We have found a neighbor nation. Caelum, land of birds and ice. Their combat tactics are interesting, as birds tend to either win or lose very fast. Their units fly and surround yours so if you can survive their alpha strike you can break them right away. They are annoying though as it's difficult to keep them from fleeing, and they can assault your forts from multiple provinces away, capturing them with little chance of retaliation.
Our lands are Heat 2 which has a couple of bonuses. If we can spread our dominion to their lands, it'll literally melt their forts. They can't build forts in heat (they are made of ice) and they lose wall integrity when exposed to heat. Also their troops have no armor to speak of, except for a couple of units. This armor is also worse in heat. And these units cost as many resources as 6 lesser units, but those less armored folks do better for the alpha strikes. I can just have a big blob of free helotes, hide my Gigantes in them and after their alpha strike I'll just grind them all down. Also Curse of Stones makes them very sad. Adds fatigue per distance moved and flying from one side to the other in a single turn is a lot of distance.
Their magic is almost exclusively Air and Water, which means they have no ability to harm Megatron. They have a lot of interesting commanders they could summon, but they have to build their pretender around summoning them. I'm sending in scouts to see if I can spot it. It'll probably be a dom 1 human rainbow (multipath but low in all the paths of magic) Pretender.
But back to Phlegran news. My First Tyrant has hit the field. Sending them out to start the friendly recruitment drive and site search for my important paths. I also received a free commander Pagobar the Hog Knight. They are searching for the mythical Forest of Truffles (a gem site). Not the most impressive stats, but a free commander is a free commmander
Our Inevitable Legions continue their march across the land, subjugating once again those who had forgotten their oaths to defend the Great City. As we proceed, our reawoken commanders have begun to remember the tactical acumen they once possessed, and we are finding it easier and easier to crush what resistance there is. Weaker undead - the bodies of those who never served in the Inevitable Legions - begin to flock to our cause. If they did not serve in life, they may serve perfectly well in death ... Their slow, shambling gait would under normal circumstances make them a liability, but for us, they march with equal speed to our heavily armored legionnaires. And so, we place them before our legions, in their masses ...
... and the living enemies they fight attack them first. Cavalry break their lances against them, and archers riddle them with shots. Then the true Legionnaires arrive and begin their work. We have issued a proclamation to all of our generals, encouraging the use of these Auxilia ...
... as the results speak for themselves.
The Presence within the Rift was, I can put no better word to it than "agitated," for several days. Its usual whispers in the back of my mind were transmuted to a strangled scream. After days of this, it began to rise in pitch and unheard volume until I found myself again in the Great Square, kneeling before the Rift, when suddenly it stopped, and before me an old friend appeared as if from nothing. Scipio Serpentis, the general who led our most successful assaults against Old C'Tis, once against stood before me - but much like myself, he had been changed in the intervening millenium. Without argument, he took up his arms and began calling to his form Legions. We are glad - I am glad - to have him back, as his knowledge will be critical in the days and months to come.
Far to the north, rumors of great men, whose footsteps cause thunder, have proven somewhat true:
The people of Ulm are deluded; they blame us for an apparently random attack against their God, unable to fathom that necromancy is not the sole domain of Ermor. Perhaps we should be happy that they attribute such power to us, but it is necessary for us to focus on other items first and foremost. We must gain at least a short-term peace with Ulm, and so we must find a way to convince them to turn their armies in their steel skins another direction.
Meanwhile, our proposal to Atlantis has been answered.
So now we build. And in the far west, rumors of serpents with the manners of men abound ...
(Apologies to anyone reading this one, in particular, on desktop ...)
No Flappy or any other gods for that matter. Maybe they roll at the end of turn?
4 Storm Guards is not ideal, but we have a fully cleared capital now and are up to 550 resources which basically maxes my recruitment points
We have contact
So the double attack turn is out. If they were one turn slower this would matter less but our fort finishes this turn and construction happens after battle resolution. They will see something like "The enemy force appears to consist of a single Seraphine" and barring a scout already being in here they might think snipe that temple and even then it might be snipe that fort. It's entirely possible they think our forces are still largely light infantry and mammoths, and they do kinda chew that up as you can't trample giants, if a scout is here they might have seen me just take the forest this turn and deduce most of my forces are out of position. If the scout saw the fight or my army though then they know my comp is much heavier but we would actually get reported as "archers & storm guards" so they might think the melee is quite small
We have sent a noncommittal "don't go any more east" message. The giants don't really have all that much we're interested in. Earth/death/fire gems aren't great for us aside from the earth. Maybe we can trade for another hammer? They will make their own hammers and quills if they ever find any air. Their mages cost much more to recruit and they don't seem to be magic 2. This might be counteracted by my having spent more on the even more expensive mammoths so they may have lots of gold to spend, but I did eventually break out quite successfully and they don't seem to have a ton of provinces
If there's 30 Gigante Warriors mixed in though and they attack then yeah we're possibly gonna have a bad time if they attack. I'm gonna guess that they have a Tyrant leading the army too as it's too big for a Chieftan unless there's multiple commanders and a smith would be a total waste
Still though we can put up a fight. This is an example of how good my troops are, any attack that doesn't bypass my shield has to deal with 40ish prot. This Storm Guard eventually died - because he rolled def 19 vs attack 27 and rolled only average for prot and didn't get a shield bonus. But even a giant will have some trouble getting through the shield
MEGATRON HAS ARRIVED. Our god has landed on this planet, to subjugate these primitive lands. None can match their might! Just in time too, as we have received multiple diplomatic messages.
One with mock friendliness
And one attempt at flattery and deflection of our Divine attention
But both make the same mistake. Daring to tell MEGATRON where they cannot tread and what they cannot do. For this slight, they will fall
MEGATRON agrees to nothing, for if they have not the might to take these unclaimed lands before we arrive, they do not deserve them. They have not yet seen MEGATRONs glory, so they may think they have some semblance of a chance at victory. But there is none for them. Their window has closed, and victory is ours.
This turn we forge arms for our Lord, and they will strike out towards the throne on our Caelum border. Sending a scout to ping the other throne, to see if it suitable for MEGATRON to take as well.
In domestic news, our hogknight has taken up a position patrolling our capitol, keeping peace and looking for spies. With all of these messengers it is likely something has slipped through our borders.
Our first tyrant Starscream is searching a nearby swamp for gem sites.
Research is still slow, but will start to accelerate after MGEATRON rolls out and we can focus on research and not forging.
Excellent news bird friends! Flappy has awoken! It's time for possible folly #2
The mega-rainbow, with the idea that he can search for everything and also craft everything and also cast everything except water. Flappy will craft our hammers and then go search high probability targets. 55 RP is a lot but it's also technically only 27.5 air gems turned into quills so magic sites are worth much more in the long run
The bless is: shock resist 5, blur, reinvigoration 3, hp +3, awareness
So I'm not actually convinced I've seen Phlegra's capital, that might be a very, very early 2nd fort and the province name doesn't follow the convention of being named after the nation, so they could be doing incredibly well. But we now know where we are. We see Oceania to our west and Ys to our east but Ulm sees them opposite so Ermor and Ulm are in the unmapped slice
Our castle finished, castle part #2 is on. We will get a lab in ASAP and start pumping out more ice crafters but money is incredibly tight right now. The double attack is back on and we are starting to free more seraphines for active duty. We should have a 3rd attack force soon
We now have an official non-aggression agreement with Ys, along with an Owl Quill from Caelum. This useful device will speed our research nicely. Good, as we're behind from All the Priests.
We provide them with some additional information and propose a long term agreement- no war, just a Throne race. In theory this could involve turning on Ys, but in practice unless they turn their coats I don't intend to fight Ys or Atlantis for that matter. Going underwater isn't worth the effort.
Western Plains falls without a single loss. Our wounded commander was too slow to fall in battle! And it was Barbarians, so good revenge. Doven goes down as well to only a single troop lost.
Haunted Woods turns out to be an even split between the two troops types. Bander Log is to our North; rather than risking a fight, we send them a message proposing to team up against Ermor, and move into the Haunted Woods with Kallum.
Gods begin to awaken. Hrm. Could be a problem if the dead were sleeping.
Haunted Woods falls almost insultingly easily. Bander Log expanded west, so the worries about accidental contact were unfounded.
Titansbreath Peaks falls to our eastern army; the silver mine belongs to Ulm. Beyond it, I can see Ermor and Atlantis- our eastern spy has circled the world.
We lose Queen Forest to a Troll King, and plague breaks out in Titansbreath Peaks just after we take it. What is up with the world hating Ulm?
In High Peaks, the heretics are slaughtered but we have not found their leaders.
Next month, we will be able to begin forging. This month, the armies move to take Range of Shadow and Saetica. In the west, we will have to find a place to fort up against Ermor soon.
In Haunted Woods, we have our first recruitable Nature mages. We'll need to get a mage there to build a lab and begin training them. The army building in Ulm moves into Wesh to guard against the trolls moving in. We'll bring more troops along with a second commander.
The barbarians of Desert of Visions assault Minstra. Not confident in this attack, but we shall see. Our reinforcement army takes a risk and moves on L'iss.
Ulm 13
Bander Log agrees with the plan. Good.
Caelum provides information, and another Owl Quill.
INCARNATE STEEL RISES AGAIN. Minus a little bit of his magical prowess, but. ALIVE. This time we will recruit dedicated very angry bodyguards for him.
Range of Shadow falls easily.
Saetica falls easily...to Ermor. Apparently our plan to bypass the obvious province and move forward to capture territory ahead of the dead was only partially successful. Ermor crashed into the independents and killed them. Then our army arrives..
Don't fuck with Ulm, children. Even if you are creepy dead children. One of their commanders escaped, along with a few ghouls. The rest were put down with relatively minor losses on our side. In a stroke of good luck, most of their missile fire was directed against the shield wall, letting the two-handed infantry close and smash up their main force. Still, Ermor should be assumed to have tides of dead; I cannot risk this being their main field army. On the other hand, this army did contain their Prophet.
