Shoey was blue, I was red. I started off pretty well, I had built a couple of juggs early and sent them over to shoey's side. I saw that he had a transport already and then proceded to demolish his foundry and shipyard. Because blue is the better spot on this map...I couldn't bombard his city from the coast. So I left him alone and encountered his transport...because I had 3 juggs, I managed to sink it. He built a few ballista to keep me away and I started working on my ground forces.

I knew that he had a peasant on the top island, so I decided to try and take it from him. But I messed up because I only sent 3 grunts to try and destroy is whole base. I managed to kill a lot of his peasants..but he had a barracks built and started a couple of towers. So I knew that I wouldn't be able to take it over with those guys. By this time...my mine was hurting so I sent some peons over to the bottom island to start my new base there.

Because he had all those ballistas, he could protect his new shipyard on one of the narrow straights. In hindsight...I probably should've tried to take it out...but oh well. So he eventually built another transport and sea forces.

Because the lab I play at doesn't have sound cards...I sometimes lose units because I can't hear the "we're under attack" message. I guess that's a decent trade for ethernet, since I'm usually really good about seeing the messages at the bottom of the screen. Anyways...Shoey managed to sink my 3 juggs without me really paying attention. I knew then that I was in real trouble.

Anyways...we attacked each other on and off for the next 1/2 an hour. Then I finally landed a transport full of ogres on shoey's main island. I was then able to destroy his farms, blacksmith, stables, and everything else. So I knew he would have to waste gold rebuilding them. Because the board is so small...there wasn't a whole lot of room to hide my transport, and shoey's 3 battleships had finally been able to destroy my shipmaking capacity. So at this point...I began thinking draw. So I spent the rest of my money building ogres on my main island.

At this point...I had guys on 3 islands. Shoey and I both had mined out the all the gold. The game doesn't end until one player loses all his buildings and all his peons. So we I dug in for defense and shoey planned his attack with his limited resources.

What turned out was he built a couple of ballistas to try and kill my guys from long range. But it didn't work so well and I was able to kill fend him off. Eventually...he did take over my main island but I had 5 ogres left on his island and a few on the bottom island. So when he finally took out the 5 ogres that were on his island...I believe he was down to 2 footman a knight and a couple of peons. At this point...I had 1 ogre and about 8 peons left. Neither of us had any gold...so this is all we had to fight with. Well...he sent in his 3 normal units and managed to kill everything except 4 peons, and they were all hurt. So he sends in his 3 healthy peons, and my 4 finally kill his 3, with only 1 left standing with 9 hit points!

At that point...it was all she wrote. Neither of us could kill the other, so we finally called it a draw. I have to admit, it wasn't the best played game on either end, both of us made a bunch of mistakes. But it was evenly played. It wasn't a fun game, but I think we both are better players because of it. I'm not sure how often draws happen in Warcraft 2, but this is the first time I've ever seen one. I hope its the last.

-Vermeer

So there we were. Vermeer and I, standing face to face on kchat. Last time we played, it was a team game, so I decided to take him out by building a barracks first and blitzing with footmen. It was high resources, Garden of War, so it was begging for me to punish him that way.

But such things are forgotten, as he and I square off again. I offer the challenge, he accepts, and we are suddenly transported to the warcraft 2 battle arena.

He chooses high resources, X marks the spot, one peon. I gulp and hold my breath.

Now, you see, I really hate X marks the spot. It's a level where I've been beaten once too many times. It's got those puny little gold mines of 25000 or so on the island you start with, and two other islands with mines of about the same amount. Ships are important, but the war is without debate, a rush to the second and possibly third islands in order to start a new town hall.

So, knowing this, I prepare for the worst, as my peons begin to build my town hall, farm, lumber mill, more farms and then shipyards and barracks and such. The importance of my shipyard is very high, so I send a pair of peons to build it, and a pair to build the foundry after that is done.

Soon my first transport is ready, and 3 footmen and 2 peasants are put aboard. I sail to the next island over (I started in left, so I go to the top). My troops land and begin construction of the new town hall, far inland to prevent bombardment.

The transport moves back, just in time to see a pair of juggernauts bearing down on my pathetic little naval base. As I don't have a smith, I am helpless to watch my shipyard be annihilated by the huge cannons of these warships.

Fortunately, I run a distraction with my transport, drawing Vermeer's attention, and he is caught up in chasing the transport long enough for me to finish my new town hall. I build a barracks quickly and begin to pump out peons. My original gold mine has since run out, so I am cautiously holding my breath as the peasants brigade begins to fetch the precious gold from my new mine.

I am just getting comfortable when suddenly a pack of about 5 grunts lands on my new island. My three footmen fight bravely, but are slaughtered without mercy. My peasants nearly suffer the same fate, but Vermeer decides to delegate one or two grunts to killing peons, and the remaining two to smash my barracks.

