1785

Yeah, taking one of my thrones would have been difficult. You were wise to go the other route.

High end astral toys are nice, but sheer mass matters more. While raiding seemed to keep us close in size, Machaka controlled a LOT of land for a long period of time and his globals just piled on more gems, production and gold.

1786

Although, you had all fun removing my globals!

I was hoping to grab those thrones as fast as possible, and hope that my thrones could hold off.

1787

Okay, if no one objects, I’ll stop the game tomorrow.

Honestly, I’ve never got to such a late stage in the game with all those late game summons and spells.

Master Enslave kicked my ass a few times, and cost me some great stuff and taught me the value of anti magic.

For Warrior taught me the importance of magic weapon, and that Fire Storm doesn’t do enough damage on its own against heavy armor (I had to combine it with Iron Bane to work).

I got an epic Ettin Thug, which got mindhunted, and taught me to keep scouts with all my important troops.

And just before the end of the game, I think I stumbled over a decent counter to teleporting Golems. You didn’t see it yet (although, ghost Ridders are crazy).

Finally, I think Phantasm Warriors is horrible, cheap and overpowered. I think. Man, that was annoying. I’m using it against @pyrhic right now!

1788

Mostly i think it’s just a waste of good air gems

1789

Back in the early days of Dominions, I used to lean heavily on super powerful thugs with lifedrain weapons (before they were nerfed) and rushing to Ghost Riders, lol. After that, the game was won! This was very early and single player when I was just learning back in Dom 2, but man it was fun (especially when you could cast 2-3 at a time and have them all attack at once in the magic phase)!

1790

Congrats on the win, lego! That was quite a marathon and well fought game!

I will try to write a little more later, or at least answer any questions, but I wanted to add at least a few comments now that the game is over (before I forget them!).

First off, I want to apologize to @Evil_Steve for not going through with our agreed upon coordinated strike against @wahoo . I had my armies marching and ready to go through with it, but ended up not attacking for more than one reason. First off, I believe I was fighting what I now believe was Covid. If I recall correctly, this was just as it was starting and a few weeks before things shut down in the country. There was no real testing being done in our town and most didn’t even know much about it yet. I had a 100+ fever for 10 straight days and missed work for two weeks (have never missed more than 2 days in a row in 30+ years). I could barely walk around the house without feeling like I was going to pass out, so the game wasn’t really a priority and planning a war was the last thing on my mind. I have to apologize for that and shouldn’t use it as an excuse. If it was an easy strike, I would have probably went through with it, but wahoo had his pretender marching through the sea and was right next to my capitol (or within one province) and I didn’t have anything home to stop him from rampaging through my lands if we went to war. I had no idea it would end up so one sided and I wish I would have went through with it now, even if it would have killed me off. My instincts told me to stop to stay alive and grow stronger, which I did for a bit, but that wasn’t something I should have done and not something I am proud of.

Later on, I knew @dfs was coming after me and I had 3 armies, one at each main border location, all setup with very good chances at success, I believed. He attacked me in one place, and I seem to remember I won handily, and if he would have done the same in all places, I felt strongly I would have done very well on all of those battles and then could have taken the attack at him. He made a good judgment call and didn’t attack in two locations and started raiding and wearing me down instead of going in with brute force and slowly broke me down. Well played, sir.

1791

the betrayal, it hurt… right up until you apologised, then it was as if nothing had ever happened! GROUP ELBOW TOUCH! ;)

ps hope you feel better

1792

This was my first dominions game in 6 years. I had some professional and health issues that just put the game out of reach from a time standpoint. Given the circumstances of the world while the game was on, I’m grateful that I had something to pour myself into.

Two “turning points” in the game I’ll revisit.

One of the problems with propaganda is that folks never know exactly what to believe. @Strato and I were making inroads against Machaka while Na’Ba was standing, but @pyrhic’s posts and messages convinced me that he was going to be out of the game in a couple of turns and we weren’t doing enough.
I had a large border with Abyssia and there were a lot of troops there. I couldn’t fully commit my forces into Machaka while Kelan wasn’t committed to war someplace. So with @kelan refusing to enter the war against Machaka and thinking pyrhic was really just about out of the game and that Kelan was getting ready to cross my border, I made peace with @legowarrior. Of course Pyrhic stuck around for much longer than a few turns, although once he was gone Machaka steamrolled Strato and we ended up with the three way stalemate.

I like the Pythian troops, but I got smashed several times by folks more willing to back tough troops with their mages. I raided, simply because I was trying to get up the research tree. It brought down Abyssia and was effective against Machaka. I still was pretty much last into the unique forges and got no elemental royalty.

The other big turning point was the Dragon Point campaign culminating in a devastating loss of a 15-20 arch-theurgs. I probably spent 20 hours preparing that turn and when things went that badly it really stung. lego finally got a counter against mind hunt AND the rng determining the order of battles did not break my way. It wasn’t the first battle my troops have lost, but it certainly hurt the most. One more turn and the castle would have been up. That would have changed the game.

This game is impossibly deep. I think this was my third (maybe fourth) go-round with MA Pythia and there are STILL things I would like to do and try with the nation. I think I used the synergy between air and astral to my advantage and got decent value from my globals.

1793

This game treated me like a pinball. I kept falling into conflicts, one after another.

First, I stumbled into Na’Ba’s backyard, and had to deal with raiding and fighting, and losing all my innocent Manticores to surprise Soul Slaying!

And while that was going on @Strato declared war one me with @dfs joining in, despite our seemingly good relationship.

