[Spoilers] Commodore as Darius of the HRE

[Ceiliazul]

A Demo teaser:

Rana cities: 5, 3, 1 Mfg: 17 Food: 31
MNG cities: 4, 3, 1 Mfg: 11 Food: 27
You ----->: 5, 2 Mfg: 10 Food: 25
Ergo cities: 4, 1 Mfg: ~14 Food: (18 or 28)
Yuri cities : 4, 1 Mfg ~14 Food: (18 or 28)

No one has any military beyond warriors.
No one has researched archery, possibly 2 civs have sailing

A Mystery:
MNG had a 54 point spike in point spike in a single turn (t32). No wonders were completed, no religions founded. He got 2 pop points on that turn, founded his 3rd city and probably researched a tech. Any ideas where the other ~20 points could materialize from?

[Commodore]

A Mystery:
MNG had a 54 point spike in point spike in a single turn (t32). No wonders were completed, no religions founded. He got 2 pop points on that turn, founded his 3rd city and probably researched a tech. Any ideas where the other ~20 points could materialize from?

Hrm. Creative border pops? The tech (see diplo screen) was Writing, which is a higher tier tech, right?

In turn-report news, the actual turn was boring.



But what's that Yuri score jump?



Ah, it's the "I have cheap forges online first" wonder. Only downside is that Buddhism will be spreading fast with an early shrine online. Maybe I should offer MNG a free Jewish or Hindu missionary.

New demos.



Nothing much else to report. I'll be dropping a line to MNG later about running through his lands to meet Yuri, it'll be hard to refuse while his warrior is still walking through mine.

[Commodore]

[COLOR="Yellow"]Salut MNG,

Comment allez vous?

And with that, my French expires. Anyway, just a couple things:
1. Barbarian warriors have started to spawn.
2. Ahem, in related news, my poor scout is no more, so do you mind if I send a recon up through you to hail Yuri? I heard a rumor some sort of ancient oracle told him the secrets of making casings of metal, and I would love to talk to the Radiolanders about it. Naturally, as with you through my borders, I'll follow any path you prefer to send me on.

Adieu.
-Commodore [/COLOR]

Might as well bring it up now.

[Ceiliazul]

I like that email. Should be hard to refuse.

Counting land points figures beautifully for MNG's score jump. Thanks for the tip.

[Ceiliazul]

MNG Dossier:

Game mechanics:
In slavery, and using the whip more than any other civ. Proven capable in this area, times whips to regrow quickly. Indications are that if ever attacked, he would know how to defend with the whip.

Economic development:
Food: 25 (4th)
MFG: 12 (4th)
GNP: 26 (5th)

First city claimed 35 squares in first 3 rings. (far inland)
2nd city claimed only 2 squares. Gotta be coastal.
2nd city expanded & 3rd city planted on the same turn = 8 total squares. Coastal again... and crazy cramped.

Stats as of 2080 show a mixed performance. He was first to 3 cities, but they are not yet grown. We know already that corruption is insanely high, and he's got to be feeling the burn. In addition, cities 2 and 3 appear to have claimed VERY little land. Surely one was a resource plant, but 2 such cities with so little land of their own seems suboptimal from an economic perspective. (On the other hand, they could be triple-fish!)

Keep in mind his rival worst GNP is actually including his creative culture! 3 cities and a palace = 8 culture per turn. Subtracting culture and espionage, MNG's actual commerce was 14 gold in 2080 BC.

Military:
Rival best military at this time. By my count, he has 4 warriors, and recently a cheap (2 turns!) power tech. I suspect hunting, but small chance he completed sailing after taking a break for writing research.



This level of analysis was only possible with graph availability, and helped by the fact that it's still early. -Ceil

[Commodore]

Thanks for that analysis, it'll be handy. I'll be sure to dump all these EPs into whoever Krull makes contact with.



I know barbs are out in force now, but it seemed worthwhile to try and push contact as soon as possible. Barb warriors make me a little nervous sending off my chariot yet.



Escort is going as planned, though, city #3 next turn, Mono the turn next.



Low man on the scoreboard, not that it matters much at this point. Demos:



Here's to more contacts soon. Have a reply from MNG, will post later.

