New strategy with "sons of arsena" dragon units

[RickWJ66]

I just posted this on the "bug" thread, as I think it raises a game balance issue, but I have come up with a very fun strategy which takes advantage of the new barbarian "sons of arsena" unit that is generated in the dragon city (with many of them generated at the higher difficulties). Get an early level III spell caster (e.g. the one you can build with Council of Esus) promoted only to "mind III" and then go to the dragon city to dominate a bunch of the "sons of arsena" units -- last night, I ended up with an army of over 15 of these very powerful units. Sometimes the domination fails and I "lose" the mind III promotion, but I just save up the promotions so I can easily re-promote to mind III every time this happens. And the sons of arsena units themselves can also be eventually promoted to mind III to increase the rate of domination. Very fun! (But, again, totally imbalanced.)

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

wait, you mean the sons of the inferno right? sons of asena are doviello UU for axemen..

 

[nzk13]

What do you mean, I never saw this unit called "Son of Inferno", certainly not in the Dragon's Hoard city?

 

[[to_xp]Gekko]

son of the inferno is the unit that upgrade from disciples of Acheron

 

[RickWJ66]

Sorry for getting the name wrong. I would have to go back and double-check the name, but I do not have the game with me here at work. I do not recall them being named "sons of inferno" but, whatever they are called, I am talking about the super-level 3 fire-spewing mages that spawn in what I simplistically call "the dragon city" but maybe should call Acheron's City.

 

[mcwill123]

My latest encounter with the Sons of the Inferno was fairly late game, but someone might find it interesting. My Luchuirp army had just finished destroying the Amurites somewhere around turn 400. They were not really a huge group, maybe 25. The group included a couple of paladins, a bunch of golems, 4-5 mages, a priest a couple radiant guards and a ratha or two. Acheron went down incredibly easily to the second attacker. The 20 - 25 Sons took probably 4 turns of casting blinding light, attacking with the golems and sometimes the paladins, and then casting repair on the golems. Cycle, rinse, repeat. Altogether the group suffered probably 30% casualities. Not altogether a success, but it's yet another tactic for bringing down the SoI.

 

[nzk13]

Whaddya mean, disciples of Acheron? Please explain.

 

[Angel-Julia]

I confirm they are called sons of inferno.

anyway, despite the name, yes you can dominate them. the dominate spell is one of the strongest spells.

they are also useful for exp farming, just place a summon weaker than their fire elemental out in the open. their elemental will kill it. then your mage (or dominated SOI) with C5 etc kills the weakened fire elemental for some nice exp. you can farm exp as long as you want.

 

[Emptiness]

What do you mean, I never saw this unit called "Son of Inferno", certainly not in the Dragon's Hoard city?

Whaddya mean, disciples of Acheron? Please explain.

Are you using v0.41k or later?

Patch 0.41k (will break save games)
<snip>
21. Added the Disciple of Acheron unit (fire caster that will occasionally spawn from Acheron's city, chance based on difficulty).
22. Added the Son of the Inferno unit (upgraded form of the Disciple of Acheron).
<snip>

 

[nzk13]

I'm using Fall Further 51 patch c.

 

[RickWJ66]

Yeah, you need to install a later patch, as pointed out by Emptiness -- these are newly created units for the game that were created as part of "patch k". Sorry again about the name confusion on my part -- I do not know how I ended up getting so confused. I pulled up the game agains last night -- the units are called sons of inferno.

 

[Emptiness]

I'm using Fall Further 51 patch c.

I don't think either of the units being discussed here are present in any version of Fall Further. They were only recently added to Fall From Heaven 2.

 

[cabbagemeister]

I just posted this on the "bug" thread, as I think it raises a game balance issue, but I have come up with a very fun strategy which takes advantage of the new barbarian "sons of arsena" unit that is generated in the dragon city (with many of them generated at the higher difficulties). Get an early level III spell caster (e.g. the one you can build with Council of Esus) promoted only to "mind III" and then go to the dragon city to dominate a bunch of the "sons of arsena" units -- last night, I ended up with an army of over 15 of these very powerful units. Sometimes the domination fails and I "lose" the mind III promotion, but I just save up the promotions so I can easily re-promote to mind III every time this happens. And the sons of arsena units themselves can also be eventually promoted to mind III to increase the rate of domination. Very fun! (But, again, totally imbalanced.)

It seems like the real advantage you're promoting here is to get the SoIs relatively early, when no one really has archmages and they can make a big difference in a war. So how do you actually get this strategy to work? I ask because every time I've seen Acheron's city there is a very large stack of SoIs who summon a fire elemental every turn, and my biggest problem has just been getting in attacking range of the city without getting smacked by a stack of fire elementals. So first, how do you get Gibbon Goetia into domination range of Acheron's city? Second, how do you get Gibbon and the dominated SoI out of range before the other SoIs destroy you in revenge?

 

[Emptiness]

I haven't seen the barbarians attack anything with their summoned Fire Elementals. They just summon them and move them as far as possible. I can walk right past the city, or even walk up to it and fortify next to it. The Fire Elementals never do anything.

Are they attacking your units?

 

[Angel-Julia]

Stack size also impacts their behabiour. they wont attack large enough stacks.
I wonder if we should give the elementals the "lemmings" AI, i assume the lemmings AI is designed to suicide attack the closest target irrespective of combat odds.

 

[RickWJ66]

Yeah, it is true that the fire elemental will attack weak, undefended units but I have never seen them attack stacks of strong, well-defended units. I just have a stack of units fortified next to Acheron's city and then have Gibbon (and/or Coraline) dominate a "son of inferno" each turn. Once you get some sons of inferno, they can then summon your own fire elementals to further help defend your stack.

It really would make sense if the fire elementals did attack strong stacks, however, since they are just summoned units. With the collateral damage they cause, there are few stacks that could withstand their assaults.

 

[cabbagemeister]

Ok so stronger units and bigger stacks are the key? That's good to know but...kind of wimpy behavior from an elemental incarnation of flame, passion, and destruction.

 

[Angel-Julia]

maybe we should try changeing their AI from AI_ATTACK to AI_COLLATERAL. then they should act like catapults.