Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Mardagg, your point will be much stronger if you are succesfull with the "E9N4 bless on hunters" -strategy when 'everybody' knows you'll be using it. If it would be succesfull one time when nobody expects it, it would be just put down as a fluke ("yeah, it was succesfull in that one game, but that proves nothing" -style) :)

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

In the past few days i´ve been looking at the discussion in this thread and tried playing Machaka with both schemes (bless strategy/riderless spiders strategy) to see what my mileage gets...

After some SP playing i find that the riderless spider strategy is unbeatable in the early game, and gets much more bang for the buck than the big blessed spiders strategy...

The big blessed spiders, at least in SP, is however more powerfull after you expanded a little and is able to max produce the sacred spiders from the capital and is more effective if you are able to produce 10+ sacred spiders a turn (either via initial dominion of by building temples to increase production). About the bless i found that an E bless does little to the sacred spiders, while even a small N bless does improve a lot the sacred spiders survivability (specially their riders). A good W bless do help a lot too.


I found both fun and strategycally sound, at least in SP, to create a F2W4S4N4 great sage pretender and produce only brown spiders for the first year and a half, then, after i expanded my nation and have at least a second castle, start producing sacred spiders in the capital and brown spiders elsewhere...

On the mage front, i always produce the Sorceress and forget about the witch doctors... some Black sorcerers for their paths but research wise i leave everything in the hands of the sorceress and they are very interesting as combat commanders because of their spider forms....

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

good point Jarkko:)

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Interesting. I find the Sorceresses weak. Not bad for research and neat for the spider form, but at 1F1E1D they're not what I want to be using my one capital commander slot for. I'd buy tons of them if they were recruitable everywhere. As it is, they get bought when I can't afford the real prize.
Like most top end capital only mages, I can't get enough Black Sorcerers. They're your high end mages in most paths, your best battle mages, etc.
Since they have the Spider form, they even make decent thugs. And you'll want a lot to get the random combinations.
Since Witch Doctors have lousy research, I'll buy a couple for specific duties, but I don't want a bunch of them sitting around.

On the uberbless vs minor bless vs no bless controversy, the big spiders seem pretty effective at expansion even without a bless. You'll lose a few more, but I'm not sure you lose enough to actually slow the expansion pace. And if you're not relying on a bless, you can build researchers instead of priests in the early turns.

I haven't played with the little spiders enough to say how effective they are for expansion.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

riderless spiders are the way to go. 0 upkeep for great expansion parties and tough armies (when backed by mages).

The problem is, it's not enough. Machaka needs a modest boost to become good instead of Meh. Perhaps some spider like summons from the jungles and caves of Machaka's native turf. I don't know, something, anything to make this interesting nation actually competitive.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

wraithlord's idea of the extra randoms is probably the best call. A simple change, but greatly increases the nation's effectiveness.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Its just too early to call for another boost.
After all,they just received the -33% cost reduction on the top tier unit.QM stated some pages ago,that he doesnt think Machaka needs more boost besides the PD.
Better to speak again in six months on that topic.

MA Ulm is much more important,i support Quitti there.
I just fired up a game with them and I must say they are the only nation i would refuse to play in the whole dominion world.
There are some people here arguing LA Ulm is weak...well,if i compare LA with MA,its getting ridicilous.
There is practically not a single area in which LA isnt better than MA.
The mages lack N,D,S,B(A,W).
The enc is way too high on all troops and essentially taking the guardian out of the game,which is needed to counter rushes.
Iron Angel is very difficult to cast with that requirements.
No endgame,tough early game,and nothing special midgame wise.
just plain bad.
Making the iron angel more easy to cast isnt enough here imo.
Am i missing something?

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

qm isn't going to go adding paths to mages anyway. He's said that many times.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I got some ideas for MA Ulm.
MA Ulm wants to win per force and not per magic.

1.
Make the guardian non-cap only.
Alternatively make him slightly better and add a new unit,something like "Black Guards",which is a non-cap only weaker version of the guardian(important here: also no shield!).

