World breakers , zombies and horsemen

[flugauto]

@flugauto:

20 adepts + 20 skeletons also cost 40 upkeep . And infinite skeletons is only possible if you control the battle. But you can't really do that with just skeletons, against a smart prepared enemy. I'm sure it works against the AI, because the AI is passive.

You don't need to keep skeletons summoned.

[Mardoc]

You don't need to keep skeletons summoned.

Sure. But that's only an advantage if you're going to build your army and not use it. In which case, why did you build an army, again?

[Serdoa]

40 axes cost 40 upkeep so they have to attack to be effective against 20 adepts.

And adepts and their skeletons are free? Especially if they are outside your borders they do cost quite a bit.

Why Sheaim? Sheaim start with death mana, so they can get free death1 with only 1 death node. And adepts and summoning isn't for all the Sheaim leaders, it is for Tebrin. Arcane adepts get alot of bonuses over normal adepts, so Balseraph have to get luck with Perpy being Arcane or wait with Kyleen gaining experience.

Well, Tebrin has NO actual useful traits in terms of expanding or economy. All he does is getting strong adepts/mages. I ... heavily doubt that you can win against decent playing human opponents with that leader. I mean heck, how long does it take for Tebrin to even reach the techs necessary? 640 beakers for Necromancy, 360 for KotE, 200 for Myst. 1200 beakers without any kind of techs to improve your lands or anything. CoE instead needs 120 for Crafting, 140 Masonry, 200 Mining, 400 BW. 860 total to have Warrens and Axes. 580 to 680 beakers (depending on path) get you to Archers, which defend a hill-city at str 10. And again, for the price of 1 adept you'll get 2 of those.

I'm sorry, but really, at the point that you have the techs in place for your adepts a leader with a good economic or expansive trait will have outresearched, outproduced and outexpanded you. Rushes work early on with leaders only suited for war because at that point the other traits normally haven't really started to shine while AGG for example works right away. But at the point you can realistically get all those techs everyone else should be able to defend against you if they haven't fucked up or have much worse land than you.

[Serdoa]

I dont either but it works. I just feel pretty guilty forcing Sheiam on you due to me not realizing I dont have time for these type of games.

Don't worry, you didn't I wouldn't have taken over if I had to play Sheaim (but thats mostly because of my bad experience when I played them the first time, though I do think they really need a buff). But the others were so kind to agree to me taking CoE instead, so everything is fine.

Well, Sheaim have better mana than most, so maybe if you're rushing with skeletons they'd be better since you'd only need KotE, not also Necromancy. Or on a very custom map, like Mist makes, where it's difficult to get the mana types you want until late game.

Ok, thats a point. You could save 600 beakers before you start them, getting you much quicker to your rush unit. So IF you have an unprepared opponent you could potentially wreck his game. If he has a few Archers though (same tech cost) you'd probably be stopped still. And I'd expect that someone starting next to Sheaim would take some pre-cautions in the early game because Pyre Zombies. And if you are prepared for a stack of 10 Pyre Zombies then you are prepared for a stack of 5 skeletons.

But yeah, I could see that work maybe. Not sure how to follow it up or what to do if you don't crush that first opponent. Might be my personal dislike for long wars, but imo the longer the war the higher the chance that you'll lose your army because he reinforces quicker. Heck, if you attack with 5 Adepts and 5 Skeletons, I should be able to produce several warriors. Just need to make sure not to throw them away piecemeal if at all possible. But maybe I am just thinking about this wrongly. I am used to need big stacks to win against my opponents and not that 5 Skeletons are enough to kill them.

[Tasunke]

Well, I think Ryan is thinking of the game where I had Saverous + 10 adepts and he had a highly promoted Rosier +4 mages or so. And ... he attacked and lost. Well, the way it worked his 1 Rosier +4 mages + 4 pitbeasts had to fight against 20 of my skeletons (over 2 turns).

Another time I had 4-5 adepts and I held against Ryan's 3 priests of winter.

Eventually his priests died to about 6 skeletons and 3 pyre zombies, but only after about 20 turns of him being hit by 5 skeletons every turn. So they were highly promoted but meh ... the RNG I suppose. I think I may have used the PZs first tbh, due to their 'automatic HP damage' and then just prayed that the next 6 skeletons would be enough to finish the job.

After that, he had many more cities and a HUGE army capacity, but for the most part he just attacked piecemeal. I suppose he did it in order to keep 'pressure' on me, but its impossible to do so against a civ with Summons. The entire time I was also at war with a massive Svartalfar AI on the other side of my empire, which I dealt with using whatever adepts/skeletons/pyrezombies I could muster.

In the end, his armies began to gain momentum until I got Sorcery/Spectres, and then well ... with 1 mage, I just slowed him down. With 2, I started to hold my own ... and after I got 3 mages, his army began to get devoured. Again though, he was invading piecemeal, so the 3 spectres never had to face more than 3 javelin/axes at the same time. Soon after that, Ryan saw his advances were being pushed back, even close to his own territory. By that time, I was maybe 10-20 turns from taking a direct offensive, and he quit while seeing his loss inevitable.


About having skeletons 'unsummoned' ... its to save on upkeep. If fighting defensively, you only need to summon them the turn you are invaded. Perhaps this works best in simul turn games.

Other times, I would have my 6 adepts on one front of the war and my 6 skeletons on the other side. If I needed the skeletons on the adept side I could just delete and re-summon.

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I consider adept/skeletons to primarily be the defensive screen against economically superior opponents until you have Spectres and can kill everyone. If you can suffer the hammers into Tower of Necromancy, its a decent boost.

also, Spell Extension 1 is a promo that doesn't need any techs, so your Skeletons can become mobility1 before the rest of your army. Can be nice for exploration and border confrontations.

suicide skeletons work best when combined with Pyre Zombies, but can work alone if need be, at least for a goodly number of turns.

[Qgqqqqq]

I agree with serdoa here - in our game they were strong because we were a) fighting the ai, and b) they were supported by sinister fawns.
Summoning skeles aren't that strong against humans on the offense or if you haven't had time to feed them xp.

That said, they still shouldn't be 0 maintenance

[Tasunke]

pah. You can't have your cake and eat it too Q!

[Merovech]

No offense, but I personally feel that Tebryn is a noobtrap, like Boadicea in BTS

[Qgqqqqq]

The sheaim do as they will

@Merovech: Same.
I played a tight game (versus the ai) meaning to take advantage of awesome mages, and ended up using Pyre zombies the most.

[Tasunke]

What difficulty level?