VT2 - we need to talk..

[Ethan]

Only serious arguments for DE:
1) Better NW/A for troops on a 6/6 vs. human. Only one of 2 with 6 def. Saves land in towers.
Counter: requires A/m type build (not A/M) to exploit the NW well. Human sci massive NW saver. Human income doesn't burn mana. Once pumped human A, A/t or A/T beats out DE A or A/m. (With same army values... stack others vs the human from there.)

2) NM chains. a/t/M or a/T/m kingdom strat, and good god the NM chains.
Counter: I'll find out this age!

This is, btw, my first age ever playing anything besides human. And only reason I stopped now is cause we finally are trying the pure DE idea. We will probably suck, cause the coordination and activity required is probably beyond us (might be beyond anyone not on charts)... but who knows, maybe this is exactly what we needed to get everyone excited again. I only wish we had tried it back when DE had the +30% Magic damage and the +1 stealth... that age, massed DE rogue with one uber thief and one or two pure mages would have been scary. +5 stealth per hour, 1.6 NS per prov per hour. Or AW if the NM isn't succeeding often enough. (And of course if the NS is failing, run the NM!) Only thing it can't rip to bits is a T/M... but then, why do we care about it?

Please note... I think it will be great fun. I think it will rip gettos to pieces. I know there are kingdoms out there active and coordinated enough to kill us dead. I don't know how it will perform against equals - nor can I guess until we've tried it. But win or lose, I won't regret that we tried it. (Nothing else could cause me to give up my precious sci.)

[_greenie]

5 stealth/hr = 2.5 ns/hr
if you can get ~3raw tpa/wpa, you can do pretty well in the ghetto levels =)
the biggest -ve to DE is the defensive elite
it is something that takes a bit of getting used to if you have never done it before =)

[Saveid]

I like gnomes. They're so cute.

[Shambles]

The wages is a big issue too i think. +30% wages is a lot, esp as you're going to want to be be paying 200% anyway

[Turtle Man]

We tried the DE/Rogue thing, it worked out well in the first half of the age when activity was really good, but second half they got ripped up...What it came down to was that the DE's needed no runes and had ToG at the time, plus the DE/R were able to steal a lot of GC's, but problem is that other races get stronger as the age progresses, DE turns into a paper tiger by eoa, so have fun the beginning, but when ur beloved humans, dwarves and elves are pumped up, your DE will become a defensive race at best and will be kept on its heels

btw, for the record, gnomes suck, they kinda sucked in past ages, this age they still suck pretty hard, Dwarves pwn gnomes on any given day :)

[Shambles]

If this age is a short age as planned, gnomes will be a good pick, thier thievery and pop bonus are great early age, so if this age really is only a month, they'll be one of the top races