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* Round B Prizes and Awards, Part 6: *
* *
* THE WARLORDS WAR MUSEUM - ROUND B *
* *
* "Honoring unique battlefield achievements both mighty and minor." *
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Tournament Round B Archives on the Web (including game histories):
http://www.pixgen.com/~rfheeter/w2home/archive/tournament/roundb/
1. The "Ninja" awards - nastiest, cleverest, and deadliest hero slayings:
(a) "When is a Navy not a Navy?"
The combination of flight items and navies led to some very bizarre
hero slayings in this round. It would be difficult to mention them all,
but here is a good example. The turning point of the Mac-Deluxe game
B05 came on Turn 12, when The Untouchables set a trap for Celeborn.
Anticipating that Celeborn's crack +4 hero Manwe would make a move
for a Worm ruin, The Untouchables' hero Vijay used his flight item
to drop off a devil and a heavy cav on the shore outside of a
nearby city. Since the units were sitting on shore, Celeborn thought
they were navies, and concluded that his hero would be safe, thus
falling into the trap. But the dropped-off units were *not* navies,
and on the next turn they marched through the newly-taken city
and rejoined their flying hero with just enough movement to surprise
Manwe and shatter Celeborn's offense. Celeborn collapsed and
soon The Untouchables (led by Bob-alias-Headquarters) took over
the entire map...
But even Mr. "Advanced Tactical Ideas" himself, has learned a trick
or two from these history files. Consider this episode from B07:
(b) "Masters of the Flight Item":
First, Lord Gumby uses a VERY sneaky flight-item trick to break
through Avenger's outer defenses... As told by Gumby, here is the
recipe for a Deluxe hero with a flight item to move over open water
at navy-speed (1 point per square) rather than flying-hero speed
(2 points per square):
>Hero stack with flying armies and flight item joins a navy.
>Drop flight item (on shore). Deselect stack. Pick up flight item.
>Reselect stack. Now stack can travel at navy pace.
But then Avenger comes up with a sneaky flight-item trick of his own,
and buries Gumby's crack hero with a nasty, clever, and very
deadly hero-slaying:
>And now the crafty bit. The griffin stationed on the ruin
>moves SE three spaces, meeting up with the light infantry
>boat that travelled from the same group near Thessaly 53.
>The griffin lands on the boat and moves the two single
>spaces that the boat can take it. The minotaur boat that
>had avoided the coast then joins the griffin and takes it
>one more space on the water SE. The griffin moves one more
>space SE, joining with the elephant navy coming from south
>of Knossos 27. They travel the open water until they reach
>the shore just NE of the helpless, wailing citizens of
>Gumbyville.
>
>Achilles then flies to the dry land just east of Gumbyville
>with his remaining troops. The cries of the city burn his
>ears, and he looks desperately around for inspiration. He
>sees the griffin and elephant camped on the shore just north
>of him and he is struck by inspiration! Leaving the devil
>and the rest of the troops behind, he uses his flight item
>to deposit the navies on dry land and await his next
>command. And yet, it is still not enough! The remaining
>griffins guarding the heavily fortified city will tear the
>attack to shreds, leaving the grinning Lord Gumby burying
>the valiant Greek Hero Achilles in clay, like so many other
>loyal Greek armies. But wait! What was that boat coming
>over the southern horizon? Yes, it was a lone archer coming
>around the peninsula. Once again, Achilles flew to the
>shore to collect the archer navy and rejoin his troops.
>
>"This is it - we shall retake what once was ours, and return
>the thrice-damned Lord Gumby to the very clay from whence he
>came! Your deaths will serve a greater purpose, for your
>sacrifice will mean that the Greek people shall survive to
>fight again another day! We shall either return with our
>shields - or carried home on them!
>CHHHHHHAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGEEEEEEE!!!!!!"
2. "The Student and The Master" award:
In B16, the accomplished warlord Lovesword (Red) often praises
the skills of the tournament organizers, especially his
Round A moderator turned Round B enemy (White). At one point,
the comments go to White's head, and he writes pedantically:
>Heh, heh, I took advantage of the fact that a number of
>small attacks actually often works better than one or two
>big attacks. If Kent had done the WarBOT math based on two
>attacks, he would have been right that I couldn't take the
>city... Ahh, the intricacies of Warlords and WarBOT!
Due to the genius of e-mail, Lovesword is able to conceal
his smug grin as he replies that White had forgotten to
include the blessings of some of the Red armies, and so has
to redo the turn without taking the city.