Fortunately, I was able to quick build a tower and upgrade it to a cannon tower before Vermeer destroys anything. The tower begins to fire and kills off most of Vermeer's remaining grunts. My barracks begins to produce footmen, and more peons are made, averting disaster, for now...

It must have been around this point when Vermeer started running out of gold because he sent no troops after me for a while, while I built a second tower and tried to upgrade. As the tower was about to finish, a small pack of ogres landed, and I was immediately assaulted. I began construction of a shipyard as the battle raged, and was nearly done. However, back at the base, the ogres were about to finish off the tower. I sent peons to repair the tower, but the ogres kept fighting back. Eventually, as the tower ran into its last few breaths of life, the guard tower finished, and killed off the last bits of the invading force. Mercifully, I exhaled.

At about this time, Vermeer was pummeling my main base with his juggs. I had just finished my foundry, and decided it was time to retake the seas. I build a battleship and hunted out his juggs. I killed one of them and severely wounded the other. The second battleship was out the gate and finished off his wounded jugg. Then I found a transport and killed it. I moved to position to bombard his coast, but there was strong resistance. As the sea battle raged on, it became clear that I was going to win, and eventually, I sent out a last pair of battleships to kill off his remaining shipyards. As I was about to finish his last shipyard, a submarine appeared. I, without flying machines, ran, and then guessed the position of the sub. It was sunk very quickly. I quickly moved to kill off his last shipyard, but by I noticed he had a transport. He moved away. We played cat and mouse with the transport until eventually he landed about 8 ogres at my main base. The main base was doomed. I had no forces left there, and I couldn't build them fast enough to stop the ogres.

I resolved to let the base die and killed off Vermeer's last transport, rendering him sea powerless.

And so it came down to the wire. I had sea control with two wounded battleships and a newly minted transport. He had ground control on three islands. His main base had about 6 ogres, and a few peons and the like. My former main base was now overrun with about 8 ogres. His second island had about 14 peons and one ogre. And he was stuck on his islands, with no money anymore.

But I had 6300 gold left. Unfortunately, I didn't have a stables, smith or lumber mill (they had all gone up in smoke), or any farms for that matter. I just had a barracks, two towers, a KEEP, and my ship facilities.

After bombing out my hearts content of any building in reach, I began to plan and calculate how I could possibly kill all his remaining ground units with 6300 gold, one ballista, one footman and one leftover knight, with a couple flying machines for help.

The calculations going through my head were boggling... Could I upgrade to a castle and build a mage? No, not enough money. Could I build a gryphon aviary and upgrade? No, not enough money. Could I build knights and ballistae? Maybe, but I need alot of skill. Unfortunately, without money, you learn to have skill.

So, I built a couple farms, killed off my peons, except for three, and built the lumber mill, smith and stables. I pumped out a couple knights, one ballista and two footmen.

On Vermeer's main island was the largest concentration of ogres. I put a ballista on the island, and with battleship cover fire, I tried to kill off as many ogres as I could. Unfortunately, he killed my ballista, sacrificing a couple ogres in doing so. I sent a second ballista, with a few supporting ground forces to help, and this time, the ballista caught about three ogres, and the remaining ogres killed off the ballista, but died at the hands of the knights, footmen and battleships.

One down, two to go.

I had at this point, only about 2 knights and 2 footmen left. Fortunately, Vermeer got ambitious and attacked my shipyard, I sent a battleship over and killed off the two ogres there. That left 3 on the island. I tried to lure the ogres into range, but I had to resolve to deploying my knights and footmen to kill the last three wounded ogres. My ground forces landed and killed off all three ogres, but I lost a knight and got my troops all wounded.

Two down, one to go.

Normally, one knight and two footmen can kill about 12-14 peons and one ogre, right? Well, they can, but this time the troops were wounded and the peons were bloodthirsty. I sent my troops in, and they slaughtered Vermeer's forces, the ogre died slowly, but the peons dropped everywhere. Soon the fighting stopped, and to my amazement, four of vermeer's peons still stood.

I had only three peons left, so I sent them in a transport and went for the all out blitz. They killed three of Vermeer's peons and left ONE SINGLE STUPID PEON WHO WAS ALMOST DEAD.

I searched and searched for ways to make one more ground troop, but was at a complete loss. We forced ourselves to a tie, and I could have won, except for one lousy stinking peon!

ARGH! But I think it was funny to imagine me running around, killing off ogres and whittling troops down, and it comes down to the wire. If I had so much as a single peon more, I would have won! Argh!

Oh well, so that was the first draw in IWL warcraft history. I think.

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Shoey