Book 2 – Page 50

[Whispri]

Under this senario Tram either burned through some of GK's foolamancy or the yellows' first lives

Unfortunetly being able to break the laws of physics isn't something you can plan for. He can enter the MK, but casters are far more powerful and can do it too. Maybe Parson can do something else that violates all known rules, but that can't be planned for.

Maybe GK can attack, but they would have done so already if Tram had any hope at all of stopping them. And presumably Tram is using the tower defenses in the most effective way possible; we don't know the mechanics of them nor the mechanics of protection spells, (Maybe Wanda can cast anti-magic field and they'll need spare arrows.) and Tram IS saving magic both scrolls and juice. And with healing they have to burn through hits anyway.

Who else would take it? He is doing fine, he didn't see Parson's out of the box thinking ahead of time. Because its out of the box thinking. He immediatly recognized when something was wrong, then gained additional info, then concluded what Parson was doing, and finally set a volley for arrows at "Wanda".

In either case they'd be burning where Gobwin Knob's Chief Warlord wanted them to burn. That's not a good thing to have happened from Jetstone's point of view.

Perhaps not, but he could at least be aware of the danger. Have his troops ready to react at the first sign of trouble.

While he may not have been able to stop Wanda and company from attacking, he could at least make the job harder for them. Rather than easier at every step. His preferred targets for the Tower spells were the Caster's mounts. Having his choice of targets dictated to him is far from ideal to say the least.

Any experienced Warlord would have been a better choice, Jetstone have more than a few of them. What's happened may be outside of Tramennis' box, but Antium? He was reacting to the danger before the Tower opened up.

Wanda's alive and in a moment she's going to shout "Angelic Hordes come forth!"

It wont happen. Why? Because in this case there would be no need for Parson to journey through the MK. Which according to the Predictomancer is definitely going to happen. There has been too much buildup for Parson entering the MK again, too.

Uh... Wanda being alive and Decrypting is the 'go' condition for Parson being the Kaiser. He's not going anywhere without an army to command when he arrives.

And likely still would have failed....Parson positioned Wanda so she was screened. JS were messed up once Parson got his plan across to Jack and Wanda...after that, there was very little JS could do to stop it. Parson gambled...Wanda could very well have died in the fall....but he seems to have stacked the odds as much in his favour as he could. JSs trouble was that it could easily win the battle....but may still have lost the resulting war. JS held out for the traditional parley and for Tram and his forces to return. Tram wanted a parley for sound reasons as well. But once Parson got involved, even killing off the GK force wouldn't have helped....only Wanda needed to survive. JS shooting them down would have created a little bit more chaos and perhaps prompted Parson to harvest the mounts sooner to provide more cover for Wanda but the end result would be the same...Wanda on the ground with the pliers and a whole heap of dead bodies.

In other words, it took him a few seconds to realise Parsons plan to bypass a physical law. Fast. And his response is probably the best he can do given everything else. Trams problem is that there wasn't anything he could do to stop that. Wanda was screened enough that she likely would get down somehow. The big question was would she survive.

Tram has enough archers to croak the entire/most GK force. That was GKs problem. Tram seems to be having them saturate the atrium...he's getting rid of survivors and hes continuing the evacuation to deny GK more dead bodies to decrypt. If he is able to keep up the arrow storm, he may very well be able to kill off a lot of decrypted as Wanda raises them and he may even get Wanda.

As for time to organise....if they stay, they're in danger from friendly fire. That provides more bodies for Wanda. As it is, the JS troops are fighting...or did you miss the decapitated dwagon?

And there was nothing he could do to stop it. His best option was to continue with the traditional parley. But prevent GK getting to the ground? Parsons plan involved killing his own army. He needed ONLY Wanda to survive.

What do you expect him to do to stop things? He needs to kill Wanda...but Parson had her put up screening stacks. And before that he had Jack put up baffles. So killing her wouldn't be quick or easy...and Parson would just enact his plan sooner and ignore the elements that added extra confusion.

JSs mistake was not to kill GK while Wanda was an easy target. That would still have left it in a poor position.
Trams mistake was to consider the impossible impossible....while not considering that the supply rules provided a workaround. Even then, had he attacked, he'd still be left in what he sees as an unenviable situation.

You would prefer that he use up his casters juice on non-critical targets? He needed to get rid of the yellows. He chose a method that ddn't waste casters juice and didn't use up arrows. As for waste....we don't know enough to state this was the best option, but its very likely the case the twoer has more spells and juice available to it....it didn't strop casting because it ran out, he ordered it stopped.

Not a chance. GKs problem is that they couldn't win, they couldn't attack, they were sitting ducks, they couldn't move or escape. Foolamancy wouldn't help. Shockamancy wouldn't help. A suitable Trimancer link would help but none were in the hex.

600 archers firing at a cloud of targets that can't escape and 3 casters boosted by the towers spell bonus.

And you think this because...what? He refuses to shoot down his hostages (aka weakening his bargianbing position)? With all the scrolls in the world, what makes you think that his force of archers, made safe behind zone boundaries and off turn limitations, can't wipe out most, if not all, of GKs force? Regardless of what they do? The Erfworlders seem to think that is the case.

By removing units vulnerable to attack and stationing his archers in readiness for battle. What more would you have him do?

Even if they win they are in trouble. Thats a big reason Tram wants to parley.

