The Nation

(Warning : this nation is the most complex nation I ever played in Dominions, so this is the longest post of this overall short AAR, as I go into details about it)

Elphame is a tricky nation, with lots of specific mechanics, strengths and weaknesses, and making things work together is not that easy. I made a lot of testings before choosing my build.

So they shine with their magic diversity (all paths except S and B) and site searching (only 2 mages with the good randoms can search all 6 paths for lvl 1, and all can get a level 2 random to perform remote site searching). They can also have some high level mages (the queens) up to level 4 for elemental paths (A, F, W, E), but using those mages is complicated due to the complex seasons mechanics. I’ll give more about it when talking about each unit and the said mechanics.

Also, they rather not-shine with their pretty low morale. Except for the knigths with 10, the troops don’t get over 8 and sometimes less. The sacreds have 9 or 10, the mages 9 and the queens only 11. So really nothing to be proud of.

It is also important to note that they tend to be quite vulnerable to missile units, and during expansion provinces with a lot of missiles are easier to take with dedicated troops (usually knights). They are also all magical beings, and so vulnerable to spells/weapons targetting them. It also means indie commander can’t command them as they don’t have a natural way to command magic beings.

Finally before diving into each unit, people think they are elves but that’s quite not the case : no sacred cavalry or cavalry mages, almost no glamour, mostly no magic phase (possible but only on good randoms or specific queens), don’t think of them as elves : they are fays, and as such they never wear a hat (not a single unit wear a hat, except for the knight commander). However they all have spirit sight, forest survival and most of them can’t cross rivers.

Also, before I forget, there’s this quite important feature in the nation : when the national troops start in friendly dominion, they get +6 map movement. That is pretty important as the extra-mobility helps a lot to set-up a defense or redeploy mages.

So now let’s get through the troops with some comments :

• The Weefolks : those tiny flyers with glamour can help with expansion. I figured that if you mass the melee variant for a 2 to 1 numerical advantage, they take most non-archer indies (in particular barbs). I thought the archer variant could be used as massed archers for flaming arrows, but with only 8 ammo I figured it wasn’t worth it.
• The Pixies : those expensive fragile flyers don’t do damage : they apply false fetters and other less interesting debuffs on their target – with an MR check. In my expansion tests they could really help paralyze ennemies that would then become sitting ducks. It’s a bit random, and I’m pretty sure they could be used as anti-thugs at some point. But, in the end, I think they are a bit too expensive due to their vulnerability to missiles and evocations.
• The Wildfays : your only stealth troops. The melee variant have good defense, have below average protection (and no hat). They have a decent movement (14) though. The missile variant is really special, dealing a 1-aoe MR-resist ranged fatigue damage but only against living units. That can be very efficient to neutralize ennemy troops as long as they don’t have high MR. As soon as the MR gets too high, the efficiency drops quite a lot. I never used them, too situationnal imo.
• The Fay Guards : Decent base infantry with average protection. They can hold the line, do their job, still don’t have a helmet and won’t hold that long.
• The Fay Archers : Pretty good archers with range 40 and 11 dmg composite bows. Also decent protection. At some point in the game I used them a lot and they behaved well.
• The Fay Knights : The strongest unit with the best armor and a pretty high defense. Still miss a hat, but the body armor and shield helps a lot. A lance charge plus 3 attacks, including a magical one with the alicorn. That single magical attack is a real bonus against ethereal/invulnerability.
• The Sacreds, I’ll cover them with the Queens and the Seasons mechanic.

The commanders :

• Tha basic commanders, Wild Matron and Fay Champions are unimpressive with 40 units command capability and reduced survivability. The Wild Matron is stealthy though and can stealth with the Wildfays and Weefolk.
• The Fay Lord cavalry commander on the other hand with 80 can use formations. They are also the only unit coming natively with a hat and can be used as light thugs. During expansion I did always set them to attack along with the knights and I got a few heroes this way.
• The Pixie scout is nice as it’s flying … but 1/3rd of the time it won’t move because busy doing unrest … So I prefered indie scouts.
• The Fay Assassin is an average assassin. But it has one single perk that makes it very special : its map-movement is random and each turn it can range from 16 to as much as 100 (teleport). As I say in my final thoughts of the game, I used them a lot to bring in gems and items on thugs/armies in the field, but not so much to assassinate.
• The Seelie and Unseelie fays. Those are the main varieties of your mages. They all come up with 3 magic levels, 1N or 1D depending on the flavour and then a combination of F/A/N or W/E/D. They are sacred, which is very good for the upkeep and can help on the battlefield. The fact that they can get a lvl 2 of each of these 6 schools make them pretty interesting. I won’t through all the details of the crosspath usage, but the main uses I had :
  • A2 can magic phase and cast air elementals and A evocations.
  • F2 can use a wide variety of F spells, including Incinerate, Flaming arrows and later Pillar of Fire.
  • N2 has also its usages for point buffing (wooden warriors, enlarge) and forging and even some big battle spells (Howl)
  • W2 for elementals, forging, point buffing (quickness)
  • E2 for elementals, forging, point buffing (iron warriors, strength of giants, iron will)
  • D2 for skelespam, forging, summoning
  • Also, you have a number of crosspaths, but not all the good ones. No F/E (charcoal shield), no F/D either (skull of fire) nor W/N (mossbody, foul vapours) or even the paths for the Staves of Elemental Mastery. All in all the available crosspaths are disappointing as they are missing some of the best ones.
• And now the queens, they deserve a special chapter

The Queens and the Seasons mechanic :

This is the most complicated part of the nation and the one that can really change the flavour of your game.

