Looking for help with SC pretenders

[Molog]

You get +2 images for every level above one. Mirror image seems to be the best in keeping your pretender alive against independents.

[archaeolept]

its true that the GK is not the best combat pretender. I like it a lot, and think it's paths should be increased in price, but it is still not as good an indy clearer as a VQ, or numerous others in fact.

[Cohen]

Usually Air is needed for Mistform and Mirrors (that is 2*Air +1 mirror images).
Water is needed for quickness, optional breathe of winter.
Earth optional for protection.
Fire optional for Fire Shield.

Otherwise another non race specified choice is Virtue.
An A9 or something about Virtue could take out Indep with Awe and few less than 20 Mirrors.
Could think on a 1W for Quickness.
Later however the SC role falls into a mobile gunship.

[Boron]

A PoD is quite good too .
Nationspecific the Nataraja is just awesome . Against indies he is already good and later with equipment he just rocks . Jotunheim and Pangenea have good nationspecific pretenders too .

Any indy fliers are bad
Against heavy knights 15 protection is not enough to survive the lance attacks . With mistform + ironskin you are relative save though . If you are not playing Arco or using Vq i think your pretender is not worth being risked against indies with Knights/Heavy Cav + X-bows .
You survive normally but the risk to get an affliction is quite high .

I personally mostly take A2 , W2 and E3 on my Sc-pretenders . Air 2 for mistform + mirrorimage but mainly for cloud trapeze as magic movement later .
W2 for quickness + BoW and later i can forge then some boots of quickness this way if i have no watermages like as ulm .
E3 is for forging dwarfen hammers + earth boots later and this way i can use later invulnerability instead of ironskin as buff too

I think the best indy expander sc is the Vq .
Later the strongest Sc pretender is probably the Nataraja , especially with Arco .

The problem is though that some of the summonable Scs are really good too and can give any other pretender than the Nataraja a really good fight and win probably .
Normally you prefer to equip your Airqueen/Niefel Jarl/Ice devil and use him as antiplayer-sc then to risk your pretender .

[Kel]

The GK isn't good because it is an uber SC, like the VQ was, it is good because it is a relatively economical indy clearer, forger and site searcher.

The VQ was all of those plus a top notch SC. It is still good, it just isn't as economical anymore. I hate things that sound fanboyish but in this case, the developers really did a good job of balancing without gimping.

- Kel

[Huzurdaddi]

Some more reports:

The Virtue with a lot of air is a little better at cleaning out indeps than the ghost king. The Virtue also flies which is very handy.

However you need more research with the Virtue, you really need evoc 2 for shockwave and alteration 3 ( but you can live with 2 ). Soild choice.

or numerous others in fact.

This is what I don't get. What are these mysterious others? Are they all nation specific? The Virtue was slightly better I'll agree to that. And the wyrm was a touch better.

What else is good?

[Huzurdaddi]

Tried out a PoD with Death 9, Water 1. Scripted Quickness, Raise Skelly x4, cast.

Works out pretty well. Can even handle cav most of the time. He does lose sooner or later though.

He takes more research than the ghost king, and is not as flexable as the ghost king, but is perhaps slightly better at busting indeps.

Any other ideas?

[Yossar]

Void Lord is great against Indy's but probably needs more attack and defense to be viable against other SCs. Carrion Dragon is really good because of recuperation and sleep vines but suffers late game (like all dragons) from a lack of equipment slots. A lich/saurolich spamming raise skeleton is pretty decent.

Other than that, most of the large, high-hp pretenders can make decent SCs with the right types of magic.

[Cainehill]

Several of the best are nation specific - Allfather, Carrion Dragon, Niefel Jarl, maybe the Medusa. Others include the cyclops, several of the titan-esque pretenders, even the earth momma (albeit she is, imo, _crippled_ because of the way trampling works - same with the Dagon).

[JJ_Colorado]

Cainehill,

What do you mean that the Earth Mother is crippled by the way that trampling works? It seems really effective (trampling) in my experience.

Thanks,
John