They don't have one beyond dumb luck. GK doesn't have to parley...in which case JS wipes out their strike force. GK doesn't have to agree...in which case JS wipes out their Strike force. In both cases, GK gets nothing, Wanda dies and JS gets the pliers. If GK does agree, it gets the return of a powerful strike force, several experienced warlords and a Master Foolamancer in addition to a secure border.

Thats a potentially powerful incentive.

And it is NOT GKs turn. GK cannot attack. It cannot move. It cannot fight. It cannot escape. Its options are limited to tossing off a few S-Bombs and trying to survive the onrushing arrow storm. It doesn't matter what Hamster knows or can find out. He can't make use of that information. Because its not his turn.

He's doing quite well so far. Hes reacting quickly, he's grasped Parson plan and hes doing what needs to be done to counter it....evacuate the atrium to give his archers a clear line of fire and deny Wanda more bodies and have his troops try to remove Wanda. Is there a better plan? He could have had all the troops remain to search for Wanda...but that would remove his archers from that battle and give Wanda more troops if they didn't get her...GK does have a Foolamancer.

Your "few seconds" are an absoloute minimum of half a minute, likely far, far longer given pause panels and time for movement. That's hellishly slow in the circumstances. Even if he really is doing the best that could be done at this moment, he's still responsibile for it happening in the first place. An army is loose in his garrison and it's too late to stop it. It may have been impossible for him to hold back this storm, but he didn't even try. The drop was unmolested, the landing unopposed, the Atrium itself barely contested, the best chance his infantry had against the Decrypted thrown away. And potentialy, his best screen against Dwagon breath attacks wasted as well.

So yeah, if you regard the grand total of one hit scored on Wanda's mount by a certain hailstorm of arrows to be impressive, if you ignore the threat of mid-air Decryption as Tramennis did, if you care nothing for Foolamancy Scrolls, the multitude of other scrolls they could be carrying with them, the fact that your vaunted Caster links can in fact be used to create scrolls, that Casters can drain the Treasury to create rocks to drop, that the airgroup can stay out of range of the enemy Caster's indefinately, the terrible warnings Jetstone had been given and feel that putting a Rupert in charge of the army was a good idea, then yes his complacency might at least be understandable. And that list of dangers? Nothing Tramennis couldn't have known about and some things he has to have done.

You dismiss the drop as a gamble, but a gamble, no matter the odds, is a still a better hance than just floating up there waiting to die as Tramennis was apparantly expecting. It's also a gamble aimed at victory made by a man with a mathamancy bracelet at his disposal, merely surviving the battle in the skies without conquering would have been an entirely different kettle of fish, a kettle of fish that left some Jetstonians feeling the need for the Faq Expeditionary Force to stay in Spacerock as reserves. And really, only Wanda (the most valuable unit in the hex by a wide margin) and her mount need to survive.

As far as negotiations go, you don't sacrifice your most important unit to save a few easily replacable sky-mooks. And really, Jetstone isn't in a position to dictate terms, Gobwin Knob can crush them without the airgroup. They've no reason to accept whatever insult Tramennis offers them.

[decius]

Suppose that there is such a thing as 'parley', in the same sense that there are hexes. Ansom certainly trusted it well enough.

Suppose that crapping isn't a violation of parley, because the rules didn't consider it.

Certainly harvesting food would not violate parley.

That means that Jetstone, by firing off the spells and arrows, actually broke the truce.

[Decorus]

Yes, it would be a very good way to balance the 'pliers, but that's not the point: Arkentools exist to be OVERPOWERED. Having weaknesses which balance them would totally kill the point.

I meant balanced against the other Arkentools. The 'Hammer lets you convert dwagons, rock out and use some basic changeamancy. The 'Dish gives very powerful thinkamancy and maybe a bonus to gaining archons. And both of those are incredibly useful tools. But they don't really measure up to perfect conversion of all enemy units to your side with no upfront cost.

No thats all Stanley can do with it. Stanley has admitted he has no idea of the actual powers of the Arkenhammer since he is too stupid to make good use of it.
You also left off it lets them purchase dwagons, but taming wild dwagons is faster and cheaper.

[Fug]

By the way, in the second to last panel, is that a red dwagon being beheaded in the background?

I wondered that too- it does seem like the dwagons body is standing up. I would have thought red dwagons were a little tougher than that. On the other hand maybe it was already dead and its body was blocking the door and they had to cut off its head to get through the door behind it

[GaryThunder]

I think parley is an informal arrangement rather than an explicit rule. Parson was called out by Tramennis for violating parley - not in hushed tones of awe for breaking a rule, but with righteous disapproval at his dishonorable act.

Whispri, the point is that whatever tricks GK might pull, they can't (to most peoples' knowledge) move out of the airspace. Any tricks with Foolamancy or anything else won't do anything more than increase the number of arrows/scrolls/juice needed to bring down the group. They can't attack out of the airspace either, even with spells (except by crapping, apparently, but they definitely can't attack the tower from where they were, recall Tramennis specifically had the yellows move away from where they could hit anything but non-valuable ground units), so Tramennis was mostly right to consider that they were caught.

Also bear in mind that this specific situation probably happens very, very rarely. An enemy force in a city's airspace during that city's turn? No group would voluntarily end turn and trap themselves in a city zone, and until Kingworld there was no way to forcibly end a side's turn. (Or so it seems.) Charlie's Archons ended turn in Gobwin Knob's airspace, but they didn't act until the Coalition's turn, and that was still an unusual circumstance. Tramennis, inexperienced at warfare as he is, would know even less about a bizarre fluke encounter that has probably never happened to him before, involving a caster with powers he has definitely never had to directly face before. This entire situation is unprecedented, and Tramennis, while smart, is not a battle-oriented warlord. He seems to have figured out what's going on by now, though.

