Book 2 - Page 4

[Trigger]

Pre-veil-reveal I was expecting Sizemore to show up and just build a second bridge and have the whole decrypted pain-train go around the princes.
When I read the plural and saw Jack I figured that meant they were both there. Wanda+Jack probably makes the most sense.

Also: am I the only one expecting the dittomancer to be almost featureless less a fake looking smiley (ala the pokemon)?

[Dahak]

"Casters" could imply Wanda + Jack, or Sizemore could be there as well.

And on the outside edge of possibility Ansom may be right and Decrypting may count as repopping. In which case some of the decrypted Warlords may have repopped as casters.

[Pax]

The biggest problem with the "How I Would Use Decrypted" theories are that they all assume Wanda is the Overlord.
Stanley still is. Stanley's units are the dwagons, so those are the units that are going to be used most carefully.
Decrypted are loyal to Wanda, while regular units are loyal to Stanley.

Actually, for my post? I was assuming nothing more than "if I, Sean / Pax, were the Chief Warlord - and didn't have an idiot like Stanley in the Overlord slot".

If you were playing a game where you had access to decrypted units, but the decrypted were controlled by a single unit, and that unit could in theory turn against you or disobey you, turning the entire army against you, would you build your whole strategy around them?

I might. It'd be a gamble - but a gamble against only the one unit, rather than the usual gamble against the whole WORLD.

Pax, yes that's a solid plan* but still a bit "inside the box", so to speak. You still want to control and use territory. I'd like to point out that a purely decrypted side could dispense with this. Nomadic, targetting power centers, razeing them to prevent them being used at full capacity to quickly; killing everyone else or at least keeping them down.

Your nomadic force would be stronger in the short term: every single newly-decrypted unit woudl immediately aggregate to the Doom-Ball. Still, the weakness is this: your ball-of-doom can only be in one place at one time. I can only do so much in a single turn.

My territorial force would be stronger in the LONG term: every city the doom-ball ran over, would KEEP producing units; while garrisoning them with decrypted units would slow the doom-ball's EARLY growth, eventually the growth rate woudl escalate - because more and more cities would be forwardin units to the doom-ball, as more and more of them were able to meet their garrison needs with purely-Decrypted units. And those garrisons would in turn become more and more impossible for the enemy to defeat, too.

Which plan is better depends on the world size and the players in it, I guess. Intuitively, it makes sense that the safest way to deny territory to your enemies is to hold it ... but then again not being constrained to defend has its own liberating effects ...

True on both points, but I was looking at holding territory not for the sake of denying it to the enemy, but for the purpose of being able to exploit it for resources / growth.

*: again, we're just discussing a hypothetical decrypted-only side, or at least a side where the overlord commands such units almost exclusively. This is not the case for Stanley.

Absolutely true. In Stanley's case, I'd make sure that the strength of any Garrison remained solidly at LEAST 60% non-Decrypted, and that ALL Warlords on Garrison duty were non-Decrypted, period. I'd also insist on rotating my non-decrypted warlords into the front lines for some solid levelling, as well.

Lamech, I think that what Pax is getting at is that you can get one reverso-death in battle if you keep your regular units long enough to be sent to battle. Croak-n-Decrypt them as soon as they pop, and when they are killed in battle they get dusted. If they were still living when you sent them though, they get one extra life. Whether it's worth it or just a complication depends on how fast-and-usefully you can get them killed off.

In my later suggestion, yes, exactly this.

Also, consider the sort of loyalty you can get out of your living troops, if they KNOW that they WILL be restored to perfect, breathing-thinking-and-NOT-decaying "life". You coudl literally strap explosives to a thousand pikers, light the fuses, and yell "CHARGE!!" ... and never even incur a loyalty check. Or if you did, have a stupendously-large bonus to the check.

Most of the time it really would make sense to just pop units on the executioner's block as you suggest.

If you're just making garrisons, and your Decrypt-capable unit(s) have the mobility to reach enough production sites, yes.

...

Now there's a thought. How does Croakamancy work, if the Crokamancer themself is Decrypted?

[k33g0rz]

did they take uniroyal's chief warlord and the other conquered warlords with them?

[BLANDCorporatio]

Scarlett!

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it's late and I lost control.

[MarbitChow]

Scarlett!

I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it's late and I lost control.

Ooh! Ooh! Is this the part where I speculate that Scarlett and Misty will come flying in on a mechanical dwagon named Deus?

[BLANDCorporatio]

Yes, but the dwagon must be the big-eyed reincarnation of Bogroll.

[GobwinPie]

Ooh! Ooh! Is this the part where I speculate that Scarlett and Misty will come flying in on a mechanical dwagon named Deus?

Clearly, the dwagon would have to somehow be formerly mechanical.

