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Originally Posted by BB Shockwave
Frankly, why is Leadership that important to you? A Mage has even less, but surely it's fun to play a Mage.  Think of Paladins as "Clerics" in D&D - they are good in close-combat and can wear armor and weapons, though not as good as fighters, and they have lots of spells to strengthen their allies. They can cast damage dealing spells too, but they are never as potent as that of a Wizard.
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Damage. I didn't think leadership was that important either, but it really is the pinnacle of everything. Units do FAR FAR FAR more damage, your units abilities gain far more, etc. Of course it is overpowered to have a warrior with too much mage power, and a mage with too much leadership. That's why one should strive for it.
Pop quiz, what is better? -20% leadership for paladins or +20% damage for paladins OR +20% critical for paladins?
Answer is leadership in nearly every scenario. It isn't obvious, but I am happy to show you the numbers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BB Shockwave
I'm on level 11 now, and my current line-up (Royal Griffins, Rune Mages, Inquisitors, Horsemen, Witch Hunters/Guardsmen) works pretty well. Just defeated Rolf on Bolo. Holy Armor saved my bacon quite often!
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I do miss Holy Armor. Counter attack is not nearly as useful as I thought yet.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BB Shockwave
You get them sure, but a Mage or Warrior never gets that many Mind runes to get there. You will most likely spend your runes on Might Skills and a few Mind skills like Adrenaline as a Warrior, while for a Mage, the Might skills are more vital for survival in battle. The Paladin has the luxury to develop all the Mind skills, if she wants it.
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That's the problem. The mind tree is extremely good as support, but not very good otherwise. Morale boosts are great, but they can be eliminated by the enemy. Adrenaline is too luck based. With the ability to kite or outwit stronger enemies, learning isn't that wonderful (besides raising your final score).
So far the only ability I really want in mind tree is Level 3 critical hit.
I mean, maybe if it was much easier to resurrect dragons. Paladins + Dragons + Rune Mages.... this MIGHT work. Hmmmmm.
That's the biggest Paladin advantage, which is basically the only guy who can easily raise dragons' morale.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BB Shockwave
Dragons and Animals - so this includes Griffins/Royal Griffins, all sort of Snakes, Bears, Hyenas and Wolves. (Oddly the programmers at Nival think Spiders are not animals...)
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I hate royal griffins since they hate dragons.

Eh, there are FAR FAR FAR cheaper ways to boost royal griffin's morale, and, morale can be diminished by negative status effects.

Royal snakes are cool, but I don't like them either haha.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BB Shockwave
Your choice, but I think a Warrior will always lack the spells needed to boost a melee army. If you face an enemy shooter army, you will need spells like Mass Haste or Oil Clouds to quickly reach the enemy. A Warrior will never have much mana, unless you luck out and get the Picture of Magic (+20 Mana), or the runes needed to develop enough intellect for the spells to last long in the battle.
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Well, the mana thing is mitigated by transmute and mana accelerator. Yeah, pure melee is a little tough. Looks like I am going with somewhat a hybrid build for now. I didn't realize just how AWESOME assassin's dagger is to synergize with goblins and assassins. Gross.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BB Shockwave
I never understand why double weapons are so hot. Even as a Warrior, I often opted to use a shield rather. Offense is nice, but as you progress in the game, enemies will start to outnumber you, and you cannot win the battle in a few rounds... meaning you need to use Defense to minimize losses. If you are so keen on dual weapons, use followers who have weapon slots. Me, I preferred to use followers with many Artifact slots, as the special bonuses artifacts give are often better.
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Triple weapons. Double Battle Axe + Judgement. Arbator, Astral, Whip of Pain, makes Hunters kill dragons before they even make their first turn. For that shooter build, the artifacts are sacrificed to achieve more critical hits (100%+ is the goal).
I've killed Ktahu as a Warrior in Impossible, no loss in 11 rounds. Offense can be used to win once you get past the breaking point. The problem is, the game is balanced so mages can never get past the breaking point.
Warriors can touch it though.
Mostly because mages spells ... they sort of suck in Impossible mode. At last the pure damage ones. Black Hole sort of changed that a little bit, but oddly it falls into the SAME problem you described. You wont' have enough offense to win because you are out gunned.
Spells like pygmy, helplessness, Super Phantom

raise a mages's damage level to somewhat similar levels as a warrior.
But a warrior with proper usage can still cast pygmy.

But mages got the double cast, so they have more flexibility. Paladins? What do they have?
That's precisely why I'm pissed at that Paladin Class build. It can do neither well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by BB Shockwave
You also don't have to go with this combination. You can use Trolls, Dragons, etc... Sure, you won't have as many as a Warrior does, but well that's why you have your spells to boost them. I found Peacefullness is a pretty good spell to turn one of your stronger units like Horseman into a tank.
Everyone has different opinions on gameplay - frankly, I'd get bored with doing the exact same thing every battle. If you want to try this strategy, you might be better off in one of the smaller campaigns like Defender of the Crown, where there are a few battles only.
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In my opinion, opposite. Those campaigns force you to dynamically pick a strategy with a hodge podge team. Basically, what I'm doing in OOTM before I get to my "final team build".
So you can't pick a specific team since you can't fine tailor your army in those campaigns. You make with what you got.
Mage's biggest advantage is double cast. So, it isn't like the warrior can't use magic either. It is a bit harder at first for the warrior, until he gets order/distortion and transmute.
So, yeah if I go Paladins, basically I have to go dragons and rune mages. Not necessarily a bad thing, but if anything, that sounds like doing the "same thing" over and over again to me.
Right now I'm still able to switch between melee and ranged as a warrior or a hybrid of both ranged/melee.
[edit]
Sorry if I sounded so negative. I think I also got a bit off topic.
I think another way the paladin could be more "useful" so to speak is he can clearly traverse deeper into the mage tree than the warrior can. I'm already able to hit level 3 distortion / level 3 order with the warrior at level 23?
I suppose the paladin can trade away his mind runes to max out either warrior or mage tree. I'm not a big fan of trading though since it is still less efficient.
So I need to find a mage skill that I wouldn't normally get as a warrior that the paladin can get, that has high utility.
I'm thinking, maybe level 3 magic light? Combined with the paladin's native resurrection skill, that should let me resurrect a lot of units, yeah? Sometimes it is more convenient than the turn back time combo + paladins.
Although, I hate how you need so much intellect to make spells useful. Bleh.