[EitB LVIII] Und wenn sie nicht gestorben sind - Xist Fairy Tales

[xist10]

Hunting, sorry.

[Qgqqqqq]

By the by, I think warrens before settler is a mistake. Although it's always a tricky balance for Clan - Warrens really aren't cheap, and the immediate snowball impact is significant.

[xist10]

I really forgot to update here, or ?
I do plan to catch up, but this needs time.
I needed nearly 3 month after gamestart to create my german thread and another month to finish the pregame writeup.

Anyway, I do hope to catch up over easter and I can post the (small) pregame writeup here.

Like you already know, I choosed the Calabim for this game.






Bloodpets are normal warriors, so they're boring to begin with. The specialty lies in certain interactions with other units (vampires).

With the Moroi, things start to get exciting.
These replace the axe fighters (T2 melee fighters) and actually have the same stats.
The special feature is the ability Burning Blood. Burning Blood gives +20% , +1 , Lightning and Immune to Fear (this is rather irrelevant).
However, there is a 20% chance per turn to become barbaric.
Since a simple combat1 promotion already gives 20%, this ability is a bit worse than it sounds at first.
The Moroi also interact differently with vampires than axemen.

And now we come to the actual UU of the Calabim.

Vampires replace champions - the T3 melee fighters.
Slightly weaker in defense (6/5 instead of 6/6), but Vampires start with Vampire, Channeling1+2 and Death1+Body1.

It should also be mentioned that vampires, unlike regular champions, come with feudalism instead of ironworking and thus cost less research. In EitB, this has been weakened to the extent that vampires also need bronze working, which makes them come about the same time.
The research path still makes more sense. YOur missing your iron weapons, but you get otherwise better techs - and horsemen.

As I said in the last game, the strength of vampires is the fact that they are regularly buildable mages.
Death and Body also have quite good spells.
Death1 permanently raises a skeleton (weak with 3 , but mass does the trick), Death2 raises a unit with affinity death. - Affinity increases the unit's by 1 elemental per mana in the tradenetwork.
Death2 - spectre - has 3 + 1 death affinity as well as fear, which means that most units do not attack spectres and even flee from a stack.

Body1 has Haste (+1 for one turn), Body2 has Regeneration (healing after movement, +10% healing). Basically some of the best spells in the game, but one or two capable mages are enough.

Otherwise, vampires also start with the Vampire promotion.
In addition to direct +10% , Vampire also grants 3 other abilities (spells).

Feast - reduces the population of your own city by 1, in return you get experience points equal to the remaining .
Feed - destroys a blood beast, in return the vampire heals and can attack again (also casting spells ?)
Poison Vampirism - turns a 6th level unit (or 4th level Moroi) into a vampire - gives the Vampire promotion, not the unit.

The only disadvantage: The vampires cost 180 instead of 120

Bruja are berserkers with the vampire modifications - channeling1+2, death/body1, vampirism. Otherwise no change.
Vampire lords are even harder to create than immortals - experience level 12 unit to upgrade, not 6, but channeling3 and additionally spirit1. Like the Bruja, otherwise no tech change.

But both units are gated behind endgame techs that probably won't be important.

The UB are also good.
The Breeding Pit gives +20% after growth, plus +2 directly and +1 .
The granary was weakened in FFH and only gives 20% - and costs more.

In return, there is a 2nd building with 20% after growth - and the Calabim are the only nation that can receive 60% after growth.

The Gouvernor's Manor is a prerequisite for Vampires and gives 1 . In return you get 1 per and the war dissatisfaction is reduced by 25%.

In genral, the Calabim want big cities and don't really care if the grow in unhappyness.


The blocked units are endgame and therefore uninteresting, but the blocked buildings ?
I would definitely build both research buildings and especially Elder Councils - and it's good that I can still build them as a PHi player, isn't it?




As mentioned, Alexis is PHI.
It's quite nice here, as you can keep up with the Elder Councils a bit better in research.
Even if it's not in the game plan at first, I could definitely get Knowledge of the Aether with a GS.
And I do want to have necromancy to build additional death nodes.

And AGG is especially welcome in the combat-focused FFH.





Losha Valas is harder to kill, but in the end just a better vampire ?

