What are lunatics good for?

[doktarr]

Beautiful, Choriston. I love it. I do like Lunatics a lot in the game I'm playing. Basium also has the Raider trait, which I now realize has made my life quite a bit easier. I've also been hitting mobility 1 with my first promotion every time.

Your approach has the obvious virtue of getting rolling relatively early in the game, because no big midgame techs are required (I think Mind Stapling is the biggest ticket on the list). Using Pact of the Nilhorn to get early mobile siege is a nice touch, too. On the flip side, Basium's Lunatics are crazy cheap, and they turn into Angels when they die. So I'm getting two reasonably strong units, one of which often starts with a lot of experience, for 33 gold and a slave. It's sort of ridiculous.

I really want to get the Baron in my game as well, but mainly because (if I'm reading the code right) werewolves are now beast units instead of animal units, so Mercurian werewolves will generate angels on death. So I can eventually get to something like a quadruple win mechanic (kill an opposing unit, chance to generate both a werewolf AND a slave, turn slaves into Lunatics, get angels if/when either Lunatics or werewolves die). I will probably never build any melee/archery units all game long.

I managed to break the back of the Ljosalfar last night, losing maybe a third of my Lunatics in the process (but hey, more angels for me). Once they start getting kills the collateral damage keeps things rolling. The Kurios now have their full 5 cities, two of them heavily forested former elf cities, all of them landlocked. Once I get to Astronomy I'll cross my fingers and hope that they give me some airships.

Chalid is almost built, which will be great when I have to turn back to the Bannor and finish them (which, judging by the power graph, is going to mean dealing with a serious stack of doom). However, this means no more Asylums for me, so when I start fighting on other continents I will have to deal with the annoyance of shipping slaves back home. Even with airships it will be a pain - only the Nexus would really make things easy for me. I'll probably reach that point in this game, though, as things have consolidated a lot and the Sheaim look pretty strong. I don't see a quick easy steamroll in my future.

---

The Warrior->Drown->Stygian upgrade path is really fun and effective, but as it requires Fanaticism it's more of a midgame strategy than the early/midgame strategy you have outlined. You build and build and stock enough warriors to discourage anyone from attacking, then when the upgrades open up you upgrade en masse and go on the attack. On the right map Stygians and Cultists can just roam along the coast, mowing down everything. The last time I really leaned into that strategy I was playing the Luchuirp, and I combined Stygians/Cultists with golems loaded on boats to use as a kind of mega-arcane barge that could offload onto land to hit interior cities.

 

[Choriston]

Wow - never considered the Mecurian angel mechanic. That's Awesome! My next game. Also isn't Basium aggressive too? I think you've found a mechanic that might be able to take the (unfortunately non-existent) Quickest Victory on Huge Map Trophy.

Yeah, Nexus is the way to go when moving all these slaves around. Also great when combined with Guild of the Nine. Storm a city, pop in a bear with Nexus, bear summons a mercenary. Cast dancing bear and that's garrison, happiness and culture for 180g and a big save on cargo spaces/slow armies. Love Nexus.

I try to hit Sheaim, Bannor and Balseraphs as early as possible. Those three civs have the capacity to get really powerful mid-game. I find that invisible hidden nation flesh golems are the answer if you can't take them on in a straight fight. They can do everything a shadow can (and better) plus blame-free pillaging! Add the boarding promo and load 'em onto The Black Wind and suddenly The Useless Ship becomes The Real Nuisance. If I could just get a cultist on board too... Missed the opportunity with the Bannor this game and sure enough they've totally dominated their continent with the Amurites and Sidar as their vassals. Looks like an interesting end-game for me there.

Found myself at the mercy of the Ljosalfar treant horde today. First fighting retreat of the game. Bless those fire elementals. Mananged to cut off Gildern and Kithren from the rest of their troops though which was quite satisfying.

