Power Rankings: Episode 45 – S4

Cloudy:

I don’t know how I could write a better eulogy for Latvia than TopHatPaladin did in the discord screenshot used for last week’s Latvia slide. That eulogy was imbued with a passion and closeness that could only be achieved by the man who made the mod, but I won’t lie when I say that that same enthusiasm rubbed off on me from an early stage, as soon as it became clear that Latvia wasn’t going to roll over and die. Most rankers placed them very close to the bottom and we were proven wrong almost right away. Latvia was expansive, scrappy, and aggressive, constantly winning wars with what seemed like hardly any troops, always flirting with the specter of devastation, but always eking out a win in the end. They landed a deathblow against Makhnovia; outmaneuvered Royal Hungary, Bavaria; crushed the hapless Finns; and even seized a city from the mighty Faroes in a war that the islanders started. Even when they faced doom at the hands of the Selkups, they fought the enemy to a standstill, clawed back as much of their lost land as they could, and escaped mostly intact. And when total war came, they had one of the densest carpets on the cylinder, even if it was outdated, and despite being targeted with dozens of nuclear strikes, their haggard forces stretched thin between the shattered husks of cities, they continued to fight, and they never gave up. They will be missed. So long, Karlis Ulmanis.

Reformer:

It’s eulogy time. Dearest Pontus. You were one of my favorites at the beginning of the season. A long-awaited inclusion, with plenty of hype behind you.

…hype that proved to be excessive, undeniably.

Pontus’ history is filled with skirmishing against various neighbors fruitlessly, with some rare exceptions. Let’s go through the big hits.

Pontus’ first war was against Kalmyks on turn 34 - an early war against a neighbor protected by rough terrain. Over 50 turns of war, and for nothing. While still involved against Kalmyks, they declared war on Afsharids, just to really hammer in the fact their early aggression would be wasted.

These early declarations, alongside a few others, seemed to garner unwanted attention, as on around turn 112 Pontus became victim to a small coalition. Qarmatians and Royal Hungary, still respectable at this early point in history, were too much for the ill-prepared Pontic army. Still, losses to this coalition were only peripheral, being weak cities in Arabia and Europe. These losses were far from crippling, but this was still quite a setback.

Pontus would then enter a period of mostly-peace for over 200 turns, a period which would be ended by their third attempt against Makhnovia being successful. One of those big Makhnovian cities on the Black sea would end up in Pontic hands, showing that Pontus could defeat a significantly weaker opponent.

Another massive period of peace would follow. On occasion, Pontus would beef with a neighbor, but these would always be low-stakes: Mamluks, Saba, Kanem.

Until finally, four-hundred turns later, on turn 524, it would be time for retribution. Technologically and numerically superior Pontic troops would descend upon Qarmatian Arabia, taking back those cities lost so long ago. Spurred on by success, Pontus took this war all the way to the finish line, eliminating Qarmatians in 32nd place. This, unfortunately, would be the last excitement Pontus participated in before Total War. Which, yes, leaves another nearly 300-turn period of peace in-between.

We know how Pontus fared in Total War. The multitude of fronts eventually got to them - and though they more or less held against Latvia and the African civs, they would meet their fate between Afsharids and Faroes, squeezed to death in 12th, on turn 834. An ignoble end for a mostly peaceful civ. But that is not the whole story, is it? Pontus’ greatest contribution to Total War, and arguably the entire game, was their UA coming to play. For anyone unaware, the Pontic UA causes cities controlled but not founded by the enemy to enter resistance when Pontus defeats their units. The greatest victims of this ability (as I recall) were Wahgi and Sierra Leone. In both cases, Pontus likely played a significant part in these civs’ downfalls, though it is difficult to say for sure how significant the impact truly was. For this single contribution, I salute Pontus. Any contribution against the monstrous Wahgi is welcome, and through this feat, they have made their involvement worthwhile.

…One more thing. In a certain prominent doomed timeline, Pontus’ UA proved far stronger than expected or intended. All enemy cities end up with hundreds of turns of resistance, and the only movement on the cylinder would eventually be Pontic troops marching from city to city, conquering the cylinder unchallenged. For the proper timeline that we got to observe, the UA was indeed fixed, weakened, nerfed, however you want to put it. The truth is all the same: Pontus was holding back for the entire game, and transcended the prime timeline just to punish Wahgi. That’s a good story in my books.

