With regards to Miguelito's question about why Amica's thread has more views and posts:
I often think about how I know that I'm rooting for Amica due to literary, not in-game reasons. From a pure civ-playing perspective, Amica in his occasional crises of confidence has acknowledged that he has made unorthodox, non-standard moves. By his own admission, he underbuilt cottages in the early-game, and his economy ran on intercontinental trade routes in the mid-game. Now that it's the endgame, he doesn't have the research or production capability to win a space race, and is falling a generation behind on military technology. Before this whole world war started, he admitted that he was a long-shot behind Picc and Mig.
And yet... for all that, I root for him, and my sympathies in this game lie with him, primarily for literary reasons. I think it's the usual comeback story. The hero shows moments of vulnerability and weakness, and yet somehow comes out on top anyway. Early in the partition of pindicator, I vaguely remember him despairing about his chances to win. Yet through some miracle, he managed to end up with pindicator's core. Similarly, in the mid-game, he was despairing over the possibility of a Cairo conquest and his relatively underdeveloped lands, yet he was able to survive based on intercontinental trade routes. In the late-game, I don't remember the exact details, but he's managed to use the Kremlin whip strategy combined with the hilariously broken Cereal Mills to become a major player, taking out many backwards civilizations and rendering Cairo irrelevant on the global stage. Now, despite his knowledge that he can't win a space race since he can't whip spaceship parts, he's (presumably) plotting how to conquer enough land to hit Domination (or at least give it the ol' college try).
Meanwhile, Picc doesn't report, and Mig, when I read his stuff, until lately I've always gotten the sense that he's confident and in control. For me, it reads more like a war diary of how to play Civilization (and lately play the geopolitical game), rather than Amica's more psychological description of a human struggling against the world. I fully admit I may be misreading reports due to merely skimming them, though.
One particular illustrative moment hits me: Amica and Mig's discussion of civics. Mig's discussion is purely on the technical, game level. He wishes he were in Nationhood and Theocracy to draft mechs. Amica's, meanwhile, dips into the RP level. He jokes that his slave-holding, Buddhist-theocratic dystopia where the citizens are grown on bland, corporate cereal, then ruthlessly culled to produce more tanks and bombers for an endless world war, is pretty similar to depictions of a dystopian future. It's mechanically defensible, but also provides a vivid image of the kind of empire he's ruling in the narrative. You can almost see him being a megalomaniacal, eternal autocrat, constantly doubting his own abilities yet dreaming of world conquest, rather than some person playing a video game.
This is not to knock anybody's games, of course. Whoever wins, wins, and save some sort of cheating scandal, they fully deserve it. Of course, we, as the readers, have no moral authority to critique any of these authors' works. And of course, I probably have subconsciously exaggerated my points for rhetorical effect. But wrapping things up, Miguelito, and with full knowledge that I should not be swayed by these literary, rhetorical appeals, I do find Amica's thread more engaging than yours. I hope you will forgive my cursed mind for thinking so, and do not take this as a recommendation to change your writing style.
And wow, I'm getting flashbacks to pindicator's quip, as preserved in Sullla's PB2 writeup, that half of the lurker comments in that game were dedicated psychoanalysis. I guess we can add literary criticism and book reports to the list. Hopefully the teacher won't catch that I've been skimming, rather than close-reading, the assignment.
I often think about how I know that I'm rooting for Amica due to literary, not in-game reasons. From a pure civ-playing perspective, Amica in his occasional crises of confidence has acknowledged that he has made unorthodox, non-standard moves. By his own admission, he underbuilt cottages in the early-game, and his economy ran on intercontinental trade routes in the mid-game. Now that it's the endgame, he doesn't have the research or production capability to win a space race, and is falling a generation behind on military technology. Before this whole world war started, he admitted that he was a long-shot behind Picc and Mig.
And yet... for all that, I root for him, and my sympathies in this game lie with him, primarily for literary reasons. I think it's the usual comeback story. The hero shows moments of vulnerability and weakness, and yet somehow comes out on top anyway. Early in the partition of pindicator, I vaguely remember him despairing about his chances to win. Yet through some miracle, he managed to end up with pindicator's core. Similarly, in the mid-game, he was despairing over the possibility of a Cairo conquest and his relatively underdeveloped lands, yet he was able to survive based on intercontinental trade routes. In the late-game, I don't remember the exact details, but he's managed to use the Kremlin whip strategy combined with the hilariously broken Cereal Mills to become a major player, taking out many backwards civilizations and rendering Cairo irrelevant on the global stage. Now, despite his knowledge that he can't win a space race since he can't whip spaceship parts, he's (presumably) plotting how to conquer enough land to hit Domination (or at least give it the ol' college try).
Meanwhile, Picc doesn't report, and Mig, when I read his stuff, until lately I've always gotten the sense that he's confident and in control. For me, it reads more like a war diary of how to play Civilization (and lately play the geopolitical game), rather than Amica's more psychological description of a human struggling against the world. I fully admit I may be misreading reports due to merely skimming them, though.
One particular illustrative moment hits me: Amica and Mig's discussion of civics. Mig's discussion is purely on the technical, game level. He wishes he were in Nationhood and Theocracy to draft mechs. Amica's, meanwhile, dips into the RP level. He jokes that his slave-holding, Buddhist-theocratic dystopia where the citizens are grown on bland, corporate cereal, then ruthlessly culled to produce more tanks and bombers for an endless world war, is pretty similar to depictions of a dystopian future. It's mechanically defensible, but also provides a vivid image of the kind of empire he's ruling in the narrative. You can almost see him being a megalomaniacal, eternal autocrat, constantly doubting his own abilities yet dreaming of world conquest, rather than some person playing a video game.
This is not to knock anybody's games, of course. Whoever wins, wins, and save some sort of cheating scandal, they fully deserve it. Of course, we, as the readers, have no moral authority to critique any of these authors' works. And of course, I probably have subconsciously exaggerated my points for rhetorical effect. But wrapping things up, Miguelito, and with full knowledge that I should not be swayed by these literary, rhetorical appeals, I do find Amica's thread more engaging than yours. I hope you will forgive my cursed mind for thinking so, and do not take this as a recommendation to change your writing style.
And wow, I'm getting flashbacks to pindicator's quip, as preserved in Sullla's PB2 writeup, that half of the lurker comments in that game were dedicated psychoanalysis. I guess we can add literary criticism and book reports to the list. Hopefully the teacher won't catch that I've been skimming, rather than close-reading, the assignment.
More people have been to Berlin than I have.
It's not just about the gameplay, it's about the holistic reading experience. Also, Amica's improvement arc over the games he's played here has just been fun to follow, even if he's understandably done with multiplayer Civ for the time being after this game wraps up.
![[Image: noidea.gif]](https://www.realmsbeyond.net/forums/images/smilies/noidea.gif)
In this game that's going to help us because he's going to go to the negotiating table with twitchy eyes and slightly too wide a grin and terrify the neighbors into favorable border agreements, one-sided tech deals and staggered NAPs."
