So I DLed Master of Magic...

[Dulahan]

...And holy crap do I suck! (And this in spite of being a MOO and Civ player!)

I'm starting to get the feeling that turtling and slow, ponderous expansion is probably a bad idea for one. And I'm not sure just what I'm doing to begin with.

Ermm... So, hints? Tips? About the only thing I could figure out to do the one time I have been attacked so far was summon armies of spectral warriors to save my outnumbered butt.

[Matt David T.]

...And holy crap do I suck! (And this in spite of being a MOO and Civ player!)

I'm starting to get the feeling that turtling and slow, ponderous expansion is probably a bad idea for one. And I'm not sure just what I'm doing to begin with.

Ermm... So, hints? Tips? About the only thing I could figure out to do the one time I have been attacked so far was summon armies of spectral warriors to save my outnumbered butt.

In the realtime combat, defense in 95% of the time your best option. That is to say, unless you've got a very good reason to do so, it's generally better to position your troops and let the enemy attack you.

That's it for the moment, I'm at work. But when I get home, I'll try and compile a good list of tips.

[Afterburner]

...And holy crap do I suck! (And this in spite of being a MOO and Civ player!)

I'm starting to get the feeling that turtling and slow, ponderous expansion is probably a bad idea for one. And I'm not sure just what I'm doing to begin with.

Ermm... So, hints? Tips? About the only thing I could figure out to do the one time I have been attacked so far was summon armies of spectral warriors to save my outnumbered butt.

Capturing neutral towns is a key component of a winning strategy. Capturing neutral towns will give you access to racial abilities and units (both general and race-specific) that you won't have with your starting race. (Example: In my current game, my starting race is the Nomads. They don't have Engineers, so they can't build roads. So it behooves me to capture a neutral city of a race that can produce Engineers.)

Capturing neutral cities also serves as a key component of early expansion, since many neutral cities are connected by a pre-existing road network. And since most cities are going to be easier to take over than a lair or temple or other monster hideout.

Phantom units (Phantom Warriors, Phantom Beast, etc) do not get their "ignore armor" special ability vs. undead.

Food works differently in MOM than in the Civ games. Food is used to support units, not grow your population. If you have a food shortage, there is no stockpile to burn through, even if you have granaries. You'll simply lose units until the food shortage is relieved.

If two cities are connected via road, they get a 0.5% trade bonus if they're the same race, and a 3.0% trade bonus if they're not.

Long-range units are invaluable in combat. Don't leave home without some.

[Dulahan]

What's a good early build strategy? Should I use Housing until a certain point? Or should I start cranking out other stuff immediately?

[Afterburner]

What's a good early build strategy? Should I use Housing until a certain point? Or should I start cranking out other stuff immediately?

Granary first. Pop growth in MOM works like pop growth in MOO. Granaries increase your growth rate, and are therefore crucial for cranking out settlers in a timely fashion.

Also build a small army of early units. Some ranged units if you can, but at least a couple swordsmen units and some spearmen. Then set them off to conquer small neutral outposts with only a few defenders.

Sawmills are like early factories, and will increase your production output, so they're handy to build as well.

[Matt David T.]

Oh, and if you're nature at all, Sprites rule the early game with an iron fist due to their lovely ranged-ness.

[Dulahan]

OK, so my sort of juggernaught ended with me conquering two High Men cities (I'm nomads) and on an island....

Wiz stats as follows

6 Sorcery
2 Chaos
Archmage
Sorcery Master
Charismatic


But beyond that? Any way to heal units? I took a mauling for some units in my last attack on a city, so a lot of them only have 1 hit left.

[Weltenreiter]

*Grabs Dulahan and prepares to perform Evil Yoga TM on him*

How did you get it to run on XP? Spill it! :D

[Afterburner]

But beyond that? Any way to heal units? I took a mauling for some units in my last attack on a city, so a lot of them only have 1 hit left.

Life magic has all the heal spells. So you're SOL there.

However, units heal over time if they don't move. Certain units and heroes have the "Natural Healing" ability, which increases the heal rate. Damaged units stacked with Natural Healers will regain 20% of their health per turn, in addition to whatever else they might recover due to other effects, standard healing rates, etc.

High Men and Nomads have Priests, which have this ability. Priests can also cast a heal spell during battle. (Only once per Priest unit, however.)

Shrine -> Temple -> Parthenon will get you Priests.

Since you've taken Sorcery, you'll wanna eventually research Enchant Roads. Enchanted roads give infinite movement, like railroads in the Civ games.

[Dulahan]

*Grabs Dulahan and prepares to perform Evil Yoga TM on him*

How did you get it to run on XP? Spill it! :D

DOS Box.

[Afterburner]

Dulahan: Here's a suggestion for your next game, btw.

Start off with the Orcs as your race. The orcs have no restricted buildings. They can build all buildings available in the game, and can build all standard units available in the game.

That will give you a better idea of what you're giving up when you select races with restricted buildings. Some of the races with significant combat bonuses (Trolls, Dwarves, Gnolls) are really hampered in their ability to contribute to the greater empire since they can't build any (or very few) of the higher-level structures.

[Kevin J Chase]

The most important thing to learn is that you won't have the cash to maintain every upgrade in every city <em>and</em> keep a real army in the field. For most cities, local defence can be handled by a few Halbardiers (or whatever else comes out of an Armory) with either archers or wizard magic backing them up.

For the field armies, consider which races you expect to do most of your fighting, then produce one or two cities of each (more on a huge map) dedicated to producing soldiers. These few cities are the ones that get the War Colleges and Fantastic Stables. These cities should be next to Mithril or Adamantium deposits &mdash; that +1 per figure adds up <em>fast</em>, and means they don't need magic weapons to hit most opponents.

After a certain point, your heroes will be the kings of the battlefield, but you have to keep them alive long enough to get to that point. If you have any ability with artificing at all, deck them out with magical goodies. A few +1s here and there will keep them alive.

Finally, bank every bit of mana you can into Skill, since this is what limits your Wizard's casting ability more than anything else. You have to get enough skill that you can buff your troops before battle and still have enough left to solve whatever problems your opponent sends your way.

Finally, there are a few tricks to watch out for:
<strong>Paladins</strong> are good fighters and <em>immune</em> to magic. Give them mithril and that air spell that protects against arrows and precious few armies can deal with them.
<strong>Adamantium Slingers</strong>, or any other Halfling unit. These guys cram nine soldiers into a space normally occupied by six Humans. Since the Adamantium gives +2 per <em>figure</em>, they dump their normal hefty attack +<em>18</em> damage every time they fire. These guys are why you enchanted those Paladins.
<strong>Undead War Trolls</strong> &mdash; the dark channels prevents them from healing, but it doesn't prevent their magical regeneration. &ldquo;They just won't stay dead!&rdquo;
<strong>Artificer</strong> is a cheat if you combine it with, IIRC, Archmage. Add up their bonuses and you're producing magic items at 25% the normal cost, then breaking them on the mana forge for 50%. 25% profit, every time.
<strong>Enchanted Roads</strong> work both ways. What you see as a private rapid transit network, your enemy sees as a way to nail an undefended city on the other side of the world.

Finally, the Mana Drain overland spell sounds good, but in reality the computer Wizards sit on such enormous stocks of mana that they'll never really feel the squeeze.

[mEGA]

*sigh*

I spotted this thread, and it made me go and download MOM myself. And play it for about 4 hours straight, despite having booted it up "to see if it would work". I love this game so much. My dark elves have about a 1/4 of the plane so far! And my gargoyle armies know no equal (yet, that is, since I've yet to cross into the normal plane).

[Grimn]

Here's a gamebreaking combo:

Halfling
Warlord
Alchemist
The rest in Life books.

You can take the hit in life books in order to start on the other plane but I rarely did. In this package you'll get Ultra-Elite(after they gain exp) Halfling Slingers with magical weapons as your default combat unit. Cheap, fast to produce and utterly overwhelming against most things. You'll have heal at the very least which helps a lot in the early game. If you're lucky you'll get War Altar and... Damn. Can't remember the global Life spell that boosts all of your units exp by one level. Making sure those Ultra-Elite Slingers are even more ridiculous. Take some high men cities to get paladins so you're able to utterly destroy the few units the slingers won't be able to.


