Frechdachs on edge (started)

[Bluebird]

Ok, here we go for the 3rd round of the Frechdachs games. Again, we have the same set of rules as we await the upcoming Dominions 3 (I hope everybody has already placed his or her pre-orders).

Nothing is changed, but you know: Every game of Dominions is different! Have fun ...


Urgaia Map
15 VPs on the map, 9 to win
Independents: 3
Magic Sites: 60
Common Events
Normal research
Richness: 2
15 HOF entries
Starting Provinces: 1
Renaming Allowed
Master PW set
We start with 24h QH
Conceptual Balance Mod 5.4 ( Link (http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/download.php?Number=383903) )


And again, we go for 6 players, but we will also start with 5. Also, I will also give Caelum a try (these flyers look like fun).


Bluebird - Caelum
Wish_For_Blood_Slaves - Abysia
KissBlade - R'lyeh
shovah - C'tis
Reverend Zombie - Marignon



House rules: No Ermor death theme, conceptual balance mod 5.4

Hostname: zoo.in-zueri.ch Port: 8193

[shovah]

Looks like kiss is going to have a fairly big advantage if no-one is atlantis, if some-one is atlantis then their large water income should mean lots of krakens and serpents to eat rlyeh.

[Wish]

I am going with abysia on this one

[shovah]

Abysia and caelum on the same, small map. Hope you can push your dominion hard (both of you)

[Reverend Zombie]

I'll take Marignon.

[Bluebird]

These Frechdachs games tend to become so intensive that I really do not think that R'lyeh has an advantage, but we will see.

And yes, I am really looking forward to the Dominion battle between Wish_For_Blood_Slaves and me http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Wish]

haha

[shovah]

flying and stealthy vrs strong+blood sacrifices. Should be fun.

[Wish]

if its like the last game VPs are going to be the real dominion pushers.

[shovah]

yea, luckily last game (although i lost) i was able to push my dominion with just 3 priests (2 basic guys with jade knives sacrificing 4 a turn and a high priest of the sun prophet with a knife sacrificing 7 slaves a turn).

[Bluebird]

Looks like we are only waiting for shovah to upload his (her?) pretender. My problem is that I will travel to Canada next weekend and I plan to play from there.

As I also want to give a 6th player a chance to join, I plan to schedule the start of the game for next Monday or Tuesday (depending how fast I get Internet connectivity in Toronto).

[shovah]

My pretenders uploaded.

[Wish]

heres to hoping for a sixth

[Bluebird]

Ok - as nobody has joined and all pretenders are uploaded, I will just start the server now. Because of my travel plans, I will not enable a timeout. That way, we can play without the pressure of making a move.

[Reverend Zombie]

New turn's up.

[Bluebird]

Ok, I have arrived in Toronto and I should be able to deliver a turn every 24h. Still, as I am not completely established here, I would like to leave the timer off for a couple of days more (if nobody objects). It should still be possible to get a reasonably fluent gameplay.

[Bluebird]

Ok, as I am now well connected in Toronto, I have enabled the 24h timeout.

[shovah]

Sorry about that reverend, was just a blind dash to have some form of access to the mainland (being boxed in by abysia and rlyeh owns the seas)

[Wish]

heh, well unless marignon is the navigator version, its not like he can invoke a whole lot of retribution.

[shovah]

Not worried about that, just being neighbourly (after attacking and routing a nice sized army of course...)

[shovah]

New turns up

[Bluebird]

Hmm - what is happening there? Abysia bashing C'tis?

[shovah]

No, marignon just took back a province i rather accidently took from him. Once ive finished conquering my little corner of the world i'll either have to take on abysia or do the near impossible and expand to the sea.

[KissBlade]

Haha ... expand to the sea ...

[Reverend Zombie]

shovah said:
Not worried about that, just being neighbourly (after attacking and routing a nice sized army of course...)



Your PoD got somewhat mauled, though, didn't he? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/evil.gif

[Wish]

yeah, our NAP is pretty thin, I suspect in a number of turns I will be fighting the lizards.

[KissBlade]

ARGH ... no wonder my income is so horrible. I just realized I suffered the infamous scales bug and received ONE order scale out of the THREE I took. (which of course also accounts for my random string of bad events) I've also received ZERO growth out of the three I took. THANKS A LOT DOMINION BUG.

