NvV3: Pre-game Discussion

Ok, my first proposed pretender design (with astral), End of year 1 (Winter first year)

Territories: 23
Gem Sites: 3 (+3e +1d total increased gem income)
Fortresses: 2nd one building
Research: Alt 2/Evoc 3 (and the next turn will net Conj 1+2)
Events: Much fewer than expected with Tu3 Lk3 (7 all year, 1 increase PD, 5 gem, 1 for 200 gold)

Note: This is with me suiciding my GK into the toughest indie province I could find in mid-fall just to see how much he could take, so I could reasonably have 25+ provinces by the first month of year 2 by not doing that. (Amazons + pegasus riders are ridiculously tough)

I need to do this again without astral to see just how much that changes things.

Edit: wow, it was a turn earlier than i thought it was. Ok, next turn involves me capturing another 3 provinces... (originally said start of year 2)

More Edit: Do i even need an early game pretender? I'm thinking about taking an awake sage for the research boost because my normal armies are so awesome. Although I suppose i could use the GK for undersea expansion...

Ok, I think I want to do this:

GK Awake
D5A2N2 Dom 9
Tu3 Pr3 Co3 Gr0 Lk3 Dr3

D5 will give good endgame death magic and make his Fear +10. Air gives me air shield and mirror image as reasonable early buffs. Nature gives me barkskin early.

Research path: alt 2/evoc 3/conj 3 in that order, probably followed by constr 2/conj 5/ench 2+ in some order. I'll start year 2 almost to conj 3.

From the looks of things, I can get about 30 provinces in the first 11 turns. I think I'm good on expansion rate.

I'm going to want to trade for some crystal shields by the end of year 2.

Squirrelloid wrote:Ok, I think I want to do this:

GK Awake
D5A2N2 Dom 9
Tu3 Pr3 Co3 Gr0 Lk3 Dr3

D5 will give good endgame death magic and make his Fear +10. Air gives me air shield and mirror image as reasonable early buffs. Nature gives me barkskin early.

Research path: alt 2/evoc 3/conj 3 in that order, probably followed by constr 2/conj 5/ench 2+ in some order. I'll start year 2 almost to conj 3.

From the looks of things, I can get about 30 provinces in the first 11 turns. I think I'm good on expansion rate.

I'm going to want to trade for some crystal shields by the end of year 2.

Have you tried a "good-scales" design to see how it compares? Shinuyama has massive magic power and diversity, and doesn't really need much extra. Initial expansion can be good if you have extra cash, as you can spit out plenty of O-bakemono (only 1 resource, but with lots of HP and reasonable protection) and archers - with indie commanders, you can have an expansion army out every turn! Replace O-bakemono with more efficient Dai-bakemono when resources crank up after the first few conquests around your capitol.

There's a very bad downside to Drain with Shinuyama!!! It adds greatly to spell-casting fatigue, which is already a problem with your old Sorcerers - pile on Drain and you might make them very ineffective in combat

Best plan IMO, go for a sleeping or imprisoned Titan (A2E1) or Celestial General (A1E1) with an extra point of Air - just enough to get you Dai-Tengu later if you want them (they are good air mages). That or an imprisoned Anything with N4 - if a sorcerer gets diseased, you can get a Shroud from an ally to keep them alive.

Yeah, and don't worry about off-path magic items - this is a team game, not an alliance, so offering compensation to teammates is nice, but I sincerely hope people will just give things when absolutely necessary. Besides, I want crystal shields too

TwoBits wrote:

Squirrelloid wrote:Ok, I think I want to do this:

GK Awake
D5A2N2 Dom 9
Tu3 Pr3 Co3 Gr0 Lk3 Dr3

D5 will give good endgame death magic and make his Fear +10. Air gives me air shield and mirror image as reasonable early buffs. Nature gives me barkskin early.

Research path: alt 2/evoc 3/conj 3 in that order, probably followed by constr 2/conj 5/ench 2+ in some order. I'll start year 2 almost to conj 3.

