Book 2 – Page 36

[Ansan Gotti]

I don't see any advantage of #3 over #2. At least in #2 Jetstone is using up arrows.

I am refering to when the fighting starts, which clearly was has to happen for GK to do anything because if they could initiate the action you describe they would have done it by now.
It is a plan which assumes the JS forces will stand around like dummies while all this happens, or at best behave like idiots.

The advantage is surprise, which is what got Ansom, and the RCC, and more recently Wanda. And they haven't done it before now because Parson is only just coming onto the scene.

And we have a pretty good idea it will happen before the fighting starts because Parson just said -- in this very page that we're commenting on -- that he will get them during the pre-battle parley.

[splintermute]

No, the archers aren't shooting at all. It's a parley, remember? And who said anything about the courtyard? The dwagons can either be over the tower or the walls, we know from a previous post, and so they would all be dive-bombing the tower.

What about dropping onto the tower rather than onto the courtyard, though? (Still keeping the dwagons as blockers.) They can still aim to croak Slately.

I don't think they can dive bomb the tower - I don't think they can even fly over the tower. The tower and outer walls are two areas that the archers can shoot FROM, but that GK can't shoot TO - arrows would stick in a vertical zone boundary (see Klog 002). I'm imagining an invisible, impenetrable zone barrier, infinitely high, surrounding the tower.

There really isn't a lot Wanda can do. If she moves the dwagons higher the archers and tower defenses will just shoot higher. I'm fairly certain there hasn't yet been mentioned combat penalties for altitude, so I'm reasonably certain they don't exist.

It's amazing how asymmetrical combat within a city hex is: attackers are restricted to zones by move, while defenders essentially have infinite move; attackers are apparently affected by height - fall height has an effect on fall outcome (Klog 002) - while defenders seem to be unaffected - "Distance would not save them. The tower could strike any unit in the city's airspace" (Update 021) (although it's unclear whether that refers to air defenses or archers). Oddly enough, Wanda's AYBABTU in tBfGK only affected the closest fliers, but we don't know if that was a distance limitation, or if it was because Wanda specifically directed the spell at those units.

[Pointyleaf]

I am refering to when the fighting starts, which clearly was has to happen for GK to do anything because if they could initiate the action you describe they would have done it by now.

Really? Ossomer, Scarlet, and Wanda all seemed sort of at a loss for what to do. There was no effective leadership, so nothing has been done. They didn't even have any foolamancy on the stack.

It is a plan which assumes the JS forces will stand around like dummies while all this happens, or at best behave like idiots. You will put GK forces on the ground in the city - they can't attack the tower until they control all the other zones - which makes them an easier target to the archers who will be on the walls not on the ground. Do not mistake a plan that increases the chances of "winning" the battle for one which increases the chances of surviving. This is a high risk-reward strategy for sure, but the risk of losing means losing the war, not just the battle.

Of course, Wanda's survival is all-important. I don't know if she's more likely to survive on the ground or in the air. Presumably Spacerock's "Atrium" was mentioned because it would be relevant - I expect that archers might have a hard time shooting into the Atrium from the walls or tower. The Atrium might be defensible by a decrypted ground force. Might be. But right now, I don't see any better choices, other than "stand there and take your hits like a man".

[Ansan Gotti]

I think it would be really funny if Rob never references the Atrium again.

[DevilDan]

Splintermute: the asymmetry lies in the fact that it's no longer the attacker's turn, which is surely a very uncommon situation.

What about dropping onto the tower rather than onto the courtyard, though? (Still keeping the dwagons as blockers.) They can still aim to croak Slately.

I don't think they can dive bomb the tower - I don't think they can even fly over the tower. The tower and outer walls are two areas that the archers can shoot FROM, but that GK can't shoot TO - arrows would stick in a vertical zone boundary (see Klog 002). I'm imagining an invisible, impenetrable zone barrier, infinitely high, surrounding the tower.

We saw Jill fly very close to the tower and next to the parapets. One might think it reasonable to think that there's no real "buffer" zone between the tower and airspace any more than there appears to be one between the the airspace and the tower. Getting on the tower might be more difficult, but I doubt it's not doable.

[Chris Goodwin]

We saw Jill fly very close to the tower and next to the parapets. One might think it reasonable to think that there's no real "buffer" zone between the tower and airspace any more than there appears to be one between the the airspace and the tower. Getting on the tower might be more difficult, but I doubt it's not doable.

Recall though that she couldn't actually get onto the tower until it was her side's turn. She couldn't have actually gotten onto the tower no matter what, until then.

[Ansan Gotti]

We saw Jill fly very close to the tower and next to the parapets. One might think it reasonable to think that there's no real "buffer" zone between the tower and airspace any more than there appears to be one between the the airspace and the tower. Getting on the tower might be more difficult, but I doubt it's not doable.

Recall though that she couldn't actually get onto the tower until it was her side's turn. She couldn't have actually gotten onto the tower no matter what, until then.

