[SPOILERS] Yossarian blames Caledorn

[YossarianLives]

Good point about no tundra in the BFC. I wonder what's really going on over there, then. Someone smarter than me could probably figure it out based on the growth timing and possible tile yields, but I'm gonna stop trying to figure it out, it makes my head hurt.

Turn 21

So NE-N it is.

Whoops, nevermind! I stopped at this point to chat with Cal and Old Harry.

YossarianLives:
Hey Old Harry, are you around?
I wanted to ask your advice in PB14
Old Harry:
Sure
YossarianLives:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/73u2910tci0rn9...ot0819.JPG

East onto the forest hill, or retreat back se?
Old Harry:
Crumbs! Was the other lion 3E? or did it move away?
YossarianLives:
He's still 3E
Old Harry:
I think you'll get a 95% shot on the forest hill (best check in worldbuilder) so I'd move there
YossarianLives:
The hill gives us 175% defense bonus for 2.75 v 2, right?
Old Harry:
you'll get more vision too, which could be vital
What level is it? I think you get a bonus vs animals on Monarch and Prince
YossarianLives:
I think it's monarch
Yeah, Monarch
You're right, I probably need to log off and run a couple tests...
Old Harry:
Or use a combat calc
I'll just load mine up
I've got Cyneheards
YossarianLives:
Thanks!
Old Harry:
You get an extra 20%
So it's 2 v 2.95
YossarianLives:
Nice! Is that against all barbs, or just animals?
Old Harry:
or 90%
I think all barbs, but you might want to check...
YossarianLives:
90% is pretty good
So what's going to delay us more, healing after the fight, or trying to dance around all these animals...
There's also a panther down south that could be chasing us that might cause problems if we retreat
Old Harry:
You can never tell what's in the fog either...
I'd take the fight and hope you get the time to heal before the next fight...
YossarianLives:
Yeah, I agree
Thanks for the help!
Old Harry:
np
YossarianLives:
And if we die, we can always blame Caledorn!
Old Harry:
Keep up the good reporting!
YossarianLives:
Boring reporting so far
I'm hoping it'll pick up as we meet our nieghbors
Old Harry:
Yeah, why didn't he delete those lions?

So we moved east, and made contact!

So, we're neighboring the Aggressive Romans. Caledorn, time for you to shine!

[Caledorn]

So, Yossarian has played the turn and will post the turn report soon. (Short edit here: I blame myself for Yossarian beating me to the post! You will be hooted for this, Yossarian!) He tells me we've met the Gladiator's Glory team - and boy are we glad we have the romans as our eastern neighbours! *cough*

So I came up with a quick draft for our first message to them, and discussed it a bit with Yossarian on GTalk. Here's basically what we came up with, but thought we'd ask for some lurker feedback on before we send anything:

Greetings to the Roman Gladiators

I have to admit that I detest writing "First contact" messages, as no matter how much I try to word them nice and eloquently they always seem extremely corny. So, let's just get down to business instead and skip the fluff for now.

We would like peaceful relations with you, and as such we suggest a NAP until at least turn 100. Obviously we ask for a long NAP, as we hope that you too desire at least one friendly neighbour that you can cooperate with, and it is our most sincere hope that you will find someone else to pay a visit with your praetorian legions when that time comes. If you agree, we look forward to discuss other treaties and possible avenues of cooperation as well. How does that sound to you guys?

(Blame) Caledorn

I initially wrote T75, but as the following conversation will reveal Yossarian had a better idea:

Yossarian
Sounds good. I would try to push that NAP even a little further, maybe T100?

Caledorn
I wanted to write that, but was a bit worried it may sound too desperate..
They're probably very very aware of their nation choice, and that a nap until t100 means we don't want praetorian visitors

Yossarian
Yeah, they'll know what we're going for. But T75 just gives them peace long enough to get their Praet's online
Let them counter us with that, then we'll know if they're gunning for us or looking for peace on our side so they can focus on their other side

Caledorn
I guess I could be brutally honest and write T100 and make a joke about the prats..
{snipping the draft, since I pasted it to Yossarian here}
How about that?
I can obviously skip the entire sentence about the cooperation-crap and the prats if you think it's overdoing it

Yossarian
I think it sounds good
Let's put it in the thread for some lurker feedback
I'd love to hear Scooter's take, for example

Caledorn
Great!
And yeah, definitely
This is going to be a lot easier than the ISDG though, as I don't have to deal with all the fluff crap
Well, with some teams I have to..
But I doubt these guys will appreciate fluff to be honest. I reserve the fluff for Maga, Halvgud and Parkin
Since they'll obviously know that we are aiming to avoid the prats I feel it's just as simple to just state it outright
Could add something about the fact that we feel lucky they're the first team we meet, so we get an early opportunity to make a deal with them before anyone else gets the chance perhaps?

