Mod: Ulm Reborn v.1.7b - Updated 14th June 2009

[VedalkenBear]

Sombre said:
Well just to start things off, I want to point out that I always intended this nation to be hard to play. I don't want them to be very underpowered, but they're supposed to be challenging and to force decisive gameplans. As a result the AI sort of sucks uing them. From the get go I set my sights on a nation that /really/ wants;

Well, my question to this is why should it be harder to play than vanilla nations, if it's meant to be played alongside them? About the only other nation that is this schismatic is EA Arco, and there the choices aren't nearly so hard.

High Dominion for spawns and widescale sacred production.
Resources and an economy focused on national recruits (so production and order)
A high earth bless for the super-armoured sacreds.
A bless suitable for the swarms of sacred chaff (ie, not earth)

Well, I don't necessarily agree with points 1) and 3) here, from my own experience. Don't know what you mean by 'high Dominion'; my Oracle had a 7, and I found that it was pretty overkill from most standpoints.

Also, I'm not sure why I'd want an Earth bless. As you point out, it doesn't help your Penitents at all, and everyone else already has more than sufficient protection. I would think that a Bless that helps out Penitents (Fire/Water/Death/Astral) would be good, since it also boosts your other Sacreds at the same time. Playing a high-Earth bless seems to be overkill while doing nothing for your sacred troops' weaknesses (i.e., magic).

So even at the creation stage you're faced with some hard choices. You obviously can't have all of these things. On the other hand if you specialise completely your plan can easily go very wrong.

I think that there is a much more optimal strategy for these guys than you might think. It may not be as optimal as the strategy for some others, but it's not simply a bunch of trade-offs.

On the other hand, you have made a couple of very good points about Ulm Reborn's weakness on a larger map (over 120 or so provinces). I didn't intend for them to just fall over and die if the map is big, so this is something I'm interested in rectifying.

Please note that that is basically all I play, so I'm pretty biased here. But even most 'capital-centric' nations (EA Mictlan, Arcoscephale, Sauromatia to some extent) get a researcher outside the capital.

1) They are meant to be capital centric, but I do take your point. I am happy for them to be just about as capital centric as a nation can be in dom3, but not to the point where it's very frustrating for the player. I am willing to make Black Priests available everywhere in the next version. This allows frontline chaff production (although it's decided by dominion, unlike the white priests). I will also be giving the black priest an earth random so you'll get H2E2 ones maybe 40% of the time. This allows them better site searching, earthpower etc. Cost might go up a smidge. They are still there to be priests and penitent gatherers, but with some E2 you'll get a bit more research and whatnot from them.

E2 is pretty good, but that's not as important as the non-capital-only designation. May I suggest that if you do that, switch the domspawn to the White Priest?

2) Well the national summons give you some more magic. I think I'll stick a 10% or so random extra astral on the white priests, but this is always going to be a very weak nation magically, apart from the E3 that is. I mean they're like LA Ulm only with even LESS magic. It's intentional.

It's about on par with LA Ulm right now, and yes the National Summons give you more magic (I had a Sturmheld hero join me), if you can afford them.

4) Yep, I wanted more hard decisions in the nation regarding gold usage. I think the white priests are priced ok, but maybe the reborn guard could do with being a bit cheaper.

Yes, the White Priests seem okay compared to other mages, but the fact that they're your only good researchers more or less means you need to recruit one/turn. So while they are worth their cost, they are not necessarily worth their cost _for purposes of research_.

The mindless magic units are Anchorites - when they die a pissed off penitent falls out of the sealed armour and starts smacking things. I believe the bless remains on him too, although for me that was generally an earth bless so didn't help. I think some people have used them to great effect, although they might need a slight cost reduction because they almost always get killed off. Regardless they're sacred and not cap only, which means you should have some of them out there at some point.

Interesting. It seems to be designed from the wrong end of the stick, though, y'know? Generally you make a very easy-to-kill unit that changes into something 'bigger'. E.g., Jaguar Warriors. This unit is almost like an egg or a small oyster. I was honestly expecting something a little better than a Penitent for a MagB unit (which isn't as bad to lead as some but still can cause issues).

Oh before I forget - were you using regular Ulm Reborn or CBM Ulm Reborn? They aren't crazy different, but the balance is obviously changed.

I was playing regular Ulm Reborn. I can also try the CBM one if you wish.

