RBP3 [SPOILERS] - Friendly Kittens (Ragnar of Maya)

[Cull]

Why is Byz so annoyed, and generally, wary of England. They seem nice, and workable. See the chat I had with them to see Bob's response when I brought up England. It wasn't good.

England said okay to the formal requests.

Can you guys post a microplan once the barbs are gone?

Also, chat with England reveals results. News to me, maybe not to you guys, but the Krill/Portugal War is phony to cancel trades?

WTF?!?

Eh, if one of you can elaborate for me, that would help...

[RefSteel]

Quick answer for Cull: England is in the Hydra. Worse, England had agreed to be part of the Mali/Babs/Byz/Us trade group prior to learning about the Hydra, then jumped ship and became part of the Hydra instead. (This was ages ago - like before Turn 60.) Byz doesn't like that sort of thing. We're working with England (among others) in hopes of splitting up the Hydra though, and making some headway in that direction, it appears - though early returns are always unreliable.

[Cull]

Quick answer for Cull: England is in the Hydra. Worse, England had agreed to be part of the Mali/Babs/Byz/Us trade group prior to learning about the Hydra, then jumped ship and became part of the Hydra instead. (This was ages ago - like before Turn 60.) Byz doesn't like that sort of thing. We're working with England (among others) in hopes of splitting up the Hydra though, and making some headway in that direction, it appears - though early returns are always unreliable.

Oh

[RefSteel]

Errr ... just noticed I left a question out.

We knew (from checking in-game stuff) about the fake war between Krill and Portugal. Why would you declare fake war on someone just to cancel trades though? Well:

Let's say Egypt has one of a resource that he doesn't need at the moment - say a happy resource when all his cities are below the happy caps, or horses when he doesn't plan on building mounted units - and Portugal lacks that resources and could benefit from it (to raise happy cap while whip anger wears off, say, or to build chariots). Or the other way 'round. If they have a trade network connection, Egypt can gift/"trade" the resource to Portugal - but the game won't let them cancel the deal for ten turns. What if Egypt wants their resource back sooner? Well, there IS a way to cancel the deal early: These deals do NOT prevent a declaration of war, and DoW automatically cancels all trade deals, meaning Egypt could use their resource again, and Portugal would have to give it up. (Open Borders works the same way, by the way. India's claims, both to us and to Sumeria, that OB would provide a ten-turn automatic peace were either outright lies or an ignorance of Civ game mechanics that I find nigh-impossible to believe for the players on that team.)

The actual situation with the Egypt-Portugal war is almost certainly more complicated than that, but that's the basic idea of war-to-cancel trades.

Also: Which turn are we on at this point? Did I miss a reload in there somewhere? And is it just me, or have we had more reloads in the past three turns of this game than we had in the first 65+?

[Maniac Marshall]

We're on turn 72.3.

[RefSteel]

So after France plays, is it okay if I post in the e-mail thread:

Guys, really sorry, but I accidentally fortified one of our workers on an ice tile, and set one of our gunships to autoexplore. Can we get a reload to my last login on T72?

Y'know, just to have 72.4...

(In honesty, I'm actually glad about these delays. I don't have the RL time to keep up with the game at its "normal" pace.)

[Maniac Marshall]

Oh, btw Cull, yes, i'll post a micro plan soon. If the turns will ever move... In 1-2 turns, the barbs intentions should become clear and we can post a micro plan. hopefully one that doesn't involve me wasting 2 worker turns X_X or, if it does, one of you can point it out to me.

Look for it either tomorrow or Friday.

[Maniac Marshall]

OK, the turn rolled, and I have moved our scouts, and our units in the south, where the situation is resolving itself. Lets have a look.



Note: I have moved the worker to the rice since doing this. Krant is pretty dinged up now, but thats ok, he shouldn't have to fight for a while. Dralthi, the chariot covering the workers presently is at 3.6/4.

The remaining barb near temminck is no longer a real threat. Dralthi will be healed in no time, and we can always whip the chariot there if needed, something I'd actually still want to do eventually, but not till it can work the rice to regrow if at all possible.

The barb menacing Pride Rock is also not an issue. There will be an axe there next turn that can deal with him.

Mali is chasing after that barb on the spices. He's a few turns away from being a real issue anyhow.

The barb east of the capital is more of an issue, but still not that worrying.

Now, here's the REAL problem. If the barb in the north moves to our mined hill, and the barb next to the sheep moves to the sheep, we can't attack them both with our ONE axe, and we WOULD get pillaged.

As far as I can see, we have these options:

1) Road the corn, move the axe to the silver tile, where he could attack onto the sheep next turn. Maybe we get lucky and the northern barb suicides onto him, but if the barbs move to the sheep and the mine, we'd have to attack the sheep one and get the mine pillaged.

2) Road the corn, move the axe to the silver tile. Move the warrior to the hill, where he would have the advantage of C1 and 25% defense, causing an unhappy citizen for 1 turn until the holkan could arrive to garrison.

3) Penalty whip the city, losing 20 hammers, but getting the axe next turn and guaranteeing we don't lose the mine.

4) Upgrade the warrior for 80g. Guarantees we don't lose the mine.

At this point, I think I'd actually favor #4. It'd cost us a couple turn on metal, but, on the other hand, we wouldn't have to whip the capital immediately, so it would help make some of that back. You guys tell me.

EDIT: OK, I played around in the sandbox, and it appears to me that if we do the upgrade, we can still get MC before turn 90 even with the upgrade, and maybe as fast as turn 88 if Kyan has currency and someone can loan us 20g. We'd also have a 4th city, and a library at Teminck, so at this point, you're going to have to sell me that the upgrade is not the way to go.

[Cull]

If upgrading still let's us get MC before t90 AND prevents the mine from getting pillaged.I'm all for it. Don't see why not.

[RefSteel]

OK, I played around in the sandbox, and it appears to me that if we do the upgrade, we can still get MC before turn 90 even with the upgrade, and maybe as fast as turn 88 if Kyan has currency and someone can loan us 20g. We'd also have a 4th city, and a library at Teminck, so at this point, you're going to have to sell me that the upgrade is not the way to go.

I'm the worst salesman this side of the Mississippi. And the world I live in has sphere-like wrap, so "this side" includes everyone not actually on a boat on the river itself. I'd rather lose the mine than 20 hammers, I'd rather lose 20 hammers than 80 gold, and there's a chance the barbs will move in such a way that we don't lose anything if we risk the mine - but just because I'd rather do something one way doesn't mean it's the best thing to do, and I'm not going to try to sell it beyond stating my preference.