Guide LA R'lyeh or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Dreamlands [Archive]

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Squirrelloid

June 22nd, 2009, 02:27 AM

I noticed there was only one real guide for playing LA R'lyeh, and it was an MA/LA guide (see here) (http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showthread.php?t=34929) whose LA advice was basically: "Play LA R'lyeh like MA R'lyeh, and take growth to mitigate your dominion's dreamlands effect." Its a good MA guide, and some parts of it (like the early game synopsis, and Baalz post in the thread about R'lyeh as a submarine, for examples) are still relevant, at least to degrees, to LA R'lyeh, but burning 120 design points to mitigate the dreamlands seems wasteful, and otherwise trying to play LA R'lyeh like MA R'lyeh is probably not optimal.

Table of Contents
1. The Dreamlands as a strategic asset
2. Scales
3. Pretender Design
4. Units: Micromanagement Hell
5. Commanders
6. Research
7. Some Additional Strategy Notes

1 - The Dreamlands as a strategic asset
As LA R'lyeh, your dominion is toxic. You will kill off your population amazingly quickly. While this will impact your income and supplies, it will also make taking lands that you have held for any length of time a poor proposition because they simply aren't worthwhile for other nations anymore. This is an advantage - fighting LA R'lyeh is like fighting an opponent with a scorched earth defensive policy, leaving nothing for the invaders. Furthermore, enemy armies that enter your dominion will see their commanders slowly go mad and begin behaving erratically. Pushing your dominion into your opponents' lands will reduce their assets and drive commanders even outside of your borders to madness. The dreamlands is your first line of defense against invasion and an offensive weapon against your neighbors.

2 - Scales

Since spreading your dominion will also spread your scales, you want to choose scales that maximize the toxicity of your dominion.

Death 3 is an obvious first step - since you've already accepted that your population is going to die, they might as well die faster. Its 120 basically free points. (And its not like your starspawn have to worry about old age).

Sloth 3 is even more obvious for LA than MA R'lyeh. Most turns you will only ever purchase a commander in any given territory.

Cold 3 is another obvious choice. You will be mostly unaffected underwater, and your water evocations will benefit on land.

Turmoil 3 and Luck 3 are an advantageous combination for you. On the one hand, your income from holding provinces is going to be poor. There are, however, a large number of events which will give you additional cash. These include the relatively common 100-300 tax, temple donation, and similar events, and scale up to the 1000-3000 gold events. This is an important source of income that doesn't care what your population is, just how many provinces you have (more chances at events).

Good events will also supplement your gem income, which is even more important to you than your cash income in a lot of ways.

Magic 0 is perfectly acceptable - you'll be buying a large number of mage commanders. Anything higher than Magic 1 is unnecessary.

3 - Pretender Design

So, our preferred scales are Tu3 Sl3 De3 Co3 Lk3 Mg0 for the reasons given above. This nets us a massive 360 extra points for our pretender.

Regardless of what chassis you ultimately decide on, the first thing you're going to do is increase your Dominion to 10. Spreading the dreamlands as far and as fast as possible is to your advantage.

R'lyeh has no early bless strategy. Our only purchaseable sacred unit is the priestly Starspawn, who is not immune to insanity and therefore of limited use to us (for the void gate, generally). All our void creatures are sacred, but their availability is unpredictable at best and as such they won't be able to be fielded in any numbers until the mid or late game. At best, a moderate rainbow bless is all we're going to want out of our pretender for this.

We are going to care immensely about our gem income though, which suggests an Awake Rainbow pretender for manual site searching. Despite being aquatic only, I prefer the archmage. With a little bit of air he'll be able to forge himself an amulet of the fish to get onto land later, and has easy access to new paths of magic while having a low chassis cost. A lich or master lich could also work, but the chassis will eat a substantial number of points.

You should definitely prioritize at least N1 so you can find underwater fortifications - they're common and will multiply the number of Starspawn mages you can buy, given cash. A1 will let you make an amulet of the fish if you need it. While you can send out some of your mages to help with site searching, i find having water and astral on your pretender makes your site searching more efficient (although forgoing astral and doing that remotely is certainly an option). Ultimately, having every (non-blood) type of magic in the 1-4 range will help you find a large number of sites quickly and ramp your gem income up. Since Blood is really hard to get into underwater (can't bloodhunt in sea and ocean provinces), it may be best to skip it (although having blood on your pretender can allow you to use bloodhunting for crafting purposes in the midgame - for example, making Robes of the Magi is certainly not a bad idea).

4 - Units: Micromanagement Hell
This is usually the place where a guide writer reviews all your units available for purchase and makes recommendations. Instead, I have a simple analysis: ignore every single non-commander unit you have for purchase. Ok, you'll buy some in the first few turns for early expansion, and the MA/LA guide is perfectly adequate at covering that. But after your second army is out the gates, don't bother.

Reason number 1 is the freespawn. You will get ridiculously large numbers of them. You will need commander units to ferry all these freespawn around and get them to the front so you can sacrifice them en masse. Armies of 500+ units are not implausible. This is, however, micromanagement hell. But you will need to manage the freespawn because they do cost upkeep, and the more of them you can get killed the less of them you have to pay for.

Reason number 2 is you need every available penny for commanders and upkeep. Your battles will be hordes of freespawn backed up by mages and summoned creatures. Having sufficient mages to maintain research and run your armies is critical.

Your freespawn come in a few varieties. Underwater they can use multiple chassises (merman, deep one, triton), and on land they tend to be human or hybrids. They can be Dreamers (regular troop) with good morale and daggers, or Mad Ones (magic troop) with no weapon and unbreakable morale (50!). Additionally, creatures MA R'lyeh can only void gate summon will sometimes appear as freespawn in your provinces, possibly effected by high luck and local dominion strength. These can include such gems as Formless Spawn and Greater Otherness, but I have not observed a Vastness that freespawned yet.

Yes, i know illithids are good. No, you can't afford to keep 50 gold troops around. Get over it (or go play MA R'lyeh where you can enjoy your illithids).

5 - Commanders

Starspawn Mage: 280/1 W1S3 +2 @100% WESD +1 @10% WESD
This is almost where discussion about purchased commanders stops and ends. As your only commander unit (other than your god) who is immune to insanity, these are immensely valuable not only for their spellcasting ability, but for their ability to be able to act every turn as you desire. Many of your freespawn are also magical creatures, so your mages will make decent battlefield commanders as well. They come in a number of distinct flavors, so lets review the most useful ones.

W1E2S3: Your best dry land battle mages, they can cast Summon Earth's Power -> Gift from the Heavens without boosters, and slapping crystal shields and/or rings of wizardry on them will make them even more efficient. Empowering to 1N will give them Eagle Eye, and 1F will give them Magma Eruption.

You'll also want to empower one of these to E3 (can't wear boots, but you'll have the earth gems) so you can make early hammers to help reduce forging costs, especially for astral crafts. This same mage can later be boosted into casting Forge of the Ancients with a RoWizardry and an Elemental Staff.

W1S3D2: Capable of Skelly Spam and some value as artillery support with nether darts. Not the most useful, but useful enough. If you want undead chaffe summons they can provide, although given how much chaffe you have available this is only useful on the front lines to replace losses if you're having logistics issues getting your freespawn there in time, so if/when you capture a laboratory you might make use of this capability.

W1E1S3D1: good as a communion slave to a mixed master pool, or with a crystal shield capable of being versatile between the previous two set ups. You'll put many of these on research duty, but a few as additional support mages scattered across your armies won't go too far wrong.

W3S3: Good summoner early on with pretty decent battlefield evocations once you get spells like ice strike.

W1S5: Good forgers for high level astral crafts (like RoW) and Mindhunters.

Starspawn Priest: 150/1 S1H2 +1 @100% WESD
Unlike their Mage brethren, they are not immune to insanity. However they do come with some Summoner skill, and so are useful for entering the void gate and calling creatures. You probably won't want to buy one until you get Thaum 1 for Returning so you can save him from attacks and getting lost in time and space. (S2 can cast it naturally, S1X1 can cast Power of the Spheres first). Since insanity and getting Lost in T+S will make them inactive for various time periods, eventually having 2 to keep the void gate active is probably a good idea, but this is not a priority.

Starchild: 85/1 S1 stealthy
Despite being prone to insanity, they're a cheap communion slave option and available for purchase at coastal fortresses. You might buy some.

Illithid Lord: 80/39
With 40/40 magical/normal leadership, they're a good chassis for moving troops around. Unfortunately, they do go insane. But they're cheaper than designating mages for ferrying duty.

Slave Mage: 175/1 W2S1 +1 @100%WESN
They can go insane, they aren't that much more efficient than your starspawn at researching (certainly not once you factor in turns lost to insanity), and they lose power on land. However, they do get a chance at nature. Empowering a W2S1N1 to W3 will let them forge clams and summon a Naiad, so you might consider trying for one with a nature pick (although empowering a 3W3S starspawn to 1N will allow the same and is superior, but you're less likely to see a 3W starspawn early. Alternately, if you can spare your pretender from site searching he may be able to summon a Naiad with the right magic paths).

Cultist: H1 +1 @?% S
Freespawn commanders (also available for purchase in coastal forts), they come in two flavors. The underwater one is amphibious and looks like a deepspawn. The land one is human-looking. Both are priests and can have astral magic. Only the land version is purchaseable, although you're unlikely to want to do so. They start insane, and will often take actions like become prophet (even if you have one), allowing you to have many H3 priests. Useful against nations like Ermor who rely on their undead, and for blessing your void troops. Since they can freespawn just about anywhere, they're also useful for ferrying troops around (admittedly without the best magical leadership).

None of the other commanders are even worth considering, and most of the ones discussed above have primarily niche uses. The backbone of your nation is your starspawn mages.

6 - Research
Conjuration 2 is a good early priority because it will let you start eating your water gems summoning a few early sea serpents to quickly dominate any nearby ocean.

Thaum 1 will give you returning for your void gate summoner.

After those Evocation 4 provides Gift from the Heavens (among other useful spells), Enchant 2 allows for skelly spam, Construction 2+ will allow you to start forging things like clams and hammers (with a little empowerment here and there), and Alteration 3 will open up Ethereal Body and the like. More Conjuration is also desirable because your only real access to good troops is summoning them, and you'll have the gem income to do so. Enough Thaumaturgy to get spells like teleport and gateway is also an excellent idea. How you prioritize these is subject to personal preference and what your local opposition looks like - evocation is less useful in an underwater war (with say a nearby Atlantis), whereas it will be critical for any serious land expansion.

Your emphasis on purchasing lots of high quality mages puts you in good position to dominate the research game, so you have a good shot at getting unique summons like the elemental rulers first, or getting your choice of global enchantments - and you'll have the gem income to do either. Once you get the necessary early research done, you may consider focusing your efforts on one of these two goals.

You have a unique commander summon at Conj 6: Contact Void Spectre. Absolutely any Starspawn Mage can cast this spell, and it gives you an ethereal undead starspawn commander who is stealthy, has S4, and causes insanity in the province he's in. Summoning and infiltrating large numbers of these can be a great way to get a dreamlands-like effect deep in enemy territory, improve your information advantage, and possibly quickly capture lightly defended territories. Sitting one or more of these on your opponents' research centers will eventually cause him to lose a lot of research/crafting/ritual casting time, and he may not even think to check and see if they've gained an insanity score. And between astral buffs and some half-way decent gear they can solo typical levels of PD.

7 - Some Additional Strategy Notes
The first thing to note is that LA R'lyeh retains all the magical strength of MA R'lyeh, so the MA/LA guide is a good place to start for this. Mindhunting, information advantage via scrying, using R'lyeh as a 'submarine' (see Baalz response in the MA/LA guide), and more are still excellent ideas. In fact, you're likely to have even more mages than an MA R'lyeh player would.

