Blood-1 in Vanheim

[tinkthank]

I wish I were better at Vanheim, because I think it would support at least one form of playing style I like. Be that as it may, my question is:

- What is the deal with blood-1 skills?

I mean this: In the default theme, there are exactly two commanders who have some skill in Blood, and both of these (fairly expensive) commanders have exactly 1 point in it. (In Helhelm, it is 1 commander.) Right. I would like to know your ideas or speculations on how I can use this, or what one is "supposed" to do with this. To be more precise: I need at least Blood 3 in order to be able to forge any items which increase my blood skill (exception: Unique item Book o Secrets, req. 2, and the Ring of Sorcery, Astral 4). Which means if I want to do anything requiring blood 2 or more, I need to get a pretender with blood. All right, I can do that, go on some hunts and make him forge the results.

But I suppose my question is: What can you do with Blood 1? Have my really expensive commander blood hunt? I suppose that could be the answer, but I doubt it, especially after reading Saber Cherry's excellent summary on how inefficient that is. So is the plan: If you want to make use of the blood skill of those commanders, get a blood-3+ pretender, make him forge some brazen vessels etc., and boost those commanders? Or can I use blood-1 for anything interesting that I have (obviously!) overlooked?

Thanks much in advance.

[fahdiz]

Originally posted by tinkthank:
I wish I were better at Vanheim, because I think it would support at least one form of playing style I like. Be that as it may, my question is:

- What is the deal with blood-1 skills?

I mean this: In the default theme, there are exactly two commanders who have some skill in Blood, and both of these (fairly expensive) commanders have exactly 1 point in it. (In Helhelm, it is 1 commander.) Right. I would like to know your ideas or speculations on how I can use this, or what one is "supposed" to do with this. To be more precise: I need at least Blood 3 in order to be able to forge any items which increase my blood skill (exception: Unique item Book o Secrets, req. 2, and the Ring of Sorcery, Astral 4). Which means if I want to do anything requiring blood 2 or more, I need to get a pretender with blood. All right, I can do that, go on some hunts and make him forge the results.

But I suppose my question is: What can you do with Blood 1? Have my really expensive commander blood hunt? I suppose that could be the answer, but I doubt it, especially after reading Saber Cherry's excellent summary on how inefficient that is. So is the plan: If you want to make use of the blood skill of those commanders, get a blood-3+ pretender, make him forge some brazen vessels etc., and boost those commanders? Or can I use blood-1 for anything interesting that I have (obviously!) overlooked?

Thanks much in advance.

When I play Helheim (which is frequently - I don't often play base Vanheim because I enjoy Helheim more for some reason) I almost always take the Allfather pretender and slap some Blood, Death, and Air on him...but always at least 5 Blood. This has the added bonus of making those Valkyries and Vans devastating when blessed.

But I am no expert, and have never tested such a build in multiplayer.

EDIT: Doh. Instead of Air (on the Allfather), I meant to type Water (had your other post on my mind, it seems ), so that I can eventually summon up Ice Devils and bust out Illwinter if necessary.

[ March 08, 2004, 16:37: Message edited by: fahdiz ]

[fahdiz]

Also, I wanted to point out that Helheim gets two commanders with Blood - Vanjarls (I believe) and Hangadrotts. Hangadrotts get Blood 2 to start with, also. They are expensive, but really worth it!

You definitely will want to forge up some Blood-boosting items for those commanders, as with only 3 Blood and the natural other skills of Vanheim you can have Storm Demons and such running around all over the place.

[ March 08, 2004, 16:51: Message edited by: fahdiz ]

[tinkthank]

Hey thanks very much.

BTW I like Helheim too. Unless I am totally mistaken, however, Hangadrotts get NO blood. It's Air 2 DEATH 3, but maybe I am wrong.

But other than that: what can you do with Blood 1?

[fahdiz]

Originally posted by tinkthank:
Hey thanks very much.

BTW I like Helheim too. Unless I am totally mistaken, however, Hangadrotts get NO blood. It's Air 2 DEATH 3, but maybe I am wrong.

Ack! You are right - I was thinking of Vanlade (one of Van's national heroes) who I always seem to get relatively quickly. Mea culpa. Those Hangadrotts are still beastly, though, after the Behemoths start coming out!

(I think I need more coffee.)

But other than that: what can you do with Blood 1?