As its stand, every season, your main magical site on your cap will change. And with it, the type of gems it will give, the kind of sacreds you can recruit, the kind of Queen you can recruit, and also some special bonuses to your Bless and Scales.

Initially, you can only recruit 1 queen per season, in the middle of the season, meaning 4 different kind of queens per year. It’s a bit limited as those will also be your most precious mages given their high paths.

Also, the queens come with their seasonnal path level 4 (like A4 for the spring queens), a H3 level and a secondary path (N2 for spring/summer or D2 for autumn/winter). But this is their peak and only happens during their main season. During other seasons, they change getting to level 3 and H2, and even level 2 and H1 during the opposite season. It also affects their HP, ranging from 24, 16 down to 8. It is important to note that if they are transformed into another shape (like with Twiceborn or Transformation), they get their middle-season paths, so level 3 and H2.

Those differences between seasons are pretty important, and sometimes you might postpone a campaign just to have your queens at their best, or at least not at their worst. However, given all queens have different seasons, if you have several flavours of queens in your armies, it can become complicated (the fog warriors season vs the army of gold season, …).

So there’s a special spell that allows you to “Break the Cycle”. When you do this, your cap-site stops changing and you are stuck recruiting only one kind of queens (with 4 recruitment points, when it was only 2 when all queens shared the seasons). So you can now recruit 6 queens per year instead of 4, but this also reduces the overrall mage output of your cap from 12 to 8 per year. So you better have a strategy based on the season you choose.

Also, when you break the cycle, given the site doesn’t change anymore this makes you have a gem income stuck on that season. Could be either a good thing or a bad one as you won’t have those extra other gems. It also makes that you can only recruit 1 type of sacred, which would also probably be part of your strategy – if you ever use them.

However, even if you break the cycle, your queens will still change with the seasons (magic paths, HP). That can be a bit frustrating as you don’t entirely get rid of the season mechanic. It’s also the same for the sacreds that have a better shape during their season than outside of it (and it’s also a reason why the sacreds are difficult to use, the best they can bring they only bring only 3 turns per year).

We have also to note what each site does for each season, because if you break the cycle you’ll be stuck with those all game :

• For Spring, you get 4A and 2N per turn, your dominions get Growth +3 and your bless + 5 SR
• For Summer, you get 4F and 2N per turn, your dominions get Heat +3 and your bless + 5 FR
• For Autumn, you get 4E and 2D per turn, your dominions get Death +3 and your bless + 5 PR
• For Winter, you get 4W and 2D per turn, your dominions get Cold +3 and your bless + 5 CR

Also to note : all queens are of course Sacred, have Awe, Glamour and are Flying. They also have special perks related to their season.

So let’s talk about each queens :

• The Spring Queen is A4N2. So a native Fog Warriors caster, an Elemental Queen summoner, and able to do most of the A tricks. Also, 2 of the end-game spells of Elphame require high A/N paths (A6N3), so they are made for this. However, the vanilla Fairy Court Conj 8 spells is still there and you can summon A3/N3. So it’s possible to have a backup solution to do what they do. However a spring queen can really help forge A boosters. They also Spread Growth where they are, which can be useful and they get better stats in Growth scales.
• The Summer Queen is F4N2. I used them for flaming arrows, some Evos and Flames from the Sky. Can forge the Flame Helmet for a good F path boost. They also are the best candidates to cast some of the most interesting national spells. They have a slightly better Awe, spread Heat and get better stats in Heat scales.
• The Earth Queen is E4D2. They can be used as thugs with they E paths and the ability to cast Soul Vortex. They can also be twice borned. In the end game they are perfect for Army of Lead, Weapons of Sharpness, Crumble, Wizard’s tower. However, they spread Death and are stronger in Death scales (and weaker in Growth). The fact that they spread Death can be a problem … even more as if your break the cycle it stacks with the fact that your dominion will get +3 Death till the end of the game (or if you lose your cap ^^)
• The Winter Queen if W4D2. Not sure exactly what to do with them. They are very close to Kokythiads that would do the almost same thing. The W4 makes it easier for the Globals like Maelstrom or Vengeful Waters. They have Fear, spread Cold and are stronger in Cold scales.

