#173 - Full Steel Independence

[Ry Vor]

This was the first attempt at the Independence concept, where there was diplomacy and all 15 kingdoms (Full Steel), but players were restrained from making agreements longer than through turn 6 at the beginning of the game, no pre-arranged alliances, and no gifting, and a restriction on trading. 

The game was won by The Wise One, playing the Red Dragon, on turn 21.  Well done and a dominant performance.  While this game was with SVC, I don't think it would be argued the SVC was easier than Rex, and also that The Wise One might as easily have won a Rex victory.

I also offer a shout-out to the relative new comers Rogal (Silver) and Thudargh (Bronze).  Don't you know new guys aren't supposed to be on the podium?   

Victory By SVC Is The Red Dragon Kingdom!

Game End Status Points

Place Kingdom Player Results-21 Grand Total

1 RD The Wise One 13,595 17,806
2 AN Rogal 8,300 11,400
3 EL Thudargh 6,080 8,845
4 DW Jumpingfist 6,200 8,700
5 GN Cloud 5,130 7,463
6 DE The Gray Mouser 4,400 6,850
7 UN Vball Michael 4,000 6,783
8 WI Lord Alz 3,500 5,250
9 TR Sinestro 2,600 4,150
10 GI Airborne Ranger 1,800 3,374
11 WA Mad Mardigan 1,490 2,513

So let's here what you thought of the game (gently) and the format.  Does Independence break down some of the resistance to full diplomacy as it prevents early alliances, gifting, and long term NAPS, but allows communication, to say, "Let's try to stop the Red Dragon from winning."?

[Lord Alz]

WI Lord Alz

The original thought was to try and grab 2 early while being friendly to everyone. The WI is left alone on a high frequency early in other games I had played and this would be my hope. With hope come preparation so instead of moving up multiple wizards early I would get a power 5 wraith on 2 and combine all my military to 1 group in case one of the militaries wanted to play. It turns out the WA and GI wanted a world without the noble peace loving WI. The WA moved a gov into Viperhead on 1 and maintained/warded through the first 5 turns. During this time the GI consolidated 4 and moved to 2. I was able to gain control of 2 without the city and then on around turn 6 my political power was high enough to make viperhead neutral and the next turn diplomacy with a 7ish brigade WI force and P5. The GI and WA both showed up the next turn at Viperhead where my group was, I had to use the P5 to insure the WA did not get a kill wizard off and basically ran as soon as the battle started. The GI would siege the city, during this time talks had been going on with a number of players with the TR most interested it seemed in helping but alas the TR decided to put his lot in with WA/GI, not sure what was promised but I am sure holding in 2 were part of it. Luckily for me I had also been secretly talking to the EL and he needed a place to expand while GI and TR eyes were on 2 he invaded 5. I was beat down to a few holdings in 2 but luckily 2 towns and 2 villages were over the water. When GI/TR turned to face EL I was able to retake the region and also get to the all important P6 and dome. This further blunted GI/TR actions militarily as I was able to move him between 1 and 2 at critical moments to both keep 2 and help EL retain 1. This WI/EL - WA/GI/TR fight waged for a number of turns with the WA mostly being involved in 1 and 5 not 2 other than early. It became obvious to me that the RD was about to win so I suggested that all 5 of us re-focus and see if we could stop the RD from winning. Everyone agreed even though much blood had been spilt. Plans were formed and enacted but alas it was too little too late and the RD won an impressive victory. My thanks to the ELF player Thudargh who stood by the WI in his time of need and was rewarded with a Podium finish. There was some bad blood this game but in the end no hard feelings and even agreement on common goals.

[Rogal]

AN - Rogal

     I picked the Ancient ones having one point of view of the kingdom, only to realize I did not correctly read this empire.  A political kingdom that would be like the Demon Princes but instead of spell abilities, I would have king abilities.  Here lies my misunderstanding, My leaders did not act like Princes and so had no ability to take over population centers.  My military looked fantastic so if go to fight the Troll in battle and if too many orcs and trolls were near, I had Wall of flame to allow me to avoid the wrong fight.  Goal one, take the city, goal 2 make the TR hostile, goal 3 grab the region. Limited contact in this game confused me in what some would constitute "rules as intended" vs. "rules as written". To play it safe, I would only deal with those kingdoms that were close by.  The TR opened a dialogue with me, he was willing to agree to my terms of control of  the city and the region in exchange for he would get the rest of  the region.   To make sure the Trolls did not change their minds, I divined region 1 and 5 for him to so smash stuff.  Made a deal with the GI to leave his lands alone, done.  Made a deal to leave the Underworld town alone for peace, done.   Same with the Elf and Gnome.  I think I spoke to 6 players total, and only 3 really more then once all game.  

