Kael
Deity
[TAB]The Svartalfar must get outside their borders to survive, must engage in battle (hopefully without declarations of war or diplomacy hits) and generally cause trouble. The Sidar are the opposite. Comfortable existing only within their borders they are self-sustaining ghosts who are the most dangerous when left alone for centuries to build and grow.
[TAB]The key unit of the Sidar is the Shade. Any Sidar unit that is level 6 or higher can retire and become one. A Shade doesn't have any fighting ability, these are the faint souls that have withdrawn from direct contact with the world for an eternal life of their new profession. As such a Shades can become a Merchant, Bard, Sage or Engineer specialist in any of the Sidar cities.
[TAB]But these specialists are more talented that those of other civilizations. All of their bards produce an additional culture, all of their engineers produce an additional hammer, all of their sages an additional research and their merchants an additional gold. This applies even if they are specialists created through non-Shade means.
[TAB]There are also wonders in "Shadow" that effect specialist production. Sandalphon's favorite is the Great Library, it causes all your Sages to produce +1 research. Likewise the Theatre of Dreams causes all of your bards to produce +1 culture and the Guild of Hammers (the same wonder that founds the guild) causes all your engineers to produce +1 hammer. The doubling wonders (Sylviens Perfect Lyre, Bazaar of Mammon and the Crown of Akharien) are equally powerful in the Sidars hands because they can focus so many specialists in one city. Wonders should be a big part of any Sidar players strategy.
[TAB]This isnt to say that the Sidar are without their military strengths. They have an assassin unit called a Ghost which can cast the Hide spell. He can travel the world invisibly, only becoming visible when attacking. This is one of the few spells that cant be cast after attacking, so an attack will at least leave the unit exposed for a turn before he disappears to the ether again.
[TAB]The Sidar hero, Rathus Denmora, shares the ghosts ability to disappear but also starts with the Nether Blade equipment. The Nether Blade gives Rathus (or anyone who kills him and takes it) +2 Death damage and +80% against other heroes. Making Rathus the perfect unit to hunt for other players heroes.
[TAB]Invisibility is also granted by the Sidars world spell, Into the Mist. With it all of the Sidars combat units become hidden. Making it easy to slip away from bad situations, or to move entire armies into place undetected. The Sidar may seem rare in their ancient cities, but you wont really know how many there are, or where they are, until you declare war. Incidently in Shadow invisibile units still defend cities, so Giant Spiders are back to being great defenders and the Sidars world spell doesnt make them sitting ducks.
[TAB]Thats the Sidar. We wanted to make a civilization that required a different play strategy and offer a new civ to aggressive players (the Svartalfar) and to builders in Shadow. Like the Clan of Embers and the Khazad I dont think they will be that successful if they are played traditionally, but with the right plan they are very effective. In my last game I focused entirely on adepts to try to rush as many units as possible to level 6 to become specialists. I was worried the strategy may be too effective, but it seemed as effective as military rushes (getting the Crown of Akharien in my sage city did ensure I would always be the research leader). I havent tried a Cardith of the Sidar game yet. We dont balance based on alternate leaders but it sounds completely broken.
[TAB]The major weakness of the Sidar is their inability to recover from the loss of one of their major cities. With the loss of a city they also loose the great people specialists that were created in that city by Shades, an undoing of their centuries of work. Also just because of their wonder focus Sidar players may find themselves spending a lot of time researching non-military techs that leaves their army lacking (this is what I did in my last game and I got crushed because of it), players will have to make sure to balance their incredible specialist economy with their more practical defensive needs.
edit: added a screenshot for MarioFlag
[TAB]The key unit of the Sidar is the Shade. Any Sidar unit that is level 6 or higher can retire and become one. A Shade doesn't have any fighting ability, these are the faint souls that have withdrawn from direct contact with the world for an eternal life of their new profession. As such a Shades can become a Merchant, Bard, Sage or Engineer specialist in any of the Sidar cities.
[TAB]But these specialists are more talented that those of other civilizations. All of their bards produce an additional culture, all of their engineers produce an additional hammer, all of their sages an additional research and their merchants an additional gold. This applies even if they are specialists created through non-Shade means.
[TAB]There are also wonders in "Shadow" that effect specialist production. Sandalphon's favorite is the Great Library, it causes all your Sages to produce +1 research. Likewise the Theatre of Dreams causes all of your bards to produce +1 culture and the Guild of Hammers (the same wonder that founds the guild) causes all your engineers to produce +1 hammer. The doubling wonders (Sylviens Perfect Lyre, Bazaar of Mammon and the Crown of Akharien) are equally powerful in the Sidars hands because they can focus so many specialists in one city. Wonders should be a big part of any Sidar players strategy.
[TAB]This isnt to say that the Sidar are without their military strengths. They have an assassin unit called a Ghost which can cast the Hide spell. He can travel the world invisibly, only becoming visible when attacking. This is one of the few spells that cant be cast after attacking, so an attack will at least leave the unit exposed for a turn before he disappears to the ether again.
[TAB]The Sidar hero, Rathus Denmora, shares the ghosts ability to disappear but also starts with the Nether Blade equipment. The Nether Blade gives Rathus (or anyone who kills him and takes it) +2 Death damage and +80% against other heroes. Making Rathus the perfect unit to hunt for other players heroes.
[TAB]Invisibility is also granted by the Sidars world spell, Into the Mist. With it all of the Sidars combat units become hidden. Making it easy to slip away from bad situations, or to move entire armies into place undetected. The Sidar may seem rare in their ancient cities, but you wont really know how many there are, or where they are, until you declare war. Incidently in Shadow invisibile units still defend cities, so Giant Spiders are back to being great defenders and the Sidars world spell doesnt make them sitting ducks.
[TAB]Thats the Sidar. We wanted to make a civilization that required a different play strategy and offer a new civ to aggressive players (the Svartalfar) and to builders in Shadow. Like the Clan of Embers and the Khazad I dont think they will be that successful if they are played traditionally, but with the right plan they are very effective. In my last game I focused entirely on adepts to try to rush as many units as possible to level 6 to become specialists. I was worried the strategy may be too effective, but it seemed as effective as military rushes (getting the Crown of Akharien in my sage city did ensure I would always be the research leader). I havent tried a Cardith of the Sidar game yet. We dont balance based on alternate leaders but it sounds completely broken.
[TAB]The major weakness of the Sidar is their inability to recover from the loss of one of their major cities. With the loss of a city they also loose the great people specialists that were created in that city by Shades, an undoing of their centuries of work. Also just because of their wonder focus Sidar players may find themselves spending a lot of time researching non-military techs that leaves their army lacking (this is what I did in my last game and I got crushed because of it), players will have to make sure to balance their incredible specialist economy with their more practical defensive needs.
edit: added a screenshot for MarioFlag
