Erf 109, Parson's Klog 11

[Chewy]

The air defense spell wasn't really dues ex machina. Wanda used up all their air defense spells and she managed to take out one archon, the unipegataurs and a few orlies. That's like not much at all. Even if that happened again and again, Parson still won't get an advantage numbers wise

It's just that Wanda took out one archon and is now uncroaking her. That's a blow to the morale of the air units.




The tunnels are also narrow, I suspect a lot of choke points so it might not be that hard to bog the enemies down in one place. Once their advance is slowed, certain sections of the tunnels can be collapsed on them.

If Webinar sends a bit at a time, I reckon the golems can hold them off at the choke points. How long can the golems hold off against marbits? Once the golems are wounded, Parson can rotate them out for fresh ones. And keep doing that.

The air spell was pretty dues ex machina. One spell or multiple dun matter was wide area of effect and deals large amounts of damage which effectively wipes out one of thier biggest threat or at least weakening it severely even with heavy leadership bonus from 2 high ranking commanders and 3 supporting archon. Since there is no real AAR yet for the damage dealt im taking klog 11 as the remainder of the air forces.

As for the tunnels since it is restricting it would be the wisest choice to send only a fraction as a vanguard to attack since commiting the whole force is futile due to space. Even then all the marbits have to do is a 1 for 1 kill death ratio. You take 1 goblin down per marbit eventually they'll run outta goblins while there will be 1500 more marbits waiting to fill the ranks. As for golems they are huge which means thier size restricts thier movement in tunnels. The stone golems were pretty big when they smashed the marbits and I hate to see how huge metal are. Also size leads to encirclement which should cut off retreat unless a golem is big enough to block the entire tunnel, but then how the hell would the golem move? Your also assuming all of webinars forces are low quality. As the marbit force is in the thousands one can naturally assume they have some number of quality troops which can rival a golem.

[Arkenputtyknife]

Wanda fiered off all the air defences.

No she didn't. When Parson asked her if she'd done that, she replied, "Most."

[dr pepper]

Hmm. One of the differences between a true wargame and an rpg is that units are not instantly divisible. It may be that our Fearless Hamster is hoping to gain some slack by disrupting the leadership at the top of the stack before the units can act, which might (i'm not a wargamer myself so this is mostly guessing) cause them to lose a turn while the command devolves.

Also, if Wanda really did wipe out 3 Charlie's Angels, maybe Charlie will reconsider his position. Even if he doesn't, i wanna see another communication. It was Mork style last time, maybe next time Parson will find himself in Hawkeye's bathrobe facing Charley across a desk in a big green tent.

[TigerHunter]

Rob and Jami are such teasers.

[rosebud]

The air spell was pretty dues ex machina.

Not really. It's home territory, and there was plenty of time for planning. More to the point, it only took out one main character though lots of secondaries. The psychological effect could be the greater one. But the Alliance still has a huge number advantage. They need to do much, much more to pull a victory or draw out of this.

[PePe QuiCoSE]

I have just skimmed through the thread, but doesn't this comic suggest that Ansom is planning differently to what Parson is expecting?

[Tarnace]

Normally whenever I see a Klog I post something cynical about how Klogs only take up precious comic space and spout useless information that is either irrelevant or obvious in it’s entirely. Today is no exception. Initially Klogs were designed to keep us up to date on the new story design helping us understand more and immerse us deeper into the story. That time is long over. There is nothing to see here – except a poor excuse for filler that has no real bearing on the actual story.

[Moral Wiz]

No she didn't. When Parson asked her if she'd done that, she replied, "Most."

Heh. Got me. But the point I was making stands, multiple defenses. That, combined with the pull away from the light show imply more than one attack, us just seeing the first.

[DougTheHead]

Parson's "heh" reminds me of Dr. Helen Narbon the First.

And if you've ever read Narbonic, you know that spells trouble.

