[SPOILERS] PB1- Mardoc buys a can of paint for Thoth and Ellimist

[Thoth]

We've played t110.....the game's back on pause again.

[Thoth]

FFS

These PYFT problems are very irritating.

At this point, I'm starting to oppose ANY more pauses and reloads. When it's your turn, use it or lose it.

+1

[Ellimist]

FFS

These PYFT problems are very irritating.

At this point, I'm starting to oppose ANY more pauses and reloads. When it's your turn, use it or lose it.

+1

Three weeks ago, we were at turn 109.



We're currently on turn 110. It will be turn 111 once amelia plays his turn.

[Thoth]

We're up.

I've done Orc and Calabim worker/domestic micro. Some military moves are yet unmade for both as I'd like the Hivemind available for those.

Saltus is looking very takeable right now:

And our Spider is right next to a 0 xp Illian Adept.



I'm aiming to get the Elohim domestic stuff done.

If you guys aren't around by the time I'm done I'll put the game on pause until we can confab a bit in game.

[Fake Edit]

Elohim domestics are done.

Game on pause pending confab re spider and a couple of other units (ie: CSS Thoth's Folly and Griffon in West and settler destination in the East. )

[Thoth]

I've finished up the turn.

Killed the Adept and promoted the Spider to C1/C2. And moved it here:

They'll either spot it and possibly move forces to try and kill it, which should draw some defenders away from Saltus. Or they don't spot it and we have 92% odds showing vs the mage.

We're also annoying them to the NW of Saltus: A wolfrider is in position to pillage their gems on t112 if they don't cover the gems. And we have a mob 1 Griffon standing on a netted Lake Fish.

So they have plenty of things to deal with along with our incoming towards Saltus.

We have a bit over 400g on hand empire wide to spend on t112. All of it goes to the Calabim and we upgrade 3 mob 1 Moroi and one c2 Bloodpet to Chariots.

That puts 3 mob 1/raider chariots, 1 c2/raider chariot, 1 Raider/promo in hand chariot, 2 Mob 1 Orc chariots, 2 Orc chariots with promo in hand, and one Elohim Uber chariots into Napa on t113.

Plus the 6 Mob 1 cats, 4 Wolf riders, Rantine, 8ish Moroi, a couple of bloodpets, 2 SoKs, 2 Thanes and two Adepts that we'll also have in Napa on t113.

Saltus gets annexed t114.

[Thoth]

As far as Smelting/IW vs Feud:

We want both, but we get a lot more short term benefit from Smelting/IW. We'll get extra hammers (from Iron Mines), ok workshops, buffs to all of our axes, moroi and chariots. 3 (5 xp) Iron Raider Hasteable Moroi cost the same as a Vampire and have much better flexibility WRT to deployment.

We want Vamps, but I think they can wait a few turns while we pump out 5 Iron Moroi per turn.

Also, Ogres are dammned good units. And we have a 25/28 unnamed Elohim Warrior who would look very sexy as an Ogre.

Our opponents still look to be in builder/one more tech mode. Fast Iron will let us

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=pla...p9yU#t=59s

Hasted Iron Raider Moroi backed up by hasted Iron Chariots will give us enough striking power to force the Clowns to cover every city within reach of Saltus. If they don't, we'll have the forces to burn any city within 8 tiles of Saltus.





Cashwise, we're in great shape. I think the end of the Orc GA will cost ~160/170 gpt. So we'll be at +21 gpt assuming no changes.

We finish 2 more markets on t112 plus tile improvements, growth, tile swapping, cottage growth ect. So we're looking at +40gpt for the Orcs post GA. Probably a bit more once we settle Island #4 (t113?/114?).

Elohim are +11 gpt but we're settling a new city for them t112 so that will evaporate. We'll have forest chops into markets in the North to help cover costs over the next few turns so we're ok here ftm.

