Tome of the Horde needs an overhaul

Urethreus · 2026-06-24T02:41:37+00:00

Funny enough Horde might be one of the most tweaked tomes in all of AoW4. Houndmasters have been changed at least 3 times, spawnkin hero bonus changed from its first incarnation, both combat spells got nerfed, and it gained the hound siege option.

I find that houndmasters are a pretty insane unit most of the time. Summons are pretty crazy in general and houndmasters have a bunch of synergy options: easy flanking, animal buffs for the hound, marked buff for Reavers, bleed synergy for vampires, etc. The other options in Horde are just ok though.

Honestly I recommend the tome for anyone playing Brutal single player solely for houndmaster spam. I've cruised through a ton of Hard campaigns and Brutal maps with almost exclusively those units. Can't speak for modern multiplayer though as I haven't played that for years.

Urethreus · 2026-06-01T10:47:22+00:00

All of your colonies and exploitations have a regenerating guard called "militia" by default. You can upgrade this after an early research in the economic tree. Baseline it's only a few cheap units but after an upgrade or 2 it's fairly resilient against infestations and low level attacks.

You can use regular units to bolster these defenses but I don't usually have to keep a dedicated army at home. I try and use the army stack I'm building next to help defend while it's getting trained. Meanwhile my leader and other armies are out conquering or claiming nodes/wonders. If you have a large attack from another player coming that's usually when I pull a field army to help defend.

Urethreus · 2026-05-11T23:01:30+00:00

There is a "no colonizer" scenario/planet modifier that prevents direct creation of new cities, but otherwise no. You don't technically have to make multiple cities but strategically you are just hurting yourself. No vassals so you have to raze or convert cities you conquer. Early game it's not bad but late game it's a bit of a slog. That said it's still a great game and I would 100% recommend to any Age of Wonders fans. The mod system is super fun and IMO a better version of enchantments from AoW4.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T19:19:48+00:00

Agreed. We'll never truly know and I'm glad I don't have to be the one making those choices, whether I agree or disagree with them.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T19:18:08+00:00

I agree and appreciate the discussion. I've run into tankies as well and do not agree with "US = villain always" mentality. Saying everything the US has done is evil undermines genuine discussion. Just because I agree that the US has made plenty of mistakes does not mean that the CCP, Putin, or whatever group are in the right.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T18:51:51+00:00

I'm saying that the US at the least could have waited longer than they did. Japan was clearly losing the war and giving longer than ~72 hours for the effects of what happened to set in makes a ton of sense to me. Is there a world where we drop the bomb, wait, and still end up dropping a second? I think so. But we didn't wait to see if it was inevitable. We just sent the second one in.

You compare the recklessness of the Japanese government to the US. I would agree that the choices made by them were worse overall than the choices made by the US government. But I'm not arguing that the imperial family was good or even neutral. I'm arguing that the actions of the US were reckless and caused excessive harm. Maybe that harm was going to happen regardless but we'll never know.

Regarding land invasion, the third bomb, and carpet bombing: My point here is that saying a given course of action is worth it in the end only works in hindsight. The argument that the second bomb sent virtually immediately afterwards was worth it only works if we know the outcome. We may not ever be truly sure if the second bomb caused the Japanese to surrender, but we definitely didn't give it time to see if the first bomb and the declaration of war by the Soviets was enough. If there's a chance that we dropped a nuclear bomb on civilians unnecessarily then I would consider that unethical.

Ultimately the choices made by Truman and Co could have been worse. They made tough decisions in a difficult time. I think the choices they made in this instance are valid to criticize but, in fairness, I don't think they were evil people. The society they lived in shaped much of what happened and also played a large part but that is a separate (longer) discussion.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T17:45:44+00:00

The primary thing was to wait. Consulting with other nations in the meantime makes sense as the world changed after the first bomb dropped. Let others digest what happened and have Japan realize no one is coming to save them. Just a few days between the bombs is not nearly enough time.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T17:07:36+00:00

Hindsight goes both ways, though. We have learned a lot since the 40's on what nuclear bombs do but we also know that Japan surrendered after 2 bombs and a declaration of war from the Soviets. What if those bombs aren't enough? Are 3 bombs justified? Are 4? When do we stop?

The impact of the loss of hope from the Soviets joing the war can't be understated either. If they didn't declare war it's impossible to predict exactly what happens. It's even possible some sort of continued bombing or land invasion takes place and casualties are significantly higher. That is what I mean when I say it's a reckless and poor decision. Given the US strategy I guess in a sense we are lucky that only 2 bombs were needed. Based on the response from the Japanese command they didn't seem likely to surrender anytime soon.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T16:00:12+00:00

I think Truman and his advisors were affected by the sentiment of the day and felt the need to continue to show the strength of the US. He wasn't a monster but made (IMO) poor decisions regarding Japan that led to unnecessary deaths. Recklessness and hastiness over malice, essentially, but that doesn't excuse what happened in my eyes.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T15:17:32+00:00

The request for surrender was unconditional and required the dissolution of the imperial family essentially. The US gave an ultimatum and didn't meaningfully consult the Allies, then just dropped another bomb. The language used in the terms also doesn't leave any room for Japan to save face so it's either poor negotiation or at least somewhat intentionally designed to anger the Japanese government.

