But do you really like SC in dominions2 ?

[Ironhawk]

10-20 decent units sounds pretty good. That's enough that they will have an impact on the battle but not so much that they will crush you utterly if you dont have a special defense.

You know... something that might be interesting would be to have "hero units" as a normal non-commander troop. And they randomly appeared at your capital, much like how maenads or those seahorse for Ocenia do. They would be uber-troops and you could drop them into your normal formations for some extra punch or something? Tho of course they would have to appear at a much slower rate...

Oversway said:

How many militia (or some other troop type, if you like) are people thinking a 'hero-style' SC should be able to kill on average? Ten? Twenty?

[Saber Cherry]

BigDaddy said:
I've never tried this on well developed SC's before, but don't magical SC's (like air queens) suck against ether warriors, and demon SC's suck against a couple groups of angels of the host?

If so, that's nice for high astral nations. Since they all need a boost=)

If "Smite Demon" was very high damage, pure physical, long range (40+), no MR roll, high precision (100) all rolled into a single spell... or if it was as it is now, but holy-2... it would be useful.

[alexti]

I like the way things are balanced now. SC can kill some plain mundane armies easily, anti-SC SC can kill anti-army SC, special anti-SC squads can kill any kind of SC, anti-anti-SC squads or SCs can demolish anti-SC squads in retaliation etc. This makes it a challenge to create a strong army that can deal with various opposition. Typically, such army would include few SC, few strong mages, some weak mages (part protected, part not), few anti-SC squads, some damage dealing squads, some squads to disrupt and slow down opposition etc. Removing SCs out of equation would simplify those issues and I don't like it. SCs are already dying easy enough now. (Damn those tritons that hit Tartarian for 200 of damage!)

I disagree that rush to SC is a must, I played few very successful games using no SCs and mostly national armies until quite late in the game. Some nations are good, some are not, so the strategy varies depending on the nation. One of the problems SC have is that they're usually less numerous than national armies. So when one side is attacking with couple of dozen of national armies, what the other side (which has let's say 5-10 SC) is supposed to do? National armies are cheap and easily replaceable and putting SC in the open alone often mean losing it. So how SC-side can defend? They can choose which battle they win, but they lose majority of battles. So to me the balance seems fine.

Looking at it from thematic point of view, it would look strange if few thousands infantrymen could defeat some fully equipped Tartarian Titan (hey, he was a god after all). But on another hand I can imaging that Tartarian may get bored killing all those annoying infantrymen. So maybe, there should be a new parameter - boredom, which increases if the unit is fighting somethign easy and decreases when it defeats something challening (for example, another SC)

[Saber Cherry]

alexti said:National armies are cheap and easily replaceable

I've heard a lot of people claim this and never found it to be true. Quite the opposite. SCs are cheap and easily replacable (Bane Lord, Tartarian, etc) if you have the magic levels to create them. National armies require huge investments (esp. in resources and supply items), and I find effective anti-SC techniques are always harder to make than SCs. As for rushing - of course you have to rush, to get the best (unique or limited) SCs, and double-rush if you want to make them invincible with unique artifacts too. Otherwise you're left summoning weak fallen angels because all of the ice devils and arch devils are taken.

Where do the cheap and easily replacable national armies come from? I've never seen or built one, except when I play Ashen Ermor. Every MP game I've played (not many) was dominated by SCs as soon as they were researched. I like to play single player because AIs don't use SCs, and the game is more fun and strategically + tactically interesting if I have to use real armies instead of just moving my SCs around without even bothering to check what's in the target provinces, because the outcome is assured. So I don't use SCs in my single player games anymore because it feels like cheating.

If making each SC took resources similar to a huge national army, that would be OK. But they simply don't, and have huge advantages in mobility, supply usage, and upkeep on top of that.

[Boron]

Yvelina said:
As for those who try, on turn 30, to fight SCs or mage squads with vanilla national troops, I have no sympathy for them. Cavarly charges against tanks have been tried, and I have no sympathy for those who got slaughtered in them. The Russians claim that Gen. Dovator had quite a bit of success using partisan cavalry tactics in WWII... but even if that's true, it's only the exception that confirms the rule.

Rambo III

OT : One serious concern with the Anti-SC-Mages is though always that many in theory decent mages ( e.g. Pythium , Theurgs + Communion ) get killed easily by anti-mage spells like Rain of Stones/Earthquake etc. . Both can be casted very easily by Tartarians .

