[SPOILER] PB37 Dark Savant tries not to be a blatant MP n00b

[Dark Savant]

The Incan Empire shall now be called the Incest Empire.

There are many reasons for this:

1. Krill didn't bother to rename his empire from the default.  Boooring.
   
2. "Incan" and "Incest" start with the same three letters.
   
3. I'd be happy to refer to Krill's city theme if he had a coherent one, but I can't see any connection between 12 Monkeys and his other cities.  (I might eventually break my own naming theme, but only in the long run and only if we do well.)
   
4. The real-life Incan Empire was known for lots of brother-sister royal marriages, as previously mentioned.
   
5. Most importantly, they're being invaded from the north by the White Walkers.  Targaryens and Lannisters ahoy!
   

[Dark Savant]

Turn 66 (1360 BC) - Part 2

White Walker assault on the Incest Empire stalls
Does the Incest Empire have dragons?

Aside from the White Walkers successfully cutting off the Incest Empire's copper, they aren't doing well:



They're losing power while their enemies' power is still rising.  And if they haven't yet been hit by chariots, they soon will be.

Gavagai has to be alarmed by this, even without knowing who is to Krill's north.  It's unlikely he realizes Krill is the invadee, not the invader.  I'm going to do what I can to signal non-aggression.

Well, except Gavagai just logged in and he can't play at the same time as someone else, so oh well.  I did leave the worker that I just whipped unmoved.

edit: Okay, Gavagai logged off but didn't end his turn.  I logged in and offered a cow-for-cow trade.  It'll alert him to the fact that we have Sailing, but he probably noticed that anyway.

[Dark Savant]

Turn 66 (1360 BC) - Part 3

Sandro and Gem both continue to move north:



I was expecting Sandro to have to decide between exploring a western peninsula and pressing northward, but it looks like GermanJoey doesn't have a western peninsula he can expand easily into.  At least Sandro can still keep going.

Gem has spotted the borders of a GermanJoey city that isn't a capital and has expanded borders.  I'm definitely going to try to take a look, if I can do so without declaring war.  She might also make contact with JR4 any turn now; that city is placed roughly analogous to where Castleview is, so there's a good chance JR4 has a city right to its north.

Then again, GermanJoey has 5 cities and I still have no idea where two of them are.

[ipecac]

We could tell ventessel failed already based on the initial power losses, which were about equal. Pillaging copper means nothing with archers and so many sources of horses around.

[Dark Savant]

We could tell ventessel failed already based on the initial power losses, which were about equal. Pillaging copper means nothing with archers and so many sources of horses around.

Well, it will at least slow Krill down a little.

Krill will probably have copper hooked up at Room 101 not long from now, anyway.

[Dark Savant]

Resource distribution

Okay, we discussed this in chat, but I did want to put this all in one place.

Strategic resources

• Copper: Everyone has about 3-4 of these, enough that it will contribute nontrivially to production.  Once the game reaches the Classical Age, anyone losing copper is basically already dead.
  
• Horses: There are even more of these, including a ton on islands.
  
• Ivory: Everyone has one of these in the jungle southeast of their start.
  
• Marble: Everyone has one of these on an island east of their start.  Contrast this with ...
  
• Stone: I haven't seen this at all, even though I'd like to find one soon because we want it for Moai Statues in Sorpigal.  If it exists at all, it's probably on islands not close to anyone's start.
  

Food resources
(not that this really matters, but hey, completeness!)

• Banana, Clam, Corn, Cow, Crab, Deer, Fish, Pig, Sheep: All very abundant.
  
• Rice: Everyone has one at their start position, but that might be it.
  
• Wheat: This is the only scarce food resource, though it's out there on islands.
  

Happiness resources

• Silver: This is superabundant; everyone has at least 3-4 of these.
  
• Gems: Everyone seems to have two of these, both in the jungle to the southeast of every start.
  
• Gold: This only appears to exist on more distant islands.
  
• Furs: Everyone has exactly one, exactly two tiles southeast of start.
  
• Ivory: (see strategic resources)
  
• Whales: Everyone has one, on the coast northeast of start.
  
• Incense: It appears everyone has one of these on a peninsula west of start (though I'm not sure where GermanJoey's is, since he doesn't appear to have a western peninsula).
  
• Dyes, Silk, Spices, Sugar: It appears everyone has exactly one of a random one of these, southeast of start in jungle.  We fortunately have dyes (extra +1 happy later) instead of spices or sugar (extra +1 health with grocer).  I haven't seen any on islands so far.
  