Talking of Arcane Barge I used to think these were great until the day I was zipping along the cost with my mega fleet and was hit by 7 triremes. So what, surely the Man O'Wars should have dealt with them. No - they sank all of my Arcane Barges and a troop carrier and the ManO'Wars stood around twiddling their thumbs and talking about the weather! I don't get it - do triremes have some sort of marksman ability?

Nice work with the Drown. I see the point. Can they kill galleys? I like to spam Zealots with my AoL/DD city during a golden age with all the +xp civics and then upgrade those for my Stygians after year 12. Those zealots are also good for cheap lvl 4 promos for my flesh golems (working towards Blitz, all the Elemental resistances).

Good hunting with the Bannor!

 

[doktarr]

Wow - never considered the Mecurian angel mechanic. That's Awesome! My next game. Also isn't Basium aggressive too?

Yep, aggressive/raiders/ingenuity. He's Mahala + Tasunke.

I think you've found a mechanic that might be able to take the (unfortunately non-existent) Quickest Victory on Huge Map Trophy.

Well, you need fanaticism, so there's some lead-in time. After the tech path you outlined, you then need Education + Code of Laws + Priesthood + Fanaticism.

One thing I'd note about the strategy as you outline it is that it's not particularly dependent on playing the Lanun. All you really used them for is their nice economy and their Raiders trait. The strategy is even less Lanun-specific you are planning on switching to the Mercurians. You could argue that the best approach would be to play Beeri's Luchuirp, to try to beeline Fanaticism. Cast the worldspell early on to get a boost.

If you want Raiders on your initial leader, too, then that limits things a bit, but you could still use 8 different civs. Decius Calabim has some obvious appeal since hitting their worldspell as soon as everyone has 3 population is a nice way to get ahead.

Yeah, Nexus is the way to go when moving all these slaves around. Also great when combined with Guild of the Nine. Storm a city, pop in a bear with Nexus, bear summons a mercenary. Cast dancing bear and that's garrison, happiness and culture for 180g and a big save on cargo spaces/slow armies. Love Nexus.

Yep. Along with Nox Noctis and the Guild of Hammers, it's the holy trinity of World Wonders.

I try to hit Sheaim, Bannor and Balseraphs as early as possible. Those three civs have the capacity to get really powerful mid-game. I find that invisible hidden nation flesh golems are the answer if you can't take them on in a straight fight. They can do everything a shadow can (and better) plus blame-free pillaging!

Fun stuff... you have to wait for Hemah to get him though, right? And you need to get guilds to get invisibility too, right?

Honestly, I find that it's rare that Flesh Golems really help me. They're great fun but by the time you can build them up you're usually doing fine without them. I started a thread about how to get a strong one early enough to be useful. I generally only build a flesh golem in the context of spending a stretch with Council of Esus as my state religion. I build the illusory flesh golem, cast trust/resurrect if I can use them, then drop Gibbon and move on to another religion.

Talking of Arcane Barge I used to think these were great until the day I was zipping along the cost with my mega fleet and was hit by 7 triremes. So what, surely the Man O'Wars should have dealt with them. No - they sank all of my Arcane Barges and a troop carrier and the ManO'Wars stood around twiddling their thumbs and talking about the weather! I don't get it - do triremes have some sort of marksman ability?

I'm pretty sure they don't... I'm not sure why the MoWs wouldn't be the first defenders. Sounds like an "issue" to me.

If you have other ways to shoot fireballs, loading those figures on boats is usually a better option than Arcane Barges.

Nice work with the Drown. I see the point. Can they kill galleys? I like to spam Zealots with my AoL/DD city during a golden age with all the +xp civics and then upgrade those for my Stygians after year 12. Those zealots are also good for cheap lvl 4 promos for my flesh golems (working towards Blitz, all the Elemental resistances).

Drowns can handle galleys, and do so quite easily once they've picked up a few promotions. Stygian Guards rule the water.

Good hunting with the Bannor!

The Bannor were shockingly easy to take down - a Chalid pillar of fire, then a couple turns of the Lunatic Stack killing everything, and they were broken. Well, given that I had Chalid, maybe this isn't too much of a shock. Plus they still didn't have iron weapons and were relying on archers, so it wasn't much of a fair fight.

