Okay Roger sent two of these cause of alittle mishap he added a few things onto my old one some quotes from the discussion that he took in part as a whole. I wanted to redo the whole thing and I did, but he already sent the other version while I was working on another and when I finished with it I passed it on to him and he told me he sent the other but sent that one in anyways. Niether have gone up and this still isnt the completely version I want to get the unit GIF's in there I just need to stick the URL's in if I can find out what they are. But for I guess the most updated version here goes cause it seems its gonna take awhile before it gets processed.
The Lizard Strategy
Original draft by Shadows Oasis, retyped by Roger the RampantWell I love these guys they can be so much fun, but a lot of people find them very difficult to play. They’re much like the Azracs where they are the best on their own turf, the problem is their own turf is the water. So if there’s not enough of it your gonna find yourself at a disadvantage.
HeroesSpell Casterslizards/frogs have naturally low defense and resistance, so they'll use up too many training points to upgrade, spells will boost that, and the water book, which you should have all four spheres in no matter what, has very damaging spells such as hail storm, geyser, and ice shards.Also you'd want to strive for spell casting five. While training your hero or leader, slack back on the attack, focus on defense and resistance a bit, strive for spell casting IV or V, just don’t neglect defense. The spells you'll be able to use will counter the weak attack, but it don’t mean jack if you can kill a horde but get struck down by a few swordsmen. I usually start off with spell casting II, make my attack 5, then pour what’s left into defense. Next level, up the defense some more then go for spell casting, resistance needs to be boosted along the way, but your greatest fear in the beginning of the game is really being hit by a blade and not a spellAnother thing that’s good to do is when your start off and it ask you to choose a spell, close it without choosing a spell, then click on your hero’s spell casting ability and look at what spells you already know, then go to the Magic tab, click the research button and research any spell you wish to add on, this is helpful for if you already have Ice Shards from the start you don’t need to research another spell and its good to research something else like water healing. Adjust the tab on researching I usually start off with something around 5 income, 10 research, this is possible with spell casting II, this will research things in twice the time as you would with spell casting I and keep the same income, the main importance is not income its getting the spells out, you can pour more into research if you can find some mana crystals early, don’t hinder your casting by having very little mana “banked”. Also if your going to research Ice Shards you can set it to 4/11 this will actually bring it out one turn sooner, main thing is to play with the tab to find a place where its suited for the income you need to cast spells, but will make your spells come out faster. The income/research is up to your discretion and style of playMelee HerosLizard have naturally low attack and resistance, but this doesn’t mean you cant make a Super hero out of him, on maps where there isn’t enough water for the use of spells like vortex, water walking, and flood, the Melee hero is the better optionItems found in caves and ruins will greatly help the low defense and damage, also note though any item that helps a melee hero will help a spell-casting hero, so often if you have the right items you can have both.In most maps that feature lizardmen you’ll have decent amount of water to use them. Also all maps that come with AOW that feature Lizardmen have good amounts of water, but when it comes to maps made by players you’ll find some that have Lizardmen without any water.Melee Super Heros are always dangerous no matter what race, they’re just harder to achieve with some, if Spell casting isn’t your thing then don’t worry about getting it as Lizardmen, because even though it is harder for a Lizard Hero to become a super hero it is still possible.Spells take a lot of turns to come out if you don’t manage them well, also unless you happen to be lucky on the items, which isn’t really that rare just have to beat the others to the items, you’ll need support troops with you this may or may not hinder you, in fact sometimes its actually more helpful but most of the times it’ll slow your spread across the map while a super hero can single handedly run around the map claiming things.
