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Mictlan Turn 08   It's pretty impressive that a goddamn B1 managed to haul 5 blood slaves out of a province by himself. Blood hunting can be real swingy.   Aaaaaaaaand we have our first setback. We whomped most of them, but they did way more damage than I had expected or hoped. I'm actually not quite sure what lost me the battle, I think it might just have been unlucky rolls, or maybe my non-sacreds got flattened and it got the rest of them to start running for it because it accounted for enough of the total HP of the army/squad.  However, this screenshot shows something wrong. I could fall back for more troops, but then it's almost guaranteed that TC would snag that mountain away from me and then have a way around me in the meantime. On the other hand, I've got like, four sacreds left, I could crash them and my prophet into the mountain and hope for the best and lock out TC... so that's what I end up trying to do. Mictlan Turn 09   Conjuration 2 isn't super relevant for most nations, for a few nations it has some early national summons(for instance the *Rus nations), but otherwise it's mostly notable for having Storm Power and Water Power, which are +1 Air and Water paths if there's a storm up or you're in water. The latter's gonna be used liberally by most UW nations and Storm/Storm Power is an integral part of playing EA or MA Caelum properly, it's kind of your national thing. So about that battle...  No lie, waiting for that battle report to come in was a real butt clencher, because if I had miscalculated that one I would've been out a prophet and, as mentioned, TC would likely have enveloped me.  I spot Pythium to the northeast, but I'm not too worried. That doesn't really look like an invasion force. Considering my Rain Warriors I may also actually be one of the nations with a fair shot at that lake throne, assuming nothing else fucks me up hardcore.  Of course, had I known about his HYDRA HELLBLESS, I would've probably been a bit more worried about this. Funnily enough at this point he probably could have owned me with just that, since I'm off to SUCH a fragile start. You may also be wondering about that straggler Mictlan Priest up there on the TC/Mictlan border, he's gonna fort that province the heck up. Another fun thing about Mictlan? When everyone gets castles in MA and Citadels in LA, Mictlan still only gets fortresses. On the one hand this is another economic malus, since it limits their maximum admin boos, and then just for a slap with the other hand, it also prevents you from getting as many commander points as everyone else will be raking in. I'm slowly realizing that I might be slightly boned this game.
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Jan 25, 2020 23:58
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PurpleXVI posted:No lie, waiting for that battle report to come in was a real butt clencher, because if I had miscalculated that one I would've been out a prophet and, as mentioned, TC would likely have enveloped me. No kidding, losing your prophet this early would've been a massive pain. Good for you that things worked out.
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Jan 26, 2020 00:55
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PurpleXVI posted:I'm slowly realizing that I might be slightly boned this game. Living the imprisoned double incarnate life. There are also a few other LA nations which lack citadels, like Pan and Jomon. The best way to deal with that is simply to take citadels away from other people.
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Jan 26, 2020 02:10
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Arcvasti posted:Living the imprisoned double incarnate life. Jomon desperately needs to get underwater far more than they really want/need a land fortress.
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Jan 26, 2020 03:04
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LA Jomon can project some serious power underwater. They're one of my favorite nations in concept but have a few real flaws that keep them from competing with the best nations of the Age.
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Jan 26, 2020 03:30
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T'ien Ch'i Turn 8 No magic sites, sad.  2 air gems, and some drain and death scales that will get overwritten by my dominion. I could get really unlucky with a misfortune + death or drain bad event here before they go away, though. I don't  And bad omens. Spooky.  Good battle here.  My priest bites it from eating one too many arrows, which as it turns out, was two.  I also saw Mictlan bounce off that cave. Having expected them to get it, I am not in position to grab it for myself. From what I saw, the darkness penalties are what got you there, your attack and defense weren't really better than the Bakemono's in the dark. I bought a Master of the Way, as buying one made my money work out better last turn, and they are the cheapest dudes I can recruit to go make labs and do certain low level forging tasks anyway. And I spy Pangaea south of Pythium and East of Mictlan. T'ien Ch'i Turn 9  Plenty of things happen for this early in the game, I finish Construction 2.  Barbarians are preparing to attack my capital. This kills some population (which reduces gold income and recruitment points) and a bunch of Barbs try to take the province.  I get 10 free PD in Blackdale.  And one of my provinces gets more people, nice.  I kill some dudes.  And some other dudes.   I also spot Bandar Log's group of mostly naked (if you don't count their fur) ape longbows.  Mictlan and Pytium are now neighbors, and so are Bandar Log and I. I make my first Owl Quill, at a 20% discount due to Ancestor Smiths having Forge Bonus 1.  Gym is known far and wide for his heroic strength, appropriate for a true warrior.  I begin my first Palisade in Blackdale, the province that got 10 free PD, the game is being very supportive of my choices.  I found a painted cave from site searching...  And a lava lake from just owning this province, because you don't need a mage to find a lake made of lava just sitting around.
