Test games played

[Seravy]

I prefer not to lose the unique "Resistance to All" priests and I think a good knight unit that has all the functions of a priest would be good and thus would need to be expensive which is...exactly what we want to avoid.

As for settlers, yes, you can produce more but can you defend all those hamlets? With the AI already having the settlers, they might even build additional basic troops to attack you with.

[Seravy]

Currently playing an Advanced difficulty game with a random High men wizard - 4 Nature 4 Chaos 2 Life Chaneller.
Eliminated 2 wizards on Arcanus, one is still in play but I'm stronger - tho I have a hard time fighting off the incoming stacks as most of my newly produced units are committed to clearing nodes and lairs, I need more spells.
The wizard on my plane is no threat - all Nature and only recently got the first rare spell while I'm already doing very rares. Nature isn't very good against pikemen and paladins either, albeit good against magicians. As the cities fill up with troops I'll slowly use the excess to conquer more of her cities.

My main strategy so far has been using the Soul Linker hero with some spiders and unicorns - didn't get a rare creature. Soon I'll be adding Colossus to that stack. I found a random generated regeneration+wraith form armor with 5 defense which is amazing luck, and will allow me to use the hero's stack against either wizard safely (as long as I win the battles.)

The last wizard however will be difficult. All chaos - well, 1 sorcery and 1 other maybe death - but with AEther Binding and already knows half of the rares. She has Flame Strike and I don't. High Men economy is unlikely to survive the big chaos spells and I don't have the upper hand in combat, so I have to use the hero stack and colossus to raze her cities ASAP and I have doubts it'll be quick enough. Alternately, if I find some relevant spells (Stream of Life and Gaea's Blessing would be great) then that can turn things around.

On the upside, I traded away my Doom Mastery for Fire Storm which doesn't seem like a great deal, but I have Holy Word.

[Kaiku]

What is it with AI being so good with chaos? In the games I've played, it's (nearly?) always a chaos wizard who comes out ahead. Yet I feel chaos may be one of the weaker realms in the beginning.

[Seravy]

Interesting especially considering Chaos has quite a lot going against it (the bug which was recently fixed for gargoyle research plus the high chance of chaotic personality).
In my case it was pure luck, the Chaos wizard started on Myrror and made no contact until 1414. I only saw what was coming when it used AEther Binding (from the portrait I knew it's going to be Chaos heavy) but even then I had no means to go to the other plane, was busy fighting the remaining two one Arcanus.


Tests in a previous version actually showed Chaos being the least likely to survive while Life and Death were doing best, both for mono and 2 realm wizards. If that turned around, the doomstack mechanic might be responsible - Chaos has very good uncommon and rare flying creatures to build doomstacks from. I don't think much from another AI can expect to stop 9 Chimeras, also Doom Mastery makes 1/3 of the normal units able to build secondary doomstacks as well.

[Kaiku]

In my current game, where I'm chaos myself, I have a chaos and sorcery wizard both on my plane. The chaos wizard stomped on the sorcery one with minimal effort, and is also spamming volcano's as if it has nothing better to do (I believe volcano's aren't great short-term investments, so find it strange).

In my previous game, there was a nature and chaos wizard on the other plane. Very (!) early, the chaos wizard already banished the nature one (but couldn't finish him off, for some reason) and controlled the entire plane.

Those are the ones I can clearly recall, but it's happened in more of my games as I do remember thinking "chaos again!" when that happened.

But I have quite a bit of trouble in getting good starts as chaos, compared to other realms. I think hell hounds are one of the weaker summons which don't allow the taking of many lairs/nodes, and their direct damage options aren't that powerful yet. So, really interesting.

[Kaiku]

Man, what a pain in the ass this game was. Too many Chaos wizards. Too many Volcano's and Fire Storms and overland crap. Was at war with three wizards, but the one I wasn't at war with was the most annoying of them all, as he felt like hugging my cities and properties with his 3294 stacks. But I think Sorcery is one of the better, if not the best realm. It really has everything. Game breaking unit enchantments (invisible, wind walking, magic immune, spell locked...) excellent city enchantments, incredible casting skill. Vertigo is so good and Magicians can cast it twice! - seems OP. They can make newbie heroes work whereas they're Slinger target practice for other realms. Not too many summons, and there's a bit of a gap between Nagas and Storm Giants (Water Elementals are a bit... meh), but even though I like summons, that's okay.

Nearly all of their spells are useful and solid, opposed to Death where the majority just... don't work in late game.

Edit: By the way, what does Chaos Rift exactly do? It says it has a 5% chance to destroy a building each turn, but stuff like this happens regularly. http://puu.sh/yB40V/52f5a031cb.png

[Kaiku]

Started a new game with Life and Barbarians. I want to see what Nelphine keeps going on about with his Jesus-Berzerkers.

Btw, is it the norm to play with 'Revolting Raiders' and 'Monsters Gone Wild' on or off?

[Seravy]

Whichever you like.
I used to play with them on for a while, but now that the AI is better I usually have them off.

[Kaiku]

It's a bit strange seeing those options in the menu. You'd think they'd be incorporated in the regular difficulty settings.

Anyway. Playing Barbarian is quite different and... interesting compared to my usual playstyle. I rushed Berzerkers, and found an enemy Wizard (solo Sorcery) on the same continent. Can't have that, so I sent my first buffed Berzerker to raid his outer settlements. The next 5 Berzerkers (unbuffed) went to capture his stronger towns, which wasn't all that hard. But keeping them while trying to advance was. I had a stream of Berzerkers from my now 3 cities reinforcing the area, leaving my own home very weak and unprotected. Barely held off a neutral raiding party thanks to battle-casted heroic Spearmen, and I'm low on... everything. This early military strategy does take its toll.

Soon the continent was mine, except for his capital. Between the Lightning Bolts and Focus Magic Naga, there's no way I can take it. This is where I am now.

There are two other wizards on Arcanus. They're allied, but I'm on good terms with them.

[Nelphine]

Don't forget the best use if hezerkers is taking lairs and nodes. I generally stay ahead of lunatuc AI on power production, despite having a very low number of cities.