[SPOILERS - PBEM29] spacetyrantxenu - Mao of Babylon

[spacetyrantxenu]

We're not going to win this game because we have the best planning, micro, or luck. We're going to win by posting more pictures than any other team.

Number One played the turn and had already hit end turn to generate the save for Dazed, so I sent that on and then loaded up the turn from when Sian sent it to me, just hit end turn and took these:

Summary: Mysticism finished, had Fishing queued up. It will be two turns to research it since we'll be short of gold to get it in one turn. Number One, if you'd taken six minutes instead of five you could have set research to zero percent for this turn.

We still have graphs on Sian and Catwalk, but it looks like Sian is spending 2 EPs on us each turn. I found out the reason for that in a chat with him today -- he hasn't met Dazed yet! His borders are 9 tiles away from Dazed's front city, I would have walked up a warrior by now just to say hello. So Sian is dividing his 4 EPs per turn between Catwalk and us. That's going to make it hard to catch up to Dazed and keep even with Sian, so this will be something to watch long term.

[spacetyrantxenu]

Another email exchange with Team Kitty, this time through Slowcheetah:

[COLOR="MediumTurquoise"]Hello Mr Mao,

Our empire fares fairly well we think. Of course this does depend on us successfully landing the oracle, but I'm pretty confident of that. Is your empire currently prospering? Our relations haven't changed much with Sian, although we did come to an agreement over the oracle in the end, we are a bit worried how powerful the great lighthouse is looking on this map, but currently we don't feel toooooo threatened by Sian. The proposed EP agreement sounds good to me, you'll have noticed I switched EP off your civilisation last turn, we already have yours and Sians charts and are looking to get Dazedroyaltys. Which graphs do you guys possess? If you have Dazed's and not Sian's we could possibly do a trade if you are interested?
Can't think of too much more going on at the minute, we need more technology really.

Yours terrifyingly awesomely
(No really we are terrifyingly awesome :P)
slowcheetah and Catwalk[/COLOR]

My reply:

[COLOR="Magenta"]Meow!

Apologies, I thought I had replied to this message but it doesn't look like I have. I did not intend to delay sending a response. First, I'd like to congratulate you on your Oracle build. We can see its huge marble columns from our own territory even though we are a long way off. It must be a trick of the toroidal world wrap that lets us see so far. I've been curious to know what tech you took, Sian and I both think it was Metal Casting -- feel free to sate our curiosity, or to keep it a state secret (hopefully not revealed by the presence of triremes on our shores!).

We share your concerns about Sian getting his hands on the Great Lighthouse since he'll probably also get the Pyramids and Colossus. Do you know if he is making a run at the Lighthouse now? We know he only has two cities (or did last time I played), so if he tries to build every wonder in the ancient era he would surely put himself behind the growth curve...which could have its advantages for anyone jealous of his prosperity....

I'm glad we're agreed on EP allocation. I can't remember if I was spending 1 point on you or zero the last few turns, I think it was 1 point trying to get back to parity. Unfortunately you and I have graphs on the same people (everyone but Dazed) so we can't compare graphs to any useful purpose at this time. What's interesting to me is that Sian hasn't met Dazed yet so he can't allocate points on him. My understanding is that he is spending 2 points on both your nation and mine. With that being the case, all I can do is spend 2 on Dazed and 2 on Sian, so I'll be slow catching up to Dazed. I think he is spending more points on me than he is on you, though, so if you're able to catch up to him do let me know if he looks like he's preparing an immortal rush!

As for what's new with us, we're just trying to get our cities planted and named for our favorite Republican presidential candidates before we run out of candidates and can't build any more cities. There are only four candidates left in the race so we need to build cities quickly before the next few party primaries further winnow down the field and we run out of city names (because naming themes, not good planning and strategy, are what lead to success in civ!)

