EA Mictlan tips and strategy

[RedHeadRedemption]

Recently just started playing Dominion 6 and am loving the game so far. I chose Mictlan as my first civilization since I love the Aztec/Mayan/Inca style lore and aesthetic. I was wondering if there is any particular strategies this faction is good at? Any tips on how to play these guys would be appreciated.

[Janohito]

Mictlan basically needs heavy bless since you have recruit everywhere sacreds as well as you can summon Ozelots who are also sacred. I have found that awake god with heavy bless works the best since you can just rush research for blood 4 and get ozelots.
As for bless itself you can go either for more defensive approach with resistances + extra strength or for something like quickness + attack skill or strength. Magic weapons would also be nice if you can afford it.
Of course you will have to trash your scales, but don't worry about it too much, your scales only spread by blood sacrifice so you can just not spread them too much. I think only scale that you might want to keep somewhat decent is order since otherwise you won't be able to recruit that many jaguar warriors.

[Kassander Kaspar]

Your dominion does not spread unless you make blood sacrifices with your priests. Therefore your scales won’t spread. The one exception to this is your god once he is awake, since he has one guaranteed dom-spread.

An awake god for research and site-searching with trash scales is therefore recommended. The guaranteed dom-spread ensures you don’t get dom-killed. Otherwise you will need to make a priest and put him on blood-sacrificing-duty pretty early. A strong bless ensures you don’t get eaten early in the game, and trust me people will try since Mictlan is a late-game powerhouse.

The research from a god with many magic paths will also help you in combat if you bring sufficient mages. Your Nahuallis are great mages. They can cast some great early buffs like body ethereal, swarm and the barkskin spells. The can also travel pretty far in turkey-form.

ADHD-Version: Trash your scales, take strong bless with awake pretender, bring thanksgiving-dinner to combat.

[timlagor]

since Mictlan is a late-game powerhouse.

I feel this merits a bit more explanation

[ExasperatedCultist]

Originally posted by timlagor:

since Mictlan is a late-game powerhouse.

I feel this merits a bit more explanation

You have powerful flying multi-attack blood-summonable sacreds. You can ramp up the production of these pretty much infinitely.

[RedHeadRedemption]

Originally posted by Kassander Kaspar:

Your dominion does not spread unless you make blood sacrifices with your priests. Therefore your scales won’t spread. The one exception to this is your god once he is awake, since he has one guaranteed dom-spread.

An awake god for research and site-searching with trash scales is therefore recommended. The guaranteed dom-spread ensures you don’t get dom-killed. Otherwise you will need to make a priest and put him on blood-sacrificing-duty pretty early. A strong bless ensures you don’t get eaten early in the game, and trust me people will try since Mictlan is a late-game powerhouse.

The research from a god with many magic paths will also help you in combat if you bring sufficient mages. Your Nahuallis are great mages. They can cast some great early buffs like body ethereal, swarm and the barkskin spells. The can also travel pretty far in turkey-form.

ADHD-Version: Trash your scales, take strong bless with awake pretender, bring thanksgiving-dinner to combat.

What do you mean by "trash scales"?

[Draken]

Originally posted by RedHeadRedemption:

What do you mean by "trash scales"?

Lowering your scales into the negative effect category to get more Design Points is usually refereed as "trashing your scales".

So high Turmoil, Death, Sloth, Misfortune, Drain and temperatures away form your nation's preference.

[Kassander Kaspar]

Originally posted by RedHeadRedemption:

What do you mean by "trash scales"?

As Draken mentioned, trashing your scales is taking very negative scales. Since your scales don't spread because of Mictlan's special rules for dom-spread, you don't have as much of a negative impact from them as other nations with regular dom-spread would have.

Conversely, if you take good scales you will find it more difficult to spread them, therefore lowering the positive impact of good scales.

The Smoking Mirror is a great pretender if you don't want to use death-scales and are going to site-search early on. The Demilich is good if you want to go full hell-scales with death 3 and higher dominion as an option. You can test the most cost-effctive build via the pretender-calculator.

https://caleb-distributive.github.io/pretenders-dom6/

[ExasperatedCultist]

Originally posted by Kassander Kaspar:

The Smoking Mirror is a great pretender if you don't want to use death-scales and are going to site-search early on.

With what build and in what circumstances are you seeing EA Mictlan sitesearching with their pretender, especially early?

