Best Unit in the Game... Any thoughts?

[JoJoKobe]

This includes summoned units, of course!

Any ideas? I just started playing, and Eater of the Dead looks pretty powerful... what happens when it gets too powerful?! The game finished before I could see...

Anyway, any input on what the most powerful unit is would be welcome!

Thanks!

J

[Forrest]

Dollar for dollar

I would have to say I would have to say Wolf Tribe Warriors.

They have heart. They will have that elephant sliced up and cooking on the grill before the rest of the army even gets to move. They know how to party.

[quantum_mechani]

Apart from maybe some specially built pretenders, it's hard to beat the power per unit of a well equipped tartarian or seraph. It really comes down more to the equipment and magic than the base stats though.

[sum1lost]

militia. You can recruit them anywhere, and they are really good at packing a lot of meat into a very small spot as a constant pool of reinvigoration for your soul vortexed liches.

[Micah]

Seraph. Only real drawbacks are less than 100 HP and vulnerability to magic duels. And expense, of course.

[Sombre]

Bog beast. Whenever I tech for Wish I always start summoning and GoRing these badboys. Two misc slots baby.

[JoJoKobe]

how does one get a Seraph?
a Bog Beast?

=?

[quantum_mechani]

JoJoKobe said:
how does one get a Seraph?


Unique conjuration spell for pythium/marignon.

Bog beast was a joke, get them in a mid level conj summon with nature/water.

[Micah]

You can wish for units as well, though they require a gift of reason to be a commander.

[JoJoKobe]

gift of reason?!

Man this game is complicated.
What's Gift of Reason? =(

[Taqwus]

Most spells, esp. most summons, are described in your manual.

The 'Slave to Unreason' is quite an interesting character.

[quantum_mechani]

Taqwus said:
Most spells, esp. most summons, are described in your manual.

The 'Slave to Unreason' is quite an interesting character.

Good catch, I totally forgot about doom horrors since they are so impractical to employ in MP. My personal favorite is the maker of ruins.

[Saxon]

I think the best unit in the game has to be a mage who casts buffs on an army and globals. Pick your choice of magic paths, though a high level death mage with Utterdark, Burden of Time and some fun combat spells looks tasty to me. They have more potential to win a game than even a great SC.

[mathusalem]

Devourer of Souls of course

[Edratman]

I found that this is like a paper/rock/scissors game. Whenever I think I've found the best unit, it usually gets chopped up at some point by a counter strategy that I was oblivious to.

So how can you truly judge a unit? Some are merely good by themselves, but really trick up well with buffing.

Personally I love the rare, but strong independent mages that cover magic paths that I don't have. That may because you cannot tuly buy or make them, you have to get lucky and stumble upon them.

But think the correct way to answer your question would categorize the units as:
1. Very strong
2. Good
3. poor
4. Too expensive for what you get
Even with this, units change relative strength from early to late game. A prime example of this are mages. Without much magic research, most of them do not contribute much early and what they can do requires mundane troops to keep them out of melee. However, by the late game 4 or 5 of the right mages and the right spells can devestate a 500+ army.

[Shovah32]

Heavily equipped seraphs and doom horrors(equipped or unequipped) are probably some of the best. Specially built pretenders could over-take seraphs and maybe some of the doom horrors.
Gift of reason is a spell that turns regular units into commanders(even wishing for a commander gives you it as a unit) and so is required if you wish for a seraph.

[SlipperyJim]

I like my GoR-ed Tarrasque, empowered to S4 so she can Gateway her buddies in Team Tarrasque all over the map. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

The original question is a bit off, though. As Edratman wrote, it's really hard to pin down the "best" unit in a game this complex. Best at what? Best thug? Best mage? Best support unit? And even if you manage to narrow down your terms, you'll find that someone has a counter-tactic that will leave your uber-unit crying for mercy.

So, yeah, there is no "best" unit in Dom3. Certainly, any of the unique summons are very powerful. For example, the King of Banefires makes a fantastic supercombatant. Air Queens can use the Cloud Trapeeze - Staff of Storms - Wrathful Skies trick to wreck entire armies. Arch Devils can lead a powerful raiding force behind enemy lines. Etcetera....

In a different line of reasoning, I also like units that are reasonably powerful, versatile, and easily available. According to that standard, I like the Barbarian Heavy Horseman from Late-Age TC. Those guys are great! You can buy them in any fort, they have a strategic move of 2 (yay, horses!), and they'll grind up nearly any mundane army into dust. Just set them to "Hold & Attack (whatever)": they'll send three volleys of composite-bow arrows at the closest enemy, which will then be followed by a devastating charge. They have good defense and adequate armor, so they're reasonably survivable. Yeah, I'm a cavalry fanatic. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Shovah32]

A big group of them set to hold and attack closest(with a small screen of tower shield infantry to catch stray arrows) with two flanking groups of W9N4 ancestor vessels has always served me well(with the ancestor vessels being costly and less easily availiable but having more punch) but could be similarly effective with just the barbarian cavalry. The barbarian horsemen(and ancestor vessels) are pretty much what make LA Tien Chi a viable nation as they are very versatile and powerful.

[Gandalf Parker]

Best for what? I tend to think of best supporting units but
Standalone fighter I am guessing. IN that case Terrasque would seem to have been put in the game to be that altho eater of the dead is also a good choice

Inst there also an eater of heroes and eater of gods?

[tibbs]

There's a Hunter of Heroes.

[Shovah32]

Theres a hunter of heroes, an eater of gods, a maker of ruin and a slave to unreason.

[Cor]

the three nasties from The Kindly Ones.

