Cheater Hater's PBEM58 Thread (with a surprise post lead!)

[Cheater Hater]

Good to see everyone is still being encouraging, and not getting mad just because I threatened to leave the game--of course now this just makes me want to see the lurker thread even more; maybe that's the real subconscious reason I wanted to quit

[Cheater Hater]

Well this should be interesting--I finished the turn two hours ago, but then RB went down and just recently came up, so now I have to reconstruct the post, as well as the narrative.
T45 Report:
Here it is, judgment day--which city will I lose? I open the save and am greeted with this:


So we're back to this. I don't know if I'll accept it, but I'll look at the save first--if I don't like the situation I can always reload the save and accept the offer, or offer it back with different terms. So what do we have in the south:


So yeah, Lontano Villa has burned to the ground--considering I spent most of its time building a worker, it's not that big a loss. And then coming out of the fog is a horse archer? I'm not sure that's the best choice for someone mainly defending with axes, although I do have archery now so it's not bad. But wait, wasn't there an axe next to Harena Desert? And why can my axe get a promotion? That means...I actually got some good RNG luck and my axe beat his axe! I don't know if I would have done it, since the odds were only 60%, but good for me! Here's the combat logs for both battles if you're interested--the order of the logs shows that B4ndit lost his axe before deciding to raze Lontano Villa:

So here's how the south looked at the end of the turn, after I readied up:


Anyway, the plan for keeping Harena Desert (or at least making him fight for it) remains the same for the most part--whip the archer, keep moving the workers away from B4ndit's troops (and I can even get a turn of farming or cottaging in), and overflow into either an archer or a warrior, depending on how much overflow I get. I also moved an axe up--more on that in the capital shot.

Now to domestic matters, as RB goes down again and I'm forced to move to Notepad:


Not much here--a bit of scouting, whipping the settler, chopping the jungle on the iron. You'll notice that I moved the roading worker back--I think I have odds with the axe in the forest against a damaged chariot, but I'm not sure, and that road isn't so important I want to risk a worker for it.

Now for the scout move--and the axe move since I can fit them both in one shot:


There's AT, doing stuff, my axe found a workshop, not that much until we can actually go inside AT's borders, especially since the axe will turn back next turn to guard the settler.

I would say we'd move to C&D in the next post, but I actually just got the save while writing this post, so I'll play that now, post that turn report (if RB actually comes up and stays up), and then post a combined C&D post afterward. But as a teaser, here's the power graph:


See you soon!

[Bobchillingworth]

It's good to hear that you've got your spirits back up


Based on your screen shot I'd say you probably have pretty good odds to hold onto Harena. B4ndit's trickle tactics aren't doing him any favors here.

[Cheater Hater]

T46 Report:
So now that RB is back up, I can get back to writing more turn reports--this is where writing such detailed reports hurts me, even though I didn't do C&D last turn. Anyway, B4ndit offered the same deal as last turn (which I obviously declined), so what's the current situation in the south?


Nice! No new units (both the axe and horse archer are on the same square), and it looks like my axe should be nearly fully healed when B4ndit attacks. And "No mercy!"--cute.

See if you can notice the subtle difference between the last shot and the current shot taken right before ending turn:


Did you spot it? Yes, I can 1T another archer using the overflow! I did have to switch from the hamlet to the plains forest to do so, but it should only be for a turn, since I can 2T archers from here on out, until B4ndit either gets sick of attacking me or I get Praets in the area and take his capital after he rams it all into Harena Desert unsuccessfully. Also, since the workers don't need to move this turn, I can get 2 turns into the farm, and assuming he moves the warrior again, I can just move them 1W and get 2 turns of cottaging in

Now to domestic matters, starting with the home area:


