(cont.)
-Likho. Conj4, 10 death gems.
Summonable by our Occultists. Another unrest unit to stay behind enemy lines, in her case provoking bad events, I wouldn’t make a lot of them, but I suppose having two of them in the enemy capital is good business.
-Alkonost. Conj4, 15 astral gems.
Flying H3 commander, to capture thrones? It has inspirational +2 but it’s of limited use because it only has Leadership 40. It also has Awe and good Awe even (+5) but I wouldn’t use it in combat, it isn’t beefy enough. You army isn’t really depending of blessing so as a mobile divine blessing dispenser isn’t also very useful, so yeah, I can only think of invoking one to capture thrones.
-Rusalka. Conj4, 16 water gems. W1D1.
Another female-monster seducer, though in this case what you are really paying it’s for a W1D1 amphibious mage with Waterbreathing 10; but the big problem is how it needs a W1D1 mage to summon her in first place and water gems you surely don’t have. You can use your Rainbow pretender for that, as we will see, the big magic variety makes for a good case for a Rainbow.
She can forge Water bracelet and Water lens for herself and Frost Brands and boots of quickness for thugs. Hell she can try to clean PD underwater, escort her with 10 knights thanks to water breathing, summon first a big Water Elemental(extra regen UW) with the temporary water gem and then finish up the enemies with her Frost Brand + Stygian skin.
-Vodyanoy. Conj4, 20 water gems. W3N1.
Aquatic W3N1 mage, once you finally get a Rusalka, forge a Water Bracelet, equip it, and summon him, it will secure your Water access for forging wit W3. Being aquatic only your focus won’t be on him, but I still would make one so he can forge lots of Clam of Pearls for the Astral mages.
-Bukavac. Conj5, 5 water gems.
Aquatic mosnter, summonable by the Vodyanoy with Water Bracelet. Big, good morale and magic res, with trample, multiple attacks and fear. And cheap! A few of them and a pair of the previous water mages on their back and you should be able to clear sea provinces easily. Not bad for a land nation.
-Zmey. Conj5, 8 fire gems.
A three-headed dragon. He is basically a souped up fire drake. His fire breath has more range, he makes more damage in melee, he flies, has more hp, prot, magic res, morale, attack and defense. Still, saying “souped up fire drake” isn’t a lot given how bad they are :P. Even then, they seem an ok use of fire gems at least against some armies and not a direct waste unlike other fire summon options.
-Midday. Conj5, 10 air gems.
Flying ethereal assassin with fear, she has a weapon that causes diseases. For 10 gems apiece you can make a pair and see what they can kill. She only has two misc slots, but Skull Talisman and Imp Familiar, and later Bottle of living water are accessible and cheap summoning-units items that would go well in her slots.
-Gamayun. Conj5, 25 astral gems. A2S2H2.
Flying seducer and fortune teller A2S2H2 mage, and some nice bonus like awe and adept researcher.
Not worth it I think. You already have a A2S1 national mage, she can’t cast any new spell or forge a new item with that extra path, you have good priests and good researchers so you don’t win anything new for 25 gems.
-Beregina. Conj6, 35 water gems. W3E1N2
W3E1N2 amphibious mage. Rusalka big sister. Her magic path sounds good to increase your magic diversity, but the problem is, you don’t have anyone who can summon her! Only way would be with a Pretender or empowering a Vodyanoy in Earth with 50 Earth gems, which doesn’t sound good.
-Cloud Vila. Conj7, 40 air gems. A3S1N2
Flying seducer A3S1N2 mage. Again you don’t have anyone to summon it, but in this case it’s worth considering taking a Pretender that can summon him with Air 4. Why? Two reasons: One, she is Healer, so just having one in your research center healing your old mages and other in your main army doing the same may be worth it. Two, his A3 synergizes well with your Astraspelagists, just have your A4 Pretender forge too a Winged Helmet for them and they are ready so summon Storms. Or they can communion up to reach A4 more easily than Astrapelagists, if you don’t have the gems.
-Mountain Vila. Conj 7, 40 nature gems. A2S1N3
…Or instead of A4, take a N4 Pretender to summon Mountain Vilas which can heal two units in a month instead of one. They don’t synergize as well with the Air mages but the N3 brings even more magical diversity to your nation, mainly to buff your armies. And her sprite rocks 
-Leshiy. Conj8, 60 nature gems. A2W1E2N4
The most powerful national summon is… a bit underwhelming, to be honest. 60 gems and a tailored Pretender to summon him, he is a A2W1E2N4 mage that loses 1 in each path outside forests. In forests he can transform into a size 6 trampler berserk bear. That’s good, but I don’t think it’s good enough to pay the entry price.
