Archons, Day 32

We find Boldir's band, but can we catch them?

Ah! No worries, I've just been very, very antsy since I've been on the cusp of victory. I'm glad every one is better now (they are better, right?)

In a word: No.

Boldir, Day 33

Faced with rampant xenophobia and the very real threat that he might fail in his duty, Boldir slammed back the last of his ale, rallied his forces, and headed out to take physical possession of his charge. The Greater Demon gave a mighty roar, but it was quickly cut into thousands of tiny, angry pieces by the hordes of Berserker axes. Grogmir, having had a little too much dwarven whiskey, led the berserkers into the demon's claws instead of allowing the frothing fighters to die valiantly like good cannon fodder. His commanding officer tried to do the same, but his armor proved to be of slightly better quality.

Boldir collected the strange, apparently worthless, item he has been guarding for the last several decades and began his escape. After several tense days of charging through the tunnels, he reached an exit. Berserker axes turned a Chaos Lord and its spawn into chunks, and Boldir led his forces to escape into the wilderness.

The artifact will be contained again in the future, once this new human empire has been dealt with. They make for terrible neighbors. Especially the girl.

TS

OOC: Amusingly enough, Southern's capture of my capital is what set me on my course of "grab the Key and hope for the best". His report on the victory triggers made it my definite course. I probably would have tried anyway, and there was a message telling me what to do after I grabbed it but I wasn't entirely sure before the trigger report.

I spent one turn consolidating my berserker stacks and other units, then took off en masse for the Greater Demon. Go over the mountains to skip the Demons on the magic relays, turn the Greater Demon into Greater Kibble, and back the way I came. The South gate was within easy reach from there, and no one had anything like the power to stop me.

For the record, Wenne, (in case you were wondering) I was legit in trying to pull you in to my fight with Southern. I hadn't decided on my course of action at the time.


And now, a message from my son:

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Well played - an interesting map! I definitely should have followed my own advice.....

Congrats! I totally failed to get on track in this one and completely missed the winning condition until Southern mentioned it. By the time I understood what was happening, I was way too late at the party to make some impact.

Slow starting map this was, with some of my early buildings being really strongly guarded (a Steam Tank and 3 helicopters armed with Pistol. Really??).

TS and Good game!

With the other one also coming to an end, I am up for another one!

Which way did you even go? :p

I used the underground (obviously).

When my wizard first ditched my tower, he ran as far as he could away from you and every unit nearby ran toward him. I had a half a dozen or so berserkers that could reach his position or adjacent. The turn after that, I consolidated to the bridge just south of there with most of my army, about 3 stacks of units, to see if you'd try and push into the underground.

Then I decided to just head for the key and hope for the best. I walked past the ruined town in the underground center area and used the unguarded stairs in the SW to surface on the island. Free Movement ensured everyone had Cave Crawling and Mountaineering. I walked straight across the mountains, surrounded the demon (this is when you reported seeing dwarves in the middle), murdered the demon on my next turn and grabbed the key, then went back underground the way I came to the surface (when I denied you seeing me, I was already back at the gate and about to go underground again). Time on surface: ~3 turns. From there, use the bridge SW of the stairs (near where you kept seeing hell hounds steal that mine), consolidate into that underground dwarf town I took from you, and finally hit the Gate guards en masse to make my escape and win.

By the time you spotted my guys, I'm pretty sure your main power stack(s) were too far out of position to be able to stop me (being on the surface in my starting area of the map). I was simply too far ahead of you, and cave crawling would let me spend 3 move per hex to your 4 per hex.

For that matter, by the time you reported on the triggers, I'm still not sure you could have beaten me there. I still had my chopper circling the middle island at that point, so your balloon wouldn't have been able to stop on the water. I had several digging units that would have let me choose a different stairway to the surface if needed. It would have been much, much closer, though.