[Spoilers] Defining the phrase "€˜Hung Like a Horse"€™: Pb & the Kuriotates

[Maksim]

Ah yes, a classic Kuriotate moment. There is happiness to grow the cities -> citizens are set to work farms and cottages rather than mines -> tech rate is fast, and new buildings are unlocked faster than the cities can build them.

Sometimes, this is the moment to go for Sanitation, which is reasonably expensive, provides an economic benefit without hammer outlays, and gives production a chance to catch up. You have sidestepped this with a GA slingshot, so have the luxury of picking up Trade now.

I was not too sure how much extra commerce you would pick up with Trade - there seems to be a jump from 281 to 309 rpt between the turns, which is about 10%, but how much of that is from commerce, and how much is cottage growth, is unclear.

Visibility on other players' technologies is a double-edged sword - sure, you now know what techs everyone else has; meanwhile, everyone else can find out what techs you have, but not what techs other players have -> this may put you in the spotlight you wanted to avoid.

Temple of Overlords at Avelorn is an interesting build. I'd be surprised if you needed it for the happiness just yet, so I'm guessing you intend to hire more priests there, so as to get a Great Prophet for RoK shrine sooner. Is that right?

Also, was that the last Settler you plan to build for a while, or will you go back to spamming settlements?

P.S. As always, thanks for your excellent turn logs!

[pocketbeetle]

Turn 139:

Trade splashscreen on loading the save, plus an edible mushrooms event:



Mushrooms add +2 food to a tile, so that yield is now 3f/2h.
Sadly it means nothing to me, being outside any megacity BFC.

In the North, the recently produced Settler is heading over to the site guarded by Cloverleaf.
That will hopefully block Selrahc off from the Crabs and double Fish icy peninsula up there.



You can also see that Bob Carlyle completed the irrigation channel West of Caledor to increase the tile yield on the Wheat.
He’ll move SE next turn and change the gl farm into a cottage.



I forgot to take a screenshot, but it’s just about visible that Iskender moved his Scout onto the tile marked c7 (after first capturing the Calabim worker?), so I moved a Worker to the tile 1N to block.
Selrahc completed his Mind node this turn and settled “First Noel”.


Diplo:

Well this was the turn I was planning on asking for Sun Mana. Started the two nodes construction at the same time, but like a genius I completely forgot that desert increases the time it takes to build improvements. *Head desk* Be a few turns before I need it now. T165 completion is looking a lot shakier, but I'll deal with that.

In other news, I've settled a site with two sources of dye. Possible source of trade in the future? It will be a little while until I have both sources connected though. I decided to tell you after I'd settled this time, lest ninja settlers dive from a mountain top onto the site.

Dear Illian Chief Advisor,

It wounds me grievously that you would suggest the Kuriotates capable of jeopardising our nation’s excellent relations over such petty matters as claiming minor resources. Please, cast any such prejudiced thoughts from your mind, for the good of both our futures.

Needless to say, I had noticed the presence of some Dyes to the East.
My Cartographers however had determined they did not fall within the Kuriotates’ sphere of influence; thus I had resolved to trade for them with the eventual claimants. (Truth be told, I did send out a message for the ninja settlers to be readied, but none of them could be found.)

So with that in mind, if I may be so bold, do you like Fine Clothes Selrahc?

Tidings, greetings and general pleasantries,
HRH
Chief of Tarwin’s Gap
Grand Admiral of the Western Seas
Navigator Supreme of Erebus
Merchant Emperor of Far and Wide
Claimant of the Sucrose Bounty
Pb, Boy-King Extraordinaire.

[pocketbeetle]

Ah yes, a classic Kuriotate moment. There is happiness to grow the cities -> citizens are set to work farms and cottages rather than mines -> tech rate is fast, and new buildings are unlocked faster than the cities can build them.
Sometimes, this is the moment to go for Sanitation, which is reasonably expensive, provides an economic benefit without hammer outlays, and gives production a chance to catch up. You have sidestepped this with a GA slingshot, so have the luxury of picking up Trade now.

Pretty much agree with the above.
I'm still happy with the Sanitation bulb, and think I'm managing the building queues okayish.
Smokehouses and Courthouses are examples of buildings that would be nice, but for the moment are nonessential.

I was not too sure how much extra commerce you would pick up with Trade - there seems to be a jump from 281 to 309 rpt between the turns, which is about 10%, but how much of that is from commerce, and how much is cottage growth, is unclear.

It did actually give a decent amount, I'd estimate ~20 beakers.
Because of their size, any foreign trade routes in Kwythellar and Caledor are worth 3 commerce which then goes through the various multipliers.

