[SPOILERS] They're cOMing to taKe mE AWAy! Haha! Hoho.

[Mardoc]

What else have the Balseraphs got? Quite a bit:
Puppets
Freaks
Taskmasters
Harlequins
Mimics
Courtesans

And unique buildings:
Arena
Hall of Mirrors

I'll be talking about Freaks and Puppets later, let's start by getting the relatively simple ones out of the way.

Taskmasters are Assassins who have an additional 25% to create a Slave from combat
Courtesans are Shadows with the same bonus.

Fairly minor, but I will be in fairly constant demand for slaves, so it's a nice boost. If I ever build one, that is. I doubt I'll ever get to Guilds for Courtesans, regardless of how nice they are, it's just too far in the tree. Poisons for Taskmasters...maybe. Depends on how well my economy is doing compared to my military demands. Course, a Heroic Taskmaster would be fun, especially if he were also Aeron's Chosen...but I don't think I want it as badly as Mr. Sidar over there.

Harlequins are an odd duck. Rangers with one less strength, but the Taunt spell. Which makes a neighboring unit attack them (or, ideally, the big strong summon guarding them). Handy situationally, but by the time I get that far in the tree, I intend to have summons and magic collateral, both of which prefer to be attacking than to be attacked. Maybe if I've got a city to crack, this might be worth doing. Or if someone tries to defend with archers. One minor bonus, they're trainable with Carnivals rather than Hunting Lodges, and if I end up Creative for any length of time, I want Carnivals anyway

Mimics...are also fairly odd. They're a Champion with one less strength. Every time they win a battle, they gain one promotion from the defeated unit for free. This tends to be more useful in SP than MP - it's hard to arrange things so that Mimics have good odds fights against well-promoted foes. The main possible exception that comes to mind is if I've solid collateral, and I'm using the Mimics only as hitter. And ideally against vampires.

Mimics *can* upgrade again, to Paladins or Eidolons or a number of other T4 units. Which, if I've collected a lot of promotions beforehand, could leave me with downright godly units.

Still, Iron Working isn't a direction I see myself going anytime early. Frankly, if I can set up a situation where Mimics are playing to their strength, they're probably not necessary. If I can give them easy fights to rack up promos with, then I could do the killing with anything - warriors, summons, swordsmen-freaks, etc.

Arenas - sadly, probably should be ignored mostly. Training Yard replacement, which is good for sword production (or more likely, Freak -> Sword upgrades). Melee, Recon, and Slaves in the city can cast the Arena Battle spell, which gives a couple of turns of bonus happiness, with a 50% chance of killing the unit or a 50% chance of giving it a couple XP. Realistically, I don't want to kill off all my units to make a couple with decent XP. I could maybe see doing that with adepts if the passive RNG isn't kind, except they're not eligible. For every other unit, I'd really rather have two of them than one dead and one with a few XP.

Edit: Note to self - TEST THIS! If it's changed in EitB, or between the manual writing and last version of FFH, for that matter, this could be a method to speed-train adepts. 1-7 XP per battle, starting with a Conquest/App adept, means 1-2 arena battles to prepare each mage. Get Titan, and that's probably only 1 battle. Expensive to spend 240 hammers to get one mage instead of 60 hammers + time, but there are circumstances where it could be worthwhile.

I expect I'll likely build exactly one of these, and use it for upgrading Freaks. Yes, Freaks are 10 hammers more than Swords, but they even if I discount the value of Mutation to zero, an Arena only pays for itself after I build 7 swords. If I'm building that many swords, I'm probably in deep trouble, and without time for Arena building anyway. Plus, of course, I do expect Mutation to likely be worth the extra 10 hammers/ 5 gold, on average.

Hall of Mirrors - neat building. Too expensive, but neat. 120 hammers, requires Alteration and an already built Carnival, gives +1 happy and creates an Illusion copy of 1 enemy unit within a tile. Happiness is always handy - but 120 hammers is excessive compared to just about every other option. Illusory enemies...well, the trouble there is that any enemy worth fearing will have at least Mob I on his stack, so they ought to be able to hit me before my summon can spawn. I ought to test this - if it appears on the enemy turn as the unit moves up, it still might be worth using. At least in HK border cities . But realistically I expect to be either decimating my foes in the borderlands/their own territory, or losing.

