Part 169: Hinnom - Turn 65

Last turn, on Doomed to Fail, an update made entirely of gifs!


Constructive Criticism?


Has builds character learned his lesson about gifs?


Should you keep reading?


Just kidding!  Let's get to the turn.



Turn 65

Thaumaturgy? What is this nonsense? I thought we were researching blood!   Much like America's response to the Japanese just-in-time production of the '80s, Hinnom catches up to superior Lankan practices twenty turns late.  Thaumaturgy is a key ingredient of the mind hunts you see in this turn's messages. 

Another generation of earth elementals is sent off to die in a foreign war. Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori indeed Barathrus.  

Blood hunting breaks 100 for the first time with a few lucky rolls!  104!    Hinnom is finally a real midgame blood power!  Still, 100 slaves per turn is nothing to sneeze at and I'm continuing to ramp up my hunting.  Realistically, I'll probably max out at 150-200 slaves a turn without dipping into really high income provinces or crippling my ability to recruit Melqarts and Ba'als from my cap.



Thaumaturgy 5 has two great spells. Gateway teleports one of your mages and all troops under their command to a friendly lab.  It's fantastic for a surprise welcoming committee when your fort is being stormed or just for moving lots of demon troops across the map in a big empire.  Hypothetically.   


The other great spell is soul slay.  Mind hunt is a remote attack that hits a commander in a province with either soul slay or mind burn. Astral mages in the province stop it with a 1/3 chance per level of astral (so an S3 mage stops it entirely) and if it's stopped then the caster gets feebleminded.   Which sucks, because mongoloids can't cast spells.  Soul slay kills you, mind burn does ten + 1S damage.   HMMMM.   Because of the way the turn order resolves, I finished this research before my kraken (have I mentioned before how much I like kraken?  They all get recuperation which means if they mind hunt a province with an astral Mage in it and get feebleminded as a result they will recover) cast mind hunt at TheDemon's guys in Vician Forest.   My aim here is to kill all his commanders but I'd settle for one or two.  


Papa, I'm comin' home! 


Here we see mind hunt at work.  MR 18 has a decent chance to resist although I have a little +penetration gear (makes my guys more likely to kill) and TheDemon manages to resist the first soul slay.


And the second!  I like to imagine this as giant kraken floating in the depths reaching out and shooting orbital lasers at TheDemon's dudes and the Raksharaja are frantically dodging.


And their spectral mage trips and PEW PEW PEW! BBBZZZZZZZAAAAAPPPP.  


Remember when Antrax cast Manifestation at Vician Forest on the same turn Thuella cloud trapezes in?  It turns out the King of Banefires doesn't play nicely with the other elemental royalty.  If only I'd been faster I could have summoned Father Illearth (the other corrupted elemental king, blood/earth to Antrax's death/fire).  King Hippomnomnomnom will have a little chat with the King of Banefires about this little "prank." 


This is the lesser horror saying hello to Peak Theorycrafting.   Sadly, horrors can't open doors so he's stuck outside the fort.   A funny trick is to summon a horror and then run inside and shut the door and watch as its tiny claws scrabble helplessly against the door knob. 


In High School, Peak Theorycrafting had always picked on King Hippomnomnomnom.   Eventually King Hippomnomnomnom grew too big to stuff into lockers, but Peak Theorycrafting would still throw a little elbow as they passed in the halls and Peak Theorycrafting never passed up an opportunity to make fun of King Hippomnomnomnom for his difficulty with spherical trigonometry.   Then there was the incident. 

Once Peak Theorycrafting and King Hippomnomnomnom had been the best of friends. One summer one of the neighborhood mages summoned a dryad.  They were both young and they were both smitten.  They began competing for her attention.  One fine day, King Hippomnomnomnom invited her over to do some fingerpainting and she agreed!  As she was on her way, Peak Theorycrafting and a group of demons King Hippomnomnomnom had never seen before forced their way in.  Ten minutes later, when the dryad showed up, she heard muffled grunts coming from the house. Concerned, she ran inside.  There was King Hippomnomnomnom, struggling against the ropes tying him to his chair, Cheetos in his hair, pants wet and with the fingerpaints strewn around him, someone had drawn a giant pixel dick and the words "OM NOM NOM" onto either cheek.  His tears were beginning to make the balls run and the dryad, though who could blame her, turned and ran and never looked back.  Years later she was found dead of homesickness.  King Hippomnomnomnom had never forgotten and had never forgiven Peak Theorycrafting.  

Their tenth reunion found Peak Theorycrafting in the corner of the room, making crass jokes with a couple of Asrapa.  Then King Hippomnomnomnom swept in, Thuella on his arm, and the room went silent.  


fat guy in a little coat materialized in front of the monkey patrol and with a tremendous *RRRRIIIIIIP* he ended them the same way he'd destroyed Richard's coat.  


This is a generic mounted commander. Usually at this stage of the game I like making someone beefy and defensive my prophet so they can benefit from the bonus HP and act as a mobile defensive force in my dominion.   


I just like this event. I'm slinging spells around that unleash the four winds and drill down to the earth's core to unlock the magic therein.  Horrors from beyond rain down on my enemies and an army of giant cyclops joins my iron dragons, mechanical giants and colossal, bloodthirsty giants.  What strange events could possibly make the people more superstitious?  It's not like I suddenly learned how to script battle magic.