The settler will settle the northern city (which still needs a name--I'm just about to start the 4th chapter of Bravely Default soon, so hopefully the hub city there will be suitable for that city) in 2 turns (stupid jungle ), and it'll have roaded iron to start with--the mine actually only took 3 turns, which means I have an extra worker turn to do something. I'm also not entirely sure what I should do with the worker currently on the forest hill--it can either chop some military in Caldisla or build a riverside cottage I can give to the northern city. I'm leaning on at least starting the chop, since the northern city has a lot of tiles it can work--I'm planning on starting it on the iron so it can go workboat->workboat, then it'll grow a lot and I can whip some military/workers/settlers/a library, and I won't need to work cottages for a while. Heck, I might even just make it a super-specialist city and farm it up. So yeah, I'll chop that forest into a Praet, then pay B4ndit a visit

One thing I haven't talked about a lot recently is builds, other than the detailed manipulations needed to get my defenses in Harena Desert ready. Honestly, there isn't much to talk about, since it's mainly military, especially in Caldisla, which will be pumping out nonstop Praets for the near future once it finishes this spear. As for Norende, that's more up in the air after it finishes the axe, since--wait, why is it still starving? Well, there's a reason for that I conveniently forgot to mention last turn:


Yeah, we get our Great Scientist at EOT! The whip anger also goes away at EOT, so I'll be able to work both food tiles while still running both scientists (or more realistically, run one scientist while working a plains forest to finish the axe in a reasonable time, so I can build a settler there and whip it after I grow to size 5).

Now on to scouting--we can see AT's borders with the warrior in the previous shot, but we can actually explore AT with the scout:


There's Say My Name, the Jewish holy city--can we take this one like we did the Hindu one?
I mean, it's only defended by a spear--but obviously it's way too far away for me to reasonably take, and I kinda have my hands full with B4ndit

The mammoth C&D post is coming soon--assuming we don't somehow get another turn and/or RB stays up long enough for me to post it

[Cheater Hater]

T45 & 46 C&D:
We've got a lot to do today, so let's get started with T45's demos:


The nice thing about score numbers is that even if I don't understand and/or don't care to update, the marginal data still tells me a lot:

• AT gained 7 points, a pop point
  
• Twinkletoes gained 46 points, which means he got his land points--I'm planning on sorting out the score changes (starting with AT's phantom points a couple turns ago) in a separate post in the near future--probably not tonight, maybe tomorrow if the turns stop coming so rapidly.
  
• eastway's score didn't change, but he did found his 5th city of Eglarest, 2-pop whipped Calembel, and grew both Annu and Dale, so somehow a pop point of his didn't register in the score--more nonsense to sort out in the overall post!
  

Now to soldier points: 8k total increase, max decreased by 3k, min increased by 6k. Here's the power graph I teased before, though it's weird:


Okay, something's wrong with that graph--when does it take its snapshot of what the soldier points are? I thought it was at the end of the turn (aka when everyone had taken a turn, and the next numbered turn started), but based on what it's giving me for power in that graph, it looks like it takes the snapshot when each player would end turn--is that correct? If so, what do people in the middle of the turn see--for example, did Twinkletoes looking at the graph on T45 (ignoring that he doesn't have my graphs ) see me on top, or B4ndit? It has to be B4ndit since it couldn't show T45 scores for some people and T44 scores for others, right? That's something to note for when other people are fighting each other--say B4ndit kills Twinkletoes's axe, then I would see it in the graph but not in the demos, and that would be confusing. As such, I'll save the soldier points for that summary post I mentioned--maybe I'll have AT's graphs by then, though that's not likely since I had to put some espionage points back on B4ndit before I lost his graphs.

Now to T46, starting with demos:

• AT gained 19 points, a classical tech and a pop point
  
• eastway gained 14 points, pop points in Calembel and Annu
  
• Twinkletoes gained 28 points, something land points based--I think this might be his second city finally, but we'll sort that out later
  
• B4ndit gained 7 points, a pop point in Ankara
  

Now soldier points: 21k total increase, Max increased by 6k (note: that's either an axe or a horse archer from B4ndit now) Min increased by 1k. I could do some of the soldier point rankings now (obviously eastway's and B4ndit's as max and min), but the full picture need's AT's graphs, and the scores to be clarified. Again, I plan on doing that, just not tonight

[Old Harry]

I think the graphs are a turn behind (unless you're last in turn order and take the pic after ending turn) but its been a while since my PBEM so I could be wrong.

Good work on your new positive attitude to losing cities!

