Virtual Survey: Match Personality & Race

[Persain]

Over 8-10 days the provinces that are going to be most useful are defensive provinces, not attackers. I'd rather have Sage on Faery for defensive purposes, than Human who will have to risk being chained and lacks opportunities for ops defense. I definitely wouldn't consider Merchant on Halfling... Mystic, Sage maybe, War Hero possibly.

For the most part i agree with what you say and the rest of your post. However merchant on halfering works super well we have 4 this age. I was surpised how well it actually does work...at this point i almost like it over rogue. The "problem" with feary sage is that once u down it its going to be nearly impossible to recover/repump. Its y i'd toss rogue on feary LL+prop=decent sustainability. A human with sage is the human that has the easiest time/best chance of surviving.

[noobium]

The solution to Learn-rape - don't let it happen, because your Faery/Sages should be way up at the top of kingdom size tier if at all possible. That said, assuming a Faery gets land-dropped in war, it's only a major problem if those landgrabs and desertions are followed by learn attacks, while a dropped sage is going to have some pretty nice science modifiers - very useful for punishing kingdoms that would chain a Faery.

There are ways for Faery to recover land oow easily enough. Acres at ghetto to mid-tier level are so cheap, whether acquired through doubling up or attacking - and given how non-competitive those kingdoms are about acres, they'll probably thank you for taking them.

The problem though is that a lot of races have to pick the least-worst option, or middling options. I'd rather have Merchant on Human than most other races, and rather have Sage on Faery than most other races (although Sage at all is pretty cruddy), but neither would be my first pick. Still wouldn't go Merch on Halfer - would much rather have tog or some implied econ bonus, rather than a slight and annoying econ penalty and a limited benefit from Merchant's bonuses. Much better to pick Rogue, WH, or Sage.

[Palem]

I'll play

Avian - Tact
Dorf - WH
Elf - Mystic
Faery - Merchant
Halfer - Rogue
Human - Sage
Orc - Warrior
Undead - Cleric

All pretty standard stuff...

[StratOcastle]

Thank you all for your input. The additional explanations weren't just helpful to clarify the synergy of those participants but offers a perspective on those without. This is no doubt helpful to inexperienced players as well to realize the lattice capability of each player in kingdom.

A special thanks to Palem: The Faery Circle was the fundamental influence to the Virtual Kingdom. It was here that I decided to explore a completely diversified kingdom template as opposed to a monopersona/race based kingdom. While it can be argued these ideals aren't as effective as a totalitarian strategy, I'm convinced the factor was apex fun.

Thank you noobium for the 25th element summary; an intuitive touch I appreciate.

And don't think I've gleaned over the less vocal. I find these choices more in line with mine either by naivety, niche or bravado.

~ Again, thank you all. I'll do my best to work in the strengths of each division. ~

[StratOcastle]

Continued input is welcome. I'm simply beginning to put pen to paper so I can thread an alignment while the age still has life.
*Kingdom is based on 3 divisions of 8 players merged from different kingdoms. Below are the real game examples applied fictionally here*

Templars was 8, but I can't find the post anymore and Ardent Consortium has migrated several players out. Then there's the actual example below.

8 - 10 Ex-weHurt Asian players looking for merger.

~ thus, the possibility of 3 divisions in 3 time zones ~

[noobium]

Normally I would like Avian/Tactician, but a kingdom needs to be using a lot of avian for that setup to work properly. Av/Tact by itself can't synchronize with other hitters and use that attack speed effectively, so they just get fat quickly.

Orc/Warrior is a pick I've used in many a ghetto, and I know full well that it has some issues. Stacking Bloodlust with extra kills doesn't really change those issues, although now it does mean that an Orc/Warrior can do severe damage. Still, that damage is only effective as long as the Orc/Warrior can hit a useful target, and that window can close quickly.

Warrior is about as good as Cleric for sustainability, at least in war, but Warrior is much more effective in the early stages of war. The benefits of pentatapping are also much better than the benefits of more troop sustain. Remember that Cleric's sustain eats up population (and wages) and adds nw, while Warrior is 100% free and increases offensive capacity. Picking warrior is basically like having a population bonus. Bloodlust is also a better spell than PF.

Sage, Merch, Cleric are most effective in large numbers, rather than as minorities, so their usefulness is limited. Any Sage is going to need to be a defensive province; you do not want to be a Sage with zero defense in war if at all possible.

I don't really like putting War Hero on anything that isn't Elf, Faery, Human, or Halfling; however, there are three personalities (Sage, Mystic, Rogue) that only work well on defensive provinces, and another where a defensive province is preferred (Merchant), and those picks are going to be more essential than WH in more situations.

