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SPEARHEAD
Dwarf: necromancer
Elf: war hero
Faery: mystic
Gnome: rogue
Orc: warrior
ASSAULT
Dwarf: raider
Faery: heretic
Gnome: heretic
Human: artisan
Orc: tactician
HQ
Elf: war hero
Faery: mystic
Gnome: rogue
Human: artisan
Human: necromancer
ASSAULT
Dwarf: raider
Elf: raider
Faery: heretic
Human: artisan
Orc: tactician
SPEARHEAD
Dwarf: necromancer
Elf: war hero
Faery: mystic
Gnome: rogue
Orc: warrior
Hello.
So I went with 5 faery this age, more because The Virtual Kingdom stylizes a kingdom that counters up rather than cf. Most of these are stack builds, meaning the race and personality virtues compound rather than diversify. The dwarf necromancer is a diversified build that compensates for lower birth rates.
The elf war hero is my solution to honor stacking and shadows the human artisan in a quasi-whoring regime. The human seems to be of land-crowning DNA so I figured I’d play into that and work the kingdom as a tiered plateau with belts of resistance.
For the uninitiated, the separation of the provinces is representative of GMT divisions. The races and personalities are divided as equally as possible to reflect both pageantry(the essence of the virtual kingdom) and critique game balance, good or bad.
The gnomes struck me as the roach infestation builds that keep coming back. I’d be tempted to play a gnome necromancer myself and they might prove superior to dwarf necromancer in actual play. The heretic and raider personalities offer enough threat that I feel we can press gnomes into rogue service and not have them dog piled relentlessly.
The division system is intended to address prime activity around the world for players who have busy lives. With 5 division operating 4.8 hours apart in elliptical cycle there is likelihood of division overlap.
There are several reasons for division planning; the basis being we are not perfect. It occurred to me that certain divisions may operate more smoothly if the players could speak to each other in their native tongue. I’m a big believer in micro and understand some actions of opportunity must be done quickly.
Hyperactive players might enjoy playing in a kingdom that’s operating 24/7 rather than waving twice a day. I know in my playing days it was avian tac I enjoyed quite a bit. We lacked definition at that time, but I now know it’s wise to assign players to where they shine. In my case I could play rover and the patient hyperactives could play camper. There are plenty of players who prefer control and they will fill out the bulk of the execution crowd. Yes, they think, but they think in order rather than chaos.
The reason I post these alternatives isn’t for me to play; I’m retired. I post the virtual kingdom so that otherwise ghetto kingdoms can shape themselves into competitive fun kingdoms that don’t demand more activity, but a higher quality game experience.
There’s great flexibility this age so I had spent some time contemplating a deep investment in elf mystic to create a self spell juggernaut.
Strengthening a kingdom from within can make for a formidable war kingdom but they often lack reach outside their nw wheelhouse. This is no problem for a dedicated war kingdom but can feel stifling for whoring dynamics. I’ve not had interest in competitive whoring, but I do enjoy the ability to gobble and fortify acres.
The honor levy system used in elf war hero is available to orc necromancer in combative circles. Both elf and orc have readily available mismatch templates. I’m a little too tired to dig for more of these types, but you can see module by module how you can apply static logistics. Apply these lopsided advantages in game play and you’ll often find these builds create a transparent phalanx; where one ends another begins like locking scales of armor. What effect tpa falls to what effects wpa, falls to what effects defense.
Esoteric Elf War Hero
When we look at elf war hero in the light of an attacker who retains honor benefits, we are only achieving stage one effects. Please
turn to page two and read into the elves ability to cast support spells. The war inside the war is the theater of honor.
Specifically, the elf offers those who would otherwise surrender more honor the ability to retain it through defensive measure. If we had the elves paying particular attention to the zero sum honor struggle, we can augment strategies that accomplish objectives laterally. Unorganized honor harvesting can be like plinko and organized honor harvesting can be like jingo; a sudden dive in kingdom overall honor due to unforeseen weaknesses mined through good micro.
Experience has taught me to use amnesia and nightmares as utility spells; as an example. These nudges from adverse angles can wear down enemy foundations. These angles can be engineered into total collapse through timing and unconventional target focus. Something as simple as general arson/tornados used on an unsuspecting target can open the flood gates to devour resources.
Think it through. This isn’t stand alone but a cog in the wheel of war.
Human Artisan is Captain Obvious
But I’ll reflect on “campaign why”. From 1st game tick to last, the human builds faster and their building are generally more efficient than anyone else. In war, out of war; if this human builds 20% towers they start producing roughly 6-8 ticks sooner than their rival and produce more runes/tick. The exceptions are the guys who use runes best, but they still need more time.
Consider the shared load in ritual casting. Maybe a t/m can maintain higher defenses because the human is handling more tower duty.
Particularly, the human artisan creates problems for the enemy in war when razing would be the solution. In this virtual kingdom I use elliptical waving based in Global gmt so prime activity is offset from most kingdoms traditional wave schedules. This matters because the rebuild sequence for human artisans in separate divisions is both short and occurs at different ticks. What I’m getting at is enemy rune caches and stealth accumulation can be muted due to prevailing divisional interference. The smaller window can be made yet smaller if we reason why the enemy razed in the first place.
Just consider the amount of production we’re talking about from age beginning to end. War recovery, restart provinces, the economic leverage between war. And there’s that science to shine things up along the way.
