RPB3 SPOILERS Bismarck of India (regoarrarr, darrelljs, sooooo, sunrise089)

[regoarrarr]

With 5 picks done (Willem, Pacal, Lizzie, Pericles and Darius), we regrouped

me:

So 5 down, we are 4th. On sunrise's list that are still available

Sury, Hatty, Peter, Isabella and Mansa. Additionally Capac and Bismark from my list

My order is:

Sury (exp/cre)
Mansa (Spi/Fin)
Hatty (spi/cre)
Capac (Ind/Fin) - no Ind leaders taken yet
Izzy (Exp/Spi)
peter (Exp/phi)
Bismark (Ind/Exp)

sooooo chimes in for the first time

My top 5:

Mansa
Ragnar
Surya
HC
Peter

I think Ragnar needs more loving - aggressive and financial are both
good throughout the whole game. Mmmm, Ragnar of the Zulu ...

me

Ragnar of the Zulu - now where have we seen that go wrong.... :-)

As I was talking to sunrise, I was reminded that we also have the options of Inca and India making their way towards us. That does leave us with 16th or 17th leader pick so we'd have to be sure we really wanted that. Are there any other civs you'd consider taking over one of these leaders?

darrell

I have a lot of love for Ragnar, he's my favorite FIN leader left. Sunrise rated AGG only a 3 so it might be my SP bias showing. Another example of that is I really don't have much love for India. Fast Workers are nice, I recognize the turn advantage they give, but unless this is a AW chop fest I don't see them as that powerful.

Anyway you all have Sury in your top 3, so I guess he's our pick if still available.

Note the first glimmers of the idea of taking a civ first.

[regoarrarr]

More talking of taking a civ first

me

The thing that I think is so good about India is the ability in a game like this to really plan out your moves, you can do so much with the fast worker

sooooo

If Inca or India are available then we should take them over any of
the leaders IMO. We can then pick up pretty much any expansive civ on
the way back and have our choice of half-price terraces or cheaply
whipped fast workers. I'm sure we can get someone like Peter or Izzy
on the way back.

me:

Incas went to Jowy - so we are 3rd up now and have

India
Sury
Mansa
Ragnar

In my mind that is the order that people have been describing - does anyone feel strongly about a) anyone else included in that group of 4 or b) the order in which we pick them?

I agree that we should be able to get a decent Expansive civ (Izzy or Bismarck or Peter) on the way back, even picking 16th. Plus, we can screw over the Incas by leaving them with what we don't want :-)

So if we could get a yea / nay on this, it will help us move things along.

[regoarrarr]

me again

Things moving fast - Ragnar and Sury were the 2 picks before us.

Seems like India is the way to go, right? Confirmations appreciated

sooooo

My vote is for India. It would be nice if we could get Surya on the way back!

darrelljs

I still think the India pick is silly, but I can't offer a compelling leader as an alternative choice and in any case it looks like I am outvoted.

That's right!

[regoarrarr]

Okay so now that we have a civ, what leaders are we looking to get? We'll have 16th choice of leaders, so obviously all the top leaders will be gone and many of the mid-range leaders will too.

Our thoughts in taking India there are that there are only a few TOP civs (and leaders). And since all the really good top-flight leaders were gone, there's not a whole lot that separates say, the 7th best leader from the 8th (or 9th or 17th). But just like in leaders, there are only a few really good civs, and being able to take the 2nd best civ (well, 2nd pick - the exact rankings are subjective of course) with the 16th leader seemed like a better idea than taking the 9th best civ and 9th best leader.

sooooo

OK. Can't believe India made it down to ninth but all the better for
us! Now time for a leader. I'm definitely in favour of expansive now
we have India. Pacal and Surya have gone, but there are still some
nice ones left.