Thankful, I had a good relationship with @Evil_Steve and @Kelan at the time. I wish I could have done more to help with their fights, because fighting both @dfs and @Strato was pushing me to my limits. I was spending gems like it was Casino night, and the dice were hot.

The toughest part of the game was watching @wahoo turn his Eye of Soren-like gaze at me. He must have had a ton of stuff to throw at me. He had a huge army of Air 2 Mages, that I thought would throw up Storm, and then I would be overrun by Air Elementals.

The 3 biggest set backs in the game were the first battle of the Capital when @pyrhic pushed me back with what seemed like Soul Slay and @Strato jumping me with his pretender (I honestly was scared he would do it more often than he did).

When @dfs surprised me with Mass Enslavement (and did it a few more times).

That giant battle with @wahoo, where I only won because of massed fake Horrors kept his army away from my Mages.

Oh, and I got my butt handed to me by Fog Warrior until I put together both Fire Storm and Iron Bane (Fire Storm was magically damage, but couldn’t crack @dfs armor until I cast Iron Bane as well).

It also didn’t help that I had a fully equipped Ettin, that was taken out by Mind Hunting. I was so looking forward to having him help out. That taught me to always, always, always build extra scouts. They can act as decoys.

By the way, I had just gotten enough blood slaves together for an Arch Devil before we ended the game, but I couldn’t pull the trigger, because I didn’t know how many @Kelan had already summoned. so I was massing just a few more for a Heliophagus.

I think the biggest advantage I had this game had to be research, but my Hoplites and Black Hunters seemed to do work.

1794

Hmm, I could look it up. I believe all of the Arch Devils were accounted for and I had 2-3 Helio and 3 Demon Lords, heh.

1795

That’s is what I figured. I’m glad I skipped the Arch Devil then, that would have been a waste of blood slaves.

I probably would have spent it on a surprise 3 Red Second Fort somewhere.

1796

That’s the trick though. Do it often and you expect it. Do it erratically, and it can catch you unprepared. There was also the issue around gems. I’m so annoyed with one turn in the game where I was hoping to lead you into a bait and you didn’t go for it. But that was offset by the second defence of Na’Ba which felt good all around. Well, except for you.

Also, dfs declared war on you, and I joined in. My start was rough, which I think wahoo noticed in general discussion of this game some months ago, losing not one, but two big fights to indy’s. I lost momentum, my chance to get back into the game was to vulture some land. And what better way than against a nation that, if successful against Na’Ba, would encircle me from both East and West. No thank you! Eliminating Machaka was a great idea. It didn’t work out, but that’s the way the Dominions pie crumbles.

I don’t remember much more about the game, my save files are on my desktop computer some 400km away and I won’t be going home anytime soon. It has been a long time. I do remember saying to both wahoo and dfs as my demise started looking more obvious that if I outlived Machaka, I knew I couldn’t possibly compete with them, and I’d pretty much act like Kelan and let the two juggernauts fight out the rest of the game.

I don’t know why I chose Vanarus. I know the reason for choosing the monolith was SE paths for the fun crystal items. But there’s nothing right now I can think of that says “pick this nation for x reason” minus the fact I know in late game they have some potential thanks to their diverse magic paths. But getting there is another thing.

1797

This thread makes me want to get back into Dominions.

1798

hypnotic fingers…look into our eyes…

1799

I’ve found this group of players to be very relaxed with respect to time. If you need extra time it’s always granted if you ask.

Now…don’t get me wrong, it’s dominions and if you pick it back up you’ll likely go down the rabbit hole to try and figure out the best way to do things with your nation, but actually playing the game isn’t too demanding w/respect to time.

The pace of a turn every couple of days does give you time to anticipate outcomes and that can make victory extra sweet when a plan does come together.

I’m glad I picked it back up.

1800

lol, i mean it’s not like the battle wasn’t well documented

1801

I got to ask, what was the Pretender Build and strategy idea?
I know most people saw mine, I took a dormant Pretender - a Sorcerer.
I took 1 Earth, 3 Astral, 5 Death, 3 Nature and 4 Blood.

My sacred were good, but the goal was path diversity. Machaka is a straight jacket in terms of paths, with Nature/Fire/Earth, and only 2 death. I figured, 5 Death would help me break into late game Death.

3 Nature and 4 Blood got me a few boosters, and 1 Earth/3 Nature gives me strength of Gaia.

Although only earth 1, it was enough, if coupled with boots to get me the Blood Stone and the Astral Boosters, as well as slave matrixes.
In fact, outside of late game Death, my goal was mostly boosters. Even my Blood was all for boosters, and I only got lucky by being able to trade some blood slaves from Abysia and later getting Garnet Amazons from Van.

The only other purpose of Earth was the new national spell, allowing me to survive at least a little longer (and thankfully that was the case, since my pretender did die). Not only did he die, but he became Mute. If it wasn’t for the blood spell that heals wounds, I would be in a very bad situation. That spell really saved me, even if it made my pretender a pop killer.

So, the goal was production for hoplites, and Growth for money and a pretender that shows up for the first war. In hindsight, I think I could have made my pretender imprisoned for extra scales.

1802

I think my thought process was pretty much…
What have I done!
I haven’t played this game in forever and now I’m jumping into the deep end with a bunch of sharks!
I’m gonna get rushed and won’t last 30 turns.
Slow doen…Pythia lives and dies with it’s mages.
I need Magic Scales and as much cash as I can get my hands on.
It worked out.

I got really lucky and found those E2S2 crystal mages which is the perfect indy mage for a communion based nation. It got me helpful earth based battlefield mages and some useful forging as well.