[SPOILERS] ARRR Ye Scurvy Dogs! Hannah the Irin

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Disagree with the value of Financial as a mid-late game trait. It may be my BTS side speaking, but at maximum, it's +1c/pop. So a massive percentage boost in the early game, a weaker boost in the late game. FFH Expansive is a weird merger of BTS Exp and Imp (minus faster workers and granaries are nerfed anyway) and probably does better in the early game than Financial.

[Selrahc]

Disagree with the value of Financial as a mid-late game trait. It may be my BTS side speaking, but at maximum, it's +1c/pop. So a massive percentage boost in the early game, a weaker boost in the late game.

You know the late game Lanun will have a high population? So +1c/pop will mount up across an entire empire and potentially hundreds of population points, all multiplied through buildings.

[Mardoc]

Disagree with the value of Financial as a mid-late game trait. It may be my BTS side speaking, but at maximum, it's +1c/pop. So a massive percentage boost in the early game, a weaker boost in the late game. FFH Expansive is a weird merger of BTS Exp and Imp (minus faster workers and granaries are nerfed anyway) and probably does better in the early game than Financial.

Well, the thing is - up to this point I was pretty much working resources, farms, mines, and coves. Not a lot of room for Financial to help there. Even as the Lanun, a coast isn't the best thing to work until at least a lighthouse, and even there, I'm finding myself debating whether I really want to work that coast when I could be growing a Town instead. But! I'm now getting to the point with my happiness caps and city sizes that I'm working the coast anyway, and for those pop points it's a straight +50% commerce output.

The more tiles I'm working that are naturally in the 2-3 commerce range, the more Fin helps compared to non-Fin. And that's the ratio that increases as the game goes on.

Which leads me to an interesting question: what will Thoth do with his upcoming Adaptive swap? Honestly, I think his commerce is almost entirely aristofarms on floodplains, so giving up Financial is a straight 20% nerf to his income. And of course his expenses would be unchanged, so probably more than 20% penalty to his overall tech rate.

On the other hand, he's already at war with the Sheaim, and I've got to believe that Nyktorion's been approached and declined an NAP; possibly WarriorKnight as well. Losing 3 cities would also be a 20% nerf to his tech rate . So I'd say there's a decent chance Thoth goes for Agg/Cha/Rai to hold on to his lead. Which would put me even, at least, with him in GNP in 3 turns. At the cost of needing to spend more effort on preparing for war, of course.


Edit: Yeah, Selrahc hits the nail on the head here. Why Financial will matter to me is because both my empire and my cities are getting big. And I'm finally getting infrastructure in place to multiply the commerce, too.

[Amelia]

How did you get the time to work towns though? I generally find that cottages are inferior to Coasts, simply because coasts add an extra +1f with lighthouses. (Unless you didn't have time to build lighthouses at all).

[Mardoc]

How did you get the time to work towns though? I generally find that cottages are inferior to Coasts, simply because coasts add an extra +1f with lighthouses. (Unless you didn't have time to build lighthouses at all).

I'm only now getting up lighthouses everywhere; until now my production has pretty much been needed for stuff to put up new cities with - settlers, workers, workboats, cultists. I also had a fairly low happiness cap, and only recently had slavery, so didn't have much to do with food excess. That should be changing now that both of those are being fixed.

And, speaking of progress and the whip - I whipped another lighthouse this turn, and will probably manage to whip a third next turn. I'm coming in 3rd or 4th on the production demos - I assume whipping doesn't show up there? So I'm actually in better shape than I look, with a ~3 pop whip every turn recently? I'm now about 550 GNP to Thoth's 750, which is depressing. Hoping against hope that his adaptive switch is away from Financial or that if he doesn't, that the war is successful instead. Of course, it ought to help once I manage to get my sea havens and libraries built, but he's a moving target.

In other news - well, there really isn't much other news. I keep working on growth. Next turn should be a bit more exciting. And it's been a while, so I'll try to get some more pictures into the thread; I should have some time while my wife and relatives are out shopping.

[Mardoc]

And...we're off again!

This is a big turn, lots of stuff happening at once. Engineering came in, boosting all my roads. Phiber Optik finished the Pagan Temple, set max hammers, and started on the Guild of Hammers; it should be done in 15 turns, along with my Prophet for Nox Noctis. Unless I whip, in which case I just need to come up with ~60 population to whip . Of course that'll go down, and if I see Thoth having researched Engineering I'll probably whip the last couple turns off.

I start on Taxation, it'll be nice to grab a few more commerce from my towns and villages.

Had a nice little boon in Condor:


One more free trade route! Is this because I had Esus spread there? I'm starting to think about the right timing for spreading Esus around my civ to get max benefit from Nox Noctis without spending the money too early. If I can get bonuses like this, though, it'd be worth speeding that up a notch.

In other news, my Adepts are mastering the art of water:


I should have all the desert in my own lands wiped away very soon; then it'll be time to kill that Giant and settle the desert, so I can push some culture into Thoth's lands and destroy some more desert lands.

And, Condor whips its lighthouse; Captain Crunch will probably whip its lighthouse next turn - Slavery is working out very nicely for me so far. My new cities are getting launched a heck of a lot faster than the old ones did, and it's not just the prompt access to coves and culture.

After Taxation it'll probably be time to head for Arcane Lore, or else maybe for Smelting/Iron Working. Nah, Hemah should come first, particularly as Thoth keeps running Overlords, making me nervous he's planning a theft. That's why I started Saverous this turn, too.

[Mardoc]

First piece of good news this turn: I don't see Hyborem anywhere! . Hoping that Thoth doesn't either so I don't have to activate our demon-hunting alliance (but that he's close enough to Thoth to wreck a few floodplains).

