Possibly the last turn report of the game? (Per the tech thread.) Better make it a good one then. (And hey, if there are more turns to play, then this is a bonus!)
"We shall not stand for this!" Battle cries sounded through the streets of Libertatia. "No more!"
"You wanna be like them Ozymandians?" an angry shopkeeper demanded of a shivering Phalanx recruit. You wanna stand here waiting for them to come to us, and cower in fear 'til you die?"
"N-n-no," the recruit answered through chattering teeth. "J-j-just t-t-t-too c-c-c-c-c-c-c-cold...." Like many others in the garrison, he had been frozen in place by a pair of Amurite warriors still on the outskirts of the city, and had yet to thaw. Not so for the city's dark Ritualists however: Cold though they were, they still had mobility enough to slip through the hills and up through the western farmlands, with their adept protege in tow, to maximize the Amurite forces they could reach with their spells: Blaze after blaze of fire bursting outward in a ring from the circle of their dark incantations, crippling the Amurite armies on every side, followed swiftly by the entropic force of the Adept's secret power, gripping the iron of Amurite blades and crumbling the to a fine red dust. Then, slipping silently into the suddenly-disordered Amurite camps, the Lanun assassins struck.
Still more Lanun forces charged after them -- nearly all who had escaped the slowing cold, or by good fortune since had thawed, soon joined by others hurrying northward from far beyond the city -- and the invaders died and died: Two of the learned Amurite Wizards, a Stonewarden of Kilmorph's patient faith, the injured crossbowman who bravely sought to guard them, together with warriors and magical creatures trying desperately to guard their friends, and all five of the Fire Bow divisions who had moved to a desperate, exposed position in order to destroy the Lanun Shrine of Deception and of Esus, the shrine's dark god. Still more forces poured into Libertatia to ensure it would hold before the Amurite forces could gather themselves and try to respond. In the wake of the fighting, all reports held that the Lanun military forces outmatched the Amurites' by nearly two to one.
Yes, #1 in every category that matters (apart from Land Area, where they're second) is the Lanun.
Battered and burned, still trying desperately to establish communications with the chain of command, the Amurite forces took stock of one another as best they could.
I'm not sure what to make of being able to see each other's signs; it feels a little too much like illegal diplo, but if we can't post silly signs everywhere then why are we playing a Perpy game?
The wizards and priests, led by the Storm Lord himself, who had survived the Lanun onslaught with their few remaining guards, at last received word of the lone, limping Scout, with the skeletal companion who perhaps had saved his life, just beside the Mirror of Heaven, seriously injured by battle and flame, but still alive. It came from the south, through the small band of soldiers who had been set to guard a critical crossroads, set up barricades, and prevent still more Lanun forces from wreaking havoc among their priests and wizards.
That's a pretty extreme misspelling of Fahrenheit 532
The blockade party had taken a beating, but still survived, having done such eager work that the one-time crossroads could no longer be used as a road, much to the relief of the trailing Advance Auxiliary, safe beyond the northern line established by other road-cutting parties. Immediately upon receiving the word of Doofus McIsclick - the warrior who had previously served, at best, as ineffectual bait - they passed it on up the supply line ... to Wizards of Core Command.
And some of the Wizards in that Fire Bow + Govannon Core Command stack still have their spell staves too.
The Borderland Wizardry contingent learned the news in turn ... but now it was accompanied by definite orders. Govannon would not wait for the Mad Fiddler in the capital; he had a plan, and was already putting it in motion.
I seriously don't even know how many units are here. When I was playing, I had to check F5 just to get a sense for how much Lanun force was on the battlefield.
The huge Lanun army camp temporarily established northeast of the Mirror of Heaven was formidable, certainly, with heavy hitters defending the dark ritualists, assassins, and dark adept, but they had exposed their forces in order to make their desperate counter-strike, and the camp stood on flat ground well within range of numerous Amurite spells. The blocked and broken roads that had ensured the Amurite Auxiliary's safety would be made usable again in short order by some of Govannon's numerous combat engineers.
And again. That's ... that's a lot of guys.
Even the Eyecaster Slaves lately assigned to scout the Lanun still lived, still loyal to Govannon who had taught them their Amurite Magic, ready to act in his cause -- perhaps to assist against the deadly forces still gathering in Libertatia. Yet the archmage's plan was farther-reaching still: Secret magics brought word to adepts and disciples deep in the Amurite core, hurrying them to the front over unimaginable distances, to speed one anothers' steps and summon and strengthen an angelic host that could take part in the battle.
