Game #741 Tournament game#28 | Round 6 : PBEM 2v2 team tournament 2016 #28

Hey! Finally read this report, thanks Jean!

I'm quite impressed by your research income. How did you manage to get so much while playing Necro (= low city economy)? Also quite impressed by your summoning of Dread Reapers and all the stuff that fast.

It looks like you got the inspiration for the "no city economy" run that you achieved against gab by watching how Fistandantilus played against you.

Impressive play by Fistandantilus and Keldon too!

Late game decisions were entirely dictated by the deadline. In the last turns I could have gone north and easily finish off Melciar but with just two days remaining on the clock we would have lost anyway on points as I had no domain.

We discussed that at lenght and I'm pretty sure trying the odds in a decisive battle against you was the only option left at that point, that's why I rushed you even after seeing your armies.

It was a game of misclicks btw, as keldon can attest :p thanks for the report, it was interesting.

Did you expect me to forget to write a report on a game of this excellence? Certainly, not.
It was my best game in this tournament and I want to comment on it . Let's start with some warm words about Fistandantilus and Keldon. They both are high-level players who forced me to show my best in this game. I believe I wouldn't have managed had I taken another class, so I'm sorry for using all the powerfull features of necromancer (which might soon be nerfed). 
Keldon has become a very powerful player. I was impressed by many things showed by him in my 4-4 game against the Sinners. I'm still going to write a report about that match, it's just too difficult to do it alone (90 turns there...). In this tournament game he lacked aggression. He could have very easily backstabbed me with some hidden hunters and shamans. 
Anyway, he managed to expand a lot and almost defeated Melciar. He completely outplayed my teammate. 
Fist showed an extremely good understanding how to survive and continue fighting without any cities. In the end, he just lacked several more units to win the decisive battle...
But enough spoilers for now. Let's start the report and show you the game from the beggining. 
My strategy was pretty simple and lineal here: I took elf necro and got 3 initiatives - the best possible starting army. Using the unicorn rider to split ai units, I level uped everyone quickly and soon got 3 elite storm sisters with inflict stun ability. I was able to take a dungeon and form a good army. 
Melciar rushed into 2 crusaders and tried to take a Sphinx Temple to boost himself to exalted. He managed to win the fight but made some awful mistakes (for example, he had enough upgrade points but didn't take strong will => his leader was petrified on round 1 of the tactical battle). As a result, he went into the void >_> and lost his cavalry and one more unit. He was out of the game for at least several turns.
That's why I decided to split my heroes and send them in different directions - to be able to clean more sites (on his territory too) and ghoul more units. Unfortunately, Melciar couldn't help me with cherubs and I had to scout on my own.
Soon, we spotted Keldon's hero who was taking objects in the north.

As many objects were also cleaned in the south, I presumed that there was another small army of Keldon or some Fist's units on the surface. 

I needed to choose my route and found something that impressed me very much.

We can see two Sphinx Temples here!


It is a very good option to boost yourself to Sage, isn't it?
And very soon I found the army of Fist.


Take into account two factors - no leader here and Fist playing dwarf in underground - and you can conclude that it's just a second army. 
Let's look at the heroes.
1. Sorcerer


2. Dreadnought.



Dreadnought is a very good option here as a third hero.
Very soon Keldon started to build cities on snow and I figured out it was the closest city to me at that moment. 

When I came closer to the Sphinx Temples I found Fist nearby.
As you can see on the screenshot, I was calculating his movement points a lot at that moment. I have a strong feeling he could have taken the Temple and then left to the mountains and from there to water. 

He wasn't able to defeat my army (as the snowball was too good) and retreated taking a tomb.

My second army wasn't far away too and I didn't want him to approach it as the goal was to harass Keldon. That's why I was hunting flying units to ghoul them and soon got some. A perfect counter to cherubs. 

And here Melciar surprised me once again: he attacked a tomb near his domain and lost everything. Well, almost. And went into the void again.

After this failure he lost interest in the game. I managed to persuade him to send me some gold and build armies to defend his throne city from possible attacks.
Let's skip several turns here which were pretty boring because I was taking these Sphinx Temples and my opponents were busy too. I was expecting an attack from Keldon and enhanced my scouting. And soon I spotted him here.



His druid hero.


His path to Melciar was incredibly good, no need to comment.

I was trying to follow Fist units with my scouts all the time.

Now it's time to reveal some of my forces. This is the army which was going to Fistandantilus.



I continued to follow Fist. At this time I started to face big problems with my economy and even monoculture didn't help.

I was checking the position of Keldon's army by looking at these explored objects.

And soon Fist's leader showed up taking the goblin town.

It was pretty obvious his leader was there because he needed to escape from my main army. I also couldn't find him anywhere else on the map. The route chosen by Fist was really good: two sanctums on his way.

