Troubling Times: Game over, Marverni wins

[Amhazair]

Sigh, Bye Bye S5 Tart. Cry.Hah! Seriously? Allways happens at the worst possible time, doesn't it? :)

[PriestyMan]

There really isnt much point in conitinuing then in my opinion. The game may as well be over if marv gets an easy conquest. the chances of finding a sub, and especially one of zeldor's caliber are very low. even if a vet could be found, no sub can do as well as the orgional. if amhaizer won't roll the turn back, we may as well end it. congrats on winning such an easy war. maybe it will teach zeldor to do turns on time.

not sure its a fair win though

[Zeldor]

PriestyMan is right that stale is partly my fault - if I had time to do it earlier, I wouldn't risk some llamaserver problems or other stuff.

I have full right to decide about my nation though. I don't see a point in continuing my struggle just to make someones victory a bit more legitimate. Or to play kingmaker, when no one was really interested in my support. And I certainly don't see how game admin would suddenly gain right to give my nation to someone else and introduce rollbacks to do so.

I think that Amhazair had it won for a while - because of combination of luck, skill, sheer determination to win + incompetence of many opponents.

[Aethyr]

I have full right to decide about my nation though. I don't see a point in continuing my struggle just to make someones victory a bit more legitimate. Or to play kingmaker, when no one was really interested in my support. And I certainly don't see how game admin would suddenly gain right to give my nation to someone else and introduce rollbacks to do so.

Zeldor, you have the right to decide if you continue or not, but you do not have the *right* to turn yourself AI w/o any attempt to find a sub (or opportunity for the admin to do so).

@PriestyMan: Could you clarify please, are you saying that you think Marverni has won even if we rollback & find a sub?

@Amhazair: It does seem you have things well in hand, but under the circumstances perhaps you'd care to share your VP total with us? :)

[Verjigorm]

@Amhazair: It does seem you have things well in hand, but under the circumstances perhaps you'd care to share your VP total with us? :)

I would agree that it would be quite constructive to share not just one but all VP totals to get a sense of where the game is at.

[Numahr]

Well strictly speaking nothing in the game rules specifies that players will have to display their VPs. So I guess that doing so or asking anyone to do so falls into the category of diplomacy: you are free to do it or not.

[Amhazair]

There really isnt much point in conitinuing then in my opinion. If this is the general sentiment, then far be it from me to drag the game on by the scruff of the neck far past it's expiration date, so I'll ask again, as I did the previous time Zeldor was planning to walk away: Are there more players who just don't think the game is fun anymore? From the posts after this I have the impression several players are cautiously of the opinion the game could still be fun.
@PriestyMan: Could you clarify please, are you saying that you think Marverni has won even if we rollback & find a sub?

@Amhazair: It does seem you have things well in hand, but under the circumstances perhaps you'd care to share your VP total with us? :)Sure. From memory I currently hold 17VP. I'll fire up the game later to make sure. (Edit: Indeed, 17VP atm.)

I'm obviously in a solid position now, but I don't think it's anything a good dogpile won't fix. (The artifacts game has left me in absolute awe of the power of dogpiles. Those who have heard of it will know what I mean.) If several nations contribute competently there's just way to many provinces that can be taken in one turn, and I don't have hordes of clams hiding behind my walls obviously. One of Zeldor's frustrations though was (I believe) that he didn't see that dogpile developping so far, so I don't know if anything like it is about to materialize.

And quite apart from any chance of victory, I do believe there's a few newer or "intermediate" players who are now for the first time sitting on a largish end-game nation. Testing out some things and learning what works could be a great experience for them even if they never get close to victory.


I have full right to decide about my nation though. I don't see a point in continuing my struggle just to make someones victory a bit more legitimate. Or to play kingmaker, when no one was really interested in my support. And I certainly don't see how game admin would suddenly gain right to give my nation to someone else and introduce rollbacks to do so.

Zeldor, you have the right to decide if you continue or not, but you do not have the *right* to turn yourself AI w/o any attempt to find a sub (or opportunity for the admin to do so).
Well, I was about to reply this, but seems Aethyr pre-empted me.

I'm also pleased to anounce that Executor is prepared to take over if I don't find anyone else, although he is quite busy and would prefer it if I could find someone else. Search is thus ongoing for now.

[Numahr]

Caelum is willing to continue the Ascension Wars to their bitter ends.

[PriestyMan]

And quite apart from any chance of victory, I do believe there's a few newer or "intermediate" players who are now for the first time sitting on a largish end-game nation. Testing out some things and learning what works could be a great experience for them even if they never get close to victory.

this seems rather pointed. I've been playing for a couple years now, and i've been in large endgames enough times to understand the work they involve. including lategame with clams. anyways. lol


I'm also pleased to anounce that Executor is prepared to take over if I don't find anyone else, although he is quite busy and would prefer it if I could find someone else. Search is thus ongoing for now.

executor might make it a real fight again, but(and i know everyone will hate this) i think we ought to roll back twice so that marverni doesnt get two free turns or rocking formoria. from what i heard from Zeldor, it sounds like those free hits are pretty massive and crushing. Executor hasn't seen the turn after anyways, so marverni is free to not change their plans, and exec would be responding in a logical way without previous knowledge.

