Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Phew, turn submitted.

Sorry I've taken so extraordinarily long to do each of the last three turns. I should be able to get pretty much back to normal now. Plus, doing this turn has got me enthusiastic again! Exciting wars are to come.

That last turn was pretty dramatic in fact. A great victory for the lizards in the north, and a terrible defeat in the south. Can the lizards halt the advancing Tomb King hordes in the south? What tricks have the ogres still got up their sleeves? Only time will tell.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

I was rather astonished by just how dramatic that victory in the north was. I'd been fighting the ogres to a stalemate all this time, and suddenly they were almost completely wiped out with what appears to be almost no casualties. As of last turn I believe I could have defeated that ogre army... but not with such ease. What horrific armies rampage through the north that such a mighty foe was so heavily damaged?

As for the south, such losses will continue to plague the lizardmen for many months to come. For the folly of waging war against nehekara lizards shall die in numbers beyond comprehension! We are the masters of death, and death is what you shall get from us.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Err, it would be best of me not to mix up ooc and ic comments into the same post, I should think. In any case, I am happy as well, that battle took two turns in maneuvering to make and finally I got the battle I was looking for. If only I could have gotten a few of your mages as well. I was a bit disturbed by how easily my immortals were banished on that first turn. In light of this I am very happy with the bless I chose, frustrating as it is that it makes my own priestly spells so much less useful. In spite of my success though I suspect that the next turn or so will go rather more poorly for me. Certainly you will not make the mistake of weakening your own armor for my buried this time around :)

I do wonder a bit about the sacred lizards though. They seem to me to be worth a bit more than their cost, when compared against ogres. Basing this solely on stats, rather than anecdotal evidence of any sort, temple guards seem to be reasonably equivalent to the weaker ogres without a bless, cost less, and require far fewer resources. With a bless, which I find very hard to see Itza not taking, they're definitely superior and being recruit-everywhere I think is very powerful for them. I haven't actually fought it out to see how it goes, but any impressions on this? That said it doesn't feel so far from my end as though llama's armies are that excessively strong, but I have a number of mitigating factors working for me and I don't think I've faced quite the worst of the magic itza has to offer me just yet. Whereas he pretty much has faced mine.

Please ignore if I'm talking strangely, I just spent ~12 hours with my nose buried in a book and I tend to be somewhat spongelike about speech. Plus I lack sleep.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Ouch!!

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Sorry about the VERY slow turn-taking by the way rdonj. You've been very patient.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

I'm still looking at the balancing of lizards and indeed ogres. The Temple Guard should perhaps be cap only also - though in the case of lizards since building a fort is pretty tough, things being cap only isn't so bad.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

You're only saying that because I took out 3 slann this turn :D Unfortunately I still don't have a lot I can do to stop that most frustrating god of yours. I have a thought on how to get around this but it will take me a few turns at least. So beware! Bewaaaare! I really wish now that I'd paid more attention to your cyclops' strat move, I've never used a cyclops pretender and I wouldn't have thought he'd be able to move quite that far. I'm pretty much down to just immortals now, who have fought in only a few battles as of yet. I must also bear in mind that apparently my own god will choose to use 3 astral pearls every time he uses magic duel so that he can cast returning as intended. Although I suppose it worked out in that particular battle to be for the best that he did not.

In any case, the advancing tomb king hordes were pretty handily defeated in a mere two turns by The Old One, and once again I am on the defensive. I'm not quite sure I'll be able to turn the tide around this time, the lizardmen seem to have almost unending numbers to call upon while my own would be dwindling even without that accursed cyclops. Though I am certain there are fewer temple guards living today than there were when the lizards declared war on me.

As for turns, I am probably underthinking mine a bit. I get them in fast, but then I make two or three corrections almost every time. That last turn was probably a pretty good example of where I should have put more thought into it. Perhaps you are taking just a bit long with yours though ;)

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Taking out 3 slann is pretty painful! Do you know how much they cost?! Also the threat of your fountain effectively prevents me from using them in future, limiting my battle magic quite horribly. Hmm, it's going to be a pretty hard battle! Definitely proving an exciting game.