Tower explicitly connects directly to airspace:

http://www.erfworld.com/wiki/index.php/City_Zones

[gazes_also]

#4?? Crashland dragons on top of Slately's head. Om nom nom, Slately becomes dragon dinner. It'd be checkmate, but the chance that Slately will expose himself (*snrrk*) to GK is small.

You forgot the other sound effect.

Thuckt, thuckt, thuckt ...

...as dwagons splat against the zone barrier.

Airspace connects to Tower if it's your turn

[Ansan Gotti]

You forgot the other sound effect.

Thuckt, thuckt, thuckt ...

...as dwagons splat against the zone barrier.

Airspace connects to Tower if it's your turn

Dude, come on. Re-read this:

http://www.erfworld.com/page/7/

The entire premise of everything we've been talking about here assumes the dwagons are either falling or crash-landing, which allows off-turn zone-crossing, albeit at a price.

[fruityjanitor]

Epic update!

I love how Stanley is still completely clueless that Jillian was the heir to Faq. (For those who didn't notice, he refers to the heir as "he")

[Chris Goodwin]

Dude, come on. Re-read this:

http://www.erfworld.com/page/7/

The entire premise of everything we've been talking about here assumes the dwagons are either falling or crash-landing, which allows off-turn zone-crossing, albeit at a price.

Here's a fun one. What if GK's entire force drops as low as they possibly can. How low is that? Are they sitting on top of the heads of all of those JS troops hanging out there?

....And what happens to all of the arrows shot at them that miss? Shot by Jetstone's archers, which (since they are in their own city) can cross hex and/or city zone boundaries.....

[DevilDan]

Presumably there's something that keeps dwagons from just smacking down troops without landing...

We saw Jill fly very close to the tower and next to the parapets. One might think it reasonable to think that there's no real "buffer" zone between the tower and airspace any more than there appears to be one between the the airspace and the tower. Getting on the tower might be more difficult, but I doubt it's not doable.

Recall though that she couldn't actually get onto the tower until it was her side's turn. She couldn't have actually gotten onto the tower no matter what, until then.

Again, it would be more difficult. But betcha a running jump + some height could do the trick.

Here's a puzzler... if you tell a dwagon to throw you at the tower, do you count as a projectile? At which point does freefall change such that you'll just fall?

[Chris Goodwin]

Again, it would be more difficult. But betcha a running jump + some height could do the trick.

Nope. Look here and here. If she'd tried, she'd have smacked into the hex boundary. Nothing to do with height.

[Chit Rule Railroad]

They can't land. Period. The only way they can reach ground is croaked.

The other way they can reach the ground is overloaded. Remember Parson and Banana? Banana's descent was quite unwilling and left it upset and Parson injured, so I'm sure it counted as a fall.

The exploit of overloading multiple humanoids onto the same dwagon would be convenient for story-telling purposes because it's plausible that variations of Parson's drunken experiment of putting a heavy on a flying mount have consistently been hushed up as embarrassing "failures" by everyone in the history of Erfworld who has attempted it - meaning that the difference in the ability of Parson vs. Wanda/Jack/Trammenis/etc. to conceive of the idea would not be due to a difference in mental ability or proclivity, for a change.

[gazes_also]

Something that appears to have escaped the master strategists: Ossomer, Scarlett and the rest of the senior warlords and the Archons are decrypted.

How does that affect your crash-landing tactics?

Spoiler: show

A crash landing would be a one way trip for 2/3s of them. That's a lot of leadership bonuses to throw away

[Ansan Gotti]

Something that appears to have escaped the master strategists: Ossomer, Scarlett and the rest of the senior warlords and the Archons are decrypted.
How does that affect your crash-landing tactics?

Spoiler: show

A crash landing would be a one way trip for 2/3s of them. That's a lot of leadership bonuses to throw away

Didn't escape me; that's absolutely correct. No one ever said this was a low-risk, low-loss strategy. As long as at least one of the better warlords survives, however, then the stack will have at least some level of bonuses.

I am wondering if some of the decrypted archons might be ordered to hang back, waiting to see if GK wins rather than risking them, as their presence otherwise might be more additive than multiplicative.

The big hammer here is the dwagons, however. Happily, they are most of the force.

[gazes_also]

Dude, come on. Re-read this:

http://www.erfworld.com/page/7/

The entire premise of everything we've been talking about here assumes the dwagons are either falling or crash-landing, which allows off-turn zone-crossing, albeit at a price.

Falling - as in dropping vertically, not intentionally descending on an angle, which is what it would take to breach the tower, and which, being intentional, will stop at the boundary.

Here's a fun one. What if GK's entire force drops as low as they possibly can. How low is that? Are they sitting on top of the heads of all of those JS troops hanging out there?

....And what happens to all of the arrows shot at them that miss? Shot by Jetstone's archers, which (since they are in their own city) can cross hex and/or city zone boundaries.....

