Cost efficient blood hunting

[Huzurdaddi]

Originally Posted by Baalz

And another angle to consider is the loss in income from the province, not just the upkeep of the mage.

This is actually the most important point about bloodhunting in Dom3 and is one of the big changes in bloodhunting from Dom2.

The increase in gold/province is a large boost (relative) to less elite blood hunting nations as the majority of the cost of blood hunting is the lost gold from taxes (assuming you blood hunt in stable state by setting taxes to zero, if you patrol it is difficult to compare).

Just for comparison consider two blood hunters:

Mitclan Priest (upkeep 2.66) average blood ~7
Jotun Skratti (upkeep 16.66) average blood ~8

It seems like the Mitclan Priest is far superior. Indeed from the chart above you are getting 2.5 slaves / gold with the Mitclan Priest and only 0.4 slaves / gold with the Jotun Skratti.

However if you blood hunt with 2 per province, in a 5000k pop province (~70 income) the numbers turn out quite different:

Mitclan Priest ~5.3 gold / slave
Jotun Skratti ~6.5 gold / slave

Mitclan still wins, but they are much closer.

PS: the increase in gold / province is actually a rather large nerf to all blood hunting nations, which was noted when Dom3 was released (there were actually multiple nerfs to blood in Dom3 vs. Dom2, most relegated to devils). Given that blood is still considered very powerful in Dom3 this was almost certainly a good thing (along with the nerf to life drain which was excellent).

[Tmoe]

Originally Posted by Huzurdaddi

Just for comparison consider two blood hunters:

Mitclan Priest (upkeep 2.66) average blood ~7
Jotun Skratti (upkeep 16.66) average blood ~8

It seems like the Mitclan Priest is far superior. Indeed from the chart above you are getting 2.5 slaves / gold with the Mitclan Priest and only 0.4 slaves / gold with the Jotun Skratti.

However if you blood hunt with 2 per province, in a 5000k pop province (~70 income) the numbers turn out quite different:

Mitclan Priest ~5.3 gold / slave
Jotun Skratti ~6.5 gold / slave

I do agreed about the lost tax gold being a significant factor when comparing different hunters but I didn't quite understand how did you come up the above mentioned new upkeep costs. I know it has to do with the income of the province but just couldn't find the formula for it. If you wouldn't mind sharing .

Good points by Baalz also. Cheers

[JimMorrison]

I'm actually also curious why that 5k pop province is generating 70 income. Either there is an Arena there, or you have very high scales, because it should be ~50 income with even scales.

It's true that we have so far been only focusing on the cost of the hunters, but I thought that was what this thread was for, because regardless of your scales, the cost of removing taxation will always be fairly static. That is to say, within any given layout, 5k pop will represent X% of your income no matter what. Since that cannot be directly influenced in game, the only thing that can be influenced, is what type and how many Blood Hunters are used.

To put it another way, think of your tax loss as "overhead" and your Blood Hunter upkeep as "operating costs". You can directly influence your operating costs by hiring poorly trained migrant laborers (ie- scouts), but overhead is the cost of doing business - you either pay it, or you do not do business.

I think the only time that tax loss becomes a major consideration is, when (this happens to me too often) all of your provinces are either <3k or >8k in pop, forcing you to choose between the less effective, or the higher cost options. Also sometimes I get so "lucky" and most of my ~5k provinces have Arenas and Gold Mines and such on them. Gee, thanks.


Of course, it cannot be said enough - the use of Blood, where applicable, is essentially (nearly always) cost effective. That is, you can almost always do more with the slaves than with the gold, regardless of other factors. The trick is, how easily can you generate the gold that you DO need, relative to your other Blood competitors? The upkeep on your Blood Hunters is a very large factor in that equation, and is magnified by your scales, which cannot be mitigated in-game, and which it must be assumed you had adequate reasoning for.

[Huzurdaddi]

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

I'm actually also curious why that 5k pop province is generating 70 income. Either there is an Arena there, or you have very high scales, because it should be ~50 income with even scales.

Quite right, I was going by memory how much a 5k population province yield, and since I generally have good scales it comes out around 70 (maybe a touch less). You are totally correct that scales really change the costs.

Originally Posted by JimMorrison

It's true that we have so far been only focusing on the cost of the hunters, but I thought that was what this thread was for, because regardless of your scales, the cost of removing taxation will always be fairly static. That is to say, within any given layout, 5k pop will represent X% of your income no matter what. Since that cannot be directly influenced in game, the only thing that can be influenced, is what type and how many Blood Hunters are used.