General HerosLizardmen have low defense and resistance but whether you choose to train your hero as a Melee hero or a Spell Caster it’s a hindrance in a stat that you should have whether you’re a spell caster or melee hero.The low resistance and defense becomes more clearly evident in warlocks rules where most lizard men start off with 1 def and 1 resist. But the attack and damage are also capped and limited as well so in Warlocks rules its better to use a spell caster in a normal game its up to you.Higher-level spells take awhile to come out; this can be easily countered if you learn how to adjust the tab and control mana income. But you’ll have to experiment in Single Player before you go out and try to make a quick acting spell caster. If your not sure you can get the spells you want out before the game is over, your better not making a real spell caster a hybrid or melee hero is good. Personally I prefer hybrids.Always try to have atleast 6 attack and 5 damage, this doesn’t take much to achieve and really last you awhile. Also you can have 5 attack and 4 damage with enchanted weapon boosting it that would give you the 6 attack and 5 damage. Seeing as most hero’s start off with 5 attack you can get these from the start.Spells, Spells, Spells!Flood: this is why you need the big spell casting, spell casting I or II ain’t gonna cut it, you want to get this spell out as early as you can. Hit the magic tab, in the Main menu click the Power Distribution button, and move the adjuster towards research, away from mana. Play with the power adjustment to speed up research, cast the Flood spell as soon as possible, this will cause the seas and rivers to overflow in a few turns which means you just expanded your territory. These guys own the water, the more there is of it, the better off you are. Also on the plus side, shipyards need to be placed near water and any existing shipyard when this is cast will be floating in the water, so the owner’s troops can’t get to it unless they can fly or swim. Cast haste on a frog rider and it hops around claiming everybody’s shipyards. That said, don’t be foolish enough to just send one because they might be guardedIce Shards: 4 attack, 4 damage, repetition 3 and long range means a ranged attack that can do up to 12 damage (I've killed many warlords with this spell so don’t knock it, also with spell casting V you can cast it six turns in a row before running out of channeling points) This spell is also a dragon killer. Dragons have high defense, it doesn’t matter, the shards if they hit will do 4 damage anyway so it'll take out 4,8,12 damage every time it’s cast, just takes a few of these to hit ‘em where it hurts mostHail Storm: this spell is very useful. You can skip it, but you must get ice shards and flood, and since ya need to research two lvl 3 spells to be able to research lvl 4 spells ya might as well get this sucker, it does 5 attack 5 damage long range repetition 3 in a seven hex area, plus it does wall damage, its a mana eater though (with spell casting V it still leaves you 20 channelling points to wreck havoc with). This spell requires at least spell casting III to cast because its a combat spell that uses 30 channeling points (ouch) but it does the job, and if you don’t want to use it against units you can take out three wall hexes with it, and you will take them out and it leaves a big hole for your troops to march inVortex: you'll want this spell as lizardmen, for any other race its pointless because you’re better off sending a powerful flyer or another boat to clash with it. This spell does a lot of damage to one hex, save it for boats not other flying units, most of the time it'll hit with 9 damage on boats which means if you have spell casting V you can do 18 damage and leave a dragonship very weak for your boats to attack. Yes, your boats - just coz your units are all mighty water treaders doesn’t mean they can stand up to boats. Boats have a lot of health and can take down most lizardmen units, so it’s always good to have a dragonship or two for backup, killing off boats. This can also be used for dragons coming in and trying to fly over your waters. I suggest combining haste with this spell. Your hero comes in, does it’s damage to whatever units are there and swims away before it gets attacked.Geyser: Attacks twice and the target doesn’t need to be in direct range. It doesn’t do a lot of damage and in FC walls aren’t counted in. I don’t take this spell personally but in TC it can sometimes have its advantages because it can hit units hiding behind the walls. I find the other spells more useful, but this spell has its uses.Frost beam: This spell has a high attack rate (8) but low damage (3), do to the fact it does cold damage though and has an area affect it can freeze most units and turn them into an ice cube. This spell can be fun but other spells are useful, can be handy in TC again its fault is in FC though. Also, it doesn’t work very well against undead and frostling units. (Frostling units either have cold immunity or cold protection, all Frostlings have cold protection but some of their creatures have immunity. All undead units have cold protection and some are Immune to it)Liquid Form: Okay this spell will seriously boost your defenses. Now it can be dispelled, but any attacking units that don’t have a cleric or a hero with them, it basically doubles your hitpoints coz you only take half physical damage. Now like I said, spells and bolts it’s not gonna help ya with, but you can always heal yourself with healing water. Unfortunately the swimming ability doesn’t help lizards, but who cares it’s just good for the physical protectionWater Walking: it only takes two spells of each level to advance to the next, I usually take up water walking and Vortex as my level 2 spells. Water walking will help you because it allows non-swimming units to walk on the water so this doesn’t slow your already swimming lizard units down, any non-lizard hero would do good with this on as they can supplement your army without slowing them down by having to only use land. Like wise Liquid form also gives swimming but has a much higher mana upkeep. Its more efficient to cast water walking on a group of units the liquid form, the mana needed to keep multiple liquid forms active can really hinder you. This spell also requires less mana to cast, but it doesn’t give the Physical protection status that Liquid form provides, Liquid form is much better.Healing Water: Undoubtedly one of the best spells, it completely heals a unit. Great for running around killing things, you can use it to completely heal yourself in battle or heal yourself while running to the next city to conquer. Note a lot of players choose not to get the spell cause of the unfairness it creates.Strengths and weaknesses of different units