From the looks of things, I can get about 30 provinces in the first 11 turns. I think I'm good on expansion rate.

I'm going to want to trade for some crystal shields by the end of year 2.

Have you tried a "good-scales" design to see how it compares? Shinuyama has massive magic power and diversity, and doesn't really need much extra. Initial expansion can be good if you have extra cash, as you can spit out plenty of O-bakemono (only 1 resource, but with lots of HP and reasonable protection) and archers - with indie commanders, you can have an expansion army out every turn! Replace O-bakemono with more efficient Dai-bakemono when resources crank up after the first few conquests around your capitol.

There's a very bad downside to Drain with Shinuyama!!! It adds greatly to spell-casting fatigue, which is already a problem with your old Sorcerers - pile on Drain and you might make them very ineffective in combat

Best plan IMO, go for a sleeping or imprisoned Titan (A2E1) or Celestial General (A1E1) with an extra point of Air - just enough to get you Dai-Tengu later if you want them (they are good air mages). That or an imprisoned Anything with N4 - if a sorcerer gets diseased, you can get a Shroud from an ally to keep them alive.

Yeah, and don't worry about off-path magic items - this is a team game, not an alliance, so offering compensation to teammates is nice, but I sincerely hope people will just give things when absolutely necessary. Besides, I want crystal shields too

So, an expansion army with dai-bakemono is ~5-15 (depending on the strength of the indies). I can pop out at least one of those every turn. The GK is also a province every turn for say the first year or so. I certainly hope 30ish provinces by turn 12 is an acceptable expansion rate. (And the best thing about dai-bakemono archers is they rarely die to independents, so the armies never run out of steam.)

The only place i might be suffering a little bit (based on test games) is building the first fortress or two if i don't get gold events at all. Ie, highly unlikely.

I still worry about all that Drain. When it comes to fighting the Vets, it's going to be all about the magic, and not about the Dai-bakemono, and I'm afraid your Sorcerers will suffer badly, only getting off one or two spells before fatiguing out. Shinuyama was the Noobs first nation choice, because people were counting on them to be Giant/SC counters, especially being able to spam Bane Fire and such. But with Drain, your Sorcerers wont get off many before they poop out...

Actually, for the team, the best Shinuyama pretender might be one heavy on Earth, so the Holy sorcerers can stay in the field longer.

Shinuyama here. I can do clam forging with a single water booster in all likelihood. I'd also be reasonable for death/fire/earth forgings, but I don't have any particular advantages in forging other than i have those paths.

TwoBits wrote:I still worry about all that Drain. When it comes to fighting the Vets, it's going to be all about the magic, and not about the Dai-bakemono, and I'm afraid your Sorcerers will suffer badly, only getting off one or two spells before fatiguing out. Shinuyama was the Noobs first nation choice, because people were counting on them to be Giant/SC counters, especially being able to spam Bane Fire and such. But with Drain, your Sorcerers wont get off many before they poop out...

Actually, for the team, the best Shinuyama pretender might be one heavy on Earth, so the Holy sorcerers can stay in the field longer.

Hmmm... let me try some things.

I think the main thing people will be looking to Shinuyama for are the Water/Fire combo items, which not many other races have available. Rune Smashers especially, and eventually Elemental Staves. There might be other useful crossover items too. Like the Clams, of course

GK Awake
D5A2N2 Dom 9
Tu3 Pr3 Co3 Gr0 Lk3 Dr3

Status at start of turn, Early Spring Year 2:
Provinces: 36
Income/Turn: 3.1k gold
Gems: 1 new site (1d)
Research: Alt2/Evoc3/Conj3 + 40rps towards Conj 4
Fortresses: 2, +2 building (started 3 and 1 turns ago)

Next test:
Great Enchantress Awake
F1A2W1E4S4 Dom 8
Tu3 Pr3 Co3 Gr0 Lk3 Mg0

(Fire chosen because it works well with earth. Death is sort of random - could easily be water or nature. Test in progress. Changed to water)

Provinces: 33
Income/Turn: 2.8k gold
Gems: 1 new site (1f)
Research: Ench 3/Conj 3/Evoc 4 + 126 rp towards Evoc 5
Fortresses: 1 building (2 turns to go)

Notes in comparison:
Despite almost catching up in per turn income, its actually significantly behind on number of units produced and number of fortresses built and building. Ie, the previous run ran into some bottlenecks at the end, but expanded faster earlier and thus had far more cash avaialable to it.