The challenge with LA R'lyeh will be capitalizing on your two strengths, both of which will require lots of micromanagement. You will have a large number of powerful mages to use, and a large number of weak but steadfast troops scattered across your provinces.

You will have exceptional gem income, especially in N, W, and S with decent E and D. Don't be afraid to use your N gems to empower some battle mages - Eagle Eyes will be quite useful in getting the most out of your evocation spells. Churning out 10-20 mages worth of summons (like Wolves of Winter) in one turn is also a fairly effective way to build a decent midgame upkeep-free army from scratch.

Do put some mages on forge duty. Crystal Shields, Robes of Invulnerability, Rings of Wizardry, and other gear to protect and enhance your mages are all excellent ideas, and you can afford them in numbers to kit out your battlemages.

I like to turn my initial scout into a prophet and use him to search for holy sites - underwater temples are a common feature with S gem income.

Steer clear of summons which will cost you gold in upkeep. You will need to support a heavy upkeep burden without willfully taking on Troll summons or the like, don't make it worse than it already is.

thejeff

June 22nd, 2009, 07:45 AM

I have seen Vastnesses freespawn.
It can happen pretty early on, when they are really hard to counter.

Humakty

June 22nd, 2009, 08:47 AM

Why would I empower a W2 slave mage to reach W3 ? A simple ring can do the trick (costing 5 gems without hammer), avoiding the 50 gems empowerment if you go the starspawn way.

Trumanator

June 22nd, 2009, 09:44 AM

Seeing as how you will most likely get a pretty decent F and E income, I think that the Alchemist stone would probably be a surprisingly useful artifact for R'yleh. It will probably take some effort to get the paths, but after that you won't need to worry nearly as much about money in the late game.

Illuminated One

June 22nd, 2009, 10:19 AM

Some thoughts:

1st) I agree on the scales mostly.
However take Magic 3 - this has a good synergy with Luck for Magic Gem/Item events (and I think the 3000 gold + item event).
Additionaly with your income going to below zero sooner or later this will help keeping your research up. And, what's more all the nasty things that you can unleash on someone rushing you is mr negates, while m3 decreases mr.

2nd) Your crappy scales afford you a "rainbow SC" (especially if you take dom 10). I'd say take air and earth (since you'll have a hard time into that), the rest is up to you.
I'd definitely take something combat oriented, as your armies are even worse than the worst crap sane minds can imagine. The main problem is that they can't damage anything. Someone to use the offensive earth buffs might be worth it, although with some gems some of the illithids can do it, and for most of the time it's to dangerous to have your god hang around only protected by dreamers.

3rd) Your illithids can be thugged out to some extend and can all teleport. Your S2 illithid priests can even be blessed and teleport with a starshine cap.
Neat trick - get to the artifacts before anyone and forge the pocket lich and the pocket knight. Give it to an illithid scripted to (returning).
Teleport him into a province, the illithid will return taking the items with him, but the pocket creatures will stick around and fight the defenders.

4th) Make use of your national spells.
The illithid spectre is stealthy, flying and turns people insane.
Dreams of R'lyeh is about the coolest assassination spell ever.
Especially when someone attacks you uw - his troops will just drown.

Squirrelloid

June 22nd, 2009, 10:30 AM

Why would I empower a W2 slave mage to reach W3 ? A simple ring can do the trick (costing 5 gems without hammer), avoiding the 50 gems empowerment if you go the starspawn way.

Tempo. You can't afford that much construction before you want to start pumping out the clams, and you can use all the astral pearls you can get your grubby little tentacles on.

Its not just a question of 'can i get to W3N1 eventually?' Its 'Can i get to W3N1 before the end of year 2?' And you'll have a lot of water and nature gems, don't be shy about spending them.

P3D

June 22nd, 2009, 03:40 PM

Yes, dreams of R'lyeh is frustratingly effective and almost free for 4S. Penetration items and Soul Slay will kill almost any commanders without MR items (MR getting halved).

chrispedersen

June 23rd, 2009, 12:23 AM

No, no no no no!

Take a void lurker with W2+N4+S7+D3+. Only positive scale to consider: Luck +3. Magic +3.

You will get tons o free spawn mages. Useful in communion or researchers with +2 magic.

Research priorities: Conjuration, (voice of tiamat). Thaumaturgy (teleport, gateway, telistic animation, ritual of returning).
Construction: Whip of command, Sceptre of authority, crown of command. CLAMS. Starshine skullcaps.
Evocation: Astral projection to scout. If you're the cautious type.

Make your start build all mindblasters. Last troops you will ever buy.

Forget sea serpents. You need your water gems for water boosters (to let your slaves make clams), clams, shark attack.

Voice + tiamat + your pretender search will let you find any mage sites.

After you have shark attack, teleport, and gateway: Teleport into a possibly hostile water. Build a lab, PD, troops, and a commander (so have cash). Gate troops in, cast telistic animation to get a temple and spread dominion.

Speaking of gating:

sure you can gate with 15+50 or so troops. Or you can tag on all those equipment I named, and gate with around 200 troops - and have awe. You need to spend the gems on cmd items in order to save astral gems - which you *will* be short of.

your voices of tiamats are going to run you tons of extra earth, fire. I suggest you empower a mage with fire for the scepters of authority.

get one foot on land fairly soon. Cast a couple of black servents. Soon they will go crazy and prophetize themselves. Use them to raise undead - which your dominion is going to be killing off like crazy.

Body guard an S2 void summoner until you get returning.

You will also want nature items to make cauldrons etc to prevent starvation. Huge double bonus- makes your underwater provinces even more difficult for your opponents to storm.

Regarding mages: you fairly quickly have to make some choices.
Go with the priests that are 150ish with 6 rp, or the go with the pure mages that are around 280 for 8 rp.

With the +2 rp from magic scale, your $/rp upkeep is WAY lower on your sacreds. They are your go to guys for research.

But your mages recruitable everywhere are your goto guys for D2. Plus your S4, S5 etc.

Sooner or later you will get a visitor. Save your air gems to empower him for arrowfend.

Another reason for land: Your slave mages have feet. Soooo you can give em earth boots for a dwarf hammer.

***Pay attention**** to your first prophet. Its your last chance to actually know who is spreading dominion. Only your real prophet will. However, the battalions of fake prophets are worthwhile for preaching, smiting, and communions.

Many nations have astral mages. None of them are as good as you. Magic duel is your friend.

Lastly: Cold 3 is preferable to Heat 3. However, if the temperature scales strongly favor your competitors reverse the field.

So, abysia, mictlan, machaka in the game: go cold:

Caelum, Niefle, vanheim: go heat.

I *never* search with an intial prophet unless he *truly* has nothing to do. (hard to imagine). You have crazy guys that will holy search, without your input. let em.

Star children: Some of the *best* assassins in the game. What are you going to do: Mind hunt them?

Lastly: Be slightly aware that sea nations need to have a slightly elevated dominion compared to land nations due to the ratio of land to water. Usually I play 7-10 dominion with LA-R, but I would consider 5 the minimum. I would dare 4 with some land nations.

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 01:37 AM

Maybe I have a very different idea of what LA R'lyeh is doing, but I think you are actively wrong on a number of points. I've tried to cover what I consider the vital differences of opinion below.

No, no no no no!

Take a void lurker with W2+N4+S7+D3+. Only positive scale to consider: Luck +3. Magic +3.

I really dislike a pretender who is immobile for this. Manual site searching will net more gem income and not waste gems doing so, and the only way remote site searching can even compare to a rainbow pretender manually searching is by casting Acashic Record, which requires a whopping 25 astral gems and researching Conj 5.

Which isn't to say you can't make a Void Lurker work for you, but its hardly optimal.

Edit: What the heck does your pretender need S7 for anyway? You can get S9 on a W1S5 Starspawn mage with boosters (coin, RoW, cap to S8, Blood allows Robe of the Magi and there are also artifacts you could use). Its not like your pretender needs to make up for an astral deficiency. Astral is probably your pretenders *least* important magical path.

You will get tons o free spawn mages. Useful in communion or researchers with +2 magic.

Is that an effect of scales? So magic 3 improves the number of free spawn mages you get? I'm pretty sure this is actively untrue.

I did a little more looking at the freespawn commanders. They are either Cultist or Mad Cultist (Mad Cultists have S1). Based on the purchaseable variety, that's just a flat 20% chance. Now, someone else has already provided a more plausible argument for taking better magic scales (better chance at the 3000 gold + magic item + gems event), and a more relevant one, since your caster freespawn are actually less useful than your non-caster freespawn. The reason is that freespawn units come in magical and non-magical varieties, and you already have a lot of magical leadership in your starspawn mages, so what you are short on is normal leadership. Mad Cultists only have 10 leadership, Cultists have 40. The difference between picking up 10 and 40 is huge for your micromanagement woes, and while you can forge scepters of authority if your pretender has fire... he honestly has better things to be doing.

Research priorities: Conjuration, (voice of tiamat). Thaumaturgy (teleport, gateway, telistic animation, ritual of returning).
Construction: Whip of command, Sceptre of authority, crown of command. CLAMS. Starshine skullcaps.
Evocation: Astral projection to scout. If you're the cautious type.

Make your start build all mindblasters. Last troops you will ever buy.

This is incredibly stupid for LA R'lyeh. You cannot afford the upkeep on them. Would you rather have 5.5 illithid troops or another starspawn mage? I'd rather have the starspawn mage - he'll be far better in combat than 5.5 illithids. And that's the real trade off, both in terms of initial purchase and in terms of upkeep. And that starspawn mage can be forging or researching while he's not off providing tactical casting support - what are those illithid troops doing other than eating your money when they aren't fighting?

Forget sea serpents. You need your water gems for water boosters (to let your slaves make clams), clams, shark attack.

Voice + tiamat + your pretender search will let you find any mage sites.

Ok, first I just have to point out that it's hilarious you're against a few sea serpents in year 1 or early 2 at 8 water gems each, but you're in favor of many many castings of Tiamat's instead of manual site searching, also at 8 water gems each. Trust me, 4-5 sea serpents (40 water gems for 5) isn't going to restrict your forging capability nearly as much as 80-160 water gems burnt on site searching.

Second, that water booster requires Construction *6*. How soon do you expect to have that online? Better to empower someone so they can start making clams at construction 2, and can summon a Naiad (also possible earlier than Conj 6) who can summon more naiads and make clams herself. By the time you actually get those water boosters online you'll have so many water gems in my proposed method of doing things that you could spend 100 in a turn and not even notice.

Finally, your pretender search? Didn't you just advocate a Void Lurker? You know, immobile. Will need to build a lab to cast teleport. Pain in the *** and will cost you 500 cash every 3rd turn? And will cost you gems to move. I've even tried this. It sucked. A lot. I can't believe anyone advocating this has actually tried it in practice.

(snipped teleporting stuff)

Remote attacking is good. I left that as an exercise to the reader. (Or you could just read Baalz wonderful post in the other guide on the subject).

get one foot on land fairly soon. Cast a couple of black servents. Soon they will go crazy and prophetize themselves. Use them to raise undead - which your dominion is going to be killing off like crazy.

While utilizing insane commanders for troop ferrying is a necessity (just because so much ferrying needs to be done, and insane commanders are there and might as well do something), having strategies which involve getting to actively use insane commanders leads to disappointment. This will become a theme below.

Body guard an S2 void summoner until you get returning.

Alternative: Get returning month 2 (your pretender is doing research for the first two months - get Thaum 1 right away). Then buy your starspawn priest. Problem solved.

You will also want nature items to make cauldrons etc to prevent starvation. Huge double bonus- makes your underwater provinces even more difficult for your opponents to storm.

