Pretender Build Thread

[DrPraetor]

Caelum:
Dormant Daeva, B4, Domstr 10, Order 3, Sloth 2, Cold 3, Growth 3, Luck 3, Magic 1

Machaka:
Imprisoned Orcacle, W9S9, Domstr 8, Order 3, Sloth 3, Heat 3, Growth 3, Luck 1, Drain 2
(note a major emphasis on boosting the MR of my spiders any way I can)

Abysia:
Awake Great Sage, F3A2W2S3D2N2, Domstr 6, Order 3, Heat 3, Growth 2, Luck 2, Drain 2
idea here is I head straight up evocation. His 30 RP per turn on Easy will get me to Evoc 7 faster than taking a magic dominion would.

[namad]

I think this thread is a good idea and i think your designs are fairly good and also interesting... I don't mean to imply otherwise.. I just like to discuss things...

I am not so sure your claims about the great sage boosting research are accurate (then again i could be wrong):

While it is certainly true that you would reach a target level evocation4 faster and that you save 120pretender points versus magic1. 2rp per mage will cancel out the great sage's research bonus once you have ~15mages.

An important question here is... for the purposes of reducing afflictions from old age goes higher levels of growth matter? or does growth1 work as well as growth3? I thought growth1 worked as well as growth 3 but i could be wrong (so you could try growth1 magic1 luck0 or even maybe mf1 or mf2 so that you could add more growth... I think qm is a big fan of order/mf at least and i usually do what he says); however if higher growth matters for old mages... abysia has a lot of old mages so pursuing growth might be even more important than i think.

Then you also have to consider abyisia's perhaps slow expansion abilities and the extra 6-12provinces an SCpretender could glean in the first 10-20turns the income therein and also the resultant $$$ to be spent on labs and mages.

Also abysia has some of the best combat magic in the game so the increased mr(from dominion of drain) wouldn't be synergistic necessarily?


I am not a fan of order/luck duo (at least in situations where the pretender points seem to be tight)



After some brief testing i have concluded that prison of fire is amazing and perhaps a worthwhile rush target for ma abysia, instead of evocation. Additionally picking up agony on turn3 with an awake researcher might be worthwhile if you intend to rush evocation (because evocation takes so long to pay off). Although thau4 is an early enough goal that it is unlikely to be worth diverting from if you intend to use combat battle magic as part of an expansion plan.... then again.... ma abysia is such a bad expander that picking up provinces with a GK or PoD might have better short term benefits than using battle magic. In tests i was getting my ass handed to me by disease and old age with growth1.


Agony is very effective against barbarians but only barely effective against other indies.
Hellfire SEEMS great on paper and is just as far of a research goal as prisons of fire. IT seems like prisons of fire should parayzle as many things as hellfire kills. HOWEVER hellfire just seems to MISS ALWAYS!!!! but... IF you rush hellfire you pickup agony on turn3 AND right after hellfire at b4 comes send lesser horror at b5. Send lesser horror allows you to expand with lone scouts or indie commanders against anything but the toughest of nuts (cataphracts for example) and additionally AFTER you rush whatever you want for expansion purposes ma abysia is going to rush b5 ANYWAYS because of how effective lesser horrors would be in wars with players? right? or am I wrong here?

I would rank the awakeresearch battlemage expansion strategies as follows: worst:evocation second best:blood best:thau
further testing is required blood might actually be better than thau depending on various factors other people can feel free to chime in on this topic. Also I still feel that ma abysia would perhaps benefit greatly from an awake SC.

[namad]

Ashdod design.


Ashdod has no need of a bless to expand or fight; however, it can benefit from a bless for it's troops OR for it's thugs.
Ashdod has no need for an awake sc to help it expand however neither does it require the bless so imprisonment is not a requirement.

I see this as meaning that all pretender designs are valid.

