Thunder_Gr
Emperor
I didn't know that! Is there in a description I have missed, or you have learned it from posts?
Best Mana Type?
- Thread starter solanacea
- Start date
Well, the civilopedia sayss so. And I remember reading about it in a post i unfourtionatly can't find at the moment. The idea behind metamagic promotions to have this bonus is to replace the passive effects other mana types have to break the similarity of passive mana effects, if I remember correctly.
popejubal
Emperor
In addition, the Metamagic promotions also give -5% chance for the spells to be resisted as well as the +5% damage.
Combat V plus Metamagic III = +40% direct spell damage and -15% chance for spells to be resisted.
Metamagic III + Dominate = fun.
Metamagic III + pretty much anything = fun, for that matter.
Hmmm, never tried this. Is this an intended feature or some kind of exploit? Since the AI cannot even figure out building mana nodes, this tactic would be forever out of AI's reach. I kinda feel like it is cheating to use some tactic against the AI if AI could never ever use that.
Monkeyfinger
Deity
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I don't think it's possible to make an accurate post like that because most people just listed their favorites and didn't rank the rest.
For instance, Entropy. Only me and WarKirby specifically mentioned it and we both rated it high. Where do you get the idea that it belongs in bottom, based on these posts?
For instance, Entropy. Only me and WarKirby specifically mentioned it and we both rated it high. Where do you get the idea that it belongs in bottom, based on these posts?
Theres always the problem of the fact that you will prefer some types of mana when you are going a good number of casters vs what mana you grab when you don't plan on building more than a handful of mages(aka if you just want to stack life/enchantment/law mana for the passive boosts).
Honestly I love law mana in a game where I'm going to building a heck of alot of towns to take advantage of aristocracy, but I wouldn't bother to teach it to my mages over fire, death or air.
Water, enchantment, spirit(courage healing boost is a nice boost at adept level), and body are usually must have spheres if I don't plan on going beyond the adept level.
Fire, air, death, earth(in support of one of the first 3) are all great when I plan on going to about the mage level.
If going to the archmage level, fire is still good, as is mind(with meta of course) or chaos. I don't tend to like spellstaff, as if I'm going to be using archmages, I'm going to give them mobility promotions, and adepts with haste and mobility to keep up with them, and ideally won't have any turns when they aren't casting.
Finally if I grab chalad I'll stack sun and run around with sun 2 affinity summons. Entropy is good for the late game with rust if you combined it with as much magic resistance removal as you can find(the tower of alt, metamagic and at least mage level).
If there was any one sphere I use the most it would be body though, early on a free mobility promotion(which can be abused to even give two movement through forests or hills, just don't cast haste until you have moved the one square and "exhausted your move" then cast haste and move again) and at mage level regeneration is amazing for supporting an army. I haven't abused flesh golem much, as by the time I get to that point, my hordes of vampires/champions with mithril/iron are usually overwhelming the enemy with adept/mage support.
Honestly I love law mana in a game where I'm going to building a heck of alot of towns to take advantage of aristocracy, but I wouldn't bother to teach it to my mages over fire, death or air.
Water, enchantment, spirit(courage healing boost is a nice boost at adept level), and body are usually must have spheres if I don't plan on going beyond the adept level.
Fire, air, death, earth(in support of one of the first 3) are all great when I plan on going to about the mage level.
If going to the archmage level, fire is still good, as is mind(with meta of course) or chaos. I don't tend to like spellstaff, as if I'm going to be using archmages, I'm going to give them mobility promotions, and adepts with haste and mobility to keep up with them, and ideally won't have any turns when they aren't casting.
Finally if I grab chalad I'll stack sun and run around with sun 2 affinity summons. Entropy is good for the late game with rust if you combined it with as much magic resistance removal as you can find(the tower of alt, metamagic and at least mage level).
If there was any one sphere I use the most it would be body though, early on a free mobility promotion(which can be abused to even give two movement through forests or hills, just don't cast haste until you have moved the one square and "exhausted your move" then cast haste and move again) and at mage level regeneration is amazing for supporting an army. I haven't abused flesh golem much, as by the time I get to that point, my hordes of vampires/champions with mithril/iron are usually overwhelming the enemy with adept/mage support.
I forgot to list Entropy, it's one of the best manas to get in multiplayer to protect against melee spam. That coupled with earth for wall of stone, can help stop an attack by copper/iron wielding axemen.
I don't like the Entropy II summon, tho it should get credit for actually having a tier 2 summon. The Entropy III spell seems very nice, but I haven't been able to test.
I don't like the Entropy II summon, tho it should get credit for actually having a tier 2 summon. The Entropy III spell seems very nice, but I haven't been able to test.
entropy also hinders healing of units in your borders. What is entropy III again? Ive never used it either, but rust is a *really* good tier I spell.
also, I may be wrong, but I think the pit beast stays as long as it wins a battle every turn
Methuselah
King
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Wither (causes 10-40% damage and gives withered promotion to enemy units.)
cabbagemeister
Please wait...
- Joined
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I find that trying to rank entropy is very difficult.
The T3 spell is a direct damage spell, which is nice and rare, but it's not that strong for a direct damage spell. Certainly you can't annihilate people with just that spell, as you can with some of the other T3 spells; you need a lot of military support to make it work. And if the enemy has priests, it's a lot less effective.
The T2 spell is a low-average summon. Nothing special there.
The T1 spell is the only really good one in the sphere, because reducing a unit's base strength is very powerful (almost as powerful as direct damage). But Rust only gets really good towards the end of the game. Compare stripping Bronze from warriors (-25% base strength) to stripping iron from axemen (-33% base strength) or from champions (-25% base strength) to stripping mithril from champions (-40% base strength). From this perspective, Rust is almost as powerful in the late-game as Wither.
So you have a sphere that's only strong in the mid-to-endgame. The good thing about the sphere is that you don't have to put much effort into using its best spell, which doesn't require mages. My strategy is to make it an "afterthought" sphere, where I ignore it unless I can capture a raw mana node late in the game and convert it to Entropy. At that point, it's well worth making a few entropy adepts. But not before. Thus, I can't bring myself to rank it higher than mid-tier (and it only gets that high because it's so easy to use).
The T3 spell is a direct damage spell, which is nice and rare, but it's not that strong for a direct damage spell. Certainly you can't annihilate people with just that spell, as you can with some of the other T3 spells; you need a lot of military support to make it work. And if the enemy has priests, it's a lot less effective.
The T2 spell is a low-average summon. Nothing special there.
The T1 spell is the only really good one in the sphere, because reducing a unit's base strength is very powerful (almost as powerful as direct damage). But Rust only gets really good towards the end of the game. Compare stripping Bronze from warriors (-25% base strength) to stripping iron from axemen (-33% base strength) or from champions (-25% base strength) to stripping mithril from champions (-40% base strength). From this perspective, Rust is almost as powerful in the late-game as Wither.
So you have a sphere that's only strong in the mid-to-endgame. The good thing about the sphere is that you don't have to put much effort into using its best spell, which doesn't require mages. My strategy is to make it an "afterthought" sphere, where I ignore it unless I can capture a raw mana node late in the game and convert it to Entropy. At that point, it's well worth making a few entropy adepts. But not before. Thus, I can't bring myself to rank it higher than mid-tier (and it only gets that high because it's so easy to use).
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