Book 2 – Text Updates 024

[danielkaplan123]

I think this is a great point! I'd offer 'from the capital' may be because they have the thinkamancer there. It seems that all rulers (or tools) keep a thinkamancer at their capital and that's what allows them to send commands to any unit. So as long as Parson is with Maggie and she has juice, he can command them. Parson did this as well (using Maggie) to send command in the Battle for Gobwin Knob so I suspect this is the mechanic.

I have a feeling this line is going to come into play soon -- "The stack was subject to orders from the Commanders in other stacks in the hex, or from the capital."

It means Parson can directly command any unled stacks on GK's side but Wanda can only command the stacks in her hex in Spacerock.

Once all the warlords in the hex are dead, he can assume command of the whole hex even though he's in the capital. He can also take any leftover stacks in Wanda's hex and help with Jack's plan assuming; a) they follow Jack's plan, and b) Maggie has enough Juice to keep up communications.

[DevilDan]

I'd say it doesn't even matter that he even stabbed anyone: It matters that he got to wield his spear in combat. He died in combat, not ignominiously executed without event seeing any action as his first life ended.

[gazes_also]

It kinda of speaks to the very nature of war; there normally are no big damn heroes, just lots of little soldiers all doing their small part; and it takes all of their small parts to win the war... Say you go to war and and during a battle all you manage to do is injure ONE enemy solider before dying yourself; sure it does not sound like you accomplished much but in a way you saved the lives of every solider that one enemy may have killed in that battle... Did he croak a warlord? did he just injure her? or was it just some random unit? it doesn't matter... the only thing that matters is that with one successful stab he did his part to gain victory for the titans and wanda

Reminds me of the famous quote from Patton:
"No b... ever won a war by dying for his country. He won it by making the other poor dumb b... die for his country."

[Altima]

Let's also consider royal warlords as well.

Warlords take a long time to purpose-build, as we see from Jillian attempting to pop an heir (which, in essence, is a royal warlord, probably level 1).

Now we see these factions with dozens of warlords, as well as massive standing armies. Granted, some of these sides have been around for thousands of turns, but I still find it hard to believe that these sides can devote time to popping warlords, heirs, casters, AND units.

My theory is that there is, perhaps, a special mechanic that allows a side to promote units to Warlord status. Stanley mentions turning the 'most handsome' unit he had to Chief Warlord, which supports this statement.

If this were the case, I could see it being very expensive to raise, say, a level 1 unit to Warlord. However, if the unit were to level, then the cost of switching that unit to the warlord class would decrease exponentially. This would allow kingdoms with more combat experience to slowly, but surely, expand their leadership corps while maintaining their standing army size. This even goes along with royalty--royal warlords will have higher base stats and level faster, but they can only be created by purposely devoting resources, whereas the faction can then spent smuckers to promote leveled 'base' units.

This would, perhaps, explain certain discrepencies, too. After all, most of GK's forces at TBfGK were uncroaked, and Stanley did have enough warlords--who were uncroaked--but not a single suitable chief warlord. Transylvito, on the other hand, with the only known Warlords who are capable of flight on their own, might only promote from, say, bats or skanks, in addition to popping 'noble' warlords, perhaps. I don't know--we haven't seen enough of Transylvito to really fit this theory with them.

[danielkaplan123]

What made the difference was that in that moment, Wrigley was of a single pointed purpose without distraction or question in full acceptance of whatever was about to happen. It just happens that for him conceptually, it was to wield his spear but a once and final time.

I'd say it doesn't even matter that he even stabbed anyone: It matters that he got to wield his spear in combat. He died in combat, not ignominiously executed without event seeing any action as his first life ended.

[Dancing Cthulhu]

Let's also consider royal warlords as well.

Warlords take a long time to purpose-build, as we see from Jillian attempting to pop an heir (which, in essence, is a royal warlord, probably level 1).

I don't think a warlord takes that long to pop (relatively speaking). And while they are used as warlords I guess the heirs potential makes them special and leads to an extremely long build time. A royal heir for Faq/TV would take 60 turns, with a Turnamancer it is taking 40 - now Jillian was able to produce much of her current airforce, including 5 or 6 warlords in a similar amount of time.

Now we see these factions with dozens of warlords, as well as massive standing armies. Granted, some of these sides have been around for thousands of turns, but I still find it hard to believe that these sides can devote time to popping warlords, heirs, casters, AND units.

When popping a warlord there is a (very, very, very) slight chance a caster might pop instead, rulers don't have any control over it.

