LA Pangaea

[Novi]

Greetings.

I'm playing LA Pangaea in a SP game and I'm trying to find out how to make the best use of them so:

-What to do with Pans/Panic Apostates? The first can be quite efficient at buffing my troops with protective spells but I was thinking of perhaps a little more subtle strategy for them.

-Are national summons even worth anything (carrion stuff I mean)? Due to bad experience with Ermorian undead chaff I was a bit reluctant to try the same thing with Pangaea...

-Also, how should I express my Cyclops' full potential? Note however, that he isn't too much of a mage so master enslave and similar things aren't possible here.

Every hint will be welcome. =)

[ologm]

The carrion critters are relatively good. They are stronger than Ermor's undead, but you get less.

They heal, have good mr. Their carrion vine attacks make them stronger than they appear. A few hits and their opponent is unconcious and soon to be dead.

The carrion elephants are excellent tramplers. Don't forget to cast regrowth and protection on them.

[Ewierl]

The carrion critters also provide you with a very different approach to different foes. Because they attack fatigue rather than HP, it's as easy for them to kill a giant as it is to kill a human! Ethereal creatures are also at no advantage. Magic resistance and defense only do so much if you can swarm something, since each "Sleep Vines" weapon gives 3 attacks.

It will force your opponents to discard a lot of main-line strategies, since they have to use different approaches to fight against you; if they've spent a lot of time and design points prepping and outfitting a SC, you can really make them cry.

As for Pans, neither type is a very good combat mage. That's LA pangaea's biggest weakness there. Buffing really is your best bet, though you can also summon Lamias and their Queens for some good times, and lay out some poison clouds and especially Charm spells.

[Shovah32]

A couple of buffed carrion elephants, a couple of sleep/ghost grip casters and a bunch of vine attacking carrion will quickly exhaust and crush enemies into nothingness. Mixng some vine ogres in with carrion critters gives some staying power(and hitting power if the enemies are tired and the elephants fail).

I personally like a bless with LA Pangaea. I usually go with E9N4 or E9N9 and occasionally(only for short games, scales kill you in long games) add a W9 to that. Sure its extremely expensive but an E9W9N9 gorgon not only makes a GREAT SC when she wakes up but gives your sacreds an incredible bless(the dyrad hoplites have insane staying power and the black centaurs are both tough and deadly)

[Methel]

you can also play them a lot like middle age ulm, good infantry (hoplites) cavalry (centaurs) and tramplers too.
They all got high hp, mr but low morale.

Make good use of you're stealth preachers and cheap temples to make sure you're dominion is spreading before you're armies.

Gift of Health works wonders with your high hp armies.

[Shovah32]

Despite their good regular nationals and strong magics i really see LA Pangaea as a bless nation. With 2 strong sacred units(dyrad hoplites make great meatshields and are decent at dealing damage where-as black centaurs are very fast, quite tough and completely devastating to most units) and various good bless pretenders i find that they work well with various combinations of earth, water and nature(E9N9, E9W9, W9N9, E9N4, E9N9W4, E9W9N4, E9W9N9 ect) blesses.

[Evilhomer]

Im not sure of the benefit of a earth bless, I would rate a fire bless higher than earth for pangeas sacreds. Consider a w9f9n4 if you want a high level bless, and a w9n4 if you want better scales.

[Endoperez]

Pangaea gets E2N1 Gorgon, very good for Earth/Nature bless, but has little in the way of fire pretenders. Lady of Springs has most suitable starting paths but is a costly chassis (W2N1). Forge Lord would only be good for F9E9, which isn't bad but not what you had in mind. For Pangaea, Earth/Nature/Water comes more easily. Fire/Water is good for them too, of course.

[Evilhomer]

yes, a w9f9n4 would cost more than w9e9n4 bless to get, but I think the benefit would outweigh the cost (if you need a dual-9, i think better scales and just a w9n4 is good aswell)

[Shovah32]

The E9 stops units getting tired out, makes them much more survivable(dyrad hoplites+pans with buffs and fear spells works very well) and, although using centaurs purely f9w9n4 would probably be better i like to use both(and the grove guard commanders as thugs) and find the E9(and the gorgon, gorgons kick major ***) bless very useful.