RB Pitboss #1 SPOILER - Hatshepsut / India

[Dantski]

Imho isn't capable of launching a galley based attack is he?

[regoarrarr]

I am not sure. I do have a trireme that will be built next turn (T109) at Norwood, who will investigate things.

[regoarrarr]

Email to shadyforce

Thanks for the note. I do want to spend a bit of time clearing up what I feel are slight mis-characterizations of my play. It was not really that I excluded you from the initial round of tech deals. Well, I guess that was the end result, but what happened is that I was approached by sunrise and the Lins with a tech deal and it kind of went from there. There didn't seem to be room for more powers. In hindsight, it was a mistake to arrange a group of 5 in an 11 person game. We should have included you and Krill or whoever and made it maybe MC and Aest and a 7 person group.

As for my declaring war on you, it was a byproduct of the alliance structure. ZPV was my friend and I guess you can say somewhat of an ally? And he asked me to kill your spearman. So I did.

As for teching, I guess not getting around to replying to this email till the turn has already rolled over has deprived me of the chance to show goodwill by sharing my current path of research. As you probably have seen by now, I was researching Theology (and I think I just completed it?). I know that tech is available among your group of NUTA, so I don't know if you have plans for that already. I believe that I will have Drama within a few turns, but it might make sense for me to trade for it early. I am not sure what tech I am heading towards next. I may bust out Drama / Lit in a few turns, or perhaps move towards something like Guilds. I will likely save gold for a few turns.

From a military standpoing, at this point, I am more concerned about Imhotep. I feel that he is likely on the move to attack me. I would actually be surprised if you hadn't at least heard a few rumors towards this by now.

I would understand if you would be concerned that because ZPV and I have I guess an existing relationship you might be concerned that if you and I went after Imhotep that later ZPV and I would attack you. I don't know what kind of deal that we can work out to make that work, but I'm willing to talk about it.

[Dantski]

Not been any posts for a while, are you just too busy to post much right now?

[regoarrarr]

You're right - it has been awhile. Things are continuing on as before. A few notes on overall dealings

* As all the non-Dantski lurkers undoubtedly already know, Krill has taken the city of Taco from the Lins. It was about an even hammer trade I think - 5 cats+2 chariots+2 workers for 5 longbows, vulture, spear, and settler, but Krill did not lose any of his WEs or HAs. The Lins have apparently continued to turn down peace, so it will be interesting to see how that goes. That is their 12th city.

A few emails that I've gotten.

Dreylin

t111 - praets still in place

Imhotep (finally!)

everything fine. I’m a little busy in real life at the moment, so don’t expect a lengthy response. I’ll get back to you tomorrow or the day after that.

Imhotep

Unfortunately he didn't say much. I actually caught him in game last night and we chatted briefly. He claimed to be a "peaceful guy" but as we all know his power graph says otherwise. He claims to just want to not portray a juicy target but I doubt that's the case. It certainly is possible though, given the fact that the Praets are still in Thangodorim (20 tiles away from me) that he is aiming for someone else.

In the category of "Picture sure would be nice!" my eastern trireme went east from Terrace Park and found Zulu borders not too far. I will try to get a pic next turn after I've explored it a bit to see if there is any military / naval buildup there.

I dropped off a quick note to Imhotep

Imhotep,

Sounds good. Like I said in game, I'm up for just about anything (other than attacking me). And if you're thinking of attacking shadyforce or dsplaisted or ruff, I'd be happy to provide support (mostly for shady as dsp and ruff are far away from me). And I'm sure that our group (that you call the UTA) would be happy to include you in our tech sharing, if that's a concern. If you want to go for shady, I could provide several galleys.

Obviously I don't know a) what your relations are with the other civs and b) what you're planning, but I thought I'd throw it out there.

I have a few other things that I will try to post later today and will hope to make a bigger update with pics this evening.

