Game 150

[Rogal]

The only real thing having the DW listed is to show why the RD and DA did not go North.  The DW had the new guy protection, so really had no impact on the game except it made Region 3 a hands off zone for a good part of the game for most empires.

[Lord Thanatos]

(EL) (3rd place)

First few turns were standard short-term agreements.  WI, RD, GI, TR, and AN all provided various short-term promises of peace.  About turn 9 or so the DE asked me if I thought the GI should be attacked?  Sure, why not?  The strongest kingdom on the map lead by The Deliverer -- count me in.  I do like exciting Alamaze games.

Just after I moved into Amberland I learned the TR and GN had also joined the DE and were assaulting the GI in Amberland.  I told DE I would NOT do 3v1 or 4v1 so I withdrew from the assault.  I did ask DE to ask the TR and GN to arrange peace with me.  I never heard from them.

About turn 16 I was itching for a fight and moved into Torvale.  150,000 strength elven army group with three P5s anchored my assault, along with a sold emissary core.  I quickly controlled Torvale - even capturing the 45,000 defensive value TR capital.  DE was annoyed with me, but I assured him that if he wanted to join the TR/GN against me I would understand.  Otherwise, my peace agreement with him was still in place.  The TR/GN fought back and we settled in for what was sure to be a lengthy conflict.  I contacted both the GI and RD, who were pleased to have my assistance.  I divined GN / TR info and shared this with the GI and RD (who both had earlier provided me with information on Torvale). The DA had also reached out to me at this time and I assured him I would have the TR/GN attention very quickly.

The battle in Torvale/Oakendale/soon-to-be-in-Runnimede played out with the TR/GN militaries running from me while they assassinated all my emissaries.  Annoying, but acceptable. . .  Then, out of the blue, TR proposes peace.  We negotiate for a turn or two and by about turn 24 a deal is struck.  The EL empire is larger than it was before, but the TR regains control of Torvale and is free to assault the rest of the map.  I refused to join them against RD and GI.  So the kingdoms I would not attack now were WI/GI/RD/DE/TR/GN/DA.  The UN and AN had been eliminated.  That left the DW or SO.  I divined SO and DW pcs and prepared to march across the board confident that JumpingFist (RD) and The Deliverer (GI) would never willing bow to the DE/TR/GN/and-now-WI team.  I think if I had know the WI had joined with the others I would not have agreed to peace.  But since I always keep my agreements there was nothing I could do but watch the new players immolated by that four player team.

I figured I had second place locked up and was actually counting on GI/RD to thwart DE/TR/GN to give me a shot at victory.  Alas, it was not to be!  The WI is a formidable player in his own right and I did not know he had joined the other three.  As it turned out, I slipped to third place in a very enjoyable contest.

Lots of diplomacy in this game, which I usually do not have time for.  But I find if the others players reach out to me I ALWAYS respond so I ended up talking to everyone except UN, DW, and SO this contest.  Maybe if I had relented and joined into the 3v1 (making it 4v1 against The Deliverer) I might have had everyone declare me an enemy and I would have taken second?  Third place with my integrity intact is certainly acceptable.  A 30 turn contest is certainly delightful. Although the EL still has not finished first in a contest, I believe it is certainly capable of victory.

CHANCELLOR - DE, for holding together his alliance for so long;
IRON-WILLED - DA, for holding out so long;
INFAMOUS - DE, for holding together his alliance for so long.

Great game, my friends ! ! !

[Cloud]

This Valhalla thread just got started, but a lot of virtual ink has already been spilled about this game.  This is my story.  There are many like it, but this one is mine. (DE)

Looking for the Future
At the start of the game, I saw danger.  TR and GN are pre-allied.  AN and TR usually work out some sort of arrangement.  AN is my natural enemy and often actually goes after DE.  So there was only one thing to do.  Offer myself as TR and GN’s third before they get things settled with AN.   I figured I had one key advantage over AN in this.  I could offer TR all of Torvale and AN couldn’t.  So I made my pitch, but I was a little late to the table.  Talks with AN had begun already, but I must have made a convincing argument because they chose to go with me and our fates were bound together from that point on.  On turn 1, I moved a Demon Prince to Meridon and issued a Status Quo order on turn 2 before heading home, successfully getting 2 high level AN emissaries arrested.  I also got 2 of my own arrested when I attempted to take the two R8 cities but had completely spaced enamoring the region on turn 1.  Getting the region became a chore after that but I managed.

