Priests and LA Ermor

[Torin]

probably he wants to keep it secret.

if your enemy is showing only castle undead he is fielding less than half undeads as he could be.
By turn 25 any nation can have an army to meet them. Not only 40 priests but the priests + army + archery + magic.
The point is to use everything you can.

True you can loose, but if you can hold on you can outtech him. I think is hard to manage a good research with LA ermor. At least harder than the living nations.

If you hold, a strong thug with a charcoal shield is useful too.

in fact it´s easier to deal with LA ermor than is with lanka or the other rushers.

[Jurri]

Here are a couple of tricks that work against Ermor in certain situations: since Ermor's armies tend to mostly consist of mindless undead, any spells and attacks that don't target them will focus on the commanders. Thus using such spells as soul slay and mind burn or even charm you can destroy all the commanders in a short time. This will in turn result in the army dissolving. In my experience this is a very cheap and effective tactic against an unprepared Ermor. (There are of course counters, as for all tactics.) Note that Ermor's PD has ghouls (or at least it did in Dom2) which do suck up the spells, so this is more of a defensive trick.

In a similar vein, mind hunt is pretty powerful in stopping Ermor armies: of course, that takes a couple gems per casting and you'll want to have penetration items on the mages, but it's still a cost-effective measure if only for dividing Ermor's army before a large assault by killing off a couple commanders which leaves their underlings to the province of origin. (This, again, can be countered with a bit of planning by Ermor.)

Attacking the problem from another angle, equipping thugs with fire shield and making sure they are tough enough to withstand a multitude of attacks by mundane weapons (that are Ermor's mainstay) is an effective way to kill masses of undead. It's not really an early game solution, though, unless you happen to have a pretender with fire magic. More generally, if you can field a thug that can survive until the end of the battle, you can kill Ermor's army by making its commanders rout if you're the defender. (Body ethereal, protection over 20 and some regeneration is a good start; it's also essential to make sure there's enough reinvigoration to prevent fatigue from accruing.) In practice it's not very easy to field a thug like that very early especially with Late Age nations, but later on you really should make sure to have some.

To get even more nation-specific, there are sacreds that can beat very large numbers of Ermor troops even severely outnumbered. To name a couple of examples, T'ien C'hi's sacreds with E9N4-bless will kill untold amounts of undead if managed properly (coupled with their other strength, powerful PD , they are indeed quite an effective nation against Ermor). Pangaea's Black Centaurs also present a very effective fighting force that can be massed to beat any size of Ermor armies early on. There are other sacreds that I wouldn't hesitate to pitch against the undead horde, as well. (Of course, a competent Ermor will find a way to lure your troops into a battle where he has a sufficiently large numerical superiority and kill you off, or find another counter.)

There is no one size fits all -solution to beating Ermor, the same as any other nation. Every nation has some thing they can try, though.

[On a completely unrelated note, I find it crass in the extreme to moderate in so hamhanded a way in the public. If you want to threaten Bob or anyone else with various sanctions, I for one would appreciate it being done in private.]

[Lord_Bob]

You are actually being polite. It really is not that hard telling the difference between real politiness and "I'm-So-Much-Better-Than-You" fake politeness.

People aren't interest in discussion, that's why they say "use Archers" against Quickened Van Calvary and Skeletons with Tower Shields. Yes, archers are the natural counters to Calvary and units with large shields. I'm simply the first person aggravated enough to tell them they are saying nonsense, and maybe they should let people actually discuss facts for a change.

All debate has stopped. Things like giving Patala/Bandar Log/Kailasa 5 Melee Markata per PD point and a Mage and +3 Melee Markata after 20 should illicit a yawn from players. Most players wouldn't even notice. But it would make Patala playable. And I get an extreme reacion even though everyone agrees monkey PD is horrible.(The PD's own archers kill the melee markata till they route. Once the melee markata route, all units most make morale checks every turn. Everyone routes fairly soon.)

I'm not saying races should be balanced. Forget that. Certain concepts, like LA Ulm, are going to have trouble because the Concept is weaker. LA Ermor is a rock solid Concept. It's going to be strong. It should be strong. BUT. Things like making the castle skeletons stronger than normal soldiers and giving them 14 MR! is extremely problematic. That 14 MR doesn't JUST apply to banishment, you know. And then the Dusk Elders have access to SIX! paths of magic. AND Independent Shamans give Ermor access to SEVEN paths! And then they get Darkness at Alteration-6.

Some nations should be weak, and some nations should be strong, but this should be kept within certain limits.

[Jazzepi]

Maybe you should consider the fact that 99.9% of the other players on here, when they ask question or debate topics, don't elicit such venom. It's clear to me that the only variable that never changes in the past 3-4 times you've gone off on some tangent offending people, is you.

If I were you, Bob, I would start blaming yourself, instead of whining about how everyone else around you treats you, for how people respond to your behavior.

Jazzepi

[VedalkenBear]

Bob, I resent the implication that I am not _really_ being polite to you. If I am not interested in discussion, then may I ask how you explain that I have responded to each of your posts, and tried to carry on a dialogue with you which, to be frank, has at times seemed pointless.

And the castle undead have 10 MR. Now they might get +4 MR when they get buffed, but to get that buff they have to _fail_ a MR of 6 or higher.

For the record, I said 'Use Archers against LE Ermor', because Ermor has a lot more unshielded undead than shielded undead. However, you tend to narrow each situation for the sole purpose of being able to dismiss another person's advice.

If you don't want to state publicly who you are playing (for whatever reason), you can always privately message us for advice. You have us flailing in the dark here regarding the best ways to help you, and instead of enlightening us you seem to be taking a perverse delight in the fact that we suggest general solution, when the reason we cannot offer more specific solutions is because you will not give us the information we require for those solutions.