Not to leave out our other competitor, what have you guys seen from Dazed? It looks like he's working on expanding right now, as he's up to three small cities. I think he's whipping his people, which I must admit greatly pleases Mao. Other than that we don't know a lot about what is going on in his land since we can't get in at the moment. If you hear anything that should concerns us and were to pass it along, I'm sure Mao would be very appreciative of the help and would likely slaughter 10,000 peasants in your honor.

Hail Ronald Reagan!

Mao (meow),
Chairman
Republican Party[/COLOR]

TL;DR - We agree to shut off EP points on each other, we can't help with sharing graphs since we have them on the same people, we congratulate them on finishing the Oracle and try to fish for information about the free tech, we try to find out if they know of anyone working on the GLH without giving it up that we're trying to build it, and I play fearmonger at Sian getting all the wonders.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Summary: Mysticism finished, had Fishing queued up. It will be two turns to research it since we'll be short of gold to get it in one turn. Number One, if you'd taken six minutes instead of five you could have set research to zero percent for this turn.

I ran at 100% (IIRC) and finished Mysticism. Why drop to 0%? We needed to a turn of profit-taking at some point to get both techs anyway, why not finish up the tech? If I didn't run 100%,

Edit: I think I understand the issue. I don't have enough in the bank to run 100% THIS turn, after I hit enter. Oh well.

[spacetyrantxenu]

We've played 2 turns so far today and I think a third one is coming before too long.

Will report later when I'm not at work!

[spacetyrantxenu]

T34-36 OK, that's three turns for today. Nice job guys.

As for a report...well this is going to be sketchy. I'll probably have to wait until tonight and open these saves again and check my end of turn save (before hitting end turn) to see exactly what I did. In the meantime it goes roughly like this: Newt finished a granary and a worker, is size 5 (was I supposed to whip somewhere?) and is building another worker now, due in 3T. This one probably gets whipped. Mitt was size 2 for a hot minute and got whipped down to 1 to finish its granary, overflowed to a worker which is almost done. The worker that just finished in Newt is mine/chopping the shared forest hill tile between Newt and Mitt so Mitt can work it when it gets back to size 2. As for Rick Santorum, it has finished its granary this turn via a whip. Overflow is onto a monument, we'll lose 2 hammers from the cap but I can live with it since it starts our 5 turn timer next turn for getting the borders to level 2. That will get our horse tile in culture and workable for size 3 (or 4). The two workers at Mitt roaded the corn tile this turn so they can move to the copper next turn and begin mining it.

Photos later, if I get time tonight. When I played my turn it was 1840 BC. I'm curious, does anyone know what year the vets are at? I assume they're ahead of us because we had delays before, but surely this helps to catch us up some.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Turn played.

Switch tech to 100%, sailing due in 4 (1g left in bank after).

Worker complete in Mitt. Set work to Monument. Want to go monument/WB and get fish going so we can whip this city for barracks/units.

Newt should have had the first worker whipped/overflow into second worker. No problem, I'll kill them now. Whipping now into subsequent worker. Can change if needed. Overflow into another worker will get another in 2T. I suggest you let it finish. Your call. This should get us all the chops we need for GLH and improve what we have built, plus set us up for city #4.

Santorum - 1 hammer short of a 1T monument. Oh well, such is life.

Workers: New one from Mitt (named D - Worker. Also renamed GFH miner to C - Worker. Rename as you see fit) will help with the GFH mine. A, B workers moved to Bronze, start mine (2T). Will complete as city grows.

Explorers explore. Nothing fantastic uncovered.

Check demos, no nasty surprises on power, no religions founded yet. Seem to be on course for now.

[spacetyrantxenu]

Everyone is at 3 cities now with Sian and Catwalk dropping cities sometime during today's demi-blitz. We're tied for the lead in crop yield with Dazed and are behind both Dazed and Sian in MFG. GNP is inflated heavily by culture for Sian and he's a clear #1 there, but we're close to Catwalk even though we're in last place.

