Some hint about early nations to ban to skilled players?

[Aezeal]

Well gandalf that is just plain not right... there are clear differences between the power of nations where if you pick 2 nations played by players with lots of experience with their own nation one nation will certainly win 90% of the matches.

[rdonj]

Well, I would say that gandalf is at least partly right, a player that understands well how to use one nation to its fullest will do well against most or all other nations by understanding how to play up its strengths and cover for its weaknesses. Whereas with a different "strong" nation that they don't understand how to use as well they may do well against some people but not do as well overall.

I think though, especially in the early to mid game before you have diversified much magically, that a significant part of the equation is the comparison between the two nation's inherent capabilities. As a completely random example, niefelheim is considered one of the strongest ea nations... one of the strongest nations period, even. But one of the nations they are worst equipped to fight, imo, is ea Yomi, considered one of the weakest nations in the game.

[Gandalf Parker]

One of the great things about the game is that nations are not balanced against nations. Its a rock-paper-scissors form of balance.

[Psycho]

Originally Posted by rdonj

As a completely random example, niefelheim is considered one of the strongest ea nations... one of the strongest nations period, even. But one of the nations they are worst equipped to fight, imo, is ea Yomi, considered one of the weakest nations in the game.

Could you elaborate, please?

[Tifone]

Fire and poison tossing troops and easy access to many cheap archers easy to "flaming arrows" up, I suppose

[Gandalf Parker]

Some of my personal complaints are Caelum and Pangaea. People often declare them weak but when you talk to them they are playing it likes its Ulm. Trying to build big armored armies to march across the map.
I have nothing against that playing style. It perfectly fits some nations. That person would do great with those nations.
But how can you declare Caelum weak if your strategies do not include the advantages of flying armies?
How can you declare Pangaea weak if you dont use stealth armies?
Its usually easy to read a nations description and see what has been built into its basic theme. Any effort to declare a nation as great or worthless needs to take those things into account InMyHumbleOpinion.

[rdonj]

In elaboration. Yomi has, as tifone said, fire and poison tossing troops (though I probably wouldn't rely on these), cheap archers and access to flaming arrows. They also have cheap, highly massable stealthy units to raid with.

They also have cold resistant multi-form blockers that turn ethereal when they die and do large amounts of damage, the earth mages to cast armor of achilles, destruction, earth meld etc, and to cast strength of giants. If you go the alteration route you also get blight, which they can natively cast, that you can use to increase unrest in their capital and kill off some of their population. In short yomi has access to pretty much every method I've heard mentioned that's helpful for killing niefel giants. If it's later in the game it's almost just better for you because you'll be able to combine more of the above methods, and maybe even add in weapons of sharpness.

Pretty much the only thing they don't have is cold immune thugs, unless you research conjuration for the ghost generals or trade for some rings. If you can manage to get cold immune oni generals/dai oni, you can spam hand of death at them.

Anyway this is all theorycrafting since I've never actually done it in practice, but I'm pretty sure it would work.

[MaxWilson]

Originally Posted by Gandalf Parker

Some of my personal complaints are Caelum and Pangaea. People often declare them weak but when you talk to them they are playing it likes its Ulm. Trying to build big armored armies to march across the map.

I suspect, Gandalf, that you would *LOVE* being Italy when playing Diplomacy. Lots of potential for poking your finger in other people's schemes. Caelum and Pangaea are great as allies.

-Max

[Gandalf Parker]

They play fairly well on really large maps also. They both have the ability to "checkers hop" across the map taking weak provinces and leaving strong ones in place as a buffer. They can attack an enemy fairly early. And then that enemy has to fight a string of both their provinces, and the stronger indepts that they jumped over to get there, in order to strike back.

And Pangaea can send an army to the backside of an enemy taking a province there and forcing them to split their forces to fight back. I know that Pangaea does not have the ability to meet an army head-to-head very well but it can put one of the most complete armies (priests, mages, infantry, longbows, mounted cavalry, blesseds) anywhere on the map which is usually quite capable against what most people put into back defense and PD.

But again, its for a player who likes to play those styles. Its best when the players style matches the nation. Ive noticed that my tendency to play diplomatic (including the dark side of seduce, spy, assassinate, CIA armies) shows up no matter what nation I get. When I get one of the "strong" nations I do horribly because I dont play to those strengths. Just not my style.