[Fug]

They're on the ground. Arrows in Erfworld are only an effective weapon against fliers. Against ground troops it seems to do little else but a little softening, altough lucky hits are possible as in the begginning of book 1.

That is a really good point I hadn't considered. On the other hand when they were targeted with arrow earlier in book two they had a strong chief warlord (bonus) with them and JS had just lost their chief warlord. Now JS archers will get their chief warlord's bonus (granted it seems unlikely that Trem would have leveled much from diplomacy ) but JS also is lacking a chief warlord in the hex.

[President_Allosaurus]

Your "few seconds" are an absoloute minimum of half a minute, likely far, far longer given pause panels and time for movement. That's hellishly slow in the circumstances. Even if he really is doing the best that could be done at this moment, he's still responsibile for it happening in the first place. An army is loose in his garrison and it's too late to stop it. It may have been impossible for him to hold back this storm, but he didn't even try. The drop was unmolested, the landing unopposed, the Atrium itself barely contested, the best chance his infantry had against the Decrypted thrown away. And potentialy, his best screen against Dwagon breath attacks wasted as well.

So yeah, if you regard the grand total of one hit scored on Wanda's mount by a certain hailstorm of arrows to be impressive, if you ignore the threat of mid-air Decryption as Tramennis did, if you care nothing for Foolamancy Scrolls, the multitude of other scrolls they could be carrying with them, the fact that your vaunted Caster links can in fact be used to create scrolls, that Casters can drain the Treasury to create rocks to drop, that the airgroup can stay out of range of the enemy Caster's indefinately, the terrible warnings Jetstone had been given and feel that putting a Rupert in charge of the army was a good idea, then yes his complacency might at least be understandable. And that list of dangers? Nothing Tramennis couldn't have known about and some things he has to have done.

You dismiss the drop as a gamble, but a gamble, no matter the odds, is a still a better hance than just floating up there waiting to die as Tramennis was apparantly expecting. It's also a gamble aimed at victory made by a man with a mathamancy bracelet at his disposal, merely surviving the battle in the skies without conquering would have been an entirely different kettle of fish, a kettle of fish that left some Jetstonians feeling the need for the Faq Expeditionary Force to stay in Spacerock as reserves. And really, only Wanda (the most valuable unit in the hex by a wide margin) and her mount need to survive.

As far as negotiations go, you don't sacrifice your most important unit to save a few easily replacable sky-mooks. And really, Jetstone isn't in a position to dictate terms, Gobwin Knob can crush them without the airgroup. They've no reason to accept whatever insult Tramennis offers them.

There's nothing to support anything more than a minute has passed. It is incredibly suspect that more than half a minute has passed. Yellows cwap, Tramennis orders them shot down. Dwagons begin dropping, Tramennis is confused, and while the dwagons are still falling realizes they're killing their own mounts and gathers the gist of the cheat. He orders a response immediately. As far as facts we've been shown go, Tramennis responded appropriately and quickly. I don't know where the tittering about how slow he is comes from.

What exactly could he have done to stop the dropping? To oppose the landing? Within moments of the crapping the Atrium was being evacuated to avoid further damage to their troops.

Sure, he didn't consider that Parson would have a plan that was able to bypass the rules of zone boundaries. That's the whole point of Parson's strategic ability. Parson plans things that seem to Erfworldians like he's breaking rules. It is, in fact, a plot element that he is breaking these rules that everyone adheres to. Tramennis could not have planned for something no one has ever considered. He's not stupid, but he, like everyone else in Erfworld that isn't Parson, inherently adheres to basic rules and informal niceties that the rest of us boggle at, and like Parson, the gamers amongst would seek to manipulate and abuse these rules. He's stupid for not being like us? Isn't that the whole point?

For an Erfworldian, Tramennis has been competent and intelligent. I'm happy to see Parson rip his city apart, and I hope Tramennis' mind is broadened by the experience to make him a deadlier foe in future issues.

:
By the way, in the second to last panel, is that a red dwagon being beheaded in the background?

I think it is! In fact, it looks to me like the warlord doing it has black hair and a red cape. Check out Panel 7 for more of that warlord being totally badass. I think they're supposed to be the same. I guess he or she killed that dwagon and moved onto the red.

A really awesome closeup of a shattered soul.

Kudos to you good sir.

Thanks! I think it might be more appropiate for what's going on in Ossomer's head right now. He's got no side to be on. :[

Did anyone else notice the white-haired soldier in Panels 4 and 6? She looks distinct from the other units, and seems to be focusing on Antium. I wonder what's up with that?

[GaryThunder]

Thanks! I think it might be more appropiate for what's going on in Ossomer's head right now. He's got no side to be on. :[

I think Ossomer has the perfect "wut?" face. He just has no clue what the hell is going on.

Did anyone else notice the white-haired soldier in Panels 4 and 6? She looks distinct from the other units, and seems to be focusing on Antium. I wonder what's up with that?

She could have a crush on him and be upset because he's missing significant portions of his body. Or maybe she's just stunned at seeing Antium, normally a bastion of strength (his name is Adam Antium, for boop's sake), so horribly crippled and wounded.

[President_Allosaurus]

She could have a crush on him and be upset because he's missing significant portions of his body. Or maybe she's just stunned at seeing Antium, normally a bastion of strength (his name is Adam Antium, for boop's sake), so horribly crippled and wounded.

