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Evidence: https://github.com/larzm42/dom5inspector/blob/db51d07fd9a98416fea364dbf8c7899220e0346c/gamedata/attributes_by_nation.csv
Mekone (nation #32) is the only nation to have attribute 378 and it's set to 15.
As this patch added this mod command
I believe Mekone has #fortunrest 15.
I assume you are speaking of MP with this. The nation is far too new to know its impacts on that arena just yet. Good players are likely to find ways to dominate that are not so obvious from staring at Dom Inspector stats. MP games tend to focus on one aspect of Dominions that I truly dislike so I don't have that much experience in them, but even I can see the many advantages this nation brings to a game and I certainly would not rate them as "the weakest land nation in the Early Age." And I think you are flat out incorrect about Kailasa being weak in MP in Dom 5 with the new bless system.
In terms of RP and SP, this nation is simply fantastic. Love the historical parrallels to Sparta and the scripted events. Free Gigante assassins every year from every city that you can deck out in all manner of OP items make them arguably the strongest assassins in the EA. After a couple of years you can have whole squads of them wreaking havoc on everyone.
And if you want to make a political/social statement, you can always take an Enlarged bless and have Neodamodes with Shrouds (or Neo Prophets) and/or Crowns of Titans and/or Amulets of Giant Growth leading Gigantes. Thumb your nose at the gods AND the giants! ;p
It's also telling that when I counter by asking for a weaker EA land nation, I usually get crickets, silence, or people reminding me Kailasa exists. It isn't that Mekone has no strengths - it does; it's path access to elemental boosters is second only to Vanheim, and it has some of the most cost efficient line holders in dominions, let alone EA. But superbuffed helotes aren't scary, 1/3 fireball/falling fires spammers and 1/3 bladewind/meld spammers on a 195 gold cost mage isn't scary, and you'll never have enough Polemarchs to be scary because they're cap only. Their fundamental issue is that their mages appear designed to buff elite troops, but Gigantes simply fall short of the title of "elite": at least as it pertains to multiplayer.
And yes, this is a review on their performance in multiplayer, which has so far involved them getting bless rushed early, or outscaled later on. You can certainly win with them of course - diplomacy makes winning with any nation not simply possible, but sometimes downright easy, and sometimes you just have the luck of the gods when you're site searching - but the amount of effort or luck you need is much higher.
The problem is Mekone has not been given the tools to be aggressive in the early game; they're usually the one being aggressed upon because their troops are inferior to the actual early game powerhouses of EA.
-Archons are pretty great at casting evocations, gives a good variety with orb lightning / falling fires, but I mostly use the earth one for legiosn of steel/ giants.
-Ephors are pretty amazing at casting Rain of Stones. If you get the air random, give them earth boots and script to cast earth power -> rain of stones. I usually give them a helmet for this.
-If you manage to get a water random cyclops, you don't really need any site searchers besides him. I usually make 2-3 cyclops but their lack of sacred really makes me not want to make them due to extreme cost and I don't see them as better than archons, just more variety.
-The nation seems built around thugging out Polemarchs. They're very strong with access to lots of nice self-buffs and fire evocations. But how do you bless them? Or are they just super defensive casters? Do I really need to dedicate a cyclops to forging flasks of holy water each turn?
-The gigantes seem weak. If I gather 50+ of them they seem to die just as easy as if I gather only 10, the reason seems to be that if an army can kill even a few of them then they can easily kill masses. Disco has not nearly enough ammo.
-The Helote Hoplites seem to be an amazing deal. I like to build a lot of them in capital with all my other forts making the max amount of the two hoplite gigantes.
-The assassins need poison daggers by default. They don't seem to be nearly as effective as pythium's assassins for this reason. As a result they need to be given forged weapons, which isn't bad but I just feel that assassins are supposed to be able to do something by themselves.
-The mages as a whole seem terribly overpriced. Polemarch price seems ok, but I have to figure out a way to make it more killy if it's an attacker, as a caster it's pretty good besides the massive encumberance.
-The lack of 10/path rainbows hurts this nation. Blesses in general are kinda difficult because you either want to pimp out your polemarchs or just buff casters, either way your troops aren't sacred so you're entirely reliant on your capital. Just not a good medium really. The nation in general wants E4 minimum for some reinvig, but also wants minimum N2 for some nature diversity, but blood kinda helps too, as does fire shield for making polemarchs killy... you see where I'm going here.