A Drain Life squad is more expensive then a few SCs . Either you take Demiliches or stuff like Sauromancers + Deathstaff or you take the Drain life Standards but they also cost 20 deathgems .
A Banelord with drain life standard + boots of flying for mobility + jade armor costs 10 deathgems + [ 20 Deathgems + 5 Earth + 5 Water + 5 Air gems ] * Forgeboni .
Equipping this Banelord into a thug would be cheaper and probably more promising .

The problem is that imo there is always a too big rush for the ultraelites . If you have mech men and devils you won't use other troops expect those 2 .
If you have tartarians why should you ever use any other kind of mages ?
If you have wish why shouldn't you wish each turn for 1-2 AQs or similiar SCs each turn ?

There are 2-3 troops / mages / Scs / weapons / spells that are so uber that you use them almost exclusively once you have them .

[Zapmeister]

Saber Cherry said:
Every MP game I've played (not many) was dominated by SCs as soon as they were researched.

Same here. As much as I enjoy winning the SC race, I can see that the game would be much deeper if national armies remained relevant. But I also think that nerfing life drain is just about all that is required.

[Graeme Dice]

Saber Cherry said:
Quite the opposite. SCs are cheap and easily replacable (Bane Lord, Tartarian, etc) if you have the magic levels to create them.

A bane lord has to have extremely expensive equipment that at least triples his cost in order to make him able to stand up to elite national troops. He'll need a luck pendant, antimagic amulet, starshine skull cap, wraith sword, flying boots, and a jade armour at the very least. Even then, a lucky set of 50 barbarians or so can take them out from time to time.

As for rushing - of course you have to rush, to get the best (unique or limited) SCs, and double-rush if you want to make them invincible with unique artifacts too.

Very few of the artifacts are worth using on SCs. The weapons are only worthwhile if you also have a blood thorn or can cast soul vortex and have a regeneration source. The armours are too heavy for anything that isn't undead and very beefy. The shields are very good.

Otherwise you're left summoning weak fallen angels because all of the ice devils and arch devils are taken.

The devil commanders from hordes from hell would almost certainly be a better use of your blood slaves.

I like to play single player because AIs don't use SCs, and the game is more fun and strategically + tactically interesting if I have to use real armies instead of just moving my SCs around without even bothering to check what's in the target provinces, because the outcome is assured.

Well, that's to be expected if you're playing against the AI. You simply cannot send SCs into a battle unsupported after a certain point in the game, as they will be taken down by an appropriately constructed army or ghostriders.

If making each SC took resources similar to a huge national army, that would be OK.

Should the battlefield affecting spells also take similar amounts of resources then? Wrathful skies is far more effective at destroying a huge national army than even the most expensively equipped bane lord ever would be.

But they simply don't, and have huge advantages in mobility, supply usage, and upkeep on top of that.

Armies have their own advantages, they can be far more numerous in number than the amount of SCs that your opponent can put out. If you have a dozen armies, he needs more than a dozen bane lords, and that gets extremely expensive.

[alexti]

Saber Cherry said:

I've heard a lot of people claim this and never found it to be true. Quite the opposite. SCs are cheap and easily replacable (Bane Lord, Tartarian, etc)

Bane Lords are relatively easily replaceable. If you equip them with wraith sword, boots of quickness and luck pendant only (still 35 gems and they're not particularly strong). non-Commander tartarians are somewhat easy to replace (if you have research and if you have enough death mages with death boosters), but only GoR-ed Tartarians can be used as SC, and that's quite costly, especially 20 nature for GoR.

Saber Cherry said:
if you have the magic levels to create them. National armies require huge investments (esp. in resources and supply items), and I find effective anti-SC techniques are always harder to make than SCs.

It is not particularly hard to deal with a particular SC, but it is hard to deal with any SC. So as long as you know what SC you'll meet you should be ok.

Saber Cherry said:
As for rushing - of course you have to rush, to get the best (unique or limited) SCs, and double-rush if you want to make them invincible with unique artifacts too.

There isn't many artifacts that are good for SCs. Couple of shields and few swords and that's about it.

Saber Cherry said:
Otherwise you're left summoning weak fallen angels because all of the ice devils and arch devils are taken.

Devils commanders are pretty good, cheap and they come with the imps and at desired location. I often prefer them to Ice/Arch-Devils. If you plam to use them for raiding they work just as well as great devils and considering that you generate that devil by casting HfH on enemy's province gaining gold and gem income, the devils comes essentially free.

Saber Cherry said:
Where do the cheap and easily replacable national armies come from?

