I don't know if I need to put a bunch of useless text at the start of a thread or not since the forum move but here goes with some of my thoughts on the football (or soccer if you prefer) world cup.

Group A

Brazil
Mexico
Croatia
Cameroon

A deceptively strong group, Brazil are the clear favourites to progress but they aren't widely expected to win their home tournament after some less than stellar results over the past couple of years. I'm picking Mexico to finish runners up as they're usually a very solid team that doesn't get torn apart, with Hernandez up front they can always sneak goals. Croatia can beat anyone on their day however and shouldn't be discounted, I think they aren't working as well as a team right now though. I don't know too much about this Cameroon team but if they still have Eto'o (sp?) as their main goal threat I think they'll struggle.

Group B

Spain
Netherlands
Chile
Australia

I think anyone who's not Chilean will predict the 2 European teams topping the group, Chile are a good team though and could earn draws vs Spain and Netherlands if they stay compact and disciplined (this is the main problem for Chile IMO). Australia are unfortunately the whipping boys and will do well to get a single point. I think Spain are no longer unbeatable and the Dutch may top the group.

Group C

Colombia
Ivory Coast
Greece
Japan

One of the weakest groups, Colombia did well in qualifying but haven't done anything in a major tournament for a long time and frankly are fortunate to be so high in the world rankings. So its good for them that they avoided a strong European team and if they want to be taken seriously they need to top this group. Ivory Coast aren't the same threat as they were a few years ago with Drogba being older, but I would tip them to get slightly better results than the next 2. Greece are a solid but unspectacular team, they have no world class players but will rely on strong teamwork and a bit of luck to win or draw matches. Japan typically underachieve every tournament when they should be at least as strong as S.Korea, with one of their best players Kagawa not starting regularly at Man Utd, I don't expect them to have a happy WC.

Group D

Italy
Uruguay
England
Costa Rica

Maybe I'm just negative but as an Englishman I don't see England making it out of this group. Italy dominated England in the Euro's and although they aren't the best team themselves, I think they're good enough to get 2 wins in this group. Uruguay did well in the last WC and I wouldn't be surprised to see them replicate that performance. With some very talented individuals and a willingness to do whatever it takes to win, they could even top the group. England were unbeaten in qualification, but lost both recent friendlies at home, their main problem seems to be keeping possession and scoring goals at major tournaments and this is unlikely to change. Costa Rica might be able to scramble a 0-0 draw with England but are unlikely to achieve much more.

Group E

France
Switzerland
Ecuador
Honduras

Considering France struggled mightily to even make the tournament, they'll be delighted with the perfect draw. They won't be winning the WC but this group should be a cakewalk for them. Switzerland are bizarrely one of the highest ranked European teams (ahead of Italy and Netherlands???) but I'd expect them to have a tight game with Ecuador to decide who comes 2nd. I know very little about the Ecuador or Honduras teams.

Group F

Argentina
Bosnia
Nigeria
Iran

Easiest group to pick a winner from, if Argentina don't win all 3 group games they underachieved. After that its a tossup between Bosnia and Nigeria, I'm favouring Bosnia because they looked surprisingly good in qualifying. Expect Iran to put in a similar performance to N.Korea in the last WC. Their game with Argentina could see a lot of goals.

Group G

Germany
Portugal
USA
Ghana

Germany are my pick to win the WC so I naturally have to put them top of the group, I think they have strong individual talent backed up by the ever present German teamwork. After than its tricky to call, Portugal look to be utterly reliant on Ronaldo and that may be enough to get them into the last 16 but their game with USA might go either way. USA are solid but got a tough group, Ghana come last because I don't know anything about their current team.

Group H

Belgium
S.Korea
Russia
Algeria

Belgium are probably the most widely predicted team to fall flat on their faces this WC, they have plenty of well known players and they comfortably won their qualifying group, they've got 2 difficult games with S.Korea and Russia but you'd expect them to win 1 of them. S.Korea have a fairly good WC record and seem to have a knack of making it into the elimination rounds so I'm predicting they finish above Russia. The Russians can't be discounted but they are so unpredictable its hard to know what team will show up, they can top this group and cause major upsets if they're on their game but equally could lose to Algeria and go home with nil points. Algeria make every WC it seems and never make it out of the groups, expect more of the same from them.


