Power Rankings: Episode 21 – S4

Cloudy:

Dai Viet is so fucking dead it’s not even funny. It will take a little while for Zheng to finish the job but there’s absolutely nothing Tran Thanh Tong can do about it. Sell your stonks now folks, they’re going down.

Orange:

The Mamluks avoid last place yet again by someone else being on the chopping block first, but who’s to say how long this will last. One glance from Saba D’mt would end them, they just have to keep hoping Makeda doesn’t turn her head.

Nathanmasse:

Kazakhstan ticked up a rank this week thanks to Dai Viet's slide to the bottom.  Otherwise, their situation is about as bad as it gets.  Kazan has placed several citadels around the arctic outpost, completely cutting it off from the outside world.  Now it's just a matter of time until Kazan finishes them off.

Orange:

MacGregor does it again! A beautiful display of wheeling and dealing to come out on top of this whole situation. Money sure does make the world go around and MacGregor is the one spinning fast. Here’s to the next big swindle; let’s see if we can get our man all the way to the moon!

Msurdej:

Down to only two cities, Royal Hungary is circling the drain. The only reason they haven’t died yet is that Central and Eastern Europe are a clusterfuck of wars. This allows Elizabeth to slip through the cracks a little while longer, especially as they wrap up some more irrelevant wars. But once that comes to an end, and people start focusing Royal Hungary without distractions, it could be trouble.

Nathanmasse:

No movement for the Alaouites this week.  The Visigoths are still trying to divide their two remaining cities with another citadel but Ismail has built a new route through the mountains.  Despite the density of units, they are at least a generation behind their neighbors so any war should hopefully be a swift death.

Nathanmasse:

I have a soft spot for the Kalmyks.  Realistically they should have been eliminated long ago but skillful diplomacy has allowed them to hold up in the Caucasus Mountains for the last 10 episodes.  Their religion has come to dominate all of the surrounding civs and by all accounts they seem on good terms with their neighbors, so I expect them to continue holding out for some time yet.

NopeCopter:

Burgundy’s odds have been looking a bit better now that England looks significantly less likely to make actual gains and Bavaria is busy getting owned, but make no mistake, they’re still screwed in the long run. Their stats are low, there’s nobody around they could really break through barring a leftover Bavarian rump state or a timely Faroese invasion of England, and even if they did make gains now, the other powers of Europe have a massive head start. There isn’t anybody who can directly threaten Burgundian lands right now unless England somehow makes a breakthrough, but they’re still most likely at a dead end.

Msurdej:

Tehuelche falls back down as the tables turn on their war with Tiwanaku. Koluel Kayke is now under attack, and while it might not fall, with Huyustus having less wars to fight, it could be trouble for Maria.

Cloudy:

No one is in a position to kill Harappa right now. That’s the only good thing I have to say about them though.

NopeCopter:

While they didn’t give away any cities this episode, Makhnovia’s odds are still looking worse than ever. For one, Latvia is currently looking a bit closer to actually taking a city off Bavaria, though opinions are split on whether they’ll manage it. To make things worse, Pontus is harassing their Black Sea cities, as well. Given that even Turkey struggled to take anything off the Kievan Rus’ back in X3, the odds of this actually going anywhere seems miniscule, but it’s definitely not good for them. Makhnovia’s odds of a comeback have pretty much vanished after their recent city gift, so now it’s basically come down to how long they can hold out before finally crumbling to dust.

Cloudy:

The Finns are still here. Somewhere. Standing out in the woods, 6 km apart cause they’re not gay.

Nathanmasse:

Let's be honest, Eswatini seems to be in a bit of trouble.  First they give up a city to Saba and now war hawks in Mogadishu pulled the Sunni nations into a holy war against Ndongo.  Fortunately the fortified line along the old border with Rozvi should slow an overland advance.  Additionally from previous holy wars, I would expect this war between Eswatini and Ndongo to be short so there's still a chance they get away unscathed.

Msurdej:

Bukhara had a silent part this week. No mentions, no discussions, merely appearing in the background or to the side of other important goings on. Such is the nature of certain civs in a game with 61 players, we all can’t be exciting all the time.

JDT: The Crow go up by 3 as they manage to take Bakhisee back from the Thule, allowing for them to gain another city and push them up in the rump rankings. Sure, substantially their situation has not changed, but the additional city gives them more population, production and stats to survive a future reckoning. And it is at least enough to rise them over other rumps like eSwatini and Bukhara.

