[SPOILERS] Lurkers Thread - Well someone has to do it

[Selrahc]

Potency lets disciples gain some passive xp. About the same rate as a non potent channelling 1 adept.

[Ranamar]

Potency lets disciples gain some passive xp. About the same rate as a non potent channelling 1 adept.

... which makes sense, given that Potency adds another +20 to the channeling XP cap.

[Thoth]

Does anyone know if Lightbringers or Savants actually earn passive XP? With a Spiritual leader, the Malakim get a free Potency promotion on these units, which increases the rate of XP gain. But neither Lightbringers nor Savants have any of Channeling I/II/III, which enables passive XP gain in the first place.

Lightbringers no.

Savants/other disciple units yes.

[NobleHelium]

Are you sure about that Thoth? I believe Potency Lightbringers can get the same amount of experience as Potency disciples. What enables passive experience gain is a (channeling OR potency) promotion AND (disciple OR arcane) unit class. Vampires and firebows don't get any passive experience despite having channeling because they're not disciple or arcane units.

[Azoth]

The only counters to Darrell's spectres right now looks like either 1) demon or undead units, or 2) hoping the horsemen demolish half his cities. Ilios is going in the direction of #1, uberfish has definitively passed up on Diseased Corpses...

That might not be such a bad thing. I can't say I approve of Ilios' planned Diseased Corpse army. With the Ljosofar-Calabim Life Mana-for-Body Mana trade, all sides (will soon) have access to Destroy Undead, which will simply demolish them. Champions cost 20 hammers more but are the much safer bet, and can further be hasted. Alternatively, Stygian Guard, at the same price, resist spectres and come with March for free. I'm surprised they haven't gotten more attention, actually. Serdoa would have done much better going for Message for the Deep (instead of, say, Currency) and upgrading Warriors to Drown when attacked. And Spritual Ilios would be better off spending five turns in OO than investing too many hammers in an undead army.

[NobleHelium]

Okay, that's true, Destroy Undead would definitely demolish Diseased Corpses. Stygian Guard sounds like a better idea, yeah. Ilios's Beasts of Agares and Eidolons will be pretty good for tanking the spectres already, though. It will be interesting to see if uberfish takes Capture Beasts on his rangers...you need a lot of experience for that though. Groo can definitely take it with his next promotion.

[DaveV]

What enables passive experience gain is a (channeling OR potency) promotion AND (disciple OR arcane) unit class. Vampires and firebows don't get any passive experience despite having channeling because they're not disciple or arcane units.

Still not quite right. The thing that enables passive XP gain is the <bFreeXP> tag in Civ4UnitInfos. Chance of gaining XP is the sum of bonus from channeling promotions plus potency bonus, minus current XP. Lightbringers do *not* have this tag set, so will not gain passive XP, whether the leader is Spiritual or not. A Disciple of Leaves, for example, has no channeling promotion, and therefore will gain passive XP only for a Spiritual leader, with a max of 20 XP. Advancing from 19 to 20 XP has only a 1% probablity, however, so it may be a long wait.

[Mygdala]

Eidolons on the field, very exciting. I believe this is the first time we've seen Tier 4 units in a PBEM here. I've always wondered how effective they would be in limited numbers against a human.

[NobleHelium]

Never mind.

[Gaspar]

I sort of thought the current situation was obvious once Darrell posted his I have a secret after uber posted his cryptic messages, but I wonder if this is the wisest move for Darrell. Malakim has passed their peak, but the longer the game goes on the stronger the Elves get. I suppose geography dictated the 2v1 would be most effective against Ilios who's smack dab in the middle, but still think its an interesting choice.

Still like uber to win the game, but that well promoted Darrell army will be hard to stop. Looking forward to watching it play out.