Who is apparently named Headless? Guess the penchant for flowery bullshit only applies to their diplomatic corespondents.
Indeed it isn't- another Ermor army has moved into Pzucz. I expect that army to hold while Ermor attempts to curl around the South, but we shall see. For now, the main army holds position and begins building fortifications in Saetica, along with a Temple to ward away the unholy dominion. Kallum's army moves into L'iss. As long as Bandar Logs holds true, Ermor will find it difficult to get to our eastern flank.
L'iss falls; the risk there was worth it. Ministra beats the barbarians back. Turns out a big sword doesn't do too much against heavy cav.
This also puts our first and probably main fort just two provinces away from the dark heart of Ermor. And Saetica finally provides Scouts, so Ermor will be very well viewed.
And now that Incarnate Steel lives again, we have SO MANY spare priests to go to the front and ward against other faiths, or use their calling to smite the undead directly.
Luck smiles! We find some nature gems.
And spits out a curse- Misfortune 3 in Wesh.
This is getting very, very silly.
No troll attack this turn, so the forming army moves to Desert of Visions. We will want to expand west as as can. The sooner we cut off Ermor from that side, the better.
Whoops, so I mistook Bandar Log's astral gems for air gems, too used to 4 which has different icons. So I'm the only source of reliable air
Anyway, vast successes on attacks. Virtually no losses. Eventually we will have to get these injured mammoths killed off, they're actively useless now. We are pumping out 15ish storm guards a turn which can take a weak province by itself
The throne is quite well defended
And yeah we were mistaken as to the exact origin of Phlegra, they are doing quite well
MEGATRON has triumphed, bereft of any gear, his battlefield prowess still undeniable. He took not a single point of damage. He will claim this Throne in His name, while we ship arms and armor to him
We are preparing to build a fort on the border of the Deadlands to contain them, and to give us a point to sally from against Oceania. The birds shall wait, the gem income from killing Ermor and potentially getting Oceanias capital as well is too tempting
Unfortunately, Ulm has not chosen to respect the line that I had suggested. Even worse, they moved in a great force and, while the Inevitable Legion is strong, we have not yet reconstituted its numbers sufficiently to stand against the plate-and-mail of Ulmish infantry. And so our first battle against them in the just-recently captured lands of Saetica have proven disastrous for our forces:
But to my east, I have encountered the ape men of Bandar Log; I believe that they might prove useful against the Ulmish threat, as Ulm is very much a powerful threat right now. Their mundane forces are plentiful and powerful, though with time they will prove week to magical forces, time is not something we can guarantee we have.
To the north, Phlegra has disagreed with my proposed line:
He is a fool ... the point of setting a line between two peoples is to ensure that they do not spend their forces uselessly against each other, rather coming to an agreement before the bloodshed. But still, if he requires that I take some territory first, then I shall do so. And, in the meantime, I make the calculated decision to propose peace to Oceania - I cannot afford them attacking me, as well.
OOC: I'm in a really bad spot, having messed up my initial expansion and now running into several players who will almost certainly jump on me. I got lucky in that my Prophet escaped combat, but there is otherwise not much I can do at this point to defend myself against Ulm ... I have hordes of chaff to tie their infantry up forever, but my ability to actually kill them is nonexistent ... The magical research I need for that hasn't come online yet. Uh, so now I'm kinda scrambling for what to do ... My best hope is that someone else attacks Ulm and that his troops all catch diseases and die in my territory. Wish me luck?
Kane Red RobeMaster of MagicArcanusRegistered Userregular
edited May 20
Observer spoilers
I'll admit I thought everyone was exaggerating the amount of aggro Ermor was going to pull but it sure looks like Elvenshae is about to get attacked by at least three other players in the next couple turns. Oof.
Ulm has held steady in the south, not pressing their current advantage. Perhaps the territory they have taken is sufficient for them, and they do not wish to conduct further raids into our territory. Still, we must be careful, as their steel-gauntleted fist is very close to our fair city, and we know the dangers of Ulm on the march.
Our forces have engaged and routed a probing force from the apes of Bandar Log. Although we sent a message offering to allow them to stay to the east of Wic Forest, they nonetheless attempted to move northwest into the forests of Wolvermory. The battle was a complete rout, as, after engaging the land's native soldiers, the apes began to celebrate, thinking themselves safe. Our commander came upon them and mistook them for the land's normal defenders. In their drunken confusion, the apes abandoned their commander - their Prophet, Carasura, a large ape of dark coloration wearing great gilded armor and a mighty sword - and our cavalry rode through his camp and trampled him into the ground. The Bandar Log had mustered a strong force of pale apes upon tiger mounts, but upon the death of their commander they turned tail and fled, and were dispersed by our advancing legionnaires. We must issue an apology to the Bandar Log apes, even though this loss was their own fault, and hope that they will continue to focus upon the Ulmic threat.
The small number of Bandar Log infantry advancing, leaving their Prophet behind, guarded by a single archer. The tiger cavalry waits for their Prophet to bless them before they ride to join the battle. Meanwhile, the undead knights sally forth and pass beyond the meager line of infantry.
The Bandar Log tiger riders charge forward, and now their commander is almost completely alone.
The undead cavalry sweep in, with predictable results.
A far northern territory near Phlegra that has fallen under the sway of the Presence. and it hums on some nights with a different pitch. It grants me visions of winged men, fighting with spears and bow and covered all over in armor of purest ice. The Sylphs of Caelum have come within our reach, now. I anticipate reaching out to them shortly, as they might serve well as a raiding force against Phlegra.
With Ulm apparently content to remain where it is, we have ordered several of our lesser, still-living priests to investigate the area surrounding the Thrones nearest our great City. To the west, we know that the Throne of Winter sits, but we do not yet know which the others are. It is time to correct that oversight, as well as determine what forces are truly guarding them. This has taken greater urgency, as a great tremor rippled through the very fabric of our reality, causing the Rift to swirl and sweep. Megatron, the so-called Pretender of Phlegra, has claimed one of the Thrones - or, at least, it was claimed in his name:
MEGATRON has proclaimed their dominion over a throne. Now all shall know to fear them.
We have found more of our future subjects. Oceanias cap is in sight, as well as Ctis. Ctis turns the world into swamps and causes disease. It's very annoying. Ermor is annoying as well, but I am certain their neighbors will take care of it for me. I'll build up forces in that fort down there, but probably going to keep expanding west until I meet up with Caelum from the other side. Free real estate is best to grab before needing to fight players. As much as I want to just march MEGATRON onto Caelums cap...
And so our forces move west, while MEGATRON site searches the throne he just conquered, hoping for some good gems sites in the many paths he can search.
Despite them constantly disappointing me when sitesearching my first Gigante Tyrant is about to be prophetized. Starscream will serve us well. Maybe. The main reason to prophetize him is cost and durability. Prophets have zero upkeep. And a Gigante tyrant won't fall to assassins or remote spells.
It may only seem like 30 gold a turn, but it adds up.
MEGATRON has found multiple sites on our new throne. +1 to Nature, Earth and Glamour income. And some population growth. Not bad. They are now armored, bringing their protection up to 37. The cap is 40. MEGATRON is out of reach of mundane weaponry. Now to fill their slots with more items to ensure they can ruin any army they come across.
A mage priest is being sent down to our border with Ermor. Need to make sure to put temples up to keep their toxic dominion out.
Our forces move further west, our faithful lancecatchers taking many a blow to ensure Gigante lives are spared.
There was one major failure attacking the longdead horsemen, they rolled distressingly well and we weren't in cold so prot was low, we didn't get shield bonuses and we lost a pile of good troops. But not the seraphine. But the other attacks worked with minimal losses aside from a handful of archers. We are probably significantly smaller than Bandar Log or Phlegra (who seem to both be heat scales irritatingly), but research is going well. Ulm & Ermor are fighting. Ys is probably off eating the juicy pile of AIs they are next to. Caelum is very... seasonal so getting a winter offensive prepared is probably a good strategy to fight extra effectively outside our dominion
Ulm's 2nd hero & Bandar Log's hero prophet died though. Phlegra declares a new prophet, but that could be an intentional killing. Our prophet is now the highest living hero!
Ermor's dominion is encroaching and we need to fight Bandar Log & Phlegra's heat (I suppose some of it could be the summer though?), so we are building temples now and will put a 2nd fort down in the forest south of the throne. A 3rd fort will go up on the eastern throne, we are going to beat up on the AI for some easy gains. Flappy is searching with some bodyguards, the High Seraph comes online next turn as does conj 4. We are going to grab thau 4 for auspex too. Research is 150/turn, the plan is to get up to 400 without Flappy by end of year between the 2nd fort and quills and spare capital recruits
We continue to get good events without luck scales! More gold and gems, we can basically get a 3rd hammer if we want it. Eventually Flappy will end up at another fort with a lab and can craft it then
Some strange beast or man named MEGATRON has claimed a throne. Less than ideal. Ermor sends us a message, claiming we've "violated" their "proposal" or some such. They chose not to respect Ulmish lands and steel, now they choose fire and a second death.
But not yet. A fort is under construction still, and we will wait. In the meantime Kallum moves to join the main army, conquering as he goes. We consider sending a response, and decide silence is the best answer for now. Ermor will know our response when our troops march onwards.
Wesh proves unlucky again, as huge hailstorms ravage the land. Costing us men and precious gold. (seriously this is getting stupid)
In the newly conqured lands, we find mages better than those of the Haunted Woods. In addition to being Nature mages, they can sometimes know another path. They aren't as stealthy as the druids, so we'll likely train druids as well eventually. And both provide a foraging bonus to our armies- extremely useful moving through lands Ermor has ruined.
This is doubly true since Incarnate Steel's loss of magic means he can no longer forge the best methods for increasing food.
Ulm 15
Queenstomb Desert is ours, and with it the path to a Throne. That will wait, for now; I do not relish the idea of fighting in the dark below, especially as other false faiths may lie below the surface.