[VedalkenBear]

Regarding other suggestions... please realize that a 50% ES is generally preferable to 20% E 20% S. The latter has a 64% chance of not having any magic while only a 36% chance of having at least one pick and a 4% chance to have two.

And this nation is already not horribly bad at communion; I'm not exactly sure why you wouldn't want them to do it.

Just a point: Your national summons do give you access to Quills.

[llamabeast]

Is it possible to make a unit that reverts to another when the battle finishes? In the same way as Black Serpents revert to Lamias, or something?

If so, perhaps you could have the Anchorite reveal a "Newly Reborn" or something on its destruction. Like penitent, but even more filled with rage and fervour. He could refuse to die (15HP), feel no pain (4 prot, like berserkers) and fight with the strength of a fanatic (strength 14, attack 12 or something). The anchorites themselves could be cheaper, but maintain the high resource cost. Perhaps you could lower their attack a bit (although I can't remember what it is, so that might make no sense). Then a block of anchorites would be a solid defensive wall, and if they got damaged - surprise! The Newly Reborn would emerge, and cause a heap of damage (they'd also have flails and be sacred of course, so they could be quite nasty). Then after the battle the Newly Reborn would revert to penitents. Whaddya think?

[llamabeast]

Well, you could have 30% E 30 % S then. I just personally like having separate randoms, because then there's at least some small chance of getting a really specially good one.

Yeah, I'm not sure about communion, I guess there's no strong reason to discourage it - I guess it depends on the flavour Sombre's going for with the nation.

Personally I tend to think that the mind-manipulating aspects of strong astral magic make it feel a bit evil.

[Sombre]

What should the cost of the white acolyte be?

They currently are buildable anywhere, have ES110% magic and a research bonus of 1. This gives them a general research level of 4. They are also priests H1 but they do not spawn penitent. They are physically weak, but not suffering from immediate oldage, have a mapmove of 1 etc. Obviously they are drain immune. They can't lead any soldiers.

I have them at 140 gold currently.

[llamabeast]

I'm not the best at balance, but I'd either give them a bit more research (a further +2 even), or make them quite a bit cheaper (say 100). I'm just thinking about Sauromatian Enaries (Sauromatia being the nation I've played the most) - 150 gold gives you much more good stuff (S1D2N1). Similarly Marignon witch hunters are good (F2S1H1) for 150 gold, and Mothers of Avalon are A1N2 for 130 gold (they're the other nations I've played recently).

On balance, I think I'd go for either a research bonus of +2 and cost of say 100, or even a research bonus of +3 and cost maybe 130. I think with a total research of just 4 they wouldn't be very tempting to recruit. If they were my main researchers I would cry (but then I obviously like high research scores because I always take magic scales).

[Sombre]

Well they aren't there to be your main picks - that's the white priests. The point of the White Acolytes is giving you drain immune researchers you can build outside of your cap. If you're just building one WP a turn then you're not going to be picking up that much speed on the research race. If you have WAs churned out by other forts (several forts are a good idea - this is Ulm we're talking about) then you're going to get the research moving at pace.

They're also sacred, which makes them cost efficient researchers. But I take your point. I'll drop their cost to 100 and keep them at +1 research for the average of 4RP.

Also, 0.9 is now out, so refer to the main post for the download ;]

[llamabeast]

Hi Sombre,

I had a quick look at the new version - I'm excited to try it, but haven't really had any time yet. Quick comments, because if I was a sensible person I would be in bed (got up ridiculously early this morning):
- I really like the white acolyte. I see you managed to find a good sprite as well.
- I really like the Emergent too! Clearly I'm particularly fond of things I was involved in discussing. I think he adds extra punch and flavour to the anchorites though, and they're a favourite unit of mine now. They have got quite low attack though - is that deliberate? No reason why not, just wondering.
- Your writing is exceptional. The quality of the mod is really impressive.
- I had something else interesting to say too, but I've forgotten it. Hopefully it'll come back to me.

Also, a separate issue - did you know that everything on linux is case sensitive? That means that if you give the name of a unit graphic (e.g. Troll Shaman.tga), and the real name has a character in a different case (Troll shaman.tga), the mod crashes. I've been meaning to mention this for a while - it's come up because the windows half of my computer has died, so I'm playing on linux now. Anyway, I can't remember if I had to fix Ulm Reborn, but I definitely had to do a few fixes to get Vaettiheim working (which I also looked at briefly and which is also awesome!).

