[SPOILER-PBEM14] Bismarck of Maya

[Gaspar]

Response from scooter:

Gaspar,

First off, since you mentioned it I should clarify that my email didn't just come because of one paragraph from you, but it largely came because of Sandover as well. It seemed that both of you (you in particular) were trying to cleverly avoid my questions, so I figured I would just ask you about it rather than drawing my own conclusion. I hope my message didn't seem accusatory. It wasn't meant to be, rather it was meant to just flat-out ask you which of the two scenarios was the case because I had my own theory already. Your response makes sense to me - and I mostly figured that was the answer I'd get - but I figured it couldn't hurt to ask.

Generally speaking, if you're asking the question "why should I trust you" then whatever answer I give will likely not mean much to you . I think you can figure out on your own though why it's an intelligent decision. Quite frankly, you need a friend more than I do with your position, and I think you're well aware of that. You either need to buddy up with Sandover so you don't get trapped down there or with myself or Lewwyn in order to protect yourself for if/when you have Sandover problems. I think you've figured out how Sandover works by now... He avoids formal agreements so he can say he doesn't break them. He is extremely opportunistic, and if that means a random worker steal, so be it.

On a new topic, have you met Serdoa yet? I'm curious if he actually talks to anyone else, as he seems really really quiet.

scooter

TL;DR - Meh, whatever. I think scooter and I are a bit of oil and water here. If the game dictates we should work together we will. Otherwise, we'll have this awkward semi-uncooperative relationship. All this diplo is cute, but I think the die has largely been cast on diplomacy in this game, only actual actions in the game will impact it from here.

In the actual turn, Animal Husbandry is in, followed by Fishing. After that we'll go to Hunting, to complete the mastery of fauna trifecta.

Otherwise, just getting in position for things. If I were not building a wonder, I'd revolt to Buddhism this turn, since we'll settle next turn. I want to get all of this nonsense out of the way as soon as possible, however, so I'll probably revolt when city 3 is about to be settled. Not a huge issue until I research Monotheism anyway.

The power spike Lewwyn was worried about was scooter, as I have his graphs. Nothing all that scary, probably an Axe being built. Oracle in 2T, we hit size 3 this turn, 2 more turns to size 4. Probably going to go Forge -> Settler rather than Settler -> Worker just because it makes sense, gives you a bit of bootleg Imperialistic. New city will start with MP, then Granary, then be a short term worker pump while I build other locations.

No pictures this turn - nothing picture worthy.

[Gaspar]

Let me clarify my thoughts on diplomacy in this game that I began expressing in my previous post. I think the discussions have been... interesting, but largely here's what we have:

Sandover - being Sandover. Because I was most willing to subjugate my own... privacy, and also most willing to engage Sandover where he likes to be engaged, I have a decent relationship with him. Now I know he could change his mind in a heartbeat, but I don't think he will, at least not for a little while.

scooter - being scooter. scooter likes plots and schemes, scooter likes to do the driving in diplomacy. Logically, he and I should be allied, we're far away from each other, we could tag team Sandover, forcing him to fight on both flanks, and then reassess after the Sphinx has been brought to his knees. Unfortunately, I decided I could work with Sandover better than I could him, mostly because it was convenient. In doing so, you can tell from the tone of his later emails he's made alternate arrangements. While its certainly possible its Serdoa, everyone's inability to communicate with Serdoa, combined with Lewwyn's personality lead me to believe very strongly that he's gotten hitched with Lewwyn. As soon as that happened, I'm forced even more into cooperating with Sandover, as I have little interest in being third wheel.

Lewwyn - well discussed above, and I think in a lot of ways, a Maya-Turkish alliance would have been more interesting than what's actually occurring. Unfortunately, as I warned in the pre-game, I met Lewwyn too late. Additionally, cooperating with Lewwyn is probably mutually exclusive to cooperating with Sandover, both geographically and because it conflicts our jihad.

Serdoa - who knows. He might just be able to avoid all the fireworks and tech peacefully and financially away while we all beat each other up. Nonetheless, I doubt he's heavily invested in this game.

So that's where we are. The thing is, and its shown in game after game, none of this pregame bullshit will matter once the sparks start to fly. Someone will lose a stack, maybe lose a city or two, and be forced to make some hard decisions. Someone will switch sides, the global geopolitical situation will change, and we'll start all over. So hedging for some future eventually is silly. From here on out, I'm going to think of Sandover as a reluctant ally, scooter as a likely enemy and Lewwyn as a wildcard, but one who can't be trusted. Serdoa - he'll be ignored until he does something worth paying attention to.