Orange:

And down they go, Sierra Leone finally bites the dust. On the eve of total war they seemed promising, the strongest power in Africa and ready to push into the Med, but alas it was not meant to be. Sierra Leone started off strong but then struggled to keep up, and I don’t really know why. They just, stopped producing units, and with that, they had a slow tumble down to the hands of the top power of the Faroes and the scrappy underdog in Ndongo. They really should’ve done better with what they had, but they just couldn’t keep up. It feels like a weak end for a civ that could’ve been much greater.

Sierra Leone throughout the game had an interesting path to the end. They had a nice amount of expansion with some quite out there settles that they weren’t punished for. They then struggled in war against the Alaouites for a while, but eventually persevered. And then as the game went on they fought with Kanem-Bornu and Rome, securing West Africa and much of northeast Africa as well. Sierra Leone even took Rome itself. But despite all that, they just couldn’t hold up in the war, they failed to use their core to push out Ndongo, and were unable to defend against the much stronger Faroese. I’d lay a fair amount of this blame towards their lacking tech, they had weak units and cities with little strength at all. Ultimately, they couldn’t stand shoulder to shoulder with the others, and now they lie to rest here in 11th (15th for now because of revives, but really 11th).

Reformer:

Afsharids? Yeah, they died. Sure, they currently hold a city, but that’s a REVIVAL, so it doesn’t count. We will slap them in the face with an eulogy to make sure they know they’re dead. So let’s go! It’s time for an adventure!

Afsharids’ performance is best characterized as a rollercoaster, going up and down and up and down, in perpetuity. Until they died, that is.

Much of the strength of the Afsharid Empire was built upon good early settling. Much of that strength was undercut by early failures in war. Perhaps the most famous example of course is the loss against the Qarmatians. This certainly did not radically change the overall trends, but it no doubt slowed down that oh-so-crucial early growth. And when Afsharids next headed to war, the result was…successful, albeit lukewarm. This was their first war against Bukhara, of course.

More important than the actual outcome of the Bukharan war was the apparent regaining of confidence, as afterward, Afsharids would partake in smarter, smaller wars, which always ended up in Afsharids’ favor. Kazakhstan, Harappa, Vijayanagara, all were defeated, though never decisively. This would be followed by a period of peace…

…until the 270s, when Afsharids took the battle to Harappa again, only to be beaten to the punch by Khoshuts. With the help of a coalition, Afsharids would soon enough attempt to break Khoshuts, but to no avail. Indeed, Khoshuts came out of the coalition war with a net gain of one city! Embarrassing. Afsharids would return home and lick their wounds. And after a short 30 turns later, Afsharids would return to waging war against Khoshuts. What difference could 30 turns make? All the difference, apparently, as Afsharids would straight up MURDER Khoshuts during this war. Nothing beside remained. This would end up being one of the bloodiest non-TotalWar conflicts in the history of the cylinder.

Afsharids would afterwards return to smaller wars, slowly growing between periods of peace. Kalmyks, Bukhara, and Selkups would all be defeated- Kalmyks eliminated and Bukhara crippled, of course. These less impactful wars would be the last of Afsharid expansion before Total War.

As mentioned, throughout this history, Afsharids experienced a never-ending rollercoaster, though that may not be apparent from the above brief history. The rollercoaster becomes more apparent when looking at their history of stats, which continuously oscillated in an absurd manner. Every episode, you couldn’t predict how strong they were under the surface, even as they stayed at peace and simply rested. What strange incidents were happening in this empire? We’ll never know, but Afsharids’ failure to maintain good domestic policy is easily the single most important contributing factor in the failure to win the game. They played a fairly smart game in all other regards. But let’s get onto Total War, now.

Afsharids would end up taking on a big brunt of Wahgi’s Intercontinental Drone Fleet. Against our expectations, this monumental challenge was handled pretty well, and Afsharids would go on to retake the South Asian territories they lost to Wahgi, all the while stalemating Selkups and Pontus. Eventually, fortunes ran dry in the east, but instead Afsharids pushed through the former stalemates. Most importantly, Afsharids pushed through Pontus like a wet piece of cardboard, reaching the Mediterranean. A grand success of course, but if we know anything about Afsharids, it is that fortune heralds misfortune. Goguryeo, having conquered their way through Selkups, had reached Afsharid borders, and progressed unchallenged into Afsharid lands. In the west, Faroes took the other half of Pontus, and in them, Afsharids gained another undefeatable opponent. And just like that, the Afsharids were crushed to death in 10th on turn 842, with the rollercoaster hitting a brick wall. Two brick walls, really. The trend that defined their game would end it as well. How poetic!

