4th age and curses...

mepbmlist
#1

--- Gavinwj <gavinwj@compuserve.com> wrote: > Din
wrote:

> b) curses to come back.

I've never quite liked curses, even though I
obviously use them when
available. Everything else has a counter order,
curses doesn't. This makes
it way too lethal.

Curses have problems. Mainly they take so long to get
ready.

You need 3 mages at 70 natural rank each in order to
kill one person. And each of the 3 need to pass their
skill roll. If you are only 70, then your skill isn't
that good - maybe 70 or 80 % ?. The odds of succeeding
at odds of 80% three times is only a bit better than
50/50.

And getting to a natural skill of 70 (or higher) isn't
that easy to do. The higher your level, the lower the
increase you get.

The other problem is that the ability to gain curses
is given by certain items (and we all know what these
items are). Smart cookies will limit the enemy getting
these items, or will ping the item and send in agents
to stop the items being used (so people with curse
items tend move every turn).

Then when the mages are off killing people, they are
not at home doing prenmgy and getting better.

I'll hazard a guess and say that two curse squads is
the normal limit per side ?

If we said 'agents can only kill someone if you have
three of them, all with a minimum natural skill of 70,
and all have to pass their roll', I'll don't think
many people would like it (unless you hate agents).

Actually the only good thing about curses is that it
has a one hex range (but i'll admit that this is very
powerful).

I feel that if people can spend so long, on so many
characters, to kill one person per turn, then good
luck to them.

I would only dislike curse squads if they were easier
to crank out.

thanks
din

p.s the counter to curses is to limit the enemy having
access to the items that provide curses.

Gavin

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#2

Din, the fact that getting curses takes so long is not really an argument in
its favour. Once you have them, the effect is too powerful. I'm in a game in
which there at least three curse squads on one side and it's very clear that
they are operating very near to 100 skill. That's three "free" kills per
turn. (I've been on both sides of the equation, so this isn't sour grapes.)

My "counter" remark was aimed at the pairings that occur in the skill
orders: 615/620 is countered by 610, 210 is countered by 215, 520 is
countered by 525 etc. Curses is the only effect which operates at a distance
and thus there is little or no risk to the caster. At least with Sickness,
you need to be in the same hex and are therefore open to a counter
(assassination or challenge).

It *is* possible to eliminate the squad, but you really need 19 characters
to do it... 18 agents and one sacrifice.

Maybe if there was a downside: every use of the spell removed between 1 and
10 health points permanently from the caster, something like that. Then
there'd be a bit of balance.

I'm not really sure why it was ever included, to be honest.

Gavin

#3

Din wrote:

p.s the counter to curses is to limit the enemy having
access to the items that provide curses.

Or maybe introduce a 'Circle of Protection' spell?

-ED \1/

#4

Din, the fact that getting curses takes so long is not really an argument in
its favour. Once you have them, the effect is too powerful.

Yup. You do need three mages, 66/66/68 in rank, and you probably need
a half-dozen mage items to boost their casting ranks to the point
where they'll usually succeed, but neither of these is impossible to
come by for a well-coordinated team (or, for that matter, for a
Noldo or BS player all by his lonesome).

And the effect (auto-kill of highly important characters from
complete safety) is very powerful. Particularly when used in
conjunction with armies and/or agents -- but taking out high-ranking
army commanders (who are difficult to assassinate) and/or mega-agents,
before any agent or emmy actions can take place, can make a big difference.

Also, curse squads are _much_ more mobile than armies, their primary
prey (since agent movement is too hard to predict.)

My "counter" remark was aimed at the pairings that occur in the skill
orders: 615/620 is countered by 610, 210 is countered by 215, 520 is
countered by 525 etc. Curses is the only effect which operates at a distance
and thus there is little or no risk to the caster. At least with Sickness,
you need to be in the same hex and are therefore open to a counter
(assassination or challenge).

Actually, 610 doesn't really counter 615/620 (a 100+ agent can
blow through any guard); what works best is doubling the agent.
  

It *is* possible to eliminate the squad, but you really need 19 characters
to do it... 18 agents and one sacrifice.

You only need to take out one mage to cripple the squad.

I'm not really sure why it was ever included, to be honest.