The first hero of Ulm, Kalloman, gives his life scouting the Throne ahead of our building fortress. The defenses are weak and should fall to the army easily enough- but for four Wizards on the field.
We now begin considering: those Gods that awoke. Some of them will be Men leading Men to the faith, like Incarnate Steel. Some, however...especially the god of Ermor...may be monsters. It would be well to have something to kill monsters.
The first part of that plan begins recruitment in the capitol. A Lord Guardian and a group of Guardians for him to lead. The attacks of the Guardians are perilous to the unfaithful, and just as important their weapons brush aside armor with impunity.
Incarnate Steel himself makes Dwarven hammers, the better to speed Part Two of that plan- Black Knights with Blades of Sharpness and magical protection. While a large monster could destroy any given knight, a group of them would hurt it sorely indeed.
I do not know where the Ermor army that was in Pzucz went, which is..vexing.
Ultima Typhia is struck with plague, which is...more vexing.
Phoenix-D on
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Lord_AsmodeusgoeticSobriquet:Here is your magical cryptic riddle-tumour: I AM A TIME MACHINERegistered Userregular
Ys, recent turns (I've fallen behind a bit so I'll be condensing a lot)
The Palisades in Fas Dir were finished, and recruitment of coastal Kurnou troops to supplement my forces has begun, my Prophets forces were also reinforced and begin to head out
We received a message from Ermor it takes me a couple turns to respond to, warning us about Ulm ironically, it takes me a couple of turns to send my non-committal response. Meanwhile the AI in Phaecia launches a failed invasion of my province Hynaphe
Battle
Bandar Log seems to be gathering forces on my border, and I boost the defence of a few of my provinces bordering my enemies, I also spend a couple turns pointlessly sending my Prophet hither and yon trying to stave off potential invasions that do not come, thus styming my expansion. I think it's time to take out Phaeacia and then start focusing on C'tis.
I crush the independents of Norville, then begin to head for where Phaeacia's forces are gathering on my border. I also send my Morgen Princess with what forces I have in my capital to Fas Dir to reinforce and then begin taking more Independents. Bandar Log continues their expansion near my territory which I am unhappy about but won't be doing much to stop at this stage. I have also begun to build a temple, and later a lab, in Fas Dir to begin local recruitment. I think I need a second Fort on my shoreline. I have also noticed my dominion shrinking, will need to start having priests spread it.
Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. - Lincoln
Posting from work after a late-night turn, so no pics this time.
Ulm and I both had the same idea and commander pinged the throne to my south.
Only wrinkle is that his commander was crippled and died when it got run down by heavy cav, and mine saved his skin by sacrificing a handful of worthless zombies to distract them as he made his escape.
My other ping on the northern throne confirmed that it’s basically undefended, and has been the whole time. The scouting report indicated it was defended by just a handful of heavy infantry and heavy cav. I thought it was likely to be more heavily defended, which would make it a candidate for the Throne of Dreams - which, being associated with Glamour, meant that it had a bunch of invisible / hidden enemies hanging out. Nope! It’s actually just that weakly protected. We move on it this turn.
Oceania has accepted my NAP, which is bad - it delays any attacks I’d make on them - but also awesome - because I can focus on the real dangers. Also, their home province is down to 3 candles, so there’s a decent chance they get Dom killed and then I move in for free, since all of my troops are amphibious, Pirates of the Caribbean-style.
Bandar Log has at least for the moment accepted my apology for accidentally killing his Prophet. I’ve followed up with an NAP offer and moved my nearby troops away to prove I have no bad intentions (and also to invade that Throne I mentioned earlier). Hopefully, he’ll join in containing Ulm who is spreading far and fast.
No responses yet from Ys. And Caleum is definitely bumping up against Phlegra. Between us, we’re going to make his lands really, really cold, as I dumped my heat scales to -2 Cold and Caelum likes the cold, as well, and is probably at -1 (default), -2 (easily handleable, like winter for normal nations, so basically free points) or -3 (a little harder for Caleum natives to to handle, but way worse for everyone else - except me). Need to check on Phlegra’s preferred Heat scale - hope it’s +1 Hot …
For some reason, it looks like Atlantis is staying in their lake - if I can swing around the west side of it, I can do something interesting since the AI seems loathe to break NAPs. Also, on the other side of the lake is Phaecia, another AI.
Edit: Oh! I totally forgot. I was ferrying troops around, so hadn’t scripted their combat stuff. In a random event, a whole pile of Troglodytes burst out of the ground and took over the territory. Lost ~100 troops, admittedly most of them the cheap stuff but still, what the hell, Trogs?!?
This is all going rather poorly. We are claiming the High Throne now which is great for dominion spread, but that's it. Size wise we're still too small and it's awkward attacking in summer. But winter is coming
Megatron the Bronze Colossus is on our border and I don't even know how we are going to fight that. I need to observe a combat so I can view it's equipment, bless & script. It's absurd, resistant to all forms of melee attack, resistant 15 to all elements and 25 natural prot, mindless and a pile of HP. If he took astral for some reason I can magic duel him but that's unlikely. It has air so it can get shock 20 easily so lightning bolt is useless. Thunder Strike would be okay maybe except for the inaccuracy
If Flappy had water then Acid Bolt could do something. Star Fires would work, slowly. Shadow Bolt looks promising, I'm not sure it can be paralyzed but 8 AN magic damage MR half does something at least. Nether Bolt is also interesting A1D1 when I have A5D3 so that's 26 AP damage (both paths add right?) Fatigue would not be a thing either, I can cast that pretty much forever. We will be getting evo 3 next turn and evo 4 2 turns after that
Weapons wise, a greatsword of sharpness plus some buffs could do some work. At con 5 there's some more options but we'll see if we get there first
Bandar Log is also on our borders but isn't attacking yet. They seem to be using small armies of a few melee, some archers and tigers to clear independents. We're going to see if we can snipe them, though I suspect they will take a different province instead. I'd go there instead but it's heat 1 sadly
And Ermor is sending an army of longdead our way. Only "140" units, we'll see exact comp if they attack. No riders showed up in the report though which is good news
There is a very interesting trap that could happen next turn, I'm emptying out my province with a lone temple and I could maybe get Ermor to fight Phlegra's god if they both attack. I'm probably just going to stack up though to fight Ermor if they advance
After several months of holding our breath, an idiom that remains in my vocabulary despite not having applied in some time, and marshalling our forces, Ulm has at last declared war against us. I suspected it was coming when they made their unreasonable demands regarding our border, though I had hoped to have more time to finalize our research into magical ways to defeat the mundane steel of Ulm. But we have run out of time, with Ulm attacking us across a broad front. They planned their attacks poorly, however:
They struck at 3 separate locations, hoping no doubt to drive us quickly backwards. They send only a minor force into the plains of Pzucz, where admittedly we, too, had only minor forces present. What we had proved to be enough, however, as the human soldiers defending their homeland against Ulm persevered through the destruction of their undead supports and slaughtered the priests of Ulm where they stood:
A ghoul, on fire, pulls itself into melee range of the invaders of Pzucz.
The last standing priest of Ulm's patron, Incarnate Steel, dies, abandoned to his fate by his soldiers.
Our worst performance was in the Summerlands, a location we had left lightly defended. There, a relatively powerful Ulmic force attacked, and the humans defending their homes were overmatched. Only 3 so-called knights came when called, and they charged ineffectually into the Ulmic lines:
Our greatest success, however, was in the land of Temiglia, where the main might of the Ulmic attack came, and where it was rebuffed with minimal losses, except amongst the auxilia. While their losses are regrettable, they are far less critical to our plans than the forces returned from the Inevitable Legions, and so should be sacrificed first as necessary to achieve victory for Ermor.
The battlelines meet.
The lictors meet their opposite, the Ulmic black plate infantry, and crush them.
Many of the troops brought by Ulm were wounded and starving from spending time within the Demesne of the Presence.
The Inevitable Legion chasing down the fleeing men of Ulm.
The bucher's bill.
So now we must counterattack and drive the forces of Ulm from the lands we call our own. If we are lucky, we shall not do so alone, however. I find that, in order to increase the odds of our success, I must take the field personally. And so, after I pen these last few messages, I will ride to Midria with my closest lieutenants and oversee our efforts to drive Ulm back, recapture the land they took, and claim the Throne of Dreams for ourselves.
We have sent a missive to Bandar Log, requesting that they aid us in overthrowing Ulm's might. While, on an individual basis, their troops might not stand up to Ulmic steel, I hope that between numbers and because Ulm will be forced to split their attention, that they can do serious damage to the Ulmic economy. Furthermore, our nonagression pact with the apemen ensures that, should we accidentally run into them in the confusion of battle, there will be no unnecessary losses.
We likewise send a diplomatic message to Ys, on Ulm's eastern border. Although we have no formal peace agreement with them, this might encourage them to snip at Ulm's flanks, further diverting resources from our fight.
Finally, we send a delegate to Phlegra. They had earlier indicated that, since we did not hold the territories we were claiming as our border with them, they would not recognize it. That has since changed. We shall see if they are now more amenable to a firmer border.
Ermor didn't attack and Bandar Log did sort of do what I expected but not what I hoped. We're going to reshuffle a bit and fight in the east. Many sites found on the High Throne but no air (and with Flappy, the Prophet, the High Throne and 2 temples 9 of my 13 spreads are over there right now) and it looks like Tien Ch'i was cold? We should have just kept going another province or two east in the initial scout and might have seen that. Oh well
We'll send Ermor a message and see if they are also content to expand in another direction. If not we will get thunder strike online soon and that's a pretty decent low hp skeleton wiper
We have now scouted our winged neighbors. Their lands are but a fraction of our own. It would be like crushing a hatchling before they learn to fly. We will give them time, so that they know their might will never reach MEGATRON. MEGATRON moves south, as the dead gather on our border in numbers
This army is led by a Wraith Lord.