[PePe QuiCoSE]

Normally whenever I see a Klog I post something cynical about how Klogs only take up precious comic space and spout useless information that is either irrelevant or obvious in it’s entirely. Today is no exception. Initially Klogs were designed to keep us up to date on the new story design helping us understand more and immerse us deeper into the story. That time is long over. There is nothing to see here – except a poor excuse for filler that has no real bearing on the actual story.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/searc...earchid=450363

nice.

OnTopic: I 'm thinking a bit about Parson motivation, and i believe that what he was aiming for is looking stupid/provoking Ansom so he wouldn't expect nothing unusual from him so Ansom would simply go the safe way to ensure he (Ansom) would have the last laugh.
Still there's a thin line between that and provoking him into a full head charge, which is precisely what he doesn't want.

Uhm... so, it's reverse psychology?

[Occasional Sage]

Normally whenever I see a Klog I post something cynical about how Klogs only take up precious comic space and spout useless information that is either irrelevant or obvious in it’s entirely. Today is no exception. Initially Klogs were designed to keep us up to date on the new story design helping us understand more and immerse us deeper into the story. That time is long over. There is nothing to see here – except a poor excuse for filler that has no real bearing on the actual story.

Actually, there is good and new information in this which would be either 1) really long-winded to do as exposition, and 2) would create the most canned, unrealistic dialogue possible. I'm glad that this was a Klog rather than an attempt to bludgeon this information into a more standard format.

I have to say that a new Erfworld posting made my (otherwise bland and overworked) day a lot more interesting. I'm glad that I'm not the only person to be excited by an update to my (our?) favorite webcomic.

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/searc...earchid=450378

nice.

Well played, sir. Well played!

ETA: your link wasn't working for me. I replaced it when I quoted you. Hopefully, you searched the same thing I did.

[ShinyBrowncoat]

If Wanda can raise all those buried troops after Sizemore digs em out, then Parson would seriously bolster his defenses.

Well, if Wanda can raise an unlimited number of killed enemy troops, then whoever has her on their side is pretty much unbeatable (unless there are some kinds of units that are un-uncroakable...)

[Chadwick]

I have just skimmed through the thread, but doesn't this comic suggest that Ansom is planning differently to what Parson is expecting?

If you mean by moving the attack to the tunnels instead of convention, no. He is hoping he puts lots of troops into the tunnels. The klog even says he let them move there.

Ansom is not attacking till everyone gets into place. Parson is not going to wait for the enemy troops to get into their spots but attack the stack in the tunnels. This costs no move he can put what ever does the attack back to where they need to be.

Ansom in waiting has split is forces and let a weak enough force close to an enemy that is large enough to destroy it with out aid from the rest of the alliance.

[PePe QuiCoSE]

ETA: your link wasn't working for me. I replaced it when I quoted you. Hopefully, you searched the same thing I did.

Oh, you are right, it seems it's a different link according to user.
Well, for those who want to see what i meant, click on Tarnace name -> view profile -> view all post of this user.

If you mean by moving the attack to the tunnels instead of convention, no. He is hoping he puts lots of troops into the tunnels. The klog even says he let them move there.

Ansom is not attacking till everyone gets into place. Parson is not going to wait for the enemy troops to get into their spots but attack the stack in the tunnels. This costs no move he can put what ever does the attack back to where they need to be.

Ansom in waiting has split is forces and let a weak enough force close to an enemy that is large enough to destroy it with out aid from the rest of the alliance.

No, i meant that Ansom is doing something different from convention, which would be to wait to attack until "all pieces are set".
Though, i think now i get it. He provokes Ansom to attack first, but through the tunnels, not the walls. Ansom would win if he attacked through the walls first chance (at some causalities cost). The tunnels are overall a bad idea, and hopefully uncoracked units will have Wanda's bonus for next turn.

