Civ Battle Royale April 14, 2026
Shaggysnorlax
100% organic, gluten-free CBRX. Now with more boats!
Hello, hello. Welcome one and all to another episode of CBRX Season 5! I am Shaggy, your somewhat opinionated narrator this week in addition to your perennial Power Ranker, Stonkmeister Emeritus, and Tlingit Defender. Thank you for your patience with this episode’s release, Coiot was abducted from the sub by some enterprising barbarian units last week and it took a doozy of a time to recover him and his trove of cylinder snapshots. But we are here now, so on with the show!
Our first OC this episode is courtesy of the illustrious Semiconscious. North America is a battleground now, pitting neighbor against neighbor. Many of us, me included, have civs we like on both sides of this kerfuffle. Will we see the big players duke it out or will the smaller proxies be forced to face the brunt of the chaos?
Our second OC this episode is this lovely comic from Orangechrisy. If Hyksos is one thing, it’s slow. Slow to settle, slow to build, slow to do much of anything other than spread their religion far and wide. No wonder (ha) their neighbors are doing everything Hyksos wants to do before they get around to it.
If you’ve seen it once, you’ve seen it a hundred times. Or at least twelve times this season. Do please donate to the Ko-Fi page to help support the server costs of running the site if you don’t see yourself on this slide and a very hearty thank you for your donation if you do. Coiot has been putting in some amazing work this season with the site features and supporter benefits, including dynamic supporter civs on the donor slide each week. Pomo is the default setting for completely unknown and random reasons but as a Tlingit fan (even though my supported civ here is France) I am compelled to encourage you to usurp the orange menace here with your donations and preference changes.
Vyatka wins the prize for most volatile ranking this week. Unfortunately for them, they did so by dropping a staggering 12 ranks, more than double anybody else’s rank delta save for Xaragua. Not only that but there were a wide range of opinions among the Power Rankers around how far to drop Vyatka’s rank after Scythia continued ripping through them like wet paper with some even dropping them into the 50s! Ioann Myshkin isn’t out for the count yet but the walls are closing in quickly. He’s been knocked back for centuries at this point, it’s time to make a stand lest Vyatka rolls over and dies on some slab of ice in the Arctic.
Cases of scolopendrophobia skyrocket in Nikolaevskoe and Iman as residents of both cities are beset on all sides by Rouran’s Wriggling Riders. “They’re everywhere,” the Green Ukranians shout, “and they have so many legs!” There does seem to be some interesting maneuvering that these ambulatory units are trying to pull off as they are not satisfied trying to besiege two cities but are also advancing on Zeya to boot. The lack of a complete blockade in either of the frontline cities allows messengers through to call for reinforcements but Yurii Hlushko has so overcommitted to raven hunting in the tundra that only sentries remain in Green Ukraine’s more temperate territory. He settles for peace treaties with Yunnan and Pegu to allow him to refocus on the pests within his lands. Off-screen, Luba declares a pair of nothing wars against a pair of nothing civs.
Rokside falls to Scotland one short turn after Sigtuna’s capture. Scotland’s dominance of the northern waters is now fully entrenched as no viable Kalmar navy remains to attempt to flip either city back. Stralsund quakes as the only remaining expeditionary settlement in the area independent of Scottish rule. “I assure you, we are benevolent rulers,” Mary’s missive reads, “look at the tapestry of ships we allow to sail around our rightful waters!” [Shaggy’s note: I do love how colorful this part of the map gets]
“Holy ship!” Scottish captains in the North Sea cry out as a Kalmar carrack approaches them from the east, “look at the size of that thing!” Whether the model size mismatch between carracks and triremes is diegetic or simply an artifact of the sub’s monitoring technology, they sure do look funny. Kalmar has another carrack sailing towards Ribe to try to clear the Scottish blockade and force the invaders back to their islands.
Across the Atlantic, Joseph Maria is invited to Coapite to witness a symbol of Karankawan greatness. Halfway through the journey, he begins to see the hull of a gigantic ship floating beyond the coastal road. It gets larger and larger as he approaches his destination and he begins salivating at the potential conquests he could use such a behemoth to accomplish. Upon arrival, he immediately meets with the shipbuilders responsible.
“Gentlemen, I applaud such a marvelous feat of engineering! Our enemies will see these from miles away and surrender at our might! What do you call this achievement?”
The shipbuilders look at each other, somewhat confused at their leader’s praise.
“A Dug-out, sir, but this ship is not for conquest. This was built as a work boat, you see, for fishing and such.”
“FISHING,” bellows Joseph Maria, “FISHING? We’re in the middle of a war! I want this ship outfitted for combat immediately!”
“That may take some time, sir, at least let us use it for the intended purpose first. Once we do that, it may be war-ready” the shipbuilders reply.
“Whatever it takes.”
On the journey back to his palace, Joseph Maria decides to barter for peace with Anishinaabe given the delays his idiot shipbuilders have muddied his mind with. Better to have fewer enemies for a civ so small.
Castel Gandolfo is recaptured by the Papal States and compensatory wheels of cheese are distributed to the few remaining citizens as a tentative air of optimism arises in the city. There are no Aures ships this side of Sicily and Castel Gandolfo enjoys a bit of breathing room. Papal units have also blockaded the island city of Arris, but there don’t seem to be enough units to maintain that for long.