In summary you have a Nation with a kind of crappy army but with good magic, more exactly with great variety, but that combination makes it what we could call an “advanced nation”, as you really need your way around magic to do it well with them. I’m still trying to juggle 7 different mages in my head, and a few more in summons. You literally have access to all the magic paths in the game with this nation (not including the Leshiy in the list!):
Fire: Starets, Alchemists, MoN
Water: Rusalka, Vodyanoy, Beregina
Air: Starets, Astrapelagist, MoN, Cloud Vila, Gamayun, Mountain Vila
Earth: Alchemist, Beregina
Astral: Six national mages, three summons
Nature: Vodyanoy, Beregina, Cloud V, Mountain V
Death: Occultist, Rusalka
Blood: Starets, Occultist, Fivefold Angel
Another interesting point in the design of the nation is the theme of covert warfare you can deploy. Why? Well, you have unrest provoking including units and 2 commanders, 1 bad event provoking unit, 2 normal seduction units, 1 dream seduction unit, 1 spy and 1 assassin. That’s like, a entire C.I.A. cell.
Strategy and Pretender
The basis of my army I think is going to be a mix of:
25% Peshtsi Spearman as shield screen. I suspect they are going to be replenished every few battles.
40% Grid Druzhina firing arrows
35% Malaia Druzhina holding in the back and charging
?% some extra Black Hoods groups as you recruit a few of them here and there and send them to the war front.
All leaded up by Veliki Knyaz with Crowns of Command or Helmet of Heroes and Styags in each squad. That should be +5 or +6 morale to each squad.
Researcher: Master of Names, MoN in outside forts and Starets in cap later.
Magic support in early game to mid game:
-Occultists with Nether evoc against big armies of chaff or…
-Astrapelagists against smaller armies that are better armored.
-A pair of Kalendologist in arch army to increase magic flexibility.
-One Astrapelagist for Wind Guide.
In mid game to late game:
-More focus in Astrapelagists doing communion for Thunder Strike.
-Starets with booster for Flaming Arrows, in communion with Alchemists or MoN with Fire random for bigger Fire spells.
-Astrapelagists in communion with Starets, MoN with Air random or other Astrapelagists for Storm and Arrow Fend.
That’s mostly evocations and offensive power. But the army is still lacking in buffs, so finally the Pretender is going to take Nature, that way we can add:
-Pretender or Mountain Vilas to use Nature and use big spells: Mass Regen, Army of Giants and Mass Protection for your army. Creeping Doom and Howl too.
Late game:
Astral Corruption and Horrors!
The true reason to choose it is because I never used it before and wanted to give it a try, it isn’t truly needed nor the nation adapt itself as well as other ones like MA/LA Abysia, Mictlan or LA Ulm to do it, though it’s possible. We don’t have complete Blood+Astral paths but:
-Occultist with two boosters can cast ‘call lesser horror’
-MoN with random blood needs two boosters (a blood item and an astral item) to cast ‘call lesser horror’ and ‘send lesser horror’
-Starets with random blood and the two boosters can ‘call horror’, and an extra astral item (or the 10% random) to cast ‘Send Horror’ and ‘Dream Horror’.
-Pretender can cast everything of course.
All together, given the nation has good magic spread and even greater spread with the summons, and add the fact it doesn’t need any particular bless for the units, I think the best is to embrace that wide magic spread and take a Rainbow pretender, to secure a good and varied gem income and access to National summons, and choosing well the scores we can make a Pretender which at the same time it can cast Astral Corruption as I want.
Pretender has to be N4S4B3W2
Armor: Armor of Twisting Thorns
Weapon: Blood Thorn (or Thistle Mace)
Misc2: Crystal Coin
Misc: Brazen Vessel
Head: Starshine cap
It gives +3 Blood,+1 Nature,+2 Astral, that buff us to N5S6B6
Water2 is just for the water income and water summons, it’s optional
Globals in our reach are then:
Astral Corruption (S6B6)
Mother Oak (N5)
Eyes of God (S5)
Stellar Focus (S5)
(and changing the Blood thorn for a Thistle Mace);
Gift of Health (N6)
Wild Hunt (N6)
Finally, I got this
The other way would be to fix the weakness of the nation with the Pretender instead of trying to boost their strength, in this case it would be to take a SC Awake Pretender to compensate the initiak weakness of our army, instead of a Rainbow. In exchange you would have to choose between Water/Nature support and Astral/Blood possibilities.
An example
Feel free to make suggestion, correct me, etc.