To sum these all up - they're nice. With cool abilities, and they definitely set a theme for the Balseraphs. If I weren't planning an Arcane game, I would definitely use them. But...none of them are so powerful that I really feel the need to invest in them instead of the arcane tree. If I find myself with extra beakers and time, I might circle back and pick up one or more of these guys. If I go for any, it would likely be Poisons for Taskmasters - all my foes are telegraphing arcane gameplans, too, and assassins, well...

No matter how subtle the wizard, a knife between the shoulder blades will seriously cramp his style.

But we'll wait and see on that.

[Qgqqqqq]

Yeah its kinda sad really that the Balseraphs have all these cool toys, and yet none of them are quite strong enough to use in MP, so we always just see puppetspam with them.

Still, that applies for most any FFH2 civ :/

[Qgqqqqq]

What about the cages (Ive never built one...)?

[Qgqqqqq]

Umm...whats the little thing in the corner of the mini-map?

[Mardoc]

Come one, come all, see the grotesque, the disgusting, the amazing, the Freak Show!


Freaks are an odd duck. Like most of the Balseraph toys, they can be quite powerful, or mostly worthless, depending on the situation.

At base, they're a Str 3 unit that starts Mutated, costs 40 hammers. For combat purposes alone, that's a horrible deal. Mutation is usually a bonus, but it's not enough to justify the cost or the lack of weapons. But of course, they're not really intended as a combat unit, any more than a Lightbringer is. They can upgrade to sword, hunter, or archer - starting those units with Mutation for a slight hammer premium and 5 gold. And meaning you can build only one Arena, one Hunter's Lodge and fill them with Freaks from your entire empire.

Also, they have the Create Freak Show spell. A Freak Show is +2 culture, +1 Bard GPP, +1 happy. That's actually a pretty darn good deal for 40 hammers - strictly superior to a monument or any religion spread you don't plan to build units with. Granted, Bards themselves aren't terribly useful, but they fill out part of a Golden Age just as well as anyone else.

Finally, later on, once you get slaves, you can add them to the Freak show for even more culture and happiness and GPP. Can build each of Orc Cage, Elf Cage, Dwarf Cage, and Human Cage, if you get the right captures. That's a much better use for a slave than turning them into 10 hammers somewhere! In this game, I think I can count on collecting a fair number of orc slaves, due to the size and high difficulty (once I'm in an appropriate civic, that is). Other slaves are iffier. Elf slaves are possible from HK. Human ones from anyone. Dwarf slaves - well, I've a chance of getting them if anyone goes Kilmorph, or from the Undercouncil Slave Trade resolution. Similar trouble as getting the most out of Mimics, though - I can't count on warring on my own terms, terms that might allow me to actually get away with the captured slaves. I can count on getting them from the barbs, but from anyone else, it'll take luck or the right circumstances. Most likely, I'll get a few, if I war for another purpose, but never enough to count on.

Still - if I can get constant skirmishing going on, while I'm in Slavery, Undercouncil, or with Taskmasters, I can turn that 40 hammer investment into a Freak show into potentially +4 happy, +4 Bard GPP, and +5 culture/turn. I'm quite likely to be able to guarantee the orc slaves, at the least, for +2 happy/+2 GPP/+3 culture. That's an excellent deal!

That combination of Freakish abilities means you can cherry-pick the awesome mutations to keep as swords, hunters, etc, and still get a good return on your hammers for the less lucky ones. And you have a culture source that you can build in your core and use on the periphery, without it needing to be religion.

So all in all, Freaks are a very nice bonus to the civ, and another great reason to research Festivals early.

A couple caveats: Need to remember, culture only matters when you're ready to work the 2nd ring, happiness only matters when you're close to the happy cap. Don't go on autopilot here and start every city with a Freak. Need to overbuild a bit, too, so that I don't have to pick between working the corn/gold in 2nd ring and keeping my Heroic Attack/Defense Freak for upgrade. As I tend to run excessively light on military, I hope that the pressure to constantly build freaks for new cities will mitigate that a bit.

What about the cages (Ive never built one...)?

Awesome! Not buildable conventionally, though. Need Freak shows and slaves, rather than hammers.

[Mardoc]

Umm...whats the little thing in the corner of the mini-map?

