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

[Old Harry]

[Cheater Hater]

That's a little vague Old Harry--that could be anything from shock at eastway declaring, to my moves for the turn, to me putting off C&D in the short term
(yes I know you probably can't elaborate since you're globally lurking, I'm just teasing you )

While I'm here, the eastway post is coming today soon, but I just woke up

[Cheater Hater]

I'm really not feeling it right now--I played T64, and eastway offered straight peace. I obviously declined--and then looked at the power graph:


Apparently eastway has the power to conjure an army out of thin air--and now I'm left with two options:
1. Fight a long, drawn-out war, maybe get I and E, no chance in hell of getting anything relevant without completely crashing my economy
2. Accept straight peace, eastway techs forever without anyone wanting to challenge him (especially since he looks powerful now), we waste six months hitting enter, and I become completely irrelevant as soon as someone gets maces or longbows

Seriously, why did I even join this game? I know I don't like war, and I hate the prisoner's dilemma that is AI diplo. In order to play "optimally" (and if I'm not at least trying to do things perfectly, I don't see a reason to do so), I have to spend hours on number-crunching, and then feel the game slipping away from me as I can't afford to/don't want to spend so much time on this game. I make one decision to punish someone playing stupidly, and suddenly I'm being piled on even though I'm last in most of the stuff that matters. Maybe I should go back to just being a good ded-lurker

Edit: I did play the turn and send the save along, so don't think I'm quitting just yet--but I don't think I like this game at the moment. At this point, I'm still playing the turn and taking pictures, but don't expect any sort of comprehensive report until I get in better spirits--or get replaced as main player.

[Bobchillingworth]

You really don't need to bother with the constant number-crunching. To be brutally honest, I'm not sure it's helping you if you make complaints like:

Apparently eastway has the power to conjure an army out of thin air

He's running Slavery, right? So yes, he can conjure an army out of thin air, if by "thin air" you mean "population points". Producing large ancient-era armies is very easy on quick speed, where only a single hammer of investment is enough to 1 or 2 pop most units. I don't mean to crap on your game-play here, but rather suggest that spending hours tediously tracking demographics data isn't a great investment if you aren't prepared for someone you're at war with to rapidly increase their power using one of the most fundamental mechanics in Civ IV MP.


Also:

suddenly I'm being piled on even though I'm last in most of the stuff that matters

Do you see a possible cause-and-effect relationship within this statement?

[Oxyphenbutazone]

Yeah we don't play civ with post-cold war geopolitics of not attacking weaker countries to maintain the status quo. It's more of the early-20th-century-Europe-dog-eat-dog variety.

CH, I'm trying really hard not to be condescending or churlish here, because you seem like a really bright guy and I'm not the most qualified person to be giving this advice. But I feel like you're making the classic strategic mistake of assuming everyone thinks like you. Maybe you would just shrug off somebody unprovokedly attacking your second city, but many people would respond to such aggression with aggression. It certainly didn't help that you kept the city and then refused to garrison it properly. You need a better casus belli than: "it was a completely rational play by me," because the person you attacked may just disagree with you.

I also dispute that it was a completely rational play by you to attack bandit's city. I would agree that it was poor play to not guard a city at all, but you attacking it was pretty short termist. The attack was only a good play if bandit made no attempts to capture it back, and I as I mentioned before, I don't think you could make that assumption. Let's say it's turn 100 of this game and bandit has left 2 workers in range of your chariot. Would you declare war? Probably not, because even if you keep the workers(which is not a given), breaking the peaceful status quo would not be worth it.

As for your current predicament: I have a lot of sympathy. Being attacked totally sucks. At least for me, I get attached to the empire I've built, so it's the worst feeling in the world when someone successfully brings that down. But I wouldn't worry that much. You have slavery too and very powerful praets to play around with. Just double whip a bunch of praets and you'll be fine. It can be fun to play in total survival mode with no chance of winning. In PB11, I was running around with my 120-knight stack whilst everyone else had tanks, and I was having a ball to the end.

