(April 26th, 2013, 04:35)Qgqqqqq Wrote: Non-assigned...
Unless RB does something I'v forgotten to mercantalism, you should be able to swap that specialist with another (+/- signs).
Besides, given all 17 pop are working tiles, why are there two specialists rather then just the free one?
There are just 16 citizens working tiles, plus the city centre.
The engineer has the +/- signs, but the minus sign is cropped away from the screenshot, and the plus sign is missing because he has just one engineer slot.
Because I am bad? Nah, that too, but in this case it is simply because I switched to the wealth build only so that I get over 200 gold produced in that city I do produce actual units / buildings there right now for which the engineer is helping along.
If someone has checked civstats he will have seen that I was 2 hours logged in yesterday. I didn't forget to log out, instead I really sat there 2 hours and thought about what to do. Because I am done imo. I had not only the worst start position in the game in terms of actual starting tiles and surrounding lands (arguably) but I also have the worst position in general because I am in the middle. Everyone else has on most sides huge stretches of water or world-end or a really weak neighbour. For example Bigger has just me as neighbour he has to be wary of. Commodore the same. Plako has me and slowcheetah but his lands "next" to me are still separated by 2 BRick cities and even if not those would be new 1-pop or 2-pop cities. In reality I am not his neighbour. slowcheetah has plako. I?
east: plako and xenu. plako could be opportunistic, knowing I can't really retaliate over water. xenu could just feel it is more fun to attack me. So I do have to keep quite some forces in BRicks old lands.
south: Commodore and scooter. I have to keep strong forces down there. Really strong forces because except for our border there is no need for Commodore to put any forces anywhere.
west: Bigger. Who does still have an army from his Azza-attack and probably will keep it. So again strong forces necessary.
north: Kinda quiet right now but there are islands which Bigger probably will try to settle.
In reality, I need to have triple the military of the others to keep myself save because I am surrounded by enemies while they all can focus on me. But there is no way I can produce that much military AND keep up in infra AND keep up in new cities AND keep up in tech. That's not going to happen. But if I show a weakness on one front, I am sure I'll get attacked.
At least, that is the current situation. But as soon as Galleons come into play - and that can't take that long anymore - it will get even more messy. When that happens, I have too many cities that all can be attacked with them. Sure I can try to get scouting boats in the water. But even with 1 more turn to prepare, I am fucked. So I need Galleons on my own. But that means obsoleting the Colossus. That will tank my economy.
I am not sure what to do tbh. Krill might be a strategic mastermind and be able to see a way out of this, but I sure don't. I just can make myself a target that is sure to cost the attacker so much that he'd rather not do it. Because that sure works with Commodore... but even if it does, I still won't be able to compete with the others. Oh well, I expected to lose this since T40 so it could be worse. At least I did get up to second in crop yield and first in MfG even if Commodore is in a GA.
Quote:but I also have the worst position in general because I am in the middle. Everyone else has on most sides huge stretches of water or world-end or a really weak neighbour. For example Bigger has just me as neighbour he has to be wary of. Commodore the same. Plako has me and slowcheetah but his lands "next" to me are still separated by 2 BRick cities and even if not those would be new 1-pop or 2-pop cities. In reality I am not his neighbour. slowcheetah has plako. I?
east: plako and xenu. plako could be opportunistic, knowing I can't really retaliate over water. xenu could just feel it is more fun to attack me. So I do have to keep quite some forces in BRicks old lands. south: Commodore and scooter. I have to keep strong forces down there. Really strong forces because except for our border there is no need for Commodore to put any forces anywhere. west: Bigger. Who does still have an army from his Azza-attack and probably will keep it. So again strong forces necessary. north: Kinda quiet right now but there are islands which Bigger probably will try to settle.
In reality, I need to have triple the military of the others to keep myself save because I am surrounded by enemies while they all can focus on me. But there is no way I can produce that much military AND keep up in infra AND keep up in new cities AND keep up in tech. That's not going to happen. But if I show a weakness on one front, I am sure I'll get attacked.
I know how you feel - it really sucks having heaps of open fronts and knowing that everyone else has backline that is easily protected.
And even with that, I can't even comprehend the horror of having all those cities coastally vulnerable.
So yeah, good luck
Erebus in the Balance - a FFH Modmod based around balancing and polishing FFH for streamlined competitive play.
Yeah. City 3 was just dumb. Tbh, I feel that was the weakest part of my game, when I realized how bad (early game certainly, late game arguably) my immediate surroundings were I should have started scouting parties to find better land. The same goes for losing that city to Bigger, that was just dumb, I had 2 units in it after I took it from the barbs. Would I have secured that part of the land than I think it is safe to assume that Azza and Bigger would still be fighting each other while I would be considerably stronger AND much less attackable. What I am missing is a core - that's btw why I settled those cities against Commodore. I can't let him have a city next to my capital and 2nd city. Now he can theoretically take them, but if he does he opens his stacks to counter-attacks. That's why I hate Eles so much right now, I need 2-movers so that I don't have to have dozens of units in every city. I can reinforce all my southern cities with just one stack of them - doesn't help though if Commodore brings Eles. That's why I do build Catapults right now, so I can weaken them enough to hopefully be able to kill them. Still leaves cities vulnerable to being razed via sea of course, but with 5-7 defenders in a city, it gets kinda expensive for the attacker (at least that's the hope).
