damage 9 = 25 .
now you simply cast weapons of sharpness on them .
maenads are size 2 so they swarm the sc and the minotaurs get hopefully as late attackers later attacks . if the minotaur is e.g. the 11th attacker the defense of the sc will be lowered 10 points , if he is the 21th 20 points .
so he will quite likely land a few hits .

because of weapons of sharpness even against protection 40 ( that is the cap right ? ) the minotaur will do 5.57 avg damage .

against protection 30 which is more common he does 10.13 avg damage .

btw the maenads do 0.570 avg damage against protection 30 .

so with a bit luck you should inflict at least 50 more likely 100 damage in one combat round .
the costs are extremely cheap only some hundred gold for the pan + minotaurs and 10 earth gems for boots of earth + 1 earth gem per weapons of sharpness cast .

only reliable counter which comes to my mind so far is casting blood venegance on your sc .

[Vynd]

I suppose this could work. Although if the SC has a life draining weapon he may still be able to replenish his hit points faster than you can wear them down. You'll also have to worry about your troops routing before they finish the SC off.

On the bright side, a Pan that can cast Weapons of Sharpness can also cast Petrify. After you research up to Alt 6 (or is it 7?), of course. That ought to be pretty helpful in taking down SCs.

[Kel]

Originally posted by Boron:
so next attempt :
take pangenea or vanheim or ulm . rush to con 7 .

Putting aside the idea of why you would even want to rush to const-7 to make nation specific common troops useful against SCs...
or why you couldn't just use crossbows with wind guide, flaming guide or just a mass of them...
or why if you had a research level of 7 and a 5E mage, why you wouldn't just petrify instead...
are you taking into account common SC items like luck ammys and charc shields ?

-Kel

[Boron]

Originally posted by Kel:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Boron:
so next attempt :
take pangenea or vanheim or ulm . rush to con 7 .

Putting aside the idea of why you would even want to rush to const-7 to make nation specific common troops useful against SCs...
or why you couldn't just use crossbows with wind guide, flaming guide or just a mass of them...
or why if you had a research level of 7 and a 5E mage, why you wouldn't just petrify instead...
are you taking into account common SC items like luck ammys and charc shields ?

-Kel

---

yeah i take that into account .
afaik weapons of sharpness makes weapons magic too . so etheralness doesn't protect .
that means 50% of the hits fail through luck from luck ammy right ?

afaik the damage shields apply AFTER the attack .
so 90% of the maenads will die through the shield but that damage is after the maenad did damage to the sc right ?

furthermore a minotaur has 27 hp so he will survive 1 damage shield attack right ?

concerning life steal :
the pretender replenishes the same amount than he does as damage right ?
he will most likely have quickness so 2 attacks in his turn .
if you have a charcoil shield you have only a blood thorn or a soul vortex .

i don't fully know the soul vortex still , greame said he thinks it does drain 1 life on a couple of targets in the drain life area .

so without considering life drain if you don't fight a nataraja the sc will have either a charcoil shield + a bloodthorn most likely or a wraithsword but no shield .

he could cast a fire shield instead too .

so hopefully he takes 50-100 damage then with damage shields about 30-40 maenads will be dead .
if the sc has more hp than that , a vq would e.g. be already dead , i think he replenishes with 2 attacks about 20-30 life but perhaps that is too high.
if he hits e.g. 2 1hp maenads who survived the damage shield he only gets 2 hp drained or ?

because 100 maenads are really easy to achieve i think you have 2 combat rounds with full force .
it will be really tough .

@ Vynd petrify is really great too didn't think on that so thnx for the idea

what i liked with weapons of sharpness is that with that the maenads which are completely free should be very useful against common troops like knights too .
with 5:1 ratio maenad : knight the knights should get killed quite quick too .

so if you even research after con 7 alteration 6 for petrify you could script your horde to hold and attack and your mage(s) to weapons of sharpness , petrify , petrify , petrify , petrify , cast spells .

since the maenads are so easy to get you can even guard your mages by 20-30 of them which will kill most small attack Groups thnx to weapons of sharpness too .


so what do you think now ?

you can even make your own scs with pan and cheaply be a danger to most scs after some turns with my described idea .

since you research con 7 you can forge dozens of bags of vine with your nature gems and use harpy scouts for that .
so after a couple of turns in midgame you can supply an army of 500+ maenads with mages .

and you have stealth forces so you can use gandalfs great tactics to weaken enemy economy furthermore

[tinkthank]

Originally posted by Boron:
ok as promised my first attempt to provide a cheap sc kill idea :

Here's one from me.

1. Choose Caelum base theme.
2. Recruit some troops, any troops. (Infantry of some sort would be nice.)
3. Set to "attack fliers"; kill SC.

Heheh, sorry Boron, couldnt resist after our Last little MP together.

Here's another one.
1. Choose Machaka. Or Marignon. Or Tien Chi. Or any nation with easy access to fire and archers.
2. Reasearch Flaming Arrows.
3. Set to "fire enemy fliers"; kill SC.

EDIT: Sorry, this assumes by SC you mean your beloved VQ.

FA is particularly nice because at least some of your troops can keep their distance; the SC cant be everywhere at once.

Here's another one:
1. Choose Ermor. Or Pan CW. Or any nation with easy access to lots of undead.
2. Make lots of undead armies led by undead mages.
3. Swarm SC.

[ July 29, 2004, 15:08: Message edited by: tinkthank ]

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by alexi:
ummm, the description of the spell says, and i quote: "Magic resistance negates"

That surprises me actually, since there's not muc reason for an astral 3 mage to pick it over soul slay then.

[Boron]

Originally posted by Kel:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Boron:
so next attempt :
take pangenea or vanheim or ulm . rush to con 7 .

Putting aside the idea of why you would even want to rush to const-7 to make nation specific common troops useful against SCs...
or why you couldn't just use crossbows with wind guide, flaming guide or just a mass of them...
-Kel

---

because flaming arrows shouldn't work according to saber cherry's dice odds

flaming arrows has 8 ap damage .
avg. damage on a 20 protection unit : 1.29
avg. damage on a 30 protection unit : 0.321

the normal x-bow missile : marignon :
10 ap damage :
so avg. damage on 20 protection : 2.13
" " " " 30 " : 0.570

i wouldn't rely on that .
staff of storm lets you use only 50% of missiles or precision is -5 one of the 2 iirc .

invulnerability is a common sc buff . if you place your sc rearmost the hitting odds even with wind guide aren't too good .
so i wouldn't rely on killing him unbuffed in the first round of combat if you are defender .

furthermore lategame robe of invulnerability could be in use or a high prot armor .

bane lords + wraith lords & a couple of others have already something about 20 prot unequipped .

so you have quite a high chance not killing the sc . guess what happens if he flies in your archers :
lots of losses through friendly fire hehe .