I'll post some updated graphs soon, but that about covers it for now.

[spacetyrantxenu]

T42 - OK, so I've played a few turns this weekend and haven't posted updates. I was out of town and playing on my laptop so there won't be pictures from those turns, but here is what we have on T42 after I ended turn.

I screwed up with unit movements leading to the unhappy face at Mitt Romney. I moved out a bow headed toward Rick Santorum, which will need the garrison in 3 turns. After I ended turn, Mitt grew to size 3 and went 1 over the happy limit when I had been 1 under the limit at size 2. I think at size 2 the citizens didn't fear for their safety. Oops. I'll probably move the bow back into Mitt and move the one finishing next turn at Newt over to Rick. That should get Rick garrisoned a turn before anger on the next population growth, which will get it to size 5.

Here are our current builds and a general overview of our cities:



Individual cities:

Newt Gingrich

The capital will regrow to size 5 next turn and work the grass river cottage. I would have to build another bow to solve the garrison problem here but with us building another settler next the city won't grow and maybe Mitt will have time to start producing units like we planned for it to.



Mitt Romney

The tiles being worked here are wrong, the AI just set it to this when I ended turn. Obviously with an unhappy person already here I don't care about growing faster. We'll move the bow back into town to end the happiness problem and get back to working the mine and make that barracks a 2 turn build. After the barracks finishes here the infrastructure in this city will be finished for quite a while, and it will do nothing but build settlers, workers, and bowmen. Working the unimproved grass forest is a temporary measure; the borders pop in two turns and I have a work boat exploring north of the city that will be on the fish when our borders cover it.


Rick Santorum

Rick has grown quite a bit since I last showed it ten turns ago. We have in place both a granary and a monument. I always dislike building monuments but is has been necessary in this game since we are chasing the GLH. We haven't had time to divert techs to get a religion. With that being the case, a monument here allowed us to get more forests and two special tiles in culture so we can work them. The borders just popped here this turn and I have two workers ready to pasture the horses next turn. Also next turn I'll pause the lighthouse build, put one more turn into the work boat to finish it, and work the crabs in 2 turns. That will help us grow to size 6 fastest, at which time we should be working copper, corn, horses, and 3 mines (not the crabs at size 6) for maximum hammers. I want to try to get as many hammers slow built in the city as possible to allow us to chop the GLH out in the last turn. We have enough workers to do it and will really only cause us to risk losing a lot of forest hammers on one turn. Of course, being third in the play order sucks since that will give both Catwalk and Sian the chance to snatch the wonder. I'm sure it won't be Catwalk but Sian is the biggest threat to grab the Lighthouse from us. I'm still not convinced we'll beat him to it, but I think it is valuable enough on this map to try, never mind the value of denying him so many ancient era wonders.

Here is a preliminary dot map of our land SE of upcoming cities 4 and 5. The settler is already on the way to C4 (not the old C4, that's now C5 -- changed because workers can get to this site sooner and a settler is already in the queue in Newt to cover the new C5). C4 will found on T44, we will be the last team to settle 4 cities, but maybe we'll be among the first to settle our fifth.

I just threw some of these locations on the map and haven't got input from Number One yet. I feel pretty good about the two sites closest to C4 and C5, but beyond that I still need our intrepid warriors to finish scouting out that area before we can decide final locations for the next ring out. Whether we land the GLH or not will determine where we place some of these cities, and when -- without the extra trade routes we may not be able to afford some of the maintenance in the short term.

We also need to figure out when to build galleys and settle our stone and gold islands. Those may be contested, and I'm not sure what else is in the fog but I want to know. I have not seen marble on this map anywhere. I wonder if Commodore put a treasure island out in the middle somewhere, maybe accessible after Astronomy? There are certainly a good number of tiles in the black center of the map because I see tile yields extending beyond any possible BFC from cities based on our home landmass. Those indicate they are reachable from the other side. I don't need a new image of this, I posted a horribly drawn image from Paint sometime last week and it doesn't deserve to be linked again.

