Etzel on Toad
Chieftain
- Joined
- Apr 28, 2009
- Messages
- 8
While eagerly awaiting Shatner's take on the subject, I found myself playing another game along the lines I proposed in his thread. So I sharpened my quill, readied my spare supply of vellum, grabbed a large can of PremierPlus Wand Polish (note: not related to the other W-word) and hastly donned my robe to make it on time for todays lecture. Welcome to:
The Map: ErebusContinent, Normal Size, x-axis wrap, More Mountains, fewer Jungles, Living World, No Tech Brokering (as opposed to all out trading)
The Difficulty: Prince (but then I'm not very good)
The Speed: Normal
The Opposition: 8 random civs
"...and so it stands to reason, that for any given value of E, under these preset conditions, any manipulation of A, will only ever result in an increase of E, resulting..." murmer and shuffling of feet among the seats - time is about up - ...ahem...ultimatly resulting in a resonance desaster, that will destroy not only the node, but may well create such an energy draw as to rip the very spark from the manipulator, reducing the value of K to zero." More murmer - this time of disbelieve - K is not supposed to be zero, beeing the most important variable in existence, even with a pie of three, it's just not going to happen - "And allthough some of you may find it hard to concur,..." Dain turned as to face a bit more towards me - oh great, now comes the dreaded 'look at the funny monkey I brought' moment - "...you may well remember the story of Beadel Etzeltoad here. Lecture adjourned, see you next week. Now get out of my room!"
As the students shuffle towards the exit, I try to sneek out amongst them, ignoring the all to familiar sneer of superiority on their faces, when I hear his sharp voice, commanding me to do his bidding: "Beadel 3rd Class Etzel! A word!"
Yep, that's me. A Beadel 3rd Class. Complete with a truncheon of office, nicely engraved with ancient runes saying "FABRICATE DIEM, PVNK!" and a stupid looking sash. It doesen't matter if you were amongst the brightest students this university has seen ever since it's founding, or if you allready had a bachelor in high-energetics magic under your belt, if you're about the only Amurite incapable to make even an apple float to impress some wanton servant girl (not that any selfrespecting servant girls would be impressed by floating apples, at least not on this plane), you become an anathema.
Maybe the only reason I was not simply cast out was that it actually was his bright idea to try it and that he told me, that I should conduct the experiment, so that he could take notes. Oh, how I hate him.
Instead they gave me a sash and my truncheon of which Hall Monitor Whimsical is convinced, that it says 'to serve and protect' - I had not the heart to tell him otherwise - and put me on a desk in the basement, where I spend my times requesting more paper towels for the students of the faculty in elemental air and water magic, who seem to go through them like...uhh...paper towels.
I don't know if I have a family I could return to, having been raised by the guild ever since I can remember, and my only knowledge of the outside world is from the books I have read. Frankly I was scared, that's why I stayed and that's why I'm in his lecture room now, awaiting to hear his orders.
"The faculty of Elemental Air and Water Magic..." - you can almost hear him talk capital letters - "...have secured enough funds to branch out in their own building. As you are intimatly aquainted with their ...err...needs, it will fall to you to facilate their sucess with this endeavour. Report to the Dean immediatly. I believe they are about to set out."
And with these words my King and my God sends me from his presence. I have to leave beatuiful Cevedes, sitting on a hill atop a river, overlooking rich corn farms and sheep pastures as well as a hill with glittering yellow stones to the south, a vinyard and rich forests as well as some grassland where horses frolic in yet to be taken freedom to it's north, all along with it's academy behind and venture out into the world. That prospect scares me to no end.
Dean Heron is mandatory about setting out asap, so we venture west towards the coast, that a scouting expedition has mapped some time earlier. As to his orders we settle atop of a hill right next to the ocean, where crabs and mussels are to be found and so Udenarat is founded.
That man is a slave driver, setting us to work on a new seat for him, as soon as the fishingboats have left the shore. He claims his old seat to be broken during the travels and commands our entire workforce to construct what later would be called 'Heron's Throne' in hushed voices.
Still, he soon enough makes a scientific breakthrough, when he explains what he calls a 'Message from the Deep'. Dain is taken by the idea and makes it an official motto.