Cauldrons are nice, but at some point I just stopped caring. Who cares if they starve? You're just going to get them massacred by the thousands. Starving will not make them notably worse in combat. And every cauldron you make is a clam you didn't make. I'm going to side with Marie Antoinette on this one: "Laissez-les mange le gateau."

Regarding mages: you fairly quickly have to make some choices.
Go with the priests that are 150ish with 6 rp, or the go with the pure mages that are around 280 for 8 rp.

With the +2 rp from magic scale, your $/rp upkeep is WAY lower on your sacreds. They are your go to guys for research.

But your mages recruitable everywhere are your goto guys for D2. Plus your S4, S5 etc.

Sure, rp/$ is way lower. Until you realize that *only* the starspawn mages are immune to insanity. So eventually your starspawn priests go insane and start losing research turns. Eventually they become so insane you never get to give them an order again. So their average rp/$ is actually worse than the starspawn mages. And that's just considering their value for research.

Starspawn mages are also far better for combat and crafting purposes. So if you go with the priestly starspawn you'll have to build all your mages for those other purposes from scratch whereas you'll have a ready pool of workers who can be diversified into all your vital projects. Acquiring a mage task force early will also start generating various magic path combinations on your mages so you'll have the mages you want on-hand for particular crafting or combat applications. Basically, you pay more for them, but you get a lot more out of them and will have the capabilities you need as soon as you need them, not 5 months down the road.

Starspawn priests are a trap. Just get two for playing in the void gate and then forget about them.

Another reason for land: Your slave mages have feet. Soooo you can give em earth boots for a dwarf hammer.

I don't understand how this helps. At best a slave mage has E1. Boots -> E2, Hammer requires E3. Your Starspawn mages can have E2. Both will need empowering to make a hammer. Your starspawn mage won't ever go insane. Winner: Starspawn.

The only use for a slave mage is the Nature pick, and even then its pretty marginal because you're buying a commander who can go insane. Despite the lower likelihood, trying for a W3S3 starspawn and empowering to N1 is probably better for you. Especially since you're going to buy a lot of starspawns anyway.

I can't emphasize enough how bad commanders other than the starspawn mages are for you. It won't seem bad early on, but as they get increasingly insane you'll find yourself losing months of time waiting for them to become sane again. Making your research dependent on characters who could all decide to start calling god instead of researching is a recipe for disaster.

I *never* search with an intial prophet unless he *truly* has nothing to do. (hard to imagine). You have crazy guys that will holy search, without your input. let em.

What does your prophet have to do in the early game again? Oh right, nothing. He should join a main army with a good number of void summons so he can divine bless them with whatever rainbow bless benefits you have.

Star children: Some of the *best* assassins in the game. What are you going to do: Mind hunt them?

Star children are *also* prone to insanity. And Every ~3 of them could have been another starspawn mage. That starspawn mage can simply mindhunt or dreams of r'lyeh a province (with higher success rate against more targets) without having to move there first, making a single starspawn mage vastly more effective at killing enemy commanders than three star children at the cost of a pittance of astral pearls. They have a niche use as slaves in communions, nothing more (and i'm even starting to regret buying some for that in my current game).

Summary:
Your conception lacks understanding of some basic principles.

Tempo. You realize you can get something eventually, but you never think about how long it will take you to get it. Getting things early is important.

Relative gem throughput. You criticize ~40 gems spent in the first 2 years on summons, and advocate spending 4x as many in that period on remote site searching.

Insanity. Only one (living) commander unit type is immune - the Starspawn mage. This is such an advantage over every other option that it trumps virtually any considerations of efficiency, because insanity is a hidden efficiency cost of those other options. And he does absolutely everything you need a commander to do, including lead large numbers of troops (higher than Illithid Lords out of the box, admittedly biased strongly towards magical troops). Basically, the Starspawn mage is hugely efficient by any metric except gold cost, and once you figure insanity into the equation, he's at least equal in efficiency with the other options.

Calahan

June 23rd, 2009, 03:13 AM

That's some very nice work indeed Squirrelloid. Many thanks for your time and effort.

WraithLord

June 23rd, 2009, 03:56 AM

Are all R'lyeh pretenders immune to insanity?

I know for certain that enemy pretenders are not immune.

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 04:21 AM

Well, as long as I have insomnia...

I started a new game as LA R'lyeh with a random medium map with 10 total players. Pretender:

Archmage awake Tu3 Sl3 De3 Co3 Lk3 Mg0 Dom9
A4E4F4W4N4D4

This results in 0 unused points. So i'm willing to step back from Dom10 as an absolute - Dom9 is probably plenty strong enough and a lot more rainbow friendly. I really want to squeeze some Magic in there, but I keep feeling like I don't need the extra research points since my mages already generate a good number, and thus it feels inferior to rainbowing my pretender.

Its probably possible to cut down the magic a little bit (most sites will be found with X3 instead of X4), and since your early site searching will be entirely aquatic you can base it off the possible sites in oceanic provinces, but I like the ability to give a decent rainbow bless to my void creatures, and getting to 4 also enables virtually all the boosters.

You'll note an astral absence - i have plenty of astral without giving it to my pretender, and why tempt anyone to try and mage duel him?

At the end of year 1 I've only got 6 provinces (mostly due to some unlucky battle results and/or independent compositions - shamblers absolutely destroy most of your troops and i've seen two provinces with them), but i've site searched all my provinces and have reasonable gem income, have seen one 3000 gold event rather late in the year (still using that cash, >2000 remaining), and have 3 fortresses (2 from site searching), 2 labs, 11 starspawn mages, 1 starspawn priest, and a national hero (the aboleth). I researched Conj 2/Thaum 1/Evoc 2/Conj 3 in that order, and am header to Conj 4. Have 4 sea serpents as (part of) my main expansion force, and am realizing that rapid expansion isn't critical here - provinces are really only as good as my ability to site search them.

With a little less risky play and less annoying independents, I'd probably have 8 provinces trivially. I'm also way up in the research game because I'm only buying starspawn mages, and haven't bought a non-commander unit since turn 1. (More attention to units and early expansion could certainly have netted me more provinces at the cost of research, which i decided was more critical).

Important tip: Rename all your mages to their magic paths. This'll make finding the right mage *much* easier.

Edit: Also, not being attacked by stupidly strong independents when you have Luck 3 would be nice.

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 04:23 AM

Are all R'lyeh pretenders immune to insanity?

I know for certain that enemy pretenders are not immune.

I'm reasonably sure they are. At least, my archmage has never gone insane in any of 3 games, and i see no reason why he'd have special immunity.

WraithLord

June 23rd, 2009, 04:38 AM

Are the heroes immune to insanity?- Cthugul and Auluudh?

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 04:53 AM

Are the heroes immune to insanity?- Cthugul and Auluudh?

You know, i never really checked. However, as one of my games went through a few *years* of turns with both Cthugul and Auluudh sitting in my capitol, and neither of them was ever insane, my guess is yes.

Illuminated One

June 23rd, 2009, 07:46 AM

Natpy

June 23rd, 2009, 08:14 AM

I think Master Lich is a better choice for the almost same price. With dom10 he is even cheaper.

WraithLord

June 23rd, 2009, 08:17 AM

So Illuminated One, how would the starspawn priests go insane if not from the insanity dominion?
And what are you basing that claim on, manual, tests?
Do you make that claim only for the priests or also for some of the other commanders as well, like the starchilds?

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 09:28 AM

Sure, rp/$ is way lower. Until you realize that *only* the starspawn mages are immune to insanity. So eventually your starspawn priests go insane and start losing research turns. Eventually they become so insane you never get to give them an order again. So their average rp/$ is actually worse than the starspawn mages. And that's just considering their value for research.

That's not true, starspawn priests can go insane yes, but they will never from your dominion - at least I've yet to see it.

I've seen a starspawn priest go insane. Ok, I don't know for certain it was from dominion, but what else would it be from?

Natpy

June 23rd, 2009, 09:44 AM

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 10:00 AM

So, even accepting that Starspawn priests are immune to dominion-based insanity, I still feel you want to be pumping out mages. You need to start generating different path combinations early and often, and those mages will be far more useful at a variety of tasks, not just researching. Effectively, you need your workforce to be capable of multi-tasking, and need to have the necessary magical capabilities already lined up before you actually need them.

It does suggest that once you have what you consider enough magical might (imho, somewhere in the 30-50 mage department is probably sufficient for awhile) you should purchase the priests for research duty (which will help free up some of those mage assets for other tasks even when those tasks aren't critical).

Illuminated One

June 23rd, 2009, 12:14 PM

Sorry for not being clear, it's as Napty says, but they don't get insane just for hanging out in your Dom, only based on having a good bunch of illithid priests for 40+ turns.
Everything else (Starchild, Freespawn) goes insane.

It does suggest that once you have what you consider enough magical might (imho, somewhere in the 30-50 mage department is probably sufficient for awhile) you should purchase the priests for research duty (which will help free up some of those mage assets for other tasks even when those tasks aren't critical).

I'd go the other way round, I'd first build a research base from the cheap mages you have around and then start building some combat mages.

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 12:47 PM

It does suggest that once you have what you consider enough magical might (imho, somewhere in the 30-50 mage department is probably sufficient for awhile) you should purchase the priests for research duty (which will help free up some of those mage assets for other tasks even when those tasks aren't critical).

I'd go the other way round, I'd first build a research base from the cheap mages you have around and then start building some combat mages.

Here's the problem I have with that theory: you won't get the starspawn mages you need reliably, and that's a problem. There are a lot of possible combinations, and only a few of them are really desirable (many of the others are pretty interchangeable). W3S3, W1E2S3, W1S3D2, and W1S5 are your preferred combinations for most purposes, and to get those in any numbers you need to buy a lot of mages.

Further, starspawn mages are more efficient turn-wise with research, and are more efficient capability-wise as well. I'll pay the extra upkeep/purchase price for that versatility alone. That they are better than the priest starspawn at any activity isn't something to be looked down at. Only after my versatility needs are met would I start to think about specialist researchers. (If you could purchase the exact paths you wanted when you bought a mage my opinion might be different, but the random element means I want to have those mages before i need them so i do have them when i need them and don't need to spend 4+ turns buying mages to try and get the one(s) i need).

Its not like you need to buy troops. You're trading gold efficiency for other kinds of efficiency, and advantages like research tempo and crafting tempo.

Edit: Want efficient cheap research? Craft skull mentors.

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 01:22 PM

Hmm... edit period expired. Consider this an addendum to the previous post.

On specific mage path demands: When you get construction 2 the items you most want are dwarven hammers, clams, and crystal shields. This requires you have a W3S3 mage ready to be empowered to N1 (preferable way to get clams), and a W1E2S3 mage ready to be empowered to E3 for the hammer (also minimal mage to make the shields before empowerment, so you may want more than one). The odds of getting both picks in the same school is 1/16, but with a 10% chance of +1WESD getting either of those is more like 1/15. That's an expectation you'll have to buy 15 mages to see the one you want. Don't wait to start buying.

Assuming no 3rd random pick, distribution of mage paths are as follows. Especially desirable combinations are marked with an asterix.

W3S3* : 1/16
W2S4 : 1/8
W1S5* : 1/16
W1E1S4 : 1/8
W1E2S3* : 1/16
W2E1S3 : 1/8
W1S4D1 : 1/8
W1S3D2* : 1/16
W2S3D1 : 1/8
W1E1S3D1 : 1/8

chrispedersen

June 23rd, 2009, 01:47 PM

Take a void lurker with W2+N4+S7+D3+. Only positive scale to consider: Luck +3. Magic +3.

I really dislike a pretender who is immobile for this. Manual site searching will net more gem income and not waste gems doing so, and the only way remote site searching can even compare to a rainbow pretender manually searching is by casting Acashic Record, which requires a whopping 25 astral gems and researching Conj 5.

I never suggested Acashic record - complete waste of gems.