So the forces were arrayed, and so the battle began, as Floating Eyes were deployed to establish a clearer picture of possible Lanun reinforcements, and seeing little there, some among the broken-crossroads guardians echoed the power of the Lanun's dark adept, turning mithril blades to glowing rust in the hands of Lanun phalanxes and their demonic Eidolons.
As the Lanun reeled, with the combat engineers' work complete, the Storm Lord and his son called upon the power of the heavens, and maelstroms of thunder and lightning cracked the skies.
Though a few Amurite forces remained within range of the storms' relentless power, the bolts of heaven would not kill, nor even severely injure, so that the mostly-crippled Amurites were nearly all spared even when they could not remain safe in the heart of the storm. Not so for the proud phalanxes and swordsmen and boarding parties, the fell ritualists and diseased animated corpses of the Lanun. When at last the skies cleared, the Einherjar Hosts struck first, rushing in from afar, shortly followed by ensorcelled beasts, each taking up enchanted weapons as they could in hopes of beating back the mightiest of the Lanun.
The battle was so intense at this point, and I was so busy thinking through what the best next move would be, this is the last screenie I remembered to take in this part of the fighting.
They broke through. After a few spellbeasts wore down the camp's defenses, the full Amurite Expeditionary Army was able to gather for a final push. Once a wizard's sped the army's attack, rear-guard Fire Bows launched volleys of burning arrows to lead the way, and soon even Wizards and Priests whose spell power had been expended lent their own strength to the effort, removing the deadly Lanun assassins from their back lines ... and Govannon unveiled a new tactic that would prove decisive: A secret maneuver designed especially for dealing with crowds of weak or worn-down enemies that would be known to later generations - thanks to the meddling of the Fiddler Perp of course -- as the Burning Blender. It would see further use soon enough, but first the Amurite Expeditionary Army wiped out Assassins' Camp to the last murderous chariot, and proceeded south - those who still could - to the broken crossroads of the Ashen Veil.
There, a Wizard who lacked the power of summoning hastened the blockade forces on their deadly business with a simple spell, another granted nearly the entire Expeditionary Army the power of regeneration, and Amurite soldiers were dispatched to echo again the rusting magics of the Lanun adept whose bones lay upon the battlefield to the northwest. Then, with the garrison of Libertatia deprived of its mithril weapons, a few Amurite warriors too slow to keep up with the main force were assigned to protect the flank of the advancing army.
I just didn't want her in my back field when she might well have xp enough to promo-heal and kill someone I liked.
As Brigit the Shining was screened from their flank and forced homeward, away from the front, the remaining Amurite forces marched on through the through the night, to the very gates of Libertatia. Even with their blades rusted away, the Lanun forces there were formidable ... but the full Expeditionary Army had arrived, and among them was the Archmage.
Stay frosty, guys!
A blizzard swirled around Govannon, dropping three feet of snow in the course of a single night, trapping the followers of the Ashen Veil and freezing the hellfire that gave them strength, crushing not only their armored bodies but their fell spirits and sneering pride. The spellbeasts of the Amurites charged forward, unhampered by the snows, taking up enchanted weapons and roaring their battle-cries, and the Lanun forces shattered before them. After the first sharp confrontations, the people of the Ashen Veil whose cry was "Sacrifice the Weak!" were crippled, weak, and ready to die themselves.
Wilmore, of course, is the name of the Warrior now standing under the brown "KILL" sign. (I would later make another slight change; I liked it better swapping the "No!" for a "But..." in "But I *like* Wilmore!") Just because we're playing out the climax of the war doesn't mean I can't have some fun on the side.
The Burning Blender went into effect once more - not quite as devastating as it had been against an enemy on flat ground, but still decisive against weakened enemies: A Wizard doubly-learned in the ways of Spell Extension would call forth an impossibly-swift-moving spellbeast or sorcerous Host, which at once took up the Axe of Orthus and slew one of the broken, scattered combat divisions of the Lanun.
