On Ansom's Reasons, and Good Ideas that Go Wrong.

[Silverlocke980]

Also subtitled "Overbearing Confidence: Starting a Land War in Russia."

A lot of discussion on these forum boards of late has been the reasoning behind Ansom's attack in the first place. We have all spotted, correctly, that even if Ansom had managed to find and kill all those wounded dwagons, Stanley would still have him surrounded with a very large number of very angry dwagons. To bet everything on this one throw of the dice, to surround oneself with angry foes, and to willingly risk it all for what turned out be a trick, makes it seem like Ansom is a bit dumber than boop.

However, I may have a reason for him. Ansom was betting on Stanley. Good old Stanley, who has indeed proven himself dumber than boop several times before this, who has only 200 living men left to him due to his actions in the war before this assault on Gobwin Knob, who... is less than a genius when it comes to strategical combat.

I think the main reason behind Ansom's plan was that he was assuming Stanley wouldn't recognize what a golden opportunity it would be. Killing Ansom and Vinny in one stroke would be incredible work, well worth killing some of your dwagons.

But Ansom figured Stanley wouldn't think that. He figured Stanley would do one of two things, both betting on Stanley's over-reactions to everything and anything. For that matter, over-reacting seems to be Stanley's one constant trait- he summons dwagons and mutes Parson for an inane comment, and goes berserk when he finds out that Parson moved/kept retreating from battles/didn't know a thing about Erfworld combat.

In plan A, Stanley starts freaking out when Ansom just mows through all those wounded dwagons. Terrified of the thought of losing his remaining forces, Stanley runs them all for the hills, not realizing that Ansom would be so weak after all that slaughter that one good max stack could wipe him out. In short, the trap is never sprung because Stanley himself disables it.

In plan B, Stanley attacks, but Ansom figured that even if Stanley did assault him, he'd be able to hold out with the help of Jillian and the Archons, as well get reinforcements to himself. It was an acceptable risk to kill that many Warlords and Dwagons, and save his siege.

More importantly, Ansom was betting on Stanley going through with plan A. It's a classic case of Stanley's overreactions, which Ansom has probably had plenty of experience seeing if he's fought Stanley even once before; he's the kind of person who, upon noticing he has a weak point in his defenses, rushes everything to that weak point and leaves himself undefended everywhere else. Ansom was betting that Stanley would cut his losses and run for it.

However, Ansom did not plan- and does this make his little quote in the cast page more significant, I wonder?- on Stanley suddenly gaining intelligence. He doesn't know about Parson, so he'll just assume that Stanley suddenly got brilliant or lucky enough to appoint a really good Warlord, but it's obvious to him now that this was a trap. And that makes him realize that plan A isn't going to happen, and plan B is going to be a lot harder to live through than he'd originally planned. Fighting a booping idiot with an army is much harder than fighting a tactical genius, even if they are using the same army.

In many ways, it's like all those men- Napoleon and Hitler foremost- who have invaded Russia over the years (hence my subtitle). They all bet that the Russians would be stupid enough and weak enough to take over without having to do a winter affair, which would be so bitterly vicious that it would wipe them out.

We still have a Russia, but both the French Empire and Nazi Germany are gone. Why?

Because they thought wrong. Ansom's Assumption, in other words, and it deserves those capitals. He was wrong.

That's my take on it, anyway. Thoughts, anyone?

[ChowGuy]

I've given my ideas elsewhere in the Forest thread as to why Ansom would risk Riding Into the Jaws of Boop and think he had a chance to ride out again. Well, actually, I think he has a chance to extract himself and Vinny anyway, because no way I buy that high ranking Warlords with the Flight ability have no more move then basic infantry. But the question remains, will he now abandon his troops?

Dunno. If he's a "go down with the ship" commander he won't. If he's smart he will; no matter how "dishonorable" it makes him look personally he should put the overall good of the coalition first.

Which brings us to another thing, a plan C if you will, that no-one here seems to have considered. Everybody is assuming that he'd not have rushed to a battle where, even if he won, he's doomed to be croaked in return. But... his goal was to preserve the siege units, and therefore the ultimate victory, while inflicting as much damge on the enemy as possible. If he's an honorable soldier, and he knows that the only way to achieve victory to undertake what may be a personal suicide mission, he'll take the chance.

