[SPOILERS]yuris125 looking for inspiration in Pitboss 73

[yuris125]

Yeah it does sounds like its benefits in sequential are limited at best

I'll be down to 1 city next turn (there are 3 war elephants outside Antioch, which is defended by a wounded axe, and I can't get phracts there in time even if I wanted to). With axes the only units I can build for defence against berserkers, I assume it won't take Scooter long to send me packing

So here're my semi-final thoughts on how this went

I think we all (except Scooter) blanked on the fact that the map was big & small-based. I know I did. Thinking that we would all start on the same continent, as is normal for RB games, I was focused on picking a tech to avoid dying to Artillery. Well, it's T95, and I haven't even made contact with Luddite! On the other hand, Dutch being left on the table in a game like this is silly - and I could've taken Dutch + Astronomy

I definitely overvalued starting military techs. The problem with them is, you have to stifle your own development to take advantage of your superior military unit before opponents with economic edge get the counter. By stifling your development, you fall behind in city count, and they can just defend by virtue of having more cities and being able to produce more stuff. There has to be a balance, and I'm sure it will be found if we continue exploring this variant - but in this game, my problems started because I found myself next to a player with turbo-powered economy, feeling constantly under pressure to make something happen before phracts could be countered. But also Oxy, who started with no military edge whatsoever, is doing quite well - evidently, superior military techs couldn't stop him either - and that's after me calling him a sitting duck at the start

When it comes to starting positions, sharing the continent with Scooter was probably the worst possible pairing for me. Player with strong economic starting tech, strong knowledge of the game, and strong understanding of multiplayer - he knew how to turbocharge his starting position and how to contain me into a position which ended up being unwinnable

In hindsight, me accepting the first war-peace was potentially a game-deciding mistake. At the time I was still very much under impression that Scooter had axes on the field, and I had to think about not dying to an axe rush. I neglected to check his resources regularly once he researched Sailing and I could see them, and didn't realise the military position he was in. Even then, him seeing me with 3 axes and immediately going for a war-peace should've tipped me off. That was the time when I could put pressure on him and force him into building axes of his own, which would've folded to phracts. Instead, I gave him 10 turns of peaceful development, 10 turns of working towards the counter to phracts

By the same token - as I posted before - if I was regularly checking his resources, I would've known that he had access to horses, and I needed spears on defence rather than axes

Ultimately, Scooter succeeded in slowing down my development, while I didn't find a way to disrupt his plans. That led to me falling behind and having to take bigger and bigger risks to find a way back in. Eventually the risk taking went wrong. I can lament all I want how I got unlucky on the key combat turn and how Scooter won 3 coinflips in a row - fact it, I wouldn't even be in that position, wouldn't have to take a risky attack, if I wasn't under so much pressure to make something happen quickly

All in all, without perfect play I had no chance to win a duel against Scooter, and my play this game was nowhere near perfect

[Qgqqqqq]

Oof

I agree you played well and from arguably the worst starting position.

[yuris125]

Not convinced I played well - less happy with this game than 68 or 71. Maybe it's just me feeling outplayed for the entire game

But man, was research visibility on Scooter a curse this game. I knew I was under pressure to make gains against him, but seeing his tech lead grow in real time has been constantly bringing a sense of doom and despair

[T-hawk]

Well, the big swing was the two cities getting razed early. If that doesn't happen, then you have maybe five or so more phracts for that critical war. Hard to say if that could turn the tide, or just hold out in a stalemate and throw the game to Oxy instead. You'd need to successfully outfight both Scooter and Oxy to win and maybe eventually even Luddite; that's a tall order even for phracts.

[yuris125]

Yeah I really wish I didn't overlook that critical detail about the map, picked Astro, went with traditional REX to begin with, and tried to leverage naval advantage. Astro has longer shelf life than Guilds, I wouldn't feel so much pressure to stop expanding and switch into phract production. With Scooter getting a super early, unnerfed Great Lighthouse (and don't think I could contest it with slower start and without Bureaucracy), he probably would've had a huge economic edge anyway, but at least I would've had means to contest his Viking ships, develop in peace, and look for openings all over the map, not just on our continent

But losing the two cities early certainly didn't help, and was avoidable. That's the main reason for me to feel unhappy about my play

[Tarkeel]

I think you played a rather good game actually. Yes, losing those cities were rough.