Spell creatures that survived the first attack, empowered by the Axe, could charge again - and when their targets had been on flat ground in the northwest, even a third time - slaying their foes left and right. Then, when finally exhausted, they could be made to disappear in a puff of enchanted smoke, leaving the Axe behind just as they did when they died in battle ... where it was ready to be taken up once more by the spellform that followed behind. A Wizard with a spellstaff could in theory defeat no less than seven enemy units in this way by following up two spellbeasts with an attack of his own, but no such extremes were needed; indeed, by the end of the Batte for Libertatia, Spellbeasts began to eschew the Axe in favor of the Crown of Command, a tactic which allowed the last Lanun Adept in the combat theater to join many Libertatian civillians in surrender, flocking to join the Amurite cause and learn under the tutelage of the great Govannon.
In hindsight, I probably should have kept the city, to restore Copper and Iron to my rusted troops and give me one more length of road into Lanun territory. It just didn't occur to me that I probably could (and should) hold it until a little bit too late.
The city fell, and the Temple of the Ashen Veil within, its altar wet with the endless Lanun rituals of human sacrifice, burned in cleansing fire. The battle was won, and the winners wrote the history.
After that, it was just a matter of maneuvering and preparing for the battles to come. The spellbeast that had burned the Shrine of Deception in Club Mate, his spellforce running out, simply moved to block the easiest road from Port Royal to the Amurite Wizards and Stonewarden Priests, but other forces advanced behind it to be ready for the next wave of attacks.
Not pictured: A couple of Lanun Swordsmen to the southeast who could reach the ruins of Libertatia - but no further without magic - this turn as well.
Another Phalanx and a band of diseased animated corpses stood helplessly nearby, still frozen in place by a spell cast when the Black Sword of the Amurites still hung in the Fiddler Perp's hall. The garrisons of Port Royal and even the Ashen Veil holy city of Pirate Bay were, for the moment, but a single combat unit each, and had no time to react before the Amurites established their defenses atop Libertatia Hill.
The need for instant defenses meant enchanting the bones of the fallen from the recent battle, but there were already too many skeletons around the empire for the Fiddler to control at once. The solution was simple: With the assistance of another rusting spell from a Scout, teams of skeletons charged the enraged Lanun Boarding Party and Barbarian Champion threatening Bupsy, and another dark champion staring down at the Wizard and Stonewarden just southwest of Loop.
The crumbled remains of their bones soon littered the ground, but they destroyed the invaders ... and several more old skeletons still had to be laid to rest so that the Storm Daughter could call up a quintuply-empowered skeletal force to help protect her and her and her cohorts while the Libertatia Hill force buffered its defenses as well - with the help of a swift-moving Scout who bravely crossed the front to capture a band of enraged Lanun slaves and prevented them from being used as combat engineers. The slaves were not killed, but invited to join the Amurite Empire: Lanun forces were welcome to try recapturing them and expose themselves in a roadless wilderness, on flat ground.
Even the Lanun capital of Tortuga was barely defended: Forces there might reach the ruins of Libertatia (even Brigit might if she happened to thaw right away) but committing too much to a counter-attack could leave the three greatest Lanun cities vulnerable to immediate capture or burning. Unless serious reinforcements arrived from overseas, there was even a chance that they might fall in the next push anyway.
And in case they didn't, there were more forces coming.
Yes, that's four more adepts-who-can-immediately-upgrade-to-Wizards and two more Stonewardens, all just whipped this turn. Yes, that's a whopping ZERO cities above size 5.
The entire Amurite civilization had been turned over to military production - and to the fastest military production possible. They were locked in a war for their continent, and unless and until they won it, decisively, the Lanun would simply destroy them. Before Govannon set forth on his daring plan, the Lanun military had been almost twice the strength of the Amurites' ... but the calculations that said so had discounted the wisdom and power of Wizards and the countless students of Govannon's universal spell schools.
Before you cheer our #1 position in Crop Yield (by a single bread slice) remember that Lanun people eat only half as much as ours since they're in Sacrifice the Weak.
After the battle, in spite of intentionally disbanding several units to provide wider access to critical enchanted weapons, the Amurites stood nearly equal to the Lanun by the same measures of power - measures that overvalued the technology, population, buildings, and especially the scattered ships of the Lanun military. The Amurites had local dominance in the southern theater, and they had to prolong and exploit that advantage before the Lanun economy - far more powerful than the Amurites' and QVC's combined - gave them a chance to permanently turn the tide.
Fortunately for the Amurites, the opportunity was at hand: If the wonders and people of Pirate Bay and Tortuga fell, with Port Royal and the last two Lanun continental holdouts close behind, the Amurites - still the only Not-Evil civilization in the world - could survive, could thrive ... could win.