[Yrkoon]

If you include blessable unit in your pool of units to choose from, then I'd say blessable non-capitol only units are the best.
Being non capitol only they can be recruited in large numbers, and being blessable they can be made much much powerful than regular units. Sure, one tarrasque will eat one blessable unit for breakfast. But armies of units can be easily raised, and they will mop the floor with the tarrasque (or any very very strong expensive unit)

[quantum_mechani]

Yrkoon said:
(or any very very strong expensive unit)

Not quite, SCs can be built that will mop the floor with most unsupported sacred troops.

[SlipperyJim]

I'll put Team Tarrasque against nearly any blessable units. Have you looked at a Tarrasque's stats lately? They're significantly obnoxious. Poison cloud, regen, recuperation, high protection + HP, and bile breath. Think Uber-Hydra. Anything that isn't poison-immune will be in for a rough time....

Of course, hordes of undead will probably wear them down, especially if those undead have chill auras. A swarm of ghosts would ruin the Team's day for sure. But that fact just reinforces the previous statement about how there is no "best" unit in Dom 3. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[thejeff]

Yeah, Team Tarrasque may beat most sacreds. Though, what about the summoned sacred some nations get now?

It will lose to a dozen or so S1 mages casting Magic Duel.

[Shovah32]

And again here we have the good old 'unit X will beat super unit Y and will lose to unit X counter unit Z' ect.

[SlipperyJim]

thejeff said:
Yeah, Team Tarrasque may beat most sacreds. Though, what about the summoned sacred some nations get now?

It will lose to a dozen or so S1 mages casting Magic Duel.


Hmmm ... I'm not familiar enough with the summoned sacreds. Did you have a specific example?

Team Tarrasque might suffer some pain from a bunch of E9N9 Niefel giants, especially if the giants had a caster along to make them poison-immune.

And I know about the Magic Duel vulnerability. Fortunately, I'm playing against the AI, who rarely uses Magic Duel. Otherwise, I suppose I'd just keep pumping Astral Pearls into Empowerment until my commanding Tarrasque is S6 or better. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

(I never said it was efficient, just fun.)

[Valandil]

On the subject of barbarian horsemen and tarrasques, i've seen the AI kill five tarrasques in one battle with nothing but T'ien Ch'i cavalry of various sorts.

I submit that the best unit in the game is a sprite. Those elf shots are evil.

[TwoBits]

Best unit in the game? I'd say any cheap, piece of crap unit you can throw Army of Gold/Lead on. That horde of Vine-men ain't so funny now, is it? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Valandil]

Haunted forest + dragonflies.

[Ironhawk]

Sages

[Shovah32]

Lore Masters http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[General_Jah]

Edratman said:
However, by the late game 4 or 5 of the right mages and the right spells can devestate a 500+ army.



Could you please give me an example or two of this? With non pretender scenarios

[Shovah32]

Flame storm hits 40 squares(which would hold 120 human units) with a strength 15+AP fire attack. Shimmering Fields hits 50 squares with 10+AN shock damage. Rain of Stones hits the entire battlefield with 14 mundane damage and earthquake does the same with 8AP damage. Wrathful Skies(in a storm) hits a certain %(might be 10%) of the squares on the battlefield every turn with a powerful shock attack. Fire storm and astral tempest are both powerful battlefield enchantments. Master Enslave, when cast by a powerful mage with penetration items, can enslave a large portion of the enemy army in a single casting and as an odd example bloodletting, a spell requiring only 4 blood magic and 4 slaves, does 1AN damage(MR negates) over the whole battlefield and adds damage done to the mages life force which means a few mages casting it at a very large army could keep going until it was decimated.

[Meglobob]

I am particularly fond of illusionists myself, also Caelums A2W1 flying mages.

The best units are not your end game mega stuff but ones that you use the majority of the game to get you there.

So the very best units are useful in the early, midgame and endgame.

[HoneyBadger]

My favorite unit in the game is Cthulhu.

[llamabeast]

Argh! Stop with the misleading statements HB!

[Gandalf Parker]

Its not Cthulhu, its Hastur. The cthulhu rules say if you speak his name 3 times he comes and destroys the town.

-- The DM hands you a piece of paper which says that you see carved into the tabletop of the bar...
"For a good time call Hastur".
What do you do?

[NTJedi]

JoJoKobe said:
gift of reason?!

Man this game is complicated.
What's Gift of Reason? =(



Yes, I could tell you're new with the game when you mentioned Eater of the Dead being powerful. Based on the cost of gems and what it does in battle... it's one of the worst deals in the game. It's a strong unit yet way way over priced and never worth considering in a multiplayer game.

[Kristoffer O]

> It's a strong unit yet way way over priced and never worth considering in a multiplayer game.

Of course he is! He grows like a sponge! Cover the world in sponges and you will rule th galaxy http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Edit: DOn't forget to feed him http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[NTJedi]

Kristoffer O said:
> It's a strong unit yet way way over priced and never worth considering in a multiplayer game.

Of course he is! He grows like a sponge! Cover the world in sponges and you will rule th galaxy http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Edit: DOn't forget to feed him http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif



Even after being fully stuffed with corpses he has multiple weaknesses for costing 50 astral ! First only one can exist on the map so any opponent wanting to destroy all your hard work just has to summon one of them. Second this creature will go beserk and leave you... possibly return to attack you. For a few more astral gems I can summon a army of ether warriors and an ether lord commander which could slice and dice three eater of the deads in battle.
It's a strong unit, but if you check the multiplayer games... it's never casted.

[Kristoffer O]

> First only one can exist on the map

Not after he has broken free.

Of course it is not casted! People like control over things http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[NTJedi]

Kristoffer O said:

Of course it is not casted! People like control over things http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif



Well it's more with the cost of the spell... 50 astral gems is a very high price for a single unit which comes from a high research level.

