RB Pitboss #1 SPOILER - Hatshepsut / India

[regoarrarr]

Okay - for my information, the following is the passive espionage costs

Passive Missions
Base Factor * (100+How much they have against you)

Demographics=0.3
City Visibility=1.2
Investigate=2
See Research=0.75

We are somewhere around 310 / 130 in EPs (I don't know if he's runnign the slider or (more likely) he just has a ton of courthouses).

So he very likely has city visibility on me, and probably will have Investigate before too terribly long

[regoarrarr]

Brief little update on T169. A few things going on.

Military buildup - in progress. I am up to 17 rifles, most of which are in various stages of making their way to Evendale and the front. I have been #2 in soldiers for several turns now, and I was unclear who was #1. I thought DSP looked ahead of me, and I have lost Exploit's graphs as he is espionaging me out the yingyang. But now that DSP got most of his army smacked down by Elkad, I can confirm that it was him who was ahead of me as I am now #1, and by quite a large margin. (Something like 939K to 808K). So I may tone down the aggressiveness of my buildup. I also have noted that Exploit has not whipped or drafted at all. He is in a golden age, so perhaps he's holding off until he's out of it. I had a spy in Pirates Pad, and she was moving in and out of his lands, to reduce chances of being caught, while checking on things every other turn.

But while deep in Incan lands, she went to move out, only to find that the border fence had been moved (he popped his 3rd ring). Annoyingly, that turn she was caught. Where is Sydney Bristow when you need her!

Tech - I am researching Steam Power, at about 445bpt. I will have it in 4 turns, on T173. DSP has reported that he will be done with Mil Trad on T171. I may slip in a few Universities and Observatories if I can push off all military, all the time. Also I can start Oxford in Cincinnati after a few more Unis.

Settling - A few turns ago I founded Forest Park in the north, which will be my NE/NP city. It is busy on its granary and then will go library. I can't start preserving till I get Sci Meth, which will probably be the next tech dsp researches. I did get an 86% odds G. Engineer, who is going to rush the National Park once I get Biology. I also have started on a settler to found the fish / horses city in my SW.

Operation Backdraft - I cooked this one up as a plan to slip a few units in Exploit's back lines (to the west of his island city). He has a pike on sentry duty, but I believe that due to forests there is one coastal tile that he can't see. I have a rifle and elephant that are going to land there next turn and make their way towards the Incan core. I also have the ISS Athens, my first frigate, who is heading that way.

[regoarrarr]

Few things

First - quick email off to sunrise

2 things.

#1 - annoyingly I forgot to log in after you gifted me that gold last turn so I lost a turn on Steam Power - still due in 4 :-(. And I could nto remember if you had enough gold to give me this turn, so I held off one of my upgrades. I currently have 251 gold and am at -227 gpt so if you need your gold for other folks this turn I'm good. If you have it to spare, I can use it to upgrade

#2 - do you still need all those garrison troops (Warriors / archers) I sent over? If you don't need any of them, I could use a few of them back for some of my smaller cities that are now size 6 and 7 and "whining"

I upgraded my musket and a 11/17 C2 Form Mace.

[regoarrarr]

Also - operation Backdraft is not going to be a raging success

Here is the area in question



I could only see the southern pike - so I thought I might be in business, but Exploit has a good sentry net up there. He can't kill my rifle in a forest, so I don't know if I will send them further west or not. You can see the ISS Athens (Frigate) heading west to cause some mayhem

Also, speaking of Exploit, he voted No rather than Defy to the AP resolution I proposed to stop the war against me. So it passed, and we are no longer at war. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not, or if he will just re-declare on me in 10 turns or what. I certainly plan to continue preparing as if we were at war.

[regoarrarr]

And, here is a shot at the power graph.



I am at 951K and the strongest rival is at 851K. I could have SWORN that it was in the 840s when I first logged in. Plako (Broker) did log in while I was in, and I see via CivStats that his score increased by 24 points when he logged in, so I am going to assume that he got Chemistry from Dreylin. Assuming that gives soldier points (yup - checked - 6000).

So perhaps Broker was (or now is) #2.

To investigate, sent an email out to the folks

Hey guys,

Do any of you have charts of Exploit and/or Broker? I am trying to figure out power here and having a hard time, since I am missing their charts.

Here is what I have for power - http://img63.imageshack.us/img63/2012/ci...ot0029.jpg

I am #1 - 951K
My strongest rival according to demos is 851K. I think that must be Broker, since when I was logged in, that number went up, coinciding (I am assuming) with Plako / broker logging in and increaseing 24 points, I am assuming from Chemistry from the Lins and the 6K soldier points that go with it.

