Picks and civ analysis.
superjm: Volanna of Svartalfar
Bobchillingworth: Garrim Gyr of Luchuirp
Mr. Cairo: Flauros of Calabim
Aurorarcher: Auric Ulvin of Illians
We'll start with me, my list was thus:
1) Auric Ulvin of the Illians
2) Flauros of the Calabim
3) Valledia the Even of the Amurites
4) Cassiel of the Grigori
5) Volanna of the Svartalfar
So I got my second pick. Auro got the Illians, which is annoying, I was looking forward to playing with them. But, the Calabim are good too, I think. At the very least they're the civ I ahve the most experience playing with in SP, and they just seem kinda generally strong.
I picked Flauros (CRE, FIN) mainly for the Creative trait. Their other leaders are Decius (ORG, RAI) and Alexis (PHI, AGG) and I don't have very much experience playing with Raiders or Philosophical, and I wanted mainly economic traits. So Flauros it is.
The Calabim are the Vampires, and their melee unit line has been replaced by Vampire uniques.
Warrior -> Bloodpet. Identical to warriors, but can be eaten by the Vampire unit (see below)
Axeman -> Moroi. The same as Axes, but 15 hammers more expensive (on normal, being FIN, and knowing about cheap markets I'm more likely to be upgrading Bloodpets than building these directly). They have the ability "Burning Blood" It gives them +1 movement, +20% Strength, immune to Fear, and can attack multiple times per turn. It has a 10% chance of wearing off each turn, but also comes with a 20% chance to turn into a barb each turn. They seem very good coupled with Decius' Raiders trait giving them Commando (imagine them with this, mobility, and haste for 4 move blitzing commandos), but they're still good even with Commando. Ideally used when charging into an enemies lands so if they swap to barbs they don't hurt me.
Champion -> Vampire. Cost 60 hammers more (on normal, so again, mostly likely going to be upgrading) and one less defense power. But they come with a bunch of spells and abilities. They start with Body 1 (haste), Death 1 (raise skeleton), Channeling 1 & 2 which lets you promote to Body and Death 2, and Vampirism, which gives three abilities: Feast, which sacrifices population in your city and grants xp to the Vampire. Feed, which sacrifices a Bloodpet in the stack to heal the Vampire and allow it to attack again. And Gift Vampirism, which lets it pass on the Vampirism promo to any living units of at least level 6 (like Mages, for example, who can then easily promote even further by feasting on your cities). They also require the Feudalism tech and the unique building Governor's Manor to build (which I think is an EitB nerf)
Immortal -> Vampire Lord. Can only be upgraded from a unit of level 12 or higher (twice as high a level requirement as the Immortal). Same strength as the Immortal, but as with the Vampire, comes with some spells, the same as the Vampire, but also with Channeling 3 and Mind 1. So they can cast level three spells for Mind, Death, and Body, which is quite good if the game gets that far (it's like another 4 Archmages, if somewhat limited). They also have Vampirism (of course), and like the Immortal, will resurrect in the capital if killed.
Berserker -> Brujah. Identical to the Berserker, but comes with the same spells and abilities as the Vampire.
The mana the Calabim palace gives is Body, Law, and Shadow.
Body is good for haste, which Vampires have anyway, but Vampires are not easy to get to, so I may well be using Adepts with Haste and Moroi's at first.
The Shadow 1 spell gives Blur to the stack, which makes units in the stack immune to Defensive and First Strikes. Law gives -5% to maintenance costs.
The Law 1 spell gives Loyalty to the stack. It makes them immune to capture, resistant to Charm Person, and most relevant to me, removes Burning Blood. So I can use Burning Blood on a stack if Morois attacking/defending a city, then remove the promo after they've attacked to make sure none become barbs.
The Calabim also have some unique additional buildings:
Breeding Pit: Stores 20% of food like a Granary, and also available at Agri, but it also gives 2 Food and 1 Unhealthiness. I don't know how good they are really, considering the hammer cost (120 on Normal) but I'm going to try them, maybe, which means I might as well try using Granaries and Smokehouses. I don't know about the Slavery route however, it didn't seem to work out with Superjm last game, so I'll probably only build these things later in more established cities.
Governor's Manor: 120 hammers on normal, it has a few effects, the most relevant one being that it's required to build Vampires. It also gives 1 Unhappines, -25% WW, and gives 1 hammer per unhappy face. Which can be a lot of hammers in a big city. Tech requirement is Maths.
Their World Spell is called River of Blood. it requires Feudalism, and when cast reduces the pop in all non-Calabim cities and increases it in my own. Certainly a late game World Spell, and more incentive to go for Feudalism. Ideally used when times with a GA to make the best use of all that pop.