[WraithLord]

Hey guys, just sort of stumbled into this thread (actually from a post in the other forum :) ).
If possible I'd like to further encourage you to get the game to conclusion and not turn a powerful nation to AI, thus breaking the game, thus most players (but winner) have played so much and got so far for nothing. At least do a decent effort to fight Amhazair, it may be actually fun to fight such an uphill war. It's the sort of stuff bards sing about for years to come :D

I'm just a visitor here, I hope I got the facts at least halfway right and am right at least half the time ;)

GL all.

[Aethyr]

I am willing to continue, as I'm still having fun.

I have mixed feelings about rolling back two turns, but I trust PristyMan's view on this. However, in fairness, I would like to hear Amhazair's opinion as well.

@ WL, are you volunteering to sub? :D

[Amhazair]

I have mixed feelings about rolling back two turns [...] However, in fairness, I would like to hear Amhazair's opinion as well. My opinion is that rollbacks are the spawn of the devil and should be avoided at nearly all costs. :)

Especially Rollbacks where (one or more) players get the opportunity to redo their turns, after seeing the previous one, and thus knowing what everyone else was up to, they just open waaay to many possibilites for arguments and recriminations. I have to say I'm hard pressed to think of a situation where I would think this was a good idea. (A litteraly game-breaking bug maybe? The game being the cause of a cosmic tear causing our solar system to be swallowed into the dominions universe right after Ermor's fall would probably qualify.)

I also checked with some other game admins to see what their thought was on the matter (After all, I'm a newbie as game admin, so allways prepared to listen to wiser heads than mine ;)) but they all pretty much agreed with me on the subject.

Luckily, with Fomoria gone AI, Llamabeast has agreed to go to the trouble of rolling back this last turn, using all our submitted turns, so no one can take advantage of posterior knowledge, and allowing the sub (who has no previous knowledge) to submit a new turn. (And a massive thanks for Llamabeast, who doesn't normally do this, but will do it due to the special sircumstances, as well as my adorable puppy-dog eyes.) This will limit the sub to a single stale.

I had also planned to not to perform any offensive action this last turn and refund the income from the provinces I took in the post stale-turn, but unfortunately, due to my screw-up with extending the timer my original turn-with-offensive-action got allready taken into account, and will be used by Llamabeast along with all the other turns. I will do something similar for next turn though, I'll hash out the details with the new player.

In further news, none of the other players I asked seem to be willing or able to sub in, so I asked Executor to confirm his take-over.

Oh, and to answer in Wraithlord's stead: He was one of the players I asked, (Can't imagine a tougher nut to crack amongst the current crop of players) but regretfully he had to decline.

[Zeldor]

See, that is funny. You are willing to go through lots of trouble [even imaginary, as it's standard that when you roll turn back all turns are kept, without any action needed from llamaserver].

So instead of offering me anything that would convince me that I should stay after a stale turn, you prefer to find someone else to replace me and offer him better conditions. All for game not endangering your victory in the game and addition of it to HoF. Great way to admin the game.

[TheConway]

Well, inconsistency is not exactly a good thing, but he has a point in that you're tendency to wait until the very last minute to even send in a preliminary turn is a large part of what led us to this impasse. However, if Amhazir is willing to give more generous terms to a sub rather than the original player that is pretty underhanded.

[Amhazair]

So instead of offering me anything that would convince me that I should stay after a stale turn, you prefer to find someone else to replace me and offer him better conditions. I offered you the exact same: One turn with no offensive action from my part while you were free to do as you wished.

I also fail to see why I should "convince" you of anything. Either you want to play on, or you don't. It's your call.

For reference: I could agree to some less brutal solution - 5 turn cease-fire, all provs return to me + you compensate me for all my losses, lost income, items, research and cost of retaking my provs. We could resume war back then and see if you really deserve to win it. Is what I did NOT agree to as it's plainly ridiculous.

I will also say that any agreement I, as a player, make with an opponent is a voluntary friendly gesture from my part, and has nothing at all to do with my job as game admin. If I, or any other player, would answer you that I/he doesn't feel like changing his turn just because you didn't get your turn in in time I don't see why I/he should be blamed for that. (Appart from the fact that I'm indeed in the delicate double position of opponent and game admin, and should thus indeed be consistent to whoever plays Fomoria.)

[Rytek]

I can't stand roll backs and am never for one; even if it were to benefit me. I just don't see the point in them. Even in this case. An AI formoria is bad. But it also could be the trigger that causes the dogpile upon Marverni as even I would be loathe to sit by and watch as he absorbed the AI and all the victory points without a reckoning first.

[PriestyMan]

hey, rytek showed his face. maybe now he'll answer his pm's

[Verjigorm]

Zeldor, you seem to be getting a bit.... How shall I put this... "bent out of shape" for no reason other than you feel that you will lose to Amhazair, and that you don't like to lose. In my opinion, going AI is one of the worst things you can do in this game as it disrupts the progress of the game. It's sort of like tipping over a chess board when you lose your queen.

Sure, he may be able to win, but this game is rather huge and there are a lot of players. I'm had been getting kind of bored with it (up until I was attacked), but I'm certainly not ready to toss my arms in the air and storm out of the room like a spoiled child.