Incidentally you've wiped out all my main armies, so it's interesting that I seem to have unending hordes. You appear to have unending hordes! However, I do have a considerable advantage in cash, so I suppose maybe time is on my side.

While we're on the subject of time, I'm actually just about to go to a conference in Boston (my first time in the US!). I'll be back next Sunday. Sorry for yet another delay. I've done the current turn though, so if you take yours Sombre, we can get at least one turn further on.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Oh yes, that is exactly why I had to do it, even though I was certain I would lose the battle :) 2,150 gold of dead slann, ah yes.... You can still use your slann for research though, I'm falling pretty far behind there having to use almost all of my mages to hold you out.

Well, you seem to have unending hordes probably because of your rather enormous skink army. Your losses from the horrible defeat in my lands were replaced in one turn, and I pretty much inflicted the same amount of damage here. So perhaps you are down mostly to skinks now but they are pretty overwhelming in number. Time does seem definitely on your side, I suspect that if sombre is defeated I am soon to follow. I just don't have the armies to hold all of my territory on all sides. Unless I get lucky and kill off your god soon :P

Wow, you are one busy llama!

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Holy temple guards, batman! Something gives me the feeling that the next turn is either going to be a major tomb kings victory or a near death experience.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Wow, another very dramatic battle. The fields of Barra must be soaked in lizard blood and littered with bones and the charred remains of ancient mummies.

Thank goodness, my gambit with the smashers paid off. I had no idea if it would work, but it seemed to go quite smoothly. It's a shame both my sleepers had to die along with their items, but I think it was a very worthwhile sacrifice. I'm glad I noticed that the fountain had the lifeless tag.

Apart from that it was a complete debacle at the lizard end. Your wailing winds and other magic, combined with your endless hordes of Immortals which make any casualties I inflict irrelevant are making things pretty tricky for me. My quality sacreds are effectively just chaff. On the other hand, I expect you _really_ regret casting that Firestorm. Fog Warriors, combined with an accidental Luck on all my mages, really saved me from the worst of it.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Hmm. Well, that certainly didn't go as well as I had hoped. I was really hoping you'd be considerate enough to throw everything you had at me there, including those wolves sitting in skavenblight. And as a slightly annoying side effect of my wailing winds I failed to kill pretty much any of your skink horde. I also really was not expecting my god to die on the first turn of combat! Blech. If I had not insisted on throwing out that one magic duel before the intended returning the smasher gambit would have failed completely and my god would be ready to go in for another run at your slann next turn. And my god dueled a skink. That hurts, that really hurts.

As to the fire storm, I was really hoping fire fend would help more than it did. I've never had occasion to use it before, but my fear was more along the lines that most of my commanders wouldn't get the fire fend rather than it just completely failing to save them. I figured with immortal sacreds to use as chaff and fire fend on my commanders I would be pretty much safe... not so, it would seem. I certainly wouldn't regret it nearly as much if it had destroyed your enormous skink communion. On the other hand, only one of my tomb kings died, and I have a number of sorcerers that I kept out of the battle, so while losing 17 commanders certainly hurt it isn't nearly the "near death experience" I was contemplating earlier.

I would never have done the fire storm if I was really expecting to win this game... I'm pretty well convinced that I'll never be able to actually kill you, as anything I send at you that isn't immortal is guaranteed to die if it meets your god. Although if you noticed, his intended assassins were in that battle :) And my immortals are taking up a huge amount of upkeep, so I really don't have a lot of flexibility in what I can do to attack you. Either I can kill my immortals off in your dominion, or I have to somehow get candles in every province I attack. But I am too poor to build much of anything due to immortal upkeep and the cost of recruiting a tomb king each turn. I also have yet to get a single 2 astral tomb king, somehow, to turn into a teleporting thug.

