[SPOILERS PB71]Krill: By the numbers, when the walls fell (on everyone else)

[Krill]

Can I just keep on throwing out tangential points to get you to provide content?

[greenline]

For as long as I am waiting on the next PB / civ 6 pbem to start. I have a naming scheme planned that will take up most of my words of the day once that happens

[Krill]

You know much about human psychology related to greed?

[Krill]

Pin and Com are engaged, so they will want to carry on. Yuri as well. Bing doesn't post much, he just puts together videos with his horrific upper clash English accent. Thoth is actually putting plans together (just seems he forgot how to not go broke).
.

I've just been looking at the graphs and reflecting whilst doing some gardening, and I've come to the conclusion that SD is going to Keshik rush me.

The thinking is this: He is now pushing out one keshik per turn and he can only hit yuris or myself.

He is making no moves towards yuris, QED I am the target. Previous power increases could be considered to be general units but three turns of consistent 6K plus increases will only be keshiks. I reckon an normal civ player would look at power and just reconsider the wisdom of this, but SD has never been one for making the smart choice

Time to chop those forests.

[Krill]

Also, for the record: SD must have 46k worth of buildings and tech (3 Gers = 12k, Hunting, Mining, AH = 6K, Wheel - 4K, Archery = 6K, BW = 8K, HBR = 10K).

He has a size 5 capital and two other cities, lowest pop is 33k so that can't be SD, so I would expect SD to have 10 pop over those three cities for another 5k in power. Add in a couple of warriors and easy to see him at atleast 55k.

Second in power is 93K, 38k difference. I see at least 4 Keshiks built which is 24k and 14k not accounted for but probably an axe and couple of chariots (worst case for me).

I have split front cities against him (nothing I can really do about that), as of next turn both cities will have 3 strong units in place with more behind and following in. Looking at a core defence of 4 units per city (spears, and/or CG1 archer on a hill behind walls). I have to go heavy on spears, with him having two promo keshicks I can't win except through numbers (still need to get a stables in Pear and Apple doesn't even have a barracks). I have gold saved to upgrade two warriors with more coming (those warriors are looking smarter by the minute).

Looking at this I'm not sure SD can actually do an awful lot...? I can even two pop emergency whip a spear in Cherry if I have to...? All this was simply an assumption until I looked more closely at the numbers, but I don't know if SD realises the situation given his poor scouting, game knowledge and general wisdom.

[greenline]

You know much about human psychology related to greed?

The last time I looked at anything related to psychology was when I took a class about the biological connections between the brain and certain phenomena of which greed wasn't considered. That was years ago, too. So anything I say here is just based on intuition.

Greed does not seem to be a primary motivator that a person feels driving them to action, but instead a secondary reaction to how others may perceive what they do. People generally do not understand or describe their motivations as, "I want this because of greed, I am doing this because I am greedy or to satisfy my greed." If they do, it is usually done for the sake of polemic and is not genuine. Instead, greed is a label applied to an action or a motivation by others who observe it. This comes in several forms, for example:

Shaming of gluttony. Someone who eats beyond a 'reasonable capacity' is seen as greedy. This is an old one, and probably has a useful social signaling function. The potentially gluttonous person potentially harms their tribe or neighbors by consuming more of a scare and important resource that will provide them with diminishing returns. The people who label them as greedy send a warning that they might have to gang up on them if they do not stop hogging the food. 

Shaming of (excessive) polygyny. In monogamous groups, the man with more than one wife, mistresses, often draws scrutiny for this behavior, which is recognized as greedy, in addition to sinful and whatever moral adjectives are used. Similar to above, this reflects a tension over scare resources. I would be curious to see if a reversed trend exists in the few polyandrous civilizations and tribes that exist, but I am not too familiar with them.

Shaming of usury. An old and common trend in many civilizations was to view any charging of interest on loans as greedy, or even extending this to the very existence of a mercantile class at all. This is unlike the previous two trends because it steps further away from the personal, as someone can be judged and potentially tarred and feathered not for taking actions that people who live near them would know and understand, but just for being part of a group with known traits.

(Marxist or Jacobin?) Shaming of success. This is the most common one in modernity, and by far the most potentially destructive. Here, there is hardly any direct personal action that is being judged. Instead, the person guilty of greed is generally guilty of either holding more 'stuff' (not solely, but commonly material wealth) than whoever is set as holding the lowest bar, or of being part of some process that is deleterious. This generally leads to two outcomes - either a suffocation of productivity, as groups strive to avoid having the target of success pinned on their back, or mob violence and purges, if the 'communist' element is strong enough to force them.

