[SPOILERS] - Tredje and Mardoc are Sheelba of the Clan of Embers

[Tredje]

Diplomacy:

Talked to Bob. He agreed to settle no closer to us than 1E of the Standing Stones. He also agreed to a NAP until T110. I think this gives us enough time to get our Sons. If we can't, we'll be left for dead anyway since it is 500 beakers in 60 turns. I'm not sure if it would have been better for us to hurt Bob, but I was afraid we could be locked in a prolonged conflict when we don't know what will happen in the west. My reasoning is that we now have secured our entire eastern flank and we can focus on getting what we want from Sareln. That is the main objective right now, along with fixing our poor economy. My immediate thought is to get Fishing after Exploration so that we can work those water tiles for 2 Commerce.

What do you think Mardoc?

I will make an update on the actual turns tomorrow. I am dead tired right now, so it will have to wait.

[Mardoc]

Hmm. Well, I think Bob's probably dancing, telling himself that he'll surely be in a dominant position by then and he didn't give up anything of consequence. That said, you have a point about not overcommitting until the Sons arrive. If we didn't have that trump card, we'd need to take all the advantages we can get right now, but with it, well, things are a little more relaxed. It makes sense not to risk getting in trouble now.

Honestly, I think we could have kept him choked for 40-50 turns anyway, and not have to rely on him keeping his promises; I prefer 'can't' to 'won't' when it comes to diplo. But again, the Sons...

I think Fishing is actually a good idea, but it'll look weedy to people who don't know what we're actually after. Honestly, I suspect that we'll be losing in all or almost all categories for pretty much the entire game, until we burn their cities down. The fact you're a newbie and I'm relatively new should help out here

It's not just 600 beakers in 50 turns, it's 600 beakers, a built trireme or two, and sailing south and back. Which is why I approve of Fishing; it'll help cut down that time. Probably go for Bronze next, before settling on Sailing.

Honestly, except for an unnatural fixation on the sea, we ought to aim for a normal looking Clan game, so still lots of emphasis on expansion, Warrens, a bullying persona, and the like.

[Gaspar]

FWIW, I can understand why you did the NAP w/Bob, but my general rule for Civ is you don't want a NAP if the other team is more scared of you than you are of them. That's doubly true in FFH, and triply true if the other team has to worry about barbs and you don't. My humble opinion is that you should take the secure flank and smash Sareln with everything you have. I wouldn't take a NAP of any sort. Even with the Sons, a sit back and tech game is a losing game for you, you can't possibly hope to keep up with the non-Barb civs.

I guess I'm saying, I wouldn't take a NAP with the Amurites unless they gave you a lot more than room to settle in.

By the by, I don't need or expect you to actually listen to me, just chipping in on the off chance something I say is helpful. You could do the exact opposite of anything I suggest and I would be fine with that. Mostly I post to force myself not read the other threads, because its very tempting.

[Tredje]

Gentlemen, what you say makes a lot of sense. And if it weren't for our 4 Sons of the Inferno I never would have agreed to this deal with Bob. He probably thinks he has made a fantastic deal. Neither would I have agreed to peace with Sareln if he leaves the Clam site to us, which I will.

Right now I have one priority: Getting those Sons off their island and onto this continent. To achieve that we need as many beakers as possible. While it is undoubtedly true that we could hurt both Bob and Sareln, they might decide to fight fire with fire, and then we would have no option but to build more troops. And the way it stands right now we cannot afford to pay for more troops unless we are willing to ruin our economy completely. If we do that we might be able to do some damage, but we will not win this game. With the Sons we might actually have a shot.

To stress how precarious the economic situation is I just disbanded two Warriors this turn to reduse our deficit by 2 Gold. The Archers will have to do garrison-duty once the situation in the west is determined.

Now, for the actual update.

On Turn 49 we get a useless event:

This is the southern lands as of Turn 50:

Power graph on Turn 50. Note how the Luchuirp's power is spiking:

Plan for the upcoming turns. Get our Archers in position against Sareln. Move the Wolf Rider and Archer back. Finish Exploration and build a road between our cities. Build a road to the Mine. Start on Fishing. I actually finished the Settler, which I think was a mistake, since I am not sure if we can afford to settle it right now.

All in all my play has been suboptimal. For the Horde would have been better to cast after our economy was solidified, but we were at risk of being boxed in, and that could have been worse. And we might not have gotten 4 Sons then. I shouldn't have finished the Settler, but if Bob wanted to fight I would have felt it necessary to settle the Copper.

[Mardoc]

All in all my play has been suboptimal. For the Horde would have been better to cast after our economy was solidified, but we were at risk of being boxed in, and that could have been worse. And we might not have gotten 4 Sons then. I shouldn't have finished the Settler, but if Bob wanted to fight I would have felt it necessary to settle the Copper.

