Late age R'lyeh vs Ermor

Nightblade · #1 March 5th, 2007, 05:33 PM

So the best i can do in such setup should be :

-maximising the scales that provide bonus to me.
-getting a very strong dominion.
-and more than all : attacking as soon as possible the land to get quickly the horde of priests that are usually a good Ermor counter.
-marching on Ermor main fortress in the fewer turn possible to besiege it.
-not buying expensive (upkeep) troops to prevent the income bankrupt but getting anyways some non armored illithids for the "commander mindblast" in case the enemy has mindless troops.

About magic research,
As i need to be very aggressive quickly, it will not really be possible to get research going high before a lot of turns, as there will be a need of everyone on the front lines.
But should i try to get at least a minimum of research going, even if it means less magic user on the beacheads ?

Nick_K · #2 March 5th, 2007, 07:06 PM

Research /can/ be very useful. Magic is one area where you can get a huge edge over the AI. However, on small maps I've often defeated several AIs (On normal or difficult) before my research bears major fruit. Effective use of magic could give you a huge advantage, but I think you'll get a bigger edge from focusing on expansion at first. Independant heavy inf, priests and archers (pref longbows) backed up by illithids and (lots of) wine bags should be perfectly adequate to beat AI Ermor with, as long as you have enough of them and can field one or more big armies without being overrun.
Battle mages, summonings, SCs... these could all help a lot, but you don't /need/ any of them.

Belcarl · #3 March 6th, 2007, 05:40 AM

Don't forget a few of the cheap forged ranged items that you can put on your freespawn commanders. The ones that can't cast banish initially anyway.

Herald lance, judge mans cross etc all helps reducing all the undead chaff.

Nightblade · #4 March 6th, 2007, 10:21 AM

That's a very good suggestion, in all my games i usually do not bother with the lesser items, trying always to get some better ones available before building them for my best commanders.
But in the case of Ermor on such small map,as i must confront them quickly to have a chance later, anything can help.

Quote:

Independant heavy inf, priests and archers (pref longbows) backed up by illithids and (lots of) wine bags should be perfectly adequate to beat AI Ermor with, as long as you have enough of them and can field one or more big armies without being overrun.

About that independant armies, i know that priest is a must have to prevent Ermor just rolling over my armies, but for the cannon fodders, should i give priority to heavy infantry or to archers when getting them from newly conquered provinces (as ressources are usually not very high in newly conquered provinces).
Should lots of native infantry with few archers more effective against an average Ermor horde, or lots of native archers with few infantry should be prefered ?

In fact my question can be sum up as : are the archer usefull against undeads as they can be when i face a different nation with "living" armies ?

SlipperyJim · #5 March 6th, 2007, 10:37 AM

Quote:

Nightblade said:
About that independant armies, i know that priest is a must have to prevent Ermor just rolling over my armies, but for the cannon fodders, should i give priority to heavy infantry or to archers when getting them from newly conquered provinces (as ressources are usually not very high in newly conquered provinces).
Should lots of native infantry with few archers more effective against an average Ermor horde, or lots of native archers with few infantry should be prefered ?

In fact my question can be sum up as : are the archer usefull against undeads as they can be when i face a different nation with "living" armies ?

Not just "priest" but "priests". As in: Lots of priests. Buy one in every province until you have a whole mob of the buggers....

Regular archers do well against Ermor as long as they have a meatshield to hold back the ravening hordes of zombies. Most undead are low Prot, so regular indy archers should be fine. Longbows are better, of course. Crossbows are unnecessary; the ROF matters a lot more than the AP damage.

TomD · #6 March 6th, 2007, 12:03 PM

I would have thought that the LA Ryleh freespawn priests would be very powerful against Ermor? Even if they're too mad to move they're still there boosting province defense.

It might also be worth pointing out how good Magic-3 is against Ermor, the reduction in MR makes massed priests much more effective, even against the more powerful undead.

Taqwus · #7 March 6th, 2007, 04:19 PM

The free H3 priests are a nice bonus, and the freespawn can provide a meat shield.

Consider the old tactic of drive-by banishing to attrit them -- banish and run away.

Get a fire mage if you can, for flaming arrows. Regular arrows won't help much nearly as much against a front line of cheap dispossessed spirits or ghosts. If the Ashen Empire shows up with a horde of ghouls and ghosts, forget about the idea of mindblasts locking onto commanders for an easy victory.

Boots of Quickness + Herald Lance = 2x Solar Rays/turn + local morale boost. Not bad if you have a mundane commander.

A Vastness's Blood Vengeance can wreak havoc on low-MR freespawn undead in melee, and will punish the commanders of any army composed almost entirely of mindless units.