Quote:
Avians - Heavy Attacker, Attacker/Thief, or Attacker/Mage
The main strength to Avians is the combination of greatly reduced attack times (equivalent to 30%+ Barracks), 6-point Defense Specialists, and 7/4 Elites. While many see Avian Elites as being weak (vs 8- and 9-point elites, as well as no Stables), their defense is second only to Dwarves among offensive Elites - coupled with their rapid speeds, they are less vulnerable to Ambush than most other races.
While the 'No Stables' seems like a liability at first, it's not so bad once you start looking at the actual numbers. The 6-point Defense Specs means you can use 17% fewer specs for the same defense (vs 5-point Specs), meaning more Elites instead for an effective gain of 1.17 points 'per Elite' than you would normally have. (Way back when, an Avian A/T could steal someone else's horses to use - but this has been nixed for a long time.)
At any rate, not needing Barracks or Stables frees up 25%-50% of your available lands for other buildings. Though one could still build Barracks for even faster attack times (and/or opt for the Tactician Personality), you CAN have too much of a good thing. Since most buildings, as well as magic and thievery defenses, are affected by your total land, rapid-fire land grabs can quickly leave you wide open - in this way, the -10% Attack Gains is actually a bonus. However, this combination can be a devastating asset for your Kingdom by focusing on non-traditional (Raze, Plunder, etc) attacks to weaken opponents during war.
You can't have too much of a good thing. Gains penalty is not a bonus, it is land this game is all about. What you meant to say was that high speed avians get fat quicker because they usually trade more land(like orcs), but that's only a side-effect to a good thing, not a problem. Better talk about hospitals and stuff when giving advice to avians.
Quote:
Dwarves - Heavy Attacker or Attacker/Mage
Solid and stoic, Dwarves are good, all-around Attackers - and one of the few races who can benefit from an all-Elite army. Their +20% Building Efficiency can be a far greater boon than is readily apparent, and free construction frees up an active attacker's funds to maintain all-ELite forces. While they do have the weakest offensive Elite in the game, Stables bring them at least on par with Avians.
Their biggest liability is +50% food requirements - coupled with their -25% Thievery Effectiveness, a warring kingdom will usually open by stealing all your food reserves. Fortunately food has very little effect on Trade Balance, so this shouldn't prove too ostentatious a liability in an active Kingdom.
Oh my.. Avian is 7/6, dwarf is 6/5. Even with stables avian is better both per acre numbers and added with horse nw, also per nw numbers offense wise. Btw although going into stuff on full leets is usually nice, it inflates their nw quite bad - for leets you keep home u get only 5 def for 6 nw, 17% less than ds. Their biggest liability is not food, you just build 4% more farms and cope with that. It is the crap elite with crap nw and the change of building costs formula.