I am also building workboats to act as scouts in the waters. I will get Caravels soon to put better scouts in the ocean, but for now that has to suffice.
Oh, and obsoleting Colossus will be -60 commerce I think. That will hurt. Though I can get up to 892 GNP right now if I build wealth and concentrate on specialists. Should I run for Nationalism and build Taj? A GA to get some GPs for another one would be kinda helpful. But it would cost me so much production. Oh well, I don't know what to do anymore.
Took the last city from BRick on the continent and razed it. I know since 3 turns that xenu is building up troops in the nearby city (I have a Sentry-Knight nearby) and is up to 6 catas, 7 WEs, 8 spears, 5 pikes, a few axes and so on. So I should not have taken that attack. Oh well. He probably will kill all my 10 Knights which are out there. I offered him my map - as another sign of friendship as I don't intend to attack him anytime soon but I don't know if he is even interested in that. He could attack scooter instead and actually get himself a few cities (I think he should have done that some time ago already but I can't say for certain how good his chances really were).
Anyhow, if he kills those 10 Knights it would suck. He should be able to do that without losses even. And those are highly promoted ones. I thought about covering them, but really that will make no difference. If he attacks, I lose them. Simply as that. I don't think I will lose Terrapin, it will have 6 LBs, 3 Pikes, 1 Mace and 10-15 Knights.
More importantly, Commodore has shown me that he has Galleons, so he took Astronomy with Lib. And he can theoretically move them through scooters and xenus borders and attack me on half my cities. Well, 9 at least, Lakamha being one of them. Great, just great. I can't defend against that, I can't put everywhere enough troops to defend against that. Of course, I don't know what he would do with most of those cities, but just razing them is a possibility. If he razed Lakamha I would lose a big part of my economy. Colossus, Shrine, Moai... so, do I put 10 LBs in there? And if I do that, what to do with the other cities? I can't even produce that many...
So, I can simply only hope that he doesn't attack me because it makes no sense to go to war with me about cities that are just newly founded and don't really add anything to his empire. Sure he can raze them or take them. But there is always the possibility that I drag out the war, even though I can't win. See PBEM46. So that potentially does hurt more than it helps. Also he is in front right now and I think he can already compete with his land. Additionally, it sucks to own my land, as it is indefensible. But of course he is a big part of THAT problem.
Well, tbh, I think I will leave this game soon. Azza and BRick might go before me, but I am not sure if plako will take out Brick and I actually don't intend to sail over to his last two cities. The same is probably true for Azza and Bigger. So, actually, I might be the next player to leave the game, despite being in 3rd position according to score. Oh well, it was nice while it lasted, especially as I've learned that you really can come back even if you are behind a bit. But I don't think I ever had a chance to win this game with the map being as it is. But I whined enough about that, I think the map in general was rightly chosen by Krill (though I'd still like to see how the first map looked). One players spot being bad is probably not avoidable as long as you don't want to handcraft the map.
That's good because he hopefully will finish BRick off and not come for me afterwards. I will put some more garrisons on those border cities now because
- xenu declared on me, killed my 10 Knights and offered peace
I had expected that as written in my last post. I thought he would accept an offer of 15 gpt. Of course that is not as much as those Knights would have been worth, but quite honestly, he is now getting 0. So he did not take 150 gold just to kill a stack of units from me which he isn't going to follow up and with me being clearly in the stronger position. That's weird xenu. You know that I can come back later and those 10 Knights being dead won't help you.
The whole play is baffling for me tbh. He isn't winning anything with this, quite the opposite. So why do it? Taking the gold would hurt me as well but would but earn him at least something. But this? That just helps plako, slowcheetah and Commodore - and maybe Bigger. But that's it. That's just so irrational. Also, with that stack, why did he not take the fight to BRick? He could have taken that last city from him easily. What again would have gained him more. Or move it down south and take some cities from scooter. Actually that's what I don't understand at all. Why not attacking scooter and getting that land? That might make you somewhat competitive again. Better than to sit around and wait for your demise, isn't it? Really mind-boggling.
I did. No reason not too, as I said I did not intend to attack him right now. Emotionally of course I'd like to attack him, but looking at it from a rational perspective there is simply no reason to do that. Those 10 Knights are lost and won't come back. He won't give me anything for peace either, so no need to haggle. Tbh, losing those 10 Knights sucks - I don't think I lost much more in the whole Brick-war - but getting peace for 10 turns with xenu right now in return is a boon. That let me concentrate on a different border. And while those 10 turns tick down, the cities from BRick start to mature and to contribute to the empire.
Of course, that attack still was a losing proposition for xenu. But I kinda understand it. He doesn't think he has any chance in this game anymore - which might be true but when I look at scooter, whom we all thought are the firsts to leave the game after Commodore started to mob them up, it shows me that there is always a small chance. But xenu isn't seeing it, so instead he just plays his turns and is just looking for ways to make it more fun for himself. Which is fine. But I think setting himself the goal to take scooter out would be fun as well - and he should have realized latest after last turn that I intend to be friendly towards him. In reality, he should know that since several turns. I gave him pig for free, which is not much of course, but it is showing a sign of friendship imo. I don't know if he doesn't understand it, simply doesn't care or ... oh, well, I can ramble on forever, fact of the matter is I understand why xenu plays the way he does but I don't agree with it.
I do produce actual units / buildings there right now for which the engineer is helping along. 
