Archmage 101 - Nether Mages

[sperm]

1 turns per 2 mins--> More turns, more attack, more land... Faster way to go up.

Some simple hints and tips for beginners...
1. Wine of the three whips is a must item to have, if others are betting too much for Ash, carpet or even oil flask... Then Wine is your investment. Trust me, you will need this item more than ever.

2. Dread knight and Crypt keeper are a must heroes. Animate dead, necromancy are very helpful abilities... When your Dreadknight has Unholy aura, then thats really an added bonus, coz most of your units have weakness to attack type holy. Some heroes to have are Necromancer or soul reaper (Get the Necro and drop the soul).

3. Spells that should be running in your country... Concentration, Shroud of Darkness... and Black Sabbath (increase your mana production)--> So basically, nether mages need more towns and farms rather than nodes. Well, the thing with black sabbath is, it gives you free zombies and skeletons. They can be a an advantage or disadvantage... Some nether mages tend to keep zoms and disband skels.  If your using zombies, then make it your top stack, more like a "shock absorber" and the damage doers are the 2nd to 4th stack creatures. Some of the nether mages too just disbands them, not worth keeping--> this could be a hassle because you just keep on disbanding. By the way, When logging off, make sure to reserve 7 turns and cast mind bar... this is an added protection for incoming spells.

4. monostacking is great, but if you reach 3K land, you might try running 4 stacks, reach 4K land, then 6 stacks and so on... 10stacks is preffered.

5. Your targets... Now this is the fun part. Ascendant and Verdant mages are likely to be your target. White, most of them run mono AAs or Doms, fat land... You can either milk a white mage or you can go Mass wraith, cast invisibility on attack--> the thing is to inflict a lot of damage in your first attack, it doesn't matter if many AAs survive, this is a guaranteed win! Attacking verdant can be tricky, its either thier top stack is phoenix or the all powerful treants... if you are going head to head with treants, you need to Flame blade+Ash; however Flame blade will just do the trick... You can use Horned Demons..> the additional strike is really great! plus they have a decent attack and HP. If you're planning to attack Reds, then you Head of Medusa+ Lich combo.

6. You are the only color that can power up so much!!!

[javierea]

if you are going head to head with treants, you need to Flame blade+Ash

Treants have the lowest iniciative, you should use oil flasks better or spider web (so Treants don´t attack). Anyway, I wouldn´t plan to atack a Verdant mage who is using treants unless it´s a counter.

[javierea]

If you're planning to attack Reds, then you Head of Medusa+ Lich combo.

Lich + Ash works even better. And use unholies on the 2stack to maximize damage. Just remember to get rid of the unholies after attaking :golpeado:

[sperm]

Well, another note... in dealing with treants its always best to pair them with Lich. Lich is one the most dependable unit of a Black mage... with 95% melee resist. but try to lower them down on defense coz you might get a lot of white attacks.

Anyway, coming up soon... How to cast Contract of the Soul without the hassles of recovering. Hehehe... Still on the testing phase though.

[sperm]

I think they already fixed the geld bug... aww

[sperm]

Well... Still not done testing COS... Did not do what I hoped for.

Well, I guess you need to zero out your pop for the devil prince to leave or use a 3 days worth of turn.

[plutohu]

I used this stacking in the original Mari magewars.  During one stretch I blocked 48 out of 49 white attacks.  So I think it's pretty good.  Basically I hunted whites solely, hoping that greens don't attack me.  The stacking is as follows:

1. Zombies
2. Efreeti (second best holy absorber after zombie)
3. Lich (no need to mention these two)
4. Mind Rippers
5. Vampires (these blood suckers are safe here)
6. Sirenes (can kill a couple of dominions)
7. Dark Elvan Magician (very underrated)
8. Nymphs (can kill one dominion)
9. salamanders
10.  hellhounds (these two to clean up some opponent fodders)

10 stacks is highly recommended as would many other players.  When attacking or defending, always cast Blood Curse to stop resurrection.  Vial of Venom is good against white but here my stacking doesn't have many melee units, so it's not efficient.  I usually didn't use any items at all coz the constant white attacks will exhaust them really fast anyways.  

Like I said this is stacking is very vulnerable to greens as treants would demolish the zombies and phoenix slaughtering the efreeti.  But there is never a perfect stacking anyways and considering the frequency of the white and green attacks then this stacking is still preferable.  

