Red Dragons vs. Emerald Green

[The Rider]

Originally Posted by Tibster

I like dragons , but i think they are verry ineficient : power/leadership ratio.
So i prefer the greens for this reason.
Not that i dont dream of a all dragon army ...

Actually the red dragons are the most efficient of the dragons. I checked all of them vs. a single stack of druids. Black dragons do worst damage, than emerald and the red dragons win the contest

[Infiltrator]

Originally Posted by The Rider

Actually the red dragons are the most efficient of the dragons. I checked all of them vs. a single stack of druids. Black dragons do worst damage, than emerald and the red dragons win the contest

And you consider that test to be valid? I'd like to smoke whatever you're on man.

Here's how fundamentally flawed your testing is:

1. What leadership was chosen? 1900 (emerald) vs 2000 (red) vs 2500 (black). If you want a perfect balance when it comes to raw strength per stack, it has to be a number which is dividable by all of the above, OR, a 10k leadership - 5x reds vs 4xblack vs 5x(emeralds+5.2% damage to make up for the leadership difference between the red dragons)

2. Resistances to damage and spells. Obviously it's not all in being able to dish out, but take damage. Emeralds have the weakest physical resistance, followed by red and blacks have the highest. Emeralds have 50% fire resist whereas Red and Black are immune. Finally, both Emerald and Red have 30% magic resist whereas Blacks are immune to magic.

This has many different results in different circumstances. You can stoneskin your red dragons and they'll be a fortress, but at the same time still vulnerable to debuffs and nukes. Black Dragons have the highest natural physical resistance, can't take any buffs, but at the same time you can rest sure no one is going to nuke your black dragon to oblivion or debuff him. Remember that debuffs now LOWER morale so a debuffed red/emerald dragon is SIGNIFICANTLY weaker.

Finally, special abilities. This is probably the place where you totally lose any real sense of balance, because the abilities are all good or bad given the right circumstance (and by no means single

3. Special abilities. These are a HUGE factor. In fact it probably makes any kind of comparisons redundant. Emerald Dragons are great for mana-hungry mages or others who like to cast a lot of spells, and their no-retilation grab is welcome, Red Dragon's flame stream is very useful given the correct positioning, and he can do it from a safe distance. The black dragon on the other hand can burn several enemies on very erratic patterns and suffer no retaliation from any of them, while being able to use it both offensively and while retreating. Not to mention he gives a huge boost to your army by lowering the enemies' initiative.

All of those abilities are very useful but situational given the circumstance. Sometimes you have Emeralds and you wish you had blacks, and sometimes you had reds and you wish you could squeeze mana out. In the end, it's too cumbersome to switch dragons based on the fight, so the best thing to do is plan your hero build around what, and if yes, which one of the dragons will best compliment Amelie and her other creatures.

[blueshrike]

Originally Posted by Infiltrator

In the end...the best thing to do is plan your hero build around what, and if yes, which one of the dragons will best compliment Amelie and her other creatures.

That's the sign of good design, where any of them aren't necessarily the best. So rather than decide, I'll go with Tirexes . j/k

[Tianx]

I like Red the most because ultimately you can use your pet dragon to squeeze some mana out. Green just doesn't have enough HP to withstand the hits. I think Tirexes can be a good unit but the problem with that is you get them WAY too late to really be much of use in the game. Wish they had these lizard units earlier in the game though.

[DGDobrev]

They can be, if you learn to sneak & steal maps. In addition to that, Tirexes are the perfect sacrificial lambs. They can eat up a corpse every 3 turns (as well as when they kill), which means every 3 turn you get free troops through sacrifice.

[Elwin]

Exactly ... i started game and i went straight for reha :p lvl 20 warior 4 tirexes owns :p

[Metathron]

Originally Posted by Ryastar

*gasp* communist!!!!!

I meant the ummm Red Sox.

Wait, what?

Re: Dragon city in Montero. I haven't tackled it still, an all dragon army is something I'm not too fond of fighting. And there are a lot of them even on normal!

[Zechnophobe]

Red Dragons are the best. They do better damage per leadership than black dragons, and by far more than greens, just on their basic attack, but can hit two squares. They have better resistences than greens.

The line of Flame ability is often a 2 or three hit ability without retaliation compared to the Capture ability for greens that only hits one with no retaliation. Mana source is the only obvious advantage of greens, and while it is kinda cool, the mana generation from it isn't very impressive compared to most other ways for a mage to get mana (Transmute, concentration, etc etc).

[Metathron]

Originally Posted by Zechnophobe

The line of Flame ability is often a 2 or three hit ability without retaliation

And will often burn targets to boot!

[Saridu]

Originally Posted by Elwin

Exactly ... i started game and i went straight for reha :p lvl 20 warior 4 tirexes owns :p

Heh did the same thing, my paladin was lv24 with tirexes (tons of them on Reha) I found the +2 morale lizardmen bracelet (+1 from max persuasion) max morale Tirexes rock!

On subject, it would be nice to find a easy to get and reliable source of red dragons, with the new burning rules I think they could be quite nasty. For me, Green dragons have lost that edge, they're easy to get (I think the cave in Elon always stocks them?) but there are better ways of recovering mana in AP (as somebody mentioned, Transmute, mana accel) so that only leaves their retal skill, which is good but I would rather have Tirexes roar (which is cute, hey gives them a ranged ability first turn) and their ability to recover their health on kill, very nice!