[Commodore]

Aaand take it away Mr. Nice Guy:

[COLOR="RoyalBlue"]Hello Commodore,

Funny timing about barbs appearing. I noticed in my morning turn that there is actually a barb city in my view. So, that's definitely a happening thing. Hopefully a similar thing doesn't happen in an inconvenient place for you. But I notice with your chariots you should have no trouble against them any time soon.

And Yuri got MC out of the Oracle? I didn't have confirmation on which tech he chose. Was in a hurry so didn't have time this morning to congratulate him or warn you about the barb city popping up. Sorry to hear that your scout died, but I'd be fine with you sending a recon to meet Yuri. I'll have to look, though... it may be quicker to use the spokes. You both have cities right off the spokes. I'll count tiles when the turn comes around and get back to you on that, as well as with specific directions.
Until later,
MNG, Hattie of France[/COLOR]

So, upshot, he notes and respects the chariot(s), he won't be squawking about me sending something through him, and I'll be directed to Yuri shortly. I am curious now though...will definitely be checking on our bridge to spot his borders if he expanded south. I wonder how cramped he really is...

[Ceiliazul]

I don't think he expanded South yet, because a city near those horses would have claimed too much land... but that site is so fertile that I can't imagine he's got a better one.

Honestly, I'm confused by those cramped city placements... I can't imagine what he's doing.

[Commodore]

I'm honestly a little confused as well, is it possible something caused score drops at the same time as he founded? Just boggles the mind that he'd have great close locations like that stone site and the horse site and yet he'd sit one on a spit of land. Unless he's reaching for the silver hard, which would be dumb.

In other news, a bit of diplo with MNG:

[COLOR="RoyalBlue"]Hi Commodore,

Just wanted to give a quick shout out to our southern neighbors. Noticed that not only did you settle city #3 this turn, but you managed to land Judaism? Are you headed for the hydra next? We don't plan on pursuing religion any time soon, so if you need a neighbor to spread a religion for your eventual shrine, we'd be a happy target for such a move

Until later,
MNG, Hattie of France[/COLOR]

So I sent back

[COLOR="Yellow"]Hey MNG!

We felt that your poor wounded warrior need more cultural defense to safely head home, so at great damage to our dotmap, the hospitable-to-a-fault Hyborians decided to lend a hand. ;-). As for the religion, well, have you seen the title of Krill's latest game, "Krill hates building monuments"? That's me. I believe Hinjewdisim is quite enough for me, and honestly, the religion was a bonus...OR/missionaries is what I was heading towards...which is a long way around to saying it, but yes, I'd be happy to look into missionary trades if you don't get any free spreads once we get trade routes up. Not sure yet if it's going to be Judaism or Hinduism, still waiting for one of them to spread to the capital. :-) Naturally I need about a hundred more workers first, but you'll definitely be first in line for our proselytizin' bald guys.

Speaking of trade routes, with no Ind I've more or less forgone GLH (although please keep that to yourself, might as well let the Ind Civs worry), but foreign TRs would be nice to combat the maintenance load I'm feeling. You have three cities as well, this feeling toroidal much to you?

Cheers,
-Commodore[/COLOR]

Nothing too major there, friendliness all around.

Also, Krull the explorer finally found someone! It's GES and he's pissed:

