Flesh Golem strategies

[citizenalex]

It's one of my most fav subquest to delve into when playing a game, but I've reached a point where I need to compare what I know in case I missed something...

Best base for a graft : Kraken
Strongest base strengh achieved: 26 (17 Kraken + 1 Kraken with strong promo + Sheut stone + flaming arrow + nighmare + poisonned blade + heroic strengh/def 2)
Most golems a non-calabim/amurite civ can have: 8 (+4 If you have druids)

I've often had the bad (good?) habit of switching to Octo just for the time it takes for grafts to take place, and maybe get Hemah to twincast the last two, bring my total to 10. I'd like to know what's the best alternative to Krakens, of if there's anything better out there...

 

[WarKirby]

I believe special strength is counted too. I like grafting paladins.

Some useful things to graft

1. A hawk. gives it flying.

2. Mimics (Balseraph only) they can pick up so many nice promotions, and grafting them with a golem can produce incredibly varied results.

3. Vampires (Calabim only) great easy way to get all xp-acessible promotions.

4. GFreater spiders (archos only) gives an easy way to get cannibalize for your golem, as well as unique spider promotions.

5. Freaks (balseraph only) or any mutated units with Chaos II. I'm quite fond of building a massive stack of warriors, casting mutate on them all, and then merging the best ones with the golem

6. Any recon units (as svartalfar or Sidar). Svart recon units can give your golem Sinister and Stalker, Sidar can give Soul Divider, both useful.

 

[citizenalex]

Wow, hawks I never thought of. Do you know if getting flying cancels out the Heavy promo (Or at least the negative aspects of -1 movement range)

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Yes, because flying gives a flat movement rate.

Note that this also means that units with flying cannot take advantage of roads.

 

[WarKirby]

Roads are for baby cowards who can't fly. Who needs them when you have Mobility I & II plus Flying, and any other speed boosting promotions you can eat.

 

[citizenalex]

Can you graft elementals onto flesh golems? The seraphic pyre's real estate value might go up on that...

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Well, since units must be alive to be grafted into a flesh golem, no, elementals cannot be grafted into them.

 

[Guybrush!]

Can you graft heroes / national units to flesh golems?

 

[WarKirby]

Can you graft heroes / national units to flesh golems?

I believe so. Only those who are alive and not immortal, of course.

good way to get Hero for your golem.

Switch to Order, and teach a High Priest command I-IV, then graft that too.
Oh, and switch to any religion you don't like, just to level up and graft their heroes, then switch away. IT both denies your enemies a hero, and strengthens your golem. And saves your civ hero.

 

[Guybrush!]

Good god....how did I ever function WITHOUT body mana? Haste, regen, golems....wow.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

The hero promotion doesn't really help Flesh Golems, as they have no unitcombat and so cannot use the free xp it grants.

Grafting your civ hero does of course make you able to build the shrine of the Champion, and lets you cast Resurrection to get the hero back.

 

[WarKirby]

The hero promotion doesn't really help Flesh Golems, as they have no unitcombat and so cannot use the free xp it grants.

Grafting your civ hero does of course make you able to build the shrine of the Champion, and lets you cast Resurrection to get the hero back.

Well, it does give 20% magic resistance, and reduced chance to defend the stack.

But I'd say the main point of grafting a hero, is less about the hero promotion, and more about the other things you can get from grafting a lv10 unit. lots of pretty promotions like Heroic Strength.

 

[Quetz]

It's one of my most fav subquest to delve into when playing a game, but I've reached a point where I need to compare what I know in case I missed something...

Best base for a graft : Kraken
Strongest base strengh achieved: 26 (17 Kraken + 1 Kraken with strong promo + Sheut stone + flaming arrow + nighmare + poisonned blade + heroic strengh/def 2)
Most golems a non-calabim/amurite civ can have: 8

I've often had the bad (good?) habit of switching to Octo just for the time it takes for grafts to take place, and maybe get Hemah to twincast the last two, bring my total to 10. I'd like to know what's the best alternative to Krakens, of if there's anything better out there...

Wait, wat? Being OO with body mana lets you build... 8 26 str units? I thought Flesh Golems were a 1/civ national units.. that is massively overpowered.

edit: 24 str I guess since they wont all have heroic str/def, but still...

 

[citizenalex]

It's not so much a problem, Just about every one else can get these units, regardless of religion. Using alternative "graftees" like phallanx or crossbowman will give you a golem with 2-3 points less in strengh when you have no access to Krakens.

