Newbie enjoying undead, looking for advice

Sorlakind · #1 January 3rd, 2007, 05:47 PM

Ah and my inaccessible cardinal beta beats all your alephs together and more!

Shovah32 · #2 January 3rd, 2007, 07:38 PM

Another note aleph: You should, if at all possible, get your dominion up to lvl 9 or 10 with ever LA ermor pretender you make.

Aleph · #3 January 5th, 2007, 05:08 PM

My current LA Ermor leader of choice is a Lich Queen with 10 Dominion and excellent Astral and Death magic. I'm sure there are more optional mixes of elements for a combat pretender, but astral and death do fine for me, and I really like Immortality with such a high dominion.

Shovah32 · #4 January 5th, 2007, 05:41 PM

Yes, thats a nice build. One thing i would suggest is try to get some other paths in there(specifically elemental magic but maybe nature too) mostly for forging items to kit out SC's and thugs.

Aleph · #5 January 5th, 2007, 06:17 PM

I don't find that to be too much of my style for LA Ermor. I'm often assembling small armies out of the freespawns and throwing them at whatever is handy. I usually have more troops available for smashing indeps than I know what to do with, and I tend to use battle magic, Wailing ladies, and dominion affecting spells to wipe out opposing pretender's armies. I can see forging for Ryleh (who also have a lot more natural advantages at it, given that they have pretty much everything but air/blood/fire in their available recruits) given their ability to mix freespawn and chosen recruits - a couple ice pebble staves or black bows in the hands of commanders / cultists can really add up. But I've only scratched the surface of gameplay thus far, so perhaps that's something I need to try.

Taqwus · #6 January 5th, 2007, 07:10 PM

Earth is a potentially very valuable path for Ermor; most of the more common free-castle or free-income sites for magic provinces are Earth. A bonus 100-gold site will pay you 200 when taxed 200% even if all the population is dead.

Fire can also help for the alchemy income, but it gives you less free stuff like free fortresses.

A quasitraditional Dom2 build involved getting most paths at least at level 2, except for blood -- blood is almost completely useless for the Ashen Empire since you will rapidly lose population and it's difficult to get blood slaves. It's harder in Dom3 now that randoms tend to be restricted; for instance, you can't get a blood spectre, so you would end up having even fewer effective hunters than before.

Aleph · #7 January 6th, 2007, 10:09 PM

I tried the all 2+ with an Enchantress, threw Twiceborn on her, killed her off, to try to protect her from Burden of Time. She got diseased when she died, but it had no effect on her as a Wight. However, when Burden of Time came out, she started collecting afflictions like mad. Scrap that game and that idea. I guess I could just give her Elixir of Life instead.

My current build ideas are either Lich Queen with Water/Earth/Nature 3, Astral 5, Death 6, or Master Lich with 2 Fire/Air/Earth, Water/Nature 3, Astral 5, Death 6. The Master Lich's fragility makes me nervous, but I suppose I can keep him out of harm's way with magic, and he is immortal. Both the Queen and the Master can afford to summon Naiads for clams, which made me really happy when I realized that was viable since it really drove my last Ryleh game (I know, it's probably old hat to everyone else...).

Endoperez · #8 January 7th, 2007, 07:34 AM

Master Lich won't die as long as he's in your dominion. If he "dies", he is back to your home province. As Ashen Empire, your dominion should be as strong as possible. So you can use him for everything but waging wars deep inside enemy lands. Immortality also means that he heals any afflictions he might get, btw.