And of course, you're starting to counter my magic now with your endless bag of tricks....

Edit: Something very strange has happened. One of my experienced tomb kings in my capital has entered old age, and for some reason he has gained the #immortal tag. He also is listed as crippled, where my scripting for him implies he used to have air magic, but currently does not. Any idea how this could have happened...?

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

It's not one of your capital Tomb Kings, it's the one you said died. When a Tomb King gets very badly hurt in battle (i.e. reach 0hp and would otherwise die) they become weaker (magicbonus -1), get the old age tag, and change to appear skeletal rather than brown. This represents a big release of magic to save them. However, from then on they are immortal.

I believe that in that battle a couple of other TKs got hurt enough to go skeletal. One apparently then got destroyed again, and so his immortality returned him to the capital. He won't stay crippled for long.

I'm surprised you hadn't come across that before, but it's good news for you, because you've got immortal mage-thugs to go along with your immortal armies.

Oh, by the way, I *did* throw in everything I had. I basically have no other troops, apart from a posse of skinks sieging the Ogre Kingdom. I didn't send in the wolves because I think they'd do more harm than good, since I don't think their cold aura will affect you, and it'll knock out my lizards fast. I get them from a magic site you see, it's not that I'm choosing to summon them.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Ahh, so that's why. I've never used tomb kings as thugs in battles before and I almost never lose them when they're mages. And I've never actually lost any inside of my own dominion before. So I was thinking the description of immortality they had meant they had phoenix fire, basically, and I just never actually saw any of them die when they were below 100 fatigue. That's pretty cool actually, I never realized they did that. So I guess I do have a fairly major advantage, again, as long as I can stay in my own dominion. And looking at my tomb kings, it would appear the fire storm caster is the other king that went skeletal. So you can appreciate that :P Too bad I don't really have the gems to thug out many kings.

Actually my units are only 50% cold resistant, so they would fatigue me, just not very much. Plus they're ethereal, and I don't have a magic weapon bless, so they wouldn't make bad army blockers. Of course all my evocations would still work. You would just have to use them away from your temple guards somehow.

Anyway, unless things change soon this is going to be a very long struggle between the two of us, between my undying armies and your endless skinks. You must be sieging sombre with a LOT of skinks. Skinks killing ogres... what're the odds.

P.S. - This is one of those turns I'm glad you two are taking longer than me with, I did my turn a bit hastily earlier and nearly left the assassins with very bad orders :D

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Muwahaha. The tired inhabitants of Barra have found hope in a newfound belief in The Old One.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Blast your excessive gold income :P It's okay, I turned them once, I can do it again... maybe.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

I just had a great idea for a way I could try to kill you! Unfortunately, I don't have anything remotely resembling the research, and by the time I did you'd have three or four paths at 9. Bleh.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Hmm, intriguing!

Also, I really have to apologise to you rdonj, you've been the most patient opponent in the world while I have been freakishly erratic in my turn-taking. I'm just beginning to come towards the end of my PhD and I'm generally getting more erratic in life - lots of unanswered e-mails, piles of laundry, I'm sure you know the thing. Anyway, I'm really enjoying this game, but I'm sorry you've had to put up with such a frustrating opponent! Thanks for being a good sport.

In other news, reports from the lands of Nehekhara indicate that the locals are being led astray by idols carried by the agents of Itza. By the time patrols arrive, nothing can be found but the occasional hint of a blur of motion in the corner of a soldier's eye.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

I'm just going to tell you now, since you're definitely going to kill me before I gain 6 levels in a path with 80 research a turn. I got the idea to use tomb king communions to make lucky, phoenix pyred, soul vortexing, invulnerable communicants to attack into your territory. Hmm, if I used two masters I could get even more buffs. Anyway they'd be pretty tough like that, I think you'd have to work a bit to kill them :) But I spent too much time researching other paths and marching armies of mages around the map. And then incinerating them.

