Noobs vs. Vets II: Mysterio's Revenge, EA, CBM, Game Over. Vets defeat Noobs.

[Ironhawk]

Darloth - say hello to the Tet Offensive!!

Well, helheims version of it, anyway. I look forward to testing your mettle on the battlefield!

[llamabeast]

Re Fomoria's staling, this game does have a master password so you can just use that in place of whatever password Fomoria set.

There is not much of a risk in a PBEM game in telling people the master password - they can't do anything with it unless they get hold of someone else's turns after all.

[Septimius Severus]

Re Fomoria's staling, this game does have a master password so you can just use that in place of whatever password Fomoria set.

There is not much of a risk in a PBEM game in telling people the master password - they can't do anything with it unless they get hold of someone else's turns after all.
Thanks Llama, yes we have worked it out.

[darloth]

I look forward to it with a sense of lambent dread.

However, it may irk you further to learn that this is my first time playing C'Tis (in any age) and, except for a bit of prodding at LA Ermor, my first time on a death-heavy nation.

Sadly, this upstart temerity doesn't stop the turn from falling -just- over my working hours - I can't finish it tonight (I should probably be in bed right now :( ) and I'll have barely an hour tomorrow.

Can I have a 6 hour delay please? I'll play it when I get home, so hopefully I won't use all of that.

[Ironhawk]

I look forward to it with a sense of lambent dread.

However, it may irk you further to learn that this is my first time playing C'Tis (in any age) and, except for a bit of prodding at LA Ermor, my first time on a death-heavy nation.

I insist on you having more dread!! Heheh

Nah it doesnt irk me. We just had some trouble managing your shades at first and had to cook up an alternative plan. Took a long time to bring it to bear but now you see it. Really I think you played CTis pretty well overall. There are a couple of things ling and I want to point out to you, but we cant do it while the game is running.

[Septimius Severus]

Game delayed 6 hours on darloth's request.

[TheDemon]

I'm really enjoying the back and forth in this game.

[Lingchih]

Yes, it has turned out to be a very good game. A bit unexpected... since I thought that the vengeful Vets would quickly dominate the game.

[rdonj]

Well, you are pretty well dominating it thus far. One noob at death's door, another on very shaky legs. No news from abysia of late, but they seem to be on the verge of collapse as well. Caelum did get hit pretty hard last turn... perhaps enough that some ground can be made up. We'll see :).

[Lavaere]

haha, amazed that I lasted as long as I did. considering bad research and a really slow start

[quantum_mechani]

No news from abysia of late, I believe they are down for the count, capital was taken some time ago.

[darloth]

eurgh. That turn was -horrible-. Meanies.

[Septimius Severus]

I see Helheim is denuding my Retiarius.

[Septimius Severus]

Either that or trying to prempt an attack/move.

[Ironhawk]

I see Helheim is denuding my Retiarius.

Yep. You should never ever put gladiators in the field where your enemy can see them. EVER. There's really only like 1 or 2 niche situations where gladiators can be effectively deployed in dominions.

[Septimius Severus]

I see Helheim is denuding my Retiarius.

Yep. You should never ever put gladiators in the field where your enemy can see them. EVER. There's really only like 1 or 2 niche situations where gladiators can be effectively deployed in dominions.

And unfortunately you seem to have hard to detect stealthy units almost everywhere right now.

[LumenPlacidum]

I've submitted turn 27, but would like to either delay turn 28 until Monday or get one of the alternates in to play my Agartha turns for a while due to my needing to go to a funeral. Hopefully whatever needs to be done can be done without my intervention, since I leave early in the morning.

Cheers.

[Septimius Severus]

I've submitted turn 27, but would like to either delay turn 28 until Monday or get one of the alternates in to play my Agartha turns for a while due to my needing to go to a funeral. Hopefully whatever needs to be done can be done without my intervention, since I leave early in the morning.

Cheers.

I'll see if I can contact one of the other alternates (Grudge is already in for Fomoria), if not perhaps rdonj or someone else will handle it. If you have specific plans, be sure to post them on the noob forum before you go. We will try to avoid a delay and/or stale if possible.

[Ironhawk]

Actually Im in the same position as Lumen. Sorry I didnt mention it earlier but I will be away w/o computer access starting tomorrow. Unsure how it could of skipped my mind that I would be unable to turn. I *might* be able to squeeze in turn 28 before I go but no promises. Regardless I wont be back until Monday.

[GrudgeBringer]

I also will be gone Playing Rugby in Tulsa this weekend, leaving at 1 PM CST tomorrow and returning Sunday evening.

I am subbing for the Noobs and If I get a turn before Noon tomorrow I will get it in but that will be the last one I can do until Sunday evening.

[Septimius Severus]

That's odd. All turns are in but the game's not hosting. Well lets force host and see what happens.

Ironhawk, Grudge, Lumen, try to get your turns in before you go if you can.

Edit: Seems every game's got the same problem right now.

[Ironhawk]

I would if I had a turn. Going to sleep soon tho so the window of opportunity is closing...

[Stretch]

Not playing until Monday is good for me too... it's going to be a very busy weekend. I can probably scrape a turn together but not turning until monday night/tuesday morning for turn 28 would be fine by me. It seems like llamaserver is broken for the moment anyway so we won't lose all that much time anyway.

[Septimius Severus]

Oh well, with 3 people out till Monday and unless the problem with Llamaserver is fixed very soon, looks like it'll be Monday at the earliest before we can get to turn 29.

