Nobody expects the Chinese Inquisition: Isabella of China

[Gaspar]

So now that all the picks are in let's take a look at our opponents. We have a 4-player game, which has only been tried a couple of times around here, so we have 3 rivals. What does this change? Well, I think it reduces competition for some things and means that there are less possible contenders for any given "first to" bonus. Other than that, not a lot - its very rare that in they typical 5 or 6 player game that there's not at least one hanger-on Civ who isn't especially competitive anyway. Without further rambling, onto the competition:



Commodore, Washington, Mongolia (PBEM19 - in progress; Charismatic, Expansive; Keshik, Ger; Hunting, The Wheel)
Interesting choice from Commodore - I had strongly considered Washington as my choice as well. I think Charismatic is the best of the less popular traits (IMP/CHM/AGG/PRO) and there is certainly an aggressive undertone to pairing it with the Ger - one of the better UBs in an MP game. However, and I've been saying this for ages even if my own picks haven't always followed it, starting techs are a bigger deal than UU/UB unless you're talking Fast Workers and Terraces. Hunting/The Wheel is a crappy start, only surpassed by the wretched Hunting/Fishing. Unless there's a hunting resource at his cap, he's forced to research whichever resource is there first and unless the mapmaker gets cute could get Mortiused. This doesn't hurt on quick as much as it does on normal but it still hurts. He's obviously the team most likely to want to grab Stonehenge though he'll need 2-techs for chops/whips not to mention Mysticism, so a dedicated push by one of the other teams can beat him to the punch. Expansive to me was the no brainer choice, which is why I dislike this sort of ban system, it is head and shoulders the best trait remaining. More on that when I get to talking about my choice.

Commodore has played one PBEM around here, fielding Darius of HRE in PBEM19. He's played well there, sitting in a solid 3rd place behind the two behemoths. Had the game stayed as the noobs game originally intended, I think he might have won - I've been more impressed by his play than any of the other less experienced players in that game. He's shown an opportunism in that game: responding violently to MNG pink-dotting him in the tundra, jumping on MNG's dessicated corpse to ensure Seven didn't get all the spoils without any real military commitment, preparing to do the same against luddite before that war fizzled out (tough to talk about this game too much considering Lewwyn is pretending to play in it.) The point being is that he isn't necessarily your typical new player pacifist and definitely has some real experience with the game, even if he is the least experienced of the 4 players here. I expect him to be a contender, particularly if he gets to Knights quickly as it will be relatively trivial for him to get triple-promoted units in the field.

On a personal level, which matters in these games when we foolishly leave diplo on, I probably have more of a relationship with Commodore than any of the other players in the game. That said, we were at odds in Diplo2 and I don't think we have the sort of relationship where we're natural allies. I do think he's the sort of player who would rather be friends with everyone so it would be foolish to take a good relationship as proof of partnership, but I also believe given the personalities of the other two players we're quite likely to get along well if we're not 1 and 2, which I don't expect us to be.

Bottom line: Commodore's probably as good a bet as any to win this game.





Twinkletoes, Julius Caesar, Holy Roman Empire (PBEM3-trainwreck, PBEM4g-trainwreck, PBEM7-trainwreck, PBEM10-bad, PBEM13-slightly better but a loss, PBEM15-not lurking, PBEM20-not lurking, PB6-no comment; Imperialistic, Organized; Landsknecht, Rathaus; Mysticism, Hunting)
Well, you can always count on TT for the unexpected. Still impossible to discuss the fact that for a game on Monarch he went with 2 decidedly bottom tier traits. Organized is particularly if you ask me since an Inland Sea map is by definition flat, greatly reducing maintenance costs. When you combine that with the Org Rathauses pick of HRE, I'm not sure what TT's driving at here. No question the combination is powerful, but the games where we've seen it shine around here are Toroids - I can't imagine the benefits to be worthwhile on a flat map. His starting techs leave a bit to be desired as well, again without an obvious worker tech to start, but there are only so many Civs available. The Landsknecht is a decent unit in an MP game, which features a lot more pikes than SP games do, but its nothing special. Clearly the idea if you're taking JC is to spam cities all over the map. I think Joao is a better choice for this, as the best way to deal with high maintenance costs is more cottages and more trade routes, but it's safe to assume this is his plan.