Yossarian
Yeah, the praet's aren't somehting we can really tiptoe around. I think the first message is good without the extra about how happy we are to meet them, but maybe add that in once we've secured a NAP

[Caledorn]

Oh, and 3 lions and the Romans as our neighbours?

[YossarianLives]

A couple of notes about this turn:

Two techs were researched. I think Eagles and Condors got the wheel, and Maga got mining.

The gladiator capital is exactly 14 tiles east of us and 1 tile south. And that's because we moved our settler 1 north. A good potential border agreement might be something like "we don't settle east of the peak that's in the fog just east of SP, they don't settle west of that mountain peeking out if the fog nw of the lions.

Aggressive Romans are serious business. Next order of business needs to be scouting out the Roman lands, to keep an eye on their city placements and look for the hammer that shows up when they settle for their iron.

What's the best counter to prats? Axes, HAs, cats?

[YossarianLives]

Well, the Gladiator's have spotted us:

I think we should go ahead and send that message off, Caledorn.

[Caledorn]

Well, the Gladiator's have spotted us:

I think we should go ahead and send that message off, Caledorn.

Sent!

[YossarianLives]

Cool, thanks Caledorn!

Turn 22

Time to assess the damage from the lion attack:

The lion didn't attack! It must have been scared away by that bear. Anyways, that let's us move along undamaged. Also, I did check the espionage spending, and it appears that we are not the first team that the gladiator's have met. I'm not sure if this is good news or bad news. Hopefully it means they've already started scheming on how to prat-rush their other neighbor.

The newly formed regime over at Eagles & Condors grew to size 3 this turn. Team Orgy, the Little Ponies and the Gladiators all grew to size 2.

Orgy also finished a tech this turn, which was accompanied by a soldier increase of 2k. Now I'm confused. Orgy has completed 3 techs already, and every time, there has also been a 2k increase in overall soldiers. This probably means that one of their techs was powerless, and that someone else built a warrior somewhere. But for now, I will give them Hunting, Mining and AH (although if they really finished AH in just 6 turns, we're really in trouble!).

The turn flipped when I hit enter, so here are some pictures from T23:

I'm thinking NW-NE with the scout next? Then we'll circle the north of Gladiator's land before continuing east?

Care Bears completed Bronze Working! In order to make the numbers add up, they also must have completed a warrior back on T21. This means that I was wrong about one or both techs researched that turn. Either E&C did get The Wheel and Maga got a powerless tech, or they both got techs that come with 2k soldiers (meaning E&C probably got Mining). C&D is hard, I'm sure we're already way off here

[Old Harry]

Just beeline alphabet and you can stop bothering.

NW-NE sounds good.

[YossarianLives]

T23

Not a whole lot of new stuff revealed. I guess we want to end up on the forest silk or the adjacent hill next turn. Any preferences?

As I already mentioned, Care Bears completed BW one turn before us. They also grew their capital to size 3 this turn. The two Cre teams got land points for their border pops back on T3. Maga finally grew her cap to size 2. She was the last one to grow.

I sent the Gladiator's a short message in-game letting them know they have email. Embarrassingly, I forgot our email password, so I have no idea if they've already replied or not. Caledorn, you are definitely in charge of all things diplo.

[YossarianLives]

Heading out to work, so no time for a full report, but we finished BW and revealed Copper:

So the question becomes, do we want to move our second city south one tile so it gets copper in the second ring? The plan was to put it southeast of the corn, so if we move it, the city will also pick up that grass cow, but it will lose the fish and a bunch of other capital tiles it was going to be sharing. Also, it would not be safe to send the settler unescorted, so we would need to finish our Quechua first, significantly delaying the settlement date.

Another option is to move the gold city one tile west, so it loses the corn but picks up the copper. If we do that, this city would only have the cow as a food resource, and probably will never get enough food to work both the corn and copper.

Or we can stick to the current plan, and hope that there is food south of the copper somewhere, or settle a city by that eastern source of copper. What do you guys think?