ECH:

The Khoshuts, ever so stuck as ever, have made the genius decision to reignite their war with Shang! You remember the last war, right? Where they could barely dent a city without defenders in resistance as they tried to get chariots through the one tile passage in the Himalayas? Let’s see how this one goes…

ECH:

Oh boy, a busy episode for Cornplanter, and a major rank jump in turn! This is in fact the highest Seneca has ranked since Part bloody 4! And all they had to do was take back a city they handed over last part, flip a Floridian city many many many times, and get started on sieging a barely defended Thule port-town on the Atlantic. Are they actually good in much of any way? Not really, though their stats have moved a bit out of the ‘total trash’ category. Am I shocked to see I myself apparently placed them 38th? Yes, not sure why I did that, but I’m sure it made sense to me at the time. Will they probably arch downwards in the next episode’s ranking? Almost certainly.

Cloudy:

Ayy lmao. Shang dodged a bullet again, making peace with Ikko Ikki right before losing Anyang, in a turn of events that gave everyone a massive case of deja vu. How do they keep doing it? Nobody knows. In any case, Shang is slightly less fucked now that it looks like a couple of their cities are finally out of resistance, but that doesn’t mean anything because we all know Daji will just kill some more citizens and start it again.

Orange:

They’re about to take a fuckin Seneca city the madlads, is this finally it? Taino’s chance to break out of the Caribbean and become the next greatest island civ this cylinder has ever seen? Well, probably not, but like, it’ll still be real cool for them to finally take mainland cities.

Reformer:

Snoozing. And not simcitying too well while at it. Qarmatians’ strength is quite obviously war, and they haven’t had a good war in a while. Afsharids are still distracted by Vijayanagara and would make for a viable target, but not for long, because soon Vijayanagara will be distracted by Singapore’s oceanfaring fleet. Besides that, uh…um…hmm…Well, I have to say, I think the good Qarms are shit outta luck!

Msurdej:

Bavaria continues to hold on to 37th place, as they staunch the bleeding and make peace with several rivals. But while the battle with England is going nowhere, the threat of Latvia (and to a far lesser extent, Royal Hungary), is still real. Nuremberg is under attack, and Straubing could be next. Ludwig’s army seems to be mostly siege weaponry, with most of its melee forces stuck in the south. If it wants to keep its territory intact, Bavaria will have to stave off this attack, then make peace as soon as possible.

Orange:

They’re defending against Thule well, so that’s something. Feels like the only thing that’s gonna take out Nivkh is Gogurt, and when they do it’ll be a swift and massive strike. So until then, good luck Umu, maybe you can get something off of Ikko Ikki soon if Thule stops.

JDT: England rises by one as the war with Burgundy and Bavaria continues to stagnate. By all accounts, looking at the unit concentration in Normandy, England should be dumpstering Autun. However, because the AI is the AI, and because of Burgundy’s shape and the war with Bavaria, they aren’t. Enjoy the view guys, because I think this may be all you’re getting for the next few parts.

Reformer:

Nothing of note is happening in the central African Empire. Further, the mood among the rankers regarding Kanem-Bornu is akin to…a den of gamblers betting on when prey will be caught by the predator. Whoever conquers Kanem-Bornu has the keys to the kingdom - the kingdom being African unification - thus making Kanem-Bornu the kingmaker, in a cruel and twisted manner. Personally I hope Kanem-Bornu instead rises to the occasion and defeats the odds, the expectations, and fate itself. Now that’d be a good story.

Orange:

Why do I, the Visigoth hater, keep getting the Visigoth slide? Who knows, but at least they went down. I mean, it was only one spot down, but it's down nonetheless. Maybe in the next part people will see them for who they truly are, a terrible civ who should not be so high. Will they ever take a city? No, I don’t believe so.

JDT: Mogadishu rises by 3 in spite of their stats going down and not really doing anything in the part. Their biggest contribution to the part was setting up Eswatini to die against Ndongo by declaring a random holy war against them. Yeah, you got me, by all accounts this rank shouldn’t make sense. I guess everyone below them is just that dogshit. Enjoy watching one of your expansion options get killed.