[Cheater Hater]

Okay, I'm finally getting some responses--let's start with Bob:
First of all, I didn't completely discount slavery--check what I can see of eastway's cities (which includes most of the main cities) from T61-64:

And now the power graphs from T61 and T64:




I will admit I missed the whips on T61 (mainly because I stopped doing any C&D at that point), but other than that I can't see any whips (and to see those whips/net changes, I would need to do the detailed C&D I hated doing at that point)

As for "last place so I'm being attacked", the one thing I was good in was soldiers! And that was before I went full-scale producing Praets. If eastway wants more territory, go attack Twinkletoes again. He didn't even keep the workers he sniped (because he knew he couldn't keep them), and now he wants peace--this isn't that he wants territory, he just wanted to hurt me--even though I don't need to be hurt. This goes back to the discussion I've seen in other games about playing to help yourself vs playing to hurt someone else--obviously that's not inherently bad, but of course I (as some who "cares too much" as we've discussed before, back when I threatened to quit) am going to be hurt by that.

Now to Oxy:
I actually really agree with you on the first point--I assume good play from my opponents, and that's completely unreasonable (especially in a greens game, with people who probably haven't been lurking as long as I have).

As for my conflict with B4ndit, I've been over the numbers in the thread a ton of times, and I still don't think it was horrible--heck, if B4ndit doesn't lose the axe on the initial attack, he probably just takes Harena Desert, takes straight peace, and I've exchanged some hammers for some commerce, along with distracting my neighbor. And it's not like B4ndit's sitting pretty at this point either--we're fighting over not being at the bottom of the scoreboard.

And I think you've gotten the idea of eastway's and my current conflict wrong--I could take straight peace whenever I want most likely, and then I'm hitting enter for 6 months without any chance of winning--is the right move really to just whip my empire to the core to build Praets, then go rampage over AT or someone else who's not expecting it? That really doesn't seem right--I'd hate to be on the receiving end of that, and I'm on the "only play to make yourself win, rather than to make someone else lose" side of that debate. That's not even taking into account the fact that I hate all the micro of trying to declare war, so that probably wouldn't be fun for me

I don't know what's happening--maybe actually playing in Civ games just isn't for me? What I loved is just sitting back as an involved ded-lurker, like in the demogame and PB14; just asking informed questions and being helpful. Maybe I could transfer my newly-found C&D insight into such a role too--if that's all I needed to do (and not trying to plan a grand strategy and handling micro on top of that), maybe I'd like it more.

[mackoti]

I know i would like you to do CD for me, i never do that.Well actualy i check graphs and see how much everyone has but not in numbers or something else.

Best advice if you continue to play: plaay your game and consider everyone wants something from you at least till turn 80(quick) ,100 (normal) usualy after that time people dont snipe workers or something like that.And never asume there is no enemy in fog...

[Cheater Hater]

Thanks mackoti for the encouragement--don't worry, I'm not quitting this game anytime soon; I can only pull that stunt once per game at most
T65 "Report":
I really don't know what's going on here--eastway tried to offer straight peace again, but he should have at least some idea that I'm not going away quietly--look how long it took for B4ndit to take back Harena Desert from me, even with an overwhelming force. I seriously thought about coming back with a counter-offer of peace for E and I, but there's a couple things I don't like about that:

• Those cities would be culture-swamped by Brithombar, and thus wouldn't be nearly as useful without that
  
• I know eastway wouldn't accept, since I think he thinks he has good chances of defending, at least at the edges of his empire
  
• There's an element of vengeance here--as I posted in my initial T64 post (before I got moody and deleted it), eastway has chosen unwisely...
  

Here's what the current military situation looks like:


Isengard has an axe and spear in it, and there's an axe outside its borders. I'm thinking I might want to bypass it for now--the plan is to move the available troops 1NW of the gold mine, force his worker away, and see what happens there--from the mine I should be able to see enough of eastway's troops to get an idea of what's coming. Here's how the power looks:




I'm actually top of soldiers again, but eastway's now in the conversation--here's his empire, see if you can see all the whips that have to be taking place:


One more picture for today (the rest are in the dropbox as always), the domestic picture:


I 2-pop whipped the worker in Norende this turn, I'll 2-pop whip a Praet in Caldisla next turn, I'll start producing military in Starkfort after the work boat finishes, Misama Woods finished its archer at EOT thanks to the chop, I'll settle Florem next turn, finish Construction end of next turn (then move to finish Calendar), and hopefully have enough military to hurt eastway

[Cheater Hater]

Hooray, a rare weekday TWO TURN DAY! Fast turns means I have no reason to waste time on C&D
T66 "Report":
No peace offer from eastway this turn, so we'll get to the action:


Yeah, eastway's still managing to produce an army way too quickly--and what makes even less sense is that he's doing this while not tanking his tech rate (as whipping your empire should do--or at least is doing to me ). He has an axe and spear in Isengard, two axes on the gold hill guarding the worker, and the chariot's still floating around. As such, I'm just staying on the hill this turn, then I'll move south with five units total (2 Praets and 3 Axes) to start moving towards the plains hill N of Elgarest. Now let's take a look at eastway's core:


(Dale is size 6; it just missed being in the screenshot)
So Elgarest got one-pop whipped, other than that no whips I can see--but what's that in the corner?

