132 The Battle for Gobwin Knob, Page 119

[SteveMB]

I may be looking too deeply into the whole "turn based" deal but how is Parson moving troops when it is not his turn or is he just choosing to engage them now (w00t warlords)?

Moving units within GK doesn't require move (units have no move except during their turn, which is the basic limitation on redeployment).

Edit: We know that units can move from one zone within GK to another off-turn (e.g. Wanda was summoned to the situation room immediately after dawn, which means she moved from the dungeon to the tower during Ansom's turn).

[DevilDan]

Parson lost a battle before because he didn't antisipate how powerful stacking bonuses is. He's not going to make the same mistake twice.

If you're referring to the loss of the group A dwagons over the lake, that was a battle that he had hoped would not be fought at all, not only because he created the dwagon donut but because the units that had been sent on the dwagon hunt originally were not flying units but forest-capable ones.

[Godskook]

Wanda's units
1) better than average, she was being extra careful when making them
2) in the same hex as wanda bonus
3) in the same stack as wanda bonus
4) in the Gobwin Keep garrison hex bonus
5) on the wall bonus probably does not apply to flyers
6) in the same hex as chief warlord bonus
7) if there is a bonus for number in 1 stack vs number in the other stack
8) wanda can use her magic to keep the undead going

We've only ever been told that chief warlords have hex-wide bonuses. Wanda's bonus was refered to as being given when she leads troops. Leading is only used this way in stack systems, indicating that she only yields it to members of her stack.

[Godskook]

Figuratively...

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*ba dom dom TISH*

(My "rimshot" onomatopoeia is sadly deficient.

I'm kicking myself for not figuring out a way of working the Vinny's counting ability into that post somehow.

[TheMutant]

Oh man, I hope Wanda survives this. *nailbite* o_o Ansom's pliers look like scissors in that final panel, with the rather ominous line 'to cut a thread' and the references to Atropos... Awesome page, on the whole.

[DevilDan]

From what I remember, the RCC warlords agreed that Ansom would get knocked on his boop but they wanted to try to break through the walls while Ansom was still alive. And I think this is what worries Parson, not the relatively small dent that Ansom can make in the uncroaked.

Also, we don't really know how long it has been since Ansom started his assault. It could be all of five or ten "minutes," for example.

As to movements within the city, Parson says this in Klog #11: "Each zone has its own rules of engagement, but they're all considered part of the city, so we can deploy and redeploy units without expending move.

[rman]

I may be looking too deeply into the whole "turn based" deal but how is Parson moving troops when it is not his turn or is he just choosing to engage them now (w00t warlords)? On a similar note, I think that the "rush" to get the siege moved up is more a story component than a game mechanic. Furthermore, I believe that Godskook makes a good point when saying that Parson may have been bluffing. Assuming the RCC can only see that the walls are swarming with undead not necessarily how powerful they are their reactions would be justified.

The rules do seem rather flexible. The appearance so far is that Parson can move troops because they are all in the same hex.

So far Ansom has moved into the Gobwin Knob air hex and has engaged ground unit stacks.

From the appearance of it Parson can now choose stacks to put up against Ansom. The assumption would be that the stacks that Ansom initially engaged got destroyed and now the "defensive" stacks on the same hex get to choose who engages next.

The end point would be that at the end of a turn you cannot have opposing forces on the same hex. Either one sides stacks all destroy the others or one side chooses to withdraw.

Normal combat would suggest the side whose turn it is chooses the initial match ups. Rules might then determine which side chooses the next match up. This would be complicated by Garrison rules, rather than open field.

This system uses movement into the same hex. Rather than other games that attack from adjacent hexes.

[DevilDan]

I'm kicking myself for not figuring out a way of working the Vinny's counting ability into that post somehow.

"One hundred bats. Two hundred bats. Three hundred bats. Ah ah ah ah ah."

(With apologies to Count von Count and the fine people of Sesame Street.)

[ishnar]

It's possible, but I hope you'll agree unlikely. From the tone of their comments at the time (and I can't access them directly since it was in the last strip that is temporarily offline), it seemed pretty clear to me they were concerned about his solo attack in its own right, and not some secret ace in the hole.

Look, I understand all about fog of war, and differences of viewpoint, and morale, and all the rest. I'm a wargamer myself. But the level of the discrepancy between:

1) RCC Leaders - Ansom is toast in moments, we need to rush to support him for his gambit to have any hope of succeeding, and even then he's probably still toast; and

2) Parson - Ansom seems assured of breaking through that wall alone and the only thing that can stop him is our previously unrevealed air force that the RCC has no knowledge of;

is large enough that good storytelling practically demands some explanation, and not just some inferences by the reader. I feel similarly with the chokepoint battle, although again I'm reserving judgment and giving the authors the benefit of the doubt until we see the results of that on the Transylvito side.

First of all, 2) is completely wrong. He's not breaking through the wall, he's holding off a bunch of uncroaked. While ranged whittle away at him.

