Season 3: Chapter 200: Fast Shield Archer Rush (3)
To the casters, it happened in an instant.
Almond hung off the ladder while shooting arrows. Pang followed behind with a curve shot. The enemy’s arrows barely grazed Spam’s side. With a flurry of arrows, Persia’s three ace archers suddenly died.
The situation had been too difficult to follow with the naked eye.
“Waaaaaah!”
The crowd erupted in cheers.
The casters shouted at the top of their lungs, “No way!? They took them all down!? From below the wall!?”
— ???
— What?
— Crazy
— Did Persia’s three ace archers die again? lol
— Huh?
“Almond! And Pang!! Amazing!”
“Joseon’s ladder squad is all alive! They’re all going up now!!”
Joseon’s forces began to reverse-occupy the wall surrounding Persia.
“The wall now belongs to Joseon! The Ancient Walls can be thought of as protecting the base, but it’s just terrain!”
“Ah! It’s not protecting them! It’s watching over them!”
“Exactly!”
— lol
— Reverse terror
— It was the Sixth Sense~
— It has become a prison
“This is a complete prison! A prison! Joseon’s forces are now looking down on Persia!”
“It’s like Joseon is saying, ‘You’re trapped!!’”
— lolololol
— You’re kidnapped…
— It’s true
— Can they reach from the wall?
— Wow
That was exactly the situation. Joseon’s forces could freely roam around the wall while Persia had to avoid them.
“Ah, Persia is finally deploying barbarian soldiers.”
Unable to leave Joseon’s forces on the wall, Persia had to mobilize barbarian soldiers.
“They should be out hunting, but they’re being used to clear the wall!!”
[Gather]
[Breakthrough]
Around twenty barbarian soldiers rushed up the stairs and significantly outnumbered Joseon’s forces. However─
“Ah, barbarians alone won’t be enough!”
The Joseon archers placed on the wall fired wildly, leaving the barbarians with no chance.
Thud!
Thud!
The Joseon archers didn’t excel at curve shots, but they possessed unmatched precision and quickly took down the enemies with headshots.
“From above, it’s almost always a headshot! Persia will lose everyone at this rate!”
The barbarians had to retreat before they could even attempt a breakthrough.
[Retreat]
Ping.
They received a retreat order and pulled back.
“They’re retreating! Otherwise, they’d get wiped out!”
“This is really frustrating for Persia!”
“Yes, and they’re not giving up! They’re coming back with archers and even spearmen!”
“They’re determined to break through this time!”
Other units besides barbarians also joined the assault.
“Even if they break through, Joseon still gains more. Persia’s plan to rush into the third era is now ruined.”
Producing units before reaching the third era had strained Persia and they already took significant losses.
“But they can’t leave Joseon on the wall. The damage would be worse!”
Persia couldn’t leave Joseon’s archers on the wall. The Joseon archers could move to attack the woodworkers from the wall.
“Exactly! If the Joseon archers move to the wood resources and shoot from the wall, they can kill the workers like that! It would be chaos.”
The Joseon archers on the wall could potentially reach the woodworkers, especially with the focus trait.
“The wall is supposed to protect Persia, but now it’s extorting protection fees!”
— lol
— Are they gangsters?
— Shield-fast archer rush lol
— Exactly lol
— Protection fees paid in lives
— lol
“So Persia is declaring a war on crime! Elepher is determined to break through!”
“Yes! Persia’s forces are charging up the stairs again with archers and spearmen!”
— Are they prosecutors now? lol
— Joseon is playing the villain for the first time lol
— lol, the players are entering~
Persia gathered its forces and charged up the stairs again. The improved composition consisted of two archers, one spearman, and around twenty barbarians.
The Joseon archers still found themselves outnumbered.
“Persia should break through this time, right?”
“Yes, it’s not a situation where Joseon can just shoot them away… Oh?!”
Despite the superior composition and numbers, Joseon had one overwhelming advantage.
“Joseon has completely blocked the stair entrance!”
It was the terrain.
[Block the stairs with a shield]
Thud.
The shield-bearer positioned himself at the entrance of the stairs to the wall.
[Volley fire from behind the shield]
Three archers shot from behind at those coming up the stairs.
Thwack!
Thwack!
[Rear fire from the wall]
The other three archers shot from the wall at the trailing enemies.
“They’re doing it!”
“I thought the shield-bearer would be useless on the wall, but they’re using him effectively!!”
“The barbarians are falling!”
“Persia’s spearman is pushing through!!”
A spear thrust into the shield.
Thud!
— ??? Next!
— Slow
— Cool
Even though the spearman and archers shot from behind, the shield blocked most of the arrows.
“Ah! The shield is…!”
“The shield-bearer Moggie is like a mountain!”
Curve shots didn’t work.
[Beware of curve shots]
Persia’s curve shots were clumsy without their three ace archers and they couldn’t overcome a specialist shield-bearer with clear orders.
Moggie extended his shield like a goalkeeper.
Thud!
The curved arrows struck the shield.
“Another save!”
— Crazy
— ??
— What is this?
— Insane lol it’s a real save
— What does it mean to shield?
“Even curve shots don’t work! They can’t break through!”
“Joseon is saying, ‘Bring a warrant if you want to enter!’”
— Crazy lol
— Of course, the romance of the second era
With the entrance blocked, Joseon began their counterattack.
Thud!
A Persian archer fell with a white flash.
“Almond shot down the enemy archer accurately!!”
From the wall, Almond had fired an arrow.
“Oh! Be careful—”
The remaining Persian archer aimed back at him, but—
Ping!
