[SPOILERS] Iskender and the Sidar

[uberfish]

I would keep teching if I found it worth the effort, but IMO it's not.

I could take the AH->Feral Bond->Commune with Nature route. It'd require roughly 5000 beakers and 500 hammers if CwN were taken via Tower of Divination. This would give me Satyrs, Rangers, Duin and Druids. On the other hand, I can use this 5k commerce for gold (netting even more than 5k due to higher % modifiers on gp - GK and Bazaar) and use it for 2500 hammers worth of upgrades (+ another 500 for the Tower). More valuable hammers because they're becoming available with every turn.

IOW I'd rather have more units now than be able to build better units in the future.

This being a pretty low econ game, I think you're right about Feral -> Commune being impractical on sub 200 beakers per turn. But rangers might be arguably worth it just to get a mobile/higher base strength unit.

Congrats on the first SoI kill!

[Bobchillingworth]

I guess you really *did* have a plan for dealing with the SoI after all!



Congrats! One wonders why Mardoc didn't cast regeneration... or why he didn't stick one of those excess Fire Elementals in the forest... or really any of his moves as been questionable.

[Iskender]

This being a pretty low econ game, I think you're right about Feral -> Commune being impractical on sub 200 beakers per turn. But rangers might be arguably worth it just to get a mobile/higher base strength unit.

Congrats on the first SoI kill!

I'm not particularly fond of Rangers. They have 1 str on Horse Archers, but are 20 hammers more expensive and there's this -20% city attack. Satyrs with their 9 str attack are tempting. With only 4xp more needed for Fauns to upgrade to Satyrs I could get a decent number of them, but then again I don't need a high strength unit that much when Tigers and Ritualists are still doing a good job bringing top defenders down to a beatable level and Ghosts trim stacks from the other end.

I guess you really *did* have a plan for dealing with the SoI after all!



Congrats! One wonders why Mardoc didn't cast regeneration... or why he didn't stick one of those excess Fire Elementals in the forest... or really any of his moves as been questionable.

Yes, an elemental in the forest would've saved Levi's hide. Maybe it didn't occur to Mardoc that I can reach the blockers in the forest with hasted tigers from Nowhere. What puzzles me more is why haven't he fielded any Guardsman defenders knowing that the Sidar UU is Assassin. Maybe there are some in the east, blocked by the Infernals atm. He'd better get a few before Square Leg starts blinding the remaining Sons.

[uberfish]

Maybe it didn't occur to Mardoc that I can reach the blockers in the forest with hasted tigers from Nowhere.

That's because they would have come out of nowhere. :neenernee

[Iskender]

Could've been much worse had they come from Mike Rotch

Which reminds me of a scene from Bruce Almighty that I have in mind whenever I summon tigers

[Iskender]

T173:



Have I? You sure it wasn't for Mardoc, RNG?


Lately he's been receiving a regular portion of death and destruction:



The Clan lost two cities to Square Leg's Gargoyles.

Alas, Levi's death was avenged by his still alive brothers. It's the first time I saw the Sons getting their hands dirty instead of using elementals to do the job.


Rathus Denmora is ready for action. His first task is to pass the Blade:



The tiger is going to use it against today's target - Renegade Hill. Here's the attack team and the garrison:



The usual RoFing:



Then triple Rust (forgot to take a screenshot), which left only Rantine with Bronze Weapons and gave Rusted to most of Clan's melee.

At this point the top defender is the Flesh Golem, Ghosts have 95% odds on a Shaman.

The Blade Runner tiger hit at 11% and lost, dropping the blade and leaving the golem at 0.5 str. A Diseased Corpse is nominated.

The weakest of the tigers picked up the blade, which improved its odds from 7% to 41%. I wanted the tiger to lose and pass the Blade but it won. Oh well, it happens.

Another tiger lost at 60% to the second Diseased Corpse damaging it down to 1.7 str and making an Axeman the top defender. At this point PoLs' odds look attractive and the best PoL takes a shot at 94% and wins. Then another PoL wins at 88%. Tiger wins at 40% and another one at 28%. The third tiger breaks the combo dying to the lizardman at 40%.


Then I realized that I should've brought a few more units for an easy capture (I had left 4 PoLs at home for blooming and preparing for Stephanos). Rantine hasn't yet been nominated (dunno why) and I had only 4 tigers left which were blocked by 2 more (relatively) healthy lizardmen.



The RNG was merciful and rectified my mistake by making two tigers win vs both lizardmen at 35%. This made Rantine finally appear and successfully defend vs a tiger (0.7% for the tiger to win) but lose 2 points of str in the battle (down to 1.6).

Then followed some slaughter. Every PoL and Ritualist had a chance to hit either an Axe or a Warrior at about 95%. All won, but I ran out of real muscle:



The Ghosts could take out 3 of the remaining 6 with ease, but this still leaves 3 units. There are still the adepts though. The first one (be a Mage or die trying) wins at 67%, the 2nd one at 88% and the 3rd loses to Rantine at 60%. Somewhere in between a Ghost took out the Flesh Golem and one of the Archers (bodyguards for the priests) kills a Shaman.

This leaves only Rantine and a redlined Lizardman. Another Ghost takes care of Rantine and a DS kills the lizard and burns the city:



There was an AV in the city so razing it actually lowered the AC by one point down to 34. Mardoc is left with maybe fifteen cities, most of them underdeveloped. In the Clans's west the only decent ones left are Shazak and Udenarat.



EOT:

Five DSs trained. Another big increase in WW - it's now up to 6 in the biggest cities. A game mechanics question - if working citizens are lost to WW at the end of a turn do they still contribute to this turn's production/food etc? IOW which happens first - WW increase or filling the bars?


Demographics:

(Someone's life expectancy is 23. Live fast die young )

[Thoth]

A game mechanics question - if working citizens are lost to WW at the end of a turn do they still contribute to this turn's production/food etc? IOW which happens first - WW increase or filling the bars?

AFAIK WW doesn't apply until the next turn.

Rantine hasn't yet been nominated (dunno why)

The Hero promotion gives a reduced chance to defend the stack.

[Iskender]

The Hero promotion gives a reduced chance to defend the stack.

So Rantine would have been a perfect counter for Ghosts if he was given Guardsman instead of Heroic Def.

I forgot to mention that 5 priests are already above 20xp. If all 5 Wane and settle it'll boost gc/turn by about 90.

[uberfish]

So Rantine would have been a perfect counter for Ghosts if he was given Guardsman instead of Heroic Def.

I forgot to mention that 5 priests are already above 20xp. If all 5 Wane and settle it'll boost gc/turn by about 90.

Wouldn't you rather just keep the high level priests to fight with though?

[Iskender]

Probably I should but I still have this vision of a megacity with a gazillion of merchants making obscene amounts of $$$ *pimp*

Well, it's a pipedream in MP, but I'll still try to get as many GMs as possible.