My top 3 picks to win the tournament

1. Germany
2. Spain
3. Argentina

So, I am playing my first "real" FFH PBEM. It's certainly going to be a doozy.

If you are another player, leave now, for you have entered my domain.


But if you are here to witness my journey, welcome, for you are about to behold:

Here's the map and lurker thread. I'm kind of bummed, I sank a bit of time into a nice 6-man map and that's busted now. So. Um. Five players.

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I cant seem to find, what the probabilities of each terrain specials are. Does anyone know?

The Cat only grinned when it saw Alice. It looked good-natured, she thought: still it had VERY long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt that it ought to be treated with respect.

'Cheshire Puss,' she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. 'Come, it's pleased so far,' thought Alice, and she went on. 'Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?'

'That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat.

'I don't much care where—' said Alice.

'Then it doesn't matter which way you go,' said the Cat.

'—so long as I get SOMEWHERE,' Alice added as an explanation.

'Oh, you're sure to do that,' said the Cat, 'if you only walk long enough.'

Alice felt that this could not be denied, so she tried another question. 'What sort of people live about here?'

'In THAT direction,' the Cat said, waving its right paw round, 'lives a Hatter: and in THAT direction,' waving the other paw, 'lives a March Hare. Visit either you like: they're both mad.'

'But I don't want to go among mad people,' Alice remarked.

'Oh, you can't help that,' said the Cat: 'we're all mad here. I'm mad. You're mad.'

'How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice.

'You must be,' said the Cat, 'or you wouldn't have come here.'

Alice didn't think that proved it at all; however, she went on 'And how do you know that you're mad?'

'To begin with,' said the Cat, 'a dog's not mad. You grant that?'

'I suppose so,' said Alice.

'Well, then,' the Cat went on, 'you see, a dog growls when it's angry, and wags its tail when it's pleased. Now I growl when I'm pleased, and wag my tail when I'm angry. Therefore I'm mad.'

'I call it purring, not growling,' said Alice.

'Call it what you like,' said the Cat. 'Do you play croquet with the Queen to-day?'

'I should like it very much,' said Alice, 'but I haven't been invited yet.'

'You'll see me there,' said the Cat, and vanished.

Alice was not much surprised at this, she was getting so used to queer things happening.

So, I was doing some spelunking in 1.3.1's orion.exe, looking for further information on the back of this (while that tells me the different biases for personality traits for the races, it didn't tell me what the biases are with respect to race goals)

And before that I found the list of planetary names, the list of colours, the default names of the colony planets and all the other default planets... and then I found the original race names listed in there. Starting at 0x21e90, I find Human, Feline, Silicoid, Saurian, Mentat, Avian, Klackon, Ursoid, Meklar, Nazguul. Yup, in Star Lords, the Darloks were called Nazguul, which cracks me up to this day.

I'm just intrigued that these are still listed in the exe, since they're not used anywhere. There's also some default emperor names I don't remember having ever seen - Durash IV for Humans, an entry of Zygot for Psilons (but not the one with the extra space in it)

MYKI welcomes you to His thread on AlaePB1. Fashionably late, as ever, but since He has recently come into contact with Zanth’s warrior He felt His humble people may be of some interest to lurkers...

By way of introduction (since this is my first appearance in RB, despite having followed Gavagai’s PB12 and Bacchus’ PB13 efforts closely and read through some of the classic games – I particularly enjoyed the PB8 exodus), this is my second PitBoss, both with this group of players and ever. I am partly writing to prove to Gavagai that I am real and not a construct created by Bacchus to taunt him (more on that later), but also to learn. On a good day I win SP as an Emperor (more good days now since I have learnt that the farmer’s gambit is not always the way to go). If, therefore, I’m doing something stupid – and, let’s face it, I am - please do not hold back in telling me so. Get rowdy.

Anyway, it’s T45 at the moment. As it happens, I took some screenshots at T1, so I am able to provide a bit of context. Not much, but a bit...

Here's for hoping that it goes better this time around

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turn -1 have been done with Drafting Mardoc for support role

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Leader Ranking

Flaulus of Calabim
Rhoanna of Hippus
Hannah of Lanun

other picks that was interesting but in the end neutered was Beeri of Lurichup and Varn of Malakim