RB Pitboss #1 Spoilers - Joai of the Incans - Krill/Memphus

[Krill]

And then there was war: I moved 1 tile, and saw a worker. Figured that Sunrise would have a city guard, so went for the choke and not the rush approach, and took the worker. Turned out to be the right move.

http://i554.photobucket.com/albums/jj417...t55war.jpg

I asked Kalin, sunrise and regoarrarr for a chat, and they all blew me off. Well, so much for interesting diplomacy, I hope everyone else bands to gether once they see what they are up against, and we are going to try and help them...

[Speaker]

Pictures please, you devious bastage!

[Krill]

What do you think that link is? I have a woody2 Quechua 77 of Sunrises cap which has one of his warriors next to it, and an archer 3 tiles away. Only way I could have taken it was if sunrise doesn't log in for the next 9 hours. Considering the tech path Sunrise must have gone, I don't think he has BW.

2K from pop
3k Archer
4k warriors (must have 1 guard for city 2)
8k tech (Hunting, Archery)
= 17k soldiers.

I think Sunrise will be the lowest, so would need 8k soldiers extra to have BW, and nothing else, which I seriously doubt consider he got monotheism.

So now he can't chop out extra workers, or slave. I wish I could take out the corn tile but I doubt I'll be able to because he could risk the double team with the archer and warrior. If he moves the archer forward though...either way, I think Sunrises' long term prospects just went up the spout...along with some of my own, but now this is effectively a 5v1, until and unless I can convince people to join me in an alliance...

I hesitate to say this is all sunrises fault (partly stems from our original thought that the NE passage was either a dead end or a land bridge, instead it turned out to be a road to no where), but when you form a 5 player alliance, and tell someone next to your borders with a woody 2 unit to FO, you really should be more careful.

I really hope everyone else considers how useful sunrise is now though. I doubt they'll kick him out of the alliance, but I also doubt that Lin is going try and keep Sunrise up and running and coming after me, instead focussing on improving their land. I'm quite tempted to offer sunrise peace this turn as well...we can't get his capital, probably won't get his corn...and we can still send Q1 to scout for Imhotep (sticking to the defensive tiles as well...)

[Krill]

Krill and Memphus,

We wanted to send you a formal response to your diplomatic overtures.

As you have deduced the five of us settled into an early agreement to trade techs and maintain good relations. While nothing too formal has been agreed upon, we have agreed to the tech trade that you are aware of and a mutual defensive pact. After looking at the tech tree, and discussing things at length, we feel we are served best with a five-way trade, and adding a sixth partner isn't in our best interest. This decision isn't easy, as we recognize the skill of your team, but we feel a five-way deal works best.

Sincerely,

-Broker, League of Lin, Regoarrarr, sunrise, and ZPV

Just received this...sunrise has yet to log in this turn...

Hehe. The mutual defense pact will be fun to watch working out; Sunrise is now weakened, leaving Lin as teh only credible threat. ZPV hasn't even met me yet, and regoarrarr is 30+ tiles away, and Broker is way south of Lin according to our chat.

I actually doubt this game is salvageable now. We have no copper, and heading for IW (if we actually have any near us, which knowing my luck with strat resources we won't) will cost us a lot. Better to just offer peace now and see what Sunrise does. If he accepts, great, if he doesn't he thinks he'll have to deal with a woody 2 quechua and hence will spend the next two dozen turns building warriors and not workers in his cap, which is totally unacceptable for someone who wants to win the game. I think he'll accept, and hold a grudge and come visit me later. We run to maths, and horses, and rush out scouts to the west, and then maybe alphabet if someone else hasnt gotten it. I think we can get both Maths and Alphabet by t85 at the latest, so we shouldn't need too many partners to keep up in tech.

And just why the **** does no one ever want to be my friend in these games? They must know by now that there is a decent chance someone is going to get screwed over by me one way or the other.

[Speaker]

What do you think that link is?

Of the rest of your land. How many cities do you have? How developed is your land? Yada-yada-yada. Don't make me get Nolan on TS again to badger you to post screenies...

[Krill]

OK, so now some questions for the viewers at home:

Does anyone feel that this is below the belt, stealing a worker off sunrise? Or is it a fair diplomatic reprisal for the tech embargo that has been placed on me?

