Why no love for Caelum?

[Arryn]

Kristoffer O said:
The sermon of courage is not bugged, but it's effects are not comparable to the fear inducing effects of several horrors.

One sermon can probably counter one horror with good effects, but if you are attacked by dozens of horrors you will need a lot more than one priest casting sermons.

It *is* bugged if, as is being reported, priests never cast the spell at all. The AI should cast Sermon immediately once units take morale losses, regardless of why there was a morale loss. I've seen the AI cast Sermon repeatedly, as units take physical damage (and thus lose morale that way). If the AI is not recognizing morale loss from castings of Horror, then it's a bug. Perhaps someone should confirm this by having one casting of Horror per combat turn and seeing if the AI ever casts Sermon to counter those *single* horror castings. If the Horror spell drops morale by more than Sermon raises it, that's a seperate issue. The question, at present, is whether the AI even tries to counter the Horror spell at all.

[Cheezeninja]

Even postulating that Caelum's 100gp wizards can take out extremely large amounts of pd with little to no danger, i fail to see how this should automatically equate to a nerf of Caelum or false horror. Caelum is a powerful raiding nation, false horror is a powerful spell, the simple fact that you have already won 2 of the 3 Caelum wars you have fought should do alot to assure you that the nations are balanced overral. And if you plan on arguing that you won because you had more skill than your opponents despite a national disadvantage, well what of it? The game would be boring if all Nations played the same and had no respective advantages/disadvantages. Until people playing Caelum start winning an inordinate percentage of the time (and this hasnt been my experience) how can there be any argument that they are overpowered? False horrors with Caelum IS a powerful strategy, but it is meant to be. You could make the same argument for Pythiums theurg's being underpriced. Because for all that they initially cost the right amount, the fact that they are sacred (reducing upkeep) and the easy availability of cheap communicants could be said to push their versatility through the roof. In fact, i believe the addition of astral magic is more than worth the extra gold.

In point of fact i just ran several tests in which i left 2-4 raptors from call of the winds in a province with 1 pd (man) and then proceeded to cloud trapeeze seraph after seraph into the province. The raptors were able to routinely win against the single seraph so long as there was at least 2. Occasionally a raptor would be killed by the seraph before the seraph died, allowing the next seraph to conquer the province (as 1 raptor was not enough). But nevertheless, with 4 raptors (1/5! of a call of the winds, not even counting the commander, an investment of 1!!! air gem per province) i was routinely able to defeat a single seraph set to cast quickness, false horror, FH, FH, FH. You can hardly argue that a single air gem is too big of an investment to counter seraphs now can you? Especially since it takes a mere 2 air to cast call of the winds, and conj 3 (which most people should be shooting for anyway). And once you start scaling it up and talking about multiple seraphs wielding perhaps SoS's.... well once a staff of storms is involved, or multiple national mages... NO PD stands a chance, or is supposed to.

Hardly overpowered to my mind.

[Arryn]

Nicely argued, Mr. Cheeze!

[Boron]

Arryn said:
Nicely argued, Mr. Cheeze!

yep true . and from zen too .

e.g. pan has several harpies as pd .

but that are the "only" exeptions . AND call of the wilds is AIR magic too so this is not such a good argument imho .

so stormbinder is still true :
harpies/black hawks win against a single seraph wow .
now if the seraph only takes with him 5 caelum troops on guard commander though i think he wins again against EVERY pd of about 20 and even some black hawks mixed in or something similiar don't beat him .


what makes this almost unique is that caelum can do this early midgame ( turn 20-30 ) to 5-10 of your provinces .

arryn your attack strat won't work .

you as any other nation can effectively attack 2-3 provinces , caelum can attack 5-10 low protected with the seraphs combo storm mentioned and attack 1-2 with their main army ( e.g. several high seraphs , staff of storms etc . , mammuts + archers , later air queens and lots of good other choices ) .

so you almost can't win in the late earlygame or in midgame against a good caelum player .

you can't castle your whole mainland earlygame and if you do you waste too much resources for this .
even if you castle it doesn't really help the caelumplayer just has to turn taxes to 200% and economically bleed you out .

furthermore caelum has stealth preachers + flying scouts .
so they always know where your anti raid army/armies is/are and can attack all the other provinces .
losing 1-2 seraphs is no big loss too .

so caelum can do 2 things better than ANY other nation from turn ~15-40 :

- prepare battles of encirclement and annihilation
- raid large


furthermore you can afford easy e.g. a vq which adds further strength to caelum . caelum is the only nation where even pd has a good chance to kill a vq all other nations have trouble earlygame vs vq .

vq is ideal for caelum too :
-cold 3 scale , additional free points , stronger breath of winter
-vq can be a good start for a blood economy , provides caelum death + blood magic to make them even stronger
-stealth preachers , together with raiding / temple killing this way you have good chances pushing your dominion into the enemy
-atleration 6 = false horror + invulnerability (alt5) and soul vortex for the vq

a pod should work almost as well too and save you 100-200 points but as caelum you can afford the vq too .

