MoM: What your favorite Magic type

[player1]

Chaos for me, whith all those damage dealing spells.

Life is good too, since it has some nice spells like Heroism (helps you nicely against raiders)

Never used Nature magic too much.

Sorecery magic looks OK, but is not my style.

Death is inetersting, but you'll need to inverst a lot to get something usefull (like Shadow Demons or Lycantrope)
After that it's to easy against AI.

[aaglo]

Nature is my favourite. All those neat unit enhancements, and CALL LIGHTNING spell

[MariOne]

I've tried different approaches to the game, and spent time to make my own version of the spells listing, with higlights, grouping, tables, etc.
The wonder of this game it's that there are so many options you can choose from.
But in the end I think that specialising in one field, although making that game interesting as a challenge, leaves you limited in the early to mid game before you can get the bigger spells of that realm.
So in the end I tend to pick a book in every field.
I usually go for 2Life 2Chaos 1Nature 2Sorcery.
This will allow to:
- pick Node Mastery: double magic return from Nodes, and no fizzling of spells when fighting inside a different realm Node (useful both when you conquer and when you defend it)!
- Trade spells in all the fields (barring Life/Death exclusion). Your limitation to the lower level spells will be overcome by trades, everybody will have something to trade with you, help you getting also some of the higher books spells or filling in the ones which weren't randomly pre-picked.
If you specialise in one field, you'll only be able to trade spells there, and it could rule out 2 or even 3 out of 4 magicians as potential trade partners...

Besides, for my stile of combat, I could hardly do without Healing -> Life
And also I think Web spell alone is worth spending a book for Nature.
Fire Bolt is hardly replaceable as early game attack spell.
Pahntom Warriors often can save you in a lost combat at a cheap price.
Whence my book picks.

[player1]

Phantom Warriors?

Fire Elementals give much more for the buck (uhm... mana).

[aaglo]

Phantom warriors have illusory attack (ignores shields). Works fine except against undead creatures, opponents with ranged attacs (missiles, thrown, breath & gaze) and immunity to illusion...

[player1]

I like Fire Elemental since they are usualy enough powerfull to help me win some battles with less loses.


P.S.
Proiblem with phantoms is that they have no shields so they die out quickly.

But they are good enough to take out one enemy swordsmen unit.

[aaglo]

Yes, they don't have shields... but they are good for softening up the enemy. I rarely play with chaos, so I think I've never used fire elementals...

[MariOne]

I also use Fire Elementals, but for several years you can usually afford summoning one PW in combat while you can't afford a FE.
(10 mana against 20 IIRC, magnified by the distance factor)

Besides, I'm not sure the difference is that big, remeber that you have to multiply the melee value for the number of figures in the unit, and the FE is a single creature while PWs come in 6.
True, they fare remarkably well against certain types of units and they're helpless against others.

[aaglo]

One thing about sorcery (blue) magic; It does horribly against death creatures... I think the only sorcery spell that works against death creatures is banish.
Heh. I had a wonderful time (as all sorcery magician) trying to take out a tower defended by four death knights and some zombies...

and most high-end death creatures are also immune to illusions, so invisibility does not help much...

[Rex Little]

I find Sorcery to be the most useful, especially for the defender in a fight. He can get off a Counter Magic before the attacker has a chance to throw a spell. Confusion has great bang for the buck; for 15 mana you end up at least killing one enemy unit and heavily damaging another. And if you can get up to Sky Drake. . . cast Guardian Wind on one and watch him rip through those Slinger/Shaman stacks the AI loves to build, or stack after stack of Dark Elves.

Nature is almost as good, especially (as noted above) for Web and Call Lightning. One puny flyer can take out a node full of Great Wyrms using Call Lightning.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by Rex Little
I find Sorcery to be the most useful, especially for the defender in a fight. He can get off a Counter Magic before the attacker has a chance to throw a spell. Confusion has great bang for the buck; for 15 mana you end up at least killing one enemy unit and heavily damaging another. And if you can get up to Sky Drake. . . cast Guardian Wind on one and watch him rip through those Slinger/Shaman stacks the AI loves to build, or stack after stack of Dark Elves.

Nature is almost as good, especially (as noted above) for Web and Call Lightning. One puny flyer can take out a node full of Great Wyrms using Call Lightning.

I try to defend as little as possible!



However, I usually take 2books of life, 2 of nature, and 5 of Sorcery. Take Artificer and Runemaster and you can make magic items cheaply and break them for double what you spent on them. I know it's a cheat.

But, even if I don't take Runemaster and Artificer, I still get the same books.

2 Life books for Healing.
2 Nature books for Web.
5 Sorcery books for Phantom Warrior, Confusion, Dispel Magic True, and for either Counter Magic or Guardian Wind.

I find Phantom Warriors to be my most used spell.

Why?

Because if you combine them with any other attacker, they always get attacked first, giving my other units time to close with the enemy. So, basically, they are just cannon fodder.

However, with Magic Spirit, I will cast multiple PWs to attack weak neutral towns.

[Father Beast]

I am torn somewhat between life and sorcery. Life gets me the healing, and heroism (neccesary for my heroes who get their buts kicked when they have no experience) and those wonderful city spells. sorcery on the other hand gives flight, counter magic, and those lords of cannon fodder, the phantom warriors. Summoning a couple of phantom warrior troops can really turn the tide while trying to take a neutral town early on.

I have won more often with life, though.

BTW, did you know you can cast stream of life on an outpost and have it pop into a town in just a few turns?