You're forgetting the difference between turns and tactical rounds I think. Ansom won't last the turn if he stays up there unassisted. Eventually the ranged units will damage the mount and it will fall and Ansom won't have his flying bonus anymore. The number of rounds it takes for him to fall is unknown. But game mechanics wise, moments means sometime this turn, since the number of tactical rounds a turns only ends when a side decides to pass their turn.

So you have to keep in mind that Parson is still thinking in RW terms, but Erfworlders do not. From their perspective, Ansom will fall in moments > this turn whether new units are brought out or not.

I see Ansom falling soon. He's too much the Evel Knievel clone not too. He has a crash and burn incomming. Now that he's jumping over the too tall wall, he's got to fall.....and survive somehow anyway.

I like how panel 8 shows the negative effecs of all those cave-ins.

[Fjolnir]

honestly, all they need to do is destroy the carpet and flier ansom becomes faller ansom, I think a max stack with at least a chief warlord present in hex /croakamancer bonus/wanda's normal leadership bonuses can destroy the carpet, leaving him to be devoured by minideads

[headhoncho]

First of all, 2) is completely wrong. He's not breaking through the wall, he's holding off a bunch of uncroaked. While ranged whittle away at him.

I feel that's a semantic difference which doesn't really affect my overall point. Parson said they can't hit him, and that his actions (directly or indirectly) are going to lead to big trouble. To me, this feels like a stark contrast to the suicidal nature of the act as expressed initially by the other RCC warlords.

The rest of your post is excellent, and I tend to agree that it might turn out exactly that way. Those arrows in the carpet are a telling point. And once his mount's gone, he's toast.

I'd kinda like to see Wanda and her air force smiting the carpet and then seeing Ansom fall, surrounded by undead, and Wanda strolling up after the fact and picking up the pliers.

[PyritePyro]

I think Wanda is casting a croakmancy spell, though, not the type she cast for the tunnels, the type that makes people croak. Or at least, weakens the living. I'm kinda hoping that it's not the sort of croakmancy that is going to make her croak as well. Unfortunatly she'd probably do that, if she thought that it was what duty required.

[Angband]

Interesting. Wanda has definitely stuck her staff in between the jaws of the Arkenpliers.

Maybe Ansom's trying to crush her head (I'm crushing your head! Crush! Crush! Crush!), is he going to be able to break Wanda's staff or has she successfully blocked his attack with it?

[LurkerInPlayground]

I really wish we had the last strip available, because my strong impression was that they were saying that he would fall very, very quickly.

But yes, it's entirely possible I'm reading too much into it.



I'm not calling it a plot hole. I'm making a distinction between good storytelling and great storytelling.

And again, I don't get the impression they are just demoralized (although they are) or overestimating Parson's abilities (I didn't get that at all from the last strip). My impression was that Ansom was nuts for going into a suicide mission alone, and that it would result in a quick death. One that might be averted if they acted quickly to bring in the siege (or that his death wouldn't be "wasted" as Pepe indicates above), but that he was in gigantic trouble no matter what.

It may be that they expect that Ansom will quickly bite the dust if left to Parson's devices. Maybe they don't really expect the uncroaked to be all that effective, but Parson has proven that he is dangerous enough to bring a few surprises to bear.

Likewise, if Parson were to leave Ansom alone, he would expect Ansom to render them strategically ineffective in short order.

[Chewy]

I may be looking too deeply into the whole "turn based" deal but how is Parson moving troops when it is not his turn or is he just choosing to engage them now (w00t warlords)? .

Well one thing I have to say is that this comic is more and more developing into Real Time Tactics rather then standard TBS.

Anyways to actually answer this question in TBS terms basically all tbs games during the overworld map you can only move when its your turn. However when another opponent initiates combat you move into the combat map which is generally a zoomed in version of the hex that is contested. So now you in a hex which breakes down into more hexes and both parties are allowed to move depending on the ruleset. This can either be both teams are allowed to move their entire army once then end turn and the other goes or its based on an initiative score.

The initiative score is just bascially a counter for who goes first. For example I have 3 units called A, B ,C who has initiative of 5,3,4 respectively. So A moves first then C then B.

[jtheory]

The avenging angel swoops in for the kill. Though I have a feeling neither one of them will be dead in the next couple of pages -- for plot reasons more than game mechanics, but perhaps both. I wasn't expecting her to engage him in physical combat!

Here's the text of Wanda's verse, typed out simply because I enjoyed it (afaik it's original):

Rejoice.  Despair. 
Fate does not care.
Each knotted mind entwined.
Each soul, another's bind.
And blind, though we are led,
In time, we do know when
  To cut a thread!

Nice work with the delayed punch at the end! A sort of tail rhyme.

And a bit of digging around in poetry terminology suggests that this might be called a good example of Skeltonic verse.

[Sieggy]

Whoo doggies! Wanda's going to boop that boy up bigtime! If those are, indeed, Webinar & Dora on the other mounts, when they close, that will most likely give Ansom a bad case of shock & dismay ("Oh! My Friend! What has my hubris cost you . . .), which would leave him open to some kind of magical attack from Wanda or Jaclyn the Necrophiliac Dream Girl. (BTW, I'll bet you didn't know that if a necrophiliac impregnates his victim, the results are a dead issue . . . And, of course, it makes you wonder when Wanda says she's going out for a stiff one . . .)