The Elliptical Wave
I noticed thejudge post http://forums.utopia-game.com/showth...derous-Changes and immediately thought about sync waves and their vulnerabilities. A lot of players don’t realize a lions share of common strategy is actually common game culture.
Think about why it’s important to sync waves. Yes, if the hammer lands, but all we’re really doing is having an activity contest if we
truly know our targets. This is the walking dead bot effect. Everyone prescribes to surface logistics and determine whole kingdoms based in the numbers they culturally believe are winning logistics: it’s a cargo cult. Top kingdoms have airplanes, ghettos have bamboo effigies.
How can I say that? I’ll make the tired point because some people will miss this. A few ages ago one of the guys reactivated The Faery Circle; a kingdom built exclusively as faery. Anyways, it just so happened that very age the faery got nerfed. We decided to run it anyways. With half apathetic activity we did very well and basically I feared nothing. Now I’m talking about running faery attackers with a -10% population locking horns with orcs, avians, what have you.
I’ve run orc mystics, elf clerics and it doesn’t matter as long as you know how to rock. And I don’t play through the age with builds I proved virtually invincible. If I see I’m operating unopposed/nearly unchainable then I shelf the build. Three of those builds were the aforementioned elf cleric, a human cleric and an undead sage. I don’t compete because I’m not fond of being the 20th pickle in a jar. I respect those who do compete so I try not to build in their way, but I am extremely driven to prevail when challenged. If I build something that can terrorize at any level I implode that build unless my kingdom is ambitious.
So I’ve just pointed out what is possible when an enthusiastic player is off the chain. The secret is nuance and the rule is the exception. Doctrine is the ideal, the perfect storm. The rule is opportunity, adaptation, anticipation and killer instinct. So you go to divisions depending on where people are in this world or how their quality time is allotted. You want micro because you need it more than kingdom syncing. You can always cripple a sync wave if you do quality micro. The division system mirrors the cohesive nature of a jazz quintet. The sync wave mirrors the cohesive nature of an orchestra.
The best kingdoms sync wave because they are built by the most experienced campaigners and command the highest order of recruitment. The wave moves when the conductor says so, and the conductor has great insight.
We don’t all have that luxury, but tight knit players can micro with the best. We want to experience facing the best. From there you can decide if you want the glory of the 20th pickle or enjoy the renegade in you and just make your point when faced by the best.
In divisions you’re still sharing intel kingdom wide and have consensus goals, but your division has objectives. If you’re spearhead you’re going to engage t/ms and if you’re assault you’re engaging the core. And I remind you the rule is the exception. There is “what you were built for” and “what you do”. A faery is supposed to caste spells and pray for unbreakability, but a faery can mull any heavy attacker head to head if you play the game. You’re playing Utopia when you know you’re “in it” with anyone.
Prime activity. Quality activity layered by the hours with no lull is far superior to the painful act of trying to sync wave with players with half a foot at work and the other at home raising kids. We have to find a way to enjoy the moments rather than labor the hours. Everybody suffers the same attack times, so we should be looking at opportunities to make that our favor.
Faery Heretic ~ the magnetic glue screw
The utopian lords drop gems every so often and this is one of them. This is not better; that’s not how I think. This is part of the resource/honor/nw zone digestion system.
I’ve long been an admirer of the amnesia spell and have built what I call amnesia cannons. Amnesia cannons are my least molested builds and I was a ghetto lurker. I love them but I seldom built them because I played for challenge not dominance.
Well now the devs have incorporated the cream of the cream spell batteries in amnesia, fools gold, nightmares AND instant damage bonus. You must imagine my disdain for cf to understand how much of a Hallmark moment I had when I saw that. I believe in agreeing not to hit each other rather than cf. I want my enemy to ask me and I would always humbly comply.
The meat and potatoes are amnesia and fools gold oow(out of war). In war, nightmares, augmented by amnesia opens thief vulnerability to get that Brick Tamland trident effect. You can sculpt targets with nightmares rather than squander mana/runes for inefficient gain effect. It’s not that you only max, it’s that you max till it’s more efficient not to. That’s the nw zone effect.
Recognizing Bottlenecks - As neglected in business so to is the bottleneck effect in Utopia.
Communication is a huge bottleneck in society thus filtering into gameplay. Player action to Command structure execution is pretty sloppy and slow, or doesn’t exist in a practical way. You might notice I said “player action to command structure” because this is the actual crux of bottleneck effects. It’s not that the core player runs the show, but at a skilled zenith the player should be able to execute sans communication and accomplish exactly what is best for the kingdom. The command structure micros efficiently because each player knows the trigger of the objective in question. In military terms this is ground forces calling in air strikes or special forces deploying precision strikes to open enemies to blunt trauma logistics.
When I was clearing a nw zone it was easier to demonstrate the evolution and benefits rather than explain my actions so the leadership could order me to do what I just told them. Mind you, it was my responsibility to establish the nw zone while following orders; which made it more difficult than necessary. I point this out because most players, including leadership, in utopia think in colonial terms and spearhead tactics. I think in flanks because the spearhead is killer instinct. In other words, there’s a time for full chaining, not all the time. Most kingdoms full chain all the time which is akin to leaving your flanks wide open. This is cultural strategy or cargo cult. As one player I could circumvent the entire enemy chain alignment by nw zone tactics which resulted in chain sloughing(poor max ranging made chaining incredibly difficult against my provinces).The result was markedly higher resource retention on my part. Because I could retain resources I could provide aid
to our chained provinces which freed up our t/ms to hopefully achieve unbreakable through focused resource implementation.
