Clockwork Horrors vs. Golems

[krpeters]

I was playing around with thugging, and I thought I had a pretty good build going. It was pretty cheap, and did a great job of chewing up 200 troop AI armies. Then it ran into a dozen Clockwork Horrors and got chewed up and spat out I'm looking for advice on how to improve it--cheaply!

Here's the build:
Golem (30 S)
Vine shield (10 N)
Shield of Gleaming Gold(5F 5E)
Starshine Skullcap (10S)
+3 pearls
Script: Resist Magic, Body Ethereal, Astral Shield, Astral Tempest, Attack Closest
Note that Astral Tempest is only 4S and one pearl in CBM1.7

So, against the usual AI-horde-o-crapola, after casting, the Golem stands around protected by Awe, Vines, and paralysis, waiting for the Tempest to kill off 50% of the enemy so they rout, with 25% more dying on the way off the field. I was initially quite pleased.

Then the AI happened to have a dozen clockworks horrors; they ignored the Awe and Paralysis and chopped my Golem into chunks of clay. Arrrghhh!

So what's an effective defense? I've looked at the armors available; I doubt that P-18 Chain Mail of Displacement will be enough to do the job, and a Robe of Invulnerability is way too expensive. The Black Steel Full Plate (P22) is tempting, but the -5 to Def would probably cause more hits than I like. I also want to save my E gems for more golden shields.

What else is good at stopping these critters? Meat shielding is not an option; my Golem is teleporting in to wherever I can find a horde to chew on.

[Debaser8]

Give him a fire brand instead of gleaming and script personal luck instead of astral shield/astral tempest. It's worth a try anyway. Also you can replace hat with fear hat and maybe add a shroud if you a decent bless.

[CthulhuDreams]

First up, cast personal luck as well as body ethereal: That will reduce the number of hits by 50% straight away. (ensuring that only 12% of attacks hit.)

Use an earth coin instead of the starshine skullcap
Use a horror helm instead of the starshine skullcap (Alternatively, a horned helm)
Replace one of the Shields of Gleaming gold with a fire or frost brand.
Add boots of quickness.

This gives him some serious punch to punch dudes to death, which is what you need vs undead and other stuff not effected by awe or morale.

If you have a great bless, use a shroud.

[Kobal2]

Try Stymphalian Wings. Their fear comboes with the gold shield, they make the golem an offensive powerhouse even with two shields, clock horrors are size 1 so extra trampleable, and they'll give the golem flight to go back to the lab for another go that much faster.

Only downsides are the cost (each pair costs your a golem, basically), and the encumbrance of spell casting + trampling so you probably want to add a recuperation pendant and/or boots to the kit, and script a "Hold" or two before you attack as well.

Also, give the golem a Pendant of Luck, it's standard thug equipment for a reason

ETA : oh, and whatever you decide the Black Steel Full Plate is naff. Super high encumbrance (remember, spell casting encumbrance is double that !) means by the time your golem gets to the end of his script he'll be so tired even a militia could crit him to death, and of course he'll fatigue himself even more hitting dudes. The only use for Black Steel is on undead who don't care about combat encumbrance.

[CthulhuDreams]

golems don't care about encumbrance

Also, give the golem a Pendant of Luck, it's standard thug equipment for a reason

A golem can easily cast the spell, so often the 4 pearls can be better spent.

[Finalgenesis]

I'll forgo the short answer...

The long answer:

I'll lay out the analysis and hopefully can help you see what to consider when facing certain things and arming gears on thugs and SCs in general.

Offense
-Clockwork has prot 18, 5 hp. So any hits doing 23 dmg will kill them. Since Golem has 25 str, any weapon with non-negative dmg they use will kill clockwork in 1 hit, therefore dmg on weapon is not a consideration. They have defense 10, so any attack 12+ can usually hit them, 14 or more is best.

-They are a swarm type, size 1 and really packs together. If you can find so some way to do AoE that would be ideal.

-Unfortunately they are quadra elemental immune, so ice and fire brand area damage won't affect them at all. The damage will only come from the phyiscal attack itself.

-What other ways are there to do AoE? a) trample. b) non-elemental AoE. That means either stymphian (Ouch, Super expensive in cbm 1.7), boots of behemoth (5E!), or midget smasher. Lets just drop midget smasher, it's not usable in this situation (or most situations) for obvious reasons.

-Trample also happens to be AP attack, cutting clockwork prot to 9, and its low hp together makes them very trample worthy.

