DaveV goes on the hunt with Volanna

[Dreylin]

Maybe, next time set up the game with no lairs, maybe.

I tried

I promise to agree with you next time ... oh yeah!

Also, sympathies on the whole "being eaten by Auror" thing. At least he's in a position to make it quick.

[DaveV]

Also, sympathies on the whole "being eaten by Auror" thing. At least he's in a position to make it quick.

I've seen it coming for a long time, and it looks like it's going to be slow and methodical. Although if jalepeno keeps sitting on Arcane Lacuna, he'll have pretty good mobility through my lands.

[DaveV]

I played turn 116. jalepeno gifted me copper, since Aurorarcher had pillaged mine. He also fired off his worldspell, so my priests are just passive healers now. The only important picture is this one:

[DaveV]

I played in a hurry, since I should have been leaving for work, so no screen shots.

Aurorarcher made a naval invasion, and razed my city of Ash. I killed several of the invaders, despite losing three 70% attacks. I did do more damage than expected with the initial 29% attack, and managed to kill his Ratha with its bonus against recon. But it's just delaying the inevitable.

[DaveV]

Aurorarcher razed another city. I got incredibly lucky and killed his Ratha at 27%, but then had only 50% odds against his axemen, so didn't make any more attacks. Sigh.

[DaveV]

This game is still happening. It doesn't take me long to play my turns, but Aurorarcher must be pouring a lot of time into what I consider a foregone conclusion. He needs to provide a dictionary link to "concession" to the other players.

Here's a shot of my shrunken empire.




The highlighted stack is sitting 4N of Pecan. There's also a galley approaching from the south, as well as three chariots coming overland. I have nothing that can match his C2, enchanted blade axes; he could end this right now if he were willing to take some losses.

[DaveV]

Blight hit a couple turns ago, and my cities are all starving. Aurorarcher has pulled back his troops and seems to be concentrating on jalepeno, whose power is dropping. Aurorarcher is still harassing me with galleys.

I repeat my willingness, nay eagerness, to end this farce whenever the other guys can be convinced that we're all wasting our time.

[Aurorarcher]

It looks like this map is in the shape of a snowflake, with branching arms radiating from a central hub. Potentially interesting, if one of the players doesn't score an early great scientist from a lair, a super-promoted scout, and fills up the hub with cities. Have I mentioned before how much I hate lairs?

And I don't mean to minimize Aurorarcher's accomplishments: he's done a great job of snowballing his early advantages. But it's just kind of a boring game, where it's almost turn 100 and I don't even have contact with one of the other players. Plus there's been a clear leader for pretty much the whole game and the rest of the world seems incapable of doing anything about it.

I can understand this somewhat. I think I mentioned this somewhere in my thread, in the early game the BigGood prize from lairs is just so good that it's tempting to pop them. Especially if they're not right on your border but a bit more distant. Lairs are annoying in the way you described, but some people think the element of luck is fun to have (same with events obviously). I think the new level requirements for popping lairs in v12 is a good consolidation; no more super early pops but the lairs can still stay. I guess no lairs is still more balanced way to go, so you have a good point there.

One question. Do you regret going 2 workers opening? I know Svart's workers are slow but you were sitting at size 1 for a pretty long time.

[DaveV]

One question. Do you regret going 2 workers opening? I know Svart's workers are slow but you were sitting at size 1 for a pretty long time.

Not sure. I felt as though I was behind on worker turns this whole game, until the outcome was already decided. An extra hammer on plantations, mines, and cottages is cool, but all the extra worker turns from building on forest (with already slow workers) really slow down development. In retrospect, I probably should have grown a little after the first worker.