Well, getting into a second game that was more active helped a lot. That game just got put on hold for half a month though, so I'm going to have a lot of waiting to do now I guess. It's okay llama, this has been a good experience for me. I've learned a bit, validated some of my ideas and got to play around with some things I don't normally get to. You're more of a frustrating opponent in the way you seem to infallibly target my armies with that colossus god of yours! I still haven't gotten over those two turns of death.

Oh, so that's how you managed to keep Dommen down at 2 candles with all my preaching. It really is too bad I killed off every single high priest I had with that fire storm... oh well. It's not as if you have a whole lot to worry about from my patrols anyway... my long, closely matched war for dominance with the ogres left me with somewhat income-plagued lands as he had a penchant for taxing me into oblivion. Plus he managed to take at one point or another just about every province I had. Then came the lizards. Our front is rather more defined than the one I had against sombre was, but I'm still poor and haven't had time to restore the pd to its former levels. Some of my provinces still haven't recovered from the ogre invasion, actually. In any case, for the most part my pd is minimal at best. There are all of three provinces that are even capable of patrolling.

I can see the game quickly drawing toward a close... sombre seems to have gone AI, so the ogres are probably going to be gone soon. And with them gone the lizards will be free to swarm all over my nice clean desert and make a big mess of things. Until then, I dare you to come into my dominion :)

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Well, hmm! That turn seems to have gone exceptionally poorly for me. Not only did I lose an assassin, but I failed to kill the rather frustrating god, as well. Further annoyingly, it was outside of my dominion so no resurrection :( I didn't even get a decent affliction on it. Sigh.

And then I had to go and lose 4 provinces in 1 turn. It's about desperation time here in nehekara.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Okay llama, if we were playing mortal kombat right now, my character would be wobbling on his feet and two words would pop up on the screen... FINISH HIM! :P

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Heh, I'm working on it!

By the way, that battle a couple of turns ago when you tried to assassinate my pretender was terrifying! I think he was really really lucky to get away, especially without any afflictions.

I wonder how this turn's battles are about to go...

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Aiee! Poor Old One! I have to say you took him down very efficiently. I noticed quite a few cunning things you did there, like give your assassins fire resistance. Attacking there was definitely a mistake.

On the other hand, the Great Crusade now stands before Nehekhara itself. If the capital can be destroyed, the Slann will finally have no more need to fear the Immortals. As the last march begins, will the Nehekharan defenders be able to hold against the powerful magics of the ancient Slann?

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

I have to say I'm very happy to have managed to take the old man out before kicking the bucket. Though I wish I'd killed him a few turns earlier (he just would NOT pick up that crippled affliction I was hoping for), my assassins finally paid off, so I'm happy. Having to hit him with my god, several fire immune thugs with dusk daggers, and an army of immortals to take down your god is a bit humbling. I will never underestimate the cyclops again.

And I just received the next turn, realizing belatedly I forgot to pass out a death gem for wailing winds! Wow what a blunder.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Well I see now that it would have completely failed to matter :D Next turn I have one last thing to try. I fully expect to lose, but I want to see how effective it turns out. Scripting this may take a few minutes.

That has to be the most effective use of rain of stones I've seen so far. Stupid fog warriors.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Okay, I'm ready to face my doom. *hands in .2h file*

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Muwahaha! The walls of Nehekhara are broken! Soon the ancient palaces and temples shall be brought crashing into the dust, and the Immortals shall find peace at last.

That was a very cool thing you did with the Tomb Kings there. I think the one issue really was fatigue. By the time my guys reached your line your TKs were all knackered, so they were able to get loads of critical hits in despite all the buffs. Otherwise I think they might have really struggled. Using Darkness was very cunning, since it made my evocations ridiculously lame - apart from the Rains of Stones, of course, which cleared away the Immortals very handily. This time I was clever enough to buff my communion with Invulnerability, having found that neither Twist Fate nor Luck seem to work and afflicted all my dudes last time.