[Cheater Hater]

Really, I'm at the bottom of this forum too?
T47 Report:
No peace offer this time when I opened up the save, but B4ndit's war moves are interesting...


So it looks like he's given up on Harena Desert for now and heading for Caldisla--let's see how things are going there, just for fun:


Yes, the iron has been mined and the road will finish next turn--maybe invading the guy with Praets just as he's getting iron isn't the best move...
Yeah, I'll have Praets starting next turn, and I just started that chop on the hill 1N of Caldisla, which will accelerate the process even more. I might even chop the forest 1S of the iron to keep the Praets coming. I'm certain there's no way I'll lose any of my cities unless we see a lot more units (a horse archer every other turn isn't going to cut it when I have Praets coming early and often), which means I should start wondering when I'll ask for straight peace--or whether I should starting pushing to Istanbul

In domestic moves, you may have noticed my Great Scientist; it's heading for Caldisla to found an Academy and get my tech rate back up. The northern city (still not sure of its name--I like Starkfort looking over the locations, but that isn't a certainty) will be founded next turn, with the same plans as before. I'm not sure what I'm building next in Norende, maybe a Praet, or that plus whipping a settler destined for the east--I need more cities, but I'm not sure I can afford a Praet not on the war effort--maybe that's why I would want peace sooner rather than later.

Now to the south, after heightening my defenses:


Not much here--I'm just going to finish the warrior, then depending on what B4ndit's doing, I'll either have to build another archer or go back to the granary and resume building up the city--the problem with that is that I can't build metal units out of Harena Desert, so I can't, say, build a Praet or two and wipe out B4ndit with them and my promoted axe

Now to scouting:


Really, Say My Name is that close to the capital? (that should be the capital's gems I think) We can also see Felina in the capital shot--I forgive you for thinking it's boring compared to the war

Now to C&D--I think I might actually do the full score analysis tonight, but it'll be separate from the T47 C&D.

[Cheater Hater]

T47 C&D:
Before we get to our number crunching today, I have some worrying news from abroad:




Yes, that is six and seven cities from eastway and Twinkletoes respectively. By comparison, AT still has four cities, I will have four next turn, and B4ndit only has the two--eastway and Twinkletoes have ~60% of the cities founded so far. Now we can start number-crunching!

• eastway gained 24 points last turn, 2 classical techs or land points, although we know he founded a city this turn and grew in Brimothar--I really need to figure out how land points work
  
• AT lost 7 points, a loss of 1 pop point
  
• Twinkletoes gained 21 points, a pop point and 2 cities being founded (seriously, how does Twinkletoes have an economy at this point?)
  
• B4ndit gained 12 points, a classical tech--this is probably Iron Working, since the last one was obviously Horseback Riding, but the power rankings will confirm that.
  

Now to soldier points: 16k total increase, 10k max increase, 2k min increase--the max is B4ndit getting Iron Working, the min is B4ndit's population increases, but the main situation is still a mess.

I'm going to try and start the process of getting my SPLT rankings back in order now, I don't completely understand land points, but hopefully with careful analysis (and everyone's third ring of the capital being the same) I can figure this out.

[Cheater Hater]

SPLT Catch-Up:
This post is mainly for me, it's going to have a lot of analysis, checking previous reports, lots of math in spoiler tags, checking similarities between civs, and no pictures--if you want to follow along feel free; if not, I don't blame you. I'll post important developments as they come up, and by the end I'll hopefully have complete SPLT rankings, although I'm not promising anything. First I need to figure out how land points are working:

