@nullzone In one of your posts, I recall you providing a list of races, 3 or 4 categories with comments of 'suited for attack early', 'able to hunker down', etc... but can't seem to find it. I am trying to add crib notes to the manual and work on some core strategies... can you point me back to that post or just give me your thoughts? Hope you are feeling better
Thanks! Doing a bit better today, but still nothing to write home about. That could be the vassal race listing, here http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?p=3803871#post3803871 , and continue post on the next page. Or the Superhero post, here: http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?p=3816386#post3816386 . That one needs a rework stil.
Is the adept difficulty meant to make some stupid mistakes? I was attacked by 9 rune golems and 2 rune cannons and I knew I wouldn't survive the attack especially without any walls . I decided just to take out what I could before I recapture the city. After I destroyed 2 rune cannons, they all ran away and escaped. They could have destroyed me.
Another spell list, this time for water. Running Water Mastery and Enchanter, so adjust those mana values up or down accordingly depending on your build. T1: Insect Plague. W/Biomancy, 25 mana, 1 mana upkeep. Target enemy city has -25% production income. Water Walk. W/Augmentation, 26 mana, 1 mana upkeep. Target unit gains water walk - can move over water tiles on strategic map. Unlike Pathfinding, does not carry over to army - all units in army must have water walk to move as one over water. T2: Cold Pulse. W/Destruction, 29 mana. 4d6 ice damage to chosen army. Army can be standing army located in city. Floating Island. W/Summoning, 29 mana. Summons a floating island - a floating tile that essentially acts like a boat. Freezing Weapon. W/Augmentation, 58 mana, 2 mana upkeep. Target friendly unit does +1d4 cold damage. Quicksilver. W/Biomancy, 26 mana, 1 mana upkeep. Target friendly unit gains +1 movement point. Resist Magic. W/Protection, 48 mana, 1 mana upkeep. Target friendly unit gains +10 spell resistance. T3: Creativity. W/Mentalism, 78 mana, 2 mana upkeep. Target friendly city gains +50% research income. Nagas. W/Summoning, 102 mana, 3 mana upkeep. Summons a naga. Prosperity. W/Augmentation, 71 mana, 2 mana upkeep. Target friendly city gains +50% gold income. Spell Lock. W/Protection, 65 mana, 2 mana upkeep. Target friendly unit is protected from dispelling effects - existing enchantments cannot be dispelled. Wetlands. W/Biomancy, 42 mana. Transforms target plains tile into swamp and desert/tundra into plains. T4: Aura of Majesty. W/Mentalism, 255 mana, 5 mana upkeep. Improves relations with other sorcerer lords. Might be of use in trading, maybe. Magic Affinity. W/Augmentation, 297 mana, 8 mana upkeep. Increases spellcraft by 25. Planar Shift. W/Biomancy, 85 mana. Teleports an army to the same spot on another plane. Note that this doesn't have to be your army - it's possible to walk up to an enemy city, teleport their army away, then walk in and sweep up the militia. Of course, make sure you can deal with an angry roaming army on the chosen plane. Also, spell fails if the same spot is a water tile or occupied. T5: Purging Waves. W/Biomancy, 76 mana. Purifies chosen tile. Spell Blast. W/Mentalism, 170 mana. Interrupts the spell target sorcerer lord is casting. Tide Mastery. W/Augmentation, 340 mana, 6 mana upkeep. All your ships have double movement points. T6: Marid. W/Summoning, 510 mana, 10 mana upkeep. Summons a Marid. T7: Creature Binding. W/Summoning, 552 mana. Takes control of target summoned creature. Divine Fertility. W/Biomancy, 585 mana, 12 mana upkeep. +40 population growth to all cities. Mana Short. W/Augmentation, 680 mana, 10 mana upkeep. Target sorcerer lord has costs of strategic (out of battle) spells increased by 25%. Sea Serpent. W/Summoning, 595 mana, 12 mana upkeep. Summons a Sea Serpent. Shackles of Ice. W/Destruction, 382 mana. All units in targeted army cannot move until they save against spell. T8: Flood. W/Biomancy, 680 mana. Turns target tile into a water tile, destroying any features/units on it. Target tile must be non-city tile. Great Unsummoning. W/Summoning, 850 mana. Attempts to banish all enemy summons on chosen plane. Maelstrom. W/Destruction, 637 mana. Does 15d8 ice damage to all armies in 3x3 area around chosen tile. Power Leech. W/Augmentation, 765 mana, 6 mana upkeep. Leeches 6d4 mana from enemy sorcerer lords every turn. Spell Binding. W/Mentalism, 850 mana. Gain control over existing global enchantment. Suppress Magic. W/Protection, 1020 mana. Attempts to dispel all spells cast by other sorcerer lords. T9: Call of the Depths. Pure Water, 977 mana, 10 mana upkeep. All friendly units treat water/shore tiles as roads. In-battle next post.
