Test games played

[Tlaloc]

That's good you managed to hold on long enough to cast SoM! I'll check out that video.

[Seravy]

Today's first game :
5 Chaos+5 Life, Runemaster. High Elf.

Stared on a large continent, Scouted early with hell hounds. Only one enemy wizard was on the continent, playing the same books as me. However, Militarist with barbarians, so peace is impossible.
There was a pretty decent size klackon city next to his capital, which I was able to get using a single hell hound and a fire elemental summoned in combat. Made a few swordmen, summoned more hounds. When the capital was poorly defended, only 3 hell hounds, I attacked. Used 5 hounds and a swordsmen, the rest didn't make it there in time. Lost the battle : I forgot about the wall of fire. My hero arrived next turn and I was able to eliminate the wizard anyway. Meanwhile my settler was waiting to be able to build my first new city, as a random lizardmen outpost got planted next to my capital. I immediately went to destroy that after the other wizard was gone. Managed to get rid of it easily...then, surprise, 9 stack of doom comes from the sea in the opposite direction and game over. While the stack didn't contain much lizardmen units (it was 2 heroes, 4 sprites and 3 lizardmen), the race managed to make itself a nuisance again, as it beat me to the spot close to my capital despite starting on the exact opposite half of the world. Ultimately it was my mistake to attack, considering the large size of the continent I was on, I should have expected more significant enemy presence - revealing the map after losing make it obvious this continent was over 50% of the entire landmass on Arcanus. Seeing only one outpost mislead me into thinking I'm at a safe distance...

The game was recorded and uploaded as well : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5k48OCx...e=youtu.be

[Seravy]

Today's second game, same wizard. This time, landmass is Large. I got a pretty nice continent all to myself, no other wizard on it and no settlers coming either. Didn't make contact until turn 56. On turn 57 I met a wizard who had...14,800 gold and 7800 mana crystals. That's just screaming "Hey I had 30k last turn form a bug but used alchemy to hide it". I aborted recording, made a backup and kept playing. The effects are clearly visible on the enemy economy - armorer's guilds, cathedrals, fantastic stables everywhere, stacks of 5 griffons roaming, etc. I was doing pretty well anyway but fixing the bug cannot wait, right?
So I fixed it. Now I have two choices. Replay the game from turn 54 where the game is bug free...or start another one. The problem is, this game seems interesting. I had a good start, no early war, and no contact with others so no multi-front war either. On the other side, I know a lot of things I'm not supposed to. I know the rough shape of the Arcanus map, the names and objective of the remaining wizards (I had to reveal the map while looking for the bug source) and I'm not too interested in playing a game that way...
(the opponents by the way are 2 all death wizards, one all chaos, and a life+sorcery. The former 3 are all militarists and have a bunch of powerful retorts like archmage, specialist, etc. The life wizard has nothing.)
I guess I'll decide tomorrow morning, too late to play more today.

[Domon]

I think som should be renamed spell of castery in this mod

[Seravy]

Game 3, Life/Chaos Runemaster, Large land, etc

No one else on my continent again, and I found Mithril and adamant. Good start, I should win. Made contact with the first wizard. Militarist, declares war immediately. Second wizard, same. Third wizard, same. Except, this one is Flandre. Incoming corruptions before I can even produce my first mithril or adamant units, and large stacks landing on my shores from ships. A stag beetle, many horsebowmen, 2 fire giants and other low end, but good units. I have no military yet, my only way of resistance is using my only hero, the Thief. She is nearly invincible when buffed...but the AI knows to use Eldritch Weapon and Fire Bolt against it, and she dies to the attacks of the Fire Giants. I haven't lost the game yet but have no military and 3 wizards attacking my continent, so it's pointless to continue.

I'm starting to think the militarist/expansionist war declaration is no longer a good game mechanic. It used to be when the AI was weaker, but right now, the human player has no chance to defend themselves in time unless playing some sort of a fast setup (early gargoyles, werewolves, military race with alchemist etc).

I wonder if the militarist type war declaration needs a higher time limit than the others? The rest are rarely unavoidable in the early game...