I didn’t mention the level 1 units because there basic units with swimming added to them.Giant turtles (turtle ballista, turtle catapult):These guys will rule the game if you manage to pull flood out they already have the advantage over most ballistae cause they can just cross the river and strike cities from behind instead of going through the bridges. Now the only thing that you have to fear once flood is out is flyers, and let me ask have ya ever sent a group of flyers head on into a wall of ballistae? It ain’t pretty, once flood is out that limits more units from surface cities coming to the rescue, and your ballistae now getta go play in the water and cut right to cities even faster then before. These guys make great body guards, keep your leader back, cast spells at oncoming units, and your ballistae impaling anything else that comes close, while your catapults bust their walls open. One or two frog riders for back up melee support might be helpful, but that’s if the enemy ever gets close enough. Most of the times, unless it’s Warlords or other big crush units like that, they get stomped flat by incoming javelins. You may think this hinders your hero increasing levels but actually it doesn’t coz you most likely take out a unit every turn with your spells. I’m not saying you definitely will, I’m just saying you’re likely to. It’s the same for melee heroes, unless of course they send em single-handed with no back up at you, heh 10 defense means the ballistae hit max every time, and so will ice shards, which means they are in for a lot of hurt when these things contact. Although they make great backup support too if your trying to move cross land they can hinder you because of there low movement points, but there great if you have enough water to just walk into the city by swimming into it. If there isn’t any water on the map turtles are the same as regular siege units accept they can be dominated and healed. 3 ballistae, 2 catapults, and 3 frog riders or Wyverns, are my ideal Lizardmen stack they can break down the walls and hit hard.
Basilisk:What, you expect to win the entire game on siege troops only? Basilisks are great ranged backup, huge health and doom gaze are goodies, plus they can actually strike back when attacked head on. You might want to replace a few turtle ballistae with these guys once they pop out. Also there night vision makes them great for underground exploring, accompanied by a few salamanders they can be a good underground exploring unit.
Wyverns: These guys are just overpowered goblin riders, and I love em. Turtles take a while to get there but can be produced faster and deal more damage, but their movement points can prove to be a hindrance. This is Wyverns kick in, they make great scouts, can take cities quite easily, and poison strike is a good thing to have ... poison is deadly, but common. Having a few of these to fly ahead of you and take out nuisances is good. These guys are strong flyers; if you cast haste on these it’s even better. They have high health (12) compared to most of the other level 3 flyers this alone makes them one of the best flyers. Wyverns are great in multiplayer for the fact they can move fast, and are pretty strong flyers that can last awhile, a stack of turtles is undoubtedly more powerful but wyverns can get there faster. Sometimes movement is better then power, sometimes its not, in most cased the quick movement of Wyverns make them good for taking out cities and getting them on the scene quicker. They move 5 hexes more then a turtle that is a big difference. If your choosing to use a Melee hero these guys can provide support that wont slow you down and if they do it isn’t by much.
Lurkers: These guys can play some nasty hit and run games. There usefulness is also increased if you can bring flood out. They have water concealment, which makes them ideal for guarding water nodes and taking shipyards. You can also use them as what I like to call them hidden “mines” having a group of them hiding near your territory and just wait till something heads out into the water then leap on them, they’ll never know what hit them (unless they have true seeing of course). Either way rogues and assassins are limited to forest, these guys are limited to water, flood expands the water what else can you want? They have there down sides though; unlike the rogue and assassin they lack a ranged attack and are clearly open in site while on land, but they do have poison strike and have high damage (6). Also they have low movement does hinder them moving across the map but since your using the water as a way to move them its not that hindering.
Frog Riders: These guys can be quick although they don’t have the movement points of normal cavalry, they do have swimming which can make up for it. I suggest getting these guys out first as they can conquer cities quicker and bring in the much-needed income faster then the turtles. You can opt for going for siege weaponry first, but these guys can get some cities early on faster, also they make great support troops for your turtles. Turtles have low defense and resistance so they are more often then not in trouble when something gets at melee with it. Frog Riders can be used to divert fire and take out anything that gets near them. I suggest firing on something and if its low on health use the Frog riders to run up and kill them. Most of the time by the time something gets near your ballistae your turtles would have taken it out but big crush units like Warlords and Titans will have the health and defense to make it through, but a few Frog Riders can take out the wounded Warlords and Titans. Frog Riders are not strong, and cannot take a Warlord or Titan straight out, but if the Warlord has low health, that’s a different story. Also if there isn’t any water on the map it is often better to produce these guys instead of turtles because of the swiftness factor, turtles are only swift if they have enough water to use it as a short cut.
