[Spoilers] What, no fireballs?! Team FFH: we're not in Erebus anymore

[DaveV]

It seems as though Serdoa and Lewwyn are both proposing borders, roughly along the lines we were originally planning. I think it would be a good idea to respond positively in the spam thread, instead of taunting them. Back to the original plan on the western border, and settle the cows/[strike]reagents[/strike]spices/rice city on the east, since Lewwyn seemed to cede that one to us.

[Ichabod]

It seems as though Serdoa and Lewwyn are both proposing borders, roughly along the lines we were originally planning. I think it would be a good idea to respond positively in the spam thread, instead of taunting them. Back to the original plan on the western border, and settle the cows/[strike]reagents[/strike]spices/rice city on the east, since Lewwyn seemed to cede that one to us.

If Lewwyn is indeed close as he says he is, then I'll probably agree with the site he proposed (but seriously... how wouldn't I have seen him early? If he had some cities to our east, we could take them easily later, they have to be very far from his core).

But I won't agree with Serdoa. He's just being a bully. For all I care, he can throw all those spears and axes at us. I rather lose the game due to a grudge by other player than be bullyed around.

[Ichabod]

It seems that all the bullies are out to get us...



No worries, we just need to find some kids and get their skates...




But what about DaveV, you ask? Well, here he is:



No one can beat us now, we will be the masters of the clock gaming!

[Ichabod]

No one can beat us now, we will be the masters of the clock gaming!

Or better yet, we can go back and not sign for this game!

[DaveV]

Yay! Does that mean I get to drive the DeLorean? It would be way cooler than my minivan!

[Ichabod]

[SIZE="4"]Turn 325 BC:[/SIZE]


Turn 325 BC was another one of the calm, almost not worthy of a report turn. We kept on with what we had planned and the citizens of the Malinese Empire were kind of wishing that they could have some more thrill in their lives.

Yet again, people were careless about what they wished for...

But let's not rush into what happened. Let's take a look on what was considered interesting in 325 BC (which is soooo last week in 275 BC).

Greed, probably my biggest mistake in this game, finally was size 3 working all its good tiles:

Don't get me wrong, the city isn't bad. Corn + Iron + Gold is decent, at least. Some coast + mines would make it a fairly decent production city on the short term and after some irrigation, it could be an interesting one. The problem is that this city is far away from our core, difficult to improve and reinforce (luckily, the neighboors in that direction aren't that close).

---

Acedia whipped the axe at 4/35 production to throw a great overflow into the Moai Statues. A chop is also being made right now, so they'll be up soon. After that, is coast working time.

---

After some time spending the EPs on Rome, I lost the visibility on Sunrise's cities... But the EP screen said I still had enough to see them:

I turned the EPs back on Sunrise. I'll build a Spy soon to scout his land. It'll be way faster to do so with city visibility from the EPs, so I'll keep them focused on him until that happens. I think I'll get visibility on his border sugar city when Lust pop its borders, which will happen soon.

---

In the interesting things that I didn't know department, I noticed a very high jump in Sunrise's score during the turn, while watching civstats away from my Civ computer. I knew that you can increase/decrease score during turns by settling/whipping. But that growth in score was too big to be one of these.

So, I thought about it a bit and realized it must have been a bulbed tech. I feared for the philosophy plan, but luckily, I soon realized that Sunrise didn't have alphabet yet! So, my guess was a Theology bulb for the AP.

In the end, a quick exploration in the game revealed what I hadn't think about:

The only buildings you can build during a turn in a Pitboss games are the ones from GPs and only the religious ones count as World Wonders and score. So, yeah, Sunrise got the Kong Miao to go with his religion.

---

Finally, what was all the hype in turn 325 BC, we had a city to settle. I went against both my team players, since I was decided to settle Vainglory, the wheat + cow + iron city.

Little did I know that the troop movement I made for it was perfect, but for totally different reasons. I was really in love with that city. Like I said, that should have been our third city, with wheat and cows, a plan that was botched due to my fail scouting. But, at least luck decided to give us a hand...

[Ichabod]

[SIZE="4"]Turn 300 BC:[/SIZE]


So, this turn started before I logged in to the game, with the following:

Hi Team FFH. I am your direct Eastern Neighbor. I've been avoiding contact so that you wouldn't know. But now our borders are only a few tiles from each other. Please do not settle any further East as I would have to assume a hostile stance. You may also see my chariot there. I moved him at the beginning of the turn. I could have waited and double moved you, killed your skirmisher or sniped your worker, but I hope this is a show of good faith. No killing...

Oh and you may settle the plains cow south of your city there, but I wish to settle the bananas south and more east of that.

Opinions?

So, like I previously posted, Lewwyn had found us. Fortunately, he seems to like our team and I suspect its due to Meta reasons (he doesn't want to double move the teams that doesn't want to double move). Anyway, we were lucky, because he caught us in the worst possible moment. The city of greed has two honourable defenders, a Skirm and an Axe. The Axe was to the north, taking care of a spearman barb and the Skirm was out of the city to protect the worker + rice from a warrior barb. The warrior barb had just suicided against the skirm, which was 3.5 health. If Lewwyn had killed the Skirm, we would be in a difficult position. He could also had sniped the worker.

