Utterdark : Living With It

[Baalz]

Blood hunting nations do surprisingly well under utterdark. Bloodhunting isn't effected by it, and demons all see in the dark. Use whatever gold you have to just recruit blood hunters and switch to just using demon troops. Depending on your research level, Hinnom has easy access to:

Those national lighting throwing demons.
Demon knights
Devils
Hoard from hell
Ritual of the five gates
Arch devils, Heli-however-you-spell-it, Lords of Civilization.

You've also got those quasi-imps in the conjuration tree for nature gems who are cheap, see in the dark, and work quite well after being buffed by bloodlust and weapons of sharpness.

Ps. Go tit-for-tat and put up Astral Corruption on top of Utterdark. Then stick your tongue out at him.

[Sombre]

Hinnom doesn't have easy access to the lightning throwing demons. They require A2B2. They also aren't as good as the Se'irim for the cost.

But Hinnom has plenty of summonable DV units and demons, that's true.

[Baalz]

A couple of their national heroes can cast the (level 4?) spell and I was referring to the national ones (don't remember the name) who are summoned 3 to a casting so you don't need too many casters. Also, I think they just require one path in air, and with solid air site searching it shouldn't be too hard to line up 50 gems for a single empowering. Over 10 turns a single caster can mass 30 lighting throwers who will decimate most non-lighting immune armies (particularly in the dark with no effective counter fire and easy access to wind guide).

I guess you're right that it's not "easy" access, but easy enough.

[Sombre]

I think the Se'irim would be far more cost effective at killing in the dark. If you get enough of them together they have critical mass too - they just deal too much damage too quickly.

[K]

Utterdark + Gift of Nature's Bounty = total of 30% base income.

That being said, Utterdark is the prime game ender. He only has to have enough gold for four or five turns upkeep and he can destroy all your non-commander units.

[Baalz]

I don't know, seems like when I tested this out before units desert at a very slow rate, a lot less than you'd expect if every unpaid unit immediately left.

[Atreidi]

Baalz said:
I don't know, seems like when I tested this out before units desert at a very slow rate, a lot less than you'd expect if every unpaid unit immediately left.

What did you test?

What I am not sure about is if your Province Defence is automatically reduced each turn when your upkeep is more than your income... How does it work?

[Atreidi]

I got wiped out He used the astral teleportation and transported a huge army to a province next to my capital, then maximised the province defence and attacked me from two fronts. I holded out a couple of turns but it was useless. My blue dragon killed Tiechi units left and right but it was no use, they reproduced too quickly. I learned my lesson though, I will not expand so quickly next time.