Armageddon

[Executor]

Can two armageddons be cast on the same turn, do both of them have effect? And how many armageddons would it take to "purge" the map, give or take a few?

[lch]

I haven't tested the first, but I suppose it can be cast multiple times just like any other spell. Armageddon works just like Volcanic Eruption on every province in the game, I believe, so it kills a third of the population and you can't really get the values to zero just by using this spell. One or two Armageddons may have a big effect on income, subsequent casts not so much anymore.

[Executor]

Yes but what I what to do is to kill as much population as possible, and cast some suicide global spells as utherdark. So I think about 10 armageddons would kill about 90% of population. That would mean much less troops and mages, well none actually because of utherdark. The point is to switch everybody to magic only, no sacreds and national troops.

[lch]

So I think about 10 armageddons would kill about 90% of population.
About 98% of the population, yes. 100*(1-1/3)^10 percent of pop remains.

Mages still require gold, lots of gold. With pop reduced like that and the additional unrest, mages will be extremely expensive. The units that people still have still require upkeep, so nobody will be able to recruit anything anymore. And when finally enough units have deserted, which commanders like mages never do, then you will probably only make enough gold to recruit cheap units again instead of mages.

[Psycho]

With 5 Armageddons population is down to 13%. With 6 it's down to 9%. And since Utterdark reduces income by 90% after this you will have 1.3% or 0.9% of start income. This will probably mean that nations without sacred troops will soon be without troops as they will desert.

[Executor]

Let's not forget to mention it would destroy blood nations.

[Poopsi]

It could work through, if you have a big enough gem income and summonable mages.

I can see LA Ryleh pulling out that one, since they will have to move to void spectres sooner or later anyway.

[Psycho]

I just tested it. It is possible to do multiple castings on the same turn, but it doesn't kill 1/3 of population. It kills 1/5.

So you need 11 castings to get population below 10%.


pop remaining = (4/5)^no_of_castings * 100%

1 casting : pop remaining = 80%
2 castings: pop remaining = 64%
3 castings: pop remaining = 51%
4 castings: pop remaining = 41%
5 castings: pop remaining = 33%
6 castings: pop remaining = 26%
7 castings: pop remaining = 21%
8 castings: pop remaining = 17%
9 castings: pop remaining = 13%
10 castings: pop remaining = 11%
11 castings: pop remaining = 9%


Still it's hardly worth going over 3-4 castings, especially if you plan utterdark afterwards.

[Bwaha]

Ermor would love that. All those corpses. I think that LA Ermor would be the race that gained the most. :D

[Executor]

It could work through, if you have a big enough gem income and summonable mages.

I can see LA Ryleh pulling out that one, since they will have to move to void spectres sooner or later anyway.

Any clam forging nation could pull it out.

I don't think LA Ermor has strong enough astral income for this, they aren't a very strong astral nation, I think!?

[Bwaha]

Their pretender could. And come to think of it. They should. All that magic resistance wouldn't hurt.:D

[Edratman]

All Ermor would need is to get a Lizard shaman or Amazon independent for one astral, site seach for pearls, and between empowerment and forging, it is doable. Or capture a capital with a pearl site. Actually a decent probability.

[Aezeal]

Personally I'd say just they -90% from utterdark would do the trick :D

[Executor]

Empowering from astral 1 to a point where you can cast wish is very hard. You need at least 5S for wish, ermor would be better on hoping for a tartarian random astral pick rather than empowering, of course you can still empower a tartarian if not too expensive.

[Edratman]

I didn't say that it was easy for Ermor to get to Wish with a 1 Astral mage, but they have no other use for pearls, so all can be dedicated to the task.

[Zeldor]

Just get Gift of NAture's Bounty for few turns [and tax at 200] and you'd have enough gold to pay upkeep for 20-50 turns.

[vfb]

Personally I'd say just they -90% from utterdark would do the trick :D

But Utterdark can be dispelled, and all the income comes back. With the armageddon wishes, the peasants are all dead and buried. Well, until Ermor raises them up, that is.

Sounds nasty!

S6 is all you need on your pretender, and it's not entirely wasted since the +2 MR is pretty decent on your knights.

Edit: Doh! Bwaha already said that, pretty much.

[Poopsi]

How about MA Ermor? They DO have a steady source of astral magic. And if by that point of the game they have researched some conjuration or enchantment they should have fairly mighty undead summonables, to compensate a reduction in thaumaturgist numbers

[chrispedersen]

Its actually more effective. There is a chance that commanders etc die as well. It does something like 10 pts of damage pls random vs some commanders.

I lost about 6 artifacts (and about 30 magic items) when oceania cast Armageddon.

Finally, several armageddons + wish for population.
It brings 5000 population to you, while taking it from other places....

[vfb]

What's the actual damage on units from Armageddon? Is it AN? AP? Mundane? Is the damage affected by twist fate (from shrouds) or luck?

[AdmiralZhao]

It seems to be mundane damage. If a commander's armor + HP is over 20, then they will usually survive a hit (though possibly with an affliction). A suit of Marble Armor seems to a do a good job of both protecting the mage and avoiding afflictions.