[Occasional Sage]

Well, if Wanda can raise an unlimited number of killed enemy troops, then whoever has her on their side is pretty much unbeatable (unless there are some kinds of units that are un-uncroakable...)

Or she's seriously outnumbered and so the fight only lasts one turn, or the fight is someplace she's not which means the bodies disappear before she can get to them, or... one of the other thousand ways of preventing the use of such a spell.

Nit-picking aside, I agree with you: croakamancy would be seriously unbalanced if it allowed mass uncroaking without repercussions. I'm willing to believe that the ability is present in Erfworld, but there must be a heavy penalty attached to doing it.

If there is something akin to a "mana pool" perhaps such a spell would be the only thing castable in the round, keeping Wanda from participating in the fight and thus running the risk of not being alive to use it? Or there might be a special item required to cast a mass-uncroak spell which burns out on use and is hard to replace? To put a seriously anti-munchkin cap on it, it might be usable only a fixed number of times per game, even!

There are a number of ways to rebalance such a spell, but we're making WAGs all the way around, here. AFAIK there's no evidence that such a spell exists.

[SteveMB]

Nit-picking aside, I agree with you: croakamancy would be seriously unbalanced if it allowed mass uncroaking without repercussions. I'm willing to believe that the ability is present in Erfworld, but there must be a heavy penalty attached to doing it.

I figure that casting in general is limited in what a caster can do each turn (e.g. Maggie's comment that she was "nearly spent" after trying to help Wanda, and only had the ability to send one more Thinkagram). Presumably, items such as the scroll and magic dust Wanda used during and after the interrogation, and on a larger scale the air defenses of Efdup Tower, are "stored casting", allowing extra power to be unleashed on a given turn at the cost of using up some of the caster's ability on previous turns to create them in the first place.

[Chewy]

Not really. It's home territory, and there was plenty of time for planning. More to the point, it only took out one main character though lots of secondaries. The psychological effect could be the greater one. But the Alliance still has a huge number advantage. They need to do much, much more to pull a victory or draw out of this.

Secondaries win the game not main characters. Heros just make winning the game easier. Parson complains he has no air power. He whips out ultra mega super death beam from nowhere which wipes out a huge amount of the enemies air power which effectively secures a major hole in his defense in less then one turn. Id call that pretty dam convient.

Regarding the croakmanct debate I remember someone posted this earlier, but did everyone forget they rot? Even if you can raise whole armies they probally decay too fast for it to be any use. Lets consider this scenario. There are 11 cities which consists of Stanley's empire. He defends a city and repels the attack. Now wanda goes uncroak couple thousand troops. Now allied forces attack another city multiple turns away. So while croak troops march they rot. Croak troops arrive then allied troops peel off and launch another assualt multiple turns away. As the alliance consists of over 6 races/factions its not hard to believe hit and run tactics were used to drain croaked troops.

[teratorn]

Well, if Wanda can raise an unlimited number of killed enemy troops, then whoever has her on their side is pretty much unbeatable (unless there are some kinds of units that are un-uncroakable...)

Uncroaked are probably rather low quality troops. One would need to know the stats on uncroaked vs living units of the same type. Probably there is also some cost (schmuckers) involved in the uncroaking process. And once your army is made mostly of uncroaked you don't gain much in a battle (if given their poor performance you lose several uncroaked per enemy unit killed).

To fully exploit croakamancy you probably need to risk your croakamancer so she'll lead the uncroaked in the battle boosting their performance. But given the scarcity of casters in Erfworld that's probably not a good idea except in desperate situations. Here would be such a case.

[OldeGai]

Even if Parson does tunnel collapse at best it shouldn't be that effective. Even if Parson sends his whole force Webinar still outnumbers Parson 3:1 and thats only if he brought Marbits. By only sending a fraction of his forces to engage and he can win by numerical superiority while the rest are reserve in cash of ambush or traps. Once the tunnel collapsese killing/trapping the vangaurd all Webinar has to do is dig through or rienforce the main attack above ground.