Visibility on other players' technologies is a double-edged sword - sure, you now know what techs everyone else has; meanwhile, everyone else can find out what techs you have, but not what techs other players have -> this may put you in the spotlight you wanted to avoid.

Agree, but I think we're past that point both in terms of score and demographics.
I'm also less concerned now that my power rating is respectable and will be continuing to climb for the foreseeable future.

Temple of Overlords at Avelorn is an interesting build. I'd be surprised if you needed it for the happiness just yet, so I'm guessing you intend to hire more priests there, so as to get a Great Prophet for RoK shrine sooner. Is that right?

Yes indeed!
Although I'm still undecided about whether the RoK shrine or the AV shrine will be the first created.

The extra happy is useful also: Avelorn has a lower happy cap (16) than most other megacities due to the recent focus on spamming Settlers/Workers.
Now that I have Construction for irrigation and also Sanitation, I can start chaining farms around Avelorn and growing the city properly.

I'm starting the build up for it to become a GP farm, which will involve building an OO temple, the cheaper Pagan Temple, plus also the National Epic and its prereq a Library (meh) there.
Unfortunately I still need a couple more Settlers really, to found settlements at the Gems (c7), Bananas (c9) and maybe another around the Ivory (North of Iskender's city).

It will be a bit of a balancing act, but the faster I grow Avelorn the quicker it can build the necessary items, so I can't delay any longer.

Also, was that the last Settler you plan to build for a while, or will you go back to spamming settlements?

As above, I'd say I still need at least 2 more Settlers (c7 and c9), preferably 4+ in the near future.
Then it becomes a case of backfilling.

P.S. As always, thanks for your excellent turn logs!

And thankyou too for the feedback and stories. =)
I'm glad you're all enjoying it and finding things to ask questions/talk about.

[pocketbeetle]

Diplo:

Following on from my Wheat embargo thought, I took a look at the map and could only spot one source near the Calabim, and it’s about equidistant from the Hippus. If I could get Iskender to secure it, then the only players with spare sources of Wheat would be Selrahc and myself…

Hey Iskender,
I picked up Sailing last turn and was quickly going through the Calabim resources.
It looks like they have a Deruptus Brewery, but no Wheat, neither connected nor in their territory.

I looked around the map and did spot one (only one!) nearby, approximately 6 tiles SouthEast of Radonnor (spelling?).
I don't know if you have a source of Wheat yet, but given the choice between our neighbours the Hippus getting it or the nasty vampires, we'd choose you every time.
So if you happen to have a Settler available, why don't you take a look?

Kind Regards,
Pb, Picking a Side Boy-King

Hello Wise King Pocketbeetle

The wheat tile you're referring to won't be within anyone's cultural
borders soon as it lies in the demarcation zone that me and the
Calabim agreed not to settle.

Iskender

Hey Iskender,

I see, well that's a shame.
There's no way for you to pick it up, say within the third cultural ring?
No problem if you can't, just thought I'd mention it!

Jungle chopping should be completed on schedule, and that Goblin chasing your Scout is dead by the way.

Kind Regards,
Pb

I could have it in the BFC, but the city would be in an extremely poor
location, probably not worth it.

But he ain’t biting.
Oh well.

Cull gave me his Gold, so let’s thank him for that, and offered Fine Clothes ingame.

Hi Cull,

Thanks for accepting the trades.

To make up for the loss of the Gold happy, I've offered you Fine Clothes ingame.
This is just a temporary gift, with the aim of helping you out and keeping the Dwarves afloat.
The only condition I'm making is that you don't trade it to another civ.

Kind Regards,
Pb

More interestingly, there’s some frustration building up in the East.

I bring you various tidings from Lord Decius,

I'll be blunt: would you be interested in declaring war on Cull with me at some point in the future? My sole reason for asking is so that we can eliminate him to make the turns run at a decent pace. I think you probably share this objective. I don't have an army set up to attack him right now, so I'm not talking about anything immediate, but I can put together a decent conquering force in short order. If you're interested, maybe we should see if Selrahc wants to get in on the action as well, Iskender too (although I get the impression that he doesn't care too much about the pace).

I know that taking out another player just to maintain a quick turnover rate is pretty severe, but I'm not going to stay up until the wee hours of every night waiting for him to remember that he's still playing in this game and send me the goddamn file. And if I can't play until I get back from class in the morning / early afternoon, then the turn will sit for hours until Sareln can reach it, and by then it may be too late for everyone else in Europe to play. So essentially we may be looking at a turn every other day. And given how slow everything is to happen in FFH, and how interesting this game has been so far, I'd really rather we maintain a fairly steady turn-a-day.


So yeah, any interest?
-Bobchillingworth / Decius / Whatever

It’s very much not in my interest to lose Cull: doing so would put the Calabim in monopoly control of (all?) the Gold on this map.
But equally, I do like fast turns.

