[sRH] vs [SCS] | Siege of Winterfell | Season 17 Round 4

Hello all! Today we speak about a different event. The Siege of Winterfell! A very popular and anticipated event. If you wish to read about our strong victory in the 6th Round of Season 5 of the Arena of Honor, click here: Vindication: An Arena of Honor Story | Season 5 Round 6.

Today I speak about the 4th Round of the 17th season of this event. My alliance sRH faces the mighty SCS alliance. Their average attendance in the previous matches is around 55-60 members compared to our average of 30-35. This number is nearly a half of what SCS could field. We are going into the match with a major disadvantage.

Regardless, we are an alliance filled with seasoned players. We would fight to the end no matter what. Almost all of the members knew what to do without being told. Would we continue fighting until the last few minutes? Would we keep the score within 10,000 points? Or would we only complete the initial 20,000 point reward? Read to find out!

Chapter 1: Strategy

Our plan is simple. We focus our attacks on the Armory and the Hot Springs. Out of the two, the most important objective would be to hold the hot springs. The 100% healing speed would help us in our fight against superior numbers. However, considering the near 1:2 ratio of sRH and SCS members, it would be incredibly difficult to hold it for a long time.

As for the dragon, I chose a small team of 4 accounts. Rudi der 1's strong infantry stayed in the reserves in case he would need him elsewhere. Initially, however, all four of us were split into the two groups attacking the armory and the hot springs.

I was itching to test my new castle skin, Crossbow Miracle. The buff that increases my army size by 40,000 would help a lot. However, I was aware that if I faced a strong spear with good RTS lineups, the extra army size would not make a difference.

Chapter 2: Skirmish at the Armory

I was faster than both the enemy and my alliance members. All 3 of my troops began to capture the armory. Immediately three of the enemy players contested for the armory and began to attack my army. In 10 seconds the enemy decimated my third army. And the other two armies were killed just as quickly.

Quickly they overwhelmed our forces at the armory. We were fighting 10 against 25. Their strong T5 troops and powerful commanders made quick work of our armies. We could barely heal one army before another fell. We were slowly pushed back to the Stark stronghold.

I was disappointed and frustrated. I had hoped to stall them for a few minutes. It had been only 3 minutes and we had already lost the armory. I looked over to the hot springs. Rudi and the others were also struggling. Our strongest player Phantom01 was the only one who could stand his ground against waves of enemies.

Chapter 3: Attempts to Fight Back

In a change to the plan, we rushed to distract the enemy from the dragons. We hoped that the enemy would be busy fighting at the cities to not notice us. I sent several of our men to attack the vanguard. The Greyjoy stronghold was chosen as the target. If we could distract them long enough, the rest of us could capture at least one dragon. And while they would come to capture the dragon, we could capture their cities.

The plan would, however, depend on them being uncoordinated. I secretly hoped that would be the case. This was how we had defeated another alliance nearly 2 times our size in the previous season of Siege of Winterfell. However, just as our troops landed at the dragon closest to us, about 20-30 armies rushed to attack us. We were outnumbered. They had suspected our plan from the beginning....

The enemy troops were incredibly strong. Everyone was defeating me. All my hard work in getting the castle skin for the extra 40,000 army size felt worthless. I had spent hours ensuring that I had the skin by the third match. But I had missed the chance to play with my friends due to personal reasons. I could not even enjoy using the rewards of my achievement.

Chapter 4: Treasures

I slowly moved to the alliance chat. With a feeling of defeat, I asked the others if they wanted to retreat. Most of the members agreed to a retreat. We had been beaten badly. We slowly retreated to the Stark castle. I felt sad that we couldn't make any extra points.

However, the others were not willing to part with the treasures. We have to at least get those rewards. These would require coordination and not strength. I recalled my armies and prepared to send them the very moment the treasure notification would go out. The others prepared to go to different targets. We have to capture as many as possible. I have a lot of healing left. So I don't worry about the costs.

We were largely successful in collecting the boxes. Some of our ambitious members even collected the boxes in enemy territory. However, as the game progressed, the enemy leadership noticed that we were stealing their rewards. They dispatched their top commanders to hunt us down. However, due to my speed, which was unrivaled in this match, I collected several treasure boxes before they could defeat my armies.

But the others were not so lucky. So the number of treasure boxes we were collecting halved within a few minutes. Regardless, we had done a good job.

Chapter 5: Full Retreat

Sensing that we had to change our tactics, I asked several members to attack their less fortified castles. We have to distract them while collecting treasures. I could see that quite a lot of the accounts in the enemy's camp were second accounts. As a result, they were slower at reacting to changes. This could very well work for us. We could distract such accounts and increase the enemy troop's response time while we collected treasures.

Within minutes they realized what our plan was. I could only watch as they sent more and more armies to block the entrance of our hive. I was successful in escaping due to my marching speed. However, the others were not so lucky. Collectively we decided to retreat for good this time. The cost vs. gain was too high. I couldn't help but feel dissatisfied that we could not collect the other treasures.

Looking at the score, I noticed that the enemy had almost 80,000 points. Some alliances stopped and let the opponents collect points after this. I hoped that SCS would be kind enough to let us collect the extra points.

Chapter 6: Rush for Points

They began to call back their armies. However, some of their members continued to attack our troops. Some even captured one of the dragons. I called the others and told them to capture all empty castles. Minutes could change things. We had time to get 40,000 points.

Slowly SCS members fell back to their hive. We began to capture all the castles and the dragons. I observed the points increasing from just 4,000 to 33,000. 3 minutes were left on the clock. We had two dragons under control. We would reach 40,000 points once we delivered this. It would feel like a small victory if we achieved this.

Just as we were starting to feel happy, we realized that the second dragon was further away from the goal than we had thought. It would be very close. Mere seconds would decide whether we could achieve 40,000 points or not.

I could do nothing but hold my breath and look at the time counting down. 1 minute, 50 seconds, 45 seconds, 30 seconds, 15 seconds, 10 seconds.

I could do nothing but watch as the timer ended right before the dragon reached our hive. So close. Just 30 more seconds and we could have those points. 30 seconds. I felt incredibly sad. If we had fought on in some form and not gone for the treasures, we might have had 40,000 points. I felt frustrated by my inability to change the outcome. All our effort had been in vain. Just 1,300 points...

Chapter 7: End of Battle

We had fought hard to the end. I knew that this defeat shouldn't discourage us. We were, after all, fighting an opponent twice our size. But I could not be happy.

Our team now had 2 victories and 2 defeats out of 4 matches. In both our losses, we had faced enemies who were twice our size. I hoped that we would have opponents with similar attendance numbers as us for the fifth round. We have to make many changes to our strategies. We have to be prepared to not lose on such small margins.