With this combo it really is too easy.


Still fun though... :)

[Weltenreiter]

Bah DOSbox, too much hassle.
Back to the drawing board I guess. It MUST be possible to reverse engineer how I got it working on my old XP comp.

[Dulahan]

Bah DOSbox, too much hassle.
Back to the drawing board I guess. It MUST be possible to reverse engineer how I got it working on my old XP comp.


Too much hassle? Seriously?


Just download the program, and drag the MOM Executable onto it... Easier than a ROM...

[AliasiSudonomo]

Another fun build is the Flying Warships of Doom.

You build... whatever the exact name of the best human ocean-going ship there is.

Then you cast flight on 'em. Plus other buffs and a spell lock.

Not only are they good units when you make them fly, not only do they easily transport large stacks, but the AI goes nuts trying to deal with them. :D

[Dulahan]

Whoa... Now there's a roadblock I never expected. City Walls... And Halberdiers guarding them. . Errrrm.... What's the best way to deal with Walls?

[Weltenreiter]

Another fun build is the Flying Warships of Doom.

You build... whatever the exact name of the best human ocean-going ship there is.

Then you cast flight on 'em. Plus other buffs and a spell lock.

Not only are they good units when you make them fly, not only do they easily transport large stacks, but the AI goes nuts trying to deal with them. :DYou forgot to mention invisibility. ('other buffs' doesnt count. :P)

Wheres the fun if they KNOW how/why/where the rocks are coming from. :D

[Weltenreiter]

Whoa... Now there's a roadblock I never expected. City Walls... And Halberdiers guarding them. . Errrrm.... What's the best way to deal with Walls?Flyers. Missile troops. Spells (Flame Strike Goooooo!). Heroes.

[Zweihander]

I don't know if it was mentioned, but most all races have a shaman/priest unit at the top of their early game units. They are capable of healing.

[sys64738]

Halfling slingers rule (tho elven longbows and paladins are darn good as well).

Archer hero with Wind Walk + 7 stacks of slingers FTW. _Maybe_ mix in a melee unit (cf. paladins) for the odd skeleton, tho even stuff that is "immune" to missles is, in actuality, "mostly immune" to missiles.

Green and red magic for Healing and Flameblade.

[VoiceOfIsaac]

Okay, some tips from a longtime MOM veteran. :)

- The halfling/warlord/alchemist/White Magic combo is indeed All Powerful. White is by far the most powerful magic set in the game.

- Don't bother taking Red magic unless you have a lot of spell-casting heroes in your main war-party to take full advantage of it. Red is all about constant attack, and if you can't keep up the constant barrage, it's useless.

- When casting Summon Hero or Summon Champion, save the game one turn before the spell goes off. That way, if you get a totally worthless Hero (of which there are many) or a Hero that doesn't fit in your strategy (a melee fighter when you need a Mage or an Archer, for example), you can reload the saved game and get a different result. If you get another useless hero, Lather, rinse, repeat, until you get one you want.

- Jaer The Wind Mage is extremely useful! This hero is a moderately powerful spellcaster, but his real strength is his inherent Wind Walking power. Slap some movement-boosting spells and magic items on him, and he becomes your Army Caravan. Put a stack of powerful units and heroes with him, and plow a path through the enemy. You WILL appreciate the mobility and speed he gives you. I always use the aforementioned "Get The Hero I Want" trick to get him as soon as I'm able.

- One of the reasons that White is so powerful is because only White casters get access to arguably the nastiest hero in the game: Torin The Chosen. Torin is Combat Mecha-Jesus, Magical Smackdown Buddha and Snake Gandhi, all rolled into one. He has no ranged attack, so equip him with a movement booster to charge into combat, and other magic items of your liking to help his combat, and watch him scythe through your enemies. Best of all, even if he dies, you can bring him back by re-casting the Incarnate spell, and he'll have just as much XP as he did when he first died for your sins.

- Starting on Myrror is a very fun and powerful ability -- but make sure you take the picture of the dragon-mage for your custom character in order to improve the chances of your having Myrror ALL TO YOURSELF for as long as possible. Myrror has richer resources, resources not found in the normal world, and more powerful Nodes. Myrror also has VERY powerful races available: Dark Elves, Dwarves, DragonMen... and two more that I don't recall at the moment. DragonMen are okay, but Dark Elves and Dwarves ROCK. ALL Dark Elf units have a fairly powerful ranged attack, even lowly spearmen, making them very powerful in the early stages of the game. They can also build nearly everything available for cities, and produce Mana for you just by being alive. The downside is that they grow very slowly. They are also the only race to produce Warlocks, a spell-casting unit that can cast DOOM BOLT for free once per battle. Doom Bolt is an attack spell that cannot be blocked or defended against, save by total Magic Immunity, a useful trick against high-defense enemies. Dwarves are the tough buggers you'd expect, but have the additional bonus of being more effective engineers, and having the best Melee unit in the game outside of Paladins -- Hammerhands. Get a squad of mithril/adamantite Hammerhands rolling, and you're set. Don't bother with Golems, they're useless in comparison. Also, Dwarves make money faster than anyone, so you'll never lack for funds.

- wow, that's alot already, I'll stop here - Isaac!

[Wizdoc]

You might want to check out the Complete Master of Magic strategy guide:

http://www.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/game/564960.html

425Kb of MoM goodness. As comprehensive as it can get.

[Peers]

Damn you people for bringing DOS Box to my attention... and here I was hoping to do something productive this weekend...

[Vigorous Ape]

Is there a manual anywhere for this game, because i have never played it and have no idea how to. I'm just looking at these wizards and wondering what the hell the symbols beneath them mean.

[Afterburner]

Is there a manual anywhere for this game, because i have never played it and have no idea how to. I'm just looking at these wizards and wondering what the hell the symbols beneath them mean.

Which wizards on what screen?

Character selection screen?

[Bahama'at]

Is there a manual anywhere for this game, because i have never played it and have no idea how to. I'm just looking at these wizards and wondering what the hell the symbols beneath them mean.Hit the GameFAQs site, link provided upthread.

- Ma'at

[KingoftheAges]

I didn't see anyone else mention it but this is a guranteed game winning strategy.

Put all your books into Life. Then cast Fountain of Life. This will ensure that your population produces insane amounts of gold and are always happy.

[Dulahan]

Ouch, ouch ouch...


I just watched my entire army of two heroes (One a rather powerful one with no stat below ten and a +3 shield), a summoned fire elemental, 2 pikemen, a horse archer, and a halberdier get butchered by one unit of halberdiers defending a city gate...

[Li of Orchid]

Try to capture minor nodes (or whatever the magical mana producing fountains are called... it's been so long I forget) as early as possible in the game. The extra mana boost after capturing your first couple is pretty important.

Expand into the Mirror plane quickly as well, and capture some native cities. Most of the native races of Mirror produce mana as an intrinsic ability, and some of the special units and powers of the races are absolutely out of control. The dragon-men and dark elves come immediately to mind.

Make sure you play a Red magic heavy wizard at some point. There's nothing quite like casting all of your world-destroying spells all at once and watching the resulting havoc.

[Vigorous Ape]

OKay i found the r-click to be quite useful. What's the difference between a guardian spirit and a magic spirit, they seem to do the same thing?

[Xenon_Wulf]

A guardian spirit is harder to remove than a regular spirit, as they can be removed by an opponent's spirit.

[Allon]

Congrats for getting one of the best games EVAR btw...

edit: Try to stay away from Skydrakes...

[Yessod]

Ouch, ouch ouch...
I just watched my entire army of two heroes (One a rather powerful one with no stat below ten and a +3 shield), a summoned fire elemental, 2 pikemen, a horse archer, and a halberdier get butchered by one unit of halberdiers defending a city gate...