Soon afterwards, the faculty for elemental earth and fire magic, having recently proven the yellow stones in that hill to be an element they call 'gold', demands funding for their own building, desiring a location east of Cevedes, residing near a deposit of minerals, they delight in calling 'copper'.
Funding is approved and Nimarail is founded, not only providing access to this 'copper' stones but even more to something Dain calls reagents and is very keen on obtaining.
Proved to be a good investment, too, when only shortly afterward they explain the 'Way of the Earth Mother'.
During a period of prosperity resulting in a constellation of stars working out very favourably to us, a bright head called Lugus explained how he could use the 'Tablets of Bambur' to harness the magical power of the very earth.
Just then a shock ripples through our lands, as we find every third to forth person missing. We do not know who or what caused it and have no means to avail it.
We finally found out that we were living on a peninsula that was on the western part of a larger continent. To our south east there was a giant carnival going on, under the mad rule of a spoiled brat. North of them, to our east, lived in valleys between tall and inhibiting mountains, dwarves under a ruler named Garrim Gyr, that seemed to value engeneering above all else.
With the expanding university, Dain approves of a significant increase in numbers of beadels and sends us out to clean the lands of the wandering ruffians, that destroy the property of the university and write obscene messages on the walls of the restrooms.
The following years are of prosperity and growth. A group calling themselves 'Council of Esus' is founded, expanding on the foundation Dain laid on the use of subterfuge in war. Much research is made and many great sages are born.
The carnival is preventing us from further expanding our thriving university and the newest boytoy of their little princess, a guy called Loki, delights in running around our halls, shouting out '..iehre I ahhm!' annoying professors and students to no end.
Garrim tells them they are no longer welcome and asks us to join in teaching them the value of silence, Dain heartly agrees. Together with a large group of beadels I am sent out to remove the annoying disturber. We carry with us a new device called 'catapult', originally developed to faciliate the supply of paper towels and toilet paper within the faculty of elemental air and water magic, but now modified to hurl stones instead of packs of paper towels (not much difference in texture anyway - both strain the skin almost equally).
Meanwhile another bright bloke called Beara helps the council of Esus with their work by finishing a treatise titled 'Nox Noctis'.
As we head towards Hexam and rid the clowns of it, in what would become the first beadels vs clowns battle (a sport almost like a rough variant of rugby, everything is a go but a straight kick to the groin), a dwarven peddler offers to sell an iron orb to the faculty of EEF.
Suddenly they make a research breakthrough and find out how smelting is supposed to work (seems that it is advisable to take some precautions against the molten metal flowing over the younger adepts helping with the process). They claim it all due to their brilliance, but later I find out that they broke the thing to find out why it is so darn heavy and found some clues in the inside.
We march towards Comble View where we finally manage to corner that Loki guy - although he seems not very strong, he's tough enough to take repeated punishments without hampering his ability to annoy.
After some liberal use of the towel dispenser (aka catapult) I finally manage to club some sense into him (No running in the hall during my watch!), leaving a nice imprint of '...IEM, PV...' on the back of his head.
With that taken care of, pleasent silence is restored.
Near the city limits of Comble View we find famed Letum Frigus and allthough we're not able to find any trace of Kylorin, the story inspires our people to another age of prosperity and growth.
We are contacted by some rowdy sailors following a captain Falmar who want to make port, but we decline them, telling them, that we value our peace above everything else. Soon afterwards a certain Tebryn Arbandi is evicted from our library for repeated talking and staining the covers. He's told to get lost and not to enter again, lest more drastic measures shall be taken.
Soon after the fall of Comble View a group of strange fellows discover what they call 'Corruption of Spirit' there. They are full of promisies of power and knowledge. Dain is taken even more by that idea than he was by that 'message from the Deep' thing.
So once again a new motto is spread amongst the university, this time with an undertone of harshness. Talk of strict discipline and pure meritocratism goes round and soon enough the order of the day is 'Sacrifice the Weak'.
It seems then, that the head of transdimensional magic was unusal successful when he contacted a huge demon calling himself Hyborem. Unfortunatly the department, along with it's Dean then became suddenly headless. But tampering with magic was never a safe occupation and losses are to be expected.
Although some are shocked at his apperance, Dain expalins how he could be a valuable ally, even a tool in the times to come.
