Round 21

Round 21
Winner 🥇
Player:	Robert
Dominion:	Dr. Awkward
Race:	Dark Elf
Second 🥈
Name:	Almezo
Dominion:	Creed Bratton
Race:	Goblin
Third 🥉
Name:	Faith
Dominion:	Cliffs of Insanity
Race:	Sylvan
General
Changes:	Round 21/Changes
Valhalla:	Link

Round 21 began on November 11th and ended on December 13th. This round saw the introduction of a brand new tech system with the number of techs increased from 27 to 66 (with smaller bonuses). 3 new wonders were added (Hanging gardens, Gnomish Mining Machine and Horn of Plenty), maximum pack size was changed to 4 (down from 5) and the maximum number of packed players per realm was changed to 6 (down from 7).

Round Win Story

Before the round started, we suspected wonders and black ops would yet again play a significant role. The possibilities to obtain prestige intrigued us. We decided to try something new and make a strategy around an Orc. We wanted at least one wizard and spy, an Orc, and the final fill in role should be something good for hitting wonders and war. We finally decided to complement the Orc with a Merfolk, a Lizardfolk and a Dark Elf. After signing up, we found ourselves very fortunate with several excellent randoms. Slz reinforced us with a slow attacking Icekin. Itake and Winter joined us with an early converting Nox and Goblin.

Virchue started some rigorous simming to optimize our OOP and to plan for the best paths of techs. We hoped our combination of races would be effective to get our Orc over the desired 1000 prestige as fast as possible. As I had some experience with playing an efficient teching Dark Elf, I decided to give it one more try. We had our doubts whether it would still be viable with the new teching system. I would have to take more risk, and deconvert and convert at exactly the right moment.

The hour before OOP was about to start, was pure mayhem. I wasn’t able to complete my CTP until the last hour, but Mikey (Orc) and Mulla (Merfolk) still had to do theirs also. Mikey missed a few steps in his protection and had to start all over again. Minutes were passing by and OOP was getting close. Apparently, Mulla was still painting his new apartment and was about the miss OOP entirely. Luckily, he popped in for the last few minutes to apply for a quick start. Mikey managed to get rid of his protection tag with a few seconds (11 seconds I think) left on the clock. It was a lot of unnecessary craziness but we got the job done.

OOP

It was time to start the hunt for some easy prestige and cheap land. I managed to get three 75%+ hits on the first day, did another bottom feed and released my swordsmen after a final bottom feed on a copycat bot named "abracadabacadadabra".

2020-11-14 18:10:21	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 31 land from Ella of Frelle (#15).
2020-11-14 18:42:09	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 29 land from Abandoned boat (#22).
2020-11-15 06:56:00	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 30 land from Hailstorm Prime (#4).
2020-11-15 20:56:48	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 16 land from Ella of Frelle (#15).
2020-11-16 11:45:05	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 17 land from abracadabacadadabra (#8).

I knew the next phase would be difficult. I had to maintain 40% schools for a while (Maxed out at 420 schools total), while maintaining some Wizard Guilds, not having much/any space for diamond mines, and had to grow to 2800 acres by day 25.

Exploration, wonders and prestige

Whilst our attackers were progressing well, I took a bit too much risk and got invaded by Zamunda (#5) losing 66 land. Over the next few days, I tried to play it a bit safer, optimize my economy and prepare for blacks ops and wonders.

2020-11-20 12:59:33	Zamunda (#5) invaded fellow dominion Dr. Awkward (#18) and captured 66 land.

The Ancient Library dropped as one of the first wonders. It would be a decent boost to our heavy improvement strategies, but realm #5 managed to take it before we did. We decided to grab the bull by the horns and declare war on them. Within a few minutes, it was a mutual war. There were 7 of us wanting to participate in the wonder takedown for the prestige. We ensured Mikey received the full 125 prestige and split the remainder 6 ways, meaning we all received ~100 prestige. I got another fifty or so prestige from fireballing, and over a hundred prestige from snaring and sinking Honey Badger. I gained over 300 prestige in two days. Unfortunately, #16 came along and trashed our wonder in a matter of hours. Something they did a few more times in the course of the round.