3. The "Didn't You Have a Plan for Getting Out?" award -
Star Wars movie fans may remember that when Luke Skywalker
and Han Solo run into difficulties while rescuing Princess
Leia from the Death Star, she quips "Well, when you came in
here, didn't you have a plan for getting out?" In B08,
Gandalf has the same problem! His hero goes in to steal
MadMax's Devil, flying in aboard a dragon. However, his
hero doesn't have a flight item, and Gandalf has no way to
get the land-based Devil back out again!
This little episode then sets up our next award:
4. The "Remember, I Want to Work WITH You" Hostage-Taking Award:
While on the subject of hero-doings, we have to honor MadMax
of B08. MadMax was probably the only player to literally
hold another player's hero hostage for a number of turns.
Gandalf sent his hero to steal Max's devil, even after Max
warned him not to. Max then killed the dragon which
Gandalf's hero flew in on, so the hero couldn't leave!
(Remember the map - it would take too long to walk through
the swamps around the ruin, and without flight Gandalf had
nowhere to go. And a reinforcing navy/flyer group would be
easily slain.) But rather than simply kill the hero,
Max takes him hostage and tried to broker an agreement:
>So, we'll leave your hero where he is for the moment. You
>may try to leave by boat if you wish, but I wouldn't do
>that. I can kill you with NO losses that way, so-- as I'm
>trying to work WITH you-- I would advise that he just sit
>tight for yet another turn.
Later, after he kills the hero, Max comes clean and admits
that his heart was that of a true terrorist:
>I never expected to give Gandalf the hero back.
5. The "3-Hero Item Shuffle" Award:
One of the clever tricks you can use to quickly strengthen
your forces in one area is to have one of your heroes fly
over to another and drop off some items; the second hero can
then go on a surprise rampage with the extra items. In
Round B, with 3 heroes, one can even imagine using the
second hero to shuttle the items over to a third hero. And
in B10, on Turn 12, Kamevil did just that, shuffling one
item between three heroes, all in one turn!
6. The "No Surrender, Fight to the End" Award:
This award rightfully belongs to all the numerous warlords
who died with honor fighting overwhelming foes. A particular
mention, however, goes to Maddog (blue) in the game B16. As
white bore down upon him, he received a number of offers
from the white/yellow alliance, including a proposal for a
three-way alliance against Red. But Maddog said, "no thanks."
Then they offered to let him live through the end if he would
cease to fight, and he replied, "I'll die, thank you very much."
In the end, turn 15 was his last, but the memory of his
fight to the death lives on.
7. The "Scorched Earth" award:
In B15, *every* Red city was burned to the ground by the end
of the game! No one else managed to "match" that!
8. "Just Like Sardines":
In B01, Lord Elric actually did stuff 32 units into a single
city, on Turn 17. And it wasn't a wimpy garrison, either:
there was a hero, a devil, a worm, a pegasus, a trio of
elephants, an elemental, a griffin, 2 unicorns, and a
contingent of 21 spiders. It was his last city. The
garrison strength with bonuses was a whopping 362 (see
Maginot Line in the Scroll of Honors). With the whole city
packed - just like sardines - the defenders appeared
invulnerable! But King Chu's army came in like a hungry cat
and ate up the defenders - just like sardines! Three waves
of attackers cleverly cancelled the defenders' stack
bonuses, and Lord Elric was eliminated. 53 units died in the
struggle (see "War is Hell" in the Scroll of Honors).
9. The "Triple Crown":
Some of the major goals in Warlords are to complete quests, kill
enemy heroes, and of course to eliminate enemies entirely. Few
Warlords ever accomplish all three in the SAME battle. Nonetheless,
in B01 on turn 18, King Chu of Formosa assaulted the last Red city,
killing the Red hero, eliminating Red from the war, and incidentally
pillaging the catapult production to complete a quest! (See
"Just Like Sardines" up above for more details.) We hereby
nominate King Chu for the *Triple Crown Trophy*!
(Just as we were going to press it was pointed out that
Dark Lord Pi pulled off the same feat in B12 when he
eliminated Bottom Burp. So we honor him too!)
10. "The Phony War" Award -
Gor Bonecracker of B06 made it all the way into Turn 13
while losing only a single unit (and killing only 5!).
Surely this was not characteristic of one with such a
bloodthirsty name! In his own self-deprecating words on
Turn 10: "Oh the songs that will be sung about this Mighty
Warlord and his lust for battle!" Indeed! (snicker)
(But we are happy to report that he finally acquired the
martial spirit and made up for lost time on Turn 13, sending
6 waves of attackers to capture a single city, and
succeeding only after the loss of 26 of his own units and 29
enemy units, and earning a "War is Hell" award.)
