Summer Update - 033

[balder]

New one is up. Really slick art from forumite Madea.

[Hatu]

Oooh, this looks interesting. (But how is it possible for me to dislike Wanda even more?)

-H

[Anca]

I like this. Better look at Ansem's head, and another outside look at Wanda. The power and - inevitability? - of their force is impressive.

I feel for those poor defenders, though.

[zz_tophat]

Interesting, this shows that they are all on the same side and that Stanley is the overlord. I was wondering if the decrypted troops answered only to Wanda but I guess they are still bound by the natural thinkamancy that makes Stanley the overlord.

Of course it's clear where the loyalty stat is leaning.


That said, I wonder if those defenders are even worth decrypting. I suppose for zero upkeep they are.

[gameboy1234]

Red and orange is Unaroyal? So the warlord who picked up the pliers at the end of book 1 was a Unaroyal, I guess.

[Itzal]

heh jillian won't like hearing that... if he tells her i suppose.

[Anton Gaist]

heh jillian won't like hearing that... if he tells her i suppose.

I'm looking forward to that. So far Jillian was angry at Wanda but didn't hate her, I feel that'll change soon enough.

[cloudbreaker]

That said, I wonder if those defenders are even worth decrypting. I suppose for zero upkeep they are.

Also, I'm sure they will want to leave some troops behind to guard the place as they head off to the next city.

This update had such a wealth of subtle information that I am having trouble absorbing it all. Not that I'm complaining. For instance, we now know that Tchotchkes, sourmanders, and wiener-rammers all have at least 18 move and 6 base attack. We know that Warchalking has no tunnels. And we know that Wanda does give a bonus to Decrypted units, and not just the ones in her stack.

Still, I can't help wondering if there was some special reason why Ansom called Wanda "Chief Croakamancer" instead of just Croakamancer. Hmm...

[SkarmoryThePG]

Keep in mind, the moment the defenders get decrypted, their attack jumps from 2-3 to 5-6 from Ansom and Wanda's global bonuses. AND if something happens, you have Parson back home to pull miracles out of everyone's posteriors.

[BarGamer]

I like Wanda's Darth Vader helmet. Sends all KINDS of nasty implications. (And only one good one, but.)

Minimum total attack for a column unit is 9, unless Decrypted, which would make it 10. Ansom's own stack of Decrypted heavies probably have a base attack less than or equal to 12, with the (possibly not-Decrypted?) Knights being equal to or (most likely) less than 20. Ansom's Base Attack is (probably) less than or equal to 15.

Of course, Ansom is still thinking additively, so a survivor of Parson's tactics would use multiplicative against him, which would be hilarious and bad.

Assuming noone does, any defenders that do fall and are within line-of-sight of Wanda risk being Decrypted and turning on the other defenders with minimum attack jumping +4 (so 6-7), more if Wanda HAS to be in the hex to Decrypt, creating a Deadly Domino Effect. Those defenders are (Una)royally BOOPED.

[Arkaim]

At first, I wondered if Ansom's and Wanda's stack bonuses replaces hex global and hex bonuses or adds to it. After some addition, it would be impossible for the base unit attack score to be six or greater to have a minimum of thirty attack in their stack if those bonuses simply stacked with each other. So those stack bonuses must simply replace them. Guess it's time to figure out how Erfworld calculates what bonus a Chief Warlord gives to all units in his side.

[BarGamer]

How is it impossible? I can easily see a Decrypted heavy/Knight having a base attack of 12. It's exactly the kind of unit I'd see Ansom bringing to The Battle For Gobwin Knob and everything in between, and we currently see him using it to conquer other cities. Add Ansom's and Wanda's, and you've got a unit with a TOTAL ATTACK of 30. It's simple addition, like Ansom's been playing all along.

[Arkaim]

How is it impossible? I can easily see a Decrypted heavy/Knight having a base attack of 12. It's exactly the kind of unit I'd see Ansom bringing to The Battle For Gobwin Knob and everything in between, and we currently see him using it to conquer other cities. Add Ansom's and Wanda's, and you've got a unit with a TOTAL ATTACK of 30. It's simple addition, like Ansom's been playing all along.

My mistake. I didn't write that message clearly at all.