Wraith Lords are normally a Conjuration 8 spell. They are immortal, d3 casters with full plate and magical weapons. They are very annoying.
This one would be Ermors national Hero, Etimmu. Etimmu can win wars all by themself. They are a priest as well so they can just bless themselves (Ermor will almost always have a hellbless) and be effectively invulnerable to independent troops. With immortality you can just run them into the enemy army every turn and even if they kill him you'll make them use gems or attrition them down. That they have him leading squads and not solo expanding is promising. It means they know not Ettimus true power or are short on commanders.
If you ever play against Ermor remember this. They cannot buy commanders to lead their troops. There is no amount of gold to give a independent commander Undead Leadership. They can hope to find independent priests and put Undead Leadership on their bless, which is janky and inefficient. Or else they have to summon commanders with death gems or rely on RNG mound kings to spawn. We patrolled out a Black Servant (Conjuration summon ghost scout) from Ermor already so we know they are using gems on not troop commanders.
The point of that is, if you have assassins or remote magic attacks (Seeking Arrow, Mind Hunt, Earth Attack, etc) That will hit commanders you can render them useless pretty quickly that way. If there is no undead leadership on the field the whole army dissolves into dust. Their only unit that's not mindless are their sacred Lictors. Which has pros and cons.
We don't have assassins. But we have something better. Free chaff to match theirs and loads of fire and death magic to eradicate them by bunches. Just need to see their bless to use the right spells. Classically Ermor goes with Blood Vengeance as part of their bless to counter priest spam and battlefield wipes. I prefer other options, but I have no idea how Elvenshae will play them.
While I don't want to fight another human player as my first war, 200 troops on my border are certainly a statement. Also Ermor reduces the value of any land they occupy to nothing and it gets harder to root them out over time as they fort every province and freespawn thousands of troops every turn. I'll just have to head towards some battlefield wipes earlier rather than later. Probably Enchantment 6 or Evocation 5. Enchantment 6 gets me Foul Vapors to kill any army of the living easily and Wither Bones which is an AoE guaranteed AN damage vs undead. Evocation 5 gives Earthquake (defense negates damage, skelemans have 7 defense) and Falling Fires (easy to spam with all of my f3 tyrants)
The province they could move into will be forted this turn so I won't lose territory but MEGATRON will still be on hand to check their power. All else fails MEGATRON will take advantage of their construct nature and sit on Oceanias capital and reduce their dominion to nothing so we can take that province for free. (If a player has no more candles they own in any provinces, they are vanquished and all of their forts sit empty and free to take)
In the north we might bump C'tis next turn. Bumping is when 2 players armies both move into the same space that neither of them own. It makes one player fight the independents or province defense first, then if they win that, immediately (not restoring hp) fight a second fight against the other army. It is risky and why most people negotiate borders ahead of times. If you're confident fighting two straight battles like I am with my army, you go for it and it doesn't count as an act of war since it is an accident. Or at least that's what the diplomats will say.
Lord_AsmodeusgoeticSobriquet:Here is your magical cryptic riddle-tumour: I AM A TIME MACHINERegistered Userregular
I'll have time to actually do my turn summaries before next turn starts then
Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. - Lincoln
Pfft just be lazy and only type a paragraph or two and don't crop screenshots! Full 3240x1920 to show a message someone sent!
The forums disallow the big pictures. I've tried
They do? Because not bothering to crop the pictures is exactly what I've done.
Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. - Lincoln
I just post links directly to the steam hosted ones. If you click on view online and then right click -> copy link address you get something that can be posted in an img tag. Upload it as unlisted to let people see but also to not have it show up to friends
You can even edit the screenshot before hitting the upload button and steam will happily host your edited screenshot
(sorry about the delay, had a weird few days. turn later today)
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Lord_AsmodeusgoeticSobriquet:Here is your magical cryptic riddle-tumour: I AM A TIME MACHINERegistered Userregular
So, long delayed, Ys Turn 18
So I fought in Silverham and Clon, and some other Pretenders claimed some Thrones, whatever they are I assume they're not important anyway the FIGHTS
The Battles:
Clon, vs Independents
I need to work on the scripting of the bless so my sacreds actually... get blessed, and I lost my Kurnou cavalry, but in the end even without the bless my Sacred Knights held the field for me
Silverham, vs Phaeacia
On my side, a line of Spearmen holds firm as the Morvarc'h Knights form up behind them, and all are blessed by my Prophet
Phaeacia's Forces are in more of an unwieldy mass, a throng of Colossus Orichalcum Guard and some Gigantes, lead by a Lochos Gigante as their general, they march into war without the blessings of their false deity.
After a moment of dread stillness, the silence is broken as our lines charge towards one another
My blessed Knights once again outpace my spearmen and clash with their Orichalcum clad Colossi, mighty burning steed crashing together with men who stand as tall as a mounted soldier, towering Gigantes anchoring their lines, our Spearmen come in to envelope the enemy.
Our blessings and skill at arms begin to tell against their number, our spearmen add the weight of their spears to the blazing fire of the Morvarc'h's burning breath
Their Lochos falls in battle, and we push through to their last line
Without their leader, and with the last of the Gigantes falling beneath our golden lances, the last of their guard break and flee as they are run down.
So, now moving further into Fall, I send troops to further reinforce my prophet for the planned confrontation in Phaeacia itself, even as they push into the Royal Forest, and our forces in Clon return to our fort in Fas Dir to replenish their number for a push into the woods to the northeast.
Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. - Lincoln
Much has transpired in this past month, which has seemed to alternatively drag and race.
The winged men of Caelum have responded, and for the moment they seem to be content with our proposed borders. I have suggested that we make the agreement more permanent.
We hope that this peace will hold, as the forces of Oceania have elected to cancel our Pact of Peace. This is most unfortunate, as we had hoped to instead allow the tendrils of the Presence to work its way into their lands for some time before the war between us began. As it stands, their primary stronghold, in the lake to our northeast, is only weakly under the grasp of Blassyr.
As for myself, I rode forth with my closest advisors and attacked the Ulmic forces located around the Throne of Dreams. The losses we suffered were extremely heavy ... amongst the auxilia. The losses our Inevitable Legion sustained were far lighter, and in exchange we destroyed nearly the entire Ulmic force, as well as a large number of local defenders stiffened by yet more Ulmic troops. Importantly, after the battle, one of my lieutenants brought me the head of an Ulmic knight. It was, according to Decima Numonius Cacianicus, the remains of the Prophet of Incarnate Steel, a warrior known as "Kallum." We laughed, at great length, when he presented it ... perhaps it is nothing more than just a family name passed down through the ages, but in this, our time of trial, it provided a needed moment of levity.
Now we must take the offensive against Ulm, and drive them back, taking their new fortress in Saetica before it is upgraded to a truly stunning defensive structure. Our reinforcements come from the north, from the Great City itself, but we must move quickly.
OOC Note: Yep, lost a lot of undead, but they show up every turn for free everywhere, so the real cost is just what it takes to move them to the front. And, yeah, their job was to give Ulm's Prophet, who I knew was in the territory because he spent last turn claiming the Throne, something to throw magic at. In exchange for losing a couple turns of free stuff, I killed his Prophet (a legendary hero and expensive in his own right, because he's heavy cav), 4 other knights, 15 heavy infantry-types, and ~10 other troops, and knocked out something like 30-40 points of Province Defense. Province defense starts at 1 for free, and then each additional point costs as many gold as points - so 30 points costs ~460 gold and 40 points costs ~800 gold, so that's a pretty steep loss. If I'm lucky, his retreating troops died when they fled, but I can't count on that. The main cost to me, other than a couple of freespawn turns, is that I had to pull so many casters from my capital and pause my research, which is one of those long-term costly things. Honestly hoped it would've been cheaper, but that's life. Unlife.
Bad news bird friends. What luck we had ran out, kinda. Tien Ch'i's god is right next to the throne and doing fuck all about Bandar Log's territory grabs. We attacked and lost ~3 turns worth of recruitment, plus the initiative penalty of not doing something better. This was sort of overly optimistic on my part TBH, I'd hoped to get an army rout but it just had too much HP with it's dom bonus
There is one piece of good news though, it has zero shock resistance so we can bring in some A2 mages to lightning bolt it to death. The bad news is both of my high seraphs rolled S1 and this is S6 so magic duel is a big worry - 1/36 to tie though! But it's interruptible so maybe my attack rear squad can disrupt it. And my god has S5 and I don't want to risk it at -1. And I only currently have two other A2s available. We are recruiting more though
Caelian logistics get quite complex
We crossed the 2k income barrier, but it's ~4-5 turns later than it ought to have been. Fort #4 is going up now and we have 6 temples, probably putting up another temple each turn from next turn
The giants of Phlegra have seen the path of wisdom, and have agreed to let us bide our time across our shared border. This will allow the first of the reconstructed Ermorian borderforts time to reach completion. Though they can toil endlessly through day and night, the soldiers of the Inevitable Legions are no longer as motivated as they once were, and so proceed no faster in their endeavours than the living.
Our hopes of turning much of the central nations against Ulm have not yet proven fruitful, with both the apemen of Bandar Log and the sea elves of Ys ignoring the opportunity. Both claim to have higher, more pressing needs at the moment. However I believe that diplomacy still has a place here and that Ys has provided the key ...
If the threat of Bandar Log declaring war on Ys might for the moment slacken, and if I were to turn the might of our legions against C'Tis at our earliest opportunity ... a thought that enkindles a burning sun in my veins ... now that I know where they are hiding, then perhaps we might together work to eliminate the steel threat.
We shall see what we shall see.
The lands of Midria are under constant assault from Ulm; this month, they invaded with a reasonably strong force with many priests. Between them, the 6 priests were able to return almost 100 of my Legionnaires to their rest. And though many of my lieutenants were forced to flee the field of battle, I planted my vexilla and stood my ground. More than a dozen Ulmic soldiers met their deaths at my hands, their spirits ripped from their bodies or their minds crushed beneath the powers that the Presence has imbued me with ... In the beforetimes, I was a competent general with a minor grasp of magic, but since my reawakening the Presence has burned new pathways through my mind, unlocking far more power than I knew in life. Perhaps it will be enough to save my people.
