The Kuriotates: A Tale of Centaurs, Hubris, and Unbridled Enthusiasm

[Mardoc]

Engineering still gives 3-move roads in EitB right? That alone would probably let me get away with about 15% fewer workers, plus the massive advantage of moving defensive forces along more quickly, and offensive forces too actually. Combat roads are great.

Yes, that's the main reason I'm suggesting it. Although the Guild of Hammers would also be handy.

Edit: And, um, Engineering is also a prereq for Airships. Along with Astronomy. Would definitely allow us to finish off Thoth, and maybe be useful in other wars as well. If I remember the discussion in PBEM1 - units can disembark from Airships with full movement, so Airships essentially would add 3 tiles to our striking range for any unit.

Granted...first priority is units to put in the Airships

[HidingKneel]

Yes, that's the main reason I'm suggesting it. Although the Guild of Hammers would also be handy.

Forget transporting workers... it'll have amazing synergy with raiders, when it comes time to start . Guild of Hammers is great. And City of a Thousand Slums! Can you imagine being able to work three rings of tiles on a map this lush? You'd completely... oh, wait.

Engineering is definitely appealing. But expensive... along with many other expensive, appealing options. I forgot how much sorcery costs! Going to have to think about that when the time comes.

But the early part of the chain looks solid, at least. We can probably get the ingredients for a ToD together in the next ten turns. Then it'll take another dozen turns to actually build the sucker (unless we use SoKs again, which I'm not in favor of). After that it's still another five turns to build a grove. But it'll all be worth it when we've got eight druids raining fire on our enemies.

Provided that we're still alive at that point! The path I've outlined is conspicuously light on military techs. I think we've got enough for the time being (with paladins + Orders from Heaven goodies). But maybe we'll want to replace sorcery by archery -> stirrups, and get the centaur factory rolling again.

[HidingKneel]

Edit: And, um, Engineering is also a prereq for Airships. Along with Astronomy. Would definitely allow us to finish off Thoth, and maybe be useful in other wars as well. If I remember the discussion in PBEM1 - units can disembark from Airships with full movement, so Airships essentially would add 3 tiles to our striking range for any unit.

I want to finish off Thoth with krakens and Eurabatres . Surely we will get extra credit if we manage that!

[Mardoc]

Engineering is definitely appealing. But expensive... along with many other expensive, appealing options. I forgot how much sorcery costs! Going to have to think about that when the time comes.

Did I mention that I'm in favor of Currency and growing Commodore like a weed? . And remaining in Foreign trade to grow all our cottages, and building lots more of them, and...

Yeah, I know, our wishlist is something like 30-40 turns long at this point. 40 turns ago, the world was still ending! The only way it's remotely feasible is if our GNP keeps growing in leaps and bounds.

I want to finish off Thoth with krakens and Eurabatres . Surely we will get extra credit if we manage that!

Krakens can't attack land, I'm pretty sure. But Eurabatres...and he'd be magic immune, too, I believe. That would be fun!

[HidingKneel]

Played around with Eurabatres using worldbuilder:

1) Magic immune doesn't make him immune to the Lanun worldspell. But at least highly resistant. Raging seas brought him from strength 23 down to strength 22.5. Seems to be immune to tsunami, though. (Also, I didn't realize that the Lanun don't get their worldspell until optics. So quite likely Thoth will never enable it.)

2) For some reason I thought Eurabatres can't take promotions, like Auric Ascended. But he can, just doesn't get free experience. That means he's much stronger than I realized. Might be tough to get xp on him, since he'll have ridiculous odds on just about everything. But promote him up the drill line and he can take blitz at level 6, and tear apart just about anything. And he can even soften enemies up with a collateral damage "breath fire" attack.

Might well be the strongest unit in the game, aside from Auric Ascended and Meshabber of Dis!

3) Must have must have must have must have...

[HidingKneel]

Turn 88 played.

Let's see:

Promoted this guy to flanking I, and sent him into the well:



Not sure if the flanking promotion will function if he's attacked while exploring? But, at least it'll give him an extra 1% chance of a positive outcome. Cross your fingers!

Over here, Plako has discovered our location, and we've discovered his:



I've got a centaur covering Basium (who doesn't need it; he killed that demonic elephant without a scratch) and another centaur covering the worker: should be careful of those, with Plako lurking about.

On the subject, Mardoc offered the following thoughts:

Can we kill Loki? Can we can we can we?

Need at least 8 units that can reach him - but centaurs might well
manage to do that in a couple turns.

