[SPOILERS] DaveV and Averax end the revels

[DaveV]

Turn 63. Here's an after-EoT shot, showing me completing my first workboat.




My economy is in bad shape, so I'm going to push hard for Cartography. If an event fires at exactly the wrong time, I'll have to live with that.

[DaveV]

Turn 64. After EoT, Scottish Play's borders pop.




More coastal city sites, ahoy! Also, the barbs' kill team is nearly complete. That could be a nasty surprise for someone. Final note: I'm burning through cash to finish Cartography on the same turn as the settler.

Demos are meh. Power is spiking; judging by the graphs, the top number is probably TBS.

[DaveV]

Turn 65. Settler and Cartography finish next turn. And not a moment too soon.



TBS is in God King and Apprenticeship. If that doesn't scream "Rush", I don't know what does. I have to crank out some warriors now to encourage him to choose a different target. Sigh.

I just don't see how this is good strategy for TBS. Sure, he can wreck someone else's game, but how does it advance his cause? He can't possibly keep someone else's cities, because the costs would wreck him. He can't use his God King production to produce a bunch of settlers and spam out cities, because see above. About all he can do is crank out a bunch of shock warriors, kill himself with maintenance costs, and ruin the game for himself and one other player. The map is just too big for a rush to a conquest victory.

[DaveV]

Turn 67. Revolt. Before:



After:

[DaveV]

Turn 68 starts with a diplo window.



I accepted. I'm going to interpret this as a "let's be friends" overture, and switch my capital from a warrior to another settler. I've already moved my settler to my back lines spot instead of the dyes between me and TBS. I'd like to nail down that border; getting a trade connection would be nice, too.

This was the turn for pop-ups: I got an event, too.



I took the second option. Ten gold is painful, but I'll save a lot more than that in the long run. Inflation is going to be a real pain in this game, and I don't need any extra.

Overview, showing the newly settled Othello. TBS is still at four cities; superjm has three.

[DaveV]

Turn 71. Not much happening on turns 69 and 70; the workers are building roads and cottages, waiting for mining.




Note the barb warriors piling up in Zbolub, probably because they have no cities within range to attack. I may need to use a captured animal to lure them towards superjm.

After EoT, Othello's borders popped, revealing another barb city.



Demos, because I haven't shown them for a while.



TBS still has four cities, superjm three.

[DaveV]

Turn 72. Still not much to see here.




superjm revolted to Aristograrianism. That should help him catch up a bit in food, where he's been lagging badly (I'll show all the graphs in three more turns).

[DaveV]

Turn 74. Hello, TBS.



Looks as though he's planning to put some cultural pressure on the barb city, too.

At EoT, I finished Mining and get to see the copper.

[DaveV]

Turn 75. TBS moved into the barb city. I finish a settler in the capital, which will settle south of the copper (you can see the warriors and the pre-roading worker at bottom center).




After I ended turn, a barb kill team moved out. Because of TBS's warrior?



Turn 75 expanded report time. F1 screen:




Demos:



Top five cities:



Graphs:

[DaveV]

Turn 76. Another trade screen.



I accept; that trade favors me a bit since corn will give me +10% commerce when I build Deruptus in the capital. There's a little stub of road leading southeast out of Zbolub, so we must have a road connection through there.

After ending turn, I get +5 commerce from trade routes, and Animal Husbandry research time drops from 3 turns to 2.




The barb kill team appears to be heading up to ruin superjm's day.