     I focused on my ESO which I nabbed on turn 10.  Next step, clear artifacts from my region and got 2 weapons, a key, palantir, and the crystal of seeing. My AN4 hunted artifacts, AN1 would recruit from my city till I ran out of population, and 2AN would boost my capital defenses and production.  Since I had such a narrow margin to control my region, I would only recruit one unit at a time while i move that population to my capital by increasing production.  The game got a little slow here but then a few new ideas popped up for me.   I saw in my other game I was in the AN using the Bounty spell, I did not realize how good that can be, by the end of this game, I finally had some good income.  Food, whats so good about that until you see  what increasing 25% turn after turn can do.   The 2nd big thing that happened was the new player aid for unusual encounters came out. This would allow me to set up the most effective way to clear the unusual encounters going from easy to the big key/gem of planes. The Rd sure is growing in power, what to do.

     My next mistake occurred when I read my map.  How do I cross the board, ahhh portals.  So my regions portal landed in water, no army group there.  Oakendel portal I had in the water, I got this mixed up with one of my encounters.  I should of looked south but chose to see  what the message boards could do to give me some ideas.  The DW/UN war had begun and my card playing tell of where I wanted to go went unnoticed or no one cared, whats some new player really going to do against the Eastern Empires.  The Gem of Planes was my solution. I arrived at the location with a patrol just as all the co-motion about big red was going to win.  I had to hope to slow the dragons down so I could get the gem.  My reports show me denigrating blindly 4 or 5 times, and not one landed, but I got the gem. Finally was going to make an army with all my big hero's and the game was over.  Did I get lucky to get 2nd place,, you bet I did.  To many people, my game may be boring, but I liked it.  Here are what got me my end points:

 1,000 Regional Control of a region: Torvale

400 Military Have a warlord: (4AN) Warlord Keera
400 Military Have a warlord: (4AN) Warlord Mistrock
200 Military Have a marshal: (1AN) Marshal Damagur
400 Military Group with > 70k vs. PC: (1AN) 79,376
200 Magic Have a pwr 5-6 wizard: (2AN) Pwr-5 Kharazan
400 Artifact Item: Last Herd of Winged Stallions
400 Artifact Item: Great Axe of Hurblind
400 Artifact Item: Crystal of Seeing
300 Artifact Item: Golden Spear of Lerix
300 Artifact Item: Palantir Ambalar
500 Artifact Item: Gem of Planes
400 Political Have an influence of 20+: 20.33
200 Political Member on the High Council
400 Covert Have an agent 11+: Agent 11 CLOAK
400 Covert Have an agent 11+: Agent 11 Denox
400 Covert Have an agent 11+: Agent 11 Viperfield
200 Covert Have an agent 8-10: Agent 10 CORALAX
400 Economic Total food production of 100k+: 149,671 food per month
1,000 Citizenship Survive until end of game

[unclemike]

Rogal, now that the game is over, I checked your AN's denigrates since Consuls have a decent rate of success and found out that you were issuing the wrong order. You submitted the normal denigrate order #475 but the special Consul denigrate is order #478. The normal denigrate has a minimum 10% chance of success while the special denigrate only for Consuls have a minimum 35% chance. So you were issuing the wrong denigrate and losing 90% of the time.

[Rogal]

Oh wow, thanks for the information there, the game is still over  and I am learning.

[Thudargh]

Thudargh, Lord of the High Elves


Guess my Chivalry days are over!  Congrats to RD on a well-earned victory.

My game began with a proposal to TR to trade villages, since TR starts with one in Oakendell and EL starts with one in Torvale.  I got no response, and thus guessed I was getting invaded sooner or later.  Well good!  After failing to stop TR in 159 and slicing through EL as TR in 161, I liked the opportunity to figure out how to stop the juggernaut.  And sure enough, come turn 2 there was 3TR at my Torvale village.  Fortunately, I found TR’s Oakendell village on the same turn.  He got my village on Turn 3, I got his village and his governess on Turn 4.  Not a bad start to the war.

As it turned out, 1EL, 2EL, 1TR and 3TR all ended up at GG on Turn 4 as well.  I had consolidated all my brigades into 1EL, but had lost my marshal in a US and hadn’t had any chance to do any recruiting.  I wasn’t ready to bleed out all my brigades, so I planned to evade.  Then TR contacted me.  He had basically concluded that his war with me was a lost cause and that he preferred to withdraw from the game than stick around to be an annoyance.

TR dropping would no doubt have been to my advantage, but where is the fun in that?  I replied making a case for sticking it out and offering a 5-turn peace.  I don’t know if my words had anything to do with it, but TR took my up on the 5-turn peace and ended up sticking out the entire game.  Hats off to TR for doing so, even when the going got pretty sucky.

I had a few more turns for developing my kingdom and figuring out what to do next.  After Turn 7, WI contacted me looking for an ally in his fight with GI & WA.  I decided to take him up on the offer.  I didn’t feel like turning the Northern Mists into a 3v1 gang-bang, and I wanted to get access to Dome of Invincibility in case TR decided to invade after all when our peace was done.  Thus did the Great War of the North begin!

