Post by Adam on Jul 9, 2009 14:53:39 GMT -5
The Arcanum are human wizard-scholar-types, who hold a somewhat-harsh-but-fair ruling over a large domain. They're reasonably benevolent as rulers go, and most people are satisfied with the way they run things. The main source of dissatisfaction against them stems from the fact that if you want to have a major say in the running of the lands, you have to be a wraithseer, and if you're a seer in the Collegium Arcanum (and why wouldn't you enrol in the Collegium?) you get a major say in the running of the lands regardless of your aptitudes towards this. Fortunately, in practice most seers are happy to study or fight, maintaining use of the laws written by someone who knew what he was doing a couple of hundred years ago, only changing them as necessary to move with the times. The Arcanum are the equivalent of an elite army. The standard wraiths every acolyte learns to summon are mostly based on old myths and religious texts, and come in groups of four types, with each group radically different in appearance and abilities than the others. New groups are occasionally added to honour particularly skilled or prominent Arcana.
Angels Mobile, flexible warriors. A force comprised entirely of these will be fast, and relatively versatile for a force made of four wraith types, but fragile.
- Guardian Angels are unusual shielders. The unusuality comes from their low rank - 3 - and their wings. Guardians are also blessed with an ability to responsively block ranged attacks in the enemy's turn - once a turn, the Guardian can move into the LOS, blocking it, and gets hit instead. They're obviously weaker and not as protective as the Arcanum's other shielder wraith, the Phalanx Knight. Guardians lack offensive ability; their only weapon, a ceremonial spear, isn't good for much due to its low power. Their usefulness is in the mobile protection and in the ability to fly around providing a mobile null zone. (They will die if they do this too audaciously, though. Guardians have high armour, but three essence won't go that far...) Like most shielders, they have some resilience and no spells, meaning not only will they be harder for the enemy to kill but they won't kill themselves either. Which is always nice.
- Spear Angels are Rank 4 hunter wraiths who excel at pouncing on and backstabbing larger enemy warriors. Spears are armed with their namesake weapon, one in each hand in fact (although non-warriors don't get additional attacks with other weapons). One spear carries fire, the other lightning. The flamespear does more damage on its own, and can ignite its target on a critical hit. The lightning spear, however, does more damage when other Spear Angels are nearby, by a considerable amount. The lightning spear also has a longer reach. Spears are the fastest Angel, with a speed of around 7. They don't have a lot of spells; most of their abilities come from useful special rules.
- Seraph Angel is a solid rank 6 warrior unit without a lot of magic or special abilities - it has a spell called Death from Above where it essentially teleports onto an enemy and slaps it silly, but it mostly just beats the crap out of stuff with a huge sword. Might have another (one-essence) spell that buffs its attack and/or damage.
- Twisted Angel is a mutated, rank-7 Seraph. Not as good in combat by a mile, but it's an insane AOE spell bomber. A ranged template attack that roots enemies to the ground in its radius (translation: debuffs their defence and speed). Will-radius lightning storm and combined buff/debuff (boosts friendlies' attack and lowers enemies' attack, say) spells. Will-radius ability (costs no essence!) that sucks essence off enemies and heals the angel and others nearby.
Knights Utilitarian beatsticks for the most part. You could make an army out of only these and it would perform pretty solidly, although it'd be rather disparate.
- The Phalanx Knight is a rank-5 Shielder which lacks the Guardian Angel's mobility but is an immensely solid model. It has an aura which grants some of its Shielder benefits onto models near it.
- Questor Knights are medium-high rank fast melee units - they take the form of cavalry knights with lances and are technically warriors but share some similarities with hunter wraiths. Questors have a good speed and weapon reach, letting them hit stuff from a considerable distance.
