So far what nations look strong... and weak?

[Joonie73]

Couls someone briefly explain what communion is & how it works? What makes it so powerful?

[apoger]

>Couls someone briefly explain what communion is & how it works? What makes it so powerful?

In Brief:

Some mages cast Communion Slave while others cast Communion Master.

The Slaves take the fatigue when the Masters cast spells. This allows a great deal of casting by the Masters.

The Masters also get magic skill bonuses from the Slaves. All skills +1 for 2 Slaves, +2 for 4, +3 for 8, +4 for 16.

For example:
An Arch Theurg (air-2 astral-3, lets say the ? comes in as nature-1) goes into battle.
There are 8 Communicants with him.
The Arch Theurg casts Communion Master.
The Communicants are slaves automatically.
The Arch Theurg is now air-5 astral-6 nature-4.
When he casts spells, he does not fatigue, the slaves soak up the efforts of spellcasting, allowing the Arch Thuerg to use his pumped up ranks over and over again.

More Slaves will absorb more fatigue.
More Masters will gain the full benefits of the Slaves. The Slaves are shared.
The only danger is driving the Slaves fatigue beyond 200, at which point they take damage and die. Burning out the slaves is common in long battles, however it gets you a stunning supply of mage power before they drop.

My feeling is that Carrion wood is not particularily strong, if anything I would say it is a weak theme. While it has a strenghts it also have weaknesses. To mention a few:

You do not get as much free summons as Ashen empire, nor do you get the boosted gem income.

Your home province will eventually loose all its pop which will hit your resources severely and keep you from utilising the normal resource heavy troops recruitable in the capital, amongst them the sacred black centaurs. IIRC you cannot build harpies, you just start with one, and can recieve a Arcopythera. Your Panic Apostates are only 30 cheaper than ordinary Pani and have one random less, and do not recieve Meanads.

The effects of the dominion will eventually significantly reduce your income. As long as you manage to keep expanding the theme should do ok, but if you slow down the free summons you get will not offset the income loss.

You will also in multiplayer recieve the same reaction as Ermor, making you a likely target for alliances.

It may be weak compared to the basic Pan theme; but since I haven't played Dom1 I never knew it. I haven't played it in epic, XXXXXL maps with 17 opponents, so I couldn't tell you on that end.

In a certain mindset; not having anything to look back on is a good thing. Especially midsized games, with opponents who sneak attacks and other underhanded ways to cut off supply lines, but your is mobile. Not as good as Ermor; but I wasn't playing it like Ermor, I was playing it like Undead Pangea .

I primarily make Black Harpy flocks (which you can make and I have them in droves cutting supply and starving enemies as well as rearborn mages) and Minos as you lose resources. (Just Mino's, not War Minos since they have 46 Resources)

Also the Black Centaur is a measely 70 Gold, 11 Resource Sacred and with the number of points for a Carrion Wood theme you can make that pretender with good bless effects.

If you are aggressive (Which you should be with this theme) you are overtaking and using new forts to build up your new living troops and throw them in armies with your Manakin's/Mandragora so they never rout and crush through those annoying undead unfriendly units. Also Manikin's regenerate during battle and can tear through provinces quickly when you get started.

Maybe I haven't played enough long games with them or been slowed significantly in order to see that approach. I'll freely admit that I do not know everything; but I would put the theme higher ranking that Alex did simply for the fact of how I have used it.

Maybe I got lucky; and hit quick and fast enough to cause an uproar in my targeted enemies without having a huge domain that caused me to be ganged up on because I was killing others provinces.

War needs no reasons, alliances happen regardless of your actions for the safety blanket. This theme only means you are cut out of most alliances (all except Ermor) unless you have the upper hand.

[Gandalf Parker]

I like Pangaea default. I appreciate the addition of more sneak units such as more centaurs. Still no assassin but I can push for the blood heart to get that. I dont even recruit any of the units that are non-stealth

[HJ]

Originally posted by johan osterman:
Your home province will eventually loose all its pop which will hit your resources severely and keep you from utilising the normal resource heavy troops recruitable in the capital, amongst them the sacred black centaurs.