me: Hey, Commodore here!
7:09 PM How's it going?
7:10 PM jtgoldsmith: Whats up
We met
me: Cool, just check, who met you?
jtgoldsmith: One of the warriors
7:11 PM Don't know the name
me: Krull the south warrior?
jtgoldsmith: Yeah
that sounds right
me: Cool, he's the one I thought, but I have a few other meandering.
7:12 PM jtgoldsmith: Any interest in agreeing to some NAP
me: Heh.
7:13 PM Statement one for my lurkers was to limit NAPs.
7:14 PM I will however say I have zero interest in fighting you and once you punch a scout down there you'll see we're a vast distance away.
It's a huge ~12 tile jungle arm.
jtgoldsmith: Well, that isn't going to suffice for me because you are getting close to my cities. I cannot have you messing with my micro.
me: Oh!
jtgoldsmith: So the options are, some sort of NAP, or I kill it with a war chariot
7:15 PM me: My warrior can turn around immediately if you'd like.
jtgoldsmith: That works too, but it would need to beat an immediate retreat.
me: That's completely fine.
7:16 PM I'd just prefer to have him fogbusting rather than die.
jtgoldsmith: Well, we can agree to some sort of short NAP
me: Oh, free info: Bard cities are appearing.
jtgoldsmith: Or some sort of other arrangement
me: SUre, 10 turns is fine.
7:17 PM jtgoldsmith: OK, that works for me.
I would love a barb city to pop up on my lands
That would be tasty for farming XP with a war chariot
me: Mostly it's just seeing how silly-long NAPs in other games cough the one you're admining* tend to ruin stuff.
jtgoldsmith: Yeah, indeed
me: Nothing hostile meant, and I'll scuttle happily away.
7:18 PM jtgoldsmith: BUt they are somewhat necessary too, otherwise you have to be in a constant phase of military build-up
me: Nothing hostile meant, and I'll scuttle happily away.
jtgoldsmith: That's fine.
I didn't think anything was
I just cannot allow the chance that you decide to take a swipe out of opportunism
me: Absolutely understood.
7:19 PM Early chariots helped keep my closer neighbor (NMG) very polite.
jtgoldsmith: You will get blocked by my borders if you keep going east and I don't have OBs, but if you head north and then east along the coast, there is some tundra you can move through
7:20 PM me: Oh, yeah, the icy hell center.
jtgoldsmith: Any interest in exchange screens?
me: I suspect wheel script.
Did we agree screens before paper or not?
jtgoldsmith: Yeah, some sort of heavily modified series of islands in a circle, leading to some sort of bizarre center spoke
7:21 PM Pretty sure we did
That is the standard around here
Waiting until paper is pretty silly
me: Cool, I'll edit out definite stuff, but I'll show the loooooong arm we have and other items of interest.
jtgoldsmith: It just complicates diplo
7:22 PM If you use alt+i
you get a bare map
no need to edit
me: Cool, thanks mate.
7:23 PM Darnit, Yuri just got off, no save seen.
jtgoldsmith: damn
that sucks
it was sent to him 20+ minutes ago
me: Hrm
7:24 PM Maybe he'd been chasing Judaism?
Needed Maestro's input.
jtgoldsmith: Did you land Hindu and Judaism?
7:25 PM me: Yeah, was gunning for a not-monument way to pop borders.
Krill's thread title in 20 is my feeling too.
jtgoldsmith: I am pretty pissed at you to be honest. I missed both by 3 turns. I figured who lands Hindu and then goes for Judaism too?
7:26 PM me: Dang, sorry man.
Need a CoL or Theo non-compete?
jtgoldsmith: nah, if you get there, it is all good
I just wish I had met you before I wasted my time
7:27 PM me: Yeah, me too. :-(
jtgoldsmith: I could've had math by now
me: I was actually beelining OR more than Judaism.
jtgoldsmith: Huh. TBH, I figured I would be the only one who would want it this early for that reason, since I am the only SPI civ.
7:28 PM me: Yeah, well, sucky Hunting/Myst start = late slaves.
I just double revolted.
7:29 PM I will never pay so little attention to starting techs ever again.
jtgoldsmith: That is all I looked at
I just narrowed my list to the Ag/Wheel and Ag/Mining civs
7:30 PM and then chose one
me: Yeah, wish I'd done China
Love the Ag/Mining combo
jtgoldsmith: China is way underrated. CKNs are useful for almost the whole game.
7:31 PM I prefer Ag/Wheel just for the saved beakers
but Mining is good too
me: Ah, but BW so long...that hurts.
jtgoldsmith: Wheel give stuff to do early to prevent wasted worker turns too
I haven't even adopted slavery and I am SPI