[GrudgeBringer]

Just got the turn and will get it in before I leave (This Turn) but will not be able to do the next one until Monday.

[Septimius Severus]

As we've a few players out for the weekend, hosting will be delayed for 48 hrs.

[Septimius Severus]

Vets, any suggestions on nation mods for MA that are nice, balanced and/or compatible with CBM? I like Nehekhara and perhaps Arga Dis. Though I don't know if they are CBM compatible (QM?). Perhaps we will go vanilla.

[quantum_mechani]

Sombre made quite a few mods CB compatible, though I don't know offhand which ones. Is this for the next newbs vs vets? Because personally I'd kind of like to keep it to regular nations.

[darloth]

If you want extra flavour, throw on holy war and maybe CPCS instead? A couple of endgame summons (I have a tweaked one), especially if Llamabeast finishes his early?

[Stretch]

I wouldn't mind a mod that gives archers eagle-king seeking rocket launchers that work during storms. PS: Damn youuuuuuuuuuuuu Caelum! *shakes fist*

[Lavaere]

well for next game I was hoping to be skaven.
actually with my solo games in MA I normally add Skaven, Nehekhara, Lizardmen, Arga Dis. along with CBM and Standards. with no overlaps that I've seen so far

[Lingchih]

I agree with QM, and think these type of games should be vanilla nations, but with the CBM mod.

[Septimius Severus]

Sombre made quite a few mods CB compatible, though I don't know offhand which ones. Is this for the next newbs vs vets? Because personally I'd kind of like to keep it to regular nations.
Yes, I am considering a few carefully selected and well crafted MA nation mods due the number of proposed players in NvV III.

[Septimius Severus]

well for next game I was hoping to be skaven.
actually with my solo games in MA I normally add Skaven, Nehekhara, Lizardmen, Arga Dis. along with CBM and Standards. with no overlaps that I've seen so far
Well that's good, apparently they all mesh well, you can't tell by looking at the descriptions on the Llamaserver MA nation mod section though.

[Lingchih]

Is it really a Noobs game, if the Noobs are playing mod nations? I don't think so.

There are plenty of other games out there to play the mod nations.

[TheDemon]

I think the purpose of this game is to teach noobs what to expect in a normal game so they can be competitive.

For example, CBM is in the majority of games, so it makes sense. I'm not sure some of the extra spells mods or the mod nations make sense for the purpose of this game until you would come to expect them in a regular game. Sure, it would be a great team game, but it wouldn't hold true to the purpose of noobs vs vets anymore.


And on the subject of EK-seeking rocket launchers that work in storms, that's pretty much what EKs are for everything else :D

[Septimius Severus]

Quite true vets, yes I generally agree. I wanted to keep it to regular nations and maps that are included with the distro. I would point out though that some of the better mod nations are often used in "normal" games and are no more difficult to play than the vanilla ones. Again, I am considering it due to the number of players to allow more choices, most likely they'll be snapped up by the vets who'll again have the optional first choice. My question though is what are the best MA CBM compatible mod nations? In terms of balance, completeness, design, etc. I noticed for instance that some of the Nehekaran commanders had a base movement of 4. Some say there are some that are overpowered?

[TheDemon]

I think the best way to balance nation selection: each team sends an ordered list of all the nations. Vets gets their top choice, then noobs get their top remaining choice, then vets get their top remaining choice, etc until each team is full. This way the "power" nations get distributed between the teams. After all the nations are distributed this way, players on either team can swap for any non-picked nation, first come first served.

As far as mod nations go, I haven't looked at, played with or against any. Not sure what's balanced or compatible.

[Stretch]

I know we're looking for pretty noobish noobs here, but it'd be nice to get people who are actually going to participate in our forum discussions and planning. Perhaps we could emphasize that in the signups for the next game? My first 3 battles were vs. a member of my own team who refused to look at the forum to see what indies I was taking, or respond to ingame messages.

I think 7 or 8 people were using the forum, but we had at least 2 that I'm not sure checked it once. The 7 or 8 people who checked were far more effective than the 2-3 that didn't check.

[Septimius Severus]

I know we're looking for pretty noobish noobs here, but it'd be nice to get people who are actually going to participate in our forum discussions and planning. Perhaps we could emphasize that in the signups for the next game? My first 3 battles were vs. a member of my own team who refused to look at the forum to see what indies I was taking, or respond to ingame messages.

I think 7 or 8 people were using the forum, but we had at least 2 that I'm not sure checked it once. The 7 or 8 people who checked were far more effective than the 2-3 that didn't check.
Yes we are looking for real fresh noobs, some of them may not have even read the basic info about not password protecting your pretender. Formoria did not participate and it cost them. Rest assured I will be much more strict on communication and coordination next time. This will be posted. Also alternates will need to provide an e-mail upfront. You'll find all of this when I put up my proposed settings.

[Septimius Severus]

I think the best way to balance nation selection: each team sends an ordered list of all the nations. Vets gets their top choice, then noobs get their top remaining choice, then vets get their top remaining choice, etc until each team is full. This way the "power" nations get distributed between the teams. After all the nations are distributed this way, players on either team can swap for any non-picked nation, first come first served.

As far as mod nations go, I haven't looked at, played with or against any. Not sure what's balanced or compatible.
Nice idea, though I still think you guys might want to keep first choice, especially given the number of noobs I intend to throw at you. :D Yes, we shall have fun indeed! I'm working on the backstory now. All of my proposed settings will be listed.