2.
Give MA Ulm a Relief type battlefield wide spell that costs E gems.

3.
Make the Iron Angel E3 or E4.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

...

Make their heavy armor actually beneficial by reducing its encumbrance by 2 points? Surely the most skilled smiths in all dominions history can make armor which fits well and is lighter than its strength implies.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

As was hinted at above it seems really odd to me that the spiders (black and brown) have different bite damage depending on whether they have riders or not. That makes no sense. It's the same spider, it should be the same bite.

It won't make a big difference in terms of balance, but the riderless spiders getting the higher damage would be nice.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Also on the MA Ulm issue, even making that 10% F/S/A random on master smiths a 100% one would be a good asset, compared to what they get now. In addition to reducing the cost/requirements of Iron angels.

I know that QM is reluctant to add new content, such as spells, so reducing enc of the ulm blacksteel armors by 1 or 2 would create the same effect. Though that would make the ulmish full chains useless, so they would require some looking into also.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Could reduce enc on the blacksteels but increase resource cost even more. That would make the units distinct.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

How fares MA Man in CBM 1.6?- In vanilla it is weak, has that improved?

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Agree. It seems like a logical way to do it.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

In CBM 1.6 they just got Wardens/Warden Lords recruit-everywhere, so they have a really stepped up stealth-raiding force. You still can't trust ever getting a Crone with E2 or W2, but the chances are way better than in vanilla.

It's hard to tell if they're still weak, though.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I would say they are certainly still one of the weaker nations in the game. Certainly recruit-everywhere wardens helps, but it's not quite enough.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Its debatable that CBM actually weakens Man a little, since it moved Flaming Arrows to ench 5.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

That's strange. I fired up a test game with MA Man under CBM 1.6 and didn't see wardens at all. Were they removed from the capital?

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

You must have had a mod conflict (or anything...) because I could swear (almost :) ) I've seen them as recruit anywhere troops.

I'm perfectly sure you can't have a troop recruitable everywhere but not in the capital !

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Well I do have BI (Better Independents) on as well. No other mod.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

ok I ran some tests. BI 2.1 conflicts with CBM 1.6 and removes wardens altogether.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I really appreciate QM's work on CBM but I must say I dislike the changes made to MA MAN. Specifically making warden recruitable in all castles is bad. I mean who needs yet another run-of-the-mill EN bless nations?- And why commit this to MA Man who was weak but had flavor. Now it's less weak but has no flavor. Who will ever want to recruit them archers or knights of Avalon under a strong bless?

Man could have been made stronger by giving it Merlin (S3+3 random picks) and Morgan Le Fay (s2d2n2?) heroes and by making mothers cheaper (100g) or have +2MR (so that they won't get MHed to death in mid-late game. It could have been tweaked in any other way, but making it another bless nation for me kills the last residues of fun it might have had.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I particularly like the idea of Morgan/Morgana Le Fey (who would cause unrest), and perhaps some of the more famous arthurian knights (Lancelot, Gawain, Galahad, Tristam, Percival, etc) or perhaps a generic multihero: Knight of the Round table

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I'm not convinced adding a few heroes would actually make Man stronger.

Giving them something other than N or A as a real path would, but QM doesn't do that.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Agree on this.
Another thing - EA C'tis got the price on their Hierodulae reduced again. I think this is completely off-target: they aren't recruited not because they are too costly, but because they are worthless. So the fix should be to give them some worthwhile ability, not reduce their price (even at 0, they would still require fort-turn - and High Priests pray better, bless better and can find lvl 2 holy sites...). In keeping with what they actually are, I'd think that the best ability for them is to produce (via summon or domsummon) some lizardmen units - I'd say normal lizard troopers/dancers/other Hierodulae or Princes at different domsummon levels.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I think people just need to accept that some units are useless. not every single sub-par unit needs to be tweaked.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I'm playing them now in Utopia under 1.6, but it's not really a good game to judge them on, since money and resources are set to 250%.