11. "Hero Fiddles While Home Burns?":
In B01, somehow Lord Elric had a hero, a devil, and over 6
other units out wandering the map when King Chu overwhelmed
his last citadel, which was packed Just Like Sardines with
32 units, and a veritable Maginot Line with a total
defensive strength of 362. Alas, the extra units were unable
to help or to find a new home afterwards, and perished.
12. The "Boeing Award":
Some players had their heroes search ruins to get a flight
item. But generally only one; after all, one is all you need!
But somehow, one of Wolfgang's heroes in B01 wound up with three!
13. "My Elephant Can't Swim?" -
To Wolfgang in B01, for accepting with grace and dignity the
quirky and entirely unexpected drowning of his elephant,
resulting in the death of his hero a turn later.
14. "Here I Stand!", "What's so important about Pacifica (58)?",
or the "World War I Trench-Warfare Award":
In nearly-senseless carnage reminiscent of WWI, B02 warlords
The Wall (White) and Captain Picard (Blue) lost two heroes
each (four total) defending the peninsula seaport city of
Pacifica (58) from the other in their hard fought conflict,
as the city changed hands seemingly every turn. Why this
city was so important only they know, for in the end
Pacifica (58) was reduced to burnt ash and broken dreams.
15. "The Star Trek Massacre" or "Most Heroes Used by a Player"
In B02, Captain Picard (Blue) nearly killed off the entire
cast of "Star Trek: The Next Generation"! Setting a record
for most heroes used by one player in a game, he actually
managed to use five heroes in his fight for the Federation.
Alas, four died: Lieutenant Data, Captain Picard, Worf, and
Lor. Only the fifth hero, Geordi LaForge, was left to pilot
the Enterprise and save the Federation as it finally found a
wormhole to exit the quadrant where it met so much
misfortune...
16. The "6+2=5 Math Award"
In B15, Kalten (Yellow) captured Red's "33 Pegasi City"
on Turn 11, and quickly fortified the defenses to +2,
leaving his strongest hero (+4) on defense with only a pegasus
(+2) for support. Thinking that with the extra fortification
his forces were safer in the +2 city, Kalten found himself
greatly surprised to see his best hero slain the next turn by a
pegasus and two griffins commanded by Wayne's Warriors (Red)!
Kalten is to be commended himself for swallowing his "6+2=5"
mistake and the loss of his hero with very good humor:
>Congratulations for killing my strongest hero! I thought I
>will keep it safe by increasing the defence of the city to
>+2, but the stack was already at +5 bonus, so it didn't make
>them stronger, not one bit.
17. "Lord of the Skies, Lord of the Flies"
One of the unique moments in Warlords history came on Turn 2
of B04, when Small Player gambled everything on becoming the
Lord of the Skies: he installed 4 pegasi builds on a single
turn, following them up with a griffin the next turn. (Or
perhaps they were just a birthday present; he turned 10
years old during the round!) Unfortunately the plot began to
read more like Lord of the Flies when the slow-building
fliers failed to materialize ahead of the hostile forces
which Small Player had stirred up on both borders. As a
result his little kingdom fell into disorder and collapsed
in chaos. Finally, though Small Player pleaded for his life
and sought to keep one last city, Duncan Macleod showed no
mercy and eliminated him, but soon found his own fate
written on the wall... (See "Decline and Fall of the Macleod
Empire" below.)
18. "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire"
It seems that several players got themselves into competition for this one!
The runner-up was in B15...
Affetmezler (White) had 18 cities and was the strongest
player on the board in a fairly solid alliance with
Kalten (Yellow) - until Kalten's strongest Hero fell in an
error in calculation (see the "6+2=5 Math Award" above).
Meanwhile, the Blue player had gone static and was down to
2 cities, while the Red player had razed everything in sight
(see "Scorched Earth Society" above) and also held only 2 cities.
Kalten found himself with only 13 cities and no hope
of catching up to his ally's 18. He wrote on Turn 13:
>Disgrunted at the situation on the battlefield, Yellow
>forces turn upon their former ally White.
... and he immediately captured 2 undefended cities and won
5 minor battles. Affetmezler responded with the usual
"treachery!" message:
>If other warlords ever read the archive messages of this
>game, I would like them know what you have done in the
>battle field as opposed to what we had agreed on when we
>decided to engage an alliance and set the rules of it. I
>hope none of them dares to think of you as an ally in future
>games.