[Freerefill]

That's an extremely interesting point, one that I never considered. Why indeed would Ansom and Vinny stroll right into a Donut of Doom to croak a Party Platter of Doom? Granted, wiping out half of Stanley's dwagons would be great for the Alliance, but at what cost? Ansom is no fool, nor is Vinny. Both of them should have realized that once they were in the center of the Donut of Doom, they were going to be attacked from all sides. Knowing this, I don't think they would have gone in with just enough forest units to croak the injured A dwagons.. I think they have enough to wipe out the injured A dwagons, the healthy B dwagons, and still have enough left over to march proudly back to the column for some afternoon tea. They would never have gone that far without enough to wipe out all of those dwagons, knowing that they could all attack at once. If that's the case, then there's no way Parson could get the Arkenpliers on his next turn: Ansom's forces are enough to wipe out 19 injured dwagons and 24 healthy B dwagons all at once. That is, unless Parson somehow manages to whittle away Ansom's forest army, which I doubt he'd be able to do.. Woodsy elves and gumps aren't exactly siege towers. It could be that he took only enough forces to slaughter 19 heavily wounded dwagons and 27 healthy dwagons and not have enough for 43 healthy dwagons, but I doubt he'd take only enough to do that, especially being so far away from reinforcements.

Assuming that's true, Ansom is completely protected and safe where he is: Even if Parson attacked with such a strong force, he would suffer too many losses. Which means he wasn't Parsons target in the first place. Which means Parson has other targets in mind and he drew those forces away from the column for some other reason.

I can't even speculate what's going through Parson's head.. I can imagine if the plan wasn't to trap Ansom but to lure him away then Stanley will be quite upset at not having trapped Ansom at all, especially after taking credit for it.

This is a common strategy in chess: move the enemy. Position your men such that there's only one possible alternative for the enemy, and that alternative is where you want them to be. That's exactly what Parson did. The siege towers are almost a null point in this plan. He attacks the siege towers, sure, but he could have hit anything. As long as he attacked in such a way that he could attack again, as he did, he represents a threat to Ansom that MUST be eliminated. Thus, Ansom MUST act on it. Ansom's best bet was to circle around the Donut of Doom. Sure it ate up his move, but going by sheer numbers, it was his best bet. I think that's what Parson wanted all along; to put Ansom and a bunch of his forces in that area. What I can't understand though is why. Ansom is very well protected. Parson cannot obtain the Arkenpliers even if he attacks with all the dwagons and even if he did, he would suffer such losses as to make that plan completely useless. The siege is another null point. Parson could keep the dwagons in Gobwin Knob and attack the siege from there just like he's doing now. Keeping the dwagons in the city would be the same as keeping them over the lake; only Ansom's fliers would pose a threat. Parson must have had a reason for getting Ansom and his forces over there. A purely logistical one I'm guessing, since my theory is all about moving the enemy.

So what does moving Ansom and a bunch of forest units away from the column do for Team Stanley? The answer, I'd imagine, would lie in the answer to "What good is Ansom being inside the column?" I doubt it's so elementary as "Ansom and the forest units could better defend the siege towers as to make a repeat of the Party Platter of Doom useless." We've not been told of any other targets of opportunity within the column where Ansom's lack of being there allows them to be hit. Perhaps there's another layer to the logistic plan. If Ansom is thinking he's gonna get his boop handed to him on a dwagon-scale platter, he's going to do something about it. He's going to re-organize what he has before his turn is up. Mass his fliers, call them in for defense? Jillian is still on reserve. We don't know how far away she is, but the reasoning for her not being used was that only her, 5 gwiffons, and the Archons could reach the center hex. It's likely that that means she can reach Ansom. And there's still a lot of fliers out there that seem to be more or less unaccounted for. Someone mentions them as "Not a lotta that can reach." If it is about logistics, who is it that Parson is trying to rearrange, where, and why?

One final note.. Parson says that Ansom fell for the trap. Without reading into it much, the simple explanation is that there is a trap and it's for Ansom. While I highly doubt that Parson is gonna go all-out and completely obliterate Ansom's forces with everything Team Stanley has on hand, since it would cost too much in the long run, not reading into the trap comment seems to mean that that's exactly what's going to happen.

They better wrap this thing up soon. The edge of my seat is getting worn out.

~(V)

[Gdrad]

I just glanced over the comic again. And the telling thing, and I say this in agreement to the OP, is stanlys line "How? He croaked 3 dwagons" while scowling. Stanly, as a RTS or stratgy player, is simple minded. I guess from the lofty position of not being a nub you can fling insults down on him. But he's basically a new player.

