RBPB4 [SPOILERS] - De Gaulle of the Egyptians

[Lord Parkin]

Reply from Plako:

Hi,

Nice to meet you too and thank you for not threatening my worker.

I'm alright with the NAP until 1AD although I consider it also pretty unnescessary in this case. However if you want it, I'm happy to accept.

I would prefer continuing our conversation on email/chat. My email address is <withdrawn> and I can use that or MSN for chatting. You're still on my MSN list so that might be easiest for us although I'm more frequently available on gmail.

Best regards,
Plako

[Lord Parkin]

Another message to Plako:

Hi there,

May as well go with the NAP until 1 AD. Doesn't really mean anything at this point in the game, but it's a nice gesture anyway.

I've added you to my Gmail chat contacts - let me know if you see me. My gmail is <withdrawn> if you don't already have it.

- LP

[Lord Parkin]

Just had a very long and meandering discussion with Luddite about future borders. Quite frustrating in the beginning as we had very different ideas about what was "fair", but we managed to eventually reach an agreement.

Ok, so just to sum up our arrangement so far:
- Neither of us will settle on or within 3 tiles of the two city sites discussed (on the plains-hill 1E/4S of the chokepoint, and next to the Copper 1W/7S of the chokepoint), until we reach an agreement at a later date.
- You won't settle any other cities beyond the chokepoint on my side, and I won't settle any other cities beyond the chokepoint on your side. Essentially, this will leave some of the poorer land between us unsettled for a while, but this will allow us both to concentrate on settling towards our neighbours without feeling like we need to rush for the less useful sites between us.
- You'll concentrate on filling the land between you and Mackoti, and I'll concentrate on blocking off Plako in the south before he can run away with too much of it.

Think I managed to do alright in the end. He was very insistent about wanting cities on my side of the chokepoint, but I pointed out that we only had one arm to expand along while he had multiple options - and Mackoti had even more. Pointing out that his previous arrangement with Mackoti was very much in Mackoti's favour helped a lot. (Luddite had agreed not to settle west of a choke point to his south, which gave Mackoti more than two thirds of the E-W tiles between their capitals (12 vs 5)!) Also Luddite's fear of Plako eating up all the land to the south if I kept settling west helped. (I'm a bit worried about him too, but not as much as Luddite, apparently.)

Anyway, the land to the south is far superior to the land to the far west, and there's only one fairly average city site that we won't be able to settle as a result of this deal (and it's one that wouldn't have been until at least city 10-12 anyway). So I think we've done reasonably well out of this. I'll include a map later.

[Lord Parkin]

So here are the two locations that we've agreed not to settle for the time being, and to decide about later. Even if luddite gets both of them (which I think I'll be able to avoid through future bargaining), he still doesn't get that much of "our" land. Plus, we've now got a guarantee that he won't try to settle anything else at all past the chokepoint, so everything else north of the Gems bar those two city sites is guaranteed to be ours. Not bad.

[Lord Parkin]

Well, Luddite finished the Oracle and netted Metal Casting, along with a huge score jump. He might have just made himself more of a target to the rest of the world than plako... maybe. Either way, nice to have some attention taken off me.

The other big news is that circumnavigation went this turn - to plako. (*Groans*) Like his civ needed that particular boost in addition to everything else going for him. At least ships will be less useful on this map compared to the maps I'm used to (continents/islands). And it does confirm that most of the world is almost certainly a single land mass, since Plako was able to walk right around. Still, not exactly good news.

Back to 100% research on Pottery. Settler finished in the capital, Worker started. Settler is heading towards the Gems spot, will arrive there in 3 turns and settle in 4. Warriors are heading out from Evermore to guard the Settler, and moving down from Magadan to replace them. Our two Workers at the capital moved to start chopping two more forests next turn after finishing the last two.



To the south of our land, our Scout discovered something interesting this turn: there's a Fish out at sea in the east. This obviously changes our previous plan for a city on the jungle tile 1SE of the Pig. It'd now be much more sensible to found either 1E or 1SE of that spot, to grab both the Fish and Copper (and potentially a Spice resource). Further exploration in the next couple of turns will reveal which is the preferable site.



Joe met Plako in the south this turn, as previously mentioned. There's a Worker right next to him, but it's probably not worth bothering to cause trouble... it'll likely be moved next turn anyway.



Bob managed to successfully get through the chokepoint just before Mackoti settled his city. Darned good one too, by the looks of it.

Other great news: we can see SleepingMoogle's border, so we'll meet him in a turn or two. It'll be nice to have contact with the one remaining Industrious civ. Only one to find in the west is Sunrise now.

[Lord Parkin]

A few messages exchanged with plako. Relevant parts:

Hi,

Alrgiht we've a deal then until 1AD. ;-)

Regards,
Plako

Congrats on circumnavigation, by the way.

- LP

[Lord Parkin]

Incidentally, in the process of exchanging screenshots with Luddite, I got a sneak peek into his empire. (He would have got the same with me - we both forgot to crop.) As at the current turn (54), he's generating 25 beakers at 100% science with -2 gpt. About the same as us, considering he's behind on expansion. He's 3 turns from Polytheism. Also, there's quite a large amount of land to his south and southwest.

Also discussed with Luddite about some kind of espionage agreement, but didn't reach any conclusions. He's putting 1 EP per turn into us at the moment; says he'll put it into someone else once he meets someone new.

