Favorites, to battle! - 8 - The Battle of Favorites! - 8

07.12.2015 FireToSky (Blue, Castle, Valeska, Loynis) def Chemist_HP (Red, Rampart, Kyrie, Kyrie) Spider 143

Turned out to be a very lucky-spinning coil)))
:smile14:

So, Val was bred without upgraded archers, but there are 25 of them, plus a ballista, Octavia, and Rizza. Along the way, I broke through 50+ halflings with Lenya and a prayer, and there stood 40+ gogs behind a scroll and lizardmen. Didn't want to trade archers, so all first week I worked the respawn via chains. I captured an external dwelling of horses, upgraded them at the stables, and at home built them in the Citadel too. At the start of the second week, I take Lenya's Dwarf Cottage with 20, and Valeska breaks through the archers and travels the long road from the respawn. I exited the respawn only on day 123, but the scroll behind the gogs turned out to be a Town Portal scroll :smile54: and the plan became as clear as day — quick construction of some village, while Lenya meantime on two horses with Earth magic moved off-road to explore another passage through the lift. On day 124 — he explored a Rampart village and captured the green barbarian computer
125 — through a bugged passage I see that the green guy is no simple lad and didn't hesitate to thrash ORANGE himself, who by chance also turned out to be Castle :smile54:
From the barbarian to the Castle through the bugged passage is about 2500 moves, so Val only reached him on day 126, and in the Rampart there's already Mage Guild level 2
I prepared for a carefree old age, built a City Hall at the barbarian's, and also at the Castle since it turned out to be the same, planning to leisurely build Mage Guild 4 and by mid-third week fly on Archangels, but no such luck, dammit!!!:eek:
From the lift in the barbarian steppes next to a huge palm tree, Kyrre herself came running-flying and without hesitation took my barbarian with a hefty army in the form of 40+ Grand Elves, 18 Wyverns, 6 horses, and 8 Angels — and that against my 30+ Marksmen and 10 horses scattered across the entire map! :smile40:
All plans go to hell, and only a miracle can save me; I'd cleverly split the army: 6 horses for Valeska and the archers with 2 horses and pikemen on a decoy near the barbarian, which the opponent didn't bother to cut off. So under war conditions, a plan begins to evacuate the rest of the army, finish building the coveted guild, and slow down Kyrre!
In short, I had to set aside an interesting series and seriously focus on calculations. The gist was that from the barbarian to the Rampart, Kyrre needs 2500 moves, to the Castle-town also 2500 — if she captured either of these castles this turn, I would have lost... I disrupted her momentum and set the decoy on the road near the Castle, hoping he could make a difference and that she wouldn't have enough movement, because near the Castle there's a fat Griffin Conservatory, which I didn't dare take.
Lenya meanwhile reached some village in the wilds and with Expert Earth was at the starting line :cool:
Kyrre saw a piece of the Castle from her lookout, but I don't know why she didn't go for it and instead marched like Napoleon into the portal to my capital (which at full speed was 6000+ moves away :D ). Thank the gods, hope appeared, so on day 131 I finish building Guild 4 — there's naturally some junk like Counterstrike and Fire Shield, I split Lenya — he takes the Conservatory level 3, then I jump into the Rampart — the decoys take the Conservatory. Well, overall, while Kyrre ran back and forth, giving up on reaching my capital, I slowly pulled myself together and gathered an army for defense. In Guild 5 they gave me Titans, I planned to rebuild Guild 4 to get some combat spell and slap that cheeky elf, but then disappointment awaited me... We're playing without rebuilding the Mage Guild, CARL:smile31:

On day 134, I still had to give up the Rampart village, fortunately it no longer had anything useful, and I had already taken everything around it — the Conservatory, Dragon Fly Hive, and Cyclops pit) I Town Portaled to a village underground, and from there went to the treasure zone. At the end of the week, I had to move the army from there to defend the Castle-town, since Kyrre saw it was substantial. In the end, Lenya leisurely on days 141-142 takes 3 Dragon Utopias in the treasure zone. All minis(((((( gave all level 6, all level 2, Giant's Bracers, and Kostya Lizard's favorite orb :smile54:
I can already picture Lenya without Dimension Door running on Archangels across the map and offering to pray... yeah, not a cheerful prospect...
But on day 143, after 3 scrolls of junk on Easy Game, I take a Dimension Door scroll in the treasure zone, and from there through papal inspections I see a cluster of red shields not far in another treasure zone, hop-hop, and Lenya caught Nelka with the army. There were 36 Wyverns, 50+ Grand Elves, and 18 horses. All were taken without losses, then I upgraded to Archangels, hopped around the map, and it was my opponent's turn :smile15:
Thanks for the game!