Summer Updates, Some More Info

[BarGamer]

An analogy that would fit better is, say you liked a certain recipe, then you watched a show on the Cooking Channel on those kinds of dishes, before the chef that made the original recipe made an announcement that he's still cooking and creating more dishes, and he's gonna reveal it when the Fall Season starts.

[Kreistor]

I recently made a post about Rob revealing rules throughout the summer, and some people in the reaction threads jumped on me. Reaction threads get forgotten, so I'm going to post to this thread instead.

Rob stated on the old forum that he needed to reveal more rules for us to understand what is going on in the next story. Some of those will be revealed in the summer updates. Please note that he is making some of these rules revelations subtle.

Today's update, 9, revealed some things:
1) Garrison is not a permanent state.
2) Units assigned to Garrison have their Move reduced to 0.
3) Parson was a Garrison unit during tBfGK.

Previous updates revealed:
1) Archons are not casters. Archons gain spells as Natural Abilities.
1a) Archons cannot go to Magic Kingdom.
1b) Archons cannot learn spells through practice, as Sizemore tries and Wanda succeeds at doing.
1c) Archons may not have "Juice".
2) The ability to perform fireworks (Shockmancy or Foolamancy) must be a low level ability for all 28 decrypted Archons to perform it. Can't assume any were Level 1, since they were sent to GK after Jaclyn died,)
3) Units don't forget random abilities when decrypted. Since all 28 Archons retained one of their abilities, there was no random chance while decrypted that some memory loss would randomly eliminate a n ability.
4) Makeshift weapons can be used to kill.
5) A Unit does not require archery to kill at range.
6) Dwagons are not enslaved to Stanley. He still needs to thump them when they get out of line.
7) Cities have different Zones and interconnections. (Given Stanley just revealed he wants to recover his cities... this is probably far more vital than we thought initially.)
8) Cities can only be built to Level 5.
9) Cities can pop at any level: they don't need to be built up turn by turn.

And that's the short list. We have learned so vary much. And Rob has assured us that we will learn more about what we feel we didn't learn, but should have.

This will be a summer of explanation: of that we have been assured. And the rules are there for you to find. Not every page has had an obviously useful rule, but they are there for the finding. It was no accident that I could write that list.

[Maldeus]

I hesitate to write in this thread, because we're approaching the end of page 3, which is usually where respect and decency go out the window and someone gets in a fight with Kreistor. Nonetheless...

Today's update, 9, revealed some things:
1) Garrison is not a permanent state.
2) Units assigned to Garrison have their Move reduced to 0.
3) Parson was a Garrison unit during tBfGK.

Previous updates revealed:
1) Archons are not casters. Archons gain spells as Natural Abilities.
1a) Archons cannot go to Magic Kingdom.

This is most likely true, but still disputable. It's still not known exactly why Parson was able to get into the Magic Kingdom and whether or not he actually is a caster. It is most likely that he is a hippiemancer as stated in comic, however.

1b) Archons cannot learn spells through practice, as Sizemore tries and Wanda succeeds at doing.
1c) Archons may not have "Juice".
2) The ability to perform fireworks (Shockmancy or Foolamancy) must be a low level ability for all 28 decrypted Archons to perform it. Can't assume any were Level 1, since they were sent to GK after Jaclyn died,)

The fireworks appear to be more or less tactically useless. It may come with every level one Archon. It may also be that natural abilities aren't gained with levels but rather with a purchased upgrade, as with StarCraft.

3) Units don't forget random abilities when decrypted. Since all 28 Archons retained one of their abilities, there was no random chance while decrypted that some memory loss would randomly eliminate a n ability.
4) Makeshift weapons can be used to kill.
5) A Unit does not require archery to kill at range.
6) Dwagons are not enslaved to Stanley. He still needs to thump them when they get out of line.

The Dwagons may be instinctively enslaved to Stanley, i.e. they have a natural and strong desire to do whatever the wielder of the Arkenhammer wants. Simply being spooked doesn't mean that the Dwagons are disobedient.

7) Cities have different Zones and interconnections. (Given Stanley just revealed he wants to recover his cities... this is probably far more vital than we thought initially.)

Hm, say what? What exactly do you mean and which update was it revealed in?

8) Cities can only be built to Level 5.

According to what source?

9) Cities can pop at any level: they don't need to be built up turn by turn.

[Kreistor]

Maldeus, all of that comes from the SUmmer Updates. Go look harder, if you didn't get it. (I wasn't the one to add Level 5 max to the WIki. Someone else did that. I just found where he confrimed it.)

So go read and have fun figuring out what others have, instead of asking me and trying to drag me into some kind of fight. It's all there, and you shouldn't need me to explain it to you.