You are completely right, that this is a game of tempo. But you are completely wrong in suggesting that the only way remote site searching can compare is with acashic record.

Check out the other thread, where I show what the distribution of underwater sites are. Realize that by casting Voice of Tiamat *every* turn, you will on average have a *higher* gem production, and a higher total research by turn 12 than you will by manual site searching with your pretender.

Edit: What the heck does your pretender need S7 for anyway? You can get S9 on a W1S5 Starspawn mage with boosters (coin, RoW, cap to S8, Blood allows Robe of the Magi and there are also artifacts you could use). Its not like your pretender needs to make up for an astral deficiency. Astral is probably your pretenders *least* important magical path.

You are planning on an A5B5 (with or without boosters) when there are no blood sites underwater? And you are going to get 50 blood slaves how? When your dominion kills off population like crazy, and you have no blood hunters save your pretender?

Finally, you need S7 on your pretender because Astral gems are at a premium. You will need every single astral gem you get your hands on. As the game will be won or lost often by the endgame wishes/master enslave - every single S on your pretender is an astral gem that doesn't have to be dedicated to a booster.

You will get tons o free spawn mages. Useful in communion or researchers with +2 magic.

Is that an effect of scales? So magic 3 improves the number of free spawn mages you get? I'm pretty sure this is actively untrue.

You suggest later on that I don't know the game. To make the above statement really reveals *your* lack of knowledge.

I am not saying that Magic 3 improves the number of free spawn mages you get.

I'm saying that without M3 they are 3-4rp each. With M3 they are 5-6rp. (I forget which). And as you will have literally 100-200 of these by endgame, the M3 scale will be earning you hundreds of rp.

Now someone else has already provided a more plausible argument for taking better magic scales (better chance at the 3000 gold + magic item + gems event), and a more relevant one, since your caster freespawn are actually less useful than your non-caster freespawn.

You have obviously never used a communion.

The reason is that freespawn units come in magical and non-magical varieties, and you already have a lot of magical leadership in your starspawn mages, so what you are short on is normal leadership. Mad Cultists only have 10 leadership, Cultists have 40. The difference between picking up 10 and 40 is huge for your micromanagement woes, and while you can forge scepters of authority if your pretender has fire... he honestly has better things to be doing.

Make your start build all mindblasters. Last troops you will ever buy.

This is incredibly stupid for LA R'lyeh. You cannot afford the upkeep on them. Would you rather have 5.5 illithid troops or another starspawn mage? I'd rather have the starspawn mage - he'll be far better in combat than 5.5 illithids. And that's the real trade off, both in terms of initial purchase and in terms of upkeep. And that starspawn mage can be forging or researching while he's not off providing tactical casting support - what are those illithid troops doing other than eating your money when they aren't fighting?

I said your starting build. 8 troops. Which you can support the upkeep on. And which will help your initial expansion tremendously. And by the time you get to mid game they are dead.

Hard to see how 8 troops can be *incredibly* stupid. Especially since it works.

You can build a starting mage, if you wish. But there about a 25% chance that your starting troops will be unable to take a province turn two.

I'd rather ensure I take a province turn two, than gamble on it.

Ok, first I just have to point out that it's hilarious you're against a few sea serpents in year 1 or early 2 at 8 water gems each, but you're in favor of many many castings of Tiamat's instead of manual site searching.

I am not against manual site searching. I'm against buying a rainbow pretender for site searching.

However the more salient detail is this: My approach, which you ridicule trades water gems for research. Ie., by turn 12 if you follow my approach, you will have higher research and higher gem production on average. Just no sea serpents.

Second, that water booster requires Construction *6*. How soon do you expect to have that online?

You think water boosters require Con6? Have you checked recently?

Finally, your pretender search? Didn't you just advocate a Void Lurker? You know, immobile. Will need to build a lab to cast teleport. Pain in the *** and will cost you 500 cash every 3rd turn? And will cost you gems to move. I've even tried this. It sucked. A lot. I can't believe anyone advocating this has actually tried it in practice.

Try listening. In most maps you will have remote waters that are *not* connected to your original starting position.

The ability to take those locations early game and project dominion is critical.

You will be building a castle and a lab there in *any* event. You know, for things like mage recruitment.

What my pretender design allows you to do is teleport and take those locations that you *cannot* do with your build.

Aka: you can move to them, as the archmage can't go on land. And you can't teleport to them, because you're not strong enough to beat the indy defender.

Sure, rp/$ is way lower. Until you realize that *only* the starspawn mages are immune to insanity.

Factually not true. It makes me wonder if you have actually played the race.

I have never seen more than 1-2 of either type go insane from dominion.

Starspawn priests are a trap. Just get two for playing in the void gate and then forget about them.

Personally, I buy mages until I get the combos I need and priests thereafter.

I don't understand how this helps. At best a slave mage has E1. Boots -> E2, Hammer requires E3. Your Starspawn mages can have E2. Both will need empowering to make a hammer. Your starspawn mage won't ever go insane. Winner: Starspawn.

The only use for a slave mage is the Nature pick, and even then its pretty marginal because you're buying a commander who can go insane. Despite the lower likelihood, trying for a W3S3 starspawn and empowering to N1 is probably better for you. Especially since you're going to buy a lot of starspawns anyway.

I can't emphasize enough how bad commanders other than the starspawn mages are for you. It won't seem bad early on, but as they get increasingly insane you'll find yourself losing months of time waiting for them to become sane again. Making your research dependent on characters who could all decide to start calling god instead of researching is a recipe for disaster.

So much of this is just flat out wrong. Your priests realistically, don't go insane. And its a MR roll for your slave mages to avoid going insane. Yes slave mages will go insane. At the end of year two, most recent game, I had purchased three early slave mages. Two had no insanity at the end of year two. One had 9 insanity.

Go luck at the probability charts at the front of the book. Look at mages mr, and see the chance of going progressively insane.

I'd rather spend 600 gold for 4 slave mages with a 25% nature pic - and a variety of other useful picks (like water, for voice of tiamat) than 90 design points for N4 on an archmage.

You have a 1/16 chance of getting a e2 or d2 mage. I can not tell you the number of times I have gone 2 years without getting either. I did a statistical calculation after one of my games. (I'm sure someone will do it again in an attempt to disprove the point). But after the end of year two you still have a significant (40%?), chance to not have gotten *ANY* d2 mages.

I *never* search with an intial prophet unless he *truly* has nothing to do. (hard to imagine). You have crazy guys that will holy search, without your input. let em.

What does your prophet have to do in the early game again? Oh right, nothing. He should join a main army with a good number of void summons so he can divine bless them with whatever rainbow bless benefits you have.

Seems like now you're telling him to do what I have him do: Accompany an army. I usually smite more, as in the early game the sacred spawns are few, and the weaker types.

Alternately, if you prophetized your scout - you are using him to project dominion in an enemy land. Or your own. The strength of the free spawns in your land is directly tied to your dominion strength.

There are twelve? (again going by memory) holy sites. Don't get me wrong - I will happily site search with free spawn priests. Or let them do it themselves. Your prophet has better things to do.

Star children: Some of the *best* assassins in the game. What are you going to do: Mind hunt them?

Star children are *also* prone to insanity. And Every ~3 of them could have been another starspawn mage. That starspawn mage can simply mindhunt or dreams of r'lyeh a province (with higher success rate against more targets) without having to move there first, making a single starspawn mage vastly more effective at killing enemy commanders than three star children at the cost of a pittance of astral pearls. They have a niche use as slaves in communions, nothing more (and i'm even starting to regret buying some for that in my current game).

And what do you do against an opponent that has astral mages, before you have dreams? Mindhunting marignon, ermor, lizard shaman is a rapid invitation to feeblemind.

Against many of these nations, an 85 gp starchild is a good trade. Especially since its the only thing you can build *on land*.

I don't quibble that I would *rather* build a mage or priest, most of the time. However, you ignored a unit that is useful 25-30% of the time. It deserves mention.

Summary:
Your conception lacks understanding of some basic principles.

Tempo. You realize you can get something eventually, but you never think about how long it will take you to get it. Getting things early is important.

Relative gem throughput. You criticize ~40 gems spent in the first 2 years on summons, and advocate spending 4x as many in that period on remote site searching.

Insanity. Only one (living) commander unit type is immune - the Starspawn mage. This is such an advantage over every other option that it trumps virtually any considerations of efficiency, because insanity is a hidden efficiency cost of those other options. And he does absolutely everything you need a commander to do, including lead large numbers of troops (higher than Illithid Lords out of the box, admittedly biased strongly towards magical troops). Basically, the Starspawn mage is hugely efficient by any metric except gold cost, and once you figure insanity into the equation, he's at least equal in efficiency with the other options.

Just wrong. For all intents an purposes, mages and priests are both effectively immune.

A priest with M3 is 8 rp for an upkeep cost of 5. A mage is 10 for an upkeep cost of 10. Thats a 60% advantage for priests - and you are unwise to ignore it. (I'm going by memory, so if anyone wants to correct the math, feel free).

Lastly: Cauldrons/wine skins are more than worthwhile for the increase in combat efficiency. Sure, its not my first priority either.

Dragging around hundreds of diseased (and starving) units means that they have lower hitpoints. They die easier, and route faster requiring more leadership for the same combat effectiveness. Healing spells (no, I'm not a fan) are not effective, and they aquire afflictions which reduce their effectiveness further. Crippled, blind, etc.

As for not understanding key concepts, I'd be happy to play a game or two to demonstrate my lack of understanding.

Look, generally, I agree with a lot of your guide - and I think its valuable and a pretty solid.

But you are wrong on several key points:
1. Priests, effectively, don't go insane.
2. Mage+3 scale is perfectly viable, and probably the best way to go.
3. Freespawn mages are *useful*.
4. And I quibble on some of your design choices. Blood on your pretender, for example. I believe the extra hp for the void lurker, astral picks, and extra dominion more than make up for immobility and 20 path cost.

Fundamentally, you are saying that it is better to buy FxWxExAx on your pretender, and site search every other turn, than use the design points for Magic3, and site search every turn with Voice of Tiamat with a 150 gp mage.

Personally, I don't agree with you - but I wouldn't say you're choice is ridiculous, or demonstrates a lack of knowledge of the game.

thejeff

June 23rd, 2009, 02:01 PM

It seems to me this approach trades off early game for mid/late game potential.
You might be able to get away with this, because there's no direct competition for water in the Late Age. 6-8 provinces in the first year will put you dead last in expansion. That may be okay if no one else is able to get into the water effectively, you can finish taking water provinces at your leisure. It'll certainly work in SP.

In MP, what do you do when you run into Atlantis and Mictlan and don't have any expansion after the first year without an early war that you really don't want? Ermor may be trying to grab some water as well. Not sure who else.

chrispedersen

June 23rd, 2009, 02:12 PM

I agree that my approach has better endgame potential.

However, I don't concede that it costs anything in the early game.
The archmage with no research is of no use in early expansion. In my opinion 8 mind blasters paralyzing closest adds as much combat effectiveness as your archmage pretender.

Of course if ermor, or mictlan get into the sea, you do whatever it takes to take the seas. Including sea serpents, if necessary = ). I just dont' think it should be a tactic against indies.

Against opposition - it depends on setup. Connected waterways? Chokepoints?

thejeff

June 23rd, 2009, 02:43 PM

chrispedersen

June 23rd, 2009, 02:59 PM

Agree completely.

Gregstrom

June 23rd, 2009, 04:46 PM

thejeff

June 23rd, 2009, 04:54 PM

That's right. I'd forgotten about Jomon's new underwater units.

They're not guaranteed to start by the coast and lack an easy way into the water, though.

Gregstrom

June 23rd, 2009, 05:21 PM

Yeah. That recruitable dragon mage is good motivation though.

