OB07 - The First Shall Be Last

[Conroe]

The single source of Mithril on the whole continent is in Hippus' lands, who even don't know the tech...hilarious!

Do vassals work the same way in FFH that they do in BTS? If so, we could gift her the tech and then take the resource once she has it hooked up. The only downside would be if she got big enough to break free. And I'd think we'd be doing something wrong if that were the case ...

 

[Jet]

I adjusted builds...

getting national units built promptly - great
units - good
Courthouses, some Smuggler's Ports, some Money Changers - OK
Alchemy Labs, Gambling Houses, trade route multipliers in cities with 1-commerce trade routes - bad

I have to admit, I warmed up to Arquebuses as the turnset went along. Once we had a more comfortable mass of units built up, quality started to look better than quantity.

...and gave Rhoanna Mithril Working and demanded it when she hooked it up. But I converted her and gave her resources. She's up to Cautious. Might want to convert her last city to be safe.

...and moved around units a bit to prepare for war. I had the mages and some attack units attack the northeast city, mobile units in Dis, and stationary units garrisoning the other two cities.

I declared a few turns in, and Einion attacked Spilan. His army surrounded it, standing inside the "stand here for ring of flames" lines I drew on the ground for them. But when I sent in reinforcements he must have gotten nervous, because he didn't really attack, just sort of stood there for a couple turns while I picked him off. Took the northeastern city, too.

So then I started moving down, taking cities with two or three parallel stacks. I lost a few T3s and 4s (but not Beasts or Eidolons) when Sandalphon's main stack showed up, and I was a bit spread out. But Einion's wind seemed to be knocked out, and he mostly just had 4-5 unit garrisons everywhere.

Meanwhile...

Charadon asked us to declare on Alexis. We were spread a little thin but not that thin, so I did it because he was out of WFYABTA again. So I traded for Religious Law, Tracking, Theology, and Animal Handling. I self-researched Poisons so that we could build Shadows faster by building Scouts and upgrading them through the Assassins path. I did the same type of thing for mounted national units. By the end of the set we had 4 Knights, 4 WCs, 4 Shadows, and 3 Profanes. Just starting to build Balors, and we can start the Phalanxes in a few turns.

Charadon appears to be building Blood of the Phoenix, by the way. So if we attack him later it will be gigantic monster stacks x 2.

Oh yeah. The AC hit 80, which meant we got Champions all over the map. Many were useless, but those that could get into our cities became OK second-rate garrison units with the Mithril upgrade. I left some of the spawned Champions, such as the ones on Charadon's continent, where they spawned in an interesting or amusing spot.

I also acquired three mana nodes: one from a colony that Alexis put on that elf fire node, an Enchantment node redone from the Hippus Entropy node, and our first Death node from settling the elf desert city. We're not going to be doing massive waves of Wraiths unless we build Imps Imps Imps, but if we hook up more Death nodes we might get some wraiths from free promotions, and maybe Liches later. Self-researched Necromancy for the Death node. The Sheut Stone bonus from Necromancy was long overdue.

Back to the war front...

The main issue is speed, and knocking down city defense. Of course, we're attacking with move 2 units only. (The western stack I have right now does actually have a couple 1-move units, but that stack was more of an afterthought.) Another thing limiting our speed is knocking down city defense. We should probably split up our mage stack. And build more boats, since they bombard too, and we might want them later. Only one unit has Guardsman (Hyborem), but if we're careful to watch out for Sidar Ghosts I think we can probably keep our mages safe enough. Maybe we could use our Shadows to help with forward recon, but they didn't really seem to be invisible when I experimented with them.

Besides Mobility I've been promoting down the Combat line going for March. Right now I have most of the mounted units in one stack, but that's stupid, since they can't get March and so they take longer to heal. Really, the mounted units should be split up as stack helpers, then heal and catch up.

We picked up the Nether Blade (Mardero got it) and the Athame (a Death Knight has it.)

I think that covers everything.

 

[Ozbenno]

And just like that we're back to Conroe!

I have in the back of my mind that there are 800 turns in a game. Is this right? Does that mean we have 95 turns left to win?