Strife, war and chaos are ahead, he claims, and only knowledge and power can prevent us from loosing everything.
So with added vigour (helped by the fact that lack of enthusiasm may inflict a sudden lack of limbs), we prepare ourselfes for the times of strife to come. Beadles are outfitted by the dozend, adepts sent into the Cave of Ancestors. Most perish, but those that return are stronger by leagues.
About this time Falmar adopted the Veil, but Dain still refused his sailors to crowd our cities.
A huge book, called The Necronomicon is written and the Tower of Eyes errected in Cevedes. Dain now spends almost all of his time atop of it, gazing into the world.
He never gives lectures anymore and the few murmurs that can be heard at his door, almost exclusivly concern themselves with 'fluids of magic', and 'essence of power'.
Another Tower was errected, this time in Nimarail and devoted to Necromancy. Allthough some scoffed at the idea, Dain was mandatory that moral constraints were for the week. Magic gave power and it was our birthright in every form. We were stronger for it and if not loved, then we should be feared. To be feared we needed to be as strong as magic would make us, therefore we could not afford to abstain from using some aspects of it.
All to soon he should be proven right: only a little while after the Demons came to Erebus, the strife began. Wars were beeing fought around and Hyborem tried to get us to help him to destroy Garrim Gyr and his people.
And although Dain gave in to his demands he had plans to play the Devil. He orderd me, freshly promoted to a Beadle 2nd class, complete with a shiny new sword and all, to aggressivly pursue the intigration of three sites owned by the Luchuirp, containing some yet untapped mana nodes and then to coerce any knowledge they might be hoarding from them in exchange for protection from impending extinction.
So we marched against our former allies and soon to be vassals. The war went without any serious troubles. The treatise of the Council of Esus proved to be very reliable and a good supply of Mages that were capable of circumventing their defenses, allowed a batch of firebows that had trained under a Magister Govannon, to rapidly take down their defenders.
We took the three sites Dain wanted, including the capital and then Dain demanded their surrender. They agreed, reluctantly and furious, but agree they did. They could offer only a map and we were to learn of the world that was Erebus.
To the north east of the Luchuirp reside people calling themselves Dovidello. The Infernals have a large valley to the east of our Vassals. East of the Infernals reside, along the coast of a huge inland sea, the Lanun. South of them were Sheaim and Bannor to be found, north of the Bannor and east of the inland sea Orks were thriving in their own empire constantly waging war against the Bannor, who again to their east were beset by the Calabim, residing on their own peninsula to the far east of the world.
And as many as they were, none of them were friendly to us, some angry, some furious. Still, Dain's claim proved true: due to our strength none of these people dared to attack us, even Hyborem decided to pursue other targets. We kept our borders closed to all of them lest they should steal our secrets and try to use them against us.
Again all efford was directed towards our continued advancement. The Rites of Oghma were completed yielding three more mana nodes within our borders.
Mithrill was found and at the command of Dain a Tower of Divination and a Tower of Elements were errected.
Then suddenly war is declared on us by the Dovidello. We had disregarded them almost compleatly, since they we're more or less just a group of hunter gatherers living way out of our reach. But it turns out that they have spend their time to build a gate through which the so called Mercurians entered. They claim to be Angels, but they may well be just a rival sept of Demons.
So we march north across the lands of the Luchuirp, reach their capital 'city' of Urslo and take it almost like an afterthought. Then we turn east and hasten towards the city of Myrean, where the Mercurians reside. They are no match for our forces and quickly dispatched.
Mahala then surrenders to our forces. Dain does even allow him to retain his cities, as to make him some usefull vassal in the future.
By the time we return from the campain, we learn that yet another tower was being build, this then a tower of Alteration.
Seriously, with the tower fetish Dain has, one could suspect he was compensating something. But as the last tower is completed, he emerges from his seclusion to make a rare appearance amongst a selected few.
He explains that yet another tower must be build. This on bigger and more potent then all that were before. It would allow total control of the flow of magic giving power alike to the gods.
Only with this tower would we be safe for any time to come. But our enemies would not stand by and watch. If we were to begin building such a tower, they would unite all their strength against us - unless their attention was taken by fighting amongst themselves. And there was only one power that would start a war agains the Calabim, the Orks and the Lanun at the same time...the Infernals.
