Malakim advantages

[odalrick]

- You can promote from Disciple to Recon: Disciple of Leaves --> Ranger (They lose Potency so wait as disciple to gain exp first?)

- Allow you to cherry pick ones that spawn with Council of Esus and promote them to Recon line. (If you have all the techs and buildings, and don't manually go through Disciple of Leaves but jump straight to Ranger, they shouldn't lose Esus. The religion gives recon units extra abilities.)

Do Lightbringers start with Medic I? Because, for me, the biggest reason to upgrade Disciple to Ranger is to get March. Without Medic they will need to start with 10 exp to get it.

Also it seems to me that the advantage of upgrading from Lightbringer drops sharply after just a few... How many units with Sentry do you need?

I suppose you're trading for ...

 

[PekkaR]

Do Lightbringers start with Medic I? Because, for me, the biggest reason to upgrade Disciple to Ranger is to get March. Without Medic they will need to start with 10 exp to get it.

I knew I'd forgotten something.

Disciple of Leaves gets Medic I, and I think a unit promoted from Lightbringer straight to Ranger got it despite not losing Esus religion... It's been a while since I did that. Anyway, you must take March before promoting to Ranger. Only Melee, Disciple and Beast units can normally take March. Stygian Guards promoted from Zealots can take March at any time. I've sometimes given Savants March before turning them into Mages but it seems important mainly when facing area damage spells.

Edited previous post to include note about March.

Also it seems to me that the advantage of upgrading from Lightbringer drops sharply after just a few... How many units with Sentry do you need?

I suppose you're trading for ...

I rather like having Sentry on everyone at this price, so I don't have to think about it when splitting stacks for scouts or something. If you start in the desert as Malakim, gold is what you have.

 

[sharper_knives]

I had my fastest peacemonger win ever with the Malakim, 250 some odd turns to an Altar victory. Any Malakim city can be an obscene GP factory.

 

[JonathanStrange]

This is why FFH2 is a world unto itself! I'd never thought too much about the Malakim; they usually vanish from the historical records before we ever reach their former homeland. Mostly, all we find are some broken walls, a fallen statue half covered with sand, and little else.

We ask the lizardmen and bandits who inhabit the ruins, but they shrug and sigh "What does it matter? It was a long time ago, and they're all dead now anyway..."

 

[DirtyFinger]

Do Lightbringers start with Medic I? Because, for me, the biggest reason to upgrade Disciple to Ranger is to get March. Without Medic they will need to start with 10 exp to get it.

Also it seems to me that the advantage of upgrading from Lightbringer drops sharply after just a few... How many units with Sentry do you need?

I suppose you're trading for ...

Lightbringers can get March after getting Combat III. If your holy city doesn't give enough bonus XP for instant march, consider the aggressive trait. This gives you Combat I for free.
But it's much easier to simply convert to disciple of leaves (free Medic I), grab March, then go Ranger.

Also it seems to me that the advantage of upgrading from Lightbringer drops sharply after just a few... How many units with Sentry do you need?

The main selling point of Lightbringers is that they are disciples and get easy XP.

 

[Jet]

Lightbringers don't get easy XP. (They benefit from the desert shrine and altars.. but so what?)

 

[Monkeyfinger]

So, adepts don't. Getitng them halfway to mages and with no other experience boosters and all the way there with a couple thrown into the mix is a big edge.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

They aren't any better than Savants though, expect for not needing the religion and temple.

 

[Jet]

"Getitng them halfway to mages and with no other experience boosters and all the way there with a couple thrown into the mix is a big edge."

A big edge over what? They can't upgrade into mages except through Savants.

If you just can't wait until you get Corruption of Spirit and are just dying to prebuild a bunch of Lightbringers to sit around costing maintenance and not getting free XP until you can upgrade them into Savants... then... yeah.

 

[DirtyFinger]

"Getitng them halfway to mages and with no other experience boosters and all the way there with a couple thrown into the mix is a big edge."

A big edge over what? They can't upgrade into mages except through Savants.

If you just can't wait until you get Corruption of Spirit and are just dying to prebuild a bunch of Lightbringers to sit around costing maintenance and not getting free XP until you can upgrade them into Savants... then... yeah.

Lightbringers can directly upgrade to Mages. No savants needed.
And they don't have to sit around, they can scout around or protect your cities from barbs. Since they start with more XP then your warriors - the first great prophet, desert shrine and apprenticeship should come around pretty fast - they do at least as good a job as any warrior on that.

