Guide MA Mictlan - An Introduction

mathusalem · #1 May 27th, 2008, 04:59 AM

oups, boots of Youth, sorry

Rytek · #2 May 28th, 2008, 10:30 PM

A sleeping Moloch with F9, B4, dominion 9 or 10 can still get you good scales. Eagle warriors set to Hold and attack rear are wicked. Include some of your astral mages amongst them and cast Body ethereal/luck for great defense with the offense.

sum1lost · #3 May 29th, 2008, 01:14 AM

Molochs aren't allowed with MA Mictlan.

AreaOfEffect · #4 May 29th, 2008, 05:06 AM

Zeldor, I often don't see then randoms as something to rely on. I generally just see their existence as a bonus. I suppose I did however make a bigger deal of it then I meant to. When I get the time I'll correct the wording. I wanted most of my ravings to be about how good the fixed qualities of the nahualli are.

mathusalem, I do not hold to your ideal that blood is something MA Mictlan needs. They only have one old unit and more then 1 out of four of those aren't old due to nature randoms. I'm playing a game with death 3 and I have yet to lose a high priest of the sky to disease. You may have had bad luck, or I might have had good luck. In my opinion you don't need many high priests as you won't have that many armies and priest kings can fill the needs of normal troop movement.

Rytek , I'm sorry but the Moloch is not available for the Middle Age. Though I down-played the importance of the pretender selection in the guide it is worth noting that the selection is drastically different.

In regards to a blood/fire combo I've played around with the pretender selection. I found that spite the attempts to use pretenders with fire magic already, I do believe the oracle is the most cost effective choice.

An imprisoned Oracle with dominion 8, fire 9, and blood 4 leaves you with 26 points remaining. This is before taking things like heat and sloth. An imprisoned Arch Mage with dominion 8, fire 9, and blood 4 leaves you only 4 points left. This also doesn't mention that the oracle also has 3 astral as a bonus and a higher starting dominion, so dominion 9 and 10 will be progressively cheaper with the Oracle. That said a reasonable pretender design exists.

Rytek · #5 May 29th, 2008, 04:25 PM

Oops, that must have been an earlier patch then. My opponrnt in one MA game definetly had a moloch, although that was a few patches ago. He did use the ethereal and luck to good use though.

Horst F. JENS · #6 June 27th, 2008, 05:47 AM

just discovered that nearly all MA Mictlan Mages are sacred. So i wonder, is there good battlefield spell that would profit from the extra 2 AN Damage of a D9-blessed mage ?

llamabeast · #7 June 27th, 2008, 06:05 AM

D9 doesn't give extra damage to spells. However, the affliction chance increase does apply, so if a death-blessed mage can cast earthquake or something it can seriously mess up the enemy army.

archaeolept · #8 August 21st, 2008, 01:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rytek

Oops, that must have been an earlier patch then. My opponrnt in one MA game definetly had a moloch, although that was a few patches ago. He did use the ethereal and luck to good use though.

I believe that was me

I had the last MA Mictlan Moloch ever... the patch that deleted him from the list came out just after the game started... I was a little bit worried i'd suddenly have him transform into a magicless arch-mage

also, of about 40-50 turkeys, i got 4 or 5 with a blood random

I figured it was in keeping with my god's plan to bring mictlan back to the true path...

chrispedersen · #9 February 10th, 2009, 03:18 AM

Pretender: Imprisoned Oracle. T3S3H3D3L3M3. F9W9S4 Dom 7

There are some days, JK/KO do a really great job of giving a race a really good look and feel. MA Mictlan is one of those times.

Okay, you're probably already protesting at the *horrible* scales. So how on earth can it work? Well just like in EA/LA it all boils down to the Mictlan Priest.

Your basic unit of conquest will be a MP, hanging all the way in the corner, with 7 jags a tad to the south. Bless, bless, bless hold hold... and your choice after that. Just keep him out of harms way.

This basic unit of conquest will work for almost anything except heavy cav, and deer archers. For cav, throw in a screen of slaves. For really heavy provinces - hit em with two groups.

First turn: If mountains are close, jack up taxes to 200%.
Prophetize your scout. Have your commander patrol. Leave him there, patroling. Build your first researcher. Yep, a Mictlan priest.

You'll be building your first castle on turn 3.
Your basic unit of conquest 7*25 gp +60 = 235 gp. Whenever someone takes a hit, and loses some troops, either build a fort, or bring him back to research.

That same mictlan priest- 60 gp buys ..... 5 research points. Sacred research points. Or 12/gp per rp. The cheapest research in the game, afaik.

And it has one cute little aside... If you were so lucky as to build your second castle next to your first... (Sacrilege, for most races - but perfect for mictlan.. I mean - your whole buildout takes 22 resources.).... you don't even have to build a lab. Just build a temple, and crank out your researchers. Now thats cost efficient! Run them over to your capital to research. Sure sure, someday when you have money you don't know what to do with.. build a second lab.. just not.. now.

So what do you do with those researchers. Construction-2. Somewhere in your first few turns, build a sky priest or 4. See, Mictlan loves animals. Toads, oscelots, jaguars, blood bats... Oops sorry reverted to an earlier age... oh yes.. Owl quills.

Sure, sure, everyone is going to say I've got better use for my air gems than quills. Maybe they do... but 5 research points, and 5 air gems buys you 3 rp. If you can finagle a dwarven hammer you're a better player than I..

By rapidly building a fort, (and keeping up that fort construction rate) you are essentially doubling your research rate. Sometime around turn 12 you should be around 150 rp.

So, sometime around turn 9, I like to build my first nature, fire, priests. Although if you get lucky with getting the Mictlan National dead guy, you might want to consider conjuration. I switch over to thaum for the site searching spells. Dead guy will also give you a convenient entry into blood.

It really is best to play with graphs off. You have good prospects at being tops in provinces & forts - and research will be top third. But if you are playing with graphs on - you might want to hopskotch a few territories so you can take them at your leisure.

A few other notes: Taking S5 on your pretender allows eventual rings o sorcery, rings o wizardry.