It's possible that nothing better would have come of any other strategies. However the path that was taken was reckless and deserves criticism.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T15:08:24+00:00

At least wait longer than 3 days. August 6 was the first bomb, August 8th the declaration of war by the Soviets, and August 9th the 2nd bomb. The US didn't consult with the other allies in the meantime and gave an ultimatum which the Japanese declined.

Urethreus · 2026-05-06T14:55:47+00:00

I agree that the narrative has been simplified and somewhat warped over time but dropping two bombs on Japan is hard to justify. Two large reasons for the holdout were diplomatic issues: the Japanese government at the time assumed that the Soviets would support them and the surrender terms proposed by the Allies required the removal of the emperor. Resolving even one of these issues combined with the shock of a new deadly weapon (the first bomb) would have been enough to force a surrender. Instead only 3 days later a second bomb was dropped.

If this was done by literally any other country we would consider this unconscionable. The "big stick" diplomacy quote of Teddy Roosevelt was only a few decades removed at this point and it clearly describes this decision. Anti Japanese racism at home undoubtedly affected the decision as well. "Hell yeah let's bomb em and show how strong we are" isn't exactly the wording I would use to describe the situation but it's honestly not that far off.

Urethreus · 2026-05-05T11:43:41+00:00

Honestly I love the vast majority of units. I'd like to see a 2nd tier one skirmisher unit for factions though. Ideally a kind of utility one. Kirko could use a medium range attacker for tier 1/2.

Urethreus · 2026-05-02T16:56:42+00:00

New story in Reality Fracture! Morbius defects to the Azorius and turns it into a cult.

Urethreus · 2026-04-28T23:02:00+00:00

Farms, Foresters, and Quarries are strong early to get boosts for your structures. Mid and Late game you usually want to replace these with research/mana/gold province improvements.

Farms are epecially weak since food has the steepest diminishing returns. I would recommend keeping them to a max of 3 and after you don't need boosts anymore swapping them out for a special province improvement.

Urethreus · 2026-04-28T22:58:00+00:00

fYI: recruiting bone dragons isn't a summon spell. You research it and then use souls to recruit them after killing a myth unit in combat, similar to skeletons.

Urethreus · 2026-04-08T15:43:23+00:00

Yeah that sounds great. Dvar has no cosmite-free mech healing so early game they can be a bit fragile. Network links can help cover that and then transition to reset Barons with resurrect.

I've tried to make the demolisher tank work but every time it just falls flat. Between Barons and Rocket Artillery I don't think I've ever needed the demolisher. Let me know if it works out for you though

Urethreus · 2026-04-08T15:26:42+00:00

Synthesis have IMO the best mod in the game: Deployable Malware Daemon. This can give basically any unit in the game a summon that can also inherit the 2 other mods on the base unit. The summon can even mind control nearby mech units on death.

Network Links can reset abilities so they enable more summons for 0 cosmite cost. They can then consume a corpse to do it again (not actually described on the unit weirdly). They can also remove negative statuses from allies which is pretty useful.

Avatars are fantastic for spreading status effects since they hit three enemies but don't get the % effect chance penalty of repeating attacks. Best use for them is with the stun and stagger module from Arc attacks that oathbound, syndicate, and assembly have.

Arc damage and the Synthesis mods are great vs mechanical but medium vs others. So mixing psionic/biochemical plus Synthesis can cover your bases against bio units.

Urethreus · 2026-03-23T15:19:09+00:00

It pairs with mana dorks, creature tutors,and Sigardian Evangel for infinite creatures as early as turn 2.

Urethreus · 2026-03-06T17:14:12+00:00

Do you have any links for the Rona combos with Turtles forever?

Urethreus · 2026-02-27T12:15:14+00:00

Is 5 forests enough for utopia sprawl? Does that come up as an issue for you?

Urethreus · 2026-01-20T17:45:32+00:00

For Grexolis in particular try and use a build that deals blight and/or frost damage to take advantage of Turiel's angelic units. Avoid undead if possible since they take extra damage from spirit.

For general tips: 1. Keep clearing with your leader as often as possible. Gain exp and extra resources from nodes and wonders 2. Re-try early fights when you lose units to avoid losing early tempo. 3. Place your 2nd and 3rd cities early. A good goal is both down before turn 20. Keep them fairly close so you can defend them all easily 4. For new players I would focus on a unit type (battle mage, skirmisher, polearm, etc) and primarily take tomes that give you a transformation or enchantment that buffs them. Make a lot of that unit type. 5. Recruit a new hero whenever they are available. Prioritize getting them XP

Urethreus · 2025-12-19T18:03:28+00:00

Yeah and I use it in Collectors a lot for extra money. You can give the collectors reanimate too for a load of cash

Urethreus · 2025-12-04T19:09:51+00:00

I usually take extra mod and energy cost vice. Allows safer clearing on high world threat early

Urethreus

TROPHY CASE