List of in-battle Water Spells. Running Water Mastery and Enchanter. T1: Ice Bolt. W/Destruction, 5 mana, 6d6 ice damage to target enemy unit. Mirror Image. W/Protection, 5 mana. Target friendly unit has first hit each turn negated. Phantom Warriors. W/Summoning, 11 mana. Summons phantom warrior. Psionic Blast. W/Mentalism, 4 mana. Does 6d4 arcane damage to target enemy unit and lowers their will saving throw by -1. T2: Freezing Weapon. W/Augmentation, 9 mana. Target friendly unit gains bonus +1d4 ice damage. Mind Storm. W/Mentalism, 8 mana. Target enemy unit reduces fortitude, reflex and will by -3, and AC by -2. Resist Magic. W/Protection, 9 mana. Target friendly unit has bonus +10 spell resistance. T3: Arctic Chill. W/Destruction, 12 mana, 4d6 cold damage to all units on battlefield on turn cast, all units have movement points cut in half for four turns. Cannot be re-cast until previous one wears off. T4: Dehydrate. W/Destruction, 17 mana. All units in 3x3 area around target tile take 4d8 ice damage and reduce fortitude saving throw by -2. Reflect damage. W/Protection, 26 mana. Target friendly unit gains damage shield that reflects all melee damage taken for three turns (but still takes the damage). Water Elemental. W/Summoning, 29 mana. Summons a water elemental. T5: Lower Resistance. W/Destruction, 17 mana. Target enemy unit gains -5 spell resistance. Phantom Beast. W/Summoning, 29 mana. Summons a Phantom Beast. T6: Benediction. W/Augmentation, 42 mana. All friendly units gain +5 spell resistance and bonus +1d2 ice damage. Command. W/Mentalism, 42 mana. Takes control over target enemy creature - it becomes a friendly unit if it fails to save. Will not stick around after battle. Globe of Invulnerability. W/Protection, 26 mana. Target friendly unit is immune to all spells for three turns. Ice Storm. W/Destruction, 29 mana. Units in target 5x5 area around chosen tile take 4d6 ice (and some regular) damage for two turns. Cannot be recast until first one wears off. Nullification. W/Protection, 42 mana. Attempts to dispel all enchantments on battlefield with x2 mana modifier. T7: Ice Sphere. W/Protection, 32 mana. All friendly units take -25% less damage from spells. Slow Time. W/Biomancy, 76 mana. All enemy units move once every two turns. No T8/9 in battle spells.
Incidentally, just won that water run. Unhallowed, starting on shadow plane. Being able to build up huge stacks of Cold Pulses meant I could start city-conquering with my starting army from turn 1. Started with Cartographer, other sorcerer lord was fairly close, eliminated her within ten turns. Took another 10-15 turns to mop up the rest of the cities, then chilled until about turn 50 building up my cities, researching spells and making an arcane wraith/phantom lancer army. Cleared out some dungeons/nodes/howling mines for extra power, then went interplanar exploring once I got bored of that. Water plane was pretty empty, eventually found the other sorcerer holed up in the prime plane. He had a whole bunch of tiny armies with Founders clustered in a corner near the gate - I'm not really sure what his plan was there, rush through the gate once someone else broke through it? Did his AI just bug out? Anyway, cleared those out, then after that it was all downhill from there clearing out his cities - he turned out to have just three. The greater challenge was fending off huge neutral armies from the cities, all of which seemed to have been hidden just out of sight and pounced the second my main army left the city. Cleared out his last city just as I finished researching every spell save the spell of domination, and was pondering whether to go ahead and turtle up to cast it if taking this last one didn't finish him off.