I'm not going to pretend these guys are the new powerhouse natioin of EA.
But they can do a lot. Personally I use the Elder Cyclops (love these guys) and Polemarchs on the battlefield. But Archons only take one turn to recruit, and will be one of three things: E1F1A2, E3F1, or E1F3.
Heck the E1F1A2 isn't that useful lacking the partners for team thunderstrike, but he can cast Wind Guide (if you somehow find that useful), Arrow Fend (with extra gems), heck he could cast Storm with a booster and couple gems. Or an Elder Cyclops with the same boosters could forge Staff of Storms.
There's nothing there an Elder Cyclops can't do, but Archons come in 3 flavors, and all are useful - unlike some other nations where you have some wacky E1W1 Warrior Smith who hangs out in a lab his whole life.
Depending on how research goes, and gem availability Mekone will have no problem forging:
1) Staff of Elemental Mastery (need Construction 6, and a water bracer/robe first, so water gems) by Elder Cyclops.
2) Having the item above, They can pretty much make all the Elemental Boosters, aside from Skulls of Fire, and Bloodstones I think.
There is basically no big battlefield spell from the Elemental Paths they can't cast somehow. Maybe not Shimmering Fields, but I really don't think most people want to ever cast that one except in a special situation.
If you are talking about massing a ton of cheap casters to fireball everything on a budget, well maybe that really isn't their niche.
But even if they would dearly love some nature magic on the battlefield, heck I really don't know of another faction who can pull off all they can, potentially if we are just talking about Elemental magic.
I really don't understand this. I've noticed they are kinda weak against Niefel Giants (chill aura), but they chomp through the nonsacred Neifelhiem troops.
Haven't gone against Hinnom or Fomoria yet, but I imagine a Rephaelite Giant against a Gigante Hoplite isn't a super one sided fight (well not counting a bless on the Hinnomite).
An equal number of Gigantes moneywise against the equivalent from Hinnom? I'd lay money on the Gigantes.
Like to see a line of Gigantes agains Vanheims Berserker sacreds. I think Vanheim wins pretty easily, not considering magic, but that's just my guess.
But these are very, very solid troops. Be interesting to see Xibalba go up against them. Curious as to how that Lance does against all that armor.
The Rephaite vs Gigante matchup has been done - even unblessed Rephaites win gold to gold. (which surprised me; though this is only gold to gold on the buy price, not counting Rephaites many other . . . issues, like the causing unrest and the poploss). Gigantes do beat an even gold amount of any other Hinnom troop except maybe the chariots.
They do mulch through Jotuns, but Jotuns are awful troops that most generally avoid because everything relevent mulchs Jotuns.
Vanheim's sacreds can usually kill an even number. With Quickness bless they rarely take losses while doing so. Vanheim also rubs this insult in their face by being better at elemental magic boosting than they are, outside of water path.
Xibalba is only going to win that with bats if they get a lucky kill on the commander. Beast bats also aren't great against them, but blessed Ozzies tend to obliterate them.
Honestly if they wanted the Gigantes to be impressive they should have given them all god slaying spears. Not like this is unprecidented either, given the existence of MA/LA Ulm.
As for thugging, Polemarchs do it extremely well - but cap only thugs are not some great impressive strength. They're too expensive to be thugs, and lack the HP to be SCs, which puts them in an extremely awkward spot.
This is not an argumentation. Remember when I said "a real answer, not a questionable comparison with the cheapest/best mage of the era" ? This is a questionable comparison with the cheapest/best, wait for it, mage nations of the era. Questionable because Mekone is not a pure mages nation. Not a pure units nation either.
Vanheim can't forge all elemental boosters, Mekone can't too but can forge all elemental boosters with the exception of the skull of fire and the blood stone and including the staff of elemental mastery.
Mekone can also summon all the queens and the kings without the pretender god. How many nations can say the same?
That said, the ephor. The main criticism is the price, 195 gold. So? How cheap or not is the ephor? Good or bad is according to the average, not to the minimum or maximum.
There are 10 recruitable sacred mages with 3 paths in the early age: the ishib, the olm sage, the kuliltu queen, the guru, the earth reader, the druid, the sidhe lord, the fomorian druid, the vanjarl and the ephor himself. The average cost is 201,5 gold.
