Test games played

[Seravy]

Well, I don't have Life this game, and Flame Blade only won't help them avoid getting nuked.

[Nelphine]

Correct . I'm just pointing out what they synergize with. They aren't designed for chaos late game - they're an early military race, and optimize the best with early military picks. 

They also don't die just the same as longbownen - they still have twice the health. They do still die of course, but not just the same.

The big problem is that virtually all races die very easily if you don't use picks to avoid that. Spells are designed to be better. The diffence between a 25 production unit and a 100 production unit, when going against summons that cost 100+ mana or combat spells that cost 25+ mana is virtually nonexistent. The spell steamrolls both production unit.

It's why I'm so concerned with dwarf casting skill, and it's why buffing is so strong.

[Seravy]

   

The Myrran wizard broke towers around 1412, at which point they had about the right strength compared to others. However, they quickly obliterated most cities that belonged to yellow and then proceeded to mine.
I haven't lost yet but I probably will. Currently researching Armageddon but it's still another 15-30 turns away and I can barely afford combat spells to defend myself.

A few thoughts :
-Towers are breaking too early. 1408 with Warlord Myrran and 1412 with normal Myrran - but we designed the game around the assumption the player gains full control of Arcanus and has their first very rares in 1418. Earlier than that and late realms/strategies won't be human playable as they can't stop a much more powerful Myrran wizard with only uncommons and a few rares. If this happened during/after I research Armageddon, I'd be good to start the final war. As is, I'm not.
-The Myrran wizard got Doomsday about one year after that from treasure. I can't help thinking up to 4-6 years before I get my very rares is still too early to find them in treasure by the Myrran AI - who has the best chance of doing so. I lost about 300-400 gold a turn to that, plus god knows how much production.
-Unsure how much of this failure is due to the Lizardmen race, so I'l play it again with Death next time. I suspect they might need at least some more food buildings but might be ok otherwise - the main contributing factor to the loss was Chaos being too slow compared to the Myrran wizard (who was Chaos/Nature btw, Beastmen Sage Master).
-Lizardmen economy used to be good for magic - they have most power buildings. However now the lack of research buildings hurt too much so they might no longer work for it.

[Nelphine]

Sage master makes a big difference. It takes expected very rares in 1418 and shifts that to 1414. So getting that doomsday is almost exactly in line with when sagemasters should have very rares anyway. And treasures should have the chance to come before you actually get that tier, that's always been part of the game. If anything is say that 1413 is still too late (as a specialist sagemaster would already have very rares).

[Nelphine]

My dwarf game with the 3 cities with combined 165 power has concluded. In Feb 1413, the 2 Arcanus AI sued for peace. I ended up with better skill than the previous game (62 more combat casting skill, 19 months earlier), despite not taking archmage; but the books were much better for city buffing, so combined with Spellweaver (and dark elves instead of beastmen!), my overland spell skill was just ridiculous, permitting all 49 cities that could, to have Uranus' Blessing by early 1412. I updated the stats in my 'crazy spell casting test game' post.

Interestingly, in the same turn they sued for peace, they also conquered the very first city I lost in the whole game. So technically, they were doing better than ever before! (Not really. I had 9 cities on Arcanus with 1 swordsmen guarding them. They took the one with a dwarf swordsmen, mostly because I was lazy and fled. In reality, they can't actually beat a single dwarf swordsmen with their strongest doomstack.)

[Nelphine]

Oh. Uranus' Blessing no longer affects Alchemist's Guilds. Did the AI learn this and therefore avoid casting it on dwarf cities? (I assume it already avoids barbarian cities.)

[Seravy]

No, the AI casts it on any city. Barbarians actually benefit a lot from the added magic weapons.
In worst case, the AI still gets the free Counter Magic which is not bad enough to exclude those cities from the list.

[Nelphine]

Edit: Neve mind I had no idea it acted as an alchemists guild for producing units. That's amazing for adamantium barbarians!

I personally wouldn't cast it for the counter magic, but as the AI is expected to be on the defense, I can understand that.

[Seravy]

Started the 10 Death Lizardmen game.

This one sure will be different. 

I believe the race has three-four main design areas it is supposed to be good at.

I. Scouting
The race is amazing at scouting as expected - In 1403 I already know the entire map. Not the lairs though - I decided not to waste time on scouting those as my primary strategy is better against wizards. This scouting allows me to easily eliminate other wizards using early werewolves, and being able to transform them on the destination continent means I effectively have "almost waterwalking" wolves. It also means easy access to neutral cities, and thus other races.

II. Sea dominance
The race...fails at naval dominance, their main "feature" due to what I explained last game. Yes they fight better than ships, but they move slower and cost more to maintain so an actual blockade is too inefficient - Ultimately it costs more to field the "sea garrison" than to put proper units into the cities, as protecting the sea always means a larger circle than the cities themselves and it also costs more than having a specialized army of galley or warships for it.
Hey, even a Floating Island with random ranged troops on it work better at defending your seas, at least that moves 3 tiles a turn! Best bet is probably having like 8-10 stacks of 2 warships though, no transport can slip through that and it's available to half the races.

III. Spreading
The race also fails at spreading which I learned from this game. Not because they can't reach good spots before others, no. It's because ultimately you ask yourself "Do I want a lizardmen city there or the elves my opponent plays?" and you'll want the elves. Being able to build more cities is not an advantage unless those cities are actually at least average in quality, which lizardmen cities definitely aren't - they are bad at research, food and production, and only average in military and power.

IV. Early military
While their units are good in the early game my Arcanus standards, they are nowhere near the quality of excellent units other races offer - horsebowmen, longbowmen cost less, are more resistant and come faster for the same firepower, and the other units are niche targets for buffing or countering some enemy strategies. I fail to see the high strategic strength of halberdiers too - they have 50% more HP and 1 more armor but lose 4 ranged attack strength compared to a Javelineer. So they might be near double on defense but they are only half on offense ratings. However, a race having four main roles is excessive and we have many other "early military" races in the game, so Lizardmen failing at it is acceptable. Naval Domination and settler advantage are long term (mainly midgame, maybe late, but definitely not early) strategies.

I feel a somewhat larger re-design is needed to fix this - not because the race is bad or anything like that, but because they...don't do what they are supposed to. It's the only naval/settler expanding race in the game and it fails to take advantage of it.

We don't need to fix I. as it works as intended.
Not sure what we can do to fix II - we might need to design a new, specialized anti-ship unit that is great at seas but medicore on land. Probably at Fighter's Guild level, or maybe two, one for FG and one for AG or FS.
III. is easy to fix - we need to allow the race to build more stuff. Most likely not every building like dedicated late races, but definitely more than what they have now. Sage's Guild and Forester's Guild perhaps.

I'm worried about making changes like these though - the race had to be nerfed last year due to it being far too dominant under AI use.

...made a copy of this post in the races thread, please reply there if it's specific to the race.

[Nelphine]

Trying a Lunatic Chaos Raise Volcano strategy. Probably going to die miserably. So be it. But I found the first AI when his fortress was still pop 2 (Aug 1402), and started tossing volcanoes on it. We'll see!