But it also depends on the number cities you have and what lv they are. Warlords (and thus casters) and heirs seem to only pop in the capital. In that case you can have all your other cities popping pikers and stabbers and what have you while the capital concentrates on command units until it has enough. The more cities you have the more troops you can be popping. And we saw this with Oss deciding to stop Dhrystone popping gumps in favor of popping infantry - in the time it took to pop 1 gump you could have popped about 27 basic infantry units. Presumably similar times apply to things like Megalogwiffs, which explains why Jillian didn't have any real ground forces beyond her 5 warlords and a handful of knights (promoted from the few stabbers she popped in the early days I assume).

My theory is that there is, perhaps, a special mechanic that allows a side to promote units to Warlord status. Stanley mentions turning the 'most handsome' unit he had to Chief Warlord, which supports this statement.

Stanley himself rose through the ranks, so it can certainly happen.

I think this is a great point! I'd offer 'from the capital' may be because they have the thinkamancer there. It seems that all rulers (or tools) keep a thinkamancer at their capital and that's what allows them to send commands to any unit. So as long as Parson is with Maggie and she has juice, he can command them. Parson did this as well (using Maggie) to send command in the Battle for Gobwin Knob so I suspect this is the mechanic.

Only GK and TV have thinkamancers we've seen so far, but that might work in a limited sense, though it would probably drain the thinkamancer quickly - depending on the amount of battle management being attempted - simple, quick orders would make it last, but complex battle plans? Back in the summer updates Vinnie noted Jillian trying to show a lv 1 warlord some strategies and it going over his head. I can't imagine an unled unit of stabbers could be told via thinkamancer to do something more complex then "attack" or maybe "attack x".

I'd say it doesn't even matter that he even stabbed anyone: It matters that he got to wield his spear in combat. He died in combat, not ignominiously executed without event seeing any action as his first life ended.

Indeed

But what does this accomplish? Is Trem going to be more hesitant about attacking Wanda's stack if a warlord is croaked unexpectedly?

I don't see why, he is a leader, he has to know losses will sometimes occur. He had to have know there would be some slight risk to the lv 1 warlords he put in command of the infantry stacks by themselves. They were only there because they might have the chance to lv, which meant they would have to be fighting and risking death themselves.

+ what ftl said.

in a way, i find a bit more significance in him NOT croaking the warlord...

Agreed, and your reasoning is good.

No no, he meant, assuming Wrigley managed to kill a warlord, that Ford's plan resulted in a warlord's death.

Maybe, it just read to me like... well, "looks like Ford took a warlord with him after all" when it doesn't look like Ford actually took anyone with him. Apologies if I'm mistaken.

Plus his plan didn't really result in it, after the leaders were dead the leaderless stacks just did what they'd naturally do and might have killed a lv 1 warlord as a result.

In book 1 Webinar and her girlfriend don't have capes either. I support the theory that capes=high level warlords/units. Ossomer for example had a cape, as well as Ansom, both being the strongest princes of Jetstone, while Tramenis the diplomat probably sees little frontline action and thus must be just medium level.

I wasn't disagreeing, I was just saying we can't probably base it on Trem not wearing a cape since most princes/chief warlords have distinctive looks. Beyond the cape Ansom and Oss always dressed differently (Ansom had a few costume changes). Trem dresses very differently again, and none of them dress anything like the rest of Jetstone's warlords who all look similar (beyond the question of capes).

And I'm not sure about the lv thing - Trem is likely a lower level then his brothers, yes, but closer to a potentially capeless 1st lv warlord then them, Antium, I. Brows or any of the other number of caped individuals that were in Oss's stack? (I do like the idea of some really stuffy ceremony though where a warlord gains the right lv and is presented with a cape). And I don't know - he is also older then them. We only know that during much of the RCC time Slately had sent him off on a diplomatic missions, not that he has mainly been limited to diplomatic missions throughout his life (I'd be surprised if he was lower then lv 6).

[multilis]

Small chance we may *not* have seen the last of Wrigley...

Trem now suddenly wonders if decrypted can be turned based on Jills statements. Only way he could find out is to do an experiment, capturing rather than croaking a decrypted enemy. If wrigley catches his eye, Wrigley may be "wrigley extra long lasting..." - gum commercial.

Would make for interesting story later if Trem and Jill talk, and JIll says "I think you were right about your brother, impossible to turn...", then Trem says "no, you were right, I did experiment and *did* turn one - see that warlord/former stabber...".

[BLANDCorporatio]

Small chance we may *not* have seen the last of Wrigley...

Dare I say we can inaugurate the WINDY club now?

(Wrigley Is Not Dead Yo!)

[Dr Pepper]

Wrigley remembered practicing his stabities. A while back Webinar told his troops to "take it like a drill". Those would be a complete waste of time if it were not possible for units to advance. My theory is that practice acts as a multiplyer for experience points, therefor practiced units level faster. And once a unit reaches a certain level, it is able to gain the special skill leadership, with confirmation from the chief warlord or from the ruler. That's how you gain a warlord. But the ruler might also choose to give the unit the elite combatant bonus instead. If so, that same unit would become a knight. And of course a warlord can be made chief.