[Evilhomer]

Its actually a combination of the high cost, rather low survivability (low defense+low protection) and the fact you lose control over it.

[Kristoffer O]

>50 astral gems is a very high price for a single unit

Actually it's a low price for freeing the fettered one and unleash him upon the world. The fact that his physical powers are limited by time, space and the newly dead doesn't make the powers of his fetters less strong.

[ologm]

A eater of the dead should spawn more eaters of the dead once it grows to a certain size. Attack of the blobs

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Agartha can get a 300+ hitpoint commander, by prophetizing a Marble Oracle which you must admit, is somewhat insane, considering thats more than most pretenders.

I'm hoping to figure out a working astral pretender build, so I can try a Juggernaut with the Golem Cult bonus.

[Gandalf Parker]

I had an eater of the dead show up on one of my chaoticised maps. I loved it. As Pangaea I would rush a couple of Pans over there to follow it around. Every time it cleared a province, my hidden pan would toss a couple of maenads and take ownership. Since the pans stayed hidden they were not in danger from the eater.

[Meglobob]

Lazy_Perfectionist said:
Agartha can get a 300+ hitpoint commander, by prophetizing a Marble Oracle which you must admit, is somewhat insane, considering thats more than most pretenders



I have a 500+ hp prophet at the momement, I prophetized a tartarian! 50hp/turn regeneration... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/stupid.gif

Him and my destroyer of worlds pretender, only 200+ hps make a cool duo... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[NTJedi]

Kristoffer O said:
>50 astral gems is a very high price for a single unit

Actually it's a low price for freeing the fettered one and unleash him upon the world. The fact that his physical powers are limited by time, space and the newly dead doesn't make the powers of his fetters less strong.



Actually it's a high price when you can alchemize the gems for 25 of another type and then use those 25 gems to summon units/commanders which can kill the beast.

[HoneyBadger]

What would be great is if, when the Eater of the Dead wanders off, there's a chance he decides *he* is a god, he becomes the Pretender of a nation of his own misbegotten, mutant children-by mating/raping various furry forest critters, the dead, MA Ulm, etc, and the Eaters of the Dead nation showed up on your doorstep.

Maybe-with multiple castings-even more than one.

And to whomever questions the existence of mighty Cthulhu-well, have you ever Wished for him?

well, have you?!?

I THOUGHT NOT!

Muahahahahaha!

[Valandil]

Yes. I have.
Unfortunately, I was running a mod which added him, hence, it worked perfectly.

In other news, bathusma (eg.) has like 90% regen, right. If you power wished, would you have like 250 hp per turn?

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Yeah, but you need to reach conjuration 9 for that. I can get my Marble Oracle at conj 6, with my national mage. OTOH, is a Tartarian gate REALLY only ten gems. Wow... That's a hella lot of tank for your buck. At least I have better protection, for what little that's worth (15 gems, to be precise).

[Meglobob]

Lazy_Perfectionist said:
Yeah, but you need to reach conjuration 9 for that. I can get my Marble Oracle at conj 6, with my national mage. OTOH, is a Tartarian gate REALLY only ten gems. Wow... That's a hella lot of tank for your buck. At least I have better protection, for what little that's worth (15 gems, to be precise).



Yes tartarian is only 10D gems but you do after cure the afflictions and gift of reason in most cases.

However in the case of my 500 hp tartarian prophet, I got lucky in that it came as a commander with no afflictions. Has magic paths of W3 D2 H3, which is good. I can quicken self, breath of winter, divine bless, soul vortex (with 1 death gem of course), Hold a turn (catch his breath after all that spell casting), attack closet (whereupon he slaughters anything foolish enough to get in his way).

Oh he also has a personal bodyguard of 5 mammoths, so any spells like disintergrate, soul slay, petrify, horror marking etc target those instead... http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Cainehill]

SlipperyJim said:
I like my GoR-ed Tarrasque, empowered to S4 so she can Gateway her buddies in Team Tarrasque all over the map. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif




In a big/long MP game (map of our world, like 350 provinces) I GoRed a tarrasque and empowered to 2 or 3 in air, fire, and earth. Fire for fire shield, earth for the fatigue recovery spell, and air for .... cloud trapeze! Never mind mirror image, it was a great party crasher. It's a bird, it's a plane, it's .... Oh shoot! Runaway! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Oh - if the big T didn't come with regeneration, I either empowered in nature or put a ring of regen on it. Fun critters, even if not KoB level. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Gandalf Parker]

Cainehill said:
Never mind mirror image, it was a great party crasher. It's a bird, it's a plane, it's .... Oh shoot! Runaway! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif



LOL

[HoneyBadger]

Well, actually...I don't know from the "best" unit in the game, but my *favorite* unit in the game is probably the Ancient Kraken.

There's just something really cool about the Kraken, especially after you've watched 'Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest' at the drive-in.

[bananafish]

Arco's Oreiads

best assassin type unit... if u can't seduce 'em, charm 'em... and if that doesn't work, let the (magic item) bodyguard bash 'em...

if they get found in a province w/o real troops, can single handedly take down a medium PD'd province.

can play havoc w/ an enemy's army when u 'charm' the commander and gives u an action report of the ensuing combat. and if u happen to charm his 'thug' in the army... wreaks havoc on his own army..

[Aleph]

Pound for pound:

Gold - I'll second the "quality recruitable anywhere sacreds." In particular, Mictlan with F9/W9 and Lanka with E9/N9 can be absolutely devastating from year 1 through the endgame (sure, counters will come up later on, but they are still among the best basic troops, and numbers are king in Dom 3). Jotunheim's sacreds are horrifically powerful, but they are capital only and so favor smaller game types.

Magic - Dakini. Great access to air personal enchantments, flying, blood vengeance... a hunter, forger, raider, and SC chassis for a song.

