Jomon advice wanted

[JimMorrison]

As Zenzei showed, it isn't 100% necessary to go 3 Prod, but the high resource cost of Jomon troops will remain an issue. Really, your 2 primary options are either 3 Prod, or an awake SC. If you don't have one or the other, you will be dreadfully slow in growing, as once your starting garbage troops start to die, you'll have only a handful of men to replace them with.

So basically, to avoid the 3Prod, I'd generally take my buddy:
Cyclops, E9, Dom 5, Order3/Cold1/Drain2

You can put him to sleep to research buffs or cons first:
Dormant Cyclops, E9, Dom5, Order3/Prod3/Cold1/Misf1

While I mostly have used the Earth bless for Jomon, I am a big fan of Water as well:
Dormant Lady of Fortune, W9 S4, Dom6, Order3/Prod3/Cold1/Misf2/Drain2


As far as sticking with your Celestial General, you have to ask yourself, "what do I really expect to get from X magic path?". Maximizing your pretender build is extremely important, as it's the only thing you can't just change in the middle of the game. Using your D4 as an example, the highest level Jomon summons, needs D4. If you took D3, you can make a Skull Staff to use for the summons. Bear in mind, that 4th circle cost you 32 points, that's almost a scale point - and you need 1F as well to summon the Dai Oni, something that you lack.

Some points to bear in mind - if you want to do a bless strat with capital only troops that need 20+ resources, you probably need the Prod3. The 3 minor blesses that you show (A/E/D) won't provide near enough benefit to even worry much about your bless anyways. The problem for you with Jomon, is that your other heavy infantry are pretty solid, so you really need a major bless to even make it worth fussing over. Simply put, 20% Air Shield, 2 Reinvig, and +100% Affliction rate isn't going to make your bless troops substantively more powerful.

Since your General wasn't awake, I'll give another suggestion for a more magic/summons heavy strat:
Dormant Enchantress, 6 Dom, F4/E4/S4/D4, Order3/Prod3/Cold1/Misf1/Drain2 - You could drop the Drain into Misf, but Misf3 while doable, can be frustrating. You could also experiment with dropping the Prod 1-2 points to boost the other damaged scales, or balance with a little out of your Order, if you are used to playing without the cash. Just pay close attention to your rate of troop acquisition in the starting phase of the game, and how fast you are able to topple indies. If you can't expand your territory very efficiently at first, then the second stage of the strat needs to come fairly early, and be well thought out.

[JimMorrison]

Max made a shorter post that raised a couple of my points while I was still typing. Forgive me if I don't want to edit the entire body of it to reflect that.

[Hoplosternum]

Max and Jim both posted good points while I was typing as I type very slowly I'll be here far to long if I try and edit so I'm not going to bother either

[Micah]

Jomon is incredibly resource hungry, so that means you want an awake SC (with awe, of course). If you're keen on having death access I'd go for a ghost king, give him a bit of A/E on top of his death so he can self-buff (air shield is especially important early, it should make him able to solo most indies right off the bat)

The other option is an awake 'clops, which will give you a couple more points of productivity and a safer early game SC, at the cost of some magical flexibility. (Or you could splash D on him instead of taking scales if you prefer...the GK will have better mobility later on, but is vulnerable to anti-undead spells, the cyclops is less mobile, but doesn't have the undead weakness to certain spells. Take your pick.)

You'll need to budget 45 astral pearls in order to empower one of your S2 guys to S3 to make the 2 rings, but you've got crystal coins available nationally, so it's not a huge weakness.

I wouldn't bother with the Jomon sacreds, they're kind of horrible. Go with the archers and flaming arrows strat mentioned early, just keep recruiting until you get an F2 mage and cast phoenix power and you're good to go. Commune if you get bad picks and only have F1 mages available.

[Pablomatic]

Good stuff. Thanks everybody. I do appreciate it.
I tend to play thematically, which makes me balk at a Ghost King or Cyclops pretender. This is why I like the Celestial General. He has an awesome standard, and should be a decent SC if I can ever get there, though his paths aren't what I'd like for Jomon. I might go with either a Lady of Fortune, Lord of Plenty, or an Enchantress. A Crone might be perfect, but I can't stomache having an age problem with my pretender.
I guess I will bite the bullet and go for production 3, and maybe Luck 3/Disorder 3.

Another question.JimMorrison said he likes an earth bless for Jomon. I can't understand that. Since Jomon's mages aren't sacred, they get no benefit from the reenvig. Sure the pretender gets a benefit, but there's no other real use.

Also, does anybody know how/if the Lord of Plenty pretender brings "good fortune to those around him."

[atul]

Crone loses her age problems the moment you take a nature magic pick. Or two, can't remember for sure. As to earth bless, if you have heavy sacreds, reinvigoration and extra armour help them a lot. But really shouldn't bother with Jomon's troops...

[Micah]

I think Jomon's summons tend to be sacreds, so they do get help from an E bless, but that's not a great reason for a huge one. If you're wanting to use Dai Oni they'd benefit from a couple of points of reinvig for sure.

And I reiterate my pretender suggestions, celestial general is crap. If you want to splash around in the kiddy pool of playing thematically be my guest, but it's frustrating to be asked for strategy advice and then have it dismissed for non-strategy-related reasons. And just to make it clear, this is NOT a minor point for Jomon. They are one of the worst nations in the game to attempt to play without an awake, functional SC pretender to get some resources into their cap and money into a second fort as soon as possible.

[Pablomatic]

Hey Micah. Don't be frustrated. I didn't dismiss your strategies. Ok the Celestial General is crap. Fine. I really appreciate your advice, and I'll try it out.

[Pablomatic]

Just seems like every nation should take a Ghost King, or a Cyclops, no matter what. Well, that's a slight exaggeration, but reading through the strategy guides, those seem to be the most common, with perhaps a vampire queen thrown in.

Guess I need to start powergaming if I want to try MP, or I won't last long.

[JimMorrison]

Pablomatic said:
Another question.JimMorrison said he likes an earth bless for Jomon. I can't understand that. Since Jomon's mages aren't sacred, they get no benefit from the reenvig. Sure the pretender gets a benefit, but there's no other real use.

First I would like to point out that though the "cyclops" is a western name, Japanese folklore has mountain warrior spirits that could be adaptable, with a little imagination.

I tried the earth bless with Jomon because your sacreds start at 14 prot. Since you have samurai with No-Dachi and 16 prot, and other people have 20 prot heavy infantry, I went in the direction of having better tanking power. The difference between 18/20 prot seems small against conventional troops, but yours are better offensively, and get the reinvig for staying power, especially important against a cold/heat scale enemy.

As far as the mages not being sacred and not getting the reinvig, it seems that the Shroud of the Battle Saint is 0 Enc and only costs 5 pearls to make. That's a pretty cheap investment for 4 reinvig, and whatever else they might get (+2 morale for mages, yay!).


I am kind of new-ish, so I don't see quite the necessity of such strict adherence to a small list of pretender choices. Obviously, some of the pretenders are just shabby or in no way cost effective, but it all comes down to strategy, and if you think yours through well enough, just about any pretender should be capable. Just don't get too pissed off when someone's cyclops shows up at your capital on turn 5. >.>