[ShieldOfAthena]

I love the summer updates, but having to read this one update at a time is painful to my soul. Never liked a web-comic so much that I started to resent it for being a web-comic.

[warriortribble]

Oh dear... I do hope Stanley, or someone in Gobwin Knob at least tries to kill Wanda soon. A decrypted world united under one fatalistic woman is wrong.

And for reasons unknown it seems Opera considers decrypt not to be a misspelling. How strange. Perhaps there's a hidden Erfworld fan deep within Opera Software?

Edit: Silly me. Decrypt is a real word.

[DivineDragoonKain]

How is it impossible? I can easily see a Decrypted heavy/Knight having a base attack of 12. It's exactly the kind of unit I'd see Ansom bringing to The Battle For Gobwin Knob and everything in between, and we currently see him using it to conquer other cities. Add Ansom's and Wanda's, and you've got a unit with a TOTAL ATTACK of 30. It's simple addition, like Ansom's been playing all along.

As I recall, you also get a bonus for each unit in the stack, up to a maximum of eight. I don't recall if what sort of bonus it was was ever stated, though.

Oh dear... I do hope Stanley, or someone in Gobwin Knob at least tries to kill Wanda soon. A decrypted world united under one fatalistic woman is wrong.

And for reasons unknown it seems Opera considers decrypt not to be a misspelling. How strange. Perhaps there's a hidden Erfworld fan deep within Opera Software?

Decrypting is another of the Erfworld guys' numerous puns. The process of decryption finds roots in translating encoded messages, like ciphers. It makes sense to me - Wanda has "decrypted" the foreign units into something familiar and controllable. And then there's the double entendre of crypt being a place you go when you die, and to be de-crypted...

Yeah. It's clever.

[BarGamer]

How is it impossible? I can easily see a Decrypted heavy/Knight having a base attack of 12. It's exactly the kind of unit I'd see Ansom bringing to The Battle For Gobwin Knob and everything in between, and we currently see him using it to conquer other cities. Add Ansom's and Wanda's, and you've got a unit with a TOTAL ATTACK of 30. It's simple addition, like Ansom's been playing all along.

As I recall, you also get a bonus for each unit in the stack, up to a maximum of eight. I don't recall if what sort of bonus it was was ever stated, though.

Oh WOW, I completely forgot about that bonus! It's rare I miss a math trick like that. Ok, so the wiki states that the stack bonus is a linear +1 for each unit in the stack, so...

Ansom's stack's weakest unit has 30 attack. Ansom has his bonus of 10, the stack bonus of 8, that leaves 12. Since it's stated that no unit is less than 6 base attack, and Wanda's bonus for Decrypted is 8, as well as an unknown Arkentool bonus to the hex... that means that the Knights in the stack have been mathematically proven NOT to be Decrypted. WOOHOO!

This means that at some time, Ansom or Stanley ordered more KISS popped. *Feels PROUD.*

(Ansom attacks at 33. Stack bonus of 8, Wanda (plus Arkentool?) bonus of 8, his own bonus of 10... that leaves 7 base? Does that sound right...? Unknown terrain bonus, too.)

[Marller]

Still, I can't help wondering if there was some special reason why Ansom called Wanda "Chief Croakamancer" instead of just Croakamancer. Hmm...

Yeah, it makes it sound like there is more than one Croakamancer. And why is she out on the Battlefield? She wasn't before.
Does Stanley hope she might die in battle or does he just not want anymore in his vicinity.

[TMZ_Cinoros]

As I recall, you also get a bonus for each unit in the stack, up to a maximum of eight. I don't recall if what sort of bonus it was was ever stated, though.

I do not think it has ever been made clear if the stack bonus is cumulative for each unit, or is a flat bonus for the entire stack. Nor do we know precisely what the maximum stacking bonus is, just that the maximum stacking bonus is achieved at eight units.

I apologize in advance if this observation has been made before. I have not seen it in the wiki, and there are A LOT of posts that I have not read through, which means I have likely missed this speculation if it has come up before.

