Arena of Honor Season 2 Round 5 - Disaster on the horizon?

Still summer here on Westeros despite hearing Jon Snow keep saying that Winter is coming, guess he is watching a different weather channel. As you can guess its time for another [N0X] adventure on the plains of Arena of Honor. As you may remember from the last story, VERGO is still in Essos for that all inclusive vacation he paid with the gold he got from Cersei and this time one of our knights, Crystal was replaced by the one we call Mac II, a very strong knight in [N0X] rankings. Our leader has chosen 19:00 time for this battle as per usual and a while before the battle we sat on the table and started doing strategies. [N0X] team was coming after 2 really good rounds, where they scored 2 wins while they had military camps so the decision was a no brainer to go with the same strategy and hope its gonna work once more. For this round [N0X] joined green plains of House Greyjoy while on the other sides of the battlefield we had [WAO] joining Targaryen, [G2L] fought for Tyrells, [N2D] joined Starks, [NWL] got bribed by Lannisters and Baratheon was joined by [WxC] and [NW1].

After a quick spying on the other teams we noticed that Targaryen has a strong team and decided to keep an eye on their battlefield to see what they doing. Fight started with the opening of strongholds and [N0X] warriors rushed to occupy them and once the occupying time ended we went for cavalry military camps.

Everything seemed to work well, military camps were building altars being taken by our players until our NPC's attacked a Watch Tower that was occupied by the Targaryen's that did build infantry camps for this round and Shado was sure the attack will be a success but the Old Gods decided that today will not be our day and the disaster kicked in as soon as the npc's hit the Tower and instead of turning it to our side it remained occupied by the Targaryens. As soon as he seen this, Shado started sweating and this time wasnt from the outside temperature, knowing that counter usually wins the NPC fights he started brainstorming of why our cavalry NPC's couldnt win against infantry.

The [N0X] team started discussing as of why something that worked so well in the past 2 fights now it doesnt work at all, a few knights tried to figure out along with Shado as commander but nothing made sense and the fight continued with us losing basically every NPC attack. The catapults opened a few minutes later and what a surprise we couldnt win any attack on those either so by now the gap in points was widening and [N0X] was sitting on the last place. Shado tried scouting the catapults maybe they use a spear front formation and thats why our cavalry keep losing, but [N0X] scouts werent able to provide information about what formation the enemy uses.

It was now time for the City of Glory opening and Mac II our rally banner for this fight opened a rally so [N0X] can try and get the City so at least we recover some points. The attack was successful and we kept the City for a bit but a sped up rally from Targaryen's quickly took'it, not a good sight for [N0X] as it was a infantry rally and now the City of Glory was filled with infantry, while most of our knights main spears.

[N0X] knights tried a few more rallies but Targaryens led by Favofest were too strong and having all the catapults under their control ment that [N0X] had to withdraw and let them have the City of Glory. Once they occupied the City Shado noticed the points ranking and almost had a heart attack(a virtual one no worries), [N0X] only had 17.000 points and the NPC can't occupy any building Shado took a look on altars and noticed that [N0X] side had very few altars under their control and that was one of the cause of Greyjoy NPC were unable to be victorious in any of the fights. As [N0X] was on the last place and potentially losing 20 hard earned glory points, Shado suggested a stronghold swap from military camps to trading posts so at least [N0X] can get some points per minute and maybe climb a bit on ranking. The team members agreed and a swap was quickly done and the trading posts were built but not fast enough as [N0X] knights were tired towards the end of the fight and their troops didn't reinforce on time. [N0X] also proceeded on taking their altars back and points started to look better, we even moved up 1 rank to 5th place with a small chance of getting 4th and maybe not lose the glory points.

Shado and Leandra tried to rush [N0X] warriors into taking more buildings, offered drinks and treats at the end, even a bounty to be claimed if we get 4th but our swap was too little too late and we ended up not getting 4th. While the match was considered a disaster and some of the knights weren't happy [N0X] learned a bit from these defeats as they learn from the victories. What did [N0X] learn you might wonder? well first of all just building military camps and hoping its enough it won't work, specially if other houses build military camps too. Also learned that if a strategy doesnt work you don't stick to it, a quicker swap to trading posts on our side would've avoided the loss of glory points and avoid the storm. It was a harsh lesson but [N0X] will get up and dust of and be on the field for the next round for sure. See you all on the battlefield!