Macro post
Nice illustrations nevertheless!!
Yeah...
We have only bad options.. 
1. I think the attack plan on TBS is the only one that really could surprise our target, but that is also difficult to execute and makes our geographical position even more vulnerable even if we succeed perfectly.
2. Suttree already has an army ready..
3. Fast and efficient attack against dtay is difficult because of geography.. It's unlikely that mackoti is sleeping like m_h was and he also has the same power as we..
4. We can really only take 2-3 cities from Ichabod and then we have a strong pissed off neighbor that can boat us from his capital..
5. Let's beeline Astro and raze plako's capital just for fun?
I think in reality "the only smart play" is to focus on economy, wait and prepare for opportunistic chances and maybe make some gradual gains at suttree's expense eventually. But yeah, unless something miraculous happens that's a beaten path too. (I doubt mackoti is willing to waste his army on suttree anytime soon and dtay is not ready to eat TBSJ yet so I can see any great opportnunities arising before we are already way too much behind in land). So from one perspective high reward-high risk plays are actually only ones that make sense..
The sad truth is that we probably lost this game already on turn 0.
1. Our crappy starting land put us easily more than 20 turns behind the teams with better starts. Together with solid, but not too early traits it was always clear that our target is to keep the distance to leaders as small as possible, not to lead the game ourself
2. I was optimistic earlier when I noticed that our neighbors m_h and suttree are not playing especially well, but unfortunately we had to clash with suttree too early in order to get at least some useful land and he did not react as nicely as TBSJ did after fighting dtay... And because of that large jungle area to our south, m_h never did become our neighbor and now we have to deal with mackoti instead.
Conclusion:
As I've said in the chat to OH: Since I'm heading to Indonesia already in 12 days and will be a long time away. It is very likely that this game will turn into Old Harry's game in the process and at the very least Harry must be the one playing crucial turns (150-175). (By T175 something radical has either already happened to us or our competitors... or the game is lost.)
Therefore it's only fair that Harry is the one doing the decision, which way to go, pull the trigger or not.. Probably mostly based on what he considers to be the most fun approach.
?? I won't be reading any other threads of course and if Harry wants me back and there is still a game to play, I probably can help with the struggle again in late January..
Final more optimistic words:
1. I think we don't need to be ashamed of our performance even though nobody will really consider it strong, because in the end only results matter and it's so hard to judge whether my ranting is justified or not.
2. I think we are currently solidly in ~top5 position as always so deceiving score suggests, and we have a strong economical phase coming. Consequently it's only our long-term position that truly sucks. This means that you have Harry a lot more resources to do something fun with our civ than the weaker half of our opponents and I hope that the game will remain enjoyable still for a good while.
PS. I'll comment on current turn micro later in the evening when I can again log in
(December 16th, 2013, 18:25)Old Harry Wrote: Sorry, none of that is very positive. Additionally until astronomy Ichabod is pretty safe from us and right now Suttree is far too spiky to contemplate attacking, so perhaps teching a navy is a good alternative? Astronomy opens up a lot of options, but it keeps putting off the gaining of the land we need to let us to stay competitive.
Nice illustrations nevertheless!!
Yeah...
We have only bad options.. 1. I think the attack plan on TBS is the only one that really could surprise our target, but that is also difficult to execute and makes our geographical position even more vulnerable even if we succeed perfectly.
2. Suttree already has an army ready..
3. Fast and efficient attack against dtay is difficult because of geography.. It's unlikely that mackoti is sleeping like m_h was and he also has the same power as we..
4. We can really only take 2-3 cities from Ichabod and then we have a strong pissed off neighbor that can boat us from his capital..
5. Let's beeline Astro and raze plako's capital just for fun?
I think in reality "the only smart play" is to focus on economy, wait and prepare for opportunistic chances and maybe make some gradual gains at suttree's expense eventually. But yeah, unless something miraculous happens that's a beaten path too. (I doubt mackoti is willing to waste his army on suttree anytime soon and dtay is not ready to eat TBSJ yet so I can see any great opportnunities arising before we are already way too much behind in land). So from one perspective high reward-high risk plays are actually only ones that make sense..
The sad truth is that we probably lost this game already on turn 0.
1. Our crappy starting land put us easily more than 20 turns behind the teams with better starts. Together with solid, but not too early traits it was always clear that our target is to keep the distance to leaders as small as possible, not to lead the game ourself
2. I was optimistic earlier when I noticed that our neighbors m_h and suttree are not playing especially well, but unfortunately we had to clash with suttree too early in order to get at least some useful land and he did not react as nicely as TBSJ did after fighting dtay... And because of that large jungle area to our south, m_h never did become our neighbor and now we have to deal with mackoti instead.
Conclusion:
As I've said in the chat to OH: Since I'm heading to Indonesia already in 12 days and will be a long time away. It is very likely that this game will turn into Old Harry's game in the process and at the very least Harry must be the one playing crucial turns (150-175). (By T175 something radical has either already happened to us or our competitors... or the game is lost.)
Therefore it's only fair that Harry is the one doing the decision, which way to go, pull the trigger or not.. Probably mostly based on what he considers to be the most fun approach.
?? I won't be reading any other threads of course and if Harry wants me back and there is still a game to play, I probably can help with the struggle again in late January..Final more optimistic words:
1. I think we don't need to be ashamed of our performance even though nobody will really consider it strong, because in the end only results matter and it's so hard to judge whether my ranting is justified or not.
2. I think we are currently solidly in ~top5 position as always so deceiving score suggests, and we have a strong economical phase coming. Consequently it's only our long-term position that truly sucks. This means that you have Harry a lot more resources to do something fun with our civ than the weaker half of our opponents and I hope that the game will remain enjoyable still for a good while.
PS. I'll comment on current turn micro later in the evening when I can again log in