Here is our current tech tree:

I was a bit indecisive about what to tech next after we finished Masonry this turn. Polytheism is still available 43 turns into the game, believe it or not, and since we don't have a religion that would be an obvious choice. However, going for Writing now lets us get to Mathematics next, and we can increase the value of all the forests we have available to chop in the city NE of Newt. Depending on what is available (and if we've settled our stone city), we have options for those forest hammers. The smart money is to chop out another swarm of workers and settlers, if we've landed the GLH and our economy can support it. An intriguing option would be to try a late (late!) pyramids if Sian leaves them around that long. I know he has stone, too, though I doubt he has it connected yet. But surely by the time we can tech to Mathematics he can have his stone hooked up, if he wants to build the Pyramids. If he does then there is obviously no way we can beat him to it and it probably isn't worth the try anyway. I'm mostly thinking out loud here. Those trees really should be used to build settlers and grab as much land as we can hold. That seems to be the strategy Dazed is running right now (he was first to four cities).

Even if the Pyramids are gone by then, the MoM would be a nice grab and by the time we get to settling this city we'll probably need Calendar anyway (assuming we're already building the cities in the third ring out from Newt by then).

Here is our military situation and a larger mini-map:

If we could attack with workers we'd have an army, but fortunately for us this (plus BW and Archery techs) makes for the world military power! Obviously when Mitt gets the barracks finished and starts pumping bows like there's no tomorrow this will improve. I would say we feel woefully under powered, but compared to our rivals we're doing OK. This is an Always Peace game, right?

F8 shows that no one is close to winning. This is really only useful to let us see how close we are on population. This is the best our numbers have ever looked, by the way, with cities size 4, 4, and 3. Maybe that's why I'm showing it now.

Demographics are in and they look mostly as mediocre as they have for the past half of the game so far:

Fortunately we know where everyone is on this chart now, as this turn we finally got graphs on Dazed to complete our set.

Score: This is from last turn. At end of turn this turn we're ahead of Dazed by one point, since Masonry finished. Take that! Obviously if he does anything other than whip the flesh off his people (which he has been doing fairly frequently), he will pass us before the turn gets back to us.


Sian's culture powered GNP is number one by a large margin, but I believe he has a good deal of genuine research going on there aside from the inflated culture totals. I assume he is running binary research, as we are. Dazed is behind a bit in GNP but that's because he is rapidly expanding and whipping hard. Some of Catwalk's GNP is Oracle culture but I think he is probably doing about as well as us in real beaker production (except he is ahead MC from the Oracle -- I can't remember for certain since I was chatting to him while working but he may intend to use a forge GE to try and grab the Pyramids).


There's no faking a MFG graph, we're just behind in hammer production. Sian's big lead may or may not indicate he is currently working on a wonder or a forge, but he says he isn't (as of last turn anyway). I don't really care if he is, as long as it isn't the Lighthouse


You may be wondering, shouldn't we be leading at least one of these graphs? Yes, we probably should. But we're average in all of them. Go team! Sian should definitely be leading this graph since he isn't whipping cities yet (not in slavery? Why delay that?) If slavery is a bad option then the map is too lush, that's all I can think of. See, I can find a reason to criticize a perfectly good map after all! :neenernee Actually, Sian had told me he wasn't in slavery because he didn't have enough food to justify it, but that doesn't make sense to me since we have no problems repeatedly whipping our people into dust. Unless Sian has made some markedly different settling decisions than we have (sounds like he hasn't -- I think he settled his copper/horse site almost the same as we did).


OK, so here's the graph we're leading. Great, it doesn't help you grow faster (unless you're putting the bad guys to the sword). Like I said earlier, a lot of this is just tech so we're actually as poorly defended as everyone else.