They seem fine to me, though with perhaps less flavor, but when you can recruit 30 Knights of Avalon in one turn, it's kind of hard to judge what they would be like in a normal game :D

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Wardens everywhere is actually in-line with flavor. They're supposed to guard mothers, and mothers are everywhere. The previous discrepancy in recruit options between the two made no sense.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Hierodulae are the best blood hunters for MA C'tis, before you empower/summon a B mage.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Why best blood hunters? Just because they're sacred & cheap?

I'm not sure it's worth using up castle recruitment slots over the standard indy scout.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Yes, sacred and cheap. Indy scouts get miasma and die if you don't send them off to do actual scouting outside your dom. Whenever I was short on cash and could not hire a mage, I bought a H1 for blood hunting.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Miasma. Of course.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Perhaps that's true but the bless change makes a body guard unit into the main fighting unit. You're not supposed to have armies of wardens as MA MAN. Besides, the bless effect factors in and I really don't think another EN bless nation is required and certainly MA Man shouldn't fall into that category. It is not a faith nation but rather a pagan, mysterious & mystic nation, at least that's the way the myths tell it.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Uh.. weren't you the person who was just referencing arthurian mythos as the inspiration for it and asking for Arthurian heroes? How is that a 'pagan, mysterious, and mystic' set of source material, especially as regards *the nation*? Most certainly religious (You don't get more religious than questing after the Grail). Only the women of avalon would be mysterious or mystic, otherwise its an early medieval feudal nation with all the political and religious implications that entails.

I would wonder which source material you would class as 'pagan', given the maybe 10% that's derived from potentially pre-Christian sources was filtered through a Christian lens. Most of the Arthurian tales are the product of 12th century or later writers like Christian de Troyes, and have very definite religious overtones. Especially the Quest for the Grail, as in, the cup of Christ? I'm especially confused how you can consider the material not heavily-faith based. Knights who successful quested for the Grail were the epitome of the perfect knight in the Arthurian romances, and had to have profound faith to succeed - ie, Galahad and Perceval. Faith is definitely the appropriate cultural ideal.

Pagan is a totally inappropriate word in this context - what does it even mean? I mean, all nations worship and have faith in a god - the pretender. That's the whole premise of the game. Thus, every other nation is 'pagan' relative to your nation, and your nation cannot be pagan. ('Pagan' is a Christian-world word most closely related to the muslim use of 'infidel' in meaning, and was used to refer to anyone who didn't have faith in the God of the Pentateuch (ie, not Jewish, Muslim, or Christian) - the modern reclamation of the word as a name for a type of spiritual practice is basically reverse propaganda. As a perjorative word, no one pre-20th century would have referred to themself as pagan. The use and meaning of the word thus best translates into 'not worshipping our pretender' in dom3 terms, as I claimed above).

Drawing a distinction between 'faith' and 'pagan' is especially offensive. None of the groups historically described as pagan would have thought of themselves as anything but religious and with faith in that religion. I certainly doubt modern pagans would similarly appreciate being told they have no faith.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Yeah Wraithlord, how dare you say something so offensive to medieval peasants!

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I stand corrected :D

I've no desire to stumble into the mine field which is religion either by way of overloaded terminology or semantics.

Let's stick to the point please. MA Man becoming yet another EN bless nation is lame. I'm sorry but no sugar coating would make me feel different about it. Under CBM 1.6, I feel like I don't want to ever play MA Man again and if I get it in RAND I'll probably lose any fun in the game.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Well, no one forces you to play them as a bless nation. It is unfortunate that KO chose a rather bizarre sacred unit for man. (Seriously, where did heavily armored magical men come from?) I would have figured them for a sacred cavalry nation based on the theme.

But lets face it, if you're not playing Man as just another EN bless nation, you're playing them as just another archer nation. They don't really have much worthwhile to set themselves apart, especially since their magery is basically 'like Eriu, but with more suck'. And we already know how well that worked out for Eriu...