TT always has a plan. Usually its crazy, but he does usually have one. He's definitively improved as a player from PBEM3 - which is sort of the gold standard for horrible starts, but he's not what I'd call one of the better players around here. Not sure if anyone is following 15 or 20 here and can give me a tip-off as to how he's doing there as I'm enforced to not follow 15 and not especially interested in 20, so it'd be good to know how he's doing there. I've played a few Gamespy games with him recently and he's doing better but still prone to making large errors. Diplomatically, TT can be a fantastic ally if you can get him onside, but he's also prone to grudging, something Lewwyn can relate to. I expect to be active in diplo with him, working to get him onside quickly unless I see opportunity otherwise. We have a decent if not particularly long standing relationship.

Bottom Line: I'd expect 4th place for TT here unless he drafts in an experienced dedlurker to assist. But he's not the pushover he used to be.



Mackoti, Pericles, Maya (PBEM9-won, PBEM10-won, PBEM18p-probably the current leader, PB4-bad loss; Creative, Philosophical; Holkan, Ball Court, Mining, Mysticism)

Mackoti probably ended up with the "safest" pick of the four of us, going with Pericles' combination of cheap libraries and Philosophical for the super charged specialist economy. On the whole, I still think Gandhi is a better choice for the specialist economy, due to his ability to utilize Caste System in the early game better, but Pericles certainly makes for a strong surrogate. Obviously, Pyramids are a key wonder here, especially as nobody has chosen an IND civ. He has the best starting techs in this game, non-me division, and creative Ball Courts are nothing to sneeze at. Adding a resourceless UU which has a lot more value in a barbs on game, and he's got a nice combination. Really, nothing to complain about with this combo - its easily the best "early game" value pack on the board and I'll be shocked if he doesn't get himself an early tech lead.

mackoti is sort of the definition of an enigma. He's very hard to get a read on diplomatically, and one gets the sense he gets frustrated due to his obvious lack of ability to communicate in English. I think that sometimes results in him not getting the credit he deserves as a player - he played fantastically well in PBEM9, quite well in PBEM10 and has an excellent start in PBEM18p. He's been nicknamed midskoti for his proclivity for building them, and he has a clear preference for the specialist economy. And why not, he's done quite well with it. He also quite clearly carries a chip on his shoulder from PB4 and he's a quite aggressive player. He can be dealt with diplomatically, but you don't have a lot of room to negotiate - he's got a short temper. He's also shown a willingness to break deals. I have no interaction with him really, so this will be my first attempt to make sense of the situation.

Bottom Line: Mackoti is the favorite here, no doubt. I hope he ends up in between me and someone I can work with.

[Gaspar]

So now that we've talked about the competition, a few thoughts on my pick and what kind of game I'm hoping to play. This begins the part of proceedings where I'm aiming to get feedback.

As I said, I sort of impulsively joined this game, spurred on a bit by my frustration at letting a pretty decent lead slip away in PBEM14. That may have been the spark, but the kindling was set well before that. I've played in 3 BTS games here at Realms Beyond. Let's talk a bit about that so you have a better sense of where I'm coming from.

In PBEM12, Nakor and I played as Willem of England. The map was a complete farce - in my opinion easily the worst map of any of the PBEM games thus far (I'm sure there are a few smart alecs in the crowd who might nominate my work from PBEM19.) Not only were there no rivers, thus indirectly nerfing Financial which 4 of the 6 teams chose, but there was a forest on every tile in a game featuring India. Now Kyan was the best player in that game and would have won most likely in any circumstance, but the game itself was no kind of spectacle and the players called the game ~120 with no war of consequence being fought. This was my first education on the folly of long-term NAPs without a plan to back them up. I think we played okay, we finished a close 3rd (close to 2nd, I mean) but for a game in which I handled the majority of micro for the team, I learned a lot but didn't play particularly well.