He knows he has units. He knows about how strong they are. He gets lucky in some ways (having gobwin knob and the folks under him he does). However he's not willing to make sacrifices. He doesn't think beyound "If I attack with this, it kills them and I don't lose anything. Thats good.". This level of simplicty, HORRIBLY easy to fight. Never hits your glaring weaknesses.


Honestly, as I think about it. Stanly is like a child player in many ways. Prone to tantrums, lack of understanding, and undeveloped understanding of the system.


Heck I know someone. Who introduced me to an RTS called red alert 2. And he played it alot and I never played it before. After I understood what each unit did (which took a few games and some campaign playthrough) I started wailing on him when we would fight. Simply because he NEVER played "competivly" IE: Against another player that isn't family. And had no idea what a rush was. Its like that level of skill development, coupled with a temper and wanting to be all that and a bag of chips.

Stanly would be a wizard, in dnd, with ONLY blasty spells. As in no grease, featherfall, or teleport let alone something like timestop.

[TheTurnipKing]

That's my take on it, anyway. Thoughts, anyone?

I think the problem is that assaulting that donut of Dwagons is starting to look like it wasn't even remotely a good idea. One thing that did occur was that maybe Ansom was chasing some unknown victory condition ("Kill <x> number of units, or Capture Gobwin Knob").

The effective result of the deception is that there are about 17 more dwagons and 3 more warlords out there than Ansom was expecting to be facing this turn. It might be that Ansom has a strong enough force to survive one turn of assaults from the donut Dwagons, but not the force of the A Dwagons, too.

The real question is, what's going to go down next turn? Would killing Ansom be enough, or does it make more sense to take out the siege. I doubt Parson has enough Dwagons to achieve both objectives.

[ChowGuy]

Knowing this, I don't think they would have gone in with just enough forest units to croak the injured A dwagons.. I think they have enough to wipe out the injured A dwagons, the healthy B dwagons, and still have enough left over to march proudly back to the column for some afternoon tea. They would never have gone that far without enough to wipe out all of those dwagons, knowing that they could all attack at once.

Given that after Ansom lays out the order of battle he says "We must conserve our limited forces, to take on the base hex" to which one of his own commanders asks "Will we have enough? Against a score of Dwagons and three warlords?" though Vinny grunts "Dwagons with just a few hits left." I doubt he had/has the force to take on the sort of fight you paint.

No, his boop is booped alright, and he knows it.

I think the problem is that assaulting that donut of Dwagons is starting to look like it wasn't even remotely a good idea.

He had no choice. "If we let those Dwagons heal at dawn, they'll again hit the column.... This turns losses will look small if we do nothing."

[Chewy]

Plan B is the most plausible explaination. This is a turn based game with stats. We do not know these stats. Archers usually have a very good defensive stat in these kinds of games. Not to mention the Gumps are trees which probally boosts a natural defensive trait which is pretty standard in turn games, such as bark skin.

Also keep in mind thier called forest units for a reason and they are in a heavy forest it should be natural they recieve a defensive bonus which would further boost Ansom's defensive capabilities.

The last factor is sheer numbers. Depending on how combat system works Ansom can create a donut of his own on the tactical map. If no 2 units can occupy the same hex he can create a donut of melee in front and then archers in the center essentially he'll win through pure attrtition.

Of course theres the possiblility of the more elaborate plan of punching through the hex with 5 or 6 dragons then link up with the column or at the VERY least move his stack to the LIGHT forest hex which is only 2 hexes away from the center hex then recieve rienforcements to buffer his hex stack who will then be able to engage the dragons since thier in a LIGHT forest hex (refer to page 56 for map.)

[Scientivore]

If Ansom's assumptions had been correct then Stanley would now have 24 dwagons and no warlords in the area. Ansom's wounded troops wouldn't heal until just before his next turn; however, those two dozen dwagons would have to fight everything in the hex -- to the croak! -- if they attacked. Whether or not Stanley threw away some more dwagons to get him, GK's fate would already be sealed; within a few turns, Ansom would move from the dungeon to the throne room. I'm not liking that plan because of the reliance on fate, assuming that he would be captured when he might be croaked instead; but I can see a brave commander taking that chance.

