Endgame Diversity Mod - v1.2 released

[Gregstrom]

I'm pretty sure zztop^H^H^Hcat was being sarcastic. As you rightly comment, one flavour of Tartarian Cyclops has E3A2 - it's a very popular choice for GoR and RoS spam as a result. 1 time in 4 35 Air gems gets you a RoS caster (A2E2 and non-0 enc isn't enough for RoS spamming) with half the hits and none of the resistances of a Tartarian. IMO, that is probably sarcasm. Commenting that you sometimes get A4 this way when you can guarantee yourself A4 by spending 25 Air gems added to that impression.

Asynja and Cyclops (also a great candidate for RoS spam) both have the advantage of reliability over Tarts, and I'm not sure how that balances out. You're always getting a usable commander and caster, even though neither one is guaranteed to cast RoS out of the box. Perhaps the Cyclops having a reasonable chance of E5 is a little much, but I think it's too soon to be sure. There are so many other uses for 35 E gems that some nations will probably prefer to run a Tart factory until they can GoR an E4 Tart cyclops instead.

[zzcat]

Originally Posted by Gregstrom

I'm pretty sure zztop^H^H^Hcat was being sarcastic. As you rightly comment, one flavour of Tartarian Cyclops has E3A2 - it's a very popular choice for GoR and RoS spam as a result. 1 time in 4 35 Air gems gets you a RoS caster (A2E2 and non-0 enc isn't enough for RoS spamming) with half the hits and none of the resistances of a Tartarian. IMO, that is probably sarcasm. Commenting that you sometimes get A4 this way when you can guarantee yourself A4 by spending 25 Air gems added to that impression.

Asynja and Cyclops (also a great candidate for RoS spam) both have the advantage of reliability over Tarts, and I'm not sure how that balances out. You're always getting a usable commander and caster, even though neither one is guaranteed to cast RoS out of the box. Perhaps the Cyclops having a reasonable chance of E5 is a little much, but I think it's too soon to be sure. There are so many other uses for 35 E gems that some nations will probably prefer to run a Tart factory until they can GoR an E4 Tart cyclops instead.

As Valerius's point out, you have only 1/7 chance to get a E3A2 Tartarian Cyclops per cast, 4 times in 5 you need extra 15N to GoR them(so 27 gems in total), and you have to have GoH or the chalice to make them usable. With earth boots 3 in 4 asynjas will be RoS caster, the other can cloud trapeze then cast fog warriors and wrathful skies w/o any equipment. IMO it affects end game even more than cyclops do.

[rdonj]

Just for fun, I've got a grendelkin picture. Hardly ideal gear, really... this one exists to kill armies of 100+ warhammer ogres. As you can probably tell, it hasn't quite gotten that far yet. My ideal anti-sc would have quickness, probably dual swords of swiftness or anti-undead weaponry, and an insane attack skill. That's an e9n4 shroud it's wearing by the way, and it has 36 regen a turn. If you have anything resembling a decent bless, a shroud makes a lot of sense to slap onto one of those. Imagine one with W9/Fx/Nx

Also, I am all for boosting the elemental royalties, moreso than I'm behind nerfing the end game diversity summons. Although I think taking air away from the cyclops makes sense. I would leave the royalties still more expensive. They should be good enough to be a prize though to have now. I kind of like the idea of making them generate gems, but that would probably make them hoarded too much. Giving them #onebattlespells seems like a much better idea, since they'd have to be used more aggressively. They could also potentially receive hp boosts.

I would have no problem with them having things like earthquake, living earths, storm... not sure what to do with pedoseion. Blood rain?

[Gregstrom]

Originally Posted by zzcat

As Valerius's point out, you have only 1/7 chance to get a E3A2 Tartarian Cyclops per cast, 4 times in 5 you need extra 15N to GoR them(so 27 gems in total), and you have to have GoH or the chalice to make them usable. With earth boots 3 in 4 asynjas will be RoS caster, the other can cloud trapeze then cast fog warriors and wrathful skies w/o any equipment. IMO it affects end game even more than cyclops do.

Tartarians are spammed - sooner or later you will get a usable Cyclops, and you get a lot of other useful stuff along the way. As I said, the advantage Asynja gets is reliability - most casts will get you a unit that can do a low-fi impression of a Tart Cyclops. It costs more, and isn't quite as accessible as Tartarians. If you think you aren't paying enough of a price for that reliability, fine. What should you be paying instead?