[SPOILERS] Tres Equis: Mardoc plays the Most Interesting Civ in the World

[Mardoc]

Been a couple turns, so have an update.

First up: at home, Vanilla was growing way faster than the worker could keep up, so I decided to knock out a second worker. The pause will let the current worker catch up, and then two workers will hopefully stay ahead of our growth rate. Maybe even with enough spare worker turns to start preparing for the settlement of Strawberry.



To the east, our scout killed a griffon on defense, and is now finishing healing, before taking over for the warrior on eastward circumnavigation attempt. The warrior will aim to both pillage the tiles I know about in this area, and defog enough else to enable dotmapping in this direction.




I'm honestly getting a bit confused at not finding more people yet. As you can see, there's 1248 land tiles, that's only 250/person. Sure, that still means we're looking at conflict in the mage era, not the PoW era, but...three scouts, and all I've found is a scout? Ah, well, we'll just keep going.




I think I agree with Q on Stasis: preventing improvements for nine turns is probably the most it can hurt your opponents, but even if you do let them get out a worker or two before you pop it, you still cost them nine turns of research and production. It doesn't hurt quite as badly as if they had nothing to do, but then the GA is barely worth anything early, either. But honestly, a GA catches you up more than just one turn, if you time it mid-game. Probably worth 3ish, plus ideally some anarchy too.

That said, I wish for a redesign that would stop it being banned. What if it were given the Deepening effect, instead of either production stopping or GA? Temporary freezing of the world would still be a dramatic penalty to everyone not Illian, but not a penalty that makes playing turns even more boring. If anything, it would make the early game more exciting, as you debate which tile to work, is it worth farming the corn now or do I wait for it to thaw and save the worker turns, etc.

[Thoth]

That said, I wish for a redesign that would stop it being banned. What if it were given the Deepening effect, instead of either production stopping or GA? Temporary freezing of the world would still be a dramatic penalty to everyone not Illian, but not a penalty that makes playing turns even more boring. If anything, it would make the early game more exciting, as you debate which tile to work, is it worth farming the corn now or do I wait for it to thaw and save the worker turns, etc.

I'm not sure if "Free" second Deepning is the exact answer, but it's more likely to get the Illian's worldspell unbanned than buffing Stasis.

[Mardoc]

Nothing much new, until this turn.

We met HK - well, his scout anyway



And then we met Molach! It's a regular convention over here.


Still not sure where anyone's capital is, but at least we ought to be getting a prereq bonus on a few things now. We're getting close to circumnav, I can fit both ends on a single screen now. Of course it'll probably turn out to be not enough water.

We're the smallest, probably because we're also the only one with 2 workers. Just finished Calendar, so next turn we're revolting.

[Mardoc]

It never rains but it pours. Several boring turns, followed by three things in one turn.

It's now T27. First bit of news is, we now have circumnavigation...if and only if there's enough water for it to be enabled. I guess we find out next turn. I'll start bringing the units home, by a different route, so they can find more out. And pillage on the way, ideally .



Second, Vanilla has hit its temporary happiness cap - won't be able to grow any more until we get some roads built to the sugar and silk. Which will take a good 3-4 turns . So we're using our massive food surplus to knock out a first settler.



Where's that settler bound? Probably to the Strawberry site, although Mint is also a very strong city with just current tech.



At end of turn, we finished Exploration, leaving a tough choice. Do I want to go next toward Mining, to swap the balance of the empire toward hammers a bit? Toward Animal Husbandry or Fishing, to enable cities on the lakes and plains? To Education, for cottages, and probably onward to Code of Laws for Aristocracy? Or to Mysticism and Philosophy to enable Temples of the Hand?

I'm currently thinking what makes most sense is a land grab. Which means probably Fishing followed by AH. While we're mass producing settlers, agrarian farms are worth as much as mines. Trade routes and rivers and lakes can keep our economy limping along for a while. But settling new cities without food lined up is foolhardy. So go for the food.

[Mardoc]

Looks like not enough water for circumnav. Guess I'll just have to settle for knowing the general size and more-or-less layout of the land.

So, when I loaded the turn, there was a griffon next to my exploring/pillaging warrior. He was probably dead, but I moved him Northeast - away and onto defensive terrain anyway, out of hope...




Well, so much for that plan

The sad thing is, it almost worked.



But lucky enough for a wounded warrior to survive 1 griffon isn't lucky enough for 2, it appears.

In other news, the scout about 5 tiles south found Molach's borders - you can just barely see them by the minimap. Just need to find two more, now.

[Mardoc]

Got a bit of a dilemma for myself. I think I'm going to hold the save til tomorrow so I can sleep on this one:



I can kill that worker, for sure. I might even be able to capture and bring it home, if I get lucky. Does it hurt Molach enough to be worth making an enemy?