edit : typos

[Boron]

a big problem though is that when trying to say why one nation is so good you always overlook something because dominions 2 is so deep and has so many choices .

though e.g. abysians demonbreds are capitol only with 5-10 devils as troops they can do probalby the same but are even a bit stronger .
they can't do that earlygame in so big numbers but midgame abysia has vampire hordes then .

caelum though has the big advantage of staff of storms then to win time to cast more battlespawns ( lesser horrors ) .


i still think though if you play a 1on1 with 2 players of similiar experience game caelum is almost impossible to beat .
vanheim may come close but the vans are more expensive , can't fly + have no W for quickness .
pythium i think doesn't win too because there caelum can scout + seeking arrow some expensive theurgs/arch theurgs earlygame .
furthermore pythium doesn't have +120 freepoints through cold 3 and has slow movement .


if you want someone very expierienced (ZEN) could agree to play a urgaia blitz against a very good caelum player .

if he wins clearly then i will stop my claiming that stormbinder is true and perhaps stormbinder will too .

i really can't imagine though how he can do this .

Boron said:

but that are the "only" exeptions . AND call of the wilds is AIR magic too so this is not such a good argument imho .

so stormbinder is still true :
harpies/black hawks win against a single seraph wow .
now if the seraph only takes with him 5 caelum troops on guard commander though i think he wins again against EVERY pd of about 20 and even some black hawks mixed in or something similiar don't beat him .

what makes this almost unique is that caelum can do this early midgame ( turn 20-30 ) to 5-10 of your provinces .

arryn your attack strat won't work .

you as any other nation can effectively attack 2-3 provinces , caelum can attack 5-10 low protected with the seraphs combo storm mentioned and attack 1-2 with their main army ( e.g. several high seraphs , staff of storms etc . , mammuts + archers , later air queens and lots of good other choices ) .

so you almost can't win in the late earlygame or in midgame against a good caelum player .

you can't castle your whole mainland earlygame and if you do you waste too much resources for this .
even if you castle it doesn't really help the caelumplayer just has to turn taxes to 200% and economically bleed you out .

furthermore caelum has stealth preachers + flying scouts .
so they always know where your anti raid army/armies is/are and can attack all the other provinces .
losing 1-2 seraphs is no big loss too .

so caelum can do 2 things better than ANY other nation from turn ~15-40 :

- prepare battles of encirclement and annihilation
- raid large

Anyone who can build a blood economy and cast Bind Fiends can raise an army of flying stealthy things that can not only raid as well as Caelum, but are rock solid in battle (and cost NO gold or maintenance). Both BF Ulm and Abysia can put together the same sort of raiding/surrounding conquest strategy in the same time-frame that you're talking about for Caelum. Probably Mictlan can as well, though I'm less clear what they'd use to lead the sneaky flying armies (Abysia uses Demondbred and BF Ulm uses Vampire Counts).

Dusk Elders are sneaky, ethereal and can beat most PD by spamming Raise Skeletons/Raise Dead. Give them boots of flying and they too can be super raiders. Again, no gold and no upkeep.

I don't think Caelum has any claim to uniqueness in this area.

What's more, the ability to raid behind the "front line" is very nice, but it's no way to conquer and hold territory permanently. If your opponent has a solid army, you are going to have to beat it at some point or he will take all that territory back very quickly.

Mark

[Boron]

Mark the Merciful said:

Anyone who can build a blood economy and cast Bind Fiends can raise an army of flying stealthy things that can not only raid as well as Caelum, but are rock solid in battle (and cost NO gold or maintenance). Both BF Ulm and Abysia can put together the same sort of raiding/surrounding conquest strategy in the same time-frame that you're talking about for Caelum. Probably Mictlan can as well, though I'm less clear what they'd use to lead the sneaky flying armies (Abysia uses Demondbred and BF Ulm uses Vampire Counts).

Dusk Elders are sneaky, ethereal and can beat most PD by spamming Raise Skeletons/Raise Dead. Give them boots of flying and they too can be super raiders. Again, no gold and no upkeep.

I don't think Caelum has any claim to uniqueness in this area.

What's more, the ability to raid behind the "front line" is very nice, but it's no way to conquer and hold territory permanently. If your opponent has a solid army, you are going to have to beat it at some point or he will take all that territory back very quickly.

Mark

nice attempt .
and who leads the fiends of darkness and is stealthy ?
there is no item to make a leader stealthy .
mictlan + abysia don't have stealthy leaders who can fly .
furthermore the mictlan scout has 0 ldrship
the abysian slayer has 0 stealth too .

of course abysia has flying armies with the demonbred .
but they are not stealthy

that is true of course for caelum too but they have stealthy flying scouts + stealthy preachers so this is a big advantage .

the main difference between abysia + caelum :
caelums mages are not capitol only .

furthermore summoning fiends with blood earlygame is time consuming : only 1 per mage summonable .
so your research suffers and you can only use your capitolonly mages for that as abysia .

so abysia has to spend a demonbred per flying army + use blood for this

caelum has only to spend a cheap mage who is not capitol only .

