Spiel #585 Turnierspiel#42 | Round 3 : 2017 PBEM Duel Tournament #42

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It was a very hard start! At first it looked like an easy first battle, but after my Draconian Theocrat got Immobilised, then frozen, and my Mammoth Rider also got immobilised it looked like I would lose my whole army in the first turn! Video of the first turn and the battle in question is here.



After that first battle, it took a few turn before I engaged in another battle. I also struggled with arctic wetlands, so the journey towards clearing the 3 sites for my first settler took 3 turns! And the problematic start didn't end here, the earth node was guarded by 1 T3 earth elemental, 1 T2 earth elemental and 2 Boars, so I didn't think I had enough power in turn 4 to clear it. The Necromatic circle next to my throne was guarded by 4 frostling reanimators, so I had to leave that until 11.

Once my Theocrat leveled up it was becoming a bit easier and my leader didn't need to cast Holy Cure as much, and from turn 6 I was able to clear all sites that I came across.

The worst cosmic event of all, Shooting Stars, almost caused my Mammoth rider's death. 


At Turn 12 my scouting Ice Scaper found a warg of Melciar in the UG, South West and maybe 7 turns from my throne. I went back to the surface after I spotted him and was concealed in the arctic terrain. I sent a Fairy over water to pick up a treasure and the following turn the warg appeared on the surface and was erased before he could gather any intel!

At around turn 13-14 I changed my plans, and instead of rushing Melciar, I decided to clear the sites north east of my empire, this cost me around 6 turns, but allowed me to level my leader and heroes up, and also create a few support units that could join my army. At around turn 18 the game really turned in my favour, as I was struggling with mana (no nodes in my close proximity except for the earth node) but I researched magical structures and after that I never had any problems with mana any longer! I also found 2 Heart structures which I created fortresses for and in that way got to 75cp with only researching Sorcery 1-3.

At turn 16-17 my wisp's had entered the UG and hoping to find his throne undefended, it wasn't! But a city close by was, and I tried to raze it, but his Goblin Reanimators moved to quick to save his city!

In the military score you can see a large jump at around turn 22 where I levelled up all my key units at a pillar of champions, and converted 1 phantom warrior, 1 yeti and 1 eagle rider.



The next big event was clearing the Forbidden Sanctum at turn 24, the defender set was a Shaman, Dire Bear, 2x Orc Priest, Nymph and a Blight Doctor. I think this is the absolute weakest set of defenders and earned me a Summon Fire Elemental.



At this point I was getting ready to go under ground and find Melciar, but the Dragons offered a quest, so I split my army in two with my leader, heroes, mammoth rider, yeti and a phantom warrior cleared a lost city, dungeon and later a sphinx temple, while my other units went to complete the quest for the dragon vassal, and on the way also a haunted boneyard. It was tricky without any healing, but I found some melons that could heal my units.



At turn 31 the Eagle rider and the quest reward of 2 vywerns launched an attack on Melciars cities, in turn 31 they took one city, and the following turn they took his throne with the help of a wisp.



I was hoping for a grand finale, a big battle with all Melciar's ghouled units, but sadly he surrendered before we could finish this match in a epic showdown! 

Some screenshots with the scores can be found here, here, here and here for those that are interested.

Full playlist of our match can be found on YouTube.

Please click here to read the rules. In order to avoid advantaging one team or the other, for each match, the team who will host the match was randomly selected.The first team in the "turn order" above (who is also the team on top in the tree here) must host the game. Tournament Game #42 Round $roundza ! When players do not show up for their match, the Tournament Judges have the right to change the match!

I've tried to add Melciar on Steam today so we can get this game going!

Hello Melciar, don't you want to join the match so we can start our battle!?

Ok we have both your class/race, you're good to start! Good luck and have fun!

Hello Melciar, seems I'm the host!

Game Name: PBEM Tournament Match 42
Password: mvsm

Please find the screenshots below:



Good Luck!
/Marcus