It fell to me to make the bargain with the Devil. And as I approach the infamous city of Dis I can not help and wonder about my fate. Even though Dain told me, that upon completion of the ritual the Blood of the Phoenix flows in my veins, granting me a second chance at life, should the negotiations turn sour.
Still, wandering on this tainted soil, looking at hills ablazing with flames of hellfire, I can not help but wonder what may befall us all, should we fail.
As I walk the last mile to the accursed gates of Dis an old song comes to my mind and uncontiously I begin singing along: We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when...
So, that's my story. While not as entertaining as Shatner made his stories, I hope it helps to pass the time.
Some observations I like to make:
- I'm a religion who'...though more for the mana than anything.
- I kept GK until I grabbed Comble View. It worked quite well, especially with a settled sage and an academy at my capital. Mysticism and ECs with assigned specialist, combined with a philosophical leader in pacifism was just insanly fast producing sages with the occasional prophet strewn in for later use as mana source.
That gave me an insane tech lead, not only against the usual suspects, but also sending champions against wood golems and dwarven slingers.
- firebows with earth II via Govannon make for a very nice unit, capable of taking down quite a lot of the enemies defenders without significant loss
- Blood of the Phoenix grants immortal to GPs, too. As I had three engineers left, I was thus able to build a ToM in one (1) round. I don't know if that is intentional. I tried later on, yes, you can settle/sacrifice to research and you retain your GPs.
Especially with settling and then keeping the GP to settle again, this seems more like an exploit than a feature.
- shadow mana is way underrated
- I had the Luchuirps holding a complete north-south corridor between me and the infernals. Thus hell terrain did never enter my realm, even though it was me who was the power-hungry bastard that brought the Devil to the world in the first place. This impunity, while undeserved, allowed for insane growth and liberal use of specialists during the mid to late game.
- I may need to up my dif level
I made no 'real' rules as to my game, but I never opened borders with anyone but my vassals, went for a as high as possible tech rate, build a EC asap, assigning a specialist as I could and never traded a single tech to anyone. Hey, it's not as if I got it for free, Flauros!
Beadel EtzelToad or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Infernals
The Map: ErebusContinent, Normal Size, x-axis wrap, More Mountains, fewer Jungles, Living World, No Tech Brokering (as opposed to all out trading)
The Difficulty: Prince (but then I'm not very good)
The Speed: Normal
The Opposition: 8 random civs
"...and so it stands to reason, that for any given value of E, under these preset conditions, any manipulation of A, will only ever result in an increase of E, resulting..." murmer and shuffling of feet among the seats - time is about up - ...ahem...ultimatly resulting in a resonance desaster, that will destroy not only the node, but may well create such an energy draw as to rip the very spark from the manipulator, reducing the value of K to zero." More murmer - this time of disbelieve - K is not supposed to be zero, beeing the most important variable in existence, even with a pie of three, it's just not going to happen - "And allthough some of you may find it hard to concur,..." Dain turned as to face a bit more towards me - oh great, now comes the dreaded 'look at the funny monkey I brought' moment - "...you may well remember the story of Beadel Etzeltoad here. Lecture adjourned, see you next week. Now get out of my room!"
As the students shuffle towards the exit, I try to sneek out amongst them, ignoring the all to familiar sneer of superiority on their faces, when I hear his sharp voice, commanding me to do his bidding: "Beadel 3rd Class Etzel! A word!"
Yep, that's me. A Beadel 3rd Class. Complete with a truncheon of office, nicely engraved with ancient runes saying "FABRICATE DIEM, PVNK!" and a stupid looking sash. It doesen't matter if you were amongst the brightest students this university has seen ever since it's founding, or if you allready had a bachelor in high-energetics magic under your belt, if you're about the only Amurite incapable to make even an apple float to impress some wanton servant girl (not that any selfrespecting servant girls would be impressed by floating apples, at least not on this plane), you become an anathema.
Maybe the only reason I was not simply cast out was that it actually was his bright idea to try it and that he told me, that I should conduct the experiment, so that he could take notes. Oh, how I hate him.