so who can do this easier earlygame ?


abysia can field midgame 2 or 3 scary devil flying armies but only 2 or 3 .

caelum can midgame attack every low protected province with stormbinders mentioned combo .


sure the 1 mage attack doesn't hold the territory . but that is not his purpose .
as long as that forces your opponent to keep significant amounts of garrison/countertroops at home it is a big success already .
furthermore you just need to tax every this way captured province to 200%.

repeat that a few times and your enemy is economically broken
prevents recruiting , taxing and bloodhunting .
so only the gemincome is left

and the knowlegde that caelum can do this forces caelums neighbors to madcastle + keep significant defense forces at home .


the only other races which can do similiar things are the ones with spies so ulm + marignon + tien chi with the unrest command .

the caelum way to do this is though better because as long as you build up your mageforce you can use them for research/forging .

[WraithLord]

A single attacking seraph is vulnerable to magical counter attacks. seeking arrows, assinations spells, call of the winds etc.
of course not all the counters are trivial or accessible to all nations.

Also player's shouldn't count on PD to hold their territories.

Boron said:
nice attempt .
and who leads the fiends of darkness and is stealthy ?
there is no item to make a leader stealthy .

There's the - Black Heart? - blood item that turns a leader into an assassin.

mictlan + abysia don't have stealthy leaders who can fly .
furthermore the mictlan scout has 0 ldrship
the abysian slayer has 0 stealth too .

of course abysia has flying armies with the demonbred .
but they are not stealthy

I don't know Abysia so well, and was under the impression that Demonbred was stealthy. But I speak from experience when it comes to BF Ulm, who can launch massive stealth raids using Vampire Counts leading Fiends in the air, and Rangers on the ground.

that is true of course for caelum too but they have stealthy flying scouts + stealthy preachers so this is a big advantage .

the main difference between abysia + caelum :
caelums mages are not capitol only .

furthermore summoning fiends with blood earlygame is time consuming : only 1 per mage summonable .
so your research suffers and you can only use your capitolonly mages for that as abysia .

so abysia has to spend a demonbred per flying army + use blood for this

caelum has only to spend a cheap mage who is not capitol only .

so who can do this easier earlygame ?

abysia can field midgame 2 or 3 scary devil flying armies but only 2 or 3 .

caelum can midgame attack every low protected province with stormbinders mentioned combo .

sure the 1 mage attack doesn't hold the territory . but that is not his purpose .
as long as that forces your opponent to keep significant amounts of garrison/countertroops at home it is a big success already .
furthermore you just need to tax every this way captured province to 200%.

repeat that a few times and your enemy is economically broken
prevents recruiting , taxing and bloodhunting .
so only the gemincome is left

Only if the victim sits there and passively accepts that sort of attack. As Arryn pointed out, he will - or should - be hitting back in ways that suit HIS strengths, not playing to Caelum's

and the knowlegde that caelum can do this forces caelums neighbors to madcastle + keep significant defense forces at home .

You're stating theory as though it's happening in real games. In practice I don't see this happening, and would see it as precisely the wrong reaction to the Caelum threat.

the only other races which can do similiar things are the ones with spies so ulm + marignon + tien chi with the unrest command .

Apart from the ones that I mentioned and you ignored

BF Ulm
Ermor (Dusk ELders & raise skeletons)

The Caelum player also has to worry about defending his own territory if he wants to be able to afford to maintain all these Seraphs. More to the point he needs a strategy that's a bit more complex than relying on a single tactic for defeating PD. It's not that I don't think it sounds strong; it's just that it isn't the whole story, and anyway doesn't seem to me to be grounded in much real MP experience.

[Cainehill]

In addition, the nerfers have been totally ignoring one thing : if Caelum (or another flying / stealthy army) raids behind enemy lines, what happens when they rout? Every single mage and troop is lost : they don't get to retreat to safe territory that's within easy flying range, they don't get to sneak into the neighboring province with their stealth.

Caelum's raiders, similar to Pan's stealth marauders, take a lot of casualties because of routing. A couple of roving bands of defenders can easily cause the routing.

Yes, Caelum's flying scouts (and Pan's harpies) can more easily keep track of armies than many nations. But even if they can blanket every enemy province, they still don't know which way the roving defenders are going to move, so raiding via normal means gives a good chance of running into the rovers, if there are enough roving bands - say archers / xbows, some 50-morale magic troops, and a mage or two.

Air Trapeze does allow them to airdrop in before the defenders can move. But then Caelum is spending gems to attack, can't bring any screening troops, and can still be busted if people reinforced the PD with a handful of other troops (archers, priests, fast moving cavalry, etc) and nailed even worse by hidden defenders with glamour - Vanheim and LoT Man can easily manage this, and both Vans and LoT infantry can sometimes be recruited via magic sites.

Apparently the AI / Sermon of Courage does need to be fixed. But Caelum doesn't need to have its advantages nerfed. First False Horror, then, oh my - two seraphs can route 20 PD all by themselves with Quickness and Lightning, so Lightning has to cost more fatigue too!