I like that, I think it might be a combination of them. All awestruck by him being so commanding while so wounded.

[Kyrt]

Perhaps not, but he could at least be aware of the danger. Have his troops ready to react at the first sign of trouble.

Which would be? The problem is, as far as Erfworlders appear to be concerned, GKs ability to do ANYTHING was severely curtailed. They could only move within the hex. Their only method of attack was via the yellows. They were covered by 600 archers and several tower boosted casters.

GK...off turn...had two viable options.

The first was to use the yellows to attack. Tram dealt with this by having them move over the Atrium where they wouldn't spoil his parley.
The second was die. Tram helped with this by having 600 archers on hand.

Some of GKs forces MAY have survived the turn....but they'd have lost the vast majority of their troops.

What else would you expect Tram to do?

While he may not have been able to stop Wanda and company from attacking

He didn't really have to...Zone boundaries do this automatically. The exception was the yellows and he dealt with that. First by moving them away and second by killing them when they did attack.

, he could at least make the job harder for them. Rather than easier at every step. His preferred targets for the Tower spells were the Caster's mounts. Having his choice of targets dictated to him is far from ideal to say the least.

His preferred targets when he attacked were the yellows...because they were the units attacking. As for his initial plans, the plans you refer to, the palkns for actually wiping out the GK force as oppsoed to holding them for ransom...the casters were the most dangerous units there and the prime targets. Where was his choice dictated by anything other than his tactical and strategic needs?

Why was having the casters mounts as primary targets a bad idea?

Any experienced Warlord would have been a better choice, Jetstone have more than a few of them. What's happened may be outside of Tramennis' box, but Antium? He was reacting to the danger before the Tower opened up.

And so did Tram. Who also assessed the situation and countermanded a general attack order given by the KIng.

Your "few seconds" are an absoloute minimum of half a minute, likely far, far longer given pause panels and time for movement. That's hellishly slow in the circumstances.

Pause panels? We are seeing several points of view simultaneously. As it is, Tram was surprisingly quick to realise that Parson had actually done something he likely considered physically impossible. Not onyl that, but he came up with what seems a viable counter strategy - kill Wanda - pretty quickly and had the archers engaged while continuingint o deprive Wanda of a source for troop decryption. For 30s, given that he is an Erfworlder, that seems pretty fast.

Even if he really is doing the best that could be done at this moment, he's still responsibile for it happening in the first place. An army is loose in his garrison and it's too late to stop it. It may have been impossible for him to hold back this storm, but he didn't even try. The drop was unmolested, the landing unopposed, the Atrium itself barely contested, the best chance his infantry had against the Decrypted thrown away. And potentialy, his best screen against Dwagon breath attacks wasted as well.

How is he responsible? There is literally nothing he could have done to prevent it. Nothing he could do to mitigate it. And it was an impossibility. If he left the troops in place, there'd have been more dead troopers for Wanda...crushed by the falling mounts, killed by the survivors. He could have ignored Parsons attack and the dwagons would still have been croaked. If he'd killed them, he'd have saved Parson the bother of wiping them out himself. As for best chance against the Decrypted...that's a poor target. He has enough firepower to kill them all. He needs Wanda dead.

if you ignore the threat of mid-air Decryption as Tramennis did

I do...as they'd then be subject to off turn restrictions...no attacks, no movement.

if you care nothing for Foolamancy Scrolls

Meaningless....they'd make things harder and help increase the chance SOME of GKs forces would survive the turn....but NOTHING else. Without the ability to move or attack, GK had lost this battle.

the fact that your vaunted Caster links can in fact be used to create scrolls

Good thing there was no GK Thinkamancer in hex to form a link then.

that the airgroup can stay out of range of the enemy Caster's indefinately

No...they can't. GKs airgroup was effectively dead once JS decided to open fire.

You dismiss the drop as a gamble, but a gamble, no matter the odds, is a still a better hance than just floating up there waiting to die as Tramennis was apparantly expecting.

If I'm falling to my death, flapping my arms in the hope that I will spontaneously discover the secret of flight will be betetr than doing nothing. It is, however, unlikely to work. Gks choice in that situation as far as Erfworlders were concerned was simple...die or....well, just die.

As far as negotiations go, you don't sacrifice your most important unit to save a few easily replacable sky-mooks. And really, Jetstone isn't in a position to dictate terms, Gobwin Knob can crush them without the airgroup. They've no reason to accept whatever insult Tramennis offers them.

Really? Casters are rare and worth a lot. Master class even more so. JS was offering Jack...plus a fairly power airgroup. Plus a secure front.

You think GK would turn down the return of an emerald because the diamond was given back as well? Either way, if JS is in as much trouble as Tram seems to feel it is, they lose nothing by parley. Why not explore the option?

[Radagast]

Yes, it would be a very good way to balance the 'pliers, but that's not the point: Arkentools exist to be OVERPOWERED. Having weaknesses which balance them would totally kill the point.

I meant balanced against the other Arkentools. The 'Hammer lets you convert dwagons, rock out and use some basic changeamancy. The 'Dish gives very powerful thinkamancy and maybe a bonus to gaining archons. And both of those are incredibly useful tools. But they don't really measure up to perfect conversion of all enemy units to your side with no upfront cost.

No thats all Stanley can do with it. Stanley has admitted he has no idea of the actual powers of the Arkenhammer since he is too stupid to make good use of it.
You also left off it lets them purchase dwagons, but taming wild dwagons is faster and cheaper.

