Necromantic concerns

[Zenithir]

I mentioned some of this in another thread but thought I'd mention it here.

I feel a few things seem a little out of whack with the necromancer:

What is with the dark citadel, maybe if we could move our immortality to it, or it counted as a temple, or it spawned its own undead, but really I feel like it was the necromancers first home. It needs love, yeah, there is a crack running down the middle, and there is a gas leak, but I made it myself so I can't give it up. Seriously though, is there someway it could be a place of darkness, giving hands, undead, cheaper ceremonies, attracting hades units or something.

Which brings me to another aspect. I get that necromancers use the sinister hands, neat. But in ther end it feels more like a person who couldn't man up to being a demonologist, as it is all sinny, rather than just dead. So instead of relying on death to fuel me, I rely on people being extra mean, and then dying at the hands of others. I'd think hades would be candy store for a good necromancer, not him trying to explain his impotence to the spirits there and how he always just wanted to be around undead and left alone by the living, but its so hard when those hands they throw away are so, well, handy. a poor mans addiction to dumpster diving, rather than infamy it seems.
Maybe giving something like killing power from people dying in the world, drawing power from the number of spirits in hades around that space, or maybe having some secondary resource for an alterior mage who works with dead and death, instead of just necrotic tissue of mean people.

Also, maybe being able to upgrade that sad dreary old castle into some dark citadel? Maybe? Or some sort of ethereal wall, or maybe pulling the castle from the underworld up, making a whole between the two so people attacking there have to contend with energies of hades pouring through.

[♔ Affable 7th Wave Teaboo ♔]

Not entirely sure if this is a serious topic.

If it is, similar arguments can be made about just about every nation. Yes, everything can be more complex, involved, detailed, expanded. Necro is not special in that regard.

Also, do not forget that the point of CoE, as opposed to Dom, is to have easy, quick, pickup and go game that gets going fast and ends fast. Expanding all the mechanics is liable to push the game away from that goal and turn it into variation of Dom.

[Zenithir]

It's really more aimed at the thematic and play aspects of the class, as apparently they stand over game mechanics and balancing. Which I actually kind of like about the game, just to clarify.

As for the difference, perhaps I am ignorant to this, as there are several speeds the different classes play at and Dom can go rather quick at times for myself. I find both relatively intuitive, if a bit different in style. Seems to me more story, theme, and scope are different than the speed.

[Aquillion]

Necromancers already have enough stuff to form at least two complete factions, maybe three. They don't need much else.

[♔ Affable 7th Wave Teaboo ♔]

Originally posted by M3t15:

As for the difference, perhaps I am ignorant to this, as there are several speeds the different classes play at and Dom can go rather quick at times for myself. I find both relatively intuitive, if a bit different in style. Seems to me more story, theme, and scope are different than the speed.

Those were not really my words, I was merely paraphrasing the devs. Dom is designed to give games that last for many, many hours. Higher level Dom play strategies are exremely complex, and end game grows to practically industrial scale.
CoE is designed to provide quick and less involved experiences. CoE can last as little as three turns (accoriding to some reports on this hub ). So, any new feature has to be weighted against consideration of retaining simplicity.

[Spinx42]

I am Just a little miffed about the necro class. I went though all the trouble of getting an old castle and saving up hands to become a vampire. He died once at the castle and never came back. bah

[Foddercat]

Okay, recently concluded a long game with several other people, and I might be a tad salty, so don't take what I say as being anything objective... but I really don't think the necromancer needs a buff.

I don't like nerfing. I don't think they need to be nerfed. But a well played necromancer is a nightmare in the end game. They get good magic, several immortal commanders, an immortal scout, and immortal grunt units. They disease, decay, and curse what they don't kill outright. They get the best use of Hades, and can even send their Tartarian Spirit underground to grab a few resources from Agartha, or just move around unopposed. They don't need gold for normal units, so they hire a lot of apprentices and mercenary wizards, and can easily save to make use of libraries. Their summons never backfire, and they have a damn good chance of getting leaders from those summons. Even the mound king can be used to lead a bunch of zombies around in the ocean.

Playing against the computer, you don't need to worry about advanced tactics being used against you. Even on emperor, it just means you have to fight bigger armies with more elite units. When a person is controlling that Necromancer though, you can expect to be constantly harrassed by lone or small groups of immortals who suicide attack your main armies. Mummies are immortal, tough enough to reach the front line, and disease units that attack them. Carrions fly right up to your troops on the first round, and explode on death, causing disease and a bit of damage. Wraith Lords are sneaky little jerks who tend to kill a few troops even on a poor attack, and a Wraith King can actually solo a small army of normal troops with fair regularity.

Oh wait, what's that? Banish? Sure, you can banish the wraiths. They'll be back the next round after spending one AP, but hey, at least they're out of that particular fight. Friggen wraiths. :(

Then there's the big ones. Liches and vampires. Vampires, and the rare vampire lord, can and will fly around your territory and ruin your day. You need to attack them with powerful or numerous units in order to take them out. They fly, and can use stygian paths in a pinch. You can (must) try to run him down and send him back to his castle for a little rest, or you can let him get behind your lines. Do you have any farms or villages that you needed back there? Well... the vampire is going to eat them, or turn them into ghouls. Lovely.

