[SPOILERS] PB7: Winning The Hard Way - Mao Plays Craps

[Commodore]

Grande overview shot of the day. Y'know, I wish the cows and rice had swapped down south, that oasis would irrigate things nicely. Ah well. Moot point most likely, this empire is about death and glory (but probably mostly death).



Speaking of death...I see that train a comin', it's coming 'round the bend...how's this for combat roading?



I'm getting thrown a bit in my micro by normal speed, but that's a help in an invasion. Cahokia's last semi-peaceful build is going to come in four turns from now as the roaded forest gets chopped. Then a little roading or archer-chopping and it's time to pasture cows and whip in chariots and archers. Protective Native Americans...yes we will be offending with bows.



I do know some things. Like, for instance, might as well swap to the cottage while finishing up the Miccosukee worker, because rounding would take one of the extra hammers anyway. Spear next to prevent decay?



Looking good. One nice thing is, I think we'll keep whatever we manage to take this side of gunpowder.

[spacetyrantxenu]

Yeah the spear has been in the queue for a long time now so it needs to finish.

The road building plan failed its environmental impact study but I hear that Mao approved it anyway. The NA DoT is free to commence building on schedule. I burned MackSeven's cities just to watch them die....

[Commodore]

Okay, another hum-drum turn as such things go. Hard Way and the unnamed worker finished up the fp farm for Poarch Creek, speeding up the growth by a turn. Hard Way should do north next turn to chop the forest and then road towards the silver. Poarch whips in totem pole ASAP and then overflows into a couple-turn granary so the army whipping can begin.



Xenu, I got to say I'm kind of in love with the hammer output of Miccosukee here. Once the spear finishes swap to a settler (3 turns!) and then let the massive overflow roll into a 1-turn worker for the offensive road (NE worker chopping 1S). Seneca will get a farm soon after settling and she too can whip a couple chariots out against the macksevenmonster.



White whale? Perhaps, but call me Ishmael, I will work hard to enable Xenuahab here.

[spacetyrantxenu]

Wait, saying you are enabling me implies I have a problem. I can quit Civ any time. Really. I can. Just after I play a few more turns.

I'm not good for a lot of analysis here, I'm really tired after driving half the day. More hammers = more WMDs to spend on MackSeven. More farms and cities = more peasants Mao can kill (which is pure win on its own), but converting their bones into WMDs is even better. But we're hunting land whales, not sea whales here. :aar:

[spacetyrantxenu]

So bluster in the public diplomacy thread. The last time Seven offered me a deal he broke it anyway (killed my warrior with an axe even when he said he'd let it pass if I moved away from his city), so I'm not inclined to care about his opinion on what I do with me settlers or army. I think his plan early in the game was successfully enacted, killing his neighbor to gain a lot of land. Now he wants to go into full builder mode and play in his mountain protected sandbox all alone. Well, sorry. He sees our power graph and is just trying to scare us off. Yes we will probably not gain a lot from fighting him. But we'll make him play defense and stop building.

But his attitude I could do without. Am I green? Probably. Is he a better player? I'm sure he is. Do I give a shit? Nope. Talk down to me in the public thread, it'll do you good! I'm not in the mood for this. We were already going to invade, just deal with it. He knows what's coming, he can see our power graph. If he can't handle playing defense at tech parity in the ancient era, go play SP. The AIs will let you have the pyramids.

[Commodore]

*wanders in*

Ack! Xenu! Seven is a smart guy, and I dumped extra EPs on him. Abort, abort! Brinkmanship is for NAP games! This is a game where we sweetly smile until we road a dozen units down their throats. Seven and Mack are the two most paranoid guys around.

Trust me, I know, Seven is a condescending bombastic asshole with all the charm of a shark, but we need to be a little less "gonna attack you now, dude". If you permit, I'll try to redirect by negotiating for the furs area, if we focus there and show a little skin up there there is an outside possibility they'll think north.

[spacetyrantxenu]

That's fine by me, negotiate away. He just rubbed me the wrong way and I barked back. I'm not in a good mood and probably should stay off the forums today (no spoiler here for anyone in the game, but I'm not sure if you saw what I posted in the PBEM29g tech thread, there's a reason I haven't played the save yet).

[Commodore]

Just for reference, here's the power graph. I'm sure right now Seven is bummed about it, because they have stone...they want to make the 'mids, not more units. Hint: We want them to make the 'mids, not more units. And then kill them and take the rock pile.



Seven's not wrong about how hard it is to attack another human at tech parity in slavery. But these demos scream "temporary advantage" to me, with the real advantages (Pro Natives, dogs) enjoying their time in the sun right now. The attack will probably fail, as you well know. Don't let Seven get under your skin as he whines about that, desperate times and all.



The slight bump this turn was because of the spear being born. Next turn the worker in between Miccosukee and Cahokia can start roading along with the new one born from Cahokia. The other two get shaken lose in three or four turns.



Expanding while about to war? Yep, I'm a noob too, but needs must as devils drive. This really really is an amazing capital, 19hpt is great. It's going to be sad when we whip it to the bone.



With Seven keyed up, Construction is the next goal, methinks. Let's play all-in, eh?

[spacetyrantxenu]

Catapults sound useful since I've delayed this long in throwing an army toward him. We just have to be careful to not fall into the "let's wait for the next unit" trap for too long.

[Commodore]

Catapults sound useful since I've delayed this long in throwing an army toward him. We just have to be careful to not fall into the "let's wait for the next unit" trap for too long.

Oh, no worries on that account, we'll begin building nothing but military as soon as each city's current build finishes (okay, Poarch gets granary too but that's a 1-turn delay). It's Mack and Seven and they have stone. They're about to blast the science rate off of every other team as they get the 'mids and once again prove how broken they are. The window, is...actually, probably twenty turns ago, but far closer to now than to later.

On the plus side, LP ought to actually have a rival worth double-moving out of this. One empire with the 'mids and three civs' worth of land is going to be the end result here, one way or the other.

SevenSpirits patented rage quit? Probably not, but prepare for many, many words of pompus condemnation.