PICK ME I KNOW... havent you seen the movie 300 and i think Wanda may lead the under ground strack if she can because thing about it you could potentialy Double the numbers of troops you have by un croaking them AND then get the other sides croaked troops. As for numbers

We will lead their troops into the pass where their numbers qwill cound for nothing...

tunnels are the perfect Hells gate

[Chewy]

300 the movie is a retarded example. The spartans did not stop 1345252523 troops with just 300 people the real battle had a 9000 greek miltia backing the spartans mixed with thier slaves. Also the spartans didn't make the stand alone a thousand slaves stayed with them while the greek militia retreated. Also the persian army was completely disorganized and ill trained a big mix and mash of units from conquered cities which is not what Ansom's army is. Thie trained thier seasoned vetrans over the entire course of the campaign and they believe in what thier fighting for. Another reason this is a stupid example is the reverse training. Already stated marbits have been fighting since the comics introduction and probally the whole campaign. Those goblins are fresh fodder at level 1.

[multilis]

In a normal strategy game faced with this situation, you attack one portion of the attackers, in this case most likely the tunnel set as it costs 0 movement points, he can even use his 0 movement point defenders. Sometimes the game mechanics allow a semi-cheat in that you can repeatedly attack and retreat over the course of your turn, with each attack taking out a portion of enemy, then retreating before they can propperly hit back. Every attack by parson can involve all the bonuses of his casters on their units, plus likely a warlord and a fortress bonus, plus the mind control powers of the thinkomancer. Biggest key here may be the undead units, if they get enough bonus from Wanda, they may be as good or better than regular units.

[SauroGrenom]

This Klog answers a few questions, but as is typical leaves many more unanswered. From a strategy perspective, I see Parson having two major options depending on the answer to a bunch of If's.

If Wanda has raised a bunch of flying uncroaked, and
If those uncroaked are sufficiently powerful, and
If some of those uncroaked fliers can be mounts,

Then Wanda and the uncroaked warlords and her fliers can finish the surgical strikes on the siege. She could even do it in such a way as to have minimal losses, thereby forcing Ansom and everyone to enter through the tunnels.

More likely is the second option. That is that Parson will use everything he has to decimate the forces in the tunnel. He could collapse a few tunnels, and there's mention of some traps which could generate some casualties. After that Parson will use all the stackable bonuses that he can to perform his "surgical" strikes in the tunnels. He can withdraw from fights where units get wounded close to death, then replace them with fresh units. The wounded units can go wait on the outer walls, and they won't be attacked this turn so being wounded doesn't matter. In this way he can stack up all his leadership bonuses, caster bonuses, and gobwin fighting bonuses that can be stacked. Hopefully he'd produce a good set of casualties, with no or minimal losses. He's up against possibly over 5000 troops in the basement, so he'd need to have a tremendous success ratio to get very far. He can even hold all the heavies and such which cannot enter the tunnels as reserve to guard the Garrison in case Webinar decides to counter attack on his turn.

Others have already pointed out that the uncroaking of enemies is way powerful. If Wanda could uncroak lots of them, then she can create a rolling wave of undead slaying the foes and the fallen rising as more undead. Personally I doubt it. If that was the case, Wanda would have been rolling over them from the beginning. In fact, we've never seen Wanda uncroak more than one unit/day. That may be her limit. It may be higher but considering that Gobwin Knob has only 210 undead infantry, I highly doubt that she can raise more than 10 units/turn. Although the interesting thing is that we just saw Wanda raise a unit on the opponent's turn... So apparently you can cast when it's not your turn.

Another thing is that the Klog tells us that the # of units on a wall is important to resist siege, but there's nothing about those units being wounded or fully healed... We don't know if wounded troops are just as good at defending the walls as the fully healed ones. If the wounded are effective at this (and that's a big if), he could repeat this whole strategy next turn and put lots of wounded units on the walls if he can clear the tunnels. Then with basically all the troops on the walls, the siege may never be able to get through.