Bit annoying that you won in Skavenblight. Having been using uber battle magic for a while, I'd forgotten just how deadly your armies are when I can't use Fog Warriors and other megaspells.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Hmm. Somehow I seem to have failed to leave a tomb king scripted to cast divine blessing. Wouldn't have saved me, but it might have helped a bit. I have to admit, I was fully expecting to lose that battle but not nearly so badly. Aside from getting them all pretty fatigued with my buffs, they don't seem to have listened to me! I had them scripted to (communion slave)(attack closest), and I don't know what you saw, but in my battle they became slaves and... stood there. I thought attacking was supposed to work with that. The darkness did work great, it was fun watching all those magma eruptions hit blank space... but you did get lucky enough to pop a few mistforms, so it wasn't all bad.

Muahaha, not so tough when you don't have a 56 mage communion backing you, are you? Well, in any case that last turn saw the loss of just about everything I have, and no real loss to you. It's pretty obvious you've won at this point, so I'm quite willing to concede the game. I'll go ahead and turn in my next turn though so you can have the pleasure of killing my god. Er, again.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

So just how DID you destroy sombre's army so easily, anyway? Was it a giant communion like what got me, was it the Old One? Or was it something completely else?

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Muwahaha! Nehekhara is fallen! Its pyramids have been crushed by the powerful magic of the Slann, and the enchantments preserving the buried Tomb Kings have been broken. Never again need the living fear the walking dead of Nehekhara.

Man, I did a big scripting effort for that battle - the few Slann were going to leave after one turn, so as to not lose too many to Magic Duel, and the skinks had lots of little nasty spells (Frozen Heart, Farstrike) to kill off your army. I'd expected that your Tomb Kings and Immortals would have been reborn yet again inside your walls - I guess perhaps it doesn't work like that?

Yeah, I noticed that none of your TKs had cast Divine Blessing last turn. That was quite unfortunate. I'm surprised they didn't cast it themselves. As for the communion - once one of the communion masters has cast a spell, all the slaves take no action for the rest of the turn. One slightly gamey way around that is to make sure that all the slaves are first in the list, and the masters at the end (actions are always taken in the order the commanders are listed in).

I beat Sombre's army by having a huge array of skink priests with astral, and perhaps one Slann at the end of the list. The Slann (or it could have been a skink casting communion master) cast Power of the Spheres, and someone brought the Banner of the Northern Star. So all the skinks were S3. Then I just spammed Stellar Cascades. There's no way of resisting that, so all the ogres went rapidly over 100 fatigue and I had a horde of red crested skinks to mop them up. It was brutal. I can find a turn file if you'd be interested.

So, game over? Thanks very much for the game, I enjoyed it a lot. And thanks again for being such a good sport with my _extremely_ slow play recently. I think I'd better not take on any more games for a few months, till I'm done writing up, but after that I look forward to playing with you again some time.

Re: Warhammerama - Running
 

Yeah, immortals don't seem to come back if you've got an army sitting on the capital, even if they still own the fort. I did say last turn that I'd lost almost everything I had :)

I see! I hadn't quite understood the way that worked before. Hopefully I will remember that in the future, I think if I'd been a bit more careful with buffing I could have made a pretty impressive army out of communioned tomb kings toward the end there. You could definitely make an attempt out of it at least. Just too bad I never got phoenix pyre researched, I would have gotten a little extra damage out of it and maybe killed a few more things :P

Yeah, I'd be interested in seeing that turn file. It was a very impressive victory, I'd love to see how it played out. And definitely game over, there's just no recovering from that. The little army I have sieging skavenblight is certainly not going to be able to do anything to stop your iminent domkill, congratulations on your win. I'd love to play with you again sometime, but maybe it would be best to wait a while on it and avoid 11 day turns :)