Sounds like you got pretty unlucky.

City gates basically add on to the defense of people behind them. This mens you should direct missile fire at the enemies in the center of the town, until you are about to get up to the gate. Then direct fire on the unit in the gate. If you can, try to have a powerful cavalry unit (like paladins, or a hero) with high defense make the initial attack. Charge in, attack them, then move in once they're down. You'll get attacked by everyone in the town, but they'll no longer have the benefit of the walls, which can make a difference.

Halberdiers are about the roughest unit the computer builds in Neutral cities, except in rare circumstances. You may not be able to take that neutral city for a bit. It sounds like you're playing nomads; your pikemen are an extremely effective melee unit, particularly through walls. Just remember that they'll take really bad losses; their benefit is armor-piercing. Let them attack, then pull back. Keep cycling which one is fighting. A group with half its figures will nearly always suffer horribly against a group with all its figures.

Use magic. They're a neutral town, so you have that edge. Send in some summoned units if you can summon units. Particularly if you can get some gargoyles in there you've got a good chance, the gargoyles can fly right over the walls, attack from the back, and since they're flying and have high defense, should not have many dying problems. Combine them with a few hellhounds that can race in to the city once the gate is cleared. That fire elemental was probably not too effective against walled opponents, since fire elementals are entirely based around "I do very small attacks to every figure attacking me", and thus have problems against anything really tough (like other summoned critters) or anything with a lot of defense per figure (like anything behind a wall). If you went black, Lycanthropes work great in the early game. White or green, make sure your units are fully buffed, particularly the ones that are spearheading the charge in. Blue, it's all about the phantom warriors. Expendable, deadly... they're great. By the time they die too quickly to be very worthwhile, you can start summoning phantom beasts instead. Think of them as a fireball which gets to walk around and hit things.

Oh, and your heroes? Melee heroes in particular are not too useful their first few levels. Keep them with your troops, and don't let them die. If they get injured, keep them away from the front lines. They'll get xp, and after a bit the good ones will become truly, horrifyingly unstoppable. Keep an eye out for heroes that get a bonus to hit (blademaster), or a bonus to their attack type (arcane power or might), particularly if one or both has a star next to it. High level heroes with super arcane power or super might and a nice weapon can one-shot kill dragons who are immune to their attacks.

[Robovski]

Damn you all. I either never had the money or it was no longer out, and so I never played MOM before today (unlike MoO or CIV).

Now I'm going to have to get to know everything.


At least TheWife(TM is away this week with the Mother-in-Law on a trip to the continent - the computer is all mine!

[Dulahan]

Yeah... It just dawned on me why Phantoms would have been a lot better for attacking the gates than a fire elemental. 4-5 guys with armor piercing, or two with 12 attack and almost as crappy armor. The armor piercing would have let me at least do some damage.


Course now I also need to figure out how to kill that Djinn in a local node. I should darn near almost start over, I started out on a crappy, small island with my city, room for one other, and 2 High Men neutral ones I conquered right quick, and a long way from any other land. Plus no nodes or anything fun, wasn't even a shrine or any ruins on the island!


And I'm finding Charismatic was a waste of points, the Comp declares war on me for no reason and out of nowhere anyways, so why bother?

[Yessod]

Course now I also need to figure out how to kill that Djinn in a local node. I should darn near almost start over, I started out on a crappy, small island with my city, room for one other, and 2 High Men neutral ones I conquered right quick, and a long way from any other land. Plus no nodes or anything fun, wasn't even a shrine or any ruins on the island!


Yeah, that doesn't sound like a very fun start location. Pretty bad, actually. I'd personally restart to a place here you'd have more fun.

As for how to kill Djinns? A good chunk of pikemen should work pretty well. A few gargoyles would probably come in handy as well, or hell hounds. The trick is that since he can fly and teleport (IIRC) he can choose who he attacks, meaning that you don't want to bring heroes or soft units unless they can take him for a round or two. If you send in just pikemen, he'll have to attack dangerous units in H2H. I've found that Djinn tend to cast countermagic with their mana instead of hanging back and bolting, which is the sort of behavior you want to exploit. Gargoyles and Hellhounds could be useful since both can actually attack him. The Hellhounds will drop like flies, but at least they're pretty cheap.


And I'm finding Charismatic was a waste of points, the Comp declares war on me for no reason and out of nowhere anyways, so why bother?

Yeah, Charismatic isn't so useful. There are better picks out there. The main use is half price for mercenaries and merchants selling items, but you need a lot of fame before that's particularly useful.

[Vigorous Ape]

Are there any huge differences between the races? I noticed that Klackons are good production workers and some other race are good farmers, halfings I think.

I'm using High Men and there's only one building they can't build, so what is the difference between them and orcs?

[Afterburner]

Are there any huge differences between the races? I noticed that Klackons are good production workers and some other race are good farmers, halfings I think.

I'm using High Men and there's only one building they can't build, so what is the difference between them and orcs?

The special units. High Men get Pikemen, Warships, and Paladins. Orcs get Wyvern Riders.

Keep in mind that when the manual says "Can't build $FOO," they also can't build any of the structures that require $FOO. Like, Klackons can't build Temples. Which means they also can't build Parthenons or Cathedrals. They can't build Sage Guilds, so they can't build Universities, Banks, Alchemist Guilds, etc.

[Unferth]

Are there any huge differences between the races? I noticed that Klackons are good production workers and some other race are good farmers, halfings I think.

I'm using High Men and there's only one building they can't build, so what is the difference between them and orcs?

Different races get different units. Pretty much every race has a unique unit or two, sometimes more.

High Men get paladins, who are one of the best high-end melee units in the game. Orcs get poisonous wyvern riders. Most races have some advantage or disadvantage that helps shape the way the game plays out - nomads and orcs are probably the most average of the races.

Damn, now this thread has gotten me interested in the game again.

[Yessod]

Are there any huge differences between the races? I noticed that Klackons are good production workers and some other race are good farmers, halfings I think.

I'm using High Men and there's only one building they can't build, so what is the difference between them and orcs?

As I believe someone beat me to saying, the difference is in special units. High Men get Paladins as a special unit, Orcs get Wyvern Riders, Elves get Longbowmen and Elven Lords, Halflings get Slingers, etc. In addition, the units are very slightly different between races. For example, High Men units of Mages have 6 figures per unit instead of 4, High Elven units all have better resistance, Klackon units all have a bonus to their defense, etc.

There are a couple of races that get bonuses to production or farming or gold, like the ones you pointed out above. Races also have different population growth rates. Barbarians and Halflings, for example, get a bonus, while Klackons and Elves get a penalty. A couple of races even produce power based on their population, which can provide a definite edge.

[coeli]

Yeah, Charismatic isn't so useful. There are better picks out there. The main use is half price for mercenaries and merchants selling items, but you need a lot of fame before that's particularly useful.

Charismatic + Famous, on the other hand, can be a worthwhile combo. With a little luck, you can get a kickass hero or two early, which can make a significant difference in the speed with which you can take the first few neutral towns.

[NOTE: I haven't played in a bit, so all the names and such in this are approximate.]

Here's the way I usually play. Land size=small. I make a custom wizard, being sure to pick the draconic dude's portrait. (Ss'ra? Something like that.) Then I make the following picks:

Myrran
Alchemist
Warlord
3 Life spellbooks
either 2 Sorcery or 2 Nature spellbooks

Then (and this is the "clever bit," or taking unfair advantage, your call) I pick Draconians for my race. All my home-city units fly. Thus, I can scout and move much more easily than most opponents. Oh, and by taking the Draconian wizard's portrait and setting up on Mirror, I guarantee a plane to myself, so I (usually) have lots of time and space to expand before my opponents start moving in. Yes, the neutrals and monsters average a bit tougher, but this can be dealt with.