Though Affetmezler offered terms for peace, Kalten refused
to negotiate, saying:
>"During the game, I watched your armies grow in strength, as
>a result of youtaking the cities on the border between us
>and sudden dissapearance of Roadrunner. Envy grew in my
>heart. Finally, I understood that the only way to make my
>empire great is to defeat you in battle. I secretly prepared
>for the attack, so as not to rouse your suspicions. I
>decided against risky dealing a bigger surprise blow at the
>cost of putting my armies at risk. As a result, your empire
>might still be stronger than mine. However, now we have a
>chance to prove of the battlefield who deserves the right to
>be called the greatest Warlord of the land of B15."
Both other players were eliminated by Turn 15, which meant
it would be Kalten against Affetmezler, and the surprise
attack had crippled his war machine. Affetmezler's crumbling
empire was dealt the last straw when his capital fell,
driving him from the field of battle into a static defense.
The Static White empire finished with just 5 cities at the
end of Turn 20, less than a third of the 18 it once had.
But, for the sake of the winner, we will have to rename the
award altogether, for never have we seen the mighty fall
from so high to so low:
19. "Decline and Fall of the Macleod Empire"
The war was B04, and the warlord was Duncan Macleod.
Never have we seen such a massive fall from grace.
He fell from a high of 19 cities to just 1! His high point
came when he eliminated Small Player (see "Lord of the
Skies") from the game - after Small Player had asked for
mercy. That one act of ruthless warlording was Duncan's
downfall, since the other two in his war, Piglet
and Magnus, never let him forget it and got justice for it
(or at least used it as a pretext to attack). Duncan
played the role of the wounded martyr very well, but
Magnus betrayed him twice and Piglet once, and the combined
forces of his enemies were too much for him.
In an amusing sidenote he had lectured Magnus early on not
to raze his cities, at a time when Duncan was doing really
well and Magnus really badly. Duncan said razing was
self-defeating. But after he took Small Player's last city
and found himself betrayed by Piglet, his opinions changed,
and in the end it was Duncan who razed nearly all his
cities - leaving himself with only one at the end.
20. "Any sufficiently advanced strategy is indistinguishable
from stupidity"
The famous science fiction author Arthur C. Clarke once
noted that "any sufficiently advanced technology is
indistinguishable from magic" (to those who don't understand
it). In Warlords, it seems any sufficiently advanced
strategy can be indistinguishable from stupidity!
For Round B this award goes to Avenger of B08, and here's why:
Avenger was one of the few players this round who did not go
after the +2 command item near his home city. He reasoned
that doing so would slow down his early advance, and that +2
command was not very useful early in the game. There was an
added bonus, however. Iceman, later admitting that he felt
this move demonstrated that Avenger was an incompetant
warlord, began a risky invasion against what he felt was a
weak opponent, and to his great surprise Iceman was himself
utterly destroyed by the end of the game!
21. The "Phoenix Award" for the Greatest Comeback -
This honor can only go to Lovesword-B of B17. He took over
as a substitute player for the very error-prone player
Powerjeff, whose highlights were forgetting to install any
of his builds on Turn 2 (which unfortunately no one spotted
in time), and then forgetting to defend his cities on Turn
3. After two of his cities were burned to the ground on
Turn 4 by a roaming White elemental, Powerjeff gave up in
frustration. And then Lovesword-B came in, with a good
attitude and a great sense of humor:
>I guess my goal of this tour of duty is to play better than a
>static defense. FEAR my 9 armies and 5 cities! :)
Everyone was expecting Blue's quick death, but they got a
big surprise with Lovesword, who was the complete opposite
of the player he replaced. He quickly organized his forces
and fought a very effective campaign, aided by his alliance
with Steve the Giant (Yellow) who helped distract his White
and Red foes. Lovesword finished with a very good 2nd place
in the game, scoring 38% of the cities and ranking 7th for Blue!
22. The Great Minoan Tragedy -
No one knows what happened to the famous Minoan civilization
of ancient Crete, in the Mediterranean. But what we do know
is that in B18, Vance Kic caused a new Great Minoan Tragedy:
Five minotaurs -- some from each side -- died in a single
battle, where only three armies of any other type died.
23. "Self-Inflicted Wounds?"
Lord Callahan of B19 earns this distinction, for being the
only person in Round B to reportedly attack himself!
>Actually, I didn't attack myself but rather White Side 1. ;-)
>Sorry for the misreport. Enjoy!
24. "Homeless Heroes"
The new (4th) White hero of Dragon Lord Gary IV was
hired, unexpectedly, in the ex-yellow capital in B23...
