MP: Legends - EA, no diplo, CBM 1.92, limited magic - Samhain/Fomoria wins!

[Valerius]

The game is ready for pretenders. The average number of provinces/player is higher than I had in mind but I'm inclined to go with Plane of Rusty Nails for a map because Calahan recently created a version with 10 fixed land starts and 1 water start. Since we are all land nations the water start should just be ignored.

You can find the map (and elmokki's other maps) here. Note that Calahan didn't post the .map file so the starts would be a surprise so when you download the map you won't see those start locations.

[Valerius]

And just a reminder that when creating your pretender you only want the game mod active - not CBM (since the game mod includes a modified version of CBM).

[shonuf]

Hey,

Just tried to submit my pretender but got this:


I received a pretender file from you, but unfortunately your pretender file is for Early Age Caelum, while the game 'Legends' is set in the Middle Age. Please try again with a pretender for the Middle Age.

Details of your e-mail:
Subject: Legends
Sent at: Tue, 4 Sep 2012 22:13:48 +0200
Attachment: early_caelum_8.2h

[Ossa]

same here

[Valerius]

Sorry about that; I guess I'm just used to playing all these low magic games in the MA. Era has now been changed to EA.

[Austen]

OK.. I ended up rolling TC.. which is clearly going to end in disaster.. but there it is... I'm in now in any case..

Re: Helheim, I just think that with the disappearance of their lategame strengths, compounded with the blood and Van nerfs, there's not much reason to play them when TNN is in the game... they become pretty inferior in most ways..

Honestly, I can't think of a game setup that would be more in favor of TNN.. all of their strengths are kept completely intact (and many are accentuated by the easy research) while all their endgame deficiencies are washed away. Nerfing the midgame blood just makes it even more pronounced.

I explored Nief, but I have never played them and I couldn't make a build that emphasized the things I think are likely to be important and still have any sort of economy. In my tests, I just couldn't ever solve the money problems. Prob a me problem, but that I couldn't solve it..

[Valerius]

Originally Posted by Austen

Honestly, I can't think of a game setup that would be more in favor of TNN.. all of their strengths are kept completely intact (and many are accentuated by the easy research) while all their endgame deficiencies are washed away.

I agree completely that TNN's time is the mid-game. All I can say is the game certainly wasn't designed to favor my nation. I've run several of these low magic games and played Eriu, Van, Pan, Caelum and now TNN which, if you're familiar with my nation choices, is actually less TNN/Eriu/glamour than is typical for me.

Are you interested in playing TNN? If so, I could choose a different nation (probably Van, Hel or Pan).

Originally Posted by Austen

I explored Nief, but I have never played them and I couldn't make a build that emphasized the things I think are likely to be important and still have any sort of economy. In my tests, I just couldn't ever solve the money problems. Prob a me problem, but that I couldn't solve it..

I think the strength of Niefel isn't the Niefel Jarls but blood magic and skratti. So in this game, demon troops and reverse communioned skratti to crush people with brute force. Scales with maybe a light bless for the Jarls?

[Austen]

[quote=Valerius;810709
I agree completely that TNN's time is the mid-game. All I can say is the game certainly wasn't designed to favor my nation. I've run several of these low magic games and played Eriu, Van, Pan, Caelum and now TNN which, if you're familiar with my nation choices, is actually less TNN/Eriu/glamour than is typical for me.

Are you interested in playing TNN? If so, I could choose a different nation (probably Van, Hel or Pan).[/QUOTE]

I wasn't trying to imply that you were putting in the fix and I know you love some TNN By all means, you should play them..

I was just bringing these things up regarding making Helheim/Vanheim mostly superfluous... there's just no reason to play them instead of TNN in this setup...

[Valerius]

Hmm, well it may certainly be the case that under these settings TNN wins the battle for best glamour nation but looking at it in a larger sense are Van/Hel competitive under these settings? Because that's really what I'm aiming for - that every nation has a chance.

And I think the key question for those two is whether blood is a viable option. When I played Van the blood summon prices were *really* high (ex. 50 slaves for ritual of the five gates). But I was still able to get good mileage out of blood magic on the battlefield, in particular bloodletting (which I removed from the next game as being too much for these settings).

Here I've only bumped up ritual of the five gates and a few national summons in cost so considering there's little opportunity cost in lost research to blood hunting like crazy I think it should be quite possible to mass blood troop summons. And of course you can reverse communion thugs just like Niefel.

If there were something I'd change it would probably be the cost increase to Vanjarls since I was kind of on the fence about that anyway.

[tratorix]

Changed my nation pick to Abysia and submitted my pretender.