[Spoilers] Commodore as Darius of the HRE

[Commodore]

So, actually looking at the bloody thing in paint might have talked me out of it.



Man that's a weaker city site. It gains another silk and a shared fp farm (which Teal will need almost full-time as the only semi-decent food available to it), at the expense of shared Oasis, river cottages, and a lot of production. Gah, Gray would like the grassland to itself, but that's not a huge deal.

One thing that does occur to me is that rather than a fishing village Teal could (post civil-service) farm the extra grassland to become a gnarly production site, especially naval. That's three grass hill mines, a plains gold mine, and quarried marble...um, wow that's a good set of production. Before chain irrigation, that's still a max size 6 city with a huge hammer income.

It's good land, just needs more worker love, needs more settlers. Farmer's gambit ho!

[Ceiliazul]

I agree teal is a good-to-great city longterm. I also agree that the barb city is too weak to keep.

[Commodore]

Well, nice to hear support for it.



The chariots slammed into Magyar today.



There were no survivors. Except, of course, for the hapless workers. Which was actually perfect...



Ophir finished a missionary for Nemedia and originally swapped to a worker (at happy cap, too dang low-food to whip). Thing is...now I have that worker. And with tile micro, I can make a five-turn settler there. And currency, which makes new cities more affordable is due in...

Oh hell yeah. Settler being built now.

Demos are okay-ish. I feel like I can turn this around. Nine-turn ETA for CoL.



Ah, and lastly, my warrior and space chariot are finally heading home. Mr. HRE likes what he sees:



Marginal land, great fishing. I think I'll refer to this as Greenland from now on.

[Ceiliazul]

Is the capital working on the GL? I see the settler at the marble site, so expecting marbl to arrive in 3 turns or less. how many workers are chop mining at the cap?

[Commodore]

Sigh. To answer the question, two, although two more were heading in that direction.

Unfortunately:



I'm disappointed, but not heartbroken. It was Ranamar, the rotter, who built it.



Oddly enough, I find I'm content though. The Marble site will still be a great production city (Granary is waiting for Hindu spread, the workboat is for the choke city GES-ward), and the failgold is just enough to finish currency a turn earlier.

Need to pump missionaries for my new cities. Khoraja (marble site) actually takes first priority to get the FP/gold in working range ASAP, but Koth needs a border pop too.



Gaston L'Armon promoted to C1 and will be guarding the spoke from the Greenland-spawned barbarians,, while his friend El Borak is off to fogbust out west.



Greenland itself is becoming clearer.



I need to start diplo towards GES for that awesome silver site. Perhaps after I send the first missionary:

[COLOR="Yellow"]Hey MNG,

Sorry for the tardy reply here, despite being able to play several turns yesterday it was always just pop on computer, play, hop off. Have a bit more time here now, I'll address the proposal:

*Unfortunately, the barb city messing up my dotmap pushed my settling into a slightly different order than expected, it might be a bit longer than that before I have the Moai site up and running.
*My ideal missionary-to-France city, Nemedia, has yet to see Hinduism spread and the other Hindu cities are pumping workers/settlers at the moment.
*The shrine GP will actually be second after the Academy GS, baring odd RNG results, so spreading has very little near-term benefit right now.

I still would love to work with you here though. How about this counter proposal:
-10T of Stone once the Moai starts, with at least five turns warning to you and you reserving the right to delay a reasonable (say, 15 turns) amount of time if you're currently using it.

In return, Hyboria provides you with either,
-One missionary immediately, started within 2 turns and immediately run up to you to gift as soon as he's within your borders.
Or,
-Two missionaries before the stone is actually sent, with again some reasonable (first delivered by T70) anti-tardiness provision.

How does this seem?

Regards,
-Commodore[/COLOR]

Random chats later (mostly gossip about the other players, map speculations, etc)...

[COLOR="RoyalBlue"]Hi Commodore,

Thanks again for the chat tonight. I find it's always easy to chat with you, and that's been nice on a game level and a player-player conversation level too. I think your proposal outlined below is perfect, and I'm fine waiting for the missionary hookup as outlined below with 2 missionaries to be delivered roughly T70.

Thanks and until later,

MNG, Hattie of France[/COLOR]

I think I'll be spinning this as, hey, as Org/HRE I can use that site without nearly the heartache that MNG would get for expansion out there. I'd be willing to give him free silver/furs for no quarreling with the location (hoping he, um, forgets the GLH or something). Really, if I could seal him off towards Greenland and push a second-wave expansion there (with heavy Rathaus whipping) I could quite easily make this a very peaceful advantage. The extra cities I've plunked down sure haven't dented the GNP.



GES is beelining Confucianism so there shouldn't be any reason to blow a tire rushing CoL. I'm thinking I'll detour to Priesthood to get temples and a GP out of Nemedia soon. It's actually been painful to delay the shrine as long as I have.

[Ceiliazul]

Ah, that was a super early Great Library. :-( at my last demo check he didn't even have aesthetics...

I like your expansion plans. I wouldnt worry about the shrine yet, you are too food poor to afford a priest. Its only worth 4gpt at this point anyway

[Commodore]

Hrm, mechanics question, what are the free-spread chances with vs. without the shrine? I'm wanting to make MNG Hindu too.

[novice]

Oh I understand your PBEM17 comment now.

[Commodore]

Thanks novice, it was probably for the best. GL would have been nice, but those hammers into workers and settlers will be even better.


Turn sixty is in, and things are quiet, if with a few ominous signs. GES seems to have finally gotten out of his land, which means scouting in Greenland, all well and good,

[img] http://dl.dropbox.com/u/28594063/t59/Civ...ot0240.JPG[/img]

...and also Hyboria, which is very, very bad.

[img] http://dl.dropbox.com/u/28594063/t59/Civ...ot0241.JPG[/img]

Bit of an inconvenience there. I dashed off a hopefully reasonable email along with the save.

[COLOR="Yellow"]Hey GES,
Congratulations on landing Confucianism! I hope it is a great comfort to the Egyptian people under your slaver's lash. Just a quick note or two:
-Your hub WC will probably find silver to your east.
-Your "arm" WC is welcome to head towards MNG...he's letting military scouts in, as otherwise, closing borders...not wise.
-I'm certain your intentions are as pure as drive snow, but please refrain for taking potshots at my locals. I know it's tempting, but beating up on the runaways neighbors isn't going to help. Well, either of us, because you're the other tough team's neighbor.
Cheers,
-Commodore[/COLOR]

We’ll see how he replies. Barbs are still being annoying, with a warrior threatening my copper on Turn 59.

[img] http://dl.dropbox.com/u/28594063/t59/Civ...ot0237.JPG[/img]

The warrior had no issue defending across the river, of course, but I need to move one of my chariots out there to fog bust ASAP…before axes start spawning, that will be the real issue.

The quarry at Khoraja drops workboat completion time to another four turns, after which the poor place will probably work on a missionary while waiting for the border to pop.



My workers road towards the gold, which should be hooked up the second the borders pop. My fertile core is still pumping away in a builder frenzy.



This is what a farmer’s gambit looks like.



…and this is why.



Still EXPANSION MODE time.

[Ceiliazul]

It is unfortunate that the settler was discovered, but is there any question that the sheep site is on your part of the arm?

I hope he responds positively, because you two really need to work together against the big bads up North.

You're running an farmers gambit, but it appears to me that MNG is not. I see enough army there to make an attack on nemedia worth it. You NEED defenders in nemedia... at least 2 or 3 warm bodies. This is your choke AND your copper city.