With Archon Prophecy Triumph did a pretty good work making the classic Angelic/Archon theme feel complete, with Tome of Virtue and Tome of the Archon you have everything you need to have a celestial heavy army in a self contained way.
Which brings me to the other side of the coin, over the course of the game there have been plenty of concepts that simply do not have enough to stand by themselves and just are a throw away without coherent follow up.
Two tomes is the minimun to have a complete concept, and that is why one can argue that Tome of Frost and Deep Dark, while barebones, at very least are enough to make your empire feel like an artic power, the next tomes do not even get that.
True orphans, these are truly on their own and are totally disjoined from everything.
Tome of Fey mists: This is the most evident and visible orphan tome, it builds up for a fey centric strategy and then... it ends there, no more Fae are present in helping its strategy, no more thematic fairy tomes, without luck with ancient wonders you get only three Fae units and the Horned God is not a unit for Fae, but for plants and animals, Season 3 needs at least one more fae tome and new fairy units, you simply cannot do very well a fairy centric empire with just fey mist, it is isolated from everything. Triumph made Celestials and Infernal Demons on par with each other, but Fae are at the bottom of availibility along with Accursed Demons... talking about them.
Tome of Calamity: This Tome by itself is excelletn and complete, it self countains all accursed demons... at T4, you go all the game without using them at any capacity, and unlike the prosperity counterpart one can at least argue you taste both Dragons and Celestials before reaching prosperity, Accursed Demons are the most uncommon unit type in the game and you cannot build a youkai army until end game and even if the Tome is really good it has little support specifically for the youkai empire since in the end of the day it is a single tome, they do have minor synergy with the infernal tomes and that is great for a combined demon army but infernal demons and accursed demons are far from being the same.
Orphans with marginal support: These have more thematic support... under very restrained conditions and in practice they really need more support.
Tome of the Dreadnough: A great gunpodwer tome and magitech thematic force that makes you be able to play the early modern fantasy... if you choose Reaver, if you are not Reaver it is a thematic clash that barely fits anywhere, and even with Reavers the support it gives for a gunpodwer faction is minimal, as it stands we need other tome for the theme, by itself complements Reaver a bit and is a lone weirdo for everyone else, hardly soemthing to build a strategy.
Tome of Corruption: This tome by itself is a very small shadow (heh) or what the Shadow demon faction coul offer, you CAN make a Umbral Demon empire... with Umbral abyss enabled, without it umbral demons are the most incomplete thematic you can pursue, its T5 is boss only, it only has a single umbral unit, and nothign really benefits Umbral demons themselves to make you want to use them beyond Umbral malady inmunity, i have mentioned you need a society trait to be able to spread gloom? Umbral Demons NEED support, Tome of the Tentacle has a weak thematic link the same way Alchemy and Trasnbmutation get but these clearly do not help each other. At least other Umbral tome to complement Umbral armies is needed and another tome to link them to undead, because it is a is quite baffling that Urrah is both the master of Undead and Umbral abyss and yet these two do not work well at all together, here is where Calamity got a thign right by working well with Infernal demons, Undead and Umbral should work if you choose to pursue both, like how Prosperity works with Dragon or Celestial bonuses... talking about Prosperity.
Special case.
Tome of Prosperity: It has the same inherent issues as Calamity in which you never see prosperity units until endgame, no Prosperity armies and no thematic cohesion to base your empire in the Mandate of Heaven, it is not a total ofphan purely because Celestial and Dragon Support DOES work with them so at very least once you reach prosperity you can build a strategy around them, and Tome of Discipline does stick to this better than Tencacle (no use for Umbral in itself) and Shade (A rouge tome in every sense unrelated to youkai) this is admitedly the theme with least need for more tomes in season 3 by a fair margin, but still was worth pointing this out.
Which brings me to the other side of the coin, over the course of the game there have been plenty of concepts that simply do not have enough to stand by themselves and just are a throw away without coherent follow up.
Two tomes is the minimun to have a complete concept, and that is why one can argue that Tome of Frost and Deep Dark, while barebones, at very least are enough to make your empire feel like an artic power, the next tomes do not even get that.
True orphans, these are truly on their own and are totally disjoined from everything.
Tome of Fey mists: This is the most evident and visible orphan tome, it builds up for a fey centric strategy and then... it ends there, no more Fae are present in helping its strategy, no more thematic fairy tomes, without luck with ancient wonders you get only three Fae units and the Horned God is not a unit for Fae, but for plants and animals, Season 3 needs at least one more fae tome and new fairy units, you simply cannot do very well a fairy centric empire with just fey mist, it is isolated from everything. Triumph made Celestials and Infernal Demons on par with each other, but Fae are at the bottom of availibility along with Accursed Demons... talking about them.
Tome of Calamity: This Tome by itself is excelletn and complete, it self countains all accursed demons... at T4, you go all the game without using them at any capacity, and unlike the prosperity counterpart one can at least argue you taste both Dragons and Celestials before reaching prosperity, Accursed Demons are the most uncommon unit type in the game and you cannot build a youkai army until end game and even if the Tome is really good it has little support specifically for the youkai empire since in the end of the day it is a single tome, they do have minor synergy with the infernal tomes and that is great for a combined demon army but infernal demons and accursed demons are far from being the same.
Orphans with marginal support: These have more thematic support... under very restrained conditions and in practice they really need more support.
Tome of the Dreadnough: A great gunpodwer tome and magitech thematic force that makes you be able to play the early modern fantasy... if you choose Reaver, if you are not Reaver it is a thematic clash that barely fits anywhere, and even with Reavers the support it gives for a gunpodwer faction is minimal, as it stands we need other tome for the theme, by itself complements Reaver a bit and is a lone weirdo for everyone else, hardly soemthing to build a strategy.
Tome of Corruption: This tome by itself is a very small shadow (heh) or what the Shadow demon faction coul offer, you CAN make a Umbral Demon empire... with Umbral abyss enabled, without it umbral demons are the most incomplete thematic you can pursue, its T5 is boss only, it only has a single umbral unit, and nothign really benefits Umbral demons themselves to make you want to use them beyond Umbral malady inmunity, i have mentioned you need a society trait to be able to spread gloom? Umbral Demons NEED support, Tome of the Tentacle has a weak thematic link the same way Alchemy and Trasnbmutation get but these clearly do not help each other. At least other Umbral tome to complement Umbral armies is needed and another tome to link them to undead, because it is a is quite baffling that Urrah is both the master of Undead and Umbral abyss and yet these two do not work well at all together, here is where Calamity got a thign right by working well with Infernal demons, Undead and Umbral should work if you choose to pursue both, like how Prosperity works with Dragon or Celestial bonuses... talking about Prosperity.
Special case.
Tome of Prosperity: It has the same inherent issues as Calamity in which you never see prosperity units until endgame, no Prosperity armies and no thematic cohesion to base your empire in the Mandate of Heaven, it is not a total ofphan purely because Celestial and Dragon Support DOES work with them so at very least once you reach prosperity you can build a strategy around them, and Tome of Discipline does stick to this better than Tencacle (no use for Umbral in itself) and Shade (A rouge tome in every sense unrelated to youkai) this is admitedly the theme with least need for more tomes in season 3 by a fair margin, but still was worth pointing this out.
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