[PB64] Lurking Randomly

[Charriu]

I love how peaceful Superdeath is in his corner

[Krill]

Gotta love Nauf. "I will go to war with the one person who has been helping contain Amica because I want tundra deer and I don't think they helped me enough even though any attack at all wouldn't have been possible without them". 

I don't think tech will stagnate, they are playing on Monarch....... PB46 looks huge......

PB46 was huge but if the cities have twice the fat cross and double the minimum city distance, then the map stays big but the number of cities falls by a factor of 3ish and everything is beautiful.

[Mjmd]

Man I hate Commodore's city placements so much. Colm is just a disgrace. He either should have settled fish / copper city (which I assume is next based on roads) OR if he was feeling unsafe settling near SD he should have just settled 1W of the cow for a lovely little commerce city. That city would have had more grassland river tiles than the rest of his empire I think* plus 3 silks. Still leaves a grassland farm (farm around lake not river) horse city 1SE of his current ice spot eventually, so same number of cities without resorting to whatever Colm is supposed to be......



At least Aisling was moved to be first ring food. Prob should have a cheap cha monument to grab that lake tile though..... (unless warrior blocking / I'm just not seeing)

[thestick]

The entire series of events leading to the nauf-Gav war has been completely insane. This border conflict over an insignificant city is going to expand into a major war with at least one major battle at Alexander III. Gav puts it better than I ever can:

I cannot get over the sheer insanity of Naufragar's stunt. He needlessly escalates at every corner. First I just asked him not to settle the city, indicating that he will earn my enmity by doing that. I expected a counter-offer of some sort but he just declared war on me, removing many of my reasons to keep the peace. Now, when I want to keep the conflict localized, he is moving a million units into my territory, trying to turn it into some kind of total war. It is insane for me that he is completely indifferent to Amica's most powerful army on the map. Does he know something I do not?

I suppose part of this is land rights. nauf thinks that the Deer city is his by right of being closer to his capital, while Gav thinks that the territory is disputed by right of arms and settling races.

It's also very strange how badly nauf misread the situation before declaring war. He was hoping that he could just hole up in his cities so that he can keep the war limited, only to realize that his cities are spread out and split by Gav's culture, making them indefensible. So he feels he has to move out his armies in a big attack on Alexander III, escalating the situation way beyond his initial intentions.

Some of this is bitterness over Gav peacing out vs. Amica. I guess nauf expected Gav to do more fighting? It looks like nauf thought that the Gav/nauf war vs. Amica was an existential dogpile war, whereas Gav thought that it was an opportunistic war grab a bit of territory.

But fundamentally, it looks like fatalism and differing views of the situation. I don't know how much nauf is being serious in his reports, and how much is him posturing/venting/trying to control the narrative, but nauf writes like he's already lost. A good example was when he saw Amica's coastal cities getting a lot of GLH trade, not realizing that Amica has a crashed economy, suffered from overexpansion, no cottages, and just fought of Commodore for control over the precious trade route island. Gav and Amica think that nauf is still a contender; nauf disagrees. Therefore, in his mind, he's not playing to win, so he can afford to play for spite/reputation in future games. Thus Gav is completely blindsided by nauf's actions, because Gav thought that nauf was playing to maximize win chances.

This also ties into why nauf is so angry at Gav for peacing out with Amica. nauf thought that Amica was a clear runaway, so Gav should have kept fighting to knock him down. Gav apparently didn't.

[Magic Science]

Now both Gavagai and Ginger have noticed that Amicalola has no cottages at all, and Commodore made a correct guess along the same lines earlier. Will nauf notice? Will anyone guess that Amica has decided to combine a variant game with a Pitboss game? Probably not.

[wills]

He told us to speculate and I definitely need help doing that. What the hell is Gavagai got under his belt that he is keeping secret? He's got open borders with people so he can't be hiding a stack somewhere so what is he doing? I've never played multiplayer before really and only new to civ in general so I'm at a loss. Could it be that he is going to declare war on someone? Ahhhh. The suspense, I can't take it.

Also just wanted to state again how utterly hilarious and interesting this game is to lurk as a first time with all the nauf, amica, gavagai stuff plus everything else. Now that people have started to notice that Amica is not building cottages do you think its going to good or bad for him? I wonder if people will underestimate his position and not bother him or think he is an easy knock out and attack.

[Mjmd]

My best guess on what Gav's secret could be is a in pocket GA to switch to police state. Its also possible he thinks Commodore is a firm ally vs Ginger.

[Charriu]

What the hell is Gavagai got under his belt that he is keeping secret? He's got open borders with people

In that case ease: Plague and cholera! Easily transmitted via open border trade.

[wills]

My best guess on what Gav's secret could be is a in pocket GA to switch to police state. Its also possible he thinks Commodore is a firm ally vs Ginger.

Oooo interesting yeah I could see that.

[Mjmd]

Well Commodore is going in vs Ginger. I don't think Ginger can really punish. Between wealth builds, wonders, and pre building knights he doesn't seem to have built a lot of catapults.

I am curious why the focus on Ginger. He has mostly been left to tech and wonder whore so long term its a bit tricky, but I would still A) be more worried about Amica with that number of cities and B) its actually easier for Commodore to expect to make gains against Amica. Would have to war peace Ginger and have a stack of galleys I guess.