[Shovah32]

Dakini and Mandahas are both nice. Mandahas are tougher but no blood vengance.
In response to bananafish's commend on Oreiads being the best assasins i would have to say that i prefer Succubi/EA Abysian Demonbred Slayers - Succubi are powerful and can also seduce but are expensive. Demonbred Slayers are flying, can lead raiding forces of misbreds and fiends of darkness and have good stats.

[tibbs]

bananafish said:
Arco's Oreiads

best assassin type unit... if u can't seduce 'em, charm 'em... and if that doesn't work, let the (magic item) bodyguard bash 'em...

if they get found in a province w/o real troops, can single handedly take down a medium PD'd province.

can play havoc w/ an enemy's army when u 'charm' the commander and gives u an action report of the ensuing combat. and if u happen to charm his 'thug' in the army... wreaks havoc on his own army..



Those are fun units. In one MP game my cap was sieged by Mictlan. I had about 6 or 7 oreaids and I set them all to seduce. I think I seduced 2 of his commanders and killed the others with lightning bolt. It was great.

[Burnsaber]

Heh.

Soldier: "Sir, those Jaguar warriors are hitting quite hard"
General "We no choice, but to use our ultimate defense.. release the maidens".

[Meglobob]

Not the, "best unit" and SP only, but if you get a few barbarian provinces and have a decent nature gem income. Then build a load of barbarian leaders and give them all berserker pelts.

This effectively makes them 99 morale and gives them the +2 berserk bonus at start of battle. They add alot of bite to your armies and are fun. The ones that survive can get heroic abilites, those you may want to consider giving additional equipment too. I give additional equipment to those who get quickness or more hps.

Even more fun is Lychantropos Amulet on your barbarian leaders, its a bonus if any turn into werewolves.

10 berserk barbarians on the right wing and 10 on the left wing with orders attack rear can be very devestating when it comes off.

[bananafish]

Oreiads are better than succubi's-

Oreiads do not bring the seduced unit back to the capital but the nearest adjacent friendly province. this is huge, since on a decent size map you don't have to spend the next couple of turns flying back into enemy territory.

If the seduction is unsuccessful, a well-equipped Oreiad can sufficiently defend herself (bottle of living water) and in the meantime attempt to charm the enemy commander... and you don't charm the mindless units-

when u start taking over enemy commanders and have them fight there own armies- can cause some serious havoc-

one caveat tho', prophet units cannot be charmed...

[thejeff]

Oreiads are worse than succubi's-


Oreiads do not bring the seduced unit back to the capital but the nearest adjacent friendly province. This means you can only use them on the front lines and not for raiding the enemy's research and casting centers.

[Endoperez]

Shouldn't Succubi have both #seduce and #succubus commands, to give you a choice between the two different forms of seduction? It could most easily be done via #shapechange into a second succubus form with the only difference being in the description and in the type of seduction available.

[bananafish]

most casting centers/research centers i know of usually has high PDs and patrollers...

which causes more disruption? capturing a research mage or capturing an outfitted combat mage?

which unit can be brought back into service quickly?

unless you are playing on a relatively small map; the oreiads are much more flexible and handy...

AND if assassinating the commander is just as good as capturing it, then the oreiad being sent to that research/casting center is just as good; b/c if u don't seduce u enter combat and effectively kill the commander or better the commander you charm takes over the province.

you can easily build and outfit enough oreiads to cause havoc on an enemy's main army than to summon 6-10 succubi's to do the job.

[MaxWilson]

General_Jah said:

Edratman said:
However, by the late game 4 or 5 of the right mages and the right spells can devestate a 500+ army.



Could you please give me an example or two of this? With non pretender scenarios



I recently had a handful of Umbrals (20-odd) and some unblessed Blindfighters (15 or so), plus 2 Ktonian Necromancers, take out 1200 or so underwater R'lyeh troops (sea lions, sea serpents, polypal spawn). Essentially the game plan was Army of Lead + Plague. Army of Lead kept the umbrals alive, and Plague killed all the enemies. I lost the battle because Plague eventually infected my own necromancers and killed them both, but only after the whole battlefield had caught the plague. I think only one enemy unit survived, a Mind Lord.

So anyway, Plague is a great army devastator.

-Max

[PvK]

I still think Tartarians are about the "best" bang for buck, generally speaking...

[Meglobob]

PvK said:
I still think Tartarians are about the "best" bang for buck, generally speaking...



I agree, but please never nerf them.

[CUnknown]

Tartarians already are pre-nerfed, aren't they? I mean, most have afflictions, and most aren't commanders so they cost an extra 25 nature gems to make them really good. And since they are level-9 conjuration, it makes sense that they are extremely good bang for the buck.

[Shovah32]

The main balancing factor of tartarians is that they need a mage with 7 death magic to summon them which means that without huge investment/design points+pretender time its hard to get them, let alone in large numbers.

D3 mage with skull staff, skullface, ring of wizardry and ring of sorcery - 30 death gems and 100 astral pearls iirc

D4 mage with skullface, skullstaff and ring of sorcery - 30 death gems and 40 astral pearls iirc

D5 mage(rare, probably either pretender/D3 mage with 110% random that includes death which requires alot of luck) with skullface and skull staff - 30 death gems, hard to get

D6 mage with skullface - 10 death gems, either pretender or one of the previous mages empowered in death

D7 mage - Pretender/one of previous with empowerment

note: boosters could be swapped for levels of empowerment in death.

[PvK]

It does take some doing to get Tartarians, but it's worth doing and there are death summons which can help many nations climb up to it. To get started you need a D2 mage, or a D1W2 or D1S3. Then you can summon something with D3, boost to D5, which lets you summon a D4, then you can probably find something to boost him to D7.