Bleed, Blood Burst, Blood Heal, Pain Transfer, Reinvigoration, Sabbath Master/Slave, Summon Imp, Banish Demon, Leeching Touch, Bind Serpent Fiends, Leech, and Blood Vengeance all only require Blood 1 - quite an impressive list, actually, for a commander with all the other great skills possessed by Vanheim! Just one forged +Blood item gives them access to Spine Devils, Fiends, Agony, Hellbind Heart, and Harm.

There are some really good combat spells and some decent early-game summons in both of those lists - and that's not even taking into account their other spell levels (Air, Death, and so forth)!

Blood 1 is combat, combat, combat. Which, coincidentally, works quite well to supplement and round out those expensive-but-heavy-hitting Van commanders. And if you happen to run into some Garnet Amazons or some such thing, you can use *them* for blood hunting (or use scouts, as is commonly done with a nation like Vanheim or Jotunheim) or for following your Van commander around casting Sabbath Slave.

[ March 08, 2004, 17:57: Message edited by: fahdiz ]

[Nagot Gick Fel]

Originally posted by tinkthank:
- What is the deal with blood-1 skills?

For Vanheim (Vanjarls) it's blood sacrifice. Although I don't think it's used very often.

The other reason is it's "thematic".

[Saber Cherry]

Blood 1 means empowering to Blood 3 only costs 75 slaves, not 125 slaves, as if you had no blood magic. However, if you want to play seriously with blood, I suggest you take Blood-3 on your god so you can forge Blood Thorns and Brazen Skulls before you have 75 slaves for empowerment... and be sure to hoard Earth gems so your dwarves can forge Dwarven Hammers.

Vanheim's blood-Users also get randoms, so blood-2 is a possibility if you make lots of mages.

For units that only have blood-1... in combat, I use them to summon imps. But for any powerful mages casting lots of spells, a blood pick is useful for reinvigoration (except that spell is broken right now).

Originally posted by fahdiz:
Just one forged +Blood item gives them access to Spine Devils, Fiends, Agony, Hellbind Heart, and Harm.

Keep in mind that a Blood-1 mage can cast Blood-2 combat spells with an extra slave... just make sure he starts with at least 2 slaves, and specifically script the spell.

[ March 08, 2004, 19:55: Message edited by: Saber Cherry ]

[Truper]

Vanjarls get no randoms, although the Vanadrotts do. But at 380 gold apiece, you won't be making many of those, so the odds against a random coming up blood are pretty high. You pretty much need to decide at pretender-creation time whether or not your Vanheim will be a blood nation. I often use a 4 water, 4 blood Dragon for the pupose. Decent blessings, not bad at early province taking, and able to summon Ice Devils and forge blood-empowerement items. After an affliction or 3, your dragon retires to a lab, and jump-starts the blood process...

[tinkthank]

Thanks once again for these replies. Hope you dont mind me asking follow-up questions?

- "it's thematic" -- yeah, I sort of had that impression. But my impression has also been up till now: IW has something "in mind" when they designed it like this, they pictured the Van-folk *doing* something, and I hadnt imagined it would be casting bleed. I suspected something else.
- "Blood 1 is combat, combat, combat" -- ok, this is new to me. I have NEVER used blood in combat before, and I like to play Absysia. Am I missing out? My experiences up till now have been: toasting my slaves, little bang for the buck, hence: summoning, summoning summoning. But of course I wouldnt be toasting my slaves with Van. Still, with Air 2 I have lightning bolt, which beats all of those blood spells you listed and costs 0 gems. I just dont see blood 1 being exciting.
- "Empower to 3" or "Pretender Blood3+, then forge" -- ok that is sort of what my suspicion was what I had to do, but felt that this would somehow go against IW's grain (why I thought that I dont know).

So I need to get a LOT of scouts, right, to make all those blood items to then be able to forge em and then to finally use those skills? Anybody have any success with this? Well I will try it out, could be fun.

Thank you very much for your replies.

[fahdiz]

Don't forget that Blood 1 allows you to do Sabbath Master/Slave. Now, I'm certainly not saying that Vanheim/Blood = Pythium/Astral (because Pythium has Astral mages cheap and out the wazoo, not to mention Communicants, whereas - as you've stated - Vanheim doesn't have very easy access to Blood mages, and they're expensive as hell) but rather that in a pinch, it can be nice to be able to pump up your Vanadrotts with either other Vanadrotts or some Garnet Sorceresses/Priestesses.

As Cherry pointed out, being able to summon imps very early on in the game can help with some expansion issues, too.

[ March 09, 2004, 15:52: Message edited by: fahdiz ]