He was wrong. Stanley's warlords will almost certainly still be there when their turn starts. And, all it takes is one to make the gumps entirely irrelevant on defense. The woodsy elves are only marginally more useful; they'll get some hits in while the dwagons swoop in, a few dwagons will grab the warlords and pliers while the rest croak some archers and then it's buh-bye chumps.

Having a lot of dwagons left is just a bonus for Parson. I think that he's planning on pulling off both tricks at once, getting Ansom and the pliers while also finishing off the siege. That's slick.

[The_Alec]

From what is presented in the comic I think plan B is what Ansom was counting on.

Namely that he could punch through the ‘weak’ hex then easily massacre the units in the center hex without taking much damage in return. Since the dwagons were low on health they could be killed before they had the chance to do much damage and Ansom would be able to one hit kill the uncroaked warlords using the Arkenpliers. Thus his forces would still be near full strength if the remaining dwagons counter attacked.

How well they would have stood against the counter attack depends on a number of factors we don’t know much about. While the woodsy elves don’t seem that strong compared to a dwagon the Grumps seem to be rather strong unit. Also they would have had the combined stat bonuses of three warlords while the attacking dwagons would have had none. Seeing as Ansom joined the attack himself it seems that he was confident that his forces would have been strong enough to survive.

Of course now the situation is a lot different. Ansom may have been able to survive if everything had gone to plan but now he is stuck between the full force of Stanly’s dwagons.

[TheTurnipKing]

He had no choice. "If we let those Dwagons heal at dawn, they'll again hit the column.... This turns losses will look small if we do nothing."

Even if the alternative is losing the queen, it would still be exceptionally unwise to place your king in check.

[Chewy]

Even if the alternative is losing the queen, it would still be exceptionally unwise to place your king in check.

not if losing the queen makes you forfeit.

[TheTurnipKing]

Which was something that remained to be seen.

With Stanley as the warlord, going in through the tunnels must have been a reasonably viable option to make it a believeable feint.

[Flakey]

You seem to have left out plan C.

After killing off the center hex, Ansom and Vinny travel back to the column. It does not matter then if the 'B' dragons then kill the remaining elves and gumps. Ansom would still have been miles ahead in the exchange.

Unfortunately for Ansom its a trap and hes stuck out of position and out of move for the ordinary units. He kind of done in what ever way he moves Jillian and himself, the elves or the seige are left very vulnerable.

[Talanic]

My take?

The Group-B Dwagons left in the donut are not enough to croak or capture Ansom and Vinny. They're powerful, they're numerous, but they're not powerful enough or numerous enough.

The fully-healed stack of Group-A Dwagons over the lake, though, will be fully capable of taking out Ansom's entire stack once the next turn starts. That's why Ansom had to be stranded out there; so that he's forced to end turn where he is and will lose the stack--and himself--the moment the next turn starts.

Odds are good that the remaining Group-B Dwagons won't even engage this turn, since the damaged units that they don't kill will heal before the main group can attack.

[SteveMB]

Odds are good that the remaining Group-B Dwagons won't even engage this turn, since the damaged units that they don't kill will heal before the main group can attack.

Huh? Both the dwagons in the Donut of Deception and the dwagons (and warlords) hovering over the lake can easily reach either Ansom or the column during Stanley's next turn. Ansom's units heal at the start of Ansom's turn (by which time the dwagons would be back home, at least according to Parson's original plan).

[WoodenTable]

It's possible Parson didn't plan for how strong Ansom is, especially if he reinforces his position with Jillian and the Archons. Ansom went in thinking that either the B dwagons were something he could defeat, or that being defeated by them was acceptable (maybe he also has some way of uncroaking). It's entirely likely Parson could lose more than half the A and B dwagons trying to take Ansom down, not to mention what could happen to the warlords.

I don't know how many dwagons gobwin knob has, unfortunately, so I don't know how hard that would affect his airforce. Probably a lot. Parson doesn't think like me (I'm not a very... forward thinker), but it's just the kind of thing I'd do: Empty the city of half its dwagons, and since the enemy can't see that, they don't think "Hey great, I can storm the city with air right this turn to have a good chance at winning." Risky but fun. Bet on them running to the defense, rather than ignoring you and going for the big prize.

Anyway, a loss of say, 25 to 30% of his total dwagon pool plus 3 warlords would probably be a disaster for gobwin knob. If they were outnumbered before, they'd be a lot worse off then.

