Pretender Design: Water Cults

[Vicious Love]

Gandalf Parker said:
I think of it as a surprise tactic. Any game which agrees ahead of time to have no water nations or you are the last guy into the game see thats the case. You have this thread "Why Water Cult could be fun or worth it" and you have many threads asking "how can I get my nation started into the water quickly" which usually recommends the use of water mages and mercenarys. So being able to enter the water right away without waiting and bidding on the mercs that everyone else is hoping to see would seem to be an advantage. Being able to put my priests into the water next to someone and build temples in every water province on their border would seem to be at least a nice irritant (does water cult allow building castles? I dont remember). It might work best on a small tight map where provinces will be in short supply.

So the "what good is water cult" side by side with "how to I get in the water" seems to be the answer. Maybe not a great one, but a tactic worth keeping in the card file?

No castles or PD, meaning defending the aforementioned temples is pricey and unreliable. Besides, furnishing a few priests with water breathing is hardly a daunting task by the time that sort of dominion-pushing becomes relevant. And the element of surprise counts for very, very little when one can only produce 10>sacreds per castle per turn, move said sacreds at one water province per turn, and keep your dominion one step ahead of them.
Still, if one is willing to wait 30 or so turns for the element of surprise, there is something to be said for 100 or so previously invisible vans galloping out the ocean to bring The Pain to their foes. Coincidentally, there's exactly as much to be said for 100 or so previously invisible vans sailing across a neutral province to bring The Pain to their foes. Particularly before said foes have any clue their overseas neighbor is Vanheim. I'd find the latter scenario significantly more surprising, personally.

Mind you, this might not preclude making good use of Water Cult with Jotunheim or C'tis, but I can still hardly imagine it being worth 50 points and the exclusion of other themes. Ever.