As an aside, I wonder if the lurkers find this metagaming stuff interesting or insufferable. I think mostly its a way to entertain us through the early turns while we wait for things to get interesting. This game feels unbelievably slow after PBEM12, truth be told, even if we've gotten in a turn a day everyday.

[Gaspar]

Based on what I discussed above, I took a different tack in my conversation with Sandover. Here's where we are currently:

Your Dark Lordship Pharaoh Sandover,

(Lightning quick response time, as I'm likely to be out of commission for a wee bit. Don't let it ruin my reputation.)

Actually, its more a case of my correspondence with virtually everyone else has irritated me significantly. scooter wants to lawyer everything, Serdoa, as you said is useless. Lewwyn's kind of fun to trash-talk with, but I'm 95% sure he's lied to me already. You might be the scariest one in the bunch, but at least you're honest. I'll just have to remember to ask you every few turns if there's a SoD waiting in the fog for me.

I'm a pragmatist, so I'll work with someone even if I don't like them if I have no real options, but I'm still fully behind the idea of the jihad as my preferred game resolution. Just seems like it'd be silly for me to tell them that just yet, particularly as you've been known to change your mind from time to time.

I do wonder if Serdoa's particularly into this game. Between his non-diplomacy and essentially no lurker thread, maybe he's just looking for a quick exit. Sadly, he's the furthest away, so probably unlikely we'll get the opportunity to give it to him.

Prophet Gaspar

Prophet Gaspar,

That's more like it. Thanks for the clarification.

I spotted a settler inside Lewwyn's border last turn, so he will join scooter at three cities before too long. Scooter's third city is actually quite close to me, but not in a way that interfere with my settling, so I'll leave him at it so long as he isn't coming further south. I'm going to try to establish my border with Lewwyn with my next city but that is some time away still.

Where's your explorer heading? I sent Rowain to check up on what scooter is doing and Darrell just found a mountain ridge near Eureka (Lewwyn's second city) that's causing him to backtrack for a while.

Your Dark Lordship, Pharaoh Sandover,

Glad I can be of service.

Last things first, I've sent Mortician south of Lewwyn to see what if anything lies there, he made a wrong turn at a peak tile, but I should be able to see where that branch SE of the marble goes shortly. There's still an outside chance there's a second connection in the south, so the opportunity to flank him in possible future military action seemed worth exploring. Since I've already met everyone, I'm less concerned about getting eyes on exactly where they're located, I'm sure some HAs/Knights/Cuirs/Cavs/Tanks somewhere down the road can finish the exploration. On that note, perhaps we'll get the foundation for a map trade in the future this way, I can defog the south while you get some of the north. Food for thought, anyway.

My settler will be in position next turn, though its forested tile, so I'll have to wait 2T to actually settle city 2. T40 - I should probably just stop playing Civ forever. Anyway, my instincts tell me that an early forge in the capital should allow me to spit out workers and settlers at a pretty decent rate soon. So long as Lewwyn doesn't grab that lousy desert city we discussed, I feel pretty comfortable that land grab's not going to matter all that much for me anyway - we're all in pretty defined areas. 3 Cities is about where I'd normally like to be now, so good for scooter and Lewwyn. May they die a thousand capitalist deaths.

Because I'm a nice guy, even though you didn't ask, I thought I'd let you know Lewwyn sent me an email being alarmed about a power spike. Now I play right before him, and I didn't really notice anything, so either he's just spiked and he's trying to softpedal it, or he's unable to read demos. Most big spikes at these turns are just the military techs coming in - wheel, BW, AH, etc, but regardless, I thought you might want to know. He tried to imply it was you, of course, but fearmongering is what those capitalist running dogs do best. I'd prefer if you kept this between us, so that perhaps Lewwyn will be brave enough to give me more info in the future.

Come to think of it - are you up to anything militarily? [Consider this a recurring question that will be at the end of every 4th or 5th exchange we have.]

Prophet Gaspar

Prophet Gaspar,

I like the map trade idea. I'm not a big fan of trading screen shots though (so much easier to have stuff visible in the actual game) and paper's quite a distance away. I'll be focusing exploration north however, so we definitly have reason to share our findings some way or another.

Expansion doesn't feel just as important as it normally is for me either, as it's pretty easy to see who's going to get what to my east. I think the situation might be different in the area between the financial civs, but that can only serve to our advantage. If everything goes as planned I'm going to place my third city at the lake north of the marble. Once that happens planting a city at the actual marble is going to look very unattractive to Lewwyn, so I don't expect to see him going for it any time soon if at all. He should be busy grabbing land to his north.

