Decline26: Come One, Come All

[Infinitum]

Yeah, the combination of ridiculus burst blood hunting, Cloud Trapezing H3's, gate smashers and three red seconds is pretty scary. I must've pulled like 200+ blood slaves per turn once I started hunting my forts there.

Not over yet btw. It was, but then the Giants unleashed their power of TIME WARP and now one of the thrones might still fall by storm after all (because effing fort mechanics, how do they work?).

You actually attacked in the nick of time. One more turn and I'd have a palisade on the throne of fire and proceeded to summon in all of the ogres to defend it. If you'd harrassed me earlier on it might've elayed me getting Hinnom's throne of Bronze (and maybe collapsed my defenses what with me already having 2 front to contend with), but then again I don't think early R'lyeh can beat Wailing Winds in genereral so a midgame push not getting all of my forts at once (as you did, with all my Rakshas being out chasing thrones) would definitly maybe have been beat back eventually.

 

[Infinitum]

Requesting forced processing of the turn. KoolNoodles looks like he has moved on to better things, he can't influence my throne rush that I know of, I'm pretty sure this is the last turn no matter what (one way or another; I'm going ai unless this works) and this game has dragged on long enough.

 

[sqeecoo]

I understand your point, but he's the main admin, I don't wanna force start against his extensions. He's not gone, just busy, the poor noodle. And for some, the game has just started :D

 

[sqeecoo]

Kudos on the victory, Infinitum.

For my part, I have to say I kinda like EA Rlyeh. Sure, it has some glaring weaknesses and is weaker than MA R'lyeh, but it also has a great recruit anywhere mage (water magic is actually good! I've learned ) and is pretty playable once it gets going. I enjoyed my game but was too passive, as I didn't realize a throne victory was actually on the table. Too bad I never got to really fight Lanka in a committed battle - probably would have lost, but it'd have been interesting. I was working up to arcane nexus in a few turns there

The map was very pretty but very shitty for the UW nations since the land was one big blob and the water just a single-province ring around it, making UW war a logistical nightmare and grabbing land provinces impossible since they will always be fully surrounded by other players (in a map with a proper sea you can have a fight to establish UW dominance, in a map with lakes you can grab some land provinces in favorable positions).

Overall a fun game, if a bit anticlimactic from my perspective. Lanka definitely deserves the win here, well played

 

[Infinitum]

Thanks! Looks like my bitching was unfounded. GG, sporting of Isiloon not to attack that throne. Pretty sure it'd had held mind since I'd Trapezed in another 10 kitted Raksharaja thugs fighitng in darkness (negating that order malus), and did have a plan B of yet another Mandeha ready to teleport onto the (newly 3-red-seconded) throne of fire over the next 2 turns (as well as ~50 remaining slaves for another ~20 wall defense Horde from Hell to shore up the Throne of Flames Pallisade another turn). Still, we got the war finished before christmas new years! That oughtta count for something right?

Pretty sure I played Lanka wrong also. Having an awake expander was a bit wasted what with me not wanting to set it up vs most (strong) indy provinces, and I mainly picked the regeneration bless in order to fuel infinite horde of skeletons off small Yogini turbo-communions. Turns out that a) Sabbath Master costs 100 fatigue and b) Horde of Skeletons casting priorization has been absolutely tanked in some earlier patch, which essentially made a mockery of my earlyish Ench-5 and made severely overproduce Yoginis. Also, Lanka has a surprrisingly weak sacred game with the recruitables being various variants of overcosted 1-high-damage-attack semi-glass-cannons, which makes me think it'd be better to save in on a big bless and expand with vanilla gorillas instead. The notable exception are Rakshasa Warriors, mainly die to thembeing upkeep free and hitting fuckhard enough to kill off pretty much any Giant/Knight/Sacred/SC/Thug other players can send against them. Having Regeneraing Thugs was nice, but Raksharaja are too exepnsive to risk thugging and the Mandehas don't really need a bless. Also didn't summon enough skeletons off my priests; ~20-30 longdead and a Mound King is a pretty decent raiding party and wouldn't take that many mage turns in selected frontline forts all things considered. In hindsight I shoulda gone for a Wicked-Witch style pretender after all to sitesearch and provide decent scales/utility bless, eg:

Spoiler

Turmoil becasue the nation demands it, extra heat because it's almost free economy-wise, no luck because something's gotta give and this nation wants Conjuration 6/Blood 8 ASAP for path diversity (Spectral Mages gives access to every path except fire), Throne-nabbing Mandehas and approx. infinite immortal Vampire Lords should Throne Rushes not be feasible. Resistance/Mobility bless to help priests/rakshasas keep up with undead troops later on, and because this'd expand (poorly) with national troops.

 

[Dayyālu]

Map was terrible for UW, waited too much for gangbanging for Lanka, Lanka after it breaks on Blood is pretty much unstoppable in direct combat.

Frankly surprised at how successful the Starspawns offensive was, if people defended their Thrones better (I kinda cheat, I'm UW) we would have trucked on for a while. Or until I and Sqeecoo decided to gift to each other the Thrones for a victory.

More of a victory of no one bothering to stop the Throne rush at the last moment than one of clear superiority. Hell, it happens, I won Dec20 the same way also.