Instead they gave me a sash and my truncheon of which Hall Monitor Whimsical is convinced, that it says 'to serve and protect' - I had not the heart to tell him otherwise - and put me on a desk in the basement, where I spend my times requesting more paper towels for the students of the faculty in elemental air and water magic, who seem to go through them like...uhh...paper towels.
I don't know if I have a family I could return to, having been raised by the guild ever since I can remember, and my only knowledge of the outside world is from the books I have read. Frankly I was scared, that's why I stayed and that's why I'm in his lecture room now, awaiting to hear his orders.
"The faculty of Elemental Air and Water Magic..." - you can almost hear him talk capital letters - "...have secured enough funds to branch out in their own building. As you are intimatly aquainted with their ...err...needs, it will fall to you to facilate their sucess with this endeavour. Report to the Dean immediatly. I believe they are about to set out."
And with these words my King and my God sends me from his presence. I have to leave beatuiful Cevedes, sitting on a hill atop a river, overlooking rich corn farms and sheep pastures as well as a hill with glittering yellow stones to the south, a vinyard and rich forests as well as some grassland where horses frolic in yet to be taken freedom to it's north, all along with it's academy behind and venture out into the world. That prospect scares me to no end.
Dean Heron is mandatory about setting out asap, so we venture west towards the coast, that a scouting expedition has mapped some time earlier. As to his orders we settle atop of a hill right next to the ocean, where crabs and mussels are to be found and so Udenarat is founded.
That man is a slave driver, setting us to work on a new seat for him, as soon as the fishingboats have left the shore. He claims his old seat to be broken during the travels and commands our entire workforce to construct what later would be called 'Heron's Throne' in hushed voices.
Still, he soon enough makes a scientific breakthrough, when he explains what he calls a 'Message from the Deep'. Dain is taken by the idea and makes it an official motto.
Soon afterwards, the faculty for elemental earth and fire magic, having recently proven the yellow stones in that hill to be an element they call 'gold', demands funding for their own building, desiring a location east of Cevedes, residing near a deposit of minerals, they delight in calling 'copper'.
Funding is approved and Nimarail is founded, not only providing access to this 'copper' stones but even more to something Dain calls reagents and is very keen on obtaining.
Proved to be a good investment, too, when only shortly afterward they explain the 'Way of the Earth Mother'.
During a period of prosperity resulting in a constellation of stars working out very favourably to us, a bright head called Lugus explained how he could use the 'Tablets of Bambur' to harness the magical power of the very earth.
Just then a shock ripples through our lands, as we find every third to forth person missing. We do not know who or what caused it and have no means to avail it.
We finally found out that we were living on a peninsula that was on the western part of a larger continent. To our south east there was a giant carnival going on, under the mad rule of a spoiled brat. North of them, to our east, lived in valleys between tall and inhibiting mountains, dwarves under a ruler named Garrim Gyr, that seemed to value engeneering above all else.
With the expanding university, Dain approves of a significant increase in numbers of beadels and sends us out to clean the lands of the wandering ruffians, that destroy the property of the university and write obscene messages on the walls of the restrooms.
The following years are of prosperity and growth. A group calling themselves 'Council of Esus' is founded, expanding on the foundation Dain laid on the use of subterfuge in war. Much research is made and many great sages are born.
The carnival is preventing us from further expanding our thriving university and the newest boytoy of their little princess, a guy called Loki, delights in running around our halls, shouting out '..iehre I ahhm!' annoying professors and students to no end.
Garrim tells them they are no longer welcome and asks us to join in teaching them the value of silence, Dain heartly agrees. Together with a large group of beadels I am sent out to remove the annoying disturber. We carry with us a new device called 'catapult', originally developed to faciliate the supply of paper towels and toilet paper within the faculty of elemental air and water magic, but now modified to hurl stones instead of packs of paper towels (not much difference in texture anyway - both strain the skin almost equally).
Meanwhile another bright bloke called Beara helps the council of Esus with their work by finishing a treatise titled 'Nox Noctis'.
As we head towards Hexam and rid the clowns of it, in what would become the first beadels vs clowns battle (a sport almost like a rough variant of rugby, everything is a go but a straight kick to the groin), a dwarven peddler offers to sell an iron orb to the faculty of EEF.