Cloudy:

Although they’ve only fallen three ranks, Vijayanagara might be in big, maybe existential trouble. The small rank drop is so that we have time to sell all our $VJY shar—no, I’m being told the real reason is that some rankers think they’ll be fine, and might even manage to win by taking Sri Lanka’s nearby island city then peacing out. But if that’s going to happen, they’d need to move quick, because Singapore has a large number of more advanced ships lying 1-2 turns off the Vijayanagara coast, and Lee Kuan Yew isn’t going to mess around with them.

Cloudy:

Ecuador’s only hope is to get involved in Tiwanaku Dogpile 2.0. If they don’t, then I fear they’ll have missed the boat. Tiwanaku is their only neighbor who isn’t currently monstering someone stronger than Ecuador. And even then, Tiwanaku is only weak enough to attack when they’re fighting stronger enemies simultaneously. So Ecuador’s path out of its current situation is extremely narrow.

ECH:

That moment of glory didn’t last too long, huh? For those who missed it, a seemingly-religious war was declared between Osage and Seneca right at the boundary between parts, overriding the usual peace deal timeout from war and allowing Seneca to step in and take both the city given to Pawhuska by Florida AND the city they themselves handed over for no reason. Peace between them was declared somewhere offscreen during the middle of the episode, placing Osage back where they were before the Seneca war, only with more deaths to their army and a new way for Mexico to potentially invade on their Southern border. Honestly, kinda shocked they only dropped 3 spots here.

NopeCopter:

Siam rises two spots for… reasons. They’re no longer at war with Singapore, sure, and their tech count is high, but given who their neighbors are, it doesn’t seem like that should really matter. The number of opportunities to break out of the Zheng-Singapore vice grip is rapidly dwindling, and it’s only a matter of time before Singapore returns for another bout… but then again, that’s probably still better than most other civs on the roster.

ECH:

There seem to be two very different interpretations of how the war with Goguryeo is going for Mongolia: ‘A lower 20s civ is taking on a civ consistently ranked first and has only lost a one-pop city, they’re doing pretty well in context’ vs ‘The Glacier of Goguryeo slowly crept further and further into Mongolia throughout this part and shows no sign of stopping’. Honestly, I think I lean towards the latter view, I certainly wouldn’t invest in Sorghaghtani right now and wouldn’t be shocked at all if they start getting their core cities dangerously damages or even taken… but likewise, if Goguryeo decides to peace out one turn into the next episode, that would hardly be a shock either. In this context, them floating around where they were in the rankings, bumped up a bit by Osage’s downwards fortunes, makes plenty of sense, as they exist in limbo.

Nathanmasse:

Pontus ticks up a rank as they try to stake a claim to what remains of Makhnovia. They certainly have the advantage in terms of unit composition, a canal through the Bosporus, and a UA that wrecks any civ planning on sacrificing units for time. That said, the only point of attack is Ekaterinoslav which will probably be flipped into oblivion. They have the opportunity to make meaningful gains but it may take a while for them to be realized.

Reformer:

Dzungars are calm as ever. For the sake of novelty value, they DID declare war on a neighbor this episode…well, nominally a neighbor. Dzungars and Harappa share a two-tile wide border. It’ll bring a bit of excitement into the Dzungarian lives. Which is all they can handle, I think. This is a sufficient amount of excitement. Too much sweet makes you nauseous or something. That’s how Dzungars treats war.

JDT: The Noongar slip by one this week as they end their war with the Wahgi having been pushed on the backfoot. While they haven’t lost anything significant, they have lost some crucial pops to city flips and it's becoming more apparent that they are kinda stuck. Their only other option is another round with Palawa, an option that really isn’t that great because the Palawa outscale them in every metric. So, now what? Another round for Minj, perhaps? The Wahgi do have dogshit production.

Reformer: Tiwanaku is still suffering. Let’s start with the colonies. The last of Tiwanaku’s colonies in Polynesia has been snagged by Palawa. Tiwanaku does still have some Antarctic colonies but those are far worse. Next, the home continent. South first. Tiwanaku is still fighting Tehuelche, and though Tiwanaku has a staggering technological and statistical advantage, most of that strength is not being directed towards the south, and thus Tehuelche is doing just fine. Though those frigates sting even in small numbers. Finally, the actually important front. New Holland appears numerically superior, but has failed to take advantage of that fact. New Holland is also far superior in terms of production, so the current dynamic is likely to continue. One might think that eventually New Holland would break through, but you never know with these guys. NH has proven a competent naval conqueror, and an incredibly incompetent conqueror on land. Tiwanaku should hope to make peace with NH and turn the pressure on Tehuelche.