Did any of you expect warfare such as this so early in the game, and (don't answer it here, but in the no players thread) do you feel that the game dynamics have now shifted greatly in favour of regoararr and ZPV (I think they have, because they can't be called on to do anything more substantial than they already have done). What about Ruff, m-h, Imhotep, dsplaisted, shadyforce? Do they know about the 5 way trade yet? Or are Ruff and Imhotep about to go and do a really stupid thing and declare on the builders, killing their own natural allies? Because that's what I fear the most, that I discover that they are all embroiled in an early war and already out of the game, when this tech trade gets sprung on them.

And then, wow, will this game get boring fast if that happens. Well executed, but boring, right?

Hmm. ZPV is playing Washington of the Cathaginians, and must be the guy who is going for HBR if they were telling the truth about who was teching what...Any of his neighbours not in the 5 way tech alliance could be about to get HA rushed by his Uu HA replacement (I honestly can't remember the name, all +50% against melee, flanking 1 is the bonus it gets, along with the decrease to strength 5).

Damn I really need contact with the otehr 5 asap.

[Olodune]

There were some nice screens in post #62. Reading with interest

Edit: Cross-post, responding to Speaker.

[Krill]

Of the rest of your land. How many cities do you have? How developed is your land? Yada-yada-yada. Don't make me get Nolan on TS again to badger you to post screenies...

3 cities, 5 workers, terraces in all of them end of this turn (cap already has one), all cities roaded together and on teh same trade network from the turn of founding. I actually have a sim that is accurate for food and hammers, but not gold (damned bonus from other civs having whatI'm researching), so I can work out the MM for the next x turns.

We are second in crop yield, and first in GNP (and not creative, which shows we are doing OK, 26 base bpt). We are 10th in MFG though, but that's not going to improve all that much. The rest of the data is there in post 62, nothing has changed much in the 2 turns since I posted it.

http://i554.photobucket.com/albums/jj417...55home.jpg

PS. It's somewhat amusing that of the only people to not login, are the four people who could see that me and Sunrise are at war. I've actually emailed sunrise offering him an NAP until t120. I look forward to hearing him bitch on ts

[Sullla]

And just why the **** does no one ever want to be my friend in these games? They must know by now that there is a decent chance someone is going to get screwed over by me one way or the other.

I'd say it's for exactly the actions we saw this turn: you didn't hesitate to attack and steal a worker from sunrise the minute you saw the opportunity. Oh, I'm not saying it was a cheap move by any means - it was a perfectly fair action. At the same time, however, you can hardly complain when the other teams in the area don't particularly want to work together with you and Memphus. Alliances are based on trust, and to be blunt, I don't think the other players trust you at all. Because they know that the instant you see an advantage, you will stab them in the back and be all over their cities. A highly aggressive, fast-expansion approach is going to step on other's toes. That will always be the case.

And if you'll forgive me for saying this, Krill, you could handle your diplomacy better. You are very, very pushy in dealing with other people. Diplomacy is oftentimes as much about how you say something as the message itself. (Certainly you rubbed me the wrong ways at times by making repeated comments to the effect that I was incompetent at designing this map. I don't mind the criticisms, but I was irked at the way in which you said them.) I suspect that some of the players in this game might feel the same way. That's not a spoiler-related comment, just my personal hunch.

I daresay that up and declaring war on someone because they didn't want to trade with you is not going to help this reputation! Anyway, being late to the trading party definitely didn't help, but I think a lot of wounds were self-inflicted here, due to your fearsome reputation and aggressive playstyle. I mean, you said in this thread that anyone who's not on your side is an enemy. That's not an attitude that will make a lot of friends!

My question to you would be, was it worth it to attack sunrise? I have no doubt you can cripple him badly. Still, how does going aggressive with this tech trading block help your position? Isn't it just going to get their backs up and make cooperation with you even more unlikely? In other words, I think the tactical movements were well done, but I'm less certain about the wisdom at the strategic level. Well, best of luck, and you certainly make this game more exciting to watch!

