Heh. Test games... watching those formorians at work is... depressing. I send in a party of seventy something units and my pretender against an indie province, they do so at a different one with four formorians and twenty some spearmen. I lose a half dozen units, they lose... one spearman. Heeheehoho.
so very screwed >_<... also, first time I've really tested misfortune scales. Even... even Misfortune 1 is kinda' intensely painful. Capital's already been hit with five bad events and the first year isn't even done yet, and my other provinces are starting to get crapped on, too. Looks like I may be reconsidering scales in the near future :V
E: And yeah, astral on those pike critters would probably be a terrible idea. Honestly, I wouldn't be trying to build a bless for that nation
at all, except maybe some E for the casters -- their flying sacred guys are kinda' junk, and my first thought is that the only thing that would really make them approach competative would be taking advantage of the stormpower and darkvision... somehow (and considering all the formorians are 50% darkvision, probably not even that would manage).
I mean, they're flying, yes, and they're sacred, yes, but they're human/birdman and squishy with average combat stats (on top of crap defense) in a game where... most everything that's a legitimate threat (sorry, other human/hoburg nations. Those of us without formorian bruisers are in for a mess
) isn't going to be either, average combat stats isn't going to cut it, and sub-par defense is how you fall over dead to 20+ strength formorians.
I don't think any of the defensive blesses are going to make enough of a difference, for
any of the human/hoburg level sacreds. Go offensive if you go for major bless at all. The pike guys are at least as cheap as mine and also recruit anywhere, so you might even consider a major blood just so you at least get
something from them as they die in droves -- and the strength buff might help some vs. those prot 18 formorians in particular, which are copious and plentiful. Fire might indeed be a good option for the extra repel, as mentioned (not that it's going to help
that much -- most of the formorian access nations have troops with long spears, which means the pike length is only going to help so much) and extra damage.