GI did contact me right after my emissaries showed up in Amberland.  I would say our negotiations were quite spirited, and we actually got very close to an agreement.  But in the end, we just couldn’t get there.  For the record, GI was right – we got bogged down in a long war which allowed another kingdom to get in with the SVC.

I can actually point to the exact moment where the war bogged down and my assault was doomed.  It was Turn 11 when GI regained control of Amberland, I believe by the skin of his teeth.  He also successfully denigrated me, so I went from Friendly to Suspicious in one fell swoop.  Suddenly my second wave of emissaries weren’t powerful enough to 2-step usurp the PCs they just relocated to.  I kept up the assault, but never regained the momentum in Amberland.  On Turn 13, TR showed up in Oakendell in force, followed by GI on Turn 15.  The defense of Oakendell was underway!

My main strategy was to move emissaries into taken PCs once the enemy groups had moved on.  This worked pretty well, especially since the groups never seemed to back-track to try and capture my emissaries once they usurped the PCs.  Then 1EL successfully intercepted 2TR at Lorethane on Turn 16.  It was a party!  1EL, 2EL, 1GI, 2TR and 3TR all in the same place!  I evaded, WI Domed Lorethane, and I slew a TR marshal.

After Turn 18, WI rather surprised me by reaching out to GI/TR/WA and proposing peace for the purpose of stopping RD.  I was equally surprised when they took him up on the offer.  Not that I minded – after 10 turns of war, I considered us at a relative impasse, and with DA having been eliminated, I realized that I could no longer attain my SVC.  There was no chance of me getting to a Rex victory before RD got to his SVC(or a Rex on his own for that matter), so it was in my best interest to stop fighting and work on developing some status points to try and reach the podium.  I joined in the huge turn on RD, while also working feverishly on developing wizards and agents to status point thresholds.

And it worked!  I squeaked in with the bronze!  Goodbye Chivalry bonus!  Goodbye newbie status!

Now to prove it wasn’t a fluke…

[Jumpingfist]

If your natural enemy starts the game you are not penalized if they are eliminated. You can still declare SVC having more region or influence than your NE. I had to do this on the very first SVC game actually. That was in clipper but I would guess the ruling still stands

[Ry Vor]

It does.  Again, impressed the new Players at EL and AN can both be on the podium.
Thanks for the cheerful Goodbye to Chivalry.  Appreciated.

[unclemike]

The RD is back on top with a victory as they should be !!!

Had lots of fun playing the RD. I started the game with nearly all of my initial pc's close to the Steppes so I decided to go after that region the first few turns. And I have to say, those dragons can really cover a lot of ground. I nearly explored the entire region in just two turns. The DA was busy with the RA in Synisvania so I pretty much took control of region 6 without an issue. Since the DA player was fairly new, I gave him a chance to survive in the game but he didn't want to work with me so I had to take him out.

Then I moved into region 9. I gave the same chance for peace with the RA as I did with the DA and the RA was more willing to cooperate allowing me to gain control of Synisvania while he was busy with artifact hunting or such. I only had to tangle with the SO who put up a fight at his capital but he cast the wrong spells at our confrontation and I easily wiped him out. [After the battle, I sent him an email on which spells would have been more effective against a big dragon force than his tornados.]

With two regions under control, decided to go after the Sands. Somehow the BL must have got wind of my move because he showed up at Vanasheen with all his troops ready to put up a fight. And I was really looking forward to this battle. Finally, I was going to see my dragons breathe fire on the acid spewing blacks for the ultimate battle between two mighty dragon forces that bards would sing about for ages. It would have been glorious.

But at that very moment, the BL player dropped due to personal reasons. You've got to be kidding me. I was so disappointed in this because I wanted to EARN my 3rd region since the first two were too easy against inexperienced players. With no BL, I quickly gained control of the region and decided that I have to fight someone, anyone, in this game so I decided to go after the GI in Amberland.

But at that point, the GI was severely weakened by fighting the EL and others so he didn't even come down to region 5 as I had hoped. It was turn 18 and I decided that it's probably better just to end the game rather than go for the Rex like I originally wanted.

So it ended up being an easy victory for the RD but I still enjoyed the majesty of the dragon kingdoms with their ability to fly around the realm with impunity and threaten (yes, threaten, the order that no one else does) the local populace into submission. I hope the novelty of the dragon kingdoms never go away and remain as a playable position (hint for the game architect).

[Benedict]

Two huge mistakes I made playing the BL was that I threatened too early and was on the bubble of pulling it off and lost a P1 AND I wasn't up-to-date on anyone being able to use any artifact. I found Dragon Slayer early on and gave it away because I didn't think I could use it.