Firstly, as everyone here seems to have pointed out, he's Egyptian, and hence, inherently strong, although the general feeling seems to be that a lot of people feel Ra or Isis are more powerful. I think (and I know some of you guys out there know this too) that is just as powerful, but a lot harder to use.
Oh, and this also isn't a guide...it's no where near comprehensive enough to be one given my VERY limited experience of the game (I can't even remember how much certain upgrades cost such as Shaduf! And if you read the rest of this, you'll soon learn just how n00b I am Set's animals have been nerfed, and as such, they're not as viable an option as they used to be, however, he does have a few advantages that make him a competitive force. (The funny thing is that I got AoM just less than a month ago, so I never experienced the whole period of animal rushing Weaknesses 1) No economic benefits- This point is highly debatable. After all, his Migdols cost 100 gold less, so by building 3 Migdols, you're 'saving' 300 gold (hey, I can get another migdol 2) Feral sucks. 3) Can't pick up chicks as well as the Greek gods. 4) As that lessthanjakeman dude pointed out, Pigsticker > Strengths 1) Uber Scouting- Hyena scouting is awesome. Your priest can also convert a nearby wolf or some other fast-moving animal (only 1 pop slot), to scout even more. With 2 critters running around, you'll learn all about the map in no time. Converting may take a while, but you'll still have enough time to scout the map by the time you hit classical. This is always nice as it frees up gold with scouting. Even Isis' obelisks cost 10 gold I believe, and despite prosperity, she's still spending gold early in the game to scout. Ra has the luxury of using priests to empower and scouting with the pharaoh which allows him to pick up relics- an advantage of Ra. Still, with time and population as the only factors affecting Set's early scouting, you free up gold to build your starting temple and a monument later (this somewhat compensates the lack of cheap obelisks, cheap monuments, priest empowerment, etc). 2) Animals on age advance- as Set, I like taking most of my starting villies off food, but I like to keep 4 or so hunting at all times, and killing off your animals (hey, theyre not that strong, and they take up pop) for food. In classical, you get 3 gazelles and 2 hyenas, for a total of 225 food. It's not much, but at least it's fast food. You can easily get them on berries and later back to hunting once you get bigger, meatier animals in the later ages. Feral makes Set's animals give more food, so you might want to try that as well (I haven't really taken a detailed look at it yet). So anyway, the reason why I don't consider this a particularly useful economic advantage is because the animals provide very little food, simple as that. The hunting is ok, I suppose, and maybe getting hunting dogs early for all the hunting you'll be doing in addition to this makes it good, but I dunno...it just feels too marginal of an economic advantage to really be considered a strength you can exploit I generally don't think it's a good idea to build a monument straight away even as Set- there's really not much point in your pharaoh summoning weak animals unless it's for the purposes of FOOD. Now that I think about it, I haven't tried this out yet...it MIGHT work, especially since eggies get free houses so population shouldn't be much of a problem. Of course, it’s mainly for the archaic age…by the time I’m in classical, I want at LEAST six guys farming, but maybe summoning animals for food can last me long enough to get shaduf and then cheaper farms. 3) He looks cool. 4) And the main reason why Set is awesome- he has the same minor god selection as Ra that allows for UBER INFANTRY. Ptah-Sekhmet-Horus. This gives Set THREE boosts to Slingers instead of the usual 2 from Ra. Not only do Set's slingers have Electrum bullets and Slings of the Sun, but they also have Set's innate bonus of training faster (it's like a private levy just for slingers!), and more importantly IMO, more hitpoints and more less hack damage vulnerability. All this adds up to make Set's Slingers better than that of any of the other Egyptian Gods. Combine this with the other minor Gods, and Set's Spearmen and Axemen are just as good as Ra's while having slightly superior slingers. Now, this begs the question: does Set's bonus to Slingers (and therefore slightly better infantry than Ra) compensate for both Ra's and Isis' superior economy? IMO, there's the rub! I think that Set is better than Isis in this respect, though. Isis may have the economy, but she doesnt get Horus, or Ptah, or Sekhmet which is a real pity (though she's strong enough as she is). Egyptian infantry are CHEAP, and when pouring from 4 or 5 barracks, are not funny to play against. It won't matter if Isis can spam more infantry because of a superior economy because your army will be more cost-effective. As long as your economy is good ENOUGH (not necessarily as good