In PB4, Nakor and I teamed up again as Asoka of the Vikings. A lot of the "power" leaders/Civs were banned and we just about talked ourselves into a pretty stupid choice. I think we were spoiled by the ludicrous tech pace of PBEM12 which was still active at the time, and discounted how much more important starting techs are on Normal/Huge. We dug ourselves out of the hole a bit, but again, short-sighted diplomacy and a map that did us no favors compounded by our poor leader/civ choice resulted in us getting lapped by the stronger competitors late on. Effectively we probably just about deserved 4th/5th place before the Parkin war, but we finished a disappointing 7th, and were most likely to be eliminated if the game went on another 20 turns.

In PBEM14 I took the command chair for the first time and rode decent diplomacy to a reasonably commanding position as Bismarck of Maya. However an incredibly dumb start meant I had some catching up to do before realizing a position of strength and I didn't call time on the farmer's gambit soon enough. I could still win this game, despite all this but even if I do it will feel a bit hollow - more due to the poor decision making of my competitors (Hi Lewwyn!) than anything I did. Much like the previous games, I find myself in a position where I played really well for stretches but ultimately made enough dumb mistakes to cost me the game.

Isabella of China



(I have no idea who that is, but she came up in a google image search of Isabella + China, and um, well, you can see why I felt the need to share with the group. Though why she's wearing the Argentina shirt is beyond me. Also, China didn't qualify for the 2010 World Cup.)

So I've touched all of the power traits at least once (Fin/Cre/Exp) and also played a game without any of them. I enjoy playing with Exp the most, because it really helps your new cities get off to a hot start. It also provides flexibility - if you're Fin, you lay cottages everywhere, full stop - as Exp you can take advantage of different types of economies to succeed. There was never any question with Fin banned I was going to take an Exp civ. What I really wanted to do was grab Joao of Egypt - hence my mild lawyering in the tech thread - and just expand everywhere and use War Chariots as a deterrent while getting ahead. Once Egypt was off the board I didn't like any of the other ancient UU civs well enough to take advantage of Joao's unique expansion capabilities. I then settled mentally on Washington, intending to play a similar sort of game but probably with a 'henge build down the line. Unfortunately, Commodore took him before it got to me. At that point, I decided I wanted a way to pop borders easy and the next best option after Cre is Spi. I almost talked myself into Gandhi, but at the end of the day Cheap Granaries are too good to pass up. So Izzy it was.

The Civ choice was much simpler. With the best UUs and UBs already off the board (Fast Worker, Terrace, War Chariot, Cataphract, Ball Court, Hammam) I just didn't see any of the remaining ones as worth selecting a civ for. So I focused solely on starting techs. The best pair for fast expansion is either Ag/Mining or Ag/Wheel. I'm a fan of BW first with Expansive, as it allows you to use your first worker to chop a second more efficiently, so China it was. I'm certainly not married to that choice of opens - that depends on the map - but that was my thinking. CKNs kind of suck in MP where everyone goes mounted and first strikes are negated, but they do have value on an Inland Sea as off-boat collateral. Pavillions are pretty much Theatres in that the best argument I can see that I'll build any is to meet Globe Theatre requirements. So once the first turns are over, I could be playing as the Martians for all I really care.

Strategy really has to wait for contact with the map, but I certainly intend to focus on growing like a weed. Mentally I would like to run a specialist economy swapping to workshops late game, but more likely I'll run a hybrid with cottages early and workshops late. If we find stone nearby and can get the Pyramids built - well, that's a different story. But given I expect those to fall to mackoti, focusing on cottage spam and trade routes to keep the economy close before maybe layering on the monk bit later is the far more likely solution. On an inland sea we're more likely to come into land conflict sooner than later, so probably aiming for a first strike at Guilds is a reasonable solution, particularly with Mr. Hyper-aggressive himself as a dedlurker to agitate for such.

I hope to maintain an entertaining thread and play better. Modest aims and we'll take it from there.

[Kyan]

I'll lurk you if you like. Am largely unavailable until end of the month due to work constraints but am free again after. You picked the exact leader/civ combo that I would have done so maybe we're more alike than we realise hah.