Leman:

A titan fell today, and what a thunderous crash as Bol'im hit the ground. Wahgi was truly an unprecedented civilization, in so many ways. Their start was a rollercoaster, settling very well at the outset of the game, then being punished for that aggressive settling Maguindanao, only to completely turn that around and help tear Maguindanao to shreds. From then on, the early game was full of instances that us Power Rankers thought would be the end of Wahgi, but Wahgi always managed to pull ahead. Their war against Zheng, their first war against Bora-Bora, their first war against Noongar, all were solid victories pulled from difficult situations. Wahgi showed their competence and resourcefulness.

Wahgi’s central story, however, had not yet begun. While Wahgi was scrapping with its neighbors, they were growing and teching up, mostly on the back of their very powerful UB, and building wonders. The most important of which was Gate of the Sun. Together, the UB, Gate of the Sun, and a few other synergistic wonders, transformed Wahgi from a scrappy, solid civ into a technological nightmare. Unprecedented growth catapulted Wahgi far, far ahead of their neighbors, unmatched even by the other top tiers. At their peak around turn 380, Wahgi had built up a lead of eight to ten technologies over civilizations like Faroe Islands and Gogouryeo, and a lead of fifteen to eighteen technologies over neighbors like Palawa and Bora-Bora.

Wahgi did not put this tech lead to waste either. They built advanced, state of the art, units. And more units. And more units. And more units. Siam didn’t stand a chance when hordes of paratroopers invaded their enlightenment-era cities. Bora-Bora didn’t stand a chance when waves upon waves of Wahgi units crashed into their shores. Bora-Bora fought well but when your foe has triple the production, eighteen more technologies and nine-times the military manpower (and growing), Bora-Bora didn’t stand a chance. Wahgi, over the course of a hundred turns, threw units at Bora-Bora until their massive empire was reduced to three sad little cities in South America, and Wahgi ascended to number one on the power rankings.

At this point, the game should have been in the bag. Who was going to stop Wahgi? Nobody was going to catch them technologically. Nobody was going to catch them militarily. The entire South Pacific was covered in Wahgi drones! The entire South Pacific was covered in Wahgi drones… Who was going to pay for that? Bol'im’s war machine had been out of money for dozens of turns by now. He had been financing the whole thing off of Bora-Bora spoils, and as that war finally concluded in overwhelming, fantastic victory, that revenue source dried up. The money for all these drones had to come from somewhere. Bol'im stopped producing science at a once impressive 100 technologies, letting old rivals pass him by. They tried to go to war to get a little bit of money – Wahgi picked off Mexico and Vijayanagara, but those were small fry. Wahgi never bothered to go after someone substantial again. Wahgi never managed to restart their dominating science again.

But Bol'im never stopped building units. At the dawn of Total War Wahgi had over four million troops, over quadruple the next most powerful military, and the largest military the CBR has seen since Brazil probably. They spread across the South Pacific, South America, India, Persia, Quebec, and South-East Asia. These troops, once state of the art, were old, out of date, and out matched by most of the powers in the cylinder. But there were more of them. That had been Bol'im’s strategy against Bora-Bora, that would be Bol'im’s strategy against the world. Throw units at his problems until they were dead.

At the dawn of total war, this seemed to work. Noongar was obliterated in a matter of turns. The Afsharids were hollowed out and neutered. New Holland was blasted to bits, former Ecuadorian land turned into radioactive rubble. Singaporean India was razed to the ground. Zheng was partitioned. Palawa was bloodied. Faroese Quebec was ransacked. Singapore’s core was scratched. Random cities in the Middle East, Europe, and Africa were sniped by unending legions of Wahgi military. Wahgi ballooned up to 97 cities at their peak after the first episode of Total War.

But slowly, Wahgi’s military score began to slip, then fall, then collapse into nothingness. One by one, each one of Wahgi’s 4,607,083 troops perished. Civs that had completed the tech tree held on in the face of Wahgi aggression. The Faroes managed to clean up their Wahgi problem quickly. New Holland managed to keep their core intact before forcing Wahgi out of South America. Singapore stood tall, unbroken. Goguryeo seemed to hardly notice. Wahgi lost 50 cities in the second episode of Total War, dropping down to 47. They lost 41 more in the third, dropping down to only six.