Lewwyn must be trying to fabricate something. I don't see what Serdoa would've done to spike (granted, I haven't actually been keeping an eye on him) and I know for a fact that the rest of us are running paper tin defenses right now. Gold Ergo Sum the warrior told me he's using his grr-face to scare potential enemies from invading Egypt, but I sincerely doubt that would've caused a power spike! Maybe Lewwyn is in "OMG war chariots lets panic"-mode?

I'm not sharing our discussions with Lewwyn, and I expect you to keep quiet as well (though that probably goes without saying). He's not very interogative or sharing so we should have no issues keeping him out of loop. In general it seems you're having somewhat better luck talking to him while the same goes for me regarding scooter. Pre-game interaction undoubtedly have a way of easing things up no matter whether said interaction was of the positive kind or not.

I'm not up to anything of the military kind today, no. I might change my mind tomorrow, obviously, but so it goes.

His Dark Lordship, Pharaoh Sandover

I think its going well, if I lack a little bit the leverage.

[Gaspar]

Sent this off to scooter:

scooter,

I think we talk a lot about the diplo situation early on because the turns are slow and it keeps us engaged in the game. The game is fluid and the situation will frame the debate. In PBEM3 you and Bob geared up to carve up Timmy and then within 5T you were plotting an attack on Sandover. In PBEM10 Tatan went from Serdoa's sworn enemy to his virtual vassal. Those are just two examples off the top of my head, I'm sure there's probably dozens of others. Somehow we seem to have gotten off on the wrong foot a bit, but I'd say its just as likely we work together down the road as end up at loggerheads. I certainly am keeping my options open, I'd assume you are as well.

Eh - I think I could make an argument that I need a friend less than anyone else, I have a completely secure flank. Sure, Sandover can screw me, and sure Lewwyn can try to box me in a bit if he's figured out the map, but I still never have to fight on more than one front. You have a South and West flank, Lewwyn has a North and East flank, Serdoa has South and East. I only have a North flank, so even if I get dogpiled, I'll always know where its coming from. That doesn't mean I wouldn't like friends however - certainly would make the game easier in the long run. I do find it interesting that both you and Lewwyn talk a lot about what Sandover could do to me. You've played with Sandover before, yes? Do you honestly think 1 city Maya down on a little southern peninsula makes a more attractive target to him than scooter's Byzantium with a deadly medieval UU or the Ottomans that he already has eyes on the cities of? I don't. I have little doubt he'll attack me one day - that's who Sandover is. I just think its far more likely he'll attack one of you two first. I could be naive though, wouldn't be the first time that's been suggested.

I've met Serdoa, and exchanged hellos. I don't personally get the impression he's very invested in this game, but I could be wrong. Last I checked he's playing in 4 games at the moment with no partners/dedlurkers since he rarely updates his threads. Probably doesn't give him a lot of time to play in our reindeer games. Perhaps someone should relieve him of the obligation.

Anything else fun going on Byzantium?

Gaspar

TL; DR: Really, really, really not interested in your games. Talk to me when you've got something to offer me, because you do need me more than I need you, whether you realize it or not.

[Gaspar]

A momentous occassion in the annals of Mayan history - 2nd city founded!



Other news - none. Oracle completes in 3T. I could finish it in 2, but I'd rather let the city grow a bit faster so I can work some cottages for a bit. Scooter and Lewwyn are on their 3rd cities, still a little ways away from that for me, as I intend to get a forge up first.

Anyway, that's really it. Buddhism spread naturally in 99 Luftballons after hitting enter, which is nice, though to be honest, I expected it to happen sooner rather than later.

[Ilios]

A momentous occassion in the annals of Mayan history - 2nd city founded!

You mean you won't play this game as a one city challenge?

[Gaspar]

You mean you won't play this game as a one city challenge?

Heh - it was starting to look that way, no? I really made some bad decisions in the first 15 turns, being very indecisive and doing some foolish build and tile swapping. I also think I prioritized getting Henge and Oracle out early a bit too much - reading the tea-leaves around here should have told me both of those would have been sitting there for me later enough that I could have gotten settlers/workers out first.

Nonetheless, Oracle will finish soon and we'll get on to playing a normal game of civ. My relatively sheltered position means that my builders gambit was a bit safer - and so long as I have a few more turns of safety, I'll get myself in position to defend and expand - getting a couple of early forges should pay for the Oracle hammers many times over, especially as my land is not especially production rich.