One thing I've been wondering, though . . . some of the Archons are still dressed in the dance-fighting pink poodle skirts & bobbed hair . . . more than enough time has passed for them to get back into uniform, or are they still expecting to engage in dance-fighting? I would also take it from the raspberry that the one Archon is giving Parson and the expression of the one in panel#3 that they are hacked with him for being responsible for the croaking & uncroaking of one of their own. If so, that may be a foreshadowing of them wanting to get even with Parson later on . . .

[FoE]

On one hand, Ansom still has those Arkenpliers. And he hasn't taken a wound yet.

On the other hand, those Uncroaked with Wanda are likely pretty powerful, and Wanda isn't getting turned to dust. Ansom now has to fend off these attackers as well as the minor Uncroaked on the walls.

[Lamech]

Hey I had a thought... we don't know ANY of the requirements for attunement. Could Wanda attune to the pliers mid-combat, and have them blast Ansom to bits?

[Leewei]

Musing about some possible outcomes:

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1. Wanda falls to a heavily wounded Ansom, only to be uncroaked by some contingent spell she'd prepared. Once arisen, she croaks Ansom and attunes the arkenpliers, which maintain her in her state perpetually.

2. Wanda kills Ansom and uncroaks him, at which point he attunes to the arkenpliers himself, and becomes a death knight-like unique permanent uncroaked unit under Wanda's incomplete control.

3. Wanda is on the ropes and Stanley shows up to save the day in a fairly nuanced Big Damn Hero saves Damsel In Distress scenario.

2 and 3 wouldn't be mutually exclusive...

[Raguzert]

Well, I used to look forward for those battles between major characters, not anymore. The way stanley's last battle ended makes me feel certain that this wanda x ansom clash will be hardly important. I mean, even if something meaningfull happens, the expectancy is low.

[ishnar]

Musing about some possible outcomes:

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1. Wanda falls to a heavily wounded Ansom, only to be uncroaked by some contingent spell she'd prepared. Once arisen, she croaks Ansom and attunes the arkenpliers, which maintain her in her state perpetually.

2. Wanda kills Ansom and uncroaks him, at which point he attunes to the arkenpliers himself, and becomes a death knight-like unique permanent uncroaked unit under Wanda's incomplete control.

3. Wanda is on the ropes and Stanley shows up to save the day in a fairly nuanced Big Damn Hero saves Damsel In Distress scenario.

2 and 3 wouldn't be mutually exclusive...

I really do not see Ansom dying here. He's Evel Knievel, and Evel Knievel never died from his stunts. However, since he has pulled off a few successful stunts, he's due for a failure and a bunch of broken bones. But not death. I see his carpet getting totaled though. I can see his broken body at the bottom of the wall, tears comming from his eyes as he crys "My New Carpet!, my dad is going to KILL ME!" :P

[MickJay]

It would be interesting if Charlie finally got the pliers the moment Stanley returned to Knob, given Stanley's distrust towards Charlie.

[AngryAngel]

Wanda seems to resent the implication that she knows anything about troops or combat (though I think she does). Parson's Klog #4. For my own part I foresee Wanda killing Ansom quickly, perhaps by a direct blow, or by knocking him off his carpet into the teeming masses of uncroaked below, while seizing the Arkenpliers. It also wouldn't surprise me if she attuned to them, thus becoming the mightiest Croakamancer in Erfworld.

My reasons for thinking these things is: to truly win the Battle for Gobwin Knob, Parson has to win decisively. An eked out, barely won victory won't do, or else the RCC will just regroup and try again. It has to be a shattering victory, both in moral and material terms so the RCC breaks up and slinks away home. A good step toward such a victory is killing the leader of the RCC. I'd be disappointed if it didn't happen simply for plot purposes.

[Cadrys]

"I really hope you can see this Jillian.

Whatever happens...one of your lovers is about to get broken."

[TheCat]

The numbering problem means the RSS feed isn't updated, so I suspect some people won't know it's up.

[MrPhoenix]

"I just....Yeah, hi. Same to you."

i'll never be able to stop laughing again.

[Avilan the Grey]

Ayyyyy, too tense.

Personally I want to see Ansom win this. Both sides are incredibly interesting and well told, I just prefer the 'good guys'.

We have no proof, other than unit design, that the GK side is evil. We DO know that Ansom is an annoying @$$. (But so is Tool).

Hey I don't even think the Tool started this war?

[Avilan the Grey]

My guess is that Wanda's instructions were only to try to get the Pliers (and retreat). Also Remember the klog where it was mentioned the huge bonus undead got when lead by a Croakamancer, maybe Wanda with his little airforce will be enough to just get the job done

Exactly my thought; She will swoop in, grab the pliers and swoop off. At least that's the plan. If Ansom is too good to be surprised by her, or if she is enjoying the fight too much to withdraw, is another matter.

[K2]

Have I ever told you guys how much I love this comic?

The fact that Ansom is about to be croaked or captured. I don't know what I want to see more, Jillian rescuing Ansom from Tool or an UnCroaked Ansom eating the tar out of Jullian