[Krill]

Now you're dead, I think we can say that you didn't have an awful lot of choices in this game. You had to take start 4, and then the choice is and shouuld you have taken Civil Service? I'm not sure. You would have been SoL on leaders and CS with a bad leader, with the constraints of start 4 was not straight forward. If you had been next to Luddite you'd have been deader than you were here.

[yuris125]

I'll be honest - I didn't recognise Civil Service as one of the more powerful options to pick. I was too fixated on (tunnel visioned into?) picking a military tech

If I did see the power of Civil Service, think I would've been ok to take it alongside start 4. With only 5 players, I was sure to get a good Fin leader at any point in the draft. Yes, Pacal is likely the best leader in the game - but is he that much better than Willem / Darius? Or if all of the big 3 were gone, Mansa / Hannibal / Liz are still fine options. Scooter is doing just fine with Mansa after all

That said, I agree that there's a fair bit of bias due to how the game played out. I made an aggressive pick and lost to a heavily economy-oriented opponent who found a way to counter my advantage and outgrew me, with another economy-oriented opponent stopping me from shifting aggression his way by parking 4 triremes between us. So naturally this leads me to thinking that picking a military tech wasn't as important as I thought before the game started. If I shared the continent with Luddite, it's very possible that my opinion would've been different

[T-hawk]

Yeah, Scooter had a perfect storm of just about everything to counter you. Civil Service with a highly multipliable start, ivory for elephants, jungle buffer to slow you down, perfect tactical play to snipe those two cities of yours, and enough research with the GLH to get to berserkers just fast enough to finish the job before you really got phracts rolling.

One speculation in the lurker thread was that Arabia's camel archers might even have been a better pick than phracts, since they don't need resources, just HBR. Probably true in this particular situation vs Scooter, though maybe not so much against a broader field of possibilities.

And remember that round 1 pick 1 was Artillery, so of course that started the fixation on military techs, Guilds certainly didn't look like a bad idea then. Scooter basically said, if I lose to one of the military rushes so be it, and ended up with a situation that did give him enough time to get rolling.

[scooter]

My current plan is to build 6 phracts, poke around Scooter's land, see if I can accomplish anything, but main priority is not to lose them. Then build 3 galleys, sign peace with Scooter if he's still willing, and see if I can take some of Oxy's holdings. However, looks like this plan is about to be disrupted again, putting me on defensive

I guess I should have left you alone at this point.

Got 3 peace treaty offers from Scooter upon opening the turn. Something tells me Scooter might be getting annoyed with me not taking it. However, I do believe that at this point, peace would benefit him way more than me. It would give him 10 turns of safety from cataphracts, maybe a possiblity to chase wonders, maybe an opening to himself go after Oxy with his uber-galleys. It would give me.... nothing? An opportunity to resettle cities Scooter razed?

I said before that I don't think there's any way for me to get back into the game peacefully. I have to make gains through war, and Scooter is a natural target. Even if he put a lot of effort into being an unattractive target, I cannot afford to close the option of attacking him for 10 turns

So if he's venting in his thread about me not taking peace.... this is why. It's not revenge and it's not me ruining my own game - I genuinely don't see how peace at this stage would benefit me

Nah, I definitely wasn’t mad. I was just trying to communicate to you “I don’t actually want to fight you and am open to a solution.” I was watching Oxy blaze away untouched and felt like I was winning the battle while losing the geopolitical war, if that makes sense.



Anyway, I agree with the lurker comments at the end of thread here that there wasn’t too much you could have done here, though you definitely made me sweat despite my massive city lead. The Phracts were honestly brutal to deal with, so I put all my effort into pressuring you in other ways. Your remark about getting promos on the Phracts was super accurate - the promoted Phracts felt unkillable. Anyway, it was super interesting to read your thoughts during our conflict, thanks for reporting this one so well!