I also like to try to get Jaer the Windlord in order to make moving my main army simple. Failing that, ships, floating islands, flight, or waterwalking let me get from place to place. If I have the flight spell, I tend to make flight amulets so I don't have to futz about recasting it on all my heroes every time somebody gets cute with dispell. I use a lot of ranged-attack troops, and back them up with as few spells as I can get away with until I'm really well-established. (Then I beef up my main army with as many enhancements as I can pile on. Gets expensive, but they become tanks.)

[Afterburner]

Is it just me, or does the cheesy background MIDI music for MOM sound vaguely like "The Bear Went Over The Mountain?"

[Afterburner]

- Starting on Myrror is a very fun and powerful ability -- but make sure you take the picture of the dragon-mage for your custom character in order to improve the chances of your having Myrror ALL TO YOURSELF for as long as possible.

CONSUMER NOTE: If you're running MOM v1.2 or earlier, the above tactic will guarantee that you have Myrror all to yourself.

If you're running the latest patch (v1.31, available here: ftp://ftp.microprose.com/patches/mom/mom131.zip), the above does not guarantee that you have Myrror all to yourself -- any wizard could, concievably, start on Myrror. I think the odds are still in your favor, however.

[Chuk]

Anybody play Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic? It's a lot like a modern update of MoM, but with multiplayer and better graphics. (And I mean a LOT -- there's even Chaos Orbs in it.)

[mEGA]

Even better news: Atari & Stardock are making a MOM2 (http://www.masterofmagic2.com/)!

[Kaiten]

Do you have any idea how much sleep this thread cost me?

Back to my Orcish hordes....

[Dulahan]

Holy gadzooks!

I started over, slightly different stats. But anyways, my starting position was with not one, but TWO diamons in range of my home city, that was 12 gold a turn from the start, and it's only getting higher. Then there was a neutral city that essentially blocked off half the continent for myself! It had diamonds too. It was also halflings (And I had two Life books). Oh, and the second hero I hired? Noble stat. 10 more gold a turn! I'm now cranking out like 70-80 gold a turn (Going slowly downwards now though, since I'm on a war footing). I have an elite Wyvern Riders unit that is running rampant over some barbarian cities across the ocean on its own. Damn....


Shame I still can't take a tower.. And can no longer afford to try since I have a constant stream of enemy troops coming after me.


Edit: Oh yes, and I'm nomads, so I get a money bonus from the get go!

[Vigorous Ape]

For the road trade bonus does it matter who controls the joined cities? Do I get a bonus for connecting to computer cities/my own cities?

I'm playing High Men at the moment and going for peaceful expansion. What race goes well with apocalypse destruction and hell-razing?

[Afterburner]

For the road trade bonus does it matter who controls the joined cities? Do I get a bonus for connecting to computer cities/my own cities?

No. Yes.


I'm playing High Men at the moment and going for peaceful expansion. What race goes well with apocalypse destruction and hell-razing?

Barbarians + Chaos Magic + Warlord if you're wanting to kick ass and take names from the beginning.

All Barbarian melee units (and maybe even ranged units for all I know) have the "Thrown" ability. This ability is a free extra attack done before the actual melee attack. Although you have to be initiating a melee attack to get the bonus, the Thrown attack is treated as a ranged attack, i.e. it doesn't generate a counterattack from the defending unit. (The "counterattack' is what causes you to take damage from a defending unit when you attack it with melee.)

So all attacking Barbarian melee units will initiate a thrown attack at the start of their combat. This may reduce the number of figures in the defending unit. And THEN they issue their actual melee attack (which prompts a counterattack as normal, but might be less powerful if the Thrown attack took some health off the defending unit).

Very nasty skill, especially with higher level units.

[Lamoth]

My few tricks:

Paladins: As said, they absolutely rock! No other non-magical unit except halfling slingers have a real chance against them. And if you are willing to sacrifice a few of them you can emtpy even the strongest nodes with a constant barrage of paladins. Add Missile Protection or Lionheart or Invulnerability to them and you are golden. With adamantium weapons they become even stronger.

Life: Best color in the game. You can resurrect all heroes if they die, gain the Invulnerability spell and some other niftys. With the stream of life enchantment on all your cities you can increase taxation to maximum and they still stay totally happy.

Green: Regeneration on your heroes makes them immortal if one single unit survives a fight. Change Tarrain and Gaias Blessing are the best spells for those who want to terraform their empire to a breadbasket. And call of cracks. I hate when the computer has this spell. 20% chance to kill any ground unit is really nasty if you can cast that spell multiple times per fight.

Red: Meh. I never cared much for that color. Disintegration, Doom Bolts and Chaos Vortices are nice though.

Black: Sweet, if a bit difficult to handle due to the inability of most monsters to heal naturally. Summoning Doom riders once early in the game is a good way to win though.

Blue: Really nifty bag of tricks. Magic Immunity helps a lot late in the game as Missile Protection does in the beginning. Spell Blast is perfect to keep enemies from finishing any annoying spell.

--------------------------------------------------------------------
My strategy for a almost sure win game on "hard" setting if I do not want to exert myself:

8 Books Life, 3 Books Nature. Humans.

I turtle until I can build Paladins. I capture one tower and look for a night elf city. All expansion is done with night elves for their mana. A single human city near an adamantium vein constantly produces paladins.

I summon heroes as soon as I can. If I do not want a hero, I hire him and kill him off. That removes him from the pool. My dream team: Warrax, Elaine, Thorin, Jaer, Mystic X and "Insert Spellcaster Hero I forgot", They all get artefacts with the best stats. Especially Elaine is able to harm magic immune monsters with her normal attack quite easily when she has 30+ attack power.

It is not really difficult to win with this setup.
------------------------------------------------------------

Dirty tricks:

There is a bug in the artefact creation. Select a Staff and select Charges of a Spell you want it to have. Then deselect it, and select other four attributes. The Artefact will have those four attributes and the spell charges when it is created.

Restart the game until you start in an area whit good conditions for your first city.

You can find special abilities and books in nodes and ruins.

[mEGA]

Just whomped a Blue-booker. He cast countermagic and had missile immunity on his entire defending force (at his fortress). Me, I had 6x Halfling Slingers, 1x Shaman, and 2x Unicorns. Anger was felt when I discovered the missile immunity. But it didn't seem to work against my ultra-elite shaman. And then the Unicorns hit ^^

Oh, and a random High Men city just joined my empire. From half way across the world. It was interesting. Literally the turn after they joined, a huge AI raiding force took it back from me. Last ditch effort to avoid the wrath of the raiders? I think so...

[Robovski]

OK, I am purposefully NOT playing today as I have been turning into bed at 2am lately and I need to work tomorrow - I had to work today, and I think I just may be old enough to learn a lesson from experience. So no game as it is now too late in the evening and I'll be up half the night.

But tomorrow. Tomorrow I will start anew after I get home from work. I will play a few mixed books - white blue and green, whatever is left after I buy warlord alchemist and artificer. High Human I think. Yeah...

[Afterburner]

Like many others, this thread prompted me to pull MOM out of the mothballs.

For funsies, I'm playing game in a way that I never have before: My wizard is 100% all of one magic school, with no special abilities. I plan on doing this for all of the schools, eventually, as I figure it'll (A) be something of a challenge; (B) get me out of my 3/3/2 Life/Sorcery/Nature (with a dash of Myrran thrown in for good measure) rut; and (C) give me an idea of the true strengths and weaknesses of the school in question.

Current wizard dumped all of his 11 starting points into Sorcery ranks, since I perceived that to be the weakest (and, thus, the most challenging) school to specialize in. Also started with Nomads, just to be different.

At the current stage of the game, I have researched all of my spells except for Spell of Mastery, have eliminated one of my opponents, banished another to limbo, and completely dominated the entire plane of Arcanium. All cities on Arcanium belong to my mighty empire, as do all the nodes. My empire consists of Nomads, Orcs, Lizardmen, Halflings, and Klackons. I also have a small Beastman province (two cities on a smallish island) in Myrror, where Ss'sra, my sole remaining opponent, resides. According to the "Astrologer" info screen, I am miles and miles ahead of anybody else, spell-research-wise. I am researching the Spell of Mastery. They're still trying to figure out where the rabbit comes from when you pull it out of the hat. Figuratively speaking.

