Arise, Riders of Rohanna! Ride for Molach! [SPOILERS!]

[Ranamar]

Now that you have corrected me, it does seem like the map is about twice as generous with mana nodes as I had, for some reason, thought. Yeah, that makes a Tower victory easily within grasp, especially since, looking at the map again, that it seems like each civ got a metamagic node near their start: which means two for us and two for the Orcs. (I do wish ours hadn't been on the other side of a desert, though... the elven one is frankly more convenient.)

If someone's going to do military, it might as well be you... I don't think anyone else has the mobility to get units to the enemy at a reasonable rate. I suspect you're going to want to do a raid on the orcs, rather than actual sieges, at least initially, if you do go to war with them. Even being 2-move after a mobility promotion, siege engines are going to take a lot longer than cavalry to get to any enemy positions. Honestly, what with the fire mana right in your empire, I'd almost be tempted to say go for fireball/haste mages because they'll be slightly faster... but it'd be a massive distraction unless we're just trying to buy time for our own towers or something, and they'll take time to mature. (You'd need to build a body node and research the Mage tech, but you don't *need* to do Elementalism.) You might want to capitalize on your Adventurer to unlock Form of the Titan, in any event, so that you can immediately promote catapults with mobility no matter your civics. (FotT hasn't been built yet, right?) Pity it doesn't affect hired units...

[Molach]

@ Ranamar:
Thats 3 for military, 0 for peaceful.

There's a lot of stuff I could use, I just gotta ask - is it worth [(beaker cost) / 100] mounted mercs?

Anyway, about going all-in military... these graphs pretty much agree:
Graphs:

I will lose the peaceful race. Serdoa is a proven builder of towers, he has a gazillion mana types to play with.
Can I delay him, thus paving way for my own tower? I don't think so. I think my forces (limited, because I spend beakers researching instead of buying) might do some damage, perhaps disconnect some mana, raze a city or two...but once it is defeated, he will simply continue building away. Bottleneck is research and hammers in main cities. And Serdoa will have enough forces to eliminate my stack after I have some fun with it. And frankly, I do not think I'd be able to delay him long, if at all...I would need to know which mana types he was needing at a given time, loot them while he was building that particular tower....naw, hopeless. Delay 2-3 turns, but he is more than 2-3 turns ahead of me. And he might of course be able to harass me, I'd have to spread out a bit and get all these different types of mana too...

So max military it is! Besides this will be more fun.

Sanitation before CoL, merchant isn't quite ready for the bulb yet.

Minor barb troubles:
89.5 % - success! Also 4 + 1 exp means new promotion. Mobility, obviously.


99.6% - success! 2 xp.


The famous North east - we have found a lair of furry evil bears.

I think I'll let my scout go home and become a horseman with animal capture promo. hunter is better, but no hunting for me for a while.

My totally inadequate anti-barb task force...looking at 30% odds versus this archer.

Perhaps a chariot, a catapult first. Thing is, I probably should keep this city, even though I could have fitted several more with a different dotmap. Size 7 is pretty decent.

Demos:

[Molach]

Quick report.
Horseback riding is in, several guys will now get mobility.

Catapult ready...wonder what sort of damage he will do to the crowd? Suppose I need to wait for a chariot to be sure of victory here.


Demos (see what teching with no prereq does to my stats....)

[Molach]

Been some hectic days, have played (eventually) but no decent reports till tomorrow, I'm thinking.

Some teasers: We settled some, built some stuff, worked some land and lost 2 units to Serdoan attack. No cities though.

[Ranamar]

Some teasers: We settled some, built some stuff, worked some land and lost 2 units to Serdoan attack. No cities though.

We're at war? Somewhere, I missed that.

[Molach]

The First Orcish War

The 1st Scout had been through a lot. As old as the city of Rochirost itself, this proud unit had served the Hippus well. It had cleared away dangerous beasts from around the imperial border, and even helped in the sack of Elf-home.
Currently hunting bears, they found their quarry mysteriously vanished.
"It's like someone else has been hunting them" one of them mused.
Then, through a clearing in the forest, the chief ranger saw a sight that made his blood grow very cold.
"ORCS! On the hill. We must escape!"

The unit was tired after a long days march, but after some quick discussion it was decided that Mobility was paramount now, and that they must head back to the hill and the safety of the 4th Archer unit they had left behind earlier. There they could make a stand, protecting the worker and settler units coming up from the south.

They were never heard from again.

"Cease fire? I never knew we were at war!"
Ranamar stood thoughtful, holding a letter with ugly, Orcish letters scribbled in. It had arrived by raven very early this morning. The contents were shameful to any lord of the realm, and the quick-angered lord of the Hippus would surely fly into a rage as the news was delivered. Still, it had to be done.
The Lords must be told.