My third ring is all land, B4ndit's has at least one water tile, eastway has two--this means that the third ring land score isn't going to be constant for the third ring
Land score for each land tile is around 2.5, and it shows up when you've held the land for 20 turns, but I'm not sure of the exact value at all--we know the map is 32*32=1024 tiles, but that includes water tiles, which aren't counted--let's go through each of my point jumps and check them:
T20: Initial city: 20 point increase for 8 tiles->2.5 points per tile
T22: First culture expansion: 30 point increase for 12 tiles->2.5 points per tile
T43: Second city: 23 point increase for 9 tiles->2.56 points per tile
T45: Second culture expansion: 40 point increase for 16 tiles->2.5 points per tile
So this analysis confirms 2.5 points per tile, and it appears the game is rounding the odd .5 up (so it goes 3->5->8->10, etc) To confirm, let's check eastway's tiles, since we know all of his territory:
T20: Initial city: 20 for 8->2.5
T22: First expansion: 30 for 12->2.5
T??: Second city: 9->23 points
T??: Second expansion: 14->35 points
Now to figure out when stuff happened:
On T44 eastway got a 34 point increase while whipping 2 pop and growing none, meaning he netted 48 points. Subtracting the 35 land points from the second expansion leaves 13 points, an ancient tech and a pop point--but he didn't grow any pop points:




I also rechecked T44; he hasn't founded his 5th city yet either--what's going on? The only thing I can assume is that the tech was a classical tech and the extra point is something to do with rounding, likely on the land point side--I guess we'll have to see where extra points show up in other people's analysis.
On T45 eastway gained 36 points while netting a pop point--this works with the second city (23 land points+7 from a pop point+6 from ancient tech), which connects perfectly with us knowing about his second city on T26.
On T47, eastway gained 24 points--checking T28, Calembel was founded that turn, so that would be more land points. Calembel only had 4 new land tiles, which is 10 points, leaving 14 points for pop points--and those pop points are the founding of Fornost Erain and Brithombar growing, so perfect!

Okay, I think I understand how land points are working: 2.5 points per tile, rounding the odd point up (3->5->8, etc), and minus an extra point from eastway, I think I have his SPLT rankings figured out (I'll leave them in the bottom until I get everyone's done, but you can look if you're interested).
Now I'm going to work on B4ndit for many reasons: he's the max which helps, he only has the second city (since Edirne doesn't count), and he's kinda the most important right now

B4ndit's first two sets of land points are the same (they're the same for everyone), but his third ring is different, mainly since we can't see all of it. His first unexplained point increase is on T44: 39 points, with no change in Istanbul's pop (since we can't see Ankara) We can see 12 tiles in B4ndit's third ring, and fog-gazing says the third ring is probably 15 tiles total (this assumes the peak counts as a land tile). 15 tiles is 38 points, which means either it's a 1 pop whip+an ancient tech or a phantom point--that's annoying
I think it's a phantom point, because of this:


This is T44's GNP graph, which shows B4ndit's GNP going up on the interturn (and stays constant on the next turn to boot)--both the whip and finishing a tech would be reasons for the GNP to go down, not up. This also means it's consistent, though I'm not sure if I like consistent extra points
Now to calculate the marginal increases and fix B4ndit's SPLT ranking!

Okay, so B4ndit's SPLT rankings are complete--and there aren't any problems at all this time, unlike eastway

With the announcement of a slight delay from Twinkletoes, I'll continue this--by starting with AT (he has fewer cities, and I can see most of them)

Same first two land points as always, and then we have an unusual blip of 18 points on T43. The one problem I just realized is that I didn't have contact with AT back on T24
However, I did figure out he did found his city on T24 (mainly since he gained 2 pop points), which means we just have to figure out how many land points there were. The diplo screen says city 2 was Say My Name, and thankfully we just scouted it this turn:


Wow, there's only 4 land tiles there period, and the tile 1N of the gems could be an overlap with the capital. That means either 8 or 10 land points, leaving either 10 or 8 left, an unclean number
If there's a phantom point, the 8 points work with a pop point, but I'm not sure
T44 AT gained 44 points, almost certainly his capital's 3rd ring. Unfortunately we can't see his capital yet (we will next turn almost certainly), but we can do some possible calculations: 12 land tiles (30 land points) works with 2 pop points, and 15 land tiles (38 points) works with a classical tech--we'll need to see the capital to know more. After that there's no unusual changes, so we're on hold here until I do more scouting

That was inconclusive--we have to come back next turn when we've scouted out AT's capital, at least to the extent that we can confirm if Say My Name overlaps a fat cross with Ozymandias to start, then we have to see the whole 3rd ring (or at least two water tiles) to figure out the last increase.