Although I like the theme, and think that idea for it is really great, I agree with the black centaur issue. The fact that they are only buildable in the capitol, that you can only build them in a first couple of turns when you don't have that much money and have other things to spend it on, that you're also limited by the number of sacred troops, and that they will run an additional risk of starvation later on due to the destructive dominion unless commanded by nature mages will make black centaurs rare birds indeed. Maybe if thay are made to be buildable anywhere with fort & temple? I mean, it's not like you will be able to build many of them even in that case, since temple will mean strong dominion resulting in that province getting depopulated pretty soon as well, but it will offer an opportunity to make at least a few of them later in the game.

[Teleolurian]

Tien Chi gets the Nataraja too

[ywl]

Originally posted by Teleolurian:
Tien Chi gets the Nataraja too

And an immortal hero who can heal.

Tien Chi also gets very good heavy cavalry at a reasonable price (25 gold / 28 resource), who can shoot, charge (lance), long spear and a strategic movement of 3. Their heavy infantries and archers (both bow and crossbow!) are also very solid.

The Celestial Master, with only one Astral, is very susceptible to Mind-Duel and is a pain. But at least, the Master of the Way is cheap (100 gold for 2 magic and 2 holy) and recruitable everywhere.

[Truper]

To me Tien Chi magic seems very... muddled. Examples: The Celestial Masters are best at water magic, though their nation is neither underwater nor cold-loving. Their home province does not provide an income of water gems. One of their national specials is summoning Celestial Soldiers, which requires an Air 2 Astral 1 mage, but they do not have any such mages until/unless a Celestial Master gets his random pick in air. A couple of people have mentioned their national heroes - but another of their national specials is that they get province defence for free in provinces with Order, so it seems natural to want to maximize Order which of course means they are very unlikely to see any of the heroes. In my curent test game, I'm playing them with order +3, I am on turn 19, and have yet to get an event of any kind (random events are rare), much less a hero, although I did take luck +1 partially in hope of seeing them. Celestial masters have intrinsic fire magic, and not intrinsic earth magic, but their home province does not provide a fire gem income while it does provide an earth gem income. The likelyhood that a CM has a lot of paths at 1 but only water at 2 makes them terrible site searchers.

Their most interesting troops are all expensive and hideously resource intensive, making them something of an Ulm of the East. You really want lots of order, lots of productivity and lots of administration, which is going to leave damn few design points for the pretender or anything else.

In short, I have no clue how to play these guys But I am working on it.

[Keir Maxwell]

Originally posted by Truper:
so it seems natural to want to maximize Order which of course means they are very unlikely to see any of the heroes. In my curent test game, I'm playing them with order +3, I am on turn 19, and have yet to get an event of any kind (random events are rare), much less a hero, although I did take luck +1 partially in hope of seeing them.

What I remember reading was that your chance of getting heroes is based on luck only and accumulates from turn to turn. With -3 luck no chance, with -2 1% +1% per turn resetting when you get one, with -1 2% pt etc.

Playing +1 luck I have got nationals heroes at a good clip.

Cheers

Keir

[Keir Maxwell]

Originally posted by Zen:
War needs no reasons, alliances happen regardless of your actions for the safety blanket. This theme only means you are cut out of most alliances (all except Ermor) unless you have the upper hand.

It has been noted previously in relation to Ermor in Dom I that with experianced players an alliance/co-operation with Ermor is viable. With care you can keep Ermors dominion under control - if you are limited neighbours - and if not then having Ermor on the other side of a mutual enemy could work well.

As I pretty much only play no alliance games or scenario's with set/restricted alliances in MP I'm open to limited co-operation (ie leave them alone) with anybody whos growth can furthur my aims. If my race has powerful anti-undead capabilities then thats all true twice over - always nice to have the edge over races one is leaving for later. Are you reassured Zen?

cheers

Keir