This Time for Sure: Mardoc reprises the Lanun

[Mardoc]

actually, 9 h per turn in Mizzenmast iirc....+ another 7 from GA hammers.

Ok, maybe I miscounted. Still a very nice number, and worth the expense. That's 1/6 of the next closest hammer rival's whole civ, after all .

Trade routes with the Sheam just got shot to hell thanks to the loss of "years of peace" modifier. No reason to let him into our seas/lands to scout us out.

Resource trades (if there is anything to trade) sure....but OB? Fergettit.

Hmm. I'm hoping for something to appear that makes sense as an incentive to stay at peace with us. While, say, we gobble up Tatan and let the Lacuna time tick down. But you're right that most trades don't make sense. Pretty much only mana trades, and even then there's the question of timing.

Maybe we just stick with an intimidating military for that purpose. And maybe he doesn't give us the option of peace.

[Mardoc]

News of the turn:

Uberfish accepted peace. We're going to sail a galley right past him, therefore, to scout him and help to guarantee circumnavigation. I'm starting to get itchy on that.

Wheat city is founded, named Wheel. Immediately, itself pays its own maintenance, boosts research and trade routes...yadda yadda yadda. You've heard that story already .

Also, we've our first Shipyard:


Isn't it beautiful? Yeah, I know we grew into unhappiness and could use better stuff for our citizens to do - which is why we're building a market next turn while finishing the workshop, then over to settlers.

Other stuff? Cities are growing like weeds, but we still have the highest Approval Rating because of our awesome set of resources and speed of founding new cities. Started on Guybrush this turn, so we can have ourselves a Shrine. Demos continue to look awesome, except we've only a small lead in Power. Probably going to have to put another city to military production; although maybe the swap to military civics will be enough. We're now to 18 workers and a slave for our 14 city empire, and it's still not quite enough. Although Jib Boom, at least, is within 10 turns of being improved totally and never needing a worker again (err, assuming we don't let ourselves be invaded, that is).

Given that Religious Law is so close, we need to be considering what's next. I think, tentatively, that it should be the mana techs followed by Sorcery and Arcane Lore, then Mind Stapling. Or maybe Mind Stapling then Arcane Lore.

But, well - we could also be very close to things like Mithril Working, or Animal Mastery, or the Precision. We're barely going to be able to build a few units before they're obsolete!

[Thoth]

RL--> Optics-->Nerve Stapling-->Node stuff-->Sorcery--Poisons-->Other stuff.


(also: Mizzen goes Settler-->Market not the other way around. )

[Mardoc]

RL--> Optics-->Nerve Stapling-->Node stuff-->Sorcery--Poisons-->Other stuff.

Fortunately, aside from Religious Law, they're all basically one turn techs, or will be by the time we get to them

[Mardoc]

So, it's confirmed, we're stuck between the civ who's in 2nd and the civ who's in 3rd, both of whom are certain we're the obstacle on their path to victory. We did kill the Griff at EOT, so now we just need Ilios to either not see us or not kill us. Then we can bolt eastward and get out of his hair.

The southwestern galley discovered already popped borders in Uber's new city, blocking us from going thataway. I still think we should scout him while we've got peace; maybe that means knocking out another quick Galley from Mizzen to head east, while this one returns to ferry duty? Either that, or run a Pirate past his waters in 5; that'll be a tad tougher to kill on a whim like he did our Galley.

And, even ~180 gpt income isn't enough to rush everything we want. Just could afford the one Shipyard this turn; we've got 3 more in progress, plus 2 workboats to rush next turn, plus it'd be nice to upgrade the Zealots to Cultists, and establish temples in the newest cities, the ones without culture. I think at least Topsail will have to go without a rushed shipyard, its Shipyard is due in 2 turns anyhow thanks to all those trees and workshops. Next turn we probably should rush the workboats in Wheel and Crow's Nest, and upgrade the Zealot near Mainmast then stick him onna boat to Wheel. After that, we can return to Shipyard rushing. The one we rushed this turn was the only one currently with a combination of lots of water tiles worked and not a lot of hammers otherwise.

In other news, the island cities are starting to come into their own. Both Jib Boom and Ballast are size 6, with lighthouses and coves and seafood and decent hammer sources; pretty soon they'll have Shipyards, then it's just Sea Havens and basically all their tiles will be good to work. We'll have to decide between Command Posts, navies directly, or health and happiness buildings to continue growing. Right now I lean toward having at least one on naval duty at all times, trading off which is working on self-improvement. Time to stop risking our cities being boated.

And...we're now #2 in Power. Not a good sign! Not obvious who's beat us, but we're gonna have to keep the current military cities going, and probably add another one or two to military duty.

[Mardoc]

Another day, another 6 tiles toward circumnavigation:


It's hard to know for sure, but I'd guess we're within 5 turns of the mark. I did figure out that sending a second galley around the bottom of the map to race the one on top was rather silly, it's the same path and hence same hazards. If this fellow fails, we'll try again after Optics.

In homefront news, we're taking a break from most military stuff, mostly because Tatan continues to have enormous power without having Fishing, while we're at peace with Uber. Tatan's tech thread post about an adventure also suggests he'll be hitting someone. Doesn't really matter who, from our perspective, so long as it's not us.



Our empire continues to be prosperous. About to expand by two more cities; we're simultaneously trying to get them prepared in advance, finish tile improvements in our current cities' BFCs, and set up for the next wave of settlers. Which is a large part of why, for instance, our next non-iron city will be overseas, with all of one workable land tile .



I don't really know what to show anymore, not as long as we're at peace and growing like a weed still. Any requests for information?

[Tredje]

Hey Mardoc, how's it going?

I couldn't help but notice that several of your seaside cities are getting hammers out of coast tiles. If I'm not mistaken only the Heron Throne gives you that ability in regular FFH. Has anything been added to EitB that enables a player to get hammers out of water tiles? If so, is it a Lanun specific boon?

[Mardoc]

I couldn't help but notice that several of your seaside cities are getting hammers out of coast tiles. If I'm not mistaken only the Heron Throne gives you that ability in regular FFH. Has anything been added to EitB that enables a player to get hammers out of water tiles? If so, is it a Lanun specific boon?

The Shipyard, available at Iron Working to anyone, adds a hammer/ocean tile now, in addition to its old roles of +25% water unit production and +4XP to water units.

That's why 3 of our cities are currently building them - and at the others, anywhere coastal, the only things higher priority are Lighthouses and workboats.

Lighthouse, Sea Haven (harbors now give +1 Commerce), Shipyard now make ocean tiles worth working. At 3/1/3 for the Lanun, or 2/1/3 for anyone else. It's not as nice as the Elven economy, but it sets up a lot faster. Add in coves and suddenly you want to play the Lanun according to theme - all over the water, with reluctant settlements inland for resources or hammer heavy cities.

[Tasunke]

Add in coves and suddenly you want to play the Lanun according to theme - all over the water, with reluctant settlements inland for resources or hammer heavy cities.

Honestly?

Lanun were always awesome at playing towards their theme (at least as far as water-economy went) ... it was just the Boarding Party UU that was underutilized.

That and well, OO and their Worldspell being too good, naval battles never become an issue which is another reason the unit becomes underutilized.

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But I really do like the changes, I think, because it allows others to get some decent utility from Sea tiles

[Selrahc]

At 3/1/3 for the Lanun, or 2/1/3 for anyone else. It's not as nice as
the Elven economy, but it sets up a lot faster.

Tile yields are only half the story. Just how much commerce/turn are you getting from trade routes? I bet *that* will close a lot of the gap.