I might swap my round 3 picks to the following:

Avian/Warrior
Dwarf/Tactician
Elf/Sage
Faery/Rogue
Halfling/War Hero
Human/Mystic
Orc/Merchant
Undead/Cleric

That would put Sage on an Elf, where I think Sage works better; War Hero on a Halfling, which is superior than on Undead; Tactician on Dwarf which is an effective speed hitter; Mystic on Human, which while crappy for attacking is useful for extra ToG in war (and Humans can get pretty decent mWPA); Undead gets shafted with Cleric (and denies Cleric to Human, who really benefits from it); Orc and Avian are where they were, mostly by default. Elf and Halfer could swap their picks.

[Palem]

Putting merchant on anything that doesn't have ToG is a waste imo.

I would much rather have:
Human/Merchant
Orc/Mystic

than:
Human/Mystic
Orc/Merchant

Maybe if Orc still had it's leet credit bonus, but not without it.


Also, WH on dorf works well for 3 reasons.
1. There are better personalities better suited for better races. Utopia 101: Build towards your strong suits, don't try to cover your weaknesses.
2. You can undergo massive rebuilds/pumps very quickly and basically for free.
3. WS works well with 6/1 leet.

[noobium]

There are only two races with ToG. Those were examples of what I would pick if I had to go through 3 times and could not repeat picks, for the third round. It was a thought experiment to see what kind of weird race/personality combinations could work best. I put Orc as Merchant because the remaining defensive races (Elf and Halfling) had so many better picks, whereas Orc only has Tactician, Warrior as good picks, Cleric as a really iffy pick that works better elsewhere, and WH/Merchant as cruddy picks.

If we are only going to go through once, and run 3 of each race/personality, then I do not see anything that would be better than the races I picked first. I'd much rather have Merchant on a race that can grab acres effectively than one that has difficulty landgrabbing.

Dwarf/WH is fine, but Dwarf/Cleric is better - not having to build hospitals is best for a race that has a BE bonus already. The best use of Cleric personality in a normal kingdom would be on Humans, but in this scenario Humans have at least 2 preferable picks and Warrior/Mystic are both viable. (Human is about one of two Mystics I would even consider running in a normal kingdom, so there is that...)

I'd much rather have WH on a race that can turtle, but failing that Avian and WH are a decent match - probably the best WH out of the races that can't turtle, since they are more likely to benefit from dragon and plague immunity than the other attackers.

Elf/Mystic, Human/Merchant, Undead/Warrior, and Halfling/Rogue under these situations are almost givens for first pick. All except Human/Merchant are going to be the best fits for those races 90%+ of the time for normal kingdoms, and all are by far the most effective in their specialty of magic, making money, hitting stuff, and opping stuff. Undead by design are going to be giant piles of sustainable offense, and Warrior is effective at making the best use of that offense (not to mention the extra general is likely going to be used for plague spreading on defenseless provinces). While Orc/Warrior does more damage, it isn't anywhere near as sustainable as Undead and the extra kills+gains is overrated...

[Persain]

Putting merchant on anything that doesn't have ToG is a waste imo.

You want merchant on a race that can make income. That means either tog OR ability to hold peasants. Halfer has a nice ability to kidnap peasents all war IF needed and they draws fireball focus all war. thats something that neither a human/feary can do cost effectively.

[noobium]

Faery can't kidnap peasants? It's pretty damn easy to kidnap as Faery, except that they often don't have to.
Human does alright kidnapping too. Fat attackers are ripe for peasant theft, especially for humans that manage better-than-average mTPA.
The only advantage Halfers have there is that they can kidnap some targets that wouldn't be available, but that is a dicey proposition at best. It really only makes a difference for kidnapping Faeries or other Halfers.
In exchange, Faery and Human do so many things, while Halfling only does thievery particularly well. I'd gladly trade a little difficulty in kidnapping for all the things Human and Faery do so much better than Halfer.

Also bear in mind that this kind of kingdom is probably going to avoid war, because it's a really bad warring setup; therefore you are going to want to pick options that are effective at oow growth as well as warring ability. Halfling/Merchant does pretty much nothing for a province that is whoring away or pumping. I kind of like Orc/Merch for its oow utility, more money to pay for more acres and a fairly expensive elite, and the ability to build up more freebie credits while doing so; it's not great, but it works alright considering the dearth of good Orc personalities.

[Persain]

cost effectivly is the word i added that me me right :P Theres more to kidnaping that just taking peasents.