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Jan 26, 2020 04:04
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Atlantis Turns 8-9 Turn 8 Another turn I didn’t get screenshots. Instead of generally talking directions, here’s a map with all of my nearby provinces. Edited just because it’s from the current turn.  Okay, a few corrections from turn 7. I did not send the party from Kark to take it. I had that party head south to Valrest, which they took without trouble. On the tick to this turn, I had that party move to take Olm, which they also did with few losses. I also had a separate party consisting of the beaten Tungalik and some reinforcements move into Sea Stag lake and take it on turn 7. I then sent them north to take Good Water, which they took this turn with few losses. For movement this turn, I have the Good Water party move to take Emerald Lake. Additionally, I recruited my first Angakok this turn, who will be sailing over to Mag to beat up those druids that beat me before. Finally, I have the party in Olm move to take Wacce. Eagle-eyed readers might notice that Jomon’s capital is right next to it. I did not realize that, and was originally hoping to grab Wacce to be an eastern sailing point, especially because I saw that Jomon had already taken the Blue Moss Forest. I also had recruited an indie commander in Sea Stag Lake, and I set him to building a fort there to unlock my underwater recruits. Lastly, diplomacy-wise, I found a new neighbor: Erytheia, who had taken Nashen. We negotiated borders and agreed that he’d get Nashen and the province below Wic Forest, while I would get the Desert of visions and Wic Forest itself, leaving the throne for whoever took it first. We also agreed to not fight over the lakes for now. I’d take the ones north and west of Nashen, they’d take the one east and the small one to the south. I realize that essentially all this did was cede ownership of the eastern lake, but I think that’s a fine price to pay to not have them threatening my cap circle. Turn 9 .jpg) The screenshots are back! .jpg) .jpg) The lake and druids both fall, though I took more losses than I thought I would because the druids kept putting people to sleep again. .jpg) Now for Wacce. First, I take it with one lost Mournful, which is a great result. .jpg) And then Jomon bumps into me with a squad of Ashigaru! Thankfully, I stomped the party pretty solidly. Though I won and cleared the province, I didn’t realize that it was in Jomon’s cap circle so I apologize for the bump and leave it undefended for them to take. I mostly didn’t want to fight them because there were a lot of provinces still available for expansion and they took Heat 3 scales (like most people would). Without a later spell (Wolven Winter), I have no way to reduce the temp in their provinces, so my ice troops would get slaughtered if I didn’t win by the time spring came around. .jpg) For my only event, I get even more extra gold and a small boost to luck on my cap. Still loving these scales over misfortune.  Thanks to my diplomacy limiting options, I send my prophet to take Wailwind Waters and move the other party to take the province north east of Mag next turn.  I also have my Angakok move to take the Faraway Sea. It’s a bit risky thanks to the extra losses from the druids, but I’m still confident that I can do it. Lastly, I see that I will soon border Pan. That’s a little less than ideal, because Pan is Pan, but still something I can work with. I won’t reach out just yet, but probably will in the next turn or 2. OOrochi fucked around with this message at 16:33 on Jan 26, 2020 |
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Jan 26, 2020 04:54
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How are u posted:LA Jomon can project some serious power underwater. They're one of my favorite nations in concept but have a few real flaws that keep them from competing with the best nations of the Age. I'm so sad that it isn't easier to make a sick-rear end Shramp & Crab battle army. Arcvasti posted:Living the imprisoned double incarnate life. However, Mictlan, and in particular with my bless, is great for the strategy I call "become a rump state that endlessly mires someone in war and causes them absurdly disproportionate losses when they invade you, resulting in their eventual destruction because everyone else didn't waste resources fighting you." If it ain't a spite strat, it ain't a GREAT strat. PurpleXVI fucked around with this message at 10:12 on Jan 26, 2020 |
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Jan 26, 2020 10:09
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PurpleXVI posted:However, Mictlan, and in particular with my bless, is great for the strategy I call "become a rump state that endlessly mires someone in war and causes them absurdly disproportionate losses when they invade you, resulting in their eventual destruction because everyone else didn't waste resources fighting you." Isn't this exact strategy why no one likes Ermor, Rl'yeh etc. ?
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Jan 26, 2020 12:17
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Arcvasti posted:Living the imprisoned double incarnate life. Simply let a friendly neighbour borrow your cap for a few turns!
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Jan 26, 2020 12:56
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The dark vine battle screenshot is posted twice and the Jomon battle screenshot is missing.
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Jan 26, 2020 14:14
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Donkringel posted:The dark vine battle screenshot is posted twice and the Jomon battle screenshot is missing. Thanks! Fixed it.