I used to be a game "hot head" when I was in college--I was really good at games most of the time and I was, obviously, conditioned to be competitive and to consider myself better than everyone else, but that just made me an arrogant ***. Of course, testosterone being what it is, I may have simply mellowed in my age...

The purpose of the game is to stimulate the mind, not to win. Working from an "underdog" position always excites me--what can I do against an opponent who has power beyond reason? It is in these situations where one gains the most from playing the game. You don't get nearly as much from being dominant.

I suppose that this makes me a rather poor ally since you can't always count on me to "do what everyone else does" and always take the "Min/Maxed" obviously dominant strategy in a game, but it has been interesting thus far except that I haven't really been attacked by anyone up until now, and as soon as I start fighting.... Here we are with the people calling for the end of the game... Why am I playing again? Certainly not to play the exact same way 13 other people did before me...

Bleh, now I'm rambling.

[Zeldor]

Nah, I don't mint losing games or wars. I knew my chances pretty well and I knew Marv is going to attack me sooner than later.

My complaint is that I just don't agree to go with a stale a turn after getting invaded. I can fight normal wars, but only against opponents, not situations like that.

Maybe at least some people will start caring about the game now - at least posts here look like that.

I know rollbacks are evil and I would never insist on that after a stale. It was enough for Amhazair to be understanding and offer some solution to make the war fair instead of being arrogant and thinking about easiest victory to make me stay in the game and fight till the end.

[Verjigorm]

I must've missed something as I was not aware of the stale (reads backwards).

[Executor]

Hello again everyone. I just received the turn from Llamabeast and it seems I'll be stepping back as Fomoria this time.

Now, I'll have to apologize in advance as I'll certainly need some delays. The next 15-20 days I'm going to be extremely busy as I have a couple of exams I *have* to pass, and there are other stuff that demand my attention, like Serbian New Year tonight so happy New Year to me! But seriously I'm rather busy and have a lot of stuff that demand my attention besides my exams which start in just a few days, and that's why I preferred someone else take over Fomoria (I still do), or Zeldor take it back again.

I will do what I can to stop Marverni, but from looking at the turn I can pretty much tell everyone that if I don't get some support Fomoria will get rolled over and that will most likely king Marverni as the winner.

It's not easy taking over a nation at this point in a game, especially in this large a game, with two stales and a massive invasion. And I have no idea what Zeldor planned, what his strategy has, or even what Marverni is throwing at me at this point as I can't see a lot with the second stale.

So several of you will be hearing from me shortly,
and Everyone is offered peace and a NAP, and a renegotiation of the borders, except Marverni.

Cheers all.

[Aethyr]

Welcome back Executor, and thanks for stepping in to help keep the game alive.

[Aethyr]

Amhazair, could you please clarify what I need to do with the most recent turn? Do I need to resubmit, and if so what turn number, or will Llamaserver handle the rollback without any action on my part.

Also, should I expect a "new" turn file, or play the turn that I've already recieved? Sorry, but I'm a little confused at this point. Thanks

[Amhazair]

Amhazair, could you please clarify...Sequence of events:

* Executor has now received turn 63 from Llamabeast.
* He will now play that turn (having not received turn 64, he should have no knowledge of events in that turn.) and send it in.
* I rollback the server from the current turn 64 to turn 63, submit Executors new Fomoria turn (which replaces the one turning Fomoria AI) and immediately force hosting again.
* The game will then resolve the turn, using everyone's previously submitted turn 63's + Fomorias new one.
* We all get a new turn 64
* We play on using that new turn.

And all hail to LLamabeast for spelling the above out for me. :)

[Amhazair]

It's not easy taking over a nation at this point in a game, especially in this large a game, with two stales and a massive invasion. And I have no idea what Zeldor planned, what his strategy has, or even what Marverni is throwing at me at this point as I can't see a lot with the second stale.Just a small clarification: With the turn 63 you got Zeldor staled just once, not twice. Also, the fact you don't know what I'm throwing at you has more to do with the fact I disguised my real armies by attacking the provinces they moved into with remote attacks first, than with any stale. You should actually know as much about what I'm throwing at you than Zeldor did. (Though Zeldor probably knew more about what he himself was doing than you do.:D)

PM'd with more details.

[ghoul31]

Let us know when we should be entering a turn.

[Executor]

I'll be submitting the turn to Amhazir during the day so he can force host it. So expect a new turn during the day.

Although I have to admit rollbacks, even in this case, are the work of the devil IMO, as I've only been in 2 games that were ever rolled back and they both crashed...

[Amhazair]

Hurray! Everyone should receive a new version of turn 64 in the next few minutes, and we should be ready to continue now.

Before playing your new turn, it is advicable to first delete the .2h file you currently have in your game folder. Some of the glitches that are sometimes experienced with rollbacks (Orders not being accepted and the like) might be caused by players not doing this, so in your own intrest, don't try to save 30 secs of your precious time by not doing this. Better safe than sorry.

So to be very clear on how to proceed:

1) Delete the .2h files currently in your games folder.
2) Save the new turn file in the game folder, thus overwriting the previously received turn 64.
3) Play your turn as normal.

