Guide MA Pangaea strategies

kasnavada · #1 March 18th, 2008, 10:55 AM

Quote:

Pans really do have a variety of options.

I actually think that a lot Pangaea units have multiple options open to them. For example : a dryad can be a thug, anti-undead priest, vine arrow lauching platform, stealth leader, stealth preacher... pans have the same options : they can be thugs, powerful mages, chaff spammers, good leaders (80 base is quite good), they are also stealthy, they have large amount of HP so they are also good for fever fetish...

The centaur archer is the same : it is stealthy but also holds its own in a regular battle, is even quite powerful in melee (for an archer at least), allowing for lots of options. Furthermore it has 3 mapmove, which is a great thing when you need to defend yourself. Harpies can be raiders or scouts...

I do not know other nations very well, but the way I try to play pangaea is as an unpredictable nation, forever changing.

(Right now in MP I've been losing some battles rather badly, but I'm learning).

My next test (tonight) will be about making thugs out of harpies, and trying to use vampires in a defence situation for Pangaea, because I think it is a good idea !

Gregstrom · #2 March 18th, 2008, 11:12 AM

Vampires? They must be a bit of a stretch for MA Pan - you'll recruit just about no Pans with Blood/Death. I'll be interested in seeing the results though.

kasnavada · #3 March 18th, 2008, 11:35 AM

Well I planned to use an heavy blood way for this. It's rather easy to give a pandemoniac an high level in blood magic, and some of the high-level devils have blood and death. Or you could give your pretender the necessary magic paths.

The point is that Pangaea has cheap temples and large amount of dryads, so you should (will) nearly always fight in your dominions. That's why I think it's a rather good idea to use them, since even for border skirmishes they will not die. Since they fly, they move everywhere with little to no problem, allowing for raids (even if they retreat it doesn't matter, they will be back eventually). Finally, your opponent after a few battles will have to do something about them and change his strategies to handle them, and that is where you move in with other troops.

kasnavada · #4 March 18th, 2008, 04:41 PM

Well, after some testing, none od that work. Harpies can't take enough items. Vampire can be used with a pretender with the required magic path, but it is not practical to aim for them with pandemoniacs or pans. The good thing is, once you have the first of them, a simple death booster (and a lot of blood slaves) will be enough to summon others.

Renojustin · #5 March 21st, 2008, 08:48 AM

It's always good to get a carrion factory going... those things are just plain menacing when set to Guard Commander with Pan support. Enemies charge across the screen and just sort of pile up like, well, a compost heap. Sleep Vines is a super effective attack.

This means that you're going to have to beg, borrow, and steal for death magic... get a death economy going as soon as inhumanly possible. This pretty much means that you need at least Death 1 on your pretender... more helps, but really isn't necessary.

Minotaur Warriors during MA are fantastic. There's not a whole lot that can face them when buffed. Satyr infantry in general is extremely worthy. With high MR, high movement, stealth, forest survival, high hps, low resource cost, spears, REALLY good morale from the ubiquitous druids casting Sermon of Courage... heck, they even have armor so you don't have to Protect and give them fire vulnerability, just slap on some Legions of Steel and they're good to go. And don't get me started on Revelers.

Harpies are very good for patrolling, which works really well with a thematic Growth scale.

And centaurs... centaurs are peerless archers with 12 base precision on top of longbows. Huge hps, especially with Gift of Health which is quite simple to manage in any era with Pangaea.

Afflictions, pish. Old age? Here, let me cast Burden of Time myself and watch enemy skeleton hordes crumble into dust over the aeons... ok I think I just got carried away there.

kasnavada · #6 March 21st, 2008, 09:30 AM

The best bet I've found for carrion factory is one of the indy shaman priest. It costs 110 gold (same as dryad), is sacred, gives the same research (by now you get what I mean) and has 10% chance of death magic. Just get some until you get death with one, and set the excess ones to research (that frees dryad for other tasks or more research).

The carrion lady is the best carrion generator / nature gem spent to summon them, but she doesn't have have access to 3 holy magic and can't lead too many undead. I rely on summon king to lead my undead carrion armies anyway (easy to get once you have the shaman I speak of above), since it cost so few death gem (which are not really useful anyway in early game and mid-game).

The last carrion summon is, however, a strong spellcaster and a good priest to boot. You can also use him to make a prophet and get 4 holy.

Gregstrom · #7 March 22nd, 2008, 01:51 AM

Carrion Centaurs get 80 undead leadership, and are therefore very useful for commanding carrion, just as the Ladies are good summoners. I think the best chance for starting Carrion work in MA (unless you set up your Pretender for it) is a Pan - you'll be buying some anyway, and the 25% chance of Death will likely come up while you're recruiting Pans for other purposes.