Sorcery Pros

-Phantom Warriors are damn handy things to have in the early stages of the game. And they're dirt cheap to boot. Phantom Beasts are even better.

-Mind Storm (-5 to ALL combat values (Attack, Ranged, Defense, Movement, Resistance) is great for taking out tough Heroes with lots of spiffy gear used by the AI.

-Mass Invisibility is a handy spell for protecting your units against hordes of ranged units.

-Wind Walking, for when you absolutely positively have to get your hero and his army around the world in a few turns.

-You can disrupt enemy global enchantments with a fair degree of ease.

-Sky Drakes kan be pretti nasti.


Sorcery cons

-Artifact creation is very limited. Sorcery magic provides very little in the way of offensive magic, so there's not many offensive spell-like effects you can stick on a weapon.

-Lack of offensive spells. Not much you can do to help your troops out in combat in most cases.



All in all, it's just a boring, unexciting school of magic. Can't rain death and destruction down on your foes. Can't enhance your cities at all. Can't heal. Can't really buff the offensive capabilities of your troops. Just...not much to do.

[Dulahan]

YAY!!! I finally took my first tower!

And holy shit do Rangers kick ass. I thought my slinger horde was good... Then these guys started raining death in their small stack. Great Ranged, slightly better Melee... Multiple moves. Time to march through Myyran under my new hero and capture some Dark Elf cities and all that other fun stuff. Woot!



Edit: And for the record, I think the fact you can produce the units of the stuff you capture is awesome. Not being confined to your starting race is a novel approach.

[Weltenreiter]

Yay for lively MoM discussion.


<strong>Artificer</strong> is a cheat if you combine it with, IIRC, Archmage. Add up their bonuses and you're producing magic items at 25% the normal cost, then breaking them on the mana forge for 50%. 25% profit, every time. :eek: :eek: :eek:

Missed this one the first time through the thread.
Calling Artificer+Runemaster a cheat is all kinds of wrong, thats a perfectly valid combo!

You spend, what, 8 or so char creation picks on it for the retorts and the prerequisite spellbooks, and end up with a lowww (if broad) spell knowledge. (And a powerful ressource infrastructure tool)
Such sacrifice/investment is worth getting a little synergy besides the sum of the parts out of your picks, thanks.
Nevermind, it actually IS nothing more than the simple sum of the parts, they just happen to work as advertised.

Also, take Alchemy with it, so the combo can fully supplement your money income too, not just mana income.

Since spellpower is at work for you 24/7 creating ressources when not casting actual spells, getting Archmage to support it would be highly worth it, but getting a color up to 4 books (prerequisite for AM) is pretty hard when doing this, if at all possible (I forget).

Congrats for getting the best game EVAR btw...
fixed your typo :D

(on throwing: ) Very nasty skill, especially with higher level units.Invincible Sword Princess Shalla the Amazon agrees.

JaerJaer indeed rocks on toast. Fill him up with +movement artifacts (cheap to make, as they don't -really- need other stats) and he's your airlifter from hell. Only a medium-high hero too, not a champion (i think?) so gettable earlyish.

I summon heroes as soon as I can. If I do not want a hero, I hire him and kill him off.Alternatively, or additionally, save the turn before the summon finishes, and reload if hero isn't to your liking. (My tolerance for the 'Picard Maneuver' aka save/reload is massive though, so YMMV.)
Make sure you actually fulfil the requirements for the hero/champion you want before going on a long loading spree.

Also, after having a hero apply but rejecting him, when he returns later he'll have gained a level. Might make for a nice powerlevelling method, but I don't remember what, if any, limit this has and if it applies to summoned applications.
Heroism probably is less hassle for comparable results.

There is a bug in the artefact creation. Select a Staff and select Charges of a Spell you want it to have. Then deselect it, and select other four attributes. The Artefact will have those four attributes and the spell charges when it is created.You should be able to switch item type while doing this also (may have to stay with a held item though, I forget), allowing you to make spell-throwing swords. Cool.

Restart the game until you start in an area whit good conditions for your first city.I can add one to this. (Cheese warning, I guess)
Take green book (May have to be 2, I forget if 1 book already gives you a starting spell). Invest green spell pick in Earth Sight (or whatever the spell that defogofwars a screen was named). Restart until you get a nonsucky starting location as above. Save. Put all Power to mana and cast Sight a couple dozen times to verify that your continent is worth spending a game's time on too, not just your starting city. Load. Start game.

Another one to add to this pre-game routine: The unresearched spells in your spellbook aren't just randomly scrambled, it actually is an alphabet. So after following above procedure, decode your (few, if playing retort-heavy) unresearched spells to see if your spellbook potential is worth playing too, not just your starting loc and continent.
Be prepared to make steep sacrifices in what map you tolerate if looking for specific Rare or Ultra Rare spells (Crusade, Stream of Life) with few spellbooks.

Also, before doing any of these, play the game a few times 'regularly' without stacking the deck like this. Exploration factor is probably still enjoyable then and not just a nuisance that gets in the way of the story you want to play.
Assuming you -do- want to play a story in your strat games at all, which may well not be the case if you are less nerdy than I am. :D

You can find special abilities and books in nodes and ruins.You can also reload and refight the battle for different rewards (of the same general type) if what you get doesn't fit your advancement concept.
Useful if, say, you want specific retorts (usually Warlord) or are working towards specific spellbook amounts (usually in blue) that are needed to enchant specific item abilitites (usually Haste and/or Phantasmal).
Cheese: Bring excessive force so the 'refight' can be reliably done one-click via strategic combat.

[Weltenreiter]

Gratz on the Tower, any phat loot? :D

And holy shit do Rangers kick ass.That they do, especially on the strategic map:
Personally I find them better used not stacked together, but accompanying a stack of Horse Archers, for a really cheap to assemble 4-move ranged hit squad. (Pathfinding halves move costs for the entire stack, not just the unit itself like Forestry or Mountainwalk does.)

[Afterburner]

And holy shit do Rangers kick ass.

If they're in range, yep. Gotta move 'em up a bit before you can really bring the hurt thanks to the range penalties.

Do yourself a favor. Capture an Orc or High Man city and build a Wizard's Guild. Magicians rock on toast. Just make sure they're protected from ranged combat, because the AI will target them.

[Afterburner]

Uh.

Someone wanna explain this screenshot to me?

http://www.mobygames.com/game/dos/master-of-magic/screenshots/gameShotId,3236/

Title screen for Master of Magic.

Note the version number at the bottom. "v2.3"

v1.31 is the latest version as far as I know. Anybody know different?

[Weltenreiter]

Agree on 1.31 being latest afaik
My Google-Fu draws a blank about anything 2.3

[Safid]

What a blast from the past this is. I still had my old copy on my hard drive (imagine that!) and just started playing all over again.

There is nothing, and I mean *nothing*, more fun than watching Jesus (I mean, uhm, "Torin") whallop the crap outa people once you've decked him out in Righteous, Invulnerable, Lionheart plate. That's basically what I live for, every time. :)

Well, that and playing Death Hobbits!

[Weltenreiter]

There is nothing, and I mean *nothing*, more fun than watching Jesus (I mean, uhm, "Torin") whallop the crap outa people once you've decked him out in Righteous, Invulnerable, Lionheart plate. That's basically what I live for, every time. :)You said it man. Nobody fucks with the Jesus Torin.

I do still prefer low-book high-retort games to the 11-book approaches (of which Torin is undisputed king) though. Printing your own mana is kinda addictive.


Something else:
A venerable link I dug up: Master of Magic Heroes Page (http://mom.diaspora.ru/txt/heroes.doc/). Useful for the newcomers and a nice retrospective read for the veterans.

[I Love Stupid Stuff]

What exactly are the Nomads good for? I (playing as merlin) have just overseen the victory of my orc army in their effort to take the tower of R'jak, and have liberated the Nomadic people living under his oppressive rule.

