How to play Nightmares

General Nightmares Strategies

Generally speaking, Nightmares of Meloen is a faction made of fast units that lack of resilience. In order to win, you have to keep your troops mobile and follow the day-night cycle. Some of Nightmares' units are relatively expensive which makes them unable to compete in number with most of default faction, but on the other hand they got a lot of abilities and specials that make them deadly when used right.

They don't have a typical village holder and it is most of the time better to leave a village open than to sit on it waiting for your opponent's attack. If holding a village is of paramount importance, good candidates are the Unhatched and the Black Cat, the former should be use to hold village threatened by melee oriented units while the later can hold against ranged units. Given his poor resistance the Black Cat can't hold well against more than 2 units, so make sure to zoc out the other possible attackers. On hill and cave villages, the Unstable Elemental may be considered too.

As Nightmares of Meloen are quite fast units, the village grabbing should not be a problem in the early game: Unhatched, Black Cat, Unstable Elemental and Floating Darkness all have 6 or more movement points. However as the last 3 units are rather weak and expensive, make sure you keep enough cash to buy units to protect them later. A typical first turn recruitment could be: 2 Unhatched, 1 Black Cat, 1 Unstable Elemental and a Life Thief or a Scournful Watcher .

Unhatched: for his high resists and his low price, the Unhatched is the tank unit of Nightmares' faction. It's good to have some for any of the matchups in mainline's. As they are very efficient in taking damage in defense, they also have a major role in most offense strategies. When attacking with them, mind the trait who gives them an edge against some damage type.

Black Cat: it is the magi of Nightmares. He helps reduce the defender defense when pushing an offensive, hence boosting every unit's damage per cost ratio. While having strong defense overall, it suffer of poor resistance making it quite weak in one versus some combats.

Life Thief: while it can be compared to the Ghost by some, it differs in its statistics. Even if it has more HP and better attack than the Ghost, it has worst defense and resistance. This overall make him less like a tank and more like an offensive weapon. This is particularly true against factions with bad arcane resistance. It can make an upset to a push of chaotic units with low defense too.

Scornful Watcher: if it can be considered as the archer units of nightmares, his role is major against any faction that have good arcane resistance. As it turns any arcane resistance into a weakness, this Nightmares' unit is Loyalists' and orcs' nightmare. The Scornful Watcher is just a support unit against both Drakes and Undead, where, when you have one, you wish you had none and use it to make retaliation damage to the opponent's cold ranged.

Howling Darkness: a 7 movement point flying skirmisher with leadership is what we talk about. Lacking a melee attack and low hitpoints, the Howling Darkness can't take care of itself. In exchange of their protection, other units will receive lower damage from opponent's attacks with the Howling Darkness. Keep in mind that to give that bonus, it should get next to the opponent's unit.

Unstable Elemental: this is the game's most volatile unit. Most of its stats change according to the terrain it is standing on. With a very high movement point and a flyer movetype on its basic form, this can be used as Nightmares' scout. However be aware than in some of its variations, the Unstable Elemental trades most of its mobility for some resist bonus.

Creepers: a strategy changing unit. When all your attempts with Unhatched or Life Thief have failed, this is the time to bring the Creepers in. Low cost and low upkeep, you can mass them to block opposition's advance. They have very high damage as long as you use the banding ability when attacking. If they can't win a game, they can save your day.

Drakes

Unless you got a Life Thief right on, it is likely that your first recruit will be a little backward what is truly needed against the Drakes. Still, your Unhatched units should be put to good use as they still deal a good amount of damages at night. After acknowledging your opponent's faction, you should start getting a few more Howling Darkness and Life Thief units as they both have a damage type the drakes are weak too. If you got a Watcher, do not worry too much, your opponent is likely to have gotten a few saurian units on their first recruit, thus your Watcher will still have his role to play.

More than in most match-ups, this one will use heavily the Time of Day cycle as your opponent will unlikely base his strategy around saurians, and will make heavy use of Burners. This will lead to a match between quick and hard hitting units with opposite alignments. Do not fear to leave your villages at day, you will get them back as the night falls.

