so, i just finished what genuinely might have been the hypest twilight imperium game that i have literally ever played. i'm going to write a bit of a summary of the important parts of round 5, because it was genuinely so awesome.
our players:
(i have anonymized all of their names because i'm not sure if people would want me putting their names on the internet, and better safe than sorry)
- me (IseeL), as the yin brotherhood (with imperial)
- mark as the emirates of hacan(with tech)
- (redacted) (this is a friend of mine who was previously mentioned in an ask that i got on this blog, and who asked me to remove their name from it then, so i'm also removing their name in the same way now), as the federation of sol (with diplomacy)
- dave, as the titans of ul (with construction)
- our lord and savior, harbinger of world peace (olashowp for short), as the ral nel consortium (with warfare)
- the nomad (from math), as the nomad (with leadership)
of these people i've played about 20 games, mark has played 7, and all of the rest are new to ti.
ok, so at the start of round 5, mark is at 8, dave and i are both at 7,
(redacted) is at 6, and the nomad and olashowp are both at 5
revolutionize warfare and command an armada are both out as stage 2 publics (armada was neuralooped in at the end of round 4), and everyone but the nomad and
(redacted) scored command already.
dave was on seven and already had saturn engine 2 and hel-titan 2, so he only needed 1 more upgrade, which he could get easily with tech secondary (he also had plagiarize and focused research, so he was definitely getting that tech). he also had been elected with search warrant and his last unscored secret was establish a perimiter (which like, he's ul, he already had 6 pds). that meant that everyone after him in initiative order either had to stop him or win during action phase.
the next strongest contender was probably mark, who had one upgrade already and could get his other two with tech primary
fairly early in the round, the nomad realizes that they are not going to win, so they just pass pretty early and hang around for the rest of the round. they also at some point in the round (i don't 100% remember when) support swapped with
(redacted).
redacted also passed early into the round after they fortified mecatol a quite a bit, used diplo on thunder's edge, and built up a bunch of ships there.
that left me, mark, dave, and olashowp unpassed in the round
i'm thinking my only real route to winning is if i can take mecatol from
(redacted) using quantum dissemination, indoctrination, all of the yin tools in the book, get the imperial point score a public (populate the outer rim, which i already very securely had), and draw a secret objective that i can score in action phase (either from imperial primary if i can't get mecatol or i have impersonate to also get one (and if i get mecatol and the impersonate card is bad i can galactic counsel to try for a better one)), so like, i'm basically out, but i'm trying to figure out any line left that can take me to a win. once
(redacted) fortifies up on mecatol, i realize that i really have like no chance of taking it (there's like 13 infantry and 4 mechs (as well as magen with structures), so like, i'm really not taking mecatol). but then, i support swap with olashowp, which kind of puts me back into the game if i can get a decent secret from imperial or impersonate. as part of the support swap, i promise olashowp that if i can't find a line to win, i will try to help him win if i can.
during this time, olashowp scores two different action phase secrets, which brings him to eight, and he's now a contender to be reckoned with. that said, he doesn't have any upgrade techs and already scored armada, so for him to win, he has to score outer rim (which, he only has one edge system at this point), and whatever his secret is.
it is at about this time that olashowp starts talking to everyone about world peace. he points out how everyone else is neighbores with everyone else except for him and dave, and he makes it his mission to, by the end of the game make sure that everyone is neighbors, or, as he calls it, world piece. (it is later revealed (first to me, and then to the whole table) that his secret objective was foster cohesion, which, to be fair, he was able to make that a lot less obvious than it maybe seems to you, the one reading this blog post).
anyway, mark and dave are fighting. mark starts by trying to take out several of dave's hel-titans so that dave doesn't score and mark can then score his stuff, and i decide to also help and join in, because if dave scores and wins in status, olashowp doesn't win, and either way i will have either won or lost before than anyway, so i might as well honor my deal that i made. all in all, mark loses some ground combats but i'm able to take out 3 hel-titans (which with the one extra one that dave awakened, puts him at 4, which is the exact amount he needs to score his objective, but if any of them can be destroyed he can no longer score it).
then, mark decides on a different tactic. he uses his hero and war machine to produce two war suns, some dreads, and a bunch of ground forces, has olashowp activate that system so he can use counterstroke, and then on his next turn sends that fleet into dave's home system and wins the space, bombards most of the ground away, and easily takes out the rest of the ground
with that, dave can't score his public anymore (and one of his hel-titans died, so as of now, he can't even get that secret), so he passes pretty soon after that.
now all that's left are me, mark, and olashowp. i use imperial to score populate the rim, but my secret sucks and is bad (it's some status phase crap that i can't even score anyway), and impersonate isn't any better, but i draw the mentak alliance from yin ascendant, and i realize that mark still has his support, so i start attacking him to try to take it from him. he's got four prommisories left in his hand at this point, so i need to win four combats to get it from him, but after i beat him once, he just gives his support to the nomad, so i can't get it from him, and i pass pretty soon after that.
olashowp starts going for the outer rim on his side of the board, attacking one of the nomad ships and winning gets him to 2 edge systems, but then, mark uses his last tactic to come and attack that system with a bunch of cruisers. olashowp uses survival instinct to get a few extra ships in, but mark then uses rescue to take an extra cruiser out of the wormhole nexus into that system. but then, olashowp uses watchful ojz to retreat one of his ships into the nexus, giving him another edge system, so even though he loses that fight, he's still at two edge systems
mark passes, because he's out of tactic, leaving only olashowp unpassed. he takes a bunch of cruisers into another of the nomad's systems and gets his third edge system and passes, and we move on to the status phase.
we're pretty sure at this point that olashowp is going to win and that it's honestly pretty cool and hype because he was at 5 earlier that round and he had very much been in last place all game
nomad was first in initiative, and they scored
but then
(redacted) scores armada as well as their secret objective, strengthen bonds
which brings them to 10 points
everyone is absolutely amazed
we had all pretty much just assumed that when they passed,
(redacted) was just doing the same thing as the nomad, and kind of just giving up.
like, it's a long game, and their ride home had already been waiting around for a bit (and had to wait for like anothe half an hour while the rest of us waffled around on what we thought would have been winning the game, but was actually just completely unimportant (although i would like to note, that if my line to win had worked, it would have happened before
(redacted) had won, so really i was the only person who was doing important things at that point, which is honestly really funny because i was doing what were probably the least important things out of anyone who was still unpassed at that point)).
final scores were
(redacted) at 10, me at 9, mark and olashowp both at 8, and dave and the nomad both at 7
anyway it was super awesome and hype and cool, and i know that
(redacted) has read this blog at some point (although i kind of doubt that they still check it now that we're done with high school and not in the same math class anymore), but if you see this at any point,
(redacted), i hope you remember how awesome that win was.
like, holy shit i'm still in shock, i should probably go to bed by now i've been writing this for like over an hour at this point.
bye!