Part 41: Turn 41

Turn 41






Mind hunting gets one of the thugs. I will continue to try to zorch them.



+1 air gems from tiny bubbles.



+1 nature gems. I love monstrous conches now.



Hell yes! +1 nature and +1 nature and a f r e e f o r t! I... was already building one but I guess i don't need to upgrade it so uh it isn't a total waste of gold.



+ 1 water gems. Great turn for gems.





Phelegra hits my fort but it will take a long time for them to get through it so whatever. They have a commander and this wizard so i could mind hunt it if i wanted. If you try to mind hunt a province with an enemy astral mage each astral mage has like a 40% chance per dot of cutting your mind hunter's mental cord, rendering them feebleminded. An s3 mage is proof against mind hunts. I have stories about this.



The two surviving thugs continue to attack underwater. For now.



Clearing some underwater C'tis PD.



I doubled back off the Phaecia cap with most of my stack to hopefully catch the thugs but they didnt move into me. Also to shield myself from a potential cap break before I was getting into as I was a little paranoid about that at the time.



Pinging the Phaeacian cap




This is what they have and the game plan seems to be storm power-> summon air elementals and have other casters buff his troops with body ethereal while his god uh, thugs, check this dude out-



Its simple but probably effective. My gut says I can MAYBE break this, or at least do a lot of damage in the attempt. I am not certain at the moment though and the god might need more direct magic action but this is deep in his own candles which means his his magic resistance will be pretty high. I probably want a howl caster but don't have one of those anywhere remotely near this theatre. It would take like 6 months to get one here being UW sucks sometimes.



Before we forget- we are clearing out an absolute pile of sea trolls. I gathered up all my freespawn hippocampi to screen because I might as well get SOME use out of them.



The blue meat square and its boss.



They kind of just flail at each other until my other dudes arrive.



A line forms and whoa look at that one breakaway dude going right for the king! Who is this absolute maniac??


a hero



He fights valiantly, getting one arm shattered and spearing the troll, but a second blow lays a great merman low.



Emboldened and inspired by his sacrifice, his bravery, the remaining warriors swarm over the trolls and send them fleeing. The king flees the field like a coward.



12 dead hippocampi and.... one dead wave warrior ....



Mass panic working for me for once.



These guys again. They get around.



The overview.



Jumping back on the cap here reasonably confident I can win or at least deal a crippling blow to his isolated cap. I am trying to mind hunt his thugs too, of course.



I get to thinking. I need 2 more thrones to win. I am going to ping this zeus throne. I might be able to just straight mind hunt it clear if it comes to it, but Nazca might try to kick me off so I should mass some troops in case.



And as for the other one... I could march my Awe throne stack... 3 provinces overland into the lake throne through the Ulm-Phlegra war zone? I like the idea.



The overview. I want to keep Phaecia occupied and immobile. If these dudes take their eye off the throne ball I could snake the win here. There are also other thrones that are coastal so while I am keeping options open. I do have to commit to targets far in advance because UW slow movement. But we have a road map forward.