Game01 Turns 10 to 15

Turns 10 to 15
I've decided that to play and blog 5 turns of this single player game per day. Some turns may not be remarked upon as absolutely nothing interesting happens in them. This should be rare. I'll attempt to take as many screenshots as possible.

Month 12

I had my first engagement with an enemy nation this turn. I invaded one of the few remaining neutral provinces near me with my army of winged riders. After flawlessly defeating the indies Pangaea decided they wanted the country for themselves. Their army consisted of a dozen or so centaur warriors led by a minotaur lord. A small number of Satyr infantry guarded the minotaur lord.

It was a slaughter to say the least. The centaur warriors routed almost immediately after engaging with my wind riders. The minotaur lord and satyrs were completely surrounded and cut down. Over the course of the fight I only lost two wind riders. Very high ratio of troops killed to troops lost.



In addition Agartha declared war on me this turn. My castle on his border holds enough of an army to drive him back, and my wind riders can be there in one turn if makes a move.

Month 13

The old age of my mages has begun to give them many afflictions. These are various negative attributes (Diseased, Weakened, Lost an Arm etc) that will never heal without intervention. Luckily Arcosephale can recruit healers with the ability to randomly cure afflictions. I will recruit one this turn and leave her on healing duty.

Next turn gives me Evocation 2, supplying my mages with a variety of new offensive spells. Nothing too showy yet, but solid enough that they can have some impact on a battlefield. I'm switching gears on my research again, this time in the Thaumaturgy field. Thaumaturgy has a large number of astral spells I am interested in.

My first objective is "Curse" a 1N1S spell that has a 100% chance of cursing an enemy unit. Once cursed the unit has a greatly increased chance of suffering Afflictions. This will allow me to spam the Curse spell in battle against enemy armies and hopefully target a few enemy commanders. Once cursed their lives will be painful and short.

Another useful aspect of Thaumaturgy comes at rank 2 in the form of a set of four ritual spells, Augury, Auspex, Gnome Lore and Haruspex. Each of these spells costs 5 of a certain gem and allows me to search a province for all magical sites of the same type. For example Gnome Lore costs 5 earth gems and reveals all earth sites in a province. This saves me a turn per area searched (manually searching requires a move, search, move, search pattern) and guarantees I find all of the magic sites of the chosen element. If a mage with earth 2 searches a province and there is an earth 4 site hidden there, he will find nothing.

Month 13

Tragedy has struck. I sent my wind riders to claim the final indie territory (ignoring the one rules by that damn vampire count) and conquered it without a single loss. Unfortunately once again Pangaea was there to ruin my fun, and this time they brought along an army worth calling an army.

The bulk of his army consists of satyrs and barbarians. A small group of harpies are present in the rear, and centaur warriors hold the north flank.


My army is scripted to hold and attack rear. Ideally they will hold their ground for two turns and then fly to the rear and destroy dangerous mages and archers. This worked to my advantage during this battle. Pangaea centaurs charged quickly at my wind riders. Just as their charge arrived though my wind riders Hold and Attack script went off and the wind riders were laying waste to barbarian and satyr alike.

Unfortunately while my wind riders were busy destroying the infantry the centaurs fell on their exposed flank. Just as the Pangaea's infantry was routing the last of my wind riders was killed. Luckily Antimachos escaped the battle when the route occurred. He lives to lead another army.

With Pangaea pushing me in the north and Agartha's army nearing in the south I prepare the orders for my armies to fall back to my castle. I recruit an additional scout to send south into Agartha's lands and learn what he can.

Month 14
Agartha splits his army and attempts to attack both my castles in one turn. My patrolling troops turn back his army with minimal losses. His troops are somewhat scattered around my southern castle (Debrithia) now. I gather all nearby troops to defend Debrithia. My economy has taken a heavy hit and I am desperate for income. I send Antimachos with a modest 10 wind riders to harry Pangaea's lightly defended provinces. After capturing these provinces taxes can be risen to 200%, improving my gold income and fermenting unrest in Pangaea.

I begin recruiting slingers, peltasts and barbarians in my two cities.

Turn 15

The defense I purchased several turns ago (and never mentioned) in my archer producing province between my two castles paid off this turn. Agartha sent a small army against it hoping to catch me offguard. The militia rallied and repelled his army.

I have researched Thaumaturgy 2, and I'll be using my mages to begin magically searching for gem sites now. I've been operating on my base 2A2E2S income for too long now. Unfortunately not many of the mage I have recruited have gotten lucky enough to have the need level 2 in air or earth magic.

Taking a gamble I send my pretender leading a strike force of 22 peltasts south into Agartha's territory. I need extra gold, and taking it out of my main opponents pocket seems the way to go.