Best strategies for lunatic (CoM II)?

[zuzzu]

Hello everyone!

What are the current best strategies to play against lunatic, with CoM II?

I've been trying a sorcery + nature run (focus magic, flying sprites; aura of majesty; etc). 

I'd like to try a new one with death, or perhaps with fire.

Suggestions are welcome!

[GMBarak]

This is my strategy:
https://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/show...?tid=10818

it's 4 life, 4 sorcery, 1 nature,
Artificer, Archmage and Astrologer,
I was able to win a few games in Phantas, 13 wizards, normal map with the high elves.
Chose the spells:
Blur - can trade for any sorcery spell,
Confusion - can kill monster easily.
Phantom warriors - can kill nagas 70% in node and can kill all air elementals, you need 28 SP to cast them twice, send a spearman.
Heroism,
Just cause - will increase your income and allow you to hire 10 fame heroes
holy armor - very important to heroes who will get hit.

Build order: Market, magic market, stables, 2-3 cavalry.
You can clear the easy lairs with the cavalry for example phantom warriors (use the first strike - attack and move back) node/lairs, nodes/lairs that you cast confusion and evade the monsters with the cavalry 5 movement and also use their first strike if the monsters have low hit points after a battle with your phantom warriors.

create 1 movement + pathfinding artifact and save money (500 gold with 10 fame) for the hero coming after June 1502. if you get archer make bow with exorcise and +1 movement. if you get a mage, make wand with exorcise and +1 movement.

A few examples:
An good archer archer with 5 movement can clear 2 dragons node/tower (huntress) by itself
zaldron can clear 7 vampires with 6 movement and the exorcise staff/wand (maybe you will also want to send 4 spearman to stand in the front in the start of the battle).
cavalry can clear lair and towers (not nodes) with gorgons/Cockatrices using confusion.
just remember to case resist magic/resist element on the unit your confusion worked on so they will kill the other gorgons/Cockatrices and not die themselves.

Also, block other wizards from settling near you, discovering your cities, especially chaos wizards so they cannot cast harmful spells on your cities and their soundings and from taking nodes/lairs near you using spearmen/trireme etc...

You can see example here of a spell of mastery win at about 1518:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1...sp=sharing

If you have questions, feel free to write them...

[zuzzu]

This is my strategy:
https://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/show...?tid=10818

it's 4 life, 4 sorcery, 1 nature,
Artificer, Archmage and Astrologer,
I was able to win a few games in Phantas, 13 wizards, normal map with the high elves.
Chose the spells:
Blur - can trade for any sorcery spell,
Confusion - can kill monster easily.
Phantom warriors - can kill nagas 70% in node and can kill all air elementals, you need 28 SP to cast them twice, send a spearman.
Heroism,
Just cause - will increase your income and allow you to hire 10 fame heroes
holy armor - very important to heroes who will get hit.

Build order: Market, magic market, stables, 2-3 cavalry.
You can clear the easy lairs with the cavalry for example phantom warriors (use the first strike - attack and move back) node/lairs, nodes/lairs that you cast confusion and evade the monsters with the cavalry 5 movement and also use their first strike if the monsters have low hit points after a battle with your phantom warriors.

create 1 movement + pathfinding artifact and save money (500 gold with 10 fame) for the hero coming after June 1502. if you get archer make bow with exorcise and +1 movement. if you get a mage, make wand with exorcise and +1 movement.

A few examples:
An good archer archer with 5 movement can clear 2 dragons node/tower (huntress) by itself
zaldron can clear 7 vampires with 6 movement and the exorcise staff/wand (maybe you will also want to send 4 spearman to stand in the front in the start of the battle).
cavalry can clear lair and towers (not nodes) with gorgons/Cockatrices using confusion.
just remember to case resist magic/resist element on the unit your confusion worked on so they will kill the other gorgons/Cockatrices and not die themselves.

Also, block other wizards from settling near you, discovering your cities, especially chaos wizards so they cannot cast harmful spells on your cities and their soundings and from taking nodes/lairs near you using spearmen/trireme etc...

