More Sorcerer Lords

[Aaron]

OK guys, we're making progress with the Sorcerer Lords. We currently have four in place (tweaking aside) and only need to come up with nine more to finish.

Now, we have plenty of suggestions. In point of fact, we have more than we need. So, we're going to have to look at what we've got and what we don't and start dropping things into place.

What we have so far:
Alhasret – Death Summoner
Ariel – Life Master
Magog- Destruction Master
R'Jak – Death Master

So we've got Sorcerer Lords using Death, Destruction, Life, and Summoning so far. We have three Circle Masters and may end up with a forth at the very end.

That means our current gaps are:
Air
Earth
Fire
Water

Augmentation
Biomancy
Mentalism
Protection

That gives us a lot of room. I want us to try to fill the gap with really interesting builds (that are still accessible to new players) or solid archetypes (as they are sometimes called). A few examples from the suggestions list are:

Name: Rastiss
Magic: Death 4, Mentalism 5
Disciplines: Archmage, Mystic
Disposition: Semi-agressive

This is a good build because it hits the dark side of Mentalism. Archmage and Mystic work together to let him bring a lot of power to the battlefield. One thing we do have to consider is that all the tier 9 spells are now single circle. So, in that regard he may “waste a point”. However, I like it as is. All things considered this Death and Mentalism seem like a solid and interesting combination.

Name: Eve
Magic: Life 4, Biomancy 4, Protection 2
Disciplines: Worldshaper, Beast Lord
Disposition: Passive-Aggressive

Eve is interesting because she's a representation of “Earth Mother” lore (at least in my mind). The Circle combinations will give her Life/Biomancy 8 and Life/Protection 6. So, she'll have a number of general Life spells, some Negative Energy spells from Biomancy, but up to tier 8 Life/Biomancy spells, some general protection and then pretty high Life/Protection. The build supports the lore in my mind. Eve is mainly about life, protection, healing, etc. However, when she needs to she can just make you die with the power of Biomancy. On top of that Worldshaper let's her “perfect up” the planes and Beast Lord helps her recruit armies of animals. All in all it's a very good build that represents the Earth Mother Archetype.

Name: Markas
Magic: Air 1, Earth 2, Fire 2, Life 2
Disciplines: Cartographer, Lucky, Mentor, Pillager, Relic Hunter, Warlord
Negative Disciplines: Butcher
Disposition: Passive-Aggressive

This build is interesting (although it is one point over the limit) for a number of reasons. First it uses a lot of low tier magic. It has access to 2/3 of the tier 1 spells and 1/2 of the tier 2 spells. That gives you a lot of low tier options. In addition the Disciplines are going to make your heroes more powerful as well as your armies. This build uses magic to support military might rather than trying to achieve military superiority through direct magical power.

I could go on, but you guys see what I'm saying. We want things that distinguish themselves or represent archetypes well.

I would like to see a Sorcerer Lord with 9 tiers in a single circle, but not have mastery (much like the non-master version of Neve). They might have 9 in one of the Elemental Circles and then 1 in the other four (Life and Death are exclusive) or 9 in one of the Effects circles and 1 in all the others. (Some negative disciplines would need to be in there to balance out the cost.)

In any event, you guys see the gaps. Let's fill them in.

Oh, and you can basically look at this as me giving my +1 to Rastiss, Eve, and Markas (once we get rid of the extra point). So, let me know if you +1 any of them as well.

In closing I invite you to follow me up. If you want to pick a suggested Sorcerer Lord (even one of your own) to "sponsor" that would be great. You can just post them here (in the short format) and explain what makes them particularly interesting or representative of a good archetype. From there we can start collecting +1s and getting them put in the Wiki

[zdsdead]

Well, first off im going to have to +1 Markas, as I find this build interesting. I like the fluff/description, and being fairly magically weak, will give a different slant on gameplay, as Aaron has mentioned.

[Mardagg]

+1 to Markas and Rastiss. Not sure about Eve.

[Endless Rain]

I guess I'll post Kyor Baelyn again. Kyor fills both the Fire and Water gaps. She also has multiple tier nines without circle mastery.