So now I need to know how I can best fit them into my budding war machine.

[Afterburner]

What exactly are the Nomads good for? I (playing as merlin) have just overseen the victory of my orc army in their effort to take the tower of R'jak, and have liberated the Nomadic people living under his oppressive rule.

So now I need to know how I can best fit them into my budding war machine.

50% bonus to gold. It's like having a Marketplace in every city from the beginning. And Griffins are almost as good as Paladins. Armor Piercing and First Strike. Plus they fly.

[mEGA]

There is nothing, and I mean *nothing*, more fun than watching Jesus (I mean, uhm, "Torin") whallop the crap outa people once you've decked him out in Righteous, Invulnerable, Lionheart plate. That's basically what I live for, every time. Hah. Ironically enough, I've always named Torin "Jesus the Chosen" in my games. And right now he's got a sword that is resist or be disintigrated and a cloak with +3 mov, lionheart, and invulnerable.

The bitch of the game I'm in now is its down to 1v1, and we're both pure life mages. So all of our buff spells help both sides ^^. Its cool though, I've got archangels and torin, and she has, um, guardian spirits.

[Xenon_Wulf]

Odd, I've always felt Warrax was THE best hero/champion...

[Kevin J Chase]

There is nothing, and I mean *nothing*, more fun than watching Jesus (I mean, uhm, "Torin") whallop the crap outa people once you've decked him out in Righteous, Invulnerable, Lionheart plate. That's basically what I live for, every time. :)

I always found that by the time I had the magic to summon Torin, my rank-and-file heroes were far better than him. Sure, he'd level past them eventually, but after one or two disappointments I started putting my Torin budget into a nifty new orb for Mystic X. Darlok power!

[Dulahan]

One. More. Turn. (Fifty turns later... Damn, it's late. I should get to bed. But just one more....)


One of my heroes got disintigrated too. It made me sad.

[Safid]

I always found that by the time I had the magic to summon Torin, my rank-and-file heroes were far better than him. Sure, he'd level past them eventually, but after one or two disappointments I started putting my Torin budget into a nifty new orb for Mystic X. Darlok power!

Hmm. Well, whenever I decide to call upon the Son of God Incarnate, I go full on Life which allows you to select the spell that summons him as an initial pick. Then it's really just a matter of coming up with the mana, which you can do in a few ways. Sure, he doesn't come *early*, but I can get him as my second or third hero, which seems to be soon enough to make a difference.

I also have much love for Deth Stryke, if only because he's Killfuck Soulshitter's spititual brother.

[dimensional]

I also have been sucked in to this again.

and while hero's are fun, i've come to the conclusion, that their pretty much a waste, except as generals and spellcaseters for buffing units.

most Buffing spells are just so much more effective on units than on hero's
because they affect each figure in the unit.

dwavern Hammerhands + lionheart = win.

my current army of doom is 3 units of hammerhands, 5 units of slingers and a healer sorcerss. it eats all in it's path.

Jeremy

[Weltenreiter]

11-book Thorin comes really early, in that case you just restart the game if his random picks suck, sure.
In a regular game I can see how he might be rolled sub-par and ditched in favor of a set of ideally rolled Champions.

The fact that his exp will be much lower than that of the other heroes late in a regular game shouldn't be a holdup. With his excellent base stats and plain -more. skills than other heroes, he scales with levels differently than them. Smack Heroism on him (which almost by definition one will have if one has him) and equip him and the gap should be bridged for most intents and purposes.

In the end he does remain an army leader hero though, even if a mightly kickass one. A dedicated soloer-type hero, especially with well-rolled random picks, can blow him away. (Super Arcane Power Blademaster Warrax anyone? *drool*)

[ascendance]

Damn you RPG.net.

Because of this (and the Alpha Centauri thread) I was up until 5 am.

Also, Master of Magic runs pathetically slow on my Win2K notebook. I should have kept it at Win98 just so I can run MOM ok.

[Alka-Seltzer]

Nevermind.

[Afterburner]

Baghtru and Zaldron all the way.

By the end of my last game, Baghtru was a Super-Hero with a movement of 6, an attack of 21, and a thrown of 18 or so. He'd wade into melee units and start dishing out the hurt.

Zaldron is handy for research, and he's got a smokin' arcane bolt when he gets to high levels.

[Afterburner]

So, out of curiosity, why the focus on cheese? Reload games if you don't get the hero you want, reload games if $FOO doesn't happen like you like it, etc. What's up with that?

I mean, by all means, play the game in a way that's fun to you. And I'm certainly not a purist by any stretch, and have been known to do a little creative save-n-load myself. But, I mean, I just totally dominated my last game (Normal difficulty, granted) with an arguably gimped character: 11 books in Sorcery, and with Baghtru, Zaldron, Valdona, Serena, and Mystic X as my heroes. I was so far out ahead of the other guys it's not funny. No Torin. No Warrax. No Malleus. All of my heroes save Mystic X were gimpy low-level heroes.

Is cheesing out really that necessary to defeat the computer on higher level games?

[dimensional]

not realy, like in any other game cheese can be fun for it's own sake.

also in MOM as in many other similar games, the computer players have a quite large earlry game advantage, but are limited y their crappy AI. once you fight your way to the mid game, your pretty much set.

in general I've found it's much harder to take a node on powerful magic/ impossible than wipe out an enemy civilisation.

as i said, it tend to see hero's as not all that useful, maybe it's cause i do let them die.

I'll try a Torin one man army game tonight and see what happens.

Jeremy

[Alka-Seltzer]

Oh, fucking thanks people. As if I didn't need another unliving man-made vampire feeding off my free time.

I hate this game. I love this game.
I hate loving this game.

[Vigorous Ape]

Why are the AIs always bloodthirsty lunatics? Despite starting on the easiest level so I could muck about and get to grips with it, why do they all declare war on me?

Even lawful Oberic decided to declare war, then when I made peace with him (he only has his capital left), he sends an engineer to attack one of my cities :confused:

So now I have to crush him, such is the burden of power.

How can i protect my healer hero from priests? I gave her a staff of guardian wind but she just gets annihilated in the first round when I attack Oberic's capital.

[QuZi]

How can i protect my healer hero from priests? I gave her a staff of guardian wind but she just gets annihilated in the first round when I attack Oberic's capital.Guardian Wind protects against small physical missiles (arrows, etc, not the big rocks from giants), not against magic. To protect against priests/mages, use magic immunity.

[Dulahan]

Damn you RPG.net.

Because of this (and the Alpha Centauri thread) I was up until 5 am.

Also, Master of Magic runs pathetically slow on my Win2K notebook. I should have kept it at Win98 just so I can run MOM ok.


If you're using DOSBox. Then the easy answer is to ctrl+F12 to speed up the simulated Bus speed. That helps a LOT. Jump it up to 10k or so seems to work wonders for me.

[Weltenreiter]

Is cheesing out really that necessary to defeat the computer on higher level games?ROFL no.

Cheese is just fun. For it's very own sake, not for winning or anything.

[Afterburner]

If you're using DOSBox. Then the easy answer is to ctrl+F12 to speed up the simulated Bus speed. That helps a LOT. Jump it up to 10k or so seems to work wonders for me.

Oddly, I noticed that MOM performs a lot better with Frameskip turned off.

[Robovski]

Can anything be done about the box that pops for the midi controls?

I hate getting pulled out of the game and then having to fix the graphics (because when I leave it blows the color pallet entirely and it is fixed by getting a screen resilve - like going to the building menu or the menu).

[Lamoth]

Cheese isn't necessary to win at hard or impossible levels. But it is fun!

I think it might be more difficult to win an impossible game with a mix of three or more colors, focusing on one or two might make life easier I think.

the hardest part for me is to survive the first twenty turns. I am relucatant to build or summon units early in game and I favor improving my city. Sometimes that is my doom...

Having a few blue books for spell blast helps a lot at harder levels. The NPCs get the Spell of Mastery fairly easy and can win the game without ever coming into contact with the player.

