southern: Thanks for challenging me on this, my mod won't be any good without this sort of argument. Especially since I am still lacking in experience (i.e. only ever had one game where an opponent made wraiths, never used them myself in PBEM), I will spend time searching the forums for opinions on balance in the old PBEM threads.
I'll happily argue theorycraft with you to help you come to a decision. :)
southern: By catch out I merely meant making an attack before the enemy has magic damage ready, not specifically from fog of war. I am surely biased a bit by this game, where I have good vision from towers, and hasted Air Galleys to zoom my priests around, but even so the wraith still strikes me as a slowcoach.
Ah. Because of how basic Enchant Weapon is, magic damage is generally available nearly from the start in an emergency, so you're unlikely to be able to catch an enemy completely helpless against wraiths. Maintaining magic damage across a wide area is a lot harder, though. I'm thinking of Broken Bow here, where leaders could be a LONG distance from the actual fighting, especially if they don't have haste.
Wraiths move at the same speed as standard infantry; they'll exactly keep up with a stack of archers. Goblins, Dwarves, Halflings, and Frostlings move slightly slower (24MV), while one of the big Highmen advantages is faster infantry (30MV).
Bookwyrm627: Wraiths are about forcing the enemy to counter a very specific threat, and most of those counters are less effective units for general combat (ex. human priest or charlatan instead of human cavalry or cavalier). The wraith threat can't be ignored, most of the answers to that threat take significant time and gold to build, and counters can't really be built in a one-off way the way wraiths can.
southern: I disagree on this; priests are a downgrade for general combat, but they're not as big a stat downgrade as wraiths are compared to demons/bonehorror. I guess there's a question to be asked about autocombat, though - will there sometimes be battles (in PBEM autocombat) where a priest+mundane force fighting a wraith+mundane force messes up by having the priests target non-wraiths first, while the undead force kills the priests first, leaving mundane versus wraiths? Perhaps I should test.
The gold and time to make priests is less than for making wraiths, and I'm not sure I agree about wraiths being something you can make as a one-off, because of the way the installation mechanic punishes making different units. If I have to make many priests because the enemy might have wraiths, but has actually switched to demons or bonehorrors, that's not the worst thing. The priest is then a very costly archer with some knobs on, and we all know how good archers are.
Priests aren't a heavy duty combat unit, considering they tend to get distracted by injured units and their ranged attack only has one shot per round. They are support units, not fodder (archers), speedy (cavalry) or power houses (titans).
Wraiths are a unit with a very specific niche. They get a big stat downgrade from bone horrors and demons because wraiths simply can't be touched by half the units in the game. A single wraith can murder a full complement of 24 karaghs, first born, or nature elementals and then ask for more. They can't be touched by Air Galleys, Ice Drakes, Astras, or Red Dragons, and I'm not sure they can be hurt by Basilisks (Doom Gaze) or Dread Reapers (Invoke Death). A Wraith's whole thing is how numbers and walls mean nothing if you don't have magic, holy, or lightning damage present, and you need it present in large enough quantities to kill the wraith before the wraith kills the source(s).
When I talk about wraiths being one-off units, I mean you send them out alone to do their job. They neither need nor want support when actually fighting. They walk into a battle, murder all the helpless defenders, then move on while a small squad of followers occupies the town during the migration process. You don't send a group of wraiths to take out a target: either one wraith is enough or you send something else. The fact that you can build wraiths means you are only a few turns away from switching to demons or bone horrors, and then you can churn out whichever ones suit your situation.
Priests or whatever that are trying to counter the wraiths usually need to act in groups. A unicorn might be reasonably expected to solo a wraith, but a single priest or fairy is as likely to die as to win. 2 swordsmen with Magic Weapon are a reasonable choice if the wraith is solo, but you don't send just one. If the wraith sees counters coming, then they can retreat behind the undead armies until the counters are removed.
southern: I've been discussing this from a point of view which assumes the enemies of the Undead have good scouting, and are investing in upgrading their cities. But maybe it's fine for Wraiths to be weak when they're scouted ahead of time by a player that has upgraded cities, because they get to be good in games where you have an undead town tucked away in some cave and the enemy has made 100 archers.
If the enemy has good scouting and upgraded cities, then sure, wraiths aren't a huge problem. You still have to be careful to have the countering units in place when a wraith shows up, but the counters are available IF you've spent the resources to make them available. So, how much of that precious gold and time are you going to spend on countering something you might never see in a game, when it could kill you if it catches you unprepared? Magic Weapon gets expensive in bulk and can't be used on archers. :)
southern: Does this mean that in an Undead vs Undead game, people could use Wraiths as immovable blockers on the strategic map? Interesting.
Theoretically possible, I suppose. As a map maker, you could also create Wraith-Gates.
southern: In my opinion, 26 movespeed and pass wall are a bit feeble for a special forces unit. Physical Immunity is so good, but does it make up for not having concealment like the other special-forces type t3s? Come to think of it, aren't the special-forces type t3s - generally speaking the infantry with concealment, scale walls etc type ability - aren't they generally weak compared to making a t3 flyer or general combat troop? The problem being that installation, and the rarity of t3-capable towns, combine to strongle encourage you to spam beefy t3s as much as you can, I think? Having utility/stealth unit is nice, but cutting into your ''main battle tank'' production, is that ever worth it?
It is the physical immunity that makes the wraith special forces; 26 mv is standard infantry speed and pass wall lets the wraith into a city/tower. The terror it inspires is because of the specialized tools required to kill it, not the fact that it can vanish from view. A stack of giants/titans/warlords is scary until it runs into a single wraith. You don't spam wraiths (they die too easily once the counters are in place); you make a handful and use them strategically. Wraiths are a short detour for a town that is mostly making demons or bone horrors; if a horde of archers is descending on your town, then a single wraith will do more to save it than a single demon or bone horror.
southern: For some reason I thought decayed terrain gradually returned to its original state. Maybe I was thinking of frozen water, or of a different game entirely.
Path of Life, the Life magic spell Rejuvenate, and an Altar of Life's explosion will heal decayed lands, and I think that's it. Artifically frozen water does revert, and croplands will automatically rebuild as well (if the terrain and city type are appropriate).