[Lingchih]

Get ready Ermor. The Nief Jarls are newly energized and looking for another fight. Let's just say, they have a secret weapon now.

[Lavaere]

Does anyone know where my monkeys ran off to. They seem to have vanished on me

[Lingchih]

Does anyone know where my monkeys ran off to. They seem to have vanished on me

Probably the swine flu. It killed them all.

[Lingchih]

Lanka is now ruled by the prophet of Mysterio. What other nations shall soon follow?

[Lavaere]

now is the downfall of Homo Hibilis, evil, evil, vets

[atul]

Agartha might have won a battle this turn, but considering its pyrrhic nature and the fact that both his castles are now under siege I'd dare to suggest he's losing the war.

[Illuminated One]

I should stop those kamikaze attacks...

[Ironhawk]

Well well, whats this?! CTis getting bullish again?? Methinks you need another lesson, Darloth!

Oh and thanks for all the equip ;)

[Septimius Severus]

Perhaps the other vets should take a lesson from Caelum and shed some provinces. Much less micromangement that way.

[TheDemon]

Perhaps if you realized why I'm still kicking your armies around with less provinces you might have been able to prevent it :D

[Lingchih]

Mysterio sees all that is happening, and laughs. All is going towards the plan.

Now, If he could just find a way out of hell, all would be good.

[Ironhawk]

Hey guys I'm going away for the (US) holiday weekend on saturday morning. Won't be back until monday evening some time. I'm not in control of my ride so I dont know when I will return on monday.

The next turn should be up soonish so I should be able to get that done before I go away. But if the new turn generates quickly, can you please delay it until tuesday night?

[Septimius Severus]

Hey guys I'm going away for the (US) holiday weekend on saturday morning. Won't be back until monday evening some time. I'm not in control of my ride so I dont know when I will return on monday.

The next turn should be up soonish so I should be able to get that done before I go away. But if the new turn generates quickly, can you please delay it until tuesday night?

Go ahead and get turn 31 in if ya can. Delay granted (if needed).

[Septimius Severus]

On behalf of the noob team, I've no choice but to concede the game to the vets at turn 31. I'm proud of the fact that we've lasted longer than the vets did in the previous game and (as of turn 31) all our nations were still alive.

I believe we had become complacent and lost the hunger that we had in the previous game. The noobs simply could not match the maniacal revenge driven determination of the vet team. Communication problems added to our woes and our numerical superiority was simply not enough to combat the experience of the vets. Nor was it enough to overcome the considerable initial advantages granted to the vet team, for which I take full responsibility.

I will allow the game to continue for a few more turns for education's sake.

My congratulations to the vets. It will soon be time for our final showdown.

[quantum_mechani]

I'm proud of the fact that we've lasted longer than the vets did in the previous game and (as of turn 31) all our nations were still alive.

Not to be an ungracious winner, but I would venture that the much larger map size had something to do with that. ;)

In any case, thanks to all the newbs for playing, it was well fought. I look forward exchanging impressions of the game from both sides.

[Lingchih]

Awww... Mysterio never even broke out of hades. What a shame.

Good game though Sept and noobs. We had lots of fun.

Well, maybe if we play a turn or two more, Mysterio will be able to break out and see all the lands his Jarls conquered for him.

[Ironhawk]

Awww, and I just got Circle Masters too! I was finally going to have non-pitiful research :)

Good game tho, noobs! I think that both CTis and Sauro, my two enemies, must have learned a ton. CTis in particular I want to say performed admirably under difficult conditions - well done, Darloth!

And sept dont beat yourself up over the game settings. Truthfully, I think that this game was set up almost perfectly. Even with our comparative early advantage in size, all us vets knew that with the right tactics you noobs would have slaughtered us anyway. It was just a matter of experience and agressiveness - which to me, is the heart of what this game is about, right? So well done there also, I say.

[TheDemon]

Well, I think we stuck to our game plan, coordinated well, and reacted well a few things went to ****. Our wars were never really about territory control, although I'm sure none of us liked getting raided (Lingchih especially :D). Basically the plan on every front was a) smash army b) stop recruitment (squat on forts) c) bring in a siege force and move on to smash the next guy. We kind of left qm to his own devices, since the map layout made it tough initially to get him support.

Lanka, you probably the most aggressive opponent I faced, which was great because playing cautious lets us build up an even bigger advantage. Initially I was supposed to kill you, but you kept on blundering into Niefel, and then we discovered Abysia and priorities changed. One thing I'd advise you to do is script and place your troops. Ganas are great for tanking Skinshifters and unkitted Jarls, and then put your sticks and stones guys just behind them on fire closest. A barrage of high damage missiles is a great counter to Jarls. You didn't face off against my lightning squads much, but one possible counter you could have used would be to leave the troops at home and bring out your recruitable air mage demons, casting resist lightning and then either skellyspam or thug equipment.

Abysia, I feel kind of bad for you because there wasn't much you could have done to save yourself. We felt that you were a pretty big threat to Niefel and lightning is pretty much the perfect Abysia counter, so...

I'll do more commentary after we play out the next few turms.

[LumenPlacidum]

Thanks for the game, folks. I have to say that I learned on the last turn more than I think I learned in the rest of the game. Namely, that splitting up my army to fight on multiple fronts when the opponents are doing it too is not necessarily suicide and that I really REALLY need to have a means of doing more than just fire damage in an army. That was just sad...

