CFB Risk Day 13 – NOW I HAVE A MACHINE GUN HO-HO-HO

Note: Today's recap written by a guest-speaker, filling in for our friend EastCoast Esq. Get well soon – that's an order, soldier.

“Hold on to your butts.” – some guy

Before anything else, this has to be said:  Bravo.  You did it – you reclaimed our home territory and beautiful City of Ann Arbor.  It still retains all its charm and splendor despite the past management regime… and that smell will come out.  Once again we hit the occupiers hard – only 182 heroes went on this glorious mission this time as opposed to the previous 237, so this was more of a proverbial carpet bombing rather than a nuclear strike.  Either way, the vermin infestation has been handled.  Not only that, but we were able to secure every territory *surrounding* Ann Arbor – meaning that it is completely safe from attack this coming turn.  Well done.

Michigan is *still* the most powerful team in the game and now is when we are starting to demonstrate that.  We recorded 821 players last night with a combined power of 1862 stars (and remember – each player’s number of stars increases the longer they play the game, even after a few days).  The player count was slightly decreased from last night, but this could be attributable to last night’s basketball game, bar karaoke nights, hair-washing routines, exam study sessions, dinner with the significant other, or one of the host of other (weak) excuses to not put in the entire two minutes of effort to enter a move. Pretty much all teams saw a minor drop in participation last night, so this is nothing to cause concern. OSU is still the second most powerful team in the game, but has now had three consecutive days of *decline* in player count (523 players for a combined 1215 stars).  We need to continue our growth to stay ahead in this game so if you haven't already - get involved!  If you already have, the get *someone else* involved!  Recruiting matters.

The second piece of news that must be discussed before we starting digging into the details of today’s battle lines is this: the Big Ten Alliance is no more.  How did this happen?  Basically osu decided to unilaterally pullout of the agreement (despite having problems with Georgia Tech and Tennessee pushing into their territories).  So… bye, Felicia.  This has, however, set off a flurry of back-channel activity about possible new alliances between… well everyone.  So at this point, everyone is both an enemy and a potential ally (except osu, obviously).  This doesn’t mean we *should* expect massive assaults launched against us by both osu & Wisconsin, but… don’t be surprised if it happens.  Whatever – let the haters hate if they want, because…

Now we have two region bonuses.  Yippee-kiyay, mother… you get the point.  Although we lost complete control of eastern Canada (the Canadian Shield Region), we were able to secure both the Great Lakes Region (comprising all of Michigan, Wisconsin and the portions of Canada that touch Lake Huron) and the Mid-Atlantic Region (most of the land from upstate New York to Washington D.C.)  What does this mean?  Every attack move placed this turn is getting amplified by x2.  Every defend move placed this turn is getting amplified by x3.

A quick explanation of “regions”, since we will be discussing them more and more going forward:

The game is moving into phases where teams will be competing to control entire “regions”, which are groupings of adjacent territories.  The map is divided into twenty regions, as shown below.  Just like in the classic Risk game, there are incentives to control whole regions – but in this game it is a mathematical bonus to *all* attack/defend odds in favor of teams holding regions (those bonuses are not limited to actions taken within held regions – they apply everywhere).

Controlling regions is good.  Preventing opponents from controlling regions is also good.

So to summarize:

·        We are the largest team in terms of # of players.

·        We do not need to worry about retaking or defending Ann Arbor this turn.

·        We don’t have to worry about upsetting “allies” anymore.

·        We are playing with Mario Star level bonuses right now.

Yippie.  Ki.  Yay.

This would be a good time to have a high level view of the war: some way to visualize how things are progressing... like a map.

You should feel like a kid in a candy shop.

We still hold most of the northeast corner of the map, adding territories along the east coast but also losing a key territory near Hudson Bay (which cost us another region bonus – we were a breath away from having three this turn).  We now control the entire state of Michigan, everything touching the state of Michigan, northern Indiana and Illinois, and the state of Wisconsin thanks to rogue actions.  That last part is going to upset the Wisconsin team, so we should expect a heavy effort to retake it… although if we lose that territory we lose another bonus.  Wisconsin was able to secure a full region in central Canada (Northern Lights Region) so they are getting a bonus for this round as well.  The northwest corner of the board is also solidly ours – and we are in a good position to try and take the entire Pacific Northwest Region.

The Mid-Atlantic Region may be ours now, but the adjacent locales (east Appalachians and Ohio river valley and southward into the Carolinas) are still contested between osu, Georgia Tech, Tennessee and us.  Tennessee still controls the West Appalachia Region and is getting a bonus for that, but they are more of a threat to osu than us at the moment.

Our little pocket in Georgia and northern Florida has grown and we still control one of the beachheads connecting to the upper Atlantic coast.  Alabama, Florida and Georgia Tech have all been trying to harass this pocket and force us back out.