Full chaining is a practice in bottleneck risk/reward. If like me, you could stall a war by crashing chain alignment you understand the glass cannon so many have faith in. It’s a risk and requires diplomacy meta to ensure its potency. A player who sees nw and gains just by looking at kingdom pages can yank the plug on war practices common across the game. This is another reason I segmented the virtual kingdom alignment. For those who aren’t involved in top kingdom diplo, you’re running around with your chin
out when you make beautiful nw alignments in your core. It’s on the kingdom page and any player can observe this without intel. So what’s the alternative? Adapt. If your chain alignment is compromised immediately switch to zone. It’s a game so think in game terms, like football.
Same goes for t/ms. When prelude to chaining your t/ms cast nightmares etc. you need to pay attention to the target. I’ve played an avian tac who spammed mystic aura and I’ve seen dwarves do the same when I was an elf mystic anchor on the nightmare chain system. Actions like spamming mystic aura, lightning strikes and stealing runes can stall the chain. They have to reassess defenses and the chain captain has to deliver precise troop ratios to reach chain efficient objectives. This is where casual players begin to freak out because many have set alarms or hide in office bathrooms to make the wave.
Bottlenecks are the stress points you must recognize in your kingdom, your province, your enemies kingdom and their provinces to leverage uncommon logistics. It’s why certain players are underestimated and make a living off retal. It’s not recognized often enough that it’s your province/kingdom in motion that’s dangerous, not a static list of best gains races and personalities.
Relay Taps
Before imagining elliptical waving I experimented with relay tapping for several ages. The background to this; I use to run avian tac in unorganized kingdoms, but was asked to run an undead cleric or warrior in a new kingdom. I loved cleric because I learned the tactics of damage resistance from rpg’s. What the undead cleric lacked was speed.
To truly understand speed in utopia we need to understand economy. What we build, what we train between taps, and what risks arise between taps. It occurred to me that the chain effect was most devastating against provinces with low army return times. To ape avian speed with my undead cleric I began to space my army deployments until I had 4(5 that age)generals, army in tow, returning at equidistant times. I obviously represent the hyperactive player type so this is provincial tactics, not kingdom.
To digress, I will generally present provincial tactics that are meant to be incorporated into total kingdom strategy.
The undead cleric was ideal for relay taps because the durability made for reliable numbers vs continuously dwindling enemy defenses. By having armies return in short bursts I was resistant to hard chaining because I had acre liquidity. Overpopulation was muted and building credits were spent broadly so raze effect would only destroy part of my production. Compound this with nw zone tactics and I could, by percentage, resist more chaining than any player I have personally observed.
Lots of leaders would bemoan relay tapping, but that’s short sighted cargo cult mentality. The flaw of waving is that you take strategy away for logistics. Remember; hard chaining, which is traditional through the game, is a practice in diminishing returns. Nightmare waving is a practice in diminishing returns. These are not absolute no go strategies, but require more thought than chaining the guy with the highest offense down the line. You can tell nobody is thinking in a war when both sides are doing the most predictable thing twice a day kingdom wide and nobody tries to exploit it. This is the fate of the non intuitive: they will perfect a broken machine and execute with razor sharp ineptitude.
My advice to the non intuitive, or sensor, is to listen to the intuitive and perfect their prototypical machines. I was always a slop player who never adapted to bots or com systems, but always reliably got where I wanted to go. Do you know how many monolithic enemy builds I’ve crashed in single combat? With superior numbers from offense, defense, tpa, the one thing they failed in was fuel consumption. They’re brilliant and I marvel at their technical beauty. Never out of hate; I’d love to be as technically sound, but they come from a limited perspective on what a formidable opponent is made of. Oh I’d scan them for intel just to appreciate their pristine builds. I truly come from the position of respect.
So who relay taps? In a kingdom like the virtual kingdom, the rover. This is player synchronized distribution. There will be hyperactives and they are best suited as hunter/killer attackers. They occupy an assault roll, generally drawing a line between our killers and t/ms and the enemy attackers that would chain or massacre our spearhead units. A rover build can be found anywhere but the freedom to rove is best suited from the HQ or Assault divisions. They can even participate in chaining by happenstance. Optimum rover: human necromancer.
Hyperactives & Constant Pressure
One thing you learn as an effective hyperactive is how much enemy kingdoms long for your rest periods. They can’t wait to mv your defenses and throw the kitchen sink into your gearbox. I’ve received broken English messages decrying my activity from enemies wishing to bombard my province. So elliptical waving is how I translate hyperactive play without hyperactivity.
First you can’t be in the mindset that “these builds are gold and these builds are trash”. Trash builds work because the popular logistics don’t account for resourcefulness.
Ok, so I noticed the poetic inclusion of chastity in the gnome spell bank. It’s not reliable, but when it sticks we get gnome population stacking. The secret to things like this isn’t the critical moments, it’s that you land it here and there causing your opponent logistical drag. You could pop it on any number of enemy attackers who aren’t suffering from necromancer effect.
Target through mirroring. The humans have great economies most vulnerable to t/ms. This is why I believe in full lateral pressure. It’s a probe across the entirety of the enemy kingdom. When something goes easy you can dig in, but things like rune caches are zero sum acquisitions. You must stay on t/ms so they are at least forced to use resources for defense.