The Calabim work very well with the Ashen Veil and Sacrifice the weak, so I am going to go for that, also Ritualists are good units to tide me over while going to Feudalism and Vampires. I think I'm fairly likely to get Ashen Veil confiding the other civs, one being Agnostic, one being elves and so more likely to want FoL, and Bob with the dwarves, maybe will want AV, but hopefully not.
superjm: Volanna of Svartalfar
Bobchillingworth: Garrim Gyr of Luchuirp
Mr. Cairo: Flauros of Calabim
Aurorarcher: Auric Ulvin of Illians
We'll start with me, my list was thus:
1) Auric Ulvin of the Illians
2) Flauros of the Calabim
3) Valledia the Even of the Amurites
4) Cassiel of the Grigori
5) Volanna of the Svartalfar
So I got my second pick. Auro got the Illians, which is annoying, I was looking forward to playing with them. But, the Calabim are good too, I think. At the very least they're the civ I ahve the most experience playing with in SP, and they just seem kinda generally strong.
I picked Flauros (CRE, FIN) mainly for the Creative trait. Their other leaders are Decius (ORG, RAI) and Alexis (PHI, AGG) and I don't have very much experience playing with Raiders or Philosophical, and I wanted mainly economic traits. So Flauros it is.
The Calabim are the Vampires, and their melee unit line has been replaced by Vampire uniques.
Warrior -> Bloodpet. Identical to warriors, but can be eaten by the Vampire unit (see below)
Axeman -> Moroi. The same as Axes, but 15 hammers more expensive (on normal, being FIN, and knowing about cheap markets I'm more likely to be upgrading Bloodpets than building these directly). They have the ability "Burning Blood" It gives them +1 movement, +20% Strength, immune to Fear, and can attack multiple times per turn. It has a 10% chance of wearing off each turn, but also comes with a 20% chance to turn into a barb each turn. They seem very good coupled with Decius' Raiders trait giving them Commando (imagine them with this, mobility, and haste for 4 move blitzing commandos), but they're still good even with Commando. Ideally used when charging into an enemies lands so if they swap to barbs they don't hurt me.
Champion -> Vampire. Cost 60 hammers more (on normal, so again, mostly likely going to be upgrading) and one less defense power. But they come with a bunch of spells and abilities. They start with Body 1 (haste), Death 1 (raise skeleton), Channeling 1 & 2 which lets you promote to Body and Death 2, and Vampirism, which gives three abilities: Feast, which sacrifices population in your city and grants xp to the Vampire. Feed, which sacrifices a Bloodpet in the stack to heal the Vampire and allow it to attack again. And Gift Vampirism, which lets it pass on the Vampirism promo to any living units of at least level 6 (like Mages, for example, who can then easily promote even further by feasting on your cities). They also require the Feudalism tech and the unique building Governor's Manor to build (which I think is an EitB nerf)
Immortal -> Vampire Lord. Can only be upgraded from a unit of level 12 or higher (twice as high a level requirement as the Immortal). Same strength as the Immortal, but as with the Vampire, comes with some spells, the same as the Vampire, but also with Channeling 3 and Mind 1. So they can cast level three spells for Mind, Death, and Body, which is quite good if the game gets that far (it's like another 4 Archmages, if somewhat limited). They also have Vampirism (of course), and like the Immortal, will resurrect in the capital if killed.
Berserker -> Brujah. Identical to the Berserker, but comes with the same spells and abilities as the Vampire.
The mana the Calabim palace gives is Body, Law, and Shadow.
Body is good for haste, which Vampires have anyway, but Vampires are not easy to get to, so I may well be using Adepts with Haste and Moroi's at first.
The Shadow 1 spell gives Blur to the stack, which makes units in the stack immune to Defensive and First Strikes. Law gives -5% to maintenance costs.
The Law 1 spell gives Loyalty to the stack. It makes them immune to capture, resistant to Charm Person, and most relevant to me, removes Burning Blood. So I can use Burning Blood on a stack if Morois attacking/defending a city, then remove the promo after they've attacked to make sure none become barbs.
The Calabim also have some unique additional buildings:
Breeding Pit: Stores 20% of food like a Granary, and also available at Agri, but it also gives 2 Food and 1 Unhealthiness. I don't know how good they are really, considering the hammer cost (120 on Normal) but I'm going to try them, maybe, which means I might as well try using Granaries and Smokehouses. I don't know about the Slavery route however, it didn't seem to work out with Superjm last game, so I'll probably only build these things later in more established cities.
Governor's Manor: 120 hammers on normal, it has a few effects, the most relevant one being that it's required to build Vampires. It also gives 1 Unhappines, -25% WW, and gives 1 hammer per unhappy face. Which can be a lot of hammers in a big city. Tech requirement is Maths.
Their World Spell is called River of Blood. it requires Feudalism, and when cast reduces the pop in all non-Calabim cities and increases it in my own. Certainly a late game World Spell, and more incentive to go for Feudalism. Ideally used when times with a GA to make the best use of all that pop.
The Calabim work very well with the Ashen Veil and Sacrifice the weak, so I am going to go for that, also Ritualists are good units to tide me over while going to Feudalism and Vampires. I think I'm fairly likely to get Ashen Veil confiding the other civs, one being Agnostic, one being elves and so more likely to want FoL, and Bob with the dwarves, maybe will want AV, but hopefully not.
![[Image: tumblr_m4d43boOrQ1rvup99o1_1280.jpg]](https://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/tumblr_m4d43boOrQ1rvup99o1_1280.jpg)