The Sheaim have a massive empire and their power graph is shooting through the roof, though. They are almost literally on the opposite side of the world, but they will be my big challenge. I'm researching Astronomy right now and crossing my fingers that the stupid Kuriotates will produce airships for me. For the time being I will just try to puddle jump with Caravels or Galleons or whatever, though.

 

[Choriston]

One thing I'd note about the strategy as you outline it is that it's not particularly dependent on playing the Lanun. All you really used them for is their nice economy and their Raiders trait.

Sure, the economy's the main thing, raiders just a nice bonus. I could definitely play Lunatics without the Lanun; but I can't play a quick martial win with the Lanun without Lunatics. The Lanun's lack of productivity is amply compensated by their ability to tech rush and hoard gold like no-one else. This gets you to Mind Stapling double quick and pays for the upgrades.

With Currency, Taxation, Astronomy, plus all my captured inland cities pumping settlers and archers (until Guild of the Nine), switching to City States, Consumption and Foreign Trade, settling along the coastlines of my continents and building lighthouse (and Great Lighthouse), sea haven and boats!, the money is, well, completely insane! The only city that can actually produce anything is Innsmouth, everywhere else just makes money for the machine. So I tech to the top on the back of the trade routes and Innsmouth becomes a wonder factory.

Yep. Along with Nox Noctis and the Guild of Hammers, it's the holy trinity of World Wonders.

I'm not sure there is a holy trinity of wonders for all seasons. The one's you have described are certainly awesome and I have 'em, but I would say that for this particular strat Heron Throne, Complacency and Thousand Slums supported by (stolen) Crown of Akharien, Academy and Bazaar of Mammon (nat) has been the war winning combo in terms of what they've done for me. Luonattar with Deis Dei in Kingsport for decent Zealots, for upgrading to Stygians and Cultists. Guild/Nine for garrison troops. Just realised I could have garrisoned everywhere earlier on with Zealots. Doh.

This is an SP only strategy. Too risky in MP. I'm so heavily reliant on the Innsmouth monster that any player who captures that one city would bring the machine to a grinding halt.

Hmmm... I wonder what my 46 pop Innsmouth would be like with Theocracy / Sacrifice the Weak...

Honestly, I find that it's rare that Flesh Golems really help me. They're great fun but by the time you can build them up you're usually doing fine without them.

Sad but true. Great thread by the way! Some really interesting ideas about using the enigma that is... Gibbon Goetia. I've never really gotten to grips with him and on the few times that I've tried I've bitterly regretted the move to CoE, a path that seems laden with false promises. Maybe now...

But yes, it certainly seems a truism that starting to use Flesh Golems mean you've already won/ you're playing on too low a difficulty. Final victory may still be a hundred, two hundred tuns away but as they say in Starship Troopers, "someday they'll say that this is where the tide turned". Reason being I suppose that FG's are such a luxury use of Ch III that you could only really contemplate it with control of 4 body nodes, or that you're not under any real pressure. Which is, in itself, a sign that you've won.

I went really heavy with FGs this game because in an RP sense it really seemed to fit with my conception of Hannah as the Queen of Wrong-Headed Technology (not really evil but darn close).

Having dealt with the treant horde, I sent my FGs and Shadows over to the Bannor lands last night. Destroyed their frigate-heavy navy with utter contempt. Picked up the Nether Blade. Freed Brigit. Wrecked their nodes and economy. Exterminated their mages and priests. Noted with amusement that they'd been noding for Death and Entropy (what??). And realised with dumb stupification that I'd won already. Such a shame. I don't know if I have the patience to take all the cities. There's still the Infernals I suppose but nobody other than the Bannor was really in the game, as I've already wrecked the Sheaim and conquered the Balseraphs. Might have to start a new challenge, maybe Lanun -> Mercurians on Immortal. Heck, may even give this strat a run on my first ever Deity game.

