Mod: Ulm Reborn v.1.7b - Updated 14th June 2009

[Sombre]

Unfortunately you can't make a unit start off berserk. I wish you could actually, I'd use it in a couple of mods.

I tried entering morale 99 but no luck.

Black priests are useless for research in drain dominion, yes. Although they aren't generally useless because they're good priests and can produce a /lot/ of penitent if you get them in a high dom province. You also don't /have/ to take drain (although I do). It's another tough choice.

I like the idea of a white librarian/acolyte type unit. I was thinking along the same lines an update or so ago. Maybe astral 1 so you can use them for the search spell, drain immune and with ok research. Not cap only, of course. I'm rather wary of diversifying the magic because hey, this is a xenophobic priest nation.

[llamabeast]

The only trouble with making them astral 1, if they're cheapish, is that you could accidentally become a communion nation. When I see an affordable S1 mage I generally get quite excited and begin plotting big communions.

You could perhaps give them a 50% ES random or something, so that 1 in 4 with have astral (useful for searches) and 1 in 4 would have E (they could help out a bit with forging), but their only reliable use would be research.

Actually if you were going to go down that route I'd be inclined to have 20% S, 20% E, so that there was some small chance of getting both, which I always think is exciting.

[Sombre]

The 20% 20% sounds interesting.

Well they couldn't be communion drones if I made them immobile. I mean if they're just there to research and cast search spells I might as well attach them to a chair and stick a book in front of them. I could also then make them H1 priests (basically useless for an immobile unit but thematically it makes sense) without it overpowering them or forcing me to push the price up.

Whaddya think?

[llamabeast]

Hmm, I'm not sure about making them immobile. I see why it might be effective from a gameplay point of view, but thematically it would be a bit odd.

I was imagining they'd be just useful people to have around. If you needed a temple building but all your (cheaper) black acolytes were busy, you could send a librarian (I like the idea of having them H1, I think). If you needed an E1 mage in a battle for some bizarre reason, there'd be some chance a librarian might be able to help you out. But mostly they'd be inefficient for such tasks, so they wouldn't be overpowered. They'd also be rubbish for communions if not many of them had astral, because you'd never get enough together.

Now, making them immobile would get rid of any of that flexibility, and make them quite unattractive units I think. I don't know why, I just don't like the idea of having a unit that can't move - can't flee if enemies get nearby, and so on. Still, I wouldn't rule it out, I'm just thinking aloud. If you wanted to have them immobile, you could justify it by saying that each librarian takes a vow to never leave his cloister/monastery, and will die rather than abandon it.

[Sombre]

There are a bunch of ways I could explain why they're immobile. They might have all been horribly crippled during the civil war, they might have sworn never to leave their chair or book until the Aufklarung finally consumes the world, etc etc.

Anyway, I'm just putting ideas out. Immobility would solve the communion thing,... well providing we want it solved that is,... and it would help differentiate them from black acolytes and priests, who are like wandering preachers/rabble rousers right now. It would however make them slightly boring and merely functional research units.

[llamabeast]

Yeah, I do think that making them immobile might make them slightly boring (more like research factories and less like units), but on the other hand I do like the idea that they swore never to leave their books until the Aufklarung consumes the world. Well, they'll be good either way, but personally I'd be inclined to let them move. If they did have only random astral, then to the small extent that they were able to help out with communions it would be thematic (since sages etc are also capable of acting as communion slaves) and fun (nice to have another option every now and again), while definitely not overpowered.

I don't think you particularly need to worry about differentiating them from the black priests though. They'll be different just because of the fact you'll use them very differently. A librarian/white acolyte would be a rubbish wandering preacher because he'd be too expensive for his holy level, and also wouldn't generate penitents.

[VedalkenBear]

Sombre said:
Well just to start things off, I want to point out that I always intended this nation to be hard to play. I don't want them to be very underpowered, but they're supposed to be challenging and to force decisive gameplans. As a result the AI sort of sucks uing them. From the get go I set my sights on a nation that /really/ wants;

Well, my question to this is why should it be harder to play than vanilla nations, if it's meant to be played alongside them? About the only other nation that is this schismatic is EA Arco, and there the choices aren't nearly so hard.

High Dominion for spawns and widescale sacred production.
Resources and an economy focused on national recruits (so production and order)
A high earth bless for the super-armoured sacreds.
A bless suitable for the swarms of sacred chaff (ie, not earth)

Well, I don't necessarily agree with points 1) and 3) here, from my own experience. Don't know what you mean by 'high Dominion'; my Oracle had a 7, and I found that it was pretty overkill from most standpoints.

