Stats are swinging back in your favour since *drumroll* ...The age of wonders began.
This post is actually going to be totally objective I'm sure that statement will be subject of derision from TD and some claims might annoy Apoc as well but i will lay it out as i see it.
TDr prepped wonders and as in all high cap servers stood in an advantageous position as those who had simmed thru the apoc onslaught suddenly wake up for the crown. I can remember and bore witness to the frustration in TD before the age of wonders began quite simply no one in the council had any solution for Apocas attacks. As it bore out as soon as WW hits you had an overwhelming advantage in both res delivery and favour casting, which you used to your advantage quite rightly. Prepping for wonders is key. I don't think in honesty the recent city takes bear up to anything more than Apoca throwing in the towel -not to be offensive but in reality the game is over from a fighting point of view and many players don't see the point in continuing to fight on in a server they have lost. I fully expect TD to take a lot more cities in the months til the server hits the red flag and apoc to take very few. you got a solid team of attackers in the expendables, all good gamers, most heavy gold users and all in Apocs midst.
It has been discussed here about AK leaving, in reality you did very well to recover. Not from a game point of view alone but it could of been a morale crusher, instead it appears to of motivated you. However it was no where near as big a loss as the dozen players that left to join the expendables then actively to join TD for the win. In reality I'm not sure those players would of made much difference in stopping TD winning if they had remained in apoc , their leaving was far more instrumental in causing a mass reorganisation of WW in apoc . I suppose the only way to equate it so it is understood by TD would be to phrase it so - If Ef, GM , Red, cosnuta and florin had all left because you wouldn't remove Michael Cook..then joined apoca what would of happened in TD?
Favor matters hugely in such a high alliance cap and thats where you had a huge advantage in both building and rebuilding winders. I never finished a server with a higher alliance cap than 100 and often you get 3 or 4 alliances going for WW, most of the time it is mainly about res delivery and i will admit the huge numbers here caught me by surprise . I would normally focus on res delivery from local cities as the most important key to building levels but having 250 odd players able to hit 500 secs off a wonder is massive.
Ok Apoc - hard task to reorganise after losing so many players but where we/they tripped up was ultimately in prep. I think i got sick of saying about the merges and how no one was really ready.I think mistakes were made in the choices of which wonders were focused on at specific times but ultimately losing WW cities is a massive failure and at apoc the tripping and over all defence of these cities has been poor. I always count losing any inactive as poor alliance work and as good as taking an active city , but to have in actives on WW islands and then not to trip them sufficiently is amateur. Perhaps Apoc got into the habit of attack always working and so unused to defending that when they had to they simply forgot basics. Anyway it is easy to say all this with hindsight.
Please don't think i am detracting from the TD victory i am not. Just for the sake of it i will say it again, you did very well.
However all this 'who is the better fighter' chat is getting out of proportion to the facts of the server.
1. best fighters pre WW - hands down Apoc
2.best fighters post WW TDr, its that simple and the stats bear it out.
With overwhelming odds, new players in the enemy midst, WW built and crown on the way and an enemy that for the most part has chucked in the towel i think anything less than a 7:1 ratio would be embarrassing.
Anyway i am offski lads as i am back to work on Tuesday and i want to spend a bit of time with my kids -it has been a bizarre pleasure. Good luck all.