Unhatched: Although the Drakes will resist his impact damage a bit, this unit will remain damage/cost efficient, and a good option to bring the Burners down or other units at favorable Time of Day and/or with a Howling Darkness support. Also, on favorable terrain they'll be your cheapest option to block an attack and let your expensive damage dealer safe, if you really have to hold a point or cover an important unit. Try to have a couple around any time.

Black Cat: the Cat won't be as much of use as in other match-ups, as the drakes don't suffer defense alteration as much as the high-def units. Still, it can be of use against the saurian and any cheap shot to lower a drake defense is cool to take. No need to recruit several of them.

Life Thief: they really are a core troop in the matchup against Drakes. Their damage type ensures heavy damage against any of them, in addition to the fact they'll replenish life as they fight. Always have a couple of them around, but be aware that at daytime the fire damage of Drakes will tear them apart.

Scornful Watcher: It is likely that the only saurians you'll face are those from your opponent's first recruit. Poking at the Skirmishers, or finishing and retaliating against Augurs is the only use of this unit, so don't recruit it if you know you're against the Drakes faction.

Howling Darkness: While a casual support unit elsewhere, the Darkness is a necessity against the Drakes. His cold damage type makes it efficient against anything, his horror ability will make your push safer, and his skirmishing ability will help to ZoC the hard-to-trap Drakes when comes the night. You need a couple of them around.

Unstable Elemental: The scouting role will be fill by your Darkness units already, so the Elemental will be less of use here. It can still get the iffy slots you don't want your Darkness to take, and hopping on a hill/mountain or a water hex to tank can remain a decent option if you have to protect your more important damage dealers. Don't recruit more than one.

Creeper: Although dealing piercing damage, the amount isn't enough to benefit from the Drakes' pierce weakness. So no need to focus on that point. More over, its low movement and grouping constraint will make it unable to follow the day/night push'n pull of this match-up. If the game goes for a stalemate though, because of an heavy damage threat on each side or defensive styleplay, they can become an option.

Knalgan

A general purpose recruit will be good against Knalgans, all of the units you have here can serve a purpose in this match-up. Even the arcane resistance of the units doesn't make the Life Thief useless, as it remains a good counter against the Ulfserker, and can tank a bit on flatland where you don't want to expose your other units, especially against those harassing Footpads.

Unhatched: they will have a tough job dealing with the Dwarf Fighter or the Footpad because of their impact attacks. Still, the Knalgans will have to shift to other units, life the Thunderer, the Poacher, or the Thief, if they want to bring your Life Thieves down. And those units are good to charge, so keep a few Unhatched units around.

Black Cat: you will need these against Knalgans. They'll do a great job at diminishing the survivability of the elusive units, and will help to negate the dwarven incredible defense in mountains. They are easy prey for the Ulfserker though, and you will most likely have to lose a few of them during the battle. So keep a regular flux of recruiting to have 1 or 2 of them in the field.

Life Thief: a bit like the Undead Ghost, this unit will help to counter the ulf, and defend against the Fighters and Footpads you'd meet. However, they aren't a cost efficient damage dealer here, so don't recruit too many as they'll lower your fire power with each of them.

Scornful Watcher: like against the loyalists, the Watcher will get a bonus in damage against every unit you'll face, making it a precious and cost efficient ranged damage dealer. Having too many will make their protection difficult against the Ulfserkers, but having several around to poke at the melee oriented units, especially the cursed ones, is an excellent choice.

Howling Darkness: their ability is appreciable, but not a necessity. Because it is an expensive unit, and an extra safe kill for the Ulfserker, you might prefer to spend the money on more Watchers or Unhatched to outmatch the Knalgans in number or power.

Unstable Elemental: you will want one of these for the scouting role mainly : grabbing village and gathering intelligence. Don't forget that other forms can occasionally be useful, for tanking and slowing to lower retaliation.

Creeper: if the game goes for a stalemate you might want to accumulate these instead of banking. It can also be tiresome defenders to remove for the knalgans if they want to push at day. But generally speaking, you will prefer to use other units when you face the Knalgans, as few Fighters in mountains will hold massive amounts of Creepers.