Actually I think the Hammer has some Shockamancy too perhaps?

http://www.erfworld.com/book-1-archive/?px=%2F147.jpg - 4th panel.

[RichMan]

The post turn debrief on all sides will be very interesting and long

a) Transylvito - WTF happened x2
b) FAQ - WTF and Ansom chat
c) Parson Wanda Jack - Orders, following them and death
d) Parson and TheTool - "Hey your level 3 now. Why did I put you in charge again? All my Dwagons are now Wanda's"
e) Magic Kingdom - Janice and everyone else
f) Parson Charlie
g) Sizemore and whomever he gets to talk to either Janice or Parson
h) The decrypted royal family
i) Parson Maggie - loyalty
j) Rest of Erf - WTF, and sombody help us now -> hence book #3

[oslecamo2]

You dismiss the drop as a gamble, but a gamble, no matter the odds, is a still a better hance than just floating up there waiting to die as Tramennis was apparantly expecting.

If I'm falling to my death, flapping my arms in the hope that I will spontaneously discover the secret of flight will be betetr than doing nothing. It is, however, unlikely to work. Gks choice in that situation as far as Erfworlders were concerned was simple...die or....well, just die.

How about seting off a nuke at your feet and then jumping from a cliff? Because that's what Hamster ended book 1. Activate volcano, jump into the Magic Kingdom portal. Die or die taking as much oponents down with you as possible.

As far as negotiations go, you don't sacrifice your most important unit to save a few easily replacable sky-mooks. And really, Jetstone isn't in a position to dictate terms, Gobwin Knob can crush them without the airgroup. They've no reason to accept whatever insult Tramennis offers them.

Really? Casters are rare and worth a lot. Master class even more so. JS was offering Jack...plus a fairly power airgroup. Plus a secure front.

You think GK would turn down the return of an emerald because the diamond was given back as well? Either way, if JS is in as much trouble as Tram seems to feel it is, they lose nothing by parley. Why not explore the option?

[/quote]

Because GK's Chief Warlord is now Parson "I WOULD RATHER BLOW UP MY CITY AND TROOPS AND THEN JUMP INTO A PORTAL THAT SHOULD BY ALL MEANS KILL ME RATHER THAN PARLEY FOR ANY KIND OF TRUCE OR SURRENDER!" Hamster. He parleys only as a distraction while he prepares to deliver another blow. Like he did right now. Sending Ossomer to parley did bought Hamster several precious moments to put his plan in motion. But he never intended for a peacefull settlement. Crushing Jetstone is still his main objective.

[GaryThunder]

Because GK's Chief Warlord is now Parson "I WOULD RATHER BLOW UP MY CITY AND TROOPS AND THEN JUMP INTO A PORTAL THAT SHOULD BY ALL MEANS KILL ME RATHER THAN PARLEY FOR ANY KIND OF TRUCE OR SURRENDER!" Hamster. He parleys only as a distraction while he prepares to deliver another blow. Like he did right now. Sending Ossomer to parley did bought Hamster several precious moments to put his plan in motion. But he never intended for a peacefull settlement. Crushing Jetstone is still his main objective.

Blow up the city? It was a Level 1 ruin after Sizemore brought down the house. It seemed more or less the same, plus a lava pit, after the blast. And they just rebuilt it anyway. Blow up the troops? He had a tiny handful of Uncroaked and a couple of golems, and he kept the golems. Plus, Decryption. He had nothing to lose at GK, except perhaps his life, whereas he has a lot to lose here. Losing Wanda, whatever Tramennis's dark predictions say, will cripple GK. They might be able to pull through and still beat the Coalition, but they might not, and their Toolist philosophy would be shattered.

[Kyrt]

How about seting off a nuke at your feet and then jumping from a cliff? Because that's what Hamster ended book 1. Activate volcano, jump into the Magic Kingdom portal. Die or die taking as much oponents down with you as possible.

He used a portal.
He survived because he is "some kind of Mathamancer"...ie Caster
And trimancer links are powerful.

Whats impossible there? He used a known and accepted game mechanic to create a powerful Dirtamancy trap and escaped by taking advantage of his ability to enter the MK.

Because GK's Chief Warlord is now Parson "I WOULD RATHER BLOW UP MY CITY AND TROOPS AND THEN JUMP INTO A PORTAL THAT SHOULD BY ALL MEANS KILL ME RATHER THAN PARLEY FOR ANY KIND OF TRUCE OR SURRENDER!" Hamster. He parleys only as a distraction while he prepares to deliver another blow. Like he did right now. Sending Ossomer to parley did bought Hamster several precious moments to put his plan in motion. But he never intended for a peacefull settlement. Crushing Jetstone is still his main objective.

It bought him time for the perfect moment. But his plan could have been put into motion much earlier. As it is, you seem to overlook the fact that, were it not for his bypassing the off turn restriction, GK could have done nothing.

If GK can literally do nothing of substance - and no, S-bombing the atrium isn't something of substance - then what harm did it do to actually parley?

Could Parson attack during it? Yes....in a minor, inconvenenient fashion, to which JS had a ready reply.
Could they escape? No. Could they hide? No. Could they do anything at all that would pose a plausible treat or danger? No.

If you rule out off turn movement, the worst GK could do would be to inconvenience JS. And at that point, there is no need to slam the door on parley. Especially when you stand to benefit from it in a major way.

[Oberon]

[...] then decided to Parlay[/url], and only then did they do the attack which was been possible ever since they've been in our city, and you think I am an utter fool for having never seen this coming?