And about the sacreds :

• In Spring, you get the Spring fays. During their season, they are Flying with Storm Immunity and their main weapon is a magical spear that has a pretty good hard-MR-resist entanglement effect. When spring is over, they lose all of that and become pretty average infantry (but their weapon stays magical though).
• In Summer, you get the Summer Fay. During their season, they have Awe and a weapon dealing a Burn effect. When summer is over, they lose all of that and become the same average infantry (but their weapon also stays magical).
• In Autumn, you get the Autumn Fay. I think they are the most interesting because they keep most of their powers across the seasons. So those are special missile units. They don’t have armor and have a 2 handed magical staff. They main power is their ranged attack, that deals a hard-MR-negates earth-meld effect as well as some fear. The earth-meld effect is really strong and can really help your troops in various situations. Outside of autumn, the downside is that their ranged attack gets down from range 30 to range 15 and is now MR-negates instead of hard-MR-negates. Sure it’s not as good, but still pretty good.
• In Winter, you get the Winter Fay. Those are naked archers with a magical knife. Their ranged attack can be devastating, it’s a magical bow with range 45 and an additional freezing mist effect, meaning 1AN aoe-1 lingering-2 effect. Those without cold resistance won’t like it. Outside of winter, the bow is downgraded to range 35 and only a cold effect, meaning only 10AN fatigue damage, so no more Aoe.

The Summons :

I’ll get through them as they appear in the spell lists :

• Faery Godmother (Conj 5). 3D to get a single sacred flying ghost. Their main attack is AP life drain (as most ghosts have) that have an additional sleep effect. That additional effect can be really efficient is preventing ennemies to counter attack. Difficult to mass as of their price, but if you can they can do things.
• Ghost Dragon (Conj 8). 20D for a big scary ghost dragon. It’s a bit expensive for a non-commander unit. Not sure if it’s strong or not.
• Faery Dragon (Conj 8). 25N for a very good raider/army support unit. They are commanders (though can’t command anyone) and fly pretty fast. During battles, they cast random spells that can be devastating (usually aoe 5). Didn’t have really the time to use them (I would have used them as raiders I think, but only used them as support artillery in the last battles).
• Knight in Shining Armor (Alt 5). Only 10N to transform a non-mage commander into a powerful knight. The knight itself is a powerful commander (120 command ability), has good base equipment (all magical), built-in invulnerability 15 and sun-awe 3. And they are sacred. I used them both as army commanders and thugs.
• More knights in shining armor : the True Love’s Kiss (Ench 6). 12N to revive on of your heroes in the hall of fame into a knight in shining armor. An existing knight can be taken back without penaly. Doesn’t really work on mages (they come back as mummies).

The other interesting National Spells and Items :

• The Wild Hunt (Conj 8). Sends a party of neutral ghost riders raid a province for 7D. The path is a bit difficult to get (D4E4). Can destroy small ennemy raiding parties/thugs.
• Wicked Hex (Alt 5). Should be powerful, is really questionnable (I talk more about it in the end-game discussions). Will transform ennemy units into animals with a easy-MR-resist.
• Trapped Inside a Fable (Ench 8). Stops a battle on its tracks and restarts it with the survivors. Really unusual mechanic that can be used in many ways.
• Myterious Lights (Ench 8). Enemy units will instantly be retreated from the battlefield if they fail an easy-morale-check. Can be devastating against low-morale armies.
• Into the Story (Ench 8). A fun assassination spell: send your opponent into the void/inferno/kokytos ! The spell will happen as an event, so you need to be sure where the target will finish its turn. Won’t work on pretenders/immobiles/mindless. Also only work with high luck scales in the target province.
• And last but not least : the Faery Mirror. For only 10F10N, you forge a misc item that gives 3 awe and is cursed. And ….. it has an auto-charm spell ! Meaning it’s like the crown of overmight, but const-6 and build as many as you want. It can be very powerful if used in the right way.

The Build

So after testing the nation, I believed that the most cost-effective thing I had seen was the Knight in Shining Armor. So I made my build around them. Also the Faery Mirror looked super good and I also planned to get a good number of them.

I went for a dormant titan, mostly to have the muscles to fend off early attacks and a super combattant online at least through mid-game.

Given I planned on having a lot of the sacred Knights in Shining armour, I wanted a good bless for them. As a result, a Great mother with Fire & Shock resistance + Regeneration looked fine. All of my mages being sacred, it would still be a good boost against some Firestorm/Wrathful skies/Foul vapour/Acid storm attacks (both with the elemental resistances and the regeneration). Also, I wanted to throw mother Oak early, and the 7N path was perfect for that.

Given a number of my troops and mages can’t cross rivers, I got Heat 3, so no-one would be able to cross them anyway.

Finally, Growth 3 because it’s always good and also to balance my Autumn queens which spread Death 3. I also got Production 3 to have enough ressources for the knights, and Sloth 3 because the dominion tends to create Sloth anyway. Also, Luck 0 looked fine as the dominion produces some luck.

And to conclude this build, I had to give a name. So I tried to imagine the fays worshiping her. And all I could see and hear were fairies bowing to her might while endlessly repeating “Oooolooo’Ma, Oooolooo’Ma, Oooolooo’Ma, …”. So she was named.