[Amhazair]

Huh, this is weird: We're at 72h hosting, I forcehosted the game on monday 17:10h GMT, so the next hosting should be today at the same time, right? I'm also almost completely certain I checked hostingtime on tuesday and saw it being thursday, and yet, now it stands at friday at 17:10h. And yet the admin log doesn't show anyone changing the timer. (And I know for certain I didn't.)

I don't mind too much, maybe some people like a day extra to get back in the swing of things, and Executor said he'd be busy these days, but I am curious. Anyone have any idea of what can cause this? I don't suppose the Llamaserver or Llamabeast add an extra 24h to all games due to the patch or anything?


Oh, and talking about the patch: For those who haven't found out yet: For the current turn it doesn't matter whether you upgrade your Dominions or not, both ways work just fine. You will have to upgrade to be able to open the next turn. So, in essence, you can't do anything wrong.

[PriestyMan]

i'm pretty sure llamabeast delayed all games by a day or two when he patched

[Amhazair]

Ah, goody. You saved me from a sleepless night. Curiosity can be a quite annoying trait sometimes. ;)

[Amhazair]

Grrmbl. Anyone happen to receive an unexpected Ring of Sorcery from me this turn? Looks like it didn't arrive at the intendent recipient. :(

[Executor]

Not sure what just happened. I was certain I set that army from my cap to attack you and not patrol Marverni.

As for that other battle, hampering army movement with scouts is considered an exploit Amhazir.
I presume that was not your intention with the 2 GRs you cast at the province but still. At least you should not have used a scout from the province I was moving to. I probably wouldn't have won either way even if that army had joined, but Im sure I would have taken out a very large portion of that army.

[Amhazair]

As for that other battle, hampering army movement with scouts is considered an exploit Amhazir. I'm assuming you mean your army in Turmish, right? (Since you mention 2GR) I had actually ordered my entire army from Hlondeth to move there, with the intension of not letting your two armies combine. (And, if I was lucky, have a battle where you had used up your gems against the ghost riders.)

Looks like my army cancelled your move, and then your other army comming in from the Wetwoods then cancelled mine, but at least I achieved my objective of only fighting one army at a time. :cool:

(Assuming from your comments that the army I fought was comming from Wetwoods, wasn't sure if that fort was emptied out before.)
Not sure what just happened. I was certain I set that army from my cap to attack you and not patrol Marverni. If you were planning to attack Chessenta, perhaps your move got cancelled by my small probing army you smashed? If you were in fact planning to support your pretender (and I did wonder what he planned to do on his own) then I have no idea either.

[DrPraetorious]

Not that it much matters, but can we get 24hr notices instead of 12hr? I'm probably about dead anyway, so it may not matter if I'm the only one who'd prefer a longer notice interval.

[Amhazair]

Not that it much matters, but can we get 24hr notices instead of 12hr? I'm probably about dead anyway, so it may not matter if I'm the only one who'd prefer a longer notice interval.Sure thing Dr. Should have remembered doing that when we switched to 24h I reckon.

[Executor]

As for that other battle, hampering army movement with scouts is considered an exploit Amhazir. I'm assuming you mean your army in Turmish, right? (Since you mention 2GR) I had actually ordered my entire army from Hlondeth to move there, with the intension of not letting your two armies combine. (And, if I was lucky, have a battle where you had used up your gems against the ghost riders.)

Looks like my army cancelled your move, and then your other army comming in from the Wetwoods then cancelled mine, but at least I achieved my objective of only fighting one army at a time. :cool:

(Assuming from your comments that the army I fought was comming from Wetwoods, wasn't sure if that fort was emptied out before.)
Not sure what just happened. I was certain I set that army from my cap to attack you and not patrol Marverni. If you were planning to attack Chessenta, perhaps your move got cancelled by my small probing army you smashed? If you were in fact planning to support your pretender (and I did wonder what he planned to do on his own) then I have no idea either.

Ah, in that case I do apologize Amhazir. I must say I'm rather curious as how my plan for you to auto kill yourself with gift from heaven would have worked with both armies. :)

No actually, your small army didn't cancel them out. They did patrole for some reason, spies were captured.
And the weirdest part is commanders that weren't under the patrol order, once I opened the turn, were patrolling as well.
Why my pretender moved is beyond me? They were all selected into a single group, so they should have either *all* patrolled or moved.

Being all paranoid and stuff I'd have to be very suspicious about the rollback.

[Amhazair]

Being all paranoid and stuff I'd have to be very suspicious about the rollback.Shouldn't any potential rollback-related wonkiness be confined to last turn? I don't have any technologicaly nor inside knowledge, but logically speaking I would find it weird if any new effects could be caused a turn or two down the road. After all, this turn was played perfectly normal in all ways, no?

[Amhazair]

I know I'm probably giving away waay too much important strategical information, (At least if you own a magnifying glass...)but come on: Isn't this a glorious view? (Yes, my scouting network has grown massively since BoT stopped killing my scouts ;))

This one immage sums up why I like playing massive games. It's grand. It's epic. It's earthshaking. It's Dominions!