Ah, neither I'm afraid... I guess it was a posting on the WoM forum somewhere. I've been meaning to go through some of those strategy threads and gleam some knowledge; but learned a good lesson regarding writing stuff down the FIRST time I see it. I'll build up some usable docs, tables, whatnot and post here tho. You can be the filter and cut/paste usable items for your strategy guide.
Ok I got it. I guess I'll be raising the difficulty. I've been playing it on the easiest til I get the hang of everything.
Shameless Plug - Brightridge HD is out Some unsolicited advertising from yours truly Brightridge HD is finally out, I highly recommend you check it out. It's flatout the graphically most impressive thing on iOS currently (and for a long time to come, I dare say). For those who don't know it, it's a huge open-world exploration game. Robert - the developer, one I absolutely admire - already stated he'll add more stuff like quests in the near future. I'm in there too, by the way Here's the TA thread: http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=237171
Been testing the protection superhero strat. Very strong. I'm running with a melee hero, Sir Kaylan. At turn 70 he is lvl 12, with: Bless Stoneskin Bless weapon Resist magic Bone Aura Death ward Resist elements Spell lock Also a frost immunity ring, pathfinding ring, +5 fire immunity tower shield, +2 saving throws, +10 mundane resist cloak. Blademaster 3, and fortification (crit immunity) as skills. He solos pretty much everything. I'd suggest capping unit enchantments to nerf this strat. A cap at 5 would seem reasonable, still very powerful anyway, especially when combined w circle of protection.
@manneger: Hhmm, not sure if a restriction to unit enchantments is needed, nor if it would solve anything. Note that I am not even convinced we have a balance problem here: Where is the difference between having one extremely high-powered unit, and e.g. an army of Drac Elementalists who nuke everything into oblivion on battle turn 1? Just a different investment you make, in my opinion. And getting a full army technically is easier: you can build units in more than one town. While with enchants, you are limited to casting at most one per turn for quite some time. Finally, all the unit enchants are icing on the cake. Protection Circle gets you through early game at least, for midgame you can add Earth's Embrace; and for late midgame / endgame you should throw around Invulnerability like it's going out of style. Before Jenman came up with the Superheroes, I only used Invulnerability on otherwise unboosted units, and that alone was incredibly powerful already.
@nullzone Yeah, protection circle is incredibly strong. Too strong imo, should cost twice the mana for research & casting imo. And you're right that not many spells really are needed to get to superhero levels, but against the highest tiers of dungeon creatures need some extra power. The difference compared to an army is the upkeep cost. My hero is now (turn 94) at max lvl (17), costing me 4 gold and like 15 mana per turn. An army of comparable strength would cost something like 30 gold, 30 food minimum - and would also be suffering casualties all the time that need to be replaced while the hero gains strength for free through lvls and gear found in dungeons. With a cheap hero providing all the offense needed i have plenty resources to keep a good defense in my cities. Edit: And i just got invulnerability btw, havent tried it yet. Does it really protect against all damage? How can you loose then?
The main reason this strategy works (up to mageling, at least, I'm not confident enough for higher difficulties yet) is that the AI is not very smart and doesn't know how to play around it - they just toss greater and greater amounts of chaff at it, all of which bounce off without issue. A human player would probably toss around some strategic dispels, a few direct damage spells, or snipe your cities when you aren't looking - a superhero can't be everywhere. Two weavers alone would shut down a superhero sharpish - not much you can do about 120 unresistable arcane damage dropped on you from turn one.
I'm playing on wizard, works there too. Unresistable, spell resistance doesnt work? I had my spell lock dispelled once, but got it up again before i lost any buffs.