-The cost efficent method is therefore behemoth boots, 5E. Note that trample can be a mixed blessing, as instead of attacking you will always trample something smaller. Since trample does more damage based on size difference, and golem is size 5, 2-4 size elite troops with high armor/defense (defense can dodge trample) can be quite resilient to trample and mess up your golem, where magic weapon will do better vs them. When you face size 5-6 you will use normal attack.

-Trample dedicated unit can also use dual shield without much problem... until they face something same or larger size then them, then they die unless they can kill it with a stupid kick.

-The other method is laying out multiple attacks a turn, which is less optimal vs swarms but better vs elite/thugs/SCs, a more balanced style if you would. Your choices are sword of quickness, serpent kryss ...etc or gladiator glove if you are willing to risk going without shield for some fist of the north star action. Boots of quickness should be added for optimal multi-attack style. Horned helm is another extra attack you can add, which is doubled by quickness. Though if you swap out astral cap you lose teleport, so I probably wouldn't.

Defense
-Clockworks only do 16 dmg per hit, non-magical.

-Therefore prot 20+ (22+ optimally), ethereal, luck are ideal.

-Defense don't matter too much, each hit on you gives you -2 def penalty in the same turn, and these small swarms of clockwork lays out dozens of hits on you a turn, a 4 def difference is only 2 more hits you dodge out of dozens of winging blades. prot and eth/luck is therefore the better way to go, swing for defense only after you take care of those and as a bonus.

-Beware fatigue increases the rate they score critical hits (bypass prot), so watch you buffing, I'd say just luck and ethereal is optimal, but try to keep fatigue to 19 or under when you can. The astral cap is good here as it cuts down fatigue from casting S spells. Heavier armor do give you higher fatigue for casting spells. Good thing golem don't have to worry about fatigue for actual fighting. I might throw in a girdle just to fix the buff fatigue (not like you don't have misc slots to spare vs AI) and improving anti-thug/SC power at the same time, you may want AMA if enemy likes to span disintegrate. But anyway...

-You will have to consider actual armor on prot value and maybe encumb value (it still affects your casting fatigue). If cold resist is not a concern I'll just pull out the stops and go with stone armor as it also covers your head armor weakness (starshine cap isn't exactly for prot...), the +6 casting fatigue is tough though (but most higher prot armor gives +4 - +8 anyway, exception being the dragon and silver stuff, dragon can fill in missing elem resist too).

Mobility
-Astral cap gives teleport capacity, pretty standard on raider/para-commando golem.

-If you opt for extra attack in horned helm (-2 def) and went with quick boots, styphalian wings might actually be worth it to give you some mobility back (not as good as teleport... but damn good still). but trampling don't mix well with multi-attack style, it does cover small and big units (but not elite units smaller then you are), you might as well focus purely on multi-attack in that case for better cost focus and effectiveness.

That's the short analysis of it for AI only, without considering facing human opponents, indepth multi-units consideration, enemy caster support (I did put a little there) ...etc. Hope this helps.

[Edi]

Clockwork horrors are mindless, therefore they ignore awe. That was half of your problem in the first place. I expect you relied on it significantly to prevent attacks against the golem.

[Rytek]

Actually, the best answer is you dont really have to change anything. The AI got lucky and had a counter present. Its probably its only army with clockworks. Just kill that particular army with something else. Its not like the AI learned you are gonna continue to drop on it with golems and put the clockworks in every army.

[krpeters]

Finalgenesis, I think you've hit on the right solution with the protection. I thought the clockwork critters had AP but they don't, so simply giving the golem some armor made a big difference.

BTW, I have no interest in killing the critters... no need, they wind down pretty quickly. I just need to be able to stand and survive long enough for them to turn off.

And of course, this would never work against a human opponent, but then again, a human opponent would never have thousands of starving spearmen to attack me with either!

[NTJedi]

Originally Posted by krpeters

BTW, I have no interest in killing the critters... no need, they wind down pretty quickly. I just need to be able to stand and survive long enough for them to turn off.

Yes the clockwork horrors decrease in value during each round of battle. I'm thinking you placed your golem near the middle of the battlefield for them to reach and kill the golem?

Originally Posted by krpeters

And of course, this would never work against a human opponent, but then again, a human opponent would never have thousands of starving spearmen to attack me with either!

Yes the starving troops is still painful to encounter, but you can greatly decrease this AI weakness by increasing the supply multiple setting during game creation from 100 to 300.