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Jan 26, 2020 16:33
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Agartha Turn 8  Not much here. Spied another battle between Gath and some poor indies.   My troops take the mine province to the north and then decide to stake a sorcerer. The +1 Death will barely matter in the long run once my scales get there. Turn 9  Ooh! Another magic site and my first bump! Let's see how that turns out.   +1E and +1S are super useful.  My cave knight army takes the last of my cap circle provinces.  Gath is mean to more poor indies just trying to live their little indie lives.   I think what happened here was that Utgard's herse got hit by a crossbow bolt and HP routed, but since the garmhirdings berserk they didn't, leaving them leaderless when my army came in. I probably would actually have lost the battle had the herse still been there.  Lastly, my event brings me some precious earth gems.
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Jan 26, 2020 19:49
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The_Final_Stand posted:Isn't this exact strategy why no one likes Ermor, Rl'yeh etc. ? Nah, the thing about Ermor is that if they reach critical mass, they become essentially uninvadable by any nation that isn't able to field a big undead/uneating force or a lot of nature mages to provide supply(either by being present, with items, or both) since their dom aggressively depopulates territory, which also strips away supply. On top of that, this also makes their territory extremely unprofitable even once they're cleared out. Now, my territory is actually pretty great, tons of gold income even if nothing else, but for a lot of nations I'm gonna be hard to attack without notable losses.
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Jan 26, 2020 21:22
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PurpleXVI posted:...they become essentially uninvadable by any nation that isn't able to field a big undead/uneating force or a lot of nature mages to provide supply... I won't stand for this fay boar erasure. 50 supply points per immortal pig unit is extremely real when you have small armies of elite elves anyways.
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Jan 27, 2020 05:38
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MA Ermor and LA Lemuria are basically in a world of their own in regards to how hated they are. Purple touched on it, but basically it boils down to one player completely sacrificing their game to eliminate them (if they even can), because their popkill domains are so vicious that any province that enters their dominion is going to be worth precisely jack poo poo in terms of gold and population in short order. So even if you are capable of reasonably invading them by one mentioned method or another, you're just losing resources via attrition and gaining basically nothing in return. The other popkill nations both do so slower innately and, unlike Ermor/Lemuria, actually have at least some vague need for scales. So to add to the worthless land issue, they're reasonably reliable at getting large money/gem rewards for free (due to T3L3), will possibly be running some sort of silly bless for their free sacreds (more an issue with Lemuria, but it gives Ermor an elite force too) and will massively snowball into a likely uncounterable state if just ignored. That both nations can cheerfully wander underwater too makes them miserable to dig out if there isn't an actual water nation in the game too - though this does bring back fond memories of a game where we actually worked together and managed to lock Ermor's main armies away under Sea of Ice (they'd been using a few UW provinces for fast travel between threats), and then taking their final few strongholds before they could regain their numbers above water - think they eventually got domkilled there while we finished the game normally. I mean, TECHNICALLY multiple people could combine to try and eliminate them sooner before going back to their regularly scheduled battle for godhood, but these are goons we're talking about here - the best you're generally going to get is "well, I guess I won't attack you while you're containing them"(and then I'll eat your crippled nation afterwards) and even that's not necessarily always happening.
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Jan 27, 2020 09:01
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the jbbm mod often used makes lemuria at least a lot weaker/more palatable to fight
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Jan 27, 2020 09:39
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Lord Koth posted:MA Ermor and LA Lemuria are basically in a world of their own in regards to how hated they are. Purple touched on it, but basically it boils down to one player completely sacrificing their game to eliminate them (if they even can), because their popkill domains are so vicious that any province that enters their dominion is going to be worth precisely jack poo poo in terms of gold and population in short order. So even if you are capable of reasonably invading them by one mentioned method or another, you're just losing resources via attrition and gaining basically nothing in return. We did this in Fermanagh, made a big ol' "gently caress GHOSTS"-coalition and dunked on Lemuria. Meanwhile, in Eels, which I somehow won, Atelier here got ignored for most of the game, so by the end of it I think a good quarter of the world map was just blighted Lemuria provinces and I only won because the Cataclysm treated me right. Had it been a stand-up fight for longer, I would've been crushed by waves of ghosts. It was pure luck on my part that Atelier didn't get aggressive with me until I put up Purgatory when her armies started looking real spooky and in need of bustin'. I think Purgatory ended up getting dispelled like three times, though, and it loses some of its effectiveness when the ghosts have like fifty forted provinces all with temples and their dominion is real eager to skwoosh over on to you. I think it's a shame, though, like, if the game had some sort of spell for "repopulating" a province, i.e. a "RESTORE THE BALANCE" spell that adds a couple thousand pop to a province that's not a wasteland and is under 2000 or something, and/or if the Ermor/Lemuria expansion was kind of like the Necromancer event, where their growth produced valuable gem sites, then fighting them might make more sense, since suddenly there's a reward to equal the effort. Like instead of getting gold income provinces from fighting them, you'll get an incomparably rich gem income zone.