[Weltenreiter]

Enough talk, redownloading it again too and going to give getting it to run another shot.

*Edit*: Foiled! Fuck you, expanded memory. :mad: :mad: :mad:
Guess I'll have a look at Dosbox.

*Editedit* Triumph! .....So much for sleep tonight. As if I wasn't sleep-depped enough already. O_o

[AliasiSudonomo]

So, out of curiosity, why the focus on cheese? Reload games if you don't get the hero you want, reload games if $FOO doesn't happen like you like it, etc. What's up with that?

I mean, by all means, play the game in a way that's fun to you. And I'm certainly not a purist by any stretch, and have been known to do a little creative save-n-load myself. But, I mean, I just totally dominated my last game (Normal difficulty, granted) with an arguably gimped character: 11 books in Sorcery, and with Baghtru, Zaldron, Valdona, Serena, and Mystic X as my heroes. I was so far out ahead of the other guys it's not funny. No Torin. No Warrax. No Malleus. All of my heroes save Mystic X were gimpy low-level heroes.

Is cheesing out really that necessary to defeat the computer on higher level games?

As said, not at all. It's just that Master of Magic is so "cheesable" that becomes a metagame in itself, in my own eyes.

I mean, flying invisible spell-locked warships!

[mEGA]

Oddly, I noticed that MOM performs a lot better with Frameskip turned off.How does one do this? Upping the simulated bus speed to 8k-10k does a lot, but any and all improvement to my addiction is welcomed...

[Afterburner]

How does one do this? Upping the simulated bus speed to 8k-10k does a lot, but any and all improvement to my addiction is welcomed...

dosbox.conf file. There's an entry there for frameskip. Think it defaults to 0, but I could be wrong.

[Sammual]

Hey All,
I am making a TBS game much like MoM. To make a game like this ballanced what would need to be changed?

Sammual

[DariusSolluman]

You said it man. Nobody fucks with the Jesus Torin.

I do still prefer low-book high-retort games to the 11-book approaches (of which Torin is undisputed king) though. Printing your own mana is kinda addictive.


Something else:
A venerable link I dug up: Master of Magic Heroes Page (http://mom.diaspora.ru/txt/heroes.doc/). Useful for the newcomers and a nice retrospective read for the veterans.

Man. That link brings back memories :D

[Juriel]

This thread so needs to get moved to Video Games.

Still, it did get me interested and curious yet again, in spite of the crappy AI...

We'll see. I guess I could go for Age of Wonders first.

[Dulahan]

Holy Necromancy Batman!

Though for the two year update, I never did get truly better at it. ;)

[VoiceOfIsaac]

Any word of late on "Master of Magic 2"?

[Juriel]

I never did decide whether I liked Black or Red books the best, so I mostly took both, and had these undead mutants wandering around. And losing whenever an NPC wizard cast something that kills off undead or chaotic monsters.

Ah, memories...

...and I'm downloading it, so yeah, this thread's resuscitation served some purpose! Here's hoping for MoM2.

[EndlessChase]

This game is still one of my all time favorites. There's nothing like a game that has as many facets as MoM does, and making them all wotrhtwhile, useful, and balanced.

Maybe we should send a copy to Blizzard, with a note saying, "Learn boys, learn."

[Dorchadas]

Wow, I never knew about random picks on heroes. :o

Another note about cheese--an army of Dark Elf warlocks is probably the best way to take a node in the early/mid game. Just go into the node and hit auto. It apparently rolls to see if spells are blocked before your turn or something, because if their Doom Bolt would be blocked, they just do a normal attack and try to Doom Bolt again next turn.

[James Weatherby]

I think the reason MoM still trumps all its successors is that (as this thread shows) you really can play it how you want. From no cheese to extreme cheese and every type of cheese as well - without having to resort to a console cheat menu or crap like that.

Personally I liked to set the landmasses to small and the magic to as high as possible and put my picks into the abilites that enhanced summoning and spellcasting (been a long time since I've played so I'm not sure of the names) and then focus everything on building my abilities to summon and cast into battle from afar.

Because the landsize was small it usually gave me time to build up, and the AI was generally inclined to leave the Nodes alone since at the High setting their defenses were formidable. I would put all my effort towad taking them. Of course if I got bum rushed I was toast, but once I had myself set up I got great pleasure from flinging doom from my tower.

Very little gave me greater pleasure than to see some huge army attack one of my cities, seemingly guarded by nothing but a lowly halfling, only to be repulsed by the army of Air Elementals I summoned up on the spot.

AB - re: cheese. In my case I liked cheeseing this way because the game I liked to play was not "WILL I crush my opponents mercilessly?" but "HOW will I crush them mercilessly, and will I be able to humiliate and toy with them along the way?" Surrounding an enemy empire with a cordon of Sky Drakes and mangling their armies as they emerged was also a pleasure.

I suppose I really should have been a bad guy.

[Dulahan]

More on why it ended up falling short for me... the battles. Just too simplistic and crowded.

Update it, possibly like Total War - but keep the rest in place. It would be perfection!

[Broken]

So, I've downloaded MoM.

I've downloaded Dosbox.

How do I use these two things to, y'know, play MoM?

[LeumasWhite]

So, I've downloaded MoM.

I've downloaded Dosbox.

How do I use these two things to, y'know, play MoM?

Simple way, assuming you're using XP: drag the MoM executable (magic.exe) onto the DOSBox one. Increase CPU cycles with Ctrl+F12 until the game runs reasonably. You'll need to do the same thing with the MoM install executable at some point, so you can adjust the sound settings. I have it set on General Midi and whatever the last option is for digital effects.

[Rutherford]

Shit. I didn't need to see this thread. I had no idea you could download MOM.

MUST RESIST!! HAVE STUFF TO DO!!

[LeumasWhite]

Shit. I didn't need to see this thread. I had no idea you could download MOM.

MUST RESIST!! HAVE STUFF TO DO!!

Boahahaha. Foolish mortal, you cannot resist!

(11 Death is an extremely cathartic way to play. Shadow Demons for the win.)

[Dorchadas]

Boahahaha. Foolish mortal, you cannot resist!

(11 Death is an extremely cathartic way to play. Shadow Demons for the win.)

Starting with Wraiths is an excellent way to grind the entire world underneath your iron-shod bootheels right from the beginning as well. :D

[Broken]

Simple way, assuming you're using XP: drag the MoM executable (magic.exe) onto the DOSBox one. Increase CPU cycles with Ctrl+F12 until the game runs reasonably. You'll need to do the same thing with the MoM install executable at some point, so you can adjust the sound settings. I have it set on General Midi and whatever the last option is for digital effects.

Hm. Didn't work. :(

"This application has failed to start becasuse SdL.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem."

[LeumasWhite]

Hm. Didn't work. :(

"This application has failed to start becasuse SdL.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem."

Weird. Did you get it from Underdogs? And do both of those exe files work fine on their own? They don't need to do anything, just run without any error messages.

[Korror]

Ah the memories...

MoM was the first computer game I ever bought and the first game I really played and played. I still can remember my first winning game 10 years ago and my halfling empire which crushed the computer via its force of sky drakes. I played a chaos/sorcery wizard and managed to get awareness + call void before I made contact with the wizard on the other plane. A couple dozen call void spells reduced his cities to corrupted wastelands and my forced descended upon him when I eventually figured out how the towers of wizardry worked. How can it be that I still can't remember simple passwords to my accounts yet I can recall almost the entire geography of a map I played a game on 10 years ago?

I may just have to play MoM again to find out.

Korror

[Gaffa]

Any love for my main men, the peeps of love, the gnolls? Pure blitzkreig adrenaline rush -- who cares if you can't build any buildings (which, in the gnolls' case, is almost literally true). Every one of your units has double the health of anyone else. Any building you really need, you just build in one of your many soon-to-be-conquered slave cities. Otherwise, cavalry up and rush, rush, rush.

