The Gathering: Turn 22
Magic sites, fortunate events, and won battles!
However, there were three battles, when the armies of Dreamlands marched against only two indie provinces. Quick lookup reveals that treacherous Abysians charged in the fields of Walden (the province next to Abysia's capital Shub-Niggurath claimed two months ago).
Last month our diplomatic dance stopped in the point where Abysia informed he understood what my Lovecraftian passage meant, but he warned me of an old, diseased man and promised he is going to take the provinces he considers belonging to him away from me.
This came faster than I expected...
The Starspawn Council thought PD worth of 50 would be enough to keep them at bay for awhile but the fight proved to be quite difficult for my local guard, who are mainly chaff. The Abysian leader was an old wretched Warlock. Powerful when in his prime, no doubts, but now those days seem long gone.
The warlock threw Abysian axe throwers, Abysian light infantries, Abysian heavy infantries and Warbreds on our local guard. Our commanders Mind Blasted Abysian units, and the Warlock started bombarding our guard with Arcane Bolts.
The mad creatures outnumbered Abysians four to one, but they are fiersome warriors wrapped in metal plates. While our beasts surrounded the enemy, they managed to cut their way deep inside our center. Chill crawled up and down our squids' spins.
Luckily there is some strenght in numbers. While Warbreds break Slave Guardians of our centre, fresh Slave Troopers, Lobo Guards and Shambler Thralls move in!
Abysian infantry breaks eventually, but Warbreds do not run. They have gone berserk and, thus, die where they stand. The Warlock is hit by a Mind Burn spell only seconds before getting overrun by Shambler Thralls.
Hopefully their defeat forces Abysia to summon and hire new levies, giving us a short break. It is needed because Man seems to be massing archers to our border. He might be only passing by, we find out soon enough.
We make necessary preparations by buying PD up to 41, and moving all possible commanders with all possible troops to meet them if they cross. Thats not too much, but also now battle hardened Shub-Niggurath flies there too (the Vastness is still the Hall of Fame leader in kills). This is unfortunate, because other wise we could have counquered some unpredicting Abysian province with the deity.
But the Vastness aint the only Death in our deck of mad Tarot cards. We plan to burn an Abysian city North from Abysia's seat of power with a Starspawn Priest. The intel of their defences aint that accurate we know, but when studying Abysian situation in general we doubt they can do much to reinforce their defences in North right now.
The development of the Dreamlands appears to be strong and uninterrrupted while maybe a little bit slow.
Now we are in a situation where we can hire three magicians every turn (first Cursed Captain incoming!) and we are also in charge of 19 provinces, average being 17,6 (Riverlands with 247 provinces / 14 players). Next turn, hopefully, we rule 21 provinces of which we can hope to keep to our selves at least 20 in long run.
(Crossed Swords indicate expected battles, bright green circles indicate known enemy capitals, and the big banner marks still untamed area where I can hope to establish more stronger presence on land, if only Man would not interrupt at this point.)
Incoming month is undoubtedly an interesting one!