Another plan built around the assumed stupidity of the defenders, leaving troops in the open where they can be hit by falling corpses or arrows.

Didn't escape me; that's absolutely correct. No one ever said this was a low-risk, low-loss strategy. As long as at least one of the better warlords survives, however, then the stack will have at least some level of bonuses.

The stack? One Stack?

[Chris Goodwin]

Something that appears to have escaped the master strategists: Ossomer, Scarlett and the rest of the senior warlords and the Archons are decrypted.

How does that affect your crash-landing tactics?

Spoiler: show

A crash landing would be a one way trip for 2/3s of them. That's a lot of leadership bonuses to throw away

Of course. They're expendable. Considering Wanda would be in hex with the newly decrypted, plus the artifact bonus...

But yes, that hadn't escaped my notice.

That aside: what would you suggest they do? Given they have a lot of flyers, can't leave the hex, can't land, are pretty much sitting ducks, waiting for a very large number of archers and Shockamancy spells to blast them out of the air...?

[Chris Goodwin]

Here's a fun one. What if GK's entire force drops as low as they possibly can. How low is that? Are they sitting on top of the heads of all of those JS troops hanging out there?

....And what happens to all of the arrows shot at them that miss? Shot by Jetstone's archers, which (since they are in their own city) can cross hex and/or city zone boundaries.....

Another plan built around the assumed stupidity of the defenders, leaving troops in the open where they can be hit by falling corpses or arrows.

Ahh, c'mon. That was idle musing, not a "plan". But, since you mention it, panel 8 shows a large horde of yellow helmeted units right up the middle. They'll either get moved out of the way or they won't (and if they do, that's pretty much telegraphing to Parson &c that they're getting ready to do whatever it is they're going to do). Personally, if I were Parson, I'd park all of my flyers directly above their heads, and see what they do. (Also: the unit of measure in Erfworld is the hex. If they wanted to be truly safe, they'd leave the hex or, in this case, the city zone... and then once Wanda and her newly decrypted forces are safely on the ground, the tactics become different. Effectively, at that point they're holding the city zone, and Jetstone would need to take it from them.)

[Oberon]

Edit: Did I miss this in the thread or has noone speculated about the possibility to buy units from another side? I mean, we got mercenaries, but really buying another unit? Seems new to me. Exploitable?

It was suggested in the "Full Service" contract option mentioned by the Decrypted Archons. I would assume that the unit needs to be for sale first. If you could just buy a unit without the side's consent, then yes, then that would be an exploit.

You can buy another unit without the side's consent. It's called "turning" the unit, and it seems, according to the latest text update, to be something which can be bartered. Which means that schmuckers could be the tender for a unit to turn. Which means that you can indeed buy a unit without the side's consent.

I have no problem simply declaring the Time Warp spell utterly broken.

I mean, Parson's trimancer linkup destroyed an entire massive army in the space of one turn, with no apparent chance to avoid destruction. It also changed the terrain type, something only the Titans are supposed to be able to do (at least I think Sizemore said that). Boom, everything in hex dead. Rocks fall, everybody dies.

The Time Warp seems about as broken to me. Deny your opponent the chance to take their turn. Or worse -- end their turn mid way through at the worst possible moment.

Kingworld is broken, no doubt about it. But the volcano uncroaking, not so much. It has a set of limitations which makes it very unlikely to be repeated.
1) It requires an inactive volcano to be uncroaked. We have seen only one. One which is now active, and (probably) can thus no longer be uncroaked.
2) It requires that you be in a hex with a portal to the MK. Or you lose the casters.
3) It requires either a remote order, or that Parson be present. Or the Chief Warlord or Ruler dies, since no non-caster other than Parson can enter the MK.

This is not at all likely to see any repetition within the remainder of the Erfworld series.

Kingworld, on the other hand, has not shown any such limitations. A single enemy bat in the battle space, an easily gamed requirement, and you can end the turn of any enemy side whose name you can spell.

Even if the Arkendish was required that does not limit it for Charlie's use. He is a smart Ruler, I'm sure he could easily arrange to be able to cast it in situations where his gains would be considerable. Over and over. At least, as described so far.

It has frequently been argued that such a powerful spell must have very specific requirements otherwise it would be cast at every opportunity, so now who's engaging in baseless conjecture?

For my money? Those who have so argued. A undefined limitation is no limitation at all. Even a canon statement that such limitations exist would be sufficient. But without the slightest hint, there can be no logical conclusion other than this: At any time of his choosing, Charlie can hire a Turnamancer from the MK. This is something he is described as doing often, to speed Archon production. For the cost of this hiring, a turn of being incommunicado with his field units (a situation common to many field units without workarounds such as hats or Thinkamancers), and "two turns juice", coming from who being undefined, Charlie can end the turn of any side in Erfworld. Which has an incredible amount of both strategic and tactical advantage.