At one Origins, GSI mentioned that they'd wanted a way to deal with
agents ensconced in a pop center and killing everything that came
their way. Apparently they hadn't realized the effects when applied
to army commanders.

Tony Z

···

On Tue, Jan 09, 2001 at 01:58:25AM +0100, Gavinwj wrote:
--
"The King with half the East at heel is marched from lands of morning;
His fighters drink the rivers up, their shafts benight the air,
And he that stays will die for naught, and home there's no returning."
The Spartans on the sea-wet rock sat down and combed their hair.--A.E. Housman

#5

Din, the fact that getting curses takes so long is not really an

argument in

its favour. Once you have them, the effect is too powerful. I'm in a

game in

which there at least three curse squads on one side and it's very

clear that

they are operating very near to 100 skill. That's three "free" kills

per

turn. (I've been on both sides of the equation, so this isn't sour

grapes.)

My "counter" remark was aimed at the pairings that occur in the

skill

orders: 615/620 is countered by 610, 210 is countered by 215, 520 is
countered by 525 etc.

I have to disagree with you there. There is no practical counter
to really powerful and numerous enemy agents. Even an 80-pt agent
is no effective guard against an 120-pt agent. Sending in emmies
is rather pointless, you might get an agent or three if you are
lucky enough to (a) catch them and (b) spot who is there but
you will likely lose an emmy or three; and they can always
undouble fairly easily.

Agents are near the top of the chain -- a team with
superior agents, all other things being equal (numbers
and skills), will nearly always defeat the other team.
Curses is at the very top of the food chain. The team
with more curses squads will usually, all other things being
equal, eventually prevail.

Curses in 1650 is the one thing that has the power
to prevent long games from being decided by agents,
and I am so very glad of that.

Jeremy Richman

···

--- In mepbmlist@egroups.com, Gavinwj <gavinwj@c...> wrote:

#6

It does take a long time to develope,

···

----- Original Message -----

From:
Gavinwj

To: mepbmlist@egroups.com

Sent: Monday, January 08, 2001 6:58 PM

Subject: Re: [mepbmlist] 4th age and curses…

` Din, the fact that getting curses takes so long is not really an argument in
its favour. Once you have them, the effect is too powerful. I’m in a game in
which there at least three curse squads on one side and it’s very clear that
they are operating very near to 100 skill. That’s three “free” kills per
turn. (I’ve been on both sides of the equation, so this isn’t sour grapes.)

My “counter” remark was aimed at the pairings that occur in the skill
orders: 615/620 is countered by 610, 210 is countered by 215, 520 is
countered by 525 etc. Curses is the only effect which operates at a distance
and thus there is little or no risk to the caster. At least with Sickness,
you need to be in the same hex and are therefore open to a counter
(assassination or challenge).

It is possible to eliminate the squad, but you really need 19 characters
to do it… 18 agents and one sacrifice.

Maybe if there was a downside: every use of the spell removed between 1 and
10 health points permanently from the caster, something like that. Then
there’d be a bit of balance.

I’m not really sure why it was ever included, to be honest.

Gavin

`

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#7

Tony Zbaraschuk wrote:

It *is* possible to eliminate the squad, but you really need 19 characters
to do it... 18 agents and one sacrifice.

You only need to take out one mage to cripple the squad.

Yup, but you need to find the peasant first... So, given that he could be in
any one of six hexes and you want to try for the whole squad, you need three
agents in each of the six hexes plus some poor soul staked out in the open
to act as bait. 19 characters.

Gavin

#8

I have to disagree with you there. There is no practical counter
to really powerful and numerous enemy agents. Even an 80-pt agent
is no effective guard against an 120-pt agent. Sending in emmies
is rather pointless, you might get an agent or three if you are
lucky enough to (a) catch them and (b) spot who is there but
you will likely lose an emmy or three; and they can always
undouble fairly easily.

I have both played agent nations and been attacked by them in roughly
equal numbers. I think the key is earlier than the situation you
described; there is indeed little hope of digging a team out of a
massive agent deficit. BUT the same holds true for military or
economic deficits - once the other side has three times the population
base or huge armies attacking your undefended regions there is also
little that you can do. I think that in 1650/2950 agents are both
necessary and a good marker of the overall quality of a team. In 4th
age, the problem is that they really are the most powerful class;
unlike 1650/2950 where the agents start out weak they start too strong
and people don't know which nations are the cloud lords of the world
so that they can target them while they're little.