Looking for Now
I did the other requisite diplomacy of course – a town switch with BL, exchanged short term peace with DA, engaged with the RD, made a 10 turn peace with GI and reached out to WA to offer peace but never heard anything back.  Uh oh.  WA player had recently orchestrated a well organized early attack against me in another game and if he isn’t responding to peace requests, I need to get ready for war Now.  GI told me he had told WA that I was off the table as a target due to our peace.  This was getting worse.  Heard from a few others that AN was slyly recruiting for possible action against me.  My enemies were starting to stack up already, but fortunately I had made arrangements to deal with AN.  TR stuck out a 5 turn peace with AN then attacked.  I took the AN town in R8 but otherwise TR did it all his self, near as I could tell.  As turn 10 and the end of my peace with GI approached, I became increasingly nervous.

Looking Down the Road
With TR busy with the AN, I approached the EL about attacking WA/GI.  I heard that they were attacking WI and it made me feel better to know that they weren’t just marshalling their strength for an attack on me but I still felt like a target.  My recollection departs from EL’s here.  As I recall, he told me that he had a peace agreement with GI lasting until turn 15 but that I should attack after turn 10, when my peace with GI ran out and he would join in after turn 15.  I said okay, but was uneasy with the plan.  At the same time, AN dropped and TR + GN were anxious to keep fighting so we began making plans for a turn 11 invasion.  About that time WA dropped just as I was moving troops into R5 to zero in on WA holdings.  GI contacted to ask me why I was in R5.  I told him I was hunting WA pc’s and he replied that was OK but I should just say if I was attacking him.  With WA out of the game and a good relationship with the GI player, I could have pulled back.  But I already have all these invasion plans, TR and GN have built to this, and it would have meant reneging on plans I made with my best allies.  Okay.  I’m attacking you too.

Looking for Results
The initial assault against GI went well.  I barely did anything against him – just a couple pc's I think.  I limited myself mostly to WA pc’s and collected GI denigrations.  I don’t think I actually got a message from the EL about bowing out of attacking GI, but I wouldn’t have needed it.  His position is well established.  The original plan would have left me taking punches from GI for 5 turns until he showed up anyway, so who cares?  At this point, I don’t believe we communicated at all until after he attacked the TR.  Anyway, I could tell that GI was receiving help from somewhere, but I didn’t know who the co-belligerents were.  It turned out that RD and DA were aiding him with resources and spells.  They tipped their hand when DA voted to block an expulsion vote against the GI.  TR and GN wanted to pivot and attack the DA.  I wasn’t a fan of the plan.  I thought we needed to focus on GI.  We had taken from him most of what was worth having but he was still dangerous.  But I didn’t say anything.  I just kept working against the GI while they attacked DA.

Looking for Truth
Once that attack was sprung, DA contacted me to see if I would help him against the TR and GN.  No.  Well, don’t decide now, he says.  You just focus on the GI and maintain your neutrality and maybe join up with me and RD later.  The next turn, a ridiculously large RD group was at one of my cities.  I contacted the RD and was all ‘what?’ and he was like ‘you attacked DA’ and I was like ‘did not’ and he was all ‘whatever’ so then I was in a three front war.  Within a few turns, both my cities were destroyed.  GI and RD groups were all over my region and at one point I was stunned I didn’t lose control.  I had moved my capitol into a sea town in R5 already and my emmies had mostly streamed into R9 to upset RD’s position.  I almost took him out of control, but he had the upper hand and I ended up pulling out to retake R8 pc’s just as he was returning to retake R9 pc’s. 

Looking for a Plus-One
TR reached out to WI and EL to see how they would fall in this war.  WI did not reply and EL attacked TR.  About this time, DA gained his region back.  EL’s initial assault set TR back hard.  We were losing.  I had tried to reach the SO about coordinating against the RD in R9 but got no word back.  I did have success with the BL who had already been warring with RD for some time.  I declared him ally to funnel resources to him so he could keep swinging, but we never coordinated much.  As long as he had what he needed to do what he could, I was happy.  The next two developments shifted the game.  First, WI got back to us and said he’d join us after a few turns but he had obligations to the RD to attend to first.  I assume those obligations were about messing with the SO.  The other thing was The Great Elven Peace.  With TR no longer having to deal with the EL, we were free to turn our attention to the real foe – GI/RD/DA. 

Looking Top to Bottom
Somewhere around this point, the DW declared ally to RD just as Summer was approaching and RD was a mostly Southern empire with a Huge army.  Obviously, I assumed the DW was a summer food pipeline for the RD.  With WI fully on board, I had a way to protect my home region pc’s from attack I could finally go on the offensive.  I sent emissaries into 3 DW pc’s and that was enough to knock him out of control.  After, I moved into RD holdings in R3 just as DW moved in to retake and WI showed up to take Hammerhold.  Meanwhile, RD and GI troops had taken a good sized chunk out of R5 and most of my building political power was sent there to retake.  On the same turn, I took Avalon and TR destroyed Evanon which pushed me just over the edge into Control.  I then learned that GI had dropped in the midst of a march on Runnimede.  The game was progressing fast now.  I had a good start on R3 with RD’s holdings and WI had dealt with the DW response to his attack.  DW dropped and I took a few of his remaining pc’s to claim my third region. 