Fanaticism is also relatively off the primary research path. But it is needed for the 2 Endgame UU.
It should be mentioned that if you only want the vampire promotion, fanaticism is achieved relatively quickly.




The world spell is bad.
Basically, I might consider casting it as soon as I reach Feudalism ?




In fact, I don't think the mana of Calabim Palace is that good.
Body is generally good to have, but you have access via the vampires. Otherwise a good mana for the palace, but here more or less wasted.
Shadow is medium good. I'll take it, but Death, for example, would have been better.
Law is the only mana I like to take, since Law1 removes Burning Blood. Just requires me to research Knowledge of the Aether, which is actually not directly in my research plan, but in hindsight should be factored in.

[xist10]

On with the opponents.

Directly after me in the turn order is Auroarcher.

Auroarcher is an experienced and quite competent EitB player.
But compared to DaveV and Brian Shanahan, I would almost put Auroarcher in 3rd place ?
Okay, I have no real idea here.

But now to Auroarcher's civilization.





After the last game had primarily “normal” civs, this game is much more focused on the “special” civs in EitB.
These include the Kuriotates.
The Kuriotates can only found 4 (or was it 3 on this map size?) fully-fledged cities.
On the other hand, the Kuriotate cities have 3 rings and therefore up to 36 occupiable spaces.
In addition, the towns can grow to a 5th level after 60 turns (normal speed) to become enclaves (+1 , +1 compared to town).

Settlements I think are limited to size 1, but otherwise normal cities.
The 2 UB give additional , the UU require neither stables nor resources, but are otherwise nothing special.




Cardith Lorda is not really special with PHI/EXP, but is relatively good for the Kuriotats.
They want big cities and faster granaries help with that a bit.
ADA is also quite nice that Auro can remove EXP after you have used the bonus for the core cities.




Legends is also a rather weak world spell.
I think the Kuriotats are more or less geared towards cultural victory ?
Enough cities to get them and a cultural victory wants big cities.




The hero is quite powerful as a dragon.
But he'll probably arrive far too late.
This is pure endgame when the time comes.




The palace is not so good.
More war discontent is always unpleasant, the 3 mana are also rather “useless”.
Sun is the only one with a military application ?

[xist10]

I would probably rate coldrain in 4th place in terms of EItB playing strength. But I think coldrain has enough MP experience by now.




The next special civilization is the Luchuirp.
A whole group of UU, the majority of which are golems - and the rest are more or less the dwarf reskins of the standard units.
Mudgolems are also quite interesting as worker replacements. Workers with defense strength that do not block growth during construction.




Garrin Gyr looks a bit out of place with FIN/ARC.
FIN is quite good, ARC with the bonus for mages but without much obvious synergy with the luchuirp.




And now for the golems.
Slightly higher basic strength than the basic unit (6 instead of 4 ).
But no access to better weapons or direct promotions.

The same applies to the other golems (and gargoyles).
Golems are also all directly buildable, if you look at the modern Immortals and Berserkers - and the Nullstone Golems are also magic immune.




All golems also start with Golem.
I have to emphasize these promotions.
There are a few racial promotions in FFH.
For example, the Kuriotat centaurs also have the race Centaur or most not Golem units of the Luchuirp gets Dwarf. This is actually the case even if it is not explicitly stated in a UU.

Golems in this case are not alive, so they are immune to a few types of damage - unfortunately also death damage, which can happen in my case.
However, regeneration is halved.




But that's only half as bad, as dwarves have very easy access to a healing spell.
Repair heals all golems in the stack by 20 (?) HP.
There is also some synergy with ARC here. It's not necessary for repairing, but if the luchuirp are researching the arcane anyway, you can also train mages.




Because here comes the next advantage of the golems.
Golems are actually a unit that can be built en masse and have a summoning spell.
And Fireball is one of the most useful spells in the game.

Well, Sorcery is an expensive tech and a bit off the expected tech path, but Golems can get strong.

With the Vortechs for Sorcery you can also give the golems a one-time invisibility (till broken; invisible workers!) or the possibility to see invisible units.




The Luchuirp hero continues to strengthen the golems.
Barnaxus is the only golem that can use XP.
And for every combat promotion of Barnaxus, all Luchuirp golems receive a “Empower” promotion, i.e. +10%.
Barnaxus is one of the few heroes without a hero, which is why the 27 XP for Combat5 could take a little longer.