On the plus side, even though the attacking force was but a single unit, my indie researchers really gave that one unit what-for with them all casting gifts from heaven until they eventually hit in that communion. I should have tried something with those guys and communions earlier.

[atul]

Good game, it was fun, and well fought noobs. Just some coordination and aggression more and tables would've been turned, I've seen that noobs have learned some dirty tricks. Which is always good.

One thing is that everyone but Sept missed and that was raiding me. I've been topping the gem, gold and research charts for a better half of the game and that's something you do not want. Just for the next time. ;)

[TheDemon]

I have a question for TC actually, why was that lightning immune flying air shielded hounds+mages army you had never deployed offensively against me? You could really have caused problems for me if you had managed to get it into contact with my EK group.

[Stretch]

I protested this concession along with some others on the newb team, but apparently not enough to stop it. This was a disappointing game, as I wasn't close enough to any of the vets (without plowing through an unresponsive 'teammate' which in hindsight I should have done early on) to get attacked until I finally paved a way to Caelum. Soon after that war started (which was shaping up to be pretty interesting), the game ends...

Except for us, my dear Caelum. Except for us. My vans thirst for the blood of eagle kings. Let's do this. LETS. DO. THIS.

I learned things, which was good. Definitely have stuff to apply to future MP games, like expanding faster, raiding more, being more aggressive, expanding my array of dirty tricks early on, etc. If this is done again it would reaaaally be helpful to fill the noob team people who are dom3 noobs but who are comfortable with the arcane arts of forum technology and communicating with people. 6 or so from our team were using the forum but if we had all 10 checking it a couple times per turn it would have helped a lot.

[P3D]

I have a question for TC actually, why was that lightning immune flying air shielded hounds+mages army you had never deployed offensively against me? You could really have caused problems for me if you had managed to get it into contact with my EK group.

Tried to, but even flying they arrived after your mammoth walked into the next province.
Otherwise I'd have had a few EKs of my own.

[Lavaere]

One thing I learnt for this. Apart from some of the obvious battle blunders. Is to spread my research out a little more. Kinda concentrated to much on blood research while not getting a working blood income.

LOL, and I had to be aggresive with Lanka. As I was quickly surrounded on all sides.
I just wish I was able to get up to those annoying vet castles. Hold them long enough to send armies past them deeper into vet territory.

[atul]

Tried to, but even flying they arrived after your mammoth walked into the next province.
Otherwise I'd have had a few EKs of my own.
Movement doesn't work like that. You need to anticipate your opponent's moves or be the attacking party.

As to the time of concession, I think we also thought that it was a bit early, though the end result is probably set already.

And yea, noob team doesn't need to be any bigger, just more coordinated. Especially if you already got into each other's way.

[TheDemon]

Tried to, but even flying they arrived after your mammoth walked into the next province.
Otherwise I'd have had a few EKs of my own.

Well, I meant offensively, or in support of Vanheim's offensive. Seemed once I got my army out, I didn't really see it again. Which was an interesting situation anyway since I wasn't really sure what was going on as qm had done the last two turns for me. Took a bit of thinking as to how I was going to get everyone out alive.



Stretch, I've given orders for this turn, LETS DO THIS indeed.

Oh and one great trick you could have used to get on the offensive is using sailing to skip over the friendly coast and straight to the undefended Caelum farmland. I played that front pretty cautiously when it was opened because I was worried about sailing raiders, when it became obvious you weren't using sailing I was able to move my forces out of response range of my heartland with some confidence.

Maybe later on you sailed your current raiders in, but by that time it was a bit late.

I do agree that the concession seemed a little early, but we probably had inevability around when Ironhawk unleased his bag of tricks on C'tis and Atlantis started his Argatha offensive and I beat off your first army. I would greatly like to play out the next few turns.

On communication, if/when the vet forums are opened you guys will probably see that we posted a lot of information there but made very few decisions there. Fortunately for our team we were all frequent IRC-goers and there was this magical timezone when atul had just got up, qm was home from work, and lingchih was about to go to bed (IH and I have an anytime schedule, I suspect we are both students) where we got most of our planning, coordination and decision making done. I'll see if I can't dig through the chatlogs and find some choice quotes.

[Septimius Severus]

Awww... Mysterio never even broke out of hades. What a shame.

Good game though Sept and noobs. We had lots of fun.

Well, maybe if we play a turn or two more, Mysterio will be able to break out and see all the lands his Jarls conquered for him.

Now how bout telling us who or what Mysterio is?

[Septimius Severus]

I do agree that the concession seemed a little early, but we probably had inevability around when Ironhawk unleased his bag of tricks on C'tis and Atlantis started his Argatha offensive and I beat off your first army. I would greatly like to play out the next few turns.
The concensus among those noobs still active was that we should continue for a few more turns but most including myself believed it would be an uphill battle at best. Frankly, when I returned during turn 10, I knew we were in deep ****. Vanheim was actually supposed to have the front with Hinnom but it seems Formoria expanded in the wrong direction.

To my way of thinking either we win as a team or we don't win at all. I will certainly be more strict regarding communication in the future.

[Lingchih]

Awww... Mysterio never even broke out of hades. What a shame.

Good game though Sept and noobs. We had lots of fun.

Well, maybe if we play a turn or two more, Mysterio will be able to break out and see all the lands his Jarls conquered for him.

Now how bout telling us who or what Mysterio is?

I'll post of pic of the fabled Mysterio when he finally breaks free. I haven't even seen him yet.