For example, lets say that the stack bonus is +1 for every unit beyond the first up to +7 for eight units. Let us also assume there is a stack of eight doombats, and assume that a doombat has a combat/attack rating of 1. Given these assumptions, the entire stack will have a combined attack rating of 15 if it is a flat bonus (1 * 8 + 7) and 64 if it is cumulative for each unit ( (1 + 7) * 8). The former sounds much more reasonable, given that piling on more troops was described by parson as being Additive. If the latter was true, almost any group of eight units could easily croak, say, a dwagon (unless of course a dwagons combat rating really IS that high), which probably isn't the case.

Also, the flat bonus system would encourage maximizing the number of eight unit stacks, which is precisely the behavior that we have witnessed. For example, using the scenario above, lets say we have 16 doombats. Under the flat bonus system, two stacks of eight would yield a combined attack bonus of 30 for the entire force (2 * 15) versus 23 if they were in one big stack (1 * 16 + 7), while the cumulative bonus system would result in a 128 rating for two stacks (2 * 64) and the same for one stack ((1 + 7) * 16). Thus, the latter system has no incentive for maximizing the number of stacks, just minimizing the number of stacks with fewer than eight units, while the former system provides an incentive to maximize the number of eight unit stacks, unless there is some cumulative bonus that can be applied (such as stacking with a warlord) that would be greater than the opportunity cost of the stacking bonus from splitting up the force into multiple stacks.

Thus, when doing the mathamancy to determine an individual's Combat rating from this Summer Update, one should probably not add in the stack bonus, as it probably is included in the stack's full attack rating, not individual unit's combat ratings.

All of this mathamancy also implies that there is a maximum limit on the size of a stack, and the number of units/stacks in a hex. Otherwise, all of the units could be in one giant blob of a stack to get Ansom and Wanda's stack bonus and smash face.

[TMZ_Cinoros]

Still, I can't help wondering if there was some special reason why Ansom called Wanda "Chief Croakamancer" instead of just Croakamancer. Hmm...

Yeah, it makes it sound like there is more than one Croakamancer. And why is she out on the Battlefield? She wasn't before.
Does Stanley hope she might die in battle or does he just not want anymore in his vicinity.

Wanda is probably referred to as the Chief Croakamancer just as Parson was referred to as the Chief Warlord after all of the uncroaked Warlords were croaked. Its simply a title that hasn't been used before. Keep in mind that the point of view is from Ansom, who basically sees Wanda as being all but a divine being. He will think of Wanda as being the Chief Croakamancer because that sounds more grand than just Croakamancer. Maggie is probably officially the Chief Thinkamancer, Jack the Chief Foolamancer, ect.



<Aside>
Also, the title "Chief" probably has something to do with determining bonuses. For example, according to Klog #4, Parson gives units "of [his] capital" a +2 bonus. Lets assume that this description is metonymy and not literal (capital refers to his side, not to the hex he is in, which is the capital). Ansom gives +3 to all units on his side. Currently, Ansom is the Chief Warlord, not Parson. So, all units get a leadership bonus of +3, not +5, as the Chief Warlord leadership bonus can (presumably) be applied only once. Otherwise, the update would have probably mentioned Parson's bonus. Also, if this were not the case, the side with the most warlords would by likely be the most powerful, as all warlords would grant a global bonus, which doesn't seem to make sense.

Thus, if Stanley were to pop another Croakamancer (which is extremely unlikely, given how cheap he is and he probably has the best Croakamancer of all of Erfworld already), only the "Chief" Croakamancer would likely give his/her bonus to all undead on their side. Thus, the "Chief" title is probably used for determining which units will grant global bonuses for an entire side.

This perfectly explains why Stanley was so eager to replace Parson as Chief Warlord. He only gives a +2 global bonus, while Ansom gives +3. Ansom's bonus is superior on paper. And Stanley is certainly myopic enough to dismiss tactics in favor of an extra +1 for all units.
</Aside>



Anyway, as for why Wanda is on the battlefield, Stanley's reasons are quite obvious. Not only does she give an amazing bonus to units in her hex and stack, but she can decrypt the enemies she defeats. I sincerely doubt she can decrypt units outside her current hex. If she goes with the attack force, not only does it become SIGNIFICANTLY stronger, but each victory will enlarge Stanley's entire army. It will be like a snowball rolling down a snowy hill. The force can start off as a moderate size and pick up more forces, turning enemy resources into allied resources. Its a very shrewd move, and obvious enough for even Stanley to realize (especially if Wanda suggested it).