So no, the ephor is not too expansive for a 3-paths sacred mage.
Ok you're going to tell me: "the ephor is too expansive for a 3-paths mage (including and sacred mages and non-sacred mages)".
There are 13 recruitable non-sacred mages with 3 paths in the early age: the nahualli, the warlock, the dwarven smith, the sorcerer, the ah itz, the airya seraph, the mage engineer, the harab seraph, the rusian wizard, the kulullu sage, the horite shaman, the enkidu bone reader and the spider clan witch doctor. The average cost is 123,46 gold. And the average upkeep is 8,23 per turn. As the ephor's upkeep is 6,5 gold per turn. The non-sacred mage costed you less but will cost you more, and after 41 turns, in average, the non-sacred mage costed, costs and will cost you more gold than the ephor.
So no, the ephor is not too expansive for a 3-paths mage.
Ok you're going to tell me: "41 turns is in the long term, the ephor is too expansive for a 3-paths mage in the short term, when you are short of money and when you need to buy units, mages and infrastructure".
Every nation is short of money early game, but somes more than others: you can only recruit 4 gigantes in the capital, 1 gigante outside the capital and your holites cost 8 gold (for the recruitment, half for the upkeep). You are a nation prod-capped, not gold-capped. As for the mages number, early game mages are fort-capped, all nations except the ones with outside forts mages have the same mages number. Speaking of forts, your palisades costs 150 more gold but give you more admin, more recruitment point bonus and mainly 1 commander point bonus.
So no, the ephor is not too expansive for a 3-paths mage in the short term.
The real question is not "is the ephor bad or good?" but "what can i do with the ephor?", "what is the ephor potential?".
As you said, 2 ephors out of 3 can fireball or earth meld early game. But as you didn't say, 2 ephors out of 3 can magma eruption with a gem (or a fire in the jare) mid game and late game. How can a 195 gold, recruit everywhere mage able to cast magma eruption be bad?
The air random is far from useless. Perfect owl quill forger and perfect thug early game. It costs you one air gem but the combo ironskin/mistform is hard to get through if enemy units don't have and high strength and magic weapons. Not to mention the bless (because being sacred is an advantage from which Mekone has to profit). Perfect rain of stones caster late game. Not to mention the 30 hp.
Outside battles, inquisitor is quite a good ability with a lot of applications (preaching while sieging a enemy fort, etc.).
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The polemarchs are great leaders, great mages, great thugs and great SC with a bless. Cap only but Mekone can forge winged boots.
The elder cyclops are premium SC: ironskin / mistform / phoenix pyre / +reinvigoration. No major weakness like golems (anti-lifeless or anti-magic beings spells), undead and demons. Less sensitive to magic weapons than an astral or death SC. Good adaption depending the target (fire shield, iron will, stoneskin or ironskin, etc.). Cap only but elder cyclops can cast cloud trapeze. Not a single word about them in your post.
I don't think so. I think versatility is the key word. You can buff your troups, debuff enemies or blast enemies. Fire flavor or earth flavor. You're not blocked if the enemy has FR or fly. All your mages (minus the geronte) have access to the two best magic booster spells: phoenix power and summon earthpower, that's an opportunity.
How can Mekone be bless rushed early game more easily than a lambda nation?
- earth meld into 25 pierce and magic damage
- high prot cheap helotes
- high prot high damage gigantes
- free assassins (oh you prophetized your starting commander?)
How can Mekone be outscaled late game more easily than a lambda nation?
- you have deep access to all elemental magics (all the queens/kings, all the elemental resistances, etc.)
- you will break into nature for the thug stuff (nature pretender + nature independant mages)
- you will break into death for the keres (death pretender + wolf tribe shaman and bone reader)
- you can break into astral (astral pretender + crystal sorceress and lizard shaman)
- you have fire, earth and air natural income and you can forge dwarven hammer, owl quill and lightless lantern
- you will take a pretender god with good scales, at least prod 3 and growth 3
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There is still a lot to say about Mekone: synergies between the spells and the units, bless choices, the kryptes, the keres, etc.
So basicly what I was saying. You looked at Mekone 10 minutes then said the nation sucks.