[SPOILER] No, it is I, superjm, who is behind you!

[DaveV]

Oh ffs   This isn't too bad I guess, this city wasn't growing into anything useful anyway right now and the settler is coming out in two turns regardless. Just annoying is all.

Yeah, the most frustrating events for me are the ones that say "here's a bad thing, which you could have avoided if you had different palace mana."

If I get the bard, I bulb Drama...

What, have you researched Education already?

[superjm]

If I get the bard, I bulb Drama...

What, have you researched Education already?

Yeah, several turns ago. Need Education for cottages and Apprenticeship after all. Mentioned this on T53 (starting to see how turn-by-turn reports can be quite convenient )

[superjm]

Ooooh boy

T73



Oh hey, a free Mobility scout, I'll take that any day of the week. And I indeed did get a Bard at the end of the turn, now just gotta hope no one is one turn off from Drama

T74



That's a no, so I do bulb drama and revolt as planned, buuuut, we now get an idea of what Auro has been doing. I'm glad he's not my immediate neighbor or else I'd be in real trouble.

T75



Getting Bronze Working now means I can chop the sugar in my new city and chop the jungles covering certain useful resources while also getting Sanitation sooner. On the other hand, Masonry/Construction lets me get the marble and will let me start irrigating farms to the western area where there's no fresh water to speak of. I'm torn on which path to go for, but I'll bank some gold in the meantime.

T76



Or not   Well this is a doozy of a turn. So someone got a Great Engineer last turn from what I imagine was the GE event, Bob finishes Bone Palace this turn to start his golden age, and then Auro starts his own Golden Age (with the Engineer?) and pops Stasis. Well I'm glad I bulbed Drama now instead of doing literally anything else or I would well be screwed right now

[DaveV]

Stasis was altered in one of the recent revisions so that it has a shorter duration (8 turns?) and gives a golden age.

[superjm]

I suspected it was something like that, but I didn't see anything about it skimming through the changelog. I wonder how early this change was made...

[superjm]

And we're back. The turns were a bit more eventful than expected considering the whole lot of nothing going on development-wise.

T77



Traded some maps and got open borders with Auro and Cairo and found one of those annoying priests hanging around.

T78



And here's Cairo's capital, for what it's worth. Unfortunately both Bob and Cairo had settlers out when Stasis hit so they were able to at least get their 6th cities down while waiting for it to end.

T79



Oh hey another good event. I rolled a 28 here which is solid enough, that's more or less a full turn of research right there.

T80



Ah, I see, Auro is using his priests to take out the barb cities around his empire. I presume the one out east will be taken cared of soon enough.

T81



Good news: I captured a spider on defense, giving me some strong and sturdy invisible scouting when it heals up  Bad news: That mobility scout I got? Yeah, it died to a lion at 97% odds attacking, and only one response is appropriate at this point                

T82



Roll over turn with nothing of interest happening and we're (I think?) back in business starting next turn. Funny how I'm still top score, CRE really skews that rather heavily because of how much faster my border pops are.

[superjm]

Lots and lots of turns over the weekend, hard to keep track of how long ago certain events were

T83



If my research rate appears low, that's because it is. Turns out that after Stasis my cities have no trade routes at all which is costing me something like 11 commerce this turn. It corrects on the turn rollover though so that's good.

T84



Stasis did give me some time to mull over my tech path, and I decided that Construction it is. Jungle chops is small potatoes compared to being able to irrigate farms to more barren areas and get workshops down in production-dominant spots, and my science should be good enough that I can do both in short order.

T85



Growing my expansions gives me an opportunity to get a bunch of warriors out so I can take on that barb city down south once Bronze Working rolls in. I'm hoping 8 warriors plus scouts to clean up should be enough but given my combat luck in this game I may decide to go a bit higher than that before the time comes.

T86



The C1 is from killing a spider on defense somehow, so with a fully healed griffon I'm confident in roaming around to get some wandering scouts if possible.