You can see example here of a spell of mastery win at about 1518:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1...sp=sharing

If you have questions, feel free to write them...

Great, fantastic tips.
Do you have any strategy where there is one primary spell realm? e.g. 8 or 10 books with death, or chaos, or nature?

[GMBarak]

This is my strategy:
https://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/show...?tid=10818

it's 4 life, 4 sorcery, 1 nature,
Artificer, Archmage and Astrologer,
I was able to win a few games in Phantas, 13 wizards, normal map with the high elves.
Chose the spells:
Blur - can trade for any sorcery spell,
Confusion - can kill monster easily.
Phantom warriors - can kill nagas 70% in node and can kill all air elementals, you need 28 SP to cast them twice, send a spearman.
Heroism,
Just cause - will increase your income and allow you to hire 10 fame heroes
holy armor - very important to heroes who will get hit.

Build order: Market, magic market, stables, 2-3 cavalry.
You can clear the easy lairs with the cavalry for example phantom warriors (use the first strike - attack and move back) node/lairs, nodes/lairs that you cast confusion and evade the monsters with the cavalry 5 movement and also use their first strike if the monsters have low hit points after a battle with your phantom warriors.

create 1 movement + pathfinding artifact and save money (500 gold with 10 fame) for the hero coming after June 1502. if you get archer make bow with exorcise and +1 movement. if you get a mage, make wand with exorcise and +1 movement.

A few examples:
An good archer archer with 5 movement can clear 2 dragons node/tower (huntress) by itself
zaldron can clear 7 vampires with 6 movement and the exorcise staff/wand (maybe you will also want to send 4 spearman to stand in the front in the start of the battle).
cavalry can clear lair and towers (not nodes) with gorgons/Cockatrices using confusion.
just remember to case resist magic/resist element on the unit your confusion worked on so they will kill the other gorgons/Cockatrices and not die themselves.

Also, block other wizards from settling near you, discovering your cities, especially chaos wizards so they cannot cast harmful spells on your cities and their soundings and from taking nodes/lairs near you using spearmen/trireme etc...

You can see example here of a spell of mastery win at about 1518:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1...sp=sharing

If you have questions, feel free to write them...

Great, fantastic tips.
Do you have any strategy where there is one primary spell realm? e.g. 8 or 10 books with death, or chaos, or nature?

if I had to win with death, I think I would focus on creating undead from monsters in nodes and rampaging monsters, if I had to win with chaos, I think I would focus on creating chaos creature and damaging the other players cities/tiles, to win with nature, I guess I would focus on summons. I would also try to lvl up my heroes and use any artifact I get my hand on to the max.

Seravy wrote a few lines about the strengths and weaknesses of each school before the listing of the spells, I recommend you read that if you look for a good strat in each of them. if I had to play with only 1 of these schools I think I would only be able to win at Master difficulty and below.

[Anskiy]

Chaos is very difficult to play well on its own, its early game is pretty crap and Gargoyles don't pack enough of a punch to handle any serious threats.

Nature is fairly middle of the road, Sprites are good lair breakers but have lots of blind spots, Giant Spiders are strong fighters but struggle against anything resisting Poison, Cockatrices have a good resist based attack but low regular attack power, and Great Lizard is vulnerable to a million resist based effects, despite being strong on paper. Their high end summons, specifically Stone Giants and Colossi, are pretty good, but come a bit too late, and on high difficulties you need to hit the road running.

Death has a fairly good early game with Ghouls and Werewolves, but then struggles to transition to anything solid. Its best bet really is to farm undead from rampaging monsters/lairs, and use them to sweep over its foes before they become too strong. Later on, it struggles to put up a good fight, as it lacks powerful general purpose summons, and undead creation falls off until you get Demons. It also has a wide array of counters, from Life's banishes to Nature's stoning attacks. Night Stalkers are a cute game changer in the right situations, though.

None of them are good enough to win Lunatic or Phantasmal imo, unless you set the number of opponents very low and get to rush them all down quickly with early game summons.

