Erfworld

Damn, that double-eagle had better have a ton of Luckamancy stored up to avoid the near-certain death it would face in such a scenario.

edited 15th Jan '15 12:09:51 PM by Fighteer

… except that most seafarers wouldn't dare attack the Eagle.

Yep. The only threat it has is from the landlubbers. And possibly not even them, depending on how many of them have the Archery special or an equivalent.

Also important is that Forecastle is attempting to frame the battle in such a way that it's a series of one-on-one fights where the rest of the fleet doesn't have a clear view of the action. If my guess is correct each Anchorbar ship won't even know what's happening until it's happening to them.

edited 15th Jan '15 1:35:07 PM by CorrTerek

Turning Anchorbar's strategy against them. Nice.

One possibility is that capturing/killing every ship's lubber turns the attached Qwakken hostile. It sinks the ship, then goes on to attack the next nearst in a quest for food. The situation could cascade rapidly into the Anchorbar fleet being too distracted cleaning up rogue qwakken to notice Forecastle snipping them and attacking with his own.

Edit: It could be a downer ending, but if the Eagle captures anyone with a sending hat, Forecastle wouldn't even need to win just last long enough to send his findings back and now Seaworld can devise a counter strategy. Cue the next flagship being named Forecastle or Double Eagle II in their honor.

edited 15th Jan '15 3:30:38 PM by Earnest

The previous update did seem to make it pretty clear that Forecastle intends to pick off the quakken tamers. But I'm not sure if he's thought about how to survive for a turn in a hex he can't leave with over a dozen hostile quakkens swimming around. He probably don't have enough bread left to tame any more of them, and trying to raid the bread stores of the other ships while picking off the land unit on each one seems like too much of a challenge.

Trying to steal a communication device sounds like a good idea, though.

edited 16th Jan '15 4:27:35 AM by ashnazg

I forget, did the latest update say whether his window of escape had completely closed? If not, I suppose it's possible enough that he could slip out at the last possible second.

Whose window? Their ship is out of move and it's not their turn; they can't leave the hex.

Ah, you're right. I misread part of the update.

Looks like the gambling idea didn't work out. I'll admit I have no idea where this is going now.

Perhaps gambling games are small-scale and require many rounds for the eagle to siphon enough luck even for a single point. It did stay with the ship for an extended period before gathering the full 30, after all.

The possibility arises that the eagle may have cursed Forecastle too well - perhaps that blast will turn out much worse for Forecastle than it might have been otherwise.

I might have guessed that perhaps this could lead to Forecastle sacrificing his luck and himself to let the eagle gather enough Luckamancy points, but if he croaks the double eagle is no longer tamed, which defeats the purpose. Maybe just incapacitated?

I think the double eagle remains tamed regardless — it is officially a Seaworld unit, if I recall correctly. More to the point, Forecastle can't sacrifice himself because he's the only thing keeping the quaken from destroying their ship.

...Well, it's possible the Anchorbar captive would count for the quaken's purposes, but that's a pretty big "if".

edited 20th Jan '15 10:46:47 AM by CorrTerek

That, and it'd be neutral at best. Forecastle can order the Quakken to attack enemy ships, without him it'll at best stay docile while the ship is pounded.

It seems that the predictions were exactly correct. By capturing their 'landlubber' unit, the double eagle transfers the loyalty of the quakken unit to Forecastle's ship.

That is oddly funny.

Somehow I failed to really register the significance of the fact that while they had the Anchorbar captive aboard, the quakken wasn't attacking for a while. Capturing the quakken tamers is indeed a much better idea than leaving a bunch of wild quakkens roaming around the hex, in that case.

However, that does make me somewhat unclear on what exactly happened when the previous turn ended and the quakken started poking at the ship. As well as why Forecastle even needed to re-tame the original quakken under these mechanics.

Edit: Unless perhaps the effect only lasts for one turn? It would explain the bread-making facilities.

edited 24th Jan '15 3:10:00 AM by ashnazg

Yeah, as far as I gather the quakkens are much less tameable than the Double Egale. It seems they're merely pacified for a turn.

That's not entirely the impression that I got: it seems to me that the quakkens become docile towards the individual who feeds them for an indefinite amount of time. I'm not sure how any ship could carry (or pop) enough supplies to keep them in that state if they had to be fed every single turn.

edited 24th Jan '15 6:48:33 AM by Fighteer

Well, Forecastle did find tons of bags of flour and two ovens. So presumably the Anchorbar navy has actually adapted and widely implemented this strategy.

Since Quakkens exist in a kind of quasi-tamed quasi-allied state, maybe just tossing a 1/4 of the necessary bread to get them to obey is enough to pacify them and have them follow the ship, but not enough to actually protect it or follow orders.

What I'm wondering now is how the heck did they find that many quakkens? Because according to that bestiary book and Cat, Quakkens and the larger sea monsters are supposed to be rare. It's so darn many that it seems they've either found a spawning ground and been "taming" for months or years, or maybe they have an Arkentool like the 'Hammer which can somehow make it likelier they pop around the wielder.

It may be just having wide coverage and a lot of scouting. Feral dwagons would be pretty rare too, yet GK's territory averagely hosted three per turn.

Weren't there only four Arkentools? They're all accounted for. Shoes, pliers, hammer, dish.

Four known Arkentools. And there are powerful divine artifacts that are not Arkentools.

Mind, I still think it's the mundane solution of just ranging wide and "taming" any they come across, like Stanley did with the dwagons per Parson's suggestion.

Duke Forecastle, Part 21. Cut to epilogue. Forecastle won that battle, but nobody knows his role in it because the Royal Navy is so screwed up. Cat's working with him to change it.

I was actually a little worried we'd have to slough through him sinking/defeating the other 12 ships. This is a nice compromise, though I do have one big burning question.

Did the Double Eagle survive? The epilogue doesn't mention it being in the city or nearby. Presumably it's still attached to Forecastle's new side considering the name, but it'd been nice to get a little confirmation.

Also, I do so hope he wasn't B Sing the navy guys and Double Eagles really do pop semi regularly there. About the best hack I can imagine would be for him to use his own Eagle to increase the odds of another popping, only to tame them and add a steady stream of them to his ranks.

On another note, the idea of a secret history behind the whitewashed official one seems awesome enough that I forgive Cat.

It's also nice to know that Officers are promotable to Warlord. It must be a progression like for regular infantry to warlord. A city pops sailors with Seafarer, and promoting one to Warlord (or Captain I suppose) to give them Leadership is possible. It's not like they're Courtiers who are in a kind of unpromotable position.

Story time, boys and girls.