[Reay]

We just had one in Kingmaker. Seems like there is no unrest or corpses generated from an Armageddon just population reduced.

I had several thugs get chest wounds, and several weaker mages die so it seems like AdmiralZhao is right.

[Xietor]

I think it is a bit overpowered for the cost to be honest. Maybe it should not hurt domed provinces? If a dome has a percent chance of stopping hostile spells, maybe it should have a percent chance of stopping Armageddon as well. And why does it effect deep sea provinces at all?

I assume the water would slow the descent of any meteors from the sky? Plus they do not weigh as much in water.

[JimMorrison]

I think it is a bit overpowered for the cost to be honest. Maybe it should not hurt domed provinces? If a dome has a percent chance of stopping hostile spells, maybe it should have a percent chance of stopping Armageddon as well. And why does it effect deep sea provinces at all?

I assume the water would slow the descent of any meteors from the sky? Plus they do not weigh as much in water.

Read the Message again. It says "the largest earthquake ever", or some such. If you know how water reacts to shockwaves, especially at high pressure, you can imagine that deep sea dwellers might suffer horribly if the very foundation of the world trembles. Plus volcanic rifts could open up, spewing out steam and caustic gases.

Though I agree, if the effect were only half as terrible in terms of poploss, it would still be rather powerful, and would place it more in the realms of useful to someone who intends to chain cast (at great expense), rather than just alchemizing what you have left on the turn you go AI.

[Meglobob]

I tend to think of it as a, 'mass extinction event', just like the half a dozen that have happened through out earths history.

[Gregstrom]

Damnit, you've made me want a Blood version. It could be a 'black mass extinction event'.

[JimMorrison]

Damnit, you've made me want a Blood version. It could be a 'black mass extinction event'.

Black Sabbath extinction event? :p

[Executor]

What's the best way to fight Armagedon, if any? Especially if you're a blood nation?

[Gregstrom]

Kill all Astral nations in the early game. :evil:

Oh, you could put up Astral Corruption. About 1 in 5 Armageddon casts will then get hit by a Doom Horror, which should get past the average bodyguard squad.

[archaeolept]

meh, any wish caster can surely cast returning in order to avoid the horror.

Really, there's not much to do. IMO, armageddon is the only actually over-powered wish, and should be toned down some.

Blood is completely scuppered by it. Use your own wishes to wish for blood? That was my fallback position in Hellscape.

[chrispedersen]

The other problem with armageddon still remains - that it only kills small hp units.

Niefle, Most giants.. completely unaffected. IT needs to be like a straight 5% chance to kill the unit.

I'm putting a comment like this in my wish thread...

[Agema]

A blood nation isn't scuppered by Armageddon. They just need to have their own astral mage who can wish for blood slaves. You get what, 200 per wish or so? Not a bad deal.

Whatever, the next Pantokrator's really going to have rush out the "Go forth and reproduce" edict in order to repopulate the world before the next age starts with all those armageddons.

[Executor]

I think wishing for blood slaves is a bad deal since the ratio is what? 150 blood slaves for 100 astral gems. No.
If maybe 300 a wish then yes, but what the hell can you do with 150 blood slaves? Unless you're Hinnom or Lanka?
Wishing for a Seraph is much better.
A much better uys for those wish gems is to save for AN since the Armageddon is going to kill almost all the population anyway, and everyone will be forced to switch to gems only.

[chrispedersen]

I think wishing for blood slaves is a bad deal since the ratio is what? 150 blood slaves for 100 astral gems. No.
If maybe 300 a wish then yes, but what the hell can you do with 150 blood slaves? Unless you're Hinnom or Lanka?
Wishing for a Seraph is much better.
A much better uys for those wish gems is to save for AN since the Armageddon is going to kill almost all the population anyway, and everyone will be forced to switch to gems only.

250

[LumenPlacidum]

I had several thugs get chest wounds, and several weaker mages die so it seems like AdmiralZhao is right.

Let me understand this, if I may. You suffered ARMAGEDDON and several of your thugs got chest wounds? I need to know where one hires help this tough.

[Endoperez]

I had several thugs get chest wounds, and several weaker mages die so it seems like AdmiralZhao is right.

Let me understand this, if I may. You suffered ARMAGEDDON and several of your thugs got chest wounds? I need to know where one hires help this tough.

:D It sounds more impressive than it really is.

[Zeldor]

Armageddon does kill blood nations. It's 25% pop per one. Few of them and blood income is decreased by 90%. Also the damage to troops is mundane and very random, so protection helps. But yep, giants don't suffer. Well armored troops have very small mortality rate. High-hp non-armored units can get afflictions. Even well armored tartarians can get them.

And if you can wish for slaves every turn, you are not a blood nation. You are astral nation.

[Agema]

And if you can wish for slaves every turn, you are not a blood nation. You are astral nation.

