Favorites, to battle! - 7 - The Battle of Favorites! - 7

02.02.2015 The_ (Red, Dungeon, Random, Gunnar, Gunnar) def LuckyF (Blue, Dungeon, Random, Sephinroth, Tamika) 2sm4d(3) 214

At the start I was a bit slow heading out to the SM, assuming I would be red, forgetting about the color swap. In short, what I fought for is what I got — a lively SM.
We all picked rests (opponent got Shacti twice :eek:). In the end, it drew red, with two external dwellings of medusas, a home Dragon Utopia, lots of gold, a moneylender with stables and gauntlets — all good if not for one thing — GO along a roadless area, secondary zones connected by a simple road through standard guards. The opponent made it to the RE on meeting... things were more modest there...
Second game, Gunnar spawns from the start, well, that's probably it :o, one road going who knows where, which even Gunnar has to run and run along. The respawn is cut by rocks and mountains, forcing figure-eight maneuvers for scouting. On the respawn there's an external dwelling of cats, but guarded by 19 elementals of mind (since the Sphere of Permanence is thrown in), and hacking through mountains to get there takes 4 days — gave up. I ran along the road, which in fact turned out to be the only one, with a tiny branch to the dungeon GO. On the secondary zone things went better — a couple of crypts, dwarf cottages, and I found two Griffin Conservatories! With the gold I earned, I shopped up, first broke a single, then a triple Griffin Conservatory; at home I picked up another triple with a scout hero, losing an angel and a ton of feeders. Then I went to the treasure zone. Nothing special there — two Dragon Fly Hives with 12 ducks, a few stats, and an external dwelling of Azure Dragons in the far corner of the treasure zone. I flagged it only on the third day and immediately summoned an Azure Dragon. The gold boxes in the treasure zone really helped. That's basically it — nowhere else to run really. Both of the opponent's secondary zones accessible through stone passages were not an option. Through mountains, through forest, I headed to the gates, which went who knows where (because generation was already bugged) — the gates turned out to lead into the treasure zone. There was Tamika, who scoops up two Dragon Utopias right under my nose, and also shows Flight (I already had one GM5 built — completely empty, another GM5 under construction). And then I got lucky — in the corner, right under the Dragon Utopias, lay the КЗ. After that, Gunnar easily caught up with Tamika even with Flight. After the Dragon Utopias, not much army remained. Killing 1 of my Azure Dragons and losing 150 skeletons and 4 angels, Tamika fled. Then I farmed gold for Azure Dragons, broke through the GO, and captured all of the opponent's towns. Through the opponent's secondary zone (or my bugged secondary zone, depending on perspective) I went into the treasure zone the opponent was heading to. There I took a Dragon Utopia giving max +6 all stats and armor +4+4 and junk.
Tamika surprised me in the FB, bringing 1000+ skeletons and 4 new angels :confused: + nearly 20 ducks, 15+ unicorns, 45 orcs, a real mixed bag from all over. Stats were roughly equal — I had literally 2-3 more. Tamika had the КШ, which was equipped against dragons, but for some reason the dragons could still cast — I was as surprised as the opponent.
I had 19 ducks, 6 angels, 4 Azure Dragons, 15 Archliches, 4 cats, split into singles — basically the fact that it was fought without magic only worked in my favor, and victory in the FB came relatively easily. Most likely, if Tamika hadn't worn the КШ, she could have driven back Gunnar, since she had slightly over 240 mana vs my 200, and higher Spell Power.
As the saves showed, there were two Griffin Conservatories on each secondary zone, home Dragon Utopias, two built Citadels up to bears, a built Rampart with an external dwelling up to horses — in short, the full spread.
In a nutshell, for anyone who can't be bothered to read: buy Fairy Dragons — even if they don't carry the game, they demoralize and suppress the opponent. :smile16:
P.S. On day 211 there was a Plague Month, which I think also played a role, since I had practically no critical growth, and summoning dragons and buying them from the external dwelling wasn't much hindered by the Plague.

Thanks for the game!