If you have other ways to shoot fireballs, loading those figures on boats is usually a better option than Arcane Barges.

Too right! Cargoed MoW with Boarding Party, Cultist, Mage and Stygian for Offense. Longshore captured & upgraded Pirate with BP & Cultist for Defense. How overpowered do you want your navy to be?!

crossing my fingers that the stupid Kuriotates will produce airships for me

You've mentioned this before. How do you get the airships? I've tried giving away mercs to friendly civs in trouble before and there doesn't seem to be a way. What am I doing wrong?

Here's wishing the Sheaim give you a worthy fight. Mmmmmmmm, Chalid!

 

[doktarr]

Sure, the economy's the main thing, raiders just a nice bonus. I could definitely play Lunatics without the Lanun; but I can't play a quick martial win with the Lanun without Lunatics. The Lanun's lack of productivity is amply compensated by their ability to tech rush and hoard gold like no-one else. This gets you to Mind Stapling double quick and pays for the upgrades.

Yeah, it's really all about the money I guess, and the Lanun get a lot of money easier than anyone. Going away from the Lanun, you have the other leaders that have the financial trait. Rhoanna and Flauros both really want to build mounted units and vampires, respectively. The vault mechanic really works against doing this with Kandros. The Luchuirp seem like the best fit if you are going for the quick Mind Stapling slingshot. OO is a great religion for them anyway, too. So that would probably be my second choice for this strategy after Hannah, if you were planning on sticking with the civ the whole time.

Additionally, the Luchuirp are probably the fastest civ to the Mercurian Gate. An early casting of their fantastic world spell can really get you going, and will give you an GE to pop the gate with. If that's your approach then founding OO is not a priority, because you'd probably want to switch from OO to RoK with them before building the gate, so that they will produce Runes figures to generate angels.

If you went with unrestricted leaders, then a financial leader of the Malakim, Sidar, or Elohim (three civs that aren't reliant on their unique units) would make sense, too.

I'm not sure there is a holy trinity of wonders for all seasons. The one's you have described are certainly awesome and I have 'em

While given wonders can be central to a given strategy, those three are the three that I feel like I missed out if I don't have them in any game.

Getting a free Forge immediately in every new or captured city immediately is such a massive bonus that it's hard to overstate. Guild of Hammers leaves every other "free XXX in each city" wonder (aside from the Nexus) in the dust. I guess if you're playing on a tiny map, or playing the Kuriotates, it's not too great. (Even the Kurios can use it for GPP, though.)

In addition to being a sanity-saver in the late game, the Nexus completely changes what you can do on both defense and on offense. Avatar of Wrath shows up in some relatively undefended edge of your empire? No worries, just teleport your best figures to the spot. Invade and capture a city on the edge of a continent with an expeditionary force? Drop a stack there and keep rolling. Again, maybe not a must on a tiny map, but aside from that, it's transformative.

Nox Noctis is so great. It means your workers are invulnerable, it means you can sign open borders and use privateers to destroy your opponent's navy (and nighwatch-promoed-assassins to do the same on land), and it means you can peck invading megastacks to death without fear of reprisal. I suppose on a Pangaea map, if you are on offense all game, it's not so important. But aside from that, it's incredible.

How do you get the airships? I've tried giving away mercs to friendly civs in trouble before and there doesn't seem to be a way. What am I doing wrong?

If you have advanced tactics enabled, you can trade for siege and naval units. So if they build airships, I can trade for them (provided they are empty and in friendly territory, I think). Giving away units is a different mechanic.

Here's wishing the Sheaim give you a worthy fight. Mmmmmmmm, Chalid!

Still haven't gone for the Sheaim, although they are indirectly "helping" me by taking down the last large good religion civ other than my two (the RoK Sidar, who are doing better than I've ever seen before) and giving me some fresh angels to work with.

I went through a long builder cycle after securing the continent, as my economy was pretty much crashed at that point (I needed 90% on the slider just to break even). During that period, the Kurios built no airships, despite having astronomy and engineering for most of that time. Now that I am at war across the water (and they have no way to get there) I am hoping they will build some airships so they can try to join the party.

