Uncommonly Good: A Story of Elves

[Mardoc]

I'm confused - if it's nearly impossible for Nicolae to contact Brian, how the heck did he contact Acalostas? And if Acalostas is that lackadaisical, why is Brian concerned about him hearing rumors?

Really need to tech HBR early for mobility when you have such a naturally slow military, IMO.

I've lost track, have we done this? I know we're relying on Spiritual priests, but there might be other troops we'd want to put Mobility on.

[Gaspar]

Well I notice you're finally gotten your plains back around del Pipe de la Hash. So that's something. What are the plans for your witch?

Do we get a witch for that event, as in a Mobius Witch? That'd be swell if true. I really have no idea.

I'm confused - if it's nearly impossible for Nicolae to contact Brian, how the heck did he contact Acalostas? And if Acalostas is that lackadaisical, why is Brian concerned about him hearing rumors?

Acal had a hunter in Kyan's territory near Nic's border. I'll assume they got contact that way.

I've lost track, have we done this? I know we're relying on Spiritual priests, but there might be other troops we'd want to put Mobility on.

We do indeed have HBR. Turn report coming up shortly...

[Commodore]

Do we get a witch for that event, as in a Mobius Witch? That'd be swell if true. I really have no idea.

Sigh, dangit, sorry, I was thinking of a different one. This one is the Monty Python joke event that came with BtS.

[Gaspar]

Acalostas built the Great Library. Good use of those hammers. Try a few workers next time. I guess with this we have no excuse to remain in God King, right? Figured we also don't really need Agrarianism. While it creates food issues in Hash Pipe, hopefully those will soon be resolved by Ancient Forest growth. Anyway, we're spiritual so we can always change back later, right?

Before [God King/Religion/Apprenticeship/Agrarianism]:

100% Science

100% Gold

And After[City States/Religion/Apprenticeship/Foreign Trade]:
100% Science:

100% Gold:

Better, but I can't say hugely better. The bonuses will only increase with time, of course. I also offered OB to Brian in [strike] a brazen effort to get more foreign trade routes[/strike] an affirmation of friendship.

In other foreign news, Rawkking settled the Frigus site.



More infrastructure-y stuff. Library completed in Hash Pipe, dialed up a Mage Guild. Put down a Tiger Cage in the capital, raising the happy cap to 17, so I put a citizen back to work firing a priest. 5T til we pop our 2nd GP in Paradise City. 86% chance of being the Stigmata on the Unborn, 14% chance of being Song of Autumn. Either way it'll be good for research. Tech wise, we should be able to keep up with Rawkking from here on out, really. Right now, we desperately need more workers for Hash Pipe, Afro Man and Kaya, so next set of builds will be those.

The glorious empire:



Corruption of Spirit in @EOT. Did we decide Masonry next? Or Archery? I'm thinking Archery -> Math, since the Marble is less relevant with GLib off the table.

[Gaspar]

Sent the following pair of replies to Brian (one this afternoon, one just now.)

Hi Brian,

Got this and will give a fuller response later tonight. Ultimately, I doubt there's any reasonable opportunity for Nicolae to meet you - I'd never have done it without Hawks and Rawkkings assent and I don't believe Hunting is on the Sheaim tech path anytime soon, if ever. Which is unfortunate, since he has an Ivory resource he's wasting. Nonetheless, I'll direct him that you're interested in contact.

Will chat about the rest later.

Regards,
Gaspar

Hey Brian,

Re: the rest - I fully understand wanting to take out Acalostas. No offense to him, but he's clearly the most out of his depth player here - why he seems to be adverse to improving his terrain I don't know. I'm a little wary of you working with Kyan to do so, only because I'm opposed to anything that increases his power, but I understand why you feel like its a good option for you. I'm far enough away that it matters to me not one iota, so best of luck. Honestly, were it not for Kyan I'd probably be attacking Rawkking because he's settled all over me for no reason with all his land in the west, but pragmatism tells me a strong Hippus is pretty important to the anti-Clown coalition. I appreciate you keeping that under wraps as well.

I passed your message along to Nicolae, I'll let you know if he responds.

Not quite sure what else we can do, but I offered you OB in game. If you have hawks and want to rebase one over to my cities to get contact with Nicolae, that's fine by me. I wouldn't mind flying one out of one your cities just to fill in my map a bit if you don't mind. If you do, that's perfectly understandable.

Also - If you can spare a water mana loan at some point in time here, I'd appreciate it. I have a pair of desert tiles in an incredibly irritating spot I'd like to spring. If you want a loan of anything let me know - I probably won't have any nodes up for a little bit yet, but when I do I'm plenty happy to oblige. I don't really have anything else useful in surplus, Ravus only gave me two happiness resources and only one copy of each.

