Can someone explain the Aristrakh?

[OzzyKP]

I'm playing my first game as the Aristrakh and there isn't much text explaining how their mechanics work.

First off, what is the deal with souls, soul vault, consuming souls, etc?

The help text under their civilzation has three links:
Economy: Consume World
Military: Undead Horde
Population: Gather Souls

The economy link doesn't work. The military link goes to the pedia entry for Tomb Lord. It says that Undead Lords consume souls from the soul vault. How does that work?

The third link is just some more stuff about souls, which I still don't understand.

Oh, and some of my units have been getting random promotions. Like I kill an orc and I'll get orc slaying. Is that a feature of this civ or these units? Or is that a new MoM feature for all civs?

 

[OzzyKP]

Oh, and some units have the Endless Horde promotion that results in them being resurrected after killed. The promotion is removed after they are killed, but does it come back at some point? Or are they all able to be killed just once. If it does come back, how does that happen?

 

[Aiblis]

Hiho, I will try to give you a little overview

The Aristrakh are Fallow, so they don't grow their cities with food. They do it with Souls.
The whole Economy of them is around Souls in general, so that's an important aspect.

There are several ways to gain souls:
- Provider Cities
- Killing Living Units
- Spreading Wasteland (I think? Unsure here)
- Certain Modernisations give you souls. Crypts, I think.

You need souls for:
- Certain Units (Vampire Units mostly, and the Tomb Lords)
- Consumer Cities

Your cities start as Consumer Cities. So they consume souls each turn.
- Consuming Souls is like food. It gives them growth
- Certain Buildings and City Specializations increase the soul consumption per turn and give further benefits from consuming souls. A merchant city will earn extra Gold per turn per consumed soul
- It makes sense to have some consumer and some provider cities
- The Ranger Guild is super important to gain a passive soul income
- By building a certain district, your consumer city becomes a provider city
- Provider cities do NOT consume souls and do NOT grow. So it makes sense to let planned provider cities grow a while before letting them build the district that prevents growth


Units:
- Most of your Units are simple Undead Mass Units. They don't earn Exp and can be used in mass attacks.
- Vampire Units and the Tomb Lords are better. With their Auras you can increase the strength of your Mass Units
- Endless Horde is a one-time revival. As far as I know, you can't gain it again
- The "Orc Slaying" etc promotion is not special for the Aristrakh. All civs gain these

Terraforming:
- You spread Wasteland
- Wasteland is useless for all other civilizations
- If someone conquers or destroys your City, the wasteland vanishes after a while


I hope this gives you a first idea.
If you have further questions, feel free to ask

 

[OzzyKP]

So every time the food bar increases, souls are being consumed? And, depending on districts, this has additional benefits like science, gold, etc. Is there a way to see how many souls are consumed?

Also, if the city reaches a happiness growth cap, then the soul consumption stops? I see some buildings increase soul consumption, but what is the base rate? Does anything else affect it besides buildings?

And soul production is global? It all goes into the same pool/vault? I’ve been building soup generating improvements near cities that consume souls, but that doesn’t matter?

 

[Aiblis]

So every time the food bar increases, souls are being consumed? And, depending on districts, this has additional benefits like science, gold, etc. Is there a way to see how many souls are consumed?

Also, if the city reaches a happiness growth cap, then the soul consumption stops? I see some buildings increase soul consumption, but what is the base rate? Does anything else affect it besides buildings?

And soul production is global? It all goes into the same pool/vault? I’ve been building soup generating improvements near cities that consume souls, but that doesn’t matter?

- Yes. When the Food bar increases, souls are consumed and generate the growth as well as the incomes depending on your buildings
- Sadly, I dont think there is a way to see the exact soul amount... I mostly do it by guess and build ca 40/60 consumer and provider cities till it feels that my soul amount mostly only increases
- There is no real "problem" is you run out of souls. It just hurts your income and growth.

- I think in this mod, happiness was the important thing, yes. (I sometimes confuses it. Civs like this exists in some mods. In some, certain buildings increases a cap. But I think here it was Happiness)
- If your hit the happiness limit, then it stops growing and, most important, stop giving you the income by consuming souls. So its nice to always have some active consuming cities.
- I dont know the base rate sadly... Maybe it stands at this building that the palace gives all your cities, but I dont know right now.
- As far as I know, only buildings (Mostly districts) increases soul consumtpion. And some give soul income, but thats only for provider cities. (Mostly in the rangers guild)

- Souls are global, yes. You can see the current soul amount on the left side of the screen
- It goes in a pool, yes. You can store them and consume them in differnt turns.
- Thats fine. The Cities with their soul consumption do not affect the soul generating improvements as far as I know.

 

[OzzyKP]

Thanks!

 

[OzzyKP]

Ok, another question. For the Epic Destiny victory I need to level up a Dracolich Rider. I don't see that listed in the Civilopedia. I do see a Dracolich though, but that requires the Necropolis district. It looks like I can only build one of those in my capitol? So that means I can't have a Vampire Palace (or any of those nice vampire units) if I want the epic destiny victory?