Since I was close to his throne city I decided to send a third army in the underground to approach his leader. This maneuver gave me a chance to clean some objects in front of him and try to organize a leaderkill.
Approaching Fist's empire.

And Keldon going to Melciar

Fist ran away with his home army

And the first sanctum was explored

A huge missplay of Fist. One of his stacks was caught in the underground.

And the second sanctum was explored soon. I disbanded the cadaver in order not to show my knowledge of his presence here.

I needed to take the dungeon and the shrine nearby before Fist.

Fist's main stack

Keldon came to Melciar's domain where they both had some fights and lost units. All the towns but the throne city were captured by Keldon

Preparing for the fight.

Taking the dungeon.

Checking the movement points and planning my position next turn.

Fist had plenty of units defending the throne city.

He had another town, now on the surface. I needed to take it too.

And more units were trying to escape my necro army

And then suddenly I couldn't believe my eyes. Not only Fist approached my army with his leader stack, he also didn't summon a cherub and didn't remove the buff!
I decided to sacrifice two units and attack Fist's tier-1 dwarves with probably victory: make his leader believe he could win the battle and use some casting points. But I failed.

I made a number of tests which showed that this position was the best here. The plan was to split Fist's army. I had an advantage in the number of units with range attacks and had some huge hopes on the Reaper.

**************************************************************
And finally I attacked...






I lost!

The battle was very close, almost everyone was dead. As you can see, Fist's leader fell too, that's why the evangelist lost his resurgence ability and wasn't resurrected after the battle. The crusaders were insanely good here ^^
I razed almost all Keldon's cities but my second army wasn't that strong to take the throne.

That's why I had to run.

At the same time Melciar, being afraid of Fist, decided to run to my domain with his leader. And failed because he didn't scout properly >_< I also want to mention a very good play from Keldon who set this incredible trap!

So Melciar went to the void again and could have lost soon but...

I don't really understand why Fist didn't go to his domain. There was an exit to the surface not far away from the place of our fight. Had he gone there he would have taken Melciar's throne city. I'm not sure though that he would have been able to do it before Melciar came back from the void but still it was the best option because Keldon didn't have enough army to take my teammate's throne (Keldon's leader and his forces were protecting his own throne city from my second army).
So Fist went to my domain and showed himself here.

He was on survival mode because he had already lost all his cities. But still had 1000 + gold

This was possible due to a very good strategy on the map: he used all the objects to keep him alive.

As I lost my third necromancer hero I got another one right before the battle. I heavily mulliganed him in order to get someone really useful. I got a level 5 hero with a possible immediate upgrade to stealth commander. Since I knew Fist had no units with true sight I decided to take the hero and make a trap.

At the same time I backstabbed Keldon's cities because his main army started to pursue my stacks.

I'm not sure whether Fist saw the hidden army or not. Anyway, he approached my forces and took the city letting me attack him next turn.

The decisive battle and the second attempt to win the match.



The game was over after this fight because Keldon was now alone against two of us.

And it was impossible for him even to run away.

So soon I was able to combine all my forces and come to his domain to claim the victory.
Once again, thank you for a very interesting match. I want to thank the judges and the organizers of this tourney which made this match possible. Unfortunately, it looks like this game was my last one in the tournament since I am not able to play the next stage at the moment. I would be grateful if the judges allowed the Sinners to take my place there. If it happens, I wish them good luck against Bastards of the North! And the best team will fight Gab in the finals. 

Confirmed by Jean_de_Metz

EDIT: ok, I had not written down the class/race of Fistandantilus and WL, sorry, no problem here.

Match has been reported, please confirm!

Match has been reported, please confirm!

Hi! Ok let's hope he can play his turn soon as you have only 16.5 hours left. :S

The procedure for the end of the game is:
- when the deadline (see clock here: https://www.the-battlefield.c... is reached, the turn is played up to the last player of the turn (in your case, it's Melciar), then this player plays his turn entirely but DO NOT end turn.
- the last player saves & quits and backs up the save (copy the .apg and .~apg from C:\Users\[Windows user name] \Documents\My Games\AoW3\Profiles\[AoW3 user name]\PBEM and paste it to another place)
- the last player then opens the game again, surrenders, takes screenshots of ALL the scores except Seal, and sends them to the judges (Markymark and me). Then he sends the game to the next player so that other players can see there was no reload.
- the next player DOES NOT load the game.
- then everyone waits for judges' feedback.

REMINDER: the team with the highest score does not automatically win. The scores must not be judged "very close".

So depending on whether Keldon can play his turn soon and Melciar follows up quickly, you still have one more turn or this turn is the last one.

Keldon has almost missed his turn (9 minutes left and he is offline in steam). I removed the timer.

Hi!
Our turn order in this session is the following one:

Users: 
  - Fistandantilus ( team 1 / defeated )
  - Jean_de_Metz ( team 2 / host )
  - Keldon Kerripos ( team 1 / it's your turn )
  - Melciar ( team 2 )

So, I guess, Melciar is once again the last one to finish the match.

