Sentient Machines - [Game on]

[Baalz]

I'm actually pretty happy with the pretender I picked, but thought it might be interesting to post the potential pretenders that people didn't take and consider how the game might have gone. Here's the Sauromatia you're not going to have to fight:

Awake Vampire Queen F2 W9 E1 D9 B2

Dominion 3
Order 0
Production 1
Cold 3
Death 1
Misfortune 2
Drain 3

Man, I love the bless, that would have been naaaaasty with Sauro's sacred cavalry. Unfortunately they're cap only and a dominion of 3 would make unlocking that potential very difficult. As much fun as having an immortal slugger of such proportions (ironskin, fire shield, quicken self, life drain + fear & high defense) I think I'd spend the whole game lamenting the lack of dominion to use her in. And drain 3! That's not a scale you often see, particularly with heavy misfortune (gem loss events are common...yuck!) which also stacks with the death scale (pop loss events common...yuck!)

Certainly fits the description "AI made beast" to a T!

[Ferrosol]

the pretender you won't be facing from the Arcosphale


Dormant Mother of Serpents A5 W6 D6 N4 B2

Dominion 5
Order 1
Production 2
Cold 1
Death 1
Luck 2
Drain 3

not a bad pretender with access to plenty of buffs to make her a fairly respectable SC by the time she wakes up. Only problem is the bless is not good enough to rely on my wind riders for expansion and the scales aren't good enough to keep me alive long enough to do deal with any of the giant rushers. plus production scales and drain 3 make uncle ferrosols philosophers cry.

[Alpine Joe]

Good thought Baalz, as many people as possible should post their rejects. Mine was

Dormant Crone W9 S9 D9 N6

Dominion 2
Order 0
Sloth 3
Cold 3
Growth 1
Misfortune 2
Drain 3

that's an awesome bless, but with dom 2 and cap only sacreds it would be essentially useless. Tack on misfortune without order and drain 3 on the nation with vaetti hags (and sloth 3 to limit expansion) and this choice is pretty much unplayable. Unlike baalz my other choice isn't great either, but it will service I think.

[Baalz]

Heh, so far everyone has ditched drain-3 scales. Also, in retrospect a low dominion score might not be too terrible (outside of recruiting sacreds) because it looks like in general the AI isn't going with high dominions for you to push against.

Holy crap I'm glad that bless was attached to a tiny dominon Alpine Joe, it might even be worthwhile taking crap scales to bless giants thus...

[Dragar]

Those fighting Utgard won't be fighting

Awake Blue Dragon W9 D7

Dominion 3
Order 0
Production 2
Cold 3
Growth 1
Misfortune 3
Magic 1

Powerful early rush with the defence and fear, with reasonable scales, was a tough choice. Order 0 with Misfortune 3 is scary though. It is very intersting how low in Dom the pretenders all seem to be. It really does drop the bless advantage down a lot

[Calahan]

Some interesting choices coming in so far. And some obvious ones Must admit though I'd have been tempted to go with the triple blessed X9X9X9X6 for Jotunheim. I like the thought of having every sacred commander I had becoming an instant thug!

One rejected build that caught my eye big time was.....

Imprisoned Oracle
F9W9E9S9 !!!!

Dominion 4
Turmoil 3
Sloth 3
Heat 3
Death 1
Misfortune 1
Drain 2

Awful scales of course, but could actually have been worse. Plus this bless with someone like Sauro or Vanheim would have been insane! Would they actually lose even a single sacred before mid-game I wonder? But thankfuuly for you all, have a guess which nation pulled this out of the hat.......... MA Ulm

It was also interesting how some nations constantly came up with good or bad designs. At first I thought it was just random, but after rejecting 11 designs for MA Ulm (8 EA Arco, 7 EA Vanheim, 7 MA Jotun) I came to the conclusion that there must be something else at work. Since the main problem wasn't that designs were unsuitable for the nation (although that was a problem) it was the huge number of design points left over each time (which I mentioned before).

But some nations rolled their choices straight off the bat. Sauro was one of them, as the two choices I gave Baalz were the first two that were created. I also created a third (which I did for everyone) and again that was fine, and better than the one Baalz rejected. Although like I did with everyone, I only offered the first two designs that I thought were viable, and did not create a load and then simply choose the best two.

[zlefin]

you won't be facing vanheim with:

Dormant Arch Mage F9 A6 E9 S5 N3

Dominion 2
Turmoil 3
Cold 3
Death 2
Luck 2
Drain 1

did some field testing in sp, it just don't work well. but i don't wanna give away all my secrets, so i'll leave it at that.
Zlefin

[zlefin]

i'd be curious to know what some of those other ones you rejected were calahan. how many points below were they and such.
mmm, lists.

[Burnsaber]

You won't be facing EA Hinnom with:

Dormant Lord of Rebirth E9 D3 N4 B4

Dominion 6
Order 3
Production 2
Heat 3
Growth 3
Misfortune 3
Drain 1

Note - This chassis produces gems in CBM

Let that sink in for a while.

I've never been so serious in my life, think about it. I'll wait..

.........


Yeah. I hit the god-damned jackpot of all possible +250 design point creations for EA Hinnom. E & N bless for the armored giants, production 2, order 3, even growth 3 for optimal bloodhunting!

That's the problem. It's too good.

I'm not playing this game to win it. That's just a goal not a purpose. I just know that I won't have much fun playing this design (my opponents won't either!). I want to have fun. My other design provides that, althought it's absolutely horrid.

[Fakeymcfake]

Burnsaber, my first thought was "If that's the one he rejected, god help us the other one must be absolutely monsterous."

Dormant Master Druid F4 A2 E9 S1 D5 N6

Dominion 5
Turmoil 2
Production 2
Cold 2
Growth 1
Luck 0
Magic 0

Anyhow, that's my reject.