Darkness Rising - The New Batch

[WhirdCheese]

I vote we don't...

We can come back later with more units...

[WaterMonkey314]

The group makes its way through a twisting, winding tunnel. The further along they get, the less rough the tunnel appears. First wooden supports appear, adorned with small magical lamps to light the way, then the dirt floor is replaced by stone tiles, and finally the ceiling and walls themselves transition to stonework. You eventually make your way to the Hex Border, beyond which you can see that the tunnel continues for a dozen or so yards before ending in a pair of doors that look significantly larger and sturdier than the last two you encountered at the entrance. These doors look like they might even stand up to siege equipment for a while, although it's hard to be certain from this distance.

You realize that, if you cross the hex border here, you'll be forced to end turn in that new hex, no matter what you find, and so you pause to discuss your options before continuing. Nemo estimates that you're about 3 turns away from Tenebris, which is to the south east of your current location.

Kilroy thinks now's a good time to cash in and get the cavalry.

(Sure, he's dead - but when has that ever stopped anyone? I mean, just look at Sylvia, Duke Antium, Ossomer, Archduke Ferdinand... the list goes on!)

[bob the 6th]

That explains the crazy low amount of forces they displayed... Yeah, this sound like a time to run like hell. What we met were at best glorified honor guards...
Except... damn it would be cool to win this.

Concerns about running away... we have one move left, and a whole hexfull of ticked off marbits behind that door. If we run, they can hunt us on their turn and terms... If we try to say rush and hold the door, we have a potential wall to hold them back.

So, up in the air, both ways have advantages. If we push forward, we still have the advantage of surprise(he has had some time to get his ducks in a row, but not an infinite amount), he dosn't get another turns golem production, and we can have this fight in a tunnel were we have a tank to block/they can only come 2 at a time(or four deep with strike.). disadvantage is we are forcing the battle, and fighting a caster in his sanctum...
If we pull back, he can take his sweet time setting up a force to jump us, he can produce more golems, and we fight in the open were we don't have enough tanks to work effectively. Advantage is he might not chase us, and thats about it.

Then again, Rudy is looking for battle and war favors the boald!

"I say we rush the Blooping door and end this!"

[WhirdCheese]

I say we run!

[Nnelg]

Three turns is a long time, though... I don't think we can afford to wait that long. But I don't think we have a choice, either.

Rushing the door isn't going to work here. We definitely aren't doing it this turn, that's for sure; if we bit off more than we could chew there would be no going back.

I say we move back to the jail cell and make camp there. We can set a guard at either entrance, so if the marbits come we'll be ready.


Hopefully Creeperum will contact us, and authorize the popping of more gobwins. Then we'll have the force to push on through those doors.

[LTDave]

Wegio looks at Regus. "I think that's a gate too far, boss. Time to scarper."

I suggest we fall back. In the event that the GM wants to ambush and wipe us out, there's not much we can do either way.

[bob the 6th]

Thats meta game... Assuming the GM won't throw to much at us is wrong, as the world will happily throw an army at us. Lolly may or may not have the forces to kill us all, but their should be no reason for him not to do so.

Falling back... has problems. He gets to make more golems... which could make the difference between life and death for our tiny squad.

Still, I can see an ambush being useful.

[Nnelg]

Well, if we fall back we'll all gain levels, and Lolly would have to be a very high level to craft more than one or two golems in a single turn. Also, we might get reinforcements of our own in the form of gobwins.


Proceeding forwards without a means to fall back is foolhardy. We need to wait at least for our move to refresh.

The only question would be where to make camp...

Marbit, could we potentially bar those doors from our side? Also, how wide are they? Are there any sort of arrow slits in the walls?

[bob the 6th]

Natural allies are direct application of shmuckers... wonder if they could spare a few? Would be nice to have a few gobwins as back up... yeah, I think we should go back and set up an ambush for next round.

[MarbitChow]

Marbit, could we potentially bar those doors from our side? Also, how wide are they? Are there any sort of arrow slits in the walls?

There are a pair of doors, each 2 squares wide, making the entrance 4 squares wide in total. If you had to guess, you think that the doors open inwards, away from you. You don't see any arrow slits, but now that you're looking more closely (well, as closely as you can look from a dozen yards away), there DOES seem to be slightly-discolored sections of stone that form rectangles above the doors; it is possible that those sections can be opened...

As to barring the doors, there isn't much around with which to build obstructions, so it's unlikely you could do more than create some rubble in front of the doors to slow any attackers coming through.

[Nnelg]

A classic killing field if I ever saw one. Attacking unprepared -especially without the ability to fall back- would be suicide. And I mean suicide; any general who led his troops into that waiting maw would be court-martial'd. Also it's only a chokepoint coming from one direction, so we can't turn it to our advantage either.

I suggest we move back to the jail and camp there, unless we saw any other rooms on our way down the tunnel. We can put whatever rubble we can find in the tunnels to keep the enemy from rushing us, stationing guards at either door (Say, Regus and WW watching the tunnel leading outside, Melissa [unmounted] and Zed2 at the one leading towards this gate. Then we end turn and wait...

There's not much else we can do but wait. We'll decide what to do after that in the morning. So, unless anyone wants to camp outside... Can we go ahead and do that?