[Reverend Zombie]

KissBlade said:
ARGH ... no wonder my income is so horrible. I just realized I suffered the infamous scales bug and received ONE order scale out of the THREE I took. (which of course also accounts for my random string of bad events) I've also received ZERO growth out of the three I took. THANKS A LOT DOMINION BUG.



Yah, my Order scales got nailed by the bug in the last Frechdachs.

[Wish]

weird, I've never noticed that bug

[Bluebird]

Hmm - neither did I, but I fear that there is no way that I can fix this now. Perhaps I should make sure next game that all scales are ok right from the start.

[Wish]

is it possible that someone elses dominion is interfering with kissblades? I mean I know both C'Tis and my own dominion might be overlapping (although in the water areas especially, Rlyehs is winning.) but do the effects overlay a little?

[KissBlade]

No, it's the infamous scales bug that usually happens to Ryleh =).

[Bluebird]

... hoping that this one is removed in Dom3 ...

[PashaDawg]

Hi:

I received a message from shovah by email:

I will be away this weekend and un-able to play, please inform the players of frendauch on edge and animal kingdom. Sorry for any inconvenience.

Pasha

[Bluebird]

Hmm - C'tis has just played, probably the last turn for the weekend. So, as a precaution, I will change the timer to 72 hours. Hope shovah has fun, wherever he is. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Wish]

that is weird - a worldwide drop in dominion (though caelum suffered the least)

What can explain that?

[Bluebird]

Hmm - do not know ...

[Wish]

we could all have events, but I didn't have an event.

[Bluebird]

Weekend is over, we are back to 24h ...

[shovah]

And im back! I had no events either, very strange.

[Bluebird]

I didn't have events, but my searches were reported.

[shovah]

same here. I dont know why but my bets for winning this game are either rlyeh or marignon.

[KissBlade]

haha .. Ryleh?! Might I point out I'm in DEAD LAST on the score graphs. =)

[shovah]

Might i point out this is due to a scales bug and an immobile pretender.

[Bluebird]

Just as a warning: Upcoming week I will have to go to a confernce in Hamilton, Canada. I assume that I will have internet connection during that week, but unfortunately I do not know when and where. There is a very hight chance that I will still be able to do at least 1 turn every 24h, but as I do not know what awaits me, I will have to switch off the timeout.

If that is unacceptable to you, please let me know and I will try to find a sub for this period of time.

[Wish]

okay by me

[Bluebird]

Is Reverend Zombie away? 2h left on the timer.

[Wish]

I think he staled

[Bluebird]

Hmm - that is bad. As announced, I will stop the timer tomorrow evening anyway, but I still would like to get forward with the game.

[Bluebird]

Marignon seems to be there again. But I have disabled the timeout now, as announced.

[Reverend Zombie]

Wish_For_Blood_Slaves said:
I think he staled



I don't think I staled.

[Bluebird]

Ok, but it was close http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[shovah]

New turns up.

[Wish]

that aught to even things out a bit.

[shovah]

What?

[Bluebird]

Ouch, that was an ugly drop is army size. A pitty that I missed to observe this battle.

[Wish]

really it was just a horde of undead verses a dozen priests. pretty typical stuff. he did decay all my expensive troops though :/

[shovah]

Ive always been fond of f9 guardians of the pyre (since they got fireshield) so its nice to see some-one try them in mp. And it wasnt exactly typical since the undead won.

[Wish]

but with heavy losses

[shovah]

i did some rough calculations and if one death gem is worth 20 gold i won that battle by around 1000 gold, despite what the actual numbers say (can you tell me exactly how many pyre guards you lost? i have the figure around 30ish atm)

[Wish]

ah yes, but 1000 gold is two turns for me, and I imagine even if you have a hefty death income from searching sites, that 50 death gems is about 5 turns for you. and maybe even 12 if you haven't had luck with searching.

It is much too relative to pin it to a subjective gem value - when it comes down to it, both of us can reproduce the armies in a very short time.