"You wanna be like them Ozymandians?" an angry shopkeeper demanded of a shivering Phalanx recruit. You wanna stand here waiting for them to come to us, and cower in fear 'til you die?"
"N-n-no," the recruit answered through chattering teeth. "J-j-just t-t-t-too c-c-c-c-c-c-c-cold...." Like many others in the garrison, he had been frozen in place by a pair of Amurite warriors still on the outskirts of the city, and had yet to thaw. Not so for the city's dark Ritualists however: Cold though they were, they still had mobility enough to slip through the hills and up through the western farmlands, with their adept protege in tow, to maximize the Amurite forces they could reach with their spells: Blaze after blaze of fire bursting outward in a ring from the circle of their dark incantations, crippling the Amurite armies on every side, followed swiftly by the entropic force of the Adept's secret power, gripping the iron of Amurite blades and crumbling the to a fine red dust. Then, slipping silently into the suddenly-disordered Amurite camps, the Lanun assassins struck.
Still more Lanun forces charged after them -- nearly all who had escaped the slowing cold, or by good fortune since had thawed, soon joined by others hurrying northward from far beyond the city -- and the invaders died and died: Two of the learned Amurite Wizards, a Stonewarden of Kilmorph's patient faith, the injured crossbowman who bravely sought to guard them, together with warriors and magical creatures trying desperately to guard their friends, and all five of the Fire Bow divisions who had moved to a desperate, exposed position in order to destroy the Lanun Shrine of Deception and of Esus, the shrine's dark god. Still more forces poured into Libertatia to ensure it would hold before the Amurite forces could gather themselves and try to respond. In the wake of the fighting, all reports held that the Lanun military forces outmatched the Amurites' by nearly two to one.
Yes, #1 in every category that matters (apart from Land Area, where they're second) is the Lanun.
Battered and burned, still trying desperately to establish communications with the chain of command, the Amurite forces took stock of one another as best they could.
I'm not sure what to make of being able to see each other's signs; it feels a little too much like illegal diplo, but if we can't post silly signs everywhere then why are we playing a Perpy game?
The wizards and priests, led by the Storm Lord himself, who had survived the Lanun onslaught with their few remaining guards, at last received word of the lone, limping Scout, with the skeletal companion who perhaps had saved his life, just beside the Mirror of Heaven, seriously injured by battle and flame, but still alive. It came from the south, through the small band of soldiers who had been set to guard a critical crossroads, set up barricades, and prevent still more Lanun forces from wreaking havoc among their priests and wizards.
That's a pretty extreme misspelling of Fahrenheit 532
The blockade party had taken a beating, but still survived, having done such eager work that the one-time crossroads could no longer be used as a road, much to the relief of the trailing Advance Auxiliary, safe beyond the northern line established by other road-cutting parties. Immediately upon receiving the word of Doofus McIsclick - the warrior who had previously served, at best, as ineffectual bait - they passed it on up the supply line ... to Wizards of Core Command.
And some of the Wizards in that Fire Bow + Govannon Core Command stack still have their spell staves too.
The Borderland Wizardry contingent learned the news in turn ... but now it was accompanied by definite orders. Govannon would not wait for the Mad Fiddler in the capital; he had a plan, and was already putting it in motion.
I seriously don't even know how many units are here. When I was playing, I had to check F5 just to get a sense for how much Lanun force was on the battlefield.
The huge Lanun army camp temporarily established northeast of the Mirror of Heaven was formidable, certainly, with heavy hitters defending the dark ritualists, assassins, and dark adept, but they had exposed their forces in order to make their desperate counter-strike, and the camp stood on flat ground well within range of numerous Amurite spells. The blocked and broken roads that had ensured the Amurite Auxiliary's safety would be made usable again in short order by some of Govannon's numerous combat engineers.
And again. That's ... that's a lot of guys.
Even the Eyecaster Slaves lately assigned to scout the Lanun still lived, still loyal to Govannon who had taught them their Amurite Magic, ready to act in his cause -- perhaps to assist against the deadly forces still gathering in Libertatia. Yet the archmage's plan was farther-reaching still: Secret magics brought word to adepts and disciples deep in the Amurite core, hurrying them to the front over unimaginable distances, to speed one anothers' steps and summon and strengthen an angelic host that could take part in the battle.
