Question about Moro undead strategy

[Metathron]

Howdy,

Owing to the comfort that is the resurrection skill, I'm using Moro + black knights for the first time in my impossible paladin game.

I've also recruited vampires due to the morale benefits I have and the fact they can resurrect themselves, but I'm now wondering if this is such a good idea, since the unit itself is rather feeble and resurrection will bring back only one stack - I'm assuming the knights will require it. If it is a good idea, then perhaps I could recruit ancient ones as well.

So, do you guys think taking extra undead along with the knights is a good idea (bone dragons as well, perhaps?) or do you prefer to solo with them? Was thinking of attacking Hagni with just these two, but not sure if it's doable.

Any other dos & don'ts for the Moro strategy also appreciated.

[loreangelicus]

I haven't played paladin much in KBAP (I played paladin in KBTL due to the Resurrection scroll at the start), but I do believe the resurrection ability of the paladin class would resurrect the stack with the most damage based on (units lost * leadership cost). As such, if you take on another unit and that unit takes more damage than the black knights, then the resurrect would affect them instead of the BKs.

Having said that, I don't like the idea of soloing with BKs. Since the BKs don't take much damage with Stone Skin on, you generate rage only when you deal damage to the enemy. There is also the disadvantage of having nothing to Sacrifice to add more troops to your BK stack when your leadership goes up.

An all-undead team sounds nice on paper, with Eviln support to resurrect lost troops for a no-loss game, but there is still the issue of having no units to Sacrifice to increase troop size (you can't Sacrifice undead to top up other troops). I would take either of these two lineups:

1) black knight-repair droid-bone dragon-repair droid-guard droid
2) black knight-inquisitor-paladin-(insert preferred other unit)-bone dragon

Since I play warrior, I prefer the first lineup. But since you play paladin, I would suggest the second lineup.

[KongMysen]

If you haven't already gotten the Splinter of darkness, you should wait a little with the undead build. Otherwise it'll be a while before the percentage drops to zero. The Splinter of darkness is THE best item in the game, if you choose Black Knights

I kinda like the proposals from Zechnophobe, though I never tried them. Its true, that you won't gain much rage with solo BK, but with a few or single good resistance items + Stoneskin and/or Magic Spring, they are nearly invinsible, and you will have an easy time, winning with no losses. Just use Evlin once in a while and keep stoneskin on.

Skills like Frenzy and Adrenaline work wonders if you play with a solo stack, and you WILL get rage for the Treasure searcher and occassional Mana Accelerator. I don't think the dragon is going to be heavily underleveled.

The sacrifice thing really isn't necessary with wonderers scrolls imo. Just place all BK in a garrison and use a Call of Death scroll to get some more for your reserve slos.. I'm always swimming in those summoning scrolls, but I wouldn't know if thats just a coincidence for me.

Single stack BK's will most certainly get boring after a while due to the monotomi of casting the same spells and leave Splinter of Darkness do its magic, so I would go with a 5 slot army even thouh I think it would be easier with just the BK's

[Metathron]

I do have the Splinter, otherwise I probably wouldn't have embarked upon this strategy. :) I left many weaker enemies behind in the first four islands suspecting/hoping I would get the pain skull again on Nameless -- and I did for the 3rd game in a row, is this item guaranteed? -- so once I purchased that I went back to the first four islands to do some business, namely pain skull, moro's darkness, gladiator sword and spamming stone skin for medal all in one. :grin: It got rather tedious eventually (grinding = not much fun), especially with the skull which progresses really sluggishly, but thankfully that is now behind me.

My first attempt at Hagni using either black knights + vampires or just knights proved unsuccessful, so I gained a few more levels and got level 2 onslaught and level 2 adrenaline, which made all the difference.

As for gaining rage, I agree that it's slow, or non-existent rather, when the stone-skinned knights get attacked, but you guys aren't getting enough rage from all of his retaliations? Isn't that one of the benefits of the Splinter? (P.S.: Also have Anger 2)

[DGDobrev]

Well, the solo Black Knight tactic needs some planning in advance. As a Paladin, you have good access to both might and magic trees, so you need to prioritize the skills.

As a paladin, you don't have the luxury of running around with some rage always available, so Anger 3 is a must asap. My general strategy is to master it quickly anyway, even with a Mage, as that quickly deals with the rage problem.

Black Knights with splinter get the most out of these skills:
- Onslaught (+ initiative for the first round, topped with the rest actually outmatches every other unit in the game)
- Adrenaline (+2 Speed and Initiative is uber)
- Dark Commander (+2 initiative, +7 Attack)
- Frenzy (free + attack, which improves damage)
- Revenge (+20% crit when retaliating is a big deal!)

