[Spoiler] PB42: Rusten and mackoti play Krill playing Bismarck of Portugal

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

Players have that be careful after they see starts for the first time so they don't come across as whiny little bitches, so...

Thanis for the map Mardoc

People think that Boudicca is the ultmate warmonger. She isn't. If you pick Boudicca, you actually have to play "Civ City" and spend all of the time and effort managing and growing the economy. And then, if you reach the late game and you have a good enough economy, you win.

EXP balances out those weakness in a leader/civ combo. Shaka doesn't need to focus on the economy so much, because he spends less on workers so he can spend those hammers on military. Old Bismark could focus on getting that early wonder without getting run over 30 turns later by HA. Pacal can get his cottages down faster and more easily, and get them grown sooner. It lets Izzy build an empire so there is more to micromanage, more to wring out of it via civic abuses. EXP covers the weaknesses and lets the other trait be used more, and that is why it is a good trait.

Re: Boudica - Keeping up in expansion is a full time job, especially if you have easy-REX trait neighbors, but a job that can be managed if done correctly. You pay full price for early game expansion, leaving fewer resources available to harass neighbors with military like you really want to do, but you are also able to get away with borderline/aggressive settlements because no one wants to mess around with permawar Boudica even if all you have is a paper cutout army. That's a dead end road to mediocrity at best, and elimination at worst. Expansion traits (IMP/EXP), alternately, let you settle cheaply enough that you have spare hammers to invest in actual military but the difference is that you HAVE to build that military, or metagame perfectly wrt your neighbors and hope/be confident that they won't invade and take your stuff. Of the two, it's always cheaper to bluff your way into good expansion. Boudica just lets your bluff be more credible and not worth the risk of getting into a gristle-chewing contest if someone tries to call the bluff.

[Krill]

And then someone picks Gandhi and culture bombs you and everything kicks off.

[Krill]

This is the down side to snake picks. You sit here waiting and then find out the player before you took your stuff.

[Krill]

If Lewwyn doesn't pick Bismarck, I'm picking him. If Lewwyn does shatter my dreams however, I'm thinking I pick Mehmed and take HRE on the rebound. I'm not sure on how good Myst is but Henge might be an option. I say that everyone though.

But back to Bismarck: I'm more sure if I want to pick Portugal and make a play for Colossus which I never obsolete with the Carracks covering galleon duty, or Carthage as a safer economic choice that doesn't obsolete or need pop to work commerce tiles, compared to the Feitoria.

[Krill]

Superdeath should have picked Fin Portugal and locked out the late game commerce.

He made that choice easy enough for me though.

[Rusten]

Congrats on landing a combo you wanted. I like Bismarck even in the "old" version so he should be super strong here.

Going for the early 2x HE? Your capital certainly has the production for it. That also means it has production for marvelous wonders of course. That said, many of the good ones with these settings require coastal access.

[Krill]

Thank you. I considered picking Carthage but without EXP I think I'd come to believe that's a mistake as the Cothon might be 40 hammers to far at the wrong time, and looking at Superdeath, I think he valued Bismarck as well. 60 extra hammers late game isn't an issue in the context of the Ren era and not having to bulb Astro. I'm pleased with this outcome, but let's see what combinations the others can put together. Lewwyn isn't exactly playing a weak option, and is covering what I perceive to be INDs weaknesses with that Mali pick.

And yeah, I looked at that start and just thought HE. 10 tiles to cottage, gotta chop two early on, no real way to guarantee the happiness to work them anyway,I'm just glad RtR has moved away from Academy capitals because this one is junk for that. IND can afford to dump one HE into the capital. Size 9 for 25hpt and size 16 for 40hpt, I think it depends on how much Market happy is around how effective it is going to be. But it's doable.

I'm looking Colossus from T0 though, so there is a plan for MC as the first Classical era tech, but then Currency rush if there are two market happy nearby can also work, and HE if we can find the 10XP unit is also. There are options here, just gotta scout now. I don't want to split that pig off from the capital, stuck at size 5 it's not the greatest production city.

[Krill]

Snakepick is almost done, but OT4Es civ choice is irrelevant, he can either pick Zulu on a big and small map or he picks something without UB synergy. Given we can't judge the value of his starting techs, I'm not concerned by it.

- OT4E - Tokugawa of ???
2 - Mr. Cairo - Julius Caesar of ???
3 - Superjm - Saladin of ???
4 - Gavagai - ??? of Inca
5 - Donovan Zoi - Willem of ???
6 - Elkad - ??? of America
7 - Old Harry - ??? of China
8 - Lewwyn - Qin Shi Huang of ???
9 - Krill - Bismark of ???
11- Superdeath - Huayna Capac of Carthage
12- Krill - Bismarck of Portugal
13 Lewwyn - Qin Shi Huang of Mali
14- Old Harry - Isabella of China
15- Elkad - Stalin of America
16- Donovan Zoi - Willem of Arabia
17- Gavagai - UP for leader of Inca
18- Superjm - Saladin of Rome.
19- Mr. Cairo - Julius Caesar of Aztec
20- OT4E - UP for civ

I think Superdeath picked weirdly, he is the one IND player that doesn't have anything supporting early game weaknesses. Superjm I think intended to pick either Carthage or Portugal for start techs, because I can't see why he picked Rome, other than for Preats. Fair enough if he did though. DZ has very cheap libraries (around 49 base hammers due to 70% production modifier. I don't see why Cairo picked Aztec: HRE have the same start techs, you don't get a gimped sword (you just get a bland Pike that actually has a function against maces and swords now) and you get a better UB. Unless Cairo is planning to do lots of 1 pop whips, but browner maps don't really work that way unless you are just one pop whipping military. Everyone else had a strategy of some description.

[Boldly Going Nowhere]

HC of Carthage just says coastal commerce to me. Financial coast + cothon trade routes. He's going to need spare hammers and with that combo I don't know how many hammers he has to spare.

I like several of these IND pairings. Stalin in particular is interesting with this mod. I hope that Elkad can give it a good test.

[Krill]

I think he should have picked Darius, Pacal or even Vicky, but Pacal would have been my choice if I was locked on Carthage. Everyone else has a sound pairing. OT4E seems to have no good options remaining though. Just...nothing.