Looking at Nation design; I question what may be the more novel approaches to the various aspects…
Has anyone tried a “different” approach? Any hints or tips?
Thanks for whatever you care to share,
Jz
the biggest advice I’d give you in FA is this:
design your nation based upon your region choice(s). If you’re in a region with minimal terrain protection, you better build a military powerhouse (hire army for free; conjure mounts; C40; etc.). The more terrain protection you have in slowing enemy military moves against you, (allowing you to react & counter), the more flexibility you have in going in different directions away from pure military.
Dave
I did a conjure mounts/Dwarves nation… 
Worked well.
Clint (player)
Start with at least a 50 emissary, 60 if you are men.
I would start with no less than 4 emissaries of 30 or higher.
FA games tend to hit camp limit around turn 5.
Do not start with any triple class or better characters. You can not perform 3 orders in a turn, so every turn you will have some wasted class. Only exception I can see to this is C10/A?/E?.
Typical Nation designs:
Typical Agent nations:
+20 K/A nation
Double Scout / Stealth
40 Agents / Stealth
40 Agents / Double Scout
No need to start with a bunch of 50 agents. Especially if you are going to take Stealth Bonus.
Typical Military Nations:
Hire for Free / Conjure Mounts
Hire for Free / Dwarf HI / Morale 40
Hire for Free - every pure military nation should take this SNA.
A starting 60 commander could be nice as well for your starting armies training and moral.
Typical Mage Nations:
Weakness / 40 Mages - Weakness squads
Teleport / 40 Mages - Artifact retreivers
Can start with maybe one 60 mage and a 40. Name new ones at 40. There is always a chance at getting a lost list spell. I have seen curses come in on a new 40 mage. Not bad when this is the only way you can get it.
There are also some Naval Nation designs and Economic Nation designs to play with, but they are not the common. I would be willing to bet that at least 10 of the nations in your game will be one of the types listed above. These are your min/max nations where you get the most out of the nation for their particular expertise.
I have played some of these in the past, but like to try new designs now.
I hope this gives you bit more insight into creating your first FA nation and what you will most likely be going up against.
Jeff
Jz,
Alot of players dont have time for 4th age but the design nation aspect is great! No-one to blame but yourself if you get it wrong.
I’d add to the comments above by saying I try not to only look at my region but imagine/guess what my allies are going to pick given their regions and try to pick something that will be a good fit for the team.
You also see some funky comboes like 40A/40M/weakness. I’d never have picked that myself but have seen it used effectively…
Adam
Teleporting agents, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, 
yes, teleport, fast stride, long stride, or path mastery are all really interesting on agents… And the mage secondary skill addition to challenge rank doesn’t hurt either…
If your looking for a novel design my previous game had a nation built with 8 emissaries in it. and name commanders at 40. Seemed to work OK but suffered a bit by being in Angmar. Definitely viable for a neutral though.
There aren’t that many novel designs that I’ve seen in games to be honest. Most of the designs have already been described above. I rarely rate artefacts as worth it as in my experience you get crappy ones and lose them too easily to assasins.
Gavin
If you really want to try novel FA nation ideas, try FA GB. FA GB games don’t have diplos. They don’t have any information available on which nations are dead/alive (other than what your mages & emmies, or god-forbid, your turnsheet front-page, tell you). The camp limit happens later than turn 5. I think there is a LOT more experimentation on nation designs in FA GB than in regular FA games. Another reason this is possible (besides lack of information available to the enemy) is that you have 2 nations that can/should be co-designed to be complementary. And one of the reasons the camp limit happens later is that people really need to balance out their character assets because you need to gather a lot of information to play the game effectively – Talk about usefulness of mages!!! Starved for information? Mages can gather lots…
While I understand Gavin’s comment about artifacts in standard FA, I think there’s quite a case for them in FA GB… (for example).
I’m a huge fan of FA GB. Right now it looks like the player base can support one FA GB at a time. It’d be awfully cool if we could drum up enough interest to have 2 FA GB games going at the same time.
Dave
Thanks for all input given. Interesting thoughts about regional placement and team playability…might resemble more of a grudge type game…picking nation designs that complement a team concept.
Are there any 4th age grudge games/teams?
for the novelty of it; I had designed a ds nation w/ summon storms, fanaticism, fearful hearts…40 mages…took some artifacts…
It was interesting thought to influence the morale that much and get best tactic v standard every time…but the mages got trashed and I don’t believe I had much success thereafter…but it was long, long ago.
Well, anymore ideas? Thanks again all
jz
Are there any 4th age grudge games/teams?
Yes but they find it hard finding opposition.
Clint