[Maldeus]

I'm not trying to pick a fight with you. I'm not even disagreeing with you. I'm just asking for a clarification and a source for the facts you provided. I'm fully willing to believe they're all true, I just want to see a source.

[raphfrk]

I'm not trying to pick a fight with you. I'm not even disagreeing with you. I'm just asking for a clarification and a source for the facts you provided. I'm fully willing to believe they're all true, I just want to see a source.

Presumably, it is this

But they were still a Level 5 city, with special defense bonuses adding up to something theoretical like a Level 8, which was supposed to make them the hardest defensive position in the world.

It seems level 8 is only theoretical and also, at a theoretical level of 8, they get the best defence in the world.

In theory, that could mean that level 7 cities are possible in other locations, but those cities have no "special" bonuses.

[SteveMB]

But they were still a Level 5 city, with special defense bonuses adding up to something theoretical like a Level 8, which was supposed to make them the hardest defensive position in the world.

It seems level 8 is only theoretical and also, at a theoretical level of 8, they get the best defence in the world.

In theory, that could mean that level 7 cities are possible in other locations, but those cities have no "special" bonuses.

I don't think it means that -- I read it as saying that GK has a "theoretical level of 8" (i.e. is as tough defensively as a level 8 city) even though it is actually a level 5 city. In and of itself, that doesn't say anything about whether or not a city can be built up to an actual level 8 (though the fact that the old GK was "the toughest defensive position in the known world" suggests that there are no ultra-high level cities in existence).

[Maldeus]

The phrasing of it did imply, to me, that level 8 was only possible on a theoretical level, but I don't see any reason why that means level 5 is necessarily the limit. Not only is the phrasing not completely clear, even if it does mean that level 8 is only possible theoretically, that still means that a city could possibly be built up to level 7 literally. I do find it most likely that the cap is level 5, however, simply because war games usually have nice, round numbers like 5 or multiples of it for their level/unit caps.

[Kreistor]

Does this ring a bell?

"It's the toughest defensive position in the known world."

[Maldeus]

That doesn't say anything except that there are no stronger defensive positions than Gobwin Knob. Besides which, whatever the max city level is, I'm sure there are plenty of cities in powerful Sides which have reached it, so Gobwin Knob's being max level wouldn't be enough anyways. Since it's an abnormally strong defensive position already, we have no reason to assume that Gobwin Knob must have been max level, except that, as stated above, most war games have nice, round level caps.

[Kreistor]

Sigh... Combine them.

"They were still a Level 5 city"

"It's the toughest defensive position in the known world."

They were a Level 5 city before. They were the most defensible city before. Can you imagine Stanley, with 500000 shmuckers in the bank and an army advancing on his Capital not upgrading the city, if he could? [Edit: He built from Level 1 to Level 5 on less than 150000 Shmuckers, the remnant after he Summoned Parson. How much would raising to Level 6 have cost? Not more than 3x the cost of 1-5, I'll bet.] Heck, even without the incoming army, can you imagine Stanley not building the most powerful city he could? Guy's got a serious (height related) self-esteem problem... he has to show off.

Second, in the vast majority of war games, city defense is proportional to city level. The most defensible city in the world is the highest level city in the world.

(Parson is theorizing a potentially higher level for the city because of the "tiered" defense. This concept comes from Constantinople, which had tiered walls. The opposition didn't have to breach the wall... it had to breach a series of seven walls. When the first was breached, the defenders backed up to the next. The attacker snow had to move siege engines up a floor (siege engines have problems climbing slopes made of broken rocks from walls) and breach the next. And the next. Seven walls in succession, each requiring the attacker to have 10x the defending forces to take the walls. Constantinople was taken from the sea, BTW. The walls were never taken. You can see some of the pieces of the walls still standing.)

Okay, none of this is abject, 100% proof. I admit. Are there any alternatives with any serious evidence? It's good enough for Prop C. The dots are well connected. There's no counter evidence, just negativity about the level of proof. Parson does not speak of a further City improvement in the works, which GK's massive cash flow will afford, if possible. The city is so defensive, it's gone theoretical. Stanley has a tendency to show off. He built the city before he even arrived, at the level it was before it was destroyed.

So, no, I won't be deleting the idea in the Wiki. There's no alternative with any amount of evidence to compare. This isn't "Disbanding" where there's a lot of contending thoughts, each with varying levels of evidence. There's one solid idea here, with only claims of a lack of sufficient evidence as counter-evidence.

That's good enough for me. It stands alone, and it's solid. A few doubts are fine, when there's nothing solid to contend with. Rob will either advance it to Canon, or not. If not, we know we were wrong. I'd rather see us be told we're wrong, than to let a solid piece of work like this languor in Spec where Rob will never see it.