The order as I can see it goes
regoarrarr, dsplaisted, kodii, munro, shadyforce, elkad, imhotep ,sunrise

but I don't know where to slot in broker and exploit

[regoarrarr]

Email off to exploit

Hey Exploit,

So it appears that we are no longer at war! Congratulations - shall we break out the champagne and kick back by the fire and sing Kum-ba-ya together, or what!?!? :-D

I was actually kind of surprised. I figured that you would defy. I don't know if you just figured it would fail, or didn't want to take the happiness hit from defying, or just figured you'd redeclare in 10 turns or whenever, or if maybe you decided to start a secret alliance with me to rule the world.

Yeah, yeah, the last one - that's the ticket!!!! :-P

Anyway just thought I would check in - talk to you later

[regoarrarr]

Reply from exploit

I suppose given your cowardly conduct thus far that I shouldn't be surprised that you went skittling under the robes of the priesthood to seek sanctuary. Feel free to redeploy those cannons and rifles along your western front elsewhere in your kingdom. I'm sure God will protect your western front since he is apparently on your side.

[regoarrarr]

Still working on Imhotep

Hey Imhotep,

It's funny - I was just thinking about you before I got your reply the other day. I figured I had plenty of time to think about things and plan my followup emails. I was not expecting such quick turnaround!! :-D

So what are you looking to do in this game? Is it just a matter of minimizing your time investment? Would you be interested in anything fun, should we be able to come up with something? Are you interested in helping or hurting any particular power? If anything, I would vote for myself as the power that you should most want to help (no, really? :-P ). After all, I'd be willing to bet that I have sent you more email than every other power combined (not that that is a reason in and of itself, of course)

You will have seen that I offered OBs in game, which I think you rejected (didn't have time to check thoroughly). If you are not wanting to attack someone, would you be willing to let me attack through your lands? Or, if you would prefer a no scouting clause, I'd take OB with no scouting if you want. I could also be interested in sending some Hindu missionaries your way.

I guess it's up to you. If you want to just muddle through the motions as you have been, that's fine. But I'm more than happy to try and work with you to figure out something that would interest / motivate you. Obviously it would require coming up with a different goal for this game, since as you pointed out in your email, it is unlikely that the Zulu will be winning this game. But that doesn't mean that you have to be miserably logging in every day to play turns in a game you have no interest in.

Vassaling is crude and probably not worth it even if you would agree, which I doubt that you would. And that's not necessarily what I mean anyways. I'm talking just crazy things (in true RB or Deviant Minds spirit). Whether it's something like trying to spread every religion to every city of yours, or seeing how close you can get to a Cultural victory before someone nukes you, or trying to arrange your cities so they have population 10-9-8-7-6 etc. Things like that. It would at least make things interesting

I just hate to see you (or anyone) "stuck" in an unenjoyable game. To your credit, you have stuck with it, when plenty of other civs have dropped out. And through no real fault of your own. You got a crappy capital, but more importantly, the map layout (with the civs so far apart) was in direct contrast to your choice of leader / civ. I don't know if you have been following the PB2 game, but had you been in that game instead, you would have undoubtedly been much more successful.

Anyway - just some thoughts - let me know what you think

I think it has a 5-15% chance of turning into someone useful, but I'm 99% sure I'm the only one who's trying.

Also replied to Exploit with basically a

[regoarrarr]

reply from dsp

I can see broker (plako), shadyforce, kodii, Elkad, and me in the graphs.

I am ahead of broker by a large margin in the graphs, although the defeat of my stack that was threatening Elkad may not have been registered yet. After me is Broker, shady, and Kodii, all close to each other in power. Finally at the bottom is Elkad.

Odd....

[regoarrarr]

Email from shadyforce replying to dsp but sent to the group

Quick update. After he attacked the survivors of your stack, I attacked the city to try and kill some weakened units. I ended up killing 2 Rifles, a Musket and a Cavalry. In his retaliatory strike, things didn't go well for him: He lost 2 Cats, a Rifle and 3 more Cavalry. I lost some units as well but not as much and I've retreated to the forest to try and survive/heal.

It looks like he's drafted 2 more Rifles. He must be on 100% culture slider at this stage!

Doesn't look like Utica will fall but he's drafted his Civ to the ground to save himself so I guess the runner up goal of getting rid of his ability to research has been satisfied. So what now? Have we any assault left in us or prepare for a Machine Gun led assault in the near future?