Another interesting idea is that Parson could lead some of the battles himself... If he does this and wins he could perhaps level. He's only level 2 now. If he personally leads a bunch of winning battles, he could go up a few levels and that would be a significant bonus to his side.

Another wild card is that we know from here that Wanda had 6 scrolls... She used one, so I wonder what the other 5 scrolls can cast.

From a meta-plot perspective, the Klog suggests a showdown at the walls of the Garrison. The fact that there are two sets of walls, that the last set of walls defends the garrison, and that Ansom is with the siege troops... All these plot elements suggests that there'll be a big showdown at the last defense point between the leader of the "good guys" and the leader of the "bad guys".

Personally I'm expecting that Parson will use his leader swap strategy over the next two turns to wipe out the forces in the tunnels with minimal losses. Then he'll either send his wounded units to hold the walls, or hold them in the garrison and let the walls fall with token defenders... depending on whether wounded units can defend the walls very well. The end will be that everyone heals on the start of Parson's third turn so he can defend the garrison or outer walls with a fully healed and largely intact force having wiped out all the forces in the tunnels.

[Suicide Junkie]

The alliance would seem to have uncontested control of the Air zone. However, their air force is insufficient to take on the entire garrison force (if the air units attack, then everybody can fight back, not just the archers) It was that way before Wanda, and is even more so now.

The main difference is that, barring a whole string of natural 1's, Stanley should now reach FAQ successfully.

Note: Given that the doom spell did not contribute anything to the battle for Gobwin Knob, there is no way it is a deus ex machina. In fact, it only helped one of the antagonists (Stanley!).

Without Air, only the tunnels and the walls are left.
Ansom could push both, and win with heavy casualties but certainty. However, he wants to minimize casualties for a clean win, and also thinks the tunnels are lightly guarded.

The tunnels have traps and collapses to slow and hurt the invaders. They also have up to three casters giving huge boosts to the defenders going in. EVERY UNIT in the city can be used to counterattack the tunnels, although stack sizes might be limited by the tunnels. The walls and garrison can be completely emptied out to punish the tunnel attack hard, and then restocked for zero move.
Note: Uncroaked - Huge Bonus from being led by Wanda
Note: Golems - Big bonus from being led by Sizemore
Note: Gobwins - Big racial bonus for tunnel fighting.

The wall's strength is in the number of units defending... does it not care how wounded they are?
If so, everybody gets a chance to fight in the tunnels (while bonussed out the wazoo) until wounded, and then are moved to the walls.

The tunnel invaders would be left badly injured, and may not have the strength to attack on their own turn... if they go defensive, they've lost, since Parson can keep pulling the jab and retreat move.

I would not be surprised if a full load of troops on the walls will make them last at least one turn against the siege, and Parson should have his sword by then.

[Chewy]

On the contrary Air was a huge hole in Parson's defense. If we look at this Klog.

http://www.giantitp.com/comics/erf0084.html

It states no unit of his has the ability to attack air EXCEPT archers. This means a lot as that means air units have free reign and are able to surgically eliminate units such as caster or warlord, give risk free intel which WOULD give the Alliance a huge boost since they will be able to scout out the walls and find weakpoints allowing an easier siege.

There is no evidence ground units can "fight" back agianst air units unless the air unit actually lands. This is shown by how Parson surgically killed off multiple siege units even though there were thousands of ground pounders present. There was no reason air corps is able to do the same thing and surgically remove key units such as golems or knights or worse caster and warlords.

More evidence is shown by the most recent blog which states that air needs to be considered as a defense liabilty since its a way into the city so losing the entire air corps or a lot of it is a severe blow to the alliance. So I still claim this was a pretty dues ex machina event as it just save Parson a crapton of trouble.