If this were anyone apart from Cull, I’d probably say no/make plans to defend them (I estimate CAs would take ~6 turns to reach the Khazad capital).
But the player lineup is what it is, so the answer:

(8:48:54 PM) BobChillingworth: I wasn't joking w/ my email btw, I'm totally willing at this point to eliminate him to be over with this "opps i forgot the turns" crap
<<snip>>
(8:51:56 PM) pocketbeetle: Umm
(8:52:23 PM) pocketbeetle: I'd probably not join in, but at this current stage, there's a good chance I wouldn't interfere also
(8:52:39 PM) BobChillingworth: well I'd hope you wouldn't interfere
(8:53:00 PM) BobChillingworth: yeah I mostly wrote the email in annoyance but I stand by it
(8:53:26 PM) BobChillingworth: if you want to send over a dozen centaur chargers or whatever, I'll happily & easily match it with my own force
(8:53:50 PM) BobChillingworth: just burn his four filthy dwarven towns
(8:53:57 PM) pocketbeetle: Chargers? definitely havent got those lol
(8:54:22 PM) BobChillingworth: got something, judging by your power :P
(8:54:32 PM) BobChillingworth: anyway, I'm not really set up to fight him ASAP
(8:54:36 PM) BobChillingworth: but if you ever want to
(8:55:13 PM) pocketbeetle: I hear you

Bob should be careful with his assumptions, I made no promises not to get involved.
If Cull suddenly starts being more prompt, things could change very quickly.

[Ilios]

Maybe it's time for another admonishment in the IT thread...

[pocketbeetle]

Maybe it's time for another admonishment in the IT thread...

He doesn't really read it unless prodded.
I've had more success signing up to LoL and chasing him on that.

Had an amusing moment the other day while waiting for a game, in which Dantski told Cull to update his thread!
And yes, Dantski was very much aware of the irony in the situation.

[pocketbeetle]

Turn 140:

No splashscreens, so the first thing to do is send out the Hawks.



Lot of water there, but not much else.

Selrahc appears to have built his first Temple of the White Hand.
A sign of things to come…



While in the SouthEast, what’s that I spy?



Ilios, at the same time as you dared me, did you simultaneously dare the Calabim to send another Scout out?

Either way, Bobbie Coltrane is building a road to this intrepid explorer, and I think I may throw a feast at Riedquat in his honour.



…

Oh not again!

If you haven’t already, I think you guys need to start a poll in the lurker thread.
Subject: “at what point are Bob and Dave going to figure out that sending lone Scouts into the Northern wildlands is a bad idea?”


In recognition of this dastardly act, the next CA is named Agrius (naming scheme) and sprints over to Caledor, the Warrior garrison there being sent up to Orrere.



In the South again, all jungle chopping is now thankfully complete.
Iskender’s Scout also seems to have given up on getting visibility on KK, but with only 4 turns left until its borders expand, I see no reason to rush to sign peace this turn.



Tailor completed in KK, Avelorn grew:





Demographics:

I’ve realised that the -8 on the Imports/Exports is Cull.
Because he doesn’t have Sailing, he’s not getting trade routes with me yet, whereas my settlements are ‘supposedly’ benefitting from 2c trade routes with his four cities (4 x 2 = 8 ).
Oh well.

Rival best GNP is definitely Iskender by the way, who signed peace and OB with the Calabim this turn.

Selrahc and Bob continue to exhange second place on the scoreboard.

[Ilios]

Had an amusing moment the other day while waiting for a game, in which Dantski told Cull to update his thread!
And yes, Dantski was very much aware of the irony in the situation.

Ilios, at the same time as you dared me, did you simultaneously dare the Calabim to send another Scout out?

Maybe...

If you haven’t already, I think you guys need to start a poll in the lurker thread.
Subject: “at what point are Bob and Dave going to figure out that sending lone Scouts into the Northern wildlands is a bad idea?”

"Wolf Rider" might have been pushing it... great show though!

[pocketbeetle]

"Wolf Rider" might have been pushing it... great show though!

It was a bit bold yes, but I kind of want Bob to figure out it's me, just to get a reaction out of him. :rolleyes:
It was either that or a Griffon, and I was inspired by the nearby Goblin Fort.

For those that don't know: Wolf Riders are the Barbarian equivalent of str 4 Horsemen (Centaurs for me) but are also the Horsemen unit for the Clan of Embers.
The Clan can build them/recruit them from Goblin Forts, but according to the ingame information, can also obtain a Wolf Rider if one of their Goblin Scouts defeat a Wolf.

Never done it myself, but it sounds cool.

[Sciz]

Yeah I've done it with the Clan, but the question is if barbarians can do it.