[PB75 Mjmd] Call to Power

[Mjmd]

PB66 Alva C Dinkey



So in PB66 Gav pillaged some of Jacks tiles, so in retaliation I decided to take a fish, but then he placed a city to take and he was creative so he would win vs my monument. So I naturally sent what was in the area in trying to catch him off guard. Notice my gpt is up to 10gpt!!!!



100% shouldn't have done either. Partly it was bad scouting as I thought Gav was much farther west and very key didn't have any ports. Ya attack wasn't enough and poor Dinky got razed and resettled in its original spot 1E (had razed as I was very broke at the time).

T173



- I max overflowed education and somewhat good overflow from phil to put myself firmly in command of lib. Currently working on cheapest oxford possible; Neb finally doing things again.
- Ijub is doing Judiasm, theo, & nationhood which I accidentally cut off.
- Now some might say I'm looking kind of good right now, but Ginger with Dreylins land can't be ignored especially once he gets his monk buildings in them. Also, Ijub is only thing stopping Ginger from just keeping on going into Greenline. Ijub food is looking good.
- Gav is healing his stack. Curious if he goes in this turn.
- Nauf lost city he took. Thought it would show on graph this turn but maybe I'm a turn off.

Power graph. Don't know if Dreylin did the best, but certainly not the worst. I still question Ijub keeping a city touching culture with that high of power.........



Also former SD city and new city shown.



Look at this beauty. This card saw ALMOST no standard play. I say almost because there was at least 1 person playing it!!! This was later in Theros standard and I was still playing cheap standard decks. There were 4 main archtypes by that point: black (few variants spashing), spinx rev control (2 variants), mono blue, and R/G monsters. I built a lovely little B/r agro haste deck that beat 3/4 of these that topped out with 3 copies of the above beauty. Basically the game plan was hit them hard and then after they spent all their removal slam that big boy down and watch them despair.

Despite getting better at the game and having byes in the future I never did better day 1 of a GP than my 2nd big event GP Chicago going 8-1. My only loss day 1 was to the variant of control I was actually better against ironically. Sometimes even the easy matchups  you just don't draw well. Day 2 I sadly hit a couple mono blue decks which was my weak match up (had played the other 3 day 1), a mono green deck, and I barely lost on a mulligan to 4 vs control.

[Mjmd]

T182

I was really hoping Ginger either A) didn't have vision on Dreylin or B) wouldn't notice since he is at peace. Ah well. To be fair if Ijub had stayed at war Ginger wouldn't have had units in range. When Ijub had Lungfish I was originally aiming to do some sneaky combat worker shenanigans at Stonefish and erase that travesty off the map, but I wasn't diligent enough getting map updates and didn't find out until I got there so had to loop around.



Anyways, trying to figure out what will happen next with Ijub and Ginger and figure keeping promise to be at war with Ginger even if I was late might be worth something. I do need to peace out before peace treaty with Dreylin is up....... Note to self check log next turn.

But ya I'm mainly just econing up still and waiting to lib rifling. If I was in a more dominant position I could go for libbing something even better, but I just want to be safe finally.

[Mjmd]

I'm pretty sure I haven't done this one yet, and if I did, its good enough to go around again.





PB70 T90 17 city currency HG. Good times. City itself was medium, but was a vital garrison between two major cities. Once SD came in I tried to tempt him into attacking it a couple of times but he never went for it. Did end up being the base for my 4 formation pikes (from a gg).



T184

Finished Oxford, which since this city was a significant chunk of my research before....... well there is a reason I used this song!!! With double prereq and 6 KTBs my GNP is over twice everyone else's (mind a non trivial portion is culture).



Speaking of culture I'm still not sure how seriously I'm taking it, but figure by building my 3rd Synagogue now if I decide to go for later I might only need to do 2 cathedrals and can skip building the extra missionaries, temples, and cathedrals here.

I'm still just hanging out by Ginger cities for another couple turns. Gin & Drey made peace 1180 and it looks like its 10 years a turn at this point, so as long as I get out by like T186 seems safe enough. Tie down some units, which might be significant because.....

Ijub invaded GREENLINE???!?!?!?! When he made peace with Ginger I thought like 50% Nauf (would have been a mistake but still), 10% Greenline, 5% me, 35% he just made a mistake in signing peace before Ginger got rifles. Did Greenline promise help and then because he couldn't even do anything vs Dreylin Ijub thought he didn't pull his alliance weight??? Or does he figure Ginger will be able to conquer eventually so he might as well try to take territory and hold it behind cultural control? This at least would make some sense and makes more sense than invading Nauf anyways. Even if he manages to blitz through (as fast as 2 movers can in culture) he will have two problems A) Ginger peace will expire B) even if Ijub succeeds Ginger will get some territory probably cheaply and Ijub will be stuck defending a very long border without a lot of tactical depth at a tech deficit.

What will I do? GOOD QUESTION. I somewhat suspect SD is getting ready for another Gav war and I can't let him do that. He just picked up cuirs. Could be another Nauf war too I guess and in that case I do nothing for a bit??? Then in the other direction how much should I vulture and when from Greenline?

Anyone have any other questions?

[Mjmd]

T187

75% odds SD is trying to deceive me. 25% odds he actually means he wants to attack Nauf. He also sent corn for corn. Sent message back with iron one of his Nauf border cities and corn for corn.



