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

[Commodore]

Oi! What's this "raise the AC" nonsense? The ship of pragmatism has sailed long, long ago. We're the good guys, we fight Armageddon. It's our raison d'être. We do not raise pillars of chains, we raze them!

[HidingKneel]

Commodore is right! The fact that our archenemy is now the Elohim shouldn't let us lose sight of what this game is all about. If we just wanted to win, the right move would have been Corruption of Spirit -> Infernal Pact right after summoning Basium, for an 8 paladin/8 eidolon combo, ritualists for collateral, and Sacrifice the Weak for mega-ultra-supercities.

Speaking of which, we could also consider other paths to Divine Essence. Commodore was also right when he said Theology was a lot more thematic. The trouble is it's such a weak tech: high priests need to be a lot cheaper, xp-wise, to be a viable option (I guess they're viable if you're spiritual and have been pumping priests for a long time, but we haven't).

There's another possibility though: righteousness is also a prereq for divine essence, and is even more thematic than theology. And since we've got two civs, it'll unlock two super-units for us. The Mercurians could have Sphener and the Kuriotates could take Chalid.

Advantages: stylishness. Cheaper than the commune with nature route: we don't have to build a grove or upgrade anything. Both super-units get free xp from the hero promotion. Sphener can heal stacks. And building him will lower the AC a smidge (which could be very significant, if that smidge helps us avoid blight).

Disadvantages: Chalid and Sphener are irreplacable if they're killed. Chalid's a lot weaker now that he's lost pillar of flame: as far as collateral goes, he's not much better than a single druid. Sphener's a melee hero who doesn't get any collateral at all. We'll miss out on some powerful abilities that druids bring to the table (entangle/earthquake, though we can make up for the former with rathas). We'll also be missing raw numbers: a single Crown of Brilliance will do some damage, but three castings of it will completely debilitate the enemy. Also, Chalid can only be at one place at one time, where we could send druids to fight on multiple fronts, if we needed to. Finally, Chalid locks us into Empyrean if we want to keep him.

What do you think? It's definitely a weaker option than the Commune with Nature route. And we really need some good collateral for what's coming (though Eurabatres can help with that).

[HidingKneel]

Wasn't sure when you were getting back today, Mardoc, so I went ahead and played the Basium save. Not much to report. Ilios's priests have apparently moved out of hawk range; not sure where they're headed next. So I moved the Mercurian heavy-hitters here:



Because that worker could get hit by any infernal three-mover, and at this point that could be a lot of units. Rosier certainly, but 4 beasts of Agares, Hyborem, and Mardero too, given the appropriate promotions. Bob's got his full complement of beasts now, so I expect it's likely that he'll start something next turn. So I also wanted Basium to be ready to defend Kwythellar, if necessary.

Of note: Bob's got HBR, and he's connected nightmares. He can therefore 1-turn 5-strength, 5-move horsemen. Which could do a lot of pillaging, especially if supported by beasts.

Started a stables in Amatheon's to let it grow, started a training yard in Uddrur, and 1-turned axemen in the other cities. Junil's only needs 2 more GPP to get the great engineer out, so it can stop working that forge next turn (or keep working it, dunno what's best).

Then we've got the Kuriotate turn. Four hawks worth of intelligence to report. First, I sent on southwest from Uddrur:



As you can see, nothing on the horizon in that direction. Except, of course, for lots of great sites for future Mercurian cities.

Sent one northwest from Kwythellar:



Ilios is nearby. We'll have to watch out: he might be planning to come at us with his priest stack from that direction. Nothing to worry about yet, though. And that city of his looks like a soft target.

Flew a hawk northeast from Avelorn, in case Ilios was coming that way again. Saw nothing in that direction, but it gave vision on another of Thoth's cities:



Soft targets everywhere. That's the nearest target for that slow Mercurian paladin. Maybe he should go that way and take a swing?

Finally, here's a target that's not so soft:



Of course, we already knew about that. But I want to keep vision on it at all times, so the Mercurians can respond appropriately on their turn.

That hunter of Plako's was poking around Thoth's territory, within centaur range. I made an attack of opportunity and earned one of our new guys two promotions. I've also moved our advanced force up to Thoth's border:



I expect Lion Cage will be ours next turn. (Confessor and Kuriotate paladin are lagging a little behind the main stack.) I'll try to play reckless with our experienced heroic centaurs, since we're getting near Valkyrie time.

Mathematics came it at beginning of turn. Tech set to Taxation, which will take three turns.

Converted to Empyrean and started a vicar in Kwythellar. Even if we decide to go the Righteousness route, that's a reasonable build: we can trade it for an Empyrean spread + Empyrean temple in Avelorn. Built another hawk in Naggarond, this time with lots of overflow so I can build something more expensive next turn. Avelorn continued working on the Tower.

Oh, and Ilios is finally out of his golden age. He swapped back into FoL before that, so we might expect to see even bigger tiger stacks in the future
(what's our counter for that? Assassins?)

Suddenly the demographics don't look so bad anymore:

[HidingKneel]

Oh, and Ilios is finally out of his golden age. He swapped back into FoL before that, so we might expect to see even bigger tiger stacks in the future
(what's our counter for that? Assassins?)

Our counter for that is Eurabatres. His roar will send those tigers scrambling (unless Ilios keeps an adept with the stack to cast courage after each summoning. Which he very well might, if he thinks of it. But that'll slow his stack down.)