• Wine: I haven't seen this at all.
  

The Calendar resources seem to be unusually scarce; the happiness cap will not be a problem early, but will be once we hit the Renaissance or so.  It's also possible it's just a coincidence we've seen two incense on peninsulas -- maybe other people have other Calendar/wine happiness there.

[Dark Savant]

Turn 66 (1360 BC) - Part 4 (Foreign Relations with Gavagai)

I return to the game and am greeted with this:



As you mentioned as a possibility in chat, Gavagai rejected the cow-for-cow deal and made a counter-offer.

I have to turn this down, since this includes world map information we don't want to give Gavagai.  (I'd straight up give Gavagai specifically the map of Animal Farm's BFC if I could; shame I can't do that.)  I read this as Gavagai understanding that we have a non-aggression deal, but not wanting to show this to Krill.  And I presume he included the world maps specifically so that I would reject the trade to not show Krill that we have an agreement.

I will still be wary, of course, but I believe we have a genuine pact here.  I hope Gavagai can now focus on expansion and defense in Krill's direction, and serve as a counter to Krill's potential power.

[Dark Savant]

Turn 66 (1360 BC) - Part 5 (Foreign Relations with Coeurva)

Coeurva's warrior who is scouting us may see the warrior we have fogbusting on the western peninsula if I don't move him, so I do.  He finds more than I expected:



Those are apparently the borders of Whitehall, city #6, off to the southwest.

I don't think it is a good idea to offer a cow-for-cow deal with Coeurva; he's less experienced (and showed the first signs of it recently), and I don't want to draw his attention to what we have.  He can of course offer his own deal in return, but I'm just going to play dumb like the blatant MP n00b I am.  

I think it's increasingly likely we would want to declare any future offensive war against Coeurva, not Gavagai.

[Dark Savant]

Turn 66 (1360 BC) - Part 6

Our chariot cleans up the barb warrior wandering nearby:



And huh, that kill was worth 2 XP, not 1 XP as I was expecting.  That means we can already make a Sentry chariot; that was much quicker than I was expecting.

I would dearly love to get vision on Ankara, but I think it's more important to avoid alarming Gavagai if at all possible, and I can't do that stealthily without building a road towards his city, when I don't currently have anything around Castleview to cover a border worker.  I think that will have to wait until we already are chopping forests on his border anyway.

I think it should go finally do more scouting to the south.  I'm not sure how close we can get without letting Coeurva know that we have a Sentry chariot ... or that we have chariots ... or that we even have horses connected ... but I want scouting information!

[Dark Savant]

Turn 66 (1360 BC) - Part 7 (C&D)

Score tally:

• Coeurva: -5 points for a -2 pop whip (14 pop total).
  
• dtay: +2 points for +1 pop (13 pop total).
  
• Gavagai: +5 points for +1 pop in Edirne and +1 pop somewhere unseen (16 pop total).
  
• GermanJoey: +2 points for +1 pop somewhere unknown; -2 points for a -1 pop whip in his capital State of Yue (14 pop total).
  
• JR4: +5 points for +1 pop in city #2 (it's now size 7!) and +1 pop somewhere else (17 pop total); +6 points for a mystery technology (12 techs total).  It's possible he just straight-up gained 4 pop; unlikely, but I'm going to start to track ambiguities like this.  edit: t67 made it clear that this actually was +4 pop, so this is +3 pop in other cities for and JR4 still has 11 techs.
  
• Krill: +5 points for +1 pop in Room 101 and +1 pop somewhere unseen (14 pop total).
  

CML is starting to look anemic.  He does have Stonehenge, but he still only has 10 pop and he has only completed 2 technologies since completing Mysticism on t37.  He's now dead last in tech.

dtay doesn't appear to be in great shape, either.  I wonder if there was actually some sort of indecisive but hot war between CML and dtay, after all.

JR4 is looking very strong; he's got 5 cities, Buddhism, and a lot of both pop and techs.    I want to make contact with him partly to get better intelligence on him.  He also still has a decisive lead in the postcount war; he's also clearly taking this game very seriously despite being a newcomer here.

War between the White Walkers and the Incest Empire Update

The Incest Empire's turn caused 20,000 soldiers worth of units to die.    Maximum rival soldier count declined only from 75,000 to 71,000, but I suspect that maximum is now Krill's.

The White Walkers' turn led to no soldier deaths.  

Ventessel just went from "probably doomed" to "definitely doomed".  I just hope he puts up as much resistance as he can before he is inevitably overrun by Krill and maybe also GermanJoey.