Name: Kyor Baelyn
Race: Grey Elf
Gender: Female
Magic: 9 fire, 9 water
Positive Disciplines: None
Negative Disciplines: Opulent, Ascetic, Vengeful
Disposition: Will rarely declare war, but never signs peace treaties due to Vengeful discipline. Kyor absolutely hates Merlin though, as well as anyone who has no spell circles.
Strategy: Kyor focuses on mana and spell research. Due to having multiple tier 9 circles, Kyor is perhaps one of the most versatile sorcerer lords in the game.
Personality: Kyor is normally peaceful and will rarely invade you unless you do are very weak or are playing as Merlin. She does try to found lots of cities to make up for not invading others, and she also attacks independents very frequently.
Factions: Grey Elves (Common), Draconians (Uncommon) Myrodants (Rare) Unhallowed (Very Rare) Dark Elves (Very Rare)

[Beregar]

Aaron. I believe we need a bit more organizing on this. First of all we need to know some basic setups of which the most important is: how many sorcerer lords we are going to have at minimum?

For example if we know that the basic number is 10 sorcerer lords including the masters then it means we need to have sorcerer lords that run both element and effect spheres. If it's going to be more then we can run more single element or single effect sorcerer lords.

After we know the basic numbers we can start going through element by element and pull together all suggested sorcerer lords that represent that element AND then put them on a vote. Since there are also dual sorcerer lords it doesn't mean that a sorcerer lord that doesn't win will automatically get scrapped. It just means they go to vote on another element.

After we get the core lords decided we can make room for a few wildcard lords if there's enough development resources for them.

Note: I skipped the sorcerer lords from MoM with slightly atered names. There's paying homage to the game and then there's ripping it off. This is a new game. Not MoM under different name. If people want them feel free to include them as well but I certainly won't.

For example if you look Air. The proposed sorcerer lords are:

Avariel (Air 3 / Water 3 / Biomancy 5): Worldshaper. Avariel is an ancient elven sorceress who still remembers the time when all elves were but a single race. She plays no favorites among elves and is capable of both great acts of kindness and horrible cruelty. She herself is a fickle mistress flowing from one emotion to another like the everchanging wind or an ocean current. When her mood changes the very planes follow.

D'rael (Air 7/ Fire 5): Gate Master, Relic Hunter, Wasteful, Vengeful. A strange man suspected to have djinn blood in his veins. Focuses on explaration but will lash out fiercely against anyone getting in the way, especially to take over a node.

Drakhis Skycaller (Air 6/ Fire 6 / Destruction 2): Ascetic, Sage. Drakhis is a young draconian elementalist who has dedicated himself to the elements of air and fire. Drakhis is a bookworm at heart and seeks knowledge for its own sake forgoing the earthly riches for knowledge. A path that will lead to the ultimate reward: the Spell of Domination and subjucation of all other sorcerer lords.

Elron the Unconstrained (Air 4 / Earth 4 / Fire 4 Water 4): Vengeful, Tyrant, Careless, Butcher. Elron is an erratic force of raw elemental power that never forgets a grudge and has no trust in mortals, as well as a considerable ego.

Keirath of the Burning Sky (Fire 5, Air 5, Death 2): Keirath knows well the value of patience, and allies. Offend him, and the skies will darken with the wings of those who follow his desires. Befriend him, and your enemies skies will darken as long as you uphold your side of the alliance.

Zeus, Tyrant of the Skies (Air 8): Battlecaster, Warlord, Tyrant. Zeus is a powerful air mage of unknown origin. What is known is that he claims to own the skies and all that flies within them. Zeus has the biggest ego in existence. Only he deserves true and absolute power. And if you disagree with him, better hope you are lightning proof

Once we find the sorcerer lord we like we can start discussing about the sphere distribution. For example Avariel is currently primarily a biomancer. However if people like her she can focus more on air, or if they don't like her they can vote for Zeus or Drakhis instead who are more invested in air natively. Perhaps people don't like her at all and she goes to the trash bin!

However perhaps people don't want a split sorcerer lord to represent air and pick Zeus instead. This obviously does not rule out Drakhis or Keirath who will pop up when we are discussing for example fire sorcerer lords. Even if they don't make it in there might be still room in the "wildcard lords" category.

[Curtis6566]

+1 to Rastiss.