Then... you get to summon pretender-class guys for 10 death gems each turn. They're certainly worth GOR'ing and healing, but are very strong even without it, and give you more high-level random magic.

[vfb]

The FAQ states that for removing undead afflictions, you need either the Chalice or Gift of Health. I've got a few Faery Queens sitting around 'Heal'ing in one game, and while they managed to patch up a few devils, I haven't noticed any of my Tartarians healing at all.

Has anyone had any success healing Tartarians without the Chalice or Gift of Health?

[Kristoffer O]

I have a vague recollection that we didn't want them to be healed, making inanimated unhealable, but that might be wishful thinking.

[Meglobob]

Fairy queens are absolutely useless when it comes to healing tartarians, they in particular seem to stuggle to heal feeblemind.

[Amhazair]

Gift of health does a rather nice job of curing afflictions on Tartarians. In the one game where I got it up while I had Tartarians I estimate (very rough guess, with a rather small sample size since the game didn't last very long anymore) that afflictions had about 1 chance in 4 of disappearing.

[Meglobob]

The chalice is far better it basically heals same turn the tartarian is summoned or the next turn.

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

I have to like the Frost Father. It has a few weaknesses, namely encumberance of 3, and lack of any reinvig. But I've had one, no equipment, only alt 2 spells, take down fifty undead before falling unconscious. Considering I didn't get any use out of the chill aura, that wasn't bad. If i can get the right gear, he'll be untouchable.

[PvK]

Kristoffer O said:
I have a vague recollection that we didn't want them to be healed, making inanimated unhealable, but that might be wishful thinking.

I think Tartarians would be much closer to balanced (and more interesting) if their starting afflictions could not be healed.

[CUnknown]

PvK -- balanced relative to what? I think tartarians -are- balanced relative to other level 9 summons that require 7 levels of magic to cast, don't you? I mean, clearly, it wouldn't be appropriate to have them balanced on a per gem basis with, say, a level 1 summons that only requires 1 or 2 levels of magic to cast (e.g. a Black Servant).

[PvK]

I meant "balanced, all things that come to mind, sort of considered." True balance isn't measurable in Dominions, nor do I particularly seek it. I was answering the original question that Tartarians seem to me like arguably the best unit in the game based on their strength and magic paths given, for such a low cost in gems. There are many things at the top research levels that tend to overpower things at lower research levels, which is clearly intended as a way to have the game change and move towards a conclusion. So I wouldn't say it's necessarily a problem the way they are. On the other hand, I think they'd still be one of the most powerful and efficient summons, and have more interesting thematic limitations (like the way the Allfather and Forge Lord pretenders can't heal theirs), if they couldn't heal their initial afflictions.

I don't particularly like research levels having a strong effect on balance. I actually would prefer it if there were some sort of balance remaining between research-1 spells and research-9 spells, because otherwise the things in the early game tend to become almost completely obsolete by the end. But that's an off-topic matter of personal taste which can be addressed by my own mods.

As for "other level 9 summons that require 7 levels of magic", I don't know that there (precisely) are any. I think other Conj-9 summons with similar magic requirements cost more like 25-40 gems and aren't particularly worth so much more cost. But as Shovah32 pointed out, one doesn't generally have _many_ D7 casters available. And I also consider Ghost Riders pretty dang wickedly efficient at D6 for 5 death gems, even though you don't get to keep anyone from it.

PvK

[Kristoffer O]

He is comparing them to living gods, who havn't been tortured in tartatus for millenia. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[vfb]

Well, Tartarians are a lot cheaper than the Demon Lords. They're also cheaper than Abominations, and it's the 1 in 5 Titan/Cyclops/Spirit that can be kitted out and cast Petrify and buffs that really makes a difference.

[Kristoffer O]

Best unit is Daughter of Typhon, no question. Pity she is restricted to Sauromatia and serpent cult Pythium http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Meglobob]

PvK said:

Kristoffer O said:
I have a vague recollection that we didn't want them to be healed, making inanimated unhealable, but that might be wishful thinking.

I think Tartarians would be much closer to balanced (and more interesting) if their starting afflictions could not be healed.



I utterly disagree. You would just make another lvl 9 spell fairly useless/boring. Leave Tartarians as is. If you did as you suggest, I would just summon bane lords for 12D gems and never use Tartarians. So you would just remove a fun part of the game. It takes considerable planning and skill to get Tartarians/Chalice or Tartarians/Gift of Health and a decent death/nature income to take advantage of it all. It is most certainly not inbalanced and is very much needed in ending long MP games or long SP games for that matter if you actually want to complete them.


PvK said:I don't particularly like research levels having a strong effect on balance.



Put research upto very hard, then you can battle away with your armies without magic having any real influence.

[PvK]

Meglobob, you don't need to overstate your disagreement with me, since we don't really disagree. As I later wrote, "There are many things at the top research levels that tend to overpower things at lower research levels, which is clearly intended as a way to have the game change and move towards a conclusion. So I wouldn't say it's necessarily a problem the way they are."

However, not to make any other point, wouldn't you agree that once the research is done, if you go with 12D Bane Lords when your opponent can go for 10D Tartarians, even without any healing abilities, the Tartarians will handily out-match your Bane Lords for the same investment in death gems?

Yes, Very Hard reasearch is an easy (if temporary) solution to keep the army game going longer. Mods work even better.

[Meglobob]

PvK said:However, not to make any other point, wouldn't you agree that once the research is done, if you go with 12D Bane Lords when your opponent can go for 10D Tartarians, even without any healing abilities, the Tartarians will handily out-match your Bane Lords for the same investment in death gems?



Yea, your probably right on this point.

Conjuration 9 would be alot less desirable if tartarians were nerfed and personally every time I viewed my tartarians I would be annoyed that there was no way whatsoever of healing its afflictions. Horror marks/curses are already annoying enough.