[shovah]

Not quite, while you might get the gold back quickly the resources arent so easy to come by, if you have good production scales id reckon it would take you 4 (or 5 if your dominion isnt high) turns just to get those pyre guards back (problem with that abysian theme is it has so many capitol onlys).

[Wish]

true that, I can produce 6 per turn (i have sufficient resources with fortified cities and neighboring mountains) and could get more if i invest in temples... luckily I also have some amazons, for double the sacred troop output.

the guardians, however, weren't the decimating factor in the battle. They just served as a shield/target between the priests and the undead (next time the shield will likely be cheaper)

[shovah]

Damn, banelords officially suck today, first i lose one to a single charm caster in the crazy game and now i lose one in this game due to routing into bloody enemy territory.

[KissBlade]

Banelords don't have THAT high MR ... though losing one to routing into enemy territory is sort of your fault =).

[Wish]

see shovah, thats why you give them lycanthropos charms instead of regen rings. Its not like you need them to cast spells anyway - and undead don't turn into skinshifters.

[shovah]

Wish_For_Blood_Slaves said:
see shovah, thats why you give them lycanthropos charms instead of regen rings. Its not like you need them to cast spells anyway - and undead don't turn into skinshifters.



You learn something new everyday, i never knew the skinshifter thing.

[Bluebird]

As the IP situation seems to have been nicely solved for me, I have allowed myself to switch the timer back on. The timer is now 48h.

[Wish]

looks like shovahs going to need it back off till monday.

[Wish]

what I am saying is shovah posted he wont have internet till monday...

meaning hes gonna stale in 5 hours and again on sunday.
which kind of sucks since hes in the middle of a war.

[Bluebird]

Ok, this will not happen. I will switch the timer off again. Thank you for reminding me.

[Bluebird]

Anybody knows when shovah will be back?

[Wish]

hes supposed to be back sometime today. probably safe to turn back on the timer.

[shovah]

I am here, unfortunately due to the crappyness of windows xp i cant get dominions working, feel free to turn me ai as i dont want to delay you any longer (and am basically dead)

[Bluebird]

Are you sure? After we waited so long for you, I think we can wait a couple of hours more http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[shovah]

I dont expect it to be fixed that quickly and wish's hordes from hell have killed me so dont worry. Sorry.

[Bluebird]

Ok - switching you to AI if nobody objects. Was nice to have you onboard.

Bernd

[KissBlade]

I rather object to it since we have a VP game and turning a player AI imbalances such things significantly.

[Wish]

he doesn't have anymore VPs though. I think rlyeh and myself already gobbled them up.

[Bluebird]

Ok, shovah, can you please send the password to QM - he will take over.

[Wish]

dang, QM?!

dang.

[KissBlade]

XD

[shovah]

QM got the password (well i sent it) although i dont see him pulling something out of my mess of an empire (though i wouldnt be too suprised)

[Wish]

well he recognized my hordes as raiding parties and already reconquered all but 2 of the provinces they took out.

[Bluebird]

Ok, I will set the server back to 48h, to get a regular rythm back into the game.

[shovah]

If they were anything but raiding parties you would have targetted them all at one place, i simply lack the tactical and strategic mind to produce the same results as QM (hopefully dom3 will slightly bridge the gap between the new players, the intermediate players(where i hope i can place myself) and the advanced players(QM and the gang))

[Wish]

I aint met anyone whos better at this than QM. :/

[Wish]

oh yeah, the other downfall to playing agains QM (other than the fact that he WILL win) is that he uses every last minute available to him, on average - thinking and rethinking - and micromanaging every little detail.

so the game will have a notably slower pace.

[KissBlade]

I have proof that QM HAVE lost in blitzes =). Generally if every other player attacks him =D. Of course, given shovah's incredibly horrid scales, he does have his work cut out for him.

[quantum_mechani]

oops, sorry about the long turn wait... forgot I was in a long term game again. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Btw, wish, sorry you didn't get warning about me stepping in, your game certainly has improved a lot since the last time we played.

I think kiss has the game in hand, however. He is the most powerful player currently, not at war with anyone, has access to pretty much everywhere through the seas. Together with his astral for teleporting, I anticipate a (successful) vp grab any time now.