[jhsidi]

Pure Death can win in Lunatic but it's really advisable to take a couple books in some other school -- Nature for web, Sorcery for focus magic, or Chaos for warp creature. With warp creature in particular you can pull off some sacrificial battles to raise an efreet (best) or angel (nice if you have focus magic, but since you almost certainly need warp creature to get it, you probably don't have focus). I also really like to raise unicorns as undead since a teleporting creature can open up various strategies.

In case you're really set on just pure Death, then usually I'd go for early research of shadow demons + the Conjurer retort. Alternately, a stack of werewolves can be very powerful and useful, and you can get them early enough to be effective with 8+ Death books + halflings + Spellweaver. However, this is where Death really turns into a luck roll. If you don't have the right lairs / nodes around -- werewolves aren't effective. If a bunch of Life / Sorcery wizards roll around you, you're going to lose. (Although blood lust can offset the Sorcery issue pretty well, but that's another spell to research and cast.) Shadow demons are more resistant and their main issue is movement; build some boats and try to shuttle them around at sea if possible, or get the wind walker hero (again, a luck roll). For the rare tier summons, go with wraiths since the low resist of vampires makes them complete non-starters against all the schools of magic; they're really not a good anti-wizard unit unless you have multiple methods to bump up resist.

Finally, late game turns into a major slog with pure Death. City curses are almost totally ineffective on larger maps or when you have a lot of opponents; they're just way too costly to cast and the enemy bonuses on Master and up pretty much negate them, not to mention that half your opponents will have Sorcery books and aether binding, making it easy for them to dispel your effects. Every turn you spend casting a curse is a turn you don't have a new summon. Cloud of shadow is a pretty amazing defensive spell though. For very late game, eternal night + ruler of the underworld are decent globals and the demon lord is a nice unit. Regular old demon is a nice summon spell in battle since it can immediately cast for almost as much mana as you spent to summon it, and since it's flying and immune to missiles it can be great for defensive actions against Life.

I enjoy Death the most out of all the schools, but in high difficulty levels (usually I'm playing master or lunatic) it can really turn into a battle of patience as certain wizard loadouts are just way too effective against you.

[zuzzu]

Otherwise, what would be a very effective Sorcery (main) + a couple of nature books strategy?

[lono175]

I broke into Tower of Wizardry in 1504. It is surprisingly easy.
Warlord + Alchemist + Web + Earth to Mud + 8 Halfling bow men + 1 web Hero can kill 2 Sky Drake and 6 Nagas without loss.

Halfling bow men + Alchemist = 50% hit
Warlord = 6 attacks bow men
With Mithril or Guiding Beacon hero = 7 attacks bow men

Halfling does not have the exp building, but it's not a big issue. It's easy to get exp from Sourcery nodes.
The production cost of Halfling bow men is just 30 hammers, much lower than Elf long bow men (50).

My first game is pretty difficult, because I spent my hammers on settlers. On the second try, I put the resources on bow men, and start treasure hunt early.

Treasure hunt is too rewarding. I got a Armageddonx1 (super rare) spell weapon in 1503, regeneration item in 1504, and thousands of gold and mana.

[Rainor]

I was playing Death into Shadow Demons, "Against the World" setting. Won on Master, Phantasm is a bit too hellish, but fun to try
Note: older version, screens from 2022 - I did not play in ages, too busy at work


Alchemy+Sage+Specialist+Conjurer, Halflings -> Demons summoned in 1502, ideally around Feb

Nature books - 2x2 from Nature nodes (2 gorgons + 2 behemoths & 2 Wurms + 3 forgot), 1 Sorc from 2 storm giant node)
Archmage from an early (Dec 1502) ruin with night stalkers

With demons, you can conquer Myrror and Arcanus at same time, there are also many lairs that can be beaten without any extra casting. Gold economy (built by taking cities from other wizards, as you can't outcompete their eco bonuses) supplies all the mana you'd ever need, so at first you go full research, then full SP. I'm keeping taxation low, but can be certainly upped

I'm seemingly doing pretty well going by screens, but should have killed more wizards, as they'll start getting ridiculously OP soon. Tauron & Sharee are Myrran dwarves, so golems+cannons, which is damn tough to crack. Already using angels.