Actually, the combination of my OCC and having Sandover as a neighbor really works to my benefit, so long as I can keep Sandover mollified. Everyone is much more afraid of him than me, so I should be extra safe to plant a bunch of cities defended by duct tape and bailing wire. If I can get myself to medieval safely, then I feel pretty good about my chances to put a hurting on someone. And regardless of what Sandover does, I'd really like to give scooter a bit of a butt-whooping for his tone.

In the mollifying Sandover department, here's my most recent message:

Your Dark Lordship, Pharaoh Sandover,

I feel the same way about screenshots, unless its a key something in a military situation, I really don't like turn-playing to feel like I'm writing a research paper, so I prefer all the relevant info to be available in game. Nonetheless, a map trade down the line sounds mutually beneficial, so in 70 or so turns when someone maybe has paper, we'll have something to go on.

I suspect Lewwyn was really just trying to make me afraid of you - both he and scooter have mostly focused on trying to drive a wedge in the diplomacy. I really don't like the artificial attempts at relationships people try to forge. I much prefer to just keep a conversation going, then you can see who you can work with. All these early game shenanigans are is really just a way to keep us entertained until the turns get involved enough that we can have more action and less words.

Haven't heard anything else from our friends to the north since then, which is just as well, they'll come find me when they have something to say. I got my 2nd city founded finally, Oracle will finish shortly and we'll get the expansion phase in full throttle by then. I think the idea that you measure strength by number of cities is overrated anyway. Its a measure, sure, but unless there's contested land, a far more important number is how many productive cities you have at any given time. If you're planting cities just to work a bunch of grassland forest tiles, you're not actually getting yourself ahead. Anyway, I feel confident I'll be competitive on that front as well soon.

Anything interesting happening up there in Egypt?

Prophet Gaspar

[Gaspar]

Quick reply with some interesting news I don't have time to comment on:

Prophet Gaspar,

Things are starting to heat up up here. I noticed scooter building a strat. resource unit on the power graph (turned out to be a chariot) and told him I'd be sending a warrior to keep an eye his third city to make sure he wasn't sending it towards me. He responded by threatening to kill said unit, and I replied back that I won't hesitate to fight a war with him if he snipes one of my units in neutral territory. So there was a short crisis but we were both actively responding to each others emails and ended up agreeing to a NAP of sorts, basically preventing ancient era warfare and limiting stationary scouting in neutral territory. He was the one negotiating from a position of power so I'm satisfied with the result.

Serdoa has declared war on Lewwyn. I've talked to Lewwyn some this morning and he's now up to 4 cities, having shoved at least one of them up Serdoa's alley. The invasion force is apparently 4 (aggressive) warriors but Lewwyn is claiming he's got the situation under control. Nevertheless, war between the two of them will most certainly be to our benefit. Do you want to host the celebration party or shall I?

His Dark Lordship, Pharaoh Sandover

I'd like to see Serdoa do a little bit of damage here, but my guy says Lewwyn is ready for him.

[Gaspar]

Another day, another turn, another round of diplo in "As PBEM14 Turns." I really do pass for normal around here. Absurd.

This came in from Serdoa this am:

Hi guys,

I have declared war on Lewwyn as he tried to box me in and probably wanted to go to war with me anyway. He seems confident that he can win this war - too confident given that I have Archers and will have Axes and Spears in 2 turns. So I wonder, someone of you who would like to declare war on me as well? If not I would like to ask all of you for a NAP till T65. Thats not so long as that it should in any way harm you (especially when I have to defend instead of expand) but it would give me the feeling that actually it does make sense to put any more effort in this game.

Kind regards,
Serdoa

I replied benignly:

Serdoa,

If there's a dogpile, I'm not part of it, as I had not been clued in on anything regarding your situation prior to this email. I couldn't possibly be logistically farther away from you, so I can assure you no Mayan units will be deployed anywhere near you.

Best of luck in your future endeavors,
Gaspar

The Serdoa-Lewwyn war did indeed flag in the event log. Other than that, pretty mundane turn. Shuffled units, scouted, danced a jig. Minus the jig. Also, all out of bubblegum.

scooter sent me an email. I think we both want out of this conversation, so I'm probably just going to not bother responding for a while. I should send something off to Lewwyn.

Gaspar,

Fair enough on your points. I think we just see things differently on some things, but that's ok, I can live with that and agree to disagree. It's like you said, it's early and not all that significant yet. No sense in burning bridges over insignificant issues early in the game.

Funny you mentioned someone relieving Serdoa of his obligations, because apparently Serdoa is instead going to try to give this game some fireworks. T40 = first war, which is actually a little later than I would've guessed with this crazy cast of characters.

Anything in particular you'd like to know or discuss?