7:32 PM and I've had BW for 20 turns
me: More like chopping.
My infra is down next to captain whip, MNG
Oh! EPs
7:33 PM jtgoldsmith: Yeah, I am going to move them your way
Until we get to 43
me: You want to limit to graphs?
Cool, same here.
jtgoldsmith: So you have met MNG?
me: Yeah, he's to my north.
You met Ranamar?
jtgoldsmith: Am I directly to your east?
Yeah, RL7 and I are basically humping each other
me: Yeah, almost due east.
7:34 PM Yep, looks like the N/S pairs are close, while we're a long way away.
jtgoldsmith: Hard for me to see how this map is balanced
7:35 PM Some civ has to be too tightly packed and some has to have lots of room
just because of the odd numbers
me: I know Yuri is north of MNG somehow.
Not sure, think it's NE
7:36 PM jtgoldsmith: makes sense
You and MNG have some trouble?
You sound like you aren't getting along.
me: No, we're okay, just a few close-border disagreements.
7:37 PM He's a nice guy, name isn't lying.
He's just going to be a land competitor, and we're both aware of it.
7:38 PM You and Rana okay?
Skirmishers beat chariots, but I think WC have odds.
7:41 PM jtgoldsmith: I haven't messed with them
We came to a pretty easy, sensible border arrangement.
Good by me.
7:42 PM me: Nice.
jtgoldsmith: Neither of us want to mess with an early UU.
me: Yeah, I think that might have been intentional.
jtgoldsmith: That said, if I put together an Axe/WC, it is literally unbreakable this early. It has odds on everything.
7:43 PM me: Yeah, it's nice.
My other gut impulse was Ragnar of Zulu. Agg impis might match it.
7:44 PM jtgoldsmith: Nah, because the Axes still crush Impis.
Impis only get movement boni
me: Eventually, though, I reminded myself the ancient wars suck.
jtgoldsmith: But Impis are nasty early game pillagers.
me: Yeah
jtgoldsmith: Impis against AI are unfair
You can pillage them back into the stone age
and then conquer at will
me: Poor dumb AIs
7:45 PM Immortality scares you no longer, I take it?
jtgoldsmith: If you had Zulu, we could team up for Impi/WC 2-move stacks
me: Darn.
jtgoldsmith: Someone's game would be over this early
me: That'd be fun
7:46 PM Sadly, it'd take 20+ turns to even merge stacks.
jtgoldsmith: That far?
Are you my closest eastern neighbor?
me: We're making good time, no need to kick someone early.
Closest to the south
7:47 PM I think the hub is a little odd.
jtgoldsmith: Is it P-shaped or something?
me: Think a house.
jtgoldsmith: Some pentagonal?
7:48 PM me: Maybe, but MNG seems more north than NW
jtgoldsmith: Yeah, and RL7 is literally directly north of my eastern edge
we really need a damn screen shot exchange soon to figure this out
7:49 PM I exchanged screens with RL7, so I know exactly what that looks like and it straight north like an arrow
me: Yep, I have my screenies on my other laptop.
7:50 PM I um...edit them for reports at work.
Sigh.
Be an engineer, it's a great life.
7:51 PM Bleh, Yuri's still negotiating.
7:52 PM I'll be off soon, but for now: I'll move nowhere but west and away.
You said a spoke was NW of Krull?
7:53 PM jtgoldsmith: Still negotiating?
me: Yeah, he said he was trying to work diplo, thush old the save.
*thus
*hold
7:54 PM jtgoldsmith: NE of Krull, you need to move 1N, and then NE until you hit it
7:55 PM me: Okay, if I deviate from 1N, NE onwards, pop him. NAP 10turns at least, longer if needed.
7:56 PM jtgoldsmith: Sounds good.
actually, hang on a sec
me: 'k
jtgoldsmith: want to make sure you aren't going to get scewed
me: Cool, thanks.
7:57 PM jtgoldsmith: No, I think you are fine if you move 1N
7:58 PM me: Awesome.
7:59 PM Well, I'll be checking later, but for now, good luck and poke Yuri!
jtgoldsmith: ok

[Ceiliazul]

I'm happy to see my guess on the religion race turned out exactly right! I haven't gor far enough to realize it happened twice! Bummer it caued early tensions though.

exchange screens with bare map seems excellent. Since rana already exchanged with Egypt, and since Rana is perceived to be running away with the game, I wonder if they would give you the map he supplied too...

Regarding the chariot thru MNG land, you can justify starting the count from the landbridge cuz your chariot will also b barb sweeping your western wilds.

I'm stoked about how well that Jewish holy city will work out as a seal against MNGs creeping culture at your border. Def a good plan on your part.