Which nations need help?

[Meglobob]

HoneyBadger said:
EA R'lyeh sucks. A lot. And they should be the premiere EA Astral nation.

You would'nt say that if you had experienced:-

The Attack Of The Aboleths

This consists of teleporting Aboleths/Mind Lords scripted to body etheral, personal luck, quicken self, astral shield, breath of winter, attack closet.

They have life drain, EA Atlantis/EA Helheim PD 30+ stands no chance. They cause utter chaos and can overwhealm a nation pretty quickly. Especially when followed up with build lab, gateway huge armies in.

The only boost EA Atlantis needs is some way of getting more air gems (EA Oceania needs this as well) to help it get on land.

[Baalz]

Yeah, EA R'yleh has some pretty strong disadvantages, but they've also got some pretty good advantages if you play to them.

I really think MA Mictlan could use some nation spells because on top of being quite underpowered they loose effective access to the national spells they already get (blood). They really need a spell(s) to make the coutail worthwhile, maybe a astral/nature non-blood demon (like T'ien Ch'i's non-evil demons). Maybe a flying demon with a poison cloud? That could lead to some interesting strategies.

It also might be cool if, since they're thematically anti-blood magic if they had a kind of reverse Astral Corruption global which punished blood magic usage (maybe increased unrest for each blood slave captured?).

[HoneyBadger]

eh, I use that all the time, and it doesn't compare to a heavily blessed Niefel Jarl with just Breath of Winter, and on top of that, they've got great national troops and land-start.

[HoneyBadger]

Thematically, I love EA R'lyeh. It's my favorite nation, as far as role-playing goes. In practice, however, it's a big dud.

Yes, you've got nice SCs-nice and expensive-but not much else, and the SCs are difficult to use compared to many, because you can't upgrade them with items.

Your commanders, other than aboleths, are pretty sucky, you've got no national melee to back up your magic missle troops, and you're in the water. You've got nice tramplers, but they quickly become obsolete.

Yes, if you survive long enough, you can become very strong, but that can be said of lots of nations, if not all of them. They certainly don't have the ultimate end-game of later R'lyeh.

The position you start at is abysmally weak, and you don't have a fast track to power, like say Mictlan does.

Your one hero isn't even that great, nor are your Pretenders.

The free spawn you get are fine, but they do exactly 0 damage and on top of all that, your priests are immobile and you've got weak sacred troops upon who's shoulders a strong Bless is almost completely wasted.

And where are your national spells? I can't even remember them having any.

Finally, I forgot to mention that they lack the one true defining quality of R'lyeh. No Voidgate! If they had a Voidgate-and commanders with the skill to summon from it without going all "quirky"-they'd be a good, solid nation.

[PvK]

I don't think EA Ermor, EA (nor LA) Ulm or MA Agartha need boosting. EA Marverni and MA Ulm, yes. Though staying thematic while adding spells to boost Ulm might be tricky. Making Tempering the Will much easier to use would be a natural one. LA Marignon seemed weak to me, but I didn't try very long.

[Sandman]

Really, adding spells to these nations is not the way to balance them. Marveni is hobbled by its absurdly expensive druids and crummy troops, and MA Ulm just needs more magic.

[Teraswaerto]

It really depends on the spells added, doesn't it?

[Baalz]

As I said, you've got to play to their strengths. Obviously a Neifel Jarl is tougher for a toe to toe slug out, and if you play R'yleh like Neifelhiem it will be a total dud.

Don't do that. I've made the analogy before - Neflelhiem is a battleship, R'yleh is a submarine. Slugging things out toe to toe will be a dud every time. You've got to think more fade, dodge, and weave.

Here are some *significant* advantages EA R'yleh has to EA Neflehiem which you can use if you're clever.

1) Can recruit ready made thugs out of every castle, needing not a single item to take out most PD alone with a little research. Granted, you will need an amulet of the fish to attack the land, but strictly speaking they're effective out of the box.

2) All of the Mind Lords (capital only) and 25% of the aboleths (recruit anywhere) can teleport out of the box. This, combined with #1 means you can attack an absurd number of territories in a single turn against someone you don't even share a border with. Generally easy enough to forge crystal coins to get even more attackers.

3) As Meglobob mentioned, gateway is an excellent one-two punch to follow your initial teleportation wave with.

4) You can perform a brutal amount of mind hunting. This loses it's effectiveness late game, but can be stunningly effective midgame.

5) Most nations will be reluctant to attack you in the water early on. This is a powerful diplomatic tool as well as meaning you often don't need to sign NAPs, leaving you with lots of options once people start getting entangled in other affairs.

6) Voice of Tiamat + Dark Knowlege + Arcane Probing + Haurespex (+ Aschric Record for the land), R'yleh can quickly take a gem lead.

[vfb]

DrPraetorious said:
MA C'tis is a very interesting nation. It seems to me that the chief weakness of MA C'tis is that they have a lot of trouble with magic diversification. But would MA C'tis be too powerful if they didn't have that limitation? The best workaround at present is to take 4N on your God so that you can place shrouds on diseased independent casters. This is expensive and non-optimal in a lot of respects.

A ring of regeneration works just as well as a 4N shroud for preventing further HP loss and afflictions from disease. And all you need for the rings is any tribal shaman province, plus one thistle mace to kick off a mace-building, ring-building spree. Plus some gems .

[DrPraetorious]

Yeah, well, I'm trying to get people to sign up to a game to test the spells I've added, but no takers .

The proof, as they say, would be in the pudding.

Druids are expensive - but they have a shot at *two* 4s (both earth and astral), and they are sacred. The problem is that it takes a while to get those magic types going.

EA Marverni's troops are inferior - but only slightly. I don't think that's really Marverni's problem.

Anyway, if you give Marverni spells that it can use to buff itself up early in the game, I think it becomes quite a bit more competitive.

EA Ulm is definitely stronger than MA Ulm. Having lousy MR on all of your troops is a lot less of an issue when you have a real horde of them; and your commanders (except for the dismal warrior chief whom you never use) all have decent MR. But I still think EA Ulm lacks a certain punch.

I've found LA Marignon to be a very strong position in multiplayer. I couldn't tell you why.