Got Lib and took rifling. If you had told me 100 turns ago I would get Lib with my land I would have called you crazy. I'm pretty sure its the 2nd worst land on the map (poor GT). Just goes to show if you sit back and do nothing but build infrastructure while other people flail around weird things can happen. My GNP is back down to looking what it is, only slightly ahead of Ginger if you take into account all the culture. Although I did go down to 0% this turn as I overflowed into finishing engineering. Those 6 KTB techs make you look scary. Will be curious to see what Ginger does. He has the land to compete on Tech. If he wants to let Greenline mostly go he can just finish off Dreylin, maybe take 4 Greenline cities with relative ease and get to 31 cities comprising the 1st and 3rd best land on the map. He eventually will be able to out tech me. The question is what can I do in the meantime?

[Mjmd]

T188

Why did I decide this was the turn to declare on Greenline? Because troops were in position? Could I have waited for a couple rifles and should I have? 



In the most shocking news ever I want Scythian2xHorse and asked him for peace for it. Would it be nice to VenetianAresenal? 100% yes, but have no clue What Ijub considers his and I want him focused on Ginger. Plus intact infrastructure is always nice. My eastern attack is actually kind of awkward because if I raze CityStateRush Ijub might not like it. Its possible I should have just waited 3 turns for those knights to return, but figure its more pressure for Greenline to give me the city. If nothing else its a minor city so shouldn't be a big deal and will pay for those knights being out and about so long.

There is also the possibility Greenline decides to throw whatever stack he has at me, but I should take the city first and have at least 1 rifle and can upgrade more if needed. Which I'm also saving up in case I need to do vs SD (another reason to want a fast peace).

[Mjmd]

T189

Greenline resent the peace treaty, so I got the city with all its infrastructure. Including HEROIC EPIC!!! I can't even build yet lol. I was curious what would happen with that.



I settled the filler city and redid some tiles but will still starve this turn. The other nice thing about getting this in peace is that at least temporarily it should get and control its 3rd ring fast making it pretty safe from Ijub. With Heroic Epic it can also be in charge of its own defense.

Ijub did send me some diplo that came in after the treaty basically I think saying I can take this, but he wants the capital. I am curious if I could have also taken Venetian Arsenal, but ah well.

I am curious what Ginger does after he takes over Dreylin. Ijub is going to be HUGE and Ginger will border only him, but be up in tech. Will he infrastructure up or will he attack? I moved some units to pillage Dreylin lands after Ginger takes, but I may not. Its mostly farms, so its probably not worth the diplo hit.

[Mjmd]

PB77 song because I like it and don't have time this morning to go digging through old pitbosses.



T191

Spotted this SD stack in my border city with him last turn. I thought he was going for Nauf. So I had warned Nauf and now this turn I tried to make it clear SD was actually going after Gav. SD double played and I'm doubling playing Nauf, so will see how much confusion that causes.



Part of the reason why I thought he was going after Nauf is that I thought I had made i pretty clear he should go after Nauf and peace between us was on that condition. Lets see if this makes it clearer.



Or just more confusion! Who knows. If he doesn't send me back something similar those trapped knights might die as a warning. I did move my worker just in case he decides to get feisty.

Ijub cut a road for my returning knights and I'm passing by some lightly garrisoned new conquests on my way back so resent crab for crab. Could have been a road cut vs Ginger too. Ginger completed conquest of Dreylin 1T faster than I would have thought. Gingers key decision here is go after Greenline territory, go after new Ijub cities, or just tech away. I suspect he will go after Ijub. Too tempting with no cultural control and part of his army in Greenline territory. That then begs the question if Greenline is still sitting out there when peace expires do I go finish off, but will cross that bridge when we get there, as well as my entire empire as my army is moving other way.

I was going back and forth on tech this turn. I'm pretty sure Ginger is going for cannons as well, so I was going to go steam power to deny him the ktb (plus levee in capital), but if I do end up at war with SD I should probably match his cannon tech.

[Qgqqqqq]

I had no idea you could gift national wonders. Crazy.

[Mjmd]

Got Lib and took rifling. If you had told me 100 turns ago I would get Lib with my land I would have called you crazy. I'm pretty sure its the 2nd worst land on the map (poor GT). Just goes to show if you sit back and do nothing but build infrastructure while other people flail around weird things can happen. 

If people could keep flailing around that would be nice, but it seems like MAYBE peace and hitting on Mjmd is the order of the day???



So ya SD is 100% going after Gav and myself. I did resend some diplo as the city I sent in my last message was actually liberated so I assume that will mess with it. I did warn Scooter so he doesn't miss the stack on his border (he is playing 1 min turns) 

Now the million dollar question. What ya doing with those 34 cuirs Ginger???? 
1) They are going after me. After all I did the same thing, but mind you with less units. Also, an accepted defensive pact; maybe a mistake that was meant to be mirrored??? I did turn around a bunch of rifles to march east, which I'm not thrilled about just in case. However, there are 5 turns of enforced peace left and it only takes 3 turns for cuirs to get across Greenline so its extra warning, so maybe not??? I can get 14-17ish rifles and a bunch of knights in if I have to, but I did send clam for clam to try to figure this out because I would like those units to be opposite side of my empire.
2) Despite Ijub liberating Ankyra either Ginger is ambushing Ijub OR is going to mass pillage tiles. I would lean the former as then Ijub could just attack the pillaging units. 

In either case I asked Greenline to cancel deals with Ginger. While I want Ginger and Ijub fighting I don't want Ijub to be blown away. And obviously I don't want to be hit with a ton of cuirs, so can only hope Greenline feels something for our long peaceful coexistence.

[Tarkeel]

@Tarkeel I still need an accurate map description for PB63

I've not been reading threads for a while, so this is a reminder that I'll type up something when I'm not on my phone.