Nightmare is a great utility spell that’ll help your kingdom yield maximum efficiency in taps. Now generally a nightmare waving kingdom will concentrate on a couple of chain targets and taps will also. This system will demonstrate itself in diminishing returns. It looks cool and the hapless victims don’t like it, but it’s a narrow penetration against a full kingdom. The best general use of nightmare is to sculpt enemy defenses to incoming attacker troop allocations. You can also target an enemies incoming army with nightmares to reduce his offensive potential: you don’t have to wait for one of your attackers to make it optimal. It’s optimal to render kingdom defense higher than to watch an enemy bludgeon one of our own while you sit on your resources and watch an overpopulated kingdom mate lose resources en masse, unopposed.
I submit, if I run the highest offense I’m not doing it to win by glomming troops onto enemies thinking Rambo thoughts, I’m doing it as a meatshield. My job would then be to buy time. You might be surprised how many times I’ve seen players believe all is lost when the biggest attackers are chained. Retained economy is the true measure of attacker formidability. Sure you can proxy economy through t/ms but aren’t they supposed to be securing position themselves? Attacker secured economy is a rampant victory signature. We are talking relative security in utopia. This is a bigger fish game where you have to fight above your pay grade to create inroads. Instead of everybody going lemming every 12 ticks we might try casual suffocation 24/7. You squeeze gently and constantly and bite when you see their eyes turn red. A fools gold here, a tornado there, blizzards...crunch.
Dragons
Who doesn’t like dragons? Who likes paying for them?
This isn’t an absolute, but I’d say you only pay for the dragon after every province in your kingdom is squared away AND you’ve exhausted all reasonable venues of stealing your enemies gold to pay for your dragon. Obviously we’re talking about dragons in war. It is more efficient to pay for a dragon than bolstering your tpa on paper, but in practice/in motion, cultivating a higher kingdom wide tpa and using it on the enemy trying to pay for their dragon results in victory. The last age I played I was out of stealth, mana, gold and runes in a contentious war. Guess what I did? Plundered an enemy province of formidable worth on stale intel and launched our dragon. They surrendered when the news broke.
It was a risk worth taking, I‘d just rather not fly blind when it’s for all the marbles.
Paying for dragons by attacker provinces is old war kingdom Pig Latin for staying small. Your entire core will be emaciated aid reliant beggars, but you got the dragon off.
Train some doggone thieves and leave maximum offense to the meat shields. Yes, train during war. Yes, thieves. You won’t regret it.
Cross Chaining
Taught to me one thousand ages ago by Crazy Pete, cross chaining is distilled sense in chaining. Simply, the highest max hits 1st and last in the chain session. The progression is highest to lowest, then mirrors progression lowest to highest to yield even gains for increased chain integrity and ugly ambush options. So let’s barrow 3 from one of our assault divisions and here’s how it goes, assuming all relevant max factors. Yes, just like the makeup. And you thought they were just words: 2 taps each
Gretchen Carlson ~ Orc: tactician - hits first
Bonnie Schneider ~ Human: artisan - hits second
Jennifer Westhoven ~ Dwarf: raider - hits third
Jennifer Westhoven ~ Dwarf: raider - hits forth
Bonnie Schneider ~ Human: artisan - hits fifth
Gretchen Carlson ~ Orc: tactician - hits sixth
This would essentially be the chain set with opportunity attacks from rovers, campers and parasitical t/ms. In this version it’s quick, and understood without excessive communication. Once everyone knows the max doctrine, players can adjust their max alignment should the enemy attempt to stall the chain through interference. By using divisional micro the t/ms can unleash batteries on typical enemy flack points to shore up chain integrity.
Age 87 VIRTUAL KINGDOM
SPEARHEAD - Australia GMT
Dwarf: necromancer, S
Elf: war hero
Faery: mystic
Gnome: rogue
Orc: warrior, Global Strategic Council
ASSAULT - America GMT
Dwarf: raider
Faery: heretic, Economy Council
Gnome: heretic
Human: artisan
Orc: tactician
HQ - Western Europe GMT
Elf: war hero, Diplomacy Council
Faery: mystic
Gnome: rogue, M
Human: artisan
Human: necromancer
ASSAULT - Eastern Europe GMT
Dwarf: raider
Elf: raider
Faery: heretic
Human: artisan, Intel Council
Orc: tactician
SPEARHEAD - Asia GMT
Dwarf: necromancer
Elf: war hero
Faery: mystic, Internal Affairs Council
Gnome: rogue
Orc: warrior, S
This is to illustrate diversification of credible details to keep leadership sharp. By not overtaxing leaders with gathering information or being experts at everything, this helps develop new leaders and offers less stress for decision making.
For instance, Intel Council might lead the effort for daily news snatching by each province in the kingdom. This amount of information may seem overwhelming, but familiarization will help players recognize trends in the utopian world. Relevant intel can then be relayed to the Global Strategic & Diplomacy Councils. This type of knowledge can also help the Economy Council determine build itinerary or recommendations thereof.
Internal Affairs Council observe province behavior to curtail risk of poor activity, trolling and/or spies.
Virtual Kingdom Manifesto
The idea for the virtual kingdom began when I use to play in The Faery Circle; an all faery kingdom. I thought about what the opposite of TFC would look like. It then occurred to me this would be a nice way to adjust my roll play and strategic perspective. Since I dwelt in the ghetto most ages I noticed the virtual kingdom looked disorganized from the kingdom page and then I said to myself “maybe I can help less experienced players play what they want and how they want through truncating organization.”
The virtual kingdom is a game in itself. You must divide both race and personality as evenly as possible and attempt to build as formidable a kingdom as possible. The virtue is you get every benefit in the game and the liability is you get every weakness as well. You can stylize the kingdom toward honor, whoring or warring.