- A Knight Rising is an undead or ghostly knight; lightly armoured, it's of rank 3 and is the Arcanum's only scout. (Arcanum don't have rank 2s and go mostly for high calibre wraiths.) The Knight Rising, unlike most scouts, doesn't have a gun, but it does have a spell that grants it the ability to see through terrain and models, letting the seer cast spells through it at a variety of targets. It's also handy at slicing up other scouts in melee using a pair of hand-and-a-half swords called graveblades, which don't have high strength but drain off an extra point of essence every time one or both weapons damage something.
- The Blinding Knight is a Rank 8 whose scorching gaze (even though its helmet has no eyeslits) forms a powerful ranged attack that disorientates and damages enemies; it's roughly twice human height, wields a huge sword and shield, and is extremely hard to put down.
Machinae Slow, resilient support units that contribute mostly steampunk shooting. They have a special rule, Made of Armour, which gives them bonus armour against everything except spells. If you tried to make a Machina-only army, it would work as far as offense and not dying went, but your seer would be torn in half very quickly, and it'd have the mobility of a wounded snail.
- A Machina Noctus is a rank 4 hunter unit that works by sneaking up on stuff and debuffing it before shooting it silly; it takes the form of a small four-legged walker with spindly fingers and shoulder-mounted cannons. It has a spell that places an AOE of darkness, debuffing enemies. It's not as mobile as it would be if it were a scout - only the ethereal Knight Rising gets that honour.
- Machinae Vicious are nasty Rank 4-5 warriors, with a big chaingun backed up by a hefty buzzsaw and the same four legs as the Noctus. Slow, but nigh unstoppable (by mid-rank standards) without committing serious attention to it. Does a lot of damage, and can't be knocked down. It's avoidable though - Vicious don't like terrain. Anything LOS blocking will stymie a Vicious fairly well.
- Machinae Strike (rank 4-5 as well) have tank treads and don't move a lot; they carry hefty arcing-fire guns on their shoulders which are inaccurate but can knock down enemies with a solid hit, and also have an ability called Power Matrix that increases the armour of nearby friendly units (meaning they're best used trundling along behind your seer and his shielders). They have low defence and aren't as tough as the other Machinae, making them vulnerable to hunters and anything that easily gets past whatever's parked between them and the enemy.
- A Machina Omnem is also on tank treads and is a Rank 8 warrior. It is slow moving, but has the Strike's Power Matrix in a slightly different form - it affects all Machinae on the battlefield - and has a tremendous sight range as well as the scouts' arc-node ability. Its 'only' weapon is a mighty lightning caster that frazzles almost everything it hits - the higher the target's armour, the worse the stun effect, so anything it doesn't kill is probably going to get debuffed.
As can be seen, the Arcanum have access to a lot of different offensively-used debuffs across their repertoire. Unfortunately for them, many of these come from higher ranking wraiths, so it'll be a while before the debuffs can really stack up. Arcanum seers have high skill stats, and abilities linked into getting extra magic points when they need them (more so than everyone else!) to offset their lower numbers and higher cost; despite this, they're still one of the slower-buildup armies. A typical Arcanum opening will probably see a Phalanx Knight hit the table accompanied by Knights Rising or low-rank Angels; a more mobile build would see a Guardian Angel or two, plus a Spear Angel or even a Seraph.
The Arcanum's typical tactics should rely on getting multiple Rank 7+ wraiths on the table, using the debuff and support abilities present in these monstrosities to create weakpoints and press a focused attack on them while partially neutralising retaliation. The blocking ability of Guardians lets them zip in front of anything - be it the seer or the Blinding Knight - to protect key pieces as necessary. Victory would come generally via the forced creation of a hole in the enemy army through which to make a route to the seer; Seraphs, Questors and Blinding Knights are the best kill units from what's above. The Arcanum find themselves (at least at first) on the back foot when it comes to board control, because of their lack of spam-me-happy Rank 2 scouts, and an Arcanum player has to be defensive or careful for the first couple of turns. The deficit of cheap shooting doesn't help either, as the only gun-wielding wraiths are the Machinae, although the Twisted Angel has a ranged attack too. Fortunately the abilities of models like the Strike and Phalanx lend themselves to a castle or block formation, building up a cohesive unit of seer+wraiths with Spears and Noctii on one or both flanks (darkness + Noctus shooting followed by the Spear swooping in is a good way to deal with even high rank wraiths). Finally, the Knights Rising have the option to give up a point of essence to allow the seer a cheap-shot or two through intervening models to blast anything that's causing trouble with spell-based havoc if necessary; an ideal way to finish off a wounded wraithseer or high-rank monster.