[oslecamo2]

But it also depends on the number cities you have and what lv they are. Warlords (and thus casters) and heirs seem to only pop in the capital. In that case you can have all your other cities popping pikers and stabbers and what have you while the capital concentrates on command units until it has enough. The more cities you have the more troops you can be popping. And we saw this with Oss deciding to stop Dhrystone popping gumps in favor of popping infantry - in the time it took to pop 1 gump you could have popped about 27 basic infantry units. Presumably similar times apply to things like Megalogwiffs, which explains why Jillian didn't have any real ground forces beyond her 5 warlords and a handful of knights (promoted from the few stabbers she popped in the early days I assume).

From one of the text updates:

Gobwin Knob’s dominion had spread out far and wide, across a variety of terrain types, and Sizemore had seen quite a bit of it. Warlord Ansom and Lady Firebaugh had taken to razing cities which produced less useful unit types, and he would fly out by dwagon relay and rebuild on the ruins. This created a city that popped the same kinds of units the capital did: infantry and twolls for a Level One, plus spidews and warlords for a Level Two, and dwagons for a Level Three or more.

So warlords can be popped from regular towns.

Probbly only the heir can be popped from the capital, and it's extra expensive because it's a life insurance. If you die, your heir can continue your side, but whitout heir, the death of the leader means the total wipe of your faction.

My theory is that there is, perhaps, a special mechanic that allows a side to promote units to Warlord status. Stanley mentions turning the 'most handsome' unit he had to Chief Warlord, which supports this statement.

Stanley himself rose through the ranks, so it can certainly happen.

More important, it means he can choose when to promote a basic unit to warlord.

I'd say it doesn't even matter that he even stabbed anyone: It matters that he got to wield his spear in combat. He died in combat, not ignominiously executed without event seeing any action as his first life ended.

Indeed

Notice however the last part of his mind process:

He loved the Titans, and Wanda their Tool, for granting him this new life and this new spear. And though he had never yet used it, now he knew what he was for. His side was the Titan's side. They had raised him from the ground to use this spear just once.

He isn't happy just because he can finally wield his spear at a true enemy. He's happy because he can swing his spear and make a diference with that blow. Not much really, but who knows, that dead warlord's destroyed leadership bonus may make the diference between Wanda's stack escaping heavily wounded or not escaping at all. when Jetstone launches their attack on them. That was Ford's plan. We've already seen warlord leadership bonus stack to improve troop power. Every warlord dead decreases the whole power of Jetstone's army. If archers have limited arrows as Tremis said, every bit matters for Wanda.

In book 1 Webinar and her girlfriend don't have capes either. I support the theory that capes=high level warlords/units. Ossomer for example had a cape, as well as Ansom, both being the strongest princes of Jetstone, while Tramenis the diplomat probably sees little frontline action and thus must be just medium level.

I wasn't disagreeing, I was just saying we can't probably base it on Trem not wearing a cape since most princes/chief warlords have distinctive looks. Beyond the cape Ansom and Oss always dressed differently (Ansom had a few costume changes). Trem dresses very differently again, and none of them dress anything like the rest of Jetstone's warlords who all look similar (beyond the question of capes).

And I'm not sure about the lv thing - Trem is likely a lower level then his brothers, yes, but closer to a potentially capeless 1st lv warlord then them, Antium, I. Brows or any of the other number of caped individuals that were in Oss's stack? (I do like the idea of some really stuffy ceremony though where a warlord gains the right lv and is presented with a cape). And I don't know - he is also older then them. We only know that during much of the RCC time Slately had sent him off on a diplomatic missions, not that he has mainly been limited to diplomatic missions throughout his life (I'd be surprised if he was lower then lv 6).

[/quote]

Good points. Guess we'll need more updates to figure that out.

Altough another example that may be worth analyzing is Stanley himself. He doesn't wear a cape in all of book 1, but it's wearing one at the start of book 2. Maybe dragon taming gives out exp and he got some levels out of it?

[Dancing Cthulhu]

From one of the text updates:

Gobwin Knob’s dominion had spread out far and wide, across a variety of terrain types, and Sizemore had seen quite a bit of it. Warlord Ansom and Lady Firebaugh had taken to razing cities which produced less useful unit types, and he would fly out by dwagon relay and rebuild on the ruins. This created a city that popped the same kinds of units the capital did: infantry and twolls for a Level One, plus spidews and warlords for a Level Two, and dwagons for a Level Three or more.

So warlords can be popped from regular towns.

Probbly only the heir can be popped from the capital, and it's extra expensive because it's a life insurance. If you die, your heir can continue your side, but whitout heir, the death of the leader means the total wipe of your faction.