Three civs have now settled on Greenland: Onondaga, Scotland, and Tlingit, with Karankawa angling to be the fourth once they find a suitable tract of land. None of these civs are currently at risk of being fully isolated on Greenland, but backup plans and launch points for transatlantic invasions are always welcome on the cylinder. Umhaill has two triremes looking on, wondering what could have been.
The Scythian evisceration of Vyatka (say that five times fast) continues as they steamroll mounted units into Kanjak Sangir. As the last remaining non-tundra city for Vyatka and their crowning military achievement, having taken it from the Kipchaks originally, the loss of the city would be a crushing blow to remaining Vyatkan hopes of dominance. To the north, Vyatkan prospects look equally gloomy. The Kipchak defenses of the Ural mountain passes around Ak have proven quite effective and the larger Vyatkan army has been whittled down and forced to the status quo of the natural boundary. In the midst of it all, a wounded Bangladeshi scout studiously notes these tactics in their logbook so their comrades back home can use their more familiar mountains better to their advantage.
A shot of the Herero and Maravi cores. This area of the cylinder has been relatively quiet for a bit as both civs recover from the earlier anti-Maravi coalition war. Notably, Herero is now fielding a few pikemen in their army, though their greater eagerness to train mounted units makes their pikeman usage a bit more limited. Perhaps that's what Jacob Morenga has been waiting for before trying to take Tete and Sena again. Maravi, on the other hand, looks largely unchanged from when we last saw them. Still forced up against the coast and still unable to do much. Off-screen, Estonia makes peace with Pegu and Ma’in, how nice.
Smoke billows from the farms and mills surrounding Iman as Rouran’s Wriggling Riders ravage the city’s resources. The persistent scritching at the city walls is taking its toll on the individual Riders but Rouran certainly has the waves of units available to brute force their way through the gates and into the city. The assault on Nikolaevskoe is slightly less impactful, they really should stop splitting their units. Green Ukraine seems largely uninterested in reinforcing either of these two cities; few of the units north of Avacha are moving south.
Karachi is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mindbogglingly big it is. The sheer scale of the population has forced Pakistan’s hand in their selection of government as there is no rule like the rule of the people. Pakistan becomes a republic and we get a shot of their literal mountain-sized cities. I’m not sure the exact math used to convert citizen count with stat sheet population but I’d hazard a guess that there are more people living in Karachi on this slide than there exist in entire civilizations on the cylinder. And the size of it makes you forget that their two other core cities each have at least 20 pops.
The Teotihuacan side of the Pomo Pincer has quieted down. Save for one Teotihuacano chariot and one Pomo swordsmen duking it out over the existing borders (for some Pomo general’s idea of a training exercise, I guess), you wouldn’t think these two civs are even at war with each other. Pomo has held onto its core, empty though it may be, and Teotihuacan still has to find a way to get more than a minor foothold onto the far bank of the Rio Grande.
Joseph Maria receives word of the Poncan invasion as the ink is drying on his freshly negotiated peace with the far-off Potiguara. “Even if those fool shipbuilders had made that behemoth pointy, it wouldn’t help against the Ponca,” he thought resignedly. Fortunately, a general is in position to sacrifice himself to take some Ponca land and try to help stymie the invasion. If only Joseph Maria could give the order…
Ka’tuuli falls to one of the two remaining Tlingit swordsmen in the area, pressing Pomo further south. The capturing units agree that it is an odd choice to have a city somewhere other than a coast but decide that being surrounded on 5 sides by rivers is a suitable compromise. Tlingit is also showing off some cool tech on this slide with a crossbowman doing an amphibious landing exercise and a pair of trebuchets at the edge of the shot. Anishinaabe are also showing up to the medieval era here with a pikeman, but their core is incredibly sparse and the units there seem more focused on development than defense.
Tlingit celebrates their conquest by declaring themselves to be a republic. Good for them! The Tlingit navy, though, seems like it may be frozen in place all the way up here, they really should be further down the coast if they want to be effective. Honestly, there are enough naval units here to take a city or two if they were coordinated. Are they toying with Pomo? Also of note in this shot, Itelmen’s city of Shantal is growing really well for a coastal Arctic city and we can also see Tlingit’s unique improvement, the Noow, just south of Tlakwaan.
A shot of the religion map. In the New World, Caral’s Pachaism is spreading throughout South America unimpeded with all of the other New World religions appearing to be spreading to their respective civs’ sphere of influence and not much further. Tlingit’s Sgáanang has crossed into Asia and has little competition along the Pacific coast with Bangladesh’s Shaktism commanding a sizable following but still remaining predominantly inland. Bunuba’s Ngarranggarni is taking over Oceania with only Cebu’s Anito (did you remember Cebu had a religion? I didn’t) and transplant religions on the geopolitical curiosity of Papua for competition. Ket’s Samanism is a huge reason why I’ve kept them in the top 3 in my own rankings and they are successfully spreading it throughout Eurasia but are now facing competition from the south by Shaktism and the rising tide of Pakistan’s Sunni. The European religions are similar to the North American ones in that they seem to be isolated to each of their founders’ spheres of influence for the most part. Notably, western Europe still remains predominantly atheistic as the only religion that seems to be anywhere close to being spread there is Hyksos’ Pesedjet, which is itself on a tear through Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, and has crossed the Mediterranean and converted the Pope. This would be a very different game if Hyksos spread their armies as far as they did their missionaries.