Pretty much, yes. This is the crux of the Tram is holding the idiot ball position. A smart diplomat, having come to the reasonable decision to parley honestly rather than in the typical royal "insult to injury, then attack" fashion should have been able to come to the conclusion that no worthy opponent, much less the "more than perfect warlord" who Charlie strongly urged Tram not to parley with at all, would have allowed his units which could attack to be killed without getting that bit of damage in before they died. The GK attack was inevitable, unless some effort was taken to convince the GK leader that Jetstone did indeed intend to go against their SOP and offer up some real terms. Tram's idiocy was not necessarily in failing to foresee rules-bending tactics (there is no rules bending or breaking going on here, to be perfectly clear. Parson is only applying known rules in an innovative manner), Tram's idiocy was in intending to hold an honest parley and then opening that parley with a lot of insults and useless bluster. His window of opportunity to stop a GK "tantrum" was small, to be sure, but not only did Tram apparently fail to understand the inevitability of such a "tantrum", but he made no effort to prevent it. And when you are in the position that Tram was in, knowing that you could lose anyway and hoping for an alliance as your best means of halting a total war, that failure was pure idiocy.

(There is no way Stanley the Tool will accept the mass harvesting of his precious dwagons as a valid military tactic, unless it works.)

The qualifier "if it works" doesn't change the situation. Stanley expected to lose every unit at Jetstone. All his dwagons were going to die, and it wouldn't make a bit of difference if they were harvested or killed by archers and casters. If Stanley has some dwagons left, his two masterclass casters alive, and possibly even a new level 5 capitol site, I think he'll be able to overlook the harvesting of some dwagons. Poorly overlook, of course, with plenty of grumbling and complaining, but that's just the Stanley way.

I meant balanced against the other Arkentools. The 'Hammer lets you convert dwagons, rock out and use some basic changeamancy. The 'Dish gives very powerful thinkamancy and maybe a bonus to gaining archons. And both of those are incredibly useful tools. But they don't really measure up to perfect conversion of all enemy units to your side with no upfront cost.

Which arkentool does that? You mean the single arkentool that forces you to fight and win before it gives you any benefit at all? The hammer appears to tame dwagons automatically. The dish appears to reduce archon production from many turns to one per turn. The pliers do nothing for you unless you fight and win. Arguments about the balance between the three could go on forever, but the fact that the pliers require a win in advance of any benefit (other than a presumed artifact bonus for the wielder) is a unique limitation that only the pliers suffer from.

[Geordy]

Uh... Wanda being alive and Decrypting is the 'go' condition for Parson being the Kaiser. He's not going anywhere without an army to command when he arrives.

I stand corrected. I misunderstood Parson on page 49.

[Sylvan]

Erfworld mechanics may also not necessarily "take the body". It's been said that after harvesting, rations simply pop next turn. What if Parson has managed to break the mechanic, and we get both a decrypted unit and a pop of rations? Now that would be game-breaking.

This. I kind of did a whole spiel on upkeep, provisions, etc. in my first post, but this was not something I had considered. It would mean you could have your cities pop whatever can be harvested... "mostly heavies and mounts, nothing that can speak language", but then harvest them for Warlord/troop rations and still have the decrypted units with no upkeep. Okay, sure, sure, you could decrypt the soldiers so they'd have no upkeep too..... but then they'd all be fanatical puppets, so who wants that? Probably no story point to this line of speculation at all, since the impact would be small though......

But I'll still laugh if a bunch of dragon-pizzas fall out of the sky onto Parson sometime next turn.

They're on the ground. Arrows in Erfworld are only an effective weapon against fliers. Against ground troops it seems to do little else but a little softening, altough lucky hits are possible as in the begginning of book 1. But then we have Caesar taking on hundreds of archers almost by himself just because he doesn't take flight, and when Ansom went to capture Ossomer, they took heavy losses from the arrows untill they landed, after wich they didn't seem to take any more significant damage.

And then, GK's forces aren't longer limited to an area. They can now charge the garrison and go into melee. At wich points any remaining archers start risking friendly fire.

I'm not sure I agree with this, but it can be read either way, I suppose. When Ansom was fighting Ossomer at the bridge it seemed like Antium ordered the archers to fire in a way that wouldn't hit friendly units ("An overhead volley, toward the bridge"), so that could explain the fliers being safe once they had landed.

Also, in this text update with Caesar re-taking Chocula I think he only won because he captured the garrison after having his fliers screen for him. It specifically mentions bats taking arrows for Caesar while he busted down the city gate, and since he had over 200 prisoners that means none of those units were in the garrison (or reployed to the garrison during the battle) when Caesar took it. Presumably they could have killed him, especially since he was just about out of troops (3 bats, 3 birds, nothing that spoke language)

"Some stuff I don't really disagree with, after quoting me." Also a lot of stuff in some other posts I didn't see till later, that I almost entirely agree with.

To clarify myself here..... (1st quote)I do agree that Wanda will be harder to specifically target than Cruz was in that update, but I think it would behoove Tramennis to target her specifically as soon as he realizes Parson has officially accomplished the impossible. I do not think he will disappoint me "I don't believe it's a gesture, father. The pliers......."

(2nd & 3rd quotes) In the post you quote I link to the update where it says GKs forces can now attack the entire Garrison, which presumably means they can redeploy as well. Losing troops to friendly fire would suck, and who knows if it would affect morale, but it is still my position that a giant room full of your own troops being shot at and covered in acid crap with a dead Wanda is a better position for JS to be in than say, a room with a lot of dead JS troops and dwagons who can melt entrances into areas where your archers may not have such an easy time hitting them.

