[SPOILERS] naufragar, Charriu, and Zalson's Threepenny Opera

[naufragar]

Remember back when I said Commodore seemed to be playing after someone? My work-time civstats compulsive refresh tells me that he just took (and kept!) a city off of superdeath. I wonder how close they are. It's killing me that our scout died so early. We could be real close to our neighbors but remain isolated by the southern desert. One feels for superdeath's pain. But one also feels for Commodore's delayed PB38-to-PB41 vengeance. (Not that someone would ever carry over feelings from one game to the next. )

I muse about the game during down time constantly, but mostly nothing comes of it. I was thinking about civics today, and specifically how good Spiritual is on this and other watery maps. We don't have quite enough luxuries to be particularly excited about slavery yet. On the other hand, caste system with its workshops is probably going to be great. Food for thought.

[Charriu]

Oh boy. Can't wait to read Commodore's threat later. What a coincidence that he started next to Superdeath right in their next game. But looking a bit closer at civstat, I'm not so sure that you are right. Superdeath score dropped from 90 to 87 during Commodore's turn and before he finished the turn.
First of all I don't think Commodore kept any city otherwise his score must have increased the moment Superdeath lost points. His score only increased with the regular turn increases.
Second It's only a drop by 3 points which is really strange. Could be just a tile flipped from Superdeath, but then again a tile flip during Commodore's turn at this point in the game seems rather strange.

EDIT Forgot my second point. I totally missed that 3 points is 1 pop in these game settings. But I think I'm right in that Commodore didn't keep a city. Superdeath's city was propably autorazed.

[naufragar]

You're absolutely right. I think vicarious blood lust got the better of me. Civstats is a beautiful thing, but it's not an atomic clock. Especially around turn rolls it can display data a little strangely.

I completely forgot that Commodore would've had to gain points if he grabbed a city. I think even if the city autorazed, civstats would display Commodore increase, supderdeath decrease, Commodore decrease, but I could be wrong. So maybe I'm completely wrong about the city capture? Maybe that score decrease came after the turn rolled and it's a pop point being starved away?

I don't think it's land points. I can check in a few hours, but I think each land tile is something like 1.3 points.

Rats. This might be a false alarm. Sorry Charriu and Zalson.

[Charriu]

No, no you are absolutely right. Commodore attacked one of Superdeath's cities and it was autorazed. I asked this in my PB40 and somebody told me that if a city is autorazed then there's no score increase for the attacking player and only a decrease for the defending player.
The fact that the lurker thread is a lot more active is also a sign of Commodore's successful revenge.

[Zalson]

That or superdeath planted right on Commodore. superdeath seems to favor high variance strategies; this would be the essence of that. And this time it failed as he started next to Protective Mali (i think?)

[Zalson]

Sorry for the inanity of these comments lately. I feel like this guy.

   

[naufragar]

First things first:

Come into my mind and share my madness with me.

QotM?

Thanks for the reports, they make this game fun to check up on every day.

Thanks Fenn! Sorry I missed this in my excitement about the city raze. I'm glad you're enjoying it. I worry I haven't been able to put enough time into reporting. (Which must make it rough for ded lurkers when they could be reading Commodore war reports, an RB joy.) I haven't been able to give this game my full focus. For example, I've slacked off about C&D. I haven't been tracking cities and techs, which would be very useful now. I could go back and do it; I've saved the screens, but it would be a mountain of work. Commodore got Archery on turn 14 and proceeded to build a Skirmisher. I wish I had tracked his builds and cities closer after this. But let's try to guess. Before Archery he had Mining, Wheel, and Hunting. Archery before Agri/Pottery/Bronze Working isn't inconceivable, but given how cheap Archery is in RtR, if there's no pressing need, why not wait to slot it in until later? So, assumption #1: Around this time he met Superdeath, either superdeath's territory or his scout.