We could get 8 centaurs up there, sure. But he might well be gone by then. And many of our centaurs are on important business! Like harassing Thoth:



Thoth took aggressive as his adaptive trait, so he has some promoted bronze warriors in the city. Our best centaurs would probably have good odds, but our best centaurs are up north. Anyway, I pillaged the gems and moved my centaur NW. He can use that road to hit me next turn, so I sprinted two more C2/S1 centaurs from Avelorn to provide cover. Thoth could maybe get lucky and kill one, but he'd probably lose the city. Anyways, not sure if it's worth attacking: I don't want to raze the city. I could conquer and abandon it as a settlement, I guess. That'd be worth some pillage gold, and set back Thoth's development even though he can reconquer it. Not sure if it's worth it... we'd likely lose at least one centaur. Anyway, even if I don't take the city, I can set Thoth back by pillaging his copper mine (and pick up a little gold at the same time).

Over here, we discovered another unit of Plako's:



Looks like that's the skeleton that he used to snatch up our workers earlier. Not sure if that means Plako's nearby, or if he's just scouting the map with disposable summons. Maybe I'll try to kill it next turn, but for the moment I moved NW to avoid the lion (who might do the job for us).

As it turned out, not much fiddling was required to get Orders of Heaven nearly completed. Just turned down science one notch, and here you go:



9 beakers to go, so Commodore shouldn't have any problem finishing it next turn. I've also got our prophet in position to build the Code.

What else? The AC indicates that Bob still has one beast to rebuild. I'd expect that to be done at the end of his next turn, so he'll be moving the turn after. When we see which way he's heading, we can start talking tactics.

Avelorn completed a settler at end of turn, bound for the site Commodore designated. I'll give it a two-centaur escort. Naggarond will finish a settler one turn later. So figure out where you'd like it to go! After that, maybe we should slow down on the settlers for a bit. Not because we're lacking a workforce (Avelorn should rebuild that in a hurry), but because we don't have the forces to garrison these cities. Especially since we should be conquering those barbarian cities to the north in a few turns. Need to get Kilmorph's Kith spamming axemen ASAP.

[Commodore]

Need to get Kilmorph's Kith spamming axemen ASAP.

Working on it boss. Also, see my micro fail!



You also didn't mention the other reason why Basium didn't need to cover; Dumbo, you died for the cause of the light.



Also, we cooked the books:



Let's resolve to resolve a resolution!

[Mardoc]

We could get 8 centaurs up there, sure. But he might well be gone by then. And many of our centaurs are on important business! Like harassing Thoth:

Oh, fine, I suppose he can't cause that much trouble while he's at war with us anyway. Still, if he gives us an easy shot later on, I want to take it.

Not sure if it's worth it... we'd likely lose at least one centaur. Anyway, even if I don't take the city, I can set Thoth back by pillaging his copper mine (and pick up a little gold at the same time).

No, it's probably not. Pillaging is good, the only way it would be better is the next round when we can have a Raiders civ collecting the pillage bounty . But no, I'd rather Thoth have a size 4 city than Bob gain another Mane...and definitely rather not push up the AC any more than we have to right now. Much easier to contemplate once we have either dead AV heroes or Life I adepts. Ideally both .

Looks like that's the skeleton that he used to snatch up our workers earlier. Not sure if that means Plako's nearby, or if he's just scouting the map with disposable summons. Maybe I'll try to kill it next turn, but for the moment I moved NW to avoid the lion (who might do the job for us).

Didn't he kill our worker in the south? I actually assumed he deleted that skellie after that, not ran away.

Avelorn completed a settler at end of turn, bound for the site Commodore designated. I'll give it a two-centaur escort. Naggarond will finish a settler one turn later. So figure out where you'd like it to go! After that, maybe we should slow down on the settlers for a bit. Not because we're lacking a workforce (Avelorn should rebuild that in a hurry), but because we don't have the forces to garrison these cities. Especially since we should be conquering those barbarian cities to the north in a few turns. Need to get Kilmorph's Kith spamming axemen ASAP.

I suppose 6 cities is a nice start to a civ, yes. Get those all founded/captured and improved, and we can consider where to go next.

Working on it boss. Also, see my micro fail!

Huh? I don't see anything that looks like an error...unless you're counting leaving the sheep in JJ hands and delaying growth 1 turn here? I'm pretty sure it'll wash out in the end, both cities need to grow hugely.

Ok, I guess there's one thing we need to fix: those Angels have no Jewelry! How can people properly fear angels without bling? But that's HK's fault, not yours.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

That earlier growth would mean working more tiles sooner, so yeah, it counts a ton for the snowball.

I still do it all the time. And sometimes, you're working max food with no tiles to juggle between cities anyway.

Also, Commodore, did you actually turn on tech and land a holy city ?

[Gaspar]

Also, Commodore, did you actually turn on tech and land a holy city ?

The reports were out of order. Commodore's report was T87 and HK's was T88.