As for the tunnels Id say your over stating the abilities. First off theres only 20 golems which 15 or so is crap..literally. As for gobilins theres only 200 of them all fresh fodder. Its also natural to assume Marbits are effective tunnel fighters as they in the first page it shows them digging through misty mountains and they were selected specifically for this operation. Though that might be assuming too much. Anyways its not like the alliance is sending in leaderless stacks. There is still webinar a 5 only, but a 5 still and his girlfriend with a 2. Also once agian unless Webinar has major number superiority. 1/3 or so of his forces already matches or outnumber the enemy. They can all get slaughtered, but if they take down just 100 goblins or so they already severely weakened the defending force and avoid a lotta tunnel collapse casualties since his whole froce was not committed. Its a bloodbath losing 600 troops for 100 kills, but the alliance has such luxury Parson does not.

Siege combat still haven't been told to us, but juding frmo the siege equpiment that was razed it looked fairly standard and still looks very poorly for Parson. Battle bears are perhaps battering rams and siege towers are well just siege towers. If we say there are ~40 units left thats a lotta siege equipment for Parson to consider for his defense with only 600 troops. If say a siege tower can carry 50 troops on the inital assualt and theres about 20 of them spread through out the entire outer wall where the Alliance can unlaod about 50 troops and continue ferrying them in while those bears can be busting down the main gate at the same time. Parson has very little troops to defend such a huge perimeter. Honestly agian w/o a dues ex machina he should be screwed tactically.

[glenstorm74]

Charlescomm is known for being true to their contract. Unfortuantely for Ansom, I believe that the order for the Archons to break their alliance with Jetston and ally with Transylvito will provide Charlie with enough wiggle room to pull his forces back. Of course, such an assertion depends on the specific language of the contract. I'm interested to see how it plays out given that dawn is here and the break with Jetstone is about to be made.

[teratorn]

Air units like gwiffons and orlies need to land or get closer to the ground to fight ground units. I expect the same from unipegataurs. Dwagons had ranged attacks (fire, bubblegum, acid, poop). Archons may be similar in that regard, but they may need to get close for the attack to be effective, exposing themselves to the enemy.

It's not really a Deus ex Machina because we knew for some time that there were deffenses incorporated in the walls. For now we know some orlies, three unipegataurs and one archon died. There weren't that many black spots in the courtyard in the previous strip.

[Chadwick]

No, i meant that Ansom is doing something different from convention, which would be to wait to attack until "all pieces are set".
Though, i think now i get it. He provokes Ansom to attack first, but through the tunnels, not the walls. Ansom would win if he attacked through the walls first chance (at some causalities cost). The tunnels are overall a bad idea, and hopefully uncoracked units will have Wanda's bonus for next turn.

Which as I said in the my previous (and Parson before me) is a mistake. Waiting has dooooooomed Webinar's command. He is in the tunnels which is part of GK and costs no move for the troops to attack.

[Midgititp]

Chewy:

You'd be right that the air was a huge 'gap' in their defence... IF Ansom had any intention of using his air units in that way. They were just passing by and would have played no role in the upcoming battle even if that doom spell wasn't used.

[reignofevil]

Parson had no way of knowing if they would take part in the final battle or not. As such the other times they buzzed the walls he didnt set off the defences. Cities having their own kind of defence isnt deus ex, its common sense, and most games have some sort of city attack.

[Wadoka]

I wonder if Parson can break the rules of the game?

I'd say "break", no - but as in any game, you find some rules that tend to be more or less open to "favorable" interpretation.

I remember many a late night / early-morning session of "Axis and Allies" which nearly came to a fistfight over "Super Bombers can't do that!" and similar arguments.

Parson has already shown he can think more creatively within the bounds of the known Rules than many of the Erfworld dramatis personae.

Firing off the "air defenses" reminds me of buying an AA unit to defend your city stacks.

Also - shades of Jack Chalker's "Dancing Gods" series. Talk about the Rules...!