In general, when we get to Total War, there are three camps of civs. Civs that are already dead (Noongar, Bavaria), civs that have completed the tech tree but have a small military (Goguryeo, Faroe Islands, New Holland, Yellowknives, and Singapore), and civs that have not, but have a huge military. In every case, civs that have completed the tech tree always win. Their cities are more resilient, their units are more resilient, they have more production to rebuild units, they have more resources to rebuild cities. The big military civ always makes dents in the beginning but always falters.

I thought Wahgi was going to be different, for two reasons. First, nobody had as big of a military as Wahgi had. Tuva and Han from last season looked like they weren’t even trying next to Wahgi. Sure, those militaries hadn’t been able to cause enough damage in the early turns of Total War, but would 4 million troops be able to? Second, Wahgi had a fantastic production base. They had the second most production, in fact, less than only the Faroe Islands. Surely if they ran out of their 4 million troops Wahgi could replace them quickly? I think this is where an unlikely foe enters the fray, in the form of Pontus. Whenever a Pontic unit killed a Wahgi unit, every city that Wahgi captured, but did not found, went into resistance. Wahgi had a lot of units that died and a lot of cities they conquered. All that production was worthless.  

Pontus died in 12th place, three places before Wahgi. But by that point, it was already over. Wahgi was clinging onto dear life. Bol'im was killed in Mount Hagen by Lee Kuan Yew on turn 858, eliminated in 9th place. Then revived, and then killed again by Johan Maurits on turn 932, still in 9th place.

I’m sure it was cathartic for Singapore and New Holland to land those killing blows. I’m sure it was cathartic for the fans of Maguindanao, Siam, Vijayanagara, Afsharids, Zheng, Noongar, Palawa, Singapore, New Holland, and especially Bora-Bora, to see Mount Hagen flying flags of Singaporean Pink instead of Wahgi Purple.  

But I am sad. We lost a titan today, one of the strongest, most defining, most game breaking civilizations CBR has ever known. We will be telling tales of your exploits for years to come. F

ECH:

At the end of it all, there was a culture civ to chronicle these final days of multipolar peace. I take some comfort in that.

Siam shall not be staying with us long, exposed to air power, sea power, and megalithic death machine power; and armed with all of maybe 2 units to boot. Such is the fate of an endgame revival.

Cloudy:

Not so long after they exited stage left, the Noongar are back, baby! Just in time to get annihilated in total war 2! Woohoo! Witness me!

ECH:

-RECORD SCRATCH-

Who the hell let Mamluks into the finale club?! Bouncers, get Shajar the bloody ‘ell out of here!!!!!

Jesus, Mamluks will go down as a X4 civ that made it into the top 10 once, I suppose. Mark that down for trivia night and despair…

CelestialDalek:

Come on. Eswatini doesn’t deserve a ranking, much less 9th. Reviving civs should have died when Crowfoot did.

NopeCopter:

Despite fighting off Singapore without much issue, the Palawa end this episode on the verge of death anyways, because the Yellowknives have ended up making great use of their new Pacific colonies to launch a surprisingly effective invasion by sea. Now reduced to only one city in the middle of Central Asia, completely out of units, the Palawa are all but guaranteed to die in the first turn or two of Total War II - only potentially saved by Goguryeo having bigger fish to fry. It’s a bit of a shame too, considering they were having a bit of a redemption arc, but so it goes. At least they got to make it to the finale.

Leman:

Vonya’s still here babyyyy! “Unlike Hsia” is probably a Selkup warcry or greeting at this point. Yeah, yeah, we’ll have a eulogy next episode. Right now, I’m just happy Selkups made the top ten. They deserved it.

Nathanmasse:

It was a good run but things have turned decidedly against Singapore.  They’re still in 6th place but that’s not quite as prestigious as it used to be.  Their possessions in India, the Philippines, Indonesia, and even their capital have been overrun or simply obliterated to make room for the next generation of cities.  They’re not quite dead and gone; they have enough units to hold up in either Madagascar or around their remaining Antarctic cities but their days are numbered.  At least they get credit for finishing off their old rival Wahgi.