Well, if you're wishing for blood slaves you're probably an astral nation, as a blood nation would generally just hunt for their sacrificial virgins. But a blood nation with an S9-capable mage might still reasonably decide the extra blood slaves more useful than anything else for the wish: they could almost afford a demon lord and a heliophagus for one wish, whereas wishing would get only one and (I think) you'd need to GoR it as well.

[Gregstrom]

Having been a Lanka with over 100 clams in MP, I can say I only once or perhaps twice wished for Blood Slaves. If you're into serious (possibly excessive) forging and summoning (Infernal Tempest/Crusade spamming, for example), there are times when you feel the need for the extra. They would have been handy if someone had raided or artilleried my blood hunters, too.

I guess if you're a Blood nation who can cast Wish, you probably have enough slaves coming in from hunting that you don't often want the extra - and of course Wish does all sorts of things you can't easily get otherwise.

[Kadelake]

I've wished for blood slaves in MP quite a lot as Sauromatia. But yes, you'll probably need to have lots of clams or arcane nexus in order to use it as a strategy. It might be useful otherwise but not cost effective compared to blood hunting.

@Executor: The seraph is severely overrated as an SC and easy to counter. There are several things I'd rather have on my side in a battle. They do have several great uses though. Their great map move, magic diversity, S4 allowing them to teleport entire armies anywhere on the map. But in a big battle I'd usually much rather have a tartarian cyclops.

[Endoperez]

@Executor: The seraph is severely overrated as an SC and easy to counter. There are several things I'd rather have on my side in a battle. They do have several great uses though. Their great map move, magic diversity, S4 allowing them to teleport entire armies anywhere on the map. But in a big battle I'd usually much rather have a tartarian cyclops.

I thought undead are easier to counter than magical beings. What do you think makes up for that? Enc 0, immunity to drain life, different magic, the sheer amount of tartarians that you can mass?

[JimMorrison]

Having been a Lanka with over 100 clams in MP, I can say I only once or perhaps twice wished for Blood Slaves. If you're into serious (possibly excessive) forging and summoning (Infernal Tempest/Crusade spamming, for example), there are times when you feel the need for the extra. They would have been handy if someone had raided or artilleried my blood hunters, too.


Oddly, one could consider mass clamming with a blood nation, to totally supplant manual blood hunting. If you had 100 clams, and thus you were capable of Wishing 250 slaves a turn, turning your blood provinces back to tax production, and freeing up those mages to reanimate/summon/bless/forge could potentially revolutionize your late game.

Of course, as Lanka for example, you might be more than happy to just keep hunting, and roll those wishes into 9 Davanas a turn, or something. :p

[vfb]

@Executor: The seraph is severely overrated as an SC and easy to counter. There are several things I'd rather have on my side in a battle. They do have several great uses though. Their great map move, magic diversity, S4 allowing them to teleport entire armies anywhere on the map. But in a big battle I'd usually much rather have a tartarian cyclops.

I thought undead are easier to counter than magical beings. What do you think makes up for that? Enc 0, immunity to drain life, different magic, the sheer amount of tartarians that you can mass?

Maybe it's the S4 on the Seraph? 3 or 4 S1s would able to Magic Duel it to death.

Tartarians aren't immune to drain life. Only lifeless units are. And shattered soul's timing can be really annoying sometimes.

[Executor]

Yes Sauromatia can clam just fine, they are my favorite nation acctualy (in CBM). But than Armageddon can ruin your day just as easily there too. Not only would you lose the capability to blood hunt but would lose the mages who forge clams ( witch kings, yes they do die very easily to Armageddon ) and the clam holders. Trust me I'm speaking from my experience.

Here's something I like to use with Sauro, just to prove to people that it can be played like this, and very well might I add.

Dom 10 oracle with 6 astral for wish, 4 blood for items and spells (AC is needed), earth 4 for items.
turmoil 3
sloth 1
cold/heat 1
growth 3
luck 3
magic 1

General strategy, dominion kill, clam forging and vampire summoning.

Originally Posted by Kadelake View Post
@Executor: The seraph is severely overrated as an SC and easy to counter. There are several things I'd rather have on my side in a battle. They do have several great uses though. Their great map move, magic diversity, S4 allowing them to teleport entire armies anywhere on the map. But in a big battle I'd usually much rather have a tartarian cyclops.

Well I use Golems the most. But tartarian cyclops are hard to came by. I mean the E3A2 ones, which I think are the best by the way.
But if you're wishing for a SC, Seraphs the SC you want.

[Executor]

Quote:
Maybe it's the S4 on the Seraph? 3 or 4 S1s would able to Magic Duel it to death.

Actually it takes 4 S2 mages to magic duel a Seraph. S2 has a about 27% chance to do it.

[vfb]

Quote:
Maybe it's the S4 on the Seraph? 3 or 4 S1s would able to Magic Duel it to death.

Actually it takes 4 S2 mages to magic duel a Seraph. S2 has a about 27% chance to do it.

You just need to tie the roll, it doesn't matter if your S1 dies.

[Executor]

Yes I know, but I'm saying statisticaly you need 4 S2 mages to win. Sure, you can get by with 3 S1 if you're lucky but better to be safe than sorry.