What he did instead?

A normal move + a greeting message . Notice that the Skirm had already moved that turn, he was originally 1SE of that position. Pardon me from the internet culture flaw, but this deserves it. Lewwyn:



I'll post about our diplo interactions later. Suffice to say that both the city and the worker are secure. I guess he'll probably pillage our Iron at some point, but I'm not feeling bad about it.

And speaking of the barb spearman, he's now XP for the axe (the axe got 1 xp only - FfH would have given me at least 4 ).

---

But the real big news came when one of our Skirm + Spear pair continued its peregrination to capture the Roman chariot.

[SIZE="3"]A Roman Settling Squad![/SIZE]

Reaching for our wheat! How dare they? That demanded a response in tone.

Seriously speaking, this picture revealed a lot. First, it was probable that the Roman units had already moved that turn. Why? Because the chariot moved, running away from our units and it was together with the stack. So, if the stack moved away, the chariot would be defenseless. It didn't make much sense. Of course, the possibility of a deceptive move to make them win the settling race scared me. The thing is, i don't think they knew we were in a race.

The other thing it revealed is that the Romans wanted to settle the wheat as a first ring resource. So, we couldn't afford to settle Vainglory in my planned spot, since it'd never get the wheat in a culture war of second ring against first ring. How could I tell this? If they planned to settle it as a second ring resource, they would have done so by settling on the plains hill, which was a better placement (sharing pigs for growth + ph plant).

Finally, the screenshot revealed that we would win the settling race! That was a key point. We would secure that choke point and that resource to the Malinese empire, by settling a city in one of the marked tiles.

By watching our troops movement, Serdoa decided to bully us:

And Mali, move back east. I am fine we no troops of Rome going closer then two tiles to your borders if you do the same in regards to ours. Otherwise I'll guarantee that we are both out of this game. And honestly, the one running away is sunrise, not Rome nor Mali. Would be a shame if we would fight and have him pick up the remains, wouldn't it?

Notice that he doesn't seem aware of the settling race, which is good for us. They definetely logged in a lot of times in those turns (yeah, I'm getting a bit power gamey... Pitboss is really a monstruous thing...). In the end, I decided to go to sleep and if it was all a big deceit by Rome, so be it. There are other places to settle city and we could conquer it from them later too.

By the way, the bullies won't get us. We will answer in kind...



...words to confuse them!

[Brian Shanahan]

Yay! Does that mean I get to drive the DeLorean? It would be way cooler than my minivan!

But you'll never get anywhere with it. And the cops will pull you over because of the suspiciously large amounts of cocaine JdL stashed in it.

[Ichabod]

[SIZE="4"]Turn 275 BC:[/SIZE]


While we discussed things with Lewwyn in the diplo thread, he kept on with his chariot, but still doing way less annoying things than he could.

Notice the Spear build in Greed. I decided to 1-whip that spear next turn, if Lewwyn doesn't retreat. I'll need 1 turn to grow back, I think, and the Spear will be a great help. I don't want to hang on the niceness of people for too long, right?

---

And after much debate, Team FfH present:

[SIZE="3"]VAINGLORY![/SIZE]

This screenshot shows all the situation in that area. We settled the city and gained the Wheat. It's defended by 3 Skirms and a Spear. Rome's stack has an axe, a chariot and 2 spears. Yeah, they aren't going to take the city if he attacks, that's for sure. But the situation is still delicate. I don't know how they'll react when they realize we got that city. Hopefully they see its all fair game. Either way, we won't back down.

We need to decide what to do with the second Skirm + Spear pair. Ilios pointed out that some sentry units near Serdoa would be very valuable. I completely agree. Problem is, the only good sentry spot for the units is where they stand now. But I'd prefer a more defensive position. So, I think we could move 1E. That's not a good sentry spot, it would have the sight cut by the hills, but at least I don't think we'd lose them. So, move 1W this turn?

About city development, depending on what Rome do, we may take a long time to improve the wheat. The city will get TRs next turn and is already working a plains cow, so it's decent already. I'll chop a monument quickly too. It'll be a production city, so we want granary, barracks, probably a wall. If we get Taoism founded here, I won't fret too much. I don't think we will get the Shrine and the culture would help us get it quickly to third ring, which would be awesome.

---

Our Galley is built too. We could move it to explore Roman lands, but that'd probably make them annoyed, which isn't good. So, I guess I'll hold onto this for a moment, even though we could maybe take a city by Surprise factor.

How about sending it East to see if Lewwyn is indeed telling the truth?

---

Overview of our lands:

West:

East:

---

Demographics at 100% gold:

---

Any questions?

[Ichabod]

Here's Serdoa's post:

You withdrew 1N? Cardinal directions aren't easy, eh? Not to speak of the city settled in our face... feel glad that I am not the only player of Rome.

And here's my response:

Sorry, I meant 1S. My mistake.

But let me show you what was going on in my mind:

1S, 1N, whatever...

The path is still open for your units to

GET

BACK

HOME!

Oh, man, I'm starting to become a cruel person...