Msurdej:

Afsharids continue their steady decline after reaching the Top 5 a few episodes ago. It’s currently being attacked by Vijayanagara, with an army attacking over the land of Harappa. Nader Shah is currently holding them off, but it’s still not a good look for him. He’ll need to start making some better moves if he wants to get back into the Top 20, let alone the Top 5.

Reformer:

Goddammit dude. You just HAD to make peace the moment you were finally about to get a city out of that war. The one with Shang, to be clear. Anyang was yours! No questions asked! So many lives lost in the siege and the preceding battles! And all for naught! Now, you spent a lot of resources and got nothing for it, while Gogureyo is growing in TWO DIRECTIONS at once. Good god. To the south Zheng is continuously growing. To the north Thule is…well they’re trying I guess. Killing Nivkh remains an option then. But I’m not feeling too confident considering Goguryeo’s continued meteoric rise. Guess we’ll see.

Msurdej:

The Ume-Sami has only three real targets at this point: The Finns, Latvia, and The Faroe Islands. The last two would be disastrous for Rijkuo-Maja to fight, and the others are the Finns. So any other fight, be it Bavaria, Makhnovia, Nivkh or the Selkups, is almost certainly not going to amount to anything. Take the war with Bavaria  Nivkh. There’s no connecting point between these two forces, making it hard for the Sami to get anything done. If you’re feeling deja vu, it’s because nothing has really changed about Sami’s chances, making us Power Rankers lose ever more faith in them.

NopeCopter:

Rome was unfortunately unable to break Ingolstadt despite the circumstances, ensuring they’ll remain trapped in the Mediterranean for the time being. This is especially unfortunate given that the city could’ve been nice to have for their new war with Burgundy - without a (contiguous) land border, the odds of Rome doing anything to Burgundy’s inland empire are slim to none. The growth of Sierra Leone is also terrifying for their North African colonies, and there really aren’t any good targets remaining in the Mediterranean… why is Rome ranked so high, again? Well, their stats are solid, and another chance to attack Bavaria will surely come before long. Things are looking a bit grim with geography blocking expansion into Europe and rapidly-growing powers blocking expansion into Africa, but Rome can’t be counted out just yet.

JDT: Kazan rises by 4 in spite of not receiving a single mention in the episode. This is mostly due to statistical noise, because let's face it - are you really ready to rank the Afsharids, Rome, Sami or Noongar above them? Kazan has good cities, good production and good science in spite of falling behind on tech (they have not reached the 40s). Their potential is still strong. All they need now is to tech up and move.

Reformer:

Thanks to the holy war mechanics, Ndongo gets lucky and ends up at war with Eswatini. This is quite the boon, with seemingly no punishment in view - Mogadishu, the war leader on the opposing side, certainly is not strong enough to draw substantial amounts of Ndongo troops away from Eswatini. The Ndongo-Eswatini border is far from easy terrain, but Ndongo’s tech advantage should allow them to bulldoze the southerners. Ndongo’s navy will further be of critical importance, though Eswatini does have a fairly sizable naval presence. Either way, if Ndongo runs this war competently, this’ll be quite the windfall for them - a crucial stepping stone on the way towards unifying the continent, and actually contending world domination. Bulldozing Eswatini must be followed by a decisive attack on Kanem-Bornu before anyone else can sweep through Central Africa. Failure at either step risks the ascendance of either Sierra Leone or Saba, who are stronger than Ndongo AS IS. Ndongo’s future prospects hang in balance…

Cloudy:

Sierra Leone is having a stats explosion, rocketing up 7 info addict places this week to 13th overall, which means their stats have surpassed their actual rank. Sierra Leone now ranks 11th in production and an absolutely insane 4th in raw military manpower, which I think is far better than any of us ever expected. Now the question is, will they direct that manpower against one of their weaker neighbors (*cough cough* Kanem-Bornu)? Or will they sit on it until the advantage is gone? All we know is that if they move soon, they might have a shot at the top 10.

