[Baalz]

Well, that's rather my point isn't it? If you can manage to control the water (the hard part) you don't have any business fighting a fair fight on the land (easy part). The war with Caelum was negotiated before I ever set slimy toe out of water, the fight with Lanka (sorry, didn't mention this) I didn't line up a war ally until I had soundly thrashed his attacking forces (I think he expected me to be much more tied up with Caelum) and basically just trolled around for somebody willing to grab some land from his other side while I did most of the killing which I was able to do because I was at this point much bigger than him and using the income I'd grabbed from my rapid land grab to pump out Kings. Part of my negotiation with Sauro was "even if I'm wrong and he defeats me he's going to have to leave a large amount of forces guarding his coast", which made it a pretty good no-brainer on their part.