I will also open up the vet board for viewing by anyone, once we finish up.

[Lingchih]

Mysterio was a Master Druid, btw. We almost all had master druids. It was the best choice for the game settings. Sorry if you thought he was some kind of uber-monster. Sometimes the lesser pretenders are the way to go.

It was a bit like in WoW, when your whole party is Shamen.

[Stretch]

Thanks, TheDemon. I'd like to fight this war for a bit as it's been fun building up and I'd like to see how things turn out.

[TheDemon]

Depending on what supporting magic you want with your E9 bless a CBM master druid is a pretty good choice, or a great enchantress. Our nations all put a minor nature bless to work, plus we had pretty poor natural nature access, so the druid made a lot of sense. Doesn't hurt that he makes a great rainbow as well.

[P3D]

I decided to leave TC stalling - not switching to AI as it would definitely attack someone.

[atul]

So what's the deal? Turn hosted and it seems at least some of the players are happy to reclaim their lands / spam send lesser horrors. This game going on or what?

[rdonj]

The declaration of concession was something more like a declaration of intention to concede. Several of the noobs wanted to keep playing, so there will be at least a few more turns I guess.

[Stretch]

The game's over as far as bragging rights are concerned, but Caelum and I are having some war games and I seem to be playing whack-a-mole with some damned flying Melqart. I'm not sure which other newbs are still interested in duking it out with a particular vet at this stage, but I think there are a few.

[atul]

Fine by me, the early concession would've prevented me from using all my new toys.

Now please, a list of still active noobs. I want to hurt someone who's still standing.

[rdonj]

Mictlan, C'tis, and vanheim are the only ones that are definitely still playing so far as I can tell.

[Illuminated One]

Attack me please.
Or tell me where you forces are next turn.

[Stretch]

Feel free to bring that Wyrm back over, or whatever other armies you have waiting around that need some exercise, atul. I'd rather none of the remaining vets go the rituals/death-by-a-thousand-cuts route as my goose is obviously cooked. I'd rather bring the armies of the apocalypse together for some awesome last stand battles, almost definitely ending with your armies going at it over the bones of my capital, while my scouts watch and take notes.

[Septimius Severus]

So what's the deal? Turn hosted and it seems at least some of the players are happy to reclaim their lands / spam send lesser horrors. This game going on or what?
People are getting in their last licks as I mentioned.

[Illuminated One]

Well, I invite Atlantis to defend 140, Hinnom to take 167 and Niefel to defend Lanka.

It's a shame only now that the game is ended I have enough blood slaves for all my needs. :D

[Lingchih]

The Team Vet forum is now open for public viewing, but is locked to prevent any new posts.

http://teamvet.forumotion.net/your-first-forum-f1/

Caution: unlike this forum, there are some naughty words in there.

[TheDemon]

Perhaps start a new forum section on the vets site for commentary? I also want to post some IRC logs because the forums don't really reflect our planning process that well, but I don't want to crap up this thread with 3 posts of chatlogs no one wants to read.

[Septimius Severus]

The Team Vet forum is now open for public viewing, but is locked to prevent any new posts.

http://teamvet.forumotion.net/your-first-forum-f1/

Caution: unlike this forum, there are some naughty words in there.

Naughty words? You vets are truly evil.

Nice job on the maps. Hope you didn't give away all your tricks to the public and those who would use it to defeat your ilk in the next game.

[TheDemon]

Ironically as the game grew into the heavilly tactical stage past turn 20 or so, we started posting maps less and less. I think their main purpose was to help everyone familiarize themselves with fronts they couldn't see. Also as we got used to IRC meetings every two days we shared a lot of intel there.

Anyway, here's a taste of vets IRC:

(11:49:08 AM) Ironhawk: i still cant believe i got the plague
(11:49:11 AM) Ironhawk: in my cap, no less!!!

(7:39:11 PM) Lingchih: he had almost won too. the mage had run up to attack him

(8:06:26 PM) Lingchih: did you read how my Jarl got killed, Hawk?
(8:06:47 PM) Ironhawk: yeah you got killed by a sleep touch, eh? thats hard luck too
(8:06:58 PM) Lingchih: almost made me cry
A few days later...
(7:34:04 PM) qm: holy crap, now _I_ lost a sc to sleep touch

(10:35:29 PM) Lingchih: well, this conversation has degenerated to the point where we are talking about maggots in ears. Are we done?

(11:30:55 AM) TheDemon: I'm probably the worst army vs army player ever
This fact proved several times during this very game


Oh and sometimes we talk strategy too:

(5:27:43 PM) TheDemon: qm needs 400, we have about 600 total to give out
(5:28:29 PM) TheDemon: how much would you need in handouts for a fort started next turn?
(5:31:24 PM) Ironhawk: 600?
(5:31:54 PM) TheDemon: might be a bit out of our reach for this turn
(5:32:48 PM) Ironhawk: yeah i dont want it this turn, either. want to see if I luck out with the search
(5:36:17 PM) TheDemon: so for the fort plan this turn, atul sends qm 300, I send qm 100, I keep 250, we have 2 forts starting next turn
That's us on turn 7 or so talking gold-sharing for forts