Based on all those assumptions, the best alternative I can see is a trade. The Pliers for Ansom's life. Ansom can't win the battle, so he has to take it to live; and Parson can't win the war without his dwagons and warlords intact. Then the alliance loses faith in Ansom, because he failed to keep the pliers, and the plan for taking gobwin knob then gets even shakier. Parson gets away with everything, plus the Pliers. Whereas if Ansom ended up dead, the allies might conclude that Stanley is either worth defeating, or greatly weakened by the suicide attack on Ansom. And so they continue the siege until Stanley is completely beaten.

The best strategy as I see it is the kind no erfworlder would ever think of: a nonviolent one.

[sihnfahl]

Even if the alternative is losing the queen, it would still be exceptionally unwise to place your king in check.

First off, losing Ansom doesn't lose the war for Jetstone; equating him with the King in Chess is unwise.

As far as everyone knows to this point, King Slately is still safely in Spacerock and is definitely not in any danger of being croaked. So that analogy's out.

And the 'Queen' of this fight, right now, is not Ansom. It's the siege. Without it, Ansom might as well pack up and go home - he's not going to beat GK's defenses through tunnel fighting and airborne assaults.

Ansom's been put down to the level of a Knight. A piece that's powerful, but you can still win without it.

[Talanic]

Huh? Both the dwagons in the Donut of Deception and the dwagons (and warlords) hovering over the lake can easily reach either Ansom or the column during Stanley's next turn. Ansom's units heal at the start of Ansom's turn (by which time the dwagons would be back home, at least according to Parson's original plan).

It depends on if turns run concurrently or not, which I think they do; I forgot that the healing time for the different sides was not dawn for both groups. If the turns run at the same time, then the B-group dwagons can attack now, and the A-group can attack later assuming there's still something to attack.

[ChowGuy]

Ansom's been put down to the level of a Knight. A piece that's powerful, but you can still win without it.

Oooo... exactly where I'd have put him. But I'm not sure the seige units are "the Queen" either. As the strongest attack threat, but one to be played cautiously, I'd give the Air Force. Ansom's position was that of seeing his Queen side Rook lost without exchange, and the threat of the same to his remaining Rook. It's too late to castle, and without either of those he'll have trouble setting up any effective offense. His Queen is currently out of the play having been poorly developed too early, so as Knight it was his job to get in there, take out the bishops, and break up the attack as best he could even if it meant a risk trading himself off. Right idea, wrong execution, but that's what comes of not being able to see the whole board. He's a Chess player alright, but Chess this ain't.

[tainsouvra]

A lot of discussion on these forum boards of late has been the reasoning behind Ansom's attack in the first place. We have all spotted, correctly, that even if Ansom had managed to find and kill all those wounded dwagons, Stanley would still have him surrounded with a very large number of very angry dwagons. To bet everything on this one throw of the dice, to surround oneself with angry foes, and to willingly risk it all for what turned out be a trick, makes it seem like Ansom is a bit dumber than boop.

(emphasis added)
In that case, I disagree completely with what everyone has spotted and assumed.

Turn-based combat that goes by stacks and units is a funny thing--the relative power of two different groups is not a linear relation to the difference in their size, it actually has several breaking points. This is easy to forget when you're the armchair general, but think back on games like "Heroes of Might and Magic" and what happens when numbers are uneven.

Assuming you're making the first strike (and this can be easily modified if you're not first, but for simplicity's sake):

       ______  3
      /        2
_____/         1

1) If your first strike will damage but not actually defeat any opponents, decreasing the size of your group will have no further penalty unless force sizes are exceptionally small and the battle is long.
2) If your first strike will take out some, but not all, of your opponents, increasing the size of your group has rapidly-increasing benefits in terms of how much you destroy compared to how much you lose.
3) If your first strike will wipe out your opponents, increasing the size of your group will have no benefit at all.

Ansom attacked via the weak hex in order to ensure that he would be in that "easy win" range of upper-2 to 3. He planned on wiping out the wounded dwagons and uncroaked warlords with only a hit or two each, making him take very few hits in return and leaving him with the majority of his force intact--sufficient to dissuade a return attack by what remained of Stanley's dwagons. This is why it was important for him to arrive with as many forces as necessary, to stay on the good side of that cusp.

Failing to take out those dwagons completely changes his position on the scale. He's looking at a lower-2 range right now--a probable loss due to his inability to take down his opponents quickly enough to avoid casualties.