The role playing aspect of the virtual kingdom comes from my experience seeing solid kingdom forced to dissolve for loss of players. The initial idea of divisions was to offer the few survivors of these kingdoms a place to carry on the culture of their fragmented kingdoms. Not unlike ethnic burrows in large cities, I wanted them to have a chance to preserve what made them unique. I’ve seen too many merged kingdoms fail because one culture wouldn’t accept the other and we end up with even more substandard kingdoms.
I’m a strong believer in delegation to enthusiasts. My vision was to see these divisions in friendly competition with each other. Thus, we might see the division of Modesty compete with the division of Endurance War Specialists for completion of qualitative objectives. Each using their team shorthand and welcome to barrow tactics from each other.
The evolution of the virtual kingdom division system was led by 2 things: 1) monarchs asking for gmt of each player, and 2) my ghetto experiences with players hitting whenever from wherever. The strategy was to use the prime activity variations of the players into concentrated segments designed to achieve pragmatic objectives. Ideally, this is the elliptical wave. It’s a wave that is only interrupted by eowcf and then only the deployments. In most ghettos the attackers are oblivious to the actions of the t/ms. Here these players share objectives like a blitzkrieg in band level numbers so they can micro very quickly and maximize intent.
As stated before, the elliptical wave rolling armies are an extension of relay taps. I’ve had great success relay tapping, in and out of war. While not all individual tactics extend to kingdom level I consider this taking a handmade object and making it an assembly line product.
The HQ
I’ve offered what the spearhead and assault divisions do, but I may have missed explaining HQ. HQ is there to support the division either to ace an objective more quickly or bolster a division that is failing to achieve its objective. This is why the human necromancer is an ideal rover. The mystic can cast meteors where others may've failed. The elf can cast support to sagging defenses. The human artisan can update intel as well as support a nw zone initiative. All these things and many more.
The NW Zone
When I use to relay tap it was usually started by strife in war. To offer myself the best chance to stall being chained, I would march like so:
1st General: Ambush attack from attacker above my nw/acres
2nd General: Ambush attack from attacker above my nw/acres
3rd General: Trad march attacker below my nw/acres
4th General: Trad march attacker below my nw/acres
So the ambush armies started the process of the relay by returning at different times from the trads. I’d then combine ambush armies to trad down or grab easy acres in my max wheelhouse. I’d continue this process, spreading armies equidistant but relevant to enemy defenses. While this relay takes place, I’m carefully spreading nw/acres to a low max bubble. At this point anything below you is a matter of playing Whac-A-Mole: anything that enters your nw/acre dmz is attacked. You chain from above as necessary, but only absorb attacks that enhance your zone. I like to ambush the bigger provinces because it reduces their offense so they’re less a threat to our t/ms and trad the smalls to strangle their economy.
This is a specific type of attacker that can enhance the core. By providing a nw zone you offer respite for fellow attackers that breakout after being chained. Being chained and persevering is exhausting activity. These conventional attackers deserve a moment of composure. This in turn should relieve the kingdom of tremendous aid consumption.
Most leaders can’t stand my builds and if I ever go vacation mode the sitter always moves stuff away from my strat. Most of this is convention being confronted by the unfamiliar. These guys build wonderful stuff but it ends up in the gutter at the end of a chain lol. By being the ugliest thing on the kingdom page I’m given exactly what the enemy shouldn’t: time.
I’m big on guard stations like a good top player should be, but I run fat with mediocre offense and higher wpa/tpa. It’s a top build without razing homes. I simply don’t replace the homes. I almost never run barracks and barely run stables if my race has high offense. This is how hunter/killers are
built. This is a specific attacker killer that might be able to break t/ms but it’s not the focus. Basically I will lock horns with any attacker in my nw wheelhouse even if I’m running a faery attacker. My preference is the necromancer type that are durable and race is just the cream.
My wpa/tpa is used to probe the enemy for weakness and resources.
The Theater of Assault
To help explain this more specifically. You know that orc in all our kingdoms that can break t/ms but they always end up getting chained? The guys that chain our orc are the guys we beat the religion out of before they can chain the orc...or massacre the t/ms.
Assault is specifically there to keep enemy damn-dirty-ape-paws off our spearhead elements. This is not a perfect science, but practice will lead to intuitive jerk moves that’ll result in more success than failure. Screw your enemy in game and be gracious and humble in communications with them. Kick them when they’re down but just once. Offer your enemy respite, because we don’t want players to quit. We want more and better competition, so please be polite but make them earn it in game.
The Trap of Culture
The apex of society is when a people have what they want and can trust their neighbor. This is akin to the idea of never having to lock your doors. That’s the good. The bad is the desire to tolerate bad behavior to preserve the apex. This is exactly the moment we no longer enjoy apex virtue.
So let’s say in your work environment you are a metropolitan surrounded by country folk. This is not the problem. The problem is kinsman trusting kinsman to a fault. Being tested is not an offense, but being relegated to non influential status is. Because nobody wants to get out of line unless they’re ready to die on that hill; you Or they, might stand alone.
I’m a strong believer in culture as a saving grace but will once again preach the word of nuance. There has to be a dimmer switch to introduce subtle positive change. A leader shouldn’t fear an intellectual, but should have a relationship that both monitors and shares advisement. Credit matters. The intellectual should be respected but should not expect recognition.
