Something for true warriors..

[impy]

Originally Posted by Voxfox

Saiko are you certain on that as I`m sure my mages powers increase the more runes I harvest (dont use) as in the summoned creatures stack increases etc
If its capped at 20 there is no real point in Impy`s challenge

My challenge is not based on having (or not having) runemages with (or without) superstrong statistics/talents depending on creators setting limits to it or not.
Point is to finish the game with maximum unused runes left. Since runemage is a new unit and happens to benefit from saved runes, i thought - why not to include it in my challenge to see have it behaves? You can run around with orcs if you want, they are very strong or make your own challenge, thousands of options.
Hmm.. My challenges are usually not very funny, (unless your standard army setup does not include bottle of Jack by the pc table ) but difficult. Some people find it interesting this way. All the best

[Swindley]

I like challenges like this and will keep an eye on this thread, even if I wont try it myself

Oh and after some testing in my game, I've found the sheeping from the Rune Mages extremely usefull, and often have 2 stacks of powerfull enemy units sheeped, although with 30% chance it's abit random. The summoning is very usefull too, and I was surprised to find out they can heal and revive black dragons as well
________
ASIAN MOVIES

[DGDobrev]

Well, I can confirm that there is a cap on the abilities of the rune mage. Destruction seems to be capped at +200%, which still provides a real nice damaging capabilities in a straight line.

[ckdamascus]

Originally Posted by DGDobrev

Well, I can confirm that there is a cap on the abilities of the rune mage. Destruction seems to be capped at +200%, which still provides a real nice damaging capabilities in a straight line.

Sorry, I mentioned this before. All of the abilities are capped at ~20 runes per discipline.

e.g. 19-20 might runes, 19-20 mind runes, 19-20 magic runes

at about 19-20 magic runes, your debilitating effect is "sheep".
mind runes max at about 140% power as well (20*7).

[onepiece]

Now we need to compare if the rune mages are really useful for that high lds and rune cost and price (I suppose it depends on your current strategy)

A more correct comparison would be: which is better: x rune mages or x red dragons? (since they have the same lds)

[ckdamascus]

Originally Posted by onepiece

Now we need to compare if the rune mages are really useful for that high lds and rune cost and price (I suppose it depends on your current strategy)

A more correct comparison would be: which is better: x rune mages or x red dragons? (since they have the same lds)

Of course it depends on your strategy. Technically speaking, rune mage is better. You can scale up 50% more of them with the Archmage skill (a new skill in the Magic tree, but it might only show up for Mages who complete the quest). The Archmage Hero Skill reduces the leadership requirements for all mages, including rune mages.

Rune mages can raise red dragons or black dragons. It means nearly every game where I have level 5 units in my team is going to require rune mages to smoothen the game play.

Rune mages can summon (like demonologist) can revive better than demonologists. They can randomly sheep enemies (this is like a free 40 mana spell).

Rune mages are pretty tanky (650 HP with 20 mind runes).

Just phantom the rune mages and you can increase the odds of sheeping and you can re-raise many level 5 units.

[impy]

Travel update.
level: 33. Unused runes: 465. Still going with Linguistics 1, Distorsion 1, Scouting 1. My ultimate goal is to get with only these skills all the way to k-tahu. Then one will have to probably boost Distorsion for stone skin & phantom purposes.

Difficulty has been somewhat lowered but it is still gruesome. The most difficult part was level 15-25, from entering Verona until I was strong enough to defeat continent scroll guardians. Now all maps opened, finally got Inquisitor blade. Torkve now comes with 20 runemages! Btw. apart from all those boosts for runemages coming from spare runes, they also get +10 to all resistances including astral, haven't checked precisely when.
No order magic hurts, since I cannot dispel burning/poisoning/sheep.
Before I embarked on this challenge I thought a lot how I am going to do it. Since there were no restrictions placed on pet dragon, he was going to be my main weapon. One has to play conservatively, since ressurection options are limited. Distorsion 1 gives cca 20% phantom on paladins, which was very little since i had only 30-70 paladins before acquiring Inq.blade, plus I had very little mana. Problem then was how to get a lot of rage for pet dragon with conservative play. So this is how I played : round 1 - royal griffins move 2 tiles forward and summon. Rune mages move 2 tiles forward and summon. Summons stay during battle mostly in the middle blocking the enemy. Not too close to my army in order not to get my main forces hit by incoming enemy, and not too close to enemy back rank , since it would be out of safe reach of royal snakes and paladins. Hero casts phantom on inquisitors. (Phantomed inqisitors are frequent target of the enemy range units, so it helps) Now inquisitors cast holy anger on melee units, paladins cast extra turn on summoned inqusitors, sum. inquisitors cast holy anger. Second round royal griffins cast cheer and after some skirmish there is more than enough rage for ball of lightning. If there is enough rage for another one, cast awaken dragon. Summoned units most of the time just reposition and defend in order to hold enemy for as long as possible.
Obviously it is preferable to have maxed rage when entering battle. For normal fights it is not that imortant, but for hero fights & scroll guardians it is crucial. I therefore always leave "pre-allocated" weaker wandering army close to main fight; in order to charge up once i am ready for big fight. Another interesting tactics (brute force) which makes army with high number of paladins pretty much indestructible is as follows: Upon starting the battle (or after some initial lightining balls) cast maxed out mana ball close to army and leave it. Continue doing the same every round until end of battle with only few enemy archers left. Now start colecting those mana balls giving you 100-200 or even more mana in total. Use mana for phantoming paladins and resurrecting. Adios
PS. whose brilliant idea it was to give already very very overpowered droid combo - extra skill and boost to repair coming from Neatness which is an excellent skill for all classes anyway. I can only think of marketing dept. - attracting new players by introducing smooth Impossible run which may appeal to some