King Hippomnomnomnom opened the scroll with no small amount of curiosity.  Within was a masterwork of calligraphy.  Only one iron claw could possibly pen such a piece.  King Hippomnomnomnom tried to appreciate the gift for what it was. The last, great work of a master.  


Bad boys, bad boys.


Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do


When I earth attack you?


Hinnom now give you no break


Cyclops now give you no break


Not giant man now give you no break


Bad boys, bad boys


Whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do


When I earth attack you?


CYCLOPS is filmed on location with the elementals of earth.


All victims are considered innocent


Until crushed by an earth elemental. 


Antrax's ashen angel sneaks up behind Thuella, ready to put the whoopee cushion down on her seat as soon as she sits down.  Without turning around, Thuella snaps and the air around the ashen angel coalesces into a dozen tiny tornadoes.  The angel is torn apart, screaming as Thuella gracefully sits down.  "Please, go on my dear pantokrator."


Here is the province defense in Lanka.  


Here is a lesser horror.  Let's not watch.  


As the hush drew over the room, Thuella smiled coldly.  A crown of lightning played upon her brow, and she held the tiny Aegis brand clutch delicately at her side.


Air elementals appeared in front of the mob of Peak Theorycrafting's minions, flying easily through the storm Ornias had unleashed.  How are u whipped his looted fire brands from their scabbards and drew upon his feeble magical powers to protect himself.  Finally, dual wielding scimitars like his idol, he would prove himself to Peak Theorycrafting and show up this uppity bitch who was crashing their party.  Wasn't getting one dick fingerpainted on your face enough for King Hippomnomnomnom?


Thuella raised an eyebrow and mirrored How are u's spell.  He faltered as her form exploded across the room, creating hundreds of mirror images to his three.  


A single Palankasha broke free from the air elementals and shouted "show us your..." before jerking spasmodically as Thuella's lightning wreathed fist punched into his chest and crushed his still-beating heart.   


The air crackled as a thousand tiny lightning bolts gathered around Thuella.  She brought a palm to her lips and with a gentle puff, they spread outward.  As the lightning flew from her hand it grew.  By the time it reached the crowd of Palankasha, the vast network of electricity covered them all.   Crackling with energy, it exploded, flinging them to the floor.


Stunned Palankasha milled about, tripping over fallen comrades. 


A few fools who stumbled forward were quickly turned to stone or dispatched by Thuella's lightning fists.  The rest fled. 



As Peak Theorycrafting fled, Thuella allowed herself a bit of fun.  Using incredible precision, she called forth orbs of lightning to impale fleeing wights; each blast hitting exactly where she aimed as she wrote "Thuella wuz here" on their twice dead corpses.  King Hippomnomnomnom took Thuella's hand as they left.  "Don't you want to finish him?" she asked. "No, we were friends once" he paused and winked "and I have bigger fish to fry."



Tactical Discussion 
Mind hunt killed Foulsay, TheDemon's prophet, so none of these Palankasha are blessed.  Foulslay was also TheDemon's darkness caster so not only is he not blessed, but he's not operating under darkness either (not that it would have mattered with Thuella casting shimmering fields and carrying Aegis).  This is also the first battle that I tested extensively.  I was tired of losing stuff to TheDemon and this represented a large proportion of his remaining force.  Plus it would have been awfully silly if both players that summoned Thuella lost her in silly ways. Interestingly, in my testing, with darkness up and blessed, the Palankasha would kill Thuella if she melees.  With shimmering fields and living clouds she never even got hit in my tests.  

Finally, let's take a quick look at the spell Thuella cast.  It is awesome.  It takes A6 to cast and does 4 +1A armor negating damage over 50 squares with a range of 20.  Then, it does 10+2A fatigue to the same area.  With A10, like Thuella has, it does 15 damage (plus the fatigue that comes with elemental damage) and then 30 fatigue.  That's why the Palankasha that got hit had over 50 fatigue. 


In his library, King Hippomnomnomnom spent hours absorbed in the incredible detail of the brushwork. The strokes that spoke of power and softness and, above all else, understanding. 


He hung the scroll behind his throne.  A memory of his most loyal servant, a tireless friend and a beloved master.  Generations that knelt before him wondered at it.  What hidden wisdom did the scroll hold?  
"What is the original taste before ranch dressing is born?"


Thuella moves up to T'ien Ch'i.  She has MR 20 and so is significantly less likely to die to opposition.  She can also flood TC's stupid immortal mages with air elementals from living clouds.  


In Old Man Mountains, I'm still waiting to hit blood 9 before using the blood site.  TWO TIME WORLD WAR CHAMPIONS heads north to blood hunt in that fort.  


Here is the I got this turn.  Astute observers will note that I STILL DON'T HAVE A FUCKING A/W KRAKEN.


In Histyra, I prepare for reaching blood 9 by having Savnok forge the armor of souls, a blood booster.  Blood stone forging continues and you'll notice cyclops have started forging earth boots so that I can really mass an earth attack spamming brigade. PRIVATES forges a gate cleaver. I will start forging these on occasion too to help break down castle walls.   In the ocean, SHSL KRAKEN hauls its eldritch bulk above the waves.  




Flauros is teleporting to Black Alps, the province with the cursor on it to do some more blood hunting.  And look, I recruited a new Melqart! Yay!


Mictlan's storm demons have moved next door and the Mictlan/Pan border buildup has dissipated, although Pan's pretender remains. This is ominous.  



Gemgen Counter

Blood stones: 121
Cost: 573E, 912 slaves
Gems Generated: 1,567