Good catch, I forgot they were included there.

[gazes_also]

He's happy because he can swing his spear and make a diference with that blow. Not much really, but who knows, that dead warlord's destroyed leadership bonus may make the diference between Wanda's stack escaping heavily wounded or not escaping at all. when Jetstone launches their attack on them. That was Ford's plan. We've already seen warlord leadership bonus stack to improve troop power. Every warlord dead decreases the whole power of Jetstone's army. If archers have limited arrows as Tremis said, every bit matters for Wanda.

I don't think your average grunt thinks that strategically. It's his duty to hurt the enemy, the warlord is the highest ranked enemy he can hurt, that's about it. Plus the Titans will look kindly on one who fell fighting well and and scoring the best he could (isn't that Scorism - one of the Erfworld belief systems?)

One less level 1 is very little compared to the XP gained by others in a rout like this, it limits gains at most. If two level 1's level-up through this fight, the loss is pretty much off set, and Tram is still in a better position than if he'd gone straight to Spacerock.

c'est magnifique, mais ce n'est pas la guerre.

[LogicsFate]

Good points. Guess we'll need more updates to figure that out.

Altough another example that may be worth analyzing is Stanley himself. He doesn't wear a cape in all of book 1, but it's wearing one at the start of book 2. Maybe dragon taming gives out exp and he got some levels out of it?

Or maybe it's just a bit of dollamancy and up to the ruler to decide. Seems Slately would like capes, look at his.

That or, for generic warlords, capes go on Noble Warlords as all the ones in Trems stacks were at the beginning of Book 2.

[raphfrk]

Plus the Titans will look kindly on one who fell fighting well and and scoring the best he could (isn't that Scorism - one of the Erfworld belief systems?)

Yeah, Tramenis was discussing it.

[the_tick_rules]

Is this the guy who was lamenting his instant capture when wanda and ansom smashed a city at the start of her crusade?

[DevilDan]

Why can't Wrigley just die, doing his duty though he accomplishes little or nothing? Isn't that the general rule for battle fodder anyway. I don't see why it all has to be so meaningful and romanticized. He finally got to wield his spear. His purpose, as the titans dictated it, was fulfilled simply by that.

Maybe it's a matter of taste. I don't need him to survive, I don't need him to kill even a level-one warlord, I don't need him to even kill a single stabber. I think there is value an interest and poetry in his story and in how he lived and thought and died. And, yes, that may seem to make him inconsequential, but I would see him as the every[s]man[/s]-Erfling.

I don't think it even matters to him that he will be rewarded in heaven as much as it matters to him that he performed his innate duty.

[Danetrix]

Why can't Wrigley just die

The crowd probably want him to be a unit version of a Chekhov's Gun. Tsk, tsk, tsk, for shame.

[robak]

Why can't Wrigley just die

The crowd probably want him to be a unit version of a Chekhov's Gun. Tsk, tsk, tsk, for shame.

The text updates seem to work differently from the comics in that regard. We had a lot of information about Sammy Haggar in the text updates, establishing his character pretty much. Still he died in the first battle we saw. Same with Ford and Twenty. So text updates color in the background, but it's still background. Background characters don't stand a fighting chance against foreground characters such as Ansom or Tramennis. All the can hope for is an honorable mention in the comic, like Tram saying after the battle: "We lost 20 infantry and one lvl1 Warlord, let's move on to the city".

[Dancing Cthulhu]

Why can't Wrigley just die, doing his duty though he accomplishes little or nothing? Isn't that the general rule for battle fodder anyway. I don't see why it all has to be so meaningful and romanticized. He finally got to wield his spear. His purpose, as the titans dictated it, was fulfilled simply by that.

Maybe it's a matter of taste. I don't need him to survive, I don't need him to kill even a level-one warlord, I don't need him to even kill a single stabber. I think there is value an interest and poetry in his story and in how he lived and thought and died. And, yes, that may seem to make him inconsequential, but I would see him as the every[s]man[/s]-Erfling.

I don't think it even matters to him that he will be rewarded in heaven as much as it matters to him that he performed his innate duty.

That pretty much how I see it as well.

The text updates seem to work differently from the comics in that regard. We had a lot of information about Sammy Haggar in the text updates, establishing his character pretty much. Still he died in the first battle we saw. Same with Ford and Twenty. So text updates color in the background, but it's still background. Background characters don't stand a fighting chance against foreground characters such as Ansom or Tramennis. All the can hope for is an honorable mention in the comic, like Tram saying after the battle: "We lost 20 infantry and one lvl1 Warlord, let's move on to the city".

That one of the things I like about the text updates and what I have seen as one of their uses. Agree about the honorable mention bit, I can see some sort of after battle report were we get to see the final tally.