2020-11-23 18:59:50	Jamaican me sweat! (#18) has declared WAR on Green Darkness (#5).
2020-11-23 19:06:48	Green Darkness (#5) has declared WAR on Jamaican me sweat! (#18).
2020-11-25 7:44:46	The Ancient Library has been destroyed and rebuilt by Jamaican me sweat! (#18).
2020-11-25 13:33:46	The Ancient Library has been destroyed and rebuilt by Inconceivable! (#16).

Realm 23. This exchange was also the first time we thwarted Realm 23. Which must have sparked a rivalry all round as they were constantly a thorn in our sides from this point on. They declared war on #5 shortly after we did, but we managed to destroy the Ancient Library before their war was made active. They missed their shot.

2020-11-24 09:03:14	Barely active inc (#23) has declared WAR on THE BIGGEST HASS ft. Bobbo, Merf, Toothy, InternetFett, Apwang (#5).

Meanwhile, Bee (#4) was training OP like crazy. I decided to risk it and just keep growing. A few days later, the Factory of Legends spawned. We were lucky and managed to get it before others did. I actually had stocked plat and was planning to send 15 cyclones at it, but took the wonder down on my first cast. This meant we had the wonder, but on low hp.

2020-11-29 8:19:03	The Factory of Legends has been destroyed and rebuilt by Finally, thanks (#18).

Apparently, realm #23 had seen the low hp or had a vendetta against us from the Library incident. Either way, they quickly declared war on us. They were slow at taking the wonder down, but managed to do it after a few days.

2020-11-29 21:10:39	Wonder what we’re after 🤔🛕 (#23) has declared WAR on Assistance required (#18).
2020-12-01 6:11:07	The Factory of Legends has been destroyed and rebuilt by Aged Thunder (#23).

Since they were so slow at taking the wonder down, we thought maybe we can take it back quickly and show them our muscle power and scare them off from trying to take the factory back from us. Boy were we wrong. This netted me another 125 prestige.

2020-12-01 23:04:11	The Factory of Legends has been destroyed and rebuilt by Means of production: Seized ✅ (#18).

23 was so slow at taking the wonder that they were leaving it on low hp. We thought maybe we could war another realm and have them steal the wonder for next to free from us, have the wonder remain on low hp for us to steal right back. So we declared war on #21 who had a sylvan that was ~3rd overall in cyclone damage but no major threats to us as a realm.

2020-12-04 15:41:48	Assistance required (#18) has declared WAR on Philippines, China (#21).

The war with 21 went live and the factory had 35k hp for a few hours but 21 never made their move. In the end, 23 took the factory back and had solid hp on the wonder.

Then something weird happened. Realm 23 didn’t cancel the war right away. Instead they stuck around to black op some of us, mainly Mulla, Virchue and itake. Mulla and Virchue by the end of the round had 25M Lightning Bolt damage done to the two of them by 23. Anyway, since war was still active and I had a ton of mana available I just started hitting the factory again with cyclones. Eventually, 23 did cancel the war but not before we did sizable damage. We decided to declare war on 23 and take the Factory one more time.

2020-12-07 15:06:49	What in the devil is going on here? (#18) has CANCELED war against Philippines, China (#21).
2020-12-07 15:25:46	What in the devil is going on here? (#18) has declared WAR on Wonder what we’re after 🤔🛕 (#23).
2020-12-09 18:00:21	The Factory of Legends has been destroyed and rebuilt by RIP SN8, your belly flop won't be forgotten (#18).