Speaking of religions, the Bjarmians reform theirs which means they’ve been wasting social policy selections on the piety tree. I get it, their religion asks of its followers to drink and smoke and party as hard as they can under the aurora at church-owned sites with priestly trip sitters and harm reduction aides. Also it’s cold all the time there and they aren’t winning too many wars so really what else is there to do up in Bjarmian cities all day long? We will get a shot of the beliefs screen later so I won’t dig into what their new belief is, but as long as we’re here we can also see that their war with Estonia is going nowhere and only seems to be damaging their frontline amphibious siege unit that is probably staffed with relatively pious soldiers.
Having learned some habits from their contact with Rapa Nui, Bunuba decides to settle a remote island off in the Pacific with seemingly nobody around. All was peaceful on the tropical paradise until an errant Lanfang trireme stumbled upon them and crashed against their shores. The small population of Danggu fought back valiantly against the invading ship with minimal casualties ashore. The ship, on the other hand, limped feebly off the coast with sails tattered and oars splintered, the crew unsure whether to commit to the attack or begin the long voyage home to rest and recover.
So much for quiet. Herero declares a massive war against Luba and begins marching troops towards Kabongo and the Luba capital of Katende. The tech disparity may prove to be pivotal to this war as Herero is on pikemen while Luba is only on spearmen. Still, Herero’s army is largely composed of mounted units on the front lines so we may see a larger clearing of units in a century-long meatgrinder rather than full-on city captures here but there are so many of them that they may be able to overcome the penalty.
A daring Pomo swordsman recaptures Ka’tuuli, though there are more than enough Tlingit units in the area to flip the city back. The next closest Pomo swordsman is on the wrong side of Maka’hmo so the city may remain in Tlingit hands should they flip it back again. The Tlingit crossbowman is still afloat on the lake, it must be a nice posting for the time being.
HOLY SHIT, ZAZZAU IS DOING SOMETHING, ALERT THE MEDIA! Zazzau declares war on Ethiopia in an audacious bid to return to relevance. They open the war by plopping down a citadel on the outskirts of Gondar and look to immediately apply pressure. They are falling into the classic trap of splitting their units, unfortunately, as horse and spearmen advance on both Adama and Mek’ele. Focus up, Amina, this is your shot! Ethiopia has been looking stagnant for a hot minute and you’ve got such a nice buildup here compared to their token defense forces. Any one of these cities would be a massive prize for Zazzau and their beleaguered prospects, there’s no use biting off more than they can chew.
As the battle cry of the final Japanese invader wails out, Nikolaevsk-Ussurisky falls to the red but holds. There are no invaders remaining within the city’s borders, they have all been defeated or pushed back to Hiroshima or the sea. Japan has well and truly botched this war, if they were ever committed to it in the first place. Hiroshima remains as a beachhead for later attempts but continuing this attempt would be folly. At the edge of this shot, we see Iman still smoldering as their wriggling nightmares continue and the city walls tremble on the edge of collapse.
Ateas burns a fat one down as a Scythian flag rises above Kanjak Sangir. This is pure dominance. Vyatka has been reduced to scrapping at tundra while Scythia now spans from the Urals to just shy of the Balkans. Further waves of Scythian horsemen advance on the next layer of Vyatka’s cities, including their capital. So long as happiness doesn’t become an issue, a problem that I assume Ateas has a big enough supply of the top-shelf green to stave off, there is nothing stopping Scythia from continuing to take everything Vyatka holds dear. I have no hard evidence of this, but it also looks as though the Kipchaks may be starting to get some of their mercenaries back.
Here on the other side of Scythia (they’re so wide now), Hansa is guiding a significant number of catapults through the forest towards Turnu. Wallachia is nowhere near pikemen and seems to have had its armies thinned out already. For all intents and purposes, Hansa should be able to take this city but competence hasn’t been the name of the game in this part of the cylinder for a while. Scythia casts a large shadow over the region with a seemingly fully capable attachment of units at the ready, like they aren’t even needed to dismantle Vyatka.
Ket has activated their Arctic fleet and captured Glazov with ease while bringing Zyuzdino-Afanasyevskoe to the red. Shestakov looks to be an easy target next for Ket. Vyatka continues to utterly collapse under the weight of the giant snowball rolling down from the north.
A beautiful shot of Caral’s core, Yanomami’s inland cities, and half of Xavante. Large parts of the Amazon have been cleared by now, hopefully making this part of the cylinder a bit more interesting. Caral benefits from unclearable rough terrain in the form of the Andes, so it will still be a hefty task for Xavante to push through towards significant gains, whenever the war starts. Caral and Yanomami are both concentrating their units in one direction, northwest for Caral and west for Yanomami, which gives the appearance of a pretty sparse military. Xavante doesn’t have the territory to look sparse and their units are almost stacked on top of each other. Maybe a war will clear some of them out.
