Does this math work?

[Kel]

I am surprised that you use the demonbreds as blood hunters, especially early game. I usually use the apprentices (the 150 gold ones) as I can make one every turn, use them first for research and then blood when I hit const 4. I don't find that I have the gold to make a demonbred every turn in the early game.

I still like Aby a bit better (though I don't consider myself a blood veteran, at all). Faster early expansion, great HI (and even PD, for whatever that's worth), 120 free design points from heat 3, temple and sacrifice dominion spread (sorry, temple + sacrifice is still better than just sacrifice, especially early-mid game if you are trying to get unique blood summons before other people).

- Kel

[Mardagg]

Kel said:
I am surprised that you use the demonbreds as blood hunters, especially early game. I usually use the apprentices (the 150 gold ones) as I can make one every turn, use them first for research and then blood when I hit const 4. I don't find that I have the gold to make a demonbred every turn in the early game.

I
- Kel

That is exactly what I do,too.
And when I have the gold to buy a Demonbred,I normally rather buy a real Warlock in early game.

Basic Abysia is great,fun to play and quite strong.
I dont like BoH that much though.

[incognito]

Interesting comments all. A valuable difference 1 person has highlighted between Abyssia and Mictlan is use of tribal chiefs and patrolling to keep taxes high in a province while bloodhunting.

Anyone have good specifics for ratios of BH's w/SDRs, tribal chiefs w/slaves, and tax levels for a good bloodhunt country. Strikes me that you can do this in EVERY province versus the typical recommendation for just low pop provinces. Given the population deaths this will drive, you probably want to start in the high pop provinces anyhow...

Thoughts from an experienced BH'er?

[incognito]

Also, a random question on AI's... Does sitting on the AI castle/home province cause all AI forces to drop what they're doing and come back to defend?

[Cheezeninja]

One advantage Mictlan has over Abysia is that it starts stock with the summon fiend spell, which means you can concentrate on concstruction and still summon up a indep stomping demon army, with the ability to push their dominion extremely well and find massive numbers of bloodslaves they are also very good at chainsummoning vampires and being able to use them in positive dominion.

IMO the real disadvantage of Mictlan is just its micromanagement, it can get downright un-fun to do that turn after turn after turn...at least for me. If that problem ever got fixed I'd guess Mictlan would move up to its rightful spot on the powercharts (high'ish).

[Boron]

PDF Graeme said that sacrificing for Blood cancels the normal temple check .
I were your opinion but Graeme's points against it were really good . But you are a more experienced dominionplayer than i iirc you played even dominion 1 so here Graeme's main points perhaps you find something i overlooked and Graeme has forgotten

Graeme Dice said:

The effect of a temple is washed out by the effect of blood sacrifice. A mictlan priest with a jade knife, which is something Abysia has trouble forging, is the equivalent of 4 temples. An anathemant salamander costs 200 gold to get the same effect when blood sacrificing.

Sure, but blood of humans can't take a magic scale, takes an 5% gold hit in all their their provinces other than the capital, and can't summon devils without a fire magic booster.

[PDF]

Boron,
I didn't know sacrifice precluded temple check, so my experience ain"t that good !
However sacrifice leads to 1 check PER SLAVE, so it's still more effective (and simpler mm-wise!) to use it with Abysia than Mictlan...

As per the Abysian debate : Abysia rocks in early game, their unit are clearly superior to all except Jotuns IMHO. Plus the fact that you can throw fire all around them without any bad effect (they're also immune to Flame Arrows, my Last Marignon opponent still reminds this ! )
The sacred LW isn't much useful, and Bless strategies aren't worth their cost with them I think.
They are bloody devil summonners as much as Mictlan also, but without all the crap base Mictlan troops
Their problems is that all their unit are bloody expensive too, their mages are capitol only, and they suck at research (due to high cost, limited production and need for hunters). Mictlan OTOH doesn't have those...
BoH theme is IMHO much better at bloodhunting and research (considering however they can't have above Magic 0 they're just "correct", not "good"). The sacred GP *is* quite correct however and BoH can use effectively a Bless strategy.
I agree with you that they're less good at summoning due to their lower grade mages, they need pretender support to start off.

[Mardagg]

PDF said:

As per the Abysian debate : Abysia rocks in early game, their unit are clearly superior to all except Jotuns IMHO.

Dont forget,that BoH Heavy Infantry has clearly worse stats than the Heavy Infantry of the basic theme.

[Graeme Dice]

PDF said:
I didn't know sacrifice precluded temple check, so my experience ain"t that good !

It doesn't, and I didn't say that.

[Graeme Dice]

Boron said:
PDF Graeme said that sacrificing for Blood cancels the normal temple check.

No, I said that when you sacrifice 4 blood slaves a turn, or sacrifice three and have a temple that works normally you get the same effect.