[SPOILERS] Isabella of Carthage, starring Ellimist, SleepingMoogle, and Nicolae

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Nope. Nothing like giving me enough rope to hang myself with.

[Ellimist]

Well, we can get Construction next, and we might have 18 turns to build up defenses before NH/Lewwyn attack. Of course, they have that same time to build up troops as well. Kuro's not doing a good job of pretending to be friendly/reasonable, and I don't think he realizes just how many troops he'll have to commit to have a chance of beating us militarily. On the other hand, I also get the feeling that he won't ever accept peace if we start razing his cities.

Right now, I think the best move is to only plant the island cities that are relatively easy to defend, for now. Vega itself may not be worth saving, it's on flat ground and surrounded by hills. Meanwhile, we build up enough forces that attacking us is foolish, and if the threat doesn't materialize, we hit one of them with them. We need some triremes, some axes, spears, the works.

I disagree that attacking us is the only way for them to stay in the game. Not only that, but Kuro already has almost double our city count, so it's not like we'd be expanding beyond what he's done already. The whole island plan was going to hurt our economy pretty badly anyway, it won't actually start being a net positive for a couple dozen or more turns. So far, it seems like they both feel that way though. If we prepare for any possible threat, and we don't overextend onto the island, it should still slow them down expanding onto it and there's a chance we can still end up with it eventually.

So... What do we focus on, militarily? I think teching construction next is obvious, as well as building some ships to protect our coasts and harass theirs. I'd expect them to use lots of mounted units, so we'll need plenty of spears on both fronts. Meanwhile we fortify Arcturus with various types of units to hold the line on the east.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

Agreed. I think a mixed force of axes and spears, and triremes to guard our fork tiles. Actually, unless we push back Kuro's culture, he controls the fork tile to galley from, so little chance of that. I don't think cats will do too much in the pink circle, but they'll be good on the mainland. We're in no position to settle the jungle spices on the mainland, but no matter, we already have spices taken care of in the centre.

The diplomatic tack we should take is that we have the land, we sacrificed for it, and we're willing to defend it by force of arms. If you don't think you have enough why don't you pick on the weakling over there. Now that I've finished gloating over my pbem18 win I'll have more time to pore over our defenses here.

Idea: White city moved off-coast. Not good in the long run (especially with colossus coast). But if we're really desperate to avoid a fork situation...

[Ellimist]

One of the most troubling things to me is Noble's reaction. He hasn't even said "please don't do that." It's like he was already considering attacking us soon. He had been relatively friendly and chatty, now he's simply unresponsive.

Kuro, on the other hand, self-contradicts himself and can't give me a coherent statement on what he actually wants. The only thing that makes sense is that he plans on attacking us and thinks he has a chance at it. There's a decent chance we can get him singing a different tune if we show up outside his cities in force. I get the impression from him as a player that he's not very skilled tactically and knows it, he only wants to fight if he thinks the odds strongly favor him. I'm thinking we can sail a navy up to his cities, 2-3 triremes and 3-4 galleys. At that point, we may be able to demand favorable terms not to attack, and he'll have no way of knowing if the boats actually have units on them until we reach his best cities. We can represent a lot more ground u its than we would actually bring.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

The problem is, sail to which side? I would expect his forces to be concentrated on the inner ring.

Is this an invitation for me to take over and warmonger?

[Ellimist]

The problem is, sail to which side? I would expect his forces to be concentrated on the inner ring.

Is this an invitation for me to take over and warmonger?

Sure. You have a lot more experience with Civ IV warmongering than I do.

I want to avoid a two front war, and there's a chance that a strong enough show of force can get Kuro to fold. I was thinking we sail to both sides. Both fleets have galleys and triremes, one of them has loaded galleys, the other is a ruse. Or perhaps we build lots of galleys on one side and load half of them.

I was naively hoping we could peacefully claim the entire island. If we expect a war regardless, we can prioritize certain city sites and simply invade any others.

This seems crazy, but so far it doesn't even sound like NH or Kuro even want cities on the island, they just don't want us to get them. I'm going to assume the diplomatic damage is not fixable. NH seemed friendly before but it was only because we were being helpful/useful to him. Kuro has stated that he never trusted us and expected us to have attacked him already.

We do have to consider whether the current course of action is worth it though. Would we be better off settling some of the settlers on the mainland, then invading our neighbor(s)? Can we simply push ahead and turtle up sufficiently to keep them at bay?

[Ellimist]

Anyway, do you think it's worth trying for a deal with Noble? I'd be willing to give him his 1/4 section of the island if it lets us take down Kuro a few notches instead. Kuro's other pbems suggest that we could outmaneuver him militarily.

[Nicolae Carpathia]

I'm more concerned about Lewwyn's warmongering. Plus, he's not creative.

So yes, if there's someone we should be cutting a deal with, it NH. The downside is that he may take it as a show of vulnerability.

How many turns left on the NAP with our neighbours? I'll have a look at the save when I get home, look at avenues of attack and defense. I'd be a bit concerned about straight up settling the jungle, while cultural vision over it is useful, we'd never be able to keep the land as it's too far from our core.

Also, essential infrastructure only! We may be able to get away with markets and libraries, but less so with missionaries and temples and monasteries.

[Ellimist]

What do you think about this approach for NH?

Arcturus was founded 20 turns ago and you're just now settling a coastal city of your own, yet you seem amazed that there could actually be competition for land that is equidistant from all players.
So let me get this straight. You are refusing to talk to me because of an action I haven't even taken yet, despite my efforts to be honest with you about it and to be fair to you in the process.
Furthermore, due to some things Kuro has said, I strongly suspect you are planning to attack me over, again, something I have not even done yet. This is despite our agreement to the contrary and my demonstrated willingness to be reasonable and generous in my dealings with you.

I don't think this really conveys weakness, and whatever their reply is, we can decide whether to offer them zero/one/two sites. If they're acting this weird over losing their "fair share" of the island, they must think it's some sort of underhanded move on our part. Clearly it was a mistake to send the eastern settlers toward their sites before NH had planted a coastal city. We still could have beaten them to the sites without parking our settlers on the tiles for several turns.

Our NAP with them runs through the end of 118. With Kuro it's 108. I don't see Kuro trying anything alone, either, so we can probably expect them to break theirs or Kuro to hold off.


If they don't break the agreement... Do you think we'll be able to settle the cities, build enough troops, and still get on track for a good economic position? 17 more turns is pretty long, and we can start building catapults soon if we want. If you're available tonight, I'd like to discuss all this in chat.

Also, essential infrastructure only! We may be able to get away with markets and libraries, but less so with missionaries and temples and monasteries.

We can't build monasteries yet, as we haven't learned how to meditate. We've built 2 missionaries(Regulus/Arcturus), and I'm planning to whip a single temple(Arcturus.)

Due to our revised dotmap only having 7 island cities, I diverted settler #8 toward the spot between Regulus and Pollux. If another spot seems better to you, let me know. I'm also thinking we can revolt to HR next turn but stay in slavery. Caste system can come later, but for now let's get some (more) units. If NH is willing to deal, I want to hit Kuro pretty hard. He's overstretched and if we can raze one or more of his key cities, it will be quite a setback for him.

[Ellimist]

Would either of you be willing to draft an email to NH? My last post includes some directions I think we can try, but feel free to ignore those in favor of others. I think we have a better chance of satisfying them if somebody other than me makes the approach, as NH seems to believe we've done some massive betrayal of him.