Game 5033 (Privacy) Ends

[Diws]

Red Dragons (Imperial Tark) Win by Rex:

1     RD     Imperial Tark             19,360      28,906
2     HA     Jon Doe                   10,625      19,642
3     WA     Diws                       9,895      17,528
4     CI     Mad Hatter                 9,100      15,815
5     SO     Eregnon the Black          6,300      13,275
6     LI     Rellgar                    5,900      12,750

[IMPERIAL_TARK]

Finally.... proof that you can win with a Dragon kingdom even with Wizard kingdoms running around (and during a 4 on 1 war with all other kingdoms except the HA). The game went till Turn 31 with Dome spells abounding! Rick should be ecstatic! And note that the Halflings took a respectable 2nd place! I'll give my write-up a bit later. Congrats to all that stayed in this one! It was a brutal, bloody dogfight to the bitter end!!!

[Ry Vor]

Yes, happy to see the Red Dragons (never doubted it but was a long time coming) win and the Halflings medal.  Also good to see Cimmerians and Lizardmen do well. 

This was a game that started about the time of the server switch so wasn't invoiced and I don't even know what the game type was.  What was it?  Steel Anonymous?

[JonDoe]

I believe steel silent. No communication but we could see who was who

[Mad Hatter]

Congrats Tark. This was a confusing game for me really. I had never played the CI before and I don't like dealing with the possibility of running back and forth across the water in R2, but I thought I'd give them a shot. I started this one off building ships, etc... I wasn't worried about the WA coming my way, as we left each other's villages alone, so I was hoping we were good. When UM got R1 and R5 and there was a declaration with the SO, I thought I'd hit him in R5, then he dropped. So I changed course and rushed into R1 with emmies, because I didn't want the SO to get it. Somewhere in here the UN, RA, DE dropped and I thought about it too, especially when R1 turned out to have the SO and HA in there, so I thought I'd pull back and go back to my original plan....well, lo-and-behold, the RD took it and I thought about dropping again. And seeing how it didn't seem as though he was getting any pressure in other quarters, (the LI taking R10 was short-lived), but then I read Rellgar's posting on a thread about people with viable kingdoms dropping and I thought 'the heck with it, let's do this Mr. Redd Dragon'!!! He played a shell game with me for a long time and I didn't figure out what I really should have been doing until 2 turns ago. In the meantime I was having the most awesome luck....I kidnapped a couple RD emmies, a ton of HA ones. I didn't fail once. (yes Mr. Halfling, that was me and not the SO) I had some fun once I decided to stick it out. I know that the RD could have hammered me with all of his groups, but he was stalling me while he was in other regions. I don't know what happened to the WA/LI, as they seemed to have stopped playing at some point. We all knew that the HA wasn't going to do anything from the beginning and it seemed as if there was an undeclared race between the 2 of them for the win. Not complaining, I learned a lot in this one. Ready for another game!!!

[RELLGAR]

Congradulations Tark. Messed up game. Someone had to stop the RD from a win, so I did. Then the WA starts killing my Wizards instead of attacking the RD, as I was trying to stop the RD from taking R6, so I lost interest in keeping the RD from winning. I could have done a lot more in exstending the game and keeping it interesting, but others could have also. There were early drops that changed the dynamics of this game also. I lost interest. I did not drop though, I was still submitting orders, just not all of them and nothing well planned.
The LI is ok at most things with many options, but in the lower half of kingdoms to play in my opinion.

[Ry Vor]

Thanks for the write up, Mad.  The takeaway beyond the specifics is don't drop when there is some adversity.  It's actually satisfying to fight back and have even small victories and sometimes either off a ruler or change the outcome of the game. You also gain the respect of the player community as Iron Willed, as opposed to a pushover. That said, I understand new players will make lots of mistakes and would like a restart. Just veteran players shouldn't drop until, well, they shouldn't drop.

[JonDoe]

HA
The kingdom nobody expected to do anything.

I knew the RD could run me over so declared ally from the get go just to say please do not attack me. It worked I did not touch the dragon the whole game and he left me alone. Because I built up so many resources I took my region with not many PCs but it did not cross my mind for some reason there should be more PCs in the region. I guess I was making so much food and gold I did not think anything was wierd. Later I would find the RD actually had 3 villages and two towns I did not even know about.