Once you see your opponent to be knalgan, you'll want to diversify a bit your army and recruit more Watchers than you usually have, so get a Life Thief as soon as possible if you don't have one already, and same for the Watcher.

Each time it is safe, you'll want to use the Black Cat on the Gryphons, Thieves, Footpads and Fighters to negate their massive defense and make them easy shots for your Watchers mainly, but also at times your Life Thieves and Unhatched. Use those last two to charge the Thunderers and Poachers who can remain a threat to your Life Thief. If you see massive amounts of Footpads, get a few more Life Thieves, and progress slowly with a front line of them and a back-line of Black Cats and Scournful Watchers.

Loyalists

After having got a general purpose recruitment on turn 1, when realizing nightmares of Meloen are facing Loyalists, they want to get Scornful Watcher. Their arcane focus special is using loyalists' arcane resistance at their detriment. The Scornful Watcher is rather fragile on melee though and you need to protect at any time of the day. The Unhatched is usually used for that job as it is quite cheap and thus does not divert too much resource from the Scornful Watcher recruitment.

Unhatched: get enough of those to protect your weaker units. They can engage in combat with any ranged unit and melee unit too if you make full use of Unhatched's trait. Exception for the Heavy Infantry that should not be attacked directly for fear of hard retaliation.

Black Cat: get one or two of them to lower opponent's defence. Combined with heavy hitters Unhatched and Watcher they garantee maximal damage. They can be use for village holding too if the number of attacker is limited.

Life Thief: don't recruit those against Loyalist as their unit's all have good arcane resistance to counter his melee attack.

Scornful Watcher: when facing Loyalist, this is showtime for the Watcher. You have to recruit enough of them to do plenty of damage at night but make sure you can cover them when the day comes. You should consider feeding them XP so to use the level 2 at his full potential.

Howling Darkness: you can recruit one of those to help the Unhatched to clear the way for Watchers without taking too much retaliation. His own ranged attack can be of some help to weaken units that don't resist cold. Timing his attack is important because as soon as he has fired, you can't use his skirmisher for further support.

Unstable Elemental: recruit some of them zocing out your opponent's troops at dawn and trap them in at dusk. When put in water they can restrain Mermen's mobility, however they should not engage in combat due to their bad resistance. The Unstable Elemental can also help holding the line when put on hill or forest. In the later terrain, the slow special can keep the mages away and their pierce resist can hold the spearmen.

Creeper: you can use some of them to hurt mages, archers or horses. When your time of the day is done, you can also use them to shield more important units by forcing your opponent to use some unit to clear them out. Keep them in pack to lower upkeep.

Rebels

The Unhatched & Black Cat combination will shine on this match-up. The defense debuffing will negate the specialty of the nimble elves, and the hard hitting Unhatched will quickly rip off their little health amount. That will not be enough to give you the game in hand though : the cost efficient fighter can still do some nasty retaliation, even if your Unhatched has the appropriate trait, and the Wose is almost invicible against them. Therefore, you'll need a mix of support units to make up for it.

Your opponent will try to hold your night pushes mostly, capitalize experience by finishing off the units that took hard retaliation and wait to have regrouped a few Woses before attacking you at day. Try to seize the dynamic of the game in your favor with an early threat and have the push'n pull happen around his villages rather than yours. If he brings on too many Woses, counter recruit with your Life Thief units, and use the support of an Howling Darkness if too many fighters block the way.

Unhatched: They'll be your core troop here, dealing massive damage to the elves who are on bad terrain or under the effect of jinx, as well as taking the hits from swords and arrows. Have an army of them anytime but if you see wose spam.

Black Cat: Another of your key units in this match. They won't deal many damage, but they'll have a massive impact on the Rebels' defense organisation. Always have at least one, but you may recruit several as they'll be really busy cursing every unit around.

Life Thief: Their arcane damage will make them quite decent damage dealers against most of Rebels' troop. However they really shine at dealing with the Wose, and aren't as cost efficient as the Unhatched for the other jobs. So recruit according to the number of Woses you face.