[Lord Parkin]

Met SleepingMoogle. Opening message:

Greetings SleepingMoogle,

Great to finally meet you! Hope everything's been going well for you so far in the game. We were hemmed in a bit by our starting geography, so it seems to have taken us longer than most civs to make contact with others. Until recently we'd only met luddite, Mackoti and Nakor, then just this turn we met Plako and yourself. Good to be making more contacts at last.

It seems that all four of us Industrious civs are located in a row along the north in this map. As a result, it seems quite likely that the north will be fairly wonder-heavy in this game while the south may get very few wonders. We'd be interested to talk to you about what your plans are regarding wonders, actually - obviously both being Industrious civs, it would benefit us to arrange deals so that we don't overlap on projects and unnecessarily waste hammers. Right now we don't have any wonders planned for the immediate future, but we've been considering going for either the Pyramids or Great Library sometime in mid-term future. We'd be interested to hear your thoughts on wonders you're interested in, if you're willing to share. I trust as a Creative civ you weren't after Stonehenge, so I didn't cause you any trouble there earlier.

I see you've met Plako... he seems to be quite the early runaway in this game, doesn't he? Four cities already, including one nicked from a neighbour, and now the circumnavigation bonus (as if he needed it). He's our southern neighbour, so obviously all this is a bit of a concern to us. I think we'll have to keep an eye on him throughout this game. You've probably also noticed Luddite finished the Oracle and grabbed Metal Casting - this means he might be getting a Great Engineer in the next few dozen turns, which is probably also a concern to both of us as Industrious nations.

Anyway, nice to meet you, and look forward to hearing back from you soon.

Kind regards,
Lord Parkin

[Lord Parkin]

Sent a message to Nakor, the main purpose of which was to feel out his attitude towards Plako. Collaborating with him in the future to try to take Plako down a peg or two could be a very real possibility, especially if Plako continues to strengthen his already strong position in the game.

Hi Nakor,

Sorry for the delayed response. Thanks very much for the info you provided. After meeting more civs we can now confidently share with you the complete layout of civs on this map. It seems to be:

--- SleepingMoogle --- Mackoti --- Luddite --- Lord Parkin ------ Sunrise ------
-------- Adlain -------- Locke ---- Nakor ------- Plako ------ WarriorKnight ---

We located SleepingMoogle's borders this turn, so through a process of deduction it seems that Sunrise has to be our eastern neighbour - although we haven't met him yet due to sea and peaks blocking our route there. We also just found Plako's capital's borders this turn, and confirmed that he is our direct southern neighbour.

Speaking of Plako, you must be a bit concerned about the growing monster on your eastern doorstep. Not only does he have more cities than anyone else, and apparently a stranglehold over WarriorKnight, but he just got the circumnavigation bonus (as if he needed it). That must suck a bit for you guys, since one of your main civ bonuses against him (extra water movement) just got effectively nulled. At least it's not quite as powerful for him on this map as it would be on an islands/continents map, but it's still not a good thing for the strongest civ in the game to be getting, at least from our perspective.

We realise we're probably a bit further to the north of Plako than you are to his west, but we're still both his neighbours, and it seems we're the only remaining neighbours of Plako's left with a shot in this game. (I get the feeling WarriorKnight's civ will experience a Plako-induced implosion at some point in the future.) Anyway, we're still a while away from our borders getting close, but perhaps when they do we'll have a common purpose between us if Plako's civ develops into the monster it seems to be working towards. We'd be happy to talk more with you about this when and if you wish. Just a thought, anyway.

Hope your early empire development is going well.

Kind regards,
Lord Parkin

[Lord Parkin]

Corn hooked up at Evermore, on schedule. We'll prepare to hook up the Gold next by prebuilding a road on that tile. Our new Settler continues to head for the Gems spot (2 turns away from it now). We're sending out Warriors to defend it along the way and when it gets there, so it should be safe from any funny business.



Max finds another Sheep resource up north, potentially opening up a decent city spot for us with Sheep, Rice and Whales. Nothing too high on the priority list, but if there's anything else out there in the fog, it could be worth considering. It's inside "our" territory now, so we can rest assured that it will be ours eventually.



To the south of us, the Scout has uncovered another Gems resource - although this one is covered by jungle, so it won't be accessible until after Iron Working.

Also, after our discussions with luddite last night about focussing on settling south first, I'm beginning to wonder if I can maybe snatch a Pig-Gold site down south (marked). It's a little below the halfway point on the map, but not too much. Getting it would be a steal, netting us three Gold resources. However, it'd be somewhat of an isolated city until Iron Working due to all the jungle in-between, and potentially in danger of capture if Nakor or Plako get aggressive. Hmm... not sure at the moment, but worth keeping in mind anyway.



Plako moved a Settler and Worker onto the tile under my Warrior with no defender. If I'd declared war this turn, I could have killed both of them. Very tempting, but in the end I decided to keep my word. If I'm going to be trying to take down the Plako-monster at some point, I'd rather do it the right way than by very underhanded tactics right after signing a long-term NAP. Besides, taking the Worker and Settler wouldn't really affect him that much in the grand scheme of things, but it'd sure as hell make us his #1 enemy for the rest of the game. Let's not go there just now.



Met SleepingMoogle to the west, as previously mentioned. We're now past the halfway point in terms of meeting civs, which is nice... just four to go. That's still behind most of the other civs we've met, but not too bad considering our geographically contact-limiting start.