Has anyone ever pulled off a successful keshik rush in a civ 4 game? seems a weak UU. the civ 6 implementation is more interesting

[Krill]

Keshiks are just HA that can get through rough terrain more easily, but only forests or hills, not forest hills, so really a Keshik rush is just a HA rush.

There are plenty of successful HA rushes, but I don't think we're seen one on a low yield map, such as PB64 or PB69.

Greed is interesting (to me) because of the why it appears. There's the usual dopamine theory, then there's the response to trauma and security (attachment theory) but where greed edges over into less of "wanting" something, and more into control, the correct way to moderate someones behaviour drastically changes. The difference between managing someone who shows antisocial behaviours in hoarding because they have experienced starvation and poverty is different to someone who hoards to make other people reliant on them.

On topic: I sent a demand to SD that he declare on yuris, he replied that I declare on Bing. I don't have an issue with that plan, it actually fits in reasonably well with anything productive i can do, but I am reminded that SD is not that trustworthy so I need to verify he is positioning against yuris. I have a scout watching his only path to Yuri but I need to get two units out to monitor the desert between us. Otherwise, things are continuing, getting out HA and repositioning units (but I did triple whip a settler for the ivory/gold spot but that is the route to invade Bing and the overflow+chop gets a barracks, needed to manage happy, just don't know how SD will view it). I rolled the turn and played T73, so long as SD doesn't declare on me on T74 I don't think we have an issue with any double moves.

[Krill]

For posterity:

Eot57: SD researches HBR, and finishes up a few builds (chariots etc)
T59: SD power 63K
T60: 63K
T61: 67K (Chariot or Ger)
T62: 67K
T63: 67K
T64: 67K
T65: 74K (1 Keshik)
T66: 74K (1 Keshik)
T67: 74K
T68: 81K (2 Keshiks)
T69: 87K (3 Keshiks)
T70: 93K (4 Keshiks)
T71: 93K
T72: 99K (5 Keshiks)
T73: 111K (7 Keshiks)

Given that he just built the last 3 Keshiks, he should not finish many that quiickly, he may just about be able to three turn them in the capital but stuck on a 4-5 turn build cycle for the rest (SD is top MFG and not whipping). It will take him until T75 to attack Pomegranate with all Keshiks (assuming he has roaded desert I just had vision on for maximum speed), or T77 to reach Cherry (roads don't really matter, I don't see how he attacks on T76 with all 7). I will have greater numbers able to be in each city but then I don'ty know if he also has a number of chariots which would make things a bit more uncertain. What I do know is that I'd have more spears than he has Keshiks and I'd still have HA and vultures beyond that, the problem is positioning (for both of us).

I don't think Yuri would be able to withstand those Keshiks. Yuri has slightly higher power than Pin, and I can see Pin defending the city he just dropped Henge into with 1 spear. I know Yuri would be more vulnerable than I would be. I don't think SD could hold anything if he did attack me, I think he would have to raze any city he captured (given Keshiks can try and fork cities and then move on, I can see how he could try and reach Pear or Rhubarb and also pillage roads to make it hard to follow him but I have 6 workers, he will not have that flexibility. I've also chopped the forests that block the paths so he can't evade me by moving over forest to block an attack.

[greenline]

the best low yield rush is the BW-First-and-whip-5-axes, PB7 style

Greed is interesting (to me) because of the why it appears. There's the usual dopamine theory, then there's the response to trauma and security (attachment theory) but where greed edges over into less of "wanting" something, and more into control, the correct way to moderate someones behaviour drastically changes. The difference between managing someone who shows antisocial behaviours in hoarding because they have experienced starvation and poverty is different to someone who hoards to make other people reliant on them.

I have little knowledge of therapy, so I can't speak to a difference in how one might handle hoarding type impulses versus controlling types. I would be interested in seeing if there's a difference between those who consciously understand that they want to control others versus wanting the same outcome for different reasons, and only desiring the control unconsciously. I suspect there would be better ways of handling each rather than a one size fits all approach.

[Tarkeel]

the best low yield rush is the BW-First-and-whip-5-axes, PB7 style

We made do with three axes in PB62, but that map was rather cramped. I stand by what I said about SD in the opponent overview there:

Verdict: Will ruin someones game