Intellectuals can reinforce culture rather than bend or weaken it. This is why cultural leaders must be vigilant, but shouldn’t fear or ignore intellectualism. Somewhere between the two is wisdom. The ability to time what is modern and what is classic, when to implement new facets and have them be a fabric of civilization.
The reason we monitor intellectuals is because anyone finds it easier to destroy than create. For some intellectuals they enjoy secretly lording over the naive only to coerce them into self destruction.
My perception of intellect is thus: the greater intellectual can see more of the horizon, or curvature of the earth than those below. Perhaps the horizon looks flat to you. You don’t take their word. You must first perceive the scope of their enlightenment. How many chess moves can ones memory digest? Know your theater. The fundamental is to qualitatively improve your perception of your theater, not quantitively expand. So the litmus test is, if the intellectual is offering you qualitative improvements to your theater, then it’s likely positive. If all it seems to do is change for the sake of change then let that be your critical decision.
Relative Strategy
Before playing Utopia I played D&D and several other pencil and paper games. Like 30 years longer. There’s also the fundamentals in sports, and I played football. Then also, besides the epiphanies we may all have at work, I roadied for a friends band.
Thus, when I look at Utopia I see it from an applied theory to a work in motion. The math of Utopia is a passive function for me. I pretty much know what I’m getting and how effective it’ll be without crunching any numbers. In most games there’s a learning curve, so when I got serious(kicked out by my X) in Utopia I knew to go avian tac for repetition. While other builds are great for teaching wisdom, like better target selection, patience, etc., I’m already topped out in wisdom by virtue of paying attention through the years.
One thing that applies here is D&D personality categories. While we have attackers, t/ms and dedicated rolls, D&D had controllers, defenders, leaders and strikers. Defender was unfamiliar in Utopia so you might understand more on how and why I built differently
and used relay and zone tactics. My last D&D character was a defender who could absorb tremendous amounts of damage and specialized in zero range area effect attacks.
If your familiar with the fighter wall in D&D, my defender( a dwarf earth warden ) was not a conventional phalanx fighter. My tactics were to go alone, deep into the center of the enemy numbers and defend from there. The exceptions were as expected; I was fine one on one, but my zanshin was in being dog piled by enemy numbers. In essence, my character was a frustrated controller in a dwarf defenders body.
This is why you can run very successful faery attackers. By applying a vision to passive mechanics you can achieve the desired effect within mechanical limits. What I’m pointing out is that mechanics at the forefront can cloud your execution. There were always a lot of good orc warriors, but I never conceived or realized them as a threat as much as a faery mystic or rogue. I learned I could build attackers from any race. The question was always how resistant I was to t/ms? If I could marginalize t/m damage I was confident the attacking core could be handled.
I’ve played every personality, just not in Utopia. I played most of the preceding 30 years as an attacker with most of the same guys. Spoiler Alert: plan A works maybe once or twice in a campaign, and never in an epic theater. Plan B is “get’m!” and you get better and better as the illusion fades: the exception is the rule. Plan A is the ideal. Plan B is pragmatism.
Whenever your leader makes an epic plan that’s sure to result in disaster just say these words with an exaggerated Roman salute:
IT CANNOT FAIL!!!
Demand the same of your players if you’re the leader. And just tell them:
....it better not.
Earning It
It goes both ways, but earning it is part of micro strategy. While I might’ve had a gusto for retaliation it’s not just an emotional reaction. Retaliation is my favored play style for what amounts to whoring, or land gains, in common tongue.
This isn’t an individual strat, but a most ideal kingdom doctrine. The meter is pretty much the grail, and if you approach the game from that aspect you can get necessary experience when to give and take. Think of the meter as a fixed asset that can go liquid. Everything counts in that each point you surrender you’d better assure returns for the enemy reaction. Meteors hit all provinces so going in said direction must make economic sense in the long run. Yes, that means crashing t/ms etc.
The big picture is this: war is best when earned through retal. Planned wars, cfing or cowering through absorbing attacks are all recipes for garbage morale FOR PLAYERS WHO CAN MATCH BLADES WITH THE BEST. There are lots of OCD leaders who love planned wars. Some are excellent, but those aren’t the ones reading this. Planned wars require more than a love for neat and tidy things. Your diplo game has to be meta to be on point. Anything else is naivety waiting to be broken.
Out here in the field your best wars will be the ones you get through retal. No squirming. Even a powerful opponent can be wrested of station if you push the button. You’ll see that in this elliptical wave I’m always going on about is natural order, if you let war come to you organically. The stronger will attack and we retal with no cf in mind. This goes to war unless the enemy offers cf. I’m very humble about playing and feel it is polite in the gaming world to accept cf without condition. But usually the powerful will take war. This is good and there should be no “ifs”. Top kingdoms will look to farm and competitive war kingdoms will look for victory. This isn’t a game where you can’t play at the other guys level. This is the level that you learn till you are a fixture.
Ok. So in age 63 I ran a solo province in a kingdom shell and exchanged attacks with 4 of the top 6 land kingdoms. No kingdom backs down from a single province so the only way out is to grow above as many kingdoms as possible. Land kingdoms have priorities and farming a nw sinkhole isn’t efficient. Mutually, I respect kingdoms actively playing for crowns so my priorities were to only retal superficial entities like fat attackers. Still, these guys are good so my attacks had to reap benefits for me and be unpredictable enough to avoid bouncing. I generally grabbed intel in a “duck, duck, goose” system so they couldn’t trace where I’d march. Additionally, top kingdoms watch each other like hawks so I had instances of retaliating one only to have another snatch the
acres from under me. This was me accidentally being an acre proxy between kingdoms who play diplo very seriously. The real damage came from Green; a deceptively good war kingdom. They were capable of brilliance that belied their quiet exterior. I finished 47th in human land charts only retaliating and offering no cf. I accepted cfs and Binar messaged me to send him one, which I thought was more fair than getting razed.