[regoarrarr]

Email exchange with shadyforce

Ah, don't worry too much about the early trades. I'm a little annoyed but it's probably just sour grapes on my part. It's just the way game developed because of it that is frustrating.

I have noticed Imhotep's power steadily rising and I'm wary of it. Imhotep has been really quiet all game. He's one of those people that it's hard to get a reply off! Do you find that as well? If it's just me he's being quiet towards then I should be worried. I've been kind of assuming he is just playing on auto-pilot in frustration at the state of the game, but maybe he does have some grand attack scheme. He is a lot closer to me than I originally thought. I had badly neglected scouting to my east until recently, but I have a scout over there now so I can see his city nearest to me.

I'm a bit wary of Imhotep turning turning into a Ruff and just attacking the nearest guy to him out of frustration. And I'm worried that could be me. However, there is a thick section of jungle between me and him and I haven't seen him build any roads in my direction so I guess I'm safe enough. I have seen him build roads towards dsp's new city which is near him, but he might just be connecting trade routes. I don't know what his plans are and it could well be you he is aiming for. You should probably send a scout over (if you haven't already done so) and see if he is roading towards you. That might answer your question.

Regarding Drama, well let me know if you want to do some sort of deal for it. Otherwise, I guess you're taking advantage of the pre-requisite bonus for a change.

My reply

How's it going. I have to say in thinking about the early tech trades, I didn't really think about it well. I guess I kind of just assumed that hey, getting all those techs is good, and gave no thought to how that might be received. Obviously the counter move was for the other 6 of you to form your own group, so I don't know if I just thought that we would be way too far ahead of everyone and just crush you or what. But it was definitely a mistake. I think the next game I play like this I would prefer not to do No Tech Brokering, because I think that it encourages big blocs like this and makes it harder for things to be more fluid, as opposed to No Tech Trading or full tech trading. Not to mention that the super fast tech speed in this game certainly makes it different than a regular game.

As for Imhotep, yes, he has been very quiet to me as well for most of the game. I guess we shall see how things go with him. I had a scout heading that way but he (a warrior) landed next to a barb axe and died, so I'm having to send a backup.

And I think I will pass on Drama, but obbviously you already have CS and Theo anyways so it probably wouldn't have made much sense anyways.

Anything else going on that we should talk about?

I had an interesting chat with dsplaisted that I didn't keep but he basically said he's not really interested in any kind of alliance shakeup and will just wait to see how it goes as far as someone else getting killed.

[regoarrarr]

Exchange with shady

I think that No Tech Trading would be a far better game. The overall tech pace would slow down and while you can still ally militarily with people, you have to stand on your own feet economically and you aren't tied to any trading block for fear of being left behind. I'm not sure how an unrestricted tech trading game would work. It seems like tech leads would be essentially meaningless unless protected by blocks with no trade clauses and there would be end-less 'no tech brokering' clauses as well by people trying to protect the trade value of their research.

Yeah, shame we couldn't do a deal about Drama. I would love to find a way to purchase a few fast workers off you, just for the sake of having them. I still am inclined to try and collect all the UUs I can just as a fun side game for myself. Of course, I have to be nice to everyone else to get their UU but I have an alternative with you hehe.

What else? Well, I'm still at war with ZPV but I can't exactly talk to you about that, can I?

My reply

Yes - agreed on the No Tech Trading. When this game finishes (seems like it would take forever but we're moving pretty quickly), I think that would be my thoughts for the next one, should there be a next one.