Calabim are just barely gold positive atm. Another market completes t112, which will be offset by the 3 Moroi we build t112.

Looking solid all round

[Qgqqqqq]

Is it an off race elohim?

[Mardoc]

We want both, but we get a lot more short term benefit from Smelting/IW. We'll get extra hammers (from Iron Mines), ok workshops, buffs to all of our axes, moroi and chariots.

Unless we've got a lot more extra worker turns than I think we do, very little of this is short term. Iron buffs are handy, true, and will come right away. But significant hammer bonuses won't happen near term at all.

Meanwhile, the very first Vamp can Regenerate an entire stack, spread Vampirism for the buff - and after very few Feast turns can also be a Cold resist monster to eat up all the Ice Elementals they want to throw at us.

3 (5 xp) Iron Raider Hasteable Moroi cost the same as a Vampire and have much better flexibility WRT to deployment.

Well - 3 Moroi cost the same as a vamp + spectre + skellie. They don't get Regeneration, so after the first battle they're either dead or useless for ~5 turns, while the Vamp took the low odds shots with a replaceable Spectre, and has Regen between battle for the high odds shots.

Also, Ogres are dammned good units. And we have a 25/28 unnamed Elohim Warrior who would look very sexy as an Ogre.

Yes...but we're not ready to draft Ogres, not last I looked. And again with Ogres, it's either one of them or many Axes (don't remember the exact ratio, but I suspect 3:1 is about right there too). At least Vamps give us capabilities we don't already have - regeneration and summons. All Ogres give us is better city garrisons - and even there, are you sure you'd rather one Ogre to three Axes?

Hasted Iron Raider Moroi backed up by hasted Iron Chariots will give us enough striking power to force the Clowns to cover every city within reach of Saltus. If they don't, we'll have the forces to burn any city within 8 tiles of Saltus.

And yet...Vamps, alone, can do the same for 10 tiles. With Spectre Fear to make it much harder for them to dislodge us from Saltus, on top of everything else.

I guess I'm thinking of it this way: Iron Moroi are the right answer for what they have at this moment. Str 6 fast units are enough to handle their current swords/freaks/warriors/golems, at about a 1:1 hammer ratio or better. Given our relative MFG's on the graph (and Warrens off graph), that's a winning formula.

But! They're on the verge of having collateral and Ice Elemental spam and probably even Snowfall x2. They already have all the tech they need for that. All they need is the hammers and XP. Which we don't really know how they're doing, if they've got a lot of almost-mages or not. But given that's been their gameplan all along, I don't want to bet that they're still waiting on adept XP.

If we're prepared, with summon spam of our own and Cold resist vamps and Regeneration, we can handle that. Vamps may not be quite as good as Archmages, but they're close enough that our hammer advantage ought to make up for that. If all we have is Iron Moroi, we can't handle that threat. Not even with Iron Ogres can we handle Snowfall + Ice Elemental spam.

So really it comes down to outguessing them - are they 5 turns from Snowfall archmages and ice elementals in meaningful numbers, or are they 15 turns from that goal? If it's 5 turns, we need the vamps ASAP to counter it. If it's 15 - well then maybe we can cripple them with Moroi before they get there. But I'd bet they're closer rather than further. I suppose we still have a couple turns before we have to decide, and hopefully Hawks and the Saltus incursion will give us a better feel for what they've got ready by now.

But I'm looking at this as a hedge, Vamps first gives us insurance against the army they're building, while Iron first only gives us better odds against the army they already have. I don't want to take the gamble of total defeat in exchange for a faster win, which is how I see Iron first.

[Thoth]

Unless we've got a lot more extra worker turns than I think we do, very little of this is short term. Iron buffs are handy, true, and will come right away. But significant hammer bonuses won't happen near term at all.

We have 55 workers and two slaves on the board right now. 4 more workers due over the next 4 turns.

We'll get some use out of that.