This stacking is OK against blues, but you have to make a couple of changes.  First efreeti will be eaten up by mind rippers so you should move your own Lich, Mind Rippers, and Vampires up, moving efreeti to fifth.  Against the ice elementals one would think increasing the # of salamanders and hellhounds would be a good idea.  But the fact that they are weak against cold makes it really uncertain.  If they hit the ices first, u win.  If the ices hit your salamanders, you opponent wins.  
Anyhow the following stacking is above average against blue:

1. Zombie
2. Lich
3. Mind Rippers
4. Vampires (these two can switch with each other, but vampires have the flying modifier, so probably Vampires in 3rd)
5. Efreeti
6. Sirene
7. Salamanders
8. Hellhounds
9. Dark Elvan Magician
10. Nymphs

Make sure you don't use chimeras against blue.  Sure they kill ice like flies but mind rippers can easily kill your whole stack of chimeras.  You can't take the chance.  

Last but not least, from my personal experience, demon knights do not absorb holy attacks as well as expected.  So I used efreeti instead of them.  But I guess you could try demon knights yourself if you want.

Different opinions are welcome as this stacking by no means is even close to perfect.  Please give me your thoughts or even the result using this stacking.

[/Forgiver\]

I used this stacking in the original Mari magewars.  During one stretch I blocked 48 out of 49 white attacks.  So I think it's pretty good.  Basically I hunted whites solely, hoping that greens don't attack me.  The stacking is as follows:

1. Zombies
2. Efreeti (second best holy absorber after zombie)
3. Lich (no need to mention these two)
4. Mind Rippers
5. Vampires (these blood suckers are safe here)
6. Sirenes (can kill a couple of dominions)
7. Dark Elvan Magician (very underrated)
8. Nymphs (can kill one dominion)
9. salamanders
10.  hellhounds (these two to clean up some opponent fodders)

10 stacks is highly recommended as would many other players.  When attacking or defending, always cast Blood Curse to stop resurrection.  Vial of Venom is good against white but here my stacking doesn't have many melee units, so it's not efficient.  I usually didn't use any items at all coz the constant white attacks will exhaust them really fast anyways.  

Like I said this is stacking is very vulnerable to greens as treants would demolish the zombies and phoenix slaughtering the efreeti.  But there is never a perfect stacking anyways and considering the frequency of the white and green attacks then this stacking is still preferable.  

This stacking is OK against blues, but you have to make a couple of changes.  First efreeti will be eaten up by mind rippers so you should move your own Lich, Mind Rippers, and Vampires up, moving efreeti to fifth.  Against the ice elementals one would think increasing the # of salamanders and hellhounds would be a good idea.  But the fact that they are weak against cold makes it really uncertain.  If they hit the ices first, u win.  If the ices hit your salamanders, you opponent wins.  
Anyhow the following stacking is above average against blue:

1. Zombie
2. Lich
3. Mind Rippers
4. Vampires (these two can switch with each other, but vampires have the flying modifier, so probably Vampires in 3rd)
5. Efreeti
6. Sirene
7. Salamanders
8. Hellhounds
9. Dark Elvan Magician
10. Nymphs

Make sure you don't use chimeras against blue.  Sure they kill ice like flies but mind rippers can easily kill your whole stack of chimeras.  You can't take the chance.  

Last but not least, from my personal experience, demon knights do not absorb holy attacks as well as expected.  So I used efreeti instead of them.  But I guess you could try demon knights yourself if you want.

Different opinions are welcome as this stacking by no means is even close to perfect.  Please give me your thoughts or even the result using this stacking.

:blink:  :blink:  :blink:  

[sperm]

hmm... Thats cool stack man. Well, in mega blitz there are lots of green mages on top. Currently right now, im trying out a stack but kinda hesitant co'z if I get pounded My hero might get killed.. anyway, this might do the trick to defend against green.

Wraith
Lich
Efreeti
Horned Demons
Salamander
Vampire
Chims
ghouls
Drayds
Zoms

Well, from Vampires below... they are fodder killers well you can replace zoms with DEM or Sirenes. These stack really consumes a lot of MP, well balance pop eaters and geld.

[Hisoka]

 

[sperm]

The stack that I suggest... Don't mind it, there will be not enough wraith to support your top stack. Anyway, I have tried revising the stack.. So here it goes.

Zombies
Lich
Efreeti
Vampire
Horned Demons - Damage doers
Salamander - Damage doers
Chims - fodder killers
Sirenes - Fodder killers
Ghouls
Dryads or Soul speaker

You can go head to head with a green mage... Flame blade/Candles or FB/Oil or Kiss of the Vampire/candles

You need to cast Touch of necromancy to be running in your country since you are using Zombies as your top stack.