Then there's the lich. With double cast, A lich who knows Invulnerability more likely than not to use it, and if they do, you need magic to kill them. Also, I didn't think disease was all that much to worry about before being on the receiving end of mass disease spells. So I've got my nice stack of dwarves, enough of which have rune enhancements to make sure that any army that fights them in the open will regret it.

But I'm not fighting an army. I'm fighting a single lich that just ran in from who knows where. No magic items. No backup. Just a single lich. Boom! Black death, soemtimes twice. All but a few of my dwarves are now dying a slow death, and the lich gets a free trip back to his temple. Either that, or the friggen lich surrounds himself with a sudden army of skeletons, then rots, freezes, or sucks the life out of my army right there on the spot.

...

Planar swap. That ritual is brutal when used aggressively. Not long into the game, we had to deal with Orcus running around because our resident necromancer decided he wanted his level 3 library (that we could never take from him), and hey, why go through the effort of fighting the lord of death yourself when you can make the other players do it instead, for 50 hands. Oh hey, look at this big army I'm sending in to conquer that old castle and stop the vampire respawns. Ha ha ha, nope! Now I'm in hades, dying a slow death, and even if I do conquer something, it won't stop the respawn, and I won't be able to hold it. And hey, let's send a few armies to converge on an important target. Wait, one of my stacks is in hades now, and has been replaced by a lich, who promptly attacks me and wipes out half a stack of dudes!

...

Just a bit salty is all. Alright, I'm done whining. In conclusion, don't buff Necromancer. Please. :(

[niddhoger]

Yeah... Necro is probably the most OP faction outside of demo. You didn't even mention demi-liches warping on top of your citadels, killing 100+ non-magical troops, raising a massive army, summoning/recruiting a commander to lead those undead around, then repeating the whole process over again... Even if you do kill that ♥♥♥♥♥♥, he'll just reform and teleport right back into your territory. They may be hard to control, but a single demi-lich is priceless for harassing an enemy. The other immortals have to at least fly/float back into your territory from their home. That demi-lich might be stationed on the exact opposite end of the map, but can still teleport 100+ tiles back into your territory the next turn for just 2 hands.

[Foddercat]

That's true. During that particular game, there were, I believe, two demi-liches running about, and I made sure that every one of my stacks had some flame branded support to deal with this (and to try to deal with the increasingly large stacks of mummies). Because of this, it was the other players who were the primary victims of those demi-liches. The fact that I got owned so hard, while at the same time getting off easy compared to the others... means that I need more practice. Lots and lots of practice.

[niddhoger]

Originally posted by Spinx42:

I am Just a little miffed about the necro class. I went though all the trouble of getting an old castle and saving up hands to become a vampire. He died once at the castle and never came back. bah

It sounds like your vampire died when someone else took the castle? Immortality can be broken if the unit dies when teir home citadel is in someone eles'e hands. Think of it this way, their body starts to reform, but the new owners are on-hand to kill you and toss your coffin out the window before he could ressurect properly.

In my Markgraf game, I found an old castle early and make it my vampire-factory. Since the shortties are so damned slow, I just had them flying around as suicide-corps. They were reforming regularly, was hilarious when the troll king brought his doom stack within 3-4 tiles of the castle (thick jungle). My vamp lord could disease+decay, which will kill off a troll after a fight (disease halves regeneration, causing the troll to succumb to decay). I must have sent my vamps to harass/whittle away his army 5 turns in a row as they died, reformed, then flew back over the jungle.

[Zomen]

Originally posted by niddhoger:

Yeah... Necro is probably the most OP faction outside of demo. You didn't even mention demi-liches warping on top of your citadels, killing 100+ non-magical troops, raising a massive army, summoning/recruiting a commander to lead those undead around, then repeating the whole process over again... Even if you do kill that ♥♥♥♥♥♥, he'll just reform and teleport right back into your territory. They may be hard to control, but a single demi-lich is priceless for harassing an enemy. The other immortals have to at least fly/float back into your territory from their home. That demi-lich might be stationed on the exact opposite end of the map, but can still teleport 100+ tiles back into your territory the next turn for just 2 hands.

I don't know about that. I think the warlock should be included in this. They are all basically snowball classes with weaker starts but can become powerful later. The warlock can summon kings of the elements which are very powerful and have combast casting. They can cast really powerful spells multiple times per battled round.

[Jakalor]

Warlock is hands down one of the weakest classes, with an awful start, gems being nigh impossible to get large amounts of and a lot of Warlock spells have a good chance to just kill your own army.

Also, Demonologist is essentially a Warlock with easier access to their special resources at the cost of having them backfire some of the time.

Either way, Necromancer is hands down (pun not intended) the most powerful class from start to finish. High Priestess comes close thanks to Anakim spam giving them a massive lead early on

[Aquillion]

I think you're underestimating the power of the Warlock gem-generating rituals in the late game. A Warlock who starts spamming their air generator everywhere is very hard to stop.

[DasaKamov]

Speaking of necromancy, this is quite a revival of a two-year-old thread. ;)