Seems to me that there is alot of players of Dominions who would like to get rid of magic all together and just pit armies vs armies. As far as I understand dominions development history, magic has constantly been nerfed over time, making it less powerful and useful. This is very sad and diminishs available strategies and tactics.

[PvK]

I think there's a wide spectrum of tastes in magic power levels, most of which are covered by the available options, and just about all of which can be covered by mods. Personally, though I love playing with mortal armies, my usual preference falls somewhere between "I'd just like the mortal units to remain a somewhat relevant factor into the late game" and "I'd like the magic to remain balanced by cost and level requirements throughout the game". I too love powerful magic effects - I just like them to have fairly balanced requirements (and not merely based on research). However, I don't mean to inflict those tastes upon the unmodded game.

I do think though that there are some things that are overpowered versus their costs, and that the game becomes more interesting if there are requirements to get to the most powerful effects, so that the less powerful effects still have their niches. I see most of the changes from Dom 2 to Dom 3 as those sort of changes, rather than an attempt to remove the powerful effects.

I can also see that many players love seeing lots of high-powered magic, and so don't like to get anything magic nerfed. Of course, mods can serve those players at least as easily as they can the players who prefer less powerful magic.

[NTJedi]

Meglobob said:
Fairy queens are absolutely useless when it comes to healing tartarians, they in particular seem to stuggle to heal feeblemind.



The fairy queens and priestesses with healing cannot heal the undead. To heal the undead only Gift of Reason or the Chalice will work.

[quantum_mechani]

Meglobob said:
As far as I understand dominions development history, magic has constantly been nerfed over time, making it less powerful and useful. This is very sad and diminishs available strategies and tactics.

This seems a very odd way of looking at it, I can't think of a single spell that has ever been nerfed that is not still a useful part of any magic aresenal. The role of troops has been increased since dominions2, but ignoring magic is hardly a remotly viable strategy in 99% of games.

[Salamander8]

I had the combo of Gift of Health and having a commander with the chalice in the same army as some of my tartarans in a recent SP game. This really helped cure all those afflictions.

[Saulot]

Well, if the magic was toned down very significantly, I feel dominions would approach Master of Magic, which of course isn't necessarily a bad thing, considering how many years I spent playing that. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

On the other hand like you said, the ability to increase gold/resource/supplies and to lower magic sites, and increase research, really does change the game pretty dramatically in the direction you mentioned. (Not to mention what could be done on top of that with mods).

I'm just curious, do you feel like anything else should be done in that regard PvK? Perhaps some broader modding tools?

[Xietor]

There are unbeatable SC's in sp, but even the best SC can be brought low by the right combination of spells.

[PvK]

Saulot said:
...
On the other hand like you said, the ability to increase gold/resource/supplies and to lower magic sites, and increase research, really does change the game pretty dramatically in the direction you mentioned. (Not to mention what could be done on top of that with mods).

I'm just curious, do you feel like anything else should be done in that regard PvK? Perhaps some broader modding tools?


That's off-topic for this thread, so I'll post a new topic to reply.

[Shovah32]

Xietor said:
There are unbeatable SC's in sp, but even the best SC can be brought low by the right combination of spells.



Kind of annoying when your favourite SC gets taken out by a mid-level mage with a single blood slave(banish to inferno/claws of*insert word starting with C here*) with no chance to resist it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif.

[Meglobob]

quantum_mechani said:

Meglobob said:
As far as I understand dominions development history, magic has constantly been nerfed over time, making it less powerful and useful. This is very sad and diminishs available strategies and tactics.

This seems a very odd way of looking at it, I can't think of a single spell that has ever been nerfed that is not still a useful part of any magic aresenal. The role of troops has been increased since dominions2, but ignoring magic is hardly a remotly viable strategy in 99% of games.



Other than Divine Bless, Smite, site searching spells, a little constuction for magic items and mages to do research the majority of nations already effectively ignore magic for the first 20 - 30 turns of the game.

Virtually all magic has very little influence on battles, with the sole exception of divine bless/bless for the first 20 - 30 turns. The average length of a MP game of Dom3 is 60 - 90 turns before a winner is declared, so for a 1/3 of the game magic has little or no influence on the game.

In Dom3 what do most players complain about? What threads attract the most debate? The answer is unfair blesses on certain nations sacreds, how unfair a elephant/mammoth rush is on nations like Ulm. With magic being so weak in the early part of the game, a strong bless nation or elephant/mammoth rush can only be stopped by a strong bless of your own, a awake pretender or stong/lucky diplomacy.

Magic needs boosting, especially battlefield magic and especially low level battlefield magic. Increasing AOE or number of effects or precision on certain spells would help game balance alot, especially early game balance.

From Dom2 to Dom3 quickness got nerfed, so the number of spells you could cast on a battlefield effectively got halfed. A big nerf to magic. At the same time army sizes increased from Dom2 to Dom3, so a spell with 1 effect killed 1 unit out of 50 strong army in Dom2 now kills 1 unit out of a 80 strong army. Another weakening of how effective magic is.

Alot of magic, especially battlefield magic needs a little strenghening, especially early on.

[llamabeast]

Interesting. I definitely wouldn't myself think that magic as a whole needs to be stronger. By turn 30 or 40 mages can lay down a ridiculous carpet of fire that can annihilate the most powerful of conventional armies. I wouldn't want it to be any stronger.

You may be right though that early magic could be more powerful. I suppose it would be nice if a powerful F3 mage was able to hold his own even without any research. But I don't find I really have any strong feelings on this. I'm fairly happy with it as it is I think.