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Jan 27, 2020 10:56
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PurpleXVI posted:I think it's a shame, though, like, if the game had some sort of spell for "repopulating" a province, i.e. a "RESTORE THE BALANCE" spell that adds a couple thousand pop to a province that's not a wasteland and is under 2000 or something, and/or if the Ermor/Lemuria expansion was kind of like the Necromancer event, where their growth produced valuable gem sites, then fighting them might make more sense, since suddenly there's a reward to equal the effort. Like instead of getting gold income provinces from fighting them, you'll get an incomparably rich gem income zone. "Rebirth" mod does almost exactly what you're describing. If you have your dominion and growth scales over such a province (non-wasteland part included), you'll eventually get a "people are moving back in and nature is reawakening" event that restores some pop and income. I activated the mod as soon as I found out about it.
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Jan 27, 2020 11:02
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PurpleXVI posted:...if the Ermor/Lemuria expansion was kind of like the Necromancer event, where their growth produced valuable gem sites, then fighting them might make more sense, since suddenly there's a reward to equal the effort. Like instead of getting gold income provinces from fighting them, you'll get an incomparably rich gem income zone. The Roman god of the underworld is also the god of hidden riches so it's not even thematically inappropriate.
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Jan 27, 2020 13:35
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GunnerJ posted:The Roman god of the underworld is also the god of hidden riches so it's not even thematically inappropriate. Like, okay, check this concept. Ermor currently gets +1Death Gem per temple. How about instead of that, they had relatively common events where a province in their Dom for long enough would get 1 or more +Death or +Astral gem sites. Suddenly those provinces have the same advantage to Ermor that they also had, but other nations would start looking hungrily at them as a rich source of gem income. Or perhaps base it on the presence of their Bishops of Eldregate or something. It would A) make them more rewarding to conquer and B) force them to shuffle some of their fragile high-cost goons out there to generate sites, giving them some high-value targets that other players could attempt to strike at. But that's just My Thoughts On Videogames.
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Jan 27, 2020 14:46
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This is a dumb question but in the battle summaries, what does the 'sword' column represent? It can't be number of kills, it never adds up to the other teams' fatalities.
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Jan 27, 2020 21:29
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RBA Starblade posted:This is a dumb question but in the battle summaries, what does the 'sword' column represent? It can't be number of kills, it never adds up to the other teams' fatalities. It is kills. There’s just often things like friendly fire, in battle summons, or people dying to things like bleeding or poison. The sword is only added if a unit directly kills another one.
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Jan 27, 2020 21:33
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RBA Starblade posted:This is a dumb question but in the battle summaries, what does the 'sword' column represent? It can't be number of kills, it never adds up to the other teams' fatalities. It does. However, it doesn't care what kind of a kill it is, only that the unit in question is directly responsible. Stabbed an enemy to death? +1kill. Poisoned someone to death? Not a kill. Exploded a summoned skellington that doesn't show up in the report? +1kill. Shot a friend in the back? +1kill.
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Jan 27, 2020 21:33
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OOrochi posted:It is kills. There’s just often things like friendly fire, in battle summons, or people dying to things like bleeding or poison. The sword is only added if a unit directly kills another one. Oh, that explains it then. Thanks!
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Jan 27, 2020 21:34
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If you are going against a skelespam army the battle reports will generally show way, way more kills than deaths.
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Jan 27, 2020 22:38
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PurpleXVI posted:Like, okay, check this concept. Ermor currently gets +1Death Gem per temple. How about instead of that, they had relatively common events where a province in their Dom for long enough would get 1 or more +Death or +Astral gem sites. Suddenly those provinces have the same advantage to Ermor that they also had, but other nations would start looking hungrily at them as a rich source of gem income. Or perhaps base it on the presence of their Bishops of Eldregate or something. The Skaven mod actually does something like this. Skaven dominion generate sites that give Death and Earth gems. Granted, the sites also are "used up" and no longer give gems after a while. On the plus side, if you build a lab in the province, it will blow up and re-open the site. Skaven!