Lizard Shamans:Shamans are not much more then average priest with the ability to swim which is a great bonus, Also noted that since turtles are the only siege troops that can be healed they prove excellent support for turtles as they can heal the wounded ones.
Salamanders:These guys get a lot of bad press, but are can prove useful underground, the fact that they have fire immunity means that they can cross lava, and there high attack (7) gives them a strong chance of igniting a unit and giving it burning. Also fire immunity forces red dragons into melee combat with them. Mostly these guys are to helpful underground, an underground unit is something that is desperately needed by the lizardmen the Salamander is a sort of reprieve from that, although they cant cause a lot of damage they do have a strong chance of hitting.
DiplomacyBeing neutral allows these guys to flex very much on their allies, which is good, you want to ally yourself with an underground race, dwarves or goblins, so you can scout the underground more quickly. If you get flood out quickly and use good strategies the surface is yours, but you’re screwed underground, you need to be on good terms with another race to help out here. You just pop units out from the underground, use their units in a mix with a few of your own. Basilisks, wyverns and salamanders are your only useful underground units, ballistae can be used down here too, but they’re just plain ol' ballistae crawling in the dirt down there, they only shine topside.
Spell SpheresYou must have all four water spheres if available, and most maps lizardmen will play do, I also suggest getting at least one air sphere, more would be better, but you really only need one. On a 7 sphere map I usually play 4 water 3 air, you don’t really need life cause water will allow you to heal, turn undead is available to shamen, bless is very beneficial so you might want to take a life tile just for that. Other than that you can just go all out air, if you want to take death instead, dark gift will increase your damage a bit but you’re really just relying on spells if you follow this so it’s not needed. You can take up earth and get stone skin to help with the slacking defense, but for that you just get bless and boost resistance as well, stoning...weaker form of ice shards, why would you take it? Gold rush and entangle are the only good things available from earth as Lizardmen, and those aren’t really needed when you can freeze things for more mana but open up the water book for flood earlier, so I'd stick with Water and Air, and maybe one life for bless. Air has a lot of useful spells. Haste will let your troops cross the water faster and wind walking helps a lot. Chain lightning is good for when the enemy gets too close and you get paranoid, but I usually don’t bother using it. Unless it’s a group of units I really gotta fear, like two warlords closing in on me, but then again the ballistae usually blast em away, when two or three warlords get close it’s good to use chain lightning. You hope it bounces to the others, then have the ballistae pick off whichever weren’t stunned. Next turn you can either frag em or repeat the process
Just a little side not for those of you reading this, I figured out a little method to make the AI choose what spells you want to cast in combat. If you learn chain lightning the computer will always cast it because it causes damage to multiple units. When playing PBEM avoid learning chain lightning so you can use the more damage Ice Shards instead, unless of course you want the stun of chain lightning, but chain lightning doesn’t often kill, while Ice Shards more then often does. By limiting the spells you can use in combat you force the AI to cast only spells you want it to cast. It will try to cast hail storm to break the wall but since this can only be done once its up to you whether you still want to research it or not. Also, you can choose another level 3 spell which proves quite useful like Fountain of life, or healing shows that will heal your entire party and restore the land to fertile grassland, can counter the path of decay from Reapers.Note: If you have three types of tile (e.g. 4 water, 2 air, 1 life) then you can earn mana income from those three types of node. If you only take two types of tile (e.g. 4 water and 3 air) that is one less node type that gives you income. Roger the RampantI had to redo much of this to make it as general as I possibly could, I would like to thank Roger for reviewing it and fixing whatever spelling errors. I also cleaned it up and made it better. I would also like to thank Frogman who might have unknowingly helped in the creation of this, the original draft was based too much on my personal opinions although they still have not changed, he caused me to make it more general and lessen the opinions in it, I would also have taken all my opinions completely out if it was not for Roger the Rampant who also helped me decided what to edit and what to not, Thank you both whether you knew you helped or not.
People follow the light, blinded by just cause, but what has the light brought them? It has only caused me pain, while the darkness embraced me and kept me deep within its shadows away from my pursuers and made them suffer for their crimes against meInto darkness, into night, amoungst the shadows we shall fight
[This message has been edited by ShadowsOasis (edited 09-14-2001 @ 00:12 AM).]