When the battle was done, I found myself called to a ridgeline where a lone human on horseback had been slain. His equipment marked him as one of the horse tribesmen, and his tale-belt named him Vanno and a chieftain amongst them. Unlike his brethren, he carried a large, golden crossbow which nigh-exploded any of my soldiers hit by its enchanted darts. Though the man was brave, he was also foolish, for he allowed himself to be surrounded by my scouts. First, they cut the horse from beneath him, and though he leapt to his feet and pulled his spear from its sling, he was quickly pulled apart. His marvelous, dangerous crossbow survived the battle, however, and we have added it to our trophy collection in honor of Vanno's vainglory.
Elsewhere on the battlefield, we found the trampled remains of an enchanted feather. It smelled of dusty tomes and alchemy, and had no place on the battlefield. Perhaps its presence means that the Ulmic warriors are becoming desperate, pushing untrained, unwitting mages into battle. While we can hope, we cannot assume ...
... the costs of failure are far too high.
OOC: So my priests can reanimate undead in their province as their action for a turn. One of the options they get is to animate a rather large number of Soulless. Soulless is Dominion's name for Zombies, which I get for free, everywhere. They look like this:
They have a decent pile of hit points but are otherwise terrible: they're slow, they have no protection so their hit points don't last long anyway, can't hit anything, do only 10 base damage when they miraculously manage a hit, get hit by everything because of crappy defense scores, are using fists so even a shortsword can ward them off ... Romero zombies these ain't.
Anyway, I haven't bothered reanimating any until just this turn because, like, why would I? Imagine my surprise when the Animate Soulless command actually gives these instead:
I mean, don't get me wrong, they still pretty much suck but now they have actual weapons and armor and shit. They're slightly worse Militia - trading Speed and Defense for HP - but they aren't completely useless except as speedbumps, at least!
This update introduces the Grand Communion. It is a new type of ritual communion that can be used to bolster the strength of global enchantments as well as the dispelling of global enchantments. Grand communions can only be used by priest mages of a few select nations, e.g. Pythium and Ur. There are also a lot of bug fixes and some other new features in this update. E.g. it is now possible to view unit details such as magic gems and afflictions by pressing tab in the battle unit overview (F1).
General
Grand Communion (new type of communion for global rituals and dispels)
3 new magic items: The Quintessence Chest and 2 new dragon scale mails
Press Tab to show details in battle unit overview
Press K in F1 screen to show only blood sacrificers
Graphs for other players are no longer set to zero when someone wins a throne victory
Fix for too many global dispel messages
Fix fluctuating HP on shape changers with blood magic
Aurora Borealis can now also be cast during darkness
Spell AI more careful not be berserk casters
Print morale loss from dark skies in stats
Flying commander on stay behind troops could fail to attack in assassinations
Chopped off monster weapon affliction was removed after battle, fixed
More monsters can get chopped off natural weapon affliction
Projection can no longer use blood slaves
Illusions can no longer cast phoenix pyre
Illusions cannot alter their max HP
False damage can now cause HP rout
Hosting performance improvement
Size 8+ units will now become a large type mummy
If arena award is not an artifact, don't remove it from the world first
Disabled items didn't show up on F8 screen
Hidden in snow, etc. can now get more units
Communions used too many gems to reduce fatigue sometimes
Combat spells could not target col/row 0, fixed
No longer possible to de-mercify mercs by casting e.g. twiceborn on them
MR bonus from XP was not show in the detailed stats
Furniture (in assassinations) is now poison resistant
Modding / Map Making
Map editor now asks for confirmation before exiting if there is any unsaved work
New event commands: #req_kelp, #req_gorge, #req_deep
New event commands: #req_forestcave, #req_drip, #req_crystal
New event commands: #inc10var, #dec10var
Event variable can now use value -2 to -4 as well
#maxage now overrides any possible boost from having regen
Posts
Our lands are Heat 2 which has a couple of bonuses. If we can spread our dominion to their lands, it'll literally melt their forts. They can't build forts in heat (they are made of ice) and they lose wall integrity when exposed to heat. Also their troops have no armor to speak of, except for a couple of units. This armor is also worse in heat. And these units cost as many resources as 6 lesser units, but those less armored folks do better for the alpha strikes. I can just have a big blob of free helotes, hide my Gigantes in them and after their alpha strike I'll just grind them all down. Also Curse of Stones makes them very sad. Adds fatigue per distance moved and flying from one side to the other in a single turn is a lot of distance.
Their magic is almost exclusively Air and Water, which means they have no ability to harm Megatron. They have a lot of interesting commanders they could summon, but they have to build their pretender around summoning them. I'm sending in scouts to see if I can spot it. It'll probably be a dom 1 human rainbow (multipath but low in all the paths of magic) Pretender.
But back to Phlegran news. My First Tyrant has hit the field. Sending them out to start the friendly recruitment drive and site search for my important paths. I also received a free commander Pagobar the Hog Knight. They are searching for the mythical Forest of Truffles (a gem site). Not the most impressive stats, but a free commander is a free commmander
... game changer. @Phyphor for Player of the Year.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Ermor turns 10, 11:
... and the living enemies they fight attack them first. Cavalry break their lances against them, and archers riddle them with shots. Then the true Legionnaires arrive and begin their work. We have issued a proclamation to all of our generals, encouraging the use of these Auxilia ...
... as the results speak for themselves.
The Presence within the Rift was, I can put no better word to it than "agitated," for several days. Its usual whispers in the back of my mind were transmuted to a strangled scream. After days of this, it began to rise in pitch and unheard volume until I found myself again in the Great Square, kneeling before the Rift, when suddenly it stopped, and before me an old friend appeared as if from nothing. Scipio Serpentis, the general who led our most successful assaults against Old C'Tis, once against stood before me - but much like myself, he had been changed in the intervening millenium. Without argument, he took up his arms and began calling to his form Legions. We are glad - I am glad - to have him back, as his knowledge will be critical in the days and months to come.
Far to the north, rumors of great men, whose footsteps cause thunder, have proven somewhat true:
The people of Ulm are deluded; they blame us for an apparently random attack against their God, unable to fathom that necromancy is not the sole domain of Ermor. Perhaps we should be happy that they attribute such power to us, but it is necessary for us to focus on other items first and foremost. We must gain at least a short-term peace with Ulm, and so we must find a way to convince them to turn their armies in their steel skins another direction.
Meanwhile, our proposal to Atlantis has been answered.
So now we build. And in the far west, rumors of serpents with the manners of men abound ...
(Apologies to anyone reading this one, in particular, on desktop ...)
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
4 Storm Guards is not ideal, but we have a fully cleared capital now and are up to 550 resources which basically maxes my recruitment points
We have contact
So the double attack turn is out. If they were one turn slower this would matter less but our fort finishes this turn and construction happens after battle resolution. They will see something like "The enemy force appears to consist of a single Seraphine" and barring a scout already being in here they might think snipe that temple and even then it might be snipe that fort. It's entirely possible they think our forces are still largely light infantry and mammoths, and they do kinda chew that up as you can't trample giants, if a scout is here they might have seen me just take the forest this turn and deduce most of my forces are out of position. If the scout saw the fight or my army though then they know my comp is much heavier but we would actually get reported as "archers & storm guards" so they might think the melee is quite small
We have sent a noncommittal "don't go any more east" message. The giants don't really have all that much we're interested in. Earth/death/fire gems aren't great for us aside from the earth. Maybe we can trade for another hammer? They will make their own hammers and quills if they ever find any air. Their mages cost much more to recruit and they don't seem to be magic 2. This might be counteracted by my having spent more on the even more expensive mammoths so they may have lots of gold to spend, but I did eventually break out quite successfully and they don't seem to have a ton of provinces
If there's 30 Gigante Warriors mixed in though and they attack then yeah we're possibly gonna have a bad time if they attack. I'm gonna guess that they have a Tyrant leading the army too as it's too big for a Chieftan unless there's multiple commanders and a smith would be a total waste
Still though we can put up a fight. This is an example of how good my troops are, any attack that doesn't bypass my shield has to deal with 40ish prot. This Storm Guard eventually died - because he rolled def 19 vs attack 27 and rolled only average for prot and didn't get a shield bonus. But even a giant will have some trouble getting through the shield
One with mock friendliness
And one attempt at flattery and deflection of our Divine attention
But both make the same mistake. Daring to tell MEGATRON where they cannot tread and what they cannot do. For this slight, they will fall
MEGATRON agrees to nothing, for if they have not the might to take these unclaimed lands before we arrive, they do not deserve them. They have not yet seen MEGATRONs glory, so they may think they have some semblance of a chance at victory. But there is none for them. Their window has closed, and victory is ours.
This turn we forge arms for our Lord, and they will strike out towards the throne on our Caelum border. Sending a scout to ping the other throne, to see if it suitable for MEGATRON to take as well.
In domestic news, our hogknight has taken up a position patrolling our capitol, keeping peace and looking for spies. With all of these messengers it is likely something has slipped through our borders.
Our first tyrant Starscream is searching a nearby swamp for gem sites.
Research is still slow, but will start to accelerate after MGEATRON rolls out and we can focus on research and not forging.
