Uakari - MA game (upload pretenders)

[Amhazair]

Well, let's put it this way: I don't mind playing on. I can test out some things of my own, discover some new ways to abuse the power of blood (the storming of Ermor castle was quite nasty, even if I say so myself), think of optimal ways to counter your annoying moves, and generally still have some fun.

On the other hand, it takes quite a bit of time now to play my turns. I'm sitting on several k gold bacause I can't be arsed to find ways to spend it, I really should crank out a few dozen more blood hunters to improve the blood flow (even more) but don't because of the MM nightmare that would be (hmm, actually... I could build labs in my hunting provinces, that would solve both problems at once. ), I have a few dozen commanders stuffed with equipment because I need to clean out my lab every turn to make room for the new forgings, so in the end when I'm equipping a new SC there's allways some item that I know I have lying around somewhere, but takes me quite a while to find,...

So, bottom line: I know you said it was up to me, but I'll return the favor. I don't especially want to play on, but I definitely don't mind playing on either if you'd like me to. It won't feel like you're forcing me or anything. Up to you.

As we're talking anyway, I'd also like to commend Johnarryn, for holding out to litteralilly the last man standing. (I do believe your last castle is empty, right?)

[Amhazair]

Amhazair said:I have to say I also have had outrageous luck with my magic sites. Loremasters help, but to be honest they're the least of it. I won't give away everything while we're still playing, (I can tell you the specifics when we're done) but let's just say (the) god(s) is/are entitled to at least a votive candle or two.

Right, I suppose it won't hurt anymore to reveal the big secret.

My outrageous luck with sites:

* I found loremasters and enchantresses quite early on. A W/B loremaster gave me the ability to summon the Ice devils without having to empower for it. (which I probably wouldn't haven't bothered to do)

* I found a 20% enchantment site. Not that impressive - a simple 2-gem site would probably have given me more gems over the course of the game (except that this site also gave me 3 gems of his own, so it was still quite nice ) but it still saved me a couple of gems for summonning my liches (that I needed to spam ghostriders and tartarians) and my casting of earth blood deep well.

* The ultimate gateway (50%! off conjuration spells. Massive, massive site. Second time I find it, and it's absolutely ridiculous. Not quite so good early on since I went for blood first, but from mid game on... Troll king court for 28 gems, fearie court for 20. I had massively more W gems than I could use, so I started to spam Streams from Hades, giving me 3D/3W mages for a measely 20 gems... Earth attacks were cheaper too. And then of course the clinchers. Tartarians for 5 gems, and ghost riders for 3. Johnarryn was impressed by my ghost rider spam ability: this explains one half of it.

Around the same time I found the ultimate gateway I also found a 40% blood site. Cheap, cheap augurs for my magical diversity, all those greater devils were a big chunk cheaper, and the little demons were dirt cheap. (One casting of infernal forces gave me 7 devils and 20 imps for 30 slaves. Infernal crusade with boosters was 13 demon knights for 30. ) And finally the remote summoned imps only costed me 27 slaves for 25 imps + the commander devil. Without this site my ability to spam this spell would have been halved. To sweeten things up even more it was adjacent to the gateway, and both were within 2 provinces of my capital, and within 2 provinces of my enchantress site, so I had no trouble moving my mages around.

And then finally, I conquered a 20% construction site from Pythium, shaving quite a bit off my forging costs. Additionally I managed to grab the hammer of the forge lord, which gives a 50% reduction. Together that made for one ridiculously cheap item/turn, like rings of sorcery for 14 pearls. The cheap rings is the second half of why I could spam ghost riders so easily (I didn't even need 4D liches for it, my Kokyathids could get in on the business too. ) Then towards the end when I got the forge up...

All of that together...

I think I'll go luck scales again in my next game.

[johnarryn]

Good lord that's a great haul of sites. Granted, you have plenty of territory, but nevertheless some nice luck there. I wondered how you could possibly spam ghost riders three times a turn!

This game was extremely enjoyable, though I got a bit slaughtered at the end due to Amhazair's good planning and some mistakes of my own. Very good job on your part, Amhazair. You certainly used the late-game power of Blood to your advantage. I expected imp-spam, but not to the extent that you were able to employ it - that really was hard to fight against. Plus the MR 29 guys you had were well-prepared to fight against me - hard to spam disintegrate or soul slay with that, I didn't even bother.

I also have quite a bit to learn about SC's... when I hit Construction 8 early on, I thought I was sitting pretty, but even having access to many of the artifacts didn't help much. Ah well.

I would love to start a game with you guys again sometime, although i'll be traveling for about 2 weeks starting August 7th, so won't be able to participate if a new game starts before I get back.

[Amhazair]

AreaOfEffect, since I gave you the choise on whether to continue for a couple of extra turns, but you didn't reply, and didn't submit a new turn either, I'm guessing you're ready to call it a day?

Johnarryn, I'd certainly be happy to play a new game with you guys, but it probably won't be very soon. I'm currently in two new games at around turn 20-25 (one of them being the megagame), so while they don't take that much time yet, if I do well in both things might start to become very busy soon. I probably won't start a new game unless it's clear I'm fast heading for the exit in one of the others.

[AreaOfEffect]

I've been busy this week. Sorry, but a couple of friends of mine got married and I forgot to say something about it. Personally, I say we call the game and move on to new maps to conquer.

It has of course been a ball.

[Amhazair]

All righty, I'll declare the game finished on Llamaserver then.

Weddings are fun, I've apparently also reached the correct age to be invited to loads of 'em.these past 2-3 years.

Unfortunately there's not many friends left unmarried now, so I suppose it'll soon be time to start to feel old.