[Raxmei]

I play it on and off. Life magic is almost like cheat mode. Death is fun for some nice direct attacking (personally I like lycanthropes), even if it isn't as strong. My personal favorite is Sorcery because I'm a mobility junkie. Nature's terraforming is attractive but it seems to come too late in the game to have a major effect. I'm sure chaos is fun, especially since I love using what limited nukes the other schools have, but I just can't bring myself to play it. I remember having lots of fun playing as Lo Pan back when I first played.

My current strategy is a fairly noobish High Men paladin rush. Stay local except for a magic spirit to scout and concentrate on a small number of cities to intensively raise up to top tier. With Life magic that makes you unstoppable, and while Sorcery should let me advance faster I generally end up having to pause to heal too much.

Aside from that I've had some success with Barbarian rush. That can be done with lower tech units. Barbarians grow fast and get thrown weapons. That makes even cheap units somewhat effective and makes expansion by settlement viable.

[Erstwhile]

Back in the day, I usually took Artificier and then 5 Life books and 5 Sorcery books; then expanded quickly so I had at least one other city besides my capital. Then, begin creating an Artifact with Invulnerabilty + Magic Immunity. Took a long time, given my low mana, but an Invulnerable, Magic Immune hero was pretty sweet.

That strategy was easily defeated if there was a strong push early on from my opponents, though. But it was fun. In MoM, and for that matter in AoW: Shadow Magic, making magic items is probably one of my favourite things. :o

[Fade]

That strategy was easily defeated if there was a strong push early on from my opponents, though. But it was fun. In MoM, and for that matter in AoW: Shadow Magic, making magic items is probably one of my favourite things. :o
I guess neither game has a 'stolen by pesky halfling and thrown into volcano' feature?

[Erstwhile]

I guess neither game has a 'stolen by pesky halfling and thrown into volcano' feature?


Dude, in Master of Magic, Halflings don't steal your artifacts. They raze your cities, kill your heroes, and take your artifacts.

Arcanus Halflings are frickin' hardcore.

[richrf]

Easiest way to win MOM impossible...

Even easier than 11 book Torin or wraiths....

11 book endurance, invulnerable, guardian spirits!!!!

You can get them much faster than wraiths or torins and they are sufficient to kill most normal units without problems...

Speed is the essence here... I can take down 3 out of 4 wizards in less than 100 turns..

I didn't believe it when i read about the strategy, but trying it made a believer out of me.

[Count Drunkula]

I love my trolls. :D

Myrran, Warlord, 3 Life, 3 Sorcery. Crank out a few units of swordsmen and send them out to ravage the nearby villages (food and gold for the trollcorps!), and then tech up to the war trolls. With Invulnerability and Magic Immunity on them, they rip through nearly anything.

I love starting as the draconians as well. It's great fun bringing a stack of flying bowmen into a dwarf village and watching the halberdiers sit there helplessly because they haven't got a ranged attack to engage you with.


Oh man, if I wasn't playing Dwarf Fortress I'd be hunting out my old Master of Magic CD now. :D :D :D Best game evar!

[Gaming Geek]

I will resist this.

I used to own this game. Hell, I might still have the install disks (Yes, accual disks) somewhere.


I just don't have the time. Plus if I really want to play a game like this, I still have Master of Orion 2 :p

Which is also one of those clasic old games that kicks ass even against modern games.

[Native]

Yah, what a mistake.

I saw a reference to this in another forum and, since my spouse was away for a couple weeks, downloaded MoM from Abandonia (http://www.abandonia.com/games/189/download/MasterofMagic.htm), Pulled the FAQ off of GameFAQs (http://www.gamefaqs.com/computer/doswin/file/564960/2059), and quickly got this running on my XP system. (See instructions in FAQ.)

Well I quickly burned through those two weeks. How do I turn this thing off and stop playing?

This is a great game! And its over 15 years old. The graphics are pretty tired, and the music will wear on you, but its lots of fun. I've finished one game (7w, 2u, alchemy) and trying to finish up a rainbow wizard (2w, 2u, 3g, 2r warlord). :D

[Polymath]

I will resist this.

I used to own this game. Hell, I might still have the install disks (Yes, accual disks) somewhere.


I just don't have the time. Plus if I really want to play a game like this, I still have Master of Orion 2 :p

Which is also one of those clasic old games that kicks ass even against modern games.
Very true. I originally had it on 3.5" disk. I enjoyed the game so much I bought a classics pack with the game in it on CD format just so I would have a non-corruptable copy.

[Asmodai]

Are there any huge differences between the races? I noticed that Klackons are good production workers and some other race are good farmers, halfings I think.

I'm using High Men and there's only one building they can't build, so what is the difference between them and orcs?

Not much. High Men get Paladins - the uber-unit of DOOM.

Orcs get Wyvern Riders, which are OK.

High Men don't get an aerial scouting unit like High Elves or Orcs. In most games, it's not that big a deal though.

[Unferth]

Don't High Men also get magicians in stacks of 6 rather than 4? That's a huge bonus, along with paladins.

High men and halflings are the easiest of the non-Myrrar races, in my opinion. Nomads and barbarians are strong too, though their best units are less purely overwhelming than paladins or heavily buffed slingers and they grow less quickly than halflings. I always found gnolls and klackons too low-tech for my tastes, while high elves grow too slowly.

[Shadey Bladey]

I don't know if anyone has already said this as I haven't read the whole thread.

One of my favourites, and I think the most powerful of all, is to take this:

High Men

2 Chaos
2 Nature
2 Sorcery

Alchemy
Artificer
Runemaster
Node Master
Sage Master


Alchemy- interconvert mana and gold with no energy loss, all units +1 weapons
Artificer - 50% cheaper to cast Creat Item/Artifact
Rune Mastery - 25% reduction in Arcane research/casting cost, double strength Dispel
Node Mastery - double mana from nodes, immune to node's Dispel Magic
Sage Mastery - 25% reduction in research cost in all realms


So Master of Magick and other arcane spells cost 50% less than normal

Alternatively, sacrifice Node and Sage Mastery for Warlord. Any other retorts you find are a bonus.

As Rune Master and Artificer give a 75% reduction in casting cost, you can produce a 400 mana artifact for 100 mana, then immediately destroy it for 200 mana (as it's still a 400 mana item), doubling the mana you spent.

This is not a bug per se, but must be an arithmetic game design flaw as by any rules of fantasy metaphysics you can *convert* gold into metaphysical energy and you can *convert* metaphysical energy into gold, but you can not *create* energy or matter from nothing. To fix this, Artificer should give only a 25% reduction in casting cost, so together with Runemaster you get a 50% reduction, so you make a 400 mana item for 200 mana and then destroy it for 200 mana (half the 400 you spent).

Your research is so fast and you have so much mana and money pouring in, you'll be producing Paladins and casting global enchantments before your enemies even know where you are.

Even on impossible level you can usually win with this, except for random encounters and wandering monsters because the computer cheats rather than plays more intelligently, so some passing Phantoms Beasts from a Sorcery Node might wipe you out by accident early on.


Cheers

~

[Asmodai]

Don't High Men also get magicians in stacks of 6 rather than 4? That's a huge bonus, along with paladins.

High men and halflings are the easiest of the non-Myrrar races, in my opinion. Nomads and barbarians are strong too, though their best units are less purely overwhelming than paladins or heavily buffed slingers and they grow less quickly than halflings. I always found gnolls and klackons too low-tech for my tastes, while high elves grow too slowly.

High Elves have a bump.

Once you build a Sawmill you have Longbowmen - which you can use to capture any neutral city and the vast majority of the nodes and ruins.

Then there's a considerable delay as you build up again to get Magicians, Elven Lords and Pegasi.

[nonsense]

No love for dwarves? (Or where those Myrran?)

[Unferth]

No love for dwarves? (Or where those Myrran?)

Myrran, yeah.

Hammerhands = win. Especially with adamantite. Probably the best of the Myrran races, in my opinion, though most of them are good.

Halflings are worth importing to Myrrar. Adamantite slingers with the right Life magic can shoot down just about anything in the game.

Undead war trolls are always fun, too.