Izzy, Peter and Bismarck have been mentioned. Joao is still there too
and there's always Mehmed. Bismarck could be good to give us
half-price forges. Half price granaries and forges would get our
cities up (and whipping) in no time at all. With all those opponents
getting wonders may not be very likely, but the forges I think are
very good.

sunrise

Why do you dislike India so much Darrell? I know I'm no micro king,
but I think India is excellent. A few reasons why:

*The natural snowball nature of civ - 1 turn hooked up earlier corn ->
2 turn earlier mine -> 3 turn earlier city -> etc. I think India does
this better than anyone else.
*We have almost guaranteed synergy. We all consider expansive at least
a top-4 trait right? And only a few traits have obvious synergy with
UUs, much less throughout the game. AND even poor leaders, like Mao
are OK with India.
*Civ first just makes a lot of sense with the unanimous top leaders
(Exp/Cre, Exp/Fin, Cre/Fin) off the board. There are two civs that are
as powerful as a good leader, perhaps 4-5 other decent civs, and all
of the others are pretty irrelevant. Now that we have India we want an
Exp leader, of which like 8 remain. That's more than the remaining
number of good civs IMHO.
*India remains tactically useful for the entire game. Not only roading
for war and emergency defensive chops, but also chops when new cities
are planted. It's wonderful to deny the enemy the ability to put units
in your forests right away.

me:

We'll be able to tell by our pick (16th of leaders) whether there are any other Ind leaders out there (Gotta figure tehre will be) but if there aren't many, then Bismark is attractive.

Our options are, if we assume Exp

Imp - Joao
Ind - Bismark
Spi - Isabella
Phi - Peter
Pro - Mao
Org - Mehmed
Agg - Shaka
Chm - Washington

sunrise

Quite right!

My ranking of Exp leaders:

Pacal - TAKEN
Sury - TAKEN
Peter - It's a repeat, but as long as there is food this lets us get
the synergy and a top-10 leader.
Bismarck - Agree with sooooo the forges are better than the wonder boost.
Issy - Spiritual adds a long-term trait.
Shaka - See above in the email chain re: benefits of Agg.
Mehmed - There won't be much land per civ, so we've gotta hope for
torroidal again if we get this.
Mao - I actually don't hate this, because it lets us feel a little
safer even with expansion.
Joao - Others like Imp more, but if we can settle a second city on
copper or something and don't mind chopping we could probably then
out-expand everyone.
Washington - The best horse rushing civ, but that's pretty much it.

-sunrise

That said, would we consider any non-Exp leaders? Perhaps if only
Washington was left but Mansa was still out there? I can see taking
Mansa or Hatty over some of the Exp leaders, but that's about it.

darelljs

I guess I build so many Workers that I don't really need fast ones in most of my SP games! Anyway, picking India was worth it just to see sooooo's post about our "slightly better jails" ;-).

From Dan's list I guess Mao/Mehmed/Washington are out. I'd rank Peter first with tech trading on, but since we played him already, Joao could be fun. Bismark...in this game do we really plan on going for a lot of wonders? Lot of civs out there. Shaka and Isabella for some reason don't interest me, but I recognize they are effective.

Again, you see us again not listening to anything that darrell is saying. We're kind of jerks like that.

Also, just want to point out that we're first to the 2nd page of our spoiler thread

[regoarrarr]

me again, after an overnight of picking

Okay so overnight Peter and Mehmed were both taken. So with the 5th pick of leaders, we have available

Bismark exp/ind
Isabella exp/spi
Shaka exp/agg
Mao exp/pro
Joao exp/imp
Washington exp/chm
Hatty spi/cre
Mansa spi/fin

My guess is that we are going to see Shaka of Rome. My order would be

Bismark (we have seen no Ind civs though you have to figure Huayna fin/ind will be taken). While we may not be doing too many wonders, if we're the only Ind civ that's huge, not to mention cheap forges and granaries.
Isabella
Joao
Mansa
Shaka
Hatty (I'm already Hatty of the Indians in pb1)
Washington
Mao

darrelljs

Discounting Hatty, I'd order it:

Shaka
Joao
Isabella
Mansa
Bismark

darrell......what did we tell you?

sunrise chimes in

Today I like...

Bismark
Isabella
Joao
Shaka
Mansa
Hatty
Mao
Washington

sooooo

Hmm, Mansa Musa is certainly tempting. Out of the expansive civs
though I like Bismarck the best, closely followed by Shaka and
Isabella.