[Amhazair]

Well, Llama sent out a mail to all players, so you should allready now, but to repeat: One thing I forgot to do is postpone all games before turning it back on (and in fact I also forgot to get it to process admin commands so any delays by admins won't have worked) - very sorry about this, hope not too many of you staled. This doesn't really match my experience, since my turn was also sent in after the troubles started, (And thus never registered as 'received') and was still accepted and processed just fine, so I have no idea what caused the difference. Unfortunately my attempt to postpone the turn didn't get taken into account either, and it looks like 4 players staled, no idea if they had sent in turns or not.

[yandav]

@ Amhazair: I've just received this email from you: "Hello,

Looks like you've staked two turns in a row, and apparently you've also stopped sending in turns for the Good Intentions game. Is something wrong at your end that prevents you from playing? should I be looking for a sub? Please let me know what's up, so I can take appropiate action.

Hope there's nothing serious going on."

I guess you make a mistake about the name of the player :)

[PriestyMan]

nah, he sent out a message from admin, which sends it to everyone. i got one too

[DrPraetorious]

d'oh, nmind

[Amhazair]

Yeah, my appologies for that. I sent out mails for two players (Rytek and Trumanator) who seem to have disappeared. The first one I correctly sent to the player in question, but apparently forgot to un-click everyone for the second one.

On the bright side, I now know most of you are still awake. ;) No less than 7 players reacted to that message in various ways. :D Unfortunately the intended recipient wasn't amongst them... Guess I'll have to look for subs again. (I'll give them untill the evening to react and get busy then.)

[Amhazair]

Luckily Trumanator is still around. (Just not having submitted a couple of turns since his lands could mostly take care of themselves. ;) ) so I'll just be looking for a Helheim sub.

[Verjigorm]

I apologize most sincerely for not submitting my turn yet, but I would appreciate an extension and I will get to it tomorrow. Otherwise, stale me b/c I'm drunk and nothing would probably be better trhan what I would do atm.

I'll submit a turn tomorrow after I get up....

Have fun,


~ Verjigorm

[Amhazair]

Nrasch will be taking over Helheim. Added another 12h to give him time to play his turn. Unless he needs more we can continue on from there.

[Amhazair]

I have pulled something in my shoulder/back last night and now I can't seem to sit straight at my dask for longer than 5 minutes at a time to play my turn. I've postponed hosting till tomorrow, hopefully a good night's rest will make it all better.

[Amhazair]

Well, we're almost halfway, 13 players still remain.

Thanks for subbing in Dr.P.

[DrPraetorious]

I didn't do much except script a few capital defenses, successfully killing precious, precious beast bats :).

[Amhazair]

The only good beast bat is a dead beast bat! ;)

[Amhazair]

Damn, talk about going out with a bang. (At least as much as possible when you're facing dominion kill) That was a very (not) nice final turn. I'm really happy I managed to force that dominion kill, taking you on head-on might have proved painful.

Thanks (again) for subbing in (again) Executor.

Players dropping like flies now. 12 players left, and Ermor won't last much longer. (No offense Baalz. I have the faint suspicion your bag of tricks is mostly empty. :) )

[PriestyMan]

well.... i am really really embarressed now. and am reminded why it is that you must test everything three times not just once. sigh. sorry for being pathetic that turn. thats probably the most expensive f*ckup i've ever had....... i am so ashamed of myself

[Amhazair]

well.... i am really really embarressed now. and am reminded why it is that you must test everything three times not just once. sigh. sorry for being pathetic that turn. thats probably the most expensive f*ckup i've ever had....... i am so ashamed of myselfWhat did you do? A first glance at my turn didn't reveal any screwups on your part. Or was it something invisible to others, like teleporting air-breathers into the sea or the like?

[Numahr]

Reminds me of when I removed his Amulet of the Fish from my semi rainbow-Kraken pretender while he was on land... I felt so stupid and ashamed! At least there was no witness of this disaster; all soldiers guarding him that day were swiftly and discreetly beheaded.

[PriestyMan]

Well i am less ashamed, and more just confused now.

Ok, here's the story of what happened:

I wanted to know if it was possible to take the water breathing item off of units the turn you move them onto land out of the sea. So, like any intelligent person, i tested it. i took a dragon, had him kill uw indies with a ring of breathing on, threw it away, and sent him back. He survived. awesome, lets do it then. I get the next turn........ four fully kitted ember lords drowned. WTF!?!? i say. this of course led to me raging on irc about it, and Calahan decided to do some testing, because he was really confused because he had done testing for the preponderace game, and had gotten the results that my ember lords should have drowned, but the dragon definitely should have too. so we took another look. All of our tests showed that my ember lords should have survived. We also check in case it was a mod thing, but both with the cbm mod and the vanilla game, the units of many types came out of the sea alive. I sent Calahan the current turn, and the previous one, and both he and me couldnt figure out why they drowned. Cal even tested llamaserver to see if they handled it differently. same thing, the people survived. Cal is very certain that this was not the case in previous patches, since he did test it for prepo. basically, we have no idea why it happened. I have concluded that Dominions just didnt like me that turn... :P

Anyways, as you might imagine, this has really tanked my enthusiasm for this game, not to mention hurting a lot. anyways, thats the story.

the only theory Calahan came up with was this:
Calahan> The only other longshot I can think of is that I'm certain you needed items before (as I tested at one point during Prep). So maybe the patch changed something, as it changed the turn res sequence to deal with indy attacks during sieges, and TT has been effected as the game was created using 3.24 (but like I say, this is probably a long long shot, but all I can think of right now)
[16:04] <Calahan> *hasn't been effected

[Amhazair]

Damn, that's a mindboggler. I will admit I wouldn't have known/remembered how a situation like that would pan out myself, but the least one might expect is that testing it would return reliable info. Perhaps something for the bug thread? Have you tried starting a game under the previous version, (probably requiring a new install I suppose) then patching it and testing behaviour to see if it's consistent with this game? (ie, drowning.) Not sure if I would want to go through the trouble myself in your situation mind.