Yes, I finally made some actual progress in the war by capturing a worker! That felt good, especially since I'm actually keeping the worker--the only threat I can see is if eastway has multiple chariots waiting in the fog--otherwise it can just head north and help set up Miasma Woods. However, that may be the only progress, since I sent a peace offer:


This may be a horrible move, but this came after seeing the power graph:


Yeah, I'm still waiting for anyone to explain how all this power is being created even though I'm not seeing many, if any whips--I know some of it's coming from techs (eastway had neither IW or HR before this started, and I don't even think he had Archery for certain), but it can't all be from that.

Before I go, here's my capital area:


I did found Florem, and it did make my tech rate go down, but I still had enough beakers to complete Construction at least
Other than that, not much new is going on--I whipped another Praet in Caldisla (which will go on to my first Catapult if I don't get peace), and I'm starting another Praet in Norende. Starkfort is finishing its work boat, but I'm not sure what I'm building there next--either a Praet or Catapult I guess :/

[Cheater Hater]

Holy crap, three turns in one day--and on a weekday no less? And while two people are playing war turns?
T67 Report:
Let's see if eastway took my peace offer:


Apparently not...Okay, now eastway is going to die, regardless of what happens to me

To start, apparently I was overconfident in wanting to keep the worker in the east--here's what happened there:


There was only one axe in Grey Havens, so there had to be at least one axe sitting in the fog next to the city. Here's the combat log:

I guess I keep over-estimating how well I'm protected by things like hills and rivers--oh well, axe for Praet isn't horrible, and that means he has another axe over in the east, away from the main front. Speaking of...oh, boy:


That stack of five units is in Isengard, and then the tile south of the city has an axe and archer--if the archer means he's going to start moving that stack, I don't know if that's a good or a bad thing. I have the two archers currently in Hartschild, along with any number of passing Praets that can stop there if I see the stack moving--remember, eastway hasn't had HR for long, if at all, which means his stack is mainly Axes (since they're the only thing other than Horse Archers that match up halfway-decently with Praets until Maces), and it's slow as a consequence. For that matter, after seeing all of these Axes (and only the token Spear), I should probably head for HR myself, as much as I don't want to research a dead-end tech.

As you can see from the in-progress screenshot, I'm moving my main stack around Isengard, heading for Eglarest and planning to burn it (unless he magically produces an army there too ), so let's get a picture after all my movements:


So not much there--I can 2-pop whip a Praet next turn in Hartschild possibly, but I'm not sure I want to. Now to the overview of eastway:




A 2-pop whip in Dale, no other whips I can see--eastway's rate of power increase has appeared to slow somewhat, so I'm closer to him at least

Now to my core, and other domestic news:


Other than the war, the big news you might have noticed from the event log is that AT both built the Colossus (not unexpected considering he Oracled Metal Casting) and popped a Great Engineer (which I assume will build Pyramids). Not to be outdone, I set up Norende so I'll get my second Great Scientist at the end of next turn--it's heading to Miasma Woods, since I obviously can't risk it in Hartschild (and Miasma Woods probably will have more science long-term anyway). As for military, Starkfort will whip the Praet next turn, and Caldisla will finish my first Catapult as well. Norende will finish slow-building its Praet (which is only slow because I pulled the worker off the mine to become a scientist to finish the Great Scientist), and then I'm not sure what I'll do with it--it might actually build/whip another worker to get Miasma Woods back up to speed. As for Florem, it's proceding nicely--the library will be completed mainly by chopping, then I'll go to a Granary next.

Edit: One more thing I almost forgot--there's some interesting things on the demo screen:


At least Twinkletoes and AT have come to their senses and closed borders with the Great Lighthouse--B4ndit's also opened borders with AT and Twinkletoes, but he still needs to open borders with me and close them with eastway--I would have offered Open Borders again to B4ndit, but I didn't think to check the relations screen until after I sent the turn along, and it's not that big a deal

Is there a limit of how many turns you should do in a day, especially involved turns? Even if we're not counting my scout move turn in PB18, that's still 3 turns in one day. My rant last night seems so far away