Looks like Bob caught on to my plan of feeding Eurabatres experience. He's now garrisoning Cauldron lake with a scout and a handful of Elohim tigers. So I killed his imp instead, to slow the spread of burning sands.
Plako destroyed Danalin's. I finished upgrading my lancers. Got Kwythellar and Naggarond building centaurs, Avelorn chargers. Should be able to get us 3 chargers per turn that way if we run science at 0%.
Offered Basium what should be enough for two repentant angel upgrades:
So, what next? I have no idea, but my guess is that Plako is going to come at us this way:
We already know he's using that road network, and it's the closest road to our territory. I'd like to put everything in Avelorn and hit back when he does strike. But honestly, I have no idea how to hit back. He can hit us from something like 13 tiles away. So all we can do is run at him, and let him hit us with earth elementals turn after turn. Suicide.
Speaking of which, I suspect he can hit those Mercurian Ophanim north of Avelorn on his turn. (Edit: But probably only if he brings his mages right to the border. So maybe they're good bait, there. Still, I think it's risky keeping them out there.) I think at this point, we basically can't expect to keep any units that are left out in the open (or any units left in cities, for that matter).
I guess cutting Thoth's roads might help. Didn't do that this turn, but maybe I should have. Though it's basically a suicide mission for the centaurs we commit to it... we just don't have enough mobility.
How injured is Eurabatres? Have you been promo-healing her?
Merovech's Mapmaking Guidelines:
0. Player Requests: The player's requests take precedence, even if they contradict the following guidelines.
1. Balance: The map must be balanced, both in regards to land quality and availability and in regards to special civilization features. A map may be wonderfully unique and surprising, but, if it is unbalanced, the game will suffer and the player's enjoyment will not be as high as it could be.
2. Identity and Enjoyment: The map should be interesting to play at all levels, from city placement and management to the border-created interactions between civilizations, and should include varied terrain. Flavor should enhance the inherent pleasure resulting from the underlying tile arrangements. The map should not be exceedingly lush, but it is better to err on the lush side than on the poor side when placing terrain.
3. Feel (Avoiding Gimmicks): The map should not be overwhelmed or dominated by the mapmaker's flavor. Embellishment of the map through the use of special improvements, barbarian units, and abnormal terrain can enhance the identity and enjoyment of the map, but should take a backseat to the more normal aspects of the map. The game should usually not revolve around the flavor, but merely be accented by it.
4. Realism: Where possible, the terrain of the map should be realistic. Jungles on desert tiles, or even next to desert tiles, should therefore have a very specific reason for existing. Rivers should run downhill or across level ground into bodies of water. Irrigated terrain should have a higher grassland to plains ratio than dry terrain. Mountain chains should cast rain shadows. Islands, mountains, and peninsulas should follow logical plate tectonics.
Took a promo last turn because he only had 70% odds on an axemen. He's pretty hurt right now (I think 9.4/23) but still had overwhelming odds on the imp, so I let him be. Still only got 2xp for my trouble.
Alright, since Plako doesn't seem to want to go in for the kill, I guess we get to keep trying to regroup. Commodore has a good idea for how to stay active, though. Let's grab us a city that Plako can't actually take away with his earth elementals.
Here's my suggestion for next turn:
I put our Ophanim on the tile SW of Avelorn, since that seemed to strike the best balance between safety from Plako (who could conceivably send earth elementals from the south or from the east) and ability to hit Thoth. First order of business should be to sink those galleys, since I think that's where he's got his cultists. As far as I've seen, he has two of them, and the nearest one hasn't been moving lately. If he holds still, we can sink it next turn. He'll be able to counterattack then, at least with tsunami and maybe with his worldspell as well? So let's get our Ophanim out over the water, and let's spread them out so that he can't hit them all at once. We've got two 4-movers and a 5-mover, so we should be able to get to the spots I've indicated. At that point, his other galley can either move into an offensive position (in which case we can probably sink it) or retreat to a city, letting us hit the capital. (Haven't thought through all ways this might go, since there's a big unknown: just how many cultists will he have on that second galley?)
Here's another plan that (I think) the Mercurians have cooking: conquering Cauldron Lake with Valkyries:
Should be able to get them to the indicated spot next turn, and hit the city two turns later.
Of course, Eurabatres will miss his old training grounds. Fortunately, he is almost ready to move on to bigger and better things:
Happily, Bob put another axeman in the city this turn. I hit it with a meteor and then finished it off with a semi-risky battle, earning a fair chunk of xp. Promo-healed to C2. It's going to be harder to get xp at this point, but we're also only seven more away from a march promotion.
Meanwhile, I'm trying to rebuild our army. In our blighted cities, we can presently manage a centaur per turn in Kwythellar (exactly), slightly under a centaur per turn in Naggarond, and a charger per turn in Avelorn with overflow. Running the science slider at 0%, we can afford to upgrade them all, giving us three chargers per turn.
Oh, wait... this is EitB v.8, so Tsunami still has a range of 2, right?
In that case, my idea about spreading our Ophanim out might not do much good.
We should think this out carefully. Maybe sink the first galley with a 4-mover and keep the 5-mover out of sight, and hope Thoth gives us a shot at the 5-mover when he moves to counterattack?
Or maybe it's all moot, because Plako overruns us with nineteen earth elementals between turns ...
Thoth moved both of his galleys within range of our Ophanim. The Mercurians can sink them both this turn. That might be the end of his cultists: I don't see any in his visible cities. Also, he can't easily replace them, since he's running AV now.
I'm not sure if he has Optics yet... its only value to him is the worldspell, so he might not have bothered with it. If not, he'll have no way to retaliate at all. Even if he has it, he shouldn't be able to kill our Ophanim, and can at best delay the conquest a turn or two.
It's a small victory, but at this point we need to take what we can get.
I don't think we want to march on it from Avelorn with our present land forces. That's sticking our hand right into Plako's bear trap. We'll definitely eventually want to either raze of conquer it to get cultural control over the lake. But it's probably best to do either from the water (using Ophanim) or
using the Valkyries.
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