The Pen vs The Sword (Gandhi of NA)

[The Black Sword]

Lord Flashheart. I had 4 fighters on intercept here to protect Valath's BFC. There were only 2 Carriers in range and in 4 fighter battles you'd expect one of them to come through unscratched anyway. Looks like luck was on my side but Flashheart payed the price. I counted up 14 surviving fighters in the log, I have 13 myself.




In things that might actually matter, BGN was annoying again and destroyed the Confucian Academy.




OH's transports moving east. He dropped a lot of units off in Browner, so it's pretty clear those 3 transports are going to be filled with something.

[The Black Sword]

Dtay!!



He stole Industrialism off me and then declared war on OT. That should put a serious cramp in any spy transportation logistics and could hopefully delay their space time. I'm pretty sure they don't have much units, in particular navy, to defend vs Dtay. Based on how much power is sitting off my coast and the remainder is probably over by BGN.

Good thing his update made me paranoid though, OH's 6 transports teleported in range of Kasitor, where I had left about 35 destroyers. I do think a lot of those boats where empty based on the troops in Browner but I wouldn't want to bet half my navy on it. Anyway, I got to stuff a bunch of tanks into the city.

[The Black Sword]

For the first time in over a hundred years the Wesnothian countryside is free from Aztec bombing.




Bit of a risky move with my fleet here.



13 Battleships in range is only 65 doses of collateral though, less than 2 per stack. Each collateral hit is around 2.5 strength. I've already injured most of his ships in range down to that level with my airforce. So I should be safeish and I want to exert pressure here where spies might be sent across and help dtay out. I was hoping he'd hit some of the Aztec fleet some more with his airforce rather than leave lots of planes on intercept though. I cleaned up 2 transports and 1 galleon in the area, so I guess that's 11 spies dropped off. Based on the movements of another transport further east, I think that dropped off 4 spies too(I left a spy on the tile I think they're on).

The top 5 cities are finally back to where they should be:



Current army:







Only a few more builds left to complete and then I'll just be building a few more fighters and wealth. I'm sending 15 tanks to Joey over the next 2 turns in return for his SAM. So this is probably the max my army will reach. Also gave Joey another loan of 3k gold for 400gpt, which is where my treasury has gone.

[The Black Sword]

My old loan to Joey ended recently but he hasn't cancelled the repayments:




That's an extra 520gpt that he's giving me. I feel I should document my thoughts on this in case the lurkers think it's improper.

Up till now Joey's been gifting me units and while I'm sure they've annoyed OH, I don't think they've made a material difference. Given the level of Aztec commitment, I think I had enough troops to hold them off already. Additionally, I've been meaning to gift him back the tanks in exchange for a while, I just couldn't bring myself to do it because I doubt he has any wars left himself. But with dtay's war declaration, I'm even more confident I won't have any land wars either.

520gpt on the other hand, well that could make a big difference, depending on how many spies BGN and OT have got in my lands. It will make the cash rushing a lot more flexible. And to be frank, I don't think my in-game relationship with Joey deserves that level of help. While it's clear there is some antagonism with BGN in game, I don't think he's ever really interacted with FinHarry. And I'm certainly not going to be able to give him the gold back. Though I guess I could give him some more troops, I mean both troops and gold are just as useless to him really.

Anyway, despite all that, I'm not going to turn away any help the game gives me right now. It has thrown enough stuff at me already, the most obvious being the great coal shortage. I also think the whole espionage thing is a pretty cheesy tactic. Nothing against BGN and OT if they use it of course, it's in the game and they have to use everything available to them. I don't think it should be in the game though, and thought it had been removed. So, I'm happy to use the gold to defend against that.

That's my thoughts, if there's a lurker consensus that I shouldn't accept the gold, I can cancel it.

[The Black Sword]

I probably won't get to play this turn till late, so I had to get some bombing done for dtay:



I was going to repay the favour to OH and destroy some capital towns but I figured this might be more effective*. Dtay only has 3 transports though, so he's still going to need some well promoted units to win here. Chive actually only has a single Cuir in it though. If any one of dtay's transports has 5xp for the extra movement then that city is surely dead.

*Bombing improvements in general won't be too effective any more, he can just work lots of Rep scientists instead. He'll probably keep working the cap's towns since they're levee+GA boosted but even then we're only talking a 10bpt loss from town -> hamlet.

[MJW (ya that one)]

So far the lurkers have a mixed reaction to GL's gold-gifting.

Some lurkers think that GL might have forgotten about the loan. If you want to cause the loan to be cancelled if he actually forgot about it the simplest is to cancel and reoffer the loan to remind him.

Edit: This doesn't matter because Q blew his load and asked GL directly. If he cancels you keep the gold you got. If not the lurker thread will start reacting properly now that they know GL is gold-gifting.

[The Black Sword]

GJ pays too much attention and spends too much time on his turns for him to just forget. And we just agreed another loan which would naturally remind him of the first. So I wouldn't believe that. And tbh, I'm not above taking advantage of someone forgetting to cancel a loan.

But he cancelled anyway, whether due to the prompting or something else.



And birthed a GA ... I wonder if I could persuade him to part with that. I think I'd be willing to pay 4000g for it, that's got to be better than whatever other use he has, barring a golden age. That's probably a better espionage defense than cash rushing buildings that they can destroy right back. Then maybe the optimal strategy for them becomes to hit the cities equally instead of focusing on one.

Anyhow, last turn I did this:



All my fighters on intercept. I'm trying to help protect dtay's cities but they still look quite weak. He needs a lot more numbers in his border cities to soak up collateral hits.

He already lost Browner and I'm building my first transport of the game(!) to try take it back. I have 3-4 Galleons as well. I dialed the tank gift to Joey back to 10 tanks, to keep some 5xp ones that can take CR2. I'm not sure if I'll be able to take the city, but I can force OH to tie up a lot of resources at least. I want to take it to stop him airlifting in spies. More WW wouldn't go amiss either.

Looks like dtay took the Asto island from OH but didn't have enough for Engelbert or Chive.

I dropped 3 spies off in dtay's land as well this turn. I have 3k EPs into FinHarry that are just making city visibility more expensive. Might as well get in on the action myself. None of the cities look like space-part builders at first glance. I'm thinking of destroying the gold multipliers in the shrine.

[Qgqqqqq]

So far the lurkers have a mixed reaction to GL's gold-gifting.

Some lurkers think that GL might have forgotten about the loan. If you want to cause the loan to be cancelled if he actually forgot about it the simplest is to cancel and reoffer the loan to remind him.

Edit: This doesn't matter because Q blew his load and asked GL directly. If he cancels you keep the gold you got. If not the lurker thread will start reacting properly now that they know GL is gold-gifting.

This is really not something that you should be telling TBS, MJW. Like, none of it.

[MJW (ya that one)]

So far the lurkers have a mixed reaction to GL's gold-gifting.

Some lurkers think that GL might have forgotten about the loan. If you want to cause the loan to be cancelled if he actually forgot about it the simplest is to cancel and reoffer the loan to remind him.

Edit: This doesn't matter because Q blew his load and asked GL directly. If he cancels you keep the gold you got. If not the lurker thread will start reacting properly now that they know GL is gold-gifting.

This is really not something that you should be telling TBS, MJW. Like, none of it.

I think your being hypocritical about this Q and I'm pretty sure that at least one person would agree with me. I don't think you want to talk about this anymore unless something happens so I won't ether.

[Qgqqqqq]

...only because it's you, MJW.