 

[Conroe]

And just like that we're back to Conroe!

Doubt that I'll get to it tonight ... should have no problem playing tomorrow.

I have in the back of my mind that there are 800 turns in a game.

I was thinking a 1000 turns for some reason.

 

[Conroe]

I played 15 tortuous turns. I'm not sure if it is armageddon or the large map, but my machine is struggling with this save. The screens and map are just sluggish and the IBT's seem to take an eternity. At one point, I pressed F5 and by the time the screen came up, I had forgotten why I hit F5! Half way through the set, Windows popped up a warning message that I was running low on memory. But, I eventually got the turns played.

Jet left things pretty well set up for me to just plug along taking Elohim cities. So that is what I did. We captured 12 of his cities in all. Unfortunately, not without casualties. We lost a Death Knight, a War Chariot, and a Eidolon; all of which I have already replaced. We came close to losing Hyborem at one point ...

Jet did an excellent job of configuring our stacks to be comprised of fast moving units. And then gating in the slow moving defender units after the city has been captured. I continued the tradition by passing out Mobility promotions. The problem, though, is siege. Siege weapons are not eligible for the mobility promotion, thus we don't have enough siege to drop the city defenses. The fireballs come in handy for this, but we don't have enough for 2 stacks. That is how I lost those units, fighting at 80% odds rather than 90%.

Einon only has something like 8 cities remaining and is a shadow of his former self. He is not willing to capitulate. We should have no trouble steamrolling him and the Sidar cities on our continent. Although we are going to need a navy to completely finish off the Elohim:

In other news, the war with Alexis continues. She twice landed troops on our eastern shores. Both invasions were repelled without incident. She has quite a few Frigates harassing our coastal cities. With Ritualists, flame-throwing Mages, and a couple of war ships, we are slowly thinning out those numbers. We could use more boats, though.

Charadon made peace with Alexis. Which was sad really, as we were picking up a smattering of Manes from the conflict. I merged most of the Manes into Dis.

Keelyn was evidently getting bored, or at least tired of being ignored. She declared on us and the Doviello. Thus far, it has been a phony war.

On the tech front, I completed research of Mithril Weapons and started Phalanx production in Dis. I also popped Righteousness from a goody hut, researched Drama to pop borders in our new cities, and followed that up with Machinery for the extra workshop hammers. After swapping back to Consumption to raise cash, I set research on Strength of Will for the Archmages. We can revolt back to Scholarship in 2 turns. During the revolt, I also swapped out Apprenticeship (+2xp) for Guilds (unlimited specialists).

Other items to note ... I turned off production automation. Please tell me that was an errant mis-click. I also noticed several rather interesting city names.

I am also not sure why we have all those unpromoted Champions on the Doviello continent. I am assuming that was some sort of event. I didn't know what to do with them, so I just left them.

Under the heading of AI nuttiness: How many Settlers do you need for a 1-tile island?

I should probably also mention that the AC counter hit 90 at the end of the set. Not sure of the significance, other than the Avatar of Wrath shows up. Since we are at peace with the barbs, it seems like a non-event for us.

And before I close this report, I should also mention ... drum roll please ... We are back in first place, again!

The save is attached. We have 270 turns remaining ...

 

[Ozbenno]

Hopefully we can get conquest or domination win before 270 turns are up.

Imhotep is UP.

 

[·Imhotep·]

I'll get to it tomorrow probably...

 

[Conroe]

Hey, Ozbenno, I see you are sporting some new hardware under your user name! Congrats!

Hope this means you won't be leaving the SG world behind now that you are on the HOF staff. Methos used to be a regular SG player before he joined HOF. Wouldn't want to lose you too.

 

[Ozbenno]

Hey, Ozbenno, I see you are sporting some new hardware under your user name! Congrats!

Hope this means you won't be leaving the SG world behind now that you are on the HOF staff. Methos used to be a regular SG player before he joined HOF. Wouldn't want to lose you too.

Thanks.

Got the invite out of the blue today, so at this stage I don't know how it will limit my SG time. I don't think it will slow me down that much

 

[Conroe]

FYI -- Monday is a school holiday on this side of the pond. So we're going to take the 3 day weekend to hit the road. If the save makes it back around to me, I'll need a skip or swap or something.