The mega-rainbow, with the idea that he can search for everything and also craft everything and also cast everything except water. Flappy will craft our hammers and then go search high probability targets. 55 RP is a lot but it's also technically only 27.5 air gems turned into quills so magic sites are worth much more in the long run
The bless is: shock resist 5, blur, reinvigoration 3, hp +3, awareness
So I'm not actually convinced I've seen Phlegra's capital, that might be a very, very early 2nd fort and the province name doesn't follow the convention of being named after the nation, so they could be doing incredibly well. But we now know where we are. We see Oceania to our west and Ys to our east but Ulm sees them opposite so Ermor and Ulm are in the unmapped slice
Our castle finished, castle part #2 is on. We will get a lab in ASAP and start pumping out more ice crafters but money is incredibly tight right now. The double attack is back on and we are starting to free more seraphines for active duty. We should have a 3rd attack force soon
We provide them with some additional information and propose a long term agreement- no war, just a Throne race. In theory this could involve turning on Ys, but in practice unless they turn their coats I don't intend to fight Ys or Atlantis for that matter. Going underwater isn't worth the effort.
Western Plains falls without a single loss. Our wounded commander was too slow to fall in battle! And it was Barbarians, so good revenge. Doven goes down as well to only a single troop lost.
Haunted Woods turns out to be an even split between the two troops types. Bander Log is to our North; rather than risking a fight, we send them a message proposing to team up against Ermor, and move into the Haunted Woods with Kallum.
Ulm 12
Gods begin to awaken. Hrm. Could be a problem if the dead were sleeping.
Haunted Woods falls almost insultingly easily. Bander Log expanded west, so the worries about accidental contact were unfounded.
Titansbreath Peaks falls to our eastern army; the silver mine belongs to Ulm. Beyond it, I can see Ermor and Atlantis- our eastern spy has circled the world.
We lose Queen Forest to a Troll King, and plague breaks out in Titansbreath Peaks just after we take it. What is up with the world hating Ulm?
In High Peaks, the heretics are slaughtered but we have not found their leaders.
Next month, we will be able to begin forging. This month, the armies move to take Range of Shadow and Saetica. In the west, we will have to find a place to fort up against Ermor soon.
In Haunted Woods, we have our first recruitable Nature mages. We'll need to get a mage there to build a lab and begin training them. The army building in Ulm moves into Wesh to guard against the trolls moving in. We'll bring more troops along with a second commander.
The barbarians of Desert of Visions assault Minstra. Not confident in this attack, but we shall see. Our reinforcement army takes a risk and moves on L'iss.
Ulm 13
Caelum provides information, and another Owl Quill.
INCARNATE STEEL RISES AGAIN. Minus a little bit of his magical prowess, but. ALIVE. This time we will recruit dedicated very angry bodyguards for him.
Range of Shadow falls easily.
Saetica falls easily...to Ermor. Apparently our plan to bypass the obvious province and move forward to capture territory ahead of the dead was only partially successful. Ermor crashed into the independents and killed them. Then our army arrives..
Don't fuck with Ulm, children. Even if you are creepy dead children. One of their commanders escaped, along with a few ghouls. The rest were put down with relatively minor losses on our side. In a stroke of good luck, most of their missile fire was directed against the shield wall, letting the two-handed infantry close and smash up their main force. Still, Ermor should be assumed to have tides of dead; I cannot risk this being their main field army. On the other hand, this army did contain their Prophet.
Who is apparently named Headless? Guess the penchant for flowery bullshit only applies to their diplomatic corespondents.
Indeed it isn't- another Ermor army has moved into Pzucz. I expect that army to hold while Ermor attempts to curl around the South, but we shall see. For now, the main army holds position and begins building fortifications in Saetica, along with a Temple to ward away the unholy dominion. Kallum's army moves into L'iss. As long as Bandar Logs holds true, Ermor will find it difficult to get to our eastern flank.
L'iss falls; the risk there was worth it. Ministra beats the barbarians back. Turns out a big sword doesn't do too much against heavy cav.
This also puts our first and probably main fort just two provinces away from the dark heart of Ermor. And Saetica finally provides Scouts, so Ermor will be very well viewed.
And now that Incarnate Steel lives again, we have SO MANY spare priests to go to the front and ward against other faiths, or use their calling to smite the undead directly.
Luck smiles! We find some nature gems.
And spits out a curse- Misfortune 3 in Wesh.
This is getting very, very silly.
No troll attack this turn, so the forming army moves to Desert of Visions. We will want to expand west as as can. The sooner we cut off Ermor from that side, the better.
(may add screenshots later; been a day)
Anyway, vast successes on attacks. Virtually no losses. Eventually we will have to get these injured mammoths killed off, they're actively useless now. We are pumping out 15ish storm guards a turn which can take a weak province by itself
The throne is quite well defended
And yeah we were mistaken as to the exact origin of Phlegra, they are doing quite well
We are preparing to build a fort on the border of the Deadlands to contain them, and to give us a point to sally from against Oceania. The birds shall wait, the gem income from killing Ermor and potentially getting Oceanias capital as well is too tempting
Ermor turns 12, 13:
But to my east, I have encountered the ape men of Bandar Log; I believe that they might prove useful against the Ulmish threat, as Ulm is very much a powerful threat right now. Their mundane forces are plentiful and powerful, though with time they will prove week to magical forces, time is not something we can guarantee we have.
To the north, Phlegra has disagreed with my proposed line:
He is a fool ... the point of setting a line between two peoples is to ensure that they do not spend their forces uselessly against each other, rather coming to an agreement before the bloodshed. But still, if he requires that I take some territory first, then I shall do so. And, in the meantime, I make the calculated decision to propose peace to Oceania - I cannot afford them attacking me, as well.
OOC: I'm in a really bad spot, having messed up my initial expansion and now running into several players who will almost certainly jump on me. I got lucky in that my Prophet escaped combat, but there is otherwise not much I can do at this point to defend myself against Ulm ... I have hordes of chaff to tie their infantry up forever, but my ability to actually kill them is nonexistent ... The magical research I need for that hasn't come online yet.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Ermor turn 14:
Our forces have engaged and routed a probing force from the apes of Bandar Log. Although we sent a message offering to allow them to stay to the east of Wic Forest, they nonetheless attempted to move northwest into the forests of Wolvermory. The battle was a complete rout, as, after engaging the land's native soldiers, the apes began to celebrate, thinking themselves safe. Our commander came upon them and mistook them for the land's normal defenders. In their drunken confusion, the apes abandoned their commander - their Prophet, Carasura, a large ape of dark coloration wearing great gilded armor and a mighty sword - and our cavalry rode through his camp and trampled him into the ground. The Bandar Log had mustered a strong force of pale apes upon tiger mounts, but upon the death of their commander they turned tail and fled, and were dispersed by our advancing legionnaires. We must issue an apology to the Bandar Log apes, even though this loss was their own fault, and hope that they will continue to focus upon the Ulmic threat.
The small number of Bandar Log infantry advancing, leaving their Prophet behind, guarded by a single archer. The tiger cavalry waits for their Prophet to bless them before they ride to join the battle. Meanwhile, the undead knights sally forth and pass beyond the meager line of infantry.
The Bandar Log tiger riders charge forward, and now their commander is almost completely alone.
The undead cavalry sweep in, with predictable results.
A far northern territory near Phlegra that has fallen under the sway of the Presence. and it hums on some nights with a different pitch. It grants me visions of winged men, fighting with spears and bow and covered all over in armor of purest ice. The Sylphs of Caelum have come within our reach, now. I anticipate reaching out to them shortly, as they might serve well as a raiding force against Phlegra.
With Ulm apparently content to remain where it is, we have ordered several of our lesser, still-living priests to investigate the area surrounding the Thrones nearest our great City. To the west, we know that the Throne of Winter sits, but we do not yet know which the others are. It is time to correct that oversight, as well as determine what forces are truly guarding them. This has taken greater urgency, as a great tremor rippled through the very fabric of our reality, causing the Rift to swirl and sweep. Megatron, the so-called Pretender of Phlegra, has claimed one of the Thrones - or, at least, it was claimed in his name:
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
We have found more of our future subjects. Oceanias cap is in sight, as well as Ctis. Ctis turns the world into swamps and causes disease. It's very annoying. Ermor is annoying as well, but I am certain their neighbors will take care of it for me. I'll build up forces in that fort down there, but probably going to keep expanding west until I meet up with Caelum from the other side. Free real estate is best to grab before needing to fight players. As much as I want to just march MEGATRON onto Caelums cap...
And so our forces move west, while MEGATRON site searches the throne he just conquered, hoping for some good gems sites in the many paths he can search.
Despite them constantly disappointing me when sitesearching my first Gigante Tyrant is about to be prophetized. Starscream will serve us well. Maybe. The main reason to prophetize him is cost and durability. Prophets have zero upkeep. And a Gigante tyrant won't fall to assassins or remote spells.
It may only seem like 30 gold a turn, but it adds up.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
A mage priest is being sent down to our border with Ermor. Need to make sure to put temples up to keep their toxic dominion out.
Our forces move further west, our faithful lancecatchers taking many a blow to ensure Gigante lives are spared.
There was one major failure attacking the longdead horsemen, they rolled distressingly well and we weren't in cold so prot was low, we didn't get shield bonuses and we lost a pile of good troops. But not the seraphine. But the other attacks worked with minimal losses aside from a handful of archers. We are probably significantly smaller than Bandar Log or Phlegra (who seem to both be heat scales irritatingly), but research is going well. Ulm & Ermor are fighting. Ys is probably off eating the juicy pile of AIs they are next to. Caelum is very... seasonal so getting a winter offensive prepared is probably a good strategy to fight extra effectively outside our dominion
Ulm's 2nd hero & Bandar Log's hero prophet died though. Phlegra declares a new prophet, but that could be an intentional killing. Our prophet is now the highest living hero!
Ermor's dominion is encroaching and we need to fight Bandar Log & Phlegra's heat (I suppose some of it could be the summer though?), so we are building temples now and will put a 2nd fort down in the forest south of the throne. A 3rd fort will go up on the eastern throne, we are going to beat up on the AI for some easy gains. Flappy is searching with some bodyguards, the High Seraph comes online next turn as does conj 4. We are going to grab thau 4 for auspex too. Research is 150/turn, the plan is to get up to 400 without Flappy by end of year between the 2nd fort and quills and spare capital recruits
We continue to get good events without luck scales! More gold and gems, we can basically get a 3rd hammer if we want it. Eventually Flappy will end up at another fort with a lab and can craft it then
But not yet. A fort is under construction still, and we will wait. In the meantime Kallum moves to join the main army, conquering as he goes. We consider sending a response, and decide silence is the best answer for now. Ermor will know our response when our troops march onwards.