as Isis'), you can beat her infantry, no matter how much she throws at you and besides, even if you lose men, you’ll still be flooding them onto the field as fast as your opponent. One of the most important things to consider is that Isis doesn't have Greatest of Fifty which IMO, is a CRUCIAL late-game tech for the Egyptians. True, most games dont last that long, but should they do, you'll NEED IT! Especially against Poseidon or Odin. Jarls are insanely powerful, and a +10% damage bonus against them just doesn't cut it. Greatest of Fifty gives your spearmen +110% total bonus damage vs Cavalry, meaning that they only become a truly hard counter in Mythic. Should the game last this long, you'll need this tech, as Set enjoys neither the Camel bonus of Ra, nor that of Osiris' Desert wind, so you can't count on Camels countering cavalry as effective as Spearmen can. With Ra, I feel it's more of a mixed bag...Ra and Set have almost equally matched infantry armies, since they have the Ptah-Sekhmet-Horus selection, and Ra's priest empowerment could very well compensate for Set's tougher slingers. I'm not too sure on this matter. Oh, and this is why I don't really factor cheaper Migdols as a strengh of Set because his Minor god selection doesn't really allow for uber migdol units like Ra, unless you go elephants, and he DOES have bonebow for Chariots, but in doing so, I think that his STRONGEST side is being neglected, that is, decisive and aggressive use of infantry. In this sense, Set is a LOT less versatile than Isis, and even less than Ra, but he's good at what he does. When selecting a classical age God, I must admit, it's tough. Anubis also boosts your infantry, but only your Spearmen. It's a tradeoff between a When advancing to heroic, I like to think of Sekhmet as a MUST. Use Citadel right away as it gives +10 population which = 10 more villies (better econ) or 5 more infantry dudes in your army Mythic to me, seems like a straightforward choice- Horus. As mentioned, you desperately need Greatest of Fifty to make your spearmen counter cavalry effectively. The decrease in Hack damage vulnerability also makes them less vulnerable to axemen or hypaspists which means that if your opponent uses Toxotes or Throwing Axemen, your Slingers will murder them. On the other hand, he could continue to use Hypaspists as they are devastatingly effective, in which case, you’ll have to crank out axemen like crazy. Spear on the Horizon gives a very nice HP boost to spearmen, as well as a nice damage boost….not much to say about that- by Mythic, with all these upgrades, and at only 50 food and 20 gold, Spearmen are insanely powerful for their price. Not only does Horus give you hardcore upgrades for your spearmen (axe of vengeance is cool too, if you need to use axemen), but both his MU and GP are totally awesome. His MU isn’t that great vs Norse though- Jarls are inevitable, and they kill MUs even better than Hersirs, so getting avengers (a melee unit!) is suicide for them. In fact, about the only thing that seems to work vs Jarls are Petsuchos + Rocs, but I wont go there :P. Tornado is a devastating God Power- cast it on some fortresses/towers to crack a tough defense, cast it on clusters of houses so that the enemy won’t be able to produce any extra troops for awhile, giving you that edge you need it battle, or just anywhere where it’ll do a lot of damage to the enemy :P. There really isn’t much to say about this, either. I only see Thoth being an option against a Hypaspist-heavy Greek player. Mass Spearmen, Slingers, and Priests can effectively counter whatever the Norse throw at you, so it’s only against the Greeks and Egyptians where you’ll need to consider getting Axemen. In the event that the Greek player DOES go heavy on Hypaspists, you MIGHT need uber elephants from Thoth to absorb damage. I won’t deny the power of the Elephant, and when going with THoth, they’re even more powerful! Still, because he doesn’t do anything to benefit your existing infantry, I’d recommend going Thoth ONLY if you need the meatshield (there are times when even flooding the field with infantry doesn’t work because Hypaspists are just so damn strong when they’re also backed up by Toxotes- a pure anti-infantry army.) By adding elephants, even if they go hoplites, you still have Axemen and Slingers to handle Hoplites. Remember- you don’t want to mass elephants, it’s too expensive- build some, but not too many…maybe 4 or something, just to absorb damage and to distract the enemy. I personally haven’t put this into action, it’s all theorycraft Now can someone PLEASE fulfill my numerous pleas (see various threads in General Discussion) and make a really good Set Guide for the current AoM patch? :P All the guides are from when he was 'overpowered', and I'm really desperately trying to find one applicable to the current version of AoM )=. If no ones does so, I shall be forced to continue writing shitty stuff like this [This message has been edited by GRUNT (edited 05-02-2004 @ 02:19 AM).]