(1:48:30 PM) atul: Dunno about this whole C'tis debacle
(1:48:49 PM) TheDemon: well, basically we underestimated him a little
(1:49:06 PM) atul: we did, that I admit
(1:49:50 PM) TheDemon: if we figure out how many jarls ling will have, and how many will potentially die, we just send him the equipment to deal with c'tis and I think we have it though
(1:50:06 PM) atul: Yeah well, that's one of my problems
(1:50:25 PM) TheDemon: I don't think the current "make a bunch of stuff" is good enough, we need specifics
(1:55:22 PM) TheDemon: but we need a count on the jarls
(1:55:29 PM) atul: indeed
(1:56:04 PM) atul: Ever heard of "beer distribution game"?
(1:56:10 PM) TheDemon: no
(1:56:27 PM) atul: That's a classic game in system operations research
(1:56:44 PM) atul: has this line of orders with delays and delays in supply
(1:56:54 PM) TheDemon: oh, I have, but they didn't call it that
(1:56:57 PM) atul: Basically it proves how much people make mistakes
(1:57:01 PM) TheDemon: I took a whole class on modelling supply chains
(1:57:07 PM) atul: And we're enacting it now
(1:57:27 PM) atul: My minor's in operations research, we played it as a part of some course
(1:58:04 PM) atul: Anyway, this "I need a bunch, NOW" thing was the stuff that led to a downfall. :p
After Ling lost a few Jarls to C'tis and was in a bit of a panic, and atul and I putting our degrees to use.


(12:43:28 PM) TheDemon: ok. the way I see it is we have 1 turn before you'll need to have your armies in 51/73 to surface against abysia
(12:43:33 PM) TheDemon: as in one extra turn
(12:44:04 PM) TheDemon: I'm hitting 116 this turn, that means the soonest I can clear PD on 88 or something is in 2 turns
(12:44:31 PM) TheDemon: likely it'll be more like 3 as I think my next move is to siege the cap or chase down army remenants
(12:44:48 PM) atul: So if I go to 6 I'll be too late?
(12:45:00 PM) TheDemon: no, if you go to 6 you could make it on time
(12:45:38 PM) atul: 6 this turn, back to 20 - 51 - 88 or so?
(12:45:55 PM) TheDemon: next turn 6 & 116. turn after, 32 and cap. 3 turns from now, 51 and 88, 4 turns from now 88 and wherever
(12:46:03 PM) TheDemon: yeah basically
(12:46:48 PM) TheDemon: let's compare that to a "siege c'tis" plan
(12:54:19 PM) TheDemon: so under "siege c'tis". next turn: atul in 6 and ling in 37.
(12:54:19 PM) TheDemon: 2 turns: atul in 32, ling in 34.
(12:54:19 PM) TheDemon: 3 turns: atul in wherever, ling in 14.
(12:54:19 PM) TheDemon: 4 turns: atul in 11, ling in 272
(12:54:19 PM) TheDemon: 5 turns atul in 273, ling in 260
How we killed Abysia, planning stages.


(11:46:53 AM) Ironhawk: so, i tested out the vanjarl shockwave plan. it has potential
(11:47:03 AM) atul: good
(11:47:28 AM) Ironhawk: I have a strong feeling tho that I will need to use 3A mages (like Vanlade, or Handgodrotts), instead of Vanjarls
(11:47:40 AM) Ironhawk: and there will be a maximum limit on the number of troops I can fight
(11:47:52 AM) Ironhawk: since we cannot afford to forge all the reinvig items

(9:46:05 PM) atul: Did IH yet figure out a solution against Sauro?
(9:46:31 PM) Lingchih: hmm. dunno. ask him, I guesss
(9:46:42 PM) Ironhawk: about to do my tests
(9:46:57 PM) atul: Because I had one idea
(9:47:09 PM) atul: He's got 2 leaders
(9:47:14 PM) Ironhawk: unfortunately CTis didnt step into my trap and now im in a position where I may step into his
(9:47:19 PM) Ironhawk: yah
(9:47:24 PM) atul: TheDemon has seeking arrow
(9:47:33 PM) atul: he has hydras in his army
(9:48:06 PM) atul: basically if you kill both the commanders and attack that province with just a single commander, all the units should be up in one bunch
(9:48:12 PM) atul: and hydras do the killing
Ironhawk and atul brainstorming raiding strategies.

[Lingchih]

Demon, you didn't include any of my drunken ramblings from IRC.

Thanks. :)

Well, actually, you kind of did so.

OK, you can now use the basket to post comments on the Vet board.

[Lingchih]

Actually, theDemon has stepped in and set up a place for comments on the board. Please use that.

[rdonj]

Nice to see the vet forum is open. I'll have to give it a look through. Just looking at the first few threads, you guys had a much higher level of organization than the noobs did this time. I expect that had something to do with the win as well. The noobs didn't even have maps this time, except to show where capitols were placed. One player was going to do them, but had memory issues with their computer and was never able to get one out. I think everyone else eventually forgot about it.... Being able to see what borders look like is definitely very useful for a team game like this I think, it makes the situation of other nations much more real and understandable for one thing.


So who do you guys nominate as graduates for this game? I'm going to assume one of them is C'tis, since he stymied you for a while :)

Oh, I will open the noob forum soon also. I was going to do it once the game was completely through. But with you opening yours up I'm thinking maybe I'll open it sooner. I will ask the noobs what they think about it.

[quantum_mechani]

So who do you guys nominate as graduates for this game? I'm going to assume one of them is C'tis, since he stymied you for a while :)
Personally, if I were to play in the next game, I would mind at all some less newbish newbs in the next game as long as it's accounted for in the player ratios.

