Just got rolled by AI Neifel. What did I do wrong?

[Sandman]

My national dwarf mages I had research as well, but every three turns or so, due to a huge death gem income, I had them summon up an army led by a bane lord of ghosts, pale riders, behemoths, and that one shadow skull-head dog ethereal summon.

If you've got a huge death gem income, forge loads of skull mentors and your research problems will be over. Heck, you could even go for owl quills as well.

[Stryke11]

While yes, I like Ulm, and playing them is certainly fun for me, I think what I enjoy the most is trying new nations and new ideas I get here on this board and then learn to be more versatile. Dominions is just so full of content that I would feel like I wasn't getting the most out of it if I always played the same nation.

That being said, I'd rather not re-invent the wheel, so before playing a nation I like to read up on strategies you experts have used. That's what influenced me to try a dual bless Helheim in the first place.

[Foodstamp]

A few points about what probably went wrong...

I have found versus the AI, and I imagine versus other players, one army does not cut it.

Your vanguard army sounded fine, but you should have had multiple armies of say 12-20ish helherdings/1-2 vankarls. This gives you a small stealth force with a leader that can cast lightning bolt and bless. I place them on a flank with hold position--->attack rearmost units with the vankarl placed directly in the middle of them scripted to blessing/lightning bolt/lightning bolt/lightning bolt!

As shown by this video clip, giants are no match for lightning bolts!

Btw, when playing helheim there is no scissors/rock/paper if your using F9W9. You are the scissors, the rock, and the paper. Helhirdings are cheap to produce, atm can be recruited in any province with a keep, and they are GODS on the battlefield.

[PDF]

Stryke11 said:
While yes, I like Ulm, and playing them is certainly fun for me, I think what I enjoy the most is trying new nations and new ideas I get here on this board and then learn to be more versatile. Dominions is just so full of content that I would feel like I wasn't getting the most out of it if I always played the same nation.

That being said, I'd rather not re-invent the wheel, so before playing a nation I like to read up on strategies you experts have used. That's what influenced me to try a dual bless Helheim in the first place.

Well, the problem is that Dual9-bless are high-power setup not that useful to "learn" strategies because they'll force you to poor scales and will not give you a pretender that will "come along" nicely with your nation.