HINNOM EATS EVERYTHING

[DonCorazon]

Terrifying guide as usual. I always appreciate a glimpse into Baalz's sinister mind. I imagine the stock price of each nation Baalz' writes about shoots up after each guide.

Anyway, I have yet to even look at Hinnom in the game - never enough time for me - but having been the victim of horror spam now numerous times, I can say the description of it here makes it sound like with Hinnom you could just sit back and let the horrors do most of the work.

So I am always looking for better ways to counter Horror spam. To date it seems the best thing to protect your economy is to constantly have small, roving bands always on the move to recapture the spammed provinces before the enemy hidden scouts do.

I have not been the victim of mass horror spam on an SC - but would be curious to here thoughts on countering that as well...

Thanks for the guide.

[Baalz]

Well, as I'm in the middle of one horror spam campaign and gearing up for another maybe nobody should come up with counters?

Oh well. The most effective thing that has been used *against* me is to have a single cheapish mage with a couple bodyguards scripted to something appropriate sprinkled all around. The cost effectiveness of this varies a lot with the nation you're playing, but horrors have no elemental immunity, and even fall to poison so there's quite a few low level spells which will deal enough damage to stop them considering your mage will generally have several turns to blast them from short range. Even something silly like bonds of fire will hold them still for a round, chopping their defense and keeping them from life draining for long enough that the PD can whittle them down.

As to keeping them from eating your SCs...well, I've never seen anybody else do this so I don't know if anybody's come up with a counter yet (nobody's successfully countered me yet). Nothing obvious comes to mind other than keeping a significant number of bodyguards around...which rather defeats the purpose of a SC.

[chrispedersen]

Nah; Hinnom can do a horror spam, but you're far more likely to be trampled under the treads of his units in the early or mid game.

I think Baalz is right on several points; the most piquant of which is: sure you can summon LoC. But the odds are you won't GET to. And you certainly won't *need* to.

[Reverend Zombie]

I guess I've just been unlucky/unwise, but I've never had a lesser horror successfully beat ANY PD...

What's the upward limit on PD level that you've found a lesser horror can solo?

[Lingchih]

I think the pop eating is more of just a pain to manage, than a real crippling problem. You have to continually manage where your big guys go, and make sure they don't stay in one place too long, unless you intend to deplete it.

[Baalz]

As I mention above, the real impact of the population eating which you can't manage away is that your blood hunters trash your blood hunting provinces much faster than other nations. This is more than compensated by Hinnom's other advantages, but it's not totally negligible.

[archaeolept]

"crippling" might be a bit strong, but it is a very serious drawback for Hinnom. Sure, in happy-happy theory world, aka sp, you can move the rephaim to isolated desolate spots. In a real game though, things aren't so easy, if there is any sort of struggle. You need your armies where you need your armies. I had a significant force bottled up due to a siege. Population there used to be alright...

now, if only I had read the post about moving them somewhere else before they were besieged, I'm sure everything would have been a-ok.

[Poopsi]

how bout making them starve if they are at a 0 pop place?

[BesucherXia]

Originally Posted by Poopsi

how bout making them starve if they are at a 0 pop place?

They eat human not for living, just for enjoyment.

Just compare to the demon units which have tags "need not eat" and meanwhile "gluttony" (e.g. dai oni). They do consume supply which bring other units problems, but if there is no supply for them to waste at all, they will not starve neither.

[Nikelaos]

alternatively to all th bad press, the pop eating thing can be used to your advantage, sieging an enemy fort even if you don't take it you will cripple the economy of the fort so it can't output a good number and quality of troops.