[KissBlade]

quantum_mechani said:
oops, sorry about the long turn wait... forgot I was in a long term game again. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Btw, wish, sorry you didn't get warning about me stepping in, your game certainly has improved a lot since the last time we played.

I think kiss has the game in hand, however. He is the most powerful player currently, not at war with anyone, has access to pretty much everywhere through the seas. Together with his astral for teleporting, I anticipate a (successful) vp grab any time now.



You claim that EVERY game XD.

My income and troops are bare minimum so I doubt any teleporting VP grabs will be very successful. Also might I point out any teleporting solo illithid starspawn will probably be owned by pd =P.

[Bluebird]

PD? What was that again? ^^

[Wish]

dang this is a fun game http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

I'm probably just amused that your mammoths got scared and tried to run over your air queen.

[Bluebird]

Jup - errm - somewhat unfortunate ;-)

[Bluebird]

Ok, I am dead - time to switch on the AI. If there is any issue with the server, please contact me via PM, as I might not follow this forum anymore.

Was really a nice game until Marignon back-stabbed me (I though we had a NAP, I must have missed that cancelation message - all future NAPs with me must be canceled via PM). ;-)

[Reverend Zombie]

Bluebird said:
Was really a nice game until Marignon back-stabbed me (I though we had a NAP, I must have missed that cancelation message - all future NAPs with me must be canceled via PM). ;-)



I have fallen prey to the NAP cancellation via in-game message -only ploy myself. It was the last Frechdachs game, in fact. There's no way for me to prove I sent you the message at this point (I did, I promise!), but please do not take it personally, whatever you choose to believe.

Thank you for hosting! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

[Bluebird]

Hey - how is the game doing? A status report would be great ... ;-)

[KissBlade]

Actually a stalemate between the four powers with qm's position (unsurprisingly) gaining strength. =)

Speaking of which, I believe he was looking for a sub but I had told him, under no uncertain terms, that my peace treaty with him ends with the player not the nation. Hehe ...

[Bluebird]

Yes, QM wanted to pass the game of C'tis to me, but with your statement in the back of his mind, it looks like he decided to continue playing.

[KissBlade]

hehe ... yeah ,.. well if you would like to play though, I will be willing to withhold hostilities. =)

[KissBlade]

Are we all ganging on me because you're all not convinced qm is a threat at the moment? Or should I point out he has the highest in every graph save research? AND it's QM playing.

[KissBlade]

On a side note, what are people's thoughts about just calling game a stalemate since dom III is out and every other game is close anyway?

[KissBlade]

Alright well I'm staling out since I'm so flustered I'm making simple mistakes. I accidentally DROWNED my SC.

[Bluebird]

You did WHAT?!

Are you still playing? Should I continue hosting?

[KissBlade]

Yeah I'm going to do my turn still *grumbles grumbles*. Just really really annoyed at this game right now =). And yes, I DROWNED My SC. Actually I probably won't be playing this game soon though, I'm getting Dom III soon after all! Yay! Birthday!

[KissBlade]

Hey guys, qm and I have looked at each other's turns and decided to call it a draw. How would you guys like to proceed? If you'd like, I can withdraw forces and let you two fight out, or you can duel my super awesome pwnage SC of Theulla to see if anyone can take her down. =)

[Wish]

I got 4 demons and two fire kings, I imagine I could take her down. This whole game sort of looks like a draw, really.

[KissBlade]

Wish_For_Blood_Slaves said:
I got 4 demons and two fire kings, I imagine I could take her down. This whole game sort of looks like a draw, really.



Alright since we're pretty much calling it, then I shall attach a file ... BEHOLD THE PRIDE OF RYLEH!

PS. Yes that's the Magebane/Amon Hotep/Jade Armor. I can deck her out with other stuff as well (like AEgis or Summit with a Pendant of Luck) but so far that seems the most optimal with a huge 21 hp regen.

[Bluebird]

Ok - can I take down the server? I still have no definitive answer.

[KissBlade]

Yep, take it down =)

[Reverend Zombie]

Wife and I just had our baby, so I concur!

[Wish]

yeah

[KissBlade]

Reverend Zombie said:
Wife and I just had our baby, so I concur!



Hey congrats =).

[Reverend Zombie]

Thx!