Hello,

EDIT AGAIN: Once again, I'll be available to play this Friday at 6pm EST, or any other time around there based on others' schedules. I will also be playing from a cable-modem equipped house, so my latency and connection speed should be great.

If you are interested, you will want to pick up a copy of Teamspeak. Here are the official RB instructions for using it. One potential difficulty for new players however is the need for a password for the RB server. If you are going to play, I reccommend PM'ing Griselda or Sulla or another senior member and asking for it.

Gliese 581, planet recently discovered in the Libra system seems to about the right distance from its sun to have liquid water, which is essential to life as we know it.

Apparently this is the most likely planet of the ones they've discovered to have a chance at supporting life... and its "only" 20.5 light years away.

Not sure why it's called a "super-earth", though, unless it's just because the planet is bigger.

Surel Surlosol was running a similar build suggested by Soul Flayer most of her way to the Survivor title. I usually delete toons who don't make it to Indomitable Survivor, but I am having so much fun with this Sin I wasn't upset when she died half way to Indomitable, and I am keeping her Part of me was happy that now I can tweak and play her to the max without worrying about survival. Plus, she still has 20k to pay back to the coffer

And, she looks cool too. I have been known to delete toons halfway because I don't like the look anymore.
Armor - Exotic armor dyed deep purple except gloves and shoes in red
Weapon - Insightful Ghostly staff of Enchanting, and Sadi's Benediction (not shown)



Introducing a new tactical position and builds: Half Ranger. These characters play inbetween the front and mid line and often end up in melee range.
There are 2 major variations to my Half Ranger build.

The Paradox Caster draws its power from having only one attribute line to pump, leaving a lot of attribute points to do whatever you want: more damage, defense, AoE effects, party support, etc..

The build - A/x
Caster weapon with as much energy as possible
Armor - Your choice. Go with +energy if you find yourself running low on energy. I chose more defense since I will be at the front line and in melee range part time, and have no energy problem yet
Deadly Arts 16 (12+4)
Perfect fit for Mez secondary for Arcane/Echo

Deadly Paradox - All of your attack Skills are disabled for 10 seconds. For 5...16 seconds, your Assassin Skills activate and recharge 50% faster.
Cost 5, Recharge 10
This skill is a Stance and cannot be removed by enchantment removal. Not being an enchantment is both good and bad. It cannot be lengthen by +encht duration items/skills, otoh, there is no cast time and cannot be interrupted, and can be activated while performing other actions
Low cost, fast activation, fast recharge

Disrupting Dagger - Send out a Disrupting Dagger at target foe that strikes for 10...37 earth damage. If that foe was activating a Skill, that Skill is interrupted. This Spell has half the normal range.
Cost 5, Cast .25, Recharge 10
Even a fast cast Mes will have a hard time matching a Paradox Caster in the interruption department, and damage to boot. Fit it with Arcane Echo and/or Echo and you will have a non stop interrupter.


Crippling Daggers - Send out a Crippling Dagger at target foe. Crippling Dagger strikes for 15...51 earth damage if it hits, and cripples moving foes for 3...16 seconds. This spell has half the normal range.
Cost 5, Cast 1, Recharge 5
Not much use against foe rushing you but still good for kiting and to slow down foes rushing the back line. Unmatched crippling spammability.

Dancing Daggers - Send out three Dancing Daggers at target foe, each striking for 5...37 earth damage if they hit. Dancing Daggers has half the normal range. This skill counts as a lead attack.
Cost 5, Cast 1, Recharge 5
111 damage (non-stop with Arcane/Echo) ~per sec (including after cast) for only 5 energy - what more can I say?

Augury of Death - For 5...37 seconds, the next time damage would drop target foe's Health below 50%, you inflict a Deep Wound for 5...21 seconds and shadow step to that foe. This Spell has half the normal range.
Cost 5, Cast 1, Recharge 12
Okay, don't abuse this in PvP else it will get nerfed It's a feature, not a bug, WarBlade So shut up about it until I have some more fun 37 second duration means you can spam this ahead of time... The kicker to this hex, however, is that it can be cast on a foe already below 50% health and have Deep Wound kick in right away. So mostly I end up using this as a finishing move rather than a precast.

Iron Palm - Target touched foe suffers 5...41 damage, and if that foe is suffering from a Hex or Condition that foe is knocked down. Iron Palm counts as a lead attack.
Cost 10, Cast .75, Recharge 20
I use this (for now) since its in the same Deadly Arts attribute, and I need a point blank skill when AoD kicks in. Not too bad of a choice but higher cost and recharge than all other skills. Substitude with a PBAoE skill (Shockwave, anyone?).

Hope you have fun this build, and we will discuss the Mark of Rodgort/Lava Arrows/Deadly Haste Caster (there's got to be a good name for this build) when I have time to post again.