[Kassander Kaspar]

Originally posted by ExasperatedCultist:

With what build and in what circumstances are you seeing EA Mictlan sitesearching with their pretender, especially early?

Depends on the map, general diplomatic situation and of course on your definition of early.

I am currently experimenting with a Smoking Mirror who has Dominion 5 and 4 across all magic paths except for Blood which is at 5. Nets you 31 bless points if you dump all your scales except growth.

Once I have about finished researching Alteration 4 and Blood 4, I let him head out.

Still have to test it in multiplayer once I have enough time to play.

[ExasperatedCultist]

Originally posted by Kassander Kaspar:

Depends on the map, general diplomatic situation and of course on your definition of early.

I am currently experimenting with a Smoking Mirror who has Dominion 5 and 4 across all magic paths except for Blood which is at 5. Nets you 31 bless points if you dump all your scales except growth.

Once I have about finished researching Alteration 4 and Blood 4, I let him head out.

Still have to test it in multiplayer once I have enough time to play.

But that's terrible?

Growth should be the first scale you dump as Mictlan, certainly not the last. And with no incarnate bless to speak of (the only one this build can take would be Blood Bond), there's no incentive for being awake instead of imprisoned.

This is just bad?

[Kassander Kaspar]

Originally posted by ExasperatedCultist:

But that's terrible?

Growth should be the first scale you dump as Mictlan, certainly not the last. And with no incarnate bless to speak of (the only one this build can take would be Blood Bond), there's no incentive for being awake instead of imprisoned.

This is just bad?

If you think so it must be true. I am far too inexperienced a player to know the meta of dominions 6.

[Ddraig Lleuad]

Originally posted by ExasperatedCultist:

But that's terrible?

Growth should be the first scale you dump as Mictlan, certainly not the last. And with no incarnate bless to speak of (the only one this build can take would be Blood Bond), there's no incentive for being awake instead of imprisoned.

This is just bad?

I think there is SOMETHING to be said for going awake with Mictlan, mostly the potential for a significant research bonus. Mictlan's cap is a pretty busy place, having someone with a lot of magic pathing to get some key spells going for a first war might be useful... But this is something for fairly advanced players to concern themselves with, the kind of people who can look at a lobby and say, "I am playing against this player, who is known to love this tactic, which I cannot solve with my bless so I will need this spell active by this turn, and the numbers for research timings on that require the boost of an awake researcher."

[freek_o_nature]

Originally posted by Ddraig Lleuad:

I think there is SOMETHING to be said for going awake with Mictlan, mostly the potential for a significant research bonus. Mictlan's cap is a pretty busy place, having someone with a lot of magic pathing to get some key spells going for a first war might be useful... But this is something for fairly advanced players to concern themselves with, the kind of people who can look at a lobby and say, "I am playing against this player, who is known to love this tactic, which I cannot solve with my bless so I will need this this spell active by this turn, and the numbers for research timings on that require the boost of an awake researcher."

Unfortunately, it's really not all that uncommon for meta warriors to speak in absolutes that favour their own points of view. If you're talking about niche approaches that are more for interest or flavour than for competition and victory, you're likely to be relegated to SP, which tends to carry a lot less "status" with meta warriors. You're not wrong, but you might have a tough time being right! ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[ExasperatedCultist]

Please don't insult me. Ddraig and I are on (I believe?) okay terms, and they (I hope?) know that I'm not averse to finding niche strategies. But awake researchers really are very much a finesse thing that requires a very specific plan and timing, and even if you think they have a place on EA Mictlan, that doesn't change that the specific proposed build was bad. It dumps the wrong scales and doesn't allow you to take a bless that takes advantage of your awake pretender.

[freek_o_nature]

I apologize if my post was overly pointed, but I honestly can't say I enjoy discussions with people who speak in absolutes relative to their own interests, which is—in the most objective and uninsulting terms I can muster—a very common quality in people whose gameplay priorities place competitive enjoyment above individual enjoyment. I recall an exchange with you about underwater nations:

Originally posted by ExasperatedCultist:

Originally posted by freek_o_nature:

If I can, I'd like to build a little on these, taking from my own ulterior motives

I think these are all a little bit outside the scope of what Illwinter seems to want in their game.

Only for you to turn around and say:

Originally posted by ExasperatedCultist:

Originally posted by timlagor:

I'd prefer UW to just not be a thing in 'serious' Multiplayer games than to have it blandified into oblivion too. People could still use it in "let's play a game and do some cool stuff" games and in SP.