Let me do a little player analysis (or, rather, tea leaf reading). Superdeath favors high variance plays, as Zalson has put it. I think Zalson is including a lot of different things under that heading: wonders, tech path, aggression. I haven't followed superdeath's games too closely, but the screaming stand out feature of his reporting seems to be aggression. I won't spoil anything from his other games. (A downside of playing so many games is that people can't talk about your stuff in other threads. Or maybe it's an upside!   ) He is always on the look out for vulnerability. Is someone busy fighting someone else? Do I have a unique unit or other military advantage? Superdeath is predator, not prey.

Now take Commodore (and also Pind! But Pindicator certainly isn't going to be lobbying for less bloodshed.    ). He gained a reputation as a Montezuma-esque shark, or a shark-esque Montezuma, especially after showing his prowess in ancient era warfare. He's said somewhere that grinding ancient era warfare is a specialty of his. (Don't ask me where.) Plus he, like me I think, enjoys civ as much for the numbers as for the story that gets mapped on to the numbers. He marries this story to his reading of player psychology. (His opponent analyses are treats.)

So, we have superdeath, who is very open about being hyper-aggressive and who has shanked Commodore before, and we have Commodore, who prides himself on reading the player behind the civ and being a fair hand at early war. My guess? Commodore met superdeath and immediately went on the war path. Strike or be ye struck, etc.

Now, global lurkers can laugh at how wrong I am, but hopefully it keeps my ded lurkers entertained!  

Hopefully all the players I try to read take it in the spirit of good nature I intend, but the turn report:


Finally remembered to take a picture of the island. We found horses on it, which is nice. It might not be an island. It extends northwest and I think there's coast due east of the boat. (But I'm doing staring at water tiles...)

The barb is playing coy.



Our landmass continues.


My gut tells me there's seafood in the fog to the west that we've past, but that warrior has places to go and neighbors to meet. Some nice lighthouse-able lakes, though.

I hope demos don't tell the whole story this early, but here they are.


They aren't terrible.

I'm currently building too many work boats, but that's my optimism that we'll have lots of seafood to hook up and islands to scout. Creative has been doing very good work this game, with cities 2 & 4 (Bonehoard & Bafford's) getting resources hooked up way earlier than they otherwise could have. I'm not feeling especially inconvenienced by Exp. We're building another worker and lots of work boats. It's been putting in its fair share.

[naufragar]

Ninja'd!

Zalson, if that's who I think it is, that makes me the rancor's keeper: soon to be heartbroken that the hero of the story killed the monster civ that only I could love.  

I think your read of superdeath is anything but inane, and I hope I'm giving enough detail to make ded lurking possible.

I searched for what I thought was the Commodore quote. I mis-remembered, but the actual quote is even more revealing.

Ancient and classic era wars can be successful...about one out of every twenty times. The setup here probably isn't the best for it, though, with nobody so newbie or passive as to be worth hitting...

Although I certainly wouldn't call superdeath passive, and with many games under his belt, I'm more of a newbie.  

[Charriu]

Let me do a little player analysis (or, rather, tea leaf reading). Superdeath favors high variance plays, as Zalson has put it. I think Zalson is including a lot of different things under that heading: wonders, tech path, aggression. I haven't followed superdeath's games too closely, but the screaming stand out feature of his reporting seems to be aggression. I won't spoil anything from his other games. (A downside of playing so many games is that people can't talk about your stuff in other threads. Or maybe it's an upside!   ) He is always on the look out for vulnerability. Is someone busy fighting someone else? Do I have a unique unit or other military advantage? Superdeath is predator, not prey.

Now take Commodore (and also Pind! But Pindicator certainly isn't going to be lobbying for less bloodshed.    ). He gained a reputation as a Montezuma-esque shark, or a shark-esque Montezuma, especially after showing his prowess in ancient era warfare. He's said somewhere that grinding ancient era warfare is a specialty of his. (Don't ask me where.) Plus he, like me I think, enjoys civ as much for the numbers as for the story that gets mapped on to the numbers. He marries this story to his reading of player psychology. (His opponent analyses are treats.)

So, we have superdeath, who is very open about being hyper-aggressive and who has shanked Commodore before, and we have Commodore, who prides himself on reading the player behind the civ and being a fair hand at early war. My guess? Commodore met superdeath and immediately went on the war path. Strike or be ye struck, etc.