Wesh proves unlucky again, as huge hailstorms ravage the land. Costing us men and precious gold. (seriously this is getting stupid)
In the newly conqured lands, we find mages better than those of the Haunted Woods. In addition to being Nature mages, they can sometimes know another path. They aren't as stealthy as the druids, so we'll likely train druids as well eventually. And both provide a foraging bonus to our armies- extremely useful moving through lands Ermor has ruined.
This is doubly true since Incarnate Steel's loss of magic means he can no longer forge the best methods for increasing food.
Ulm 15
The first hero of Ulm, Kalloman, gives his life scouting the Throne ahead of our building fortress. The defenses are weak and should fall to the army easily enough- but for four Wizards on the field.
We now begin considering: those Gods that awoke. Some of them will be Men leading Men to the faith, like Incarnate Steel. Some, however...especially the god of Ermor...may be monsters. It would be well to have something to kill monsters.
The first part of that plan begins recruitment in the capitol. A Lord Guardian and a group of Guardians for him to lead. The attacks of the Guardians are perilous to the unfaithful, and just as important their weapons brush aside armor with impunity.
Incarnate Steel himself makes Dwarven hammers, the better to speed Part Two of that plan- Black Knights with Blades of Sharpness and magical protection. While a large monster could destroy any given knight, a group of them would hurt it sorely indeed.
I do not know where the Ermor army that was in Pzucz went, which is..vexing.
Ultima Typhia is struck with plague, which is...more vexing.
We received a message from Ermor it takes me a couple turns to respond to, warning us about Ulm ironically, it takes me a couple of turns to send my non-committal response. Meanwhile the AI in Phaecia launches a failed invasion of my province Hynaphe
Battle
I crush the independents of Norville, then begin to head for where Phaeacia's forces are gathering on my border. I also send my Morgen Princess with what forces I have in my capital to Fas Dir to reinforce and then begin taking more Independents. Bandar Log continues their expansion near my territory which I am unhappy about but won't be doing much to stop at this stage. I have also begun to build a temple, and later a lab, in Fas Dir to begin local recruitment. I think I need a second Fort on my shoreline. I have also noticed my dominion shrinking, will need to start having priests spread it.
Ermor, turn 15:
Ulm and I both had the same idea and commander pinged the throne to my south.
Only wrinkle is that his commander was crippled and died when it got run down by heavy cav, and mine saved his skin by sacrificing a handful of worthless zombies to distract them as he made his escape.
My other ping on the northern throne confirmed that it’s basically undefended, and has been the whole time. The scouting report indicated it was defended by just a handful of heavy infantry and heavy cav. I thought it was likely to be more heavily defended, which would make it a candidate for the Throne of Dreams - which, being associated with Glamour, meant that it had a bunch of invisible / hidden enemies hanging out. Nope! It’s actually just that weakly protected. We move on it this turn.
Oceania has accepted my NAP, which is bad - it delays any attacks I’d make on them - but also awesome - because I can focus on the real dangers. Also, their home province is down to 3 candles, so there’s a decent chance they get Dom killed and then I move in for free, since all of my troops are amphibious, Pirates of the Caribbean-style.
Bandar Log has at least for the moment accepted my apology for accidentally killing his Prophet. I’ve followed up with an NAP offer and moved my nearby troops away to prove I have no bad intentions (and also to invade that Throne I mentioned earlier). Hopefully, he’ll join in containing Ulm who is spreading far and fast.
No responses yet from Ys. And Caleum is definitely bumping up against Phlegra. Between us, we’re going to make his lands really, really cold, as I dumped my heat scales to -2 Cold and Caelum likes the cold, as well, and is probably at -1 (default), -2 (easily handleable, like winter for normal nations, so basically free points) or -3 (a little harder for Caleum natives to to handle, but way worse for everyone else - except me). Need to check on Phlegra’s preferred Heat scale - hope it’s +1 Hot …
For some reason, it looks like Atlantis is staying in their lake - if I can swing around the west side of it, I can do something interesting since the AI seems loathe to break NAPs. Also, on the other side of the lake is Phaecia, another AI.
Please Ulm don’t invade. Please Ulm don’t invade. Please Ulm don’t invade.
Edit: Oh! I totally forgot. I was ferrying troops around, so hadn’t scripted their combat stuff. In a random event, a whole pile of Troglodytes burst out of the ground and took over the territory. Lost ~100 troops, admittedly most of them the cheap stuff but still, what the hell, Trogs?!?
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Megatron the Bronze Colossus is on our border and I don't even know how we are going to fight that. I need to observe a combat so I can view it's equipment, bless & script. It's absurd, resistant to all forms of melee attack, resistant 15 to all elements and 25 natural prot, mindless and a pile of HP. If he took astral for some reason I can magic duel him but that's unlikely. It has air so it can get shock 20 easily so lightning bolt is useless. Thunder Strike would be okay maybe except for the inaccuracy
If Flappy had water then Acid Bolt could do something. Star Fires would work, slowly. Shadow Bolt looks promising, I'm not sure it can be paralyzed but 8 AN magic damage MR half does something at least. Nether Bolt is also interesting A1D1 when I have A5D3 so that's 26 AP damage (both paths add right?) Fatigue would not be a thing either, I can cast that pretty much forever. We will be getting evo 3 next turn and evo 4 2 turns after that
Weapons wise, a greatsword of sharpness plus some buffs could do some work. At con 5 there's some more options but we'll see if we get there first
Bandar Log is also on our borders but isn't attacking yet. They seem to be using small armies of a few melee, some archers and tigers to clear independents. We're going to see if we can snipe them, though I suspect they will take a different province instead. I'd go there instead but it's heat 1 sadly
And Ermor is sending an army of longdead our way. Only "140" units, we'll see exact comp if they attack. No riders showed up in the report though which is good news
There is a very interesting trap that could happen next turn, I'm emptying out my province with a lone temple and I could maybe get Ermor to fight Phlegra's god if they both attack. I'm probably just going to stack up though to fight Ermor if they advance
Ermor, turns 16-18:
They struck at 3 separate locations, hoping no doubt to drive us quickly backwards. They send only a minor force into the plains of Pzucz, where admittedly we, too, had only minor forces present. What we had proved to be enough, however, as the human soldiers defending their homeland against Ulm persevered through the destruction of their undead supports and slaughtered the priests of Ulm where they stood:
A ghoul, on fire, pulls itself into melee range of the invaders of Pzucz.
The last standing priest of Ulm's patron, Incarnate Steel, dies, abandoned to his fate by his soldiers.
Our worst performance was in the Summerlands, a location we had left lightly defended. There, a relatively powerful Ulmic force attacked, and the humans defending their homes were overmatched. Only 3 so-called knights came when called, and they charged ineffectually into the Ulmic lines:
Our greatest success, however, was in the land of Temiglia, where the main might of the Ulmic attack came, and where it was rebuffed with minimal losses, except amongst the auxilia. While their losses are regrettable, they are far less critical to our plans than the forces returned from the Inevitable Legions, and so should be sacrificed first as necessary to achieve victory for Ermor.
The battlelines meet.
The lictors meet their opposite, the Ulmic black plate infantry, and crush them.
Many of the troops brought by Ulm were wounded and starving from spending time within the Demesne of the Presence.
The Inevitable Legion chasing down the fleeing men of Ulm.
The bucher's bill.
So now we must counterattack and drive the forces of Ulm from the lands we call our own. If we are lucky, we shall not do so alone, however. I find that, in order to increase the odds of our success, I must take the field personally. And so, after I pen these last few messages, I will ride to Midria with my closest lieutenants and oversee our efforts to drive Ulm back, recapture the land they took, and claim the Throne of Dreams for ourselves.
We have sent a missive to Bandar Log, requesting that they aid us in overthrowing Ulm's might. While, on an individual basis, their troops might not stand up to Ulmic steel, I hope that between numbers and because Ulm will be forced to split their attention, that they can do serious damage to the Ulmic economy. Furthermore, our nonagression pact with the apemen ensures that, should we accidentally run into them in the confusion of battle, there will be no unnecessary losses.
We likewise send a diplomatic message to Ys, on Ulm's eastern border. Although we have no formal peace agreement with them, this might encourage them to snip at Ulm's flanks, further diverting resources from our fight.
Finally, we send a delegate to Phlegra. They had earlier indicated that, since we did not hold the territories we were claiming as our border with them, they would not recognize it. That has since changed. We shall see if they are now more amenable to a firmer border.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Ermor didn't attack and Bandar Log did sort of do what I expected but not what I hoped. We're going to reshuffle a bit and fight in the east. Many sites found on the High Throne but no air (and with Flappy, the Prophet, the High Throne and 2 temples 9 of my 13 spreads are over there right now) and it looks like Tien Ch'i was cold? We should have just kept going another province or two east in the initial scout and might have seen that. Oh well
We'll send Ermor a message and see if they are also content to expand in another direction. If not we will get thunder strike online soon and that's a pretty decent low hp skeleton wiper
This army is led by a Wraith Lord.
Wraith Lords are normally a Conjuration 8 spell. They are immortal, d3 casters with full plate and magical weapons. They are very annoying.
This one would be Ermors national Hero, Etimmu. Etimmu can win wars all by themself. They are a priest as well so they can just bless themselves (Ermor will almost always have a hellbless) and be effectively invulnerable to independent troops. With immortality you can just run them into the enemy army every turn and even if they kill him you'll make them use gems or attrition them down. That they have him leading squads and not solo expanding is promising. It means they know not Ettimus true power or are short on commanders.
