Champion City Siege is one of the oldest and most popular tournaments in Westeros. Since the very first days of its existence, the mightiest warlords of Seven Kingdoms were doing their best to get champions' crown and valuable rewards coming together with it. Now we are going to witness the 59th season of the event and a grand battle over Scarlet Palace between N3O consisting of RoD and BTa fighters, R4V consisting of NWB and VME warriors, KUM alliance and some other contesters. 

Once a month almost everyone who is eager to fight waiting for the beginning of Champion City Siege and inhabitants of k48, mostly belonging to BTa alliance, are big fans of the tournament. For the last 2 years we haven't missed a single CCS as our strongest rally leader CrimsoNDawn also previously known as Alatunn is one of those who is strong enough to fight for Champions’ crown and our group managed to assist our champion to get 1-2-3 places many times. It is always a good day when we have Champions City Siege and it becomes even better if we get one three top spots 😀 but even if not we are never upset if we lost in battle - tomorrow will be a new one and we will try once again. 

The 59th season came “suddenly” as our alliance, BTa, was fully focused on the Siege of Winterfell and we finished just 15 points away from playoffs so it could be a good chance to win if not one than another. On Saturday Old Gods released results of CCS kingdoms matchmaking and it came out that we got a pretty interesting battle ahead. First of all we found 2 RoD groups led by our friend B3nni – those are we could forge an alliance with for CCS but also there were a few good enemies to fight. There was a big group of NWB led by strong mostly infantry rally leader KING BELIAL on k70. Another opponent was the VME alliance led by formidable bowman warlord MondryBogdan and assisted by infantry warlord Vernei on k441.  And the cherry of the pie was well-known to CrimsoN tough cookies from KUM alliance: Nachu, Syakiri, MASAO and the rest core fighters of their alliance stationed on k87

It wasnt hard to make a deal with our friends to join forces and try to get Scarlet Palace together with all rewards but one thing is to make a plan another is to make it real 😂. Even we clearly saw we had some advantage over our opponents some unexpected guests can always join your matchup last minute and balance of of forces can get changed another problem was that previous month our team of BTa had one of the bloodiest CCS ever where we took 2nd place but lost most of infantry troops in the process. Of course, the old duke ordered the retraining of troops and a month is a lot of time but still recovering even most of the losses cost us a good amount of resources and accelerations. It is not that we were regretting our previous choice, it is not cool to use up everything and another super bloody CCS could get us there. However, the old duke agreed with B3nni on conditions and after saying farewell following the meeting, he returned to his castle in King’s Landing, K48. Tomorrow we had to fight once again. It was time to remind everyone about time, the need to recruit additional troops if they are lacking any of what we were in need to use on the next day and how to use army presets for the upcoming battle.

On the next day we met near the Scarlet Palace that was still protected by a magic dome. Our war camp was located toward the north while VWE put their forces on the opposite side. The N4V and KUM alliances decided to place their armies on the Western side near each other. It raised some concerns of whether they made an alliance or that was just a coincidence or maybe one of them was going to propose to join forces right before the battle starts. In any case all who meant to come to fight for Scarlet Palace was there and ready. Everyone was watching time when the Old Gods lift off protective dome and another fierce CCS clash begins.

When the battle just started there was chaos there – one warlord after another took over Scarlet Palace only to be kicked out by the next attacking army until at some moment CrimsoNDawn managed to capture it and get reinforced before anyone else could attack it again. At last we went out of the storm but to capture Champion City is one thing while to hold it is a much harder mission. Numerous reinforcements were sent from N3O camp to Scarlet Palace filling up the defensive garrison to its max capacity. Our enemies realized very fast they didn't have a chance to recapture it back so easily like it happened in the first minutes of the battle thus the time for serious sieges had come.

We got multiple reports indicating that R4V, KUM and VME alliances were assembling big armies although it wasn't clear what type of troops they were going to use and what their warlords exact power. Many things were hidden from us at the beginning and we only could guess and prepare for different scenarios. 

At last some of their armies started to march toward the Champion City when we could see what our adversary decided to bring on the battlefield. Surprisingly one of the big armies that was approaching Scarlet Palace from VME war camp fully consisted of infantry troops and there was no Vorian commander amongst enemy generals. That was real luck and a great opportunity to severely damage enemy troops, totally crushing them and reducing enemy morale. Vernei who led his troops only approached Scarlet Palace when suddenly incoming cavalry charge led by CrimsoNDawn swept the enemy from the battlefield like a descending avalanche sweeps away everything in its path. It was a devastating defeat that forced Vernei to forget about even trying to attack again. But there were many more that were eager to try their chances that day.