Regards,
Gaspar

That's a whole lot of gobbledygook for "I can haz water mana and trade routes plz?"

[Man Behind the Mask]

My machine overheated (really need to get it fixed!) trying to play the turn for you, but it looks like that was a good thing as I never would have made the civic swap or provided such a detailed report.

Better, but I can't say hugely better.

That is a pretty significant reduction in costs, although I agree that the increase in income is a little disappointing. Sad to lose the hammers in Chronic as well, but we’ve upped our breakeven rate and max beakers which is the most important thing at the moment. With Brian out of a Golden Age, we’re now number 2 in production, so the Elven Economy is starting to pay dividends.

Did we decide Masonry next? Or Archery? I'm thinking Archery -> Math, since the Marble is less relevant with GLib off the table.

Happy with Archery next, since we won’t need the Marble for the Library and working another zero food tile isn’t going to help Hash Pipe reach its cap. It’s less than a turn of research, and having Gilden gaining XP sooner could be valuable later.

Sent the following pair of replies to Brian (one this afternoon, one just now.)

Seems like diplo is beginning to ramp up. I imagine Nicolae will be a little sceptical of Brian’s “do you want a competent player?” line if he looks at the scoreboard. Brian must have got a really good deal from the Clowns if he thinks he’s going to be able to threaten them just by overcoming the Grigori. To give an indication of the current disparity, if you simply add the Elohim and Grigori scores together, you still get to significantly less than the Balseraphs .

Following on from RG’s email, I checked and Kyan’s trade screen currently shows 3 Death, 2 Air, 2 Chaos, 1 Mind and 1 Sun. That is a lot of mana! He still lacks Sorcery, though.

No question as well we need to get a Mage Guild up soon for adept level spells. As far as a dispel Mage goes, though, I'd assume we'll get any mages we have promoted from Savants.

On this more general point, my understanding is that Potent Savants and regular Adepts should gain XP at exactly the same rate (I wish I could find the graph that somebody posted ). The advantage of Savants is that the Potency carries over and you get mobility for free, while the advantage of Adepts is that they get an extra free promotion and can take other spell spheres for their promotions on the way to magedom. I think it will be best to cultivate a mixture.

[Gaspar]

My machine overheated (really need to get it fixed!) trying to play the turn for you, but it looks like that was a good thing as I never would have made the civic swap or provided such a detailed report.

Would definitely like to see you play a turn sometime soon, so let me know when you're able.

That is a pretty significant reduction in costs, although I agree that the increase in income is a little disappointing. Sad to lose the hammers in Chronic as well, but we’ve upped our breakeven rate and max beakers which is the most important thing at the moment. With Brian out of a Golden Age, we’re now number 2 in production, so the Elven Economy is starting to pay dividends.

Yeah, that was my feeling as well. I'm hoping Brian accepting OB will help the increase by upping foreign trade routes. The reason I think its a little disappointing is just how better developed The Chronic is than all other cities. Remember that we got off to a slow start on expansion. But as time goes on, that will be less of an issue.

Seems like diplo is beginning to ramp up. I imagine Nicolae will be a little sceptical of Brian’s “do you want a competent player?” line if he looks at the scoreboard. Brian must have got a really good deal from the Clowns if he thinks he’s going to be able to threaten them just by overcoming the Grigori. To give an indication of the current disparity, if you simply add the Elohim and Grigori scores together, you still get to significantly less than the Balseraphs .

I'm quite skeptical as well. Honestly, I don't really give a hoot what they do over there in Ineptia, I just really want TRs and Mana.

Following on from RG’s email, I checked and Kyan’s trade screen currently shows 3 Death, 2 Air, 2 Chaos, 1 Mind and 1 Sun. That is a lot of mana! He still lacks Sorcery, though.


On this more general point, my understanding is that Potent Savants and regular Adepts should gain XP at exactly the same rate (I wish I could find the graph that somebody posted ). The advantage of Savants is that the Potency carries over and you get mobility for free, while the advantage of Adepts is that they get an extra free promotion and can take other spell spheres for their promotions on the way to magedom. I think it will be best to cultivate a mixture.

Ah, didn't know that. Assumed potency was a little better. Regardless, I don't think a lot of mages are going to make the cut for us. A sprinkling of adepts and a mage or two. The military strength will come from Priests.


By the by, Brian replied. I guess we can take the water now on our first adept. I really don't need more than one I don't think.