I have played three nations that faced almost continuous agent
assaults - south gondor twice and the dwarves once. In no case did
the agents significantly cramp my style. For SG, I used my emmys and
agents to neutralize them; for the dwarves, I named commanders as fast
as they were destroyed. Two of the three teams lost, but I attribute
that directly to outstanding dark servant play.

Using agents properly requires skill and team coordination. You need
ScoChars and internal double agents. You need mages casting lore
spells to locate the enemy agent toys and main threats. Intelligence
information is the key, and this feature of the game places the most
stress on good teamwork. To put it another way, every team that I've
been on that has won an agent war has also been a team that had its
act together in other ways too. Every team I've been on that has lost
an agent war has been disorganized or simply outclassed by the other
side.

I have also used and been the subject of curse squads in equal
measure, and I like them a lot less. Quite simply, they are a pain to
create but uncreative to use. You don't need the same skills that you
do to build a winning agent war. As Tony noted, the real problem is
not curse squads knocking off agents - it is curse squads knocking off
army commanders. There is actually a simple fix - don't include
artifacts when determining the chance of casting success. Because
curses is usually learned at a low level, most curse squads just stack
up mage artifacts on the cursers. This will tend to force mages to
use weakness/sickness instead, and then they can be hit by the other
side.

cheers,

Marc

PS I am speaking mostly from 2950, where the agent war starts out
fairly even in my opinion; 1650 may well be different and I'd be
curious how many free teams win agent wars in 1650. In 2950 it is
close to 50-50.

···

--- In mepbmlist@egroups.com, JeremyRichman@c... wrote:

Agents are near the top of the chain -- a team with
superior agents, all other things being equal (numbers
and skills), will nearly always defeat the other team.
Curses is at the very top of the food chain. The team
with more curses squads will usually, all other things being
equal, eventually prevail.

Curses in 1650 is the one thing that has the power
to prevent long games from being decided by agents,
and I am so very glad of that.

Jeremy Richman

#9

Curses have problems. Mainly they take so long to get
ready.

You need 3 mages at 70 natural rank each in order to
kill one person. And each of the 3 need to pass their
skill roll. If you are only 70, then your skill isn’t
that good - maybe 70 or 80 % ?. The odds of succeeding
at odds of 80% three times is only a bit better than
50/50.

And getting to a natural skill of 70 (or higher) isn’t
that easy to do. The higher your level, the lower the
increase you get.

The other problem is that the ability to gain curses
is given by certain items (and we all know what these
items are). Smart cookies will limit the enemy getting
these items, or will ping the item and send in agents
to stop the items being used (so people with curse
items tend move every turn).

Then when the mages are off killing people, they are
not at home doing prenmgy and getting better.

I’ll hazard a guess and say that two curse squads is
the normal limit per side ?

In Game 32 I played the Noldor. I had a Curse squad with 60+% curse chance by turn 9 and 90+% by turn 23 (end of game) The team also had another curse squad running & enough characters for a third, although they never got together. The DS also had a Curse squad - until there company commander got assassinated & most of the FP agents turned up at that hex theat turn. That was with Tinculin & Elenruth both located somewhere south of Harad. For the stronger mage nations it really doesn’t take long to create a Curse squad. With a couple of artifacts, it’s also easy to get a good curse rank. It’s a nice spell if you can get it, but too powerful. Limit Spirit Mastery to Sickness or change curses to do 50% mage rank in the same hex and it would be better. Alternatively, create an anti-magic spell which blocks scrying & Spirit Mastery.

``

#10

And the effect (auto-kill of highly important characters from
complete safety) is very powerful. Particularly when used in
conjunction with armies and/or agents – but taking out high-ranking
army commanders (who are difficult to assassinate) and/or mega-agents,
before any agent or emmy actions can take place, can make a big difference.

You’ve missed an advantage - particularly for the Noldor. Curse is unblockable & comes before InfOther. If the Noldor Curse squad sit on a pop centre, they can take out the army and influence the pop centre on the same turn unless the army has backup commanders.

``