PS: is a Divine Ghostly Staff (the perfect weapon for what's coming up. And it looks good too. Yes, you have got to look good no matter what you do ) easy to farm, how much are people selling that for?


KoP

Here you go:

http://www.garath.net/Sullla/Civ4/commen...dventure18

Again, all comments are from prior to reading any of the games that closed. It looks like I underestimated how long it would take to reach Currency, but Financial + floodplains + Noble is quite a combination for teching! I found those games which popped Currency from huts to be hilarious. Looks like Civ4 has a way of wrecking the most carefully laid plans!

I'll compile the reports on Thursday in case we have any late stragglers. There will be another Gentle Adventure in about a month's time.

Just a topic to write down build ideas that come to mind. Not neccessarily builds we'll ever use.

Feel free to post your own.

Flagstand team:
D/N
Scythe: 16 (12 +3 +1); Mystcism: 11 (10 +1); Curses: 8
Chilblains, Plague Touch, Reaper's Sweep, Mystic Sweep, Eremite's Attack, Heart of Fury, Pious Haste, Res Sig

Me/Mo
Illusion: 14 (12 +1 +1); Inspiration: 11 (10 +1); FC: 9 (8 +1); Heal: 2
Migraine, Conjure Phantasm, Images of Remorse, Accumulated Pain, Power Return, Power Drain, Drain Enchantment, Res Chant

E/Mo
Water: 14 (12 +1 +1); E Storage: 11 (10 +1); Heal: 8
Icy Shackles, Freezing Gust, Armor of Mist, Blurred Vision, Water Attunement, Glyph of Lesser Energy, Heal Party, Res Sig

Mo/E
Prot: 14 (12 +1 +1); DF: 12 (11 +1); Heal: 6
Divert Hexes, Reversal of Fortune, Gift of Health, Spirit Bond, Mend Condition, Signet of Devotion, Shield of Absorption, Glyph of Lesser Energy

Mo/E
Heal: 14 (12 +1 +1); DF: 12 (11 +1); Prot: 6
Heal Party, Heal Other, Orison of Healing, Mend Condition, Protective Spirit, Deny Hexes, Healer's Boon, Glyph of Lesser Energy

Split Team:
D/E
Scythe: 16 (12 +3 +1); Mysticism: 13 (12 +1); Air: 3
Avatar of Melandru, Wearying Strike, Chilling Victory, Eremite's Attack/Mystic Sweep, Shock, Imbue Health, Heart of Fury, Res Sig

E/Mo
Fire: 15 (12 +2 +1); E Storage: 11 (10 +1); Air: 6; Prot: 6
Mind Blast, Liquid Flame, Gale, Mark of Rodgort, Fire Attunement, Draw Conditions, Reverse Hex, Res Sig

Mo/A
Prot: 14 (12 +1 +1); DF: 11 (10 +1); Heal: 7; Shadow Arts: 4
Zealous Benediction, Gift of Health, Reversal of Fortune, Shield of Absorption, Protective Spirit, Dismiss Condition, Smite Hex, Dark Escape

Seeing no real reason to do otherwise, I settle in place. Wow. After exploring a bit
I find three gold resources to the south. Can you say, “Second city?” I knew that you could.
Mansa like gold.

I switch production to a workboat as soon as we discover fishing. This, of course,
allowed me to harvest the clams. And Pottery just happens to be on the research line to Currency,
so once that was discovered I set the worker to building cottages on each floodplain tile.
Nice to have those three flood plains lined up there in a row.



And since Mansa is a financial civ, we get an extra commerce on each cottage. “So we got THAT
goin’ for us … which is nice.” (An extra point for the first one who can name that movie line.)

I discover currency as early as 1640 BC. Making Mansa happy, I now set about discovering some of those
worker technologies that we’ve needed, but neglected, up until now.
First, Bronze Working.
Since we already have Mathematics, I figure, with its 50% boost for forest chops, it makes sense to
give my worker the ability to chop something.

Here are my three cities in 25 AD:



I’m expanding on the diagonal leading down to my nearest neighbors.
I lucked out with my placement of Dejenne …



Because we later discovered copper, long after the city’s placement, in the northeast corner of the city’s territory.
Look who comes to visit from distant lands.



It’s the Chinese. Hello, Qin.

I found my fourth city, Gao, right on top of the horses to the Southeast.



This was an odd placement, to be sure, but I already had horses in the north, and this spot was the
necessary city center to pick up both the spices and the sugar in its Fat Cross. I also figured I
could fill in the other city sites in the north later on. As you can see,
Gao just continued on my weird diagonal city placement scheme:



Somewhere around this time I started figurin’ how I’m gonna win this thang. I’m just not very good at
conquest or domination. I still need work on my warmongering skills.
And I tried the culture thing in the last PETA game. Since Mansa likes gold, and I’ve out-teched the
AI’s by this point (although, I must say, Catherine was a runaway civ in my game.
Even though I had out-teched everybody, I don’t think I ever caught up with her in points. She must have had some
badlands, if you know what I mean), and I hadn’t tried a space race victory in quite some time,
I decided to go that route.