I've added 36h as per your request.

[Verjigorm]

Ulm is doomed. There are only a few individuals left. Our divine lord, Pozceracz has fallen as has our capitol of Western Sembia.

If anyone is mounting serious resistance, you may have our trove of artifacts and gems. Send a message.

[PriestyMan]

Darn those tartarians that get away with 3 HP!

[Amhazair]

Darn those tartarians that get away with 3 HP!Meh, he had phoenix power up and running, so the only thing getting through those last 3 hit points would have accomplished would have been to give her another chance to kill some of your adorable doggies instead of having to run away.

And damn, playing those turns is really starting to take ridiculous amounts of time now. Although I havent needed it so far, I do reserve the right to extend the turn whenever I feel I need it. :)

[Amhazair]

Priestyman is having/had some computer problems (his monitor died) and I've added 24h to give him the time to fix everything and play his turn without too much pressure.

[Calahan]

I've been asked to post on behalf of R'lyeh/Atlantis (Maerlande/Priestyman), to ask you all to consider doing the sensible thing here and concede an honourable victory to Marverni. As it seems Marverni have had this game won for quite a while now, and the only alternative to conceding is to play out a very long winded end game in which Marverni will certainly win without any doubt, and likely without suffering any real in-game cost. But everyone will suffer a huge out-of-game cost by continuing due to having to invest crazy amounts of time just to reach the inevitable conclusion that has been growing ever more obvious with each turn.

So can I please ask if anyone objects to saying "Well played Amhazair", and conceding to Marverni at this point in time. As this is not only the correct and honourable thing to do at this stage given the in-game situation. But it will also save everyone a huge amount of time and effort, plus allow players to join, or concentrate on, other games if their time commitments here can be freed up.

Maerlande adds that he recently went "all-in" to try and fight back against Marverni, but that his resistance was mercilessly crushed. So his ability and resources to resist any further is now minimum. (ie. There's one less nation that can fight back than there used to be)


Thank you all for your time, and sorry for the sudden intrusion.

Edit - Maerlande = Eximius Sus

[P3D]

What about the movement prevention bug?
The game decides the Ember Lord wants to stay there, then drowns when no water breathing item is found on him?

Well i am less ashamed, and more just confused now.

Ok, here's the story of what happened:

I wanted to know if it was possible to take the water breathing item off of units the turn you move them onto land out of the sea. So, like any intelligent person, i tested it. i took a dragon, had him kill uw indies with a ring of breathing on, threw it away, and sent him back. He survived. awesome, lets do it then. I get the next turn........ four fully kitted ember lords drowned. WTF!?!? i say. this of course led to me raging on irc about it, and Calahan decided to do some testing, because he was really confused because he had done testing for the preponderace game, and had gotten the results that my ember lords should have drowned, but the dragon definitely should have too. so we took another look. All of our tests showed that my ember lords should have survived. We also check in case it was a mod thing, but both with the cbm mod and the vanilla game, the units of many types came out of the sea alive. I sent Calahan the current turn, and the previous one, and both he and me couldnt figure out why they drowned. Cal even tested llamaserver to see if they handled it differently. same thing, the people survived. Cal is very certain that this was not the case in previous patches, since he did test it for prepo. basically, we have no idea why it happened. I have concluded that Dominions just didnt like me that turn... :P

Anyways, as you might imagine, this has really tanked my enthusiasm for this game, not to mention hurting a lot. anyways, thats the story.

the only theory Calahan came up with was this:
Calahan> The only other longshot I can think of is that I'm certain you needed items before (as I tested at one point during Prep). So maybe the patch changed something, as it changed the turn res sequence to deal with indy attacks during sieges, and TT has been effected as the game was created using 3.24 (but like I say, this is probably a long long shot, but all I can think of right now)
[16:04] <Calahan> *hasn't been effected

[Aethyr]

I have no problem conceding to Amhazair, who has indeed played a masterful game. His forces are simply overwheliming at this point, crushing opposition on multiple fronts...its one of the most impressive feats I've seen in a long time.

Congratulations Amhazair!

[don_Pablo]

Agree to surrender to Marverni.
That was an interesting test of EMD-summons and I have to change my valuation of them.
Vanheim is almost defeated atm and waiting for a couple final battles.

Congratulations Amhazair!

[Amhazair]

I do believe it is indeed too late to stop me now, even with a coördinated effort from all remaining players. Having said that, as long as not everyone is convinced I'm more than happy to play it out. (Especially Mictlan is quite strong and has moved his armies into position to attack, so if he wants to test my resistance that's fair enough for me.)