[Krill]

I'd say it's for exactly the actions we saw this turn: you didn't hesitate to attack and steal a worker from sunrise the minute you saw the opportunity. Oh, I'm not saying it was a cheap move by any means - it was a perfectly fair action. At the same time, however, you can hardly complain when the other teams in the area don't particularly want to work together with you and Memphus. Alliances are based on trust, and to be blunt, I don't think the other players trust you at all. Because they know that the instant you see an advantage, you will stab them in the back and be all over their cities. A highly aggressive, fast-expansion approach is going to step on other's toes. That will always be the case.

We never actually planned to steal the worker until we got the message from Sunrise that he didn't want to trade with us. We gave him a second chance, offering them all MC at a discount, and again we were rebuffed. We don't want enemies, we really do want some solid allies that we can rely on, and we would have trusted sunrise and Dreylin on our borders not to invade us if we had an NAP, just as we wouldn't have tried to backstab while we had an alliance. Once an alliance is finished though, sure, we'd have to consider war, from both sides.

We don't plan to pull off Operation Backstabs every game, you know. People just seem to assume that we'll attack at the drop of a hat; we have done now because it's safer to cripple one of our nearest neighbours now while everyone else is a billion miles away, leaving us just Dreylin to deal with short term. Long term, we had to fear a 2v1 from sunrise and Dreylin after they had tech superior units, but now, not so much, especially if everyone in their alliance has to worry about other fronts.

And if you'll forgive me for saying this, Krill, you could handle your diplomacy better. You are very, very pushy in dealing with other people. Diplomacy is oftentimes as much about how you say something as the message itself.

This I agree with, but we considered necessary for the following reason. We knew we were late to the party, and that tech alliances would be already set up. We needed to push to find out just how far along they had formed (consider regoarrarr/Dreylin: did he put together a 5 team alliance because we were around and being pushy, or did he do it because it gave him a good chance of victory? And when we did offer them a discount, why did he not want us in, was it because of what we have shown with SANCTA, or because we pushed?)

I doubt regoarrarr and Dreylin wanted us in the deal once they met us and got the others to agree. If I'm right, while you are right in general, you wouldn't be right in this specific case.

(Certainly you rubbed me the wrong ways at times by making repeated comments to the effect that I was incompetent at designing this map. I don't mind the criticisms, but I was irked at the way in which you said them.) I suspect that some of the players in this game might feel the same way. That's not a spoiler-related comment, just my personal hunch.

Sunrise got a central position on the map, what looks to be a nice chunk of cottageable grassland, and a 6 food corn, whereas we got a capital right in the North and a fish. Not exactly balanced...extra space isn't a balancing factor so long as someone isn't crammed into a corner.

I do like the map though on a strategic level; I think you have mistaken my criticisms intended to highlight potential problems and another viewpoint on map creation, as straight up bitching and moaning. I simply pointed out varying discrepencies with the fertility of the land and the value of starting food resources due to starting techs and traits.

I daresay that up and declaring war on someone because they didn't want to trade with you is not going to help this reputation! Anyway, being late to the trading party definitely didn't help, but I think a lot of wounds were self-inflicted here, due to your fearsome reputation and aggressive playstyle.

Depends, if everyone else sees themselves locked out of trading with the über tech alliance (UTA from now on) and then find out we struck the first blow by fatally weakening one of them, we could be seen as a saviour. I'm probably deluded, but whatever. Viewpoints will vary.

My question to you would be, was it worth it to attack sunrise? I have no doubt you can cripple him badly. Still, how does going aggressive with this tech trading block help your position? Isn't it just going to get their backs up and make cooperation with you even more unlikely? In other words, I think the tactical movements were well done, but I'm less certain about the wisdom at the strategic level. Well, best of luck, and you certainly make this game more exciting to watch!

It's simple. this is now a 5v1v1v1v1v1v1 as far as I can see. I couldn't join the 5, so I need to put together a 6, because that is the only credible way to have any chance to survive against the UTA; I've effectively written off working with the 5 because their trust of each other will only grow with their cooperation, and if I can't break into it now, I won't break into it then unless it falls apart naturally. And with 2 major tech trades they'll be in the medi era, whereas I'll be just about into the classical era, so how can we cooperate on a tech level then?

No, my future in this game revolves around the remainder, the ones that I have yet to meet.