22. "Duelling Pacifists"
B22 may have been the least violent game of the round,
with only 161 units being killed on all sides,
including just 3 allies, 1 hero, and 2 navies.
But there were not as many heroes as usual in this game,
because...
23. "A Hero short of a sandwich" award -
LEICHENBESTATTER (Blue in B22) didn't get a
third Hero on Turn 7, even though he had 1047 gold.
Apparently the market for prospective heroes was stiff
and they all demanded bigger signing bonuses.
24. "The Elven Civil War?"
It appears that Galadriel killed Faramir in B24 :(.
Who would expect it? Would Tolkien himself roll over
in his grave?
25. "Sometimes It's Hard to Pick Up Those Command Items":
We have to honor Medzner of B21 in much the way that we
honored Iceman of A13 for the "Puff, the Magic Dragon"
situation. On Turn 3, Medzner reports that his hero Lord
Catan has visited the ruin and retrieved Command Item C.
But sometimes it's hard to pick up those pesky command
items. They have a habit of slipping away when you least
expect it! On Turn 5 Medzner discovers this painful truth:
>I have discovered that my Hero Catan has not the command item C.
>I have reported in my turn report No.3 that CATAN HAS VISITED THE
>RUIN! HE HAS EVEN MOVED ON THE RUIN! [...]
>I just have not visited it.
Alas, there was no solution! Let the Moderator's words of wisdom
be a lesson to us all in battles to come:
>Medzner, I am afraid there is really nothing that can be
>done. The main thing is that two complete turns have
>progressed - to move back the game now would drastically
>change everyone's strategies, builds, moves, etc. All I can
>really suggest is that you make sure you check all the
>important items on your turn report with the official
>gamefile. I know sometimes with multiple saves and a lot of
>reverting, it can be confusing as to what actually has
>happened in the official gamefile. Even though this wasn't
>planned, incorporate it into a new strategy... it's early in
>the game, and fate has yet to seal anyone's future.
>
>Alex Vickers
26. The "You think *you* hate reverting" award:
To Wowbagger (blue) in B13. On Turn 13 he loses his last
hero, and faces the daunting task of reverting
for a new one in a few turns. He is down to 4 cities,
however, and has at least a small hope: that there might be
only one city left for a hero to appear in! In the end,
luck was with him, but not economics. He had only one city,
but no money left to pay for the new hero.
26. The "Sherlock Headquarters" Award:
Some very bizarre problems sometimes come up during these
games, and Headquarters gets to enjoy them all. One of his
favorites from Round B was when they were switching
moderators in B21 (Alex was going away for a long trip and
Lou was taking over), and as HQ was glancing over the game
email, he realized that there hadn't been a turn report from
White for THREE turns. The gamefiles were moving like
clockwork, but there was nary a word about what was going on!
The player involved very quickly wrote in to say that he'd
sent in his turn reports as usual, and he was as mystified
as everyone else that we hadn't seen them. But then he
found a clue. The Remailer was sending back one of its
standard error messages:
>*** A Message from the Warlords II Remailer to brodyz@bigfoot.com. ***
>You sent an e-mail to the Remailer using the "message", "archive" or
>"query" commands, but you included a gamefile or other attachment in
>the e-mail.
Now, the player hadn't actually included a gamefile,
but HQ figured out something subtle:
>I checked the last message that you got through (Turn
>12) and I noticed that at the end of the message you had a
>lot of lines that looked blank, but actually had a single
>space. I also checked Turn 9, 10, and 11, and discovered
>that the number of "one space" lines has been increasing
>each message, from about 30 to 33 to 36 to 39 (Turn 12). So
>I would predict that if you look at the message you send for
>Turn 13, it had 42 blank lines at the end, and the message
>for Turn 14 probably had 45, and your last message might be
>up to 48.
And it turns out that this was what messed up the Remailer!
Elsewhere in the Remailer error message it warned about this:
>Note: If there are 40 consecutive lines in the message with
>exactly the same length, the Remailer will believe there is a gamefile
>in the message. Occasionally, a message containing a long list, a very
>long signature, or if the mailing system of the sender uses "full
>justification", the result is a message where the lines have exactly
>the same length. In these rare cases, the Remailer may believe the
>message contains a gamefile when it does not. To fix this problem, use
>a carriage return to break up the message into segments shorter than
>40 lines.
So, after that little bit of detective work, B21 was back in business
yet again...
>My second prediction is that if you get rid of the blank
>spaces at the end of your emails, you'll have no problems
>with the Remailer from now on. :)
-- Bob, the detective... :)