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Jan 28, 2020 04:12
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Mictlan Turn 10   As my galaxy brain predicted, we're gonna have a stable and narrow border with Pythium. Narrow borders are the best kind of borders for Mictlan since everything we control is sooooooooo slooooooooooow. No cavalry and really only one option for a flying commander, ever. Even Ulm could probably outpace us in most scenarios.  And I make a declaration of love and peace for everyone in the game.  It'll either get me instantly dogpiled or left alone. Let's see! A random event drops the temperature in Dunheim, relatively irrelevant, and I forget to screenshot what the global event was. It may have been an arena announcement.   I get grabbing on that province to my west just in case TC decides to be rude enough to move on my cap circle, and shuttle a few blood slaves up north for sacrificing until I can get a lab up. Much like gems, blood slaves require labs to teleport them around instantly, otherwise you get to be hassled by a large amount of tedious rock-and-slave shuffling which I do not have the patience for. This also means our entire western border is gonna be with TC, because there's a river in the way to the west and once my Heat 3 dominion gets over there, that's never not gonna be thawed. The scout that's been out and about has found that Patala's off to our west, beyond the river, so technically his snakey dudes could, I think, actually cross it. Turn 11  There we go, it was the arena. Generally participating in the arena is only worth it for nations that have beefy humanoid options, like the giant nations or nations at the stage where they can summon nasty humanoid goons like Tartarians. See, the arena itself consists of 1-on-1 battles, so anyone not beefy is liable to get knocked over in round one unless he can spam elementals or something to protect himself(having a Bottle of Living Water along will trivialize most early arena fights). Mages aren't necessarily bad contenders, but the reward is ultimately always a piece of thuggy gear. Armor, weapons, boots, etc. that help make the winner better at fighting and not dying. None of it that I've seen really has any utility for a mage, but is universally amazing on a thug or, better yet, an assassin. There's a decent selection of non-humanoid thugs, but if you toss one of them in there you might get some gear they don't have the slots for.  A pretty trivial fight, I wish the rest of them had gone quite as easily.   Out of respect for tradition, and just on the off chance that Dominions' exploding dice comes to their rescue, most people will send a spare scout or commander off to die in the arena if they have one. The result even if they win won't be much good, but at least it'll deny someone else the win.    As seen here, by all rights Agartha's Lava-Born Commander was probably the strongest contender, but either TC had some real lucky rolls, or Agartha's arena champion had his arms and legs lopped off in the preceding stages and carried those injuries with him to the finishing line.   And of course Erytheia's arena champion gets a pokey stick for his troubles which is a real nice weapon, but he's not exactly the sort of beefy warrior that can chow through entire squads on his own with it.     So, we've got TC NW, Pythium NE, Patala straight W and now Pangaea to the east, and pretty close to my borders, too. I'm pretty sure that unless I manage to pull something genius, I've gotten hopelessly behind on my expansion. Probably my biggest flaw there was that A) I forgot how much tougher LA indies were and should've gone for less incarnate blessing or an awake expander to help me out in the early game and B) I should have recruited a lump of mercenaries or two if I could've won the bid on any of them. All isn't lost, a bad start can still turn good if you can identify the right opportunities to expand. For instance, when an opponent is hopelessly mired in a war... I immediately start casually asking everyone I border whether they just so happen to be getting into any fights yet. Hopefully one of them will be foolish enough to answer honestly when they are!
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Jan 28, 2020 19:43
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T'ien Ch'i Turn 10 The magic site I found is a Bonedoor Tower (+1 Death Gem/turn), and Purple spouts some nonsense as usual (I actually enjoy all the unwanted sequel jokes, keep em' coming Purp).  My archers continue to die very easily to arrows due to wearing bad armor and no shields, unlike my horsemen.  Forest Trolls living in a Swamp prove to be no match for my Ancestor Vessels, who take no damage from the trolls due to good defense skill, decent protection and having a shield. Just stressing that all of my foot troops are decent to good early age level troops, and that does not cut it in the late age.  Unlike a different kind of random event where you need to go kill the heretics yourself, in this case someone on my payroll had the initiative to kill them for me, making this a negligible bad event.  Since I, unlike Mictlan, am not a rude province sniper, I leave Purple's cap circle alone, and send a busywork priest to reinforce my sacred army, and have a second Khan loaded with more Heavy Horse moving north. My scouts spot Patala and Pangaea, so I have fursuiters directly south of me, and actual animal people on their flanks. T'ien Ch'i Turn 11  I make progress on Enchantment Magic and find a Maze (+2 Astral Pearls/turn), and as Purple already showed, my generic commander killed two other competitors before being robbed of a rightful victory by someone who only had to fight once. The Lavaborn Commander is actually not actually great, 15 HP and big damage (25), but average accuracy (10), on a battleaxe, but no shield, 8 defense skill and 13 prot. It's got good odds in a 1v1 due to the extra health, but is very likely to get hurt doing so, and all damage you take in the Arena stays with you for the whole thing.   I lose some income and population, Tiash actually has a luck scale someone else spread there, so the bad event isn't even my fault. And I just noticed that if someone else's dominion spreads a positive scale to your province, and you then remove all of their dominion, you do get the full benefit of their scales, as many positive effects of scales are turned off if an enemy's dominion is in the province.  No battles this turn, but I am now moving to secure my northern expansion. There are a ton of river, mountain and lake choke points everywhere except to my south, where Purple tried as hard as possible to cut me off. I at least accurately predicted that no one else would want to send an early expansion force into any of my chokepoints and likely be forced to straight up backtrack to get out.