This allows the Luchuirp to build 10 Iron Golems with +50% and the ability to summon fireballs en masse in the early endgame.
On paper, this is quite strong.




The palace is actually missing the fire mana for the Blasting Workshop.
The luchuirp don't have any really useful spells other than repair.




The World Spell creates a Golden Hammer in every city.
This unit is an artifact, so it is a civilian unit without .

The Golden Hammer can either be picked up by units for +1 offensive strength or placed in a city as a (free) engineering specialist.
To collect the hammers in a city, you have to transport them with a unit and then disband this unit.

Basically a spell that you want to cast as early as possible with as many cities as possible.
And you then have to decide whether you want to collect the engineers in a city for breeding (and for a good city) or whether you'd rather promote all cities a bit.

[xist10]

Brian Shanahan doesn't mean anything to me at first. He's probably one of the old hands gere for the FFH games.




The Illians look like a relatively normal civ at first.
The bonus on ice is unusual, but still within reason.




CHA/ARC already has a certain synergy regarding mages.
I think 8 XP is reached a bit faster than 10 XP.
AGN, on the other hand, is something new. No religion is basically not so nice. The religious units can fill one or two niches.
Conversely, it all costs and I've left out the Relitechs so far.
So it's only a disadvantage to a limited extent if you don't need the Relitechs.




The Illian Palace is the only source of ice mana in EitB.
Ice3 is interesting, Ice1 actually is too.
The rest is so-so.




Wilbowmen is quite nice. You shouldn't run into fireballs and Willbowman can't move to desert.

This is intended to be rather defensive, but nothing special as a hero. Simply a strong unit, albeit somewhat expensive ( and )




The world spell, on the other hand, is pretty annoying.

But now I want to take a closer look at the Illians.




The UB again synergises nicely with the trait and makes the cities rather useless if you conquer them.




Otherwise, the Illians effectively have 3 heroes.
Drifa is relatively weak compared to Eurabatres (‘only’ 18 ) and available rather late, but still a dragon.




The Illian also have a second ritual that summons a hero.
With omniscience, it is also relatively late and significantly more expensive than Eurabatres.




And "The Draw" is just bad for the Illian.

Why do you want to do it anyway?




Auric is the strongest unit in the game. 60 against most units.

But I have to say that in the end a super unit is not as strong as several good units, especially in MP.

[xist10]

Next we have DaveV with the Belsaraph.
DaveV is probably one of the more experienced EitB players and I'm going to put him up there with Auroarcher and Brian.

I've introduced the Belsaraph before.
Little has changed in my assessment.

[...]




The Balseraph are interesting.

Magic units can summon temporary puppets (non-living, -20% ), which inherit all of the summoner's spells and thus provide additional range.

Courtesans and Taskmasters can always capture slaves. - Slaves are BTs that can also speed up production.
The Freak starts mutated, with a random selection from a larger number of promotions. This can be relatively good, but also very bad. In genral this should be positive.
The Harlequin is weaker, but has a chance to retreat and can taunt opponents.
The Mimik is weaker (5 instead of 6), but steals a promotion from winners.

Freakshow and Hall of Mirrors are something . - Freakshows can only be built by freaks.
The arena has no difference ?

[...]




And now to the main problem with the Balseraph.
Loki is probably the most annoying unit in the game.




Directly buildable and also no further promotions, reduces disruption of the culture in the target city and can cause the city to change culture.
Loki must also be completely surrounded with units to kill him - or in a city.

The world spell is boring, starts a golden age. - Still, not weak.




Chaos is chaotic. Chaos2 would be mutation for all units on the field.
Air2 is actually the only damage spell.

I've seen better mana choices.

So far, so good. Loki doesn't actually exist in this game yet ?!

But the important change in my eyes is the leader.




DaveV plays Keelyn instead of Furia the Mad, who I rated as rather bad.
CRE is basically nice.
ING is a more or less free third trait for some.
It's great to have, there are a few units you definitely want to upgrade.
Especially mages.

And that brings us to SUM. This trait firstly boosts summoned units over promtions for the summoner.

Spellextensive gives the +1 promotion to summons and Summoner gives Combat, so +20% .
Spellextension is avaible for all, but Summoner is otherwise only available to heroes.

