MA Marignon

[J Henry Waugh]

On small maps, MA Marignon rocks… …I've found great success with Evo, fire mages, flagellants with crossbowman and stronger infantry to buffer flaggelants… …expands quick and once economic machine is churning in gear, makes it unstoppable… …typically roll up a pretender with F4 but main magic in another path (air/astral)…

[Novi]

I have to say I didn't find Marignon all that appealing. Sure it has decent (heavy) troops but its mages turn out not to be that great after all. Diversifying magic paths is a pain in the arse since Marignon's prima donnas only specialize in F and S. Also, decent mages start dying off like flies as soon you recruit them AND have never heard of communion.

IMO Pythium is a MUCH better choice if you have to choose between Ermor's descendants.^^ Heavy troops, magical diversity and power, angelic summons. Could you possibly wish for more?

[Warhammer]

Actually the troops aren't all that different. Summons are the same, the big difference is in the priests and mages.

The troops are cheaper and cost about the same in resources.

The more I look at it, the Royal Guard troops might be the best bet for Marignon. But, I still think att. 18 knights running around is pretty impressive.

[Shovah32]

Saint_Dude said:
I would not discount the A9/F9 dual bless

Sorry but this is getting on my nerves now. A stands for air. S stands for astral.


On the subject of marignon i would not bother with a flagellant bless. Either go for an SC pretender+scales(always a nice choice), a rainbow pretender+scales(also nice) or maybe a bless for the knights/paladins/angels(E9 is good, N4+ is good, F9 is good, W9 can be helpful).

If you dont take a bless strategy armies consisting of some shields(men at arms/indy heavy infantry ect) back by crossbowmen with the flaming arrows enchantment are the way to go.

[djo]

Don't forget the stealth--Marignon has spies, assassins, and stealthy preachers.

Also, if you're going to use a flagellant bless strategy, you have recruitable H3's with high leadership, which makes it a lot easier.

[Warhammer]

That was one of the reasons for thinking about the bless strategy, Marignon seems ripe for it.

[llamabeast]

I'm playing Marignon at the moment (turn 70 odd) and took an Air-4 Earth-3 Water-3 Nature-3 dormant frost father. For magical diversity it's been amazing. He can make a Winged Helmet and Earth boots, which you can give to your mages with randoms (which you end up with loads of) to get all your territory earth and air searched. You can make a thistle mace or two and give them to some indy shamen. And eventually you can summon a Naiad or a Sea Troll for more water access (I was lucky enough to find a magic site that allowed me to recruit water mages). The only magic I didn't have was death, for thematic reasons. Although recently I've found a Necromancer site and have ditched my morals.

So I went for a low-army high-magic strategy. In the early game I concentrated on Evo, and built hordes of mages (about 3 a turn quite early on). Fireball and Falling Fires are devastating, all you need to do with your army is distract them for long enough that your mages can incinerate them.

On the other hand I think I haven't played brilliant, and making better use of the troops would probably be an excellent idea.

Later on in the game the angels are amazing. I had one angel that almost single handedly captured about ten enemy provinces and killed army after army.

Marignon probably isn't as strong as Pythium - but then almost no-one is. Pythium's very strong indeed I think (good troops, very good magic, hydras, angels). But I don't know why anyone would think Marignon's mages are no good. I reckon they're fantastic.

[Warhammer]

This is actually paralleling my latest idea on a pretender. My problem is figuring out whether I go for a dormant or imprisoned pretender.

I am of the belief that maybe they don't need to go with the Knights of the Chalice and can instead rely upon the Royal Guard which will free up quite a bit of resources. The side benefit of this is you might be able to get away with a lower dominion which can be used to pay for the scales.

I was thinking about an Air-4/5, Earth-4, Water-4, Nature-4, and Fire-4 or Astral-4/5 pretender. Scales will be Order-3, Production-3, Drain-2, and Misfortune-3. Dominion will be dependant upon a variety of factors, pretender form, whether I take growth scales, etc.

Why the low dominion? A big bonus that Marignon gets is their inquisitors. They operate very well in "negative" dominion. So why focus on having high dominion? I can save those points and put those towards the pretender. Now, if I prefer, I can take higher dominion and go with an imprisoned pretender.

I think order is important for Marignon for the money. The good troops and leaders all require a good chunk of change. You are looking at 270 gold for your best mages and 210 for your best priest. The rest of the troops are a 2.5 resource to gold cost ratio. Therefore, if you want a large army, you need good production values. So production is a must. To pay for this, I go with drain and misfortune.

Now, this setup gives me the ability to cast The Wrath of God, Gift of Health, Purgatory, Arcane Nexus, etc. Purgatory and Wrath of God are very thematic for the nation. Plus, they eradicate undead and enemy armies nicely. The only problem with this is that I would need an imprisoned pretender to make it work with dominion costs. Or, I could skimp on the Nature and Water paths.

Early game research targets are Ench 4, for the Flaming arrows, and then Evo up to about lvl 4. Then const to lvl 4, evo to lvl 6, and then check to see what we need from there.

[HoneyBadger]

If it were me and I wanted to bless flagellants, I'd go with a W9 bless and get that quickness going-4 attacks a round is better than 2-the Def bonus won't hurt, and Air bless, because a huge army of flagellants in middle era is going to be hurt a lot more by crossbows than melee attacks-and, anyway, a melee attack commits an enemy unit, which is good for you when you've got knights.

[Taqwus]

...whereas, if I were planning to be the most -annoying- flag user, I'd go for death/blood blessing so that these mass-produced fast-attack clowns have a decent chance of causing afflictions, curses and horror marks to any poor SC who feels the urge to massacre them. They hit, ouch. They die, ouch.

Not every efficient, mind you. But perhaps handy if you're playing somebody who frowns upon having his units abused like that.