Conquer Club

The article in the show/hide box is my revised version of this article that I wrote for the Newsletter. It is approximately half as long (less than half actually) as the original. Many parts were deleted or altered and shortened from the original (very long) version.

I am basically posting this article for a new generation that might never read this if it is not reposted. This article represents my personal views and opinions on this strategy and all are free and welcomed to disagree with me if you wish and to let me know about it. =)

Thank You!

Trench Warfare, A New Way of Thinking. by Viceroy63

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What, exactly, do you mean by "standing army"? And what by "stack"? I thought I was following you, but I believe I've misunderstood some of the things you said. For example: "The stacks are now delegated to the position of a standing army in that Zone on TW games. It can not effect another zone or jump to another zone but must move around within it's adjacent regions one region at a time per turn." What does it mean? You can certainly move your stacks around if the reinforcement mode is Chained or Unlimited, regardless of the Trench setting. I think my misunderstanding is due to the term "standing army" being obscure to me.

LOL; Maybe I should not have edited so much then. I actually never thought that I may not have been descriptive enough and so I thank you for this opportunity to go into it more in details.

When I use the term "Stack" it is in reference to the type of game and game strategy that is being played. Stacks, or the Strategy of the Stacks, is used in regular non Trench games like the one's played by the SoC. Regular Escalating spoils games where the game can end in one round when the spoils trade is high enough to justify eliminating other players because of the position of the stacks is also just right. Stacks are normally more than one stack placed through out different parts of the game map.

A "Standing Army" is the term I use to describe the strategy to be used in the Trench games. Instead of a lot of stacks through out the entire game, in a trench game, I advocate the thought of creating just one single large stack or "A Standing Army." This strategy is not for the conquest of the world in a single turn because you can not conquer the world in a single turn in a TW game.

The purpose then of a standing army is to control, through threat of force, an area for your Standing army to continue to Grow in. Later on when the standing army is large enough to venture outward, Well that is where the real tactical and positional play comes into the game. But at first you simply want to control an area in order to build one single stack or a standing army and god help anyone who comes near your standing army. =)

Remember that TW games are a very long process of gradual expansionism. When ever I have seen players use the strategy of the stack to win a TW Game, it has always reminded me of a Bright Shiny Star. The Star that burns twice as bright last half as long. And so with the strategy of the stack in a TW game. The player may be able to suddenly expand his borders to an incredible area but never get that one region to eliminate that player. And in the end the Strategy of the Stack always reverts back to the strategy of the Standing Army in a Zone. Not to mention that the huge area gained is always lost to the other players who have and exert more power in those areas than the "bright and shiny star."

Eventually either the player that he was attempting to eliminate using the Stack method, gets away or another player ends up eliminating that color instead. But not having the reach to adequately eliminate a player in a TW Game means that all those stacks everywhere are a wasted development. Especially since a large enough Standing Army in the zone can wipe out the stacks there nearby.

As for the Standing Army moving around one region at a time, This is referring to attack mode and not Chained reinforcements. In Attacking other Regions in a TW Game you can only attack the adjacent regions from the original attacking region. You must then wait until your next turn to attack from the newly acquired region. Which means that moving your Standing Army into a new area for conquest is done one region at a time. That is the Slow and Gradual Expansionism part.

I hope I was more clear on the terms used and the strategy connected with those terms. I should have done so in the article but we don't always think of every detail at the moment. This is why the discussion thread is also here for. Thanks again for the question.

On another note; I think that I would like to form a team for TW games on large maps. Anyone interested should first be a person who likes to communicate thoughts and ideas especially during a team game. Also I would like for this team to be made up of participating SoC Students but I have nothing against any instructors who would like to join in and have fun playing on this team. After all, Instructors are people too. LOL. The purpose, first and foremost, is to have fun; While kicking Butt and winning games. LOL.


And another purpose of course, is to learn and study the strategies and tactics of Trench Warfare together.

Oh, that makes a lot of sense now. Thanks for a detailed explanation.

Thank you Universalchiro for pointing out to me that; No where in the article did I ever say where this strategy could be applied to. I fixed that in the article itself by stating that...

"The strategy discussed in this article is applicable to the Multi-player Standard Games with escalating spoils only."

This new statement is found just after the first Paragraph.

I guess that this is the revised, revised version.