Good eye!

It's either a mapmaker error, a unit placed via misclick. Or it's something intriguing that bears investigation once the map is released . Looks the right color to be something that belongs to us, unit or equipment or some such.

[Qgqqqqq]

Bah!
Your the first to guess I'm a pirate



On reflection, I suspect its just there to keep us alive while testing the map.
Hope its some sort of quest though.
What ways can one get slaves?
(Undercouncil, Taskmaster, Undercouncil resoloution...any others?)

[Mardoc]

What ways can one get slaves?
(Undercouncil, Taskmaster, Undercouncil resoloution...any others?)

Slavery civic also helps . Another +25% chance to create a slave with that one.

If we run Undercouncil, Slavery, and attack with a Taskmaster or Courtesan, that's a net 75% chance to turn a victory into a slave.

I think that's all.

[Mardoc]

Puppets!


They're simple, really. Str 2, get all the promotions of the unit who summoned them, which means they can cast spells. Their racial abilities are:
Indicates a Non-Living Race
• -20% Str
• Spells are 20% more likely to be resisted
• Spells inflict 10% less damage
• Grants Puppet to all Summoned Units

So, on first glance, why would you want them? Your mage uses up his spell slot to summon the Puppet, who in turn casts the same spell, only weaker? Their use in the hands of Keelyn is more obvious, Summoner means Puppets double the number of castable spells. But for Perpentach?

Plako in XXI, though, showed this perspective to be utterly false. Puppets give two main bonuses and a minor one. The first significant bonus, is to Hero units with Twincast - going via puppets gives you four summons/turn instead of two. Heroic archmages aren't exactly common, but 4 lvl 3 summons can still break through most defenses. Puppets make a Heroic Archmage worth as much as all four of your normal Archmagi.

More vital, though, is the extra range. The typical problem with a mage focused game is that you have to be all offense - the moment anyone reaches your mage stack with undamaged hitters, it's all over. You can mitigate that with careful tactics and bringing along some non-mage units to cover, but go too far in that direction and you might as well just use those conventional units on their own. But, give the mages Spell Extension (or better, Spell Extension 2 as well), and your spells will be cast 2-3 move away from your stack. Use Maelstrom or summons, and you can have an devestating effect potentially 4-6 movement points away from where your Mages cast - which combined with careful tactics, can mean you're unreachable by nearly anything. Especially if the Mages move away after casting.

Exceptions: Well, Mounted units with Mobility II and Haste might be able to reach - they can get to 6 moves. Raider Vampires summoning Spectres can reach, too, with the Spectres, especially if they spend the promotions on Spell Extension as well. Any stack that's big enough and faster than the mages can absorb casualties and still hit you. And, if the foe picks a target you have to defend, mobility doesn't help as much anymore.

Still, by the time anyone's spent the promos on the extreme mobility they need, the units aren't nearly as scary. I can handle a handful of chariots or a deluge of Spectres, with careful planning. The stack that's too big to take out with my mages? Well, that was going to beat me anyway, and really the failure there is economic, not tactical.

Alternately, on the offense, that range means you can fork like nobody's business. There's really no way that an enemy can defend everything within an 8 tile radius of your stack, so you should always have a vulnerable target to hit. This is how Plako managed to devastate us Kurios in XXI - we could be strong anywhere, but not strong everywhere. Enough small blows add up to a real nasty total effect.

Finally, as a minor bonus, there are a number of spells (including Mind I, Inspiration, which Balseraphs start with) that only have to be cast once; after that, they only require the spellcaster be present in the city. So Puppets let you have two of those for one adept.

As you might have guessed from my enthusiasm, I'm planning to make Puppets the cornerstone of my game, Arcane tree all the way. With possibly one addition: I might well pick up Esus or OO for Gibbon or Hemah, respectively. Those are the only Heroic Archmages I have access to, unless I'm lucky enough to pop an adventurer from a lair.
I haven't really decided which is more valuable to me: Gibbon comes earlier but can only summon Illusions, but maybe early isn't vital on a builder map. I suppose I ought to finally take the time to read the changelog for Esus for v9 and decide based on the other aspects of the religions.

[BRickAstley]

Whenever I see your thread title, my mind reads the end out further: "haha, hoho, hehe, huhu..."