[TheDemon]

It's fine if you don't until we're officialy done. The vets forum doesn't have very much scripting info in it or tactical info because most of that was on IRC. Lots of intel, but not so much that can be used against us.

I'd also echo qm's sentiment, I think even if we restarted this game right now with the same players, it would be a lot more challenging for the vet team. C'tis and TC were the ones that stood out for me, TC for his good use of magic, C'tis because every time we had a new trick he'd try something different in response.

[Ironhawk]

Yeah Darloth did a good job. The sauro player did an ok job too - however the only reason he survived was because CTis kept sucking away resources. Honorable mention goes out to whoever thought up the Rain of Toads plan, also. That was a real concern for us, as you can see in our forums. It effectively shut down Niefel for 10 or more turns. In a non-team game that would be have been a death sentence.

So, the vets had talked a couple of times throughout the game about putting together a list of advice for the noobs. We never got around to it but I thought I'd just post some ramblings:

1) Expand FAST - We specifically designed our nations for truly insane expansion speeds so you dont have to shoot for that, but you get the idea.

2) Focus on military gains, not territory gains - I think a lot of the noobs felt a false sense of security when they were able to tie up our raiders or push into vet lands. In dom3 wars, territories change hands rapidly becoming almost valueless except for their location and what you can attack/defend from them. To win, you have to destroy enemy armies and disable enemy production (capture or seige forts). If you arent doing those things you arent winning.

3) Predict Raiders, dont chase them - Dom3 movement mechanics will never allow you to catch raiders if they move away. You have to guess where they will go next to intercept them. Or use magical transport to attack them before the movement phase.

4) Dont buy more than 10 PD!! - Almost uniformly, all vets will purchase only 1pd in any of their provinces. PD are usually bad troops. PD cannot be moved if the front moves away. PD becomes insanely cost-inefficient over 15 or so. And lastly, no determined army or raider will be stopped by just PD. While there are certain exceptions to this rule based on nation and situation, I believe that all noobs should adopt it.

6) Fort production - Almost halfway through the game, we vets marveled at the fact that many noobs still had only their capital forts. Almost from turn 1, any vet will be planning where they can build thier 2nd (and maybe 3rd!) forts. Forts not only give you more mages (!!!!!!) but they also give you more troops and a defensive advantage.

6) Mages - Once any decent amount of research has been done it is suicide to send a large army out into the field without backup of mages. The number one thing that vets do when planning campaigns is figure out what assortment of mages to bring and how to script them.

7) Skelly Spam - the Ench 3 spell Raise Dead is very cheap and quite powerful. So much so that it has its own tactic name. Both my enemies could have used this very effectively early on.

[Ironhawk]

Can someone post a link to the noob forums? I'd like to read them...

[rdonj]

As I said I am considering opening up the noob forum early, but I won't do so unless I get approval from the noobs. There should be a link to the forum on the first page of this thread, you just won't be able to see anything interesting yet. I'll announce in here when the noob's forum is open for public viewing. If I open it before the game officially closes down however I will leave out the last several turn threads so that there is still some mystery.

Illuminated One (mictlan) is the one who came up with the rain of toads deluge. He had planned from turn one to lock 1 person down perpetually. I haven't read through all of your forum yet (comparing your turns with the noob turns side by side. It's an interesting contrast.), but it seems he managed to go for a double lockdown. There was some talk of try to lock down all of your caps if I recall, with priority going to caelum/niefel/helheim. I guess somewhere in there the priorities changed.

[Septimius Severus]

Yes, good job by Illuminated on shutting down vet caps.
Amazing stuff in the vet forum, the organization was equal too if not better than the noobs organization in the original game. This time we had played it somewhat footloose and fancy free and it cost us. Though I doubt I will ever have the time or devotion to take it to some of the extremes the vets did in their intricate planning and chatting sessions.

[TheDemon]

Not sure why you guys didn't go for more cap shutdown than you did. Had you shut down the Caelum cap for more than 5 turns it would have put me out of the game. I was pretty much exclusively using EKs and summons, next to zero troops and very few non-cap mages. That also meant that my expenses were basically a static 400/turn. I mean, I'd spend extra if I had it, but raiding me wasn't going to accomplish much I'm afraid. Niefel, Hinnom and Helheim are all somewhat cap-vulnerable too, but they have good troops they can recruit in their other forts. Not so with Caelum.

Once I realized I wasn't an immediate target I wasn't too worried as I had beelined it to Enchant 4 pretty early and from there it's only a few RP to level 5 and Dome of Solid Air.

On PD - it has its uses, but more than 10 is the exception not the rule, and divining what those uses are is pretty tricky. Often, too much PD in a defensive battle can be a liability rather than an asset as when they get mowed down they can accidentally cause a rout, or they can get caught in your AoE spells and effects (like Hydras, for example). One of the big reasons why I stuck with between 5 to 10 PD for all my lands was because if I ever had to deploy an EK group defensively, I would end up killing all my PD by accident, and they would cause a premature rout even if all that killed them was my own thunder strike spam.

[Illuminated One]

Well, I thought about locking down three caps, had the mages for that. Rdonj put Caelum high on the priority list but I used them against whoever was most scary at the moment, but Caelum would have been next.
But I lacked the bloodslaves through almost all of the game.
When I started it I had two bloodhunting provinces, and with the continous rituals I had trouble expanding it. By the time I could have thought about the third the casts were ineffective against Hinnom and Abysia and Lanka were going down so I focused on blood summons instead.
Kind of surprising that Niefel almost despaired, he seemed never to run out of Jarls.