You're in luck, as this also seems to be Illwinter's opinion, which... I don't fault them for? But I do think it's a false dichotomy. I think we can have flavourful UW that is still usable in the MP scene.

I gathered from this that things I think are worth investigating but you don't—affliction healing on inanimates (which is relevant to both SP and MP)—are "outside the scope of what Illwinter wants in their game," whereas things that you think are worth investigating—like making land/water interactions between nations more possible in multiplayer (which is more of an MP concern with SP getting benefits by proxy)—are important enough for major posts (albeit well-articulated ones), in spite of the fact that you admitted that this is something "outside the scope of what Illwinter wants in their game." I feel that this somewhat objectively demonstrates my belief that players whose priority is the meta have a tendency toward "multiplayer myopia": I don't think that their concerns are more valid than are those of players who want to explore, experiment, and discover for themselves.

Again, I am sorry for how pointed this is—I think it might be time to take my meds (EDIT: yes it was)—because I don't want to be mean or rude or cruel to anyone. It's just that you've got some great ideas and great advice, you're an awesome deep thinker about this game...but more often than not, I see you arguing with people over self-serving absolutes, instead. "Well, I know it's not great, but I feel like, in some situations—" "No. You are wrong." I mean, I can't help much with this question because I don't know much about Mictlan and Blood—I never got the hang of them—but you totally could...except that, instead of laying out something that helps those players to do what they want to do as best the game might allow, it feels more critical to fall in line with the meta. For example:

Originally posted by ExasperatedCultist:

You have powerful flying multi-attack blood-summonable sacreds. You can ramp up the production of these pretty much infinitely.

This is awesome advice! This is great! It's clear, it's versatile, it's helpful, it lets people know that they can produce large amounts of powerful sacred units to carry a killer bless. What it doesn't do is proscribe other players' interests and curiosities out of some elitist sense of superiority.

Originally posted by ExasperatedCultist:

But that's terrible?

Growth should be the first scale you dump as Mictlan, certainly not the last. And with no incarnate bless to speak of (the only one this build can take would be Blood Bond), there's no incentive for being awake instead of imprisoned.

This is just bad?

At the risk of insult, this feels more to me like meta-elitist superiority. "The way you're doing things is wrong and bad. Obey the meta." Give us more advice like you did at the start! Don't proscribe because "the meta"; use your extensive knowledge and experience to lay out possibilities and potentials! If players want to site search with Smoking Mirror, why not dig into your wisdom and tell them the most effective and efficient ways to do that? Why not just lay out that it'd be a tough road, because X, Y, and Z, but they'd have options A, B, and C to try and make it work? You can be doubtful, you're fully entitled to that, but these absolutes—this is bad, that is wrong, this is right—they're not as helpful to new players who want to explore the game as is the knowledge to let them explore and experiment even more.

I don't know anybody on these forums personally, but Ddraig Lleuad has never seemed like a troll to me and I'm quite sure they wouldn't let my rough week and snarky attitude influence their opinion of you in any way, so there isn't going to be any drama between you two as a result of my uppity rabble. I just wish some of this phenomenal information you have to offer was more generally useful rather than always being so hard-nosed about the damn meta. :/

Again, I apologize for being sharp, and I maybe shouldn't post this at all—if big bad Somber is watching, I'm honestly trying to engage in a respectful if frustrated manner (plz no ban for "big bad" remark, is meant in jest )—but it just gets to me that you've got all this skill and wisdom to share, but only if we respect the meta. :( Something one of my mentors instilled in me was helping people become the most of themselves they could be, which meant accepting that people are what they are, do what they do, want what they want, and responding in a way that helps them do that to the very best they can; this is why the "my way/best way" of the meta always bothers me. It's not about helping people play the best game they want play, it's about helping them play the best game the meta wants them to play.

If you're still interested in this discussion—and I understand if you'd rather I take a long walk off a short pier, that's fair—then I'd love to hear you lay out the pros, cons, and potential approaches to Smoking Mirror as a site-searching Awake Pretender for Mictlan. I always wanted to play Mictlan because I'm also really interested in those cultures and their styles, but I found them tough, so I watch out for tips that I can use to play the game I want to play. If you say it'll be a tough road, we'll believe you, but show us; lay out the reasons, lay out the whys, because that's how you'll help new players. If, on the other hand, this post makes my account explode in Somber-borne flames, then it was nice knowing you all! '^_^