Best Setups For Mictlan

[chrispedersen]

I wouldn't use the fountain of blood personally because it feels too limited for my play style. Being immobile is just to big a pain for what little you get.

Either fountain gives you 3 pics in a path, and a dominion4. This allows you to get a 9/9 or a 10/10 pretender.

I play a Mictlan quite different from most others, and it must be one of the later Versions of Mictlan (ie, 2.08 will not cut it).

My preference, again, different than most - is to go with Astral/Water. (Side Benefit - research paths coincide pretender with moon/rain priests). So I use the Oracle.

I go with a dominion 6-7.

Game plan is to churn out hordes of jaguar warriors, and priests sufficient to bless.

I build eagle warriors only to tie up enemy pretenders in citadels. Otherwise my research path is typically mindslay.

I never build any of the other units.

In this configuration, jaguars will have defense 16 MR 15 IIRC. Upon a wound, they bump up to 16 strength, and regenerate. Hence, they tend not to get afflictions.

When blessed, they get a free hit (Twist Fate).

Cost is 20/4 - this is why you can afford to set the scales Turmoil:3, Sloth:3, Heat:3. After that, personal preference. I generally go with a drain dominion.

Again strength 5 indies, and using normal common sense, I tend to not lose a single jaguar warrior through turn 10 or so.

Since my dominion does not extend (much) without active effort, I will typically try to find an indy location to setup and do research from.

I am all for heat 3 because in my experience (single player) it doesn't pull down on my economy all that much and also temperature tends to not remain rock solid across all provinces you have dominion in but you will have to decide whether it is worth the extra points to dip all the way to heat 3 v/s heat 2. I think it is but most people probably won't agree.

In my style of play, heat 3 is no question. I do it. Additionally, am cranking out the fort of your choice ever 4-5 turns - which allows for more jags to be produced.

I take Luck 3 because if I didn't do that to offset and work with Turmoil 3 then I would end up one sorry S.O.B. I like being experimental but taking Turmoil 3 without Luck 3 is just plain suicidal.

I take whatever +Luck I can afford. Point shaving, best bang for the buck is +1.

SP this never fails to win, and .. at least among the people that I play around.. it wins MP.

Best

[Norfleet]

That's certainly one approach to Mictlan, the "My Dominion Sucks" Version, as Mictlan certainly can choke off the flow of nasty dominion easily enough simply by failure to perform regular sacrificing in certain areas, combined with stone idols to poke holes.

I also don't consider the Jags potent enough to really be worth basing a bless strategy around, but they ARE relatively cheap, and as of newer patches, no longer capitol-only. I personally favor the thinking which states that Mictlan troops are mostly crud, and thus neglect them in favor of going for the blood. Another thing worth noting is that because Jags really have very little merit on their own, they tend to hit obsolescence fairly quickly. When do you start replacing them with blood in your strategy?

[djtool]

what is that blood-9 blessing (death curse) all about anyways?

[Anglachel]

Originally posted by djtool:
what is that blood-9 blessing (death curse) all about anyways?

If I am not mistaken it means that when a troop with death curse is killed it puts a curse on whomever killed it. If this cursed unit lives it will now be more likely to gain afflictions if it survives subsequent combats. Make of it what you will but in a general sense it seems of limited usefulness for the amount of points to gain blood level nine.

[ June 24, 2004, 13:59: Message edited by: Anglachel ]

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Anglachel:
If I am not mistaken it means that when a troop with death curse is killed it puts a curse on whomever killed it.

The curse is only placed if the attacking unit also fails a MR check.

[Anglachel]

Originally posted by Graeme Dice:
The curse is only placed if the attacking unit also fails a MR check.

Gotcha. Its usefulness seems to be even further into the rubber-crutch/poke-in-the-eye area.

[chrispedersen]

Originally posted by Norfleet:
That's certainly one approach to Mictlan, the "My Dominion Sucks" Version, as Mictlan certainly can choke off the flow of nasty dominion easily enough simply by failure to perform regular sacrificing in certain areas, combined with stone idols to poke holes.

I also don't consider the Jags potent enough to really be worth basing a bless strategy around, but they ARE relatively cheap, and as of newer patches, no longer capitol-only. I personally favor the thinking which states that Mictlan troops are mostly crud, and thus neglect them in favor of going for the blood. Another thing worth noting is that because Jags really have very little merit on their own, they tend to hit obsolescence fairly quickly. When do you start replacing them with blood in your strategy?

Yep, thats the standard thinking on Mictlan. And honestly, it might even be right. However, I enjoy different flavors of the game and Mictlan lets you play a bless based strategy.

I *never* go the blood route.. its much more a swamp them with quality approach.
Remember, you are spending character actions to find bloodslaves, character actions to raise slave armies, character actions to patrol unhappy territories, character actions to summon your devils/demons and imps.

I choose to go an alternate route.. typically like the astral king or supercombatant. But some of the spells legions of steel, mass protection, etc are great too.

As described, believe it or not the jag warriors can go toe to toe with heavy calvary - units which cost twice as much to build - and 1/8th to maintain.

best..

Chris