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Jan 29, 2020 00:09
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Honestly, I actually had no idea you'd weakened that province when I first came across it, I was just like "oh boy, free real estate!  "You could've probably kept me off it by saber-rattling hard enough.
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Jan 29, 2020 01:36
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PurpleXVI posted:Honestly, I actually had no idea you'd weakened that province when I first came across it, I was just like "oh boy, free real estate! Yeah, I could have, and just didn't. All the complaints in the thread are just LP smack talk. Er, I mean, I'm gonna make you pay for your unforgivable transgression in newbad4! Which, for those of you who don't know, was actually a game that began while newbad2 was ongoing, and ended back in August, a good long while before newbad2 ended and newbad3 started.
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Jan 29, 2020 02:09
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Atlantis Turns 10-11 Woo, back to full screenshots! Turn 10 .jpg) Have a few expansion battles and a lot of events. .jpg) First up is Mictlan’s first pitch. Might need some more workshopping before it’s ready for the market. .jpg) .jpg) Both expansion battles go off without a hitch. I lose a few of the guys in Faraway Sea to poison, but that’s fine. .jpg) .jpg) For events I have 2 good ones and then 2 that boost sloth in random unimportant provinces. .jpg) And finally, we have the 1st arena match. I’m a bit bummed that it’s happening so early, because it’s unlikely anyone will send anything good. Also because one of the giants could pretty easily win if they bothered to send a big guy. For future movement, I have my Angakok in the Faraway Sea start building a fort down there to get another mage facility going. Since I’m barely going to be recruiting troops, the state of the province itself doesn’t matter. I also have my prophet continue taking the lake, hitting the far eastern part. Lastly, I move parties into Hall Woods and Jome. The first is to support the Angakok next turn to take out the vine monsters, and the 2nd is going to go take the province north of the throne. Turn 11 .jpg) A pretty uneventful turn. Jomon took Wacce back with a few Ashigaru, but no fight because I didn’t leave any PD behind. .jpg) My only expansion battle goes well, slaughtering the shamblers and only losing some leftover trash from my starting army. .jpg) And, sadly, my valiant scout didn’t have any success in the arena. Cut down in his prime by an evil TC commander.  I’m 1 turn away from my first UW fort, which’ll open up some important mages.  2 turns away from my first land fort, which is in a great spot to have tons of resources. Only downside is that it’s made of ice because it’s on the coast.  And then 4 turns away from a 2nd underwater fort. My next goal is to get another land fort up, and I’m thinking Mag is a solid spot. It has good population and will have a lot of resources from the 2 forests. You can also see that my Angakok and reinforcements are moving into the Waywoods to take it before Pan can. Also, the 2nd party moving from Jome to the small forest above the lake and a scout moving from the cap to go ping the throne next turn.  And over in the east, I decide to go on land. If I go into the resting heights, I’ll probably bump with Gath’s pretender which would be a lot of pain for not much gain, because it’d just be back in like 3 turns anyway. So instead I go into Tirannea. It’s blocked by the info box, but Bogarus’s capital is to the NW of Tirannea. They haven’t cleared out their cap circle yet, so I’m hoping they go for Ragden instead of Tirannea, but I’m confident that my ice prot will help me out if we do bump. Overall, I’m pretty happy with my game so far. I’ve gotten a good number of provinces and there are still plenty of available ones nearby. I’m working on 3 forts before year 1 is even up, and I’m even building up a healthy gem stockpile thanks to 2 Lava Lake sites in my cap circle (+1 W and F Gem). I also have a few weak looking neighbors that I can easily hit with a sailing attack once indie provinces start running out.
