You speak in whispers of the devils I have slain, Brian, Sareln & Ichabod of Elohim

[Brian Shanahan]

Not a bother on me at all, have a thick skull. But I did manage to paint the kitchen tiles a nice shade of red.

I'll try and stick a photo up when the bandage comes off.

Edit 2:
I had this chat with Gaspar over the email last night and today:

TO: 1 recipient
Show Details
Well the way I see it on conceding is that if we don't dogpile him he's the game won, plain and simple, and frankly I think all of us will rather (long-term) to enter a game that wasn't nixed from the start by an unbalanced map (I still believe I got the short end of the stick there, but Kyan is a whole level better than the rest of ye, even with easy access Remains and Ygg {IMHO Nicolae should have got the tree}). So that is why I'm nearly ready to concede, the game IMO is just about dead if we don't play as a team.

As regards my NAP it is over on turn 145 (so turn 146 assumed start for me). I will have a cadre of highly promoted horsemen (probably HA ugrading)andValin, coupled with 30 turns of Sanctuary to wreak havoc we may be able to throw Kyan for six by having (for example) me sacrificing my forces and the rest jumping in in a giant back-stab.

Brian.

[COLOR="Green"]From: Patrick Topor
To: Brian Shanahan
Cc: Rawwking
Sent: Wednesday, 5 October 2011, 4:50
Subject: Re:

Hey Brian,

Obviously a dogpile is the only possibility for taking down the clowns. Unfortunately it seems like everyone but me has variable length NAPs with them, so I can't really say when we can actually get something together. But I think we all know it is necessary - its just a matter of coordinating.

As far as conceding, while I think its pretty open and shut that Kyan will win the game I wouldn't want to rob him and the lurkers of the opportunity to execute whatever his plan might be by inertia. I am happy to rob him of it by force, but I don't think we should give up so early.

Gaspar[/COLOR]

On Tue, Oct 4, 2011 at 1:36 PM, Brian Shanahan wrote:

Rawwking, Gaspar,

Any ideas re a dogpile? I'm ready to fully commit when my NAP is up (or next best date), but to be honest if we are not willing to commit to trying something I'll probably concede before the save comes back to me 3 more times.

Brian.

The reason why I sent it in the first place (the message saying I'm on the point of conceding) is that I put out feelers a few weeks ago about a future dogpile and got essentially nothing back. Gaspar replied to that one non-comittedly but nothing else.

A dog-pile can work but we have to start talking about it and working out situations which will work now, not some undefined time in the future, and I seem to be the only person talking about it seriously.

If I do not get better responses soon I will be conceding, there is absolutely no point in playing a game like this where the leader can only be stopped by a concerted effort, and would coast to an easy win otherwise.

[Brian Shanahan]

Will report properly tomorrow. But, interestingly enough Acalostas is off building libraries (including a Great one) despite having the no.1 and 2 powers beside him.

Methinks he hath chosen unwisely and not too well.

[Brian Shanahan]

Ok the turn itself was simple enough:

Nicker builds horseman queues temple of Order, more horsemen.
Muff keeps building horsemen.
Limerick builds warrior starts on stable.

@eot Acalostas completes TGL. Yay!

The yay is for the fact that Kyan is standing on ~500k soldiers, I'm on ~225k soldiers and Acalostas, instead of building a defence, decided on building 3 libraries to get the qualifications for The Great Library. All those hammers that would have been better used making axemen are instead spent on infrastructure.

Yes, I know he doesn't know we cooked up the attack, but still having the two leading armies on your doorstep should be having an influence on what type of thing you are producing, at least diverting infrastructure towards units for defence.
In response to my (leaked) reply about my horsemen on his border Acalostas sent me this:

No problem with the horses,they're not really enough to be attacking anyone, but are a strong enough pillaging force (especially with a mobility assisted escort). And yes it is good to be back in the saddle again.

Brian

[COLOR="SandyBrown"]From: "acalostas.
To: brianoseanachain
Sent: Saturday, 8 October 2011, 9:29
Subject: RE:Re: Horsemen?

No worries, just a bit nervous because the bulk of my forces are on the opposite side of my little empire. Stay if you need to.


Also, welcome back after our little hiatus!

-Acalostas[/COLOR]

Still more horse droppings from me (though I don't expect that I'll achieve much with this group, it's a diversion). But nice to see that I'm able to deflect suspicions towards Kyan at this junction, it will help somewhat.

Finally some screenshots, the great library (in Nameless City) and my two stacks:

[Brian Shanahan]

Just got an email from Kyan saying he's dropping out of the game, to be replaced by Krill so I sent him a quick message basically saying "if you want to revise current deals, talk. I make no promises though."

[Brian Shanahan]

Save is played, not much happened.

In diplo, Acalostas is getting hints from Nicolae about possible hostility from me (probably due to leakage from either Gaspar or Rawwking, I've told them I intend to eliminate Acalostas), which is annoying. I continued with the strategy of dissimulation, even if he cops on it's too late now.

Gaspar came with open borders which I accepted, and fishing for water mana, which I'm happy to give until Kyan asks or we declare war and beat Kyan. I also detailed why I went with Kyan over attacking Acalostas (without detailing the split because a) it is secret, and b) I don't want them thinking I'm getting big too).

[Brian Shanahan]

Save played, stuff happened.


Sorry for the lack of details, but built horse queued horse for every city is boring.

Expect some excitement in the next few turns as I implement Operation Brian Shanahan is a Complete and Utter Bastard.

[Brian Shanahan]

First I built some horsemen! Then I queued some more and then I moved my horsemen into position!

After that my workers built some farms (!), and finally I ended my turn and sent the save to Krill (!!!) asking him if we could talk about joint military manouevres later on tonight!!!!!

[Brian Shanahan]

The game is back in the saddle, Krill having fixed his internet.

My turns are still build horse, queue horse, move horse. Though these days I am able to chain irrigate so a lot of my tiles are now losing their forests and getting farmed over. The extra food is nice, but only being able to compete with normal starts at turn 127 isn't.

As regards techs, I've held off on the Priesthood push and am going for HBR (already have Archery) in order to get HAs. I expect at least a decent amount of my horsemen will survive and either promote withdraw 2 or combat 1 shock 1 so will definitely be worthwhile upgrading them. At the moment it is slow due to me going minimum for the last 3 turns (after the GA ended I needed to)

After assimilating the grigori I should finally have the financial muscle to tech decently without hoarding cash first, and then be able to do a priest push (and if lucky, i.e. manage to get a coalition that kills off Krill going, get Govanon for the end-game).

[Ilios]

get Govanon for the end-game

Aren't you playing the Elohim?

[Brian Shanahan]

Aren't you playing the Elohim?

Yeah I am, blame a rushed report. I of course mean the Elohim hero archmage (who's name is just on the tip of my tongue).