Three easily-killed warlords and seventeen easily-killed dwagons tempt the "bring enough troops to kill without taking losses" tactic, but even though the numbers aren't that far off, taking on the entire dragon+warlord force at once instead of in two big bites is such a dramatically different situation in turn-based combat that I'm alarmed Ansom's move is being so derided. Fault him for being tricked, sure, but if it hadn't been a trick, he could have been playing smart.

A basic guideline for turn-based combat when you're attacking first, again easily modified for when first strike isn't a given, is this...
If I have 50% more force than my opponent, I will take zero losses.
If I have equal force to my opponent, I will take heavy losses and possibly lose.
If I have half the force of my opponent, I will lose all my troops without a hope of victory.
...it's just a guideline, as it varies based on troops attack and defensive power (mathmancy it, heh) but I'm trying to emphasize how much even a few extra units on your opponent's side can swing a turn-based battle. It's not a linear thing.

If Parson hadn't put the dwagons elsewhere, Ansom would have made the right decision in bringing the forces he did to where he did. Ansom's failing was not realizing his opponent could fool him, and that's the extent of it--surrounded by angry dwagons at the end of his turn or not, it was a very winnable scenario if the wounded dwagons had been where he expected.

[SteveMB]

It depends on if turns run concurrently or not, which I think they do

To coin a phrase, why would you assume that? Everything we've seen that involves whose turn it is at the moment (Jillian being intercepted by dwagons after she "ended turn in the trees", Webinar ordering the group to continue on the road "when our turn begins", etc) indicates that turns are consecutive (Stanley's turn in the morning; Ansom's turn in the afternoon).

[spotmarkedx]

My take on this first with two assumptions:
1> Selective targeting only possible on player's turn
2> Warlords are targetable

Ansom's Expectation:

Spoiler

Show

Ansom attacks wounded stack of dragons and uncroaked warlords. Dragons are wounded, but gaining warlord bonuses. Assume, for the sake of arguement, that the dragons are at about 20% of their life.

First set of rounds or combat computations:
1> Ansom selectively attacks the uncroaked warlords and has a relatively easy time defeating them.
2> Gumps and Elves fight dragons, and don't do as well. They take some losses.

Second set of rounds or combat computations:
1> Dragons no longer getting their (undefined) warlord bonus.
2> Gumps and Elves much closer to dragons combat value, as they are still getting their own warlord bonus.
3> Combined warlords and troops deal with the remaining dragons with acceptable losses, and only need to deal enough damage to kill about 4 healthy dragons (19x.2=3.8)

Potential counterattack:
1> Dragons still not getting warlord bonus.
2> If dragons attack, they will attack randomly (potentially attacking units that can't defend vs. air such as the gumps) and will not be able to use hit&run tactics
3> If dragons attack, Ansom's troops have the advantage of the warlord bonus plus significantly reduced dragon numbers.

In short the counterattack can't hit and run, has to attack everything (can't select), is smaller (due to wounded being taken), has no warlord bonus.

Actuality:

Spoiler

Show

Now the counterattack looks like this:
1> Dragons also getting warlord bonuses.
2> Dragons can completely ignore some of the heavier hitters (gumps)
3> Dragons can selectively target Ansom, Vinnie and Tarfu to remove the Alliance's warlord bonus.
4> Dragons have effectively an additional 15 more dragons in hits than Ansom's expectations (the 19 wounded dragons, but the alliance didn't take damage removing ~4 dragon's worth of hits)
5> If GK can take down Alliance's warlords before they lose all three uncroaked, they don't need to hit anything else of this forest force. They can't run this same forest ring tactic because the only reason this is working is that the Alliance's flyers are away for the turn. All they need do is take down the leadership.
6> Assuming the Dragons have about half their dragons health remaining at the end of taking down the warlords they can still take out the majority if not all of the Alliance's seige on the way home.

In comparison this counterattack can hit and run, can selectively attack ignoring the elves and the gumps, healed its wounded, and has its warlord bonus.

Now, if warlords can selectively target opponents on the defense, things change a little, but not much. Parson should hopefully be able to calculate the odds that the dragons can take down Ansom before he recroaks GK's warlords. If the chances are good, it is a reasonable risk to run even with the potential loss of one or two of his own warlords.

