Battle Summon Placement

[Fleshbits]

When I summon skeletons, they seem to come to life next to the caster in the back of the field. This makes it such that, by the time the skeletons get next to someone to hit, my front line forces have already taken the pounding.

What can I do to use the skeletons as the fodder they were intented to be?

If I move my front line back, then I take to much dmg from archers, me thinks. Is that the only option?

[Perro Grande]

Put your mages closer to the front

[Fleshbits]

Originally posted by 3 Theories:

Put your mages closer to the front

k will try.

[KimmoKM]

You can also deploy forward troops (which you shouldn't have many of if you do intend to let skeletons do the soaking) scripted to hold and attack in skirmish or loose line formation to let the first wave of skeletons pass.

[DasaKamov]

Most battle-field summons are meant to act as reinforcements or as a constant, unending stream of headaches rather than immediate front-line troops. Note that you can summon Longdead (skellymans) as a ritual and place them on the battlefield via the "Army Setup" screen as well, which may be more useful for your original intention.

Also, the later-tier skele-summons (such as "Horde of Skeletons") can be a large boon, as just two or three Death mages can send literal dozens of fresh skellingtons to the battle each round.

[Fleshbits]

Yea, the thing is with C'tis I've already got a swarm of fodder in my built in units, but strategies suggest I should be spamming skeletons too. There is only so much room on the line.

If I was to hold and attack with my built in troops and let the skellies go, my built in troops wouldnt be doing any dmg.

I guess the best I can do is what the first suggestion said and move my mages up and just have the skelly fodder join my built in fodder.

However, while all these fodder troops are doing thier thing, someone needs to be doing dmg without taking up a melee space on the battle field, right? Who does that?

[Fortuna]

Originally posted by Fleshbits:

However, while all these fodder troops are doing thier thing, someone needs to be doing dmg without taking up a melee space on the battle field, right? Who does that?

Usually you are going to want some mages to do a lot of the damage. What spells depend on what age you are playing in. Even one Marshmaster scripted to cast Foul Vapors could spell doom for an enemy that can't get past a wall of skeletons in time.

[Fleshbits]

Originally posted by Fortuna:

Originally posted by Fleshbits:

However, while all these fodder troops are doing thier thing, someone needs to be doing dmg without taking up a melee space on the battle field, right? Who does that?

Usually you are going to want some mages to do a lot of the damage. What spells depend on what age you are playing in. Even one Marshmaster scripted to cast Foul Vapors could spell doom for an enemy that can't get past a wall of skeletons in time.

Yea, but foul vapors is level 5 and rquires a N3 mage in any army that wants to casdt it. I'd be hard pressed to get that once in the first 3 or 4years.

Other races have lower level dmging spells. Just seems like a wee bit of negative early game synergy to me.

I'll have to revist that what boost what in magic again. Maybe there is a quick way for me to get N3 casters.

[TheMage1]

My understanding is that any loss of troops from archers is just part of the strategy. By having units with shields and armor, you won't lose many of them, and you can keep on using skeletons to push.

The other potential strategy with C'tis would be to use shamans to buff things like falchioneers or slave warriors with wooden warriors/body ethereal/protection/luck. The mod editor says that shaman are 90 sacred gold, and body ethereal is 3/4 of the time attacks miss. I believe that quadrupling the defense of something makes it only twice as effective, and using slave warriors means that you should be able to get something like 3 casts off, so for shamans casting body ethereal

15(unit value)*3(units in square)*3(number of casts)=45*3=135.
Then 135(spell value)-90(mage price)=45 net gold value.

If you cast horde of skeletons, you can get four casts off in magic 3, which means 24 skeletons. Assuming that skeletons are 10 gold, you get

10(skeleton gold)*24(number of skeletons)=240
240-105=135 net gold value for EA C'tis Reborn
240-235=5 net gold value for MA C'tis Marshmasters

However, horde become better in both longer battles, as well as when you fight multiple battles, due to the fact that you'll always have the skeletons. In addition, enchantment does provide other spells, like foul vapors and (eventually)quagmire, as well rigor mortis and eventually relief, so there is other value there, while alteration doesn't give you as many battlefield effects.