NopeCopter:

As the one and only Ndongo stan (and also the creator of the mod), these past few episodes have been an absolute ride - from a mid-tier expected to get run over by Sierra Leone, to a surprisingly solidly-positioned civ expected to get run over by Singapore, to a shockingly competent civ expected to get run over by the Faroes, to now. Make no mistake, Ndongo is about to finally meet their end at the hands of the Faroes, who have a gargantuan military and a 12-tech lead over Ndongo with no distractions left in the way. But the fact that this do-nothing civ locked in this hard for Total War and managed to almost triple their city count in spite of everything is nothing short of impressive even with their solid positioning. It took Nzinga three tries, but she’s finally made it to the end of a CBR season - and I’ll save the big emotional send-off for next week, but man am I happy to see her here, even if it was a bumpy ride.

ECH:

It’s the final lap, and there’s still glory to play for between the civs that, bluntly put, will not be winning the race. Yes, it should be made clear that no-one thinks any civ below 2nd in the rankings has much of any chance right now, even if there is potential for them to make moves. However, for New Holland in particular, the discourse on where to predict these final contenders has been fairly involved and engaging.

New Holland is really competing primarily against their Northern American rival Yellowknives, and as you can see has managed to lose a spot to them in the aggregate over the course of the previous episode. I’d attribute this to three observations: the dynamism of the Yellowknives in Episode 45 (successfully conquering across the Pacific, bolstering their city count and perhaps looking set to unite Australia); New Holland’s seemingly lacklustre truce-time buildup (a lot of empty land in South America even as Total War 2 arrives, last we saw); and the consistent statistical superiority of the Yellowknives in this final stretch (around 2000 higher effective military; nearly 7000 more production than NH, etc). However, nothing is certain, and as we PR’s get ready to overview the legacy of every civ in the season, New Holland’s capacity to get underestimated shouldn’t be forgotten now of all times.

If Maurits can surge upwards, probably into North America through the East Coast then expanding into the Gulf of Mexico and Westwards, while Akaitcho get’s distracted by his other neighbours, then there’s a real shot for New Holland to be this season’s unifier of the Americas, and who knows, from there so much could occur. That’s probably a best case scenario though, and in truth I find New Holland achieving a hard-won, ground-down 4th place the likeliest outcome. Veel geluk, Johan!

CelestialDalek:

Holy shit, the Yellowknives popped off this episode. Near the beginning of total war, things looked hopeless: they were losing cities left and right to nukes, being pushed on all fronts, facing Wahgi incursions… But now, they somehow managed to push into Australia and absolutely body Palawa. The total extent of this feat can’t be overstated: they hadn’t shown any sort of expeditionary prowess of this sort before their surprise attack on Wahgi last episode, but now they show up and have half a continent under their belt. Their fronts have stabilized, and they’ve regained the advantage pretty much everywhere. Now, the main problem is that they need to win. They’ve shown their ability to establish a foothold on another continent, but can they do that in the Goguryeo mainland? Bridge the gap and take on the Faroes? Sure. They could. But the two remaining civs (it’s Goguryeo and the Faroes, you can use process of elimination) are, in our opinion, much more likely to go the full way and slaughter all the opposition.

NopeCopter:

There’s a growing sentiment that Goguryeo is all but guaranteed to win the game, but in reality, the Faroes probably shouldn’t be counted out just yet. They only have about two thirds of Goguryeo’s city count, sure, but they also have a larger military and a MUCH larger Production base, with at least one more easy invasion target in Ndongo. Considering that the Faroes have also had the opportunity to build up while Goguryeo has been busy fighting a war on the other side of their empire, wasting their troops and nukes, it doesn’t seem too unreasonable to say that the Faroes have an advantage and will continue to maintain that advantage so long as they spend their Production remotely wisely. They still have their weaknesses, of course - aside from just being kind of incompetent, they also do just have a less-cohesive core and a large navy they can’t actually use against Goguryeo - but it would be foolish to say the game has already been won.

Cloudy:

Having just said that it would be foolish to say the game has already been won, only one out of ten rankers put Goguryeo anywhere other than first. With an empire that spans from Alaska to Arabia, from New Guinea to Novaya Zemlya, they’re undoubtedly the closest civ to the finish line. If they can push the Faroes out of the rest of the Old World, then that might be enough to be declared the victor all by itself. This time, their armies would be held up by Hsia—fingers crossed—and they will flow west to the Faroese border, in a clash that will determine the winner. Given how they just dismantled Singapore, I wouldn’t put much of anything past them. But never forget—in the last power rankings before the finale of Season 2, we ranked Marajoara first, and look what happened.