Reformer:

Saba was pretty quiet this episode. But not completely quiet: they negotiated a very successful peace deal with Eswatini. The timing is interesting, considering the war that Eswatini stumbled into afterwards, but a free city is a free city, I won’t blame Saba for taking that. Saba has plenty of options for expansion here - Mogadishu is vulnerable, Kanem-Bornu is weak, and northward is probably sort-of viable too, though I’d really sooner see them beat up Kanem-Bornu first to open up that path. Across the Red Sea has been proven to be unrealistic. For now anyway. Qarmatians will continue falling behind in tech, and eventually Arabia will be open to Saba. For now I’d just wait on that if I were them. There’s better options back on your home continent…

Cloudy:

Singapore is making the right call declaring war on Vijayanagara, but they need to be careful to make sure the Vijaya fleet doesn't flip their island outpost before they can get their own ships organized for its defense. If they can weather those first couple turns, then I expect the Singapore fleet to come down like a hammer, and we’ll see Singapore climb a little higher in the ranks once again.

Cloudy:

In a shocking turn of events, Pueblo has fallen out of the top 10 for the first time since episode 1. The reason for this is obviously to anyone with eyes. Pueblo is currently facing massive invasions from both land and sea, at the hands of Mexico and Goguryeo, respectively, who both have far superior forces. To make matters worse, most Pueblo units were away fighting the Yellowknives when the invasions began. The result is that Pueblo has already lost control of half of Hawaii and could lose it all, while Mexico has seized one major southern Pueblo city and could seize another. This is a strategic coup for Pueblo’s enemies and it will require a very concerted effort just to regain their former position, let alone improve. And that’s just assuming their current string of defeats doesn’t continue so far that it turns into a game-ending catastrophe. So watch this space.

ECH:

This was a part sadly pretty devoid of Bora Bora, with no official mentions and mostly coincidental visuals on their empire (which did at least show a decent carpet of troops and vessels). Perhaps that’s a core reason behind them staying where they are even as civs shuffle around them, although behind the scenes, in the stats tables, one finds greater reasons for hope, as Bora Bora can be found second only to Faroes in effective military score, paired with strong stable increases in their previously lagging science and especially production figures (for reference, Bora Bora now has almost 50 more production than Mexico with only one more city), still behind the true game leaders but improving. As such, presuming their next big war is with one of their two obvious targets, the beset Tiwanaku or the intriguingly advanced-yet-unproductive Wahgi, it seems they’re a shark lying in wait for prey right now.

Nathanmasse:

Thule had a mixed episode.  On the one hand, their superior naval units are grinding down Nivkh's coastal cities. But on the other hand, their dispersed colonies to the east are being picked off by the likes of Crow and Seneca.  I never expected much from Báhkisee, Kinngait, or Pituffik so as long as Thule can capitalize on their war with Nivkh I would consider it a net win.

Reformer:

Latvia partakes in the fruitless attack on Bavaria. Rome already realized how pointless the war is, and made peace…whilst for Royal Hungary, this war is a grudge match…if Latvia is neither wise nor stubborn, what are they? I mean, let’s be real, as of RIGHT NOW it looks like they might be able to take a city. The war has been going on for a while with seemingly very little happening - not even a meatgrinder - but at least now shit is happening. Just, the thing is…with Latvia’s low militarization, wasting all these troops is probably going to invite aggression from Kazan again. I don’t know how these guys do it.

ECH:

So, here’s the big Wahgi news you wouldn’t know from the Episode itself too much: they are using the scientific dominance to plow through a ton of the bottom row techs, aka the land military content. As of writing, they are in the midst of researching a tech that once complete would make them two columns ahead of anyone else down there: Military Science, an industrial tech providing both Cavalry and Ulhans! To get there, they’ve already finished Fortifications, giving them Field Guns and for their cities Bastions, and they are two research breakthroughs away now from having Dynamite (Artillery)!!! Wow, they must be steaming ahead with the ga- Oh, their production is worse than Finns? Partly because of their -16 Happiness? They dropped 13 Infoaddict ranks and are still at war with another top 10 civ (albeit a stalemate)? Yeah, Wahgi’s an odd duck to judge, as many science-loving civs are, even more so for their ‘Taino Syndrome’ of being biased towards land combat techs as a civ that ought to grab the naval techs (which they still lag behind two of their neighbours on). All in all a complex civ for sure, making this place by the top 10 boundary perhaps make some sense.