And they can upgrade to disciples of any religion or tier. Ok, you can build them directly but this way you get a free sentry promotion and you can build lightbringers in advance before a quick 5-round religion switch.

This offers you (in the case of mages) great speed advantages and flexibility.

 

[PekkaR]

Lightbringers can directly upgrade to Mages. No savants needed.

..sort of.

You still need AV temple in the city. You just don't have to manually go through Savant. Possibly saves you the 5 gold (60 Lightbringer to 60 Savant) too.

Edit: I'm wrong, see below.

 

[DirtyFinger]

..sort of.

You still need AV temple in the city.

No, you don't.

 

[PekkaR]

No, you don't.

You're right. I just tested it in world builder.

All it requires to promote a Lightbringer within your lands to Mage is lvl 4, and the Sorcery tech. All it requires to promote a Lightbringer to Ranger is the Animal Handling tech and being within influence of a city with the Hunting Lodge. (No religions for mage or ranger.) Promoting to Stygian Guard requires OO state religion, Fanaticism tech and influence of a city with OO temple. (Note the OO religion tech, and thus the ability to build Zealots, wasn't required.)

Should this be reported as a bug? Lightbringers don't list these units as viable promotions in the Civilopedia or manual. Then again, all promotion lines probably work this way. In this case there's an actual advantage in avoiding some wasted research if all you wanted from a religion was access to the promotions.

Thanks.

 

[Senethro]

Eh. Its much less powerful than the current implementation of the Governor's Mansion. Until someone has found a way to make it horrible and a detriment to gameplay, its just a cute little footnote to the Malakim. Its somewhat similar to how Ing civs can get a Styg for 25 hammers and 55 gold.

 

[DirtyFinger]

I wonder if you can promote directly to even higher units without having the techs lying between, e.g. Lightbringers=>Druids/Berserker without having access to rangers...

 

[PekkaR]

Starting mana types

Malakim palace gives Life, Mind and Sun mana. I find these a slight drawback for Malakim because Adepts can be pretty useless until researching further mana node techs. Often I make 1-2 Adepts for tapping mana nodes and otherwise wait to promote Mages from Lightbringers.

Access to Sanctify, Destroy Undead (both situationally important) and Dominate (for Gibbon Goetia without arcane techs!) is guaranteed. Building more Sun nodes for the late game makes for really strong archmage summons, and/or Chalid. Scorch can sometimes support Nomad forces nicely, and allow you to summon the Sand Lions of course.

Needing only two more mana nodes for Tower of Divination national wonder is useful. Researching Divination doesn't improve your Adepts much though.

I wonder if you can promote directly to even higher units without having the techs lying between, e.g. Lightbringers=>Druids/Berserker without having access to rangers...

Druids require Grove building from Feral Bond so you have access to rangers anyway. There could be some interesting case though, even when not starting with Lightbringers.

Eh. Its much less powerful than the current implementation of the Governor's Mansion. Until someone has found a way to make it horrible and a detriment to gameplay, its just a cute little footnote to the Malakim. Its somewhat similar to how Ing civs can get a Styg for 25 hammers and 55 gold.

Well, it doesn't make Malakim as popular as Calabim or anything. There's a lot of fun in playing them though, even if it's put together from cute little footnotes. ^^

 

[JonathanStrange]

I tried some Malakim "starts", that's where I just start a game and play 50-100 turns. Just for investigating a civ, not serious games.

It seemed we did very well IF we got a desert start, we did mediocre otherwise. It annoyed me to start in a place where my Forest Elves would thrive but here my desert people were just ok, at best.

 

[Senethro]

Fortunately you have a Lightbringer for spotting Floodplain starts.

 

[Der Kantelberg]

Some people suggested to put a temple of the Veil into the city that produces the Lightbringers. But I think there's a little problem with that:

If you want a temple of the Veil in this city, the Religion has to be spread there. And if Hyborem is summoned and casts his world spell he can take over on of the cities with the Ashen-Veil Religion. He will eventually take exactly this city, because it will get reasonably great. So if he takes over the city, the land around it will get damned, destroying all forests, floodplains and of course the Alter of Luonnotar.

Even if you can recapture the city it will stay crippled.

I had this once playing Kuriotate, trying a cultural victory. One city was supposed to spam great prophets for the Altar. So I spread the Veil to it to build the temple an engage a further priest.

Of course Hyborem took over exactly this city..... every floodplain turned into desert....

I never spread the Veil to my cities again. If you do so, be shure to elimate the Infernals before they can cast their world spell.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

Well, I find most world spells annoying, so I just disable them.