Angels Mobile, flexible warriors. A force comprised entirely of these will be fast, and relatively versatile for a force made of four wraith types, but fragile.
- Guardian Angels are unusual shielders. The unusuality comes from their low rank - 3 - and their wings. Guardians are also blessed with an ability to responsively block ranged attacks in the enemy's turn - once a turn, the Guardian can move into the LOS, blocking it, and gets hit instead. They're obviously weaker and not as protective as the Arcanum's other shielder wraith, the Phalanx Knight. Guardians lack offensive ability; their only weapon, a ceremonial spear, isn't good for much due to its low power. Their usefulness is in the mobile protection and in the ability to fly around providing a mobile null zone. (They will die if they do this too audaciously, though. Guardians have high armour, but three essence won't go that far...) Like most shielders, they have some resilience and no spells, meaning not only will they be harder for the enemy to kill but they won't kill themselves either. Which is always nice.
- Spear Angels are Rank 4 hunter wraiths who excel at pouncing on and backstabbing larger enemy warriors. Spears are armed with their namesake weapon, one in each hand in fact (although non-warriors don't get additional attacks with other weapons). One spear carries fire, the other lightning. The flamespear does more damage on its own, and can ignite its target on a critical hit. The lightning spear, however, does more damage when other Spear Angels are nearby, by a considerable amount. The lightning spear also has a longer reach. Spears are the fastest Angel, with a speed of around 7. They don't have a lot of spells; most of their abilities come from useful special rules.
- Seraph Angel is a solid rank 6 warrior unit without a lot of magic or special abilities - it has a spell called Death from Above where it essentially teleports onto an enemy and slaps it silly, but it mostly just beats the crap out of stuff with a huge sword. Might have another (one-essence) spell that buffs its attack and/or damage.
- Twisted Angel is a mutated, rank-7 Seraph. Not as good in combat by a mile, but it's an insane AOE spell bomber. A ranged template attack that roots enemies to the ground in its radius (translation: debuffs their defence and speed). Will-radius lightning storm and combined buff/debuff (boosts friendlies' attack and lowers enemies' attack, say) spells. Will-radius ability (costs no essence!) that sucks essence off enemies and heals the angel and others nearby.
Knights Utilitarian beatsticks for the most part. You could make an army out of only these and it would perform pretty solidly, although it'd be rather disparate.
- The Phalanx Knight is a rank-5 Shielder which lacks the Guardian Angel's mobility but is an immensely solid model. It has an aura which grants some of its Shielder benefits onto models near it.
- Questor Knights are medium-high rank fast melee units - they take the form of cavalry knights with lances and are technically warriors but share some similarities with hunter wraiths. Questors have a good speed and weapon reach, letting them hit stuff from a considerable distance.
- A Knight Rising is an undead or ghostly knight; lightly armoured, it's of rank 3 and is the Arcanum's only scout. (Arcanum don't have rank 2s and go mostly for high calibre wraiths.) The Knight Rising, unlike most scouts, doesn't have a gun, but it does have a spell that grants it the ability to see through terrain and models, letting the seer cast spells through it at a variety of targets. It's also handy at slicing up other scouts in melee using a pair of hand-and-a-half swords called graveblades, which don't have high strength but drain off an extra point of essence every time one or both weapons damage something.
- The Blinding Knight is a Rank 8 whose scorching gaze (even though its helmet has no eyeslits) forms a powerful ranged attack that disorientates and damages enemies; it's roughly twice human height, wields a huge sword and shield, and is extremely hard to put down.