A quick twitch of the camera north for a clearer shot of Yanomami. I really do like this unit placement. Xavante and Potiguara are the only threats and capturing Cholula from Teotihuacan means that Yanomami doesn’t really need to allocate much for defending the north. Xaragua has those big beefy carracks, but it’s Xaragua, when has anybody really been afraid of them?
Vlad fails to impress his guests at Thanksgiving this year after burning the turkey and having nothing to show for it. He had wanted to do an impressive skewered turkey recipe that he saw online and had thought it looked pretty doable, but he drastically overestimated his abilities with a stake. Sidon’s tiles are well and truly pillaged but the city itself doesn’t have a scratch on it. The notable lack of any wounded Wallachian units in this shot is a testament to how little Wallachia committed to this war. Ismail Berzeg’s horsemen look on hungrily. Perhaps they will be the ones to carve the bird.
Hansa gets points for historicity and builds the Hofburg Palace. Fine, that’s technically Austrian IRL but this is the Germanic civ we’ve been dealt. Hofburg Palace doesn’t really help out much towards the objectives of the CBR game mode but what it lacks in mechanical benefit it more than makes up for in flavor. This wonder actually establishes a unique Holy Roman Empire government from the governments mod. Now, Hansa is none of those things, but from now on the Hanseatic League shall be known as the Holy Roman Hanseatic Empire League. I wonder what the Pope will have to say about that…
The Elephantarches may have the brawn, but now Bactria is pairing them with the brain of Cao Cao, the notorious schemer. Sarepta’s walls remain untouched and Demetrius wants answers. Whatever yarn Cao Cao may spin for Demetrius, the real reason why is that this is an ill-conceived invasion in the first place, the city is deceptively difficult to attack from the east with only a single lake tile to attack by water and a single cross-river tile to attack from on land. Phoenicia has quite the chokepoint here. I think Sarepta remains Phoenician in this war only thanks to the natural barriers, there definitely aren’t enough units to properly defend the city if Cao Cao plots an encirclement.
Circassia’s assault on Campulung continues with the city dropping to about half health. Ismail Berzeg is filling the Black Sea with land units and one would hope that he realizes he should clear landing spots for them to actually be useful in the battle. Wallachia, ever the puzzler, is only sparingly filtering units up here to replenish the defending force. They may be repelled by the combination of cannabis and manure odors wafting down from the veritable Scythian horde that has amassed around Kremnois. They could do more damage than just being stinky.
Ma’in peaces out with Mysore and, more importantly, Ethiopia. Ever the scrappy underdog, Ma’in is still trying to find ways to get some breathing room and the peace with Ethiopia may come at a good time. I see two settlers out for Ma’in and there are actually places to put them! Doubling their city count won’t get them back into the game on its own but it beats watching Ma’in die a slow, painful death out in the desert. Also of note here, Phoenicia seems to have forgotten that land units are important and is instead focusing on pumping out as many Biremes as the Red Sea can fit. The Sumerian army that is aimlessly wandering the desert would be more than enough to take advantage of the opportunity and chunk out a part of Phoenicia.
The Pope loses his summer home of Castel Gandolfo to Aures once again and the citizens of the city have their compensatory cheeses looted by the invaders. To make Papal matters worse, Avignon teeters on the edge of conquest as well. There is very little navy left for the Pope to keep duking it out in the Mediterranean. I’m not sure Aures will lose its grip on either of these cities, though I shouldn’t count Avignon as an Aures city just yet.
Is that… is that Hyksos declaring a war? Hyksos doesn’t do things, don’t be silly. Hyksos and Phoenicia declare war on Vyatka together in one of the more disappointing war declarations I’ve seen. Useless and symbolic war declarations are a dime a dozen, sure, but I’ve been hoping that Hyksos would figure out that their way back into the game is to invade the kneecapped Phoenicia. Instead, they seem pretty buddy-buddy and are now futile war friends. Hyksos is picking the wrong friends and the wrong enemies. Ugh, disgusting.
Wassoulou may have been granted a reprieve by Aures but Portugal knows that it needs to kick someone while they’re down to get things done in the battle royale. A small but competent pod of triremes threatens to make off with Ad Medias while military units of all sorts continue streaming down the coast to test their mettle against the walls of Odienné. With Odienné on half health and a cursory defense being mounted, Portugal looks very confident. That confidence is possibly leading to some incompetence. Someone decided it might be a fun prank to send a settler to the front. Really funny, guys.
As anticipated, Ket begins attacking Shestakov. They seem to have forgotten to actually capture Zyuzdino-Afanasyevskoe before moving on, though. Maybe Lysander will help those troops focus on the war objectives. Glazov is providing a useful passage to keep the pressure up and the entire Arctic Ket navy is pouring through the narrow waters to attack. Vyatka, seeing the writing on the wall, decides to try and fortify their position further back. Two workers have been toiling to construct forts so that nobody can desecrate the holy site on the outskirts of Osinovets. Good luck, this is the border of the two religions’ territories, even with every consecration known in Vyatka I don’t expect those forts to withstand the holy wars that will likely be fought there soon.
In a bid to continue mirroring Susquehannock’s every move, Onondaga declares war on Karankawa and moves a navy over to Karankawa’s northern backup plan cities to get themselves a piece of the action. Early on this season, I would consistently mix up Onondaga and Susquehannock given their similar colors, positions, actions, and general mid-ness. I’ve gotten better at telling them apart but the AI just wants to torment me with this mirror match. We won’t see it up close, but the Pope has once again reclaimed Castel Gandolfo and reminded me to shut up about not seeing boats that aren’t massive and right in front of my face.