[atul]

Well, I invite Atlantis to defend 140,
Ha, one turn notice for a nation who'se troops don't fly nor teleport and who is looking at the other direction currently. All right, if it pleases you I can put troops into that pit and leave Abysia for you, but if you were looking for a fight it went to C'tis direction. Sorry.

Hope you like what little I managed to gather, though.

And Sept, what extremes are you talking about? I don't recall any excessive stuff, though we had to plan around you and ourselves every now and then.

And isn't the game over officially if noobs have waved the white flag? Open the forums, rdonj! :p

[LumenPlacidum]

I have high hopes for being able to devote more attention to Noobs vs. Vets III over the summer when I'm not in final exams crunch mode. In the latter half of this game, I ended up staling a few turns and not being able to devote myself to planning and talking to my team. Sorry about that, all.

One of the biggest things I learned: I really don't like Agartha. :doh:

[Ironhawk]

Yeah open the forum up. This game is over - half the people are just staling out.

[atul]

Haha, learned something myself: second shape protects against Aegis/Gorgon effect.

Well wouldn't have done that if this wasn't over already. Have fun with boots of the planes, now is your time to shine. ;p

[rdonj]

Well, as there seems to be a general call to do so and 2 of the remaining players have said it's okay, I am going to open up the forum. It won't be nearly as interesting a read as yours was for the most part though, as I said the noobs were much less organized this game.

Alright, it's open for viewing now. Linky http://teamnoob.forumotion.net/noobs-vs-vets-ii-archive-f5/

[Illuminated One]

Those who shine last shine brightest! But there's nothing left to shine on. :(

Anyway, nice SC, I was quite shocked when I watched the first rounds of the battle.

[Lingchih]

yeah, I'm done. Just staling now. Those who want to can continue the war.

I would suggest shutting it down though. It's time to move on. So, Mysterio never appeared. He was just a master druid anyway.

[Septimius Severus]

And Sept, what extremes are you talking about? I don't recall any excessive stuff, though we had to plan around you and ourselves every now and then.

Eh, perhaps a better word for it is probably devotion. As a whole perhaps we did not put as much time and effort into the game and/or our strategies and planning as the vets this time around (other issues aside). The chat sessions I'm sure helped this communication and organization even more.

Recall the first game, the vets also played it rather loose.

[Septimius Severus]

Let me take this opportunity to thank all those who participated. All of you are brave souls and winners in my book. :up::clap::you:

[darloth]

I'm not too unhappy about how I played that game, although I did make a few big mistakes.

I'm pleased with how I handled my defensive play and strategic choices, and I think my choice of a sleeping Lord of the Gates was possibly the best I could have chosen given the game style - it wouldn't have been nearly so effective in a game where everyone was attacking from all sides, but as a source of cold-immune troops that could stop unequipped giants, it was wonderful. Sadly, they become equipped and I eventually ran out of other troops.

Unfortunately, I recognize now that I wasn't nearly aggressive enough early on (though I still don't know what I could do that would take out those elephants before the Wyrm took them - that really didn't help) and generally spent a few turns moving armies around without much benefit - I didn't want to lose them, especially not to the massive Hel raiding force I KNEW was there somewhere, but until recently I had nothing to really -fight- that with, as I wasn't focussing on evocation.

Overall, I think I did a good job of defending, but should have pushed a bit more, maybe lost some more forces.

Against Atlantis, I was/am expecting to finally lose, as darkness is useless, poison is slow (Foul Vapors is nice, but not -really- nice if you just die a few turns later), and all of those mages are just going to slaughter most of the chaff I can put up. I could maybe kill half army with shades before they get banished away, and poison the other half, but that second huge army, I suspect would kill my forts. I was going to donate most of my stuff to other people if the game continued.
Edit: I was going to gamble on a regenerating ethereal cold immune lucky astral shielded prophetized (so moderately air shielded - A6, not A4) soul-vortexed sauromancer in one fort, and a shedload of banes, the well equipped D27 banelord with some MR boosts in the other...

The 0-pd province was one Ermor planned to take eventually, so it didn't seem worth putting any there - I should have put 1 in to stop scouts though, yes.

Finally, some of my defensiveness may have been EA C'Tis's lack of national scouts - I had really, really bad luck with indie commanders in general, I only got 2 normal commanders and around 6 scouts for the whole game, plus two (admittedly very useful) 5d black servants. The NAP meant I couldn't retake certain provinces that I lost to the Wyrm killing indies early.

Thanks for the praise, I certainly tried my best.

[Lingchih]

I finally read through the noob forum. There's some interesting stuff in there, and some wildly wrong hypotheses. I think this was my favorite:

Darloth:
"I think counter-thugging is the only effective strategy against these fire resistant ice immune regenerating beserk fire shielded magic weapon wielding armour piercing holy avenged cold aura emitting niefel jarls."

LOL. You eventually figured out how to kill them though, didn't you Darloth?

[Ironhawk]

I'm pleased with how I handled my defensive play and strategic choices, and I think my choice of a sleeping Lord of the Gates was possibly the best I could have chosen given the game style

Without question. If you had not had the Lord of the Gates, you would have been quickly knocked out in either the first or second offensives we made against you.

[Septimius Severus]

I'm officially ending this game. Turn 35 will be the last playable turn. Again, thanks for playing.

[atul]

Thanks for the game. Was fun.

[Ironhawk]

Yep, thanks for hosting!