Pros:

• We're past the stage where a worker steal is crippling, but it still hurts a lot. Probably 4-5 turns of capital's production, and of course lost improvements, messed up any micro he might have, possibly a delay for more military on top - might not take him out of the game, but it'd be a serious blow
  
• He doesn't know where we are yet, unless he found us with the first move on a scout and immediately moved back. Barbs are starting to get nasty, so he might not find us at all until much later in the game
  
• He's already got his first city out - presumably the River of Blood at work. I'm ahead on demos for now, but he'll be growing faster. And he doesn't even have Governor's Manors yet. He's probably leading the pack performance wise.
  

Cons:

• Vamps are one of the earlier threats. Governor's Manors can mean lots of Moroi, fast moving, hard hitting - I just got through with being destroyed by Moroi in XXV
  His natural enemies are probably anyone but me. I think we're halfway around the world. But there is a direct land path if he really wants me dead.
  
• Molach is a good player, but probably not top tier. I have a good chance of catching up to him without being nasty.
  
• We're running on a shoestring ourselves. 2 warriors, to protect 2 cities and 2 workers.
  

I think I'm back to the beginning. Just need to think a while. Dedlurkers? You still there? If so, I'd appreciate your opinions .

[Azarius]

Poor warrior, he went down fighting. If your short term plan is to crank out settlers to snag land, Mint seems to me to be a stronger second city for that then Strawberry would be.

My natural inclination would be to kill the worker. Setting back the frontrunner can only help you (even if it does help everyone else), and if you can get it home I'm sure you can find a nice home for it in your soon to be expanding empire. As you said, you are quite far away from him, so even if he did know where you are, which you think he doesn't, a major attack against you would be quite an undertaking. He also has other threats closer to home he'd have to deal with as well. I don't know Molach all that well, so I'm not sure what his tendencies would be. You would definitely earn his enmity by doing it, but do you think it would tick him off enough that he would be willing to throw away his own game to build up a big stack to throw at you? He couldn't possibly hope to hold on to your lands early, so it would just be about revenge. So basically, how much are you willing to risk him saying screw it and coming for you, and how likely do you think that is?

[Qgqqqqq]

WAR!!1!

[Mardoc]

Poor warrior, he went down fighting. If your short term plan is to crank out settlers to snag land, Mint seems to me to be a stronger second city for that then Strawberry would be.

Ah, I knew I was overlooking something. Mint was going to be third, but mostly because I didn't scout it until after scouting Strawberry, not for any logical reason. Definitely worth rearranging them as you suggest. Both are strong - but Mint is stronger faster, especially with my current tech.

My natural inclination would be to kill the worker. Setting back the frontrunner can only help you (even if it does help everyone else), and if you can get it home I'm sure you can find a nice home for it in your soon to be expanding empire. As you said, you are quite far away from him, so even if he did know where you are, which you think he doesn't, a major attack against you would be quite an undertaking. He also has other threats closer to home he'd have to deal with as well. I don't know Molach all that well, so I'm not sure what his tendencies would be. You would definitely earn his enmity by doing it, but do you think it would tick him off enough that he would be willing to throw away his own game to build up a big stack to throw at you? He couldn't possibly hope to hold on to your lands early, so it would just be about revenge. So basically, how much are you willing to risk him saying screw it and coming for you, and how likely do you think that is?

This is where I'm leaning after sleeping on it. The fundamental thing is that I'm both halfway around the world, and I think he hasn't found me. So there's very little he can do, no matter what he wants to do, at least until Bronze - first he'd have to find me, then build a force and walk it all the way over to me, both of which while dodging bears and griffons and hopefully other barbs.

He can't do anything profitable against me for much longer than that.

If I'm lucky, someone else manages to piss him off even more before he has a chance for revenge on me. Which is more of an issue, Mr. Molach? That 50-turn-ago worker steal, or the current settlement in your face? Or, of course, someone else decides to hit him too, since he's weakened.

If I'm not lucky - well, I have to fight him eventually regardless. Recent games have emphasized just how powerful the Calabim can be if unmolested. So it's not like peaceful relations until end of time are even possible.

I wish scouts could pillage, that would really let me gimp him . Probably worth having the scout stick around for a while, though; might make him build more military. Might even make him overbuild, if he thinks this is a prelude to PoW.

[Mardoc]

Alea Iacta Est



Thinking the scout should move next turn to the forested hill next to Malefia - with the CI it should have odds on a single bloodpet on defense, so we can see more Calabim land and maybe more opportunities. What we see or don't see will determine what next and if we try to harass more or offer peace.

Worker will run west, because that's the further direction from home and where the scout came from - only chance at maskirovka here. Most likely I'll just use him to scout until he gets eaten, but maybe we get lucky. I don't see any purpose in trying to cover him with the scout, most barbs would win that fight.