[StratOcastle]

Very nice to see the insightful logic behind the builds proposed. Persain: because you have presented builds that may be appealing to players that want individuality. Then you explain the premise and effective leverage. Thank you.

These are the type of second stage leaps that get the wheels turning. If I seem remiss to express my thanks to all participants, please know it's humble respect not to mention you all by name.

[Persain]

fine strat0castle. My concept for a war kd is always a setup that cast last 10+ days of war. obvious choices to that is to pair sustainability with the "attacker" races that it compliments most. Slow attack times with big gains and low offensive losses. Those SHOULD be obvious. Then your left with sage/mystic/rogue/merchant and human/elf/feary/halfing. Honestly the Strongest choice for halfing right now is mystic. We have two of them this age and they are both ~5500 honor and easily the strongest prov in the kd. The shear power of a high wpa with +tpa means u start with low tpa and WT, grow train tpa and end up huge with amazing tpa/wpa and athe ability to hit....who doesnt like. However elf is weak if you play it anything but mystic. That is a elf mystic you basically HAVE to take out if you want magic superiority in war so by default the elf gets mystic.

Your now left with sage/merchant/rogue for human/halfering/feary. Honestly the +1 stealth and prop is kinda worthless this age without DBE TD you wont be proping an enemy t/m easily even with a dragon. So prop ends up going being cast on pure attackers. So do u really need the +tpa from halfer...no. Nor do u need cheap theives since prop will only be done on big fat attackers and losses are minimal Theres just no reason you MUST pair rogue with halfering for a rouge to get full benefits. So rogue is human or feary....hrm. Well lets look at the bonus's for merchant. Merchant gives +income +spec credits+building credits. Well feary wont be attacking so lets rule them out. Human or halfer for merchant. we're left with
rogue=feary/human
sage =halfer/feary/human
merchant =halfer/human.

If im trying to build the "best" unbrekable and have it "grow" i need to consider what its doing. i want it strong as it grows, i want it to be able to defend itself when big and i want good income. To me that says sage/merhcant. those are the best 2 options for growing/staying safe as a cow/calf in war. If thats true i'd see okay who benefits more merchant on human or merchant on halfer. Well to me giving credits and passive income to the halfing seems smart. The halfling will be able to self sustain and as it attacks with leeets it retrains with credits geting stronger. The human cant do that. The credits would simply be a replacement. As they already have -pop im not sure i want to put a personality on them that requires peasent space to be the most usefull. they also already have +science so giving them sage seems like a good choice.

So now in war who does what. My 4 attackers (undead/avain/orc/dwarf) do standard chains, taking down priorities, hitting....remembering that between those 4 the dwarf is the easiest to turn unbrekable. I have my elf mystic for casting and keeping MS on them. i have my feary which grows def/wpa/tpa via prop, handles riots and casts fireballs/tog think 20 acres/day of growth to stay safe and good at oping. I have my human which MAY be hard to op. I'd test him if hes hard to op i'd have him grow a little and try to "stay safe" acting as a bank. have him start massacring before he becomes super open to ops. If i'm able to deal with enemy t/ms he can take off growth and act as a nice bank.

My halfing is where i make them draw fire too, maybe get my human safe or my feary growing a bit quickly early then pumping. My halfing has cheap military, can easily attack, should start war with 6-7-8k spec credits so he can grow a little and then BOOM massive off spec army. The Halfing has cheap tpa to build up and counter any rogues that might op him, think 6-7 raw, and will hav good income. if hes not eating ops. The idea is he draws enemy focus. The fact that he has "low" wpa is good. it means he'll eat lots of fireballs but is easy to MV off MS. He can spend is stealth kidnaping/stealing gc and sustaining himself easily. (while a feary/human can kidnap they cannot easily replace lost leets from hiting/sleeping though some MS nor do they get cheap tpa if u need to boost 2 tpa like yesterday) If the enemy DOESNT deal with that halfer he massively produces income.

[noobium]

I don't think a rainbow race setup is going to have great endurance, even if they didn't have the added restriction of personality choices. I'm not considering 8 vs. 8, since that means most conventional warring and growth strategies are unworkable.

[StratOcastle]

Generally I agree with the skepticism. The kingdom proposed is only a template. If it did exist it would be fun forward.
Where I may find my optimism is in the pattern that AMA runs. My other consideration is in the dull world of strat dictation that while effective is detrimental to player interest.
My goal is to spark the unconventional player to find a home, and accept that they may sacrifice efficiency and/or effectiveness if this is where they thrive. I for one shun the lockstep world of Utopia and enjoy the game. This is a beacon for the fringe player.
Thank you again for your experienced evaluation and sobering view of a zero core kingdom.