I'll add 24 more hours to give everyone a chance to chime in.

[yandav]

I'm a little bit torn about this:
. on one side, I know that I'm going to be the next one on Marverni's list and I'd be happy to discover competitive late game (at my expense :p ) and have some real fight eventually, because my game was very peaceful (I'm really too passive)
. on the other side, I see that much better players than me failed to stop Marverni so I know that I won't stand a chance and I don't want to drag the game too long. So, I'm ready to concede to Marverni.

[Numahr]

I am ready to concede to Marverni, congratulations to Amhazair who makes a distinguised come back!

That was first time I got into late game. BoT + early wars with my neighbors had a very deep impact on me, and paradoxically, maybe more so against AI Nief through two disastrous battles than against human-controlled Lanka who was a fierce opponent but never inflicted me a disastrous victory. This meant that I did not have the means to take a conflictual stance with Marverni when it could have been strategically relevant to do so.

I was about to declare war, hopefully with Mictlan, now that Caelum had recovered, after the conquest of Ctis would allow me a better strategic position. Arcane Nexus was obviously the trigger to stop good neighborhood. But i was aware that this war would come too late (more so considering I would respect NAP) and would just be for honor, not for the win, and would probably just be an opportunity for Marverni to gather a nice collection of enslaved Amesha Spentas and Eagle Kings...

Also I witnessed Marverni's rise to power since its very early war against Bandar Log, and it definitily was a very nice showcase, well done!

[don_Pablo]

results of the inquiry:

Remaining nations/players
1. Marverni: Amhazair – no comments :)
2. Ulm: Verjigorm – agree
3. Mictlan: Yandav - agree
4. Caelum: Numahr - agree
5. Vanheim: don_pablo - agree
6. Sauromatia: Aethyr - agree
7. R'lyeh: Eximius Sus - agree
8. Atlantis: Priestyman – agree

9. Pangaea: Ghoul31 – no info
10. C'tis: Trumanator - no info
11. Helheim: Nrasch – no info

~75% ready to call Amhazair the winner of this game.

The rest seem to act as apolitical minority.

[ghoul31]

I'm just a small nation that can't do much. So I'll go along with everyone else.

grats

[Amhazair]

Looks like that's settled then. Thanks all for an enjoyable game. I've added a final 24h for those who want to have a last look at the Llamaserver for some unfathomable reason, and will take the game down over the weekend.

I have kept all my turn (and 2h) files of the game, anyone who is intrested in checking (part or all of) them out, feel free to let me know.

[Aethyr]

Congrats again Amhazair. You were the winner in the first MP game I ever played in, and I learned a lot from you then. If anything, you have taken your awsomeness to an even higher level. :)

Please keep me in mind if you've inclined to start another game sometime; it's always great fun to play with one of the best.

[Amhazair]

I'm sorry to splash some cold water, but I really think a game as large as faerun is not advisable.[...]


Its the map. Faerun is cursed. its such an awesome map, but its just cursed. no game can ever be succesful on it. :(Hah! Hah, I tell you. ;)

In other news, I had more or less considered writing an AAR for this game, and actually started writing along with the start of the game, but very much as I expected I didn't get very far. (Though I can help anyone intrested in an AAR of the first 10 turns. :D) What can I say, I'm a lazy person. I'll post a quick overview of my game tomorrow or so.

[yandav]

I wad going to spend 999 gems next turn to try to overwrite your Arcane Nexus: how many gems did you spend?

[PriestyMan]

To be fair, it is still cursed. We had 3 major powers get subbed out (ermor,formoria,helheim) all at really bad times, and two minor powers (ctis and abysia.)

this isnt a legitimacy thing at all i promise, its just that its still cursed with making people dissapear

[Amhazair]

I wad going to spend 999 gems next turn to try to overwrite your Arcane Nexus: how many gems did you spend?Less :D

In fact I had cast a relatively small nexus, (around 250 gems if I recall) with the idea to overcast it to 999 myself next turn too with the help of the gems it generated. I did get less pearls than I expected though, ("only" 190, while had hoped for 300'ish and expected 250 by taking my gem income and multiplying it with the total # of provinces.) so I'm guessing I would have delayed my overcasting a turn, meaning you would have gotten control.

I also have a "literariy critique" type question: As I said, I had started writing an AAR for this game, but discontinued it due to it being a lot of work. :angel

I still do have the ambition of trying it sometime though, perhaps for a smaller and/or no-diplomacy game (No promises, I am a lazy bum, and at 31 I don't think that's likely to change.) and thought it would be intresting to see if anyone would be intrested in reading this kind of AAR before going through the effort again, or if most people would think it far too long-winded or something like that. So, attached the result of my labors to this post to see what people think.

[PriestyMan]

That aar is..... huge. That would really be a full-sized novel if you did it for then entire game. I mean someone might get a kick out of reading it, but most people probably dont have time to read 18pages to get through turn 10. But if someone wanted to reasearch all about your playstyle or something it could be good lol

[Calahan]

That looks an awesome read Amhazair (which I will read for certain once a window of free dom time opens).