Hey Molach,

it seems some of your troops wandered very closely to my home while workers are building roads - I assume for even more troops? I can't accept this hostility. My own troops in the area took care of it and I am willing to agree to a Cease Fire, assuming that there will be no further "expeditions" towards my lands. I am also open to discuss a land-split up there, if I misread your intentions.

Kind regards,
Serdoa

In the conference hall, discussion ran high. Molach sat, with an almost bored look on his face, while his nobles discussed among themselves. Only when the battle plans were getting micro-managably detailed, did he stir.
"Scribe, take down this letter to the Orcs. Send it off by raven right away."
As he droned on, and the content of the letter read out to the assembled lords, their expressions suddenly changed into angry disbelief.

Hello.

I didn't actually know that your lands and workers were so close, I'll keep away in the future. My scout was actually scouting the fog, and hunting for bears to use for pets in new cities. Most of the roads here were pre-placed by the Creator. I am pre-roading to my next city site, which should be planted on a hill near sheep, pig and gold. No cities further east are planned.

Would this be acceptable?

If you can send a screenshot of your lands I'll know where to keep away.

Apologetically,
Molach of the Hippus

They left a slave worker finishing a desert road while waiting for reply.


Next session of the Lords was even less pleasant.
"We appear weak, giving in to...."
"We are giving away our birthright! These lands belong..."
"How can we make deals with the filthy orcs, who would slaughter our men without second thought?"
"Only language they understand, blood and iron!"
Ichabod read out the latest letter, this one more neatly written out, but with the same ugly Orcish characters.

Hi Molach,

Looking at what I know about the land, I'm fine with a city of yours at the indicated spot. Just simply don't move further east please.

Kind regards,
Serdoa

"Molach, I am sure this is a deception. He will let us settle here only to destroy us at will. We must attack back..."
"This is fine. New message back, scribe."

This is good, we stay there. And blame Q for the roads.

Kindly, Molach of the Hippus.

Very late that same night, a sentry thought he saw a shadow flitting through a tight opening between two buildings, headed up Spectre hill. Content that someone leaving the city presented little threat, he shrugged and went about his way.

Molach slowly walked to the crest of the hill. At the top, he slowly turned towards west, towards the sea.
"Oh drowned god, I bring you this offering. Hear us in our hour of need!
Send the madness to the lands of the Orc.
Let us strike hard, strike true and strike swiftly.
Let the Orcs forever learn to curse this dastardly attack.
We will have our revenge."
Molach performed his offering.
His mouth, the blood still dripping, slowly curled into a grin.

They would pay.

[Qgqqqqq]

HEY!!!
Those roads are sacred, leading to the ancient church-town of Doms...

[Ranamar]

Well, now we know the extent of the Orcish empire.

It looks like we just declared that we're building on Ultimate BFC but no farther east. I suppose that settles that ... for now, at least.

It's a shame we lost our plucky scout, though.

[Molach]

Yes this is the Ultimate BFC city. Struggling to find elvishtranslation for this.
This city is building monument right away, will also build carnival, run an artist to pop ring 3 as soon as possible too. I am treating the situation as "cold war" with serdoa right now. He can raze the city this turn, cost me a slave, a settler and a warrior. But then I kill his two wolf riders in return. Fair trade, as they are quite highly promoted, and settlers are fast build for me.

Forgot to post last turn report, see for yourselves:


Demo:

I didn't get a shot of the graphs...but his power is pointing straight at the sky now.

Some final (?) diplo - this must be why Serdoa didn't play yet, was waiting for my reply. I don't check this account often, so didn't see.

Hey Molach,

I'm sorry but my advisors have after some good nights of sleep decided that I have to request a NAP till T110 from you, otherwise they want me to burn your newly founded city. I don't want to do that and I think a NAP of 20 turns won't hurt either of us (looking at your soldier numbers you are nowhere near ready to attack me).

Please let me know if you agree.

Kind regards,
Serdoa

105.
?

On second thought, I say we should work out our differences and coexist peacefully without NAP.

You are right we are not ready to attack. We won't. Probably not for 20 turns.

But still.

NAPs are too boring.

Don't raze the city.

Yeah, kill the city, lose 2 wolf riders. Probably not a fair trade in the long run, especially if I lose one of the lower-odds chariot fights (will have 30% chance of dying with one, adventurer should get far better odds), but I must suspect that Serdoa doesn't have anything that compares favourably with chariots' attack strength right now. If he does, he sure got a lot of tech from huts....if he does have iron working now the game is over as he is bound to have iron in his lands. Perhaps he only has axemen and is going for the mines of dol guldur wonder, that give str 6 axemen which are probably too much to handle.

[Molach]

Oh well, I was already putting out my answer and being happy that we can peacefully coexist. Guess I'll wave my Wolf Rider goodbye and see if your Warrior gets lucky when I attack at 96% odds

Kind regards,
Serdoa

Guess that's an end to diplomacy for this game...