Noob's shot at an R'lyeh AAR

[CharonJr]

Arryn,

you are right, I should have been a bit more elaborate about this one.

Mainly it was the usual mix which which tends to lead to success for my forces:

Some enemies are enslaved - leading to fighting among themselves - while my mindbLasters do their job of stuning/killing more troops to great effect due to the additional time they get due to the infighting.

The Vine Ogres took the brunt of the infantry attack - giving my bLasters even more time to do their work - breaking the infantry fairly fast (thus sustaining only light casualties, except for the fodder which did their job of being fodder ).

In addition the knights were put on hold/attack archers (my standard setup for them) and tore through the ranks of the crossbowmen and commanders later on.

The crossbowmen were fairly inefficient due to the decent protection of my troops and the long range (they were trying to take out the Illithid Soldiers mainly).

Overall I would say that my mages played actually a fairly minor role (except for the VERY important enslaves). The major number of the kills were caused due to the stuned enemy troops who were just standing there waiting to be killed after their other forces routed. I seem to recall that about 40 were killed after the battle was won.

But my mages surely could have played a larger role if I assigned gems to them. Due to no gems they are limited to 4S and tend to mainly cast protection spells on themself after the scripted spells are cast.

CharonJr

[Norfleet]

Hmm. I wouldn't say that those enslaves played a "minor" part in the battle. I'd say they were rather crucial in buying you more firing time. Don't discount the small stuff: I've seen battles go totally pear-shaped because of a single "minor" event such as a single militiaman getting Enslaved, a battle which would otherwise have ended in their favor....but for that event.

[CharonJr]

Yup, that's why I said "except the VERY important enslaves", but after casting the scripted spells they became virtually useless

CharonJr

[Arryn]

Originally posted by CharonJr:
after casting the scripted spells they became virtually useless

If the mages are squids, you can try 5 scripted spells, then "Fire Closest" so that instead of using spells the AI uses mind bLasts. This at least guarantees 10 more attacks that aren't useless AI picks ...

[ March 02, 2004, 12:17: Message edited by: Arryn ]

[CharonJr]

Hmm, having them use the mindbLasts would be a possibility, but sometimes (even fairly often) they decide to use decent spells (Soul Slay and Paralyse mainly after buffing themselves), but this time they kept on casting buffs for some reason.

Now that I think about it this might have been due to them standing right in the middle of the Illithid Soldiers, thus having enough targets for their buffs with a range of 1.

Next time I will try to position them away from other troops, this might "force" them to use more useful battle spells.

This will leave them more vulnerable to attacks, but I will surely try to see if it helps. If it helps I can decide on a case by case basis if I am willing to risk my mages for more offensive output.

CharonJr

[Wendigo]

The Starspawn are among the best mages in the game, do not missuse them with mindbLast orders. Give them a chance to prove themselves with the right research & they will not let you down.

What is more, missile troops & commanders that run out of ammo default to attack orders...in a long battle your mages would end up charging into melee after exahusting their mindbLasts: paralyze a SC, only to purposefully suicide vs his fire/cold aura!

[CharonJr]

Originally posted by Wendigo:
The Starspawn are among the best mages in the game, do not missuse them with mindbLast orders. Give them a chance to prove themselves with the right research & they will not let you down.

What is more, missile troops & commanders that run out of ammo default to attack orders...in a long battle your mages would end up charging into melee after exahusting their mindbLasts: paralyze a SC, only to purposefully suicide vs his fire/cold aura!

Since I already suspect that they behaved this way due to me placing them right with the Illithid Soldiers there is no real danger of me wasting them

As have been said in other threads I tend to believe that about 80% of the stupid spells cast by the AI are due to "user errors" and not knowing what factors into the AIs decision about what spells to cast.

Here it seems like protecting the Illithid Soldiers got priority over offensive spells. Due to the range/precision of the crossbowmen and the decent protection of the Illithid Soldiers this wasn't a good decision in this case but it could have been a VERY good decision under different circumstances.

CharonJr