1) Imprisoned e9n6
Traditional gianttroop/sc bless
2) Imprisoned order3prod3growth3 (perhaps also e4n4 bless)
I'm a big fan of both the poison spear giants as well as the sacred giants as they both crush independents without loses
3) Awake sc no bless probably something like order/mf (dom9+fear) (gk or PoD or titan-style)
While the awake sc seems fairly pointless given the recruitable scs ashdod has the ability to legitmately claim 3provinces per turn
starting on turn2! This would be outrageous. Then again... no map will be spacious enough for this to matter with non-flying
expanders as 2provinces per turn on turn2 and 3provinces per turn on turn3 is really nearly as good.
4) Awake-rainbow (research for 1-2turns then sitesearch for a while before coming back to peform the tasks of a rainbow forger/domer)
Ashdod has particularly bad site searching capabilities and also an amazingly high need to reach the research goals of const2 and alt2 asap

5) Personally I see no reason to use a dormant pretender in this situation but I suppose thats also a category the SC or Rainbow who is only a tiny bit sleepy so that he can use better scales




i am now about 95% sure that imprisoned master druid e9n6 is the only way to go.... the only question now is prod2? prod3? mf3?mf2?mf1? (sacrifice some dominion? sacrifice some nature?)

[DrPraetor]

I'm a big fan of the Order/Fortune builds. Paradoxically, they are a big gamble - they depend on getting one of the highly favorable, order-requiring beneficial events to pay off. I also like other positive scales (growth, productivity) in combination with Fortune for the same reason. Taking a +3 fortune also protects you, in my experience, against the various gem loss events that you otherwise tend to get with Drain.

One thing about Abysia is that they have seriously restricted pretender selection. I can pay QM's ruinous 125 points for the good ol' POD, but you don't get Devas. For maximum burning, consider this build:
Awake Great Sage, same paths, Domstr 6, Order 3, Heat 3, Growth 1, Misfortune 2, Magic 3

Now *that* is a lot of RP. With that build you can get to Evoc 7/Conj 2 by turn 13 or so, and if the forge bitch has fire magic, a dragon with a flame helmet can then put up Fire Storm, which can wipe out almost anything at this stage of the game. If I can get a single dragon marching earlier, build him a lab on the way....

In a map this crowded, I'm not that impressed with early expansion. Someone on the team can expand fast - what's key is to *hold* the territory once we've grabbed it.

That said, we may be better off delaying the same plan a few turns and having another supercombatant. The argument could be made that all six of us should have a fear-causing awe-inspiring Titan, to avoiding any weakness in our defenses.

[atul]

Actually dunno about going Evo with Abysia.

Just a random thought: Go Thaumaturgy instead.

At Thau4 you get Prison of Fire that scales like mad, 3+ effects for 3+ AoE??? At Thau5 it's Raging Hearts, 60 unrest per casting.

I think the big problem here will be the placement where team members can support their neighbours. Shutting down 3 capitals at one time and striking for the middle one could provide the wedge to start pushing against other nations.

...but, just a theory. We didn't get to use Raging Hearts in last game though we talked about it, so guess I'd just like to see it in action.

[TheDemon]

Here's my Eriu build:

Awake Great Sage, F2W6E6S2D2N4, turmoil 3, sloth 3, cold 1, death 2, luck 3, magic 1 (40 RP). I think dom 5.

Expansion is with squads of 2x Tuatha using resist lightning and shockwave. In testing easilly got Conj 2/Alt 1/Evo 5 and 28 provs at early spring year 2, so stormpower lightning is plan A. There's the raiding options but I don't think this nation is really suited to them so much compared to bringing down the skies on someone's precious little army.

[TheDemon]

On great sages, or other research rainbows, it really does boost your research a HUGE ammount. In this game, having combat magic on turn 8 rather than turn 15 means a hell of a lot. There's no such thing as the long run, its unlikely the game goes beyond turn 40.

[lingchih]

Yes, these games go pretty quickly. The first one was over almost before it started, and the second one barely made it to mid-game. I would expect this one to do the same.

[TheDemon]

Marignon:
Awake Great Sage, dom 6, F1 A2 E2 S4 D2 N2 (whatever paths really) 30 RP, order 3, production 0, heat 2, growth 1, misfortune 1, magic 1

Can get conj 6 by turn 10/11 (harbingers), con 4 by turn 12, enchant 5 and thau 5 would be the next goals. Could do forge duty.

e: on atul's advice, dropped growth, added magic.

could also go with a great enchantress or a master druid, the difference is 1 turn of research to level 6. a N bless would be handy. Alternately forget about harbingers and just go for enchant and thau.