The point of this is to exhibit the refined world of very smart people who play Utopia. It’s hard to learn facing known threats or staying in your meager lanes. The more experience you get the more you test. What you want is to invoke enough stress on great players and kingdoms to show you their best stuff. That day you might be defeated, but now you know something you didn’t know yesterday. I’m speaking from the 30 years of yesterday’s illustrated in the post above.
PS While my acres of age 63 are forgettable, think about it this way: I was the size of the smaller core provinces in land contention. That’s where the math clarifies the reality of having no cfs and maximizing retal. When you have 24 more provinces to negotiate the cost benefits you can qualify strength in numbers. Your days of asking become rare.
Triads
The spearhead divisions core players are logistically the best race/personality at breaking a particular defense. Captain Obvious:
Faery Mystic vs magic
Gnome Rogue vs stealth
Orc Warrior vs defense
What your doing is finding the most profitable venue toward breaking difficult targets. The objective is to exploit at least one weakness to make the target accessible to the entire triad. Once a target is uniformly breakable it becomes an assault objective to neutralize or obliterate.
This system was clearly displayed in a long war between Pyromaniacs and Freeakstyle. Though Freeakstyle appeared to be taking a ferocious beating, they were careful to assure the breakability of key t/ms in Pyro. Again, Captain Obvious; attackers are always breakable so it’s the t/ms that possess a kingdoms ultimate security. The rare exception is the likes of hybrids or an enemy shelled so thoroughly that their wizards and thieves are nonexistent. This is why the relative security of the triad is important and the focus of how the kingdom is organized. “Relative“ because there will be compromises and there will be a price.
I grew tired of the treadmill of attackers waiting to be chained one after the other, only to find some t/m groups didn’t understand the necessity to undermine the opponents t/ms. They just spent their time smashing attackers who had no real impact on the war. And not just this; after chaining an enemy they’d all but ignore it till it became their problem again. Not realizing a chained enemy left alone, aided by their side and feeding off our chained provinces can become the distraction that leads to failure. You keep tabs on everyone. We don’t let our guys suffer being learned/robbed/razed with impunity, and we don’t let any enemy off the hook for anything but losing their province. Your honor and acres will be there, just don’t get too clever.
The remaining provinces are pure utility. They can help the orc warrior feed down a t/m, camp a high defense killer, or be a hands on extension of the assault divisions.
Dwarf Necromancer
Elf War Hero
And you could even consider switching the dwarf necromancer with the human artisan. Intel can be handy. I chose the dwarf as it is the superior camper, but that’s because I’m oriented toward endurance wars. I think the support spell casting is irreplaceable in a spearhead division so I chose the elf war hero for overall utility.
Seek and You Shall Find
Even though I’m not playing I’m still keyed into fundamentals that ape one ability for another. The speed factor of avians and tacticians seems to have gone away, but the basic element of speed is still there. You no doubt see that human artisan comes the closest, but it’s because artisan can build racks faster. These racks can be built between taps, which is another reason I use to relay
tap. In those days I couldn’t count on having runes or mana for builders boon so I’d smatter my build liberally through the day, assured of some semblance of utility for each returning army. Remember; I was trying to resist raze effect.
Since I know avian well, I learned that speed supremacy was the ideal tool for impaling enemies. Once you have return times inside your opponents you can control them rather easily. What you’re looking for is speed disparity, so to augment my racks strat I’d harass my opponent with tornadoes and general arson. The point is to put your opponent in a 16 tick turnaround for new builds, so you might additionally steal runes or hamper peasant numbers. The analogy would be yacht racing where you steal the wind to secure position.
Once your opponent is in this position they will often ponder razing, and this is where the exception to the rule of nw zone can turn to hard chaining. There are several indicators in the game to track proper chess moves. Smart kingdoms will raze from their chained attackers with residual offense. This is why you’ll see that I believe in uniform assault. The cross section of the assault array will reveal enemy weaknesses which can offer venues to drive hard with marginal resistance. You don’t do any of this without observing any trap formations the enemy might be trying to disguise. Zone is safe and should be the default, but try not to ignore your killer instinct.
When you see a kingdom with a wealth of artisans you should be weary. They can raze with impunity probably by day 2 of a war, because their armies can return from a raze and redeploy for acres before the enemy armies get home. Avian tac was phenomenal;)
One more edit. I use to overbuild racks to accommodate efficiencies when new acres came in. So instead of building for where you are, build for your projected gains. Also remember I was operating a nw zone, so once the zone was established my projections would equalize with GS and WT and even guilds so my cast reliability and wizard generation could catch up. Because your next visit will be from t/ms trying to keep you away from them. Always train thieves. Make it hard for them and you can absorb punishment that would’ve been spent on other kingdom mates.
Those Things Nobody Talked About
Human ability to grab accurate intel is akin to what use to be integral to the tactician personality. This is a great crutch to have since it’s ergo to preserving tpa. Artisan offers humans a kind of offset defense to cope with their wpa deficit. Not a direct defense, more the ability to grow fast and recover quickly.