One thing I don't like so much is the extremely magic-dominated late-game, although I suspect that's because I haven't got good at it yet. It's sad when real armies don't matter at all against hordes of SCs and Ghost Riders. I think myself I would probably like to nerf a few high-powered spells (Tartarian Gate, Ghost Riders, Fog Warriors, Will of the Fates, Army of Lead, Arcane Nexus perhaps), and also make gem-producing items harder to forge. But again I'm not sure of my own opinion on the subject.

[quantum_mechani]

Meglobob said:

Other than Divine Bless, Smite, site searching spells, a little constuction for magic items and mages to do research the majority of nations already effectively ignore magic for the first 20 - 30 turns of the game.

Virtually all magic has very little influence on battles, with the sole exception of divine bless/bless for the first 20 - 30 turns. The average length of a MP game of Dom3 is 60 - 90 turns before a winner is declared, so for a 1/3 of the game magic has little or no influence on the game.

In Dom3 what do most players complain about? What threads attract the most debate? The answer is unfair blesses on certain nations sacreds, how unfair a elephant/mammoth rush is on nations like Ulm. With magic being so weak in the early part of the game, a strong bless nation or elephant/mammoth rush can only be stopped by a strong bless of your own, a awake pretender or stong/lucky diplomacy.

Magic needs boosting, especially battlefield magic and especially low level battlefield magic. Increasing AOE or number of effects or precision on certain spells would help game balance alot, especially early game balance.

From Dom2 to Dom3 quickness got nerfed, so the number of spells you could cast on a battlefield effectively got halfed. A big nerf to magic. At the same time army sizes increased from Dom2 to Dom3, so a spell with 1 effect killed 1 unit out of 50 strong army in Dom2 now kills 1 unit out of a 80 strong army. Another weakening of how effective magic is.

Alot of magic, especially battlefield magic needs a little strenghening, especially early on.

I can't say I agree at all, there are plenty of nations with makes lots of use of battlefield magic. Nations like Marignon and Caelum would be crazy not to research some level of evocation if they are fighting an early war. A big part of what made/makes Helhiem so fearsome isn't just it's bleess troops, it's the wide array of powerful battlefield spells they can back it up with (skelly spam, lightning bolts, thunder strike, blade wind, magma eruption). It's true that people are reluctant to commit battle mages in the early game, but that is simply because higher research magic even stronger.

And all that aside, the basic way magic is used hasn't changed much at all since dom2. People didn't drag their mages off of research duty without a very good reason there either.

I won't argue there are a lot of very weak early battlefield spells that could really use improvement, but the proportion of strong ones to weak ones is about the same as anywhere else in the game.

[PvK]

I'd prefer that bless and elephants/mammoth strategies be weaker or slower to build up, rather than making magic better in the early game.

[llamabeast]

Agreed, PvK.

Sometimes the resource system is, I think, not quite what's needed.

For example elephants presumably can't in reality be massed very quickly. You have to go find them or something. But they don't necessarily need much equipment, so they don't have very high resource costs.

In my forthcoming Tomb Kings mod, the idea is that the ancient armies in the pyramids/tombs can only be woken up slowly by the priests. The resource cost should really be pretty much zero (they were buried with their armour and weapons). I've had to give them a fairly high resource cost to stop over-fast recruiting though (perhaps the rituals of awakening need lots of, er, iron).

It would be good if you could only recruit say 2 elephants a turn. But this would be a whole extra game mechanic which might be unpleasantly messy. Just thinking aloud really...

[PvK]

Yes. There are several types of units whose equipment doesn't involve much, but they shouldn't be fast to mass-recruit for other reasons (training, etc.).

In the case of your revived tomb guys, perhaps the autosummon mod mechanics could be used - a special reviver priest type unit would have a command that would only recruit so many per turn. The reviver could either be recruited, summoned, or be a national starting unit or hero.

[Saulot]

llamabeast said:
In my forthcoming Tomb Kings mod, the idea is that the ancient armies in the pyramids/tombs can only be woken up slowly by the priests. The resource cost should really be pretty much zero (they were buried with their armour and weapons). I've had to give them a fairly high resource cost to stop over-fast recruiting though (perhaps the rituals of awakening need lots of, er, iron).



Perhaps you could use a summon system instead? Though that scales inaccurately with gold/resources/supplies game options.


llamabeast said:
It would be good if you could only recruit say 2 elephants a turn. But this would be a whole extra game mechanic which might be unpleasantly messy. Just thinking aloud really...


Hm... that would be good. But it really changes the whole game dynamic. Perhaps a game option request? (Though that might be more trouble than it's worth to the devs.) (Also, I realize I'm a little request-happy, and I'm certainly not trying to be pushy or subtly complaining about what is so far available, which is considerable).

[jutetrea]

For limiting general recruitment, lower the starting game option gold/resource availability. To reduce specific unit availability modding or a summons approach would work.

For example order 3, prod 3 but with starting gold/resource availability of 50% only gives about 250g and 60res in your capital (depending on start loc). LA Arco elephants are already at 100g/62res. Of course then everyone just starts with 50% and its just a relative problem anyway.

Blesses on the other hand are a bit more tricky. I'm not generally a fan of the whole CB mod, but I like the scales part which makes blesses even more expensive. A bit more negative for bad scales and a bit more positive for good scales, so it widens the gap a bit overall.

[Edratman]

50% gold/50% resources/easy magic research/9 indies and 25 to 30 provinces per player is a good way to address magic balance/early rush tactics. This alters the ratio of resources allocated to mages/troops, slows down initial expansion/rushes by powerful troops and/or blesses and provides enough space so that the playing fields are pretty much level when you encounter neighbors.

You also have to rethink your scales because bad scales are even more of a penalty and selling everything out for a 9 F/W bless is a major buden now.