Superdeath might be hyper-aggressive, but he has one big weakness: Lack of focus. With 4 simultaneous PBs running and real life you can't do good micro-plans and detailed plans. And with Superdeath loosing one city and Commodore being his neighbor I wouldn't be to afraid. If Commodore keeps hitting Superdeath, then it will take some time, as Superdeath is also a determined defender.

Finally remembered to take a picture of the island. We found horses on it, which is nice. It might not be an island. It extends northwest and I think there's coast due east of the boat. (But I'm doing staring at water tiles...)

Boy am I glad that we are CRE with all those awkwardly placed food resources. The plains tile 1SE of the mountain is propably the best tile so far there.

Our landmass continues.


My gut tells me there's seafood in the fog to the west that we've past, but that warrior has places to go and neighbors to meet. Some nice lighthouse-able lakes, though.

That place won't be settled early, so you have some time to explore this. You can use one of your workboats for that. It might be a good idea to avoid the coast with the warrior and leave that exploration to a work boat.

I'm currently building too many work boats, but that's my optimism that we'll have lots of seafood to hook up and islands to scout. Creative has been doing very good work this game, with cities 2 & 4 (Bonehoard & Bafford's) getting resources hooked up way earlier than they otherwise could have. I'm not feeling especially inconvenienced by Exp. We're building another worker and lots of work boats. It's been putting in its fair share.

How many are you building. I don't find it to bad building some of them. They are very cheap scouts and this map being Big and Small you will get good use out of them. Like I already said being CRE is so important with this terrain.

[naufragar]

Sneaky barb:


All the tundra and snow covered trees make me think we're reaching a pole. And our warrior doesn't even have a shirt.

But I'm burying the lede:


We found a neighbor. As you know, I'm not so good with colors. I think that's Rusten? If it's Commodore or superdeath, please let me know. Assuming it's Rusten, it might be his cap. Rusten is Spi/Pro, so unless he built a monument or barracks this early (possible given that this is a natural map), a colony wouldn't be able to pop borders. I've talked a bit about Rusten back when I reviewed all the players. He's very good and has tons of experience. He's not a bloodthirsty savage, so that's nice, but he won't shy away from conflict. Spi/Pro edge our Exp/Cre out in the later game, so let's hope we gain an edge before then. Again, Rusten is good. I don't enjoy the prospect of staring down Gaelic Warriors buffed by Protective walls, but we're going to plant on his landmass anyway.

I put those signs down before I saw Rusten. I agree with you, Charriu. I like that spot for a first overseas city. I think the hill is a natural second. It'll pick up fish [EDIT: I'm a fool who didn't turn on resource icons. There's fish 2W of that hill]; it'll work the horse while it waits for borders to pop, and it's on a hill for when Rusten inevitably tries something. Rusten probably knows from PB38 that I like sending scouting work boats on long treks, so hopefully he can't C&D exactly when this one came out. If we plant these couple cities, if we're lucky, it could be a while before Rusten finds out we've set up shop on his continent, which would be awesome.   Speaking of continents, there's an outside chance that this is still our own continent that just snakes around bizarrely. I'll be cranky if that's the case.

Here's an overview:


I was exaggerating a tad when talking about the work boats. Cragscleft just finished one and it will scout a bit and then return to hook up fish for our Rusten-land city. On our eastern coast, we're building two work boats: one for Bafford's clams, another for scouting. That last could go down to the very southern fish, but I don't have a plan to settle that for a bit. The capitol will finish slow building its worker and switch to a settler. The worker on the flood plains is a turn away from completing a cottage. It and the new worker will put chops into the settler. We probably whip. Haven't figured it out. Cragscleft does not complete that axe. It switches to a galley when sailing completes. Next turn, Bonehoard finishes its work boat and switches to a spear. We want to have an axe and settler on the first galley trip, a spear and a worker on the second. We'll have to borrow our sole axe for the ride, but he gets replaced quickly. After Sailing, I think we want Archery, just for cheap deterrence. It slows down our Great Library date, but I think it's necessary.