Suddenly they make a research breakthrough and find out how smelting is supposed to work (seems that it is advisable to take some precautions against the molten metal flowing over the younger adepts helping with the process). They claim it all due to their brilliance, but later I find out that they broke the thing to find out why it is so darn heavy and found some clues in the inside.
We march towards Comble View where we finally manage to corner that Loki guy - although he seems not very strong, he's tough enough to take repeated punishments without hampering his ability to annoy.
After some liberal use of the towel dispenser (aka catapult) I finally manage to club some sense into him (No running in the hall during my watch!), leaving a nice imprint of '...IEM, PV...' on the back of his head.
With that taken care of, pleasent silence is restored.
Near the city limits of Comble View we find famed Letum Frigus and allthough we're not able to find any trace of Kylorin, the story inspires our people to another age of prosperity and growth.
We are contacted by some rowdy sailors following a captain Falmar who want to make port, but we decline them, telling them, that we value our peace above everything else. Soon afterwards a certain Tebryn Arbandi is evicted from our library for repeated talking and staining the covers. He's told to get lost and not to enter again, lest more drastic measures shall be taken.
Soon after the fall of Comble View a group of strange fellows discover what they call 'Corruption of Spirit' there. They are full of promisies of power and knowledge. Dain is taken even more by that idea than he was by that 'message from the Deep' thing.
So once again a new motto is spread amongst the university, this time with an undertone of harshness. Talk of strict discipline and pure meritocratism goes round and soon enough the order of the day is 'Sacrifice the Weak'.
It seems then, that the head of transdimensional magic was unusal successful when he contacted a huge demon calling himself Hyborem. Unfortunatly the department, along with it's Dean then became suddenly headless. But tampering with magic was never a safe occupation and losses are to be expected.
Although some are shocked at his apperance, Dain expalins how he could be a valuable ally, even a tool in the times to come.
Strife, war and chaos are ahead, he claims, and only knowledge and power can prevent us from loosing everything.
So with added vigour (helped by the fact that lack of enthusiasm may inflict a sudden lack of limbs), we prepare ourselfes for the times of strife to come. Beadles are outfitted by the dozend, adepts sent into the Cave of Ancestors. Most perish, but those that return are stronger by leagues.
About this time Falmar adopted the Veil, but Dain still refused his sailors to crowd our cities.
A huge book, called The Necronomicon is written and the Tower of Eyes errected in Cevedes. Dain now spends almost all of his time atop of it, gazing into the world.
He never gives lectures anymore and the few murmurs that can be heard at his door, almost exclusivly concern themselves with 'fluids of magic', and 'essence of power'.
Another Tower was errected, this time in Nimarail and devoted to Necromancy. Allthough some scoffed at the idea, Dain was mandatory that moral constraints were for the week. Magic gave power and it was our birthright in every form. We were stronger for it and if not loved, then we should be feared. To be feared we needed to be as strong as magic would make us, therefore we could not afford to abstain from using some aspects of it.
All to soon he should be proven right: only a little while after the Demons came to Erebus, the strife began. Wars were beeing fought around and Hyborem tried to get us to help him to destroy Garrim Gyr and his people.
And although Dain gave in to his demands he had plans to play the Devil. He orderd me, freshly promoted to a Beadle 2nd class, complete with a shiny new sword and all, to aggressivly pursue the intigration of three sites owned by the Luchuirp, containing some yet untapped mana nodes and then to coerce any knowledge they might be hoarding from them in exchange for protection from impending extinction.
So we marched against our former allies and soon to be vassals. The war went without any serious troubles. The treatise of the Council of Esus proved to be very reliable and a good supply of Mages that were capable of circumventing their defenses, allowed a batch of firebows that had trained under a Magister Govannon, to rapidly take down their defenders.
We took the three sites Dain wanted, including the capital and then Dain demanded their surrender. They agreed, reluctantly and furious, but agree they did. They could offer only a map and we were to learn of the world that was Erebus.
To the north east of the Luchuirp reside people calling themselves Dovidello. The Infernals have a large valley to the east of our Vassals. East of the Infernals reside, along the coast of a huge inland sea, the Lanun. South of them were Sheaim and Bannor to be found, north of the Bannor and east of the inland sea Orks were thriving in their own empire constantly waging war against the Bannor, who again to their east were beset by the Calabim, residing on their own peninsula to the far east of the world.