[MaxWilson]

Resources doesn't *just* mean blacksmiths. It can also mean things like the time it takes a Basalt King to enchant a glaive; anything which takes a certain amount of time. If you wanted to prevent elephants from being easily massed, it would certainly be justifiable to raise the resource cost on elephants to represent the time it takes to train one, the limited number such trainers available, etc. On the other hand, if you're thinking more about the breeding rates of elephants and how unlikely it is that a single province could produce 300 of them over the course of three years, well, population is already decoupled from army recruitment in Dominions 3.

-Max

[llamabeast]

I think I sort of agree Max - and it would be much more convenient if resources represented time as well as metals. But in fact all the resource costs in the game are pretty much based only on equipment, and resources come from things like iron mines.

Still, I don't think anyone would object if the general rules were bent a bit in certain cases - for instance elephants.

[mivayan]

quantum_mechani said:
This seems a very odd way of looking at it, I can't think of a single spell that has ever been nerfed that is not still a useful part of any magic aresenal.


(uselessinfo:)
I know one - summon lesser air elemental!

it was cheaper 4-5 years ago and isn't used now.. I think.

[Kristoffer O]

I met one the other day, but it might have come from a bag of winds.

[Endoperez]

mivayan said:

quantum_mechani said:
This seems a very odd way of looking at it, I can't think of a single spell that has ever been nerfed that is not still a useful part of any magic aresenal.


(uselessinfo:)
I know one - summon lesser air elemental!

it was cheaper 4-5 years ago and isn't used now.. I think.



Also False Horror, and the Vampire summons (Blood Rite etc). In earlier Dominions games, Caelum used to be the nation casting Illwinter because they preferred Cold 3 and Jotunheim (Iron Woods, or MA nowadays) preferred Cold 2. Reascendance (Marignon national Blood spell) is now restricted to Marignon only, while it used to widen up all Blood/Astral nations' magic by giving access to a Fire mage. Same with Angel summons and Pythium/Marignon. Carrion Reanimation used to rock in Dom:PPP (the first game), because it didn't need corpses and Jotunheim could have thousands of Soulless Giants in two turns after researching it.

The flying, gem-free summons that are very hard to kill (etherealness) and very good at routing enemies (trample or fear) were good enough to let groups of sole mages destroy whole armies themselves. Seraphs used to be Caelum's infantry: 1 Seraph == 3-5 Lesser Air Elementals, or later ~8 or so False Horrors.
Vampires aren't ethereal any more, but their cost hasn't been rebalanced.
Illwinter is still good, and very useful for EA Niefelheim, but now only three nations will ever consider it. Same with Reascendance - it isn't any worse, but it's going to be used only rarely. Same with Angel summons (Harbinger, Heavenly Choir, etc).
Carrion Reanimation is a bit weak now, because it needs corpses to work at all. If it would always create at least a certain minimum amount of undead (say, 10) and then existing corpses would be added to that, OR if it could be cast at a remote province, it would be useful again. Especially for Jotunheim and other nations with tough undead.

[Mind Elemental]

Regarding Tartarians...

Assume that you can't heal them (someone else has the Chalice, and the global slots are full, making Gift of Health iffy, at best). However, you can GoR them, using your modest nature income.

Are they still worthwhile?

[Kristoffer O]

They should be worthwhile jus by being 10 death gem monsters without any other effects.

[Shovah32]

Like KO said, even non-commander tartarians are close combat monsters, that shouldnt be forgotten.

[Wikd Thots]

Damn some of you people play like accountants. You put the game into a spreadsheet and figure out the best down to the last gem or gold piece. I guess we all want those experts around but I do not think that makes the other stuff broken or "never used". If balance is going to mean making everything match at the top of the spreadsheet then I do not want it.

Do not sweat balance kris. Just keep putting in more and more variety. Let the experts here sweat out balance (and let you know about the very FEW things that end up as a game-breaker). If you super-weak this game for the PvP people then it will trash it for the RPG people and lose half of your market. As long as you keep adding then they will have to keep playing it to test balance and the game will be fine. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/firedevil.gif

[PvK]

I think Air Elementals are still very much worth it. They can tip the scales in battles (especially if you do several at once), and still only require an Air-1 mage with one gem.

False Horrors are still worth it too, IMO.

[Shovah32]

Air elementals are fine. Lesser air elementals are underwhelming.

[quantum_mechani]

PvK said:
I think Air Elementals are still very much worth it. They can tip the scales in battles (especially if you do several at once), and still only require an Air-1 mage with one gem.

False Horrors are still worth it too, IMO.

I agree, I use elementals of all types and levels, though of course only in niche situations. I don't think false horror is usless either, though far, far less good than it it used to be. There is a pretty good case for vampires, especially the high research summons, being nerfed to oblivion though.

[MaxWilson]

False Horrors got nerfed? They're gem-free, ethereal, have decent defense, cost 10 fatigue, and have two attacks. That seems pretty decent to me, though not overwhelming. What did they used to be like?

In my SP house rules I've modded the Summon Lesser Elemental spells to cast 95 fatigue but require 2 path levels. I still don't use them but this cost seems more fair relative to Raise Skeletons.

-Max

[MaxWilson]

Shovah32 said:
Like KO said, even non-commander tartarians are close combat monsters, that shouldnt be forgotten.



True, although they do take a bit of care. They have low protection, so somebody has to buff them up with Iron Warriors or Body Ethereal or Luck or Quickening.

-Max

[quantum_mechani]

MaxWilson said:
False Horrors got nerfed? They're gem-free, ethereal, have decent defense, cost 10 fatigue, and have two attacks. That seems pretty decent to me, though not overwhelming. What did they used to be like?

-Max

Used to only need 1a.

[Shovah32]

And worked very well with caelian seraphs when quickness meant 2 spells per round.