Joseph Maria, meet Adam Duncan, the freshly minted Susquehannock great admiral that is assisting with the naval assault on Copano. Karankawa is really being taken apart with these wars. Every single one of their cities beyond their immediate starting area is at risk. They really should use their apparently competent diplomats to call on one of their more powerful friends for help to get them out of this jam.
The Caribbean is full of carracks. Xaragua is sporting an impressive fleet and Yanomami is showing that they too have unlocked the secrets of building ships the size of cities. The Yanomami retrofitting effort is further behind than that of Xaragua so a small window still remains for Xaragua to use the under-the-radar tech edge that they’ve been building. Teotihuacan doesn’t seem to have carracks yet, so Xaragua still has some edge in the region. Xaragua just needs to commit to a buildup and deployment. I know how tall of an order that is but I always enjoy rooting for a Caribbean underdog.
Kalmar redoubles their forces up in the chilly waters and gives Aberdeen a walloping. The city looks poised to be subject to a watery flip-fest with both competing civs bringing significant navies to the area. Scotland is creatively slowing down the southern Kalmar carracks through the strategic sacrifice of some triremes, thus buying time for ships out of Dundee to make their way over to reinforce the defenses and try to reclaim some of the surrounding tiles around Aberdeen. That or Kalmar has intercepted a poorly conceived backdoor invasion of Aarhus. Very effective deception, Mary.
With civil service researched, Cebu now has unlocked their unique unit, the Timawa. This is a pikeman replacement that starts with the amphibious promotion and gets a temporary combat strength boost when it pillages an enemy tile, which it does for free. Knowing Cebu, they’ll declare war on someone in the next few turns just to try these guys out. [Shaggy’s note: I did this slide before realizing that it is almost identical to slide 55 from last episode. No idea why we get to double dip on Cebu’s UU but I don’t pick the slides]
Samori Ture mourns the loss of Ad Medias and the imminent loss of Odienné. Portugal has applied enough pressure to crack Wassoulou once again and forces them back to their rumped core. It has been an expected but still sad collapse for Wassoulou. Once Aures finishes rebuilding their military, I’ll get my F key ready.
“Hey man, but, like, what if I was the Pope too? But not like a regular Pope. Like a cool chill Pope.” As odd as it sounds, Scythia has had a Catholic Reformation. Scythia is in the medieval era so they definitely have access to better policy options than the piety tree. We now have reformed Catholicism in eastern Europe, a somewhat historically accurate Holy Roman Emperor, and a Cheese Pope in Rome who follows Set. What a world. Khlynov begins to take damage as the last of the defensive Vyatkan units are thinned from the city.
The flipfest begins as Kalmar successfully captures Aberdeen but probably won’t hold it for long. The Scottish gambit to the south has paid off, delaying Kalmar carrack reinforcements and isolating the ships that had already committed to invading. This should allow Scotland to reclaim and reinforce Aberdeen cleanly enough to try to peace out with the gains they’ve already made in this war.
You probably saw the notification earlier but Seychelles has built the Itsukushima Shrine. The info sheet only has this wonder ranked as a 5/10, but I think this is a great pickup for Seychelles in particular. The wonder gives an experience bonus to both land and sea units built in the city, the amphibious promotion for all land units, and additional faith on sea resources. Anse Boileau is one of their core cities that I expect will be pumping out units to take advantage of the bonuses and we’ve already seen how much France-Albert loves having his land units perform amphibious invasions. It isn’t a game-wrecker but a leg up is a leg up and Seychelles is working those gams.
A break from the action to check out the new reformation beliefs. Scythia picks up sacred sites. I’m sure they have more than a few places picked out with all that land they’ve taken from Vyatka.
The holy Bjarmian trip sitters have had one too many devotees ask them just why they all need to party so hard, not that they’re complaining. To help dissuade the questioning in the first place, Bjarmian theologians have come up with an elegant solution. Ragnarok is coming, so we must enjoy all we can while we can. Followers process the revelation in different ways, but most find comfort in their faith that the bottom of a tankard is a better place to find oneself than the bottom of a grave.
The Bjarmian faith runs deep. Though military units are built and deployed, Hárekr wonders whether there is some way to allow them to party instead of fight. He vows to negotiate for peace and exotic herbs and wines so that all Bjarmians, military or civilian, can enjoy the fruits of this life. His people laud him and name him Hárekr the Diplomat.
Zazzau’s invasion force evaporates and Adama and Mek’ele hold fast. Adama has been thoroughly pillaged but the damage is superficial at worst. Mek’ele is being swarmed by horsemen but remains intact. There were way more Zazzau units around last time we looked at them. Those cities are pretty strong, maybe Amina’s eyes were bigger than her stomach.
Bunuba flaunts their scientific might and shows us what I believe are the first knights on the cylinder this season. After equipping the horses and their riders with plate armor, Bunuba does the obvious thing and sends them out to patrol the coast. No way that’ll go wrong. Their war with Ternate continues as a trickle of triremes bring Dodinga down to the black in a bid to regain a foothold on Papua like one of the cool kids. Pegu also declares a symbolic war against Pomo because they believe that they are the one true four-letter civ with a name that starts with P.