[MarbitChow]

Turn (*Mumble* + 1) - Marbit Hex

The Tenebrisians set up camp in the former jail, and end their turn. They sigh in relief as they see the glow of daylight fade almost immediately; they encounter no other units before the next morning.

At dawn, rations pop for all, including the new gobwin, Sto. Shortly after the turn begins, Nemo receives a Thinkagram from King Creperum. The King greets Nemo, mentioning that he sensed Whump's croaking. He asks for a status report.

[Nnelg]

Shortly after the turn begins, Nemo receives a Thinkagram from King Creperum. The King greets Nemo, mentioning that he sensed Whump's croaking. He asks for a status report.

"Sir, we have successfully cleared this hex of Marbits, as ordered. Casualties are Whump and two of the mercenary legionnaires. However, we have uncovered some important new intel -and a natural ally as well.

The Marbits we encountered on the surface had been reinforced by cloth golems. We eliminated all enemy forces in exchange for one legionnaire. Upon the end of combat, my Kitty uncovered a set of doors barring the entrance to a tunnel. Our recon force was hailed by two greater cloth golems, with which I engaged in parlay.

Though conversation I was able to determine the identity of their controller as one "Lolly Cholly", a Marbit Barbarian. After learning that Lolly had a Gobwin in captivity, I broke off and organized our forces. We blitzed the two golems, whom we eliminated without serious trouble, although some additional Marbits hit the flank and croaked Whump and the other legionnaire.

Upon the conclusion of this battle the Gobwin prisoner was freed, and identified himself as "Sto". The tunnel, however, continued to go on, and so we continued on. We scouted up to a hex border, on the other side of which we saw a larger, fortified set of doors that appeared to lead into some sort of underground structure. Short on move and not knowing what lay beyond, we decided to camp for the night and ended turn.


It is my belief that we should deal with Lolly now, while we have a force in the area. The fact we were not attacked or even probed since last turn leads me to believe that his forces are weak... However, he is or has under his command a powerful Dollamancer. If we leave him be he will only get stronger, and will no doubt one day march on Tenebris itself.

I request that you release funds to allow the popping of additional Gobwins. Additionally, if any warriors can be spared from the capitol, they should be able to reach this site by foot in three days. We can attempt to press on with just the gobwins until then, but it may take some time to fabricate light siege equipment. Also, the reinforcements could bring some much-needed supplies, such as healomancy scrolls."

[MarbitChow]

King Creperum responds, "Nemo, your mission has greatly exceeded my expectations. You've spent many turns away from home, though, and while you have been away, we have managed to expand our side by capturing one of the Breatheairean cities. The Breatheairean forces are only a single turn away* from an attempt to retake that city, and while I have every faith that Tod will hold the city and repel the assault, I do not know what state our forces will be in after the battle is concluded.

The gobwin you have captured is currently too valuable to risk allowing it to remain in the field. We can only pop more gobwins in cities that we have at least one in, and we cannot pop them in the field at all**, so it is imperative that you get yourself, your allies, and that unit to the capital."

* - This now officially establishes the New Batch encounter as having occurred on "Dis City, Turn 7". It is now "Dis City, Turn 8".

** - I wasn't able to find many references to popping natural allies other than Parsons' talk with Vurp, but even if it ends up being contracted by Erfworld canon, in 'Darkness Rising', natural allies can only be popped in the same locations that regular units can be popped in. You (and your enemies) can't take a single gobwin, hobgobwin, marbit, etc. along with your army, and pop an extra hundred units at the beginning of the turn and assault a city in that manner.

[BLANDCorporatio]

(I'll do a bit of a skip here and pretend that Zed too was briefed, in the generalities, about what KC said. Assuming said briefing actually happens)

(IC)

I'm happy to get out of here alive. Though, you know, I do wonder. What did we just leave behind to bite us later. I hope this Lolly character won't bother us again.

[Nnelg]

"Understood, Sir. We shall return to the capitol at once.

May I request an armed bodyguard be sent to meet us halfway?"


Ok, so we've got a HVI to escort now. We need to be on guard for ambushes, and keep an eye out to make sure we aren't followed.


Marbit, which version of the Foolamancy rules are we using now?

[MarbitChow]

Marbit, which version of the Foolamancy rules are we using now?

We'll be switching to the new version shortly; which version we're using at this moment is irrelevant, because you all will reach the Capital without further incident.
I'll be winding down the original Darkness Rising thread shortly as well - either by running a relatively quick combat to capture Armolad, or simply ending Turn 10, depending on what the players choose.

Once that's done, we'll get the new rules posted in a new thread, and start a new thread for a united Darkness Rising campaign.

[bob the 6th]

Sweet! might be able to bribe a proper stack out of the goverment then...

"*Sigh*, I don't feel quite safe leaving this madman free... but I see the danger is less then the gain of returning. *double sigh* We going to be doing another "ligwonery" forced march? My poor feet..."

around we go again. Also, we can haz level noaw? thinking more daka with the two ally boosting attack mods.

[Nnelg]

Before we go, there's just one thing I need to take care of...

Mounting Melissa, Nemo (veiled as a warlord again) rides up to the edge of the hex border we found earlier, and shouts:
"I know not if you're listening, Lolly Cholly, but know that I'm sorry it came to this. I'm leaving now, but I haven't forgotten about you... My advice is that you seek to curry my Side's favor by aiding us in the conquest of the elves. Fare well for now."