 

[doktarr]

Well, the game is going well in an absolute sense - I'm having a good time with my mixed army of national unit angels, lunatics, Chalid, and a few support figures. But Cardith seems content to pump troops on the home continent and never leave. Building Centaur Archers in the city where he build RotNK is great. Bazaar or Mammon? No problem. Sphener? Sure. Centaur Lancers? Sure, bag your national units. But he's also building Training Yards and Archery Ranges and the Tower of Eyes and a champion now and again, and more confessors, and, well, anything except a freaking airship.

I'll have the Nexus in 20 turns or so, so I won't have to deal with the great annoyance of transporting Lunatics to port and then across the water when I go against the Sheaim (who are in the process of wrecking the Sidar). But at least for the moment, the Kuriotates are not helping the cause at all.

 

[akatosh]

What if you gift the lunatics to him?

 

[doktarr]

What if you gift the lunatics to him?

Not sure why that would matter. It's not as though Cardith lacks units to load on the airship. He's just not building any. If I gift him lunatics, that's just more lunatics wandering my continent.

EDIT: Tholal seems to think this is a bug - i.e. the Kurios don't realize they can build airships in inland cities.

EDIT 2: If you are just talking about reducing micro, then I much prefer your approach: create the lunatics and give them to Basium. But so far, the lunatic insanity and re-positioning them hasn't been too much of an annoyance for me to handle.

Now I'm debating whether to WB some airships for Cardith (deleting some of his other units to keep it hammer-neutral). I wouldn't want to WB airships for myself, but I'd like to see if he would be willing to trade them if he knew he could build them.

 

[doktarr]

So, I did end up WB'ing a couple airships to Cardith in a hammer-neutral fashion, but not only did he never use them (other than to wander aimlessly from city to city without picking up anything), but he doesn't put them in the trade window even though advanced tactics are enabled. So... yeah, no dice, although Tholal has added this as an issue to address in future versions of the game.

Still, I've actually gotten a lot of mileage out of regular ships. I play on a snaky continents map, so most cities are reasonably close to the coast. I just keep the Lunatics stored on Galleons between wars. An enraged Lunatic can't leave the boat even if it's next to land or in a city, unless I take control of him and tell him to. In my most recent war, I declared war and, after softening up a coastal city that had ~15 defenders with 4 fireballs, a tsunami, and a pillar of fire, I just attacked from the sea with lunatics. I selected the enraged ones (which was most of them) and had them all attack first, thus curing their insanity. After capturing, I was able to unload them all into the city and then basially use them like a normal army, with a few stray losses here and there when a Lunatic wanders off.

At this point, I've just unlocked the last of the six T4 angel types. Lunatics are really just the cannonfodder of the army, although they still get most of the kills (and take all the risks except those taken by Brigit or the Valkyries). They were quite effective in earlier wars when they were the main big hitter outside of Basium, though. I've really enjoyed this style of play and I expect that if I play another Mercurian game in the future I'll probably use Lunatics again. I'm not sure I'd use them for another civ, although I suppose in a straight Kuriotate game slave trade and Lunatics could serve as a good replacement for Guild of the Nine, plus they can actually use their airships.

This has been a particularly interesting game for Mercurians because the Sheaim have been taking over the other half of the planet while I take over my half, and they have been pumping the AC counter like crazy. They actually just triggered the apocalypse (first time I've seen the AI do that), which killed my treasured Order Druid and OO Druid (along with Wilboman, Hemah, the Gold Dragon, Herne, Guybrush, Losha Valas....) but spared Chalid. I have Glory Everlasting (slowly) building and plan to attack in the aftermath of that. In the mean time I am cleaning out the other civs on my end of the map.

 

[Calavente]

the gold dragon died from the apocalypse ?
should that happen ?