Machinae Slow, resilient support units that contribute mostly steampunk shooting. They have a special rule, Made of Armour, which gives them bonus armour against everything except spells. If you tried to make a Machina-only army, it would work as far as offense and not dying went, but your seer would be torn in half very quickly, and it'd have the mobility of a wounded snail.
- A Machina Noctus is a rank 4 hunter unit that works by sneaking up on stuff and debuffing it before shooting it silly; it takes the form of a small four-legged walker with spindly fingers and shoulder-mounted cannons. It has a spell that places an AOE of darkness, debuffing enemies. It's not as mobile as it would be if it were a scout - only the ethereal Knight Rising gets that honour.
- Machinae Vicious are nasty Rank 4-5 warriors, with a big chaingun backed up by a hefty buzzsaw and the same four legs as the Noctus. Slow, but nigh unstoppable (by mid-rank standards) without committing serious attention to it. Does a lot of damage, and can't be knocked down. It's avoidable though - Vicious don't like terrain. Anything LOS blocking will stymie a Vicious fairly well.
- Machinae Strike (rank 4-5 as well) have tank treads and don't move a lot; they carry hefty arcing-fire guns on their shoulders which are inaccurate but can knock down enemies with a solid hit, and also have an ability called Power Matrix that increases the armour of nearby friendly units (meaning they're best used trundling along behind your seer and his shielders). They have low defence and aren't as tough as the other Machinae, making them vulnerable to hunters and anything that easily gets past whatever's parked between them and the enemy.
- A Machina Omnem is also on tank treads and is a Rank 8 warrior. It is slow moving, but has the Strike's Power Matrix in a slightly different form - it affects all Machinae on the battlefield - and has a tremendous sight range as well as the scouts' arc-node ability. Its 'only' weapon is a mighty lightning caster that frazzles almost everything it hits - the higher the target's armour, the worse the stun effect, so anything it doesn't kill is probably going to get debuffed.
As can be seen, the Arcanum have access to a lot of different offensively-used debuffs across their repertoire. Unfortunately for them, many of these come from higher ranking wraiths, so it'll be a while before the debuffs can really stack up. Arcanum seers have high skill stats, and abilities linked into getting extra magic points when they need them (more so than everyone else!) to offset their lower numbers and higher cost; despite this, they're still one of the slower-buildup armies. A typical Arcanum opening will probably see a Phalanx Knight hit the table accompanied by Knights Rising or low-rank Angels; a more mobile build would see a Guardian Angel or two, plus a Spear Angel or even a Seraph.
The Arcanum's typical tactics should rely on getting multiple Rank 7+ wraiths on the table, using the debuff and support abilities present in these monstrosities to create weakpoints and press a focused attack on them while partially neutralising retaliation. The blocking ability of Guardians lets them zip in front of anything - be it the seer or the Blinding Knight - to protect key pieces as necessary. Victory would come generally via the forced creation of a hole in the enemy army through which to make a route to the seer; Seraphs, Questors and Blinding Knights are the best kill units from what's above. The Arcanum find themselves (at least at first) on the back foot when it comes to board control, because of their lack of spam-me-happy Rank 2 scouts, and an Arcanum player has to be defensive or careful for the first couple of turns. The deficit of cheap shooting doesn't help either, as the only gun-wielding wraiths are the Machinae, although the Twisted Angel has a ranged attack too. Fortunately the abilities of models like the Strike and Phalanx lend themselves to a castle or block formation, building up a cohesive unit of seer+wraiths with Spears and Noctii on one or both flanks (darkness + Noctus shooting followed by the Spear swooping in is a good way to deal with even high rank wraiths). Finally, the Knights Rising have the option to give up a point of essence to allow the seer a cheap-shot or two through intervening models to blast anything that's causing trouble with spell-based havoc if necessary; an ideal way to finish off a wounded wraithseer or high-rank monster.