(4th quote) I like Tramennis, and think he is a very well developed character. I think he makes some dumb decisions by our standards, but he should not be held to our standards. This is the age of the internet, and at least everyone participating in this discussion is semi-literate.

A nitpicky argument for why my chess analogy sucked

Notice that the best among those options is as many moves as you can practically be ahead of your opponent, not some number that is as high as could it could possibly be (win before you sit down, that's a fun game!). Now, I understand your position, and I'd be a little more irked with you if you hadn't thrown that bit in there at the end about lines of attack and zones of control. But, realistically, as a game progresses most of the moves you can make suck a little in some way or another. So, shame on you for the needlessly large numbers thrown in as a distraction. No one has to calculate such huge numbers to theorize about what any particular game of chess will look like in 5 moves.

Also note that the word is moves, not turns. 5 moves is the chess equivalent of having to check your opponent's king and force it to move twice before you lolinstawin (which you admittedly have to have a better position to do). A lot can happen in five moves, or you can both do a lot of shuffling around the board trying to get into a better position.

Now, you may have a point if we're discussing tournament play here..... and indeed the stakes in these updates are high. This is, after all, a capitol fight. But as I was saying in the rest of that post, I don't Tramennis is a very experienced Warlord. In fact, I think he sucks at seeing the big picture for lack of general practice, but is quite capable of moving the individual pieces brilliantly. So while he is moving all of his high value pieces into the center of the board, to ostensibly gain control of it, and probably while trying to protect each little one with some handy pawns, he'll probably just miss this one little hole in the front lines that allows Parson to strike directly at his king. If you haven't been beaten by that, you haven't played a lot of chess against good opponents.

Parson doesn't see the hole because he calculated every last probability. He sees this hole because he's played a goddamn lot of chess and he knows to look for it. He knows to look for every last little hole that he can everywhere, and in everything, and is patient enough to give it a try or just play around with absurd things that don't exist.

So yeah, 10 moves ahead in a game of chess? Still something that is unlikely to happen between players who are familiar with each other and of comparable skill. But is it an awesome thing to have happen if you want to win? Yes, actually.

Totally cherry picked my post.

I've read your position in multiple threads before this one, I disagree with it. I think Anson Gotti also thoroughly rebutted your belief that Tramennis was only opening the parlay with silly insults by demonstrating what Tramennis learned from said parlay. I think your argument that Tramennis did little to nothing to discourage an inevitable tantrum that could only have hit unimportant targets** qualifies as someone holding the idiot ball is rather silly.

** Every Erfworlder we've seen, from Wanda, to Jack, to Ossomer, to Duncan Scone and Jillian, Slately and Tramennis, and even Duke Antium in the Atrium has had some thought along the lines of "I'm screwed" for GK units to "They're screwed/We're safe" JS/FAQ units. Presumably several of these people knew about the yellows ability to bomb the city as well.

Because GK's Chief Warlord is now Parson "I WOULD RATHER BLOW UP MY CITY AND TROOPS AND THEN JUMP INTO A PORTAL THAT SHOULD BY ALL MEANS KILL ME RATHER THAN PARLEY FOR ANY KIND OF TRUCE OR SURRENDER!" Hamster. He parleys only as a distraction while he prepares to deliver another blow. Like he did right now. Sending Ossomer to parley did bought Hamster several precious moments to put his plan in motion. But he never intended for a peacefull settlement. Crushing Jetstone is still his main objective.

Parson tried to contact all of the coalition leaders initially, but was limited by Maggie's juice. He also stated that Kingworld proved they could not parlay with JS (this time Parson was unfortunately mistaken). He croaked Ansom during a surrender Parlay, but one that would have only saved him and had him working for Charlie. I think it was more of a "Charlie can suck it" decision than anything else, but after that Sizemore stated that no one left in the coalition WOULD parlay with them. And yes, he ordered the casters to kill everything and then dived into a death portal...... in the middle of some weird game/dream sequence that was oddly like a game he was designing combined with a wish-fulfillment scenario that constantly undermined everything he did so that he *couldn't* win or even achieve piece with anyone. Everyone in the world hated them and was out to get him, remember? He was also saying "there's no place like home", and I'm sure I don't need to tell you what that is from, because if I do just........ wow. Kids these days.

[Oberon]

Because GK's Chief Warlord is now Parson "I WOULD RATHER BLOW UP MY CITY AND TROOPS AND THEN JUMP INTO A PORTAL THAT SHOULD BY ALL MEANS KILL ME RATHER THAN PARLEY FOR ANY KIND OF TRUCE OR SURRENDER!" Hamster. He parleys only as a distraction while he prepares to deliver another blow. Like he did right now. Sending Ossomer to parley did bought Hamster several precious moments to put his plan in motion. But he never intended for a peacefull settlement. Crushing Jetstone is still his main objective.

You'll recall that Parson worked the odds after the "walls down, tower down, tunnels down" ploy and came up with the fact that there were still to many RCC troops alive to give GK a chance. Parson was ready to send the casters into the MK and stand and die. He said as much. He also said that he didn't think he'd have a chance to parley, since he'd just killed Ansom during a parlay as a last, desperate gambit to turn a loss into a win. And also remember that Ansom wasn't offering a true surrender, just a formalized suicide. It was the casters who pretty much shamed him into the uncroaking of the volcano. So while I think that it's fair to say that Parson used parley as just another tool to try to even up the odds at the horribly one sided BfGK final fight, it's not fair to say that Parson is a completely nihilistic individual who will always use parley as just a means to inflict more damage upon an opponent.