Scornful Watcher: Because nearly all units it'll fight with are arcane weak, the Scornful Watcher's special will lessen its potential. Still, the rounding of damages make it do a 7-3 ranged attack (at night only) making it a passable archer-like creature. It may deal with the human mage too in favorable conditions. You can have one around, but restrain from having more as your money is probably better spent elsewhere.

Howling Darkness: If you face packs of elves to counter your Unhatched army, its horror ability will be of good help to reduce retaliation. Moreover, its skirmishing capacity will make it efficient at ZoCing units, get on the extra hex you need for damage dealing, or even slip behind the lines to village threat, decoy, create open spaces and disorganize the Rebels' defense organisation in general. It is quite an expensive unit though, so don't recruit several of it.

Unstable Elemental: The Elemental will have a vital role of scouting and gathering intelligence. It will also at times be able to tank in hills or grab the forest hexes your opponent would want. To finish with, its slowing special when coming out of a forest will ensure your Unhatched to take low retaliation even against the fighters. The unit isn't too damage/cost efficient though, so bear in mind that you decrease your fire power with each of them.

Creeper: Again, the Creepers will offer an alternative to your army, but they don't make a game on their own, especially since the Wose is about invincible against them. Go the Creepers way if you fight many elves that aren't willing to come for a fight.

Northerners

The fight between these two chaotic factions will be relentless. As Nightmares' units are slightly weaker and more expensive, it will be theirs to decide when to retreat or heal an unit. If they failed to do it and try to match Northerners in a total war, it is likely that they will end up critically wounded and undermanned.

While the natural way for Nightmares of Meloen to fight against Northerners would be to use their abilities to make for Northerners' number, that strategy doesn't fare very well. Nightmares' best chance is to turn quickly to Creepers. Getting too many Unhatched will make the Northerners turn to Whelps. As Nightmares' Life Thieves, that would be their best counter, can't beat them in price, that is not something they want to happen.

Unhatched: while it is still a convenience unit, it loses most of its power in front of a herd of Whelps. So while Nightmares will get some to hold villages, as it is still the best health points per gold ratio they can buy, it must reluctantly leave some room to Creepers when fighting Northerners. Beside Whelps, the Unhatched doesn't hold well in front of Orcish Archer's fire.

Black Cat: she is a vital unit to have to weaken defense of Northerners' melee units. Keep her on the best defense and don't leave Northerners too many spots to attack her as a Grunt only needs two hits to kill her at night. Even then, it will be Grunts' primary target, so Nightmares will have to regularly put her in their recruitment list as their Black Cats fall.

Life Thief: while it is an useful unit to face Whelps as he leverages on their arcane weakness, its low defense and fire weakness makes it Orcish Archer's favorite meal. Hence it should only be recruited when the Orcish Archer problem is under control. It is more an unit to bring in the middle of the game after Nightmares have survived Orcs first assaults and Northerners move to an attrition warfare with Whelps.

Scornful Watcher: the best fighter against the Grunts. He deals good damage without retaliation. However as it still requires 6 or 7 hits to kill a Grunt, the support of Black Cats is necessary to inflict enough damage per turn to stand the flow of hordes of Grunts. His retaliation is also good enough to make cursed melee units think twice before attacking.

Howling Darkness: it can provide helpful support to attacks on melee and its range attack is very useful to finish off cursed Grunts or Whelps. The Howling Darkness is also a very efficient helper when fighting Nagas. But as its survival hope is quite bleak against melee heavy Northerners, getting one at a time is enough. As it gets a nice health point boost on levelling, Nightmares might want to feed him with kills (a bit more than three kills needed to advance).

Unstable Elemental: this scout can find some room to fit in. It can be useful on water against Naga and can hold a hill or mountain for a while. The bramble form on forest, while it gets a nice slow special, is weak to Grunt's blade. While the Unstable Elemental is very versatile, something is common to all forms: they can be poisoned.