This version does have a research advantage, but that should become relatively small in year 2 as research costs increase and it falls behind on number of mages. Further, it has no ocean provinces as of yet (admittedly, the ocean was a little farther away than i'll be in the real game, which decreased my incentives to try to expand oceanwards.

Which means now its time to try a sleeping pretender with better scales. Lets just say i'm not enthusiastic because i doubt I'll get much use out of my pretender if it doesn't start awake since i don't have a good bless.

Yes - remember the Vets

It may be possible to make a build that can conquer 30 in the first year. But really there are unlikely to be 30 spare (unless you grab a lot of water). We are all likely to be bordering vets by turn 6 or so, especially as everyone should advance to the centre and then back fill. Or at least prioritise getting to the centre.

No point clearing the indies for their benefit if you can't hold those lands

I am not sure how good the Ghost King would be vs the Vets. He might clear indies really well, but if he can't hold off the Vets then you are better off picking decent scales as TwoBits suggests. Especially if you can field a new expansion army a turn.

I think drain would be bad for you too. Though at least your researchers won't feel it that much as you are certainly a few good reserachers nation rather than a many weak researchers nation (like me!). The difference between drain 2 and magic 1 doubles my standard researcher

Also as you are likely to get a lot of sea areas you should consider order 3 if you haven't already and possibly growth too though I doubt this will be a very long game You are likely to be a money farmer for us. As I expect you will (if you survive!) have a lot more provinces than most of us because of the sea empire. It would be a shame if they were all turmoil 3. Thats a lot of cash to throw away with your aggressive dom. With these 150% gold it is even more.

I like luck, but you don't need to get lucky to get cash boosts in a team of 12 Nor the gem finds as other players can provide what you lack. Plus Luck 3, Order 3 is not that bad if you like luck. You still get plenty of good events despite the none synergy as long as you grab enough sea for a high province count.

Jeez, I totally forgot about Shinuyama and the sea - good catch Hoplo! Yeah, I think Order-3 becomes imperative with that, because, as you said, the seas should be cash producers, and because Kappas can be kind of expensive to mass.

Squirrelloid, I'd suggest if you wanted more design points (well, the best way would be to have your pretender sleeping or imprisoned) would be to take Sloth-3. Yes, it will certainly slow recruitment of Dai-Bakemono, but then again, your regular Bakemono archers are only 2 resources each, your O-Bakemono are only 2 resources each, and Kappas are only 1.

In the end though, I still think the best play for Shinuyama overall would be as good of scales as possible (O3P3G3 and whetever luck and magic can be scrounged). About the only nod to diversification I'd make would be a god that someday could summon Dai-Tengu, but even there, heck, Caelum has us well covered in flying air mages.

Remember, don't try to do everything with your pretender - rely on your teammates to cover your gaps. You're also not expected to be a hard-core front line nation immediately. So I don't see any need for an Awake pretender or a Rainbow pretender. Work toward Shinuyama's strengths - mainly the awesome recruit anywhere (but somewhat expensive, so take Order, and old, so stay away from Drain) Sorcerers.

I really can't justify an imprisoned pretender without having any sacred troops to buy.

The GK does head off into the sea for sea conquest. This removes the need to mass kappa (until and unless i start fighting a vet in the sea). And I'm seeing enough cash each turn to buy mages and full dai-bakemono compliments for all 4 fortresses i have or will shortly have at the end of year 1. I really don't need more cash.

