Well...talk about an intimidating game!

[quantum_mechani]

Chris_Byler said:
PoD is weak to undead slaying weapons/spells (a couple sauromancers on eagle eyes, dust to dust x4 can really ruin his day, to say nothing of thugs with herald lances or flambeaux) and IIRC has fewer HP than the titans. Cyclops is weak to Vision's Foe, eye shields and assassins with magical eyes (and sometimes poison, since as an earth mage he is likely to cast invulnerability whether it is scripted for him or not).

Both PoD and Cyclops have plenty of built in abilities to compensate for these minor weaknesses. Just for starters, they each get an elemental resist that your basic titan would lack. I have yet to ever see the single eye on a cyclops specifically made use of by an enemy player (most of those counters if they worked well would work almost as well vs something with 2 eyes), and the fewer HP on PoD is extremely minor compared to the fact that it has 0 enc, built in armor, fear +10, and flying. Actually the defining characteristic of both the PoD and Cylops that make them usable as awake gods as opposed to all the normal titans, is the combo of starting armor and fear. With that and a good number of HPs, all they need is awe from dominion and they are good to go.

Compare that to your typical titan, you have to wait at the very least for some kind of armor (either a buff or item), then it's still quite risky unless you manage to get them fear or a damage shield. And even then, chances are they are a cyclops or PoD would still have the abilities and stats advantage.

Ritual casting gods is a potential niche, but one that in practice tends to be extremely small. Spells powerful and useful to need them tend to take so long to get to you can easily get the boosters items need to reach them by then.

[Huzurdaddi]

Although I am no fan of arguments based upon appeal to authority, I may make an exception for QM. He simply knows the game *that* well from a balance perspective. But then it's not necessary to simply trust his assertions since he always backs them up.

Oh, and he used to crush me with very unpleasant regularity back when I hung out on IRC.

[Folket]

I find that titans with air can be very devastating in mid game. Once you have wrathful skies you may drop it on an army having the right resistances and that army is history. You can do this long before your opponent have anything to counter your 200-300 hp god.

[llamabeast]

In Alpaca Digress had a Frost Father which turned out to be the most powerful SC I've ever seen (which took me by surprise since I was never very scared of titans). Unfortunately I can't remember the details, although I do remember it had a cold aura of 40(!).

[Folket]

Frost Father? He only got 10 hp. in dominion 10 that becomes 30, but still he should easily be taken out by lots of things.

Perhaps you meant a Father of Winter.

[Digress]

Yes the poor fella was the Father of Winter ... was countered in the end (oh for a couple of mammoths ).

The biggest problem being big is being big - your opponent can always script "attack large monsters" and your poor pretender gets a right shellacking.

[Edi]

Cold aura caps out at 24, I think. Stack a Niefel Jarl with enough cold-enhancing items and other stuff (Rime Hauberk, Breath of Winter, cold scale 3) and he stops getting any increases at 24. He'll actually ignore the scripted Breath of Winter because it won't add anything.