Well, won't the extra city get us some extra free unit maintenance, in addition to whatever commerce we can squeeze out of it? Plus, well, we need the copper anyway to build a trireme.

I am starting to think, however, that it might make sense to take a break from our beeline to pick up at least Education, if not also Code of Laws for Aristocracy. Otherwise our only commerce will come from rivers and lakes. Our research path is 880 beakers (fishing + sailing + bronze working), a detour to just cottages is 360 beakers, and a detour to cottages and Aristocracy is another 320, or 680 total.

I guess the question depends entirely on the details of what land and workers we have available.

Honestly, it's not possible to play the Clan and keep up in tech without beating down your neighbors. But conversely, we have a truly awesome power advantage right now, and then again when we get the Sons. What I don't see, really, is what advantage we gain from being at peace?

[Tredje]

What I don't see, really, is what advantage we gain from being at peace?

Let me try to explain my reasoning: If we had decided to go ahead and choke Bob, he might have started producing a lot of units. That would force us to build more units ourselves. All it would take to hurt our homeland is 6-7 Warriors, and he can build those fast. And right now, with only 10 beakers per turn with -1 gold, even one or two units more will postpone getting our Sons by many turns. In other words I saw a risk that could possibly crash our economy and make us a non-factor in the game. Perhaps I am wrong and he would only have dug in. If that had been the case, choking would have been a better option.

So what I decided to do instead was to use our strong position to create a situation where we are safe to focus only on getting our economy back on its feet. That will, hopefully, enable us to get the Sons over to the continent in time to put us in an advantageous position vis-a-vis our opponents.

As I stated earlier, I am not sure if it was the correct course of action. Perhaps I miscalculated the economic risk of going to war.

[Mardoc]

Well, in any case, the decision is made, there's not a lot of point in second-guessing it now. I think against warriors in the field, the wolf would have just munched them for free XP, but I acknowledge that it could have been bad if we lost a low odds battle when we're depending on 1-2 units to carry a war.

If you end up getting an NAP from Sareln, please make sure it ends on a different date, though. The Sons will probably win whatever war they're a part of, but they can't be everywhere. Something that would be nice is if we can get him to fire off his world spell now, in addition.

On a different note, how do you intend to judge our world spell-NAP with Iskender? Are we allowed to use the Sons against him? If not, we'll need to plan on crushing him some other way, which definitely includes getting our economy un-crashed.

Also, a note from Sareln:

Then all I've really got to say really is that you should remind him the deadline for whether to say yes or no to our settling deal just went by. And it would at least be polite to say no .

Up to you how you want to handle it, whether you want to keep him simmering or start talking now or what.

[Tredje]

Turn 51 opens with a non-effectual event:

And as Iskender already stated in the Tech Thread, Orthus has spawned between us and Bob. If I had decided to choke him, this would have been good news, as he would have been pressured from both sides. Now I fear he will get the Axe easily. Sigh. Let me say this: I was a fool for not choking Bob. The annoying thing is that while in a regular game you suffer for a few hours after making a mistake, in a PBEM you will be reminded of it month after month.

We have a Settler, and Exploration is in. So I figure we should go ahead and settle our third city even if it wil cause us a small deficit the first couple of turns. Which site do you like best? The way I see it we should get it somewhere we can squeeze some commerce out of it. The two best commerce tiles are the Oasis and the Cotton, but we could also settle it somewhere along the river if that spot is better long term. I had originally intended to settle a city 1E of the Mana source, but that will only give us a 1 Commerce tile in the beginning.

[Mardoc]

Sigh. Let me say this: I was a fool for not choking Bob. The annoying thing is that while in a regular game you suffer for a few hours after making a mistake, in a PBEM you will be reminded of it month after month.

I wouldn't phrase it that strongly. It's debatable, but not horrible when we do have 4 other players to worry about, after all.

We have a Settler, and Exploration is in. So I figure we should go ahead and settle our third city even if it wil cause us a small deficit the first couple of turns. Which site do you like best? The way I see it we should get it somewhere we can squeeze some commerce out of it. The two best commerce tiles are the Oasis and the Cotton, but we could also settle it somewhere along the river if that spot is better long term. I had originally intended to settle a city 1E of the Mana source, but that will only give us a 1 Commerce tile in the beginning.

Assuming we're going next to Fishing, I like the bronze/lake city. Probably 1S of the C3 lion site. The Lake will provide commerce, and I'd feel a lot more secure with a strong production site with bronze as soon as we research it. Maybe Bronze axes could take out Iskender when the time comes.

Of course the river is a decent spot too, especially if Bob's absolutely completely ceded the bronze to us. Then just about every tile would have commerce. Maybe the hill with the tower (if it's kosher per our Luchiurp settling agreement)?

[Mardoc]

The crazy thought is if we're confident in our settling agreements with Square Leg and Bob, then we really ought to be pushing west, right? Come back later to fill this area in. There's that minor jungle in the way, though, to make it a harder decision.