[Spoilers] Gavagai, Bacchus and Elizabeth Form a Romantic Trio

[Gavagai]

I was online at the same time when Serdoa was playing and I have some interesting observations.

1. I can confirm that Serdoa is the first in GNP, first in MFG, first in CY. Rival bests in this categories increased as he was settling a city and changing staff.

2. We are about equal with Serdoa in land area. We were second before he settled a city and has become third after that. The first one is SC and by a wide margin. Well, this gives some hope, actually.

What I deduce from those observations? Well, I'm inclined to blame the mapmker. I haven't seen Serdoa's start but he had two cities <i>and</i> Stonehendge well before T50. I'm pretty sure that his start was <i>somewhat</i> better than ours and that he started to snowball after that.

Of course, I've done my own mistakes. Choosing Elizabeth was the very first one. I now think that I should have taken Hannibal or Darius or Ragnar of Rome, should have played strategic defense against Egypt in first two cases and killed them off with praets in the third one. If Darius or Hannibal, I should be more active in settling the jungles and colonizing the land to the east. This is all hindsight, of course, but philosophical trait has no place in such a competetive game, as I now see. To leverage it fully one must sit in caste system; to allow yourself to sit in caste system early, you need to have secure borders; if you are playing in a really high-level MP, you can't count on secure borders. Hence, you shouldn't choose philosophical trait.
I have chosen wrongly and faced the following dilemma: I either should start a war with Egypt which was pretty risky one and relied on circumstances I couldn't control; or I should basically play without a trait. I started a war, wasn't able to achieve my goals and put myself behind. Together with evident map imbalance, this created current situation.
What I can now do? Not much. My plan is to finish off Egypt, beeline Astro/Rifling, find Serdoa and raze his core to dust. It would most probably give victory to Slowcheetah or Yuri but I don't care. I just don't like the fact that everyone, as it seems, thinks that Serdoa has won already.
Of course, it is possible that he will meet my redcoats with infantry...

[Gavagai]

Land we have uncovered in the north-east. Pretty good stuff.

Cities shots!



Londra. The best city in the world according to Top 5 - and justly so. I'm adding three workshops to it - in bureaucracy they are worth working even when they yield only 2 hammers. During the golden age I will build forge and market which both are absolutely essential. Then - units.



Yark. My main production city. It is now building archers for MP purposes as other cities grow. During the golden age it will add forge and heroic epic.



And this is my GP farm. Will be able to run six specialists with 2 food deficit for nine turns. Bacchus, observe that the farm which you detested is actually used.



Parthenon city. I plan to squeeze a settler out of it.



In just a few turns it will become a powerful hybrid city.



This poor city has drawn a short stick when I distributed worker labor. Will take over copper mine in a few turns. After the war with Egypt is won, will be cottaged.



Another commerce city.



This is a city I have troubles with. There are three workers improving it and yet they are unable to keep up with city growth. Sometimes it will have to work unimproved grassland.



Technically a hybrid city but will mostly produce commerce.



Another future productions site.

[Gavagai]

Also, this:



Lolwhat?

[Bacchus]

I didn't "detest" the farm, I wondered about the order in which the rice farm at Karlyle and the grass farm at Croyden were built. As you note yourself, Karlyle is lacking worker support.

What's the issue with the espionage screen? No courthouses? The upwards Egypt jump?

[Gavagai]

What's the issue with the espionage screen? No courthouses? The upwards Egypt jump?

The latter.

[Gavagai]

PB13 Spoiler

Reading Plako's thread. Basically, this is what Serdoa's neighbor was supposed to do in this game. Sad.

[Zed-F]

These are very different games with very different amount of space between players.

[Gavagai]

PB13 spoiler

These are very different games with very different amount of space between players.

Actually, I'm not supposed to know how far Serdoa's neighbors are in this game; and someone playing PB13 and reading this thread is not supposed to know how far are his neighbors in that game.
And if Serdoa doesn't have close enough neighbors here - well, I will blame the mapmaker again.

(Please, don't take my bitching about Serdoa's position too seriously. Of course, any conclusions are premature before I actually see their land and strategic situation.)

[Gavagai]

I'm now trading my only horse to Sian for dye. I can use this extra happy and I really hope that Sian will put this horse to a good use. He is almost equal with Slowcheetah in power but Slowcheetah has more land to defend and much more pop which means - less actual units. At some point SC would need to start a GA and switch to caste system - and this would be a perfect moment for Sian to attack him. I really hope Sian would prepare for this opportunity and use it - though the fact that he spends no more than five minutes on his turns makes this hopes a kind of pipe dream.

[Zed-F]

(Please, don't take my bitching about Serdoa's position too seriously. Of course, any conclusions are premature before I actually see their land and strategic situation.)

It was a general statement about the size of the map relative to the number of players, which is public knowledge, and not a reference to any details about Serdoa in particular.