[Paul Go Gain]

I liked naturebest, I think because of the cute units. IIRC there were also some nice terrain transforming spells

[LDiCesare]

Best spells IMO:
Confusion, Guardian Wind, Web. Phantom Warriors are much nicer than Fire elementals. Later on, Earth Elementals and Phantom Beasts are cool.
I liked life for Resurrect and Death for Death Mastery (name?) (all those zombies help defend conquered cities while your killer stack goes on its way).
I liked the Chaos tornado spell (whatever its name was) that allowed you to have a destructing whirlwind that spewed lightning bolts and moved 3 squares random and 1 you controlled. It could destroy 8 great wyrms with one or two casting if you just had a weeny flier to look at the fight (maybe an invisible one in case of spiders).

[Father Beast]

Originally posted by LDiCesare
Best spells IMO:

I liked life for Resurrect and Death for Death Mastery (name?) (all those zombies help defend conquered cities while your killer stack goes on its way).

Zombie mastery was a death global enchantment which turned all killed units into zombies working for you. at least that's what my spellbook says....

[Rex Little]

I liked the Chaos tornado spell (whatever its name was) that allowed you to have a destructing whirlwind that spewed lightning bolts and moved 3 squares random and 1 you controlled.

That's Magic Vortex. It's very good, but Call Lightning is better (and only 10 MP more expensive) because it hits every turn. The Vortex can wander for several turns without contacting the enemy.

Phantom Beast is good, too. But funny thing--if you're fighting against one, you're better off summoning Phantom Warriors than another Beast. Two PWs will usually take down a PB, and they only cost 20 MP total, vs. 35 for the Beast.

[LDiCesare]

Father Beast:
It was Zombie Mastery, yes, thanks for the name.

Rex:
I liked the Vortex more than Call Lightning but I didn't experiment a lot with the second. The vortex could strike twice at the same opponent if you were lucky, and it dealt damage to all those beside it after you chose its movement. With a crowd of great wyrms, you could damage 3 in a round very often.
You could also cast more than one, which you can't with call lightning.
And yes, I tended to use PW against PB too.

What about races?
I liked dwarves (gold, ore bonus) and high men (paladins).

[aaglo]

About those races... how about making a differend thread with poll

[player1]

Dwarfs are excellent race.

Especialy winged Hamerhands (using chaos channel).

Lack of range units?

No problem, chaos magic is there, and you can always get some heroes.

[Paul Go Gain]

Earth elementals a cool for distracting the enemy from your long range units. They're fast enough to keep the enemy on distance and can take some punch.

[Rex Little]

What do you mean, "fast enough to keep the enemy on distance"? Earth elementals are speed 1, the slowest there is in the game.

[Paul Go Gain]

But you can cast 'em in front of your troops

[Ecthy]

Chaos at this end.

But I never paly mono-magic games, which means I always mix spheres. And I never put any life or death in there, I'm just not a man of politics like that

[aaglo]

About magic vs magic... what colour is great against what colour... and what colour sucks against what?

I think that death and sorcery 'nullify' each other... all (?) death creatures are immune to illusions (= almost all sorcery spells), and most of sorcery creatures are immune to death spells...

Obviously life works well against death, but the main power of life spells are in improving own units, rather than harming enemy units. So the 'morale' of life spells is higher than others... , and same goes for nature (if you take out call lightning )

Death and chaos are mainly used for attacking directly and weakening enemy units... they would be horrible spells in real life

Sorcery lies somewhere in the middle...

When I start to think, I mostly like to play with wizards having both life and nature books... though I sometimes want to rant around with wraiths, shadow demons and great drakes

[Ecthy]

I often do the 3 non-religiousm so to speak, given death and life are sort of a confession. The emphasis is always on Chaos, and then a few of nature and sorcery, giving me some nice spells AND node mastery

[LDiCesare]

I tend neither to summon beasts not to cast spells on unit. All that costs mana to maintain which is better spent on research... Thus confusion, PW, PB, and some direct damage spells.
Life is pretty efficient against Death
Sorcery/Death: Sorcery is weaker as it relies only on beasts to do some damage, and they are usually less powerful than death monsters except for the sky drake.
Sorcery/Anything else: I'd vote for sorcery. It is really strong (confusion, PM, flying, guardian wind, plus better dispel magic).
Chaos is a bit limited versus Life and Sorcery I believe, as its damage can be prevented/healed, and units forbidden to attack or protected against.

[Tuberski]

Based on the Magic I hate the most, it would be Sorcery, being able to get off a counter magic spell in combat, can swing the fight to your favor in a big way.

[Jack the Bodiless]

Sorcery magic is great if you're an Artificer. A group of hasted, flying, invisible, magic-immune Heroes with phantasmal weapons is ustoppable.

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by Jack the Bodiless
Sorcery magic is great if you're an Artificer. A group of hasted, flying, invisible, magic-immune Heroes with phantasmal weapons is ustoppable.

Add Runemaster to that and it's even better.

[aaglo]

Something buggy about my MOM... I made artifacts with hasted-flying-invisible... but the heroes using these artifacts didn't become invisible... well, they did (the AI didn't/couldn't use their ranged attacs) but the AI allways moved towards my invisible heroes (the heroes weren't invisible in the battlemap).

And the AI could cast spells against those heroes too... how strange...

and don't forget about the -4 spell save staff with 4xConfusion spell (oh, don't forget the invisiblity&flying miscellaneous artifact for that spellcaster either )