Meanwhile, the very first Vamp can Regenerate an entire stack

and the first Dispel Magic Mage in the area cancels that.

Note that the Illians already have at least one DM mage.

, spread Vampirism for the buff - and after very few Feast turns can also be a Cold resist monster to eat up all the Ice Elementals they want to throw at us.

Unless Plako and DaveV are damnfools (and I have absolutely no reason to suspect that they are) they won't be spamming Ice elementals. They'll aim to spam Hosts or Pit Beasts with mages and Djin with Gibbon.

Well - 3 Moroi cost the same as a vamp + spectre + skellie. They don't get Regeneration, so after the first battle they're either dead or useless for ~5 turns, while the Vamp took the low odds shots with a replaceable Spectre, and has Regen between battle for the high odds shots.

And the Moroi have higher base strength than the summons, are on the board faster than the Vamps and have very interesting possibilities associated with them re: Haste, Commando, 2 promos and Burning Blood.

Yes...but we're not ready to draft Ogres, not last I looked.

We'll be ready to *build* them by the time we have access.

Plus upgrades.

And again with Ogres, it's either one of them or many Axes (don't remember the exact ratio, but I suspect 3:1 is about right there too).

4:1 actually.

And we want both many Iron axes and some Ogres to back them up.

At least Vamps give us capabilities we don't already have - regeneration and summons. All Ogres give us is better city garrisons - and even there, are you sure you'd rather one Ogre to three Axes?

Iron gives us a huge advantage *very soon*. Vamps are a delayed advantage.

Going thumpiethumpie on our foes ASAP plays towards the "now" advantage.

And yet...Vamps, alone, can do the same for 10 tiles. With Spectre Fear to make it much harder for them to dislodge us from Saltus, on top of everything else.

They have Spirit 1 so Spectre fear is irrelevant.

I guess I'm thinking of it this way: Iron Moroi are the right answer for what they have at this moment. Str 6 fast units are enough to handle their current swords/freaks/warriors/golems, at about a 1:1 hammer ratio or better. Given our relative MFG's on the graph (and Warrens off graph), that's a winning formula.

That's why I want to press our advantage NOW. Not 20 turns from now.

But! They're on the verge of having collateral and Ice Elemental spam and probably even Snowfall x2. They already have all the tech they need for that. All they need is the hammers and XP. Which we don't really know how they're doing, if they've got a lot of almost-mages or not. But given that's been their gameplan all along, I don't want to bet that they're still waiting on adept XP.

Yeah. So we kill them ASAP.

If we're prepared, with summon spam of our own and Cold resist vamps and Regeneration, we can handle that. Vamps may not be quite as good as Archmages, but they're close enough that our hammer advantage ought to make up for that. If all we have is Iron Moroi, we can't handle that threat. Not even with Iron Ogres can we handle Snowfall + Ice Elemental spam.

It's very hard to spam units from razed cities.

So really it comes down to outguessing them - are they 5 turns from Snowfall archmages and ice elementals in meaningful numbers, or are they 15 turns from that goal? If it's 5 turns, we need the vamps ASAP to counter it. If it's 15 - well then maybe we can cripple them with Moroi before they get there.

This is backwards btw.

If they are 5t from Snowfall Archmages, then we need to hit them sooner rather than later.

Vamps are fancy pants toys. They can wait a couple of turns.

But I'd bet they're closer rather than further. I suppose we still have a couple turns before we have to decide, and hopefully Hawks and the Saltus incursion will give us a better feel for what they've got ready by now.

We do have a couple of turns before committing.

But I'm looking at this as a hedge, Vamps first gives us insurance against the army they're building, while Iron first only gives us better odds against the army they already have. I don't want to take the gamble of total defeat in exchange for a faster win, which is how I see Iron first.

Again, this is backwards.

NM the army they might build. Let's kill the army they actually have instead.

[Thoth]

We have enough production that even if we crap out when we

make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings

We'll still come out on top if we play this right.