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Yar.

I don't really get how a simple change like making wardens recruit everywhere has ruined the entire nation for you.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Well, in SP I can do all kind of fun experiments but in MP I minimax like hell. If I have sacred mages and blessed heavy armor, 5 Enc, moderate HP unit recruitable everywhere then EN bless becomes an efficiency consideration so strong that I can’t in good conscious not take it for an MP game.
The EN looks great on wardens.
The E looks great on sacred mages.
The N looks great on old diseased mages (shroud).

It’s the ripple effect. Small change, big difference :)

Squirrelloid, you have a point there. I just wish Man would have been tweaked in another manner, one that would make it more unique and fun.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Well, from the reports I recall on MA Man MP games, I think giving them some early strategy to pursue easily can't be called 'ruining this nation game'. Afterall, they're considered really weak. Crones are a frustration on their own rigth !

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I think an E/N bless makes sense for MA Man. Consider its mythical influences: Wheel of Time, Lord of the Rings, Arthurian legend. All feature great swordsmen capable of fighting all day without fatigue and without being hindered by minor wounds. Stealthy elite infantry with that bless are reminiscent of the Rangers of Ithilien, the Lord Wardens are reminiscent of the Warders from WoT (combined with Two Rivers Longbowmen)...it gives Man a stealth-and-endurance feel, small elite armies against hordes, that is really quite interesting.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

MA Man still sucks. Sure, their troops can take on indies and some nations, but their mages are really uncool. And this nation is extremely frustrating. You can get to midgame, that's the reason for all that frustration. Because you get there and then everyoen can own you so easily. But they don't even have to - you will want to commit suicide, seeing all crones with good randoms die every winter. They are nature nation and even N4 mages are old! They live 170 years, 120 above old age limit, to die when you take over the empire. It says a lot.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Yes, I believe the Wardens were based on the Warders from the Wheel of Time books. But Warders were only trained in Tar Valon, so making them recruit anywhere strays from that.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

The mothers would also only have been trained there.

There are plenty of nations where one could make the argument that more units should be capital only if you are going by where they are trained. Units should really only be made capital only if there is a compelling balance reason that they should be.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

That too. My main point is that Man is actually a pretty interesting E/N bless nation (aside from the old age on best mages thing).

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I'd say it would be better if their mages would be somewhat improved instead of making Wardens recruitable everywhere. Another thing which is bad about them is that capital-only (which is thematically sound!) Daughters are not very usable. Maybe thay should get some interesting bonus...
Speaking of which, I noted that C'tis Hierodulae got a price drop, seemingly in an attempt to make them somewhat useful. I think this is wrong approach - they aren't bad because they are pricy for what they do, they are bad because C'tis has much more useful commanders. I'd offer to give them an ability in line with their main function ;) - make them domsummon lizard troops, possibly including elite ones: Temple Dancers and Princes.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Hierodules replace Miasma-vulnerable indy priests for C'tis--cheap, weak H1s, useful for temple-building and blesses in minor battles that don't warrant a H3 caster or when the nation can't afford one. The few times I've played MA C'tis, I've recruited 1 or 2 in the expansion phase, then never again, but I was glad to have those 1 or 2 so my prophet could do other things.

Man would definitely benefit from better mages. Less severe old age and better randoms on the crones would do it, even.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

Well, C'tis isn't only Miasma. I actually meant more EA, which I tried in SP some days ago (though LA is Miasma-free, too). And it has recruitable everywhere H2 priest and a Prince - priest-thug with map move 3. And I think that even in Miasma if all what you need is cheap temple-builder, you don't necessarily need Hierodula - especially if you'd have to move her across the map. What I offer gives her a unique niche.

Re: Nations under CBM 1.6
 

I don't see qm adding it and I don't think it makes sense to justify it as her spawning offspring. Autosummons etc are hard to balance and tend to create annoying secondary economies which don't rely on gold or even gems.

qm did try some national commanders summoning extra troops but quickly took it out.