Here are some:
- couple of seithkonur with half a dozen of giants (this one is somewhat expensive, but they usually retreat as soon as things start look dangerous, so you rarely lose them)
- 2-3 death hags with few vaetir (very cheap and stealthy, somewhat difficult to replace, because you're getting hags with other picks as well, but blood hags are useful for hunting and astral hags good to complement big combined armies and meanwhile you can put them on research).
- 1-2 seraphs and 4-5 archers (cheap, mobile and efficient) Similar armies will work for any other air nation (though not as cheap and not as mobile)
- 1-2 sauromancers and few light infantrymen (or falchioneers)
- indy commander, feathered warrior and few dozen of Mictlan slaves
- Pan with something (something may vary). This is an extremely deadly combination, because due to stealth they are hard to destroy and the enemy never knows if he's going to meet no resistance or encounter couple of extra MR-penetrating Pans. So while the enemy deals from the swarms, Pans can subvert everything valuable at their leisure.
- Pythium has plenty Theurg-based variations, which can vary air/astral scripts.

Generally, the idea is to buy 3-5 armies per turn (depends on the map size) and attack everywhere.


[/quote]

Saber Cherry said:
I've never seen or built one, except when I play Ashen Ermor. Every MP game I've played (not many) was dominated by SCs as soon as they were researched. I like to play single player because AIs don't use SCs, and the game is more fun and strategically + tactically interesting if I have to use real armies instead of just moving my SCs around without even bothering to check what's in the target provinces, because the outcome is assured.

There's some truth in this. If you're using your SC solo, there isn't much point to check what's in the provinces you're moving to, because:
- if there's something strong there it will move out as likely as not
- if there isn't anything strong there, it may come (or not come) there trying to guess your movement.
In any case, if the opponent won't guess you'll get a province and if the opponent will guess you'll get one dead SC (unless opponent is Pangaea, in which case the opponent will get one fully equipped and experienced SC ).

Saber Cherry said:
So I don't use SCs in my single player games anymore because it feels like cheating.

That's true, because AI doesn't know how to deal with SC. But it doesn't apply to human opponents.

Saber Cherry said:
If making each SC took resources similar to a huge national army, that would be OK. But they simply don't, and have huge advantages in mobility, supply usage, and upkeep on top of that.

Well, building *huge* national army is generally a bad idea. As a minimum, you'll have something left open because your mages won't have all necessary paths. If you invest in a huge army you need to make sure to cover all obvious weaknesses, so it won't get defeated by something trivial, so normally you'd have some combination of nationals, summons indies and SCs in your huge army. Do you have any national army in mind, which wouldn't be decimated by much cheaper force without any SCs? (only Jotunheim and Machaka might be able to field something reasonably sturdy)

So the idea is to buy many cheap national armies. They won't have supply problem, their number will compensate for lack of mobility and upkeep won't be too high.

[Saber Cherry]

alexti said:So the idea is to buy many cheap national armies. They won't have supply problem, their number will compensate for lack of mobility and upkeep won't be too high.

Got it; I misunderstood you. When I think "National Army" I think:

200 Ulm Infantry + 8 Smiths + 20 Black Knights
or
200 Mictlan Slaves + 200 Warriors + 25 Eagle/Sun Warriors + 10 mages and 50 blood slaves
or
30 Hydras with several poison-immune-item mages to cast body ethereal
or
30 Valkyries / Vans with 200 Hirdmen + 200 medium indy archers + 3 Vanadrotts + 5 Smiths

... and so forth. These numbers don't include various arrow-target units or bodyguards for the mages. Your "national armies" are much cheaper, much smaller, and much more mage-centric. Obviously they are effective for you, so I'll have to try them... but I would consider them "raiding parties" Still, it seems to me that a party with 5-10 fighting units would rout too fast to do anything, e.g. if one of the units took a single arrow from a defender, Dominions II gives the entire army about a 50% percent chance of routing. Once two units are killed, they'll all leave for sure, even if the mages could win singlehandedly. In other words, it seems like they'd have trouble attacking province defense of around 20 (especially backed by a mage or a few archers) let alone taking castles, conquering indies (at settings of 6+), or really doing anything useful except invading provinces where the opponent forgot to hire any province defense...

But, I'll try them out.

[Endoperez]

I think those raiding parties are succesful because Provincial Defence is not bought (in high enough numbers), and that in turn is because it is said to suck.

I agree with your definition of an army. That's what I'd like to see!