Another 125 prestige. I was able to get my schools and alchemies razed and rebuilt by this time so when 23 took the factory AGAIN a few days later, we let it go. Realm 23 was amazing. They were sending on the wonder nonstop, 30k at a time and getting invaded for it. But they really wanted it. Kudos to them.

2020-12-13 6:19:47	The Factory of Legends has been destroyed and rebuilt by Wonder what we’re after 🤔🛕 (#23).

As my growth was slower than expected, I decided to start my conversion on a smaller size. I didn't want to get stuck behind other efficient converters. After several days, I was getting close to a hit, but several scary converters like "Bismark the terror of the seas" popped up ahead of me.

Rising the ranks

I made my first hit Day 33.

2020-12-13 07:02:23	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 135 land from Hellfire (#8). 61 prestige

With several big converters entering the stage and two explorers attempting to run away, I was hoping to stay under the radar for a while. Realm 24 and realm 28 decided to burn down Bismark's impressive castle and realm 16 fireballed both explorers to a crisp. With excellent support from my realmies, I managed to get a hit about every 36 hours. We tried to focus on high prestige targets to boost my efficiency even more. I also took very low casualties as a large portion of my military was made up of Spirit Warriors.

2020-12-14 22:58:55	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 145 land from Adawadt (#11). 157 prestige
2020-12-16 02:12:31	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 159 land from Druids On STEROID (#3). 65 prestige
2020-12-16 14:03:01	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 168 land from Kyo Kusanagi (#13). 46 prestige
2020-12-18 11:31:50	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 184 land from ⛓ Porthos ⛓ (#14). 86 prestige
2020-12-20 00:59:10	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 192 land from 🛡️ D'Artagnan 🛡️ (#14). 99 prestige
2020-12-21 10:59:41	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 239 land from èn garde (#29). 38 prestige

We started to draw attention and I was getting worried people would try to slow me down with black ops. Strangely enough, our nemesis (realm 23) declared war on us yet again.

2020-12-21 1:17:52	Barely active inc (#23) has declared WAR on The wonder of charity (#18).

They still had the Factory of Legends. Maybe we would be able to take it from them? No, I think #16 saw that 23 was basically handing us Factory again so they declared war on #23 and cycloned it back to neutral space in a breeze. Mikey, his Orc finish being dead, decided to go all out on the factory. Between him and a timely appearance by Winter (who was fairly inactive at this point with his own quick convert failing) they were able to get me the Factory at the most perfect time.

Meanwhile I made sure I had enough docks to prevent a sinking campaign; however, even as a Dark Elf I would not be safe from getting fireballed by realm #16. It was important to get some of them out of my range as soon as possible. We kept a close eye on the biggest threats in #16. I had a target lined up, but it appeared I could hit one of the dark elfs in #16 too. We had a discussion about whether we should poke the bear. Mulla had a compelling argument to do so: "Poke the nest, just like in a game of poker when you have the strongest hand then be aggressive. You haven't folded those shite hands for all that time to not shit on the pot when you have pocket aces."

End game

I had to stay home for a bit to cover our Liege Lord from Tyrion Lannister. I was getting very tired and about to fall asleep. Therefore, we decided not to wait any longer and hit the Dark Elf in #16 just before The Liege Lord was home. Unfortunately, I was on my mobile and made the hit a few seconds early. It proved to be a very costly mistake:

2020-12-23 01:59:56	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 240 land from Florin City (#16). 157 prestige
2020-12-23 02:00:02	Tyrion Lannister (#24) invaded fellow dominion The Liege Lord (#18) and captured 249 land.

Though the timestamp read’s after the hour, Tyrion's hit was actually made in the same hour as my hit. I could not retaliate and he landed his hit one second before Mulla’s troops were home safe. One of the many brilliant plays made by Tyrion Lannister this round. He really played great. This resulted in a bad night's sleep. But, when I woke up, I noticed Bismark had found himself a juicy target too. Although I didn't expect to, I appeared to be able to hit him safely. It would be amazing if I could use this opportunity to catch up to Tyrion and Daenerys. This time, I wanted to make sure they wouldn't be able to follow up on my hit in the same hour. I was tense and waited for the very last second of the hour to press invade.

