RBP4 [SPOILERS] - Shaka of Zulu (sunrise089, regoarrarr, and friends)

[regoarrarr]

Following up on that, here was the (somewhat simultaneous) conversation with Lord Parkin

Lord: Nakor: Rego asked me
Are you willing to tell me when that NAP ends?
me: Rego asked you to ask me?
lol
:P
You can talk to me directly, you know.
me: well we were talking
i asked him if he knew if you and plako had a nap
that's all i said
;-)
Lord: heh, fair enough
I have a short one to cover my ass (as I'm sure most people do), renewing for short periods only to keep options open
me: sorry if i'm slow in responding - i'm in a meeting
Sent at 10:15 on Thursday
Lord: no worries
Sent at 10:17 on Thursday
Lord: so Nakor tells me you might be considering some potential action against Plako in 20 turns or so
I might be interested... only if you want to have me along, of course... don't want to steal the spoils
me: we're just talking in super high levels here
Lord: super high levels?
me: just brainstorming
but yeah berserkers, knights, cats
if we are to undertake an attack on plako
Lord: fair enough
me: it has to be all 3 of us
plus maybe locke
Lord: Yeah, need some decent technology and a lot of manpower
pretty sure he has Feudalism, and Longbows aren't easily moved before Knights
me: agreed
Lord: well I'm definitely open to ideas, so keep me in the loop
me: ok
Lord: anyway, will stop bugging you so you can get back to your meeting
Sent at 10:34 on Thursday
Lord: By the way, I noticed the turns are flying by and our own NAP actually ends fairly soon (only ~20 turns). Interested in extending at this point? I don't know about you, but I view you as more of an ally than anything else, so have no interest in war for the forseeable future. Especially if we're considering a potential campaign against the southern juggernaut. Thoughts?
me: yes i think so
though don't think i haven't noticed that you're #1 in score by 100 points now ;-)
Lord: Ok. Any specific amount?
Heh, score is misleading though
me: mmhmm
surrrrrrrrrrrrre it is ;-)
Lord: Well my crappy wonders give me most of that boost
And Plako has much more land, and we all know that land = future potential
Everything else equal, once he recovers his economy from his war with WK he'll be back in the strongest position of anyone
Anyway, how much of an extension would you like?
me: let me check with sunrise
probably need to coordinate with potential war plans
make sure we've got it in a good place
Lord: ok
extending 20 turns seems like a good rough number, though I'm happy to go longer
let me know anyway
me: will do

tl;dr
a) He is interested in attacking plako in ~20 turns
b) He wants to extend our NAP, which I think is a good idea.

[regoarrarr]

Reply back from Adlain

Hi Regoarrarr,

Secure isn't what i would call myself - but it is defiantly an improvement than what i had that's for sure . We do seem to have had a few wars sofar - thankfully mine have been restricted to 2 war that have more in common with Faux wars than real ones.

As for alphabet - that is indeed a generous offer - i hope you wont mind if i take a small amount of time to consider it, I feel i have rushed into some of my decisions in this game sofar and need to make alittle time to consider my actions in the future - expect an answer within a day or 2 on the .

As for my expansion - well tbh i doubt i will be heading further north any-time soon - Moogle was very clear in his belief that any movement north would result in severe decline of our current relationship and my borders with Locke firmed up quite a while ago naturally and actually quite evenly (would you believe no a single discussion was required over settling rights between us!!!) - im sure you will find a way if getting some decent use of the land you get with plako on the other side. i do seem to recall saying Lord Parkin would be the natural lead taker if any action was taken against plako - and i think his current standing proves my point - atleast this way LP and Plako are natural Enemys so to speak, (they share a border, and both see eachother as a threat a main to their position in the game) so im hoping that they will at some point clash and we will see the results after that.

Anyways - it is good to speak to you again - if you want to chat feel free to shout to me on the G Chat even if it says im away/ busy etc. - i will ether be able to answer or not.

Hope to speak to you soon,

Kind Regards,

Adlain.

My reply

Hi there,

No problem about waiting on Alphabet - it's not a big deal either way. I just thought it might be a good way that we could both gain something. You've got an overview of everyone's techs on the F4 screen, but may not have a full detailed amount of who has what or even who's where from a total beaker perspective. I've got some experience "decoding" the F4 screen (from the can trade and can research sections), so I thought I'd offer. If you're not interested, it's okay.

I'll try and grab you on gchat here sometime to talk things over

[regoarrarr]

And finally an email from Moogle

I had a look at Adlain's tech progress, and am indeed a some beakers ahead, but not all that many. Right now I expect to be pulling ahead of him by simple weight of population working commerce tiles, but for a while I struggled under a pretty low happy cap on the way to Monarchy, Markets and Forges.