The cheap troops are utter crap for fighting the indies. They die like flies, even with good scripts. I can't justify buying them pre-contact with the vets, can mass arbitrary numbers rapidly if i need them, and can't see really using them until i get Fire Arrows researched.

I'm pretty sure the early expansion potential with the GK will prove to generate more cash than taking better scales would. But i'll see how many trials I can get done with various builds.

Added results from Enchantress to previous post.

Also, drain is only going to hurt my spellcasting if i'm actually casting in my own territory. I'd like to play a little more offensively than that.

The GK build could comfortably take 20 provinces and have 100 dai-bakemono on or headed towards the vet's border by the end of year 1, and with strategic move 2 it won't take them long to get there if they aren't there already. I'm sure a vet can stop 100 dai-bakemono, but it'll take allocation of resources - which means whomever is helping me thrash him should have a much easier time of it. And with two good fortresses I'll be able to pump out 30-40/turn, with 4 good fortresses we're looking at 60-80. Plus 1 mage/fortress. Lets just say I can keep someone occupied.

What I might need is an ally to send me a continuous stream of reinvigoration items to supply my mages. I'll also be making extensive use of Summon Earth Power, which is 4 reinvigoration. And the elevated path level should substantially reduce the fatigue i suffer.

Basically, the GK build gives me a tempo no other build i've tried can match. And I'm reasonably certain this game will be won on tempo.

I can certainly take up some of the forging slack, I planned on using my pretender to make some boosters (astral and air for the most part as water is fairly easy) as early as possible to up the skill of my forgers - forging more boosters. I can take requests, let me know what you want me to do.

I would leave the forge thread seperate. We need somewhere where people can post requests and answer those requests. Plus post what spare gems they have. Whether or not there are designated forgers or not....

There is a point in some of us not forging. At least in the early to mid game. It is one area where you can do things for others. Apart from globals and some overland spells research benefits are not shared. Me being good at Alteration does not help your mages You still have to research them to cast the magic.

But there is no reason for many of us to spend a single point in construction - at least until most of research is done. This should be a good advantage for us. Over half of the Vets probably need to forge - both for the amount of stuff they need and to get the paths.

Test 3:
Titan Imprisoned
A5E4 Dominion 8
Or3 Pr3 Co3 Gr1 Lk3 Mg1

Test aborted. O-bakemono suck just as much as I thought they would. The better scales aren't doing anything for me.

Right now I'm looking at an awake titan research god with 35 research points, 6S1N magic 3order/1sloth/1cold/1magic/7 dom strength. My expansion is a little slower than I'd like, but by the middle of year two I'm becoming a major magic powerhouse - by the end of year two I could probably take on Ashdod solo without major worries. The thing I'd be weakest to at the moment would probably be air raiding.

I'm half tempted to name them "DormantSC" or "Imprisonedbless" to see if I can confuse the vets. Hey, a noob might make that mistake, right? since they haven't played any MP they might forget that the other players can find out their God's name.

I know you like super scales, twobits, but elephants are my main troop, and at 120/20 gold to resource cost, sloth doesn't hurt me at all. my power is in my mages anyway.

Thoughts?

I think such a role would be helpful, but I dont think im responsible enough to assume such a role.

I had success with shinuyama by using a few melee dai-bakemono to absorb arrows while I just flooded the sky with them myself with the 8g2r little bakemono archers. You can recruit any indies with shields after a couple turns of expansion to support the arrow-blocking capacity. Clearly, one wouldn't use this for enemies with big shields, but for them you can do a dai-bakemono (who have some ridiculous effective attack skill)

Squirrel - It's your pretender and build so the most important thing is you are happy with it

If you want an awake GK thats what you should have. You've even tested it and it works.

And if you are happy with your scales they are yours too Though I'll try once more to get you to change these

Luck/Turmoil rather than Order/Misfortune is a gamblers pick in most cases. You are not playing the percentages really. Now in SP that doesn't matter. And in MP sometimes it is worth going for to as it is sometimes better to gamble even if it is on average worse because the times it works it really works.

