Help with Vanheim

[Warhammer]

I've been playing quite a bit on the Orania map on Mighty AI with 14-15 AI players. I have no problems early on, but in the midgame I am getting swamped by the AIs armies that have 150+ troops.

What I have been doing is going with a pretender with primarily air, and either death or blood magic. I have tried all forms of awakenings, but still have the same problem. Plus, I am having difficulty in researching new spells.

I have been going with Order and productivity scales with -1 on misfortune, because I need the cash and the resources to produce their excellent troops. I have been focusing on the Vanherses because I like their berserk ability, should I use Hirdmen more? Should I use their less powerful cav. commanders (can't remember their names now)?

[Nerfix]

No, no, no, no, you take either Fire 9, Water 9 or both blesses as Vanheim. F9/W9 pretender and crappy scales is a time-honoured strategy. Just build Vans, they are slaughtering machines with those blesses and they are mighty with even just Fire or Water bless at max.

[Warhammer]

I'll have to try that again. I tried it once, but didn't have the spell power or army size to survive. I'll give it a go since I've learned quite a bit about the game since then.

[Endoperez]

It's EA Vanheim, isn't it? The high-blessing strategy still works. All Vanir have high defense, and their Glamour ability adds even more to it, and Water 9 with its defence makes it almost impossible for normal units to hit them. The quickness doesn't hurt either. Be careful about fighting bigger armies, though, because your Vanir will get fatiqued (bad!) and their defense goes down when they are targeted by many attacks (-1 def for every time they've been already attacked that turn).

Fire 9 makes their weapons Flaming, and increases their Attack. They will be able to handle almost any enemy then, and their natural defense is usually high enough to keep them alive.

Dwarves are good casters. Try researching Blade Wind and using more dwarves on the battlefield. Just be careful with your own troops; you don't want your own Blade Wind to accidentally hit them.

Beware bows. They hurt a lot. Storm helps, and Arrow Fend helps even more.

[Warhammer]

Yeah, its EA Vanheim, and your post illustrated a lot of what I have been thinking about. I've tried a rainbow bless, but that didn't really work well. I've thought about an A9 bless for the air shield. I've tried a F9/W9, but we didn't have enough troops. I wonder if a F9/E9 for the reinvigoration would be good.

The only problem with that is missing out on all the cool A3+ spells you get like storm and thunder strike, etc.

How much should I focus on the construction, should I just focus on the Evo school?

[Teraswaerto]

On a big map you can't rely on just your blessed troops, so taking good scales instead of blessings might be worth trying out. Take Oracle or some other low cost high dominion pretender, max out scales, build lots of castles and just get bigger armies than the AIs (or just big enough, since you can out-maneuver the AI).

Also, figure out what magics to research since that's what will win or lose the end game (less so in SP, but it's something to learn if you ever plan to play MP) .

[Daynarr]

Btw, same applies to Helheim. W9F9 bless on sacred troops is just brutal.

[Daynarr]

Teraswaerto said:
On a big map you can't rely on just your blessed troops, so taking good scales instead of blessings might be worth trying out. Take Oracle or some other low cost high dominion pretender, max out scales, build lots of castles and just get bigger armies than the AIs (or just big enough, since you can out-maneuver the AI).

Actually, on large maps it has biggest impact. With small number of sacred troops you will be able to take out indies without any losses and get lots of provinces fast as a result. Also, imprisoned pretenders can take W9F9 without getting too large hit to scales. You can still have decent income.

[thejeff]

On big maps you can rely on sacred troops until you start building SCs and mage squads that can annihilate AI armies at will.

[Teraswaerto]

Sure, it can help speed up expansion a lot. But biggest impact on big maps? I don't see it.

On a small map the deciding wars will probably be fought while the blessed troops are still relevant. Not so on a big map (assuming, of course, you survive that far).