Part 44: Turn 36

Turn 36

Our foray into Mantis lands seems to be going well! In Blue Glade we're putting up against the edge of the cave layer and into their home territory proper. If these were geared and scripted thugs we might have lost a few more clowns but as-is it's not remotely close.


Slightly north of the previous cave battle the mantises move a pathetic force our way. Any token group of clowns would kill this - but not this one poor 40 gem "thug". When most clowns have air and astral paths, and most mantises have fire and air paths, being an unmagical clown doesn't really cut it. If you remember from last turn he was scripted to head north but I guess at the last second I chickened out of having him take on an entire province and just set him to patrolling instead. Didn't work out so well.


Those indie trolls, despite doing us a massive favour last turn, are rightfully kicked off of the main candle. I know I say this every time but I really should build a fort here or something.


Also not shown last turn was that the undead said in chat that they were basically dead so I moved in to vulture a province or two. Good riddance.





I'm not too worried, a few enormous clown bodyguards could dumpster that guy easily.

Another mantis province falls to us without loss.


The storming of the rock fort is pretty much the same as last time. Once again the one rock mage that they get for free in fort battles is right on the edge of the palisade and is very annoying to kill. It doesn't matter that the rocks have long since routed as they are unable to do anything about it.


The paralysis of astral shield, the single most impactful spell for rocks, slows things down a lot and it's important to realise just how much worse it would be if I didn't have +3 MR in my bless.


Eventually though, with the help of lightning bolt and smite, we manage to make it through the big HP pool and win the day.


Wait what's that tiny icon mostly hidden behind all the clowns? Is it... can it be??


THAT'S RIGHT it's the motherfucking Steel Ovens!


This is one of the best sites in the entire game. This is an incredible site. This makes up for our site searching luck for the entire game so far. The site gives a 20% discount on all forging done in the province. Air quills, that I forge 1-2 of every turn, go from 5 gems to 4. A full set of mind hunting gear, which I'll be forging soon enough, from 55 gems to 33. Rings of Wizardry, 16 gem discount. I know we've been doing well so far but this is the turning point where I start to believe that I might actually win this.

I'm just glad we killed Karanaac before they got up and running, this site is absolutely obscene for them and a key part of my victory in the previous game. I just hope that they didn't (and won't) tell anybody about it, it's crucial that nobody knows that we have this. It's a secret between just me and you, my dear readers (JK the game's been over for ages at this point).

Each magic discipline gets a discount site like this but it's construction, alteration, and blood that are the best ones by far. There's not nearly as many many expensive and repeatable spells in thaumaturgy or enchantment to benefit from, and conjuration is good but not incredible. That is unless some OP mod nation added some...

Anyway as for events, we get some bad


and some good. Business as normal. Maybe at the end of this I'll add up how much gold I got from events and see how that compares to if I'd had gotten production scales.


Up north our forces there are going to head right onto Karanaac's last fort and then into the mantis heartland. I could have used them to take that one province between me and U but that's a whole lot of pain for basically no gain.


Our two forces down here are going to take the mantis throne which now has like 5-7 crushers on it? Just what is that AI doing? (it's summoning crushers)


We also consolidate these clown forces although that force could probably have continued west and let the fort break siege on its own.


Fuamnac the Armless Woman is going to continue leading her small group of clowns to take any undead province that's not defended and seems inoffensive enough to not draw any ire. I'm not worried about Iram but Chasos will be looking for another target to fight after this and it's probably going to be me or U.