Also, I'm not sure why I'd want an Earth bless. As you point out, it doesn't help your Penitents at all, and everyone else already has more than sufficient protection. I would think that a Bless that helps out Penitents (Fire/Water/Death/Astral) would be good, since it also boosts your other Sacreds at the same time. Playing a high-Earth bless seems to be overkill while doing nothing for your sacred troops' weaknesses (i.e., magic).

So even at the creation stage you're faced with some hard choices. You obviously can't have all of these things. On the other hand if you specialise completely your plan can easily go very wrong.

I think that there is a much more optimal strategy for these guys than you might think. It may not be as optimal as the strategy for some others, but it's not simply a bunch of trade-offs.

On the other hand, you have made a couple of very good points about Ulm Reborn's weakness on a larger map (over 120 or so provinces). I didn't intend for them to just fall over and die if the map is big, so this is something I'm interested in rectifying.

Please note that that is basically all I play, so I'm pretty biased here. But even most 'capital-centric' nations (EA Mictlan, Arcoscephale, Sauromatia to some extent) get a researcher outside the capital.

1) They are meant to be capital centric, but I do take your point. I am happy for them to be just about as capital centric as a nation can be in dom3, but not to the point where it's very frustrating for the player. I am willing to make Black Priests available everywhere in the next version. This allows frontline chaff production (although it's decided by dominion, unlike the white priests). I will also be giving the black priest an earth random so you'll get H2E2 ones maybe 40% of the time. This allows them better site searching, earthpower etc. Cost might go up a smidge. They are still there to be priests and penitent gatherers, but with some E2 you'll get a bit more research and whatnot from them.

E2 is pretty good, but that's not as important as the non-capital-only designation. May I suggest that if you do that, switch the domspawn to the White Priest?

2) Well the national summons give you some more magic. I think I'll stick a 10% or so random extra astral on the white priests, but this is always going to be a very weak nation magically, apart from the E3 that is. I mean they're like LA Ulm only with even LESS magic. It's intentional.

It's about on par with LA Ulm right now, and yes the National Summons give you more magic (I had a Sturmheld hero join me), if you can afford them.

4) Yep, I wanted more hard decisions in the nation regarding gold usage. I think the white priests are priced ok, but maybe the reborn guard could do with being a bit cheaper.

Yes, the White Priests seem okay compared to other mages, but the fact that they're your only good researchers more or less means you need to recruit one/turn. So while they are worth their cost, they are not necessarily worth their cost _for purposes of research_.

The mindless magic units are Anchorites - when they die a pissed off penitent falls out of the sealed armour and starts smacking things. I believe the bless remains on him too, although for me that was generally an earth bless so didn't help. I think some people have used them to great effect, although they might need a slight cost reduction because they almost always get killed off. Regardless they're sacred and not cap only, which means you should have some of them out there at some point.

Interesting. It seems to be designed from the wrong end of the stick, though, y'know? Generally you make a very easy-to-kill unit that changes into something 'bigger'. E.g., Jaguar Warriors. This unit is almost like an egg or a small oyster. I was honestly expecting something a little better than a Penitent for a MagB unit (which isn't as bad to lead as some but still can cause issues).

Oh before I forget - were you using regular Ulm Reborn or CBM Ulm Reborn? They aren't crazy different, but the balance is obviously changed.

I was playing regular Ulm Reborn. I can also try the CBM one if you wish.

[VedalkenBear]

Regarding other suggestions... please realize that a 50% ES is generally preferable to 20% E 20% S. The latter has a 64% chance of not having any magic while only a 36% chance of having at least one pick and a 4% chance to have two.

And this nation is already not horribly bad at communion; I'm not exactly sure why you wouldn't want them to do it.

Just a point: Your national summons do give you access to Quills.

[llamabeast]

Is it possible to make a unit that reverts to another when the battle finishes? In the same way as Black Serpents revert to Lamias, or something?

If so, perhaps you could have the Anchorite reveal a "Newly Reborn" or something on its destruction. Like penitent, but even more filled with rage and fervour. He could refuse to die (15HP), feel no pain (4 prot, like berserkers) and fight with the strength of a fanatic (strength 14, attack 12 or something). The anchorites themselves could be cheaper, but maintain the high resource cost. Perhaps you could lower their attack a bit (although I can't remember what it is, so that might make no sense). Then a block of anchorites would be a solid defensive wall, and if they got damaged - surprise! The Newly Reborn would emerge, and cause a heap of damage (they'd also have flails and be sacred of course, so they could be quite nasty). Then after the battle the Newly Reborn would revert to penitents. Whaddya think?

[llamabeast]

Well, you could have 30% E 30 % S then. I just personally like having separate randoms, because then there's at least some small chance of getting a really specially good one.

Yeah, I'm not sure about communion, I guess there's no strong reason to discourage it - I guess it depends on the flavour Sombre's going for with the nation.

Personally I tend to think that the mind-manipulating aspects of strong astral magic make it feel a bit evil.