[occasionalplayer]

I tend to agree. I am not a particularly good player, but find winning on impossible (as the name suggests) impossible - unless playing a blitz strategy (even that doesn't guarantee a win, but at the least normally enables early survival). Even strong economy setups (Dwarves with nature, rich materials) tend to fail if I choose 4 opponents and huge landmass. They are smart and fight obnoxious attrition battles, casting corruption. 
The only way I have survived so far (with aggressive wizards attacking early) has been sprites/Focus Magic, ghouls/focus magic and trolls (with additional early game picks eg Alchemy/Mana Focusing, to even be able to rush early defensive military). I do not see how a long term strategy such as Runemaster, Channeler etc. could work out if you have two militarists beside you. Of course it can be different if you only have nature dudes - but I think a strong beastmen/draconian/orc setup should be at least theoretically winnable on impossible or at least extreme (not always though but not ruled out in principle). Probably I'm just not good enough, but two militarists on impossible/extreme next to you are usually a death sentence for me.

[GermanJoey]

Pushing back the timing of the early militarist wardecs seems like a good idea... the thing I dislike about them is that it's such a wildcard factor on a game. What can be particularly eye-rolly is when wardeccing you doesn't even make sense from their own perspective... why send units all the way across the world to fight a guy when there's easy neutrals and lairs, and empty land to settle, much closer to home?

[Tlaloc]

I agree with toning down the militarist wizards given the AI improvements.

[Seravy]

First game with the new diplomacy.
5 Chaos, 5 Life, Runemaster, High Elf again.
Started on an island in the corner of the map, enough land for 4 cities. Had a small neutral Klackon city. First enemy I found, on the adjacent large continent, was Maniacal Expansionist. Books were red/green so similar alignment and some shared books. To test the system, I tributed gold to see if I can get a pact and alliance. It took more than expected, about 600 gold total but I was able to get the pact. Unfortunately the other wizard on the continent eliminated this wizard, so even though I was able to get the alliance, it was useless. That other wizard happened to be all Nature Inquisitor Tactician with Nomads. I found a nice orc neutral city on the large continent and was able to conquer it thanks to Fire Elemental. Unfortunately the Nature wizard attacked me and I was unable to defend, which started a war. I only had like 5 Hell Hounds protecting it, and they are no match for an army of multiple bears, some sprites and nomad units. Since then I was busy fighting a war with this wizard. It's around turn 200 now and now I have taken control of the large continent mostly. The wizard only has the capital and one other city left, and I expect the other city to fall soon. I used Horsebowmen, Beetles and Fire Giants for the war. Pegasai has proven mostly ineffective, they got killed by arrows, webbed, etc and did way too low damage, probably because the enemy had extra armor. Fire Storm before each attack made sure I can keep going without losing much units, otherwise all the nomad magicians and other ranged units would have been hard to deal with. This spell is amazingly powerful. I also got the hero with Flame Strike and leveled it up, but lost her and my entire stack of Fire Giants in my attack against the wizard's capital. Nothing I had was able to deal with the 20 armor , +2 To Def hero inside.
During the war I also mode contact with the other two wizards. The Myrran wizard is Flandre, Red/Black Inquisitor. We have no adjacent land with each other so she didn't attack me even once, and eventually when my military power grew to match hers, I was able to form a Wizard's Pact with her. I traded Fire Storm and Efreet away to get Lightning Bolt and Magic Vortex, I hope the latter might be able to destroy the nature wizard's capital, but with all the ranged units inside, I have doubts. The last wizard is Sorcery+Life, and allied with the Nature wizard due to the Peaceful personalty. She was also at war with the Myrran wizard the whole game, and due to realm differences I don't expect them to ever become friends. Due to the Alliance she sometimes declared war on me, but these wars didn't last long even though she has the highest military in the game still - but only about 1.5 times everyone else's which isn't enough to overcome the peaceful personality. I'm not worried much about the Myrran wizard despite her books being red/black because she isn't the most powerful...this might backfire later but I'm hoping to be able to deal with her spells using Runemaster's double dispel in the endgame if we have to fight. I'm very much worried about the Sorcery Life wizard however, 90% of my army is ranged so invisibility would be bad even though I have True Sight. There were two Gift events, the Sorcery wizard got a Valkyre Lance (6 atk, 3 hit, phantasmal sword) and I got an Artemis Bow (same in a bow) but I don't have an archer hero still.
I looked into my spellbooks, my very rares will be Consecration (so safe from Flandre), Great Wasting, Call the Void, Chaos Surge, Charm of Life and Supreme Light.
I also have Doom Mastery an Unicorns so there are three good endgame strategies available : nuking + wasting, Chaos Surge with Doom Mastery, and Supreme Light plus Unicorns. I'm not sure about risking the second, if the Sorcery wizard gets Great Unsummoning, that can backfire. Nomads and Elven Lords/Pegasai have good resistance so maybe I should. I also have the Amazon and the Draconian, so I could try to rely on them with buffs, but I need some artifacts for that and I haven't attacked a single lair yet this game, was too busy fighting the nature wizard.

