[SPOILERS] Scooticator and Pindooter give a sporting try

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Pindicator, you sounded like John Madden to me, except for the bit about the numbers. Scooter, sadly, you sounded more like Mark May. Point goes to pindicator. That scout just better keep his head on a swivel out there, or he could be sidelined indefinitely.

Edit: Which reminds me, where is your leggy sideline reporter and why hasn't he chimed in yet?

[antisocialmunky]

Hey, you can all hope for Lewwyn following your scout and the lion eating it.

[scooter]

Pindicator, you sounded like John Madden to me, except for the bit about the numbers. Scooter, sadly, you sounded more like Mark May. Point goes to pindicator. That scout just better keep his head on a swivel out there, or he could be sidelined indefinitely.

I was aiming for realistically terrible, so I'll actually take that as a convoluted compliment.

[pindicator]

Well, scooter only had two types of plays for a scout there: he can either pop the hut or not pop the hut.

[scooter]

We're Darius right? Does our Darius have a mustache?

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Pindicator, you sounded like John Madden to me, except for the bit about the numbers. Scooter, sadly, you sounded more like Mark May. Point goes to pindicator. That scout just better keep his head on a swivel out there, or he could be sidelined indefinitely.

I was aiming for realistically terrible, so I'll actually take that as a convoluted compliment.

Commentary on your punditry in no way should be construed as commentary against yourself. Commentators exist to be panned by the critics.

Now where is our leggy sideline reporter??

[Krill]

I think this thread would benefit from a TV weather girl more.

[pindicator]

By popular demand...


Turn 25 Power Rankings


Link to previous Power Rankings:

• The Way-Too-Early-To-Tell Power Rankings
  
• The Post-Pairing Power Rankings
  

Lots of reshuffling as pre-season predications get tossed aside and the game actually starts being played.  Some surprise names have climbed up the rankings and a number of well respected teams get pushed down the list as their start appears to be slower than usual.  To help me get an idea of how teams have been doing, I averaged each team's score and scoreboard rank over turns 21-25. For anybody who says I'm giving too much weight to the score, just remember that when the turn hits 2050 the person with the highest score wins.

And I'm sure people are going to want to bring out the icon a lot after reading this.  That's all right, just tell me how you would rank the players and why.  Probably better for you to put it in the lurker thread, though.  Although I won't object if you decide to post it here


Biggest Gain:  WilliamLP +16
Biggest Drop:  Serdoa -16

1. plako as Ragnar of Maya
Prev Rank: #1
I got in a fight with the stats guys when writing this.  They're trying to convince me that all the early game metrics point to another team being our #1.  I'm trying to tell them that I need to make these rankings biased per the last set of rankings I put out otherwise that would be like admitting I didn't know what I was talking about before.  And plako is still the defending champ until someone proves otherwise.

2. WilliamLP as Isabella of Inca
Prev Rank.  #18
Score don't lie.  The only two teams to hold the top spot in score over the last 8 turns have been WilliamLP and Pindicator/Scooter, and Pindicooter only did it for 1 of those turns.  WilliamLP has secured himself a religion and an early scoreboard lead and earned his meteoric rise.  The pundits are wondering if he'll still be at the top when turn 50 comes around.

3. Pindicator & Scooter as Darius of Vikings
Prev Rank: #3
Scoutgate happened after turn 25 so I can't penalize this team for it yet.  But what they have done is land a food-rich capital, popped a tech from one of their many huts, have gems, stone, and marble all within grasp, and only one neighbor who looks pretty questionable in his start.  Some hurdles on the horizon: a lack of food and neighbors with a mind for revenge.

4. Ichabod & Wetbandit as Shaka of Greece
Prev Rank: #6
Ichabod and Wetbandit -- or should I call them Matahachibod and Wetbandit Soho? -- continue to quietly climb the rankings.  They've been consistently in the top half of the scoreboard, which make them one of the few teams that is actually performing around where I predicted they would.  Naturally you should disregard all the other evidence and look at their performance when evaluating how accurate these rankings are.

5. dtay as Alexander of Germany
Prev Rank: #17
dtay is getting a lot of leniancy because I have so little knowledge of him as a player.  I still think he has a tough leader combination here, but consider that he has turned Alex of Germany into a top 5 ARGS score.