Creeper: his lack of mobility is not a problem as both factions are chaotic, while his relatively high defense requires on average two Grunts to kill one at full health. Creepers' priority is to bring down the Orcish Archers on attack and cover healing units and Watchers. They do a pretty lousy job at holding village against more than 2 units. If they can be used to attack Wolf Riders, they should hold back to retaliation for the other melee units. Keep the full health Creepers in front to maximise retaliation before they die. Try to manage your gold to recruit them by pack of at least three as power comes with number.

Summary: Use Creepers on Orcish Archers and Black Cat and Scornful Watcher on Grunts. The Unhatched should be left to protect Watchers and Cats or to hold villages. If you really have to charge something, try to use the Floating Darkness to limit retaliation (unless you target an Archer). Charging Assassin is a good idea to get rid of the poison that turns your Unhatched into a joke. If you face an army of Trolls get some Life Thieves. If you can't, best is to just ignore Trolls unless you have a bunch of idle Creepers. Don't mind high defense spot (except for the Cat) as much as unit cover when moving.

Nightmares

Like all mirror matches, this matchup requires to use units at their full potential to make a difference. The additional fun in this mirror is that you will make huge damaage at each turn is pretty high and that the number of potential targets is pretty high for most units.

When realizing you face other Nightmares, get more Life Thieves. As it has no real foe beside the Scournful Watcher, it will have a pretty easy life. The only thing to worry is to get slowed by a bramble form of the Unstable Elemental, or cursed by a Black Cat, that would make any Scournful Watcher around an immediate danger.

Move in the battlefield with Life Thieves first. While you should not let them get slowed, you can lure some Black Cat in the open to charge him with Unhatcheds. When moving, the Unhatched will under constant pressure from opponent's Life Thieves so you should keep your Scournful Watchers in range to counter an attack (bramble form of the Unstable Elemental can do either).

In the case you face a spam of bramble form of the Unstable Elemental, make sure you attack them one after the other, feeding the same Life Thief with kills. The bramble forms lacks of attack power and even slowed Life Thief will heal enough on retaliation to survive. Putting your Unhatched on forest will deprive your opponent from the best spots and force him quickly to resign after your first Life Thief has levelled.

Unhatched: while the damage the Unhatched can do is still pretty high against Nightmares, the impact damage he resists least is distributed on several units: Unhatched, Scornful Watcher and some forms of Unstable Elemental all have some and can inflict painful retaliation, which leaves the Black Cat and Floating Darkness as preferred targets. It is worth though to throw the Unhatched on any Scournful Watcher around to protect your Life Thief.

Black Cat: as most of Nightmares' units have pretty low defense, getting her is not mandatory, but if the opposition is seasoned, the increase of chance to hit will be welcome. In this case, she will be in constant danger from the opposing Unhatched. She will be most useful on Unhatched and Life Thief as they will not retaliate.

Life Thief: its arcane attack spreads panic and desolation in the ranks of opposing Nightmares. Except the Life Thief itself, it hurt badly any unit around, getting healed in the process. Get some of them.

Scornful Watcher: he is very useful to tame the Life Thief. None other unit can do the job better than him. As being the major threat to the powerful Life Thief, he will be followed closely by opponent's Unhatched and should thus be protected by yours. If present, taking at Creepers never hurts.

Howling Darkness: the Howling Darkness helps reducing the impact of retaliation, saving a couple of health points that can turn death into life. However, due to its high price and lack of resilience, one of them is enough. Its cold ranged should be left for the Unhatched that has no resistance.

Unstable Elemental: in its basic tornado form, it is quite weak, and taking into account how fast is the Unhatched it might be hard to keep alive. Move it to forest or hill and it will trade its blade for an impact attack that will earn Unhatched's respect. The bramble form gets a slow special on its range attack that comes handy against the Life Thief. This asset will make it the reigning form on the battlefield as the quake form's improved blade and fire resistance will have no use.

Creeper: while not playing a significant role in the mirror matchup, the Creepers can always bring a change in strategy. Their main targets would then be the Watchers, the Floating Darkness and the Black Cat.