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Jan 29, 2020 05:00
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Gath Turns 9-10 And I finally have screenshots again.  I keep pumping out giants at full rate, and on turn 7, started queuing up my cap-only H3 mages, to lead additional expansion armies. On turn 8, the first one completed, and was sent towards northeast. I really like my position here, there are 5 thrones that are fairly easily reachable to me. Based on the death scale, the underwater thrones is likely throne of death, and the mountains that surround it mean that I don't actually have to take it yet, to secure it I just have to take the 3 provinces north of it. I send my god to do just that. Elkland is also definitely mine, and it has jade amazons. I'm pretty ecstatic about that, as water is one of the two paths I have no access to. The throne up in the northeast might be contested, given how close Jotun and Agartha are to it, and likewise with the northwest throne and Erytheia & Rus.  On turn 10, another Kohen Gadol completes, and I send him and his friends southeast to clear that corner. Also, I tried to be cheeky and split a few giants off my northeast force to try and get cold hollows. Didn't work, the priest leading that separate attack got pasted. Tuna-Fish fucked around with this message at 14:22 on Jan 29, 2020 |
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Jan 29, 2020 08:49
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Agartha Turn 10  Having no battles this early in the game is usually a sign something has gone wrong and you've needed to pull armies back to reinforce.  holds up a photograph of PurpleXVI with the words DON'T BELIEVE HIS LIES scrawled on it  Still working on Enchantment research for my undead.  Oh hey, some nature gems for all those nature mages that I definitely have.  The arena announcement. What the others didn't state is that this is the People's Arena, which means that each participant gets a slave collar that neutralizes all their magic, which means sending a mage here would be a spectacularly bad idea.  Next turn's movement. We'll finally see if my cave knights are better than Late Age Heavy Cav. Also, I send the Lava-born Commander (circled) to the arena since he's not going to be doing anything else besides cost me upkeep. Turn 11  Actually a lot to unpack this turn. My Lava-born fights bravely until T'ien Ch'i's commander gets a lucky hit in past the plate armor.    The two sites grant me three gems for three of my primary paths.  My army takes the cav province with no trouble. If everything goes my way I should be able to grab that throne province unless Erythia gets there first.   The province to the north of my cap gets taken over by some indies. This totally won't become a recurring theme throughout the game.   I begin summoning my national undead. They'll begin replacing my infantry as chaff as we go to the mid- and endgame.  I move to retake Windsong Forest, take Sleepy Mountains to cut off Erythia from the throne (actually forgetting that they're amphibious and can thus go over rivers or through the sea), and send an indie commander I recruited last turn to start a fort in Fas Dir.
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Jan 29, 2020 17:33
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Mictlan Turn 12  I really can't wait to get a decent blood hunting team online, but in my experience as Mictlan that usually takes until Const 4 where you can make Sanguine Dowsing Rods. Anything you have that's natively Blood 2 is limited to your capital, so relying on them rather than just juicing up your Mictlan Priests with SDR's is gonna take a while.  At least Gintmark is brought into the fold in a flawless victory. Probably would have gone differently if it had been one of those provinces with cavalry, though.   Events are... good!  Right now my priority is to take as much of my eventual border with Utgard and Pan as possible, to prevent them hemming me in too hard. I have a feeling like that's probably not going to go too well, though, and that I'm going to have to look for opportunities to create a breakout or, perhaps, create my own opportunities. Sadly all that's left involves beating up big barbarian mobs, more or less.  With my first two forts up, I want them templed, labbed and vomiting out priests and sacreds as soon as possible. They're already providing a nice economic boost, but look at how fragile my dominion is, I barely have dom on half my territory! Turn 13   Acceptable losses for expanding my territory. At least in the Late Age, I'm less reliant on a small number of high-pop provinces for blood hunting, almost every province is a valid target for scraping up some virgins and tossing them into the blender.  God, it feels like everyone's had a better expansion than me this game.  Poor maneuvering has left my expanders stopped by a river, and they need to fall back a province to find a bridge, but at least that lets me reinforce them with a few more sacred losers. May as well hedge my bets considering that it's gonna be a fight against barbs.  Slightly better zoom for viewing the surrounding area. At this point if I'm going to be expand it'll definitely be up against the Pan border. On the bright side, my economy is going well and I can afford a new fort or lab/temple combo every turn for the foreseeable future, and with any luck no one will think to be aggressive against me until I've got a healthy blood economy and some awful blood spells up and running. Unfortunately two of my neighbours are going to be resistant to some of the cheaper Blood shots, both Pan and Utgard primarily have commanders that would be tough enough to go to smack town on a Disease Demon. I also start realizing that in my hurry to fort, lab, temple and everything else that gives a functioning gold/blood economy down the line, I've thoroughly neglected to send any real mages out site-searching and resolve to do this as soon as possible. Honestly it's something I should've done five or six turns ago, if not before. Every site I could've found ten turns ago is a site that could've been producing gems for that long. On the other hand, this being the Late Age, in my territory there's probably like... two sites, maybe, to find?