Illuminated One

June 23rd, 2009, 05:58 PM

In MP, what do you do when you run into Atlantis and Mictlan and don't have any expansion after the first year without an early war that you really don't want? Ermor may be trying to grab some water as well. Not sure who else.

In CBM cast Sea of Ice. By the time he can react you should have almost all of the water provinces.

Finally, you need S7 on your pretender because Astral gems are at a premium. You will need every single astral gem you get your hands on. As the game will be won or lost often by the endgame wishes/master enslave - every single S on your pretender is an astral gem that doesn't have to be dedicated to a booster.

I still have to disagree - you should be able to get at least one mage to S9 for rituals with artifacts(*), and combat S9 is not really a problem.

Considering that the void lurker has no slots to take skullcaps (so RoS is a necessary booster) or mr penetrating equipment it should be only worth it if you plan to cast multiple wishes each turn - and if it's that the 100 pearls you gain at best are weighting a lot less.

(*) And I'd say trying to claim those is exactly what you should do.
With your powerful research and skull mentors it's possible and since you can't get any uniques (well, water queens, but then after securing the waters you are the only one that can get them, so no worries right?) there's no need to rush other schools. Pick up the death artifacts on the way, and then let the most badass SC/army rush your 600 chaff army backed up by the ankh and mist warriors while your gargoyles fly in to cut off retreat routes. Death through turn limit.

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 06:01 PM

My comment was about Squirreloid's approach.
Thus the 6-8 provinces by the end of the first year. For that to even begin to viable, you have to be unopposed in the seas.

Sure, you do whatever it takes to take the seas, but it's much better to take most of them from indies, not wait and take them from opposition.

Well, that was also with a total lack of resources devoted to early expansion as well. One turn of buying units for expansion. You can do much better and still stick pretty much to what I was advocating by buying regular units for 3-4 turns. I basically decided to sit down and play a game where i bought just mages all game. You'll note I said the MA/LA guide was an ok place to start for early expansion, I just wanted to see how a pure mage set-up fared, for theoretical purposes.

(1) Crazy amount of research in year 1 without the pretender doing most of it.
(2) Plenty of gem income, even with few provinces.
(3) Had a clam forger (W3 empowered to N1) and an earth forger (empowered to E3) mage by the end of year 2. (Almost didn't have the second one. Odds of getting an E2 are actually ~1/15 because of the 10% chance at an extra +1 WESD, but that still means you could look at a lot of mages before getting one).
(4) About 6k gold from Lucky 3 over the course of the first year alone. Now, that includes a 3k event, which you don't expect to see, but i'm guessing your first year expectation with lucky is >4k gold from events even with a half-dozen territories. That's rather... substantial.

Basically, my LA R'lyeh build could afford not to expand very fast. While I haven't tried this in MP, I imagine this is useful if people are going to get disturbed should you make a push for land provinces. (You want to secure water faster than that, but you probably don't want to snag ~20ish provinces advocated for indie expansion rate since that will necessitate a large land holding that might provoke a war before you're really ready for one).

Edit
And to my advantage, I already had the research and the mages for combat support by the middle of year 2. (3 W1E1S3D1 mages with crystal shields). Evoc 5 by the middle of year 2 for Gift of the Heavens was both rather early and quite devastating for my move to land. So a 'pure' mage build is looking at being slow out of the gates, but rapidly catching up when its mages come online early. Since you'll also have ramped up the freespawn production by then with increasing dominion in many of your territories, its also far easier to find the chaffe to field for those mages.

More Edit
Ok, maybe i'll try a remote site searching version of the same to see how my gem totals compare at year 1 and year 2 end, and how my research compares. Also, how my dominion spread compares, since a mobile pretender will spread dominion more widely (which helps with generating those freespawn).

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 06:31 PM

Ok, new game, I'm going to try a couple of your suggestions:

(1) 8 starting mindflayers. Its more investment in initial expansion than I made, which means its not actually going to be a good measure vs. what I did, so i'll probably have to play another game where i invest 400 in slave troops or something.
(2) Remote searching. I wasn't attacking spending gems for remote searching, I just thought it was funny you were against spending on sea serpents when you were spending so much more on remote searching.

I'm still not sold on the void lurker though. Only two slots...

I'm going with a vaguely rainbow master Lich:
F1A3E4S4D5B4 Lk3 Mg3 all other bad scales Dom8

I took the S mostly so i could teleport with my pretender, still not sure how worthwhile this is when every other mage i have will be able to do so.

I want A because Perpetual Storm is actually a reasonably decent global for you since it will help protect *all* your troops from arrow fire on land, not to mention arrow fend, etc... and A3 gives you enough Air you can build the boosters after a RoW or Staff of Elements. (Bags of Air are good anyway because of the free air elemental - for mage teleport into PD squads).

F1 will allow him to cast magma eruption.

B4 is a +2 strength minor blessing for your void summons, and ability to forge Robes of the Magi when you can get some blood slaves. Also, I didn't feel i needed substantial fire or any water with remote searching, and nature wasn't high priority if he wasn't site searching either, so it was either Blood or be deeper in something else. Maybe deeper in something else was the right call, but Robes of the Magi are nice, and there are some other blood-crafts that are useful. Basically, its blood for forging.

The one thing this isn't going to do is find the free fortresses underwater, which is annoying.

vfb

June 23rd, 2009, 07:15 PM

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 07:23 PM

End of Year 1 Synopsis:

Gem Income: Significantly lower (Tiamat just coming online at the start of year 2)
Income: Significantly lower (not province related - see below)
Provinces: About the same (8 instead of 6, but weaker independents overall - ichthyids instead of shamblers and tritons is a big difference)
Research: About the same (Conj 3 1/2 / Evoc 2 / Thaum 1 not in that order)
Fortresses: Significantly lower (1)
Temples: Significantly more (3) - but i needed them to start boosting dominion (did not need in other set up).
Laboratories: No new labs (vs. 1 in the other set up).
Commanders: Significantly fewer mages (no second recruitment center)

Lets talk about a big difference between a mobile pretender and a static pretender - dominion spread. Most of my provinces had 5+ dominion in the other set up because the pretender visited all of them and got 2 turns of dominion spread checks in each one.

Why is that so important for this set up? Because you really need to spread those luck scales. I saw substantially fewer events than in the other game, and substantially less cash and gems from events because I didn't have the luck scales in most of my provinces. A mere 1k gold and two death gem events for a whole year.

About those 8 illithid troops:
They didn't help the army expand for longer. 3 provinces and they needed to be resupplied with troops (chaffe screen entirely gone). Indeed, one could probably say that I took more provinces because this map made resupply easier. In fact, I think they took *more* losses than my initial expansion squad from the other game while taking those first 3 provinces against *weaker* opposition, with only the illithids surviving. (Other game's expansion squad was initial troops + 2 crab troops, 2 atlantian slave troops, 2 13 resource atlantian troops, 1 lobo - 120 gold worth of troops because i also started with a mage).

In virtually all ways this start was worse by a substantial amount.

(oh, for what its worth, starspawn priests are research 6 in Mg3, while starspawn mages are research 10 or 11 (1/10)).

thejeff

June 23rd, 2009, 07:24 PM

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 07:31 PM

S is nice on your pretender because you can script it for returning when you are out site-searching.

Why don't you get rid of the B4 and take N4 instead? You get regen for your sacreds, regen on anyone you give a shroud to, and you get to find those forts. You won't find any blood sites underwater in any case.

You can wish for blood slaves to get into blood. With luck-3 you'll get Cthugul the Stargazer by the time you want to wish, and he's S5 with 3 misc slots (and a head, of course :)).

Because i'm not (aggressively) manual site searching, remember? ;) I suppose N would let me cast Haruspex at least. Eh, the first year is already sufficiently worse that I'm not sure it matters.

And S might be nice, but its also a liability when someone decides to pimp a mage and go mage dueling for you. Not having S makes you immune to mage duel, and when every other mage you ever build will have S...

Micah

June 23rd, 2009, 07:35 PM

Illithids are suck, crabs are rawk. (troop-wise, the starspawn mages are also rawk)

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 07:43 PM

Wow, I'd forgotten how lousy the early game with R'lyeh is. And those scales make it even worse. 6 provinces is better than I did.

With those scales my biggest question is how could you afford a Mage a turn? I made do with Priest and maybe an illithid.

Am I doing something wrong for expansion? There's no point in mage support without anything researched and besides you're trying for a research lead so you don't want to pull mages away from that. Do you just wait for critical mass of the freespawn chaff & Void summons?

What about an expansion pretender? You really don't need a lot of magic on him to diversify.

Ok, here's what I did in the archmage game from page 2 of the thread:

First turn: Buy: Starspawn Mage, 2 crab hybrids, 2 slave atlantians, 2 resource 13 atlantians (i had the resources...), 1 lobo.

Second turn: Buy: Starspawn Priest; Military: capture province

Third turn: Buy: nothing; Military: capture province; Pretender: move

Fourth turn: Buy: Starspawn Mage; Military: capture province; Pretender: Search

Fifth turn: Buy: Starspawn Mage; Military: Die against independents (commander escaped, i thought i could squeeze out a marginal victory but the independents increased their military by a factor of 2 before the attack, and i was too far away to resupply easily); Pretender: Move

I had a decent set of gold events at least one of turns 4-5 (can't remember) (5-600 total gold)

Sixth turn: Buy: Starspawn Mage; Military: Summon Sea Serpent x2, move commander; Pretender: Search (Fortress!)

Seventh turn: Buy:Starspawn Mage; Military: Summon Sea Serpent x2, pick up freespawn and move commander home; Pretender: Build Lab

Note also at this time that i'd seen another 500+ gold in events and had 3 provinces with 6+ dominion (and therefore full luck scales) due to the pretender dominion spread. My prophet was in the last province searching i believe.

Eigth turn: Buy: 2x Starspawn Mage; Military: pick up capitol freespawn/4x sea serpent, capture province; Pretender: Move

I also saw the 3k gold event here.

Ninth turn: repeat 8th except pretender searches, I also see a 1k gold event.

So i ramp out the mages by getting a second fortress early, and getting my luck scales spread fast enough i get good luck-based income.

I also think buying no one was a mistake in turn 3 - i should probably buy a priest... but maybe not.

Also, every mage was put on research for year 1 from the moment i bought them, with the exception of casting Sea Serpents. The aboleth hero showed up by month 6.

I finished year 1 with ~4k unspent gold as well, because i wasn't interested in buying anything but mages.

Edit: 'Commander' is starting Illithid lord, might be off by a turn on some of that.

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 07:46 PM

Illithids are suck, crabs are rawk. (troop-wise, the starspawn mages are also rawk)

Word. My empirical testing seems to support that.

chrispedersen

June 23rd, 2009, 09:51 PM

Squirrelloid

June 23rd, 2009, 10:09 PM

Chris:
Given that game's assumptions, the only effect which magic paths i put on my pretender had on the first year was how much research he accomplished, so I'm not convinced it matters whether he had Blood or Air for the differences I noticed.

I think investing in some crab hybrids is also a far better use of your cash than illithids. If i dumped 400 (ok, 385) gold into crab hybrids I bet I could pull out 9 or 10 provinces pretty easily, assuming sufficient water provinces are available. (Has been true in every test game i've ran).

The big difference is staying at home means your dominion in your conquered provinces is lower, which means your luck scales don't spread as fast, which leads to substantially fewer beneficial events for you. This in turn leads to significantly fewer gems (even ignoring the lack of site finding in year 1), and significantly less gold (by a factor of 2 or more).

Also, not getting the free underwater fortresses from site searching means no easy early second lab for more starspawn mages/turn.

Manual site searching with a rainbow has a lot of secondary advantages even I didn't fully appreciate before.

