The Haunted Forest: Mardoc puts the Sidar to the test.

[Mardoc]

If Serdoa doesn't attack on t136, I think we should hold off attacking until we have 4 Beastmasters + the Baron (possibly hold off on the Baron until after SotC? A triple promoted Baron will garner us a lot of Werewolves farming barbs )

You never know. Maybe Serdoa will throw 26 horses at us on T136, lose 20 of them, and just damage our top beastmaster a bit . If he gives us an opportunity, it'd be a shame to waste it.

Assuming he settles in for a siege...Certainly wait until 4 Beastmasters. Baron? He's something like 6 turns production post (correct) Epic - more if we make sure to put the Shrine in first (and much more if Serdoa pillages away all our mines). I can see the point to not split our army and risk defeat in detail, but I'd like to start harassing ASAP. At least kill off his Thane, for instance.

What are your plans post-136? (assuming, of course, survival)

Don't have any. Have a sort of wishlist - we want to take Asteroids and Myrean and all Serdoa's core, and build an army that can handle Bob. But I don't know that I'd call that a *plan*

We want all three....but we can only afford 1 until Serdoa has been cut down to size a bit.

It's arguable if we can even afford that one anymore . I still think it'll pay off, but...that's probably 2 turns less on units than it would have been.

Also: We're due for a GS in 6? turns
Any thoughts on what you want to do with it?

Definitely settle. It can't pay off in the short term, it would give something like Divination. So we might as well run it through the +75% beakers and play for the long game. It's approximately 12 bpt, so it only takes 80 turns to equal a bulb - but those beakers apply to what we need right now, where if we try to bulb, we're likely to end up with Sorcery while we have one adept, with 6 XP .

Academy makes no sense, it'd have to be somewhere like Myrean. And frankly any city that's not Pacman or Asteroids ought to be hammer-optimized - GNP is not our limiting factor. If we want culture there - there's still several Holy Cities unclaimed .

Same with GA - we're just not working enough tiles for it to be meaningful. Sure, it'd be useful for pulling ahead of Bob once we have half the world in our hands, but I've learned the folly of planning for a post-war world when I tried to conquer the Malakim . Best to get there first, then worry about the long term.

[Thoth]

You never know. Maybe Serdoa will throw 26 horses at us on T136, lose 20 of them, and just damage our top beastmaster a bit . If he gives us an opportunity, it'd be a shame to waste it.

Assuming he settles in for a siege...Certainly wait until 4 Beastmasters. Baron? He's something like 6 turns production post (correct) Epic - more if we make sure to put the Shrine in first (and much more if Serdoa pillages away all our mines). I can see the point to not split our army and risk defeat in detail, but I'd like to start harassing ASAP. At least kill off his Thane, for instance.

It all depends on what Serdoa does. If he attacks (and fails) then we asses the situation at hand. If he holds off, we'll need to wait on an attack until we can both defend our stack in the field and Pac Man.


His Horsemen can 1t strike Pac Man from Asteroids and we don't have the numbers to take back Asteroids in 1 t (yet)

If Serdoa holds off on attacking, then time starts to work for us rather than against us. We can afford to hold off attacking for a few extra turns in order to get some more upgrades and shineys built (and tech HBR for the Mobility line )

It's arguable if we can even afford that one anymore . I still think it'll pay off, but...that's probably 2 turns less on units than it would have been.

I *think* we can. An extra 25h/turn is huge. The lost hammers from the misclick HURT, but I don't think they change things enough to warrant switching plans for the HE. (YMMV)

Definitely settle. It can't pay off in the short term, it would give something like Divination. So we might as well run it through the +75% beakers and play for the long game. It's approximately 12 bpt, so it only takes 80 turns to equal a bulb - but those beakers apply to what we need right now, where if we try to bulb, we're likely to end up with Sorcery while we have one adept, with 6 XP .

Academy makes no sense, it'd have to be somewhere like Myrean. And frankly any city that's not Pacman or Asteroids ought to be hammer-optimized - GNP is not our limiting factor. If we want culture there - there's still several Holy Cities unclaimed .

Same with GA - we're just not working enough tiles for it to be meaningful. Sure, it'd be useful for pulling ahead of Bob once we have half the world in our hands, but I've learned the folly of planning for a post-war world when I tried to conquer the Malakim . Best to get there first, then worry about the long term.

Agreed with the above. I was mainly throwing out the options as I see them in case you see something I didn't or had other ideas.

(Though Sorcery would give us the ability to improve our 1 node to Meta Magic....not much use until we actually *have* a Mage worthy Adept, but it would allow us access to all mana types (eventually) )

[Mardoc]

It all depends on what Serdoa does.

Precisely. It's still quite plausible that he attacks, wins, and that's the game With this turn pace - we'll find out sometime next week .

We've boosted Pacman enough that if he wins, he might not surrender to Bob instantly. So there's that.

Anyway, had a turn this morning (T127), remembered to switch to the Epic with the hoplite on it, not the arch. One of our southern warriors is up to 17 XP, and marching home, but he'll probably show up about T135 . The other is at about 11 XP, but 0.2 health, so he wouldn't be able to fight and return in any event.

Our Aeron's Chosen killed a barb for his Formation promo (which provokes interesting mental images, but I digress). Pretty soon I plan to bring him home, Courage him up, then Hide him and let him sit near Serdoa; same with the other assassin. Oh, yes, and take his Netherblade to a Ranger destined for Beastmastery. I think it's safe to assume Serdoa has no Hawks or Floating Eyes, so sticking them out on their own will be reasonable.