Anyway, it feels rather odd that Adlain would tech Alphabet, since I don't really see a reason for him to unless he's trying to beeline PP. With Feudalism, his plan may be to turtle up and consolidate his current lands as best he can, which may actually not be too bad a strategy all things considered. Still, he doesn't have CoL or CS yet, which makes me wonder just what he's doing. Either way, protective longbows is not something I currently want to try and take on. We would need at least Maces and Knights to crack open his core with a 3-way dogpile, but gunpowder units would be even more preferable.

An attack doesn't feel likely in the near future. For now I'll be focussing on expanding into the land to my southeast instead. Jungle-infested though they may be, that is a lot of grassland that is worth settling right now. :-)

I replied

Hi SleepingMoogle,

Thanks for the email. I agree that it seems odd for Adlain to research Alphabet when there seems to be a lot of other things that would be better picks. Maybe he fell victim to the desire just to know where he stood. I don't know if you have felt that - I know *I* have. Though I don't know if I'd be all that interested in knowing that I was BEHIND, since I'd imagine he is at the bottom of the pack in the non-Mackoti / WK division.

Good luck hacking through all that jungle - we've been trying to chop through the western jungle and are slowly pushing it back and converting it to grassland. Where do you think your border with Locke and/or Mackoti will end up over there?

I'm starting to wonder if I (or we?) need to get involved against plako sometime here, which of course would make it hard to also fight Adlain. I'm torn whether it's best to fight plako first or steamroll Adlain and get some more land to be able to tackle plako later. Of course the longer we wait, the further ahead plako gets....

[sunrise089]

Re: City pics - man, working 2/1/0 forests and 1/0/2 coasts, I'm sure glad I farmed the city management over to the stronger player this game

[darrelljs]

Re: City pics - man, working 2/1/0 forests and 1/0/2 coasts, I'm sure glad I farmed the city management over to the stronger player this game

The truth is rego is pretty darn good at micro, the problem is he has to be because he never has enough workers .

Darrell

[Ellimist]

I don't know about you, but I view you as more of an ally than anything else, so have no interest in war for the forseeable future.

Yeah I never sign OB with my allies either.

[regoarrarr]

Re: City pics - man, working 2/1/0 forests and 1/0/2 coasts, I'm sure glad I farmed the city management over to the stronger player this game

Biiiiiiiiiiiiiite me

The 1/0/2 coast was waiting till we got buddhism there so we could triple whip the forge (which we just did this past turn)

[regoarrarr]

But in way better news, Adlain popped up on chat today and said he agreed to our Alphabet decoding offer



Full breakdown coming up shortly

[regoarrarr]

The wants section is actually the rest of the "Can Research" column. The can't trade info is in the black section

[regoarrarr]

Tech Summary:

Ancient Techs (17 total)
17 techs: Plako, Locke and Nakor
16 techs: Adlain (Monotheism), regoarrarr (Meditation), LP (Archery), Moogle (Meditation)
15 techs: Ioan (Polytheism, Monotheism), Luddite (Archery, Monotheism) and WK (Polytheism, Monotheism)

Another way - folks that are missing techs:
Monotheism: Ioan, Adlain, WK, luddite
Archery: Lord Parkin, luddite
Meditation: regoarrarr, Moogle
Polytheism: WK, Ioan

Classical Techs (14 total)

9 techs: Adlain, Locke, regoarrarr, Lord Parkin
8 techs: plako, Moogle
7 techs: Ioan, luddite, nakor
2 techs: WK

This time, this is who HAS the tech

Aesthetics (3): plako, luddite, Lord Parkin
Alphabet (2): Locke, Adlain
Calendar (5): Adlain, regoarrarr, Lord Parkin, Nakor, Moogle
Code of Laws (7): Everyone but Adlain, regoarrarr and WK
Compass (1): regoarrarr
Construction (5): Ioan, Adlain, Plako, Locke, regoarrarr
Currency (9): Everyone but WK
Drama (0)
HBR (7): Everyone but Luddite, Lord Parkin and Nakor
Iron Working (7): Everyone but Ioan, plako, WK and luddite
Literature (2): luddite and Lord Parkin
Mathematics (10): everyone
Metal Casting (9): Everyone but WK
Monarchy (9): Everyone but WK

Medieval Techs (12 total)

4 techs: Locke (CS, Paper, Philo, Machinery)
3 techs: Lord Parkin (CS, Paper and Theology), Nakor (CS, Feudalism and Machinery)
2 techs: luddite (CS, Music)
1 tech: Ioan (CS), Adlain (Feudalism), Plako (Feudalism)
0 techs: regoarrarr, WK and SleepingMoogle

Again, this is who HAS the tech
Civil Service: 5 (Ioan, Locke, luddite, Lord Parkin, Nakor)
Feudalism: 3 (Adlain, plako, Nakor)
Machinery: 2 (Locke, Nakor)
Music: 1 (luddite)
Paper: 2 (Locke, Lord Parkin)
Philosophy: 1 (Locke)
Theology: 1 (Lord Parkin)