[oslecamo2]

Blow up the city? It was a Level 1 ruin after Sizemore brought down the house. It seemed more or less the same, plus a lava pit, after the blast. And they just rebuilt it anyway. Blow up the troops? He had a tiny handful of Uncroaked and a couple of golems, and he kept the golems. Plus, Decryption. He had nothing to lose at GK, except perhaps his life, whereas he has a lot to lose here.

Hamster still ordered the destruction of his own city by ordering Sizemore to bring down the house, and he still had a thousand or so uncroaked and several gogbwin knights and marbits on top of the golems, wich was what bought him enough time to get the tri-mancer linkg going.

Losing Wanda, whatever Tramennis's dark predictions say, will cripple GK. They might be able to pull through and still beat the Coalition, but they might not, and their Toolist philosophy would be shattered.

Trems himself said that any peace deal would involve making sure Wanda decrypting frenzy would never be a threat to them again. So suicide jump is still the best plan that allows Wanda to escape alive to decrypt another day.

How about seting off a nuke at your feet and then jumping from a cliff? Because that's what Hamster ended book 1. Activate volcano, jump into the Magic Kingdom portal. Die or die taking as much oponents down with you as possible.

He used a portal.
He survived because he is "some kind of Mathamancer"...ie Caster
And trimancer links are powerful.

Whats impossible there? He used a known and accepted game mechanic to create a powerful Dirtamancy trap and escaped by taking advantage of his ability to enter the MK.

First, if Charlie knew Hamster could make a volcano nuke, would've he deployed so many valuable archons on their airspace and just let them sit there to watch the fireworks instead of taking the garrison himself?

SecondHamster didn't knew that he would survive the Magic Kingdom portal. He took a completely desesperate gamble and there was nothing hinting he could survive it. At least now he knows Wanda has 2/3 chance of surviving the fall.

Because GK's Chief Warlord is now Parson "I WOULD RATHER BLOW UP MY CITY AND TROOPS AND THEN JUMP INTO A PORTAL THAT SHOULD BY ALL MEANS KILL ME RATHER THAN PARLEY FOR ANY KIND OF TRUCE OR SURRENDER!" Hamster. He parleys only as a distraction while he prepares to deliver another blow. Like he did right now. Sending Ossomer to parley did bought Hamster several precious moments to put his plan in motion. But he never intended for a peacefull settlement. Crushing Jetstone is still his main objective.

It bought him time for the perfect moment. But his plan could have been put into motion much earlier. As it is, you seem to overlook the fact that, were it not for his bypassing the off turn restriction, GK could have done nothing.

If GK can literally do nothing of substance - and no, S-bombing the atrium isn't something of substance - then what harm did it do to actually parley?

Could Parson attack during it? Yes....in a minor, inconvenenient fashion, to which JS had a ready reply.
Could they escape? No. Could they hide? No. Could they do anything at all that would pose a plausible treat or danger? No.

Funny, that's precisely the error Charlie commited in Book 1. He could take the garrison, but instead let Hamster play his cards, and paid dearly for that. Again, if super smart Charlie could predict that Hamster would make a volcano nuke and run trough the portal, why would he risk so many valuable archons for no gain whatsoever?

Nope, Hamster won Book 1 by cheating the game, and he will do so again.

If you rule out off turn movement, the worst GK could do would be to inconvenience JS. And at that point, there is no need to slam the door on parley. Especially when you stand to benefit from it in a major way.

Again, Trems himself plans to get Wanda and the pliers at any cost. Hamster knows that. How would that benefit GK exactly?

Because GK's Chief Warlord is now Parson "I WOULD RATHER BLOW UP MY CITY AND TROOPS AND THEN JUMP INTO A PORTAL THAT SHOULD BY ALL MEANS KILL ME RATHER THAN PARLEY FOR ANY KIND OF TRUCE OR SURRENDER!" Hamster. He parleys only as a distraction while he prepares to deliver another blow. Like he did right now. Sending Ossomer to parley did bought Hamster several precious moments to put his plan in motion. But he never intended for a peacefull settlement. Crushing Jetstone is still his main objective.

You'll recall that Parson worked the odds after the "walls down, tower down, tunnels down" ploy and came up with the fact that there were still to many RCC troops alive to give GK a chance. Parson was ready to send the casters into the MK and stand and die. He said as much. He also said that he didn't think he'd have a chance to parley, since he'd just killed Ansom during a parlay as a last, desperate gambit to turn a loss into a win.

So Hamster can't parlay... because he just betrayed their oponents in a parley? Lolwhut? That's his damn fault!

And also remember that Ansom wasn't offering a true surrender, just a formalized suicide.

How do you know that? Those were the words of a crazy man. While Jetstone is renowed for being an alliance master in a world of war.

It was the casters who pretty much shamed him into the uncroaking of the volcano. So while I think that it's fair to say that Parson used parley as just another tool to try to even up the odds at the horribly one sided BfGK final fight, it's not fair to say that Parson is a completely nihilistic individual who will always use parley as just a means to inflict more damage upon an opponent.

Except that he always does use parley as a means to inflict more damage upon an oponent. That's how he baited Ansom in sending a part of his force ahead, and then killing Ansom himself, and now distracting Trems while he drops his forces on the ground.