Our Bear is approaching, as well. I'm not really sure what to do with him. Right now I lean toward using him as a city defender; we're not going to have a chance to grow before we fight, and we might want to settle him in Myrean after the war (if there is an after).

So all in all - just continuing on the plan. We'll have to slow down a bit when T136 rolls around to figure out what's next...if it does.

[Mardoc]

My goodness - Serdoa still has a Warcry unit. It's been something like 50 turns!


Killed barbs, build more epic, yadda yadda.

[Mardoc]

Also had - well, not a chat, per se - an exchange of messages with Bob.

[COLOR="SeaGreen"]Ben: stacks are moving out (in XVIII)
sending four champs + adept your way
6:43 PM sadly the addition of four new cities has sort of ground my research to a crawl, so it'll be a little while before I can ask for your map, unless you get cartography first.
6:45 PM btw, assuming I do get cartography, I would like for the map trade to be one-way, as in you gift me your map. My rationale is that since I am the one sending over aid, and I'm the one picking up a mostly useless tech despite you having a much higher GNP, I would prefer to get the most benefit- especially since I suspect I have substantially better maps that you do
I hope this isn't an issue
15 minutes[/COLOR]

[COLOR="Silver"]
7:00 PM me: just got back from an errand, give me a moment to catch up
7:02 PM um. well, in order
forgive me if I'm not quite sympathetic to your 'too many cities' problem
7:03 PM I do appreciate the champions, that will make my life somewhat easier. Although - will they actually defend? You'd have to declare on Serdoa before he declares on me, I think
7:05 PM I doubt the 'substantially better maps' question, personally, but I'm still willing to give you my map in exchange for your aid, so long as you are able to set things up so that the Champs arrive to my city and you're at war with Serdoa before T136 hits
7:07 PM and there's one last tech that I need before war, that's currently due just in time. I literally cannot research Cartography and still have a hope to survive, not unless you'd be willing to step up your contribution to something that can handle 28 horses
finally - you may be relieved to know that my GNP is, and has been, largely going to gold for upgrades
7:08 PM it's the only way I can try to match Serdoa's army[/COLOR]

In retrospect - if this is how Bob wants to play it, I should never have signed anything with him. But...it's still better than nothing. So we'll be friends for now.

[Thoth]

Also had - well, not a chat, per se - an exchange of messages with Bob.



In retrospect - if this is how Bob wants to play it, I should never have signed anything with him. But...it's still better than nothing. So we'll be friends for now.

4 champs and an Adept seems like a fairly anemic contribution. But it's better than nothing. Probably worth the unilateral map deal.

What are the exact terms of our treaty with Bob again?


Also, I had a look at the save and Serdoa's managed to recover his economy enough to have a +36 GNP. We may be facing some HAs as well as the 30ish Horsemen.

Time to get those units home (ESPECIALLY THE GHOST WITH THE NETHER BLADE!!!)

[Mardoc]

What are the exact terms of our treaty with Bob again?

Exact terms? He's been careful to mostly avoid those
What's pinned down? Apparently 4 champs, which I agree is extremely minor, especially for an army like Bob's presumably got, and an NAP to last until 10 turns after Serdoa's dead.

Time to get those units home (ESPECIALLY THE GHOST WITH THE NETHER BLADE!!!)

Ghost is already drifting home, I just couldn't resist killing a few barbs along the way. We've got three DS's protecting Serdoa's border, who can be home in 3-4 turns - and the warriors from the south are already on their way. As is the northern DS, he's guarding the bear. All are due back in time.

But yes, losing the Blade would really hurt. Let's not.

Oh, and I'm occasionally letting a Ranger take a 99.5+ battle, to keep our tile improvements and maybe get them another promo before everything breaks loose.

[Thoth]

Exact terms? He's been careful to mostly avoid those
What's pinned down? Apparently 4 champs, which I agree is extremely minor, especially for an army like Bob's presumably got, and an NAP to last until 10 turns after Serdoa's dead.

Hmm. Hopefully he can scare up the beakers for Cartography in the next few turns, but I wouldn't count on any support in our defensive plans. Our GNP is probably making him a bit nervous.

On the plus side, I did notice one thing....in addition to the +2 poison strength the Nether Blade also grants +80% vs Heros. Kinda nice in the hands of an Aeron's Chosen Ghost if certain Elf Heros need to get dead.

[Mardoc]

[COLOR="Lime"]Hey Mardoc,

I rechecked our deals and realized that our NAP-deal does not include open borders. As I don't gain anything by keeping them open I have closed them this turn.

Kind regards,
Serdoa
[/COLOR]

Dang, this comes at the exact worst time. Well done, Serdoa!





I'm honestly not sure what to try to do with the warriors. Let them try the hike? Delete them? Imitate Partisan?

The DS's will be able to make it home, if they start right away, so they will. Serdoa gets to fight his own barbs for now.

Meanwhile, our workers continue their clearcutting campaign, and next turn we'll be able to start pumping troops at a much improved rate.

[Thoth]

Dang, this comes at the exact worst time. Well done, Serdoa!

Hmm. IIRC, the OB was so that we could help defend Asteroids for him.

It's a douchebag move on his part IMO.

OTOH, it means he's worried about us being able to fend him off come t136. :hat:

I'd dearly love to pillage his road to Asteroids, but that sort of thing would give him a (flimsy) excuse to end the NAP early.

Let's leave the warriors collecting xp (and "defending" Asteroids). They won't play a role in the upcoming war I suspect, but they're both well promoted and might play a role vs Bob. Partisans FTW.