Down goes Odienné. Portugal now is one cheeky citadel placement shy of controlling the entire Atlantic coast from Iberia to the Sahara. They have responded to the claustrophobia of their starting location admirably and I would call this a true breakout for them. Not only will Portugal now be able to develop this core group of cities here, but this region may also prove to be a productive shipbuilding engine for future Mediterranean and Atlantic conquests.
Phoenicia realizes that they were feuding with the wrong bottom-feeder civ and declares war on Ma’in while peacing out with Pegu. So much for that breathing room for Ma’in that I was waxing about earlier. They did manage to settle Manhiyat but it will almost definitely get surrounded by Biremes before being able to develop into anything usable for Ma’in. The Phoenician strategy of letting Ma’in settle up and down the Red Sea for them and then just taking the cities later is really working out. As always, Hyksos watches silently.
If you want an example of the difference between intelligence and wisdom, look no further than Bunuba. Despite being the first civ to figure out how to cover a horse and rider with metal and equip them with better weaponry, they learned the hard way that the best thing to do with this invention is to then sail them off into the ocean. Bunuba decides to analyze the data more on their own time and negotiates peace with Lanfang. Dodinga still remains infuriatingly in the black and uncaptured.
The citizens of Iman have endured a full century of infestation but have not given up hope. The walls have been thinned enough to hear the scurrying of numerous feet patrolling for escapees but they do still hold. There are rumors that an army is returning from the campaign against Itelmen to drive out the invaders from Iman’s outer settlements. “Learn from the bird, eat the bug” becomes a rallying cry for the people.
The ever-reticent Ponca have advanced into Karankawan territory with enough units to clear out Karankawa’s land forces should they be so inclined. Susquehannock also commits a group of units to move on Coapite but between the chariot archers and the ancient era warrior that is somehow still moving and grooving this may be more of an economic move. For those of you who have also been trying to find Karankawa’s behemoth Dug-out, I’ve been scouring the last couple slides here to find it and I think Joseph Maria has resigned himself to stashing it in one of Carancahua and Coapite to avoid drawing attention to its size.
I… what… how… HOW??? Wassoulou recaptures both Ad Medias and Odienné on the same turn using two incredibly daring swordsmen. Unless Samori Ture has been taking night classes at the Tang School of Diplomacy, both cities will almost definitely flip back but the sheer cojones of pulling off a heist like this is impressive.
Cao Cao’s explanations as to why the invasion of Sarepta has stagnated don’t sit right with Demetrius and as he stews over them he begins to distrust his advisers more and more. “Why concentrate my power to only be subject to the interests of a few untrustworthy attendants?” he muses to himself, “what is Cao Cao but a man?” And then an idea occurs to him: drown out the schemer’s influence by introducing more voices into the chorus. Demetrius declares Bactria to be a republic and sits back, satisfied in his decision but still completely forgetting to remedy the Sarepta situation.
The French invasion of the Papal States has a few Alps in the way that make moving an army a difficult task. Few units make it through the unforgiving mountain passes while under fire from Papal arrows and those that do are further slowed by the hunger that the soldiers experience when inhaling the delicious, pungent cheese smells hanging in the air around Benevento. The smells are so entrancing that they distract the entirety of France from realizing that there are far better targets to attack. Inverness is still inexplicably Scottish and the Holy Roman Hanseatic Empire League is almost completely devoid of units. Must be some damn good cheese.
Japan is trying again with their assault on Green Ukraine by blockading Vladivostok with a small group of triremes and nothing else. There is no buildup in Hiroshima to fall back on if this fails. That being said, there is a grand total of one Green Ukrainian ranged unit available to harass those ships so whether Japan’s plan is successful will hinge on the pure strength of their ships up against the walls of Potential Civ’s capital. Yurii Hlushko realizes that Vyatka is in a similar position of simply not having any units around and having their cities get continually surrounded and chooses peace.
WOW! It looks like Vyatka is just giving up on its capital. An apparent buffer zone has been enforced around the capital trying to protect units assigned to defend cities further north from being trampled under the hooves of Scythia’s relentless horsemen. Khlynov is almost completely surrounded and has already begun to take damage. No matter how many horsemen a Vyatkan military unit can stave off, the horses just keep coming. Morale is low among Vyatkans as the political center starts to shift north towards areas where the hope for peace still remains, even if it means scratching out a meager existence in the cold Arctic wastes. Morale among the chronically baked Scythian horsemen, however, is as high as they are.
Zazzau continues to prove their incompetence as they not only split their units between their two Ethiopian targets but also position them between the two cities such that they are being continuously harassed on both sides. But what’s this? A horn sounds over the dunes as a trio of Zenata Riders appears. “We represent the Queendom of Aures and the People of Pakistan, we share in your struggle,” the leader of the Riders states to an injured Zazzau horseman. The cavalry has arrived, albeit not much cavalry. As always, Hyksos watches silently.