Whilst one of two VME rally leaders experienced crashing defeat, the strongest R4V(NWB) warlord KING BELIAL was only on his way to cross swords with us. Despite his army was one million smaller KING BELIAL has best commanders and full improved weapons of course it still was a weird choice to attack cavalry with infantry we also had one disadvantage – one of the reinforcements that arrived after previous battle was of infantry troops having not much value for Crimson`s cavalry commanders set to manage his army. Two armies collided near the walls of Scarlet palace and despite partial success KING BELIAL got defeated and was forced to retreat leaving the battlefield for us. Old duke urgently sent ravens warning that only cavalry troops should be sent as reinforcements but one of the lords who joined us right before CCS started was not listening and sending either infantry or spearmen squads. What sabotage! 😣Maybe he was an enemy agent! We sent another letter with a cavalry squad to his tent to warn that he can be expelled from our party if he continues like that.

Despite the defeat at first minutes KING BELIAL dint plan to give up champions’ crown so easily instead of that he changed commanders and troops and now was going to test our defenses with a spearmen army and that while we had that disobedient lord who kept sending us wrong reinforcement. Between two fires! Old duke was pissed off because of that lord sending the wrong troops when he suddenly noticed a weird smile on the Crimsons’ face.

– I dont get it - said the old duke - what is so good?

– Our opponent missing the point on commanders choice and while being strong infantry warlord his spears dont look so scary, we are going to win this one - said CrimsoN and mounted on his horse

– Easy like that? – asked a confused old duke watching his friend leaving the castle together with other troops to fight KING BELIAL again.

It was a fierce and close battle, additionally more than 1 million troops under Crimsons` command were spears doing not much but mostly dying against their stronger counterparts. However cavalry were doing an amazing job with flanking, charging and retreating and after all, KING BELIAL got defeated again and went back to his war camp. 

The time was passing by but our enemy didnt plan to give up. The VME joined R4V and started to attack with double effort even losing more than killing, it was now about who can afford to lose more troops. The KUM alliance also wasnt sitting doing nothing and their leading banners tried different ways to attack us. It seemed they were more interested with military science than with the real occupation of Scarlet Palace. Who knows what they were testing but obviously they didn't haste much to attack as often as they could all together with R4V. 

Our plan was to let B3nni take 1st place so one of the interesting stages of the battle had come - swapping of defenders. Numerous reinforcements were sent to the already fully reinforced Scarlet Palace and you may ask why? To let them come fast inside when the previous defender disbands the defenses of Champions City and new one comes in but while both of them from the same alliance there is no protective dome defending fortress for you until your reinforcements arrives – this is what is known as hard swap. Everything seemed okay when Nachu popped up out of nowhere with a rallied army right after B3nni entered Scarlet Palace. What a crouching tiger! However his battle comrades seemed not ready for this move as while they were trying to send reinforcements Nachu’s protective dome disappeared and B3nni quickly attacked with his own troops taking over the fortress.

The time of the long defense had come as the third lord who meant to get 3rd place – LoliEdd – already made some occupation time and now B3nni had to defend Scarlet Palace to the end of the battle. Previously KING BELIAL changed from his strong infantry to weaker spearmen and now his army became ineffective at least until he can change back – we had one enemy less. However others kept fighting despite heavy losses. Another attack of MondryBogdan turned into a bloody mess for his own army when strong spearmen led by best commanders such as Night King, Grey Worm, Saraer, Daena and Ayrmidon quickly approached bow ranks entering close quarters with poorly armored archers. It was a real massacre and only a small portion of the enemy army managed to escape the slaughter!

Meanwhile KUM waged their own war attacking us parallelly with R4V but not synchronizing their efforts which made defense a bit easier but still quite costly. One of their most talented warlords, Syakiri, undertook another attempt to conquer Champions City. Even his commanders were not so good as his opponents, the bet was made on numbers and it could work but B3nni`s garrison consisted of predominately T5 and T4 troops whilst Syakiri had good amount of T3 and T1 transforming his quantity advantage into actual disadvantage as low tier troops cause small damage to T4 and even less to elite T5 soldiers. However it was a good try and even time was working for us enemy kept making us bleed even they paid the iron price for it too 🙂

Closer to the end of the battle KING BELIAL at last managed  to change back to infantry but it was too late already as the time that left was enough only to contest for 3rd place. What had to become last hope fighting for at least some rewards turned out to be a final nail in a coffin as even the strongest enemy rally leader got defeated and R4V missed their last opportunity to get Scarlet Palace and try to score for bronze.

Soon the battle over Scarlet Palace had ended. It was the first Champion City Siege of the 59th season and we became the first winners. Despite our enemies lacked either strength or organization to challenge us more serious they put a lot of effort making us fight for real defending against their attacks making our victory being real as sometimes CCS can turn into one sided battle that time we had to take our swords out of sheath and step onto battlefield fighting until the end. What a great day for us!  Thanks to all our opponents for being there!