A newbie asks...

[Kobal2]

Originally Posted by JonBrave

[*]In battles, I'm a little confused about casting distance. Do I have to move my casters to the enemy and/or with my troops so as to get them close to enemy/keep up with my guys for effectiveness? If so with what order ?

If I'm not mistaken, the starting "no man's land" between two armies is 20 squares, give or take 5 (although it might be a bit more with larger armies). At least, that's what I base my calculations when futzing around the planning to determine where to set up my clumps of soldiers to get the first strike in.

I also believe one square on the battle planner = 1 square on the battlemap, so moving your mage all the way to the back adds a lot of range to cover. It's all right if your army is set to hold and attack and the enemy isn't, since they'll be coming in range by themselves, but against a human you probably can't count on it since they'll be buffing their army too... bottomline is : check the range of the attack spells you've got and that mage can use. Some (like mind burn) have 100 range and will essentially hit no matter what, some (like fireball) have a range listed as "35+" which means the range is 35 for a mage that has just the requisite paths to cast it, but more skill in the primary magic path equals more range, and finally some like Iron Darts have a fixed range that you have to plan for. If there are no enemies in that range, then the caster will go off script, with sometimes hilarious or frustrating consequences. Especially if the mage has the paths to cast Touch of Madness, which the AI seems to love to cast on other mages for some reason.

Same thing about buffs, by the by. If you absolutely need that mage to land that buff on these guys rather than those, it's best to place the mage so that it's in range of the former and no one else, otherwise they will throw the buff on the bigger group of soldiers, even if it makes less sense. Magic seems to do something to addle their brains, 'till they figure buffing a clump of shortbowmen with Strength of Giants is clearly more useful than my Steel Warriors going giant huntin' .

Yes, it's a bit of a pain in the nethers, but Dominions lives and dies by micromanagement

If a spell has too short a range and you need the mage to come closer to the fray to cast it, you can script him to "Attack one turn", then cast it - but be careful there. You don't want him to move further than his infantry screen, so do check whether or not he's faster than your frontline, or how many squares the frontline will have moved forward by the time he gets to that order. And definitely don't do that if the mage is a flyer, cause he'll go straight to melee.

[JonBrave]

So now I'm trying to storm this castle, this time with melee troops

Castle wall breached. His God/Leader comes plonks himself in the gateway. My melee guys stack up trying to hit him and get through, only front guys can hit. He is "ethereal", so I think what is happening is nothing, because I can't hit him, at least mostly. Over time his archers etc. ruin my army. What exactly do I need for "magic weapons" it talks about --- I don't think I have any....

[Kadelake]

Magical weapons are very rare on recruitable troops (except for Caelum, most of their troops have magical weapons). They are quite common on summoned units, though.
If you forge magical weapons and give them to your commanders they (of course) counts as magical weapons.
If you have sacred melee units and a fire 9 bless, that would give them a magical fire attack.
The fire spell flaming arrows makes your archers do bonus fire damage as well as counting as magical weapons.
Maybe the easiest way is using your mages against his pretender? Does he have 100% resistance to lightning/fire/cold? If not, that might be a good way to attack.

The two most common ways to deal with super combatants is to forge magical items and hand it to some good commanders (if you have access to a suitable chassis) or mages.

[thejeff]

Congratulations. You've just run into an SC. (Or at least the AI's attempt at one.)

Ethereal means normal weapons have a 75% chance of having no effect. Depending on what his god is, what buffs he's cast and what he's wearing he's probably got enough protection to stop most of the rest of the hits.

Some nations have troops, usually elite troops with magic weapons. If you click on the weapon name it will tell you. Caelum's ice weaponry is one example. Most nations don't. In most cases, magic weapon means a forged weapon. Have your mages forge a weapon or two, hand them to a tough commander, maybe a summoned one, and have him go whale on the god for awhile.

The other alternative is magic. Most combat spells do magical damage and will work just fine on an ethereal target.


Edit: Ninjas are good too. They don't have magic weapons, but they'll sneak up and explain them while you're typing.

[JonBrave]

I know I'm a newb, so please excuse.

I am playing MA Man (no magic weapons), my mages are nature & air, which seems to give them good protection but no damage spells, AFAICS. (Even then, wouldn't chances be they aimed their damage spells at his other units anyway? Or even hit my own in the densely packed area?) He only has his capital province left (small map, one AI opponent, normal). Even at 75% miss/25% hit my melee troops would have been enough, but because of the congestion at the castle gate (with ethereal guy blocking it) I can only get in about 3 hits per turn, with all the other troops blocked behind (tried hold & attack, still it ends up like this). I just wanna finish this game!

[thejeff]

Air has lightning spells (Lightning bolt, Orb Lightning and Thunderbolt), which are very nice since they're AN. Nature doesn't have a lot of direct damage spells. Some AoE poison, but that'll do as much or more to your own troops.

If he's the biggest and closest target, chances are good that he'll get targeted. You will take some collateral damage. Try casting Aim or Eagle Eyes on your mages first (Or just cast Wind Guide)

Or forge some weapons for your Lord Wardens.

[JonBrave]

OK, I got some kind of volunteer knight guy. Kitted him out with weapons (though I think he got killed early anyway ) Gave him a half-dozen Avalon-knight people. Put them way up front on their own, with immediate attack. Rest army behind. Anyways, they got in the breach, and (doubtless together with having half-starved occupants with long siege), and then rest came up...

So I won my fisrt game ...........

[Loren]

Originally Posted by JonBrave

I know I'm a newb, so please excuse.

I am playing MA Man (no magic weapons), my mages are nature & air, which seems to give them good protection but no damage spells, AFAICS. (Even then, wouldn't chances be they aimed their damage spells at his other units anyway? Or even hit my own in the densely packed area?) He only has his capital province left (small map, one AI opponent, normal). Even at 75% miss/25% hit my melee troops would have been enough, but because of the congestion at the castle gate (with ethereal guy blocking it) I can only get in about 3 hits per turn, with all the other troops blocked behind (tried hold & attack, still it ends up like this). I just wanna finish this game!

In this case I wouldn't try to fight the guy. Simply continue the siege and build temples. Crush his candles and he's dead without a fight.

[Jack_Trowell]

Note about Man: I think that the alicorn attack of the Knights of Avalon count as a magic attack

[JonBrave]

Some quickies. My guys cast a lot of "Bless" & "Sermon of Courage"s.

• Do you need to cast these more than once on a target?
• If not, does the computer play-out know that?
• Does my priest-guy need to be close to the target to affect it? Am I supposed to pre-lay-out all my priests so as to be near a variety of recipients? (I have a feeling some groups are getting them multiple times and other groups not at all.)