[lingchih]

Just doing a variation of the standard MA Ermor build:

Imprisoned Oracle, with S9, so the shadow vestals get twist fate. I added on A4 since I had the points.

Order 3, Sloth 3, Cold 1, Growth 2, Luck 3, Magic 1. Dominion 9.

Money seems to roll in pretty well. I hardly buy any units, so the sloth is no problem. Pretty much just buy Shadow Vestals and the occasional Principe squad. H3's reanimate all the rest of the army (longdead horse).

I won't be a research king, but I should be able to keep up.

EDIT: OK, going with a modfied build of this, which adds fire 9 (courtesy of theDemon). I won't be quite as rich, but it does give my Vestals some offensive punch.

[Baalz]

Here's my Eriu build:

Awake Great Sage, F2W6E6S2D2N4, turmoil 3, sloth 3, cold 1, death 2, luck 3, magic 1 (40 RP). I think dom 5.

Expansion is with squads of 2x Tuatha using resist lightning and shockwave. In testing easilly got Conj 2/Alt 1/Evo 5 and 28 provs at early spring year 2, so stormpower lightning is plan A. There's the raiding options but I don't think this nation is really suited to them so much compared to bringing down the skies on someone's precious little army.

Wow, that's a powerful terrible dominion! I had more in mind an imprisoned major-E minor-N bless with good scales to pump out sidhe lords (probably more like order, luck, death, sloth). With just alt-3 and items supplied by TC I can have an absurd number of thugs clearing almost anything in the field at the end of year one and fielding another 3 per turn. Getting up to ench-4 (cloud trapeze) would be just about the only other research I needed to be fiercesomely effective right up into mid game, letting me basically route everything I recruit strait to battle.

Gonna go do some testing tonight, but with the ability to skip construction research I may take drain-2 scales along with death and sloth to ratchet up my blessing. Adding a fire blessing and I may not even need a brand, just a good shield.

[TheDemon]

Wow, that's a powerful terrible dominion! I had more in mind an imprisoned major-E minor-N bless with good scales to pump out sidhe lords (probably more like order, luck, death, sloth). With just alt-3 and items supplied by TC I can have an absurd number of thugs clearing almost anything in the field at the end of year one and fielding another 3 per turn. Getting up to ench-4 (cloud trapeze) would be just about the only other research I needed to be fiercesomely effective right up into mid game, letting me basically route everything I recruit strait to battle.

Gonna go do some testing tonight, but with the ability to skip construction research I may take drain-2 scales along with death and sloth to ratchet up my blessing. Adding a fire blessing and I may not even need a brand, just a good shield.

Its a different overall strategy. Best to go with what you're familiar with, plus it was designed to power through enemy armies in case we didn't have enough heavy hitters. We got most of the heavy hitters we wanted though, so going a evocation build is somewhat redundant.

[atul]

Hah, that's TheDemon and his obsession for air evocation spam for you.

I'm taking imprisoned Father of Winters with W9E4 for bless, but a bit unsure about dominion.

Domstr 8 Order 3 Sloth 2 Cold 2 Growth 3 Misf 2 Magic 1 for lots of gold
or
Domstr 7 Order 3 Sloth 2 Cold 2 Death 1 Luck 3 Magic 1 for happy happy events.

With 6 provinces neighbouring my capital I'm not too concerned for production scale.

Hm.

[atul]

Looking at the research goals and after TheDemon's reminder of importance of domes, I started thinking about making my pretender only dormant. That way, when he wakes up after first year, he should be set to cast a global "Wrath of the Sea" that reduces income for every coastal province. Shouldn't bother our team bar Ermor and me much, but seeing every noob start near coast, heh.

[atul]

Scale dumping days are here again.

I'm submitting Dormant Father of Winters, A3W9E4 Domstr 9, Order 3 Sloth 2 Cold 2 Death 2 Misf 1 Magic 1.