If you ever play against Ermor remember this. They cannot buy commanders to lead their troops. There is no amount of gold to give a independent commander Undead Leadership. They can hope to find independent priests and put Undead Leadership on their bless, which is janky and inefficient. Or else they have to summon commanders with death gems or rely on RNG mound kings to spawn. We patrolled out a Black Servant (Conjuration summon ghost scout) from Ermor already so we know they are using gems on not troop commanders.
The point of that is, if you have assassins or remote magic attacks (Seeking Arrow, Mind Hunt, Earth Attack, etc) That will hit commanders you can render them useless pretty quickly that way. If there is no undead leadership on the field the whole army dissolves into dust. Their only unit that's not mindless are their sacred Lictors. Which has pros and cons.
We don't have assassins. But we have something better. Free chaff to match theirs and loads of fire and death magic to eradicate them by bunches. Just need to see their bless to use the right spells. Classically Ermor goes with Blood Vengeance as part of their bless to counter priest spam and battlefield wipes. I prefer other options, but I have no idea how Elvenshae will play them.
While I don't want to fight another human player as my first war, 200 troops on my border are certainly a statement. Also Ermor reduces the value of any land they occupy to nothing and it gets harder to root them out over time as they fort every province and freespawn thousands of troops every turn. I'll just have to head towards some battlefield wipes earlier rather than later. Probably Enchantment 6 or Evocation 5. Enchantment 6 gets me Foul Vapors to kill any army of the living easily and Wither Bones which is an AoE guaranteed AN damage vs undead. Evocation 5 gives Earthquake (defense negates damage, skelemans have 7 defense) and Falling Fires (easy to spam with all of my f3 tyrants)
The province they could move into will be forted this turn so I won't lose territory but MEGATRON will still be on hand to check their power. All else fails MEGATRON will take advantage of their construct nature and sit on Oceanias capital and reduce their dominion to nothing so we can take that province for free. (If a player has no more candles they own in any provinces, they are vanquished and all of their forts sit empty and free to take)
In the north we might bump C'tis next turn. Bumping is when 2 players armies both move into the same space that neither of them own. It makes one player fight the independents or province defense first, then if they win that, immediately (not restoring hp) fight a second fight against the other army. It is risky and why most people negotiate borders ahead of times. If you're confident fighting two straight battles like I am with my army, you go for it and it doesn't count as an act of war since it is an accident. Or at least that's what the diplomats will say.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
The forums disallow the big pictures. I've tried
They do? Because not bothering to crop the pictures is exactly what I've done.
You can even edit the screenshot before hitting the upload button and steam will happily host your edited screenshot
The Battles:
Clon, vs Independents
Phaeacia's Forces are in more of an unwieldy mass, a throng of Colossus Orichalcum Guard and some Gigantes, lead by a Lochos Gigante as their general, they march into war without the blessings of their false deity.
After a moment of dread stillness, the silence is broken as our lines charge towards one another
My blessed Knights once again outpace my spearmen and clash with their Orichalcum clad Colossi, mighty burning steed crashing together with men who stand as tall as a mounted soldier, towering Gigantes anchoring their lines, our Spearmen come in to envelope the enemy.
Our blessings and skill at arms begin to tell against their number, our spearmen add the weight of their spears to the blazing fire of the Morvarc'h's burning breath
Their Lochos falls in battle, and we push through to their last line
Without their leader, and with the last of the Gigantes falling beneath our golden lances, the last of their guard break and flee as they are run down.
Ermor, turn 19:
The winged men of Caelum have responded, and for the moment they seem to be content with our proposed borders. I have suggested that we make the agreement more permanent.
We hope that this peace will hold, as the forces of Oceania have elected to cancel our Pact of Peace. This is most unfortunate, as we had hoped to instead allow the tendrils of the Presence to work its way into their lands for some time before the war between us began. As it stands, their primary stronghold, in the lake to our northeast, is only weakly under the grasp of Blassyr.
As for myself, I rode forth with my closest advisors and attacked the Ulmic forces located around the Throne of Dreams. The losses we suffered were extremely heavy ... amongst the auxilia. The losses our Inevitable Legion sustained were far lighter, and in exchange we destroyed nearly the entire Ulmic force, as well as a large number of local defenders stiffened by yet more Ulmic troops. Importantly, after the battle, one of my lieutenants brought me the head of an Ulmic knight. It was, according to Decima Numonius Cacianicus, the remains of the Prophet of Incarnate Steel, a warrior known as "Kallum." We laughed, at great length, when he presented it ... perhaps it is nothing more than just a family name passed down through the ages, but in this, our time of trial, it provided a needed moment of levity.
Now we must take the offensive against Ulm, and drive them back, taking their new fortress in Saetica before it is upgraded to a truly stunning defensive structure. Our reinforcements come from the north, from the Great City itself, but we must move quickly.
OOC Note: Yep, lost a lot of undead, but they show up every turn for free everywhere, so the real cost is just what it takes to move them to the front. And, yeah, their job was to give Ulm's Prophet, who I knew was in the territory because he spent last turn claiming the Throne, something to throw magic at. In exchange for losing a couple turns of free stuff, I killed his Prophet (a legendary hero and expensive in his own right, because he's heavy cav), 4 other knights, 15 heavy infantry-types, and ~10 other troops, and knocked out something like 30-40 points of Province Defense. Province defense starts at 1 for free, and then each additional point costs as many gold as points - so 30 points costs ~460 gold and 40 points costs ~800 gold, so that's a pretty steep loss. If I'm lucky, his retreating troops died when they fled, but I can't count on that. The main cost to me, other than a couple of freespawn turns, is that I had to pull so many casters from my capital and pause my research, which is one of those long-term costly things. Honestly hoped it would've been cheaper, but that's life. Unlife.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
There is one piece of good news though, it has zero shock resistance so we can bring in some A2 mages to lightning bolt it to death. The bad news is both of my high seraphs rolled S1 and this is S6 so magic duel is a big worry - 1/36 to tie though! But it's interruptible so maybe my attack rear squad can disrupt it. And my god has S5 and I don't want to risk it at -1. And I only currently have two other A2s available. We are recruiting more though
Caelian logistics get quite complex
We crossed the 2k income barrier, but it's ~4-5 turns later than it ought to have been. Fort #4 is going up now and we have 6 temples, probably putting up another temple each turn from next turn
I can't figure out what I'm supposed to be doing with them.
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
Ermor, turn 20:
Our hopes of turning much of the central nations against Ulm have not yet proven fruitful, with both the apemen of Bandar Log and the sea elves of Ys ignoring the opportunity. Both claim to have higher, more pressing needs at the moment. However I believe that diplomacy still has a place here and that Ys has provided the key ...
If the threat of Bandar Log declaring war on Ys might for the moment slacken, and if I were to turn the might of our legions against C'Tis at our earliest opportunity ... a thought that enkindles a burning sun in my veins ... now that I know where they are hiding, then perhaps we might together work to eliminate the steel threat.
We shall see what we shall see.
The lands of Midria are under constant assault from Ulm; this month, they invaded with a reasonably strong force with many priests. Between them, the 6 priests were able to return almost 100 of my Legionnaires to their rest. And though many of my lieutenants were forced to flee the field of battle, I planted my vexilla and stood my ground. More than a dozen Ulmic soldiers met their deaths at my hands, their spirits ripped from their bodies or their minds crushed beneath the powers that the Presence has imbued me with ... In the beforetimes, I was a competent general with a minor grasp of magic, but since my reawakening the Presence has burned new pathways through my mind, unlocking far more power than I knew in life. Perhaps it will be enough to save my people.
When the battle was done, I found myself called to a ridgeline where a lone human on horseback had been slain. His equipment marked him as one of the horse tribesmen, and his tale-belt named him Vanno and a chieftain amongst them. Unlike his brethren, he carried a large, golden crossbow which nigh-exploded any of my soldiers hit by its enchanted darts. Though the man was brave, he was also foolish, for he allowed himself to be surrounded by my scouts. First, they cut the horse from beneath him, and though he leapt to his feet and pulled his spear from its sling, he was quickly pulled apart. His marvelous, dangerous crossbow survived the battle, however, and we have added it to our trophy collection in honor of Vanno's vainglory.
Elsewhere on the battlefield, we found the trampled remains of an enchanted feather. It smelled of dusty tomes and alchemy, and had no place on the battlefield. Perhaps its presence means that the Ulmic warriors are becoming desperate, pushing untrained, unwitting mages into battle. While we can hope, we cannot assume ...
... the costs of failure are far too high.
OOC: So my priests can reanimate undead in their province as their action for a turn. One of the options they get is to animate a rather large number of Soulless. Soulless is Dominion's name for Zombies, which I get for free, everywhere. They look like this:
They have a decent pile of hit points but are otherwise terrible: they're slow, they have no protection so their hit points don't last long anyway, can't hit anything, do only 10 base damage when they miraculously manage a hit, get hit by everything because of crappy defense scores, are using fists so even a shortsword can ward them off ... Romero zombies these ain't.
Anyway, I haven't bothered reanimating any until just this turn because, like, why would I? Imagine my surprise when the Animate Soulless command actually gives these instead:
I mean, don't get me wrong, they still pretty much suck but now they have actual weapons and armor and shit. They're slightly worse Militia - trading Speed and Defense for HP - but they aren't completely useless except as speedbumps, at least!
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]
This update introduces the Grand Communion. It is a new type of ritual communion that can be used to bolster the strength of global enchantments as well as the dispelling of global enchantments. Grand communions can only be used by priest mages of a few select nations, e.g. Pythium and Ur. There are also a lot of bug fixes and some other new features in this update. E.g. it is now possible to view unit details such as magic gems and afflictions by pressing tab in the battle unit overview (F1).
Modding / Map Making
Steam: Elvenshae // PSN: Elvenshae // WotC: Elvenshae
Wilds of Aladrion: [https://forums.penny-arcade.com/discussion/comment/43159014/#Comment_43159014]Ellandryn[/url]