6.  Yuris as Mehmed of Ottoman
Prev Rank: #15
Whoever is playing the turns is logging in as Yurimack.  That's enough for me to want to crawl under my bed, turn off all the lights, and wait until the monsters have gone away.  Yes, playing against mackoti evokes that kind of response in me.  It may also be the perfect ruse:  let builder yuris do his thing and everyone will stay away because of the threat of mackoti.

7. Slowcheetah as Ramesses of Mongolia
Prev Rank: #11
To show how much more informed I am than all the other sports pundits, I needed to make up a completely brand new statistic that really doesn't add new information to the subject but looks like it does and makes me look smart by extension.  Did you know that slowcheetah's ARGS (Average Rolling Game Score) for the last 5 turns is good enough for a solid 7th overall?

8. retep as Sitting Bull of Khmer
Prev Rank: #7
ARGS has places 8 through 10 separated by only 0.25 points, so I have to give retep the nod next.  But we're in the middle of the pack and I already used my good middle-of-the-pack metaphor for mostly_harmless.  What, did you think I wrote all these in order?

9. mostly_harmless as Qin Shi Huang of Sumeria
Prev Rank: #9
Another pre-game prediction that looks to be pretty close to how the game's played out.  See, I know what I'm doing here!  Just ignore all the instances where I don't.  But MH has had a solid middle-of-the-pack score so far.  As we know Civ is more like a marathon than a sprint: all you need to do is keep pace with the leader group and know when to make your move.

10.  Jowy & The Black Sword as Pacal of India
Prev Rank: #16
The Black Sword has joined on to this team, and the one clear thing that this adds to Jowy is a bit of energy.  Jowy has the tendency to get sidetracked or lose interest in his games, but if TBS can keep the energy level high in the game then Pacal of India becomes a lot more potent of a combination.

11. Fintourist & Old Harry as Montezuma of Babylon
Prev Rank: #8
Fintourist & Old Harry keep bouncing back and forth between 8 and 12 on these rankings.  Perhaps this is just part of landing Montezuma and getting slow leader traits.  But they also landed Babylon, who has some of the best leader traits.  And perhaps they are trapped in the temptation to archer rush someone.

12. suttree as Huayna Capac of Spain
Prev Rank: #10
It's starting to look like moving his first settler for two turns wasn't as productive as suttree initially hoped.  If it was then I hate to think what Brick let him have at the start.

13. Bacchus as Suryavarman of Carthage
Prev Rank: #13
The bottom third of the scoreboard is actually where we start to see some real separation in the ARGS rankings.  Of those teams only Bacchus has yet to hit 50 points on the scoreboard as of turn 25.  That's the good news.  The bad news?  It was only turn 23 that he was sitting at 39 points.  WilliamLP has been at 60.

14. Azza as Joao of the Dutch
Prev Rank: #12
There's way too many noobs in this game for Azza to survive it.

15. Bigger, Lewwyn, & Qgqqqqq as Gandhi of China
Prev Rank: #4
What makes a team tech Bronze Working first and be the last person to tech it?  Having a capital full of forests.  I almost dropped them another spot, because their score has been that awful, but I have a feeling that this is as low as we are going to see Bigwyn on the power rankings.

16.  Nakor & CFC Jester as Wang Kon of Rome
Prev Rank: #14
I know I don't have fun sight on their map, but I really don't understand their start.  They went work boat first despite having a grass cow beside their capital, and then they teched Bronze Working first only to whip off their improved tiles.  I hope I am just missing part of the picture and their play makes more sense than I suspect it does.  Oh, and the really scary part?  They are doing better in ARGS than three other teams.

17. Commodore & Kurumi as Victoria of Portugal
Prev Rank: #5
Bringing out the ARGS stat again:  Commodore is last in that stat, averaging a paltry 41.75 points.  Scoreboard don't lie, Commodore.  I hope FIN can help dig you out of this because it seems like the map has not bee kind to your start.

18. Serdoa as Mansa Musa of America
Prev Rank: #2
Is Serdoa out of the running already?  I expected a slow start with Mansa Musa as a leader, but I expected a slow start for me as well. The land must be really unkind for Serdoa to be bringing up the rear so often.  He's been last in score as often as William has been first in score as of late.  Swapping them makes a lot of sense when you look at it like that.

[NobleHelium]

I'm not sure what you expect the leggy sideline reporter to say. She has to be interviewing people and there's nobody to interview.

[Merovech]

Interview me! Interview me! I'll do my best Belichick impression!