Edit. Also, you should be able to cast foul vapors with a n2w1 mage, using an extra gem. If you are EA C'tis, the easiest way would be a thistle mace at construction 4, on a water random Sauromancer.

[Mount Nomad]

Telkine Pretender drops Foul Vapors automatically at the start of each battle, though not many nations get him, and he's not very good.

Level 5 in a path should be very doable in 3 years if you keep focus on research.

[jojeck]

Actually one solution that works well in Dom 4 is to not take the lizard chaff to the battle, they just get in the way and get killed, costing gold and might cause an army rout due to 75% HP loss.

Just use some lizards as bodyguards to the marshmasters. Put all your marshmasters togther in 2 or 3 blocks as far away from the enemy as possible to give them time to cast spells. Maybe deploy just one block of sacrifical heavy infantry to distract the enemy if he's strong. Against weak enemy the skellies from Skeleton Horde can win on their own without you losing a single troop but against a proper army you'll need to add some of the other spells that MA C'tis is good at casting, and the list is long which is why MA C'tis is such a good nation. What is good depends on the opponent and his strengths and weaknesses.

There are a lot of spells, some generate other battle summons, such as Howl, Swarm or Creeping Doom, Water Elementals. Darkness and Rigor Mortis can help against living armies that don't do well in the dark. Foul Vapours and various poison clouds or sleep spells, Quagmire slows his troops, Rain hinders fire mages and missile fire and so on.

If the marshmasters aren't enough on their own then lizard shaman can make communions with couatl masters and spam astral battle spells, including Soulslay and Enslave Mind among others right up to the big one Master Enslave.

[dyslexicfaser]

I like to have a batch of Swamp Guard or Elite Warriors (these guys are reasonably killy but have low morale, I'd throw a +morale boosting item on their commander, Nature paths have plenty of those) in a block on Hold orders near the mages but with room on the ends for the skeletons to pour around them and close around the enemy.

I gather that cavalry are better at flanking in Dom5 though, so take this advice with a grain of salt.

[Swirler]

Summoned skellys are great for slowing down units who want to attack the rear of your army.
In short battles you won't see their value but in longer ones you will see how damn annoying they can be. Provided the enemy doesn't have too many priests.

[Twogun]

another possibility, if you are dead set on using skelspam in conjunction with regulars, would be this:

regular troops en mass deployed to flanks, hold and attack-slightly recessed.

light screening force absolutely forward and center to protect casters, probably in the dispersed line formation

mages on all out skel spam in center.

the hopes here would be the skel spam would crash into the enemy, occupying them, while your regulars encircled/engaged on flanks, inflicting damage but avoiding the brunt of the casualties.

what you are doing is trying to meld two strats together, which generally hasn't worked for me in dominions. but perhaps you can make a go of it.

[Fortuna]

Originally posted by Fleshbits:

Yea, but foul vapors is level 5 and rquires a N3 mage in any army that wants to casdt it. I'd be hard pressed to get that once in the first 3 or 4years.

If you can't research level 5 in year 2 with standard settings, then you are doing something wrong.

Originally posted by Fleshbits:

Other races have lower level dmging spells. Just seems like a wee bit of negative early game synergy to me.

Not really since Enchantment 5 gives you both Horde of Skeletons and Foul Vapors. It also gives Quagmire but that is harder to cast.

Originally posted by Fleshbits:

I'll have to revist that what boost what in magic again. Maybe there is a quick way for me to get N3 casters.

A Marshmaster has a ~27% chance of starting with N3. If you get unlucky and don't get one, then you can spend an extra gem to cast Foul Vapors. If you are confident that he won't die, you can even make a Thistle Mace and/or Cornucopia for a Marshmaster with Construction 4. Also, you could make a communion with 2+ Shaman and an Astral Marshmaster (just make sure you don't kill your Shaman).