So the forces were arrayed, and so the battle began, as Floating Eyes were deployed to establish a clearer picture of possible Lanun reinforcements, and seeing little there, some among the broken-crossroads guardians echoed the power of the Lanun's dark adept, turning mithril blades to glowing rust in the hands of Lanun phalanxes and their demonic Eidolons.
As the Lanun reeled, with the combat engineers' work complete, the Storm Lord and his son called upon the power of the heavens, and maelstroms of thunder and lightning cracked the skies.
Though a few Amurite forces remained within range of the storms' relentless power, the bolts of heaven would not kill, nor even severely injure, so that the mostly-crippled Amurites were nearly all spared even when they could not remain safe in the heart of the storm. Not so for the proud phalanxes and swordsmen and boarding parties, the fell ritualists and diseased animated corpses of the Lanun. When at last the skies cleared, the Einherjar Hosts struck first, rushing in from afar, shortly followed by ensorcelled beasts, each taking up enchanted weapons as they could in hopes of beating back the mightiest of the Lanun.
The battle was so intense at this point, and I was so busy thinking through what the best next move would be, this is the last screenie I remembered to take in this part of the fighting.
They broke through. After a few spellbeasts wore down the camp's defenses, the full Amurite Expeditionary Army was able to gather for a final push. Once a wizard's sped the army's attack, rear-guard Fire Bows launched volleys of burning arrows to lead the way, and soon even Wizards and Priests whose spell power had been expended lent their own strength to the effort, removing the deadly Lanun assassins from their back lines ... and Govannon unveiled a new tactic that would prove decisive: A secret maneuver designed especially for dealing with crowds of weak or worn-down enemies that would be known to later generations - thanks to the meddling of the Fiddler Perp of course -- as the Burning Blender. It would see further use soon enough, but first the Amurite Expeditionary Army wiped out Assassins' Camp to the last murderous chariot, and proceeded south - those who still could - to the broken crossroads of the Ashen Veil.
There, a Wizard who lacked the power of summoning hastened the blockade forces on their deadly business with a simple spell, another granted nearly the entire Expeditionary Army the power of regeneration, and Amurite soldiers were dispatched to echo again the rusting magics of the Lanun adept whose bones lay upon the battlefield to the northwest. Then, with the garrison of Libertatia deprived of its mithril weapons, a few Amurite warriors too slow to keep up with the main force were assigned to protect the flank of the advancing army.
I just didn't want her in my back field when she might well have xp enough to promo-heal and kill someone I liked.
As Brigit the Shining was screened from their flank and forced homeward, away from the front, the remaining Amurite forces marched on through the through the night, to the very gates of Libertatia. Even with their blades rusted away, the Lanun forces there were formidable ... but the full Expeditionary Army had arrived, and among them was the Archmage.
Stay frosty, guys!
A blizzard swirled around Govannon, dropping three feet of snow in the course of a single night, trapping the followers of the Ashen Veil and freezing the hellfire that gave them strength, crushing not only their armored bodies but their fell spirits and sneering pride. The spellbeasts of the Amurites charged forward, unhampered by the snows, taking up enchanted weapons and roaring their battle-cries, and the Lanun forces shattered before them. After the first sharp confrontations, the people of the Ashen Veil whose cry was "Sacrifice the Weak!" were crippled, weak, and ready to die themselves.
Wilmore, of course, is the name of the Warrior now standing under the brown "KILL" sign. (I would later make another slight change; I liked it better swapping the "No!" for a "But..." in "But I *like* Wilmore!") Just because we're playing out the climax of the war doesn't mean I can't have some fun on the side.
The Burning Blender went into effect once more - not quite as devastating as it had been against an enemy on flat ground, but still decisive against weakened enemies: A Wizard doubly-learned in the ways of Spell Extension would call forth an impossibly-swift-moving spellbeast or sorcerous Host, which at once took up the Axe of Orthus and slew one of the broken, scattered combat divisions of the Lanun.