The problem as regards the map is that we got a novice builder (with little backup as well from what I could see in the number of posts in the map thread, no looking mind, just looking at who was last poster) in Amelia and he didn't do a good job of balancing the map. I'm plains and mountains mostly (except for a 5*5 square in the West) with few happy resources either (one of which being a plains hill cotton, clearly a plant by someone not used to making maps).

As regards the water mana I have it promised at an unspecified time in the future for ten turns, but I can give it to you now if you want. I'm not looking at the mana line in the near future, focusing on horses and priests, and probably won't look to mana needs for a good while, so a promise to supply (without prejudicing you) a similar resource in the future would suit me fine.

Finally, dealing with Kyan. There are 3 reasons for this 1) I was boxed in, what I've settled is all I have to gain naturally (can't eat tundra), 2) There was a giant mountain range to my east, limiting my contacts to Kyan & Acalostas, losing my scout to a lizard didn't help either. Acalostas made a pain of himself early on so burnt his bridges with me and finally 3) my land was so crappy (see above) compared to Grigori lands that if I were up against a competent player I'd need outside help to win (even playing a perfect game, which I haven't. I'm solid not spectacular).

Brian.

[Gaspar]

Early turn today...

Greeted by this:



Brian's TRs bring us up to 307 bpt @100%. Free Savant for Corruption of Spirit pops in Cypress Hill. I think I'll just let him sit for a future mage rather than spreading him to Paradise City for the time being. We can just bang out a Ritualist for that at a later date.

Threw down another Tiger cage in Paradise City, raising the happy cap there to 13. Flew a hawk out of one of Brian's cities. This is not going to go well for Acalostas:



Mage Guild done in 3T. Will bang out an adept for Spring right after. Will dial up Veil temples almost everywhere when current builds complete, except for a few workers.

Here's a look at GNP researching a tech almost everyone else has:



In a normal game, we'd be in excellent shape. Archery comes in @EOT - we can two turn Math, which is nice. I'm thinking CoL -> Currency -> Math -> Taxation unless anyone has any strenuous objections? At this point, given we pretty much already have access to any units we'd be adding to future dogpiles we should feel pretty secure to go whole hog on the economy. Probably want to get ourselves into a rushbuy Civic sometime in the near future - Military State?

[Mardoc]

Threw down another Tiger cage in Paradise City, raising the happy cap there to 13.

I'm glad to see the PoL continue to earn their keep . I haven't looked in a while - how's the Bloom campaign coming along? Are we getting close to the point where we can send all the PoL to Nicolae or RG's border? Are any of the New Forests growing up to a point where we'd regret turns out of Leaves? Which leads to...

Will dial up Veil temples almost everywhere when current builds complete, except for a few workers.

Excellent. +2 beakers, +1 happy (or is it +2, do we have Reagents?) will go over very nicely. Speaking of which...I wonder if there's anything we can sell for incense and gems?

In any case, I do like the possibility of adding in some Ritualist spam to our army.

Archery comes in @EOT - we can two turn Math, which is nice. I'm thinking CoL -> Currency -> Math -> Taxation unless anyone has any strenuous objections? At this point, given we pretty much already have access to any units we'd be adding to future dogpiles we should feel pretty secure to go whole hog on the economy. Probably want to get ourselves into a rushbuy Civic sometime in the near future - Military State?

Agreed, Priests will be our army for quite some time, therefore a pure econ focus makes sense. I like that route, although we may need to throw Warfare in to unlock MilState. The only real question is this: is it worth considering an Infernal Pact to try to destroy the Clowns' floodplains? And/or build ourselves an Infernal Grimoire with which to grab a tech? I think we could likely manage to get there first if we aimed for it, but I'm not sure what tech would be worth buying with the Grimoire. I suppose we could unlock Sorcery fairly easily.

[Mardoc]

On this more general point, my understanding is that Potent Savants and regular Adepts should gain XP at exactly the same rate (I wish I could find the graph that somebody posted ). The advantage of Savants is that the Potency carries over and you get mobility for free, while the advantage of Adepts is that they get an extra free promotion and can take other spell spheres for their promotions on the way to magedom. I think it will be best to cultivate a mixture.

I think this is mostly true. There's a caveat that we can't take advantage of this instant, and one we can.

First - Savants are Disciple class units. If we manage to get an extra Great Prophet that we can use on the Altar, that's free XP. If we can get several layers of the Altar, then we're suddenly talking near-insta mages.

But more importantly - unlike Mage Guilds, Temples of the Veil are broadly useful buildings, that we'll want for a lot of reasons (the inherent bonuses, Ritualists, Diseased Corpses maybe, Beasts). So we'll be able to spam Savants like no tomorrow, and the ones who can't seem to roll lucky can always upgrade to Ritualists, while the good ones go for Mage school.