[Sombre]

Well, my question to this is why should it be harder to play than vanilla nations, if it's meant to be played alongside them? About the only other nation that is this schismatic is EA Arco, and there the choices aren't nearly so hard.

Well as I said it's not supposed to be very underpowered and currently I don't think it is, although it could perhaps do with a boost. I don't think there's any problem with the nation being hard to play (if you're using mods I have to assume you're not a greenhorn to the game) and forcing you to make hard choices if it's still balance-wise roughly as good as the vanilla nations.

Well, I don't necessarily agree with points 1) and 3) here, from my own experience. Don't know what you mean by 'high Dominion'; my Oracle had a 7, and I found that it was pretty overkill from most standpoints.

Also, I'm not sure why I'd want an Earth bless. As you point out, it doesn't help your Penitents at all, and everyone else already has more than sufficient protection. I would think that a Bless that helps out Penitents (Fire/Water/Death/Astral) would be good, since it also boosts your other Sacreds at the same time. Playing a high-Earth bless seems to be overkill while doing nothing for your sacred troops' weaknesses (i.e., magic).

7 might be high enough. The stronger your dominion the more penitent you'll get, the more you'll be able to move the black priests around without cutting off the spawning and the more chance you'll have of amassing anchorites etc. Plus with stealthy preachers dominion kill is actually on the table.

Benefits of an earth bless: Reinvig your sacred mages. Reinvig your high encumbrance high survival sacreds who suffer badly from critical hits caused by fatigue. Push an already high protection to the point where anchorites and reborn are very, very hard to hurt. I think earth blessing works best with units that are already high protection.

I'm not a big bless player, nor am I particularly good at dom3 generally, but I think an earth-9 bless is worth it with this nation.

I think that there is a much more optimal strategy for these guys than you might think. It may not be as optimal as the strategy for some others, but it's not simply a bunch of trade-offs.

Maybe. I'm not really into looking for the 'perfect' start build. I'd probably go something like order 3 prod 3 misfortune 2 drain 3 on scales, earth 9 bless,... not sure what else,... or for a penitent build I'd go for very high dom, fire and air bless, growth scale, sloth,... you get the picture. There's probably a middle ground in there that makes the most of it all though. I leave that up to you guys :]

Please note that that is basically all I play, so I'm pretty biased here. But even most 'capital-centric' nations (EA Mictlan, Arcoscephale, Sauromatia to some extent) get a researcher outside the capital.

Yeah and I mostly play Aran and Parganos, so I'm probably biased the other way. As I said though, I don't want to cripple them for people who like large maps.

E2 is pretty good, but that's not as important as the non-capital-only designation. May I suggest that if you do that, switch the domspawn to the White Priest?

I like the domspawn on the black priests, really gives them a different role from the white priests (who just summon 1 penitent per turn). If you could build more black priests (ie, noncap) the penitent hording would be more effective, though you'd have to decide whether you want them at the frontlines pushing dom and killing cats, or if you want them tucked somewhere spawning penitent. A case where high dominion is useful I think.

Yes, the White Priests seem okay compared to other mages, but the fact that they're your only good researchers more or less means you need to recruit one/turn. So while they are worth their cost, they are not necessarily worth their cost _for purposes of research_.

If I make black priests noncap and stick in a new researching drain-proof mage that'll be sorted and you'll be able to get more use out of them. Thanks to smite, bladewind etc they do make good battlemages.

Interesting. It seems to be designed from the wrong end of the stick, though, y'know? Generally you make a very easy-to-kill unit that changes into something 'bigger'. E.g., Jaguar Warriors. This unit is almost like an egg or a small oyster. I was honestly expecting something a little better than a Penitent for a MagB unit (which isn't as bad to lead as some but still can cause issues).

They're weird, yes, and I don't think there's anything like them in vanilla, but I like that. They'll be dropped in cost a touch but the 'shapechange' stays - the idea I suppose is to avoid getting them cracked open - a bit like a tank.

I was playing regular Ulm Reborn. I can also try the CBM one if you wish.

Well it's up to you. If you like to play with CB on they're balanced towards it, obviously. Includes stuff like lower cavalry resource costs, warhorse hooves etc.

[llamabeast]

Did you see my post about the Anchorites Sombre? It just occurred to me that you were probably typing your long post when I posted about the Anchorites. Not that I'm demanding a comment, it'd just be a shame if you missed it.