[SPOILERS] Jalepeno lines'em up and knocks'em down

[jalepeno]

T115

Even with the big ol' Stygian Guard on hand, I still lost 3 units (one of them a C4 chariot) to spectres. Got a drown joining next turn, and I promoted some shock and guerilla units up to boarding party to get some more beef on hand. BP's being -1 base str really kinda sucks here! Every turn I'm worried that I'll open it up to see most of my stack gone.



I moved my chariots and some horsemen out of the city. They can either head for Auro's back lines, or that small stack dave has threatening my island holdings.



Life on the eastern front is much better. with 4 cultists, the 4 warriors in the city had no chance.



I celebrated my victory by settling another city, which immediately boosted my gold generation by 6gpt (mostly because it brought sugar under my control, which eased unhappy in a few heavily drafted cities). I'd say that I'm done settling cities, but that would be a lie.



So here's the situation in the East. I'll take Whip it next turn, and should be able to take his capital 2 turns after that. Or I can push hard to take his capital next turn (would be tight, by my count I'd have 4 tsunami's, followed by 4 horses and two swords crossing a river against 6 defenders).

[jalepeno]

Ok, I might as well give the story of the 2nd to last turn as well.

T116
I had a bunch of horse/chariots with 2 open promos which would enable attacking Auro's capital from the sea. but he's a little too prepared for that


I took Whip It as planned. Mardoc's capital has a nearly 10 units in it (don't believe the signs!)


I then setup some horse to be able to attack Auro's backlines from this side. he's been quite vigilant after I razed Gloraine, but you never know.

[jalepeno]

T117 - "Never underestimate the sea"

I opened the turn to see that my worse fear had taken place. Dave and Auro sprung the desert and hit me with everything they had. That stack used to have nearly 60 units. At this point I was pretty freaked out, but I had some hope that Raging Seas could take them down a peg or two.



So I hit their stack with all the surviving catapults (9 out of like 13 survived) to get units down to easier killing range for my worldspell. I was really cursing the fact that neither of my cultists survived here. and then it was time for the big shiny red button....

...which worked beyond my wildest dreams. Military advisor from before and after showed a total of 35 amurite and sheim units were swept out to sea!!! which left a manageable stack for me to



I had a good stream of reinforcements on their way which could reach. Those, plus the survivors of the initial assaults, plus the fast movers I'd sent after Auro's capital were enough to [almost] completely wipe out their forces.



Sorry dude, you're just too late.



On the eastern front, I took advantage of the raging seas timing to try to take Mardoc's capital earlier. I had plenty of collateral here to soften defenders up.



And the seas pretty much took care of the heavy lifting.



making for easy clean-up



My jade torc griffon even got in on the action, taking his last city (actually captured before the capital, but who's counting?)



I then set workers to forting to trying to ferry this army over to Auro's backlines



and as a last emblematic moment of this game, I settled a city. it boosted my next GNP by like 15 gpt, but it was not particularly well-named, since that's about the last thing I did in this game.



Final demos

[jalepeno]

and now it's time to go read everyone's threads!

[Qgqqqqq]

Congrats!

[DaveV]

Well played!

[Aurorarcher]

Finally read your read thread, well played! You used those forts very well on this map with shipchaining!

[Dreylin]

Congrats, was a good read!

[jalepeno]

whew, finally made it through all the threads. Thanks for all the great reporting guys, they were fun reads.

Final thoughts on the game.

Thoughts on leader/civ: Lanun Lanun Lanun Lanun.

totally agree with my first reaction. after seeing so much water in 43, there was no way lanun on the same map settings wouldn't be amazing. falamar was definitely OP on this map, but I was happy to abuse him for my first win. meta synergized great with expansive, as it allowed super easy dotmapping. plus it saved my bacon against mardoc's invisibility. coves meant every city was profitable.

I'm very happy with my early micro. that first slog to fishing can be brutal, so playing the bog-standard agr-cal opening worked great. water mana gave a huge early boost. early carto helped push the early horizontal growth. and horizontal growth enables the most efficient vertical growth (more resources!). early investment in AH and subdue animal scouts paid off hugely. I think I settled at least 5 bears, plus captured 3 griffons.

There was a while that I was afraid I would get left behind by the philo leaders' tech rates. cheap harbors (another reason falamer having exp is ridiculous) helped out a lot, as did island cities. also, I think Mardoc staying in GK too long and using aristo rather than city states limited his gnp while expanding. maintenance was heavy on this map.

I really should have put more focus into the final war. building the GLH was unnecessary in retrospect, and my newer cities (especially northern ones) would have been better put to use spamming warriors than growing on lighthouses. but the choice to use conquest to get 2nd promo made me reluctant to build units in small cities.

27 turns (well, we only lasted 21 of them) of GA was insane. felt like playing on chieftan. being able to expand far enough for marble was great, and of course the GA sped up the GC and my 2nd natural great person.

I am thoroughly, rottenly spoiled having played in this game. the turn pace was lovely, as was having opponents thoroughly report.