That's the alternative, if you ere unaware. Rob doesn't read Spec, just Prop C. He promotes Prop C to Canon. There's only one solid theory, so let him decide if we read him right. If it's wrong, it'll sit in Prop C until a better teory supplants it. If it's right, it becomes Canon. I'm fine with that, in a case as solid as this.

[Maldeus]

We didn't ask you to remove it from the wiki. I myself stated multiple times that level 5 was most likely the highest level a city could achieve. What exactly are you arguing about?

[Cmdr I. Heartly Noah]

Kriestor, I'm all about cities only being levels 1-5, but remember that they had several gems already when the upgrade took place (plus possibly some purses, chump change ~10-20K probably), so raising from 1 to 5 could well have cost much more than 150K.

[Kreistor]

Gems to Shmuckers takes a Warlord. Parson didn't do it, at least not that we could tell, since he might not yet know that he can (hardly important to him since the city was mined out and he wasn't going to be doing it. Sizemore really shuld have asked him to change it to Shmuckers, but he probably wanted to show the gem around. Parson turfing it to shmuckers would have prevented that.) That means no one could have with Parson the only Warlord, until after Stanley returned and the city was built by then. Unless you think Ansom did it, while trying to organize the new troops. I really don't see anyone doing it before Stanley got back, with Parson off in his little angst-filled world.

[Cmdr I. Heartly Noah]

What do you mean only Warlords can change gems to shmuckers?

http://www.erfworld.com/wiki/index.php/Gem
Canon
A gem is a physical object which can be converted directly to Shmuckers by a caster, warlord or ruler.

And why do you think Parson wouldn't know he could do it? Even if he didn't, Sizemore is there to tell him. Now, figuring out how and actually making it happen might be hard for a guy who doesn't fit in the world... show "the gem" around? They had several on the table right after they came back!

[Kreistor]

I shouldn't operate on memory. Okay, I forgot casters could.

Anyway, about Parson... he doesn't know what he can and cannot do. Sizemore would not have told him he could covert gems, because tehre were no longer any gems to convert... until after the volcano boomage. Before then, the mountain was mined out, so no gems needed conversion. Parson is looking for things to fight with, so telling him about gems would not be helpful militarily. Basically, there's no reason to tell Parson, and Parson didn't try to do it immediately. If he thought he could, shouldn't he have tried, just to prove whether he was a normal Warlord? He's nver quite sure how normal a Warlord he is.

[Cmdr I. Heartly Noah]

It would be a good experiment. But at the time he had other things on his mind. After throwing the sword away, and before the upgrade? Maybe he did, and didn't find it noteworthy. Maybe Sizemore or Maggie took care of it and it just didn't occur to him to hold one back to give the old college try.

[Kallisti]

If the tiered walls were the special bonuses, everyone would have them (or at least, all the cities built by rulers who thought it out after the technique was developed and who could afford level 5 cities). More likely Parson is referring to GK still being at the top of the volcano and the lava hex next door.

[cloudbreaker]

If the tiered walls were the special bonuses, everyone would have them (or at least, all the cities built by rulers who thought it out after the technique was developed and who could afford level 5 cities). More likely Parson is referring to GK still being at the top of the volcano and the lava hex next door.

I'm guessing that the city would need to be on the correct type of hex in order to build a tiered city (i.e. a mountain with a chunk blasted out of it.) And Stanley himself stated that he didn't choose the design, so that implies rulers couldn't choose to have tiered walls built wether they wanted them or not. Not to mention that a city may have to lower it's level or even completely destroy their own city in order to change the design. Gobwin Knob was pretty thoroughly destroyed and then was rebuilt all in one go. That makes me wonder, if Stanley decided to build the city up to level 3 instead of 5, would he have been able to upgrade it further at a later date, or would he have to destroy the city again and start from scratch? My guess is the former, but you never know.

[Kreistor]

If the tiered walls were the special bonuses, everyone would have them (or at least, all the cities built by rulers who thought it out after the technique was developed and who could afford level 5 cities). More likely Parson is referring to GK still being at the top of the volcano and the lava hex next door.

Take a look at what St. Helens looked like after it blew in the early 80's. It dug a hole in it's side that sloped down. A city built high up could have a series of walls that needed breaching before getting to the city near the peak. 137.4 shows the same sort of explosion... the vent is low on the side of the mountain, not high in the middle of the caldera. That will blow the mountain out, scooping a hole in the side, with a high wall for the rear and a steep slope perfect for such a defensive structure.

Oh, Minas Tirith had a similar structure, IIRC.