Not sure how many would be interested in seeing something that big as an AAR though, as it would take many sittings to read for a whole game, meaning the temptation would be very high to just skip large chunks of it if a text that size appeared "all at once" (ie. after the game). And people skipping parts would be a great shame given all the work and effort that would certainly go into it.

But what you've done there is very similar to the type of detailed DAR (D = During) that I've been itching to do for ages. And which I think players would read, regardless of text length, if the entries appeared at regular intervals (ie. every turn / 48 hours, or updated 2-3 times a week).

Doing a good detailed DAR though requires a good group of players who won't read the DAR thread, and a game with a very relaxed hosting schedule ;) ;) :poke: :poke:


ps. Congrats on the win, and possibly even more amazingly, managing to finish a game on Faerun.

[Hrum]

...it would be intresting to see if anyone would be intrested in reading this kind of AAR before going through the effort again, or if most people would think it far too long-winded or something like that. So, attached the result of my labors to this post to see what people think.

Amhazair, thanks for posting this! I finished reading it and quite enjoyed it. I am sad that it stops right when the action between you and your neighbors seems poised to commence. :cry:

Nevertheless, what you provided is both an AAR of your early game, and sort of a proto-guide to early expansion with Marverni. Add more to it about your first war or two, and you would have near on a full fledged Marverni guide in AAR form (from someone who won the whole shebang with the strategies detailed). How awesome would that be! :up:

In spite of my not playing in Troubling Times, I've been looking in on this thread once in a while since I was curious how the game would shake out with so many players on such a large map (BTW, I just looked at the mapfile to see what indies were added to Myth Drannor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_Drannor). That looks like that was a nasty one! Did anyone take that province and how gnarly was it? At least there weren't any demons flying around, so that's something to be thankful for, I guess... Just a huge TNN army accompanied by gryphons and sidhe thugs & mages - oh joy. :) ).

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed reading about your first 11 turns in the game and if you choose to add to that (albeit I imagine somewhat more summarized than the detail you included for those early turns) so that we can all hear about how Marverni progressed to victory, I would be eager to read more on this from you. I've never tried Marverni before, and didn't really know much about them before reading your AAR, and now I'm thinking I may need to give them a try at some point.

[Amhazair]

That aar is..... huge. That would really be a full-sized novel if you did it for then entire game. I mean someone might get a kick out of reading it, but most people probably dont have time to read 18pages to get through turn 10. That was what I feared might be the case for some. I mean, I know I'd read it, but then again I readily admit I'm quite weird in a number of ways. And I can't allways tell what is and what isn't ;)

Amhazair, thanks for posting this! I finished reading it and quite enjoyed it. I am sad that it stops right when the action between you and your neighbors seems poised to commence. :cry:

Nevertheless, what you provided is both an AAR of your early game, and sort of a proto-guide to early expansion with Marverni. Add more to it about your first war or two, and you would have near on a full fledged Marverni guide in AAR form (from someone who won the whole shebang with the strategies detailed). How awesome would that be! :up:

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that I really enjoyed reading about your first 11 turns in the game and if you choose to add to that (albeit I imagine somewhat more summarized than the detail you included for those early turns) so that we can all hear about how Marverni progressed to victory, I would be eager to read more on this from you. But since others apparently do find it useful, I will at least keep the idea alive. I will warn you the chances of it ever actually happening are small to moderate at best, but hey, a guy should have some unachieved ambitions, right?

In spite of my not playing in Troubling Times, I've been looking in on this thread once in a while since I was curious how the game would shake out with so many players on such a large map (BTW, I just looked at the mapfile to see what indies were added to Myth Drannor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myth_Drannor). That looks like that was a nasty one! Did anyone take that province and how gnarly was it? At least there weren't any demons flying around, so that's something to be thankful for, I guess... Just a huge TNN army accompanied by gryphons and sidhe thugs & mages - oh joy. :) ).At the end all VP province had been taken. (the heavily defended ones all have really good sites, so there's an incentive to go to some trouble for them) A few of them (Trollbark Forest, Vaasa and Northern Thay spring to mind) did remain independent till turns 60 or 70 though. I can't give you any details about Myth Drannor, it was held by Agartha by the time I got scouts in the area. The problem with those provinces is that, while some of them are quite impressive, they still behave as normal independents. (in other words: stupidly. And, perhaps more important, predictably) The SC/Thugs hang around behind the troops, melee surges forward in a big blob, and casters pick from the limited independant spell list. As such they're generally (relatively) easy prey for a properly scripted mid-game army.
I've never tried Marverni before, and didn't really know much about them before reading your AAR, and now I'm thinking I may need to give them a try at some pointI hadn't played them before either, and I have to say I'm pleasantly surprised. They're generally considered a (quite) poor nation, allthough I think they're making a bit of a comeback in the minds of people. When I started playing they were accepted to be one of the very worst nations around, which I don't think is the case anymore?

I had expected them to be poor early on, and good in mid and late game, while I found them to be mediocre early, and a real powerhouse later. Druids are really, awesome. Really, really awesome. Of course this was the perfect map for them, and I probably would have had to compromise on my scales on a smaller and/or more crowded map. (For medium games I'm leaning towards an awake great sage with decent-but-not-awesome scales to get early Gifts from Heaven, but I'd have to think it over and hash out some numbers properly to be sure.)