Spell creatures that survived the first attack, empowered by the Axe, could charge again - and when their targets had been on flat ground in the northwest, even a third time - slaying their foes left and right. Then, when finally exhausted, they could be made to disappear in a puff of enchanted smoke, leaving the Axe behind just as they did when they died in battle ... where it was ready to be taken up once more by the spellform that followed behind. A Wizard with a spellstaff could in theory defeat no less than seven enemy units in this way by following up two spellbeasts with an attack of his own, but no such extremes were needed; indeed, by the end of the Batte for Libertatia, Spellbeasts began to eschew the Axe in favor of the Crown of Command, a tactic which allowed the last Lanun Adept in the combat theater to join many Libertatian civillians in surrender, flocking to join the Amurite cause and learn under the tutelage of the great Govannon.
In hindsight, I probably should have kept the city, to restore Copper and Iron to my rusted troops and give me one more length of road into Lanun territory. It just didn't occur to me that I probably could (and should) hold it until a little bit too late.
The city fell, and the Temple of the Ashen Veil within, its altar wet with the endless Lanun rituals of human sacrifice, burned in cleansing fire. The battle was won, and the winners wrote the history.
After that, it was just a matter of maneuvering and preparing for the battles to come. The spellbeast that had burned the Shrine of Deception in Club Mate, his spellforce running out, simply moved to block the easiest road from Port Royal to the Amurite Wizards and Stonewarden Priests, but other forces advanced behind it to be ready for the next wave of attacks.
Not pictured: A couple of Lanun Swordsmen to the southeast who could reach the ruins of Libertatia - but no further without magic - this turn as well.
Another Phalanx and a band of diseased animated corpses stood helplessly nearby, still frozen in place by a spell cast when the Black Sword of the Amurites still hung in the Fiddler Perp's hall. The garrisons of Port Royal and even the Ashen Veil holy city of Pirate Bay were, for the moment, but a single combat unit each, and had no time to react before the Amurites established their defenses atop Libertatia Hill.
The need for instant defenses meant enchanting the bones of the fallen from the recent battle, but there were already too many skeletons around the empire for the Fiddler to control at once. The solution was simple: With the assistance of another rusting spell from a Scout, teams of skeletons charged the enraged Lanun Boarding Party and Barbarian Champion threatening Bupsy, and another dark champion staring down at the Wizard and Stonewarden just southwest of Loop.
The crumbled remains of their bones soon littered the ground, but they destroyed the invaders ... and several more old skeletons still had to be laid to rest so that the Storm Daughter could call up a quintuply-empowered skeletal force to help protect her and her and her cohorts while the Libertatia Hill force buffered its defenses as well - with the help of a swift-moving Scout who bravely crossed the front to capture a band of enraged Lanun slaves and prevented them from being used as combat engineers. The slaves were not killed, but invited to join the Amurite Empire: Lanun forces were welcome to try recapturing them and expose themselves in a roadless wilderness, on flat ground.
Even the Lanun capital of Tortuga was barely defended: Forces there might reach the ruins of Libertatia (even Brigit might if she happened to thaw right away) but committing too much to a counter-attack could leave the three greatest Lanun cities vulnerable to immediate capture or burning. Unless serious reinforcements arrived from overseas, there was even a chance that they might fall in the next push anyway.
And in case they didn't, there were more forces coming.
Yes, that's four more adepts-who-can-immediately-upgrade-to-Wizards and two more Stonewardens, all just whipped this turn. Yes, that's a whopping ZERO cities above size 5.
The entire Amurite civilization had been turned over to military production - and to the fastest military production possible. They were locked in a war for their continent, and unless and until they won it, decisively, the Lanun would simply destroy them. Before Govannon set forth on his daring plan, the Lanun military had been almost twice the strength of the Amurites' ... but the calculations that said so had discounted the wisdom and power of Wizards and the countless students of Govannon's universal spell schools.
Before you cheer our #1 position in Crop Yield (by a single bread slice) remember that Lanun people eat only half as much as ours since they're in Sacrifice the Weak.
After the battle, in spite of intentionally disbanding several units to provide wider access to critical enchanted weapons, the Amurites stood nearly equal to the Lanun by the same measures of power - measures that overvalued the technology, population, buildings, and especially the scattered ships of the Lanun military. The Amurites had local dominance in the southern theater, and they had to prolong and exploit that advantage before the Lanun economy - far more powerful than the Amurites' and QVC's combined - gave them a chance to permanently turn the tide.
Fortunately for the Amurites, the opportunity was at hand: If the wonders and people of Pirate Bay and Tortuga fell, with Port Royal and the last two Lanun continental holdouts close behind, the Amurites - still the only Not-Evil civilization in the world - could survive, could thrive ... could win.