With a lot of connections to my capital Sloth isn't a problem, and should expand fast enough for Death not to be an issue.

Bless is to make Vans hard to hit and enable some thuggery. As Baalz pointed out in irc, I can blood sacrifice and with domstr 9 it might be possible just to cloud trapeze in and domkill someone with low dominion score. And Father of Winters with AWE magic is too nice to have as a backup SC in case my Vanjarls aren't enough not to put some points into Dormancy.

Feel free to point out deficiencies, but that's what I'm going with at the moment.

[DrPraetor]

My main concern is that death+misfortune alows the possibility of *plagues*, which really suck.

On the other hand, with us funneling you money, you should be okay even if you get one.

[namad]

ashdod's start location has so many neighbors i am contemplating changing from prod2 to prod0 or sloth1


current pretender idea: dom8 e9n6a2imprisoned order3sloth1heat3death1luck0magic1
basically dom6-8 and sloth1-prod1 are all valid ideas in my opinion and I need to choose a certain amount of death OR misfortune to pay for it... how much is appropriate and how much isn't?


nevermind sphinx is cheaper than master druid for dom9 e9n6s3 order3prod0heat3death1luck0magic1
or sphinx with dom8 e9s9n4 order3sloth1heat3death1luck0magic1 for a wishcaster ... my troops don't really need twist fate at all

[atul]

Huh,

I thought by staying above death 3 or death 2 misf 2 you can avoid plaques...?

Hm, I can fiddle a bit to get rid of Misfortune. Guess easiest alteration is Cold3 Luck0.

[DrPraetor]

IIRC, you avoid the 40% plague but not the 20% plague, which is more common anyway.

Safest thing I've found is to go Death+Fortune, but I'm well known to have a massive hardon for the Fortune scale, so...

[atul]

Yeah I was trying to get it, but then I would've gone something like domstr 7 order 3 sloth 3 cold 3 death 2 luck 3, which is pretty little money outside events. Just didn't feel comfortable.

[namad]

hrmmm while my resources are terrific in this location, none of the provinces near my start location have high population and none are farmlands and my income cannot sustain it's own expansion properly the same way cleveland's default start locations could of course slowing down ashdod's expansion rate by 50% would still probably make it possible to get 20provinces in the first year... and this lack of income is probably more like a 15-35% slowdown...so yeah... not a big deal... also the extra domscore the sphinx gives me provides extra goldsink... also lowering production and sticking to the 48resource units costs more gold than preferring the 88resource units

[DrPraetor]

Well, we could *all* take Fortune-3, and then just pass the money around depending on who got the good events .

[namad]

the sphinx baseline is dom8 e9s4n4 order3prod0heat3death2luck0magic1 leaves 162points leftover this can purchase 5astral paths OR negitive 1astral positive 2nature paths and 2scale/dom OR 0paths 4scales OR 0paths 1dom3scales OR 0paths 2dom2scales


so? how key is 10% regen? how much does death2 hurt? obviously twist fate doesn't help ashdod but 2mr might be useful for the SCS

[TheDemon]

the sphinx baseline is dom8 e9s4n4 order3prod0heat3death2luck0magic1 leaves 162points leftover this can purchase 5astral paths OR negitive 1astral positive 2nature paths and 2scale/dom OR 0paths 4scales OR 0paths 1dom3scales OR 0paths 2dom2scales


so? how key is 10% regen? how much does death2 hurt? obviously twist fate doesn't help ashdod but 2mr might be useful for the SCS

I don't think death will matter much, this is a short game. S9 seems pointless, as does increased dom beyond 8. I'd be tempted to go with 2 scales (prod? less death?) and N6.

[DrPraetor]

Unless it's changed, the MR bonus from the blessing doesn't count if your MR is above 18, including bonuses from other sources.

Since every SC will want some kind of boost there, I don't see the point of an astral blessing. The sphinx might still be a good choice for the EN blessing chassis, although keep in mind that it's fully immobile which *is* a real and major disadvantage assuming we ever to get to turn 36 and it wakes up.

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