I've spent far too much time following this game as a lurker. I can only imagine what it's like for the actual players!
As fantastic as Sullla and Speaker's Civ play has been, in my opinion their metagaming and awareness has been equally as terrible. Sullla seems to assume that because their opponents are making basic game-level mistakes, they also must be completely oblivious to basic strategic thinking, human nature, and the tendency to act according to self-interest. He seems genuinely baffled by what HRE's motivation could ever be for going after their team. It doesn't take a genius to realize that in a game like this with no tech trading, when a team is that far ahead the _only_ chance _any_ other team has is to see them defeated. The basic assumption that other teams aren't stupid, and that they will act in their own best interests of winning, can lead to no other conclusion, even if other teams lack any Civ skill at all. I think Sullla will kick himself afterwards for not thinking on this basic level about the game as a whole. Seeing that they were pulling so far ahead, they should have had their main focus on being strong while appearing weak, starting at least 40 turns ago!
The unfortunate part of this for lurkers like me is that their thread (and Byzantine's before it) are just so detailed and fun to read and I have already learned so much about the game from them. After reading their thread and a few others, I've found I can now beat Monarch fairly easily, where it was an even match before. I would love to read their planning to the same level of detail during the middle and late game!
As fantastic as Sullla and Speaker's Civ play has been, in my opinion their metagaming and awareness has been equally as terrible. Sullla seems to assume that because their opponents are making basic game-level mistakes, they also must be completely oblivious to basic strategic thinking, human nature, and the tendency to act according to self-interest. He seems genuinely baffled by what HRE's motivation could ever be for going after their team. It doesn't take a genius to realize that in a game like this with no tech trading, when a team is that far ahead the _only_ chance _any_ other team has is to see them defeated. The basic assumption that other teams aren't stupid, and that they will act in their own best interests of winning, can lead to no other conclusion, even if other teams lack any Civ skill at all. I think Sullla will kick himself afterwards for not thinking on this basic level about the game as a whole. Seeing that they were pulling so far ahead, they should have had their main focus on being strong while appearing weak, starting at least 40 turns ago!
The unfortunate part of this for lurkers like me is that their thread (and Byzantine's before it) are just so detailed and fun to read and I have already learned so much about the game from them. After reading their thread and a few others, I've found I can now beat Monarch fairly easily, where it was an even match before. I would love to read their planning to the same level of detail during the middle and late game!