The attack was successful. I went to the Town Crier and much to my surprise, Daenerys had still followed up on my attack:

2020-12-23 14:00:00	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 328 land from Bismark the terror of the seas 🚢 (#9). 80 prestige
2020-12-23 14:00:06	Daenerys Targaryen (#24) invaded Bismark the terror of the seas 🚢 (#9) and captured 288 land. 

This couldn't have been in the same hour, could it? Did I make yet another mistake in my timing? We took a barracks spy fearing the worst, and... he missed the tick this time.

With the factory of legends back in our possession, I had been able to construct a lot to negate my wizard guild drop. But would it be enough for another back-to-back hit on Daenerys and still be safe from a potentional suicide from Tyrion? After we calced it out, I pulled the trigger:

2020-12-24 01:59:55	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 380 land from Daenerys Targaryen (#24). 163 prestige

A few hours later, Daenerys got even more unlucky and got suicided on by "This is the Way". The factory had allowed me to keep building wizard guilds at a crazy rate and I was able to make one more sequential hit:

2020-12-24 21:59:52	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 367 land from Daenerys Targaryen (#24). 136 prestige

All this land took a while to build, but thanks to the Factory I saved about 2.5M plat here on construction costs. After all was constructed I was over 90k peasants and 300k income. It was time to go after the explorers. When I was recouped and thought we could maybe catch the Exploring Goblin out front, we declared war. I pumped Adepts and Swordsmen for a hit on the goblin when war went active. The goblin looked asleep so we thought we might catch him before he had a chance to train his shaman; he had fools gold active and 4.4k draftees waiting. Turns out the goblin noticed just in time and was able to train shaman. We came within 8k Offense to break him, or less than 6k if I released my spies to draftees. Had he slept just one more hour, we would have had him.

Instead we hit smaller and outgrew the explorers. Philidor popped into range with good prestige and land types so we hit him all in:

2020-12-28 11:59:30	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 345 land from Philidor Defense (#19). 157 prestige

We had two choices at the end of the round for another hit. Tyrion and an Icekin, I love it when a plan comes together #25. The icekin was an easier target but a bit smaller, less prestige and worse land types. So I decided to hit Tyrion since he smacked Mulla earlier. In hindsight I felt bad about this hit since it was largely unnecessary and Tyrion had performed the round extremely well.

2020-12-30 02:59:09	Victorious on the battlefield, Dr. Awkward (#18) conquered 383 land from Tyrion Lannister (#24). 151 prestige

We thought maybe with the prestige from this hit and a potential mod push we could catch another explorer for a hit on the last day but that never came to fruition.

Mulla, Slz, Virchue, Mikey, itake & Winter, thanks for a great round.

Dr Awkwards' stats

Status Screen
Overview
Ruler:	Otto
Race:	Dark Elf
Land:	8,598
Peasants:	48,679
Employment:	100.00%
Networth:	1,761,572
Prestige:	2,306
Resources
Platinum:	1,773,814
Food:	177,130
Lumber:	75,294
Mana:	125,641
Ore:	343,782
Gems:	241,416
Research Points:	1,738
Boats:	4,991
Military
Morale:	100%
Draftees:	4,610
Swordsman:	43,572
Gargoyle:	0
Adept:	70,863
Spirit Warrior:	28,807
Spies:	1,232
Wizards:	0
Archmages:	0