“!?”
His arrow struck the wall and fell uselessly.
“No need to be careful! I was about to say that they can’t get an angle!”
Shooting up was difficult due to the bow’s nature. The Persian archer paid dearly for targeting Almond.
“For daring to target Almond, the judgment is…”
[Attack]
Thud!
Carrot and Latte’s arrows struck the archer simultaneously and took him down.
“Death!!!”
Bang!
Whether it was due to the imposing judgment or something else, all the Persian archers had died again.
— The tension is crazy lol
— If there was a camera, I’d bet my wrist that his face filled the screen
— lol
— Did Joseon always fight this well? Crazy
— Their execution is ridiculous lol
“Wow! Joseon is dominating! Persia can’t do anything and is about to get blocked again!” the caster exclaimed.
OrangeKing explained, “For Persian archers, shooting up is really difficult!”
“It’s about the angle!”
“That’s why the old saying goes, ‘That’s the importance of angle!’”
“Ah! Old sayings never lie! How many people have died because of angles!!”
— Crazy lol
— Where is that from? lol
— The wisdom of our SNS ancestors~
— Not even close lol
— lol
“A face like Almond’s wouldn’t have this issue, but their faces seem very important now!”
— lol
— Very important lol
— Fact: The real important person is OrangeKing
— lol
— Fact: If you’re really ugly, it doesn’t matter either
— Arabs are handsome though lol
Perhaps the angle was too difficult? Once the two Persian archers died, Joseon stopped the enemy’s rush as easily as before.
Even with a spearman, the enemy couldn’t touch the shield-bearer.
“It’s useless even with dozens of melee soldiers! They can’t break through!”
“The shield-bearer is like a mountain! It’s a divine strategy! Alone, he couldn’t do much, but it’s unbelievable with cooperation!”
The battle seemed like a demonstration of how a single shield-bearer could frustrate the enemy.
“And as I mentioned, this wall shouldn’t be thought of as protecting the enemy anymore!”
“Yes, exactly!”
“If it was their wall, they could build stairs elsewhere! They wouldn’t need to force their way through here!”
Indeed, Persia would be able to build stairs elsewhere and fight with the same terrain advantage if it was their wall. However, this wall was neutral terrain and didn’t belong to anyone. They could only use the existing stairs and couldn’t build new ones.
“If only they could build a wall to jump over, but they can’t build that high a wall in the second era!”
They couldn’t construct such high buildings until the third era.
This wall belonged to no one. It didn’t protect anyone and could even turn into a turret shooting at them.
Best Yi Sun-Shin understood this well.
“Her map usage and unit usage is incredible! I honestly thought the commander had lost it when I saw them rushing this map!”
OrangeKing had genuinely thought so.
A new commander could easily lose it. She lost her first game and had terrible synergy with the soldiers.
The next game took place on a map that made early attacks difficult. If they lost, Joseon wouldn’t make it to the quarterfinals.
She had to carry all this weight on her shoulders and could have lost her mind.
“But now I see! She had a perfect plan!”
OrangeKing had been mistaken.
Joseon’s commander was even more adept at leading the soldiers than in her first appearance.
“It’s like she was waiting for this! She perfectly positioned the shield-bearer, the shooters, and the supporters! She tactically dominated completely!”
“Yes! And this shield-bearer was a divine strategy! Not just on the ladder, he blocked the stairs too! Truly a force worth its weight in gold!”
— Truly showing up?
— Crazy impressive
— Cookie’s style is very different, no wonder soldiers struggled to follow initially
— Show and prove?
— The style of capturing Lurkers with Marines
“Thanks to this, Joseon and Persia’s food supply difference is widening. It’s inevitable, right?”
“Yes. How many hunters have died on those stairs? No wonder they’re short on food. It’s the stairway to heaven!”
— The stairway to heaven lol
— ??? The answer is returning
— lol
So many soldiers went to heaven. Persia eventually gave up on the stairs.
“Ah, Persia is giving up on this?”
Now, Joseon had completely taken the wall.
“As we speak, more Joseon archers are climbing the wall! The first ones to arrive are heading toward the wood resources!”
More Joseon archers climbed the ladder and the previous archers blocking the stairs could now freely move on to control the resources.
“The hellish battle for control begins!”
“From heaven to hell! Here it comes!”
— Actually, everything is hell lol
— lol exactly
— Both sides are hell lol
“After a hellish high school life, entering college feels like being told, ‘Oh~ now it’s time for the army!’”
— lol crazy
— Oh shit
— But that actually happens…
— lol
— lol
“They’re moving now. What will happen if Joseon reaches the woodworkers?”
“No need for a long explanation. It’ll become a siege tank on a hill! Just a hill tank!”
“Ah… that means big trouble!”
“Yes. And they’ll be able to reach the enemy workers with the wall bonus and the focus trait. That’s enough.”
A hill tank was a classic strategy from the RTS game Starcraft. It involved placing long-range tanks on a hill to bombard the enemy.
Korean gamers loved this strategy. It caused PTSD for many other race players, eventually leading to patches for all maps and terrains.
Now, that strategy was being implemented in Civil Empire without tanks.
— Everything is explained
— A strategy etched in our DNA lol
— Summary: Persia is screwed if their arrows reach the woodworkers
— Hill tank: A beautiful term capturing the longing for an unreachable enemy
— ??? A well-known strategy?
— It’s in the Book of Starcraft
— This is the land of the rebel space marines!
— The fifth verse of the national anthem
Was it to showcase the beauty of the hill tank? The observer switched from Joseon’s view to Persia’s view.