Well that explains why the Holy Roman Hanseatic Empire League has so few military units, they crashed them all into Wallachia’s accumulation of chariot archers like how a kid crashes their toy cars together to see which is the strongest. Much like the toy cars, both armies are chipped and worse for wear after the impact. And much like the joyous kid, the Holy Roman Hanseatic Empire League just doesn’t know when to stop. Turnu has been bombarded down to half health but only a handful of Hanseatic melee units are still around to be able to take the city. A group of Scythian missionaries begins proselytizing westward and has a confusing encounter with an injured pikeman who identifies himself as fighting for the Holy Roman Hanseatic Empire League despite hailing from a predominantly atheistic city.
Herero has had enough of Maravi continuing to take up space along the coast and decides that they would be better stewards of the southern edge of the continent. Horsemen descend on Tete from all sides, including from the sea. “They’ll never see it coming,” Jacob Morenga boasts, ignoring that the unit will most likely just be sacrificed in the name of looking cool. A ton of faith has been placed in his cavalry to do the bulk of the dirty work with almost all of Herero’s ranged units having been sent to the northern front to face off with Luba. The citadel that Herero used to cut Tete off should prove helpful as well.
Herero has not made much progress in their war against Luba. The Line is doing a good job of providing too many targets for the invaders and reinforcements have been able to come from the north to maintain The Line. Kabongo is getting tickled by a couple of units but on the whole this war is going nowhere fast.
Kilmarnock, a Scottish backup plan city, falls to the Kalmar Union. Colloquially, the city is now referred to as “Kalmarnock” aboard the carracks in the city’s port. I do admire when two civs can put aside their differences and resolve their border gore. Linlithgow should be up next.
Karankawa settles the most backup plan of backup plan cities as Ebahamo is founded on the edge of the map along the far side of Greenland. Its sole warrior defender bundles up and hunkers down with a good book, there is little else to do here. With most of their other northern expeditionary cities now under threat, Joseph Maria breathes a sigh of relief with the knowledge that at least one of those life rafts will float between the borders of a friend and those of civs largely indifferent to his plight on the mainland. Sailors aboard the Umhaill triremes off the coast are trapped between three different civs and keep pinging off of the borders so much that it looks to them like the aurora borealis has fallen to Earth.
Potiguara mounts their third attempt at taking a piece of Xavante, putting it on a stick, and grilling it. Xavante has had nothing to do since the last war but prepare for this inevitable repeat and has a full carpet on hand to replace the trees they’ve cut down. Potiguara has been far slower than Xavante in clear cutting forests and jungles within their borders, one wonders whether that’s because they can simply see through them with their unique ability. They will need to learn that military units and light are not similarly mobile and to make some decisions around the possible trade-offs of clearing movement paths if they don’t want Xavante to pepper them with arrows as they march through the woods.
It has been a hot minute since we’ve gotten a good shot of Umhaill’s core. There are a whole lot of triremes and Umhaill is filling their borderlands with units, but even with Scotland looking as empty as it does I don’t know if Umhaill has enough oomph to do much to those core cities. The paper company that they orchestrated a hostile takeover of is proving to be one of Umhaill’s crowning achievements and their citizens endlessly ruminate and rehash its events.
Campulung holds and holds well under the command of Charles Martel. Chuck knows a thing or two about sitting an army right in the way of an invading force and daring them to try to get through you, he should do just fine here. Vlad declares a symbolic war against the coalition enemy du jour, Ethiopia, to celebrate the appointment of his new general. Across the Black Sea, Ismail Berzeg is spending too much time looking at maps rather than practicing maneuvers given that his battle plan is “send everything straight at them” with little regard for the large body of water in between his troops and their destination. I get that he might not want to commit to building a navy in the Black Sea if this is basically the only time it would be helpful but c’mon man, you’ve got to adapt a little! Up to the north, we can see chipped pieces of toy car littered around Turnu
Ok, be honest, who else forgot Cebu was already at war with Pomo? On paper, Cebu vs Pomo looks like a diplomatic ploy. There’s a big complex war raging in the New World with enemies on all sides, it’s understandable why a belligerent civ in the Pacific might want to make some friends across the ocean for later in the game. But Humabon was off sailing during his lectures at the Tang School of Diplomacy and says “fuck paper, paper never took a city”. He does what he does best and sends an armada of triremes to Hawai’i led by a great admiral. This is a substantial enough force to take at least one of these cities. If they can focus their strength they might even be able to take them all!
Lennart Meri has heard about other leaders finding success by doing things in straight lines and tries to overcome his earlier failures by sending a line of triremes to take Vassa. Two of them aren’t even in melee range of the city but the superstition is strong and the line must be maintained. To the north, a stalemate seems to have been reached with the Bjarmians. Thankfully for Estonia, the Bjarmian units keep getting lost in the forest for some reason.
The Susquehannock invasion of Copano has been vanquished and the citizens enjoy an exquisite day on the beach without a single ship in the sea from their vantage point. The Susuehannock/Ponca invasion of Coapite is proceeding largely unhindered on the other side of the Gulf. We do now have confirmation that Karankawa is successfully hiding their still-unequipped Dug-out in port at Coapite but the port has been blockaded so there is no way for the shipbuilders to test out any modifications they may have made to the monster that they created. Further off in the Caribbean, smoke rises from Mamey.