Second piece of good news (mostly). Thoth just picked up Taxation. So therefore he's not going Engineering until at least now; the Guild ought to be fairly safe, I think. At least, I'll have a 5ish turn headstart, now, assuming it takes him 3 turns to pick up Engineering *and* he's going right there now. Hopefully this is a result of the expiring NAPs with Thessa and WK, that he's feeling the need to spend his hammers on immediately beneficial stuff rather than investments. Assuming a 5 turn headstart, he'd have to have a 37 hammer/turn city to beat me, which seems hard to believe. Pretty much the only way I can see it is if he switches to God King and builds it in his capital, but that would really wreck his GNP.

Third piece of good news - I can't quite explain how, but this turn my GNP is 593 to Thoth's 703. The gap is (perhaps) narrowing, and he hasn't even had a chance to be adaptive yet! Of course, maybe this is just a 1-turn temporary reprieve while he rebuilds gold reserves or goes hammer-intensive, but still . Once I actually get my infrastructure built (more on that in a moment) I might catch him yet.

Fourth piece of good new - Slavery + Sanitation + Coves + Lighthouses is starting to get ridiculously awesome in a few spots. In Samy, Condor, Captain Crunch, and hopefully a couple others shortly, I think I will be able to run 3- and 4- pop whips every 6 turns, and probably still have a long term growth trend - the cities are really growing that fast! And I don't even have granaries and smokehouses up yet! This is definitely the solution to my hammer woes, and for the moment I'm going to keep reinvesting in whip infrastructure to make it improve further. I won't be surprised if, in 20 turns, these cities which were nothings at T100 will be outproducing my previous stars of Phiber Optik and Phoenix! Combine a lighthouse, grown-up coves, and lots of ocean and you get lots of food surplus And in all of these, I'm down to requiring just granaries and smokehouses, which are only ~3-pop whips, then I can sneak in Sea Havens and Libraries for dramatic commerce improvement, while they grow like weeds onto Coast and cottage tiles


Captain Crunch, after whipping its lighthouse but before the lighthouse kicks in, has 17! food surplus. And this is without Sac/Weak, even.


Fifth piece of good news - I founded city #15 this turn, Terminus. I'm going to divert a Cultist from an earlier established city here so I can get the coves started earlier (and hence justify my lack of worker presence).


Any other good news? Probably. I'm a bit too happy to go hunting for it, though. Maybe next turn.

[Mardoc]

Finally, another turn comes around. Not a lot to report in Lanun, as my cities regrow from the whips, but a couple interesting pieces of foreign news.

First, an annoying thing - the Undercouncil vote comes up again, but this time it's between Thoth and Nyktorion! I figure Thoth has approximately zero chance of winning, but I really don't want to wait another cycle before getting goodies, so I vote Nyktorion.

Second, looks like Thoth switched AV and WarriorKnight got caught out of position:


Really bad time to use Sanctuary, in my opinion; it would have been much better for an attack on Thoth, or defending in the period between WK's NAP and mine, or basically anything but now. I guess Darrell decided to push to attack immediately.

Speaking of - I found him:


Basically, the only effect I expect from Hyborem is to maybe spoil the attack on Thoth, distracting Irgy and WK. I will be surprised if Hell terrain does anything this game, and surprised if it matters. Apparently Thoth declared war on Hyborem, I'm guessing to kill him with Cultists. I offered Open Borders, myself - might as well get a bit of trade while I can, right?

Yeah, yeah, I'm a mercenary.

[Mardoc]

Wow, it's been longer than I realized since I updated. At home, it's been mostly infrastructure. Abroad, the Infernals were born, declared war, tried to buy their way out of it, and were killed. Thoth and Nyktorion are likly going to war this turn, while WarriorKnight has demonstrated a significant degree of power.

Heisenberg...is frustrating. I've asked him if he's interested in attacking WarriorKnight after the war, and got a bunch of 'well, sure, in principle, but I don't want to commit' type responses. I asked him for mana, and it's 'sure, but not Ice, and I wish I hadn't given ice to WK'. I'm not convinced he'll be helping in a war against Thoth, either, not really.

Which means, despite Thoth's golden age production kicking him, at least for the moment, well out in front of me again, I'm starting to consider allying with him against the easterners. I'm getting the feeling they really do have a deal in place to keep going until I'm dead too.

Thoth finally got Engineering this turn. I've only got 8 turns left on the Guild, so he'd probably need 50 hammers/turn to catch me. And his golden age should expire before then. I think it's safe.

And, on the homefront, what have I accomplished with this building phase? Well, here are some pictures. Any questions?

I know I need to get a bunch more workers over to the island, along with 6ish more work boats, to really get these cities launched and useful. At the moment, except the most recent cities, all tiles worked are improved - continually knocking the population down to get in basic infrastructure is to blame/credit. I need a settler for the middle continent, too - this is intended more as a tactical settlement than anything economically useful - but it lets me have a lot more cultural borders, a good chunk of plains instead of desert, etc.

[Mardoc]

Not much this turn. Sorcery came in, and I'm off toward Arcane Lore. I think this might be yet another unique bonus Thoth misses out on - although his GNP is 1000 to my 700, he still doesn't have Sorcery, and it's only 6 turns for me. Which, combined with me being first in the order, means he needs to either be researching Sorcery right now, or he'll miss out on the Great Sage. And Hemah, of course, but he wouldn't have gone for Hemah anyway.

Founded the last island city - now I just get to get over a bunch of workers and workboats to finish it off. Started on my last settler for a while, to get me to 17 cities in thoth's backyard.

And, I'm finally getting troops into position to pop the Dungeon that's been there all game next to Cap'n Crunch. For all this, it'll probably turn out to be 'your warrior has found nothing' .