Machaka – a sorcerer’s fevered arachnophobia

[thejeff]

Akashic record is rarely used in MP. It's too expensive and comes too late.

Lack of Astral is a problem, particularly since it's hard to bootstrap. There are no cheap low-level Astral mages to summon for site-searching & routine forging. If you take a rainbow pretender, send it out manually site searching and hope for either Astral indies (lizards!) or you'll probably need to wait for spectres or empower for other astral mages.
I probably would take an Astral Rainbow, if only for access to RoW/S.

By the time you're fighting mostly demons and other summons you'll have your own. Undead thugs and, in CBM, drakes. Spiders remain useful until the big MR-resist spells come to dominate the battlefield, but they're not your only tool.

[BigDaddy]

OK, Ive poked around about Achashic record, and it seems that some playerscast it on swamps and wastes. The AI likes to cast it in deep ocean, I assume forts are fairly likely there.?. Also some don't reccomend it for LA. Also, some cast it on provinces with stuff like unrest and wierd scales.

But if you want a specific gem type you cast that spell. Also, get the arcan probing out of the way first.

[thejeff]

Don't do anything based on what the AI does. AI nations cast Akashic? And how do you know?
I think the biggest problem with it, other than burning all those precious Astral gems, is that it usually doesn't come early enough. By the time I've reached Conj 5 & have enough Pearls to cast it more than once or twice, I've searched most provinces, especially the more likely provinces either manually or with the specific remote spells, so the return is lower. Also by that time, there are no indies left, and I assume that whoever I'm taking provinces from has been searching, at least their main national paths, so the return will be low on new provinces as well. (This may not be so true against the AI, which doesn't site search well.)

I'm sure there are some scale/unrest generating sites that would be worth finding, but most of the ones that leap to mind (Devil's Den!) require a mage of that path anyway, so I'd search with one of those first.

[BigDaddy]

Originally Posted by thejeff

Don't do anything based on what the AI does. AI nations cast Akashic? And how do you know?
I think the biggest problem with it, other than burning all those precious Astral gems, is that it usually doesn't come early enough. By the time I've reached Conj 5 & have enough Pearls to cast it more than once or twice, I've searched most provinces, especially the more likely provinces either manually or with the specific remote spells, so the return is lower. Also by that time, there are no indies left, and I assume that whoever I'm taking provinces from has been searching, at least their main national paths, so the return will be low on new provinces as well. (This may not be so true against the AI, which doesn't site search well.)

I'm sure there are some scale/unrest generating sites that would be worth finding, but most of the ones that leap to mind (Devil's Den!) require a mage of that path anyway, so I'd search with one of those first.

No, not the AI, some players say they cast Acashic record on swamps and wastes.

[Anaconda]

Now that one cant produce FFs out of the assembly line, whats the story for proud and noble Machaka?

[TigerBlood]

They suck.

Capital only sacreds makes a bless strat fail. Sacrificing a mage turn in other capitals is also a waste of time.

You can try and field an army of Spider Warriors now, but again, capital only.

You need to capture decent provinces in order to access decent indies. Not something you can plan for.

You still have spiders, which despite a cheap second shape, require good scales to mass early in a game.

All the issues of pre CBM Machaka, but without the extra incentive to play them.

[PriestyMan]

You seemed to have missed all the CBM buffs to them...

For example their sacreds are much cheaper now, new nation spells were added, and best of all, most of machaka's mages get a magicboost in battle. just to name a few things. machaka is possibly at the most powerful point its ever been

[TigerBlood]

In order to capitalise on their mages, Machaka needs a decent army for expansion.

Mage turn spent expanding, means mage turns lost researching and site searching.

Poor PD means limited turtling capability and makes Machaka a rush target, preventing them from making the most of any research.

No hammer or fever fetishes takes away their ability to create cheap thugs, path and research boosters.

Killing off a witch doctor to create 4 spiders is not a boost.

Free scrying is nice, but I've never really used it.

Their free fear spell has not won me a single battle. It has not even helped.

And the remote assassination spell? In the 4 MP games I have played with CBM, I have never researched it. I've been too busy fending off stronger nations. Unlike other nations with weak armies and good mages, they simply lack attrition capability.

So tell me, how have I missed the point? How has the latest CBM added more to Machaka than it has taken away?

[Deathblob]

I think what you are saying, and please correct me if I'm wrong on this, is that Machaka will nevur win, because of teh PD.

Is that right?

[TigerBlood]

Oh right. Rather than discuss the actual benefits of the mod changes to the nation, you're going to make PD jokes instead.

Their capital mages are good. But they are capital only.

Their capital sacreds are good. But they are capital only.

Spider warriors are good. But they are capital only.

Spider knights are good, but they are expensive. Their size puts them at a disadvantage in large battles.

Socerers are going to be your standard mage.

Witch doctors are useful only for spamming dark knowledge then Dark Sacrificing.

The rest of their army sucks.

Did I miss anything? Is there any data supporting the claim that CBM makes them better? That it offers them more diverse strategies? Or are you just going to ignore these questions and make PD jokes?