Orange:

As a Pueblo fan, this is the worst, I’m devastated, I’m ruined, I’m crying on the floor sobbing. But I’m sure for Mexico fans this is a really good move, Walatowa fell and Pueblo is losing their Pacific holdings, so you’re now on top of North America more or less. Perfect position to soon take on Osage and become truly dominant. But alas I am a Pueblo fan, so *sobs*.

Reformer:

Why did Palawa go up? I dunno. Let’s see here. They went up a bit in stats comparisons, but the shift is pretty small. Could just be statistical fluctuation. Noongar…still sucks in comparison, but we’ve seen what Noongar is capable of when put in the underdog position. Wahgi…Oh! Of course. Wahgi has taken quite the tumble in stats, despite managing to hold Zheng back. As ever for the maritime civs, production is an issue, and Wahgi is this week’s prime example of this. All Wahgi has is science. And when I say that, I mean they’re the tech leader. But tech isn’t the be-all and end-all of CBR. A true empire must have no weaknesses. Weakness will always be abused by rivals. Which is what we should expect Palawa to do, sooner rather than later hopefully. Alternatively, we’ll watch them fight the ever-clutching Noongar.

Cloudy:

As expected, Zheng was unable to push further against Wahgi this week, and in fact they lost the cities they flipped, returning to pre-war borders for now. Koxinga should be thankful he has an overwhelming naval tech advantage, because if not for that, in his overstretched state, he probably would have lost territory. On the other hand, Zheng did rebuild a fair bit during this episode, and at the end they re-declared war against Dai Viet, which should net them a capital and eliminate a neighbor.

Reformer:

Yellowknives do what in my opinion was an error: peace with Pueblo. During the episode, we saw Pueblo start losing cities to the combined might of Mexico and Goguryeo. Now, the new attackers took full advantage of the fact that the entire Pueblo army had marched north to fight the Yellowknives, but I’d still argue that Yellowknives would’ve stood to benefit from staying in the war. Recuperating to strike some 10, 20 turns later when the entire Pueblo army has moved south instead…well, that’s also a fair strategy. We’ve seen civs re-ignite wars rather quickly in the past, and maybe that’s what’s happening here as well. That’d be quite the feat for the AI though. We’ll see. For now I stand disappointed.

JDT: New Holland stagnates in 4th as the Tiwanaku war has not necessarily developed in New Holland's favour. We expected a total demolition of Tiwanaku and the loss of one or two core cities to the Dutch. In practice, what we’re getting is a stalemate in the deforested Amazon as New Holland fields swordsmen against muskets and knights. This showcases the importance of selecting your techs right. Yes, New Holland still has incredibly powerful stats on all other metrics, being top 5 on all the big ones, but if they can’t convert that into actual viable melee units to take cities, what's the point? Only time will tell if the war will escalate into something more substantial.

Cloudy:

The Selkups are just chilling on their great stats, good tech, and big army. They have vulnerable neighbors they can take on, like Mongolia and Bukhara. All they need to do is... well, anything really.

NopeCopter:

The Faroes, for the first time in a while, take a definitive tumble into second place. The reasons are many, with Goguryeo’s (admittedly less effective than we’d hope) invasion of Mongolia being the primary one, but Goguryeo also holds a few key stat leads - Production, Science, and Happiness, the last of which is especially notable since the Faroes are currently suffering serious Unhappiness-related issues. Coupled with Mexico becoming a legitimate threat in North America, Latvia’s power growing in Europe, and the precarious geographic position the Faroese empire is built upon, these factors are beginning to shake the idea that the Faroes are unstoppable. Make no mistake, though - with a truly ridiculous military and city count lead, on top of stats that are still impressive even with -16 Unhappiness, the Faroes could easily reclaim their top spot in the coming weeks.

Msurdej:

After a long streak in the second position, Goguryeo managed to overtake the Faroe Islands and claim the top spot. Because unlike the Faroe Islands, Gwanggaeto is actually doing things. Xiaotun has fallen, the Goguryeo army is now marching on New Sarai in a flanking maneuver, and Goguryeo ships are seizing Hawaii island by island. That, combined with great production and effective science is enough to give Goguryeo the edge. But all is not safe, for the army is starting to weaken. Without building more troops, Gwanggaeto could leave himself open to attacks.