[Gaspar]

I'll lurk you if you like. Am largely unavailable until end of the month due to work constraints but am free again after. You picked the exact leader/civ combo that I would have done so maybe we're more alike than we realise hah.

Would be more than happy to have you aboard, Kyan. Actually thought about messaging you but recalled from FFH7 that you were busy atm. And I think we've a lot in common, other than the whole you being really good at this and me being patently average thing.

[Kyan]

Would be more than happy to have you aboard, Kyan. Actually thought about messaging you but recalled from FFH7 that you were busy atm. And I think we've a lot in common, other than the whole you being really good at this and me being patently average thing.

Haha, well, thanks i guess. Don't put yourself down though, you're doing well in PBEM14 against good players.

I had an interview yesterday and have another on Tuesday so am busy revising/prep'ing etc. If you make a sandbox at the start, i'd be happy to do a few run-thru's to try and get an optimal start.

[Mardoc]

I can't believe that there's actually enough Chinese/Spanish restaurants that a sub-genre of them apparently exist. Perhaps this one might work better for city names, since they offer the Chinese menu items in Spanish. Arroz Frito sounds like a capital if there ever was one.

Your google-fu is strong, Gaspar-san.

[T-hawk]

If not, might I humbly suggest items from this menu?

That is freaky, I live about 400 yards from there. Never gotten Spanish food from it but the Chinese is fine, exactly what you'd expect from your usual Chinese takeout place.

[Gaspar]

That is freaky, I live about 400 yards from there. Never gotten Spanish food from it but the Chinese is fine, exactly what you'd expect from your usual Chinese takeout place.

I believe this is the very definition of small world.

I've been thinking a bit for the last 20 minutes about the map, largely because Bob just posted a bunch. I think I considered this when Bob first volunteered, but hadn't thought about it since, but I doubt we're looking at your bog standard inland sea map. While it will certainly feature an inland sea and be flat, I don't think we can make too many assumptions beyond that. Let's think about what we know about Bob as a mapmaker.

As far as I can recall, the only PBEM map Bob has made was PBEM6. That was one of my favorite maps, actually though I know some have criticized it as unbalanced. It actually made a game of Civ feel a little FFH-ish, as it had pre-settled Barb cities, Raging Barbs and the whole lot. This honestly is one of the reasons I pushed for Barbs off - I want to REX and a heavy barb presence is an obvious impediment to that. Its probably a good idea to give a serious consideration to building the Great Wall. Thoughts on this, guys? I normally think its garbage in any non-Raging Barbs situation, and its a waste of hammers that normally could go to Workers/Settlers, but if it allows us to REX with impunity while the others have to deal with Barbs that would otherwise be headed towards us it could just be worth it. Especially if Bob pre-placed Barb cities - I believe kill teams are a feature of regular BTS as well and we won't have the ubiquitous Bronze Warrior to bail us out there.

His other maps have been for the FFH adventures. He's quite obviously a really skilled and creative mapmaker - some of those maps have been an absolute marvel. Perhaps there will be a pokeball shaped island in the middle of the inland sea? There's only so much you can do with an Inland Sea map but there's no chance that he didn't stamp his creativity on it, particularly as we told him to go ahead and get creative. Or Commodore did, more accurately. I will confess I'm always nervous when there's no map thread, even the best mapmakers miss things, but so long as its fair for everyone then I'd rather something fun and wild than totally normal and dull.

Ultimately, I'm not sure how much this should affect our planning but I felt like it was worth bringing up. I guess the only real consideration is whether or not we want to find time to build the Great Wall and how much what we know about Bob should impact our defenses. I really don't want to have to build a dozen axes - nothing slows your game down more than an army full of ancient crap.

[Mardoc]

My first inclination is yeah, Great Wall makes sense. Well - we should scout enough to confirm this is a Bob-standard map, first.

And our first city goes down before our first wonder :neenernee

Fortunately this one seems to be moving quite quickly getting set up, and with only 4 players, I'd expect the turns to move pretty fast as well.

[Lewwyn]

Early map speculation is early. :neenernee