Why no love for Caelum?

[Sheap]

well, if caelum's strength is in its mages, and its weakness is its troops, how is that balanced?

There are really two kinds of magic in the game. Combat magic, and ritual magic (including summons and globals). Caelum's mages are very strong at combat magic, and very bad at ritual magic. Combined with their inherently bad troops, it gives Caelum real problems coming up with any powerful fighting units (or gems to make them) at all.

[Stormbinder]

Well, my personal largest grip with Caelum is that it is the only nation in the game, against which any number of PD are totally meaningless. Single 100gp seraphim with no troops can rout even 20+ PD of any nation with no problem. All it need to do is to cast Quickness + endless line of false horrors. Couped with Caelum's ability to strike anywhere anytime it force any nation who is fighing competent Caelum player to madcastle like crazy.

I think it would be good if either false Horror spell would be made harder to cast (even a little bit, like Fatigue 10 air 2/3), and/or their "fear" value should be sharply decreased, or the price of the seraphims should be slightly increased.

[The_Tauren13]

from my ( very limited ) experience, archers will kill the ol quickness + false horror trick because the archers target the mage instead of the horrors

[Zapmeister]

from my ( very limited ) experience, archers will kill the ol quickness + false horror trick because the archers target the mage instead of the horrors

Sure. But he was talking about local defense.

[The_Tauren13]

dont some nations get some kind of archer for PD? or am i more n00b then i thought. heh.

That is the absolute first time I've heard of Caelum being the 'province defense killers'. There are alot of problems with Province defense and it's feasibility/usability vs Castles, but Seraph are not top on the list. Any point after turn 20 in the game there are so many things that can kill high costing PD that Seraphs are the least of your worries.

Anything with Raise Skeletons, quickness/frozen heart, false horror, blade wind can clear most PD without much effort. The main problem with PD is that they are so vulnerable to even mini-combatants.

Caelum is more than likely Banned in most of those games, because of the new influx of Map Designers, and their tendancy to overterrain maps. Causing nearly all nations to be at a strategic disadvantage and Air being more overwhelming than it already is. In such instances of heavy terrain flagged maps, flying is king and Caelum is king of flying and Air Gems for summons that fly and flying boots.

[The_Tauren13]

that sounds very reasonable, zen.
perhaps thats why i like small, clear maps like inland or urgaia

[Sheap]

Ulm gets crossbowmen for defense. If they manage to hit the mage, that will take it out quite rapidly. But if the mage is far enough in the back that doesn't work.

Rlyeh gets an Illithid Lord commander who can whack the mage with a mind bLast - it's a question of whether the spell works before the false horrors scare all the chaff away.

Marignon gets crossbowmen too, but only with their "second stage" PD.

Other races get slingers but that is not useful against anything

[Kristoffer O]

Slingers are useful vs false horrors.

[Stormbinder]

That is the absolute first time I've heard of Caelum being the 'province defense killers'.

Everything happens for the first time Zen. Name any other national 100gp commander who can kill/rout any realistic number of PD without any items. Single Sauromancer with raise skeletons (or Dwarf with bladewind) would not even come close, despite costing 180gp. Unlike skeletons, flase horrors are flying, eterial, high defense, and they mostly rout, not kill. The effect is the same though.