[Lord_Bob]

And this is exactly what I'm talking about. Right here.

Yes, 40 H1 Priests are completely useless against nations unless:

1) They use Undead.
2) They want their Dominion in your lands (Temp ones mostly)
3) They use weak demons.
4) They are not mages (which I assume is the case).

and:

5) You don't need to build temples (i.e., you already have enough priests for that).

5) You don't need to build temples (i.e., you already have enough priests for that).

And how exactly do you build those 40 H1 independent priests without temples?

I gave a construction time of 8-10 turns for 4-5 temples. Eight to ten turns is an extremely long amount of time, and if anything my number is less than the actually required temple numbers.

2) They want their Dominion in your lands (Temp ones mostly)

While real, this is an extremely limited case, as I'm sure you know.

4) They are not mages (which I assume is the case).

I said they cost 50 gold. No Mage-Priest in the game, even Mictlan Blood Priests, cost 50 gold and can be built only from a temple. So I'm glad you deliberately misunderstood me so you could "assume" another point to your answer.

1) They use Undead.
3) They use weak demons.

As I said.

So we have willfull misinterpretation, repetition of points I already mentioned, and apparently failure to understand that priests require a temple to be built.

So, you see, your statement is quite hyperbolic. And I would like to point out again that the vast majority of LE nations (by my reckoning) have access to Holy-2 Priests. Yes, some of them are capital-only. On turn 25, this is not much of an issue.

I doubt there is a player in the game who would like to sacrifice his capital-only Late Era mages in order to build an H2 priest. You know this.

Castle H2 priests, though rarer, only require a castle and a temple to build. That is 1200 gold per build site. We could easily hit 3600 gold just from the production centers required, much less the priests. For the races that have it, it works.... assuming H2 priests, boosted with items, are that great.

[VedalkenBear]

Lord_Bob said:
And this is exactly what I'm talking about. Right here.

Oh, this should be good. </sarcasm>

And how exactly do you build those 40 H1 independent priests without temples?

You misunderstood me, all throughout this post, and I am going to explain why. I am saying that you have 40 priests. Your contention is that except against LE Ermor, they are UTTERLY USELESS (your emphasis). I pointed out that if any other nations use Undead (and I can think of three offhand in the LE), they are not useless. Nor are they useless if you have to build temples (which is what your response above was to). Or if you need to preach for whatever reason.

I gave a construction time of 8-10 turns for 4-5 temples. Eight to ten turns is an extremely long amount of time, and if anything my number is less than the actually required temple numbers.

Quite possibly. However, you seem to fail to grasp the fact that gaining priests and temples to fight LE Ermor is generally considered a good strategy.

While real, this is an extremely limited case, as I'm sure you know.

Oh? Even aside the temperature issues, I can think of any number of reasons I'd want to fight in friendly dominion as opposed to hostile dominion. I'm sure you know this.

I said they cost 50 gold. No Mage-Priest in the game, even Mictlan Blood Priests, cost 50 gold and can be built only from a temple. So I'm glad you deliberately misunderstood me so you could "assume" another point to your answer.

I didn't 'misunderstand'; I agreed with you. You mentioned '50g per priest', and I mentioned that I assumed that they were not mages and so did not have 'magey' issues. However, if you are going to take that comment as a chance to 'needle' you, you underestimate both my willingness to help you _and_ my intelligence. Believe me, if I wanted to insult you, I could do so without being so stupid about it.

As I said.

Actually, what you said was that they were UTTERLY WORTHLESS (again, your emphasis) against any nation but LE Ermor, when any number of LE nations use Undead.

So we have willfull misinterpretation, repetition of points I already mentioned, and apparently failure to understand that priests require a temple to be built.

I repeat your points when I agree with them, as most people do. I did not misinterpret anything you said. And I quite well understand the mechanics of the game. That's three insulting comments _in one sentence_ from you to me.

I doubt there is a player in the game who would like to sacrifice his capital-only Late Era mages in order to build an H2 priest. You know this.

Yes, I know this. And how many of those capital-only mages are also your H2 Priests? I can think of several. Also, I'd like to ask you exactly how worthwhile those capital-only mages are if you die because you didn't have enough priests?

Castle H2 priests, though rarer, only require a castle and a temple to build. That is 1200 gold per build site. We could easily hit 3600 gold just from the production centers required, much less the priests. For the races that have it, it works.... assuming H2 priests, boosted with items, are that great.

Why do they need to be boosted? As I've stated, several nations can have 20 H2 priests by turn 25 if they set their mind to it. From statements earlier in the thread, 1 H2 priest is better than 2 H1 priests.

Now, again, who are you playing? I would, at a guess, say Patala.

[Edi]

Jazzepi, if you do not intend to take part in the actual discussion but only focus on the personality of one participant, stay out of this thread. I can assure you that the thread is under review and the moderators will be keeping an eye on it.

Lord Bob, the blanket accusation of nost people being only fake-polite seems to be quite frankly without merit, as VedalkenBear points out. Most people who are participating in this thread are trying to offer you advice and are being quite reasonable about it and the ones who have not been so have been told to shut it, so I do not see where this is coming from.

Also, do not make the mistake of assuming that simply because someone may disagree with you on something his position is wrong, which is what seems to happen an awful lot. Sometimes things come down to personal preferences and style of play which leads to different outcomes from the same starting setup, all other things being equal. In such cases, there is no inherent flaw in the game in that respect.

[Edi]

This thread is going down the ****ter so fast that I'm going to shut it down right now. Since numerous warnings to various parties were ignored, final arbitration will be handled by the administrators.