And as many as they were, none of them were friendly to us, some angry, some furious. Still, Dain's claim proved true: due to our strength none of these people dared to attack us, even Hyborem decided to pursue other targets. We kept our borders closed to all of them lest they should steal our secrets and try to use them against us.
Again all efford was directed towards our continued advancement. The Rites of Oghma were completed yielding three more mana nodes within our borders.
Mithrill was found and at the command of Dain a Tower of Divination and a Tower of Elements were errected.
Then suddenly war is declared on us by the Dovidello. We had disregarded them almost compleatly, since they we're more or less just a group of hunter gatherers living way out of our reach. But it turns out that they have spend their time to build a gate through which the so called Mercurians entered. They claim to be Angels, but they may well be just a rival sept of Demons.
So we march north across the lands of the Luchuirp, reach their capital 'city' of Urslo and take it almost like an afterthought. Then we turn east and hasten towards the city of Myrean, where the Mercurians reside. They are no match for our forces and quickly dispatched.
Mahala then surrenders to our forces. Dain does even allow him to retain his cities, as to make him some usefull vassal in the future.
By the time we return from the campain, we learn that yet another tower was being build, this then a tower of Alteration.
Seriously, with the tower fetish Dain has, one could suspect he was compensating something. But as the last tower is completed, he emerges from his seclusion to make a rare appearance amongst a selected few.
He explains that yet another tower must be build. This on bigger and more potent then all that were before. It would allow total control of the flow of magic giving power alike to the gods.
Only with this tower would we be safe for any time to come. But our enemies would not stand by and watch. If we were to begin building such a tower, they would unite all their strength against us - unless their attention was taken by fighting amongst themselves. And there was only one power that would start a war agains the Calabim, the Orks and the Lanun at the same time...the Infernals.
It fell to me to make the bargain with the Devil. And as I approach the infamous city of Dis I can not help and wonder about my fate. Even though Dain told me, that upon completion of the ritual the Blood of the Phoenix flows in my veins, granting me a second chance at life, should the negotiations turn sour.
Still, wandering on this tainted soil, looking at hills ablazing with flames of hellfire, I can not help but wonder what may befall us all, should we fail.
As I walk the last mile to the accursed gates of Dis an old song comes to my mind and uncontiously I begin singing along: We'll meet again, don't know where, don't know when...
__________________________________________________
So, that's my story. While not as entertaining as Shatner made his stories, I hope it helps to pass the time.
Some observations I like to make:
- I'm a religion who'...though more for the mana than anything.
- I kept GK until I grabbed Comble View. It worked quite well, especially with a settled sage and an academy at my capital. Mysticism and ECs with assigned specialist, combined with a philosophical leader in pacifism was just insanly fast producing sages with the occasional prophet strewn in for later use as mana source.
That gave me an insane tech lead, not only against the usual suspects, but also sending champions against wood golems and dwarven slingers.
- firebows with earth II via Govannon make for a very nice unit, capable of taking down quite a lot of the enemies defenders without significant loss
- Blood of the Phoenix grants immortal to GPs, too. As I had three engineers left, I was thus able to build a ToM in one (1) round. I don't know if that is intentional. I tried later on, yes, you can settle/sacrifice to research and you retain your GPs.
Especially with settling and then keeping the GP to settle again, this seems more like an exploit than a feature.
- shadow mana is way underrated
- I had the Luchuirps holding a complete north-south corridor between me and the infernals. Thus hell terrain did never enter my realm, even though it was me who was the power-hungry bastard that brought the Devil to the world in the first place. This impunity, while undeserved, allowed for insane growth and liberal use of specialists during the mid to late game.
- I may need to up my dif level
I made no 'real' rules as to my game, but I never opened borders with anyone but my vassals, went for a as high as possible tech rate, build a EC asap, assigning a specialist as I could and never traded a single tech to anyone. Hey, it's not as if I got it for free, Flauros!
![[NWO]_Valis](https://civfanatics-data.community.forum/avatars/m/110/110973.jpg?1475248361){kind=avatar}