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Feb 4, 2020 23:57
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Agartha Turn 12  Not much happening this turn. I lose the battle in Windsong Forest (but forgot to take a screenshot of the outcome). Let's see why:   Oh. Yeah, elemental drakes can be pretty effective against infantry due to armor negating aoe attacks.  My other battle goes much smoother.   My luck scales pay off! Meet our first hero: Eckhart von Kohlbrunn the Master of Alchemical Secrets. He's got fantastic paths, comes with a free Mercury Slime each battle, and is an amazing researcher. His only downsides are that he's old and insane (indicated by the circled icon). Insanity means that there is a chance each turn that a commander will just do whatever the gently caress they want instead of following orders. It's more dangerous on powerful super combatants like Phlegran Tyrants and Tartarians.  My expansion army moves to take the throne. Hopefully the scouting reports from the province aren't lying to me too much. I also have my capital research team start summoning my national chaff to retake Windsong Forest. Turn 13  Turn 13 is about the time the early game starts and the mid-game begins. It's also about the time that dormant pretenders wake up.   The fight at the throne was actually less bloody than I thought it would have been. Usually throne provinces that are defended by generic infantry tend to have magical backup in the forms of sorcerers/esses or conjurers. I got lucky with the conjurers, since as death mages, they mostly summon skeletons and zombies in battle, which my prophet can chew through easily with some banishments.    In fact, a diet of hamberders managed to get himself into the hall of fame and gets himself some extra reinvigoration. Since he's just a priest it's not the best heroic ability since all holy spells generate 0 base fatigue (modified by armor encumbrance), but it could keep him from knocking himself out in protracted battles. And we got a throne! Which one is it?  Oh. Dominion spread and conflict bonus are okay, but I don't need the extra order and would rather have the gold from the province so I can build mages. (Don't worry, the -100 gold is just to the province itself, not to my nation, so Doven will just never provide any gold for me).  Remember what I said about Ekhart's insanity? This is one of the more innocuous ones, but he could have decided to destroy my temple or my lab, go on a rampage, etc.  We meet another friend! Hello Atlantis!
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Feb 5, 2020 18:55
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Gath Turn 13  I continue to fill up my borders to their "natural limits". I'm feeling really good that I have access to 4 thrones here, and in general have among the very best expansion at this stage of the game. I'm starting to build forts on all the high-population provinces at every edge of my territory. (I don't really care about resources outside my capital -- the only troops I intend to use are my capital sacreds and blood summons). There was a battle this turn between me and Atlantis. I knew he could move his army there, but I was really confident on winning the battle with my god, so creaming their expansion squad was just a bonus. However, I forgot that winning is not the only thing that matters. The Atlantian cap-only sacreds look like this:  Note the weapon with a magic additional effect:  Every time they hit, and if they get through the MR, they take out a little bit of strength from my god. And that effect is permanent, and can't be healed. My Abbas can literally heal missing limbs (they actually already healed one missing arm from my god, sadly losing the arm made him drop the shield), but cannot counteract that effect. And it actually wouldn't even be that bad, because I have very high defense and MR so they are unlikely to hit anyway, and when they hit they are unlikely to get the effect. Except that their prophet is here too, and they are casting Holy Word, which stuns sacreds. And gods. So whenever my god was awake, he was happily killing frogpeople and dodging their attacks, but every now and then the Holy Word would stick, and it would look like this:  And their sacreds would happily get a few hits in, some of which would steal some strength. In the end, I'm left with this:  Which cannot be fixed. It severely reduces the damage output of my god. It's still pretty drat good, but it does sting. Note to self: keep god away from Atlantians from now on.
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Feb 5, 2020 20:47
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Goddamn, I knew Gath was doing well this game, but I had no idea you were doing that well. Though it doesn't really surprise me, having played Gath, a fun-size pack of Gibbors and a few backup giants can whomp most indies without too much trouble.
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Feb 5, 2020 20:52
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T'ien Ch'i Turn 12 Some Battles, and no magic site.  Crossbows are much better at killing my Horsemen than swords, but not good enough.  I liberate a province from an undead menace.  A scout manages to spot 30-50 feral hogs take over a province.  Marignon's god is not in his dominion, and so not blessed, but 5 Earth magic is almost certainly the Fire and Shock Resist bless. With 4 Nature, the most common options are Unaging to make sacred old men not old, where possible, or Poison Resistance, with a point or two of extra HP on top in either case.  I also see Pangaea's bless.  I will be finishing up my northern expansion in the next few turns. T'ien Ch'i Turn 13  I don't manage to peep on anyone, but I do get some events along with the usual expansion and lack of magic sites, sadly a common occurrence in the late age.  Since T'ien Ch'i somehow forgot how to make crossbows, getting Hobbits to make and wield them for me will do nicely.  Ancestor Vessels have more armor than my Heavy Cav, and Archers do not even have crossbows, so we take no damage.    The sheer terror of vanilla Misfortune 3.  Assuming Gath expanded in the other direction as well as they did towards me (as seen above, yes they did), they are very big. I'm very nearly done conquoring the hidden valley of T'ien Ch'i, seriously, there's like some kind of force field wrapped around me with all of these mountains and lakes.
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Feb 6, 2020 02:24
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| # ? Apr 19, 2024 16:53 |
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I still can't get over the fact that everyone but Mictlan gets a troop upgrade for LA.
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Feb 6, 2020 02:35
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