[Spoilers] Fintourist and Old Harry have nothing to see here

[TheHumanHydra]

Yes, I think we should whip knights. We realized a long time ago we would lose the game, gradually falling behind, if we did not make territorial gains. We have reached a point at which decisive war may be waged - not against mackoti unless surprise is achieved, but perhaps against suttree or dtay. The hard, cold logic of it is that we take the opportunity, I think. Fail though we may, it is our only foreseeable means to remain in a position in which we can compete to win the game.

To this end, I approve of the civics choices.

Speaking of which, interesting choices on the part of Ichabod.

[Old Harry]

Our next opportunity to hit Suttree is in six turns. Do we want to just do five turns of whipping and then switch back to caste? I think we can get up to about 25 Knights in those five turns.

Once we have economics we can grind straight to Rifling, or we could take Engineering to give us more military options. Which do you prefer? And which other options have I forgotten? Mil Trad and gunpowder for Cuirs? They negate walls and castles...

Ichabod (Shaka) will be producing 9XP Knights if he has barracks and stables. WilliamLP can produce Knights too though, so I'm hoping for a bloodbath over there! I've got to the point where I assume people like Ichy won't target us because that will give Mackoti another target to hit. It's far from undefended but a few 9XP Knights could run over the island pretty quick...

[TheHumanHydra]

I'd take Engineering quick; it should be fast to tech, right? And five turns of knights sounds good to me!

[Old Harry]

I have a dilemma: Mack played before us last turn, so I should wait to make sure we don't double-move this turn, when the option to declare war is back on the table? The clock is running down (9 hours left) and neither of us have logged in and I'm incapable of playing in under two hours, so do I:
- Just play
- Play PYFT-brinkmanship to see which of us can log in latest
- Message Mack to let him know I don't want to double move him
- Ask for a pause in the tech thread

This is funny because I have no intention of attacking, but sending the message to let him know I don't want to double move him could be interpreted as an attack plan and cause him some angst.

Any thoughts?

Engineering should be two or three turns THH.

[Ceiliazul]

for the good of the game, please no clock brinksmanship, unless its on the front end of the clock. If you're not planning war, I don't think the psychological impact is worth the trouble of keeping a turn split.

[TheHumanHydra]

I would contact mack. If he doesn't reply promptly due to timezones or whatever, then post in the tech thread. Or maybe even do both simultaneously.

[Old Harry]

Heh, its alright, he played almost straight after I posted... I'll go play now.

[Old Harry]

Turn 156

I'm expecting to be greeted with a peace offer, and Mackoti doesn't let us down. I panned around a bit and it doesn't look like he's done anything annoying, so I'll say yes. And we get a reward! (I learn later that I could have killed a galley, but I guess this will do.) What's really scary is that he's saving 600 gold per turn. We can get just over 200 per turn.


I don't think Dhal is going to stand up to this invasion. I guess plako will take what he wants and then offer peace (although he might just take the whole lot).




On Ichabod's border our trade mission to Stray Geese is two turns from fruition, although a small spanner has crept into the works. Ichabod whipped the city in the last five turns, so the trade mission is only worth 1300 gold. if it doesn't grow back to size 8 we could check if growing Agincourt will help or send it to Spring Breeze instead for the full 1500. It wouldn't be secret then however, and Ichabod might demand money for it... (I know that's been done in other games). Sigh. I can 1-pop whip the settler in France next turn and Rorke's Drift will be settled t159.


On domestic matters I've adjusted Agincourt to grow in four turns (in case that helps the trade mission), whipped a Knight in Dunkirk and the Market in Light Brigade (to overflow into a university). We can whip the knight in Hastings next turn and I'm debating whipping Endor (probably not a good idea as its so food-poor). Issy's Knight could be whipped the turn after that.

If you want to keep track of what techs our main opponents are up/down on us have a look here. The news for this turn is that Mackoti got Printing Press, so only needs Gunpowder and Replaceable Parts before he gets to Rifling. While Suttree got Feudalism recently, so we may face longbows if we attack him.

Demos and power. (Hey look at that! Why did we sign peace?)

[TheHumanHydra]

So suttree just got Feudalism, and mack's most of the way to rifles ... that means my previous statement about 'the time is now' is almost negated. We've really got to do this post-haste, if at all. Do you think mack is building wealth everywhere; is that why his gpt is so high? Can you post a screenshot of his land with tile yields on? (Tile yields always stay current even if you don't have los, right?)

Also, nice spreadsheet! Maybe link it on the first page?

[Old Harry]

Turn 157

Maybe Dhal will scratch plako a bit?


Although maybe not. Plako has another 7 Knights following on. And we got our 85% Merchant. A question for our two Great Merchants - do we take the 1300 gold for Stray Geese, reveal them to Ichabod to get 1500 gold each in Spring Breeze or wait for Stray Geese to grow back to size 8 or Agincourt to grow to 15 (three more turns)?


Found Suttree's stack. We can take Madrid with Knights and I *think* we can keep it. The stack then turns up two turns later and we flank it to bits with knights... (We have 12 now).


We'll finish Education this turn then start some universities.

Demos, power and other graphs.