[impy]

travel update.
level 44. unused runes 620. Only investments are still distorsion 1, linguistics 1, scouting 1.
Couple of interesting observations:
- when you have runemages in your army then fighting enemy army which has inquisitors is a guaranteed no loss win. Runemages rechargable talent Illusion creates a copy of 1-3lvl enemy, so if you at the end of the battle leave just some enemy inquisitors standing, you can bit by bit resurrect your whole army and get a full rage. This way fight with otherwise nasty Demenion is a pushover.
-inquisitors in my army are no longer for generating rage (I still have them because they resurrect cca 2000hit points and a considerable force due to inquisitors blade). Being the weakest part of my army they are a target of enemy melee & range units. Distorsion 1 gives Time Back spell for creatures up to level 3. You got the picture..
- Having inquisitors (or similar) might be the only way to fight those overpowered orcs. I tried other setups, having 95%magic res. and 70% astral but those blood shamans & goblin shamans are a menace. Great Uschuk killed 240 of my inquisitors in the first round! Time for time back
- one has to utilize the knowledge of kbap in order to proceed in the game. I occassionally had the employ the following
a) when there is a huge enemy single stack = gourguanas + dragon toy + lightning ball pretty much guarantee 50% reduction
b) 10+ clustered medium size enemy stacks (Shenobi, Hagni etc.) = pain skull + spear of rage x 1-2 + either dragon dive or fiery phantoms repeatedly, with massive rage generation
c) winter set (-1 to enemy speed) admittedly consisting of crappy parts is truly powerful. Enemy melee creatures with speed 2-3 become hopeless

[ckdamascus]

Originally Posted by impy

travel update.
level 44. unused runes 620. Only investments are still distorsion 1, linguistics 1, scouting 1.
Couple of interesting observations:
- when you have runemages in your army then fighting enemy army which has inquisitors is a guaranteed no loss win. Runemages rechargable talent Illusion creates a copy of 1-3lvl enemy, so if you at the end of the battle leave just some enemy inquisitors standing, you can bit by bit resurrect your whole army and get a full rage. This way fight with otherwise nasty Demenion is a pushover.
-inquisitors in my army are no longer for generating rage (I still have them because they resurrect cca 2000hit points and a considerable force due to inquisitors blade). Being the weakest part of my army they are a target of enemy melee & range units. Distorsion 1 gives Time Back spell for creatures up to level 3. You got the picture..
- Having inquisitors (or similar) might be the only way to fight those overpowered orcs. I tried other setups, having 95%magic res. and 70% astral but those blood shamans & goblin shamans are a menace. Great Uschuk killed 240 of my inquisitors in the first round! Time for time back
- one has to utilize the knowledge of kbap in order to proceed in the game. I occassionally had the employ the following
a) when there is a huge enemy single stack = gourguanas + dragon toy + lightning ball pretty much guarantee 50% reduction
b) 10+ clustered medium size enemy stacks (Shenobi, Hagni etc.) = pain skull + spear of rage x 1-2 + either dragon dive or fiery phantoms repeatedly, with massive rage generation
c) winter set (-1 to enemy speed) admittedly consisting of crappy parts is truly powerful. Enemy melee creatures with speed 2-3 become hopeless

Great job so far! I rare go with dragon dive tactics when I use the mage, but I found it was incredibly helpful and gave me more experience points per round than any other ability.

That's what I love about this forum, you can learn so much even after playing this darn game for so long.

That said, I am REALLY curious on how you will beat Scrounger's RIDICULOUSLY overpowered army.

I barely beat it today with my mage. I had to actually use Black Hole (I have no idea who gave this scroll to me, but I thank them tons, as it is ridiculously overpowered, but not nearly as overpowered as the porc power. Yes, I said PORC power).