[HidingKneel]

Another thought on our post-taxation tech plan:

How about

engineering -> military strategy -> iron working -> mithril working?

Doesn't unlock any angelic super-units, but the angels and Kuriotates can both build phalanxes. And it'll give a huge boost to the military we already have. Who needs centaur archers if we can have mithril-equipped chargers?
(Plus, if we find mithril on our land, it'll be a huge production boost for the super-cities.)

[Mardoc]

Our counter for that is Eurabatres. His roar will send those tigers scrambling (unless Ilios keeps an adept with the stack to cast courage after each summoning. Which he very well might, if he thinks of it. But that'll slow his stack down.)

That's one option. Another is a bunch of centaur chargers/chariots/axemen/etc - anything that considers Str 4 to be a roadbump rather than a threat, really. So long as we have more units that can hit a stack than he has Tigers to soak wounds, we're good.

Or, of course, there's a third option. Tigers are less impressive on the defense - particularly when defending cities from a fast-mover stack, like, oh, Centaur Chargers or Angelic horse units.

Wasn't sure when you were getting back today, Mardoc, so I went ahead and played the Basium save.

About nowish. But I'm a bit tired, and have other games to catch up on, so I'm glad you played.

I think Druids are still fairly thematic, at least as long as we stick to spells that come from the Good religions. But, we absolutely, 100%, need collateral. If we're not going for druids, then we should go for high priests, no matter how long we have to wait for them to gain XP. Or else go for mages/archmagi, swapping the Kurios to Arcane if need be.

As for the mithril path - it's very tempting, except for one detail. I really don't want to obsolete Axemen just yet. I'm pretty sure building Angelic Champions at 80 hammers a pop is a worse deal than Axemen at 30 hammers a pop. Of course, Mithril *would* make centaur chargers awesome. And any axemen that are built by then. And even Crusaders, for that matter, who are only something like 51 hammers. So I think I'm talking myself back into it. If we go that route, we'll want to swap Amatheon's to a Siege Workshop rather than a stable, so we can build chariots.

In any case, Engineering *is* worth going for, regardless. 3-move roads are probably worth it on their own, and the Guild of Hammers would buy us as much as the Pillar, without that handicap of being Evil. .

[HidingKneel]

So, I'm definitely leaning towards Righteousness now, over Commune with Nature. I'll admit that I'm mostly looking for excuses to build the cool heroes. But I think this is a pretty good one: the AC is at 36/146. Blight hits at 44/146. Pillar of chains will add 8 to the AC. I'll bet Ilios has already started it. So we need to get the AC down in a hurry. Maybe Bob will oblige us by sending us beasts to kill. But I doubt we'll be ready to hit Cauldron Lake before Ilios can finish the pillar. So Sphener is looking like a pretty good option (and we'll want to hit Bob soon after).

I agree that we'll want collateral. Let's look at our options:

Commune with Nature for druids upgraded from vicars. Most effective by far.

Rage, for berserkers (boosted in Eitb) and Seraphs (who can learn fire III).

Theology for high priests of Order/Empyrean. Will require 30+ turns to get the priests ready. Something to aim for in the distant future, but the tech won't do anything for us in the meanwhile.

Mages. Maybe... we don't have fire or air mana at this point. We'll need sorcery and elementalism, an adept who can upgrade (one of our adepts isn't too far away at this point, I think) and a raw mana node even to get started. I'll bet there aren't any more raw mana nodes left in the world, so we're out of luck, short of building the Rites of Oghma.

Another possibility is just to build ourselves a giant stack of catapults. I hear they move faster these days.

Some thoughts for the next turn of the Mercurians:

I wanted to start farming the corn SE of Amatheon's this turn. But I noticed that Ilios can hit that tile with 5-movers from his city. Think the Mercurians could put a unit or two on that tile to cover the workers?

I think we should aim finish Thoth off. To help with that that, I'd say Kilmorph's should start 1-turning acolytes, promoting them to confessors, and sending them to the new acquisitions. They can build order temples, and in theory we can use the free acolyte to bring the cities out of revolt, and the free crusader as a garrison.

Depending on the timing, we might also want to be able to push for Cauldron Lake after killing the next round of beasts. So that slow Mercurian paladin is a liability. Let's just send it on a suicide mission into Thoth's territory. If Thoth kills it, we get a free angel and it frees us to promote a unit with mobility to a paladin. It'll probably cost Thoth a few units to do that, and he doesn't have many.

Engineering next, after taxation and fishing/sailing. Probably Guild of Hammers in Avelorn? (So it'll make sense to put off military strategy for a bit.) An alternative would be to build it in Thoth's island fortress, if it doesn't take forever to bring out of revolt.

[Merovech]

An alternative would be to build it in Thoth's island fortress, if it doesn't take forever to bring out of revolt.

Tip you aprobably already knew about: Using a thane/zealot/other tier 1 disciple unit to spread culture into a newly captured city removes the anarchy in it, just like with a great artist. It's a very efficent option normally.

[HidingKneel]

Yeah, but this is a special case: the city's on a 1-tile island by itself. To get an acolyte or ecclesiastic there, we'd need to capture a coastal city, bring it out of revolt, research a ship-building tech, build a ship, and use it as a transport.
By the time we've done all that, the city will probably be pacified anyways.

[Selrahc]

unless Ilios keeps an adept with the stack to cast courage after each summoning. Which he very well might, if he thinks of it. But that'll slow his stack down.

No courage for tigers. Or other animals.