This one doesn't need much explanation. Sian builds Stone Henge. Sian founds a religion. Catwalk builds the Oracle. Dazed and I start building monuments.


The espionage graph: all I see here is that I was the first to take anarchy to jump into Slavery and that Catwalk was the next. Dazed is SPI so who knows when he jumped. All I know is he whips often and that pleases Mao.

If I get time tomorrow maybe I'll count up city populations since I haven't done that lately. Does anyone want to see anything else that I haven't shown? Number One, feel free to chime in on the upcoming city settlements and tech path.

[spacetyrantxenu]

T44 - I think I miscounted my turns on the last report, that should have been T43. Anyway, here's the map from this turn:

Newt's bowman will go to cover Rick in time for growth to prevent unhappiness, Newt will have to build another one to garrison itself when the settler finishes.

Close up view of the C4 site that will settle next turn. This will be Ron Paul.

End of turn demographics:

We're first in population? That surely means it's time to . Unless I'm doing this wrong, though, Mitt is the only town I want to whip right now since Newt has productive tiles to work and Rick is geared for max growth --> production while chasing the GLH. Too bad Mitt is at the happy cap from a previous series of whips (that will cool off soon).

GNP is horrible but we're saving cash this turn. Next turn, back to research.

In a bit of cool map design...do those mountain ranges look familiar?

Looks a lot like the tundra area to me. Still have to move some fog to see what else is in there but this is interesting.

[spacetyrantxenu]

T45-46 I've played two turns so far today, here's the update.

T45

Map showing Ron Paul's settlement. This is at end of turn, the lighthouse build in Mitt Romney is incorrect, that will be a bowman next turn. Rick Santorum starts on the Great Lighthouse next.

T45 Demographics:

Up to #1 in population and food.

T46

I talked to Boldly prior to writing up a report, so here's the talk about this turn:

Xenu: turn played and sent on
you around?

Number One: for a moment
what's up?

Xenu: not much, just played the turn and sent it on. we're building the GLH now
due in 9, not including 3 chops
the city will have 4 tiles mined in 3 turns, not that it can use them all
but if we need to eek out a few more hammers and starve the last turn we'll be able to

Xenu: mitt grows to 5 and produces a bow next turn
newt has 2T to finish the settler
need a garrison for it, probably the bow coming from mitt

Number One: what is the total cost for GLH?

Xenu: we're at 26/134 now

Number One: +39 hammer from chops

Xenu: so 69 to go

Number One: so 65/134. how many HPT max output in city?

Xenu: base is 12 per turn, but it will be higher than that next turn bc the governor put me back onto the corn tile, which is wrong
will be 15 per turn
16 once the PHF becomes a mine (scheduled for 4 turns but will be sooner than that)
we need 13.8 hammers per turn to get it done in 5
which we'll have starting next turn
so it looks like 5 turns to complete
T51, that's respectable right?

Number One: i say yes
also, given that we were last to 3 and 4 cities (right?) i don't think Sian has killed his expansion to rush to this. i think we have a good shot.

Xenu: sian told me earlier he has 6 workers and is about to plant city #5
we were last to 3, second to last to 4, i think
but no one is at 5 as of this turn
don't know how much you're following our demographics but we're #1 in food, soldiers, and population this turn.
some of that will be whipped away soon...i think next turn i can 2 pop whip newt to finish the setter (presently due in 2)
mitt comes out of whip anger this turn coming up and will finish a bow. can put some turns into a settler and 2 pop whip it, too

Photos to back it up:

I found that if Rick stops working both the corn and crabs next turn and works hill mines instead we may be able to finish this in 4 turns, so T50 instead of T51. The city won't even starve a pop doing that.

Mechanics question, in case of a tie in the PBEM format how are wonder races decided? If Catwalk or Sian are building it would they get it over us since they're ahead in the turn order, or is there a randomizing factor after the last person plays? I hope they doesn't have an advantage to both wonder building and trade routes just by playing ahead in the turn order.