@manneger: Re upkeep cost: I still want to write a proper report when I'm feeling better, so only a little bit now: Upkeep costs for the Superhero enchantments weren't that much of a problem. With Protection 9 and Mastery, I didn't have any of my usual town enchantments - which eat a ton of Mana upkeep too - to cast; so my Mana upkeep just went somewhere else than usual. As I didn't conquer that many towns right away - huge mistake, by the way - my gold/food economy was constantly that close to tanking completely, until it finally swung around at turn 60 or so: that was when my first town got done with building all its stuff and could switch to Trade Goods. Also, I got the Silent Sentinels spell, which helped a lot to finally get Unrest under control and increase taxes. Invulnerability works "only" for 3 turns, then it runs out. But that's more than enough to massacre almost anything thrown at you. I am running on Archmage (hardest difficulty), and even with the Orc Wargriders who are rather low-tier for a high-end unit, the Superhero strategy works extremely well. I am gearing up to summon a melee Champion and boost an Argolath (that f-huge monster Spider) and maybe a Doomdrake next, but that'll take at least 10 more turns. Too busy to cast Silent Sentinels and other stuff everywhere for now In the meantime my two fully-boosted lvl9 Wargriders (really regret I didn't take Warlord trait for those 2 extra levels) make mincemeat out of everything they come across. And nope, you cannot resist Doombolt at all, that thing really ruins your day. What I didn't try yet is if Invuln works against it. One of the enemy Darkelf towns was defended by a bunch of regular stuff and 2 Weavers, and they killed my fully boosted Wargrider in 2 turns; but I didn't have Invuln yet then. Just sacrificed a bunch of normal units to take that town out Re dispel, sniping towns, etc.: There are ways to counter those as well. Once you are done with pimping up your Superheroes, with Prot 9 Mastery you have some nice spells for that. Most notably Flaming Guardians (2 Fire Giants for all your towns when attacked, for a low 10 Mana upkeep), Silent Sentinels (4 Earth Elementals for the town it's cast on), and Astral Garrison (which is a bit unpredictable with the "replace militia with random summons" thing, but still). And there are a few spells to make dispelling your stuff harder, too. If we talk about balance, I think for multiplayer these 3 spells (Protection Circle, Earth's Embrace, Invuln) simply might have to go completely. For singleplayer I don't care, playing that for fun and screw balance UPDATE: 3 turns Invuln and Earth Embrace you can just wait out when you have townwalls, I'd say. And for the Circle we'll have to see how well Combat Dispel works, I never tried that - wasn't needed yet.
Why are you running super hero tactic on normal units? Seems much more suitable on a (melee) hero that can hit lvl 17 (mine has 204 hitpoints now for instance) and where gear can complement enchants..?
Largely because it's overkill for the purposes of city-clearing. Getting a workable hero off the ground can be a bit of a crapshoot, but the regular units, once buffed up, are capable of taking on just about anything a regular city can throw at you. I tried a couple runs with Mentor to grab an early hero, but those never quite got off the ground. Also, I like choosing units that have some way of getting past walls, so I like going with zealots/unicorn knights. I've had titan rampages stopped absolutely dead because of a single palisade I can't get past, and having to wait to slowly ferry a siege unit over to the city.
My hero was taking cities from the beginning (w protection circle), but walls may be a problem eventually, hoping to get me some magic that can fix that though.
Because it works? Fully agree, it works even better on a melee Hero, but so far even the Wargriders are more than enough. Plus, I didn't have enough picks left to get Mentor trait. And when I found two nice melee Heroes in an Inn, I simply couldn't afford them because my economy was still running in the red pretty bad. Then, when Summon Hero came around, I was too busy casting other stuff to invest 6-8 turns into casting it. That's odd about the townwalls: I never had a problem with those so far, simply because the AI is dumb enough to move out to attack me. When that changes, Unicorn Knights, Zealots etc. will be the top choices for this approach, I expect. And for standard towncleaning - short of nasty stuff like Elementalists and Weavers - everything is overkill There are a few spells to help deal with walls, but not that many afaik. And holy f... at least in the Battle Arena, you can boost Doombolt to 300 damage, for 60 Mana total - 35 base cost + 25 for 5 boosts.
