Let's talk about Lilith and Deceit..

[CommanderLaserstrahl]

Among all the Archfiends, Lilith is the one who stands out the most: her active ritual is superb compared to all the others. -2 ritual defense for every ritual category for 0 costs is just too good. Lilith allows you to see all of the bazaar's transactions right from the start. Especially in the early game, it's important to know who bought which praetors. +1 to Prophecy Strength is also a good passive, good synergy with Baleful Gaze. In my opinion, her starting Legion is also one, if not the best: good range and very high infernal with 7 hp is simply very flexible. Melee oriented opponents? Increase Melee with the first level up...often you get enough points to completely mitigate the starting value of 0. Which leads me straight to the relics: ring of prophecy, ring of liars and ring of loyalty are simply too perfect not to take them (in general this combination is very strong) each of the rings pushes their strengths even further. Many artifacts of the war also seem to be made for Ilith, as there are some that benefit from high infernal value.

Then we come to the next point: Deceit. Especially in combination with Baleful Gaze, Deceit is probably the strongest power all in all in the game. Sure, destruction isn't bad and depends on the map setup/artifacts and planar lock can really ruin your day. Wrath has its moments when you can't stop the juggernaut or the opponent creates some really nice stratagems. but this can also be countered relatively easily: wards, demonic interference. And, you also need deceit for the rituals to perform them when you are not in a vendetta with an archfiend. In contrast to the others, the level 5 deceit ritual does not require any ongoing costs or a permanently occupied ritual slot. What makes convert legion EXTREMELY strong. In many matches, most opponents buy little or no legions, more or less for that reason. If you level your Legion well or use some primers , it will soon belong to your opponent. Which is much worse than simply destroying it through destruction. The same goes for praetors or artifacts: if someone has a strong praetor refined with manuals, it will not be their property for long. Artifacts are often not owned for long. and the best thing is, all without any extra costs. And that's where things come full circle: because Lilith is extremely good at that. Baleful Gaze is the perfect synergy for deceit. doesn't work? Then the next turn with lesser defense.

I (and basically all other players as well) had an extremely painful experience with this combination in November. The Lilith player also had the Forest of Suicides right next to his fortress, Fingers of Betrayal and the Iron Maidens were also available in the shop from the start. Of course, you can guess who had these items around round 20. As well as the Scrolls of Nephilim, which belonged to me, and other artifacts that fit well into Lilith's collection. The Lilith player also had further luck and drew 2x of conquest past. By round 30 at the latest it was clear who the captain was and all the other players were just pawns. Lilith had brought into her possession every praetor, every artifact and every strong legion that was not the starting legion. Around round 45 I bought the Gorgon at auction. To double protect myself, I even played on the Gorgon of conquest past myself and had a deceit defense with relics, wards and the 7th level on the Gorgon with a value of 18. 18! I had never more in a ritual defense! Lilith couldn't have had more than 13 deceit attack, which in my rough estimate is a 30% chance that the ritual will work. And it worked. I don't want to talk about bad luck or anything else... but since Convert Legion isn't ongoing, it also included a level 6 army of death with several primers and artifacts, the level 7 Gorgon, her own, insanly primered and outstaffed Legion and a little later also the Devourer, who I dared to summon. Well done.

[Wellspring]

that's painful. When Lilith is doing well she is unstoppable, to be sure... That relic build on her is pretty broken.

If your Gorgon was actually at 18 resistance then even with deceit strength of 11+ baleful gaze for a total of 13, she was still at -5 which is a 9% chance. Sounds like it was pure luck.

https://solium-infernum-by-league-of-geeks.fandom.com/wiki/Codex-Rituals#Ritual_Success_Chance_(pending_confirmation)

those ritual chances were taken directly from the game code, so they are accurate.

[CommanderLaserstrahl]

I'm not primarily concerned with whether it was luck or something else. To be fair, she needed 2 tries with the Gorgon, but still. At the end of the match, she owned EVERYTHING the other players owned. That was an extreme match, in any case. I also wrote to the Lilith player afterwards about how much luck he can have at all... and he then said quite laconically that he had an 85% chance that the ritual would work... so not much luck. But my other observation is just the imbalance of her active skill, her legion and so on. Lilith is in almost every match and for that very reason. Of course, she is a powerhouse. So yeah, Lilith sucks ;)

i realize that the game doesn't get any support at the moment, but it would be so nice if the balance could be tweaked a bit, as well as the convert legion ritual. A few bugs ironed out and the one or other legion/praetor/artifact from the original game. It's such a shame, because it would basically be the perfect asynchronous multiplayer game for me.

[Cadia101]

Wrath is the best power, not deceit (+18 stat pers attachment slot is game winning, so is skip all phases for surviviability, deceit has no way to deal with stratagems).

But we can agree convert legion is too good, I have seen the proposition to put the attahement of the stolen legion isn't the victim vault so you don't get to steal a preator and a few relics has well.

Lilith legion is the best yes, it has 13 stats when everyone else has between 11 and 10 (exept belzbub one who as 9). But I would rather see the worst legions buffed (Andromalius and Murmur are pretty bad).

[Starwild]

I partially agree with Cadia:

I consider Wrath to be the best "aggressive" Power, and Prophecy to be the most consistently rewarding, as well as almost always the best secondary choice. Further, they're both perfectly synchronized in terms of costs.

That said, Deceit can definitely be used to counter Stratagems, though indirectly: If you plan for it, Forged Orders is an effective way to force their misuse. You can collide enemy Legions with either the Legions of other Archfiends; with Striders, the Leviathan, or Host; or with neutral PoPs; and likewise you can collide many of the above with an enemy PoP. You can even force a highly mobile enemy Legion to collide with your own slower Legion (or immobile PoP), if you consider it expendable or the otherwise preferable target.

You can also do this preemptively, though of course anything related to precise Order timing can add a lot of risk to the equation. Nevertheless, very satisfying to use enemy Legions, Artifacts, and Stratagems for your own benefit with "miraculous" timing... and then to send a thank you message. I once Forged Orders against an excommunicated Belphegor starter, on their way to my Stronghold, into a nearby Sons of Typhon - who I subsequently Converted.

In the previous example I was playing Astaroth, and many of the strategies described here for Lilith were still fully applicable. An advantage that Astaroth had was related to early game capture timing: While fast access to Prophecy 2 is amazing, good use of the notepad and fast access to Wrath 2-3 can trivialize taking PoPs, including all those that raise a Power from 3 to 4, fast-track your economy, aaand thus let you control the Bazaar asap.

That said, Lilith really is friggin amazing, particularly in long matches where her +1 to Prophecy strength lets her better apply the one Ritual which can consistently challenge other Rituals, including resistance Rituals: Demonic Interference.

[chaosguy]

Yeah, definitely some balance concerns. I wouldn't say her innate power is OP, though there are builds that make it a short trip to be so. It's more that some other fiends have weak powers compared to her and others. When was the last time you saw a Murmur use his ability? Erszebet- maybe once a game?

With the dev team on hiatus, the only real balance in the game has to be self-imposed. House-rules type stuff or an understanding that it's "everyone vs the deceit/wrath fiend" right out of the gate. Turn 2- five demands, type stuff.