[Gaspar]

Sent off a round of messages, not an interesting thing said in a damned one of them, but if you're going to hire a diplomatic advisor, doesn't make much sense to not keep him looped in on the conversations:

scooter,

Clearly we do have some differences of opinions - though mostly my guess was that something changed for you between your first message and your third. Probably some combination of really not liking something I said and getting a better option on an ally. Certainly your tone changed dramatically, so either my powers of observation aren't quite what I think they are or I'm guessing right. Fair enough, we'll see how the game plays out, regardless of the awkwardness of our exchanges here, I certainly am not taking any options off the table, and could envision plenty of scenarios where we worked together later on. Hopefully you'll keep the same open mind.

The Serdoa-Lewwyn conflict is a bit ironic given my comments, it seems. Certainly seems like you stand most to benefit from it, at least if one of the parties doesn't steamroll the other, which is probably unlikely. Nonetheless, we can all celebrate a bit conflict which doesn't involve us. If nothing else, it'll make the spoiler threads more interesting reading at games end.

Nothing really going on else, I get the sense we've pretty well talked out whatever it is were going to talk about for the time being, so I'm happy enough to leave things where they are now and agree to keep the lines of communication open for future cooperation should the situation arise. Best of luck, not that I think you'll need it.

Gaspar

TL; DR: I know what you're up to, and I really just don't want to talk to you anymore.

Hi Lewwyn,

I was waiting for you to get back to me as you had indicated, but it appears you had other things on your plate. If I know you at all, I'd suspect you were preparing for hostilities with Serdoa prior to your city plant, so I'm sure you'll be in fine shape - nonetheless, if you want to clue me in on how things are going there, I'm always interested. This is the worst part of not being able to lurk the games - missing out in the fun stuff that doesn't directly affect you.

I suspected immediately the power spike you suggested was scooter, and my graphs bore that out. Even if he intended to put that axe/chariot somewhere the sun doesn't shine in Mayan lands, I think we'd all grow old before he arrived there, not to mention that I'd be well prepared for it. Only Sandover is really in a position to rush me - which certainly is a possibility. Certainly, if you see anything interesting there I'd appreciate the tip-off. Seems like only you and Serdoa were close enough together to spark hostilities so quickly, however. The rest of us probably will get a 2nd ring of settlements out before the sparks fly too much. I suspect plenty of them will fly once that occurs, however.

Anything else interesting going on in Turkey? How's SevenScooters doing? I get the impression he doesn't like me very much - maybe he's holding a grudge from WW2, he's certainly not sending me any flowers and/or chocolate. Certainly appears that Serdoa has indeed turned out to be TRD - watch out for Mongolian Bowmen! I assume given your lack of particular interest in my map information you've more figured out than you were letting on. Which is fine, just noting it. :P

Wondering about the price of tea in China,
Gaspar

TL; DR: :neenernee

Your Dark Lordship, Pharaoh Sandover,

We are blessed to live in interesting times. From what you told me and Serdoa's reaction, I suspect this war will benefit Lewwyn more than Serdoa, but more ideally, it'll degenerate into a slog forcing them to build lots of crappy axes and the like. I'll bring the champagne if you host the party, we can switch roles for the next celebration. I have no doubt this is just the beginning of what will be an interesting game.

Interesting that scooter went so aggressive early, not what I'd expect from him. While the NAP sounds good given the situation, I do worry if he has peace with you, his other neighbors are warring and I'm far too far away to threaten him at this point. I wonder if he'll get cheeky and send a few units my way - fine by me, can always use the xp. Regardless, definitely seems like scooter's the player to keep an eye on.

Not much else to say - almost done with the builder's gambit down here so we'll have to see if these early moves properly set me up to get the rest of a functioning empire up quicker. A forge in the capital shortly should really help me accelerate the next round of expansion, so I'm hopeful on that front. Haven't explored much of anything new, other than to be able to confirm there's definitely a connection to some land south of Lewwyn. Whether it goes anywhere significant is still turns away from being solved, but it looks just like the desert peninsula that connects me to the main continent, so my guess is that it connects to some land south of Lewwyn.

Can't think of anything else worth discussing - sounds like your last few turns had to suffice to be interesting enough for both of us.

Prophet Gaspar

TL;DR: Nothing to say here either, but we're really stuck with each other at this point, so we should probably stay friendly.

Lastly, this came in from Serdoa. Really nothing to say back to him, so I don't think I'll bother. He kind of screwed himself by isolating himself diplomatically:

Gaspar,

thank you. I guess I should have listened more closely to you (and the voice in my back) when you told me that Lewwyn is always up to something.

Kind regards,
Serdoa

Questions, comments, concerns?