As a Teotihuacan fan, it has been really awful seeing them totally flubbing in this war against Pomo. All the pieces were in place: the targets, the production centers, the units, the invasion routes, everything. But nooooo, we just get to watch them patrol their borders on the mainland and be too timid to send any invasion force up the coast. If they get anything out of this war, it will be from a swindle of a peace deal.
…I don’t want to talk about that notification on the sidebar.
Old Sheehays is on a tear taking Karankawan cities. Caoque falls leaving Kouyam and that one Greenland city as the only remaining backups that Karankawa still has. Kouyam should be easier to defend than Caoque as the terrain creates a natural funnel that can only fit one Susquehannock ship at a time. To the north, a sequence of Onondagan missionaries and inquisitors stream onto Greenland to ensure that the chosen Onondagan people know that they are.
Wassoulou pulls off yet another swordsman heist and reclaims Ad Medias. The city is really living up to its name as the nexus point of this tug-of-war. Noticing a spit of sand that hasn’t been claimed yet, Wassoulou also sends a settler out into the Sahara, well away from the dangerous Portuguese on the coast.
Cebu reminds us all to put some respect on their name and captures both Koi and Kula’napo from Pomo. Not only have they almost entirely avoided casualties, but they did it without even getting the full strength of the armada into position. At this rate, they may complete the hat trick and take the Big Island by the end of this sentence.
Scotland recruits Ivan the Terrible in Inverness. The most terrible thing he could do is to turn himself into a citadel abutting Paris. Robespierre does not take kindly to the news. “Terrible? What, does he think this is some sort of game? I’ll show him terrible!” He storms off, lost in his own world.
Well the cavalry did arrive, just the wrong cavalry. Supporting troops are marching westward from the Ethiopian core to swat away the flies buzzing around their desert outposts. Mek’ele looks to be more secure while Adama sits at half health thanks to the combined attacks of Aures and Zazzau. As always, Hyksos watches silently.
For all intents and purposes, Ad Medias is the CBRX equivalent of the Fabergé egg central to the plot of Ocean’s 12. Samori Ture thought he was being sneaky and clever with a solo master thief performing superhuman feats of dexterity to break in and claim Ad Medias but in fact João’s plan all along was to ensure that he would get the city for himself and not put it in a position to be stolen at all. Apparently heist movies are a part of the curriculum at the Tang School of Diplomacy. For those of you who have no idea what I’m talking about, João takes back Ad Medias in a peace deal steal.
The walls fall and Rouran units scurry down the streets as Iman is overrun after a long, hard siege. Green Ukraine opted to use their scant defense force to make a stand in Nikolaevskoe rather than try to rescue Iman. The two settlers in Zeya are a further sign that there is a mentality among Green Ukrainian leadership that land is cheap and everywhere. Why bother defending something when you can settle elsewhere? They may soon learn a harsh lesson that there may not be many elsewheres to go.
Bunuba still wants a piece of Papua for themselves and moves on to Quellón after a dreadful peace deal with Ternate. Against all odds, the amphibious knight strategy has kind of worked and Bunuba has one knight in position to attack the city with another on the way. Three Bunuban settlers also make their way out to spread themselves across the islands of the Pacific.
“It’s a tough task fishing in the Caribbean these days. Back when I was a lad, you’d have your dinghy and you’d throw a line or two out and wait for a bite and the military would have their ships and they’d just move right on by and you could enjoy the day. Nowadays you can’t cast a lure without it bonking off the side of one of those mammoth’s they have sitting out there, just taking up space, blocking the sun, scaring the fish. They never do anything with them anyways. Might as well have them sail around and have them be other people’s problem, I don’t care, leave me to my catch.”
A Ket composite bowman stands at the edge of the world contemplating the journey. He knows that his trek north from Verkhoshizhemye was just an afternoon stroll compared to the distances he will soon cross. He knows there is someone just like him standing on the edge of each freezing peninsula on either side of him contemplating similar distances. He knows that there have been many who have gone before and many on the road behind him yet to come. He readies himself to embark, following the path that countless bowmen have followed ahead of him. The path through Glazov. “This is better,” he reminds himself, “otherwise we’d have to traverse the mountains.”
Castel Gandolfo is brought back under Papal rule once more and what remains of the Papal fleet has routed the Aures ships that have been bothering them for ages. There is joy in the streets, there is much eating and throwing of cheese, the people have hope that this time the peace will last.
Ponca has mobilized a sizable column of troops to the Gulf Coast, effectively cutting off all land routes between Carancahua and Coapite. Susquehannock has also reconsolidated their forces and are marching on Coapite from the east. They have heard rumors of some legendary Karankawan ship that dwarfs the very city it was built in and want to see it for themselves. “You can’t hide it forever,” the soldiers shout as they batter the walls of Coapite.
Trumpets blare, the crown is placed, and Old Sheehays declares himself king as this episode comes to a close. The Susquehannock core is well-developed and has units in all the right places. The Appalachians provide a reliable boundary from Onondaga and there are settlers at the ready should a suitable island be found. Old Sheehays sits happily on his throne, it is good to be the king.
And that’s all the slides I have for you. Sorry we didn’t get to see much of east Asia, I think the barbarians that kidnapped Coiot may have taken those shots from the packet. Thank you so much for reading and thank you to the dev, production and power ranking teams, and the community for doing everything that you do!
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