Agreed. However I just wanted to show that depending upon how one hunts blood, the difference is not nearly as pronounced as one would think based upon a comparison of blood hunter upkeep costs. Actually, the lost taxes dominate the costs blood hunting in many cases.

Originally Posted by Tmoe

I know it has to do with the income of the province but just couldn't find the formula for it. If you wouldn't mind sharing.

I could have made a booboo ...

Jotun Skratti (16.66*2 + 70)/16 ~= 6.5
Mitclan Priest (2.66*2 + 70)/14 ~= 5.4

But as was noted above some of the assumptions (like good scales) may be incorrect. Actually it looks like scales matter more than how efficient your blood hunters are, assuming you want steady state blood hunting.

[VedalkenBear]

CP: I don't think I'll be able to do it this week, as I have quite a bit of work plus a conference to attend, but I've just now had to review all of the statistical analytical techniques for hypothesis testing.

However, to do any of these, I need the variance of the samples, as well as the means.

[VedalkenBear]

CP: Actually, regarding the information we have on 0-Blood hunters using SDR, I tend to agree with Archaeolept. We can't say that it hurts the chances of gaining Blood Slaves. I think we can say that it doesn't help.

I'll look into collecting my own data and give some results, with analysis. I'll look at both SDR usage and also the effect of the magic site frequency of the game. (I believe that this also affects the gems you get from random events.)

[vfb]

The Hidden Gold Mine or Gem provinces should be blood hunted IMO, but tax at 100% and patrol down to 3000 pop, then stop hunting there, but crank taxes to 200% and patrol down to zero population. That's how you can generate the gold you need.

[archaeolept]

"Actually, the lost taxes dominate the costs blood hunting in many cases."

yes, exactly, and why scouts are such poor replacements for real bloodhunters. Also why the patch was such a serious nerf to Hinnom's blood power.

[BigDaddy]

Empower costs ~35 blood slaves. 25 slave booster costs ~32 before forging bonus (if any). The increase between B2 and B3 (effective) is about 1.4 blood slaves. 25 turns for empower. ~23 for brazen vessel. Now, boosting further could be done in a cost conscious way with a blood thorn, even to B4 effect or just 1 more B for any B3+ blood hunter. In those case the RoR is equal to the forge cost of the booster. Armor of souls with a 50% forge bonus takes only 25 (adding the cost of the forger's turn) turns to pay off for even your b6 souped up warlock.

Even a modest 25% forge bonus makes the bloodthorn and brazen vessel attractive, especially for low level blood hunters, especially earlier in the game, if you're in a good position.

Also, saving can be achieved if you only forge on turns you've been unlucky and caused an unhealthy rise in unrest.

[Gregstrom]

Originally Posted by BigDaddy

Empower costs ~35 blood slaves. 25 slave booster costs ~32 before forging bonus (if any). .

?????
Empower does not cost ~35 slaves. Blood boosters cost 25 before forge bonus.

Originally Posted by BigDaddy

The increase between B2 and B3 (effective) is about 1.4 blood slaves. 25 turns for empower. ~23 for brazen vessel.

Waiting #20 turns for a return on investment is rarely worthwhile in MP. If you're talking about equipping, say, 20 blood hunters with thorns or skulls, the 500 slaves (~375 with hammers) you just burned could probably have been used to summon a demon army and conquer another player (or to prevent an invasion).

Originally Posted by BigDaddy

Now, boosting further could be done in a cost conscious way with a blood thorn, even to B4 effect or just 1 more B for any B3+ blood hunter. In those case the RoR is equal to the forge cost of the booster. Armor of souls with a 50% forge bonus takes only 25 (adding the cost of the forger's turn) turns to pay off for even your b6 souped up warlock.

See above. And if you have a B6 warlock, why isn't he doing something like making Soul Contracts rather than blood hunting? If you've boosted all your warlocks to B6, why haven't you won the game yet?

Originally Posted by BigDaddy

Even a modest 25% forge bonus makes the bloodthorn and brazen vessel attractive, especially for low level blood hunters, especially earlier in the game, if you're in a good position.

They're vastly less attractive than dowsing rods, whatever you do. If for some reason you have an extremely limited supply of blood hunters, then maybe you can afford to blow your slave reserves into boosters for hunting use. Otherwise, the spend is less effective, especially in terms of return on investment, than having more hunters and only using rods.