Related to this was a skill set I developed over several ages; basically, how to be fat. If you stall a chain attempt against you or deemed a lower priority by your enemy, you are likely to get fat in war. Most see this as an awful thing, but it’s not. It’s actually a good thing if you understand how to fill your acres and what defensive measures you take. And don’t give up on building acres. You should present an ever growing threat to the enemy to take heat off kingdom mates.
Because human have accurate intel they will not be squandering thieves and thus pay less to train. So for the human artisan to exploit that edge it’s important to be in a kingdom where the t/ms know to mute the enemies magical output. Humans can economically take over the game, but they require team input to help protect their weakest shield.
As you can see, the spearhead divisions serve the assault just as the assault divisions serve the spearhead.
By keeping your finger on diverse situations you can position yourself in a nw zone and control more in the theater of war than most. Between my ears I’ll barrow experience for analogy. In the paper and pencil version of Star Fleet Battles the Kzinti have a dreadnought class ship called the Super Space Control ship. Through use of drone, main battle array and fighters the ship was designed to carry out its namesake.
We covered how to grow by using racks and ops. Now you might know what a nw/acre zone is but you should exercise skills to enforce the zone. Humans are good because of their intel ability in this. With intel you can check return times and enemy buildup. Snatch news to see the aid flow which will help conserve some stealth. I already covered relay tapping for acre fluidity and whakamole to solidify the zone.
I’m sure some are wondering how much nw/acre zone do you need to stabilize? Consider the enemy as a massive pincer. Their top jaw are the hardened t/ms with the attacker core being the bottom jaw. I’m doing this as a counter to war kingdom doctrine. The beauty of zone is that it’s a default position. If you have the top you should win the war. Zone is for when you don’t have the top. Zone is to crack the joint that holds the pincer together.
To keep it short and perhaps rude, the enemy is a fuel source. With all due respect to my enemies we both seek the same thing. If you establish a speed advantage you can then establish an attack advantage. In war we generally have to source acres to avoid disaster. This means learn, massacre, plunder and raze are hard to use under duress. The zone creates respite which will allow you to achieve an attack advantage. By reducing the enemies acres and nw they can still raze you, but their attempts at acre grabbing begin to go mute, even with a huge offense.
Instead of playing peekaboo with high offense chained provinces just continue to resource grab, do your own razes, build WT, GS, Guilds and Racks. Relay tapping allows you to react to problems as they occur. I trained even, so I trained offense, defense and thieves continuously. I also spread my books evenly as an attacker which many disagree with, but I was the one standing over many, most of the time. My objective was taking the most enemy hits while having positive acres. In most wars I’d finish 3rd or 4th while absorbing far more hits than the top 2 or 3. I’m telling you how, but I was a very off the cuff player. These are the big basics.
I was told by highly experienced war kingdom leaders that they could circumvent my tactics, so I spent a few stints up top in kingdoms ages off to hone my craft against solid kingdoms. An age off doesn’t mean you play like limp noodles, it basically means
you don’t diplo for position. In Pyro I ran an orc cleric and in Jerks I ran a 5 week old elf cleric that was a real bone crusher. Imagine having 3 top ten kingdoms randoming you and you’re gaining acres, honor and badassness. In Pyro I learned how to build a home razed attacker(thank you, Pyro). From then on I used a modified homes build because ghettos don’t have a diplomacy environment to realize the full potential of home razed attackers.
This is why I had personal doctrine. My code of ethics was
1. to never attack of my own volition. I stopped random attacking out of war and would only retaliate. I would obey orders to attack in the interest of war.
2. I prioritized retaliation on the basis of the most powerful enemy first, and I always retaliated them. If the province was below me I’d ignore it, unless I deemed it proxy. In other words, a worthy adversary.
3. I would accept cfs, but not offer them. There were times where I exchanged messages to assure a kingdom I had no ill will. The meter is there as a trust but verify
measure. Since I never attack of my own volition there’s no need for a cf.
Diplomatic Silliness
There are cultural oddities in Utopia based in the bigger fish theory. I’ve had formidable kingdoms contact me upon retal saying that I shouldn’t retal if I don’t want war. Those are a lot of words to put in someone’s mouth.
I want war and I retaliate as a means of establishing my crap ain’t free. I played because unlike the real world I get to tackle my adversaries without lawyer involvement. Why would I want to war a kingdom I know we can beat? For campaign? Even for campaigning, a crown is worthless to me unless I’m defeating the best to get there. Yes, I “get” existential whoring but that’s of zero value to me. I want my enemies to surrender.
I have now established my opinion of formidable kingdoms. This means that my opinion of kingdoms that cower from being farmed is not low, I simply don’t comply. It’s senseless to surrender for mercy vs a superior foe. There’s no meat in that type of diplomacy. You give them a bloody nose and we establish honesty. My real world ego can take it. My game ego doesn’t have to.
Think about this: someone attacks you who is bully qualified and expects you to absorb punishment till they decide not to hit you anymore. And this is how most ghettos react. Not just this but, the bully kingdom might even criticize wether you sent a message with a cf.
No.
Everybody can be hit. An attack or wave from a larger more organized kingdom is, in my eyes, an invitation to meet the challenge. I’m telling you because the results are better than your doom riddled imagination can conceive. You take it to them by playing smart , aggressive Utopia and you’ll never look back. While my literary talents may be confusing, rest assured I would rather play in half a kingdom of barbarians than a full kingdom of cowards. A bully is just a source of progression. Sometimes you eat the bear and sometimes the bear eats you.
One gets better with practice fighting more than practice cfing.