I'm not sure if it's the difficulty level, or Nature tactician inquisitor with Nomads is just that powerful but I'm having a really hard time for a game that is not even extreme difficulty.

...

Gathered 4 stacks of 9 Hosebowmen and sent them in to the green capital. Used Magic Vortex in each battle. Killed most units but the two strongest heroes survived. Sent in my only efreet, two griffins, and pegasai+horsebowmen last. The efreet died in a single hit (the chaos warrior has a death staff, 10% chance...) but lightning bolts managed to kill that hero and griffons killed the other one. (yay for armor piercing!) The wizard had no cities on other continents so only the blue-white and the black-red are remaining. Defeating green reduced relation massively with the blue-white due to the Alliance so a war is probably inevitable. She has truckloads of troops on my continents, which I want to eliminate anyway. She already has Invisibility and Guardian Wind but it's not too bad, as long as it's not Mass Invisibility, I can deal with it because only 1-2 units survive and get enchanted.
The wizard has only one city on the continent, which is High Men with adamantium and weak defense. I'm planning to attack it now but there might be invisible units so I'm hesitating.

...

Decided to play it safe, and used Fire Storm on the city before attacking. I successfully took control of it. Meanwhile the two remaining wizards stopped their war and made a wizard's pact. Unexpected, maybe the Peaceful personality modifier needs to be lower? It's also funny how I could threaten and get money even though I was about 40% weaker. Started clearing out the blue wizard's units from my continent. Not going as easily as before, horsebowmen are kinda obsolete. There are too many magicians plus invisibility and guardian wind. I bought some fantastic stables and started producing adamantium griffins plus buffed my heroes. They aren't very strong yet but at least stronger than a stag beetle.

...

Using heroes didn't work well. The blue wizard has AEther Binding so they cast a lot of dispel magic, and even Runemaster isn't enough to avoid losing a spell or two each battle. If this wasn't enough, I lost one of the heroes by attacking high men pikemen. Beginner level mistake, shows how exhausting it is to play against Hard difficulty now. I have Raise Dead but it was the last enemy unit in battle so no chance to cast it. I still have the Draconian hero but without buffs I'm not sure I want to bother. I don't have any outstanding items except that bow, and my remaining opponents are a dispel wizard and a nuke kill die wizard. Doesn't look like a game for heroes and I don't have the good life buffs - invulnerability or lionheart - either. If I found good artifacts, that could change later.
The blue wizard has Supreme Light, not good news with all the high men magician and occasional unicorns. So far I haven't lost a city and am making progress exterminating her units from my continents but still not happy about it.
The red-black found a life book so I took this chance and offered her most of my common Life spells and formed an Alliance. Now I can cast my Divine Order without her dispelling it, but maybe I should reconsider, it probably helps the blue-white more than myself. I couldn't make them restart the war which means their peace treaty hasn't expired yet. I have to try again later.

...

Having a hard time clearing out the enemy units. Griffons do ok but there are a lot of losses. Both Pikemen and Magicians can kill them. Flandre opened a tower on this continent. Now I have to decide, do I let my ally push hordes of units through, which gets rid of my enemy but puts me in a very bad position if I have to fight her afterwards, or do I block the tower?

[GermanJoey]

Would a stacked Paladin's Holy Bonus apply against Great Unsummoning? If so, then a flying (from Doom Mastery) Paladin could stack with your griffins, which would give them 13 resistance under Chaos Surge and thus immunity to GU. OTOH, there's also Lionheart, but that might be a pain against Dispelling Wave even with Runemaster...