And is best boosted by:
- Chaos magic (big time resurrections), I wouldn't skip it even if you have resurrection skill at lvl 3
- Distortion magic (stone skin, teleportation and other boosts)
- Resurrection (brings back the fallen BK's you didn't manage to ress with Eviln)

Skills to be left at lvl 1 (unless you have extra runes):
- Order magic (lvl 1 is enough to get transmutation, most order spells do not affect undead, so BK's won't get anything out of them)
- Persuasion (lvl 1 is the prerequisite for resurrection)
- Trophies (lvl 1 is enough even on impossible)
- Nighttime operations (lvl 1 is a prerequisite for both Power of darkness and Revenge, so it's enough)
- Training (lvl 1 equals a +20% pet XP bonus, which is completely enough, when combined with medals)
- Quick draw (lvl 1 is a prerequisite for frenzy)

Skills you should skip (unless you have a ton of extra runes):
- Magic tree - everything from Magic Light and Destroyer below is superfluous. Alchemy is superfluous as well, as this build gets more out of neatness.
- Mind tree - Diplomacy and Voice of the dragon are moot for this build.
- Might tree - Tactics is completely unnecessary

Personal opinion: I'd also swap Moro for Agvares later in the game to take advantage of his versatile slots. If everything's in place, you need 2 artifact slots to combine both undead sets (black helmet + Splinter and Dead Skull + Death Amulet + Hand of Necropolis), and that requires an additional artifact slot.
- that works unless you have 2 (!) Black Helmets available which is completely possible. In that case Moro's better as he has a Helmet slot as well.

So when one's making a good BK strategy with a Paladin, one should go for the important skills first. When you get these skills rounded up, simply add the rest and you will be just fine, steamrolling everything from start to finish.

[Metathron]

Yikes, I have completely forgotten about Dark Commander! :eek:

While Revenge sounds good, I doubt I'll have enough might runes to max it.

Re: Order magic. I was rash earlier in the game and maxed both order and disortion, mostly to boost healing. :rolleyes: However, I'm making good use out of level 3 dispel against those annoying alchemists's special attacks and other effects, such as the gorguana blood thingy. Level 3 phoenix has also been substantially useful due to its mobility in chasing down those stray repair droids, gobots, etc...especially on larger battlefields.

Re: Training. Level 1 is enough? Do you mean just for this build or in general, because I always try to max that early on.

[DGDobrev]

Training is a bit overrated skill in my opinion. As a warrior, you may want to raise it up due to the excess of might runes you have, but for a Paladin and Mage, the pet dragon plays more of an utility role. This is why I usually leave it to lvl 1, because I use the dragon often enough to keep it on par with my char's level.

This tactic is also supported by the fact that pet dragon's level is relevant to your own level in terms of XP gain, so excessive XP boosts aren't all that important in my opinion, not to mention the fact that as a Paladin or Mage, you have less rage and you need to be careful. Besides, you'll be killing dragons sooner or later (and the medal will boost the dragon XP anyway), so dragon XP will not be a problem at all.

[KongMysen]

The last 10-15 levels my pet gained in my impossible mage game were useless. I had already maxed the good stuff, and those extra levels just allowed me to get a super strong wall, which I never used and some more aoe dmg skills to choose from.
Pet level 40 is enough when you end the game if you know which skills, you'll use, and with training lvl 1 + medal, you'll more likely get it to 50-55.

I had Revenge and Frenzy maxed in my mage game, but had to skip Dark Commander. Frenzy + Adrenaline did alright alone anyway. I never tried paladin, but i guess it won't bet much trouble getting all three with the extra runes.

resistance items FTW..! Twinkling boots + medal lvl 3 gets a stoneskin BK from 70% to 92% in physical resistance. In other words the BK can recieve 4 x physical dmg. That includes Geyser if I remember correctly (?). I bet you had no resistance items against Hagni...

[Metathron]

Wreaking havoc in Teana, defeating huge armies...and then almost losing out to the Weed hero, who is level 30 btw, so 7 levels lower than I am. His choshas and especially royal thorns kept producing new troops, which in turn produced their own trooops, etc. To top it off, he kept dispelling my stoneskin/rising anger and even phantom knights. I had to wait till he ran out of mana to finally put stoneskin on my knights and do some resurrecting. The battle lasted 33 turns and I never enjoyed stomping a plant to the ground more in my life. :rolleyes: :evil:

[TemjinGold]

Rising Anger can be dispelled? Didn't know that...

[DGDobrev]

It can. Sometimes, it's quite a nice option - it forces the enemy hero to use dispel on the Black Knights (since Rising Anger is quite an asset), thus forcing him/her to lose a turn rather than buffing the enemy army or using an offensive spell.

[Zechnophobe]

Anger is going to be worth less than the basic +8 Rage skill for the warrior until a fair ways into the game. +20% rage is the equivalent of 8 rage only once you have 40 rage, but doesn't confer the boost to max casting potential, so even then is not as good.

If you didn't realize it, when you gain rage, you actually gain a percentage of your total rage amount. Meaning that if you have 40 rage, and gain 4 on an attack, you would gain 8 instead if you had 80.