T87



Changed the dye settle to here at the last minute, partially to grab the third dye and partially to share better tiles near Alpha Centauri. Other settler is going next to the incense down south by the way.

T88



Also forgot to mention that last turn two great people were born, one from Auro reaching Military Strategy (scary!) and a (un?)lucky roll from the Bone Palace's small number of engineer points.

T89



Gonna get a city down here as well. It's a bit crummy without help but Sanitation-Agrarianism should take care of that, and I'd like to deny Cairo from getting one of those mana nodes if I can.

[superjm]

T90



I was considering detouring to Warfare for FotT but I'm positive Auro is already building it, if not nearly finished with it.

T91



Construction finishes and with it I also get Sanitation. Growing all the new cities I plan on putting down should be a lot easier now, not to mention I get cheap Public Baths for being CRE 

T92



Take an opportunity to kill a Warrior who stepped out of the city. Warriors have been periodically attacking into my super-promoted warrior from that hill so the city's defenders have been kept low. Any additional units I don't have to kill in the city is a plus.

T93



Auro has adepts everywhere and already has Body Mana improved. He's starting to get scary, and I think Cairo is going to end up having a bad time in very short order.

T94



After BW, going Writing to get a library in my key commerce cities but more importantly to be able to build research in case of emergency research projects. Then to KotE to get Mage Guilds and my own Adepts going and then we'll see if I need to go Alteration et al immediately or can finally go for FoL.

T95



Annnd there it is. No doubt the city was immediately taken down by those Priests. Let's hope Flauros can defend for a while so that Auro doesn't snowball too heavily, but this game may already be over if he can't.

T96



No other notable developments on the Calabim front, but Bob does have Barnaxus. Need to keep an eye on his borders, will use the spider I captured to do just that in a couple turns.

[superjm]

T97



Auro captures another city from Cairo, those priests are doing work. Seems like Cairo has properly fortified his capital though which is nice, I need him to hold out as long as possible.

T98



Meanwhile back at home, the day of reckoning is upon us and Nininsnal will fall. 10 warriors with a scout in the back as backup takes care of the four defenders with only five losses, a slightly better than expected outcome  And because I'm a nice guy, here's the combat log for this fight.




T99



Keeping an eye out on the Calabim front. Auro doesn't seem to have much more than those 3 priests to act as true firepower (though they are continually hasted of course) so it'll be difficult for him to push without putting his valuable wintry units at risk.

T100



And here's something we haven't seen to this point, some of Bob's territory. Been exploring with the spider and haven't been found yet, so it doesn't seem like he has any scouts mucking about.

T101



You may have noticed me teching Hunting, and that's cause I want to get a Hunting Lodge up at least here so I could upgrade some hunters in case Bob comes a knockin any time soon. Will probably get a Training Yard (and eventually the HE) in this city too as some bronze axes wouldn't hurt on defense either.

T102



Two more cities go down, leaving only 4 of my initial dot map spots remaining to be filled in eventually while I build economy/get geared up with units. Cairo got another city razed but it seems like that war has stalled out otherwise as he has bronze Bloodpets (I'm trading him copper for his palace mana) and Moroi reinforcing his other cities as far as I can tell.

[superjm]

T103



Quick pitstop to Warfare before going down Mysticism, for reasons. National Epic being one since I can build it real quick in my cap.

T104



Auro has mages and fire mana. Bad, bad news for Cairo, he probably isn't long for this world now. Need to get my guard up now ASAP.

T105



Spawned a Great Bard which I immediately popped for a Golden Age. And the reason for getting Warfare becomes clear, as I can switch to Conquest to reclaim all those lost hammers from all forested and/or plains farms I have improved. That'll mitigate growth a bit but given Auro's (and Bob's) climbing power I don't think I can afford to split hairs.

T106



As expected, Cairo's most fortified remaining city is taken out by ice elementals and fireballs, and I'm not sure there were many losses on his side.