So, I'm not sure if you are willing to answer this or not, but are you guys in the NUTA essentially carrying Krill's research? It seems that with that big of an empire, and army, that he can't be researching very fast. Same goes for Dreylin to some extent

[regoarrarr]

An interesting chat with sunrise

(10:55) sunrise089: hi Regoarrarr
(10:55) me: hi
(10:55) sunrise089: question: if the Lins make peace with Krill, would you like me to ferry my units over to you?
(10:55) me: well i guess there are 2 options
(10:55) me: 1) am i going to need them to fend off imhotep (still open issue)
(10:56) me: or 2) if he and i reach some sort of agreement, would they be useful in attacking shadyforce
(10:57) sunrise089: oh, I talked to Imhotep by the way
(10:58) me: yeah?
(10:58) sunrise089: he said he hates the game and thinks the map is terrible
(10:58) me: lol
(10:58) sunrise089: he planned to rush, and ran right in to Ruff, also planning on rushing
(10:59) sunrise089: he said everyone else was too far away, and now the diplo blocs make traits and strategy irrelevant
(10:59) me: yeah i am feeling that too
(10:59) sunrise089: he mentions he thinks you think he is going to attack you, because of emails you send him, but he didnt comment either way
(10:59) me: i think no tech brokering is not a good choice, at least when there are this many civs
(11:01) me: so i assume you got my gold request?
(11:02) me: when i logged in last turn (last), zpv had a gold request of 50 gold
(11:02) me: which i accepted
(11:02) me: so as to not slow down his research
(11:02) me: but now i'm low
(11:02) me: i am going to lay off the whip a bit now
(11:02) me: because i think it's likely that imhotep is not going to attack me
(11:02) me: (but i still plan on being a bit prudent)
(11:04) sunrise089: yeah, i sent you 70 I think
(11:04) me: great
(11:04) sunrise089: I will be starting a market soon, so that should hel[
(11:04) me: cool
(11:04) sunrise089: taking a gamble and building a market before library, which I've never done
(11:04) me: yeah i was thinking of building one in my capital
(11:04) me: for the happy
(11:04) me: +2 since i have ivory and silks
(11:04) me: plus i have furs not too far away
(11:04) sunrise089: do you have a hindu temple there?
(11:04) me: not yet
(11:05) sunrise089: if not, better to make a temple if you're going to make the AP
(11:05) me: just finished a monastery
(11:05) me: yeah
(11:05) sunrise089: for the free hammers
(11:05) me: right
(11:05) me: hope i get the ap
(11:05) me: engineer in 11 i think
(11:05) sunrise089: i have no GPP at all
(11:05) sunrise089: I will be settling a 2-food coastal again soon, and I'll slave a temple there and then run priests
(11:06) me: on my side?
(11:06) sunrise089: along our river, yes
(11:06) me: river?
(11:06) sunrise089: but only 1 seafood; there is also a banana
(11:06) me: ah okay
(11:06) me: i know where that is
(11:08) sunrise089: I think I will settle that and then an interior city - interior city doesnt pick up a new food resource (pulls a rice from Barcelona) but gets a grassland horse and grassland dyes, which I think is worth it
(11:08) me: yeah resources seem very tight on this map
(11:12) me: so if we continue to assume that i will run 100% science and you (or hte lins or both) will fund me
(11:12) me: then i guess i should go granary->library->monastery?
(11:12) me: seems like monastery would be better than courthouses or markets
(11:12) me: especially if it has the hammers

Big news is that he talked to Imhotep who seems fairly despondent about this game. To me, that seems fairly unlikely that he will do anything like attacking me.

I plan on remaining fairly vigilant, and I will have my woody 2 axe sentry in the choke between our lands, but I am going to start laying off the whip.

Depending on what (if!) I hear from Imhotep, I may start investigating an attack on shadyforce.

[MWIN]

what is the power comparision of you vs Shady vs imphotep vs ZPV?

Can you take over Shady in 1vs1 war?

[regoarrarr]

what is the power comparision of you vs Shady vs imphotep vs ZPV?

Can you take over Shady in 1vs1 war?

Imhotep and I have similar powers. We are I believe ranked 3rd and 4th (Krill is 1st and the Lins 2nd). Shady's is significantly below ours and ZPV is somewhere around that range.

I don't thi nk I could take shady 1 on 1. Sunrise, who is a much better player than me, especially at MP / War, said that 20 units (including 8 cats) was a good army, which would probably be enough to take a city but not an entire empire.