(Assuming a purely underwater opening, your minimal rainbow chassis for site searching involves A3E3F1W3S3N2D2. Improve the ones you want involved in a minor bless for your void summons.)

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 03:21 AM

Ok... So here's my results using a not so very carefully constructed Lurker: File attached so you can see for yourself.

W4N4D4S8 Dom 9. Sleeping
-3-3-3+2+3+3

I forgot the death 5 was for the fear effect. I dropped points into growth as I really had more points than I needed. You could make him awake if you chose, add magic paths.

First a word about settings:

Map:Milkshake.
Indies all set to default.
AI's set to difficult.
Except for first couple of turns in capital, taxation was capped at 100. Yes, I would usually set it higher with dreamlands. However we need a consistent benchmark, and 100 provides about the only one you can, due to the vagaries of unrest.

Late Winter Year 1: 7175 gold. 118 gems 10 water provinces. (would have had more if I could have reached them). And I really should have purchased cmders to build forts yr 1.

Researched: Conj 4, Thau 1

At the end of year 2: 2000 odd gold. 4 Forts, 4 Labs, 4 Fortresses. 15 water, 6 land. Research 220 or so per turn.

Researched:
Conj5
Alt1
Evo2
Con4
Thau6.

6 Magic items.

I've started conquest of the second water. 30-ish starspawn mages.

Now a few interesting conundrums on this: During 2 years, I found not *one* death site, nor received any death gems. So I had to alchemize to do some searching. Still no hits.

Which, wouldn't be so bad except I *also* didnt find any water sites. Site distribution is site distribution, but clearly those are pretty bad luck.

I also didn't *find* any forts. Go figure. And only got one hit on void summoning.

Still the position is pretty strong, and would have been stronger with more usual luck with site searching. I have no problem replicating these results.

Again comparing the archmage vs the lurker:

lurker path cost :15. Immobile. Dom 2. 130 hp. Regens 37 hp/turn after you bring him home to recharge hp.

Archmage path cost 10.

The Lurker needs Dom 2 saves you 80 points for dom10? You get 13x the hitpoints. The lurker requires you to research conj and thaum (for voice of Tiamat and teleport) - two schools you are going to need anyway. And you have s7 (or 8)

Id also look at a w3E4S5D5N4, -3-3-3+1+3+3 Dom 9 Lurker. Earth + astral gives you immediate dwarven hammer at con2, astral coin, crystal shields.

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 04:07 AM

Chris:
I think investing in some crab hybrids is also a far better use of your cash than illithids. If i dumped 400 (ok, 385) gold into crab hybrids I bet I could pull out 9 or 10 provinces pretty easily, assuming sufficient water provinces are available. (Has been true in every test game i've ran).

Personally, I know *everyone* thinks illithid suck. Why you want to blow 35 gp on a critter that has 2xAtk:8 beats me. Plus he's confined to water, whereas illithids will help you break into air.

But I don't particularly care what troops you choose. I reliably get 10 provinces with illithids. So it *hardly* sucks. And I think purchasing troops turn 1 is important for R.
Which was my point.

The big difference is staying at home means your dominion in your conquered provinces is lower, which means your luck scales don't spread as fast, which leads to substantially fewer beneficial events for you. This in turn leads to significantly fewer gems (even ignoring the lack of site finding in year 1), and significantly less gold (by a factor of 2 or more).

Yes, you will establish dominion in the province with your god. Two candles. However, the chance of a scale spread (such as luck, magic etc) is actually pretty minimal.

It is *far* more important to conquer territories. If I conquer 10 territories and you conquer 6 - I'm 66% more likely to get more favorable luck events. This far outweighs the effects of dominion or scale.

So again, I'm arguing that producing troops turn one, and having a void lord (reasons outlined above) allows better expansion and better scales (magic+3) - which dwarfs the effect of dominion spread by the pretender.

Also, not getting the free underwater fortresses from site searching means no easy early second lab for more starspawn mages/turn.

But theres nothing that says you *can't* get free fortresses. A 175 gp slave mage 25% purchase gets you a 2w1n - which will find you most of the fortresses.

Why blow design points when you can purchase it for 175 gp.
By the way.. I forgot to mention it. But in the above game, at the end of year 2, slave mage 1 had 4 insanity; slave mage 2 had none.

Neither lost any actions to insanity. Again, you overestimate the opportunity cost of insanity.

By the way, the R.'s Traitor prince hero *does* go insane.

Manual site searching with a rainbow has a lot of secondary advantages even I didn't fully appreciate before.

(Assuming a purely underwater opening, your minimal rainbow chassis for site searching involves A3E3F1W3S3N2D2. Improve the ones you want involved in a minor bless for your void summons.)

Most of your void summons aren't worth a bless. The ones that *are* worth a bless, regen (vastnesses, greater othernesses) is the best. A +2 attack, +2 defense, +2 strength just ain't gonna matter to a unit that has a 6-8 attack, no prot, and a move of 8.

Next best is probably S, for the MR.

Squirrelloid

June 24th, 2009, 04:20 AM

You also seem to be using CBM, which I am not. I don't know what that changes, but I can't load the file at present.

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 04:33 AM

Sorry, I did state that I was using CBM in the original post.

Doesn't change a thing in R. pretender design, or unit costs.

CBM however does change the relative effects of some of the scales. Luck is somewhat stronger for example - and opposition's units got much better balanced. Many units were made more viable.

Squirrelloid

June 24th, 2009, 04:39 AM

vfb

June 24th, 2009, 05:16 AM

Slave Mages: If you are hiring slave mages to do your N searching, you need to get really lucky during hiring. I've wasted a lot of time and cash as R'lyeh waiting for an N slave mage. I have enough trouble getting an S2 starspawn for being able to cast Returning and escape void gate disasters.

Why crabs are good even though they have 8 attack: They have two attacks, with a 30% and 46% chance of hitting respectively. Morale 14 makes them 75% immune to repel, so against def 10 indies they've got about a 60% chance of scoring a hit. Strength 17 pretty much guarantees a one-hit kill against normal UW indies except shamblers. Protection-14 on the crabs is excellent too, considering what they are up against. They're not going to take much damage from strength-10 spears or even strength-15 dam-0 shambler claws. Add in their nice HP, great morale, and low encumbrance, you've got a great unit.

TheDemon

June 24th, 2009, 05:26 AM

In my opinion there's a more optimal strategy.

Take an awake Ghost King with F4 A4 W3 E3 D4 N2 dom 9. Turmoil 3, Sloth 3, Cold 3, Death 3, Luck 3, Magic 0. Exact paths can be whatever really, take out some of the 4s and you can have S3. CBM 1.5 was used. (edit: a non-CBM Ghost King is identical)

Research one turn (thau) or possibly two turns (ench to 1) with your GK, then use him in an attack/search pattern. You can't attack on turn 1, becaues you have to stay away from Ichtyids and Shamblers and you want some friendly dominion out there first. Anything else is fair game, remember to script attack. If you did research buffs, you want Breath of Winter and eventually one prot buff. Call it an SC strategy if you like, but this GK does the exact same work as Squirrellord's sitesearching rainbow.

I haven't experimented greatly with possible recruits on turn 1, but so far it seems to me spending all 400 gold on Crab Hybrids keeps your starting army around for much longer.

I've tried a quick expansion test 3 times, once I had 10 provs by late winter, twice 12, each time I never missed a researcher recruitment or a pretender sitesearch except turn 1. Using this strat you get the sitesearching of a rainbow, you save some dominion cost thanks to starting dom of 2, and you jumpstart your otherwise lethargic expansion better than either of your builds.

vfb

June 24th, 2009, 06:08 AM

Nice idea! I don't think you want S3 on a non-immortal god though, and it's guaranteed on every single starspawn mage, for complete UW S site-searching.

I'd be tempted to go Dom10 for the extra Awe (and also because every map I play on as a UW nation, it's tough to keep dominion up even with dom10), and F2A3W3E4D2N2, plus Magic-1. Think that would work?

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 06:09 AM

Yes, you will establish dominion in the province with your god. Two candles. However, the chance of a scale spread (such as luck, magic etc) is actually pretty minimal.

It is *far* more important to conquer territories. If I conquer 10 territories and you conquer 6 - I'm 66% more likely to get more favorable luck events. This far outweighs the effects of dominion or scale.

So again, I'm arguing that producing troops turn one, and having a void lord (reasons outlined above) allows better expansion and better scales (magic+3) - which dwarfs the effect of dominion spread by the pretender.

So, maybe I just don't understand what's going on, but doesn't the luck of the effected province determine whether and how good (or bad) of an event you experience? Ie, spreading your luck scales is at least as important as acquiring provinces. Otherwise why bother with province-specific luck/misfortune ratings?

Ie, if i have 6 territories with average luck/misfortune +2, and you have 10 territories with average luck/misfortune -1, shouldn't I do much better on events than you do?

No. Or rather thats not an accurate depiction of what happens. First, it will more likely be you will have 6 territories with luck 2.5, and I'll have 10 territories with luck 1.8. Over 10 turns you'd have 10 40% chances to increase luck.. or roughly 4 extra luck scales. And of course, over time it would converge to an equilibrium value depending on your dominion, and your neighbors.

In a luck-0 province you get good and bad events. And yes, various scales will unlock different events. For example turmoil(?) unlocks the barbarian attacks events.

We both are going to start with L+3 in our capital. You will have more or less a 40% chance to gain one scale increase in luck more than my build until my lurker awakes, each turn.

A 40% chance of increasing turmoil, sloth, etc.

So, while it is slightly positive for generating a luck event, it is more negative for generating income. Plus, as the luck scale will not propagate much - the strongly good events will only express in the +3 provinces.

Overall, there is a *lot* of scatter due to the nature of random.. But no, overall the number of provinces is going to be much more important than the the two extra candles of dominion per turn.

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 06:21 AM

In my opinion there's a more optimal strategy.
Using this strat you get the sitesearching of a rainbow, you save some dominion cost thanks to starting dom of 2, and you jumpstart your otherwise lethargic expansion better than either of your builds.

That hasnt been demonstrated, at all. Run some numbers to the end of year 2. Getting 10 territories was not difficult with the build I announced.

Plus, I *like* the ghost king - but its awfully risky. Getting one bad event - such as the atlantean militia event - and you're toast. Likewise very susceptible to enemy action.

vfb

June 24th, 2009, 08:36 AM

I tried the dom10 Ghost King and had a pretty horrible starting setup, the four provinces bordering my capitol had:

1 - 62 Triton Guards/Troopers
2 - 53 Ichtyid Warriors/Ichtyids
3 - ~50 Ichtyid Warriors/Ichtyids
4 - ~50 Tritons/Sea Trolls

But my GK took out #1 without any trouble. Though I lost most of my starting army and freespawn, my 10 crab warriors prevailed with no losses and finished off #2. And I got 400 gold and Cthugul in turn 2, making this SP game pretty irrelevant in terms of testing. Except I'm now a believer in the ability of the GK to solo. :)

vfb

June 24th, 2009, 10:37 AM

So, after one year, using the GK god, I've got 19 provinces, including one extra fort, where I've built a lab. I can now Haruspex (and soon Tiamat) the oceans to the right of my capitol. I got a chest wound on the GK from Ichtyids, and weakened by a shambler, but my GK isn't needed for expanding now.

It took forever as usual for me to get an S2, but I finally did last month, and now I feel safe venturing into the Void Gate.

Indies were pretty rough, with three big troll provinces, lots of Ichtyids, and pretty big populations in the other indies. I managed to blow up most of my east crab army on some amber clan tritons right at the end of my expansion, and still take the province. Nice, since it was going to be a long walk home.

I researched Enchant-1, Alt-1, Thau-1, Conj, Thau-2 (when I found my fort and decided to build a lab), Conj.

