[SPOILER] The Steak, Beer, and Cigar Saloon

[Catwalk]

Turn 82
Lazy report again, not much happened. Another worker finished, taking me to 5 total. 3 are being produced, planning on chopping a lot of trees now that I have Mathematics. I may be able to buy furs from 2metraninja, although I'll probably need to hook up an extra silk so I have something to bargain with.

[Catwalk]

Turn 83
Bloody hell!

Barbarian axe spawns on a single unfogged tile? At least it's far enough away that I can bring troops in for the kill. An axe will have something like 60% odds on it on flat terrain, I get a 5% bonus due to Prince level. I plan on bringing my warrior in Groceries out to inflict a single hit on it, that'll up my odds to 70%+ I think. Well worth the risk, as I'll be slightly screwed if he eats my axe. Even this plan may be too risky, feel like simming it out for me Max?

Notice the other bad news here? Yeah, zanth didn't have enough of a lead already. I don't think he took a completely outrageous tech, but even Currency is a big jump here. I hope his neighbours have the good sense to close borders with him when he gets Currency, we definitely have a runaway in the making here.

Demos as follows:

GNP goes up to semi-decent 63 at full research, it's still at 0%. I will get Currency in around 10 turns, expecting my research to go up a bit over the next several turns.

[MaxPower]

IMO, It is better to bait the barb to attack your axe in defensive terrain (ie. the hill you are mining). AIs are dumb. Sacrifice your warrior only if the barb ignores your troops and wanders around in pillaging mod (lets say, he ignore your axe and walks into the cottage). If you want to be in the safe side, put 1 turn of hammers into an axe in groceries so you can emergency whip it if everything else fails.

Since barbs now have BW tech, it could be wise to build a chariot at some point. It's not a priority since there are not too many places where they can spawn.

Bad news about the oracle. What are all those IND civs doing? Any way your are in a strong position in regards of food and production, and expanding fast, so your position is not bad at all. Keep pushing growth and (I hope) you will catch up with his lead.

[MaxPower]

I would put my next settler in city site Nº 8 (clams/wine). With not too much micro, you can finish a chop for a 1t work boat and the city could grow into shared cottages with Dishes and Always Wrong. The sugar city doesn't make too much sense right now since you go currency first and banana/gems requires both calendar and IW. None of them seem to be contested by anyone else.

[Catwalk]

Somemody had build banned GLH ...

Geeze, which fool doesn't read the rules? Good thing that fool wasn't me

[haphazard1]

A chariot would definitely be useful. I like to have at least one for zone defense and barb axe clean up duty. Without one, I agree with MaxPower about trying to get the barb to attack your axe on defensive terrain. It may or may not cooperate -- AI is stupid but it will avoid unfavorable odds if something tasty is nearby to pillage.

On the spawn, appearing in the only fogged tile is actually pretty common. I don't recall the specifics, but I believe barb spawning is handled on a per land mass basis. This map will effectively be one big land mass, and with all the players fogbusting their own regions available spawn points will be rare. So barbs popping out of any available tile will be a lot more common that you might think based on it only being a single tile. Putting a fog buster down on that peninsula could be worth it, until you plant a city there and solve the problem permanently.

Oracle...yuck. I have to agree with MaxPower, what are the IND civs doing? Letting the FIN/ORG civ grab the Oracle is just...yuck.

[Bacchus]

I have to agree with MaxPower, what are the IND civs doing?

Building the Great Lighthouse?

[Catwalk]

That's what I was about to say As much as I'm annoyed with the IND civs for not building the Oracle, I'm actually more annoyed with myself for not building it. We're on t83, it should have been obvious long ago that others were hesitant to build it. Kudos to zanth for realizing the situation and grabbing it, the benefit far outweighed the risk in this situation. Imagine if I could have snagged Currency for free right after getting Mathematics. That would have been huge! I think you suggested it earlier haphazard, I'm sorry for not paying much attention to that idea.

I'll move my axe on the hill where my worker is at now and see if the axe wants to attack at -30%. If it moves west instead, I can do the backup plan to first attack with the warrior and then the axe. That's a little risky though, do barbarians move at the start or end of turns? If they move at the end I won't be able to whip a defender in Groceries before he walks all over it! And either way I'd need to sink two turns of production into it in order to have a whip ready. I'll sim it out and see what my survival odds are, I'll want it them to be at least 20:1.

[Catwalk]

Turn 84

Quick picture report, ask questions if there's anything you're curious about or think I'm doing wrong.

Our neighbours:

Nakor is peaceful to the west, Jowy is peaceful to the east, 2metra seems harmless enough down south. Overall a positive situation threat-wise.

Our cities:

Demos & graphs:

[Catwalk]

Quick test with warrior + axeman on open land vs barbarian axeman shows that 7 out of 16 axes live. That's a horrible loss rate, as I lose the warrior regardless. If I sit on a hill tile, I run a 23% risk of losing my axe. This really isn't great. I can't whip chariots atm as the horses aren't connected, partly due to a misclick