But Mansa also needed at least $10,000, so I ran science around 80% for the first half of the game,
and used a couple Great Merchants, to boost my bank accounts.

I normally use my Great Scientists to build Academies, but this time he told me he could discover
Printing Press for me. A quick look at the F6 screen told me this means plus one gold for each village,
and plus one gold for each town. Much more to Mansa’s liking.

In 1260 AD I discover Liberalism, which means Free Speech, but then because I get there first,
and I’m granted a free technology:



I choose Economics, for the Free Markets. So in one turn I now
have two of the three required technologies, and cannot shift away from either corresponding civic.

Vilcas was my closest neighbor city to the south:



It was the Incan city placed as far north as possible. But, as you can see, it will soon flip to me
due to my culture. I love taking over cities this way; no bloodshed, no young citizens sent to
their needless deaths. (BTW, that’s one of my many Great Merchants, in the foreground, on his way
south to do business with the Incans.)

I’m trying to avoid wars with others, because, for one reason, I can’t draft any new recruits.
Now that my society believes in Free Religion, I can never “go back” to Nationhood or the draft.
The Incans did attack near the end, because of losing Vilcas, but I just concentrated on fending them off.
I think I took a couple of their cities, just for fun.

I filled in the rest of my island with outlying towns, so here’s what my civ looked like in 1585:



At one point I researched Communism, because I usually like switching to State Property. Of course,
once it was researched I looked at my F3 screen and remembered I can’t switch away from Free Markets.
Oh well, that was a wasted move.

Vilcas finally succumbs to our culture and joins our civ:



In 1960 I produced a Great Scientist. Since he can research Fission for me, and Fission is
needed on my way to the stars, that’s how I use him.

Turned down research to 50% in order to generate income. Then, once I reached $10,000, started
switching cities to production, since I already had $10,000 in the bank, and I was almost done researching
the necessary techs. Even destroyed a few towns (at 8 gpt) to build workshops. Yikes!
Never done that before. Amazing how many hammers you can produce when building these spaceship parts
(e.g., 25% for forge, 25% factory, 50% power, 50% laboratory, 50% space elevator, 100% for access to Aluminum.)
You can really create some awesome, powerhouse cities.

Received a great engineer for being the first to discovery fusion, which I used to hurry
production of the space elevator. Another boost for the Mali space race.

Mansa is the first to the stars:



Because of my tech advantage I reached the stars long before most of the AI's had even started their ships, in 1965:



(Hmm, this was almost historically accurate to our landing on the moon). But it was not soon enough,
I’m sure, to be competitive with other Realms Beyond players.
But it was fun.

The Gold graph is telling:



It dips down at the end when I start switching all my cities to production.

Space Race Victory in 1965. $20,350 gold in my coffers.

Thanks for hosting, Sullla.

Hi,

After the debacle of adventure 17 I tried this gentle adventure. It proved to be gentle for me as I never was in any trouble, but this allowed for a bit of roleplaying.

I've created a website over at freewebs, but I'm not happy with the layout yet, this will change in the future.
Now I'm curious on how the others did.

Here's my report: Adventure 18 report

Lot's of fun playing this one, but I guess I need to learn to be more war-like if I want quicker wins.

Full report is here:
http://topcat.dk/civ4.php?art=rba18

Short Summary ™:
Space Win in 1957 with 19133 in the treasury.

I need to apologize in advance for the lack of screenshots or comments for most of my game. I was in a hurry playing it (Noble made me just want to knock it out in one sitting) and perhaps the fates decided to punish me. I ended up forgetting to revolt into the correct civics immediately upon their discovery, and while I waited fewer than ten turns, I still have to declare this a shadow game.

The report itself can be found here .

Domination win in 1935 with 17, 721 gold (GOLD!) in the bank. More detailed writeup to follow. A few notes and comments.

I really liked the combination of the snaky continents and the low sea levels. This gave a large number of good sized islands that made mid game exploration more interesting than some of "pick up a fishing village" maps I've played recently. A big enough starting island to get pretty darn big, but another big enough continent to let some other civs get pretty big too.

I'm not terribly enamored of going to war in the game; moving stacks and crushing cities in foregone conclusion battles just gets to be a grind. But once HC took a punch at me in this game, I was ready to roll. Financial meant I could afford a honking-big civilization, and would do even better as I got more cities in place working more cottages. HC never had metal, so I could crush him easily; Washington had metal, but much more ice and desert, so he lagged badly in the tech race. I had the copper from SE of the start position, and popped an iron near the hammer city to the SW of the start location. A continental power is just going to be able to crush everyone else. So I did.

A good time, my thanks to the community for the writeups and the sponsorship.