Also, this is a long and sometimes painstaking process, first involving rush-training mages to body 3 (and ultimately death 3 also, since you have to lich your mages before you can get the extra 4 flesh golems) and rush-training cultists to reach speaker. Kraken are incidently not available until Theology or Religious Law, so it's not like you can turn this into your army's vanguard by turn 100.

@ Warkirkby : There's way easier ways to get heroic str and def without burning a hero. Wait until Nature's Wrath and suddenly that promo isn't so rare anymore. You can get Twincast by graft, I think, but what's the point when your golem can't cast spells? The only time it has any merit is when you're about to flip religions and you want to recycle some of that XP from Religious Heros.

 

[WarKirby]

If you happen to be using my Monstrous Creatures module, you could graft a Dragon to your golem, and it would gain the ability to breathe fire/ice/acid depending on which dragon It would also gain collateral damage.

I don't think golems are particularly overpowered, though. It takes a lot of time and effort to make them. And they don't gain any xp, so anything you kill with them is more or less a waste. They're more of a lategame toy to play with, just for amusement.

 

[zup]

Spam units with affinity to your golems. That can get some godlike results. With enough dedication, you can build something that can kill everything easy.

 

[Tasunke]

Does affinity actually graft though? I mean ... I guess you could graft a druid or a Chalid after you build alot of nature/ sun nodes. but it will only be useful if that unit is one strength above your flesh golem's strength, anything beyond that is a waste ... but yes ... I suppose if you had a HUGE empire, the ability to cast Oghma's rites multiple times, plenty of unused land, and the patience to build enough druids, yes, you would only be limited to the number of mana nodes, and that may only limit you to how many times you build Oghma's rites, and in that way you MAY only be limited in how many empty tiles you have. So, you have the possibility for building some INCREDIBlY strong units that are indeed merely toys to play with once you are past the point of winning.

OR, i suppose you could consider them "tiebreakers" if you are in a deadlock with a skilled opponent. Usually such a tie would only occur against a human player though ... and once everyone builds up, sometimes the game can get boring as turns take forever ... although its possible for civs to just build up enough to where there flavor is acheived, and to war from there, and usually war in multiplayer games is more about illusion and distortion of the facts than actual reality. Taunting the opponent into attacking, or bluffing the opponent, well it usually depends alot more on how the opponent is feeling, but either way the element of multiplayer can be a very complex thing.

 

[citizenalex]

Does affinity actually graft though? I mean ... I guess you could graft a druid or a Chalid after you build alot of nature/ sun nodes. but it will only be useful if that unit is one strength above your flesh golem's strength, anything beyond that is a waste ... but yes ... I suppose if you had a HUGE empire, the ability to cast Oghma's rites multiple times, plenty of unused land, and the patience to build enough druids, yes, you would only be limited to the number of mana nodes, and that may only limit you to how many times you build Oghma's rites, and in that way you MAY only be limited in how many empty tiles you have. So, you have the possibility for building some INCREDIBlY strong units that are indeed merely toys to play with once you are past the point of winning.

OR, i suppose you could consider them "tiebreakers" if you are in a deadlock with a skilled opponent. Usually such a tie would only occur against a human player though ... and once everyone builds up, sometimes the game can get boring as turns take forever ... although its possible for civs to just build up enough to where there flavor is acheived, and to war from there, and usually war in multiplayer games is more about illusion and distortion of the facts than actual reality. Taunting the opponent into attacking, or bluffing the opponent, well it usually depends alot more on how the opponent is feeling, but either way the element of multiplayer can be a very complex thing.

You can cast Oghma more than once?????? How??? I'm on the FF mod 0.50.

 

[MrUnderhill]

Try using Flesh Golems with the Svartalfar. They get illusion instead of golem, and with it a 100% healing rate each turn. Not so good for offense (illusion also makes them non-lethal), but nothing will get past your defenses with enough of these guys.

 

[Tasunke]

well, the only Time I was able to cast Oghma's rites more than once was while playing Fall Further Plus, and I was the Legion of D'tesh so that I had insane amounts of production.

I think that FF introduced many rebuildable rituals, although its possible that FFPlus has made a couple of the others rebuildable as well. Im certain Oghma's Rites is rebuildable in FFplus although who knows about FF.

As far as I know, the only prerequisite to building it the second time is building it the first time