On the turn I was going to get Alt-1, I took a chance and scripted:
(Breath of Winter, Cast a spell, hold *3, attack)

And very nicely the AI cast Barkskin, which was what I had hoped for.

thejeff

June 24th, 2009, 11:00 AM

You don't use the Void Gate at all, until you've got Returning?

It's random of course, but I got some nice stuff out of it in several runs through the first year. Only lost a priest once.
Is the chance of losing a Starspawn priest such a high price to pay?

vfb

June 24th, 2009, 11:26 AM

I had one game where every single turn early on, my Void Gate mage got eaten. Since then I've refused to allow mages in without then having passed an 'S2' qualification exam. I usually get Returning way before I get an S2 mage. It's only Thau-1.

By keeping my Void Gate mages alive, they also build up better summoning skill. I guess I'm missing out on some early summons, but I'd have to sacrifice more early research for a commander to shuffle the summons about, in any case.

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 12:37 PM

VFB, why not Pots + returning even on a 1 s priest?

But usually, I'll just give him 5 body guards, and that will do the trick often enough to be worth the 150 gp until I can get him returning.

Radio_Star

June 24th, 2009, 03:05 PM

If you wanted to pursue a Combat/Rainbow pretender, I'd consider a dom 9 Kraken. Using the GK scales, you can pull 5 paths at 3 and 1 path at 4. You lose slots and (temporarily) amphibious ability, but gain an amazing amount of combat potential. There's absolutely no indie that could possibly faze you and you retain some usefulness later with various buffs (see Baalz's MA Atlantis guide for Kraken nastiness).

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 03:18 PM

I actually agree with the last poster that the kraken is an absolutely great pretender for underwater expansion.

As I suspected, due to geography in milkshake, I was unable to get more than 15 provinces, year one with Ghost King.

Year 2, I actually ended up significantly behind my lurker build. I think a lot will actually depend on how likely it is that someone is going to attack you in the water; and whether there are remote water provinces or not.

With Death3 on the GK build, my capital had 10K pop at the end of year 1.

With Growth +1 (Lurker build) I had 21+K. Its not only a significant difference in income, but the difference in afflictions / old age on your slave mages is pretty significant.

Also, subjectively you get different luck events.

Also, with the GK: I prefer to prophetize the scout, and send the scout and the GK off on their merry way. However, he does tend to go crazy a bit by the end of year one.

vfb

June 24th, 2009, 05:39 PM

VFB, why not Pots + returning even on a 1 s priest?

But usually, I'll just give him 5 body guards, and that will do the trick often enough to be worth the 150 gp until I can get him returning.

PoTS is Conj-3. If I don't have an S2 by then, it's a sign the RNG just absolutely hates me. Besides, if you go PoTS-Returning, you need to give the Void Gate dabbler 6 pearls, because you can get attacked in the Void Gate and also become lost all in the same turn. I'd prefer just to spend 4 keeping them alive.

Bodyguards in the Void Gate usually just means dead bodyguards for me.

Radio_Star

June 24th, 2009, 06:49 PM

I just ran an expansion test using a Dom 9 Kraken F2A3E3D3N3 with full negative scales except Luck 3 and Magic 3. 1st year ended with 16 provinces and 9 gems per turn. Kraken attacks a province a turn out of the gate, while your starting income goes to Meteorite Guards as resources permit and Shambler Thralls! Prophetize your starting commander and on turn 2, give him the guards and thralls and hit a land province. The Kraken continued to take provinces and I started recruiting Starspawn mages until I got 2 with picks I liked (2W) and sent them out searching behind the Kraken to snag the W and S sites it would miss. I kept cranking Meteorites and Shamblers for a couple turns until my prophet swung back home, grabbed them and took a few more land provinces.

I kept expanding until I ran out of indies and at end of year two I had: 27 provinces, 4 fort/lab/temple including my cap (none of which were sites). I was a little slow on gathering research (Conj 4, Evo 2, Cons. 6 and Thau 1) but was cranking out 335 RP a turn by the end of year two. Gem-wise, I only spent gems on site searching, an empowerment for clams (I had forged 1 clam by end of year 2) and a hammer. I had 238 gems in the bank and 31 gems per turn coming in. I supplemented the Kraken/Starspawn searching with Tiamats, Arcane Probing and Dark Knowledge. I also ended year two with 31 Starspawn mages and 11 Starspawn priests.

My conclusions from this test: Early expansion should not be done in a conquer/search/conquer/search pattern. My opinion is that the pretender should carve a straight line and then, lacking new lands to conquer, turn around and site search his own tracks. Taking provinces quickly means more money sooner which means more forts, labs, mages, research and troops sooner. I also think that your national troops are viable for, and should be made all throughout, your entire expansion. The combination of a handful of Meteorites to soak an initial rush and shamblers to dish damage (supplemented later with small amount of freespawn chaff) makes for rapid expansion on land and water both. The last consideration towards shambler thralls over crab hybrids is you can suicide the thralls in your first war to avoid paying the upkeep. That's much harder to do with aquatic hybrids.

I also think that the combination of Magic 3 and Luck 3 is invaluable for the boost in random gem income. Like the expansion test Chris posted earlier, I had no death gem income whatsoever from pretender searches and Tiamats, but I was able to blow the 30+ death gems I had gotten through events on Dark Knowledges until I rolled up a small death income.

Prophetizing your starting commander and heading immediately to land lets you snag a small chunk of land and firmly entrench your dominion in it. I don't expect the idea of starting an early shooting war with Ryleh over a few dominion-addled provinces rather than just focusing on checking their dominion is a good proposition. Unless everyone decides to obliterate you because you're Ryleh, but then hey .. what's a be-tentacled encephalophage to do?

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 07:09 PM

After doing a few of these tests, I am convinced that one really does need a starting pretender - but not for the obvious reasons.
Fragility - or variability. Its simply not much fun to go through the hassle of setup and be completely nuked by aa luck event.

I'd also like to see LA-R get a little bit of mod love, if only for attention to pretenders.

Out of 10 tests, I got ruinous luck events in 4 games, even with Luck +3. Ruinous as in: destroy the lab in your capitol. Disease your pretender. Your prophet goes insane.

I'd like to propose that we standardize R. tests. I think the Milkshake map, with R starting location the middle of the eastern water is a good test.

I run with default difficulty, and 8 difficult AI's. Cap taxes at 100 except in capital.

I agree with you radio - that the god should be taking territories, *not* searching, until such time as taking territories is not feasible. Contrary to general play, I do like to go in a concentric circle with my pretender, as this does allow a ferry of troops, if necessary. It also lets you fight in dominion which keeps your hp higher.

But if you are going to do that, why not skip the elemental paths entirely and either follow him with a w3s3 or a w2n1. FFFFFSSSS allows you to claim more territory and backfll, wherease FsFs enhances gem production and is more efficient gem searching.

vfb

June 24th, 2009, 07:12 PM

Radio_Star

June 24th, 2009, 07:53 PM

With the default sites in the game, you just need to search these paths underwater:
F1A3E3W3S3D2N2H1. You might want to adjust your Kraken's paths to take this into account, if you can afford it. It's better to wait for a W3S3 rather than manually search with a W2, because then you can skip casting Tiamat on the province later.

The advantages of conquer/search/conquer/search are (1) it's more efficient than conquer/conquer/.../conquer/search/move/search/move/search, because you skip the 'moves'; (2) you find your UW forts much earlier; (3) you can get earlier gem income; (4) you buff your HP by sitting in higher dominion before venturing off; (5) your newly taken provinces have your positive luck scales. With horrible scales, most of your income will be from your capitol in any case.

edit: In an amusing turn of events, my Kraken got an amulet of the fish off a dead enemy. I kept him in the water to keep the test results sound, but it entertained me to no end.

I don't like Shambler Thralls much because I think you need a critical mass to steamroll opponents or they take too many losses, and you're not going to be able to take Shambler or Sea Troll provinces with them.

Duly noted on the underwater paths. That means you can put everything but astral on your pretender and remote search that with your starting astral income.

Conquer/search/conquer/search is certainly more efficient in the long run, but it limits you in the crucial early stages. The trade off is less early gem income vs. nearly doubling your early expansion rate. It's my opinion that the latter is the better option.

As for the shambler mass, you're right there as well. You'll find that the necessary mass is lessened considerably when the enemy AI is focused on whacking away at your Meteorites and chaff. As to the trolls in sea provinces, that's what you've got a Kraken for. ;)

I just ran a 1 year trial with Chris's settings and results are as follows: 20 (7 land, 13 water) provinces, 18 gems per turn, 134 gems stored. Research is slow at Thau 1 and Evo 2, Conj 1 with 55 RP generated. I did manage to make 2 castle/lab/temples through, bringing my total to 3 at the end of the year.

Expansion was firing off the Kraken at a province a turn. First turn was Meteorite guards and Shamblers - no commander. Subsequent recruitment was guards and shamblers with a starspawn mage per turn until Thau 1 was reached, at which point I recruited priests until I got a 2S. (I agree that void summoning without returning is a waste of resources). I ferried recruits from the cap out to my prophetized starting commander once to replace the inevitable shambler losses.

I've got a hunch that this was a lucky test and I'll see if I can run a few more in the near future to normalize the numbers a little.

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 09:20 PM

Radio_Star

June 24th, 2009, 10:14 PM

Radio,

Would you consider trying something like a E3S3D3-5N4?

My thinking is as follows:

A. D3-5. D3 allows mound fiend boot strapping in death. D5 either gives you or improves your fear.
B. E3 Eliminates all the hassle of trying to get an E2 mage.
Allows dwarven hammer at con2 (FAST) for clams. Also summoning troll court.
C. e3s3 Allows crystal coins, crystal shields
D. S3 allows teleport. Downside: makes you vulnerable to mind duels. Don't get seen, domes?
E. N4 Useful for the bless, and for possibly getting globals.

Edit: Wish we could standardize magic sites to better compare variables

Getting into death via pretender is possible, but at best you're saving yourself 30 death or 40 water gems to empower a mage or summon a naiad. The Kraken comes with fear 0 which is really enough for the early expansion that it specializes in. E3 is an absolute must, but I'm not sure how quickly you can conceivably get into clams. You'll need some sort of empowerment and that takes time. Taking astral on the pretender is mighty tempting for the forging coins but as you mention, the downside is significant.

Dom9 with full negative scales except luck and magic + all the paths for underwater sites (F1A3E3W3S3D2N2) leaves you with 2 remaining points. It's my gut feeling that if you try to take the Kraken away from its job (early expansion and site searching) you'll end up marginalizing it. That being said, I'll futz around with some higher death (forego air, maybe? how useful are air gems to ryleh?) and possibly astral builds.

chrispedersen

June 24th, 2009, 11:58 PM

Try playing with only the paths indicated. I view him as a vehicle for early expansion; after which searching; after which forging.

You get air on the visitor, you can empower although he will vanish. still, more generally useful, I think

Squirrelloid

June 25th, 2009, 12:40 PM

I like the GK idea. I really haven't played enough with the GK. In part, I've been a little uncomfortable with early game SCs (in general) because I don't have a good feel for just how much opposition they can take (and getting your pretender killed in the first couple months is never a good sign).

I dislike the kraken because new paths are so expensive, iirc. I think you really want to rainbow because you will find a use for just about every gem type, so you want to be able to find some of every gem type.

I also actively like Death 3 as R'lyeh because I want to make my lands as undesirable for prospective invaders as possible. Having population just means people want your lands more. (Edit: And that's why we took Luck 3 in the first place - so we had an income source that wasn't population dependent).

How important are air gems to R'lyeh? Quite important for the move to land in the long term. You'll want access to some protection from archer fire, which means Perpetual Storm is decent, or crafting some staves of storms. (You can't reliably expect to have an A capable mage for Arrow Fend or similar in combat, so finding ways to make your A work for you more remotely is the best you can probably do). With A3 you can Staff of elemental mastery or RoW into A4 and you're in business. And while you can rely on stoneskin/ironskin/army of gold to make your troops resistant to arrowfire, these measures will stack with that and affect the entire battlefield from the start.

