10 Magic Strength Pretenders....

[En Forcer]

I'm playing with a 10N pretender in a SP game and was wondering if any other folks have tried similar?

A few countries that can free up extra points seem to be the best for such an attempt. I plan to try some others and play 50 turns just to see what happens.

[Aku]

Well you go with a 10 bless if you want an extra point in the ability you got with the 4 bless. A n10 bless is good for that extra berserk point. Actually the nature bless is the only one I would personally take to 10.

[Cainehill]

Don't think I'd ever do it, but someone might find the water, fire, or earth path worth taking to 10 as well. That extra point of defense or attack rating might be nice, likewise the extra point of fatigue recovered each turn.

Perhaps more importantly, for fire and earth, is the benefit it gives the pretender as an artillery platform, plus the extra point armor from earth, extra point offense from fire.

Come to think of it, some might consider Air-10 also - extra precision for the pretender, lower fatigue cost for the big combat spells, and better missile protection for the sacreds.

[archaeolept]

Air 10 is maybe worth it as a blessing, if you primarily want your sacred troops as a buffer in front of your massed missile fire.

also Death 10 is much superior to Death 9, though still not that good IMO, and so might reasonably to taken for a PoD, who wants very high death anyways.

[En Forcer]

I'll field test a Fire 10 Moloch next. Those initial firefly shots at that level come in handy. And then there's magma bolts.....

[Nagot Gick Fel]

archaeolept said:
also Death 10 is much superior to Death 9, though still not that good IMO, and so might reasonably to taken for a PoD, who wants very high death anyways.

Death 10 (especially on a PoD) is the only level-10 blessing I'd consider. On sacred troops, Lesser Fear(-1) -> Fear(+0) is a much better improvement than an extra point of ATT, DEF, STR, reinvig, etc. And the PoD also benefits from it (+19 -> +20). Remember enemy troops suffer an extra -1 to their morale check at fear levels 0, +5, +10, +15, etc.

And it also means an extra Ghost per Summon Ghosts ritual

[The Panther]

Nature 10 would be useful for Serpent Cult Pythium. The +4 berserk hydras are mini-SCs sans leadership.

I once killed 2 fully decked berserked ice devils with 11 blessed hydras and some other assorted stuff. Lost only 1 hydra besides a bit of fodder. And this was with just a nature 7 blessing, which was perhaps the stupidest blessing ever selected by anybody anywhere. But it was my second MP game and I was a complete newbie at the time.

Come to think of it, I still AM a complete newbie!

[Aku]

Panther that ice devil battle isnt exactly accurate...you had like 30 tritons that caused the ice devils to go berserk(they had hellswords) which prevented them from casting their initial spells. Tritons are good at killing sc's before they get a chance to cast spells.

[The Panther]

Ah, your right! I had totally forgotten about that part. It's tough to get old!

I still think my hydras would have done a very good job on your ice devils anyway. Nine attacks per creature with multiple creatures drops the defense down so low that many attacks will always get in.

In fact, the summer lions and vine ogres were doing a very good job all by themselves, and blocking the hydras from even attacking until late in the battle. But the only reason the lions and ogres were doing any good at all is because of the lack of buffs on the devils.

I stand corrected. And I have to remember that strategy...

[Aku]

Is it by the amount of attacks or the amount of attackers that drops defense down? I thought it is the amount of attackers.

Anyway I wonder how good a n10 bless strat with the hydras would turn out. I believe sc's could take them out without a problem if equipped with any of the poison resist items. But are the serpent cult mages n3 because if so you could have them scripted to charm when you get attacked by sc's.