 

[doktarr]

Dragons are alive, so they are vulnerable. I'm not sure if this means the Apocalypse can take out Acheron but I imagine it does unless barbarians are immune to the apocalypse (which I think they are, actually). The Sheaim had killed Acheron long ago.

The most annoying thing about the apocalypse is that it bypasses basically all the good stuff that can happen on death. I don't get any angels for all those dead units, and immortal living figures die permanently. (I don't have any this time, but in a previous game I had completed Blood of the Phoenix before triggering the Apocalypse, and it did not protect figures from destruction.)

Persuant to that "fellowship of leaves for non-elves" thread, another option if you have the Form of the Titan would be to line up conquest/apprenticeship/theocracy, get a command post and Heroic Epic in a city, and just pump fawns that can instantly upgrade to Mobility 2/Combat 2/Commando Satyrs. That's an incredibly mobile army, and they become pretty experienced angels when they die. But it's tough to justify tying down 3 civics and your religion just to pull this off, particularly since they can't use metal and you need to go up the metal line to unlock T4 angels. I like the crazies better.

 

[Kiech]

Hmm...whats the best modmod for using lunatics?

 

[akatosh]

Probably magister modmod. I think his Spirit 3 spell cures insanity permanently. Of course, Magister modmod has so much overpowered stuff that you would be gimping yourself by using something as mundane as lunatics.

 

[Kiech]

Let me rephrase: what would be the most fun?

 

[doktarr]

Sadly (?) I never managed to launch my great invasion of the Sheaim. I was originally planning to complete Glory Everlasting first, but waiting another 50 turns would have been pointless, so I started putting together the invasion force. I was about 2 turns away from capturing a coastal city using my fleet filled with dozens of lunatics and Chalid, and then using the Nexus to bring in all my T4 angels and a bunch of other support troops (plus as many mercenaries as I cared for, as I was swimming in gold). But just before that I won a domination victory. I actually completed the Tower of Necromancy the same turn (setting up the ToM as an option, as the others were already done), and Cardith had popped the last prophet he needed to build the final altar a couple turns before. So I had a few different paths to victory.

The latter stretches of this game (ironically, the period in Deity difficulty) was a bit of a breeze, but while things were still in doubt the Lunatics were definitely pretty nice.

 

[Qgqqqqq]

The opening is always the hardest part in FFH.
First 50 turns at immortal (for example) is orders of magnitude easier then starting at deity.

Reason being, the ai just can't handle the late game stuff.

 

[Sporkbomb]

As far as the lunatic question goes, I stuck about 30 of them on boats but also built a SoD with standard units. I landed my lunatics, which by the time I invaded all of them were in frenzy, a good five turns before my standard SoD arrived. The lunatics rampaged in every direction across Luchirp lands, drawing their armies away from their cities and deep into their own territory. When my main force showed up, the Luchirp were so scattered that I didn't have much trouble taking their cities. When the lunatics drop out of rage, just have them pillage until they frenzy again. They are a good tool, but not that good as your core army.

P.S. - I was using Tansunke of Hippus and my main force was chariot and mage heavy.

 

[akatosh]

Anybody tried Perpentach with lunatics? Slavery civic+undercouncil resolution+taskmasters = 75% chance to create a slave. Since you don't have to buy the slaves that's 25g saved right there. Fits the insanity theme too.

Can Perpentach get ingenious as a random trait?

 

[Qgqqqqq]

No it doesn't get generated (along with Fallow, Magic Resistant, Summoner, Tolerant etc.).

 

[doktarr]

Anybody tried Perpentach with lunatics? Slavery civic+undercouncil resolution+taskmasters = 75% chance to create a slave. Since you don't have to buy the slaves that's 25g saved right there. Fits the insanity theme too.

I wouldn't regard the taskmaster's bonus as more than a nice perk; you probably don't want to build huge stacks of taskmasters after all. But yeah, lunatic usage fits right in for the Balseraphs.

You can mutate slaves, right? If so, then you could take the mediocre/negative mutants and add them to freak shows, and promote the good mutants to Lunatics.