If warlords are not selectively targetable until all troops in the combat are dead, then the real counterattack is probably only ignoring the gumps instead of both the gumps and the elves, but it means GK's warlords are pretty safe from selective recroaking by Ansom. The dragons take more hits taking down the warlords, but still theoretically have the advantage (since three unbuffed dragons were slaughtering stacks of unbuffed elves without much difficulty)

[Flakey]

My take on this first with two assumptions:
1> Selective targeting only possible on player's turn

This is false, because Jillian targetted the blue dwagon on Stanley's turn.

[spotmarkedx]

Feh. Ok, I'd forgotten. Good thing I'd already talked about how that would change my assessment in my prior post xp

[SteveMB]

So far, we've established that:

An attacking stack with a warlord can selectively target certain units and can break off the attack before defeating all units in the target stack (Parson's raids on the column, withdrawing from each engagement when he'd taken out the siege units from the target stack).

A defending stack with a warlord facing an attacking stack without a warlord can control the engagement to some extent by selecting which units defend against which attackers, but cannot break off -- the defenders are stuck in their current hex because they're off-turn (Jillian soloing the blue dwagon while using the orlies to screen off the others).

A stack on the move without a warlord must autoattack non-allied units it contacts and cannot stop until one side is completely defeated (explicitly stated in Klog 4).

What happens when one stack attacks another with warlords on each side trying to do mutually exclusive things (e.g. attacking warlord trying to focus attack on defending warlord; defending warlord trying to screen with other units) hasn't been made explicitly clear as far as I recall. My guess is that the attacker's ability to select a target wins out; otherwise, it would be easy to prevent any more hit-and-run raids by simply stacking all siege units with at least one warlord (Ansom seems to have an adequate supply, given that he addresses a large audience as "warlords" in his pep talk).

[zorac]

Most of this is assuming that Ansom is fully in control of himself, which I think is wrong.

There are some classic fantasy elements here:

- He's carrying an artifact. (See any post-Tolkien fantasy story, or any RPG sourcebook.)
- He's prime artifact bait, being already inclined to be heroic.
- At best, he has a barely coherent explanation of why he went to war in the first place, one that doesn't stand up to any kind of analysis.
- When he decided to charge into the dragons, the pliers are a big part of the motivation. (To kill uncroaked warlords.)

Lastly, the authors have given us one heck of a hint in Panel 4 of page 64. When Ansom declares that he decided to go in himself, we get a frame of his rear and the Arkenpliers. Tell me, what is the more significant object in that frame, the artifact or Ansom's butt? Even if the decision was entirely Ansom's, the import and focus of that decision isn't him. It's the fact that the Arkenpliers are going in with him.

[Silverlocke980]

(emphasis added)

A basic guideline for turn-based combat when you're attacking first, again easily modified for when first strike isn't a given, is this...
If I have 50% more force than my opponent, I will take zero losses.
If I have equal force to my opponent, I will take heavy losses and possibly lose.
If I have half the force of my opponent, I will lose all my troops without a hope of victory.
...it's just a guideline, as it varies based on troops attack and defensive power (mathmancy it, heh) but I'm trying to emphasize how much even a few extra units on your opponent's side can swing a turn-based battle. It's not a linear thing.

If Parson hadn't put the dwagons elsewhere, Ansom would have made the right decision in bringing the forces he did to where he did. Ansom's failing was not realizing his opponent could fool him, and that's the extent of it--surrounded by angry dwagons at the end of his turn or not, it was a very winnable scenario if the wounded dwagons had been where he expected.

The man/woman is a genius. I totally forgot about how turn-based tends to differ from "real" warfare- I'm an RTS man myself. I change my opinion to agree with this one- I'm pretty certain they've got the right of it.

Stupid Starcraft, teaching me wrong ways to perform violence on my fellow human beings! :)

[Sophos]

tainsouvra,
Thank you for the comments.
The logic of the move seems much more clear to me now as well.

Is zorac suggesting that the Arkenpliers are something akin to sturmbringer-lite. I had not considered the Arkenpliers as anythig other than powerful and innert; very interesting possibilities now come to mind.

Would they need to be attuned to exert influence over Ansom's personality?

[Scientivore]

Not if you're using the One Ring model. I think that's a fascinating perspective. It casts a different light on Stanley's rant on page 32, makes it more literal.

[Chewy]

[QUOTE=tainsouvra;2854479](emphasis added)
In that case, I disagree completely with what everyone has spotted and assumed.

QUOTE]

Aww I commented on how sheer numbers take the day too :(