[MarbitChow]

Also, consider the sort of loyalty you can get out of your living troops, if they KNOW that they WILL be restored to perfect, breathing-thinking-and-NOT-decaying "life". You coudl literally strap explosives to a thousand pikers, light the fuses, and yell "CHARGE!!" ... and never even incur a loyalty check. Or if you did, have a stupendously-large bonus to the check.

Based on Bogroll's final status, you'd have to draw the line at explosions.
There's also the creepy-worship-of-Wanda factor; that might make people pause.
Overall, though, those are definitely arguments in favor of being more courageous.
However, the current incentive of "if you disobey, you disband" is effectively already motivation enough.
I got the impression that loyalty and duty were similar types of stats, and only applied to commanders.

Now there's a thought. How does Croakamancy work, if the Crokamancer themself is Decrypted?

I'd imagine that they have access to all of the same powers that they did before, but probably give themselves a bonus for leading themselves.

[MarbitChow]

Ooh! Ooh! Is this the part where I speculate that Scarlett and Misty will come flying in on a mechanical dwagon named Deus?

Clearly, the dwagon would have to somehow be formerly mechanical.

Or just named "Deus The Tenth"?

[BLANDCorporatio]

I'd imagine that they have access to all of the same powers that they did before, but probably give themselves a bonus for leading themselves.

Maybe even give a bonus to their bonus-giving abilities. Eschermancy.

Or just named "Deus The Tenth"?

Argh, I guess this joke will have to be explained for me.

[TheWombat]

Deus the Tenth = Deus X = Deus Ex Machina?

[Ytaker]

Your nomadic force would be stronger in the short term: every single newly-decrypted unit woudl immediately aggregate to the Doom-Ball. Still, the weakness is this: your ball-of-doom can only be in one place at one time. I can only do so much in a single turn.

My territorial force would be stronger in the LONG term: every city the doom-ball ran over, would KEEP producing units; while garrisoning them with decrypted units would slow the doom-ball's EARLY growth, eventually the growth rate woudl escalate - because more and more cities would be forwardin units to the doom-ball, as more and more of them were able to meet their garrison needs with purely-Decrypted units. And those garrisons would in turn become more and more impossible for the enemy to defeat, too.

It depends on how many hard troops they have. If they have a lot of dwagons and archons and heavies, they can keep control of a large area, and hit and take any troops you had. You can only produce strong troops very slowly, and you can't control much more than ten cities, due to diminishing returns. Cities main advantage is that they make an army vastly more effective, with air defenses, and traps, and an advantage with archery. You can kill a lot more troops. They're not that fast at producing troops.

[OneHugeTuck]

Perhaps this has been addressed...

What exactly would the Dittomancer ability to double specials do/mean? Leadership is a special but Ansom said 'doubling leadership bonuses and specials'.

Double flight, for instance?

[Pointyleaf]

Perhaps this has been addressed...

What exactly would the Dittomancer ability to double specials do/mean? Leadership is a special but Ansom said 'doubling leadership bonuses and specials'.

Double flight, for instance?

I'm not sure flight is a special. I'd think of it more as part of the unit type (water, fliers, siege, etc). Probably he means like fabrication (for trolls), regeneration, short special attacks (like natural juice-based ones), fireball attacks from dragons, etc.

[Xewleer]

I would say: Bonus of five, suddenly, it turns into TEN.
But the Doubling surviving units stumps me a little. To take things literally: I've got five surviving units, oh hey! I've got TEN now! (end of turn, of course).

[Sixty]

I would say: Bonus of five, suddenly, it turns into TEN.
But the Doubling surviving units stumps me a little. To take things literally: I've got five surviving units, oh hey! I've got TEN now! (end of turn, of course).

It might double the stack bonus associated with surviving units. Like you have a stack of 8 pikers, 4 croak so the remaining 4 would normally have a smaller stack bonus but the dittomancer doubles the bonus to as if there were 8 units in the stack?

[MarbitChow]

I would say: Bonus of five, suddenly, it turns into TEN.
But the Doubling surviving units stumps me a little. To take things literally: I've got five surviving units, oh hey! I've got TEN now! (end of turn, of course).

It might double the stack bonus associated with surviving units. Like you have a stack of 8 pikers, 4 croak so the remaining 4 would normally have a smaller stack bonus but the dittomancer doubles the bonus to as if there were 8 units in the stack?

Well, since we're speculating, I'll throw in my two cents...
Ansom mentions "maximum stacks of top heavies", so I'm guessing that there is a hard limit of units who can engage. Once one of them dies, the Dittomancer can replace them to push the number back to the max during the same turn.
(If it's the attacker's turn, I would assume that you would keep replacements in an adjacent hex and move them in to replace the fallen.)

[gameboy1234]

*sigh*

I wish the update would get here.

[Rosa Vernal]

About that "prove your claim" thing. What, exactly, would proving consist of? I would hope that it wouldn't be just conquering the capital and Jetstone just allying in hopes that they'd not be croaked.

Of course, this stems from a desire to see Jillian go around croaking things and Wanda Decrypting them.