2Fist: you played really well this time, I just don't know why you decided to go to my domain instead of defeating Melciar (when he was in the void and surrounded by Keldon)

Don't worry, it's over. My only skill (apparently luck) wasn't enough this time 

Hi! So about 3.5 days left.

Reminder of the procedure in case the games is not finished by that time:
The decision tree described on the Tournament Player Pool will be used: for this round and for this tournament, if the game is not finished by the deadline, then the winner would be decided by comparing in this order: 1/ the combined total (general) score of living players of each team, 2/ the combined military scores of living players of each team, 3/ the combined domain scores of living players of each team. If no team has a clear superiority (not just 1 point more; clear superiority is assessed by the judges) in any of these, then the team with the highest combined total (general) score of living players win (same as 1/ but without need for "clear superiority").

Who is last in turn order in your game? Is it Warlord Keldon? If yes, then when the deadline is reached, the turn continues up to him, then after having played his turn entirely, he will have to save & quit, back up the save (copy/paste it to another location), then get back into the game, surrender, take screenshots of all the scores and send them to the judges (and save & quit without sending the turn to the next player). We'll then get back to you as soon as possible to give the conclusion.

I tried to end this game for you but, unfortunately, you got more lucky in that battle

Unfortunately I'm out of town next week-end so I probably won't be able to play any turns from friday morning to sunday evening. Hopefully the game will already be over.

One Thing you could do in the meantime: Select Teams!

Yes indeed, 9 days left and not time extension as the round already latest 14 weeks, sorry...

Less than 9 days left  Just want to hear a confirmation from judges: we don't get any additional time, do we?
Once again, to remind: turn timer on. Especially for Melciar, though he doesn't read this topic at all

Melciar has managed to make his turn in time. Moreover, I've received 2 turns today which means that our tempo is really great. Turn timer will be on (the rules require it) but I'm happy it doesn't affect us at all. 

Hi, everyone.
Melciar has received his turn today at 11 a.m. He has informed me that he is out of the town for 1 day and will come back tomorrow in the morning. He will make his turn once he arrives home. He asks to remove the timer just in case (traffic jam or whatever).
We have reached round 39 and already had some big battles. I think the game can be decided in the upcoming 10-15 turns so we might finish it in time.

Melciar has informed me that he is back.
I've turned the timer on as Hiliadan asked me to do so. I agree, we have very little time left and need to hurry. 

Hi, Hiliadan!
It's round 30 right now, we have a good pace.
Unfortunately, Melciar is going on a business trip for 5 days starting on Monday

Hi! A bit more than 1 month left for your game, what turn did you reach?

Ok you can continue, Keldon sent us a video showing the issue did occur after he uploaded (or saved & quitted) the game the first time. He did not move any unit or do anything before re-uploading it.
So he gets a warning for reload with proof.

Sorry for the delay, I've been relatively away from AoW3 the past 7 days.

Yes, please wait for the green light. Keldon is going to send us the video tomorrow.

Uhm I've received the turn, I guess I still have to wait for the judges response tho.

Anyway I'll be on vacation to France (incidentally near Metz ) from the 1st to the 6th, unfortunately I won't be able to play any turns during that period

Hi. Np at all since we play with no timer

Hi there! Keldon informed me he had an Ironman notification following an upload issue and proposed a potential solution, I am checking with Markymark how we deal with that. Please remove turn timer and wait for us...

Melciar has informed me that he is on a business trip till Saturday. 

Hello, Hiliadan!
We've already reached turn 16. The tempo is so good, I hope we continue playing like this when Fist returnes

Hello there! Which turn did you reach before the vacations of Fistandantilus?
About 76 days left.

Hi, I'll be on vacation for a week starting tomorrow (Dec the 3rd) so won't be able to play any turns till mext monday (11/12). Sorry about that

The game has started. Good luck&have fun everyone!
Do we need a timer? I'm fine with both options but would love not to have gaps between the turns.

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. Any of the players in the team can host.Tournament Game #28 Round ! When players do not show up for their match, the Tournament Judges have the right to change the match!

Joined, GL&HF

I'm sorry.
I rehosted the game with correct settings.
Name: 2-2 Tournament. Round 6.
Pass: sin

One mistake with the settings, it's 2 heroes, not 3. Otherwise ok and we have both class/race.

Keldon Gilt-Leaf joined... good luck averybody.

Hi, the Sinners!
We've just ended our previous match and it took us some time to develop the strategy, sorry.
Game is hosted now, please, join
Name: 2-2 Tournament. Round 6
Pass: sin

Congratz for reaching round 6!
The clock is already ticking, so please send class/race to Markymark and me and @Green Elephants, please host with the main branch!

You'll have 14 weeks for this match as an extension of round duration of 3 weeks has been agreed among judges.