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  #11  
Old March 17th, 2007, 05:16 AM

Blitz Blitz is offline
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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

Not a bad guide, although I strongly disagree on a few points.

Myrmidons are decent heavy infantry, but they fatigue very quickly with an encumberance of 10. While I use them, it's often as bodyguards or as flanker defense around the mages. I don't recruit them en masse, as I take sloth scales. Taking drain seems counter-productive with Arco. You have your choice of 4 different mages and 6 national paths at 2 or higher. You have the best recruitable researcher in the game, and early access to feathers. Taking drain effectively trades these advantages for 80 cretion points, and I cannot reccomend that strategy. Recruiting a Wind Lord on your first turn and making him into a prophet is almost a no-brainer. While boots of flying on a priestess (or Conceptual Balance Mod) will allow you to bless fliers, the prophetized Wind Lord is hands-down the best choice for EA Arco. Also worth mentioning is the indy Pegasus Rider, a blessable flying archer. At 50 gold, they aren't cheap, but for adding missile support to an air assault, they are about your only option.

My reccomended pretender/scales?

Lady Of Fortune, Dormant
W9 N4
Dominion 5
Order 3, Sloth 3, Magic 1

W9 bless is still imo the best bless in the game, and even with your healing priestesses, the regeneration from N4 is very helpful. Additionally, you get an Awe-4 mid-game SC chassis with high defense. Wind riders are resource-cheap when compared to the 125 cost, and the sloth is easily managable. I start recruiting wind riders exclusively on turn 3-4, with the odd myrmidon to use up extra resources. You can quickly amass groups of 20, which is more than enough to take any indy. While you will not hit 2-province expansion until at least turn 10, when your pretender awakes you should have a set of black plate and the usual construction 4 toys to kit her out. Oriads are outstanding with boots of flying, as are priestesses for secondary wind rider armies. The slower provincial expansion is somewhat medited by your rapid research speed. Early mystics while assembling your forging team can be followed by later philosophers. A single mage-engineer for forging quills until later in the game. With research kick-started, you should be in a dominant forging and casting potion before your neighbors can besiege you. The very strong wind rider bless protects you early, and your magical versitility, mobile flying sacreds, and unmatched research give you a good position in the mid and late games.
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  #12  
Old March 17th, 2007, 05:21 AM
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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

Blitz is right, W9 Bless is too powerful not to consider here.

But these are both great guides. Thanks guys.

Nice posts dirtywick.

GJ

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  #13  
Old March 17th, 2007, 03:36 PM
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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

Nice guide!

couple points

Baalz is 111% right (and i've seen him prove it)- Arco is a major communion power.

Philosophers are cool, but since they are capitol only they should only be built when you are broke since building one means that you are not building an Oreliad.

Starting with a dormant pretender and a 5 dominion as Blitz suggests is risky. You'll probably get away with it, but if some smart alec is going dominion push and starts close you could be in for a short game.
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  #14  
Old March 17th, 2007, 11:56 PM

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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

Wind Riders are very hard hitting with a F9 Bless too.

Theres not a great deal that they can't take care of (when used in appropriate numbers).
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  #15  
Old March 18th, 2007, 09:22 AM

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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

Quote:
GameExtremist said:
Wind Riders are very hard hitting with a F9 Bless too.

Theres not a great deal that they can't take care of (when used in appropriate numbers).
I cant help thinking about running some 125 gold 13 hp units into the indep mages with orb lightning.
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  #16  
Old March 18th, 2007, 10:45 AM
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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

EA Arco is one of my favorite themes, but i really think minimizing Philosophers is the wrong way to go. Philosophers are one of the most potent human units in the game; there is no other way to get 10 research points so cheap, so quickly early on. Making 8 or 10 philosophers early in the game w/ 3 sloth 3 magic will give you a very large leg up on research that will be hard to match.

I guess the idea is, while having lots of Mystics is good, what's the point of having them if you can't cast anything? Drain-2 is wrong for a lot of reasons, mainly because it goes counter to the magic heavy nature of Arco, and because it makes Mystics just that much worse at research, forcing you to depend even more heavily on your Philosophers, that at the same time, will be less than optimal.

Arco's early troops are versatile but specialized. I like Icarids as raiders but they aren't front line troops, and like Myrmiddons, they are hard to mass.
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  #17  
Old March 18th, 2007, 03:03 PM

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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

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I cant help thinking about running some 125 gold 13 hp units into the indep mages with orb lightning.
They get thrashed. 10 pegasus riders with W9 can take any standard indy.
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  #18  
Old March 18th, 2007, 07:49 PM
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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

Quote:
SelfishGene said:
Arco's early troops are versatile but specialized. I like Icarids as raiders but they aren't front line troops, and like Myrmiddons, they are hard to mass.
I've found that Icarids struggle even against weak PD. Not worth recruiting most of the time.

Myrmidons are nice, but if you've taken Sloth, just forget it. You'll never have enough of them to make much difference.
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  #19  
Old March 19th, 2007, 03:32 AM
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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

The difference between W9 bless and F9 bless on your Windriders is really a tough choice. With quickness you are getting 3 attacks every two turns. So that is a big bonus to your offense. The W9 defense bonus is really significant, too, because those Windriders are not so tough and they do like to die.

With F9 you are getting +4 attack and your lance, which already gets a huge boost to its first strike, become a flaming lance which does +6 extra damage. Not bad! That's going to do major damage on a first strike, possibly light them on fire, and continue to do +6 flaming magical weapon damage with a +4 Attack each round thereafter.

I like the W9 bless better, by a hair. Those Windriders are hella expensive at 125 gold, and they are not so tough really. They die. They die purty fast in a toe to toe fight with another toughie regular troop. And that troop probably wasn't 125 gold each. W9 bless gives them a lot more staying power, and the extra attack every other round gives a decent offensive boost, too. They are so expensive, and I hate to see them die.

On the other hand, sometimes the best defense is a good offense. And if you have enough of them swooping in with first-striking magical flaming lances, maybe that wins it. But if it's a long battle, your expensive Windriders are gonna get chopped up.
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Old March 19th, 2007, 04:59 AM

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Default Re: Beginner\'s Guide to EA Arcoscephale

Quote:
The difference between W9 bless and F9 bless on your Windriders is really a tough choice. With quickness you are getting 3 attacks every two turns. So that is a big bonus to your offense. The W9 defense bonus is really significant, too, because those Windriders are not so tough and they do like to die.

With F9 you are getting +4 attack and your lance, which already gets a huge boost to its first strike, become a flaming lance which does +6 extra damage. Not bad! That's going to do major damage on a first strike, possibly light them on fire, and continue to do +6 flaming magical weapon damage with a +4 Attack each round thereafter.
One thing you are neglecting is that lance damage is based on the unit's AP. Quickness gives a bonus to a unit's AP, which translates into a huge first strike advantage for the Wind Rider. W9 bless on lance troops is huge.
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