Hmm, Financial + Spiritual vs the expansive synergy with our fast worker ...

One thing we need to consider is how are we going to get our border
pops. We probably aren't going to be creative. So we could go for
monuments, religion or stonehenge. The latter makes bismarck
attractive. As India we start with mysticism and mining, right?

sunrise

If we get Bismark, we need to consider our wonder priority. Obviously
we can't do TOO many wonders without making ourselves vulnerable. I
like...

*Oracle IF we can land Metal Casting -> Colossus
*Great Lighthouse
*Stonehenge

I take sooooo's point about border pops. Of course we also start with
Mysticism, so we could always go for a religion if things follow the
RBP2 pattern. If it's RBP1 though then it's anyone's guess who will
land them.

Incidentally, I made the following argument to regoarrarr, in
opposition to taking Mansa (despite him being my second favorite
leader to play): If we go Exp+Ind, at X turns in we'll have 1 extra
worker. If X is before GLighthouse falls we can use that worker to do
nothing but chop out the wonder. Once we land GLighthouse we're
basically gold-neutral with Financial for much of the game. The way I
see it, all of the workers we produce after turn X, plus the granary
bonus and free health, only has to be weighed against the hammers for
the GLighthouse. I think we easily come out ahead there.

No matter what we should land Colossus. After all we get a bonus on
the wonder and its prerequisite.

me:

Okay we're on deck with only the Byzantines to pick before us. I think that we should keep in mind too that the Incans are behind us, and will almost certainly pick an Expansive leader. So if we pick Expansive, then we take one away from them, and force them to pick a "lesser" pick. Note too that Joao of the Incans is still a potential.

Shaka - sunrise 4th, me 5th, darrell - 1st, sooo-2nd
izzy - sunrise 2nd, me 2nd, sooo 3rd, darrell not listed
Bismarck - sunrise 1st, me 1st, sooo 1st, darrell 5th.

Of Exp leaders, Incans have the choice of Bismark (Ind), Joao (Imp), Izzy (Spi), Shaka (Agg), Mao (Pro) and Washington (Chm). Shaka probably out since quechua's already start with C1. Joao possibly out due to pb1

Bismark looks like the clear winner except that we (once again) stomp all over darrell :-)

So we ended up, as you can see, with Bismarck of the Indians. More overall strategy thoughts to follow

[BobRoberts]

Cheers for the update on the selection process!

Interesting to see how the choice was arrived at and it all looks cool.

Felt it was a real shame with the events in RBP2 - I was enjoying your thread. Am rooting for you in this one!

And this shoud help with the thread spam contest.

[regoarrarr]

Okay so now what? Our cheap buildings are granaries, harbors, forges and wonders, and of course we get cheaper and faster workers.

Sunrise had some wonder thoughts up thread, but we're probably going to go for Stonehenge (to get free border pops in our cities) and the Colossus and GLighthouse are also attractive.

We're also going to try to not die early on. Yes, that is a key part of our strategy.

We will use the next few turns to hash out what we are trying to do, both short, mid and long-term.

[regoarrarr]

Cheers for the update on the selection process!

Interesting to see how the choice was arrived at and it all looks cool.

Felt it was a real shame with the events in RBP2 - I was enjoying your thread. Am rooting for you in this one!

And this shoud help with the thread spam contest.

Thanks! (on both counts). And of course I want to welcome you to our thread, with a(nother) post!

[darrelljs]

I pasted in darrell's emails, even though as you will see, we pretty much end up ignoring everything that he said .

You fell into my trap completely...how can I be the fall guy if you ignored everything I said ? I have to admit I sure do look stupid showing no love for India when pretty much everyone else thinks they are the cat's meow.

I have a request for the lurkers. I'm dying to start this game and begin the slow process of repairing our reputation (sooooo, you also suck now by association)...can you in a non-spoilerish way tell us if the map is almost ready?

Darrell

[darrelljs]

Thanks! (on both counts). And of course I want to welcome you to our thread, with a(nother) post!

Speaking of another post, feel free to spam my PBEM2 thread, found here. Obviously don't click that link if you are playing in PBEM2 .

Darrell