Looking for the Promised Land
In the final push, I poured into every RD or SO pc I could reach in R9 and won the region and with it the game.  It was a truly epic contest and it earned me my single best performance ever.  A lesson to you kiddos out there – even if you mess up so bad that you get your own high level emissaries arrested on turn 2, you can still win the game.

Chancellor – Again, Jumpingfist (RD).  He was on the other side in this game but made a coalition that included a weakened veteran and a very talented new player and seriously had us on the ropes.
Iron Willed – STILLGARD (BL).  He lost his capitol so many times, I bet he’d have to dig through the turns to count them up.  No one would have blamed him if he’d dropped but he endured.
Infamous - Lord Thanatos (EL).  His strongarm tactics in negotiating the Peace To End All Peace were a wonder to behold.

[Jumpingfist]

Rogal did a good job with his write up and I am happy to leave it at that. I would just like to acknowledge a few players that may get over looked.

The Grey Mouser (SO) and Stillgard (BL) - I really hit these two hard early in the game and would come back around and hit them again if they would build up. They stayed in the game until the end. making more of a difference than other would give them credit for i am sure. if they were not there to be a pain in my side the entire game I would have been able to go more than a turns distance away from my home regions. Great Job guys sticking with it and making the game fun. SO killed most my leaders early on that only until the very last turn of the game did I finally get a warlord in my group. BL well that war was very one sided he was basically my personal moral bonus atm. In the end the BL came back big and helped to take away my final region and SO even managed to grab the R7 city for a while. I maybe could have stopped from loosing my last region but could not resist hitting the BL capital hiding in R7 one last time before the game ended.

Chancellor - Cloud(DE) - make no mistake this game was won behind the scenes and cloud did a masterful job.
Iron Willed - The grey mouser(SO) and Stillgard(BL) for reasons above.
Infamous - Rogal (DA)- GN and TR came in to crush the guy playing the DA and when the dust settled from the opening moves of the attack the GN was 4 wizards short and TR had lost a group.

[The Gray Mouser]

I didn't have much impact (finished 11th) in this game, although I did stick it out.  I was attacked right off the bat by the RD and DA, crippling my start.  My only edge was a sea-based town as a capital which frustrated the RD.  I really didn't have much chance in the game, missed a couple turns, but decided to stick it out on gold that had accumulated and got some pretty respectable wizards.

Mainly, I was a nuisance to the Red Dragon, casting Demonic Visions, I think also Summon Demon, was typically invisible, and eventually taking away control of Synisvania from the Red while he was off looking for his third region.  I wanted to give equal love to the Dark Elf, but could never quite be sure where the RD was to ensure I could go to the Eastern Mists for some payback to the DA.  

I did get communication from the BL to coordinate against the RD, but wasn't sure if I would stick, and I think he wanted knowledge of Synisvania which was already crowded.  The DE at some point had the same sort of proposal - give me info on Synisvania and lets work together.  My reactions were too bad anywhere, even Hostile in Synisvania but being there, I could fix that with wizards and an Enamoring.  The one baron was actually pretty heroic.

This was the only game I can think of where I stayed in just to be an irritation, but it can work pretty well with 4 or so P5 or higher wizards.  All my agents and all but my King and a Baron were killed off, all my fleets sunk and my artifacts stolen.  I had assumed by the DA but I believe the WI fessed up to it earlier in the #150 thread.   It seems to me if the wizard kingdoms are mainly eliminated territorial-wise, they can still make an impact with high level wizards, at least able to likely determine who will not win the game.

Thanks to Jumpingfist for the kind remarks.

[Stillgard]

(BL) I was very surprised how fun I had in this game. I really did not expect to RD to come calling when he did. I was busy leveling up my wizards to get dispel dome for my eventual fight with the SO, when the RD actually took control of region 9 I was ill prepared. I had some contact at that time with the SO and he declared me ally so his spells did not hit my armies. I did a poor job of defending against the RD and found myself almost wiped out. I did not have further contact with the SO after he took one of my villages in 10 and I figured he was on his own. The only one I kept in contact most of the game was DE. He helped me pay for my lone army and I keep taking RD PC's through the game. I think my biggest impact was with my agents. I lost count how many RD emissaries I killed through the game. I killed any and every agent I saw of the RD as well. I stole gold, and actually managed to kill an agent who was guarding the city one time! I stole the Staff of Discord and traded it to the DE who could use it much better than I could. Lastly it was me who killed the Red Dragon King on the last turn! Was very fun game indeed, even though I played most of the game with 8 influence.

Chancellor - Cloud
Infamous - Jumping Fist