Now to Twinkletoes:

Twinkletoes gained his first two sets of land points like normal, then gained 46 points on T45--but wait! We saw that Twinkletoes founded his second city on T21, which mean there should have been a blip on T40--but on T40, we only saw a 6 point increase. However, if you remember, back when we were calculating land area stuff, we figured out that Twinkletoes's second city had only 5 land tiles, or 13 points. If we combine that with the -7 points from a 1-pop whip, that equals the 6 point increase! Twinkletoes has one fewer ancient tech than we thought at the time--that's especially important since we gave him Mysticism based on the pigeonhole principle.
Going back to T45, 46 points works nicely with 16 land tiles (from the 3rd ring of the capital) and an ancient tech, and with not much else--so that was easy, and solves the disappearing ancient tech problem nicely
Now to T46, and 28 points--this is Twinkletoes's third city, and works with 6 land tiles, a pop point, and an ancient tech--2 ancient techs in a row is weird, but this is the only reasonable way it makes sense (outside of 4 pop points, but we know there's land points from the third city).

Now that the score has been (more or less) sorted, we can start working on the soldier points for non-B4ndit parties.

Holy crap, Twinkletoes's soldier points have been wrong since the T37 rebuild, when I said he had 10 pop for power when he only had 8--that means Barracks+the spare 1k becomes a chariot/spear--the curse of the barracks strikes again! That affects my pop numbers for Twinkletoes (along with the missing whip from T40), so I did that first.
(more coming soon, though maybe not until after the next turn and I figure out AT)

Here are the SPLT rankings--I'm starting from T42 (where the rankings are 100% accurate), and I'll leave them spoilered until I can figure out everyone's--they'll look weird if you see them in progress, but if I say they're current in the text, they should be current down here:
Notes:

• eastway is missing 1k solider points, since he's 1k less than the min, unless he's not the min anymore--he did research a classical tech, so that could be it. I'll figure it out when we get to the rest of the rankings and figure out what's going on with the rest of the soldier points.
  
• Anything in italics is not finished--obviously AT and Twinkletoes haven't been started yet, but eastway's soldier points aren't final (as discussed above)
  

Soldier Points:
AT: 41k (Mining+BW+Wheel+Hunting+AH+MC+Sailing*+2 Warriors+2 Spears/Chariots+10 pop)
eastway: 53k (Mining+BW+Wheel+AH+Hunting+Sailing+Warrior+4 Axes+14 pop)
B4ndit: 84k (Mining+BW+Wheel+AH+IW+HR+Archery+3 Warriors+1 Axe+2 HA+1 Axe/HA+1 Chariot+Barracks/Archer+10 pop)
Twinkletoes: 40k (Mining+BW+Wheel+Hunting+AH+Warrior+2 Axes+1 Chariot/Spear+8 pop)

Land Points:
AT: 20 tiles (8+12)
B4ndit: 35 tiles (8+12+15)
Cheater Hater: 45 tiles (8+12+9+16)
Twinkletoes: 47 tiles (8+12+5+16+6)
eastway: 53 tiles (8+12+14+9+10)
Wonder Points:
AT: 2 wonders (Palace, Oracle)
B4ndit: 1 wonder (Palace)
Cheater Hater: 1 wonder (Palace)
Twinkletoes: 1 wonder (Palace)
eastway: 2 wonders (Palace, Stonehenge)

Population Points:
AT: 10 population (Ozymandias=4, Say My Name=?, Felina=?)
B4ndit: 10 population (Istanbul=6, Ankara=4)
Cheater Hater: 9 population (Caldisla=3, Norende=4, Harena Desert=2)
Twinkletoes: 15 population (King's Landing=4, Winterfell=?, Casterly Rock=?, Highgarden=?, Castle Black=1, Sunspear=1, Riverrun=1)
eastway: 15 population (Annuminas=4, Brithombar=3, Calembel=3, Dale=3, Eglarest=1, Fornost Basin=1)