In addition, a mage can now have 2 summons active, as these disappear after 2 rounds.

The best thing, however, is the fact that there is a synergy with the Belseraph puppets.
Their summoning duration is also increased by 1.
This effectively doubles the number of magic-capable units - and quadruples the number of possible temporary units compared to the ‘normal’ players.

At least that's the theory, in the quick test this ‘+1 duration’ has no effect ?
Possibly an EitB change nerfted SUM, but that Change wasn't shown in the tooltip ?
Refsteel, Qgqqqqq do you know something here ?

[xist10]

The last one in the round is Bing.

Bing hasn't really left a lasting impression on me yet.
Relatively passive, I would probably rate Bing as worse than me.
But I can't judge Bing at all, even if i have followed a few games from bing.




The Grigori are the next "unnatural" civ.
Like the elf nations in the last game, the Grigori have a trait.
But now with ‘AGN’ an influential trait instead of something simple like +1 for archers (offensive).
The Grigori cannot adopt a religion or build temples.

UU and UB are not special.
The Dragon Slayer is a champion with a bonus against dragons (very conditional) and Courage (immune to fear (conditional) and +10% healing).
Medic and Lounnotar are replacements for the blocked religious units. - Priests act as healers here.




Cassiel is quite nice. PHI is important for the Grigori and ADA is always welcome.




Palace is basically okay.
Water is a bit weak as mana, the rest is okay.




The World Spell is one of the more influential ones that does not affect the opponent.
A reset of the counter is gladly accepted.

But why is there so much focus on with the Grigori? - And what are the Adventurers at the palace?




Well, the Grigori don't have a hero.
Instead, they can breed Adventurers as and they start with the ‘Hero’ promotion.
Adventures can be upgraded to (nearly) every other unit.
The Grigori heroes may not have the special abilities of the other heroes, but they can be reached earlier and are somewhat more common.
They cost a bit more than the other .
There is a maximum of 5 for Adventurers in a city.
In addition to the palace, the two UBs also offer 2 (guild) or 1 (tavern) .
This makes Adventurer 2 a matter of luck, not to mention 3 or 4. You are not allowed to use any other specialists, if you want more then one or two adventures.

[RefSteel]

Their summoning duration is also increased by 1.
This effectively doubles the number of magic-capable units - and quadruples the number of possible temporary units compared to the ‘normal’ players.

At least that's the theory, in the quick test this ‘+1 duration’ has no effect ?
Possibly an EitB change nerfted SUM, but that Change wasn't shown in the tooltip ?
Refsteel, Qgqqqqq do you know something here ?

I believe EitB changed puppets at some point to prevent this quadrupling effect. If I remember correctly (I don't have the game or game files in front of me to check at the moment) the puppets don't get the +1 duration even though other summons do.

A couple other notes on what you posted:

Kuriotates indeed get 3 cities on a Standard world size, and their settlements are more limited than just being restricted to size 1: They don't cost maintenance, but produce little or nothing (can't produce units or buildings for themselves, and their food/hammer/commerce yields are all divided by 4).

Illians have a couple of other rituals you didn't list: The White Hand produces three Priests of Winter, and The Deepening randomly turns ~half the map's tiles to tundra and ice and scatters a few Blizzards over the map. (I think blizzards injure non-cold-immune units that stand on their tiles each turn, and might have other effects, but don't know the details.) I think The White Hand is on Philosophy, but I don't remember the prerequisite tech for The Deepening. Also note that the ritual to produce Drifa the White Dragon ("Stir from Slumber") requires the player to have eliminated another civ (i.e. taken their last city, like scoring the kill credit in AI Survivor) before they can start it.

Thanks for posting your notes on the other players here!

[xist10]

I did shorten the rituals for the Illians a bit.
The Kill another player is on the screenshot - okay, who bothers to read that ?
The Deepening creates tundra and ice ?
I didn't write about that, because the Pedia says, it creates only blizzards. A few hazards are not that important.
The frostling ritual is forbidden, but I know about that too.

Okay, the settlements are even worse than I thought. Thanks for that. - Then why does settle Auroarcher more or less in my face ?

And towards SUM:
I really need to test that with a non Belsaraph, but even the fireball directly from the mage expired after one turn.