[SPOILERS] Tres Equis: Mardoc plays the Most Interesting Civ in the World

[Mardoc]

Wish diplomacy was on. I want to propose to Molach that we take a temporary truce to enact a PYFT-war instead...

[Azarius]

Who is the culprit? It seems early in the game for someone to be losing interest.

[Mardoc]

Who is the culprit? It seems early in the game for someone to be losing interest.

[Mardoc]

Finally have another turn! Likely that we end up waiting a long time for the next one! While being excited!

We're on the cusp of war:


Here's our little army, that I expect to beat that one. Mainly by attrition - freeze Suttree's stack and hit it with elementals, turn after turn.



In other news, I expect the first adept next turn.

[Azarius]

Update? I know you've had at least one turn because it went to the wrong place. You may have already noticed and sent it on, but turn 90 going to HK was sent to the 31 tracker.

[Mardoc]

Update? I know you've had at least one turn because it went to the wrong place. You may have already noticed and sent it on, but turn 90 going to HK was sent to the 31 tracker.

Yeah, DaveV also caught that . Save's in the right hands now.

I didn't have time to update this morning, but I've got a few minutes now. So...

We're at war! And...we didn't start it! .




I can't see anything he actually did with the wardec. Maybe he's hoping someone else sees it and joins in?

He appears to have decided not to give me the opportunity to freeze his stack in place, so I killed the scout he left and occupied the high defensive bonus tile.


He ran his army south. Presumably they're planning to fortify in the city?


Final situation. Plan for next turn is to move the PoW 1S to the forested hill, and I haven't decided yet what to do with the ice elementals. Probably just summon them to cover the PoW, but maybe move 1SE with one of them to see a little further.



One nice bit: all three Priests are now Combat III. Even with potential warriorpults, I can afford to take a little risk with them - and of course that means the Ice Elementals are Empower III as well.

In other news, Molach still hasn't attacked, and at EOT I got both a border pop at Strawberry and my first adept built. Next adept next turn - possibly two. First priority is to Enchant the Blades of all my warriors, next is to take Slow and position near the frontiers.

We keep inching along toward Alteration - should speed up soon when we whip in the Elder Council at Cookie Dough. Or if I turn on some science. Which will be easy to do if we manage to raze anything pink

[Mardoc]

I really don't understand what Suttree has in mind...trying to ambush me, maybe? Because the best kind of ambush is the kind where the defender is on good terrain and maybe razed your city first, right?



But sure, I'll burn a city if he chooses not to defend it

In other news, we've got our first adept spell cast, and three more adepts born at EOT. I imagine the holdup will be Sorcery, not mage-candidates . Definitely pushing forward on more Elder Councils in order to make that not as much of a holdup.


And...border pop reveals that we're nearly neighbors with the vamps. Those adepts didn't come a moment too soon!


Fortunately Strawberry is about to really take off, now that the bananas are in border. Should get the Temple of the Hand in place in no time, and the garrison buffs very soon.

I think I might send one of the adepts east to try to catch up to the PoW. Would be handy to have a dedicated Slow unit around, so I can have 3x Ice Elementals every turn. The majority of them are going to Strawberry, though.

[Mardoc]

Ok, I've found Suttree's army. And it doesn't even hurt yet.


Guessing his theory is that I move up next to his city, spend my elementals trying to get inside, he counterattacks and wipes my stack. However...


Looking at the odds, I think I only need 2 elementals to crack that. If I move up one-by-one, that would leave my third Priest potentially free to move through the ruins and Slow Suttree's entire stack. So that's my tentative plan for next turn, assuming further information doesn't change my mind again. I would really like to catch his main force in the open early in the war, and that's worth the risk of even more units behind these waiting to ambush my Slowing priest, I think. If he's got that much...well, first his Power graph lies....but second I'm not going to crack him anyway if he's got much more than this. Best to find out early in that case, yes?

Oh, yes, one more bit. If I'm going to have to try to absorb a horde running screaming at my face, on top of a Tundra hill is a pretty decent place for it.




Besides, if I lose my PoW, I'll be sad, but it's not the end of the world. Next wave of elemental summoners is coming along nicely.



In other news: I have my first Sage! And I also have more incoming at a decent rate. Which is good - because sages are pretty much my entire economy Growing up my cities ought to help a bit, but this is the saddest economy I've supervised in a while. And yet, it looks to be sufficient

[Dp101]

In BTS, the opposing stack would be a joke. What is different about the situation in FFH?

[Qgqqqqq]

Strength 4 warriors? Big advantages from promotions? The fact that, at the end of the day, Mardoc's stack is also only 5 units plus summons and warriorpults can do a lot of damage? The fact that expansion is a lot slower in FFH so that positions are generally less advanced at this stage in the game?

This is not expressing my opinion on how it will go, simply pointing out things that change the game state.