 

[Ozbenno]

If Immy can get to this I'd be able to play tomorrow at the earliest so I imagine we can wait until Tuesday.

 

[·Imhotep·]

I'm sorry for the delay - I've been bogged down with work the whole week. I promise to play and report tomorrow !

 

[·Imhotep·]

LOL, this game is getting huge. Normally my machine handles even huge maps without problems, but in this set I had 3 CTD. We may want to call it a day at some point, the game is won clearly anyway.

Capturing cities was easy enough with our uber-stacks.

The AC hit hundred, and some units were killed - among those was Rosier the Fallen *rofl*. Einon has no city left on the main continent, ships are on the way. Sandalphon will be dead in the next 2 turns. We built the Caminus Aureus, and next turn we'll complete the Eyes and Ears Network.

We have a score lead of 700 points now, soon ou7r peace with the barbs will end - which doesn't make a difference, because the Avatar of Wrath is dead too.

Imhotep

 

[Ozbenno]

OK, got it. I'll see if I can play a few turns.

The only way I see us not winning is if Charadon gets a religious victory if we destroy too much of the rest of the world. I'd be inclined to capitulate Ainion if he's off shore.

 

[Ozbenno]

Actually I just realised my dad is over tonight and I'm playing cricket tomorrow night, so I won't be able to play until Tuesday, so if Jet wants to get in first....

 

[Diamondeye]

We have a score lead of 700 points now, soon our peace with the barbs will end - which doesn't make a difference, because the Avatar of Wrath is dead too.

Lurker: Nice, relaxed way to tell everyone the strongest unit in the game is dead

 

[·Imhotep·]

Actually the Avatar of Wrath isn't that strong. 33 sounds much, but 4 War Chariots with Courage will take him down all the time. It's the same with the Horsemen - they are the stronger the earlier they enter the game. Late game they don't pose any threat...

 

[PaulusIII]

Lurker: Nice, relaxed way to tell everyone the strongest unit in the game is dead

Mulcarn/Auric, smite this unbeliever in thy divine power of winter!

 

[Jet]

* Set highlight: capturing Sandalphon's last, undefended city on turn zero with Commando Hyborem.
* Capitulated Einion for great justice and got some techs in peace deals and from the Eyes and Ears Network. I think Basium will auto declare next turn.
* Cast Hyborem's Whisper and took the largest city, Braduk the Burning. It turned out to have Nox Noctis. It took 25 units to get the revolt chance down to zero. Dropped the Perfect Lyre and Dragon's Hoard there for more .
* Researched Divine Essence and beat Charadon to Blood of the Phoenix. I think he might have been building it in Braduk, because he dropped out of We Have Our Reasons. Built it in 5 turns with a couple hundred base production in Dis, plus the Celestial Compass and a Life node. It was OK for denial but turned out not to affect the 99% of our units that are demons.
* We're pretty much done researching, but Omniscience could be finished off if you want to build Birthright Regained.
* Colonized the empty land masses for land count.
* Some mages are scattered in reserve. They could be left there for emergency response, or transported to Braduk. In any case, our Life Node still needs to be converted, then the eligible mages need to be upgraded to Archmages and Liches. We have 4 Death for free Death III. I added a Body for Haste and a Shadow for Shadowwalk, so you might want to convert the Life node to Shadow for free Shadow I on the Archmages... to taste. We also got Spirit from Einion for Courage.
* We have Air from Rhoanna. A city on the barb continent has some ships ready to go and an Imp with Air I. Some ships have move-to orders and I think Charadon's navy outguns ours, so watch out.
* Got an Engineer and hit a GA, 7 turns remaining.
* Slave trade resolution came up, handy for workers in colonies.
* AV is only at 58%, so there's no threat of a religious victory.
* We're ready to declare and soak up whatever Charadon has for us. Here's the epic army of epicness.

 

[Thrar]

lurker's comment: What's the unit at 20x4 (2nd from last column, 4th row from top) in the screenshot? The picture is that of an NPC from Baldur's Gate II...