A4 also unlocks the Bag of Winds, which is an item with a start of combat summons. Throw one of those, a bottle of living water, and a wraith crown on a starspawn mage and you can feel free to teleport into PD or even weak armies with no other gear. (W1S3D2 and W1E2S3 preferred). Air also allows you to craft the eyes of aiming, which will help your evocation mages hit their targets. (Not that you care if you hit your chaffe - but you'd rather have killed more stuff).

chrispedersen

June 25th, 2009, 01:55 PM

Squirrelloid

June 25th, 2009, 02:26 PM

I'm not completely opposed to death - but getting into water as a land nation is pretty difficult already. On the plus side, its points. On the negative side Death3 kills population as fast as your dreamlands it seems. And it costs you 9% compounded income.

The difference is really between year 2 and year 3.

I also don't like so many paths on a kraken;
D/S/N: in combination with VoT gives you a complete search.

More tests!

Well, your dreamlands + Death 3 should be spreading to land with you as well. I agree, water shouldn't need so much extra discouragement, but discouraging your opponent from pushing you back into the sea is a plus in my book.

One note on Kraken vs. GK - GK is land capable out of the box, which, since crab hybrids appear to be better value for your money than just about any other normal troop, gives you early expansion capability on both land and sea.

chrispedersen

June 25th, 2009, 04:32 PM

Why are you so opposed to illithid?
8 Illithids will paralyze 3 usual troops every turn. You hang out in the back with all your troops - they ahve paralyzed 10 troops by the time combat is joined.

The same illithids, in combat will paralyze 3 - allowing your chaff troops (atk values 8) to *hit* them.

Additionally, your illithids ROCK against kraken, and are land capable.

Radio_Star

June 26th, 2009, 12:54 AM

Kraken paths are initially 40 and GK are 20 IIRC, -but- the Kraken's initial cost is zero. We'd do well establish the ideal paths for the pretender 1st and then establish which pretender can provide those paths with the best combat effectiveness

chrispedersen

June 26th, 2009, 04:09 AM

So, I've tried 9 games or so through year 2.

Gk with Air1-2 W6, D3-4 is fairly hardy.
Underwater defense of about 21, ethereal, awe, plus high defense.

To go above water, able to cast air shield - and he gains 3 defense, so usually at 25 after first star.
Ghost King has the additional advantage that he can sneak into a territory to improve dominion.

All that being said, I cannot reliably get more than 10 territories. An early lucky hit cripples the ghost king.

The kraken with E5 reliably gets 15 territories. However, has a much harder time expanding onto land *or* getting into the second waters. D5 much the same - however was lowered almost to death several times.

I'm tempted to try a e3s3 kraken.

I definitely do not like death3. With d3, my income is roughly 220 per turn - I am often not getting enough random luck events to build a mage.

With growth2, even without luckevents I have enough money.

13lackGu4rd

May 30th, 2010, 12:05 PM

warning: major thread necromancy!

now that we're done with that, this is still the only real guide I've found for LA R'lyeh(as opposed to the MA/LA R'lyeh guide on wiki which Squirrelloid refers to) so I'm resurrecting this thread. now that CBM 1.6 has become the standard, thus clams are no longer an option, pearls aren't as easy to get as they used to be, which greatly effects your late game strategy Imho, as you can't get as many wishes and stuff as you've been used to. also you don't need all those nature mages for clam forging, only 1-2 for manual searching UW provinces for free forts.

a common thing in both your guide and chrispedersen's opinions is that you both agree that R'lyeh has a hard time expanding early on. to solve that I always an SC pretender seems like the best choice. now LA R'lyeh only as 3 solid SC Chastises that can expand safely right from the get go(even blindly on turn 1), those are the Wyrm, Octopus and Void Lord(not Lurker). out of these 3 only the Void Lurker starts with any magic, and unfortunately it's S+W which R'lyeh gets plenty of on its Starspawn Mages, however the other 2 lose their usefulness very very fast(basically once initial indy expansion is over). the Void Lord, while not having terribly useful paths, is still a solid SC and has all slots so he can be useful later on as well, and of course S is great for SCs, however it comes at a very high price of 125 DPs. fortunately for you, your build gives you plenty of DPs, even going with M3, so you can afford to put quite a bit of magic on an awake Void Lord with Dom9(10 is just overkill). with the Void Lord to help you expand, and to be a nice warning flag for potential invaders, you improve your early game by a lot while still keeping your pretender useful all the way to the late game, which in my book is worth the extra design points. but no, you won't have your rainbow pretender. I do have a unique alternative to it though, that will solve some(not all) of the problems which the rainbow pretender would have solved.

this guide does a good job of abusing your harmful dominion. I've been wondering about another way that could do it very well, and that I've never actually seen used before. I'm thinking of rushing to Evo6 before anything else, this opens up Mind Hunt very early on(but no Mind Burn/Soul Slay yet) but it also opens up a seemingly devastating global that you're in a perfect position to abuse. yes I'm talking about Strands of Arcane Power! assuming I understand its description perfectly(started a SP game with LA R'lyeh to test it in action, will report the results when I get to that point), it's easily achievable with S7(easily reachable on your Void Lord) and 40 pearls(easily achievable by just capital income, you probably won't get it in year 1, so you'll have the pearls). in return you get free site searching in all your provinces as well as free magic duels(I assume, as opposed to Mind Hunts) throughout your dominion, which your S7(or 8/9 to be extra safe) pretender should easily win against anything but an S9 Oracle... so you're basically delaying your gem income but once you get it(most probably somewhere in year 2) you'll get everything searched at once, and in the process saving the gems that would otherwise be used for remote searching or pretender turns(if rainbow) used for manual searching while using your pretender for much needed early expansion instead. also it means that there shouldn't be any opposing astral mages in your dominion unless it's an enemy S9 pretender, so you can safely Mind Hunt the remainder of his commanders without risk.

now, all this is under the assumption that Strands of Arcane Power actually works that way, both in terms of magic duels vs Mind Hunts as well as the site searching being all at once vs random provinces and that "mage power" refers to astral level, not level in each specific path. a lot of assumptions, which is why I'm wondering(and in the process of testing) about it, not claiming it's a fact, yet. almost sounds too good to be true and the fact that I haven't seen it used yet might mean I'm way too optimistic about it, on the other hand my MP career is very short so it could have been used successfully and I just don't know about it...

but anyway, great guide, and still the only guide for LA R'lyeh, good job on it Squirrelloid, and hopefully you'll update it a bit to take into account the changes CBM 1.6 brought. and heck, if Strands of Arcane Power actually works the way I think it does, than I think LA R'lyeh is the perfect nation to abuse it to the core ;)

chrispedersen

May 30th, 2010, 05:31 PM

I'm not at all impressed by strands.

BlanketThief

May 30th, 2010, 06:12 PM

...
now, all this is under the assumption that Strands of Arcane Power actually works that way, both in terms of magic duels vs Mind Hunts as well as the site searching being all at once vs random provinces and that "mage power" refers to astral level, not level in each specific path. a lot of assumptions, which is why I'm wondering(and in the process of testing) about it, not claiming it's a fact, yet. almost sounds too good to be true and the fact that I haven't seen it used yet might mean I'm way too optimistic about it, on the other hand my MP career is very short so it could have been used successfully and I just don't know about it...

...

Tested it a short while ago, the site-searching function just relies on the paths the mage has (And searches up to level-3), so a 1AEFWDENB 9S pretender would be ideal to maximize strands. Hopefully saved you some time testing it

13lackGu4rd

May 30th, 2010, 06:23 PM

BlanketThief

May 30th, 2010, 06:34 PM

well, that sucks, makes this sort of strategy completely unreliable for site searching purposes, and will probably still require voice of tiamat, in which case a rainbow pretender would just be better...

still wondering about the offensive capabilities, cause feeblemind is usually the bane of mind hunters, but with magic duel it shouldn't cause feeblemind if you meet another astral mage, instead it should destroy him with your superior astral level. however, if it does function like mind hunt somehow, than it purely sucks...

From what I've heard it functions like a mind-hunt in the sense that it's MR-negates (Except it's worse then a mind-hunt due to penetration boosters not affecting it) but other then that it's a magic-duel with the penalty for losing is gaining the feeblemind affliction, assuming I'm understanding your question correctly.

13lackGu4rd

May 30th, 2010, 06:57 PM

I assume that it specifically targets astral mages, so a magic duel can actually occur... and well, most regular astral mages don't have a huge MR, just standard, so I guess it's around a 50/50 shot, than with at least S7 you should win almost all magic duels. but ahhh, you don't actually kill the enemy mage, just feeblemind it heh? well, that totally sux... I guess it's still viable to open the door to mind hunts(no astral cover) but not much else, unless you're facing a strong astral nation, in which case you can put a major hurt on them.

also, at what frequency does it occur? once per turn, once per turn for each enemy province under your dominion, totally random, etc?

rdonj

May 30th, 2010, 07:25 PM

This would still more or less work, you'd just need to take either an arch mage instead, or a sleeping void lord. You'd miss the early expansion of course. But LA r'lyeh is the only native uw nation in LA, so it's not necessarily so bad. Anyway you can get 7+s and 2 of everything else easily enough with either of those two options, and 9+ dominion. Awake void lord is... rather less good, but still helpful for filling the gaps in your magic diversity. Whether it's a good strategy is debatable, but it would certainly be a funny one.

Squirrelloid

May 31st, 2010, 01:31 PM

Ghost King is a perfectly plausible early SC. I used one in NvVIII and Water Total War (which I won) to good effect. They're especially good at SCing underwater because the usual bane of their existence early on is archers, and there are no archers UW. (As long as you avoid Hydromancer provinces, the GK has no problems UW and can ignore most afflictions he picks up).

Of course, combining the GK with enough S to want to cast Strands is a little rougher. I'm not convinced you actually want to cast Strands though. VoT covers 4/8, and you have enough S,D nationally to search those. That only leaves N really, where you might want N2 for remote searching. And B is a non-issue UW (although you'll want to search H1, but you get lots of H1 commanders just randomly). Basically, Rlyeh is already well-situated for site searching, making Strands much less appealing.

13lackGu4rd

May 31st, 2010, 02:47 PM

yeah, I was thinking similarly to your EA Ermor guide in which you suggested going for that very underused Acashic Records spell. also since R'lyeh doesn't really need to get conj early, and Evo6 also opens up Mind Hunt, Wrath of God(if you put A+S on your pretender it might be worth it) and other goodies, and of course only +1 for Nether Darts. so rushing for it has other benefits besides the Strands, thus keeping up with the tempo which you discussed quite a lot in this guide. but I guess it's just too hard to pull off if you need a high S+rainbowish pretender to actually make it work like that.

otherwise, I think either a GK with S6D5N4 or Lich(not master, the regular) with S6D6N4 with Dom9 T3S3C3D3L3M1 is very affordable and leaves only 2 and 4 unused DPs respectively, so a very efficient build too. didn't try the Lich out as an SC too many times but each time I tried the GK UW I kept running into Hydromancers :( and it's not like they appear in scout reports so you can never know until you run into them, which is why I'd probably prefer the immortal Lich(also allows for D6 instead of D5 but it isn't such a big deal) as long as he can actually take on indies as well as the GK.

Squirrelloid

May 31st, 2010, 02:58 PM

Korwin

January 21st, 2011, 02:51 PM

Just wanted to post an observation from an test game.
Tried to get an Slave Mage nature random as fast as possible, so I was recruiting only Slave Mages on turn 8 one of those got Insanity (8), the next 2 turns he did what he wanted not what I wanted...