Texas A&M is continuing to dominate the center of the US and into the Southwest.  They lost the region comprising Louisiana and Arkansas thanks to some rogue attacks from Alabama players, but they still control the region in east Texas and are receiving a bonus from that this round.  They have broken up much of the ground that was controlled by Nebraska on their northern flank and Texas & Oklahoma to their west and south.  They have amassed almost as much territory as we have and they are consolidated – with nearly a dozen of those territories safe from attack.

The West continues to be a hodgepodge of small teams trying to survive: Oregon, USC, Stanford, Hawaii, Washington and it could be argued Texas and Nebraska possibly joining them.   We have the ability to strike further here from both the north (as discussed) and from the south, expanding from our bridgehead in Baja California.

Wrapping up the southernmost end of the board, Mexico and the Caribbean are both still at serious risk of becoming A&M strongholds as well in the next few turns.  Our Baja California outpost is now in contact with A&M in western Mexico, but there are still a few teams scrapping in southern Mexico (Stanford & LSU).  The Caribbean has become a direct contest between A&M and osu, with our foothold in Puerto Rico having been lost.  Both teams need to secure a region and the Caribbean is easier to hold.

A final reminder: it is strongly recommended to join the Michigan Discord server and coordinate with our friendly team leaders for assignments/orders (see link below). This is how to *most effectively* use your attack & defend moves to get us closer to actually winning the game.  However… fighting for your school, your team and your home is always a good thing, even if you have your own ideas about how to do that.  In the end, it’s still a game and the purpose is to have fun.

Team Standings

We are now down to fewer than 25 active teams in the game and the final rankings are beginning to take shape.  Here is where they stand thus far (teams are ranked by # of territories first, followed by a mix of metrics examining how efficiently they used their players & stars:

1.    Michigan (48 territories)

2.    Texas A&M (40 territories)

3.    (an) Ohio State (24 territories)

4.    Wisconsin (14 territories)

5.    Tennessee (9 territories)

6.    Alabama (9 territories)

7.    Nebraska (8 territories)

8.    Stanford (6 territories)

9.    Oregon (4 territories)

10.  Georgia Tech (4 territories)

11.  Texas (3 territories)

12.  Oklahoma (3 territories)

13.  LSU (3 territories)

14.  Iowa State (2 territories)

15.  Florida (2 territories)

16.  Hawaii (1 territories)

17.  USC (1 territory)

18.  Washington (1 territory)

19.  Georgia (killed Day 12)

20.  Notre Dame (killed Day 11)

21.  Virginia Tech (killed Day 11)

22.  UCF (killed Day 11)

23.  Minnesota (killed Day 10)

24.  Baylor (killed Day 10)

25.  South Carolina (killed Day 10)

 

So remember to drink your Ovaltine, submit your move before 10:30pm today and have fun storming the castle!

 

Steps To Play Every Day

(1) Sign up for a reddit.com account if you don’t have one already

(2) Visit collegefootballrisk.com – Click Sign in with Reddit – Select Michigan as your team

(3) Join the Michigan Risk discord by going to https://discord.gg/DRQyjp56kP (this is now a permanent link, so there should not be problems accessing it)

(4) Go to the "vetting" channel and type in your MGoBlog username and Reddit username.

(5) Once vetted, get your orders from the "orders" channel.

(6) Return to collegefootballrisk.com – Click on the blinking "target" icon at the bottom of the page (3rd button from the right), and then click on the territory you're attacking or defending.

(7) Talk trash with your fellow Wolverines as we prepare for tonight's roll.

How Does the Game Work?

It is up to each team to recruit players and coordinate moves. You can choose to defend any territory that your team currently holds or attack any adjacent territory. A "roll" happens each evening to calculate which teams have won which territories that turn based on the moves that were made by individual players. The ultimate goal is to conquer as much of the map as possible for your team. There are a number of different ways to do this, such as through recruiting players in sheer numbers or forming alliances with other teams.

 

Previous Recaps

Day 0 intro: College Football Risk is BACK - Season 3 is now LIVE!

Day 1 recap: College Risk Again!!! Sign up.... 1st in the books!

Day2 recap: No update

Day 3 recap: No update

Day 4 recap: CFB Risk Day 4: IT BEGINS

Day 5 recap: CFB Risk Day 5 - And THIS is Why They Nerfed Us

Day 6 recap: CFB Risk Day 6 - This Feels a Lot Like Real Life (Sparty Gon' Die)

Day 7 recap: CFB Risk Day 7 - F*cking Sparty (They Still Gon' Die)

Day 8 recap: CFB Risk Day 8 - WE NEED YOU TO AVENGE THE ORANGE BOWL (also, sparty's dead)

Day 9 recap: CFB Risk Day 9 - We Kicked Georgia Out of the North -- Now We Go South

Day 10 recap: CFB Risk Day 10 – The King in the North! (also, sorry about that Penn State)

Day 11 recap: CFB Risk Day 11 – ANN ARBOR HAS BEEN TAKEN!! THIS IS NOT A DRILL!!

Day 12 recap: CFB Risk Day 12 – It’s Groundhog Day…again (also, Notre Dame is finally dead)