Well I suppose I'll sponsor my own:
Name: Varkin Strongshield (Dwarf)



Magic: 5 Earth, 4 Augmentation, 2 Protection
Disciplines: Artificier, Geologist
Negative Disciplines: Boorish
Disposition: Unfriendly, Possessive
Strategy: Vakin will spend most of his power enchanting units/cities and forging magic items to create powerful units. He also likes to create large cities.
Personality/Story: Varkin was a great smith, attuned to the forges and metalcrafts, and the earth from which they hail. He also had an interest in improving things to perfection. This fueled his studies in magic until he could forge people as well as armor. He is obsessed with perfecting his cities and units to peak levels of efficiency, but cares less for beauty, as the best swords are not the prettiest ones, but the most deadly ones. Varkin will make deals with others if it is advantageous for him to do so, but is reluctant to ally with other mages, as he prefers to perfect his domain over being obligated to help others. Varkin will also declare war on someone just for getting better materials for his crafts if he feels that he can withstand any retaliatory attacks the empire might offer.
Factions: Dwarves primarily

He's a good embodiment of what seems (by reading the dwarf threads) to be the dwarf style of gameplay. Defensive, resource-hungry, good at improving things and rather gruff. He's also an artificer, which further allows him to enhance his units. With Earth he can change the landscape (for the most part) to his advantage. The only thing I might change as far as I can tell is arrange more points to Augmentation, but without complete spell lists it's hard to tell. He would also fill artificer and Augmentation roles (and represent the dwarf race).
EDIT: Just noticed the short format part, sorry about that. I'll keep it as it is until I get more time.

[Happerry]

I'll put my support behind my Fire/Water pair.




Name: Malicia
Magic: Fire 9
Disciplines: Planeswalker, Summoner, Battlecaster
Negative Disciplines:
Disposition: Rational
Strategy: Calculating. Malicia will make an objective, draw up plans to see it taken, and then execute them.
Personality: Malicia is one of the rarest of things. An old fire mage. And with age comes patience and wisdom. Not for Malicia is the brushfire raging of her younger peers, but the wisdom of the smouldering earth. She does not forget. She does not forgive. And one day, when you have stopped looking over your shoulder, she will be there.
Factions: Any but the Unhallowed. Most likely to be Draconians or Insectiods.

dn___snow_elemental_lord_by_sash0-d45qka9.jpg

Name: Neve
Magic: Water 9, Air 1
Disciplines: Savant, Expansionist, Charismatic
Negative Disciplines: Careless
Disposition: Aggressive, Risk Taking, Daring.
Strategy: Neve is highly aggressive, but will honor any pacts unless she is betrayed first.
Personality: Adrenalin Junkie
Factions: Orcs (Common), High Men (Common), Dwarves (Common), Grey Elves (Uncommon)

Neve is a young mage, but has mastered the circle of water with unbelievable speed. She primary uses those skills to seek out one danger after another, being prone to a highly risky behavior type as a partial result of her low attention span and desire for excitement.

(Honestly, I mainly just wanted a ice/water mage who didn't subscribe to the frigid passionless ice queen archetype...)

....
Also, if we're looking for unique lords, I'd like to remind people about Eyegor and Elron.

[zdsdead]

Im a bit confused, (easily done) with all these different sorcerer threads popping up, with different requirements.....

Anyway I like Varkin. I dont see the dwarves as a very magical race, normally, but I think Curtis, has done a fine job here, on putting a magical slant on a dwarf, that I would like to play, so +1 from me

Im also going to +1 Rastiss, He seems a nice and clean, SL, without too many disciplines to worry about. I would definitely give him a whirl, my only criticism, would be the name, but maybe thats just me.

orc_shaman1.jpg
Name :- Dumag
Magic: Mentalism(6), Water (4)
Disciplines: Oracle, lucky.
Disposition: aggressive
Strategy: Using his skill at premonition, Dumag, forwarns his people of upcoming fortuitous, and calamitous events. He also knows which of his rival factions cities are ripe for the taking.
Personality: Expansionist, who wants to take wealth from inferior factions
Factions: orcs

Dumag is an Orcish Oracle, who has an uncanny knack of predicting the future, and fortelling when random events are going to occur.(with his lucky trait, they tend to be more good, than bad) His favorite spells would be Scrying, and Minds eye.

Er and thats my creation, and I like him very much, and would like to play him, thats all I have to say on him

[Mardagg]

+1 to Varkin, we need a Dwarf Sorcerer imo!

[Aaron]

Beregar, you're right... I have got to try to reorganize this in some way. This has proven to be the most difficult set of posts I've had to manage so far.

zdsdead, the idea behind the numerous posts was to help shape the discussion. The different requirements represent my attempts to get things moving in the right direction. So far they have failed, lol.

It's late, but I plan to take another crack at this tomorrow...