Ancient Techs:
AT: 14 techs (Agriculture, Mining, Bronze Working, Wheel, Fishing, Pottery, Animal Husbandry, Hunting, Mysticism, Polytheism, Priesthood, Monotheism, Meditation/?, Sailing/?)
B4ndit: 9 techs (Agriculture, Wheel, Mining, Bronze Working, Mysticism, Polytheism, Fishing, Priesthood/?, Animal Husbandry)
Cheater Hater: 9 techs (Fishing, Mining, Bronze Working, Agriculture, Wheel, Pottery, Writing, Animal Husbandry, Archery)
Twinkletoes: 13 techs (Agriculture, Wheel, Mining, Bronze Working, Pottery, Fishing, Hunting, Animal Husbandry, Mysticism, Writing/?, ?, ?, ?)
eastway: 13 techs (Fishing, Mining, Bronze Working, Wheel, Agriculture, Mysticism, Meditation, Animal Husbandry, Priesthood?, Hunting, Sailing/?, ?, ?)

Classical Techs:
AT: 1 tech (Metal Casting)
B4ndit: 2 techs (Iron Working, Horseback Riding)
Cheater Hater: 1 tech (Iron Working)
Twinkletoes: 1 tech (MC/?)
eastway: 1 tech (?)

Missing Points:
AT: -1 (start)
B4ndit: 0 (start+1 phantom point from land)
Cheater Hater: -1 (start)
Twinkletoes: -1 (start)
eastway: 0 (start+1 phantom point from land)

[Cheater Hater]

T48 Report:
Things in our war are currently in a boring phase--B4ndit offered peace for Harena Desert again, but things really haven't changed:


Right now he still has his 4 units (2 Horse Archers, a C1 Chariot, and an Axe) trying to fork Harena Desert and the capital area, along with his scouting warrior chasing my workers around. To combat this I have 5 units in Harena Desert at EOT (2 Archers, 2 Warriors, and a C2 Axe), along with the axe guarding the entrance into the capital and the units coming out of Caldisla (more on that in a bit). Right now the main thing B4ndit is doing is annoying me by pestering my workers--I thought about guarding them with a warrior, but attacking across the river is still a 25% chance, and I don't want to risk the workers at that rate, especially when B4ndit's warrior is expendable. I could have used a stronger unit, but I didn't want to risk Harena Desert by bringing out my axe, at least not yet.

I don't know how many more units he wants to invest in this (notably, he still doesn't have a third city), and I've been able to defend while still getting development done--to prove that, let's look at Caldisla:


That's a nice Academy, giving me over 12 beakers this turn--that boost is allowing me to grab Mathematics at EOT, which means my chops will be full strength, in addition to pushing me to Currency. Now to get a wider picture of my core:


I founded Starkfort this turn as planned, but I'm working the fish instead of the iron this turn so I could finish Math this turn--I still think the plan is to work the iron until I build the workboat, then work the fish until it grows (if it hasn't grown already). We can also see the first Praetorian starting to be produced, and it will finish next turn thanks to the chop. I'll also continue chop the forest 1S of the iron into Caldisla for a second quick Praet, then I'll slow-build a third. I may need more troops than that for my "invasion" force (3 Praets, as well as the Axe coming out of Norende, and possibly the Axe standing guard to the capital), but other than possibly another Praet coming out of Norende and maybe a chariot or two, that's all I plan on sending southward, and my focus will change to settling city 5 in the east (probably city 3, the one by the rice--I don't think AT would dispute that spot that much, and his power won't stand up to a Praet or two if he tries to resist.

Speaking of AT, here's the scout moves for the day:


Not much spectacular here--a couple things I did notice were a Settler sitting in Felina (so Felina just produced that this turn, and hopefully it's heading straight south and not to either of my desired city sites, especially not city 3, although it appears there's only a warrior in Felina), and a Jewish Missionary in Ozymandias (although since AT's in Organized Religion, that doesn't tell us much :/ ). Of course, the important part is that it tells us everything we need to know for the SPLT reconciliation efforts we had to leave incomplete yesterday.

T48 C&D is coming next, then I'll post another catchup post where I'll be able to finish the SPLT rankings (or at least the PLT for everyone and the soldier stuff for B4ndit).