Turn 6: Confusion reign.
This is one of the turns were my recollection of what happened is different from what I saved in the H2 file. Possibly because I sent in a modified turn to the server and forgot to update the archives. I will be correcting the mistakes as well as I am able.
Three battles happen and once again no one dies. If only we could go on like this forever...
Oooh and I also won the bid for Dante's Stingers. A completely generic heavy infantry company of 30 men. They are useful because they can often expand on their own against weak indies with modest attrition.
Only two giants this turn to compliment the three already in garrison. But why? Were did all my money go?
Oh that explains it. R'lyeh is expanding southwards and I was antsy that they might try a sneak attack upon my capitol. This early they might knock me out of the game if they succeeds with that. I raises the PD in my capitol by ten points to 35 just to be safe.
Otherwise nothing much happens. Expansion continues according to schedule. Though I am not entirely sure why I did not split the southern force that so valiantly defeated the barbarians in to two groups, and attacked two provinces? Possibly because I was not entirely sure who was beneath me and weather he was powerful? I could have used a big expansion force in case I would run in to an enemy expansion force? I know there is someone starting two provinces down but I have no idea who it is.
Turn 7: Second contact of the bad kind.
Expansion continues to go splendid. Only casualties are four mercs who dies to lion tribe arrows and..... Wait? What is this? Two battles in the same province?
Oh... Well I guess I know who my eastern neighbor is.
My veteran warriors fought bravely. They battled to the last man without ever retreating. The only ones who left the field were my force commander and my cute prophet. But they were too important to die needlessly so they will just have to bear the shame.
Overall, I think my troops held up well against the enemy onslaught. The main problem was that the enemies were so numerous that they overwhelmed the Fir Bolg warriors 16 points of defense. And the enemy used one of Marvernis new national priest spells: “Strength of Boars” witch increases the strength of every friendly unit on the battlefield by 4. Meaning that almost every hit was a kill. The warriors held for a while as the slingers pelted the naked enemies with great results. But the warriors were soon overrun and the slingers who lacks the warriors high defense were cut down before they could flee.
That is one heck of an expansion force to conquer a province that my scouts told me contained only eight troops though. Almost looks like an invasion force to me. This worries me. Granted, Marverni got less than half my number of provinces and barely a third of my income. But I cant think of any other reason for such an army. Maybe he got an ally in R'lyeh?
To settle my worries I got in contact with Bluemage142 on IRC. I might have talked to him before this turn but I dont remember. I still have no chat logs, but I imagine the conversation went something like this:
Quote:
Cori>: Hello there new neighbor. Thats a mighty army you got there.
Cori>: I hope you are not planning to invade me.
Workmage>: Haha.
Workmage>: Well, I was planning to.
Workmage>: But dont worry.
Workmage>: I will change my orders as soon as I get home.
Cori>: That's a relief.
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See!? This is the power of diplomacy! Not that I think it prevented an attack, but rather that I was made aware of the attack. Armed with this knowledge I contemplate my options.
I imagine various places Marv could attack and how to counter. But eventually I just decides to play it safe and focus all my efforts on this mysterious province I just noticed, Nardago. The strange thing about this province is that it has much higher income that what should be possible. Normally a province generates 1 gold for every 100 population a province contains. This province generates 43.6 gold too much. Or if you account for the fact that the province loses 5% of its income due to the heat then it might even be 50g too much. It took a long time for me to figure out why this was so. There are no visible mines in the province. And positive sites tend not to do anything unless you find them or unless they modify scales. Eventually, after a long while, I remembered that there is a random event that increases the income of a province by 50g permanently. This province must have gotten that event while it was still owned by the indies.
Anyway, I send my other expansion force of 5 giants to it and reinforces it with 28 points of PD.
You have probably noticed that I'm building a lot of PD. This might seem strange as most people consider Fomoria to have terrible PD. And in a way they are right. For the first 19 points of PD Fomoria only gets one giant militia and one Fir Bolg slinger per point of PD. The secret is that the PD gets much better at 20+. There, it will also get 2 Fir Bolg Warriors per point and those things are awesome. Furthermore, slingers are good versus the naked troops of Marverni and they all have between 12-13 MR, witch is great against R'lyeh.
I send some fresh giants up towards the future front. Meanwhile the mercs and those giants too far away to get to the possible war in time, get to continue to expand. I finally remember to split the southern expansion army in to two, but I do not attack downward as that would put me inside the cap circle of whoever lives there. It is a bit strange that they have not yet captured a province located next to their capitol. But never the less I cant afford a two (three?) way war at this moment so I ignore them.
R'lyeh continues to expand southwards. I can only see 30 troops in the water and none elsewhere so I doubt he is in on any particular attack of Marvernis.
Ever so slowly, militia is being herded towards the capitol for some mysterious purpose....
Oh yea. I should probably state some irrational goals for this Let's Play. I'm told that's a tradition.
Here are my irrational goals that I had for this game:
1.Fomoria must be the biggest! No other nation can have more provinces on the province chart. If they do then I have to rectify that quickly. I will expand like crazy and then remain biggest for the rest of the game.
2.I must have the Isle of Balor. Or possibly Balor must have the Isle of Balor. Whatever.
3.I must never sign a NAP. This is mainly for the sake of the LP. If the wars get predictable then the LP gets boring. This will make for more excitement and random chaos. Although it will make thing hard on me as people tend to gang on the biggest player. Again, whatever.