But in a team the good luck affects are far less impressive. If you want cash for forts or emergency builds you can usually get it from teammates. And those hard to find gem finds are rather irrelevent in a team of 12 when gems you find rarely will be two a penny to some of your team mates.

And finally remember order/turmoil scales with the 150% gold while luck does not.

It's a 42% shift in income per turn (once you have spread your scales which with dom 9 you will). And that on a 50% larger whole.

There is a good reason for Order 3/Misfortune 2 being a very common multiplayer pick and here it is 50% improved

With O3/M2 you only need to find 40 design points and can keep your awake SC GK

So, I'm wondering what Pangaea, Bandar, and Agartha are planning on for the early game? Because i figure by the end of year 1 i'm going to have around 100 dai-bakemono archers on the nearest vet's borders, with 40-60+ new ones and suitable (2-4) mage support all headed that direction each turn. That should be enough to keep a vet fairly busy i'd imagine. The named four of us are the upper half brute-squad, so some support (especially from the other side to keep the vet occupied elsewhere) would be appreciated.

Also, with Agartha opposite me it sounds like we're splitting the ocean, bar whatever Ermor manages to eek out. I'm thinking if Ermor is kept suitably occupied, I might be able to help swarm someone under fairly easily with a continuous stream of dai-bakemono and mages.

My major demands from allies are going to be crystal shields and fire gems from the looks of things. Possibly some demand for death gems.

(Independent mages with air for wind guide would be really nice, but i've got decent precision on my dai-bakemono).

Heres my best plan to date, any advice would be appreciated.

Awake Great Sage

Dom4 Or3 Pr0 Co3 Gr0 Lu0 Ma3

F1 A4 S4 E1 D1

My expansion is alright, but a bit slow, ive got a few raiding parties of about 20 fliers, about two dozen elephants expanding, 60 rp a turn with three forts by the start of the second year.

Hoplo:
I can't even spend all the cash I do get most of the time in the test game.

I mean, if it really makes you happy I can take Order2/Misf2 without any problems, but i'd rather not combine misfortune with a drain scale, and a luck scale means i'll see more of a number of potentially helpful events (including more frequent heroes), and invaders in my domain will suffer from my luck scale (its misfortune to them).

Basically, I don't see those scales causing me insurmountable problems, and I'm sure I can break the bank on gem income if i try. (Not running out of gems means you're not using enough).

But if it really makes you happy, O2/Mf2 it is. It just means I need to bank my gem income on my mages every turn. And don't be surprised when I start sucking down fire/death gems like a hoover come middle-end of year 2.

Edit: That would make my pretender

GK awake
D5N2A2 Dominion 9
Or2 Pr3 Co3 Gr0 Mf2 Dr3

Proposed research plan:
Alt 2, evoc 3, conj 3, enchant 2, then conj -> 5 (tiamat at 4), evoc -> 6 (magma eruption), ench -> 5 (fire arrows) in some order, then push evocation and conjuration.

Skinu wrote:Heres my best plan to date, any advice would be appreciated.

Awake Great Sage

Dom4 Or3 Pr0 Co3 Gr0 Lu0 Ma3

F1 A4 S4 E1 D1

My expansion is alright, but a bit slow, ive got a few raiding parties of about 20 fliers, about two dozen elephants expanding, 60 rp a turn with three forts by the start of the second year.

The only thing I'm really worried about there is your dominion. In a multiplayer game you want 6+ dominion if at all possible. Mainly atm, it would save you from being accidentally squished by allied dom.

If the main benefit to shinuyama forging is w/f that can wait a while. Meanwhile, shinuyama can be building up their anti-sc repertoire which is very important in this game. And one of the other major things they could forge, drain life standards, a certain forge lord god we've been talking about recently would be an ideal forger of those.

Machaka CAN forge f/d and is going to be forging fever fetishes anyway, so there's no need for shinuyama to forge fire skulls.