With my economic base worth any two regions I switched most my focus to units and wizards. So much gold I decided to keep all but one group in towns recruiting westmen. The SO left my sea town alone in his region(likely because I left a HA brigade on it). The DU was off to a fast start. Taking R1 and then R5. I had divined all DU PCs ready to attack R1 but the DU dropped before I had all my wizards in place to launch a massive conceal attack. I had 8 or 9 wizards at that point. With the DU dropped I knew the RD would move into amberland so I avoided that area. I moved to R1 hoping the CI and SO did not yet know all the PCs. But by the time I flooded the region the SO, then CI were there. I was hoping to send the SO a message by not taking any of the PCs he already claimed with my emmies but he did not receive or care about it. He moved into and took any neutral PCs I was able to claim and then started agent actions vs some of my units in my now capital the water PC in his region.
The War with SO began, a war I did not want as I had lots of emmies and wizards but I had no dome and my wizards could not even cast a regional spell until P6. Non the less a war it was. I quickly turned about and focused on R4 while the SO dealt with the CI in R1. I took everything except the SO hidden capital which I never found. There was a huge fight. At one point for the city. He had more troops and better wizards but I cast the right spells and the HA resistances were in full swing.
For the rest of the game I would be fighting with the SO. He could not send emmies into R4 or R7 due to my ability to free recon all my PCs and my 5 high level Agents hiding in my two hidden villages. I came up with a plan to win but as I was getting into position the SO decided to go on a nuking spree in R7. He took only my city and town knocking me out of control. I did not understand. Then I divined towns and villages to find the RD had a boat load. I finished the game moving on some I would take to regain the region and get back to my plan to take R2 with 4 teleporting Division.

My hidden villages at the end. I actually had slight control of R8 with just my one village
8 SH Halfling Yhister Ro Vill 3,492 81,972 58,424 101,694 Hidden Glyph of Concealment
7 XI Halfling Cardinal C Vill 3,268 60,400 22,547 82,190


Congrats to Tark on a well fought victory.

[unclemike]

Playing the Druid was fun at start. Getting Eagle Familiar at 2nd level is unreal. Was able to cover the entire region in a turn or two and that's not just pc's but also encounters. Began exploring my second region and picking up pc's before others even got their first under control. My Druid was flying through this game...

Then around turn 11 or 12, that BS happened about others blaming me about a die roll. Really folks, I have no control or influence over die rolls so don't blame me for them. If your kingdom is eliminated due to random order execution, plan ahead and create a sanctuary to be on the safe side.

But because people were complaining that they'll leave permanently if I was still in the game, I had to take myself out. Too bad because my Druid kicked butt in gaining control of two regions quickly. I would have changed the outcome of the game for sure and I wasn't afraid of a little Halfling either

[Diws]

As the Warlocks in this one, I wanted to stay in my corner and build up my wizards. The DE eventually came after me, and gave my main army at my city a resounding thwacking, but failed to kill it entirely and I believe wasn't quite strong enough to storm the city. As I was raiding him and building up, he dropped. I eventually moved into Eastern Steppes, only to bump heads with the LI. He attacked me first, I believe, and if I remember right never stopped trying to take my PC's, so not sure why he was surprised that I assassinated a wizard or 2 of his. I was active the entire time, but trying to project into Eastern Steppes while building up my home region. I divined the RD heavily, and it seemed that his efforts were scattered, so I sniped at him only whenever he showed up in Eastern Steppes. That 33% resistance to Death magic really seemed to make a difference, as I think I summoned Demon or High Demon a good 3 or 4 times on him and they never seemed to succeed. Had only a couple of Demonic visions succeed; I learned a bit this game about the mechanics of regional spells and dispelling them.. that is one nasty spell to be on the receiving end of. Finally when the RD committed to Eastern Steppes I had a AG vs AG battle with him, and won it, although I didn't hurt him that much. Was hoping to wipe the LI brigade in the same battle, but it seems that the healing ability prevented his characters from dying, and so the artifact the brigade was carrying did not fall into my hands. The last turn saw the RD with 2 AG's and 3 armies total, most of whom were nearby. That could have been ugly.

In hindsight, I messed up in neglecting to dome the city I controlled in Eastern Steppes (in part because I wanted his army to get hurt a bit before I clashed with him, but the his attrition wasn't too bad), and in generally playing too cautiously. I have bad memories of Imperial Tark hitting me with 3 AG's vs my single AG (with 3 Summon Deaths, no less) so was very wary to be caught thus again. Overall, this was a pretty good showing for me comparatively, but I kinda feel like I was going for the field goal rather than the touchdown.