[Spoilers] naufragar's fist full of pesos (Montezuma)

[naufragar]

Thanks, Grillo and Papa Bear. Here's a chance to restrain my aggression:


Ziankali is going to found for the green river land with horses. I could raze that city if I acted now. I haven't ended turn so I could think on it.

As you can see, my own settler (which was going to go to that area) just completed. I was late by 4-5 turns. That spot is ~8 tiles away from my capital. It's 4-5 tiles away from Ziankali's. Plus, I did just send him a wheat-for-wheat trade.

If I don't get horses of my own, I can't win. I won't be able to attack, ever. I also won't be able to defend against catapults which my technologically superior neighbors will get long before me. (For what it's worth, those horses across the water couldn't possibly have been meant to be mine, right? My tech path was (Hunting, Myst) -> Agriculture -> Mining -> Bronze Working -> Wheel -> Pottery -> Animal Husbandry -> Fishing. I wasted 38 beakers on Masonry (2 turns), so be it. Even without that waste, I can't see how I was supposed to get Sailing and a galley before Aspi settled. Maybe I could have gone AH before Pottery, but I had no reason to suspect my horse location would be in jeopardy.)

I've drawn a tiny read circle on Aspi's city of TLAFTW. He went monument before granary. Looks like we're going to have a culture war, and we know where those end. I haven't ended the turn because I need to think of a cool, level-headed plan. To which lurkers are welcome to participate.  

Oh btw, El Grillo, I meant to respond to you earlier: I can only predict based on what I myself would do, hence my very conservative settling this game. If I were Joao, I would have seriously considered pantsing a defenseless Montezuma, so I had to prepare against that possibility. There was another path (perhaps stronger) that Ziankali took, but I had to treat the threat as real, because I might've done it.  

[Papa Bear]

If I were playing Joao, I'd rather found as many cities as I could peacefully and start thinking about expansion after having had a spell of vertical growth. Early wars against an AGG neighbor? Doesn't make sense to me. And it would seem Ziankali is thinking along those lines as well. The Mali is an "ugly" opponent for early wars as well. How can one hope to win on the offensive against opposition Skirmishers? I think your "natural" direction for peaceful / aggressive expansion should be eastwards...

[naufragar]

Early wars against an AGG neighbor? Doesn't make sense to me. And it would seem Ziankali is thinking along those lines as well.

This is exactly the reason to attack now when he doesn't want to fight rather than later when he does want to fight. In the other thread, Ramk reminded me that I can trade for horses. I don't like it: I don't like relying on another player for something so important. But that is a way to avoid war.

When I can log in, I'll take a pic of the East.

[Papa Bear]

In addition to what Ramk said about being able to trade for Horses it is also important to know that many players will weigh their options with the "broader picture" in mind. Let's say, someone is somewhere in the 5-10 positions and is starting a war against a neighbor without Horses. I am pretty certain that ALL players in the 1-5 positions will trade Horses to the beleaguered opponent without thinking or charging too much. Pure self interest. Don't help create more competition by refusing to help the "targets" of those seeking their chance to move up in the game's hierarchy...

[naufragar]

Ziankali's newest city is a bit greedy, in my opinion:


He planted where he did so he can get another city 3N of this one. In six turns, my borders pop and I can hit him with 1-movers from the fog. I won't do this. (I say today. I am apparently a very fickle person.) I have Spiritual, so if I can hold off until the midgame, I can use Caste System to be annoying.

The East is food- and commerce-rich but hammer-poor:


This land loves 5-pop cities with Sacrificial Altars...

I'm also interested by the Stone, Marble, and Horses in the area. I don't know how strong Holland and Nane are, but they can't be tougher than game-leading Ziankali and Aspi, right?

Ziankali refused open borders despite having open borders with every neighbor of his that I've met. Here's the Power graph:


Ziankali has double my cities, so keeping my power anywhere near his comes at an immense opportunity cost. We're not going to be friends until I don't look digestible, unfortunately.  

[El Grillo]

I see the German lurkers were able to convince you not to launch an attack. Well, that sounds reasonable enough. In general, you're not likely to be able to improve your position in such a big game without some good faith in a mutually demilitarized border with at least one of your neighbors  

[naufragar]

I see the German lurkers were able to convince you not to launch an attack. Well, that sounds reasonable enough. In general, you're not likely to be able to improve your position in such a big game without some good faith in a mutually demilitarized border with at least one of your neighbors  

I want to hope for a friendly border between me and Ziankali but the sad reality is that I'll be looking over my shoulder as long as he is big and I am small. I'm discovering I'm very impulsive, so when a chorus of people all ask "are you sure???", it's best to take a step back. Honestly, my tunnel vision on the West made me miss out on how good the East is. I hate losing that stone island to Aspi, and I hate not having horses, but if I can extend all the way East to steal some land from Holland and Nane, I might be able to stabilize.

I'm trying to not say anything more provocative, but oh well... Nobody seems to be accounting for the fact that I have a lot less to lose than Ziankali. Most of the warnings were of two flavors: 1) Ziankali is stronger than you, so don't attack. 2) Grinding wars between two powers just weakens both and usually ruins their game. My plan was always just a city snipe for horses. It's possible Ziankali would declare total war because of it (as Superdeath did in PB45), but my hypothesis was that he wasn't going to throw away his #1 position by grinding it out with me. It would have made him my enemy and likely caused him to attack me at a later date, but I believe that later attack is already coming, whether Ziankali even knows it himself or not.

Again, I'm not going to attack him. I think the voices urging caution are right, but everyone seemed to misread what I wanted. (Although I grant that I am far too quick to give small injuries.)

[El Grillo]

Is it possible that that's Ziankali's only source of horses too? So instead of it being viewed as just a city snipe along the shared border, it would be a direct threat to his own strategic planning? That could be much more likely to lead to the kind of bitter grinding war that the lurkers were warning against.

[naufragar]

You're not suggesting that lurker comments in my thread were informed by their reading in Ziankali's, are you?     Btw, I really have appreciated the level of feedback I've gotten over at Civforum. As best I can tell, lurker culture is different there. There are fewer inhibitions about giving advice and asking that a player explain their plan. Having been raised on RB's lurker style, I was originally worried that these interactions might let some information slip, but they are all model lurkers.

But as to your actual point, Ziankali does have his own horses:



This pic also shows that I would have to seriously encroach if I wanted the horses in Denmark. They are 5 tiles from his capital and 9 tiles from mine.

I couldn't find a more recent screenshot of Z's land. Now that I look at this, I'm struck that both he and I share resources: silver, dyes, wine. On the foreign advisor, I saw earlier than not everybody has silver at their capital. Some have gems or gold. I would guess that the mapmaker has given neighbors the same resources so that they have to trade with more distant players.  

[El Grillo]

Ah, I didn't mean to suggest that the lurkers had specific additional knowledge in this case, only that in my own experience, I once attacked in what I saw as a single city snipe along our border represented a crisis for my opponent, who responded with something like half a dozen whips, a counterattack that prompted more whipping on my part, and finally an uneasy peace that forced us to commit huge garrisons along that border for the rest of the game.

When you put all three horses in one picture like that, it is a bit frustrating to see...