Construction Advisor
Building Type	Constructed	With incoming
Home	550	(6.40%)	550	(6.40%)
Alchemy	0	(0.00%)	0	(0.00%)
Farm	280	(3.26%)	280	(3.26%)
Smithy	918	(10.68%)	918	(10.68%)
Masonry	0	(0.00%)	0	(0.00%)
Ore Mine	200	(2.33%)	200	(2.33%)
Gryphon Nest	233	(2.71%)	233	(2.71%)
Tower	289	(3.36%)	289	(3.36%)
Wizard Guild	3,384	(39.36%)	3,384	(39.36%)
Temple	673	(7.83%)	673	(7.83%)
Diamond Mine	685	(7.97%)	685	(7.97%)
School	0	(0.00%)	0	(0.00%)
Lumberyard	80	(0.93%)	80	(0.93%)
Forest Haven	0	(0.00%)	0	(0.00%)
Factory	0	(0.00%)	0	(0.00%)
Guard Tower	514	(5.98%)	514	(5.98%)
Shrine	0	(0.00%)	0	(0.00%)
Barracks	0	(0.00%)	0	(0.00%)
Dock	300	(3.49%)	300	(3.49%)
Total	8,106	(94.28%)	8,106	(94.28%)

Science 	+4.80% platinum production	9,439,014
Keep 	+16.47% max population	27,390,917
Towers 	+3.37% wizard power, mana production, spell damage reduction	3,031,025
Forges 	+8.92% offensive power	22,760,696
Walls 	+8.81% defensive power	22,433,656
Harbor 	+5.34% food production, +10.68% boat production & protection	6,167,846

Granaries	+2.5% food production
Planar Emissaries	+7.5% mana production
Aquaponics	+7.5% food production, -10% enemy fireball damage
Midas's Bargain	+2.5% platinum production
Master of Efficiency	-2% military training cost
Explorer's Instinct	-5% exploring platinum cost
Sneaky Spies	+10% resources gained from theft, -10% spy losses on failed operations
Mana Pools	-10% cost of spells
Banker's Friend	+10% better exchange rates
Prefabrication	-5% construction platinum cost
Miser's Grasp	-20% resources lost to theft
Sleeper Agents	+1% maximum population, -12.5% spy losses on failed operations
Pastoral Planner	+1.5% maximum population
Preservationist	-25% food decay, -25% lumber rot, -25% mana drain
Explorer's Intuition	-5% exploring platinum cost
Architect's Touch	-2.5% construction platinum cost
Ancient Mines	+2.5% gem production
Dark Artistry	+2 spy strength per hour, +2 wizard strength per hour
Maelstrom	+15% cyclone damage
Arcane Bloodlines	-5% cost of spies, -15% cost of wizards
Trick of the Light	Fool's Gold protects ore/lumber
Opulence	+2.5% gem production, +7.5% ore production
Midas's Fountain	+5% platinum production
Master of Strategy	-2% military training cost
Architect's Flourish	-7.5% construction platinum cost
Wizard Nexus	+1 wizard strength per hour
Master of Resources	-2% military training cost
Avatar of Ares	+2.5% offensive power, +7.5% wizard power
Master of Discipline	-2% military training cost
Visionary Expansionist	+1% maximum population, +15% population growth
Ross' Benevolence	-1% platinum tax from Royal Guard
Urban Planner	+1.5% maximum population
Jeweller's Delight	+2.5% gem production, -5% cost of self spells
Carpenter's Expertise	-5% construction platinum cost, -5% construction lumber cost
Surveyor's Sense	-12.5% rezoning platinum cost
Survivalist Mentality	+5% fewer casualties, +5% increased prestige gains
Reinforced Bulwarks	+30% bonus to harbor investment, +30% bonus to towers investment
Military Culture	+10% increased prestige gains
Wavehacker	+5 boat capacity, +5% fewer casualties
Ares' Favor	+2.5% offensive power
Spy Network	+1 spy strength per hour
Bunk Beds	+2 barracks housing
Centralized Intelligence	-15% cost of spies, -5% cost of wizards
Carpenter's Knowhow	-2.5% construction platinum cost
Surveyor's Insight	-7.5% rezoning platinum cost
Battle Tactics	+5% fewer casualties

Rounds

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